Free Republic

So it comes to this: After all that has been said about Barack Obama, in the end there is very little to say. You are either willing to overlook Barack Obama’s foibles and foolishness; or you aren’t. We we're right, you were wrong. You can either admit or you can't. There is no middle ground. There is no saying for example “Well he’s kind of new in the job,” or “This is an example of one bad apple in his Cabinet,” or “The president didn’t know about it.” Going into his second term, you either knew what we had...

As one of the characters in “Anchorman” observed of its bloody brawl between news teams: Boy, that escalated quickly. I mean, that really got out of hand fast. Two days after President Obama broke the law to arrange an insanely reckless swap of five incredibly dangerous Taliban terrorists for captive American Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, virtually every aspect of the deal has blown up in Obama’s face, and the whole thing has soured into another five-star scandal for an Administration riddled with them. Maybe it’s the accumulated weight of Obama fatigue, or the sheer stupidity and arrogance the President displayed in...

Liberals wanted a national enrollment system under Obamacare. They might just get it. Right now, 36 states rely on HealthCare.gov, the federal exchange, to enroll people in health coverage. At least two more states are opting in next year, with a few others likely to follow. Only two states are trying to get out. That’s precisely the opposite of the Affordable Care Act’s original intent: 50 exchanges run by 50 states. The federal option was supposed to be a limited and temporary fallback. But a shift to a bigger, more permanent Washington-controlled system is instead underway — without preparation, funding...

The IRS has agreed to overhaul a controversial proposal that Republican lawmakers warned would revive the agency’s “harassment and intimidation” of conservative groups, after receiving a record number of comments on the proposed regulation. […] At issue were new rules that would prohibit so-called 501(c)(4) groups from counting “candidate-related political activity” and other political work as activities that qualify them to be tax-exempt “social welfare” organizations. Critics of the proposal warned that this would effectively force many grassroots organizations to shut down. …

Contrary to the White Houses explanation that a few rogue agents in Cincinnati lead the targeting of Tea Party groups by the IRS, newly released emails obtained by Judicial Watch detail Democratic Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) pressuring the IRS to target conservative groups. On March 30, 2012 Levin wrote to then IRS commissioner Douglas Shulman about his concern with the political activity by conservative nonprofits. “Some entities claiming tax-exempt status as social welfare organizations under 26 U.S.C.&501(c)(4) appear to be engaged in political activities more appropriate for political organizations claiming tax-exempt status under 26 U.S.C.&527. Because of the urgency of...

New documents obtained and released through a Judicial Watch lawsuit show the targeting of tea party and conservative groups came directly out of Washington D.C., not a rogue IRS office in Cincinnati. On July 6, 2012, former Director of the IRS Rulings and Agreements Division and current Manager of Exempt Organizations Guidance Holly Paz sent an email to IRS Attorney Steven Grodnitzky asking for an explanation of how tea party group applications were being handled. Grodnitzky responded by confirming the cases were being handled in Washington. "EOT is working the Tea party applications in coordination with Cincy. We are developing...

“This is the law. And every two years — let me tell you something. Every two years I come to the Congress, just like my good friend, Mr. Labrador, we put up our hands to swear to uphold the Constitution and the laws of this country. It is the law.” That’s what Democrat Rep. Elijah Cummings told Anderson Cooper last October. What was he talking about you may wonder. Was it the disastrous Fast and Furious scandal and the cover-up that followed? No, Rep. Cummings dismissed questions over the DOJ Attorney General Eric Hold’s role in the affair as “an...

Less than a day after former IRS official Lois Lerner was found in criminal contempt of Congress, her old agency has agreed to turn over copies of all her emails and other correspondence to one of the Republican-led House committees investigating the scandal that led to her retirement. The agency´s quick concession came after Wednesday night´s 231-178 contempt vote, which closely followed the passage of a second resolution demanding the appointment of a nonpartisan ´special counsel´ at the Department of Justice. Lerner has twice refused to answer questions in congressional hearings after lawmakers issued a subpoena for her appearance. ´This

The House of Representatives voted Wednesday to hold a former Internal Revenue Service official in contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate with an ongoing investigation into the agency's special targeting of groups with “tea party” or “patriot” in their names that were seeking tax-exempt status. On a 231 to 187 vote, the House approved a contempt citation against Lois G. Lerner, whose admission last year that the tax-enforcement agency had targeted conservative groups infuriated lawmakers in both parties, led to an overhaul of the IRS and Lerner's eventual retirement from government service. Six Democrats -- a band of moderates...

Today, the House Rules Committee is considering a resolution recommending that former IRS official Lois Lerner be held in contempt for refusing to answer questions about her role in the IRS targeting of President Obama’s political opponents. It is likely that the resolution will pass, and then it will come to the floor for a full vote in the House. When it does, the vote to hold Lerner in contempt should be bipartisan – if not unanimous. Any Democrats who vote “no” should be labeled as enablers of obstruction of justice. It should be impossible for Democrats to defend a...

Ironic huh? I challenge my left wing congresswomen Nita Lowey now all of a sudden, for the first time in 27 years, i get audited....i'm now suppose to prove that i paid the $21K plus in real estate and school taxes which they charge me (and i pay)...i'm also expected to not only provide my daughters birth certificate but proves she lives with us for the child care credit... any ideas???

According to new IRS emails obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request from Judicial Watch, former head of tax exempt groups at the IRS Lois Lerner contacted the Department of Justice in May 2013 about whether tax exempt groups could be criminally prosecuted for "lying" about political activity. "I got a call today from Richard Pilger Director Elections Crimes Branch at DOJ ... He wanted to know who at IRS the DOJ folk s [sic] could talk to about Sen. Whitehouse idea at the hearing that DOJ could piece together false statement cases about applicants who "lied" on their...

As millions of Americans race to meet Tuesday’s tax deadline, their chances of getting audited are lower than they have been in years. Budget cuts and new responsibilities are straining the Internal Revenue Service’s ability to police tax returns. This year, the IRS will have fewer agents auditing returns than at any time since at least the 1980s. Taxpayer services are suffering, too, with millions of phone calls to the IRS going unanswered. “We keep going after the people who look like the worst of the bad guys,” IRS Commissioner John Koskinen said in an interview. “But there are going...

Catherine Engelbrecht became the face of the IRS scandal with her riveting testimony before Congress on how her group True the Vote was targeted by the IRS for selective persecution and harassment. Recently, it was discovered that Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings had a hand in the IRS targeting True the Vote. You might remember Cummings as the grandstanding Democrat who railed against Darrell Issa’s investigation of the scandal after a Congressional hearing with IRS official Lois Lerner had closed (and then implied that Issa was racist): Further making the situation ironic and unsightly for justice-avoiding Democrats is that emails show...

Wind Shield radar to be carried into enemy territory, track the sources of incoming rocket, missile and mortar fire.

The U.S. House Oversight Committee today released emails between the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and Democrat Minority Leader Elijah Cummings of the same committee detailing joint attempts to collect non-public information from True the Vote. According to the release obtained by Breitbart Texas, House Oversight offered glimpses into coordinated fishing attempts for information: Five days after Cummings contacted True the Vote seeking “copies of all training materials used for volunteers, affiliates, or other entities,” the IRS sent True the Vote a letter requesting True the Vote provide “a copy of [True the Vote’s] volunteer registration form,” “…the process you use...

Lois Lerner, who was director of the Internal Revenue Service’s Exempt Organizations Division, used her position in the IRS to deny conservative groups their constitutionally protected rights to due process and equal protection of the law, the House Ways and Means committee alleged today in what the committee called a “criminal referral letter” sent to Attorney General Eric Holder. The letter presents information the committee says “tends to show intentional wrongdoing, including targeting specific taxpayer groups for adverse treatment, making misleading statements to law enforcement, and the possible disclosure of confidential taxpayer information.” …

The House Ways and Means Committee has voted to 23-14 along party lines to refer former head of tax exempt groups at the IRS Lois Lerner to the Justice Department for prosecution. Although the details about exactly what charges will be have not yet been released, lawmakers are arguing Lerner has not been truthful with Congress or the IRS inspector general and leaked confidential tax information. Last time a referral like this happened, it was to Major League Baseball player Roger Clemens, who was pursued by the Department of Justice for lying to Congress but was exonerated in court....

Over the past few days, we have received a lot of questions and seen a great number of media stories about the events surrounding Brendan Eich’s resignation from the role of CEO. Many of the media stories have incorrect facts, so we compiled the following FAQ as a resource for everyone to have access to the core facts. Here is the announcement on Brendan Eich stepping down as Mozilla CEO.

It could take years for Congressional committees to get all the documents demanded about the IRS scandal under mandatory subpoenas, IRS’ new Commissioner John Koskinen testified. The new IRS Commissioner displayed the slippery style of a snake-oil salesman while testifying March 26 before Congressman Darrell Issa’s Committee on Oversight and Government. Koskinen’s excuses were especially surprising because similar demands for documents are imposed upon private companies all the time by the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission. Your author has worked as a lawyer on teams responding to such massive governmental document requests. Any time there is...