In the mid-2000s, the IRS revoked or terminated the tax-exempt status of more than a dozen credit-counseling firms after finding they operated as businesses that weren't providing counseling or education.
In 2006, the IRS took a close look at groups helping potential home buyers secure down payments, after finding some had been essentially for-profit entities working for home sellers.
Several years ago, a succession of scandals rocked Jewish charities in New York and New Jersey. A Brooklyn rabbi told clients he was using a charity to help broker the sale of black-market kidneys, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The agency also cracked down on other local charities with ties to money laundering, among other things.
So the WSJ is falling into line with the leftists' pretense that this has happened before, and in fact has happened many times before.
But what is common to all of them (BTW these are all the examples offered; I am not cherry picking) is the difference between them and the Tea Party groups: in each of these examples, the IRS imposed "extra scrutiny" on existing organizations only after bad behavior had already been demonstrated.
Don’t forget the questions that were forced on the Tea Party applicants. I have posted before the fact that they targeted Tea Party is easier to defend but he questions they forced on them and the delays prove it was political.