Posted on 04/22/2002 10:00:48 PM PDT by Kay Soze
IRS Official to Judicial Watch: Clinton Enemies Were Audited Carl Limbacher, NewsMax.com
Tuesday, April 23, 2002
An official with the Internal Revenue Service has admitted that legal opponents of former President Bill Clinton were singled out for tax audits, according to court documents made public this week. "What do you expect when you sue the president?" senior IRS official Paul Breslan told Judicial Watch, the Washington-based legal watchdog group that had filed 50-plus legal actions against the Clinton administration and subsequently found itself in the IRS's cross hairs.
Breslan's quote is cited in Judicial Watch's complaint against the tax agency, based on a host of what look to be politically inspired audits that make the worst abuses of the Nixon administration appear puny by comparison.
"There were literally six witnesses in the room when Breslan told us we should have expected an audit," Judicial Watch Chairman Larry Klayman revealed to NewsMax.com. "Four of them were lawyers."
The legal group became the target of an IRS audit in 1998, just four days after it filed an independent impeachment report against Clinton, based on years of investigation into everything from Chinagate to the Paula Jones case.
But Judicial Watch wasn't alone. Witnesses bearing damaging testimony against the president were a favorite target of the Clinton IRS. Those singled out for audits include:
Leak
The Jones case, which would eventually lead to Clinton's impeachment, was of particular interest to the IRS, which apparently leaked her confidential tax returns to the late New York Daily News reporter Lars Erik Nelson.
In a September 1997 column Nelson revealed details from Jones' filing to bolster claims that she was profiting from her sexual harassment lawsuit against Clinton.
In a subsequent interview with NewsMax.com's Carl Limbacher (then with the Washington Weekly), Nelson insisted somewhat implausibly that a "friend" of Jones had come across her tax return during a visit to her home and decided to go public with the secrets.
Quite an Enemies List
As the Judicial Watch complaint notes, the Clinton IRS also went after organizations and even media companies it perceived as politically hostile, including:
The National Rifle Association, The Heritage Foundation, The National Review, The American Spectator, Freedom Alliance, National Center for Public Policy Research, American Policy Center, American Cause, Citizens Against Government Waste, Citizens for Honest Government, Progress and Freedom Foundation, Concerned Women for America and the San Diego Chapter of Christian Coalition.
Fox News Channel analyst Bill O'Reilly, a frequent critic of Bill and Hillary Clinton, has also pointed out how the IRS has repeatedly audited him.
The political nature of the Judicial Watch's audit seems particularly blatant.
"The IRS asked for our political affiliations in the first notice of audit," Klayman told NewsMax.
When he questioned why auditors wanted to know about the group's political ties, an IRS district director said the information had been deemed "relevant."
Worse still, each time Judicial Watch seemed to make legal headway against the White House, the IRS ratcheted up the pressure.
"When we would accomplish something big, like the criminal finding by Judge Royce Lamberth against Clinton in the Kathleen Willey Privacy Act case, our lawyers would get a call saying, 'We just want you to know that Judicial Watch is still on the IRS's radar screen,'" Klayman said.
"The same thing happened when we revealed the White House e-mail scandal," he added.
Shockingly, the IRS's intimidation tactics continue into the Bush administration, which has failed to sack Clinton's IRS Commissioner Charles Rosotti.
After Judicial Watch won the release of thousands of pages of documents from Vice President Dick Cheney's Energy Task Force last month, a badge-wearing IRS agent showed up at the group's offices.
A personal meeting between Klayman and Bush Justice Department Criminal Division chief Michael Chertoff, who led the Senate investigation into the Clintons' Whitewater abuses, failed to yield any interest in pursuing IRS abuses, which now threaten to tarnish the Bush administration.
When noted columnist Robert Novak inquired of the Justice Department about Judicial Watch's IRS complaint, he was told by a department official, "I don't know what we are going to do with this Klayman."
"When we were told that we were being audited because we sued Bill Clinton, we had no choice but to stand up and fight in court," Klayman said. "By leaving Charles Rossotti as IRS commissioner, Bush obviously is sending a signal that political audits are fine with him."
It's just this infatuation that I've developed for you. Most of the time, I'm just fine, but then I read your posts and I'm a goner.
I think the thread is about Larry Klayman's need to defend himself - and his group's financial practices - to the IRS.
Of course, I might be confused.
Yeah, well your profile page creeps me out.
Oh good. VA Advogado, the PROVEN LIAR, shows up to defend Howlin and the rest of the move-on'ers. How appropriate.
At least we know that ned is spoofing us. VA Advogado, on the other hand, either really believes there was an autopsy (all because the word "autopsy" was used to caption a SINGLE photo of the wound in Brown's head on a SINGLE web site that most of us probably wouldn't want to be associated with) or he DISHONESTLY tried to call it an autopsy to keep people from demanding one (which would explain why he continues to call it an autopsy after being repeatedly shown by me and others that NO autopsy in fact took place).
And here are a few more corrections to VA Advogado's continued stream of LIES.
I have not suggested people give money to Judicial Watch ... especially given his questionable actions lately. I am simply defending what Klayman accomplished vis a vis investigating Clinton from move-on'ers how try to suggest that nothing was ever accomplished. That's a LIE. In my opinion, Klayman needs to refocus his efforts on getting Bush to investigate and prosecute the Clinton related crimes ... and then if Bush won't do that, make THAT the issue.
I also have repeatedly said go ahead and audit Judicial Watch. But he is entitled to his day in court and if he can convince a judge that he is being unfairly targeted (after all, Jackson and his crowd are being ignored) then more power to him.
Third. I am not a "plant". As I have stated on numerous occasions I have no association whatsoever with Klayman, Judicial Watch or anyone associated with Judicial Watch. I am simply a red-blooded American who, unlike move-on'ers, believes the crimes that Clinton and his democRAT buddies committed ... and Bush/Ashcroft's unwillingness to even investigate those crimes ... are a real threat to our Republic.
Now let's see if VA Advogado, by his ACTIONS and VIEWS, can convince us that he isn't a democRAT whose only purpose on this forum is to sow disinformation and keep the crimes of the democRATS from being punished. He can start by admitting that no autopsy took place.
Because he's a MAN, right?
BAC certainly DOES have to put up or shut about me saying Linda Tripp was a liar.
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