CNN’s Morgan: Hey, Maybe Government Can Become Tyrannical After All
” In a conversation with Penn Jillette, CNN’s anti-gun zealot – who has spent the last six months deriding the suggestion that the American government can’t be trusted when it comes to gun control – has had a change of heart after watching the IRS and DOJ/AP scandals unfold.”
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” The IRS scandal of targeting tea party or conservative organizations grew deeper Wednesday with the revelation that the agency denied tax-exempt status to a pro-life organization because of its hypothetical opposition to Planned Parenthood. The Thomas Moore Society, a public interest law firm announced that one of their clients was told that their approval as a non-profit was conditioned on a commitment not to protest outside Planned Parenthood abortion clinics…
…The alleged actions against the pro-life organization, however, are an order of magnitude more serious. If the allegations are true, the IRS used a specific political litmus test to approve non-profit status. It also conditioned approval on actions related to a specific, political organization. It effectively allowed Planned Parenthood to silence political opposition.”
Bill Donohue: IRS Targeted Catholic League
Chilling: IRS reportedly demanded list of high school and college students from conservative group
Was the IRS used as a weapon against Glenn Beck?
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Share Your Stories With Us So We Can Help Get To The Bottom Of The IRS Scandal
” Senior IRS Officials did know about the targeting of tea party groups who were applying for a tax-exempt status. In our statement on Bretibart.com, you can read our comments to the press.
Right now we need your help to move the Congressional hearings along and to insure the IRS is held accountable for their actions, lies, and abuse of power.
We are asking all Patriots around the country to help us with two things:
- We must insure that the hearings in Congress are substantive and get to the bottom of this scandal to reveal how deep it runs, how many other lies the IRS has told related to the these tactics, and what will be done to insure no other group of citizens is so unfairly discriminated against solely because they are speaking out against rampant government. On Monday, call your Member of Congress and both of your Senators to let them know that we must get to the bottom of this scandal.
- We need to hear from you if you or your local group has felt intimidated by the IRS actions over the last 4 years. Are you part of a local group who applied for tax-exempt status? What is the status of that application? Did you set out to form a group but were so intimidated by the IRS tactics that you abandoned that goal and wound up participating only as individuals rather than incorporating and coordinating activity with other groups? Click through to share your story with us so we have the details needed as we proceed with our next steps. Together we can personalize the problem to show the public the actions by the IRS were against real citizens and remind them that no citizen should fear the IRS will be used as a political weapon.
Over the last four years, Tea Party Patriots have repeatedly stood up against the consolidation of power by the ruling elite in this country. We will not stand idly by while unelected bureaucrats and elected representatives disregard the fact they are supposed to be public servants and instead act as rulers to increase their own personal power and political position. We will fight this problem with the IRS and we will win because our freedom depends on our ability to exercise our Constitutional rights.”
Related posts:
- Southerland Gives ‘Fair Tax’ Mixed Review
- ACLU vs. IRS over your 4th Amendment rights
- IRS taking heat from both sides of America
- Watch News Conference on IRS Intimidation
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” Across this great land, patriotic Americans are behaving subversively.
We’re quoting from our pocket Constitutions, starting reading groups to discuss our founding documents, even gathering together to “petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
Uncle Sam is not amused.
As leaders of tea party groups have been painfully aware for years, the Internal Revenue Service has given “special” attention to conservative groups.
Heritage sounded the alarm on the Obama Administration’s hit list nearly a year ago. Idaho businessman Frank VanderSloot was singled out by the IRS and the Labor Department after making a sizable donation to Mitt Romney. Who ordered his investigation?
The goal was clearly to reduce the amount of anti-government speech by making it more difficult for these groups to achieve tax-exempt status. And it worked. Just look at these examples from four different states:
- ABC News reports that Jennifer Stefano of Pennsylvania wanted to start a tea party group, but dealing with the IRS “was frightening and that’s why I shut it down. I shut my group down.”
- The IRS ordered an Ohio group to answer 35 detailed questions, including to “provide a listing of all your past activities. Indicate the percentage of your time spent conducting the activity (total of all activities should equal 100%) and the percentage of your funds spent conducting the activity (total of all activities should equal 100%).”
- In Tennessee, Kevin Kookogey was trying to start an educational group called Linchpins of Liberty to teach the economic principles of Milton Friedman and Adam Smith. When he inquired with the IRS in 2011 about the delay in his tax-exempt status, he was told: “We have been waiting on guidance from our superiors as to your and similar organizations.” He is still waiting.
- In Virginia, it took Richmond Tea Party President Larry Nordvig two and a half years to get tax-exempt status. He tells The Washington Post the wait had “a very chilling effect” on how much money his group could raise, and thus on how much speech it could generate. “
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” It’s official. President Obama is worse than Richard Nixon.
Richard Nixon’s White House had Chuck Colson compile an “enemies list” of people it believed were opposing the Nixon administration’s politics. The purpose of the list was to encourage the IRS to audit and harass those listed. The IRS refused.
Fast forward 30 years. President Obama rails against the tea party movement. His Department of Homeland Security suggested early in his administration that groups that oppose big-government spending should be looked into as possible terrorist threats. And, surprise, the IRS set up a special unit to harass tea party groups that oppose big government. Obama’s White House claims not to have sent a memo asking the bureaucrats to do this. It didn’t have to.
This is an unprecedented level of corruption. Didn’t anyone in the IRS object to these attacks? It seems like everyone involved was a willing participant in this abuse of power on the president’s behalf. This isn’t one corrupt politician wishing the IRS would annoy his “enemies.” This is a good chunk of the federal government willingly bending to the will of one politician. This is how the city of Chicago works. Everyone knows what to do without telltale memos.”
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” The town is turning on President Obama — and this is very bad news for this White House.
Republicans have waited five years for the moment to put the screws to Obama — and they have one-third of all congressional committees on the case now. Establishment Democrats, never big fans of this president to begin with, are starting to speak out. And reporters are tripping over themselves to condemn lies, bullying and shadiness in the Obama administration.
Obama’s aloof mien and holier-than-thou rhetoric have left him with little reservoir of good will, even among Democrats. And the press, after years of being accused of being soft on Obama while being berated by West Wing aides on matters big and small, now has every incentive to be as ruthless as can be.
This White House’s instinctive petulance, arrogance and defensiveness have all worked to isolate Obama at a time when he most needs a support system. “It feel like they don’t know what they’re here to do,” a former senior Obama administration official said. “When there’s no narrative, stuff like this consumes you.” “
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MCCONNELL: IRS REVELATIONS ‘JUST THE BEGINNING’
” The scandal, McConnell said, extends up the chain. “The Obama effort to shut up opponents isn’t limited to the IRS,” he stated. “It applies to the FCC [Federal Communications Commission], SEC [Securities and Exchange Commission], FEC [Federal Elections Commission], HHS [Department of Health and Human Services] …. And you remember, the Obama campaign last year published a list of eight businessmen who it believed were enemies.”
He also added that the recent IRS revelations were “just the beginning of the story. This is no little thing. This is a big thing. The good news about it is they finally got caught. They finally messed with an agency everybody fully understands. When they try to quiet the critics through other agencies, it doesn’t get attention. This does. Everybody understands the IRS and how powerful they are. This is just one example of an administration-wide effort to silence critics.” “
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” George Will could be much better described as a respected member of the Republican establishment in D.C. than a bomb thrower; so when he starts hinting that Barack Obama could be impeached over the IRS persecution of Tea Party groups, it’s significant.
“The Tea Party people have known about this and were working on this,” Will continued. “But they said — it was just some odd underlings out in Cincinnati who did this and there was no political motive whatever involved. Now the question is, how stupid do they think we are? Just imagine, Donna Brazile, if the George W. Bush administration had an IRS underling, he’s out in Cincinnati, of course, saying we’re going to target groups with the word ‘progressive’ in their title. We’d have all hell breaking loose.”
Will noted that one of the items in the 1973 impeachment articles of then-President Richard Nixon, which ultimately led to his resignation, described the Nixon administration’s use of the power of income tax audits in a “discriminatory matter.” “
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Recharged Tea Party Demands Justice In IRS Targeting Scandal
” “The Tea Party Patriots rejects the apology from the Internal Revenue Service,” Martin said in a statement. “The IRS lied. They lied before Congress in 2011, and they lied again [in the agency's apology]. We must know how many more lies they have been telling, and how high up the chain the cover-up goes.”
Attracting fury from Republicans and Democrats alike, the scandal gives recharged legs to the hands-off government network, which has seen a dip in influence since ushering into the Capitol a wave of freshman purists in 2010. Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Mn , who’s largely faded from public view since her splashy but ultimately failed presidential bid, berated the “stunning abuse of power” arising from “political beliefs.” “
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” By their second term “inside the bubble,” presidents have completely lost touch with reality: Aides and confidants conspire to keep the chief executive insulated from the real world — the bad news, the worse press coverage. They think it’s their job, and lounging on the Oval Office couches, they nod along with the president’s every musing.
But this presidency has taken OOCS to new heights. Mr. Obama has only a few trusted aides, and occasional leaks from the West Wing show a paranoid president suspicious of nearly everyone around him. Supremely confident, convinced by the fawning minions at his feet that he is untouchable, the president dismisses all controversy as partisan attacks by an overzealous opposition. A pliant press corps of stenographers follows in lockstep.
Not surprisingly, every president in the past 60 years has had a major scandal in Term 2: Dwight Eisenhower had the U-2 “incident”; Richard Nixon had Watergate; Ronald Reagan had Iran-Contra; Bill Clinton had Monica (literally); George W. Bush had Katrina (and let’s not forget those WMDs that never turned up); and now, this president has Benghazi.
Make no mistake: Benghazi is a major scandal. Benghazi is a scandal before, during and after the terrorist attack that left four Americas dead, including an ambassador.”
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” House Republicans scheduled a new hearing on the Benghazi terrorist attacks and suggested it would include new testimony from eyewitnesses to the deadly Sept. 11 assault on the U.S. Consulate who will provide firsthand reports about what happened that day.
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., scheduled a May 8 hearing entitled “Benghazi: Exposing Failure and Recognizing Courage.” It will be the latest attempt by congressional Republicans to demonstrate that the Obama administration misled the public about the true nature of an attack that killed four people, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya.
Issa did not disclose the witness list but promised the hearing “will expose new facts and details that the Obama administration has tried to suppress.”
The FBI on Wednesday released photos of “three individuals who were on the grounds” of the Benghazi consulate when it was attacked.
The photos, which were posted online by Foreign Policy magazine, are accompanied by an FBI request for information about the attack “from Libyans and people around the world.” “
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” Sen. Robert Menendez is being investigated by a Miami federal grand jury for his role in advocating for the business interests of a wealthy donor and friend, The Washington Post reported Thursday.
A story on the newspaper’s website said that as part of the probe federal agents have questioned witnesses about the interactions between Menendez, D-N.J., and Florida ophthalmologist Salomon Melgen. The newspaper said the grand jury also issued subpoenas for Melgen’s business and financial records. The newspaper cited unidentified people it said were familiar with the probe.
Melgen has given more than $14,000 directly to Menendez’s political campaigns since the late 1990s and, through his eye clinic, donated $700,000 last year to a “super” political committee that supported Democratic Senate candidates. The committee, in turn, spent $582,000 to back Menendez’s re-election effort.”
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” This is the French-owned factory which produced the Findus horse meat lasagnes being sold in UK supermarkets.
Frozen food giant Comigel produces 16,000 tonnes of ready meals in aluminium trays a year at its huge Tavola plant in Capellen, Luxembourg.
Security is said to be extremely tight with high-barbed wire fences surrounding the factory and guards preventing any non-approved visitors from entering.”
” Documents published online for the first time Thursday indicate that the FBI opened an inquiry into New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez on August 1, 2012, focusing on repeated trips he took to the Dominican Republic with longtime campaign contributor and Miami eye doctor Salomon Melgen. TheDC reported in November that Menendez purchased the service of prostitutes in that Caribbean nation at a series of alcohol-fueled sex parties. “.
Of course any thinking person can decode Idiot Joe’s words . By ” critically important ” he is referring to the leftist belief in never letting a “crisis go to waste “* . In other words , ” here’s our opportunity to shove something entirely unsalable down the people’s throats while emotions run high ” .
It’s all politics all the time and is in no way to be construed as having the remotest to do with actual public safety . They think that as long as they strike while the iron is hot that they can ram through yet another high profile policy plank of the democratic party that they know is not only publicly unpalatable but also blatantly unconstitutional .
Recall that the above young lady’s death was at the hands of a man that the democrats referred to as ” the Lion of the Senate”
What , you say ? They wouldn’t do that ? Think Teddy “the swimmer” Kennedy and Obamacare … They’ll do anything to win . Think ” nuclear option” , think recess appointments with congress still in session , think about their present talk of changing the filibuster rules . Need more ? , How about rule changes in NJ when Robert Torricelli dropped out of his senate race and similar shenanigans in Massachusetts for Teddy’s seat .
” The Obama administration is seeking to institute a far more sweeping gun-control agenda than simply reinstating the failed Clinton bans on “assault weapons” and “high-capacity” magazines.
While the administration seeks to ban whole classes of firearms, a working group led by longtime gun control supporter Vice-President Joe Biden is also seriously considering proposals for a national registration database to track the movement and sale of all firearms, and much more. (Please see related story on congressional proposals below.)
After meeting with gun ban activists on Wednesday, Biden said, “This is a problem that requires immediate attention. I want to make clear that we’re not going to get caught up in the notion that, unless we can do everything, we’re going to do nothing. It’s critically important that we act.”
Biden went on to open the door to the option of imposing restrictions unilaterally.
“The president is going to act,” said Biden. “There are executive orders, executive action that can be taken. We haven’t decided what that is yet. But we’re compiling it all with the help [of] the attorney general and all the rest of the Cabinet members as well as legislative action we believe is required.”When it comes to attacking our Second Amendment rights, this administration will pull out all the stops. “
As a final thought for our readers we must consider the fact of who exactly is in charge of these proceedings and speaks of the need for “critical action” , yes we refer to none other than Joe ” plagiarist” Biden . Who is dumber or more incompetent than crazy ” Uncle Joe ” ?
* -“You don’t ever want a crisis to go to waste; it’s an opportunity to do important things that you would otherwise avoid.”
” “I have made a study of different cover-ups – the Pentagon Papers, Watergate and Iran-Contra. I’ve never seen anything like it. I think this is probably the greatest cover-up, in my memory anyway,” the Oklahoma Republican said in an interview Saturday night on Fox News.
Republican senators John McCain of Arizona, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire said Friday that the State Department report does not address questions about the role of Cabinet officials in responding to the assault that night. “
Illustration By Gary Varvel
” #6 In some gun stores, cameras were set up so that top ATF officials could actually watch these transactions take place. Back in June, U.S. Representative Darrell Issa stated the following….
“Acting Director Melson was able to sit at his desk in Washington and himself watch a live feed of straw buyers entering the gun stores and purchasing dozens of AK-47 variants.”
#7 It has also come out that in some cases ATF agents were actually the ones buying the guns and getting them into the hands of Mexican drug cartels. The following is how author Michael A. Walsh recently explained this in an article in the New York Post….
This just might be the smoking gun we’ve been waiting for to break the festering “Fast and Furious” gun-running scandal wide open: the Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives apparently ordered one of its own agents to purchase firearms with taxpayer money, and sell them directly to a Mexican drug cartel.
Let that sink in: After months of pretending that “Fast and Furious” was a botched surveillance operation of illegal gun-running spearheaded by the ATF and the US attorney’s office in Phoenix, it turns out that the government itself was selling guns to the bad guys.
#8 According to the Los Angeles Times, guns that were purchased during Operation Fast and Furious have “turned up at dozens of additional Mexican crime scenes, with an unconfirmed toll of at least 150 people killed or wounded.” “
” Paula Broadwell hit the big 4-0 on Friday, the same day President Obama accepted her lover’s resignation. She is a soldier herself, a Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Army Reserves, promoted in August of 2012. A glance at her resume leads you to think of her as intelligent, with degrees from West Point and Harvard, she even worked with the FBI at one point, albeit with the Joint Terrorism Task Force, but my mercy the irony. She has two children ages six and four.
So where are the pundits calling her a fool? Where is the criticism? Where is the same public humiliation, on the same level that has been meted out against General Petraeus? I can not help but observe one simple fact, when it comes to affairs society seems to criticize the men who have them, way more then the women they have them with. Is it because women are considered delicate? Do we consider the sexual appetites of males to be overwhelming, thus women are excused? Basically he made her do it. I think this logic is anti-women. I’m not saying that to be controversial, or even chauvinistic, I truly believe that women are capable of doing anything and even more then men. That would include weathering the brunt of criticism of an affair. “
” The AP has released a report stating that 3 Senators, John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Kelly
Ayotte have sent a letter to the desk of Barack Hussein Obama, requesting that the Benghazi CCTV
video, which captured the attack, be declassified. “
” There is a very big chance that there will be no action to appease the American people with declassified information until after the November 6th elections. Until then, Barack Obama is likely to remain silent on the issue, dodging questions where he can and remaining silent where he can’t: “
Posted by John Galt
“How high up did the weapons of Operation Fast and Furious go in the cartels? This high:
When Mexican authorities took Juarez drug cartel carnage king Jose Antonio Acosta Hernandez — better known as “El Diego” — into custody, he had weapons from Operation Fast and Furious on his person, the English-language transcript of the Spanish-language television network Univision’s special investigation into the scandal shows.
“According to investigations, ‘El Diego’ forms the link between this massacre and Fast and Furious,” an anchor read on air in Spanish Sunday evening, referring to two different mass killings drug cartel operatives used Fast and Furious weapons to conduct as Univision reported.
“When he [El Diego] was captured in Chihuahua in the summer of 2011, he was found with weapons that the American government had allowed to enter Mexico,” the anchor added.
Supposedly, the point of the ATF/DoJ operation was to track the weapons so that they could find the movers and shakers in the Mexican drug cartels. Imagine what would have happened if the ATF actually had intended totrack the weapons and cooperate with the Mexican government, as the Bush administration did earlier in Operation Wide Receiver. The partnership might have caught El Diego a little sooner “
