Obama Treasury Secretary
Dodges Questions on IRS Targeting Scandal
Nothing to see here,
folks. It's nothing more than an Obama cabinet secretary repeatedly
declining to describe the role William Wilkins -- one of the president's two
political appointees at the IRS -- played in the agency's targeting of
conservative groups between 2010 and 2012. Fox
News Sunday's Chris Wallace phrased and re-phrased the
question, but Jack Lew wasn't about to detour from his scripted
talking points.
Lew insists that "no
evidence" exists that any political appointees were involved, and there's
"no suggestion" that Wilkins was in the planning loop.
The IRS
has lots of lawyers, after all. Wallace asks if Lew -- as Wilkins' boss
-- ever asked his subordinate about the latter's level of involvement in,
or knowledge of, the IRS'abusive actions. That wouldn't
be "appropriate" for some reason, Lew responds, adding that he's
happy to leave the investigating to the investigators. Which
investigators? Lew really can't say, but he assures Wallace that "a
lot of questions" have been asked of "a lot of people."
Carol marvels at Lew's
"dazzling" lack of curiosity. Two reminders: (1) Senior
Treasury Department officials were made aware of the
brewing targeting firestorm back in June of 2012 -- at the latest. That's
six months prior to the presidential election, and nearly year before the
scandal went public. (2) According
to the Inspector General's timeline, Wilkins found out about IRS targeting
practices as early as 2011.
Between 2011 and 2012, he would have had several opportunities to brief the
president or his team about what was happening. Did he? If not, why
not?
In addition to the targeting malfeasance, the IRS has been accused
of throwing lavish, wasteful, taxpayer-funded conferences for its employees
(and "misplacing" their receipts), as well as
leaking private tax information of conservative groups, political donors,
and candidates. Even in a case about which the IG determined the privacy
breach of a major donor or candidate was "willful," Eric Holder's
Justice Department hasn't pursued any legal
action against the responsible parties. Just a bevy of non-controversies
related to a "phony" scandal.
No comments:
Post a Comment