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NYT: Obama Administration Knew of IRS Scandal 5 Months Before Election

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:33:00 GMT

In no uncertain terms and with no hedging, The New York Times reports that the Obama Administration was aware of the fact that the IRS was targeting Tea Party groups as far back as June of 2012. The Treasury Department's Inspector General confirmed that he told senior Treasury officials in June of 2012, a full five months before Election Day.

We still don’t know for sure what the President knew or when he knew it, but this does confirm that the Administration was aware of the fact that Obama's political enemies were under fire by the IRS and covered that fact up during an election year.

As Lisa Meyers of NBC News told "Morning Joe" today, "Imagine if we -- if you can -- what would have happened if this fact came out in September 2012, in the middle of a presidential election? The terrain would have looked very different."

The first time President Obama was asked when he found out about the IRS scandal, he told the media that he learned of the news last Friday, the same way the rest of us did -- from the news media.

Thursday, a Bloomberg reporter asked the President when both he or anyone in the White House learned of the scandal. The President dodged the question.

With this latest news that confirms when the Administration first learned of the IRS scandal, we now know that, along with Benghazi and the unfurling Associated Press scandal, there were three scandals brewing and unfolding in the White House during an election year. But we are only now hearing about them -- six months after Barack Obama is safely re-elected.

This fact says as much about the failure of our lapdog national media as it does about President Obama. Why just this morning the Times itself dismissed the IRS scandal on its editorial page.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC

Fisking the New York Times' Attempt to Fisk Obama Scandals

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:09:00 GMT

Today's lead editorial in the New York Times, "The Republicans' Scandal Machine," attempts to dismiss two out of the three major scandals that have hit the Obama administration over the past week. Never has the so-called "paper of record" even been as uninterested in the record of what actually happened. The Times' attempted "fisking" of the scandals is so shameful and inaccurate that it deserves a fisking of its own.

The Internal Revenue Service, according to an inspector general’s report, was not reacting to political pressure or ideology when it singled out conservative groups for special scrutiny in evaluating requests for tax exemptions. It acted inappropriately because employees couldn’t understand inadequate guidelines.

The Inspector General's report made no such conclusions. It reported (page 8) that IRS officials claimed "that the IRS was not politically biased," but did not say whether that claim was credible, merely noting in response that "all cases with Tea Party, Patriots, or 9/12 in their names were forwarded to the team of specialists." That would seem to be strong evidence of "political pressure or ideology"--but the Inspector General could not draw conclusions.

Likewise, the Inspector General's report indicates that IRS officials claimed that "the criteria were not influenced by any individual or organization outside the IRS" (page 13), but there was no way to prove whether that was correct--and as Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration J. Russell George noted in testimony before the House Ways and Means committee Friday, the IRS officials were not interviewed under oath. So the Times' claim is false--and there is much evidence to the contrary.

It is true that "employees couldn't understand inadequate guidelines." That does not explain why the only errors were committed against Tea Party or conservative groups--and none against left-wing groups.

The tragedy in Benghazi, Libya, never a scandal to begin with, has devolved into a turf-protection spat between government agencies, and the e-mail messages Republicans long demanded made clear that there was no White House cover-up.

The tragedy in Benghazi was a scandal from the first moment. It is a scandal that requests for additional security were denied. It is a scandal that President Barack Obama did little to monitor or direct military efforts to assist Americans under attack. It is a scandal that requests for help were denied. And it is a scandal that the White House made up a false story about a YouTube video--then pretended not to have done so. (The media's coverage of Benghazi was equally scandalous, covering up for Obama at every opportunity.)

While some of the back-and-forth in the "talking points" emails may be attributable to a "turf-protection spat," it is undeniable that the talking points were edited to remove references to terror and Al Qaeda. And though the misleading story about a "spontaneous" demonstration does appear to have been introduced into the talking points by the CIA, it is unclear why they did so or whether they did so at the direction of others. We do know, from congressional testimony, that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the entire Obama administration knew from the outset that Benghazi was a terror attack. What happened next is still hidden.

The only example of true government overreach was the seizure of The Associated Press’s telephone records, the latest episode in the Obama administration’s Javert-like obsession with leakers in its midst.

It is typical of the Times to focus myopically on the one scandal that touches media freedom. But there are numerous similar scandals afoot involving similar improper seizures of information--notably the seizure of 60 million health records by the IRS, an abuse that came up at Friday's hearing and which is partly a warning of government overreach in Obamacare, large parts of which are to be administered by the agency.

Many of the Republicans who have added this action to their metaphor blender were also the ones clamoring the loudest for vigorous investigations of national security leaks.

The Times doesn't mention a single example. The problem isn't that the Attorney General and the Department of Justice investigated a national security leak. The problem is that it apparently did so in violation of existing laws and procedures regarding such investigations. An additional dimension of the scandal is that President Obama claims not to have known of the investigation--hardly likely, or excusable.

But reality simply isn’t solid enough to hold back the vast Republican opportunism on display this week.

Whatever cranky point Republicans had been making against President Obama for the last five years — dishonesty, socialism, jackbooted tyranny — they somehow found that these incidents were exactly the proof they had been seeking, no matter how inflated or distorted.

It is not only Republicans recoiling at the abuses of government power on display. There has been considerable alarm across the aisle as well. To their credit, many Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee openly condemned the IRS for its conduct. The public is also alarmed, in general, about the expanding power of big government. In January, a poll revealed that 53% of Americans believe that the government "threatens their own personal rights and freedoms"--up from 47% in March 2010.

“This is runaway government at its worst,” Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, said at a Tea Party news conference on Thursday about the I.R.S. scandal. “Who knows who they’ll target next.” Representative Michele Bachmann knew. Standing next to Mr. McConnell, she said the I.R.S.’s next target would obviously be the religious beliefs of people seeking health insurance.

It's enough for the Times and its readers to drop Bachmann's name to provoke scoffing and head-shaking. Yet the Obama administration has already targeted religious institutions in the battle over contraceptive and abortifacient mandates in Obamacare, and Friday's hearings on the IRS scandal revealed that the IRS asked applicants for 501(c)3 tax-exempt status about their personal religious prayers.

For Senator Mike Lee of Utah, these incidents proved that the federal budget has to be cut even more deeply. “We need to return it to a simpler, more manageable government,” he said, “because that’s the only way that we’re ever going to prevent things like this from happening.”

Clearly the more power the government has, the more power it has to abuse--and, it appears, the less it is able to handle core functions such as protecting Americans from terror, in Benghazi and in Boston as well.

There are no “things like this,” beyond a coincidence of bad timing. But they do have one thing in common: when bound together and loudly denounced on cable television and in hearings, they serve to obscure the real damage that Republicans continue to do to the economy and the workings of government.

This is mere partisan nonsense. As I argued earlier Friday, one of the best ways to explain the divergent performance of the U.S. economy (slow recovery) and the Euro zone (return to recession) is the ascent of the Tea Party and the firming of GOP opposition to damaging tax hikes, spending increases and regulations.

While Washington was arguing about e-mail messages about Benghazi, it wasn’t paying attention to the hundreds of thousands of defense furloughs announced this week because of the Republican-imposed sequester, which will become a significant drag on economic growth.

The Times recycles an old lie--that Republicans are to blame for the sequester. In fact, as has been proven countless times, the sequester was a proposal from the Obama White House--originally conceived as a way of pressuring Republicans to agree to higher tax cuts. It has yet to prove the calamity that Obama predicted.

It wasn’t focusing on the huge drop in the deficit, which has yet to silence the party’s demands for more austerity. And apparently it’s considered old news that Republicans are blocking several of the president’s cabinet nominees.

The drop in the deficit is at least partly due to the aformentioned sequester, plus Republican opposition to the expansive spending that Obama and the Democrats racked up in the first two years of his presidency.

As for the cabinet nominees, Republicans have had no problem passing those whose qualifications were clear and whose ideological attitudes were not fundamentally unsuited to the job. It's rich for the Times to object when Democrats filibustered Bush appointees--often with considerably more sympathy from the Times. (It reversed its position on judicial filibusters, conveniently, once Bush was long gone from the White House.)

For those who are wondering whether this week’s political windstorms will hinder Mr. Obama’s second-term agenda, here’s a bulletin: That agenda was long ago imperiled by the obstruction of Republicans. (See Guns. Jobs. Education. And, very possibly, Immigration.)

Republicans have slowed down only one of these--Guns. They have been, in general, quite supportive of some of the president's education reforms, including the Race to the Top initiative.

As for the president's jobs bills, Democrats often joined Republicans in opposition to what amounted to little more than renewed stimulus programs aimed significantly at government employees.

The top priority for Americans remains the economy, and yet Obama has constructed an agenda that largely avoids these in favor of divisive wedge issues that are of interest to small slices of the American electorate. Instead of building bridges--even to Republicans who have shown a willingness to work with him, such as Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)--he burns them at every opportunity. The only person Obama has to blame for his failures is himself.

As for the Times, it is clear why it wants to minimize Benghazi and the IRS scandal. In both cases, it had a hand in the cover-up. It cheered on the IRS when reports emerged in 2012 that Tea Party groups were being targeted. It refuses to see the AP scandal as what it is: part of a pattern of thuggery.

Report: IRS Covered Up Scandal Until After Election

Fri, 17 May 2013 16:19:00 GMT

Friday's IRS Congressional hearings have made three things abundantly clear. First, Democrats and the IRS believe they can convince the American people that the singling out of conservative groups for audits, leaks, and Kafka-esque like "questionnaires" was just a wild coincidence that had nothing to do with partisan politics. Second, Democrats and the IRS want us to believe that low-level staffers came up with thick packets that contained dozens of intrusive, un-American questions, all on their own.

Neither of those are going to fly with the American people, however, even if the media assumes their natural position (bent over) and decides to strap wings, a rocket engine, and Superman's cape to them.

The third thing, though, is by far the most troubling and was spelled out perfectly by NBC's Lisa Meyers Friday morning on "Morning Joe." From everything she knew before the hearings and what we are learning from them today, it looks as though, at the very least, the IRS knew of this scandal prior to the 2012 election and deliberately covered it up until afterward:

Transcript via The Weekly Standard:

The IRS commissioner "has known for at least a year that this was going on," said Myers, "and that this had happened. And did he share any of that information with the White House? But even more importantly, Congress is going to ask him, why did you mislead us for an entire year? Members of Congress were saying conservatives are being targeted. What's going on here? The IRS denied it. Then when -- after these officials are briefed by the IG that this is going on, they don't disclose it. In fact, the commissioner sent a letter to Congress in September on this subject and did not reveal this. Imagine if we -- if you can -- what would have happened if this fact came out in September 2012, in the middle of a presidential election? The terrain would have looked very different."

Thursday, when asked a direct question about when or whom in the White House knew about the IRS scandal, Barack Obama dodged the question: “I can assure you that I certainly did not know anything about the IG [Inspector General] report before the IG report had been leaked to the press,” said Obama to the reporter who had not inquired about the Inspector General report.

I should add a fourth thing: Apparently we are also supposed to believe that it is just a wild coincidence that the same woman, Sarah Hall Ingram, who oversaw the IRS department where all this harassment of conservatives occurred, just happens to be the same woman who was promoted within the IRS to enforce ObamaCare.

By the way, Ingram was promoted by IRS acting commissioner Steven T. Miller, who himself was appointed by Barack Obama.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC

News Anchor Who Complained of IRS Harassment 'Off the Air'

Fri, 17 May 2013 13:27:00 GMT

Larry Conners, the KMOV anchor who asked Barack Obama some tough questions about his family's vacation habits and claimed earlier this week that he might have been harassed by the IRS as a result, has been taken off the air.

According to the St. Louis Dispatch, the station decided to give Conners a "few days off" while they looked into his allegations. KMOV news director Sean McLaughlin went out of his way to say that Conners was not suspended.

“We take this very seriously, and we don’t expect this to drag on. We’re still looking into the situation and weighing our options,” he told the St. Louis Dispatch.

h/t: @agoodeye

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC

This post has been updated to correct the spelling of Mr. Conners last name.

Liberal Talk Show Host: AG Eric Holder Should Be Fired

Fri, 17 May 2013 13:11:00 GMT

Bill Press is a liberal radio show host with a syndicated show heard across the country, so, naturally, Press is also an Obama supporter. But even this Obama supporter thinks that it is time for U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to be fired.

After news broke that Holder's Department of Justice had subpoenaed the personal and business phone records of some 100 reporters from the Associated Press the liberal talker took to Twitter to call for Holder's head.

I still haven't heard a legit justification for the subpoenaing the AP phone records. They didn't notify AP, they didn't narrow search.
— Bill Press (@bpshow) May 16, 2013

What "breach of national security" are we talking about re the AP story? It's BS and Holder should be fired.
— Bill Press (@bpshow) May 16, 2013

For people who say that Holder was "just doing his job," he didn't "do his job" by going after Cheney or Bush. He left THAT alone!
— Bill Press (@bpshow) May 16, 2013

Pressure is mounting on Holder from his normally adoring liberal fans. In one example of such, on May 14, 52 media organizations signed a letter with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press demanding an explanation from Holder. The letter also demanded that the DOJ destroy all the phone records it had obtained.

Image credit: Newsbusters.org

Geraldo 'Can't Imagine' IRS Henchwoman Was Rewarded for Harassing Conservative Groups

Fri, 17 May 2013 12:58:00 GMT

Fox News host Geraldo Rivera appeared on "Fox and Friends" Friday morning to discuss the latest revelations regarding the IRS scandal and Sarah Hall Ingram, the woman who oversaw the division responsible for harassing conservative groups. The show's hosts pointed out that Hall is now in charge of the division that will implement the Affordable Care Act.

Gretchen Carlson challenged Rivera's assertion that Ingram was not rewarded for her efforts. "You think it was just a total coincidence that she was named to that post after being responsible for targeting conservatives?"

Rivera said, "I can’t imagine that she was rewarded for targeting conservative groups by getting that big job, because I think the president is smart enough to know that if you take someone who is wounded in that way, they have this metastasizing disease, this scandal, attached to them, and you give them a big job, it’s not going to protect them."

Watch the segment here:

Woodward Compares Benghazi To Watergate

Fri, 17 May 2013 12:35:00 GMT

Bob Woodward appeared on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" this Friday morning and, in stark contrast to his less-concerned Watergate colleague Carl Bernstein, he admonished the show's hosts to "not dismiss Benghazi" and compared the White House's behavior over CIA/State Department talking points with President Nixon's handling of edited transcripts of taped conversations in the oval office.

If you read through all these e-mails, you see that everyone in the government is saying, 'Oh, let's not tell the public that terrorists were involved, people connected to al Qaeda. Let's not tell the public that there were warnings.' I hate to show, this is one of the documents with the editing that one of the people in the state department said, 'Oh, let's not let these things out.' And I have to go back 40 years to Watergate when Nixon put out his edited transcripts to the conversations, and he personally went through them and said, 'Oh, let's not tell this, let's not show this.' I would not dismiss Benghazi. It's a very serious issue. As people keep saying, four people were killed.

Watch the segment here.

(H/T Weekly Standard)

MSNBC Analyst: Breitbart Sets GOP Agenda

Fri, 17 May 2013 10:25:00 GMT

MSNBC analyst Joy-Ann Reid joined host Thomas Roberts yesterday to comment on John Boehner's call for accountability and, perhaps, jail time for individuals responsible for the IRS scandal involving harassment and denial of non-profit status to conservative advocacy groups.

Reid asserted that the GOP House agenda seems to be inspired by or even crafted by, "right wing media":

I think what you're seeing is right wing media, that has taken hold among the base. Whether it's conservative talk radio, whether it's Breitbart.com online, all now fused together as the Republican agenda on Capitol Hill. Right now this is not about legislating anymore, this is about John Boehner, who was seen as an outsider to the tea party movement within the party, now bringing together all the conspiracy theories, all of the fear of the Obama Administration, under one umbrella. So now we see the right wing media agenda, which we used to see as outside the purview of Washington, brought inside.

We're pretty sure Reid didn't mean this as a compliment, but frankly, given the Republicans' problems with messaging, communications, and their ability to appeal to grassroots conservatives, it would be nice if Reid's analysis was correct.

Watch the segment here:

'Visionary' Roger Ailes to Receive Bradley Award

Fri, 17 May 2013 00:09:37 GMT

FOX News Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes will be honored with the $250,000 Bradley Prize for being a "visionary of American journalism" on June 12 at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

"Roger Ailes has been a visionary,” declared Michael W. Grebe, President and CEO of the Bradley Foundation, which will award four such prizes this year. "His innovative business-building strategies have revolutionized the uncovering and delivery of news in America."

Indeed. The Ailes media “revolution” has never been more apparent--or more important--as in the past year, when Fox News has spearheaded the media investigations of two major scandals: the “Fast and Furious” investigation, and the Benghazi debacle and cover-up.

In both cases, Fox and a few other rebel news outfits led the way in uncovering the brutal truth about Obama administration misdeeds, even as the MSM mostly chose either to ignore the scandals or else assist the Obama administration in the whitewashing.

Staying true to this speak-truth-to-power philosophy, Fox News covered the Benghazi tragedy and its scandalous cover-up relentlessly, even as other “news” networks did their best to protect--and not even question--the Obama administration's initial spin that the U.S. consulate had been attacked after spontaneous protests stemming from a random anti-Islam YouTube video.

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) recently highlighted Ailes’s central role in forcing a vigorous inquiry on Benghazi: "Why is it eight months later that finally now it seems that the, quote, mainstream media is taking an interest in what many of us have been -- if this thing comes to a full investigation, there will be two people that I think deserve credit. One of them is Senator Lindsey Graham and the other [is] Roger Ailes."

McCain has it exactly right, and his admiration for Ailes is shared by many millions of Americans.

The Bradley Foundation said the selection for its Prize was “based on nominations solicited from more than 200 prominent individuals across the country and chosen by the Bradley Prizes Selection Committee."

"Through the Bradley Prizes, we recognize individuals like Roger Ailes whose accomplishments strengthen American institutions, in hopes that others will strive for excellence in their respective fields," Grebe said. Previous recipients of the award include Ed Meese, Thomas Sowell, Jeb Bush, and the Federalist Society's founding directors.

In 1996, after making CNBC the most successful business network in history, Ailes convinced News Corp Chairman Rupert Murdoch to launch an iconoclastic and fearless news channel at a time when the legacy liberal media virtually monopolized the airwaves. The launch of FOX News Channel was accompanied by near-universal mockery and disdain by media elites, but Ailes knew that Americans in the heartland--and even in liberal areas--were fed up not only with biased news coverage, but smug, know-it-all anchors who delivered their slanted coverage with ideological and partisan relish.

When Ailes said, “We report, you decide,” he meant it. He knew that Americans could make up their minds about national issues--if they were presented with all the facts.

From its beginning nearly two decades ago, Ailes vowed his network would cover stories the legacy press ignored. And since 2002, Fox News has shown its initial doubters were wrong as it became America's leading cable news outlet.

Fox News truly is “The Most Powerful Name In News." For the last eleven years, Ailes's network has pummeled its competition and more viewers are trusting the network for breaking news coverage, as was evidenced most recently during the Boston Marathon bombings. And now, of course, millions of truth-seeking Americans will be looking to Fox for more of its fearless let-the-chips-fall-where-they-may coverage of the IRS and AP scandals.

Part of the reason for this is Americans believe Fox News holds Americans in power accountable while still never being ashamed to defend the country and its timeless--and still revolutionary--values of private enterprise, equal opportunity and fair play. That ethos is pure Ailes; it is an ethos that was nurtured in his working-class upbringing in the Midwest--Warren, Ohio, to be exact.

Speaking to the University of North Carolina School of Journalism on April 12, 2002, Ailes urged aspiring journalists to pursue the truth, but also to remember their patriotic duty as Americans. In addition, he reminded them that the critics of America should also be open to scrutiny--and to criticism:

Your generation will determine whether the American way of life can continue. Don’t waiver in telling the truth and don’t fight for a tie. There’s a disadvantage to winning. People will criticize you. They will particularly hate you if you beat them. Many of them are just pathetic people who think every kid should get the trophy. Some of them are actually untalented, vicious people who won’t be able to stand the fact that you’re more talented or work harder than they do and make more money. So, they’ll say terrible things about you. You must be able to withstand that.

Now, you’re going to hear your country criticized. As a journalist, you must question your country. But you must also question the criticism of the country, which is rarely done. We live in a country where we believe individuals are innocent until proven guilty, but often don’t give that same time to our country. So, we shouldn’t get up every morning saying, “What did our country do wrong?” We should question the country and question the questioning of the country because after 235 years, it’s small, it’s young, it needs protection. Who better to protect it to the ones who actually enjoy the freedoms provided by this country?

Of course, America can be improved. Of course, we make terrible mistakes from time to time. But in the end, the United States has fed more and freed more people than all of the other countries put together. So, you must take that into account.

We have a historic, heroic history. Don’t let people attack your traditional values if you have them, or your institutions that have been a beacon of light. American exceptionalism does exist because we believe in freedom. And you can tell this is a great country because everybody’s trying to get in and nobody’s trying to get out.

Speaking at his alma mater, Ohio University, in 2012, Ailes, after saying he may be better suited to run a news organization because he does not have a fancy journalism degree, discussed the important responsibilities journalists have and how "dangerous" it can be when those with the "power of the pen and camera" "think they know best":

And I believe journalists have tremendous responsibilities. Their job is not to invent and support positions but be skeptical of everyone. A few things I try to tell my journalists are that nobody is wrong all the time, not even Americans. You should treat capitalism as fairly as other philosophies because it’s how we get paid. Keep an open mind from the time you file your story you still don’t know all the facts. Be a big enough person to include the point of view you don’t agree with if it’s true. Our job is not to be a lap dog or an attack dog, but to be a watch dog. And as a matter of fact, the press was set up to keep an eye on government because our founders all came from countries where the government got a little too aggressive. Professional detachment from a story is different from you actually being God, because there is a tendency for people with power of the pen and camera or anything else to think they know best. That is a very dangerous problem.

By understanding the views of ordinary Americans--understanding both their instinctive patriotism and their natural skepticism of overweening ideology--Ailes resolved to serve the folks, as opposed to the New York-D.C.-Boston elite. Thus Ailes has turned a fledgling news network into a behemoth whose stand-alone value has been estimated at $12 billion.

That’s an American success story that Americans can appreciate. Yet even now, Fox retains a scrappy underdog ethos of a startup and thus has forced the legacy press to cover important stories it otherwise may have not. As a result, Fox has been a winner, Fox fans have been winners, but most of all, the United States of America has been a winner, because our republic is immeasurably strengthened when power is held accountable.

The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation was founded in 1985 and "is devoted to strengthening American democratic capitalism and the institutions, principles and values that sustain and nurture it," the foundation's programs "support limited, competent government; a dynamic marketplace for economic, cultural activity; and a vigorous defense, at home and abroad, of American ideas and institutions." In addition to Ailes, the other three recipients of the Bradely Prize this year are former US Solicitor General Paul Clement, former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, and National Affairs founding editor Yuval Levin.

The Foundation emphasizes that "recognizing that responsible self-government depends on enlightened citizens and informed public opinion."

Piers Morgan Uses IRS Scandal to Re-Litigate Nixon

Thu, 16 May 2013 23:56:00 GMT

During an appearance on Piers Morgan Live Wednesday, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld would not allow Morgan to imply that keeping a list of political enemies is the same as using the IRS to target political enemies.

Morgan brought up the IRS scandal, then asked Rumsfeld, "Are you as angry about Nixon having had an 'enemies list'?"

Rumsfeld responded that the two cases are different: "It's different. For a politician to say, 'These are the people I like and these are the people I don't like--that's the enemy.' ... I suppose politicians do that."

Morgan then interrupted, set on equating Nixon's "enemies list" with the current scandal over targeting Tea Party groups. He said, "Yes, but any administration deliberately targeting people," when Rumsfeld cut him off and said, "Not with the IRS. No indeed. That is a totally different thing."

Rumsfeld continued:

Once people get a sense that they've turned the government of the United States, with all those employees and all those tax dollars, against the people--or some of the people--nobody likes it. The people that are not even targeted don't like it.

Morgan then admitted that even he had found the political use of the IRS "outrageous." To this Rumsfeld added, "and it's also illegal, and anti-democratic, and inexcusable, and it should be dealt with in a very, very firm way."

Fox News Hires Former US Rep. Allen West

Thu, 16 May 2013 23:49:21 GMT

On May 16, Fox News announced it had hired former Florida Representative Allen West as a contributor to offer political commentary during the network's daytime and prime time shows.

In a statement, Executive Vice President of Programming Bill Shine said, "Representative West’s congressional and military experience along with his fearless approach to voicing key issues will provide a valuable point of view to the FOX News lineup."

West is currently the Director of Next Generation TV Programming with PJ Media; until the 2012 elections, he was Florida's congressman from the 22nd District, a seat he won in 2010. West lost his seat last year, largely due to redistricting. Prior to that, West was a 22-year veteran of the United States Army, retiring as a Lieutenant Colonel in 2004.

Rep. West was recently mentioned as an ideal candidate to replace Florida Lt. Governor Jennifer Carroll, who resigned in March.

Fox News' Eric Bolling: 'I Was Audited by IRS' After Criticizing Obama

Thu, 16 May 2013 23:27:00 GMT

During the May 14th broadcast of Fox News' The Five, panel member Eric Bolling announced that he believes he was audited by the IRS after criticizing President Obama.

Bolling told the panel, "[In] 2011, I was pretty vocal against four more years of President Obama, and I don't know if it's coincidence or not but I did get an IRS audit in 2012 for my 2011 tax returns. I'm not sure if there's any correlation."

Andrea Tantaros chimed in saying, "It's the Chicago way. [Obama] said he would change D.C. and the way they do business. Boy, has he ever."

On Thursday, Obama demurred from appointing a special prosecutor to look into the growing IRS scandal, saying that he thought the current internal investigations he's proposed would suffice.

"I think it s going to be sufficient for us to work with Congress--they've got a bunch of committees. Attorney General Holder announced a criminal investigation of what happened," the President said during a joint press conference with Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan.

AP Scandal: Washington Post Questions Holders 'People at Risk' Claim

Thu, 16 May 2013 19:25:00 GMT

Washington Post:

For five days, reporters at the Associated Press had been sitting on a big scoop about a foiled al-Qaeda plot at the request of CIA officials. Then, in a hastily scheduled Monday morning meeting, the journalists were asked by agency officials to hold off on publishing the story for just one more day.

The CIA officials, who had initially cited national security concerns in an attempt to delay publication, no longer had those worries, according to individuals familiar with the exchange. Instead, the Obama administration was planning to announce the successful counterterrorism operation that Tuesday.

AP balked and proceeded to publish that Monday afternoon. Its May 2012 report is now at the center of a controversial and broad seizure of phone records of AP reporters’ home, office and cellphone lines. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said the unauthorized disclosure about an intelligence operation to stop al-Qaeda from detonating explosives aboard a U.S. airliner was among the most serious leaks he could remember, and justified secretly obtaining records from a handful of reporters and editors over a span of two months.

Now, some members of Congress and media advocates are questioning why the administration viewed the leak that led to the May 7 AP story as so grave.

The president’s top counterterrorism adviser at the time, John O. Brennan, had appeared on “Good Morning America” the following day to trumpet the successful operation. He said that because of the work of U.S. intelligence, the plot did not pose an active threat to the American public.

Holder said this week that the unauthorized disclosure “put the American people at risk.”

Full story here.

Ari Fleischer: White House Claim Of 'One Word Change' To Talking Points Not True

Thu, 16 May 2013 16:05:00 GMT

Ari Fleischer knows what it's like to take the podium in the White House briefing room, especially with a hostile press corps. As the spokesman for the White House during the George W. Bush Administration, he had to deal with reporters challenging the White House on a daily basis. Jay Carney has only had to deal with a hostile press for the past couple of days.

This morning Fleischer joined me and co-host Brian Wilson on "Mornings on the Mall" on WMAL in Washington DC to discuss the latest scandals gripping the White House and, specifically, Jay Carney's role as spokesman for the administration.

Wilson laid out the issue of the Benghazi talking points and Carney maintaining that the White House and the State Department only changed "one stylistic edit" of the talking points, despite the fact that pages and pages of emails show that multiple revisions were made to them, mostly at the State Department's request.

"I look at these emails and I say, 'you know what, that's just simply not true,'" Wilson said, regarding the assertion that only one word was changed in the talking points. "On that issue, I think you're entirely right about that. And, I think the emails show that's right," Fleischer responded.

Listen to the entire interview here:

Lowry: When It's Their Rights, Media Become Tea Party, NRA

Thu, 16 May 2013 14:25:00 GMT

Another brilliant column from National Review's Rich Lowry at Politico. Lowry makes the indisputable point that the same media that have spent years attacking the Tea Party, and months savaging the NRA, are now revealing brazen hypocrisy when it comes to protecting their own rights. In spirit and goal, the media are now one with the Tea Party and NRA.

What animates the Tea Party and NRA is a legitimate concern that the government -- especially under President Obama -- has made a disturbing pivot from their Constitutional requirement to protect our liberties, to infringing upon our liberties. In turn, Obama and his media label us as anti-government crazies suffering from paranoid delusions.

But look at the reaction this week from that very same media in the wake of the Associated Press scandal. Suddenly the media don't like Big Government doing to them what ObamaCare and background checks will do to the rest of us. Moreover, the very same media that suggest not trusting the government is a form of extremism, is now demanding a law be immediately passed to shield them from government intrusion.

The media don't trust the government anymore than we do. Who is the paranoid crazy now?

Lowry:

At his briefing, Carney hung to the word “unfettered” like a drowning man. He said over and over again things like the president believes in an “unfettered ability to pursue investigative journalism” but that there should be “balance.” The implicit reaction in the room was: “Balance? Don’t give us any stinkin’ balance. Give us our rights.”

In this, the reporters exhibited a healthy impulse toward vigilance about liberty. The phrase “chilling effect” has been bandied about often. A chill comes not necessarily from what government is doing to you but from what it might do to you. Very few reporters will ever have their records secretly subpoenaed by the government, but it is intolerable to them that it could happen. On top of everything else, it is the principle of the thing — an infringement, or even a potential infringement, on the constitutional rights of even a handful of reporters is an affront to all.

There are lots of people who share this way of thinking about rights and government. Some of them gather every year at places like CPAC and the National Rifle Association annual convention.

We have just gone through a period when scorn was heaped on the NRA for opposing new gun rules out of the very same logic that compels reporters to react so strongly against the AP subpoena. The NRA will not abide an infringement on anyone’s legitimate right to bear arms, and it fears what could come of enhanced state power. Like the reporters, it casts a jaundiced eye on the reassurances of government. What they are to the First Amendment, it is to the Second.

Read it all.

At his Politico perch, Lowry is writing one of the best columns around. Keep an eye out for it.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC

Chris Matthews Loses That Tingling Feeling… For Now

Thu, 16 May 2013 13:41:00 GMT

This won't last. Chris Matthews is in love with Barack Obama. I'm not being hyperbolic, either. This isn’t about a a man-crush or even partisan worship. What Matthews feels is way beyond that. The "Hardball" anchor is deeply in love with the President. It's not a sexual thing, but it is romantic and unrequited.

How else to explain Tweety McTingles' erratic and ongoing emotional tingle-osity:

President Obama "obviously likes giving speeches more than he does running the executive branch," Chris Matthews said tonight.

Yes, you read that right: The MSNBC host who in 2008 felt a "thrill going up my leg" after hearing Obama speak has grown disenchanted. Tonight's episode of Hardball saw Matthews delivering a rare, unforgiving grilling of the president as severe as anything that might appear on Fox News.

Matthews is Charlie Brown and Barack Obama is his Little Red-Haired Girl.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC

'Morning Joe' Worries IRS Scandal Will Lead To 'More Extremist Candidates'

Thu, 16 May 2013 13:00:00 GMT

The denizens of the oddly-shaped table discussion on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" delved into the broader political ramifications of the IRS scandal Thursday morning, and panelist Donny Deutsch took issue with the assumption that the issue would be a net positive for Republicans.

Willy Geist started the discussion by declaring, "If you think Republicans aren’t going to use this as confirmation that big government is out to get you, you’re wrong."

That's when Deutsch used the story of the IRS demonizing tea party groups to further demonize tea party groups.

Basically what it is going to do, it’s going to force, in the primaries, to galvanize the Tea Party. You’re going to get more extremist candidates. They’ll lose in general election. Come general election time, if somebody voted against background checks for guns, if somebody is still doing the crazy, crazy, crazy social issues, I disagree with you.

Deutsch continued to make his case and wrote the IRS scandal off on "a few idiots" operating on their own. Even at a time when the White House is under pressure from three growing scandals--Benghazi, AP and IRS, we can still count on MSNBC to make the "crazy, extreme" tea partiers the real story.

Watch the whole segment here:

O'Donnell: IRS Did Nothing Wrong

Thu, 16 May 2013 11:29:00 GMT

Lawrence O'Donnell likes to march to the beat of a different drummer. And in the case of Wednesday night's edition of "The Last Word" on MSNBC, he marched away from just about everyone in the media and politics by maintaining that the IRS scandal is much ado about nothing.

I do not believe what the IRS was reported to have been doing is an outrage. I believe that the IRS agents in this case did nothing wrong. Let me say it again, you won’t hear it anywhere else: the IRS agents did nothing wrong. They were simply trying to enforce the law as the IRS has understood it since 1959.

Talk about your "nothing to see here, move it along" moment! If this ends up being the line of defense for the IRS, if defenders of the administration maintain that the IRS acted legally and appropriately, look for the tea party movement to grow even stronger and look for very loud calls for a flat tax solution that would neuter the over-reaching power of the IRS.

Watch the entire segment here:

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NBC News Hosts: White Supremacy Motivates Obama's Critics

Thu, 16 May 2013 10:45:00 GMT

Leave it to NBC News cable outlet MSNBC to somehow inject race into the discussion of the IRS scandal gripping Washington. As they awaited President Obama's remarks on the brewing debacle at Treasury, Chris Matthews and his colleague, Al Sharpton, discussed the ramifications of the scandal for the president.

Sharpton asked, "Could this end up backfiring on the Republicans? Are they over jumping the runway here?" Matthews revealed himself immediately by responding, "I would think that would be justice if it did happen. "

He went on from there to somehow change the subject from President Obama's White House being dogged and damaged by a flurry of embarrassing scandals to Republican critics being motivated by "White supremacy.":

There are people in this country, maybe 10%, I don't know the number, maybe 20% on a bad day, who want this president to have an asterisk next to his name in the history books. That he really wasn't president, you know, like a guy in baseball who used drugs. They wanna be able to say 'well he didn't really have that batting average, he really wasn't the first African-American president, he really didn't do health care, he didn't really kill bin Laden,' there's an asterisk. They've been fighting that, people like Donald Trump, since day one. They can't stand the idea that he's president. And a piece of it is racism. Not that somebody in one racial group doesn't like someone in another racial group, so what? It's the sense that the white race must rule. That's what racism is. And they can't stand the idea that a man who's not white is president. That is real. That sense of racial superiority and rule is in the hearts of some people in this country. Not all conservatives, not even all right wingers, but it always comes through.

He continued on his soliloquy about white supremacy by including the Speaker of the House as being compliant with the motivations against the president. "A big part of it is bought into by people like John Boehner who's not a bad guy, but he knows the only way he can talk to the hard right is talk their language. "Sharpton's response, "No doubt about it. "

Watch the unbelievable segment here:

Gut Check: Intervention

Wed, 15 May 2013 20:04:00 GMT

When I watch that really depressing TV show Intervention, it’s only to feel better about myself. It’s one of the great benefits of television: it’s personal therapy that elevates self-esteem quicker than a pep talk from a noxious life coach.

If I’m feeling down, I watch Intervention. If I’m feeling really down, then it’s Hoarders. If Hoarders cannot make you feel better about your lot in life - then you might be hopeless. Which, at that point, it’s time to watch Hardcore Pawn.

Hardcore Pawn is an amazing show for one severely disturbing reason: it’s helped to introduce what I now call “city-billies.” See, for the longest time, we've poked fun at the rural folk, referring to them as hillbillies. They’re the gap-toothed inbred freaks who fry squirrels and poop in buckets down by the creek. Deliverance immortalized them - now they’re the butt of every lazy, lame joke about the south. We call ‘em rednecks.

See the recent, stupid study done by Movoto, which lists the most redneck cities, based on number of Walmarts and lack of education. They’re able to commit this sort of lame BS, because, well, no one cares. Essentially, a real estate brokerage firm just whispered, "You don't want to move here," regarding some of America's major cities. Imagine if they had substituted "redneck" with something else.

Funny thing is, hillbillies and rednecks are fewer and farther between. But there are a crapload of city-billies.

City-billies are what’s left in dying cities with diminishing populations. They’re the people left behind... the people who can’t leave. They’re the folks that liberals say they want to help, as they pack up their Subarus and get the hell out of Dodge (or in Hardcore Pawn’s case, Detroit). Hardcore Pawn is a thirty minute tour of the city-billy life: the constant line of assorted folk selling everything from broken computers to beat-up construction equipment in the sprawling pawn shop, reminding you that every city targeted by the helping hand of government ends in abject misery.

Back to Intervention. In case you don’t watch, it’s that show that follows a family as it prepares to intervene on behalf of a drug or alcohol addicted relative. While watching, you notice how families enable much of the self-destruction by simply letting it occur. It’s usually because one parent (the mom, most of the time) fears the addict will reject her if they attempt to get him to stop snorting or shooting or guzzling. So she lets him continue doing his bad stuff, while she looks on, in tears. “Poor moms,” is all I keep thinking when I watch Intervention.

I do not blame the kin entirely for the junkie's behavior. But I blame families in part for not cutting the cord and letting the addict reap the consequences from his own selfish decisions. A junkie survives on a relative’s love, fear of rejection, and money. But it is only when the junkie is forced to live by his own decisions that he can actually rebound and become a better person.

And so while some junkies live, Elvis died. No one had the balls to shout, “Stop," which is why he ended up full of bacon, booze, and pills, a whale beached in a bathroom.

And this Elvis syndrome is, oddly enough, happening again right now, politically. I saw this same enabling behavior happen in the last five years, as the media fulfilled the role of the hopeless mom to the self-indulgent Obama Administration. And now, this week, the chickens have not only come home to roost, they’re freebasing in the garage. The family is fed up.

As I mentioned yesterday on The Five (it features five people, at 5 pm, on FNC), our national hive of hacks are really nothing more than the Memphis Mafia, the folks who protected Elvis Presley through his worst excesses, until his particular administration ended on a toilet.

But why did the media become so much like this mafia? This behavior is caused by a deep desire to be liked and to be perceived as cool.

In fact, the media are so desperate to be liked by Obama that they are willing to overlook anything unseemly. When I look at the multitude of scandals, I cannot blame the President. My disgust is reserved for the media who let him wander so far off the reservation--because they love him more than their own principles. They love him, because they want him, really, to love them back. And the sad thing is--he really doesn’t care. He’s so aloof; it makes them only love him more. This is unrequited love, among wonks.

Here is a simple fact: a liberal president operating with a liberal media leads us to a really unpleasant place--populated with programs, policies, and principles that are woefully inept and corrupt. Obamacare, Benghazi, the IRS scandal, Pigford, and weird euphemisms for terror like "workplace violence" and "self-radicalization"--this isn't a comedy of errors, it's a tragedy of horrors. There is no guard rail anymore when you’ve got the left monitoring the left.

Which is why what is perceived as cool often ends in failure.

Cool gets a pass, even if the cool thing is incompetent. For questioning the competence of the cool puts the spotlight on you, which you don’t want. If you raise the possibility that whatever the media deems cool is troubling, you inevitably end up being mocked by the cool kids. See Saturday Night Live's spoof on the Benghazi whistle-blowers just days ago. We live in a time where the hip kids think it's funny to smear those who simply want answers to the most obvious questions. Like, why did four people die, and the administration blame it on a video? I guess, if you have a team of writers and a week to play with it, you can make that funny, too.

Nobody wants to be mocked by the cool kids. SNL makes it clear that if you step out of line, the velvet rope becomes a noose of ridicule.

The media had sold its soul for a version of heaven on earth, which to them is nothing more than acceptance by someone they adore. The deal came down to one simple thing: finally, I am cool, and I will be liked. I cannot give that up, even if it means I must ignore things I would have aggressively pursued if the culprit were an old white Republican.

Look at the IRS scandal: the Tea Party was singled out, because you could single them out. This is a group that never broke a window but only broke ranks. So while a peaceful group gets targeted, terror tots like Bill Ayers get tenure. And why is that?

It’s simple: a climate created by the media, by academia, and by the Administration, made it acceptable.

How much more does a liberal media type need to reconsider his own biases?

Jon Stewart should be so ashamed of this administration, he might finally add the "h" to his first name.

Like I said, this is the Elvis Syndrome. Metaphorically speaking, the media has let Obama have too many fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches. They have enabled him right into his own destruction.

But judging by our President’s demeanor, it’s really no big deal. Unlike Elvis, he’s got an excellent metabolism.

It comes down to a simple question: who decided to go after the Tea party? Something tells me the same person who pushed the Tea Party as a target also pushed the anti-Muslim video. It's the same person who sees Ft. Hood as workplace violence, and views America as a bigger problem in the world than its vile enemies. It’s the same guy everyone thinks is cool; the same guy everyone wants to be near. It’s the same guy who makes you feel good about yourself, as long as you agree with him, and don’t rock the boat.

He’s the guy you’re happy to enable, even as others pay the price.

Greg Gutfeld is a mainstay on Fox News as co-host of The Five and the host of Red Eye. He's also the NY Times best-selling author of The Joy of Hate: How to Triumph over Whiners in the Age of Phony Outrage.

For more from Greg check out his official site or follow him on Twitter.

White House Refuses Straight Answer to Request for Benghazi Emails

Wed, 15 May 2013 18:17:00 GMT

In a tense exchange Wednesday afternoon between Major Garrett of CBS News and White House spokesman Jay Carney, the White House refused to offer a straight answer to Garrett's repeated requests that the Administration release the full email chain surrounding the shaping of the CIA's Benghazi talking points.

Garrett asked Carney three times for an answer to a simple yes or no question. Each time Carney droned on and one with platitudes about how transparent the administration had been with respect to Benghazi. The first time Garrett reminded Carney to answer the question, Carney claimed he had forgotten the question had been asked. Then he launched into another meaningless monologue, which forced Garrett to ask for a third time.

Finally, Carney answered without answering, saying only that the White House is looking for ways to release more information that, apparently, could or could not include the emails.

Over the last 12 hours, CNN, ABC News, and NBC News have all called for the release of the emails in question. The hope is to shed light on exactly what happened between the State Department, the CIA, and White House as the talking points -- that ended being watered down into something completely false -- were taking shape prior to UN Ambassador Susan Rice's round-robin of five Sunday shows a few days after the attack.

Obama confidante, David Axelrod, also called for the emails to be released, claiming they would exonerate everyone involved.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC

Politifact Knocks Obama for Second False Benghazi Claim

Wed, 15 May 2013 17:26:00 GMT

For months, conservative media has been howling over the falsehood that the Accountability Review Board (ARB) offered a thorough investigation into the September 11 terror attack in Benghazi. The most frustrating part is that in order to ignore the legions of unanswered questions surrounding Libya, Obama and his media (most famously Slate's Dave Weigel, who used the report to say GOP claims of a cover up were "pure fiction") have hid behind the ARB's report as though it were definitive.

On Monday, President Obama tried this ruse again. But now that the media has finally woken up from a five-year infatuation, he isn't getting away with it. PolitiFact has labeled as "mostly false," Obama's claim that….

Over the last several months, there was a review board headed by two distinguished Americans, Mike Mullen and Tom Pickering, who investigated every element of [the Benghazi incident.]

Here is PolitiFact's reasoning:

While the [ARB] did investigate numerous angles of the security issues, it didn’t look at who perpetrated the attack, nor did it probe the administration’s public communications afterward. No less an authority than the board’s co-chairman undercut Obama’s sweeping claim that the board "investigated every element" with repeated comments on three Sunday shows. On balance, we rate Obama’s claim Mostly False.

Oh how times have changed. Back in December, Weigel could get away with using the ARB report to falsely claim the Administration had been cleared of a cover up, even though the ARB didn’t even look into the possibility of a cover up.

Today, Obama can't even get away with it.

By the way, this is the second falsehood the President of the United States has been caught telling this week.

And it is only Wednesday.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC

NBC News Reporter: AP Scandal Angers One Of Obama's 'Most Important Constituencies - The Press'

Wed, 15 May 2013 15:46:00 GMT

NBC News Senior Investigative Correspondent Lisa Myers appeared on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" to discuss the growing AP scandal involving the Dept. of Justice secretly obtaining phone records of reporters with the Associated Press.

Myers maintained that it was unlikely that the president knew about the wire tapping because "from a political standpoint," it would anger "one of the president's most important constituencies, the press." Given that, said Myers, "it's hard to imagine they would have green-lighted this thing."

Watch the entire segment here:

Axelrod Tries to Shift DOJ/AP Blame to Media

Wed, 15 May 2013 15:17:00 GMT

Barack Obama's political Svengali, David Axelrod, appeared on Wednesday's "Morning Joe" on MSNBC to respond to the latest revelations regarding the Obama Justice Department's extensive investigation into Associated Press reporters, including secret wiretaps and collections of phone logs of the reporters and their sources.

When asked about the "chilling effect" on reporters and sources due to the signal sent by the intrusive investigation, Axelrod slipped right into talking point spin zone and actually blamed Scarborough and others who had called for investigations into national security leaks in the Summer of 2012.

Last summer, I appeared with you, and you challenged me with the same tone, actually, on these leaks and said, ‘When is the president going to send a strong signal to people that leaking classified information won’t be tolerated?’ ‘When is is he going to make people accountable for these leaks?’ They’ve apparently interviewed 550 people and went to court and got a subpoena to do what they did. In order to do what you and others said should be done.

Scarborough, to his credit, pushed back on the false narrative and pressed Axelrod for a direct answer to the question rather than seeming to shift the argument onto the media and politicians who pressed for action against the leaks:

I’ve heard the president’s defenders try to say this, and I congratulate you guys for going off into a room and calling each other and coming up with this bogus argument, but never did I suggest that 100 AP reporters have all of their phone records seized, their private cell phone records seized, their home phone numbers seized. So please save that for somebody else that’s going to buy into that. Don’t shift this to me! Answer my question: Will sources, confidential sources inside the federal government be intimidated because of what this administration, according to The New York Times, has been doing from the very beginning?

After giving lip service to the freedom of the press, and reminding Scarborough that he too was once a reporter, Axelrod continued to press the narrative that the DOJ investigation was borne out of an effort to respond to critics of the Administration's handling of leaks: "The fact is, that everyone in the summer was clambering for an investigation to do exactly what you now say you’re concerned about, which is chilling people who would leak."

Watch the entire segment here:

Stewart Nails Obama's Claim He Learned of Scandals from Media

Wed, 15 May 2013 14:50:00 GMT

One common thread in the multiple scandals hammering the Obama White House is the president's claim that he first heard of the stories from news reports. Many find this claim to be unbelievable and are beginning to echo Sen. Howard Baker's famous inquiry from the Watergate era: "What did the President know, and when did he know it?"

On Tuesday's "Daily Show" on Comedy Central, Jon Stewart appeared to have finally had enough of his candidate pretending as though he only knows as much as anyone else who turns on cable news every night.

Stewart first hammered Obama for only allowing one question from the press at his joint press conference on Tuesday with PM David Cameron. He then continued with a rapid fire montage of multiple times over the past year when the President's explanation to reporters about scandal was to claim that he first learned about it from the media.

Ultimately, Stewart concludes: “I wouldn’t be surprised if President Obama learned Osama bin Laden had been killed when he saw himself announce it on television.”

Watch the whole segment here: