Back during the Nixon days, there were "operatives" in charge of "dirty tricks".
They were young fellows, Republicans, that spent their pre-election time
finding ways to embarrass the Democrats.
Sometimes, their tricks worked, sometimes backfired, and sometimes
they were found out...to the embarrassment of the G.O.P.
Now, some such Republicans have matured into the Congressional leadership.
Can we take a look at Darrell Issa (R-CA), Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, for a minute ?
Washington Post
Dana Milbank
June 28, 2013
Darrell Issa and the overblown scandals
Quote:
This is how a scandal implodes:
<snip>
Documents released by Ways and Means committee Democrats this week show that the IRS,
in addition to targeting tea party groups, also had “Be on the Lookout” (BOLO) lists
for groups using descriptors such as “progressive,” “health care legislation,”
“medical marijuana,” “paying national debt” and “green energy.”
Finally, evidence surfaces that the investigator stacked the deck.
Tuesday night, the Hill newspaper quoted a spokesman for Treasury’s inspector general,
Russell George, saying the group was asked by Issa “to narrowly focus on tea party organizations.”
The inspectors knew there were other terms, but “that was outside the scope of our audit.”
Certainly, something went badly wrong at the IRS that caused groups
to be targeted because of ideology. But it’s nothing like the conspiracy Issa cooked up
in which the president and his men supposedly used the tax authority to attack their political foes.
<snip>
Shortly before the 2010 election, Issa told Rush Limbaugh that Obama
“has been one of the most corrupt presidents in modern times.”
He later said Obama isn’t “personally corrupt” but his administration is.
Issa then set out to prove it.
He led a probe into the failed “Fast and Furious” gun sting
by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Issa declared that “it went all the way to the White House,” insisting that the plan
was approved “at the highest levels of the Obama appointees,”
and that the Justice Department “has blood on their hands.”
The Justice Department inspector general determined that Attorney General
Eric Holder didn’t even know about the program until after it was shut down.
After the failure of Solyndra, a government-aided solar company,
Issa probed Energy Department loan guarantees, saying
“I want to see when the president and his cronies are picking winners and losers
... that it wasn’t because there were large contributions given to them.”
The committee documented no cronyism and no presidential involvement.
Issa probed the response to Freedom of Information Act requests
by the Department of Homeland Security, saying the matter
“reeks of a Nixonian enemies list, and this committee will not tolerate it.”
Nothing Nixonian surfaced.
After the killing of U.S. officials in Benghazi, Libya, Issa accused then-Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton of giving false information to Congress when
she said she wasn’t involved in denying the Libyan diplomats’ security requests.
He also said that it was “perhaps the White House” that later changed talking points
to make it appear that the assault had begun as a protest.
It turned out Clinton wasn’t involved in the security decision
and the White House wasn’t behind the change in the talking points.
.
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Darrell Issa seems bound and determined to prove the validity of the Peter Principal.