Senate The 2nd Term of the Obama Administration: Facts, Opinions, and Discussions

They were following orders? Oh my...that is a scandal. Whose orders? Their bosses?! Well, then that settles it. Let's impeach 0bummer for his treason. As much as I'm sure conservatives are ejaculating all over themselves because of this 'scandal' it really doesn't amount to much. The IRS making a group that's opposed to paying taxes wait? You don't say. They've also done this to PeTA and while I'm no fan of PeTA, I have no trouble believing them as their goal is to lose as little money as possible for their crusade.

As far as I'm concerned this is a non-story. And like most are saying: the real scandal here is how they targeted these groups and let the other, bigger bastards go on spending money with impunity and no oversight. But I know, the frail conservative ego needs to latch onto anything and the Republicans just turned Benghazi into a scandal for themselves, so quick! To the distraction mobile. But hey, our deficit is lower today than it has been. So let's keep up the march of phony scandals in the hopes something sticks--besides Republicans hands to their Viagra-induced erections over this. Yes. That was perhaps one too many masturbatory allusions, but really...this whole thing screams of a Republican ****-fest. Just look at JS's reply.

 

Since this is a Star Wars board, I feel compelled to point out that most employees allegedly don't have to follow orders as a condition of keeping their jobs. You know the drill: "George Lucas was surrounded by yes-men". As opposed to all the putative rebels out there who can just tell their boss to **** off anytime they want.

And you're wrong. The right-wing base has been ginned up as much as it possibly can be. To get more votes you'd have to somehow reach out across the aisle to the same people you're intent on grinding into the dust.

Good luck with that.

 

I remember when the 2nd (or maybe 1st) scandal since Watergate happened just a month and a half before the election. And Obama was going to be impeached over the scandal and coverup. Then no one cared because nothing important or wrongdoing happened and the only ones in a frenzy were Michelle Bachmann and Sean Hannity.

 

Exactly.

The right-wing base was going to show up regardless, they have been itching to boot Obama out since January 2009. The fact is, and JS can continue to live in denial about it, they are maxed out demographically and they simply had no shot of winning this year.

 

My disingenuousness?

Give me a break, buddy. Your tenure on these boards has been marked by a penchant to believe your own spin unparalleled by any other user.

To answer your question, well...it's already been answered, actually, by Jabba-wocky on the last page. I know you would have preferred the IRS made their internal memos public before their own investigation was complete, since in your mind that would have validated the belief that this was all a cover-up of epic proportions orchestrated by Obama himself that would have allowed Romney to win a resounding victory had it been 'exposed', but come on, seriously?

I hate to break it to you, but Romney lost, and not because of Benghazi, the IRS, or any other reason than more voters chose Barack Obama than your preferred candidate. That's all there is to it.

If I may give you a little bit of advice, you might want to come to terms with that fact before calling out the honesty of others. I've never shied away from critizing the President (or any other Democrat) when they screw up, while you have demonstrated an unswerving ability to be so highly partisan that it would make Rush Limbaugh blush.

I will put my objectivity and reputation for such against yours on this board anytime, anywhere.

And another thing: quoting a FOX news article as an objective source of information? That's about as reliable as a promise from North Korea.

 

yesss... yes... goodddd.... complete the transition of the senate to a 24-hour newschannel roleplaying game: challenge him to a fistfight

 

Well Tagg Romney wanted to punch out Obama once upon a time, so perhaps Lawrance thought the guy geniunely wanted to fight somebody?

 

Eh, never mind.

 

Blah blah blah, Obama is the evil and dishonest one here, all you liberals have an inverted upside-down worldview, etc.

 

What I mean though in asking the question is that the extent of scandals aren't known, until, well they're known. I mean it's not like Bernstein had a crystal ball and knew how Watergate would ultimately end up until Mark Felt started revealing stuff to them, and even then, the dots had to be connected. Remember, most of Watergate was concluded before the additional tapes got out. The Watergate gang got punished, and in all likelihood, that would have been it. Nixon was insulated. It wasn't until the infamous "smoking gun" audio got leaked that Nixon was personally subject to legal action and ended up resigning. Again, not because he was really tied to the actual break-ins, but because he got caught lying to Congress about his role in the coverup and when he knew it.

I'm addressing Bernstein's 2 conclusions he drew in his same paragraph. Bernstein used circular logic with Nixon, but yet, Bernstein couldn't "imagine" Obama being involved in this. Because why? Obama, Nixon, whoever are all just politicians, and as such, this scandal, like any other scandal, is just one tape, or letter, or witness away from being more or less than what it is. I'm not saying that there is anything to tie this to Obama, I'm just saying Bernstein should probably bank his defense until things are played out, or at least save his "I know Richard Nixon, and Obama is no Richard Nixon..." speech until things are concluded either way.

In fact, at this juncture, the comparisons to Watergate are starting to pile up, at least with how the upper officials within the IRS are acting. How about the fact that the IRS fed a lawyer a fake question to ask during a legal luncheon? Really? That's incredibly insulting, and yet just as amateurish. Or that IRS officials were transferred around. Or how Steven Miller couldn't recall who was in charge of what during his testimony... I think besides Miller, I can point to 2-3 other people who should be fired over this, in addition to some serious reforms at the IRS. Basically, using the criteria of Bernstein's above paragraph, at least on the substance side of things, the IRS situation is just beginning, not the other way around.

 

Why are you making up quotes from Bernstein? He never said anything about whether he could "imagine" Obama's involvement. He said that, currently, there was no evidence of such. Based on that fact, he said that, right now, making a comparison to the Nixon Administration's use of the IRS is unjustified. Could that change if there was new evidence? Sure. But that evidence isn't here yet, making their comments premature at best, and irresponsible at worst.

I like how you invented something that would imply media bias and then used it as proof, though.

 

Just to add, The one thing that I think you're totally glossing over though is the motivations of the administration to initially paint this as a spontaneous uprising, vs a coordinated attack, vs why the attack was so focused. The point is that right now, neither side is asking the right questions with regards to the Benghazi controversy. It's much more detailed than you are giving credit for.

See, it was absolutely politically necessary for the administration to paint Benghazi as a spontaneous reaction to an outside film because otherwise, the administration would have to admit ownership of a failed Libyan policy. The original intervention in Libya was supposed to represent a new kind of soft-hard power projection of which countries like France were supposed to assume the face of, and be able to win, not counting the near endless stream of cruise missiles that the US contributed. Except Libya is now in near total state of collapse and chaos, of which all sorts of tinpot and unsavory cultural, religious, and terrorist groups are vying for control. To have a terrorist attack directed at the US embassy means that that the original power projection mission was much more transparent against the US. It's also why true military support was withheld from the embassy, including the rapid reaction force which was declined to be used. Because the administration banked on a policy of promising that no ground troops would ever set foot on Libyan soil, so the embassy personal were basically left to die to uphold a policy decision that sat above them. It's not the first time that individuals were sacrificed by an administration. But instead of splitting hairs over who first called what "terrorism," the opposition party should be trying to pin the administration down to a coherent policy to stabilizing Libya, because the current instability was created by the West's intervention.

 

As for the argument that they were covering it up - or hiding it so they could win reelection - it is being reported that Issa knew about the IRS probing last July. As to why it didn't become public until now, it wasn't because of a coverup but "this is one of those things where it’s been, in a sense, an open secret, but you don’t accuse the IRS until you’ve had a nonpartisan, deep look,” Issa said. “That’s what the IG has done. That’s why the IGs in fact exist within government, is to find this kind of waste and fraud and abuse of power.”

 

I'm sorry, but that's ludicrous. Obama could have set the American flag on fire and put it out by peeing on it, and he still would have beaten Mitt Romney.

Mitt Romney was the epitome of a terrible candidate. You know how I know that? Because the Republican Party wanted ANYONE but Mitt Romney as their candidate. And in this case, the term ANYONE is very literal. They took lunatics like Donald Trump, Michelle Bachman, Ron Paul and Rick Santorum seriously. Hell, we almost had Newt Gingrich as the candidate. That is how desperate the Republicans were not to have it be Mitt. Top Republicans repeatedly asked for Jeb Bush or Chris Christie to run. Even Palin was entertained by some fringe groups. What does it say about a candidate when not even your own party wants you, but at some point they just have to 'settle' for you. How long did it take for Mitt Romney to wrap up the nomination? It was a circus. And then, when all the cameras were finally on Mitt, he stuck his foot in his mouth repeatedly. Corporations are people. The 47%, his own handling of Benghazi. Aside from the first debate where he basically lied well and Obama napped, his performance throughout the campaign was just terrible.

But the icing on the cake never came from Obama. Hurricane Sandy is what ultimately did Romney in. Because his FEMA comments came back to bite him like so many of his positions and flip flops did.

There was no need for the IRS or the Democratic party to even try and hinder the election. Romney was cooked by the end of the second debate. Romney walked into that little 'act of terror' gaffe where the audience literally laughed out loud at his blunder. In what world was Mitt Romney ever going to win? Karl Rove's world perhaps. No amount of money was going to give this man the win. Again, how do we know? Because the chief criticism about him was how much money he had! Because of the contributions corporations and people like Sheldon Adelson gave him. He never had the votes and was never going to get them because the party had so successfully alienated everyone who wasn't old, rich, white, straight and male. So to even suggest the IRS hindered Romney's electoral victory is simply not true. Even if this had been a true cover up like you say and had gotten out, it ultimately would have still been trumped by Hurricane Sandy and everyone's anger at Obama would likely still have been overshadowed by their hatred and mistrust of Mitt Romney. No matter how you cut it, the American people as a whole felt Obama was the lesser of two evils.

 

What are you talking about?

Carl Bernstein- the IRS scandal shouldn't compared to Watergate (from what we know). “In the Nixon White House, we heard the president of the United States on tape saying ‘Use the IRS to get back on our enemies ... We know a lot about President Obama, andI THINK THE IDEA THAT HE WOULD WANT THE IRS USED FOR RETRIBUTION — we have no evidence of any such thing."

That's all that I was referring to, Bernstein's own quote that suggests the idea is foreign to him. I certainly never said anything about media bias, I mentioned only Bernstein's own quote. But regardless, the one point you took out in isolation out of my entire post certainly shouldn't be extrapolated beyond its scope, especially since the scope of bias is being artificially created by you.

My point was simply that at this same juncture in Watergate, Bernstein himself had a decided lack of evidence until it was given to him and Woodward. Someone in 1972 could, with 100% certainty, say that there was no evidence which linked Nixon to anything, just like Bernstein felt the need to announce above. But before everything is known, it's meaningless either way. The structural origin of this scandal has lots of parallels to Watergate. But this fact on its own doesn't mean that this is going to result in the same resolution and Obama is going to resign. It just means that any comparison is only as valid as the points used to support it in scale and scope.

 

Okay, so if there isn't any such evidence there's nothing much to talk about here right?

 

You guys are just so funny.

Right. nothing at all to explore or examine, because there has never been anything remotely close to a developing story and/or additional information that is discovered. Think of how easy any story would be if a current lack of evidence was used as a definitive conclusion of same.

 

He used the word "idea" because that's what it is. He then described his opinion of the idea. Which was simply that there was no evidence for it. You are putting words in his mouth when you say more than he actually said. Literally.

Further, this isn't "meaningless either way." Bernstein didn't make his comments out of the blue, nor did he suggest stopping investigations. Again, he was responding to particular allegations by Republican members of Congress who had said that the episode was definitively like the Watergate scandal. Not that it could be. That it was. That's wrong.

 

I think Jedi Smuggler just made my earlier point about how the GOP is so incompetent in handling things and giving us political junk instead of "just the facts m'am".

All of this stuff comes out and all Jedi Smuggler can think of is that it doomed Mitt Romney? What?

Who the hell cares about Mitt at this point?

Really, Jedi Smuggler, that is a just so besides the point. But, you make my larger point that the GOP is using anything to latch onto their preconceived verdict about this guy being a commie, pinko marxist who steals elections, etc instead of getting to the bottom of everything, even if there's nothing there.

You republicans are really terrific at stumbling all over yourselves. We are so ill-served by our "political opposition" in this country right now. Embarrassing.

 

Ok, I have no idea what you're trying to say, tell me, or make note of, so I'll just agree with you. All I mentioned is that Bernstein didn't have to point out there is a lack of evidence at this point, because as you, yourself just said, the investigation is just beginning, not ending. And I think your conclusion is flawed. There are plenty of parallels to Watergate- from the political motivations, to the arrogance displayed by the players, to an unfolding cover-up. You can't just deny any comparison, as that is wrong as well. Just like Bernstein, you can't have your cake and eat it too. Bernstein is using a 40 year hindsight to try and quash any comparison to Watergate, while at the same time, he is forgetting how Watergate unfolded, and how the conclusion was reached in stages, through piecemeal sources.

Instead of getting into a weird semantic debate over how Bernstein used the word "idea," when I could care less because it was just a single sentence out of a larger observation I was making, how about you just cover the larger point?

 

Think how easy it is to turn any wrongdoing into the next Watergate if the only basis is "we don't know how high it reaches and the full details yet, so it could be the next Watergate but you can't say it's not until we know everything." Oh, wait.

 

I'll just echo what Shane already pointed out above with regards to the sheer amount of -gates that exist, and his desire to pare them down.

But the popular media needs soundbites, so we're kind of stuck with the suffix.

 

I just think the gates thing is silly because Watergate was called that because of a break-in at a specific building called that name. To keep calling them "this-gate" and "that-gate" just cheapens that original scandal and destroys any historical context for that and recent scandals. It's just media laziness.

 

Mr44, what on Earth are you getting at? Bernstein is not discussing what the ultimate sum of evidence would be. He simply disagreed with the Republicans who declared, on the basis of the currently available evidence that the IRS situation was "worse than Watergate."

So then what's your take on the situation? Is it truly worse? Not whether there are "parallels," mind you. But do you think that, based on what we know today, the actions of the IRS Cincinnati office represent something worse than Watergate? If not, then you substantively agreely with Bernstein. If so, then I'd like to hear some explanation of why you believe as you do.

 

It's not worse than Watergate. That's silly. However, anyone who suggests a president cannot misuse the IRS for politics needs to read the articles of impeachment for Nixon(which could never be carried out cuz he resigned first), one of which was his misuse of the IRS. I'm not suggesting it happened here. Zero evidence of that. But, a president can use that agency for politics. It helped doom Nixon.

As for Bernstein, I just think it's funny both he and Woodward are running around on all these shows now drawing parallels and differences. That scandal was so further developed when Nixon resigned. This current one is not even in the same ballpark at this time, if it ever will be.