And The Things That We Fear Are A Weapon To Be Held Against Us

And speaking of rampant paranoia and wingers on epistemic closure vindication highs over this IRS nonsense, I wonder what our friends on the right would make of the fact that, unlike the current case of extra scrutiny of Tea Party organizations for non-political tax-exempt status that resulted in zero actual investigations, when a liberal Episcopal church in Pasadena said some critical anti-war things about Dubya before the 2004 election, well that resulted in the church being targeted by the IRS in a two-year long probe that eventually resulted in the church being cleared but the IRS saying the church was guilty anyway.

Somehow, this failed to rise to the level of anyone giving a damn about impeachment at the time, nor did it raise the question by the administrations supporters about the tax-exempt status of organizations of all political stripes engaging in political business.  Somehow we're supposed to ignore this, and the whole US Attorney scandal where political enemies of the Bush administration really were being targeted by the executive branch.

Instead we're supposed to believe that the Tea Party groups were being unfairly singled out as political groups dedicated to the end of the Democrats.  Sure.

"Maybe churches and 501(c)3 political groups shouldn't be tax-exempt at all," would be the thinking person's response.  Instead, it's Clinton Rules time.

Instead of going after all the awful things Bush/Cheney did and President Obama instead chose to turn the other cheek and move forward, the Republicans decide to repay him by making everything an impeachable offense until something sticks.

The cartoon soundtrack continues.   Or as David Waldman reminds us:

Remember the outrage over IRS targeting of Emerge America, seeking nonprofit status to train women Dem candidates? nytimes.com/2011/07/21/bus…
— David Waldman (@KagroX) May 12, 2013

Remember the outrage over Bush-era IRS auditing of the NAACP? articles.baltimoresun.com/2004-10-29/new…
— David Waldman (@KagroX) May 12, 2013

Remember the outrage over Bush-era IRS audits of Greenpeace? democracynow.org/2006/3/24/irs_…
— David Waldman (@KagroX) May 12, 2013

But Obama did it, so Worse Than Space Hitler.