Via Mediaite, it took a few days but at last we have some fall guys. It’s ludicrous, of course, to think the problem was limited to two people — the IG report last night specifically blamed ineffective management and, as Guy Benson reminds us, we already know that knowledge of the harassment went all the way up the chain — but pay attention to the fine print in the video clip at 1:22. Miller, the commissioner, apparently acknowledged that the IRS’s mishandling of this went beyond the two “rogues.” Evidently they’re setting up to put most of the blame on the two employees and then appease critics with some perfunctory “mistakes were made” shinola-eating from the higher-ups. All we need now is for some IRS exec to whine that the agency’s gotten too big to manage effectively and the self-serving scandal narrative will be complete. An obvious question: When they say the employees went “off the reservation,” are they suggesting that they’re prepared to acknowledge that they had a malevolent political agenda as opposed to just being “overzealous” in policing 501(c)(4)s or whatever? I’m keen to know what “going rogue” means in this case.
Meanwhile, Sean Higgins asks a good question: Why do the IG report’s timelines of what happened in this case begin with a heavily redacted entry?
On top of page 13 is a graph titled “Figure 5: Timeline of Events and Delays Involving the Processing of Potential Political Cases (******1***** through May 2012)” that redacts the first item, not even giving a date. A spokesman for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee confirmed the “****1****” item was Treasury’s style for redactions.
The mystery date was apparently February 25, 2010, based on two appendixes in the back of the report…
(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...
