[talaniman]

Issa spoke his peace, and adjourned, denying anyone else from speaking. Further the transcripts of the house investigations in their totality, not misleading snippets or excerpts have been long released and paint Issa as a partisan hack as an investigator.

Issa: GOP-led IRS targeting probe may be at 'dead end' - CNN.com

To Cummings, the issue involved allowing Democrats on the panel to have a say.
"We were basically shut out completely," he told reporters, criticizing Issa and Republicans for repeatedly distorting the panel's findings through "cherry picking information, of sending just a few lines from various transcripts."

http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-tege/eotopici03.pdf

At the heart of the controversy, is the law which is different from the adopted regulation but the law clearly trumps the regulation which was never codified by the congress. There is the law so show me were any group applying for such status can with hold the identity of private funding or engage in state local or federal politics, or be investigated by the IRS.

I know you aren't much for reading but the extra data is important to understand the investigation into any corporate tax shelter, and makes conservatives claim of being victims utter NONSENSE.

IRS Political Bias Hearing - Business Insider

To qualify for tax exempt status such groups have to show they are not directly backing a political candidate but they are allowed to campaign on general "civic issues".
However a further 226 other political groups were also placed in the same review whose affiliations were not immediately apparent from their name alone, which is often the case among liberal campaign groups. It remains unknown how many of these were in fact Democrat-leaning groups, partly because individual names cannot be publicly released under IRS confidentiality laws.
The IRS did reveal there had been an explosion in groups of all political persuasion seeking to qualify for this type of tax exemption after a relaxation in campaign finance rules meant this would also allow them to keep the identity of their donors secret. In total 3,357 applications were made in 2012 compared with 1,735 in 2010 before the law changed.

[speechlesstx]

Issa spoke his peace, and adjourned, denying anyone else from speaking. Further the transcripts of the house investigations in their totality, not misleading snippets or excerpts have been long released and paint Issa as a partisan hack as an investigator.

Issa: GOP-led IRS targeting probe may be at 'dead end' - CNN.com

The chairmen runs the show, the only witness refused to testify, what possible question would Cummings need to ask? It's adjourned, get over it.

[I know you aren't much for reading but the extra data is important to understand the investigation into any corporate tax shelter, and makes conservatives claim of being victims utter NONSENSE.

No, at the heart of the controversy is an admission of wrongdoing, unfairly targeting conservative groups for extra scrutiny and holding their approvals hostage to arbitrary agreements such as swearing "under perjury of the law, they do not picket/protest or organize groups to picket or protest outside of Planned Parenthood. And they're STILL doing it. The IRS is NOT a political tool of the White House.

[excon]

Hello again, Steve:

No, at the heart of the controversy is an admission of wrongdoing,

Nahhh... It WAS. Now, it's the INCOMPETENCE of the committee to find out what that wrongdoing was, OR to STOP it from happening.. That's THEIR job, and they FAILED. It's NOT Cummings fault... Your crack investigator is a BUST.

IF my president is a crook, we'll NEVER know.

excon

[talaniman]

The victim card doesn't seem to be working out for you guys.

[speechlesstx]

No, you don't get to change the story.

[talaniman]

My version has always been different from yours. I take it you haven't found your version in the written law in the provided link.

[speechlesstx]

My version has always been different from yours. I take it you haven't found your version in the written law in the provided link.

My version is the facts.

[tomder55]

now we know why Elijah Cummings was so anxious to wrap up the IRS hearings and to declare "move on ...nothing there " . Turns out he was up to his eyeballs in involvement ,and may have been the prime mover behind the scenes .

New IRS emails released by a Congressional committee investigating the scandal reveal that Cummings was working in close coordination with the IRS to target conservative groups ... especially one named 'True the Vote ' .

Cummings asked 3 times that the House Oversight Committee investigate 'True the Vote ' ,and evidently had his staff make similar requests for the IRS tax-exempt division ,headed by Louis Lerner ,to do their own investigation.He specifically requested "copies of all training materials used for volunteers, affiliates or other entities" .
Less than a week later ,the group received from the IRS a requests that were almost identical to the requests from Cummings staff ,for "a copy of their volunteer registration form," "the process you use to assign volunteers," "how you keep your volunteers in teams" and "how your volunteers are deployed ... following the training they receive by you."
The emails show that Lerner became personally involved in gathering this information for Cummings . The group later received visits from the IRS and other government agencied like ATF . One of Lerner's deputies, Holly Paz, forwarded the organization's 990 forms to Cummings and his staff .
http://oversight.house.gov/wp-conten...4/04/FN-31.pdf
Wednesday ,Committee Chair Darell Issa and 5 other committee members sent Cummings a letter accusing him of “surreptitiously” contacting the IRS to request information about True the Vote.

Although you have previously denied that your staff made inquiries to the IRS about conservative organization True the Vote that may have led to additional agency scrutiny, communication records between your staff and IRS officials – which you did not disclose to Majority Members or staff – indicates otherwise,” ...“As the Committee is scheduled to consider a resolution holding Ms. Lerner, a participant in responding to your communications that you failed to disclose, in contempt of Congress, you have an obligation to fully explain your staff's undisclosed contacts with the IRS.

http://oversight.house.gov/wp-conten...e-the-Vote.pdf

Yesterday ,the Committee held Lerner in contempt of Congress.... (about time) . Here I thought that Cummings grandstanding at the hearings was in order to shield Lerner and the White House. Could it be that his reason was to end the investigation before it reached him ?

[tomder55]

update ..... remember those 18 min gaps in the Nixon tapes ? Well the IRS now claims they "lost " Lois Lerners emails for the period between January 2009 – April 2011. That's over 2 years !!!! . But not all of them mind you . They managed to retrieve the inter-agency emails . Then only ones "lost " are the ones from Lerner and outside agencies or groups, such as the White House, Treasury, Department of Justice, FEC, or Democrat offices. You know ,the ones that prove she coordinated her persecution of the TP and religious groups with the White House and Democrat Senators .
Rep. Dave Camp, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, said he was stunned that it took more than a year into the investigation for the IRS to inform Congress that it didn't have those emails. Why is he surprised ? He is in over his head . Speaker Bonehead a long time ago should've appointed a select investigative committee staffed with former prosecutors .

[smoothy]

It took them over a year to find and erase all traces of them on the servers and backups... all those things they are legally required to keep under the law..

[tomder55]

wouldn't a good forensic investigation retrieve them if Congress had the hard drive impounded ?

[smoothy]

Not simply a drive... but archival backups which could be tape, optical or a few other formats. (archival backups wouldn't be on a hard drive that could faill electronically).. in theory... it could be determined if they were altered via forensics. However there are tricks that can be employed by someone determined to alter them and knows what all the look for that can alter timestamps and everything.. basically recreating the backups minus the important emails. Done by someone who really knows what they are doing and has the time dedicated to do it on a stand alone server set up using the desired date and time not the real one. That alters the timestamps on the actual saved files to appear believable and in order with the email dates..

But knowing the quality of the people in the rest of the administration... I don't think they have anyone that could do it that's willing to go to jail for the cause. Altering those backups would be a felony. But you really can't discount the level a true beliver would stoop to.


Remember how long it took t before they produced a birth certificate... and they still came up with a document number and form that hadn't even bee issued yet the year he was born. And the fight and name calling to prevent its authenticity from being scrutenized by an unbiased third party?

It was all a stall tactic. If they had handed them right over immediately... nobody could claim it was plausible they were altered.

[cdad]

Wy dont we just ask the NSA. They have all the emails. ANd yes it is possible to rebuild whats "lost" if you know what to look for and how to unstack it. Plus it is no easy to alter in untracable fashion a video jukebox.

[Catsmine]

As Rep. Stockman put it so cleverly, "Barack Obama has brought us Jimmy Carter's economy and Richard Nixon's excuses." He then went on to ask the NSA for the metadata on the email account.

[tomder55]

The NSA ? There's a chance they would cooperate . The Holder Justice Dept is another issue. Had they been doing their job we would already have all the answers .

[smoothy]

THey are "Claiming" they were lost in a "Server Crash" what a steaming mountain (not simple a pile) of bovine excrement. These are from 2 years ago and they have been dragging their feet for the last year of it.

THose are backed up... and they are backed up frequently. I would think they are backed up daily if not in real time. Backups are there in case the server DOES crash... thats WHY backups exist. Despeite the fact legally they are REQUIRED to keep these emails in case they need to be accessed for reasons such as those why they are needed now.

Everyone up the ladder is spewing lies... and anyone who knows anything about IT even if they don't know the law in this instance... knows any size business that's not totally inept... backs up everything. Backups after they are taken are NEVER kept online, EVER, so they are availible if and when needed. And won't be lost in a catasrophic failure.

Watch to see how many idiots actually believe that story (lie actually) in the coming days, weeks and months.

[tomder55]

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen testified in March that the e-mails were not immediately available because they were safely stored offline. Was he lying then or is the IRS lying now ?

[smoothy]

THe IRS is lying... backups ARE physically stored offline in a building separate from the servers, often not even in the same city or state. In case of a severe fire, earthquake or act of terrorism. Usually in the case of government stuff.....in underground storage locations, in MD between Frederick and the PA state line....I know what town they have most of them, just not exactly where that I could drive up to them (but I do know to within several geographic miles). I don't remember where I came upon this information so I'm being intentionally vague.

[paraclete]

ah secret stuff about more secret stuff about more secret stuff, it's no wonder you guys take so long to do anything

[smoothy]

No... that standard practice for any corporation too. And the Government is actually legally Required to keep them...