CLIFF KINCAID
May 29, 2013
Republicans are getting tripped up by the media when challenged
about evidence of President Obama's personal involvement in the IRS
scandal. Rep. Dave Camp of Michigan, who chairs the House committee
looking into the IRS, "admitted there was no evidence" linking Obama to
the IRS scandal, as MSNBC described his appearance on NBC's "Meet the
Press." Camp said, "We don't have anything to say that the President
knew about it." Michael O'Brien, a political reporter for NBC News, said
both Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell and Rep. Dave Camp "admitted
they lacked evidence that the targeting of conservatives was ordered by
the White House."
But a Democratic Administration or its president does not need to
issue orders or directives or make telephone calls demanding that the
IRS act against conservatives. History shows that it is simply how the
federal bureaucracy operates. The "smoking gun" is liberal politics as
usual, and it stretches back to the Kennedy Administration.
To illustrate this point, consider an
article
on a left-wing website attempting to distinguish between the Obama
Administration's IRS "affair" and Richard Nixon's "Watergate-era IRS
scandal," The author is none other than Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who
insists that what Nixon did was far worse than anything that has been
done under Obama. He advised Republicans not to fall victim to
"anti-Obama hysteria" and to avoid talking about Obama's impeachment.
"A principal distinction" between the use of the IRS by the Nixon and
Obama Administrations, he said in his column, "is the ingredient of
direct presidential involvement."
He does acknowledge that Nixon, who resigned from office because he
was threatened with impeachment, "was aware that the IRS had audited him
in 1961 and 1962 and presumed those audits were politically motivated
by the Kennedy White House." He doesn't provide any more details,
probably because he doesn't want to implicate his father, Robert F.
Kennedy Sr., and his uncle, former President John F. Kennedy, in the
political use of the IRS. But that is exactly what they did. In fact,
they did it before Nixon, and led Nixon to believe the practice was
routine.
As noted by Victory Lasky's book,
It Didn't Start With Watergate,
the practice of using the IRS for political purposes began with the
Kennedy brothers, John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy, when they were
President and Attorney General, respectively. Not only were Nixon and
others involved in his presidential campaign audited after John F.
Kennedy won the 1960 election, "tax-exempt right-wing groups" were
targeted by the Kennedy Administration's IRS for special reviews and
some lost their tax-exempt status.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s article focused on a "Special Service" staff
of the IRS under Nixon. What he does not talk about is a special project
under President Kennedy dealing with "ideological organizations."
According to the staff report "
Investigation of the Special Service Staff of the Internal Revenue Service,"
prepared for the Joint Committee on Internal Taxation in 1975, "This
program apparently was stimulated by a public statement of President
John F. Kennedy and also a suggestion by Attorney General Robert F.
Kennedy."
In other words, initially there were no direct orders or direct
presidential involvement. IRS officials simply responded to the
President's public statements and his concerns.
Here's how it worked: President Kennedy, in November 1961, was asked
at a news conference about financial contributions to right-wing
organizations, and he expressed concern about "a diversion of funds
which might be taxable." He added, "I'm sure the Internal Revenue System
examines that." The Senate report says that the IRS directly responded
to this statement by reviewing and auditing various organizations.
Not satisfied with the results, President Kennedy did subsequently
call the IRS commissioner, telling him to move forward with an
"aggressive program" against both right-wing and some left-wing groups.
As Victor Lasky points out, this reflected Kennedy's annoyance with
left-wingers attacking him for his anti-Castro activities and military
support for non-communist South Vietnam, under invasion from the
Communist north.
The report adds that, in addition to President Kennedy's statement,
"there was interest shown in right-wing organizations by the Justice
Department," and that Mitchell Rogovin, then Assistant to the IRS
Commissioner, had said he had received a telephone call from John
Seigenthaler, then Special Assistant to Attorney General Robert F.
Kennedy. The report goes on: "Mr. Rogovin said that Mr. Seigenthaler
asked about the tax-exempt status of four or five organizations
generally considered to be right-wing. Mr. Rogovin said that, in
response, Mr. Seigenthaler was told whether or not these organizations
were exempt and whether the organization had been audited recently."
The key point is that the report links the so-called "first phase" of
the IRS program to audit conservative groups to President Kennedy's
press conference statement. It was also linked to a "suggestion of the
Attorney General" that the IRS review the tax status of certain groups.
It may be the case that Obama officials had a direct role in the IRS
scandal, going beyond simple knowledge of what the IRS was doing. But it
was not necessary for Obama to raise the issue personally with the IRS,
as the Kennedy Administration example suggests. All he had to do was
demonize the Tea Party and let his allies in and out of Congress demand
IRS scrutiny of conservative groups.
In addition to using the IRS, the Kennedy Administration used the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the "Fairness Doctrine" to
intimidate and censor conservative and Christian broadcasters. The
Fairness Doctrine was abolished under President Reagan, but liberal
Democrats have talked about bringing it back in legislative form. They
wanted to use it to muzzle conservative commentators.
As we
noted
in the current scandal, the evidence appears to show that the Obama
Administration and its allies used the IRS to enforce a version of the
Fairness Doctrine through federal scrutiny and intimidation of religious
and conservative broadcasters. For example, conservative Christian
broadcaster James Dobson was told he had to be fair to President Obama
to get his tax-exempt status. It is doubtful that Obama had any direct
role in this. He didn't have to get personally involved.
It is likely, however, that some White House or Justice Department
officials were aware of and approved the IRS campaign. The media are
already noting that the official line has been changing about which
people in the White House knew what about the IRS campaign and when they
knew it, and whether they informed the president.
The key point is the Tea Party movement was handicapped during a
critical election year. The democratic process was undermined for
political reasons in order to guarantee Obama's re-election. House
Republicans will have to decide whether they consider this an
impeachable offense.
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