Monday, May 20, 2013
David Letterman jokes about Obama spying on reportersCharlie Spiering Comedian David Letterman shared a joke at President Obama’s expense Tuesday night: The president held a press conference Monday, and the reporters were on him like a pack of wild dogs. Why did Hillary Clinton tie Benghazi to video on 9/11/12 if she talked to whistleblower during attack?Joel Gehrke Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued a statement that attributed the Benghazi attack to the now-infamous anti-Islam YouTube video in a statement on the day of the assault, even though she talked to a State Department official in Libya about the attack as it was unfolding. “Some have sought to justify this vicious behavior as a response to inflammatory material posted on the Internet,” Clinton said in a statement on Sept. House speaker on IRS targeting: ‘Who is going to jail?’Susan Ferrechio House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, Wednesday said the Internal Revenue Service broke the law when it decided to target conservative groups for extra scrutiny when they applied for tax exempt status. “Now, my question isn’t about who’s going to resign,” Boehner told reporters after meeting privately with the GOP caucus. What sparked IRS abuses? Treasury report redacts first item in all timelinesSean Higgins What kicked off the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of Tea Party groups? The Treasury Department’s Inspector General apparently knows but the rest of us cannot. Justice flak in regular contact with Media MattersMichael Barone It’s not entirely a coincidence that the left-wing Media Matters has been parroting and advancing Obama administration talking points. The Jay Carney ‘unfettered’ highlight videoCharlie Spiering In response to White House Press Secretary Jay Carney’s frequent use of the word “unfettered” during the press briefing Tuesday, the producers of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” put together this highlight video. “Welcome to this special edition of ‘Sesame Street,’” deadpanned host Joe Scarborough after playing the video. Federal safety board’s proposal would make two drinks a DUI offenseSean Higgins This is the type of news that is not getting the attention it deserves. David Axelrod: ‘The government is so vast’Conn Carroll On Morning Joe Wednesday, former Obama Senior Strategist David Axelrod essentially pleaded ignorance on behalf of his former boss when MSNBC host Joe Scarborough asked him what he would tell his University of Chicago politics class about the recent IRS scandal. “Well, look, it’s an interesting case study, right, because if you look at the Inspector General’s report, apparently some folks down in the, bureaucracy, ya know — we have a large government — took it upon themselves to shorthand these applications for tax exempt status in a way that, as I said, was idiotic,” Axelrod began. Tea Party group beat IRS scrutiny simply by changing the nameCharlie Spiering Over at the Washington Free Beacon, CJ Ciaramella interviews a Tea Party organizer who beat IRS scrutiny simply by changing the name of his group. The source was a member of a conservative nonprofit that applied for tax-exempt status with the IRS. After waiting nearly a year without any response, the organization reapplied under an innocuous name. The Cincinnati IRS office — the same at the heart of the current scandal — approved the application in three weeks. “At that point, we had a history,” the source said. David Axelrod: Set Benghazi questions asideCharlie Spiering During a conversation on MSNBC’s Morning Joe this morning, former Obama campaign chief David Axelrod insisted that the new questions about Benghazi should be “set aside,” arguing that the interest in what happened during the attacks was purely political. “I’d set Benghazi aside,” Axelrod said, when asked about how Obama should respond to the three different scandals engulfing his administration. “I know we may have some disagreements on this set about it,” he added. Axelrod called the recent hearings a “flare-up,” adding that they were simply partisan attacks against Hillary Clinton. “I really view the Benghazi flare-up right now as throwing a high, hard one at Hillary Clinton to try and dissuade her from running for president,” he explained. Ben Smith mocks anti-amnesty Republicans for avoiding Koch sponsored eventCharlie Spiering During Tuesday night’s BuzzFeed Brews immigration forum, Editor-in-Chief Ben Smith noted that Republicans who were opposed the immigration reform bill declined multiple invitations to participate in the forum. The event was sponsored by the Charles Koch Institute. “I was a little surprised – we would have loved to have a screaming match with a conservative member of Congress,” Smith told U.S. Rep. Morning Examiner: Do the Obama scandals help or hurt the rest of his agenda?Conn Carroll Tuesday night, at a Koch Industries-sponsored BuzzFeed immigration event, BuzzFeed’s Ben Smith asked the panelists whether the Obama administration scandals now dominating the news made passage of the Schumer-Rubio immigration bill more or less likely. GOP lawmakers question Kathleen Sebelius about Obamacare fundraisingByron York Three Republican members of the House Subcommittee Health and Human Services have written a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius demanding that she reveal details of her solicitations to health care companies for donations to fund the implementation of Obamacare. “We write with great concern over the reports of impropriety concerning solicitations of donations for a nonprofit that is assisting in the implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act,” writes subcommittee chairman Rep. Tough talk in Obama statement, but no mention of firing IRS employeesCharlie Spiering President Obama released a statement Tuesday night reacting to the release of the Inspector General’s report revealing that the IRS unlawfully targeted Tea Party and conservative groups. Obama called the behavior “intolerable and inexcusable” vowing that he had asked Treasury Secretary Jack Lew to “hold those responsible for these failures accountable.” The president, however, did not indicate whether he planned to fire any government employees as a result of the scandal. Since the scandal broke last Friday, members of the media and members of Congress have demanded that the IRS employees responsible for the illegal activity be fired.
Read more on WashingtonExaminer.com Obama calls IRS actions ‘intolerable and inexcusable’Brian Hughes President Obama late Tuesday called the targeting of conservative groups by the IRS “intolerable and inexcusable,” saying those who unfairly scrutinized the tax-exempt status of Republican-leaning organizations would be held “accountable.” The remarks represented the president’s strongest rebuke of the Internal Revenue Service since news broke last Friday that the agency had targeted conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status. State Department shuts down Benghazi questions: ‘You’ll have to take my word for it’Joel Gehrke “You’ll have to take my word for it,” said a spokesperson for the most transparent administration in history when reporters asked her to substantiate her claim that the CIA removed references to terrorists from the Benghazi talking points before the State Department ever saw them. “If you look at the talking points and the train of that, the reference to al Qaeda was taken out even before the State Department saw the talking points,” Jen Psaki, former traveling campaign press secretary for the Obama team in 2012, told reporters during the State Department press briefing Monday. This comment put Psaki in a tight spot because she had just denied a reporter’s request that the State Department release all drafts of the talking points. “I appreciate your ask,” she had replied, Eric Holder defends AP phone records seizureJoel Gehrke Attorney General Eric Holder defended the Justice Department’s seizure of Associated Press phone records, though he disclaimed knowledge of certain details about the investigation because he recused himself from the probe. “The facts and the law have dictated our actions in that regard,” Holder told reporters. White House: Barack Obama is no Richard NixonJoel Gehrke White House Press Secretary Jay Carney denied that President Obama’s administration bears any comparison to that of Richard Nixon, who resigned in the face of impeachment. “The people who make those kinds of comparisons need to check their history,” Carney told reporters when asked about Nixon comparisons. Harry Reid slams DOJ seizure of AP recordsJoel Gehrke Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., slammed the Justice Department for subpoenaing two months of Associated Press phone records, citing his support for freedom of the press. “I have trouble defending what the Justice Department did,” Reid told reporters in the Capitol. Jay Carney walks back denial of White House involvement in IRS scandalBrian Hughes White House Press Secretary Jay Carney began his daily briefing Tuesday with a firm denial that any White House officials had knowledge of or participated in the targeting of conservative groups by the Internal Revenue Service. “No,” he said when asked if anyone at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. |
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