Slouching Towards Oblivion

Thursday, April 24, 2014

'Scuse Me, Mr Issa

Darrell Issa's been making a fuss over the IRS flap for a while now, and even tho' it's always looked like the standard fishing expedition; and even tho' there's plenty of evidence that Da Gubmint wasn't just trying to beat down a buncha poor defenseless slobs like Karl Rove, there seems to be something missing in all the hubbub.

Here's a short look at the kind of outfits the IRS was looking into.  Remember, bureaucrats have a lot of shit to get thru in a day.  And so like anybody with a living thinking brain who's trying to work with even a little efficiency, they need to prioritize and organize; and the IRS had some database tools that they were using to help them sift thru all that paperwork and get to the good stuff first etc.

OK, so here's the graphic:


But wait - it seems the outfits that Issa is saying were being Jack-Booted by the army of evil CPAs weren't the ones attracting all the attention after all.  The TeaBaggers are down at #4, and so ermahgerd, Mr Issa has been fibbing this whole time!?!  How could this be?

OK OK, I'll stop because nobody but the bubble-dwellers ever believed it was about trying to rein in the outa-control tyranny of Da Gubmint anyway. 

Unfortunately, a coupla things are still pretty fucked up about it.

First, the law and the attending regulations are vague about what does and what doesn't make your little organization eligible for tax-exempt status.  Laws need to be specific. Laws that are not specific tend not to be enforceable.  Which leads us to the paranoid presumption that maybe somebody wants these laws to go unenforced in order to gain an unfair advantage.

And that gets us to the second part.  By bitching about the IRS, and claiming some kinda bullshit mistreatment, Issa's little dog-n-pony show conveniently distracts us from finding out whether or not any of those outfits might be breaking the law.

Darrell Issa is using his position of wealth and power to protect his clients (ie anyone else in a position of wealth and power) from being held accountable for anything by anybody.  He's protecting them from us; he's facilitating the sale of our Representation to the highest bidder; and he's using our money to fucking do it.

Helluva deal.

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