“Bring Flowers Of The Fairest” was composed by Mary E. Walsh, who was a pupil of the Sisters of Notre Dame. Under the title “Crowning Hymn” it was published in Wreath of Mary, 1871 and later in St. Basil’s Hymnal, 1889.

Lyrics:

Mary Queen of the May (Bring Flowers of the Rarest), performed by John McDermott

Bring flow’rs of the fairest,
Bring flow’rs of the rarest,
From garden and woodland
And hillside and vale;
Our full hearts are swelling,
Our Glad voices telling
The praise of the loveliest
Rose of the vale.

O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May,
O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May.

Our voices ascending,
In harmony blending,
Oh! Thus may our hearts turn
Dear Mother, to thee;
Oh! Thus shall we prove thee
How truly we love thee,
How dark without Mary
Life’s journey would be.

O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May,
O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May.

O Virgin most tender,
Our homage we render,
Thy love and protection,
Sweet Mother, to win;
In danger defend us,
In sorrow befriend us,
And shield our hearts
From contagion and sin.

O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May,
O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May.

Of Mothers the dearest,
Oh, wilt thou be nearest,
When life with temptation
Is darkly replete?
Forsake us, O never!
Our hearts be they ever
As Pure as the lilies
We lay at thy feet.

O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May,
O Mary! we crown thee with blossoms today,
Queen of the Angels, Queen of the May.

Via Andrew Stiles of NRO:

We now know through her own testimony and from the Inspector General’s report that Lerner was briefed about this unlawful targeting scheme in June 2011. But nine months later, beginning in March 2012, she sent cover letters to many of our clients – demanding additional information and forwarding intrusive questionnaires. In fact, in March and April of 2012, Lerner sent 15 letters to 15 different clients (including those who were approved after lengthy delays and those who are still pending).

In this Fox News report, Saturday, Jordan Sekulow  told the host that the ACLJ has been hearing from clients who have been getting letters from the IRS as late as May 6th 2013 (!) still with the list of “inappropriate” intrusive questions.

Daniel Greenfield, FrontPageMagazine: Inside Every Liberal Is A Totalitarian Screaming to Get Out (III):

There is a characteristic feature to tyranny. It isn’t the scowling faces of armed guards or the rusting metal of barbed wire fences. It isn’t the black cars of the secret police or the prison camps surrounded by wastelands of snow.

he defining characteristic of tyranny is the diversion of power from the people to the unelected elite. The elite can claim to be inspired by Allah or Marx; it can act in the name of racial purity or universal workers compensation or both. The details don’t matter, because in all instances, tyranny derives its justification from the superiority of the rulers and the inferiority of the people.

The left launched two revolutions. One was the hard revolution of bombs and assassinations by those who did not have the time or patience to wait for the long march through the institutions of the state. This revolution was born quickly and died quickly. It killed millions and choking on their blood it died by stages, losing its ideas and then its power, until there were only a few old men and women in shawls clinging to red velvet portraits of Stalin.

But there was also the soft revolution that was slow and subtle. It was a revolution of laws, rather than bombs. It did not concern itself with 5-year-plans but with 50-year-plans. It proceeded by increments, raising the temperature so very gradually that the free world did not realize it was cooked until it could smell its own burning flesh.

The revolutions of the east failed. They rose quickly in fire and fury and only ashes and statues remain. But the revolutions of the west have been underway for generations in countries where millions of men and women go about their business without realizing what is taking place around them.

When H.G. Wells met with Lenin in 1920, he wrote, “Our essential difference, the difference of the Collectivist and Marxist, the question whether the social revolution is, in its extremity, necessary, whether it is necessary to overthrow one social and economic system completely before the new one can begin.”

Lenin demanded a revolution that would directly attack the capitalist system, but Wells believed that, “through a vast sustained educational campaign the existing Capitalist system could be civilized into a Collectivist world system.”

Finish reading at the link.

Lord Monckton: The dollar – and the USA – is toast:

Obama has done it. He has brought America down. It only took him just over four years. The Republicans could have stopped him. They didn’t.

How did the nihilistic left succeed in destroying America? Simple. They learned just a little of the capitalism they hate, and they drove your nation into outright bankruptcy.

And here is what the GOP has to say about it: just about nothing.

The once-mighty United States is now the most indebted nation on Earth. In round numbers, here are just some of the vital statistics as the patient dies:

National debt: $17 trillion, or $50,000 per man, woman and child, or $150,000 per taxpayer. Annual federal deficit: $1 trillion. Medicare/Medicaid/Obama”care”: $1 trillion a year. Social Security: another $1 trillion a year. Defense: two-thirds of a trillion. Unemployment handouts: $2 billion per working day. Debt interest: $1 billion per working day. Federal pensions, ditto.

Now for the big numbers. Your government’s Social Security liability is as big as the national debt: $17 trillion. Its prescription drug liability is $22 trillion. Then there’s the Medicare liability of $86 trillion. Total unfunded liabilities of the U.S. government are $125 trillion.

Net assets for each U.S. citizen are $300,000. The net liability of the U.S. government, shared among its citizens, amounts to almost four times that: $1.1 million a head. And the government’s debt is growing at $1 million every 45 seconds. To cover its annual deficit, it is printing $1 trillion a year of currency that is not backed by any asset whatsoever.

Here is what will happen next. When the crash comes, don’t say you weren’t given fair and clear warning.

First, the dollar will cease – no, make that “is already ceasing” – to be the world’s reserve currency. China, as I have been warning you she would, has realized the dollar is finished. So she is quietly making startling progress with bilateral and multilateral deals to replace the dollar with the yuan as the world’s currency of choice.

Sterling, once the world’s reserve currency, went precisely the same way in 1967 under orders from Moscow, which then largely controlled the governing Socialist Labor party in Britain.

After the Second World War, the Socialist/Communist governments of Attlee and Wilson bankrupted Britain with health-care and welfare programs and nationalization of industries. Inflation rose to 27 percent.

Obama’s copycat policies are different in only one respect. Moscow is no longer calling the shots. International totalitarianism no longer needs direction. Its cruel, hate-filled, destructive mission now advances on autopilot.

Watch some of the straws in the wind. China and Korea have come to a little-noticed agreement that international trade between them will no longer be denominated in U.S. dollars, but in yuan, or Won.

Behind the closed mahogany doors of the world’s finance houses, elaborate and secret preparations are being made for the upheaval and international financial collapse that will follow the deliberate printing-out and consequent implosion of the dollar.

Your GOP representatives should be, but are not, asking the administration to reveal to them the ever-tougher terms on which the Chinese continue – with ever-greater reluctance –to lend money to keep their communist ally in the White House afloat.

Do not believe China cannot afford to let her biggest creditor fail. She can, she will, and she is making careful preparations to do just that.

Continue reading at the link.

Michael Ledeen, PJ Media: Obama Speaks, The Heart Sinks:

He’s actually getting worse.  This president will not admit that we are in a war, as President George W. Bush defined it, with various terrorist organizations and with countries that support them.  In his overlong, ramblingspeech to the National Defense University on terrorism and national security, the president never even mentioned Iran, which happens to be our main enemy and the world’s leading sponsor of international terrorism.  Not one word.

You may well ask how it is possible for the president to talk about his counterterrorism “strategy” without addressing the main source of terrorism.  You would be right to ask, and you should also ask how it is possible that, so far as I can see, not one of the pundits, experts and commentators noticed the omission.  They were so busy with the future of Gitmo and where captured terrorists should be tried, and how many drones can fit on the head of a jihadi, that they missed the biggest thing.

Talk about a dog that didn’t bark!

The speech was bizarre, to put it mildly.  It was often incoherent, as when he gritted his teeth and actually admitted that there is an ideological conflict between us and the terrorists.  “Most…of the terrorism we face,” he said,  ”is fueled by a common ideology…that Islam is in conflict with the United States and the West.”  Without taking a deep breath, he hastily added that the “common ideology” was “based on a lie.”  Why?  Because “the United States is not at war with Islam…”

It’s typical of the president’s world-view that he would assume any such war to be instigated by us, but in this case the jihadis have it right, and he’s got it backwards.  There is indeed a war, it is theirs, the jihadis’ war, and they are waging it because they firmly believe they are commanded to do so by the Almighty.  They aim to destroy or dominate Western infidels and apostates.  Those commands are in the Koran, and are repeated by a great mass of imams, ayatollahs and mullahs.  Those thousands of Iranians or Hezbollahis who chant “death to America” mean just that.  It’s the reason for their jihad against us.

***

Bonus video:

Coulter and Hannity react to the Regime’s spectacular crumbling tower of lies.

Via Mediaite: Ann Coulter & Hannity Tear Into Obama Admin For Systematic Targeting Of Conservatives and Fox:

SEE ALSO:

Mediaite: Fox’s Ed Henry Urges White House Reporters: ‘Let’s Not Be A Bunch Of Lemmings’ For Obama:

In an interview this afternoon with Laura Ingraham, Fox’s White House correspondentEd Henry explained that he has urged his colleagues to not be “lemmings” for Obama when coming up with questions to ask the president and his communications staff.

Henry claimed that when he was with CNN covering George W. Bush administration, asking similarly tough questions of the president, he was “cheered on” by his colleagues. But now that he’s at Fox covering the Obama administration, “it can get a little bit lonely sometimes.”

He clarified that his colleagues’ cheering of tough questions to Bush may not have been “partisan” so much as a desire to do their job and “taking on power.” But, for whatever reason, he said, the tough questions aren’t encouraged so much anymore… at least until the DOJ and IRS scandals emerged.

“If we’re going to be sitting there in the briefing room,” he urged, “let’s not be a bunch of lemmings. Let’s actually stand up and ask tough questions. If the administration has answers for them, great, let’s move on to the next story. But if answers keep changing, then you better keep asking questions over and over.”

The Fox News revelation followed the news that the Justice Department had investigated the phone records of reporters working for The Associated Press.

On May 24, however, Obama reacted to growing alarm in the media by asking Holder to review the Justice Department’s procedures for investigating the media.

“We must keep information secret that protects our operations and our people in the field,” the president said at a speech in Washington D.C.

“But a free press is also essential for our democracy [and] I am troubled by the possibility that leak investigations may chill the investigative journalism that holds government accountable,” he said.

“Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs … [and] I have raised these issues with the Attorney General, who shares my concern. So he has agreed to review existing Department of Justice guidelines governing investigations that involve reporters, and will convene a group of media organizations to hear their concerns as part of that review,” he said.

Friday it was revealed that the Atty. Gen. personally signed off on the Rosen probe, but he testified at a House Judiciary hearing, last week otherwise. Now,  it  looks like Holder lied under oath to congress.

The Five reacted to the news that Holder lied about his involvement with the James Rosen probe, and found Obama’s decision to put Eric Holder in charge of reviewing the Justice Department’s policies for investigating reporters “incredibly inappropriate.” As Greg Gutfeld put it, “essentially it’s like having a kid grade his own paper.”

He’s already been held in contempt of Congress.

On Friday’s Special Report, Charles Krauthammer said that Holder’s days are numbered. But the man’s crimes require more than his being allowed to resign with his head high. He should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Obama was telling the truth when he said that Holder “shares his concerns,”  I’ll grant him that.

And as the drip drip drip of Regime scandal revelations come to the fore, they both have good reason to be concerned.

Attorney General Eric Holder signed off on a controversial search warrant that identified Fox News reporter James Rosen as a “possible co-conspirator” in violations of the Espionage Act and authorized seizure of his private emails, a law enforcement official told NBC News on Thursday.

Rove was probably chomping at the bit to get on the show, knowing what Holder recently testified before Congress:

“First of all you’ve got a long way to go to try to prosecute the press for publication of material. This has not fared well in American history… In regard to potential prosecution of the press for the disclosure of material.This is not something I’ve ever been involved in, heard of, or would think would be wise policy.“

That was a direct lie. Did Holder take an oath? Probably not, weasel that he is.

Via Gateway Pundit: Breaking: HOLDER LIED TO CONGRESS On His Role in Investigating News Reporters (Video)

The “conventional wisdom” has been that Eric Holder’s days are numbered, but the Regime would wait until the scandals died down before Holder would be asked to step down (so he could leave with his head high.) But methinks this thing is going to happen sooner rather than later. The a spot under the bus with Holder’s name on it waiting for him.

UPDATE: 

Confirmed, he did take an oath. Holder has a perjury problem.

@edmorrissey @guypbenson The committee specifically said it was suspending the “no oath” courtesy.

— Gabriel Malor (@gabrielmalor) May 24, 2013

.@gabrielmalor @edmorrissey Here’s a photo of Holder raising his right hand prior to that testimony: timeswampland.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/rtxznq…

— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) May 24, 2013

Debt Ceiling, Immigration And Tax Reform – Hannity Radio 5/23/2013:

Some great points from Paul, including  his contention that Lois Lerner shouldn’t still have a job at the IRS, and certainly shouldn’t be trusted near peoples’ tax records.

Krauthammer on Miller’s IRS Testimony:

“Here’s a guy who says that the IRS openly discriminated against groups on the basis of their politics, but the action was not a political action. It was instead an attempt at efficiency.’You’ve Got to be a Knave or a Fool to Say That and an Idiot to Believe it. It’s simply a contradiction in terms.”

PJ Media: TRIFECTA: IRS, AP, Fox & Benghazi Scandals Prove the Extreme Corruption of the Obama Administration:

Trifecta told you so. The AP, Fox News, IRS, Fast & Furious and Benghazi scandals prove that the Obama Administration has brought Chicago style politics to the nation’s capital. If the culpable parties in the Obama Administration escape prosecution, will the intimidation of President Obama’s enemies continue unabated?

Glenn Beck:  How did the President not know about the IRS?:

Mediaite: Mark Levin Call Obama A LIAR Says He Knew About IRS Scandal:

Investigation Into The IRS Targeting New Calls For Special Prosecutor – Megyn Kelly:

Bob Gorrell via Cartoon via Town Hall

Andrew McCarthy, NRO: No Special Counsel for the IRS Scandal:

Let’s put law and atmospherics aside and try to be completely practical. The imperative in the IRS scandal is not criminal prosecution. It is political accountability: to lay bare what corrupt officials have done, for the purpose of swiftly determining whether they are unfit to hold offices of public trust and whether the system in which they operate tends to corruption. The appointment of a special counsel would undermine that goal.

The moment a prosecutor — special or otherwise — takes over, the public flow of information stops. All witnesses will claim that the pendency of a criminal investigation means they cannot discuss the matter “on advice of counsel.” They will cease cooperating with congressional investigators. The prosecutor will claim that grand-jury secrecy rules bar comment about the expansive investigation (a claim the government routinely makes, even though the rules actually bar comment only by the prosecutor, investigative agents, and grand jurors — not the witnesses).

Public disclosure should be the goal here. It is the one thing that has driven the IRS story to this point. Public disclosure of the shockingly intrusive harassment of the president’s political opponents, the prohibitive legal and regulatory expenses imposed on ordinary people for merely exercising their right to participate in the political process, is what has broken through the administration’s Obamedia fortress. Yet public disclosure is precisely what would be lost if Congress were to punt its oversight responsibilities to a special counsel.

Read the whole thing – McCarthy makes some very good points. Counter-intuitive, but I think he may be right.

Michelle Malkin: Your reading assignments before Obama’s Gitmo speech:

Just last week, I reminded you that Obama’s pals at the Center for Constitutional Rights lobbied aggressively for the release of Gitmo recidivist Abu Sufian bin Qumu, a lead suspect in the Benghazi jihad attack who remains at large.

I’ve reported for years on Attorney General Eric Holder’s old law firm,Covington and Burling, which has represented at least 17 Yemeni Gitmo detainees.

And I’ve repeatedly noted the bloody Gitmo recidivism under both the Bush and Obama administrations, especially through the Yemen/Gitmo jihad revolving door.

Obama’s posture in the war on terror is clear: Retreat, retreat, retreat.

Flashbacks:

July 2007: More Gitmo catch-and-release

January 2009: No more O-Kumbaya: Gunmen attack US embassy in Yemen

January 2009: “Rehab:” Gitmo recidivists thumb their noses in new video

Jnuary 2009: Pay attention to Eric Holder’s law firm and Gitmo detainees

January 2009: Here’s your jihadi recidivism

November 2009: Culture of corruption: Holder, terrorists, Covington & Burling

December 2009: Obama’s December Gitmo surprise — and the Covington & Burling connection revisited

December 2009: Obama brings the Gitmolympics home

December 2009: Yemen, Gitmo, and jihadi revolving doors

January 2010 – Gibbs: “[A]ny additional transfers to Yemen is not a good idea;” Obama: “Let me be clear…”

January 2010: Jihadi revolving doors, Pt. 999

March 2010: National security flip-flop: Obama to retreat on KSM/Gitmo detainee civilian trials…for now

August 2010: Dept. of Social Justice strikes again: USS Cole bombing prosecution “shelved”

October 2012: The Deadly Disgrace of Obama’s Pro-Terrorist Lawyers

Joel Pollak, the Conversation:  Did Feb. 2010 Austin Plane Crash Prompt IRS Scandal?

In a speech on national security today, President Barack Obama made a bizarre reference to an incident that occurred in Austin, TX on February 18, 2010 when a pilot deliberately crashed a small aircraft into an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) building, killing himself as well as an IRS employee, and injuring many others.

At the time, the media blamed the attack on the Tea Party–the first of many false accusations. The New York Times, among other mainstream outlets, wondered whether the pilot was “the first Tea Party terrorist.”

The CCCPAC TV Ad: Hold Obama Accountable for Benghazi Scandal:

Help us put this ad on TV:

The Washington Free Beacon: O’Reilly Jokes with Rosen: ‘So Rosen When Are You Going to Jail?’

Fox News host Bill O’Reilly joked with reporter James Rosen at the end of his segment Wednesday on the O’Reilly Factor:

BILL O’REILLY: Okay. Now I have got to get back to Rosen. So Rosen when are you going to jail, because we are taking up the collection for the bail now. When are you going to jail?

JAMES ROSEN: Well I’m touched by your sentiments. [ laughter ]: But that’s about all I would say.

BILL O’REILLY: Okay. I know that Fox News and your attorneys have told you that, you know, not to talk about it. But this has got to be harrowing. Your parents are involved now. And their phone lines and stuff like this. So anyway. We just want to tell the audience that Rosen is okay, we are protecting him. Getting all the support you need, right?

JAMES ROSEN: I feel good about where I am.

Fox News: IRS official who refused to testify facing more scrutiny over scandal, past:

In the 1990′s, Lerner also served as chief of enforcement at the Federal Elections Commission.

Under her direction, the FEC undertook the largest enforcement action in its history — suing the Christian Coalition for violating campaign laws. The Christian Coalition won, but in one deposition, FEC lawyers asked a defendant if televangelist Pat Robertson prayed for him.

James Bopp, the Christian Coalition’s lawyer, said he was “shocked and appalled” by that.

“Both political activity and religious activity are specifically protected by the First Amendment,” he said.

When Bopp learned years later that Lerner had been promoted to an IRS position, he became concerned.

“She was in effect being promoted for what she had done at the Federal Election Commission and now was going to be expected … to replicate that at the IRS and now we know that’s exactly what happened,” he said.

Bryan Preston, PJ Media: Was the IRS Obama’s Electoral Performance-Enhancing Agency?

The IRS scandal was always about politics.

In the very month that ObamaCare passed, March 2010, the groups of Americans that were organizing to fight against ObamaCare were targeted by the agency that will implement ObamaCare. That’s the essence of the scandal. But it is not the full extent of it.

IRS workers union chief Colleen Kelley had access to President Obama and, according to White House logs, met with him on March 31, 2010. The abuse of Tea Party, conservative, Hispanic, pro-life, Christian, and Jewish groups, which must have been in the works for weeks or even months prior, formally began the following day. Americans became April Fools for continuing to believe that we had a government of the people, by the people and for the people. As of April 1, 2010, we had a government arraying itself against the people, or at least against some of the people. According to polls taken at the time, a majority opposed ObamaCare. So it could be said that the IRS was arrayed against a majority of American voters who were organizing to protest the government’s expansion under Obama.

The abuse continued through 2010 and 2011, right into 2012 and to the present. True the Vote, for instance, still has not been granted its tax-exempt status to this day. It filed suit against the IRS yesterday. Its founder, Catherine Engelbrecht, was subjected to Kafka-esque abuses not just by the IRS, but by an alphabet soup of executive branch agencies: the FBI, OSHA, and ATF joined in.

NRCC: IRS’ted Development: 15 Arrested Development Quotes that Could Have Come From Democrats:

If you think about it, Washington Democrats are a lot like the Bluth family. They’re a bunch of out-of-touch, elite big spenders ensnared in scandal who have no concept of fiscal responsibility. To illustrate that, we give you IRS’ted Development: a collection of 15 quotes from Arrested Development that could have come from Democrats:

Mitch McConnell: Threat of Nuclear Option Is Really a Pretext for Dem Power Grab:

WASHINGTON, D.C. –U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell made the following remarks on the Senate floor today regarding what he termed a ‘culture of intimidation’ that exists in the Executive Branch and among Senate Democrats and the threat to use the nuclear option if they don’t get their way every time:

“Recently, we’ve seen troubling signs that there are some in the Executive Branch who would use the power of the federal government to intimidate political opponents.

“For instance, reports that the IRS targeted conservative citizens’ groups for harassing and discriminatory treatment simply because they sought to exercise their First Amendment rights of association and speech.

“Or during the debate on Obamacare, when the Department of Health and Human Services issued a gag order on insurance plans in an attempt to prevent them from telling their customers about problems with the bill. Now, there are published reports that the same Department is trying to shake down some of those same companies for money so it can try to convince Americans to finally like Obamacare. And over at the FCC, the President’s allies are trying to shut down or make it difficult for people who want to buy advertising to exercise their First Amendment rights to criticize the Administration.

“It all points to a culture of political intimidation. But, unfortunately, it doesn’t seem that the culture of intimidation is simply confined to the Executive Branch.

“The Administration’s allies in the Senate are trying to intimidate their political opponents as well. What I’m talking about, is the persistent threat by the Majority to break the rules of the Senate in order to change the Rules of the Senate—in other words, to use the nuclear option—if they don’t get their way.

“For example, Senate Democrats were incensed that Republicans had the temerity to exercise their Advice and Consent responsibility to block a grand total of one — that’s right, one — nominee to the D.C. Circuit.

“What did our Democrat colleagues do in response? They consulted with the White House and pledged to pack the D.C. Circuit with appointees, quote, ‘one way or the other’ — meaning using the nuclear option.

“They are not doing this because the D.C. Circuit is burdened with cases. Far from it. The D.C. Circuit is one of the least busy courts in the country. No, they want to use the nuclear option to pack the D.C. Circuit so it can rubberstamp the President’s big government agenda—the same big government we’ve seen at the IRS and elsewhere. But that’s not the limit of the culture of intimidation here in the Senate. Let’s look at the NLRB situation.

“Despite the story that the Administration and Senate Democrats want to spin, Senate Republicans did not block the President’s nominees to the National Labor Relations Board; rather, it was the President who blocked the nominees to the Republican slots on the NLRB so he could—again—pack a powerful branch of government, in this case the NLRB.

“The Administration sat on one of two Democrat vacancies at the NLRB for four months. It then waited until the middle of December in 2011 to send up both nominees for the Democrat seats on the NLRB, while refusing to send up any of the nominees for the Republican seats. In fact, the Administration sat on the Republican nominees to the NLRB for nine months. Then, with no Republican nominees to the NLRB before the Senate, the President purported to ‘recess appoint’ the two Democrat nominees to the Board when their nominations had been before the Senate for less than three weeks. It was so fast, the Democrat Majority didn’t even have time to schedule a hearing. (keep reading at the link.)

Ace of Spades HQ: Shock: Obama’s Nominee for Secretary of Commerce is a Chicago Billionairess Mega-Donor Crony Who By the Way Understated Her Income by $80 Million:

From the Chicago Tribune:Pritzker, 54, a member of Chicago’s wealthiest family, is a business executive whose family founded Hyatt Hotels. She is a Democratic mega-donor and was nominated by longtime friend President Barack Obama, whom she helped get elected.

NBC: What it’s like to give birth in the middle of a tornado:

When a devastating tornado touched down in Moore, Okla., on Monday afternoon, Shayla Taylor was on the upper floor of the local hospital, in active labor with her second child.

As the floor shook “like an earthquake” beneath her and ceiling tiles and insulation fell overhead, the 25-year-old huddled with four nurses, braving both the peak contractions of childbirth and the wrath of the worst twister the veteran Oklahoman had ever endured.

“We were all just sitting there holding each other’s hands and praying,” Taylor told NBC News.

Lady Liberty: I Am Your Worst Nightmare:

Here is my resume..

I can go after your beliefs, and your traditions.  Nothing will be sacred to me.   I will make you to “see it my way”  because “it’s for you own good” oh,  and if you don’t,  I will attack you, belittle you, shame you.   You are in the way.

You can speak out about  me if you want, however, be careful, because I can hear everything you say.  I am everywhere.  Don’t think for a moment that my  true believers wont root you out.   Don’t speak against me.

If you dissent, or oppose me, (do you really want to go there?) I can send out my minionsto degrade you, smear you, and discredit you .  You will be considered  the lowest of human beings.   It is in my best interest that I do this.    Then, if you continue to defy me,  I may keep you from having any platform for you to speak on.  You will have no way of getting out any of your views.  I will make sure of that.   I will take away your ability to learn anything of value.  I can  make your life a living hell.  I will silence you.  

Who could she possibly be referencing? Read on to find out.

Dennis Miller on O’Reilly – James Rosen, IRS Controversy, Mayor Bloomberg – Bill O’Reilly – 5-22-13:

Miller has an interesting theory involving Valerie Jarrett that I happen to agree with.

Here’s what I’ve been working on at the Conversation:

Shulman Visited White House 118 Times During Tea Party Targeting

Juiceboxers Who Visited The WH, Yesterday Suddenly Taking a Hard Line On IRS Scandal

Will Chairman Issa Recall Lois Lerner To Testify Before Congress? (Video)

Senator Vitter Passes ‘No Food Stamps For Murderers And Rapists’ Amendment to Farm Bill

FTR Radio and SGP Host ‘Operation Helping Hand’ Radiothon for Midwest Tornado Victims

Hobby Lobby Battles HHS Mandate In Federal Appeals Court Today

‘Whoops, My Bad!’: Judge apologizes for lack of transparency in James Rosen probe

“The IG report indicts IRS for a colossal management failure, but leaves many questions unanswered,” said Chairman Issa.

Congressman Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) started off by asking former IRS Commissioner, Doug Shulman to give himself a grade on how he performed as the head of the IRS, and Shulman declined.

Chaffetz asked Shulman when he first heard that the IRS was targeting conservative groups, and Shulman answered Feb or March of 2012.

Chaffetz reminded him that on June 3rd of 2011, the Chairman of the Ways and Means Cmte sent him a letter regarding the selective targeting of taxpayers. “How is it that the Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee writes to you, the head of  the IRS, a letter like this, and you can say you don’t know about it?” Chaffetz demanded.

“So….I that’s where I was going to go….” Shulman began.

“No you weren’t!” Chaffetz scoffed.

Rep Trey Gowdy (R-SC)  grilled the former IRS Commissioner but didn’t get much in the way of answers.  Rep. Gowdy focused his time on why Mr. Shulman did not take any corrective actions when he learned of the IRS targeting certain groups.

“Can you give me the name of a single person who was involved in the original decision to target conservative groups for disparate treatment?” he asked. Shulman had no clue.

His line today was that when he learned of the inappropriate behavior, he was told that it had stopped. When asked if he did anything to make sure “the insidious, discriminatory practice was stopped”,  Shulman stammered that the Inspector General  was looking into it.

“If there’s someone wielding a knife in the parking lot, are you going to call the Inspector General? Are you going to wait until the IG report is out before you stop it?”  Gowdy thundered.

Shulman just stared at him blankly.

Gowdy asked him why the culture under his watch allowed conservative groups to be targeted.

Shulman answered that he wasn’t sure that the targeting was political, causing Gowdy to explode: “You STILL DON”T KNOW THAT THIS WAS POLITICALl?!”

SEE ALSO:

The Washington Times: Congressman Trey Gowdy checkmates Lois Lerner:

From Benghazi to Fast and Furious to the Associated Press, keeping track of Obama scandals requires sharp focus. The IRS scandal involves government employees deliberately targeting politically conservative and other organizations that Obama dislikes, as well as targeting individuals who have irritated the Obama machine.

California Congressman Darrell Issa’s committee wants one major question answered: Who decided to use the IRS to target political opponents? Lerner may know. She decided to invoke her Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. She refused to answer questions. Yet she badly miscalculated.

She began with a self-righteous opening statement claiming she did nothing wrong. Only after defending herself did she invoke her Fifth Amendment rights.

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SEE RELATED: IRS, Lois Lerner, Fox News: But where’s the sex scandal?

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Republicans on the committee thought they had been defeated, but Gowdy knew better. Once a person issues a statement, Fifth Amendment privilege is waived on the substance of the statement. By issuing an opening statement, Ms. Lerner was testifying. Her right to stay silent on that testimony was gone forever.

A panicked liberal Elijah Cummings of Maryland pointed out that while congressional hearings are “like” a court of law, they are not in actuality a court of law. Even Congressman Issa, normally a very sharp and prepared operator, had to check on whether Gowdy’s interpretation applied.

It absolutely does. So what do Republicans do next?

Long ago, Obama took the gloves off because he rightly concluded that Republicans did not have the stomach for a protracted fight. They would back down because they always do. They are so scared of being seen as “mean” and “partisan” that they would rather just say they tried their best and roll over.

Gowdy does not roll over, but he is not in charge. Issa has a major decision to make.

Since Lerner waived Fifth Amendment privileges, Issa must compel her testimony.  If she refuses, then she must be arrested and held in contempt of Congress. She can sit in a cell until she agrees to testify.

This might not end the matter. Susan McDougal spent eighteen months in jail to protect the Clintons. Maybe Lerner is willing to remain in jail to protect President Obama.

Maybe she is not.

Her defenders would portray her as a victim, a poor helpless woman being attacked by mean men on the committee.

This woman is no victim. There is a criminal element in our government. Using the IRS to target political opponents is a crime. Lerner is suppressing information on who may have been in charge of ordering those crimes. She blundered on the stand, which is her fault.

Like many Obama employees, she has used the legal system to keep the truth at bay. Unlike her colleagues, she was less clever about it. She turned out to be the weak link.

Mail Online: IRS tea-party bloodbath continues in Congress, as evidence emerges that IRS’s own internal probe ended in May 2012, six months before election, but was hidden from legislators:

Tempers flared in a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing Wednesday, with members on both sides of the aisle castigating the Internal Revenue Service for targeting conservative groups with special scrutiny, and then hiding the practice from Congress.

Rep. Darrel Issa, the committee’s chairman, said that the committee learned just yesterday that the IRS completed its own investigation a year before a Treasury Department Inspector General report was completed.

But despite the IRS recognizing in May 2012 that its employees were treating right-wing groups differently from other organizations, Issa said, IRS personnel withheld those conclusions from legislators.

‘Just yesterday the committee interviewed Holly Paz, the director of exempt organizations, rulings and agreements, division of the IRS,’ Issa said. ‘While a tremendous amount of attention is centered about the Inspector General’s report, or investigation, the committee has learned from Ms. Paz that she in fact participated in an IRS internal investigation that concluded in May of 2012 – May 3 of 2012 – and found essentially the same thing that Mr. George found more than a year later.’

“The IG report indicts IRS for a colossal management failure, but leaves many questions unanswered,” said Chairman Issa.
You can watch the hearing streamed live at http://oversight.house.gov or on CSPAN.

The Committee has invited the following witnesses to testify:

• Neal S. Wolin, Deputy Secretary, Department of the Treasury
• J. Russell George, Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration
• Lois Lerner, Director of Exempt Organizations, Internal Revenue Service (Pleading the 5th.)
• Douglas Shulman, Former Commissioner, Internal Revenue Service

Chairman Issa’s opening statement:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx_5rQnSAU4

Via Liz Sheld at the Conversation: IRS Misses Deadline to Turn over Targeting Documents.

Issa slamming the IG report on #IRS abuses.

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Issa charges that IG failed to respond to concerns about #IRSabuses quickly. “We shouldn’t have to wait 10 months to find out…

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Issa: This committee will not stop this investigation until we know the #IRS is fixed.

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Cummings: This hearing must be about 2 essential things: “truth and trust.” Will other Dems on the cmte take that to heart? #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Will Dems make the hearing about “truth and trust” or as a platform to regurgitate the Regime’s talking points? #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Which Dem will be the first to mention Citizens United at Oversight hearing, today? #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Lerner very proud of the work she has done in government. (asking Christian groups about their prayers, for instance.) #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Lerner: I.have. not. done. anything. wrong. #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Lerner pleading the 5th because she has done nothing wrong. #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Issa asks Lerner to reconsider. She persists in taking the 5th. Issa dismisses her. #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Whoa – Gowdy says she waived her right to taking the 5th by making an opening statement. Says she should stay and answer questions. #IRS

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

Issa wants to ask her a couple questions, anyway pertaining to answers given under oath to cmte previously. She declines. She’s dismissed.

— Nice Deb (@NiceDeb) May 22, 2013

*New Video* IRS Lois Lerner to Congress: ‘I have not done anything wrong’ youtube.com/watch?v=btKRnj…

— Charlie Spiering (@charliespiering) May 22, 2013

SEE ALSO: 

Ace of Spades HQ: IRS Completed Internal Investigation Into Tea Party Targeting Matter in May 2012; Hid Report from Congress

The Conversation: Shulman Visited White House 118 Times During Tea Party Targeting

Juiceboxers Who Visited The WH, Yesterday Suddenly Taking a Hard Line On IRS Scandal

In this excellent video  by Ben Howe for Heritage, their never-ending  mendacity is laid bare for all to see.  Benghazi: Demand the Truth:

Contrary to the election-time narrative that “al-Qaeda is on the run,” defeated by the Obama Administration, President Obama and his staff are now pleading ignorance across the board. Pfeiffer’s problematic media appearance could fit into an emerging narrative that the Obama Administration may have been more incompetent, than Machiavellian in its handling of the Benghazi terrorist attack. Administration officials spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity, proffering the line that bungling, ignorance, and inexperience may have been at the root of the debacle that left four Americans dead in Benghazi.

It will take more whistleblowers coming out  for us to get at that truth, and it looks like that may be happening soon. 

On very short notice, and with very little organization, other than hearing about it on the radio, or online, tea partiers across the nation gathered at their IRS offices to protest the targeted  abusive treatment conservatives have received from what increasingly appears to have operated as branch of Obama’s thug regime.

One of the bigger protests was in Cincinnati, Ground Zero for the IRS scandal. According to attendees on Twitter, the crowd swelled to around 500.

Via @TanaWeingartner:

Here’s a video of the Cincinnati protest, via Ushanka. 

Via Instapundit, this sizable crowd protested the IRS office in Atlanta.

And another one from Louisville:

Via Charlie Spierling, DC Examiner: Washington DC:

More from the #STL #IRS protest @gatewaypundit twitter.com/LElizaB/status…

— LEBD (@LElizaB) May 21, 2013

Gateway Pundit: Whoa!! ARMED DHS GUARDS Meet Tea Party Protesters Outside IRS Rally in St. Louis

I snapped this one myself at the IRS office in Kansas City:

Here are some of the signs from the KC protest:

See The Washington Examiner, Michelle Malkin and Twitchy for more pix.

MORE:

While tea partiers protested, the Regime plotted and schemed to get out of the mess they created for themselves.

Ace of Spades:  Spotted: Ezra Klein, Other JournoList Juiceboxers Seen Heading Over to the White House for a Private Briefing

And Lois Lerner Will Plead The Fifth Tomorrow, Rather Than Answer Questions About IRS Partisan Targeting

Which means she’ll be about as forthcoming as Jay Carney is at the average WH  press briefing. Who could she be protecting, I wonder?

Oh. I should mention that Lerner did bad things during the Clinton administration when she was at the FEC, too. I think we can assume the woman will not be praying or engaging in any prayerful activities ahead of  the hearing, tomorrow.

Oh boy, really?? Holy Moly! Senator Enzi at Hearing: IRS Is Asking Christian Churches for Membership Lists (Video)

And Carney faced another day of tough questioning in front of increasingly skeptical reporters.

Bloomberg Reporter to Jay Carney: No One Would Ever Call You Forthcoming (Wow!)

On the Benghazi scandal front, there’s this: Report: More Benghazi Whistleblowers To Emerge Shortly With Explosive Allegations

Carney: “Nobody’s been more outraged by the reported conduct than the president of the United States”, Carney asserted, (as he likes to do.) No one ever cares as much, works as hard, is more dedicated, more outraged, or more whatever than this president. He’s the POTUS with the MOSTUS.

 Karl: “Jay, with all due respect, the outrage from the president came, last week….”

 Carney: (interrupting) “his outrage came within hours of the release of the report”...(I’m so impressed!)

Karl:” But, but, but what I’m saying is that there were  public reports that this was going on for almost a year before the presidential election. How is it that no one in the White House has a responsibility even before the IG report to say, ‘hey! By the way, this kind of activity shouldn’t be going on…let’s make sure, and take steps to get this to stop?’”

Carney: (bored, resigned tone): “Again, I refer you to the IG, who investigated this matter, the treasury Dept and others who investigated this matter.”

And then he launched into a long dissertation about the IG report, which I’m not going to bother to transcribe, because it was stupid, (and irrelevant.)

(At this point, I would have asked, “HEY DOES THE PRESIDENT NOT HAVE ACCESS TO TV, RADIO, NEWSPAPER, INTERNET? THE NEW YORK TIMES REPORTED ON THE PROBLEM AT LEAST A COUPLE OF TIMES. YOU HAD TO BE LIVING UNDER A ROCK NOT TO HAVE KNOWN THAT THIS WAS GOING ON. A FAIR AND IMPARTIAL LEADER WOULD HAVE SAID SOMETHING TO STOP IT. GEE, MAYBE YOU’RE JUST GIVING US THE RUN AROUND, HERE, BECAUSE THE PRESIDENT DID KNOW, AND WAS IN FACT ORCHESTRATING IT.”

Karl: ”You’re missing the point of the question –  public reports almost a year before the election… Is there any responsibility on the part of the administration of saying, “hey IRS, we don’t treat groups differently based on politics.”

Carney: “It is absolutely our view, (crosstalk) but you’re saying accusations, and in response to these accusations there was an IG audit launched. Uh – that was appropriate and the findings are that which we now know. And the president’s response to those findings could not be more clear (finger comes out signalling a huge whopper is ahead) We need to hold people accountable and we have to make sure that this activity doesn’t happen again because it’s very important that the American people believe that the IRS applies our tax laws fairly and neutrally.”

A poll must have told him that, because I doubt anyone in this Regime could have figured that one out on his  own.

So what’s the takeaway, here? Well, apparently, before the President is allowed to say anything about accusations, he must wait until there’s a full investigation, and a report comes out (after an election, of course.)  Because to do otherwise would just be irresponsible, or something.

But this President has used  the bully pulpit like a bully for years. On any number of controversial issues, he was happy to share his strong opinions. Even non-political issues like the professor who was accosted by police when it looked like he might be breaking into a house, (it was his own) and was arrested for behaving belligerently, Obama was happy to share his opinion that “the police acted stupidly,” even before he knew all of the details about the case.  When George Zimmerman shot Travon Martin, (allegedly in self defense,) Obama was happy to share his opinion on the case before it was investigated or litigated. Travon looked just like Obama’s son, if he had one, in case you don’t know.  When Sandra Fluke was insulted by Rush Limbaugh, the otherwise reticent President  jumped right in there! He called Fluke and said, “there there, now”, and then he weaponized her to beat all pro-life Republicans over the head for the rest of the year. (Big coincidence. Pro-life groups were some of the IRS’s targets, too.)

But most of all, Obama constantly voiced his opinions on divisive issues that pitted groups of Americans against each other. Almost like it was a political tactic, or something,.

By April of 2011, one reporter for CNBC wrote:

Will someone please rein in our relentlessly hectoring President? Barrack Hussein Obama has taken his gift for inspirational oratory—one of the traits that got him elected—and turned it into something darker and more insidious.

Bam is a bully. Bad enough that he bashes Wall Street, but this President has gone farther than any in modern history in  the wrong kind of “bully” back into what Teddy Roosevelt had called the bully pulpit.

Obama’s latest broadside came over the weekend, when he vehemently criticized the state of Arizona and its (Republican) governor for passing a tough new law on illegal immigration.

The President called the measure “misguided” and all but labeled it un-American. He even ordered the Department of Justice, before the ink on this bill-signing has even dried, to examine the civil-rights “implications” of the new law. Seems like the courts and rights groups could handle that once any problem actually emerges.

Can you remember any other modern President, wagging a finger from on high, so directly and bitterly criticizing a new law passed by any state?

It’s funny how Obama’s “bully pulpit” has become the new normal, and people now pretty much expect him to pit Americans against each other.

Obama’s visceral dislike of the tea party was noted by Jake Tapper at ABC in May of 2010.

Three days after he decried the lack of civility in American politics, President Obama is quoted in a new book about his presidency referring to the Tea Party movement using a derogatory term with sexual connotations.

In Jonathan Alter’s “The Promise: President Obama, Year One,” President Obama is quoted in an interview saying that the unanimous vote of House Republicans vote against the stimulus bills “set the tenor for the whole year … That helped to create the tea-baggers and empowered that whole wing of the Republican Party to where it now controls the agenda for the Republicans.”

Tea Party activists loath the term “tea baggers,” which has emerged in liberal media outlets and elsewhere as a method of mocking the activists and their concerns.

To those of us who were paying attention during the 2008 election,  this behavior was wholly expected of Obama. In May of 2011, I wrote, Obama Still Poised To Silence Critics.

Very early in Obama’s presidency, on February 19, 2009 to be exact, I wrote a  post about how this thin skinned president was poised to silence critics of his regime.

We already knew about Obama’s history of intimidation, and character assassination.  We knew how he had tried to destroy his political enemies – at least regular readers of this site know, because I covered it while it was happening, here, and here, and here. While projecting an outward appearance of near messianic magnanimity, his underlings, lawyers, and political allies were always working feverishly to steamroll over critics, (and plaintiffs).

Mark Hyman of  The American Spectator wrote about Obama’s Chicago brand of hardball politics, recently in an article entitled, Obama’s Enemies List. As many of us feared, the “Chicago way” has found a home in The White House:

In only his third full day as the 44th president Obama personally went on the offensive against a media personality. On January 23rd, Obama warned Congressional Republicans against listening to Rush Limbaugh. The man who offered to sit down with Holocaust denier and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad without any preconditions whatsoever views an American radio talk show host as a dangerous threat.

In precedent-setting action, Obama moved his director of political affairs, a highly partisan post, from the Old Executive Office Building into the West Wing. Political operative Patrick Gaspard was given White House access not experienced by his predecessors. Obama official Shauna Daly, a non-lawyer and career opposition researcher described as a “partisan dirt-digger,” was assigned to the White House counsel office. The move signals not only a new low in partisan activities, but suggests the office assignment may be intended to hide Daly’s political activities under the guise of the counsel’s attorney-client privileges.

Fast forward over two years later, and nobody even bats an eye at White House enemies lists, lies, threats, intimidation, bullying, corruption, and  opposition research of anyone who looks like a threat to His Highness.

This is the new normal.

Well, the new normal has come up and bit Obama on the a$$. People are sick of  the lies. They’re not fooling anyone, anymore, and what do you know?  The media has been burned , now, so they’re not in the mood to play pattycake with the Regime anymore.  For five years now, they were happy to give Obama a pass. But now, finally, as I’ve previously noted, I’m sensing a change in their reporting which is becoming increasingly unfriendly to their former God King. I don’t want an MSM on any one person or group’s side. I want them on the side of all Americans and on the side of the truth. I suspect an honest search for the truth could lead to a very bumpy ride for Obama in the coming weeks and months.. With an MSM that has an allegiance to the truth and not  some fictional hero President (which Obama never was), the Regime is in big trouble.

Via Tea Party Patriots: 

On behalf of Tea Party, Patriot groups, 9/12, liberty activists, and the American people, we are calling for anyone and everyone to protest the IRS’ complete abuse of power on Tuesday, May 21, 2013 at noon local time.

DOWNLOAD YOUR IRS PROTEST TOOLKIT:

1: Talking Points
2: Sample Letter to the Editor
3: Sample Letter to Senator
4: Sample Tweets
5: Infographic Showing the IRS Scandal Timeline
6: A sample Press Release – IRS Abuse of Power
7: Sample Sign Messages for Protest
8: Sample Blog Post
9: Sample Press Release – IRS Protests

CLICK TO FIND A LOCATION NEAR YOU

Tea Party leader, Jenny Beth Martin spoke at a press conference about the IRS scandal. Senator Rand Paul, Rep. Michele Bachmann, Rep. Louie Gohmert, Sen. Ted Cruz, and other Tea Party leaders speak out regarding IRS Intimidation.

Here’s Ted Cruz’s speech:

Catherine Engelbrecht Discusses IRS Targeting on Huckabee:

Originally aired 5.18.13
http://www.truethevote.org

SEE ALSO: 

Doug Ross: NO CONSPIRACY, NOTHING TO SEE HERE, MOVE ALONG: Voter Integrity Group targeted by IRS, FBI, OSHA, and ATF 

Via Drudge:

DOJ TARGETED FOXNEWS REPORTER...
Tracked movements via key card, traced callsl...
GOOGLE GAVE DOJ PRIVATE E MAILS...
FOXNEWS: We will unequivocally defend free press...
REPORT: DOJ Leaked Docs to Smear Fast & Furious Whistleblower...
Administration's Two-Front War...
RNC Chief: Obama Creating 'Atomsphere of Guerilla Warfare'...
Congressman: Impeachment an option...

Via Twitchy: 

 When will it end? On top of the AP phone records scandal, it is now being reported that Fox News’ James Rosen was targeted and spied on by Obama’s Department of Justice. Glenn Greenwald, no fan of Fox News nor conservatives, slammed the Obama administration for the criminalizing of journalism. He also slammed Obama cheerleading progressives who think it’s hunky-dory. Because, Fox News.

Ace reacts:

This is bad. Megyn Kelly just reported that Rosen was named as a criminal co-conspirator because when you so name a reporter, the rules say that you do not have to inform the target, and he is not entitled to have his side of things heard by the court.

This allegation makes it an ex parte hearing with only the government and, most likely, one of its favorite judges, in the room.

…
This is scary.

What scares me is what Obama will do in reaction to investigations to what he’s already done.

More from Twitchy: 

Frightening: Content from DOJ’s warrant application to spy on James Rosen [pics]

Greenwald blasts Obama admin thug tactics against FNC’s Rosen; Slams Obama cheering progs

“Irrelevant” was Pfeiffer’s refrain: “The law is irrelevant” on the IRS scandal, he told ABC’s This Week; it’s “a largely irrelevant fact” where Obama was during the Benghazi attacks, he told Fox News Sunday; it’s also “largely irrelevant” who edited the Benghazi talking points to create a misleading picture of the attacks.

On Meet the Press, he told host David Gregory what the Republican playbook is: because they “lack a positive agenda” they’re trying to “drag Washington into a swamp of partisan fishing expeditions, trumped up hearings, and false allegations.”

“We’re not going to let that happen”, he assured Gregory. “The president’s got business for the American people.”  I guess since he was on NBC, he figured he could get away with such hyper-partisan spewage.

But he had a harder sell on CBS with Bob Schieffer, who recently referred to the Regime as “Dumb and Dumber”. 

Pfeiffer dropped the same exact rhetorical turdball on Schiffer, “This is the Republican playbook, here, which is, when they don’t have a positive agenda, they try to drag Washington into a swamp of partisan fishing expeditions, trumped up hearings, and false allegations.”

Schieffer told Pfeiffer his response reminded him of how the Nixon White House responded to Watergate, lol. Not exactly the reaction he was hoping for.

Schieffer also noted toward the end of the interview that the decision to send Susan Rice to go on the Sunday shows with the incorrect talking points was basically a “PR” stunt. And he asked a question that a lot of us have had, ” Why did you do that? Why didn’t  the Sec. of State come out and tell us what she knew, and if she knew nothing, tell us, ‘we don’t know, yet.’ Why didn’t the White House Chief of Staff come out?”, he continued. “And I mean this as no disrespect to you, but why are YOU here today? Why isn’t the White House Chief of Staff here to tell us what happened?”

Yikes, this one did not go smoothly at all.

 On ABC’s This Week, host George Stephanopoulos asked Pfeiffer about the controversy surrounding Benghazi talking points. Pfeiffer had no answer as to why the talking points showed more extensive changes than Jay Carney claimed, last November, so he went on the offensive,  arguing that Republicans owe UN Ambassador Susan Rice an apology.

There are hacks,  toadies, lackeys, flunkies, and yes-men – and then there are guys like Jay Carney and Dan Pfeiffer who are in a class by themselves.

Behold the audacity of mendacity.

On Fox News Sunday, host Chris Wallace reminded Pfeiffer that Obama didn’t really talk with Secretary Clinton, Secretary Panetta, or Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the night of 9/11/2012. “He was talking to his national security staff,” Pfeiffer insisted without naming names.

Asked about whether the president entered the Situation Room, Pfeiffer says, “I don’t remember what room the president was in on that night, and that’s a largely irrelevant fact.”

Pfeiffer then argues that Wallace’s questions about the president’s handling of the Benghazi terror attack are “offensive.”

“The premise of your question”, he huffed, “is that somehow, there was something that could have been done, differently”….

Why yes. That’s exactly the premise of his question. And there indeed were things that could have and should have been done differently, as an administration official who was part of the Benghazi response told  CBS News, last week, regarding the Foreign Emergency Support Team: ”I wish we’d sent it.”

The list of mea culpas by Obama administration officials involved in the Benghazi response and aftermath include: standing down the counterterrorism Foreign Emergency Support Team, failing to convene the Counterterrorism Security Group, failing to release the disputed Benghazi “talking points” when Congress asked for them, and using the word “spontaneous” while avoiding the word “terrorism.”

The Foreign Emergency Support Team known as “FEST” is described as “the US Government’s only interagency, on-call, short-notice team poised to respond to terrorist incidents worldwide.” It even boasts hostage-negotiating expertise. With U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens reported missing shortly after the Benghazi attacks began, Washington officials were operating under a possible hostage scenario at the outset. Yet deployment of the counterterrorism experts on the FEST was ruled out from the start. That decision became a source of great internal dissent and the cause of puzzlement to some outsiders.

Thursday, an administration official who was part of the Benghazi response told CBS News: “I wish we’d sent it.”

There were no  mea culpas coming from Pfeiffer, however because the Regime thinks they have a way out of Benghazi culpability. Carney and Pfeiffer have both made a big deal about the so called “doctored emails” which he blamed on Republicans, but there is no evidence that a Republican deliberately doctored any emails. We don’t know who Jonathan Karl’s source for the emails he released were, but we do know that the source  had seen the original emails but was not permitted by the White House to make copies of them.

This is how Karl says he reported the contents of that e-mail: 

…quoting verbatim a source who reviewed the original documents and shared detailed notes:

“We must make sure that the talking points reflect all agency equities, including those of the State Department, and we don’t want to undermine the FBI investigation.  We thus will work through the talking points tomorrow morning at the Deputies Committee meeting.”

The source was not permitted to make copies of the original e-mails. The White House has refused multiple requests – from journalists, including myself, and from Republican leaders in Congress – to release the full e-mail exchanges.

The differences in the two versions are being taken by some as evidence that my source sought to intentionally mislead about the extent of State Department involvement in changing the talking points. The version I obtained makes specific reference to the State Department, while the version reported by CNN references only “all of the relevant equities” and does not single out State.

The White House that’s blaming Republicans and accusing them of “fabricating” emails could clear all of this up by just releasing the original emails. They have chosen not to do that. Instead, they’re adding to the cover-up. Jay Carney should be very, very careful with future actions. Up to now his statements have been excusable as doing his boss’ bidding. Accusing people of fabricating evidence in an ongoing investigation is a very serious charge and could open him up to charges of his own, perhaps obstruction of justice or something along those lines.

This line of attack is a Media Matters standby, by the way – find one flaw, one discrepancy that can be blamed on the enemy (Republicans) and use it to shoot down their whole argument. Because there was a discrepancy between some of the talking points that were released, and the White House version, the White House is now somehow totally exonerated? That’s the Empire’s story, and they’re sticking to it.

Chris Wallace agreed to disagree, but should have followed up with – how about telling your boss to release all of the emails, then? He missed a huge opportunity, there..

You can watch Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz respond to that interview, here.

Trey Gowdy appeared on Fox and Friends Weekend to talk about the scandal eruptions.

He noted that there’s a an Oversight and Reform hearing scheduled for this Wednesday, which should be awesome because there are some firebrands on that committee (Gowdy of course, chief among them.) His message on the House responses to scandals, so far – be patient. Congress has to be disciplined in how they go forward. But they are determined to get answers.

The one area where Pfeiffer feigned outrage at someone besides Republicans was the IRS scandal, which is killing the Regime from a PR standpoint. So Pfeiffer pretended that the very idea of the IRS targeting the very  ”teabaggers”  his boss and  media flunkies have been demonizing for the last four years is horribly offensive to them.

OMG, this is such an outrage, there’s no excuse! Who ever heard of such a thing?! That was just awful awful awful bad stuff we would never condone…

It’s  as if  suddenly the tea party conservatives who have been *cough* victimized by two rogue agents in Cincinnati *cough*(who btw, Obama heroically vowed will be “hunted down” and brought to justice just like the Benghazi terrorists) are beloved citizens the Regime wants to protect. It’s really touching how shocked and offended they are about this. And how eager they are to get to the bottom of it.

They might want to check out this Drudge headline, though: Anonymous Cincinnati IRS official: “Everything comes from the top.”

SEE ALSO:

Jonathan Strong, National Review: Pfeiffer Stretches the Truth on Benghazi Emails

On the Sunday shows today, White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer sought to discredit criticism over how the infamous Benghazi talking points were scrubbed of references to terrorism by focusing on the differences between how ABC News described a single White House email and its actual text:

Here’s the evidence that proves the Republicans are playing politics with this: They received these emails months ago, didn’t say a word about it, didn’t complain, confirmed the CIA director . . . right after that. And then last week, a Republican source provided to Jon Karl of ABC News a doctored version of the White House email that started this entire fury. After 25,000 pieces of paper that were provided to Congress, they have to doctor an email to make political hay, you know they’re getting desperate here.

This is wrong in four ways.

Keep reading at the link.

Hot Air: About those “doctored” Benghazi e-mails…

The incorrect versions – and they were inaccurate quotes – were not generated by GOP operatives. They were extracted by ABC’s Jon Karl from notes taken by attendees at the original meeting when the White House refused to initially allow anyone to have copies which could have been used for full referencing. ABC went with the notes, being the closest thing anyone had to an official record, and the GOP worked off those notes. But even then, the “doctoring” wasn’t nearly as significant as the Democrats are making it out to be.

You know what’s scary? High officials at the White House approved of Pfeiffer’s talking points, Sunday.

And they wonder why people don’t trust them.