Tag: Scandals
How and Why Do These Guys Come Back After Sex Scandals?
Another week and there goes another fallen officeholder trying to claw his way back from tabloid purgatory–another chance for some people to marvel about the power of forgiveness and redemption, and other people to marvel about the power of egomania and pure chutzpah. … It is one more occasion, in other words, for the vast majority of people who would stay crouched in a hole for years if they ever endured humiliation and disgrace of the sort Eliot Spitzer brought down on himself to wonder: What makes these guys tick?
— Politico
Someone Finally Puts Issa’s Past in Play
And if I were Republicans, I would say to Issa, in the parlance of his old business, “Please step away from that car.”
— David Axelrod, Democratic strategist, asserting that Republicans are approaching overreach concerning the IRS. Axelrod was alluding to Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), who, prior to being in Congress, was charged with grand theft auto, investigated for arson, arrested on weapons charges, and convicted of carrying an unregistered and concealed firearm.
The Case for the IRS Targeting the Tea Party
It seemed to come as a great shock when it was recently revealed that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) examines some taxpayers more closely than others.
Really? Because no one has ever objected to the IRS targeting some tax returns for audit. Among them:
- Millionaires (in fiscal 2011, the IRS audited 12.5% of them)
- People reporting more than $200,000 in income
- People claiming confusing tax breaks like the first-time homebuyer credit
- Home office workers
- Small business and self-employed people generally
- Very low income filers who claim the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC)
I’m not saying the IRS should target according to ideology. I’m saying it should target according to likelihood that tax laws are being flouted and circumvented.
So why, in the wild west of the first election years since the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling allowing political action groups, many with questionable funding, to mushroom and proliferate…why should anyone be surprised the IRS would exercise scrutiny on these here today, gone tomorrow groups? Why, in fact, would they not demand that the IRS do precisely that before granting tax-exempt status to whoever applies for it?
And why not specifically take a hard, cold look at tea party groups?
Most House Lawmakers ‘Survive’ Their Scandals
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Members of the House of Representatives have been involved in various scandals since Watergate and roughly 40% did not “survive” their scandal, according to Scott Bassenger, writing in Political Research Quarterly.
Florida’s Lt. Gov. Resigns After Questioning in Gambling Investigation
Carroll, in a public service announcement for the sham Allied Veterans group.
The ground is shifting under the feet of Florida Republicans, as Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll resigns after being questioned in a federal racketeering investigation.
The surprise isn’t that Carroll is resigning, it’s that she’s resigning over this
The Republican Party of Florida (RPOF) was caught short by the news, after more successfully dodging another recent scandal bullet. On the very day former RPOF chief Jim Greer was set to begin trial for funny bookkeeping that would have spilled the beans on almost every Republican politician in Florida, including and especially Sen. Marco Rubio, Greer copped a plea.
But Carroll doesn’t look so lucky. Exhibit A in Gov. Rick Scott’s “big tent” GOP cabinet has had her share of ethics challenges since assuming office as the state’s second in command. The issue of her shifting net worth, which she never seems to have a handle on, has been a recurring problem.
Then there’s her recent trouble, which is hard to describe in polite terms. Let’s just say that she and Bill Clinton share at least one thing in common, and that would be ladies on their knees beneath the executives’ office desks. Carroll denied the allegations by explaining that women who look like her cannot be lesbians. Many were unconvinced.
