Republicans Knew About IRSgate Too, Will Now Have To Investigate Themselves

Don't you just hate when this happens? You're desperately flailing about for years and years, trying to find just the right faux scandal to investigate so you can finally impeach President Obama (calm down, Jason Chaffetz, no, it isn't time yet ). Maybe it will be the fake-but-real birth certificate. Maybe it will be a rumor that he fathered TWO BLACK CHILDREN. Maybe it will be Benghazi, sorry, we mean BENGHAZIIII!!!!1! Maybe it will be how the IRS investimagated groups of radicals who wave their guns around in public, threatening to not pay their taxes and bring down the whole gubmint, before granting them a special "you don't have to pay taxes because you are SO SPECIAL" waiver, and since the president probably knew about it all along, he must be investimagated and probably also impeached.

But ... but what if the Republicans knew about it all along too ?

Much has been made of the fact that senior Treasury Department officials were told about the investigation into the treatment of tea party groups in June 2012 - months before last year's the Presidential election.Republicans who requested the investigation were also told about it at approximately the same time.

Oh MAN. When Rep. Darrell Issa finds out that some of his own knew about this IRS thing since last summer, he is going to be so steaming mad, he'll just start investigating everyone and then -- wait, what? What's this?

In a letter dated July 11, 2012, the man who conducted the investigation - IRS inspector general J. Russell George - wrote to Rep. Darrell Issa, the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, telling him that he was investigating the issue and offering to keep him updated as the investigation progressed.

"The Oversight Committee knew about the audit because it requested it," an Issa aide told ABC News. Issa released the letter, along with his own letter dated June 28, 2012 requesting the investigation, last week.

Oh MAN. Talk about awkward! Republicans are running around shrieking about how the Obama administration knew about this investigation last year, long before the election, but they kept it on the down low because EVIL NEFARIOUS SCHEMES. Except Republicans, including Issa himself, knew about it too. At the same time. And they didn't say anything either. Wait -- does that mean Republicans are in on it? Are they helping the Obama administration cover up Benghazi too? Maybe it's all a cover-up! Hopefully, Darrell Issa and his fierce investigatin' skills will get to the bottom of this.

Which may prove rather difficult if all of the people what Mr. Issa plans to investigate take the Lois Lerner approach :

Lois Lerner, the official who oversees tax exempt organizations at the IRS, announced at a House oversight hearing Wednesday that she will plead the Fifth Amendment and not answer the agency's questions on advice from counsel.

But she insisted: "I have not done anything wrong. I have not done anything wrong. I have not broken any laws. I have not violated any IRS rules or regulations and have not provided false information to this or any other congressional committee."

Well, okay, Ms. IRS Lady, it is your right to plead the Fifth. It's in the Bill of Rights and everything, right after the Amendment what says you have an absolute right to gay bash people in the name of Jesus, and somewhere before you have the right to secede from the union if you think the black president is going to death panel your grandma. But then maybe you should not be in charge of the IRS, Ms. IRS Lady, if you do not want to answer question about the IRS? Maybe? Hopefully, Darrell Issa will figure it all out for us, just as soon as he's finished investigating himself for knowing about the whole damned IRS clusterfuck all along, and obviously covering it up just like he says everyone else did. You know, before we have the great civil war and the American Holocaust .

[ ABC News / TPM ]