Trump looking to purge Obama political appointees if he wins

From Rick Moran at The American Thinker Blog:

Reuters is reporting that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie told Trump donors in a closed door meeting that the nominee would seek to reform the Civil Service Act to make it easier to fire Obama political appointees.

Christie, who is governor of New Jersey and leads Trump's White House transition team, said the campaign was drawing up a list of federal government employees to fire if Trump defeats Democratic rival Hillary Clinton in the Nov. 8 presidential election.
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Trump's transition advisers fear that Obama may convert these appointees to civil servants, who have more job security than officials who have been politically appointed. This would allow officials to keep their jobs in a new, possibly Republican, administration, Christie said.

“It’s called burrowing," Christie said. "You take them from the political appointee side into the civil service side, in order to try to set up ... roadblocks for your successor, kind of like when all the Clinton people took all the Ws off the keyboard when George Bush was coming into the White House.”

People like Lerner or Koskinen. Embedded people, who are partisans.

Chaffetz, Jordan Erupt After IRS Erases Another Hard Drive

From The Daily Caller:

Leading members of Congress are ripping IRS officials for erasing a computer hard drive after a federal judge ordered it to be preserved.

“The destruction of evidence subject to preservation orders and subpoenas has been an ongoing problem under your leadership at the IRS,” Committee on House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Jason Chaffetz and Rep. Jim Jordan , wrote in a letter to IRS Commissioner John Koskinen late Thursday.

“It is stunning to see that the IRS does not take reasonable care to preserve documents that it is legally required to protect,” Chaffetz, a Utah Republican, and Jordan, an Ohio Republican, said in the letter to Koskinen.

The IRS recently admitted in court to erasing the hard drive even though a federal judge had issued a preservation related to a Microsoft Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the federal tax agency last year, according to court documents. Microsoft accuses the IRS of inappropriately hiring an outside law firm to audit it and of failing to hand over related documents requested under the FOIA.

Several people in the IRS need to be frogged marched out wearing handcuffs.

House Republicans File Articles of Impeachment Against IRS Commissioner John Koskinen for Making False Statements to Congress

From Ace of Spades HQ:

Of course, we know how this will end -- the Democrats will not even show up to the hearings to hear evidence. They'll just show up when it's their turn to talk, and they'll launch into a strident defense of all our wonderful civil servants and how the civil service shouldn't be politicized.

Like, you know. Like using the IRS to target those of the opposite political inclination.

Well whatever. They will vote lockstep in the Senate to absolve Koskinen, except, maybe, Joe Machin, who will take a poll before he votes to see if it's necessary to pretend to care about this, or if it's better for him, poll-wise, to just be what he is, which is an intensely partisan and ideological progressive liberal who wears a cowboy hat every six years to gull the hicks into thinking he's "one of them."

Yes, the will NOT win the in the Senate, But that is not the point. The point is to follow up on your promises. Also, the Democrats in purple states will have to defend the vote when they are up for re-election. The IRS Commissioner vote can use used as a sledge hammer.

Impeach EPA Admin Gina McCarthy?

From Professor Glenn Harlan Reynolds of Instapundit:

Congress is considering impeaching Gina McCarthy, a statement that is likely to produce two questions in most Americans' minds: (1) Who is Gina McCarthy; and (2) How can we impeach the head of the Environmental Protection Agency?

As the second part makes clear, Gina McCarthy is the EPA Administrator. Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) has introduced a resolution of impeachment against her because he says she lied during testimony about the EPA’s new clean water rules. Says Gosar: "Perjury before Congress is perjury to the American people and an affront to the fundamental principles of our republic and the rule of law. Such behavior cannot be tolerated. My legislation will hold Administrator McCarthy accountable for her blatant deceptions and unlawful conduct."
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So why impeach McCarthy? Well, Congress has had a lot of trouble with this administration. The IRS stonewalled on the emails implicating Lois Lerner in political targeting of Tea Party groups, the State Department (and Hillary Clinton personally) have stonewalled and foot-dragged on releasing Hillary’s emails, and other officials, such as Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, have provided “clearly erroneous” statements to Congress and suffered no penalty.

Traditionally, presidents have been willing to sacrifice underlings caught in this sort of behavior, but the Obama administration hasn’t been so quick to force them out. And like any behavior, lying to Congress and stonewalling congressional oversight becomes more common when it becomes clear that there will be no significant price to be paid.

Impeaching lower level officials may be a solution. Not only is the threat of removal from office a significant one, but most cabinet officials — and even many lower-level appointees — have bigger ambitions. Rendering them ineligible for further federal office is a genuine threat.

Make someone pay the price by punching back twice as hard!

With Koskinen at helm, IRS cannot be trusted

Congressman Jason Chaffetz writes in The Spectrum via H/T at Instapundit:

“Having lied to Congress, destroyed documents under subpoena, and targeted people based on their political beliefs, the IRS and its commissioner John Koskinen want a bigger budget. . . . Trusting an agency that has so clearly run awry with more of our tax dollars would be foolish. I would be abdicating my duty to taxpayers by empowering an organization that has given the American people so much cause for distrust. Koskinen came before Congress and made promises. He assured us he would comply with a congressional subpoena seeking Lois Lerner’s emails. Not only did he fail to keep that promise, we later learned he did not look in earnest for the information. After Koskinen complained of the extensive cost and effort being undertaken to locate the documents, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) learned from employees at a West Virginia data center that no one had ever even asked for backup tapes of Lois Lerner’s emails.”

Impeachment!

The Week in Pictures - Video Edition!

From the guys at Powerline Blog:

 

 

Obama’s foreign policy explained in 36 seconds:

They speak in circles, like State Department Hack Marie Harf.

IRS Chief Koskinen Has Donated Big to Democrats Over the Years

From PJ Media:

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen looks like he got the job atop the taxman agency the old fashioned way: He bought it.

According to the Washington Free Beacon, Koskinen has donated about $100,000 to Democrat candidates and committees since his first donation in 1979. His donor recipients include Gary Hart, the Democratic National Committee, the Democratic nominee in each presidential campaign since 1980 (which would even include Walter Mondale, who stood no chance of beating President Ronald Reagan in 1984), the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and Hillary Clinton’s and Barack Obama’s campaigns. He most recently donated $2,500 to Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) in 2013.

He has given no money to Republicans. The taxman is a partisan Democrat.

Sen. Orin Hatch said that the appointment left him “more than a little mystified.”

There was nothing mystifying about it. President Obama had already declared that there was not a “smidgen of corruption” in the IRS scandal.

Appointing a partisan Democrat to head the IRS ensured that such smigdens would never get out. It was also an in-your-face move against Republicans, daring them to oppose the nomination.

Another case for NOT voting for an establishment Republican. They should have challenged his nomination. Out with Hatch, McConnell et al.

They are not opposing the Dear Leader.

They are not fighting the Dear Leader.

They need to be primaried out.

More information on Koskinen from the Washington Free Beacon:

Koskinen has been a reliable donor over the years, contributing a total of $19,000 to the Democratic National Committee from 1988 to 2008. He has made a contribution to the Democratic candidate for president in each election since 1980, including $2,300 to Obama in 2008, and $5000 to Obama in 2012.

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has received $3,000 from Koskinen since 2008, and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee received $2,000 from 2004 to 2006.

Hillary Clinton has received $3,800 for her various political campaigns from Koskinen.

He's a loyal apparatchik.

Trey Gowdy Shreds Partisan IRS Hack Koskinen

From Jammie Wearing Fools via Ace of Spades HQ:

Yet as always whenever he appears on a panel, South Carolina Republican Trey Gowdy stole the show with his interrogation of the pathetic Koskinen. This is just masterful:

By the way, if you have any inkling that Koskinen is anything other than a Democrat hack,  this demolishes that notion.

I'm shocked that the Dear Leader placed a partisan hack as the new head of the IRS. Shocked!

More from Byron York at the Washington Examiner:

The IRS commissioner is pretty sure no laws have been broken despite not being familiar with relevant statutes

Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., a former federal prosecutor, interrogated the IRS commissioner with questions about whether the agency engaged in possible criminal misconduct.

Koskinen maintains that no wrongdoing has taken place at the IRS, but Gowdy wanted to see just how much the IRS commissioner has actually looked into the situation.

“You can shake your head all you want to, Commissioner. You have said today that there is no evidence of criminal wrongdoing, and I’m asking you what criminal statutes you have reviewed to reach that conclusion,” Gowdy said, adding that Koskinen has “no idea” if the IRS has committed any crimes.

Gowdy was also quick to dismiss Koskinen's suggestion that Republicans are trying to tie the White House to the targeting scandal.
“It was Jay Carney that perpetuated the myth that it was two rogue agents in Ohio, it wasn’t any of us. Was that accurate?” Gowdy asked.
“Not that I know of,” Koskinen said.

“So that was inaccurate and that came from the White House. Who said there’s not a smidgen of corruption?”
“My understanding is that was the president,” the commissioner said.
“So that’s Jay Carney and the president both inserting themselves into the IRS scandal,” Gowdy said. “And you want to blame us for bringing the White House into it?”

Koskinen sheepishly denied suggesting that Republicans are trying to make the scandal about the White House.