Obama Trying To Whitewash The IRS Investigation

Is Obama Trying To Whitewash The IRS Investigation?

Posted 01/09/2014 06:56 PM ET

Scandal: When the news broke that the IRS was singling out conservative groups for harassment, the president assured us that responsible parties would be held accountable. Chalk up one more empty promise.

Last May, President Obama said if IRS personnel were indeed "engaged in the kind of practices that have been reported on and were intentionally targeting conservative groups, then that is outrageous, and there is no place for it."

"I have got no patience with it," he said, "I will not tolerate it, and we will make sure that we find out exactly what happened on this."

A few months later, there was a different Obama. Frustrated by the way things were turning out at the beginning of his second term, this one complained about the "phony" scandals that were forcing Washington to keep "taking its eye off the ball."

White House spokesman Jay Carney confirmed the next day that the IRS scandal was indeed one that the president considered phony, along with Benghazi.

Obama is clearly still operating on this premise. How else to explain his administration allowing an investigator who is essentially part of the machine to head the IRS probe?

Barbara Bosserman is not a household name. But she's an important figure. According to Republican Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, the trial lawyer in the IRS' Civil Rights Division is leading the internal probe into the IRS treatment of conservative groups.

She also happens to be a "significant" contributor to Obama and the Democratic Party.

"In the past several years," Issa said in a recent letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, Bosserman has donated nearly $7,000 to Obama and the party. Given this background, Issa says, the administration has "created a startling conflict of interest."

If the White House were serious about finding out "exactly what happened," it wouldn't have allowed such a frivolous appointment. As it stands, it looks as if the administration is trying to whitewash the probe so it can renew its complaint about how "phony" the scandal is.

Bosserman might not fully fit the description of "political operative" or "hack." But it's clear where her loyalty resides. She's a biased investigator who comes into the probe without the impartiality that's needed to correctly do the job. If she isn't removed, as Issa is requesting, then the public will have further confirmation that this president can never be believed.