IRS Targets Tea Party

On Monday, all three network morning shows found time to worry about IRS budget cuts meaning fewer audits and longer wait times for taxpayer assistance, but not one mentioned the ongoing scandal embroiling the agency, including Congress issuing a criminal referral for former IRS official Lois Lerner. [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump] On ABC's Good Morning America, news…

Fox News Sunday was the only Sunday show that discussed the latest revelations in the IRS’ targeting of conservative groups. As a result, viewers were treated to host Chris Wallace grilling Congressman Sander Levin (D-MI) over why the IRS targeted 100 percent of conservative groups as opposed to only 30 percent of liberal groups. Appearing on Sunday April 13, Wallace challenged Levin: “30…

Over the last seven days, three major revelations have emerged surrounding the IRS’ targeting of Tea Party groups. Despite the new stories, on Sunday April 13, three of the four Sunday shows,  NBC’s Meet the Press, CBS’s Face the Nation and ABC’s This Week, all ignored them, whereas Fox News Sunday was the only program to mention the IRS at all. On Wednesday April 9, The Washington Times…

Earlier this week, Town Hall revealed that former IRS official Lois Lerner fed tax information from the conservative group “True the Vote” to Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD).  Cummings is the ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, and recently made headlines for his confrontation with Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) over Lois Lerner’s recent testimony before the committee.  Despite…

Last week, the House Oversight Committee asked the Justice Department to seek criminal charges against former IRS official Lois Lerner. Despite the newest revelations in the IRS scandal, the Associated Press’ Julie Pace attempted to excuse the lack of media coverage. Appearing as a panelist on Fox News Sunday on April 13, Pace argued, “If you are going to keep the story going and you want to…

On Wednesday April 9, the House Oversight Committee voted to send a criminal referral to the Department of Justice for former IRS official Lois Lerner. Despite the severity of this most recent revelations into the IRS’ targeting of Tea Party organizations, ABC and NBC continue to ignore the story. After all three networks failed to cover the story on their nightly news broadcasts on Wednesday…

The National Journal's Ron Fournier appeared on Greta Van Susteren's Fox News show on Tuesday and blasted Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid for "making facts up" and "lying" in his non-stop campaign against the eeeeevil Koch Brothers. Bless his naive little heart, Fournier even actually said: "Shame on us if we in the media let him get away with this." "If"? What's all of a sudden…

I suspect that many readers who do their best to keep up with the news at a detailed level have a hard time understanding how many of their friends, acquaintances and neighbors — even many who they know put some effort into keeping up with current events — can be so unaware of many objectively important news developments. There are two answers to that question. One is that the establishment…

Doing its best to follow the narrative being peddled by MSNBC’s liberal hosts, MSNBC.com decided to double-down in its attempt to minimize the severity of the IRS’ targeting of Tea Party groups. In an April 9 piece, MSNBC.com writer Amanda Sakuma blared in her headline “GOP panel keeps fake IRS ‘scandal rolling” before pushing the talking point that “Democrats accused a House committee of…

The folks at MSNBC seem to be doing their best to try and minimize the IRS’ targeting of conservative groups. Ever since the initial reports broke in 2013, liberals have characterized conservative outrage as nothing more than a political stunt and one of many “faux scandals and conspiracy theories.” The most recent example came from Obama activist turned MSNBC host Joy Reid, who on Wednesday…

For the second day in a row, Good Morning America on Wednesday devoted a full report to investigating Vance McAllister, the married "Louisiana Republican" who was caught on camera kissing a staffer. [See video below. MP3 audio here.] On Tuesday, the show's reporters made sure to remind viewers that the Congressman involved in the alleged affair is a "conservative" and "Republican." Yet,…

On Wednesday Fox News reported that House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa threatened to hold the IRS commissioner in contempt of Congress if he didn’t hand over emails from Lois Lerner and other IRS officials. So far none of the Big Three (ABC, CBS, NBC) network evening or morning shows have mentioned the latest development in the ongoing investigation of the…

With the help of research materials from Newsbusters and the Media Research Center, the National Center for Public Policy Research (disclosure: my employer) today challenged Disney chief Robert Iger over media bias at ABC News at Disney's annual shareholder meeting. National Center Free Enterprise Project Director Justin Danhof asked Iger why, as revealed by the MRC, ABC News devoted only 128…

MSNBC continues to fail to take the IRS targeting scandal seriously. On Thursday’s NOW with Alex Wagner, Ms. Wagner and her guest, Howard Fineman of The Huffington Post, showed their utter disdain for Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and his committee’s ongoing investigation into the scandal. [Video below. MP3 audio here.] Wagner took particular offense to Issa’s move to hold IRS official Lois…