The outburst of fauxtrage that ensued when the IRS dumbassery was revealed is now coming back to bite hard on the hindquarters of the people who thought to ride it to glory. This is particularly true of Congressman Darrell Issa,who now stands revealed as an even bigger weasel than we thought he was.

The Treasury inspector general (IG) whose report helped drive the IRS targeting controversy says it limited its examination to conservative groups because of a request from House Republicans. A spokesman for Russell George, Treasury's inspector general for tax administration, said they were asked by House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) "to narrowly focus on Tea Party organizations."The inspector general's audit found that groups seeking tax-exempt status with "Tea Party" and "patriots" in their name did receive extra attention from the IRS, with some facing years of delay and inappropriate questions from the agency. But top congressional Democrats have wielded new information from the IRS this week that liberal groups were also flagged for extra attention on the sorts of "be on the lookout" lists (BOLOs) that also tripped up conservative groups. The spokesman for the Treasury inspector general noted their audit acknowledged there were other watch lists. But the spokesman added: "We did not review the use, disposition, purpose or content of the other BOLOs. That was outside the scope of our audit."

So, after all that fuss and bother, and making poor Peggy Noonan think through a Grey Goose haze for two consecutive weeks, it turns out that the only people who "targeted" only conservative groups in this whole affair were...congressional Republicans.

It really shouldn't be this easy to paralyze the government, even for a while. Say goodnight, Darrell.

Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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