We know that there aren't many scientists in the Republican congressional delegation, because if there were, they couldn't use the "I'm not a scientist" excuse to duck questions about climate change.

But by sheer coincidence, pretty much every Republican in Congress who's "not a scientist" turns out to be an IT expert, and they've rendered a unanimous judgment: The official explanation of the missing Lois Lerner emails is a lie, and the IRS is perpetrating a coverup.

No less a figure than John Boehner (who's not a scientist) says the IRS' version of events—that the emails were lost in a hard-drive crash and the backups wiped off the servers after six months, per the agency's old protocol—"doesn't pass the straight-face test."

But here's the thing nobody covering the latest incarnation of the IRS feeding frenzy can bring themselves to say clearly: It is unconnected to the "scandal" that gave rise to the feeding frenzy in the first place. And that reflects the basic illogic underlying the right's embrace scandal politics. Republicans are no longer investigating allegations. They're assuming the conclusion that a scandal is afoot, and working backwards to prove it.

It is possible that the missing emails contain incriminating evidence of some genuine malfeasance. If they can be recovered they should be. But we're supposed to believe this has something to do with the year-old allegation that the IRS targeted Barack Obama's political enemies—and only his political enemies—for scrutiny and harassment.