Lois Lerner and the Republican Pursuit of Low-Hanging Fruit
Most of us have an opinion about Lois Lerner, former chief of the IRS division overseeing tax-exempt organizations. She was recently charged by the House Oversight Committee of being in contempt of Congress. Lerner oversaw the agency that singled out 298 conservative groups for extra scrutiny if their names contained “dangerous” flag words or phrases such as “patriot,” “tea party,” liberty,” “freedom,” etc.
I have a twofold concern about Congress’ handling of Lerner. First, Republicans on the Oversight Committee’s panel seem to be going after low-hanging fruit by focusing on an administrator who might have been following orders and has claimed the protective covering of the Fifth Amendment. Secondly, there is a part of me that sees Lerner as another woman being badgered by a bunch of men. Throughout history, it seems women have been targeted for more extreme punishments than men who engage in similar behavior. This goes back to the New Testament account of the woman caught in adultery and brought before Jesus by the men who wanted to stone her. The man she committed adultery with was not brought for judgment. There are several modern-day cases involving high-profile women who have suffered greatly for real and alleged transgressions. Martha Stewart, Leona Helmsley and Paula Deen are a few that were subjected to penalties that seemed exceedingly harsh given how men who have committed similar acts have fared.
Hopefully, Lerner will cooperate with Congress and reveal if the scheme was hatched by her superiors. There might be a little light at the end of the tunnel. Multiple e-mails have surfaced establishing a trail between the staff of the Oversight Committee’s ranking Democrat member, Elijah Cummings, and the IRS’s handling of an organization seeking to prevent voter fraud. The organization, True the Vote, had its confidential information inappropriately released to Cummings’ office in an action that violated taxpayer confidentiality. If the Republicans keep digging, there’s no telling what they might discover beneath the surface. Hopefully, Lerner is only the tip of the iceberg.
