Paul Ryan Talks About the Lack of Truth Telling and the IRS Habit of Lying to Congress and We the People

Paul Ryan is reputedly a straight shooter. And he certainly demonstrated that shoot straight trait on Friday when questioning the head of the IRS.


Notable & Quotable tells the tale:


"Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) and IRS Commissioner John Koskinen at a Ways and Means Committee hearing, June 20:

Ryan: I am sitting here listening to this testimony. . . . I don't believe it. That's your problem. Nobody believes you. The Internal Revenue Service comes to Congress a couple of years ago and misleads us and says no targeting is occurring.

Then it said it was a few rogue agencies in Cincinnati. Then it said it was also on progressives. All those things have been proven untrue. This committee sent a criminal referral of possible criminal wrongdoing, just a month ago, to the Justice Department and we've heard nothing. You bury, in a 27-page letter to the Senate, asking for them to conclude the investigation, that you've lost Lois Lerner's emails during the time in question because of a hard drive crash. . . . Monday our investigators asked your agency whether any other hard drives crashed and we learn that six other hard drives of the people we are investigating were involved. . . . you didn't tell us that!

Koskinen: We told you on Monday.

. . .

Ryan: You told us on Monday because we asked you whether any other hard drives crashed. This is unbelievable. You told us in May that you were going to give us all of Lois Lerner's emails and you learned in February that this crashed.

Koskinen: I did not learn in February of the crash and we told you on Monday.

Ryan: I'm not asking a question, I'm making a statement.

Koskinen: I'm sorry.

Ryan: You are the IRS. . . . You learned about this months ago, you just told us, and we had to ask you on Monday. This is not being forthcoming. This is being misleading again. This is a pattern of abuse, a pattern of behavior, that is not giving us any confidence that this agency is being impartial. I don't believe you."

Summing Up

Did Mr. Ryan call Mr. Koskinen a liar?

And that the IRS has engaged in a consistent pattern of lying to both Congress and We the People as well?

Sure sounded that way to me.

And it sounded right to me as well.

We need more straight shooters in government. Many, many more, in fact.

That's my take.

Thanks. Bob.