[J.P.’s Moment of Common Sense on Broad View, KRNG 101.3 FM Reno. Listen live Saturdays at 11:00 AM Pacific Time.]

When your troubles become fodder for late-night talk show hosts, things are serious.  A couple nights ago, Jay Leno said, “I was going to start off tonight with an Obama joke but I don’t want to get audited by the IRS.”  There’s truth in that joke which is why it’s funny.  As we know now, targeting Obama’s critics is exactly what the IRS has been doing.

Speaking of late night television, Jon Stewart pretty much apologized to Tea Partiers for previously having called them paranoid.  Turns out the government really was out to get them.

Pay attention now because here comes a three-sentence summary of the whole IRS scandal:

About a year after Obama took office the IRS started targeting his critics for vindictive special treatment, harassing and auditing conservative groups, Christian groups, Jewish groups, pro-life groups, critics in the news media, and people who supported Mitt Romney in last year’s election.  When the harassment didn’t sufficiently petrify the president’s critics, the IRS would leak their private information to a George Soros organization (like ProPublica or the Center for Investigative Reporting) which would cheerfully publish the information to embarrass the critic... hoping that would shut them up.  Although IRS bigwigs claim this activity was limited to a couple low-level employees in Cincinnati who went rogue, the facts show otherwise: not only was it happening in other IRS offices, too, four of those low-level Cincinnati employees have come forward and said they just were following orders.

There.  Three sentences summarizing the whole mess.

Like a lot of other conservative commentators, I’m having trouble getting excited about this crap because I’ve been telling people Obama is a bum for six years.  And guess what: liberals using the IRS to quash political opposition is nothing new.  They’ve been doing it for almost a century.  The Wall Street Journal wrote this week that Franklin Roosevelt used the IRS as personal enforcers in the 1930s, John Kennedy copied him in the 1960s, the Clintons were caught using the IRS for personal revenge in the 1990s, and now Obama.

Notice all those presidents are Democrats.

My one quibble with the Wall Street Journal is they included Republican Richard Nixon in the list.  When Nixon gave his enemies list to the IRS they ignored him.  It’s a wonder they didn’t turn around and audit Nixon.  Government bureaucrats are basically big government people so they always favor Democrats and despise Republicans.  Even before Roosevelt, even before the IRS was called the IRS, they were a Democrat tool.  When the Republicans tried to investigate them in 1925 (when they were called the Bureau of Internal Revenue), the taxmen met Republican Senator James Couzens at the hearing room door with a tax bill for $10 million.  Talk about shutting someone up...

Beyond the fact that misuse of the IRS happened before with other presidents, and beyond the fact that conservatives have been screaming about Obama’s IRS harassment for three years now, the other thing that makes this old news is the outlandishly-large number of other scandals in the Obama administration.  The mainstream media refuses to cover most of these stories but this administration will go down in history as the crookedest and filthiest in history.

Even the media is finally opening its eyes because, by golly, one of the scandals finally affected them—last week we learned the Justice Department was tapping Associated Press phone lines.  “Gee, that doesn’t seem right!” said the media with hurt feelings.  No, it’s not right.  Welcome to the club, morons.  Now that your eyes are open, take a good hard look at your president for once.

In addition to misusing the IRS, tapping AP phones, treating conservatives unfairly at the EPA, using the Fish and Wildlife Service to invade a guitar manufacturer, and trying to hide what really happened in Benghazi, we have Beacon Power, BrightSource, Brookfield Asset Management, First Solar, Fisker Automotive, Nevada Geothermal, NextEra Energy, Solyndra, SunPower, Tonopah Solar Energy, and U.S. Geothermal—all failing “green energy” companies that have two things in common: one, they received large amounts of government money; and two, they funneled some of that money back to Obama.

There’s even more of them but we don’t have time.  The list of green energy companies who scammed the government out of money during the last four years is like the phone book: long and boring.

Moving past green energy we have the Fast and Furious scandal in which the U.S. government sold guns to Central American drug cartels for the purpose of increasing violence in Mexico so Obama would have an excuse for gun control.  Hang on, I’m just getting started.  We have the New Black Panther Party scandal where Eric Holder vacated a case that was already won, the Keystone Pipeline delay which benefits Obama’s friend Warren Buffet, the LightSquared scandal which benefits another rich friend—George Soros—the Open Range scandal which cost us $74 million for essentially nothing, various Obama appointees violating federal law by using personal email accounts to transact government business, the nasty business of the White House releasing a forged birth certificate to the public—twice—the Pigford scandal which cost us a couple billion, and the SIGA Technologies scandal, wherein yet another rich Obama pal got $433 million for smallpox vaccines that nobody wants, nobody needs, and nobody knows for sure actually work.

If the SIGA scandal sounds familiar it’s because I wrote a column about it two months ago.  Like I said, scandals in the Obama administration are old news—at least for anybody who can read.

That’s... today’s dose of common sense.

“Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.” —Joseph Heller

“As an early-and-often chronicler of Chicago-on-the-Potomac, I am amazed at the stubborn and clingy persistence of President Barack Obama’s snowblowers in the media.  See no scandal, hear no scandal, speak no scandal.” —Michelle Malkin

From Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA        Tweet

May 19, 2013 - Do you have plans to update the Obama administration scandals page to include his entire presidency thus far? I would love to find this all in one place. – Jerry C., Missouri

J.P. replies: You have shamed me into working on the Obama administration scandals page.  I’m woefully behind on Mr. Obama’s scandals and lies—who knew there would be so doggone many?  Give me a week and you will notice the difference.

May 18, 2013 - My hat is off to you, [J.P.], for standing up for the principles that have given us our liberty in the first place. Mary occasionally forwards things like this to me. This was an excellent article; it has nothing to do with even remote nepotism. I e-mailed some very nice words about you to Mary: you can ask her to send them to you. Thanks for your patriotism and for standing up for the American way! – Terry L., Missouri

May 18, 2013 - Another excellent commentary Jim... as your sister I am so very proud of you! – Mary D., Michigan

J.P. replies: Shh!  Don’t tell people you’re my sister—it looks better if compliments don’t come from family.

May 18, 2013 - To borrow a line from the movie A Few Good Men "and the hits just keep on coming!" This was a bad week for the Obama administration. It's hard to know which fire to stomp on, when there is so many. But... maybe the armor that some Americans view this president and his administration in, has started to tarnish. I know that some of my more liberal friends have been relatively quiet. It's difficult to blame Bush for any of the current scandals since they happened during Obama reign. Although Nancy Pelosi certainly made a good stab at it pointing out that Douglas Shulman, commissioner of the IRS, was a Bush appointee. After the weekend break of both the IRS story and AP story I will admit that I just had to watch the Monday White House Press briefing given by Jay Carney. It was good watching him squirm. Who knew those reporters would take such an exception to having their records being secretly subpoenaed? I guess they really do take the freedom of the press and free speech seriously. Granted, I could have stopped watching after the first 5 minutes, because the rest was Jay repeating himself using "unfettered" 14 times and "balanced" some 20 times. Interesting to note that now the administration wants to resurrect media shield laws, that still would have a national security exception contained in it, which the AP's records would still have been secretly subpoenaed. The killer is, that when the AP reported they thwarted the terrorist plot to blow up an American airline, it wasn't really about national security. The AP was requested by the White House to hold the story, which they did, when they were assured by the White House that no threat existed, they were requested by the administration to hold off reporting the story until after the President could hold a press conference. AP decided not to wait, and ran the story thus stealing the President's thunder. The AP has now paid the price of ticking off the Obama administration. Then there is Benghazi, in attempt to support their stand that there is no "there there" they released 94 emails. I don't know they just don't give it up?! Whose idea was the video, and who selected Susan Rice? They could at least answer 2 of the many questions regarding Benghazi. Instead they release 94 emails that have huge time gaps in them, and certainly show that the White House edits to the points were more than just changing dog to puppy and cat to kitten. Then finally the IRS. I don't know why anyone would be surprised that the Obama administration would not use the full weight and power of the White House to silence their opposition, their critics. Even some of the democrats were outraged, because they recognize that the shoe could have been on the other foot. Although I'm torn that their outrage is based on being lied to by the very administration that they have so blindly and adamantly supported, or... the fact that they got caught. I will wait and see in this one, but by no means will I be holding my breath. – Pam T., Virginia

May 18, 2013 - I wonder if the president is panicking right now. Even though he claims to have known nothing about this, people are connecting the dots. His web of lies is unraveling before our eyes. It's so comforting to know that Eric Holder is heading up the investigation....really? Corrupt doesn't begin to describe the state of our government. – Samantha R., Michigan

J.P. replies: The Obama administration is adept at starting investigations and then using them as excuses to avoid questions.  We've already heard it this week from both Holder and Obama: "I can't comment because there's an ongoing investigation."  Of course, since they're investigating themselves, they never get to the bottom of anything.  It's all for show.

May 18, 2013 - Some of us expected just this type of behavior from BHO. Just as we expected Bill Clinton to be the waste of skin he turned out to be. The press is primarily to blame for the pathetic state of political awareness in our country. Without an impartial press performing due diligence on the people who want to run the country the average voter will continue to elect hypocrites, thieves, monomaniacs, incompetents and charlatans. One only has to look at the career of John Edwards to observe the effects of turning a blind eye to the obvious. – Don S., Missouri