Posted on 06/21/2014 8:41:03 AM PDT by Renfield
A Congressional inquiry into the targeting of Tea Party and Conservative organizations by the IRS has revealed that thousands of emails from IRS head Lois Lerner and at least six of her subordinates have been lost to history after the hard drive which stored them was reportedly thrown away. The loss of the emails makes it nearly impossible to track down and verify what actually took place and whether or not the Obama administration was directly involved in the harassment of independent groups that didn’t agree with the President’s political platform.
Without the emails their is no accountability, despite the fact that the President Obama has repeatedly claimed that transparency and the rule of law would be touchstones of his Presidency. “Starting today every agency and department should know that this administration stands on the side not of those who seek to withhold information, but those who seek to make it known,” said President Obama at a press conference on the day he took office in January of 2009.
The President’s past statements run contrary to the events playing out on Capitol Hill today, where the IRS has claimed that the emails have been “lost forever.”
Congressman Darrell Issa pointed out the ridiculousness of the claims saying that such records could only disappear because of deliberate destruction.
“Official records, like the e-mails of a prominent official, don’t just disappear without a trace unless that was the intention.”
It turns out that Senator Darrell Issa is right. Records like these don’t just disappear without a trace.
We know the whereabouts of the lost IRS emails and they could likely be accessed and shown to the American public within 24 hours.
It turns out that there just so happens to be a redundant set of digital records available in a facility capable of holding some septillion pages of information (1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 pages of text) that has been actively aggregating and storing digital data for years.
Access to any of those records can be had with a simple directive from the President of the United States.
The facility where the records are stored, along with the private emails, text messages, google searches and 20 trillion domestic phone calls since 2001 is owned and operated by America’s National Security Agency which, among other things, is responsible for the monitoring of American citizens and storing any and all digital interactions captured on private and public telecommunications lines. The NSA’s most advanced intelligence monitoring facility is located at Camp Williams and is called the “Utah Data Center.”
If the emails ever existed, whether they were deliberately wiped or accidentally lost, the National Security Agency undoubtedly has a digital record of them.
Intelligence officials and law enforcement refer to the phenomenon as “digital permanence” and what it means is that there exists a record of every digital interaction taking place over the internet somewhere. So, even if you happen to lose a hard drive or purposefully click that delete button, you’d be in luck. The National Security Agency has a copy of it because they have been effectively collecting all data sent over telecommunications lines in the United States since at least 2001.
The mind-boggling amount of data being collected at this and other facilities seems like something out of a science fiction movie, but according to award-winning mathematician and NSA whistleblower William Binney it is very real – and it’s been happening for quite some time. And just in case you think they’re collecting “meta-data” such the the sender, receiver and subject line of an email exclusively, according to Binney, they are also collecting the content of the communication as well. That means they know what you texted, said on a phone call, or wrote in an email.
Binney explained that the government is taking the position that it can gather and use any informationabout American citizens living on U.S. soil if it comes from:
Any service provider … any third party … any commercial company – like a telecom or internet service provider, libraries, medical companies – holding data about anyone, any U.S. citizen or anyone else.
The government is gathering everything, including content.
Binney explained – as he has many times before – that the government is storing everything, and creating a searchable database … to be used whenever it wants, for any purpose it wants (even just going after someone it doesn’t like).
Given this revelation from someone who understands the inner workings of NSA signals intelligence and how they collect data, it’s clear that despite the IRS losing the emails in question, there exist exact replicas of them at the NSA.
It should only be a matter of time now before President Obama officially requests that the NSA turn over these records so that he can prove to the American public once and for all that neither he or those in his administration had any knowledge or influence over the IRS targeting of political enemies.
No - It is thousands of times worse.
Nixon just fantasized about using the IRS as a policy weapon.
Obama is actually doing it.
I think people are missing a BIG point....
And missing a GIANT opportunity...
we all know they did not lose the email....
but the fools step in it with the excuse...
Because the excuse..if it did happen..is the bigger crime and scandal.
so to prosecute them for what they just admitted ..
That there guilty of criminal neglect and incompetence in their office ....
Far more head should roll if they really did lose the emails from the crash of one hard drive...then for the original issue.
You would think that red-blooded American journalists would be all over this. This is Watergate revisited. Not the crime, but the coverup, remember? You would think, but all you get is a collective yawn.
Commissioner Koskinen should be indicted for perjury. But that won't happen with Holder around... unless some white guy needs to be thrown under the bus to save Traitorobama's ass.
Iron Munro ~ No - It is thousands of times worse.
Nixon's secretary lost 18-1/2 minutes of one single tape on a tape recorder that had a blow diode in the power supply's bridge rectifier.
The IRS has "lost" every one of the hundreds of relevant emails spread across scores of computers on dozens of servers with multiple backups, without losing a single bit of any other data.
Again missing the point..
Think like a prosecutor
Think like and IT professional
They just confessed to bigger scandal
pivot the investigation...
start prosecuting for the giant IT scandal
Go after all the Contracting IT companies
All the IRS officials responsible for IT
All the sudden, when they’re facing jail time for being criminally incompetent
With millions of dollars on the line
The emails will magically show up.
The hard drive excuse tossed the IRS IT and IT companies who work for the IRS under the bus.
So Issa need to start driving that bus back and forth over the IT people ..just like any smart prosecutor would get someone to turn evidence
In the end, the fall guy will be come IT guy and we’ll never get to the bottom of the IRS klepotcrats ever being prosecuted.
We have top men working on it right now…..Top…Men
The thing is it would not be one IT guy..this would be a total IRS systemic failer in fundamental IT practices.Top level managements ass is on the line for this kind of crap.
In an organization as big as the IRS you simply do not lose data and if you did everybody gets canned.
And if there’s laws about maintaining that data....people get criminally prosecuted.
to not have backup system in place..
It like Boeing building an airliner the forgetting to design in emergency exits and and everybody signed off on it that way including the FAA.
Or it like building the World Trade Center with out emergency exits and staircases.
Or buying combat aircraft and sending them in to harm way with no parachutes.
Or cruise ships without lifeboats.
From earlier threads and links, my guess is that the most “problematic” e-mails were sent outside the IRS official system on a private account to avoid detention. This violated govt rules, showed criminal intent, and makes me wonder whether the current hooha about IRS backup is a red herring. Reportedly Lerner used msn.com accounts. Issa needs to subpoena Microsoft, which likely has at least some of the “missing” data.
Who will be the prosecutor - Eric Holder? I like your thinking, but many of us have become so jaded that we can’t see it happening. Congress has lacked the balls to spearhead this kind of thing lately. You are right, it IS an opportunity, but I for one am afraid that it will be an opportunity wasted.
Guess Issa will have to subpoena the NSA... Maybe they’re sick of the Obama losers, too...
Darrell Issa is a spineless buffoon who happens to be a congress person posing as a committee chairman.
Your irony detector needs a tuneup.
My guess is that an independent prosecutor is going to appointed here shortly. Secondly, Lerner is dead woman walking and she doesn’t even realize yet otherwise she would have already cut a deal with the republicans.
Wouldn’t the records of the targeted groups contain notes, memos and e-mails on the course of action the IRS was going to take?
Better late than never for a SP. But can the Senate block the appointment or Obama veto a new SP law?
Perhaps enough vulnerable Dems will go along to kick the can down the road, but many of their members are implicated in this crime spree — I’d expect major resistance.
Bwahahahaha!! Good one! Tell another...
Look...I know...I don't write 'em, I just post 'em.....
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
