Weekly Update: Stop the IRS!
February 21, 2014
Former Clinton Victim Kathleen Willey: “Hillary is the War on Women”
Hillary Clinton remains intent on seizing the Oval Office in 2016. And so long as she (and her husband) continue to grasp for power, all of the Clinton scandals from the 1990s will continue to be relevant – from Chinagate to Travelgate, and using the FBI and the IRS to attack, silence and smear political opponents.
This became abundantly clear with the recent release of the “Hillary Papers,” an archive of records of one of Hillary Clinton’s best friends and advisers, Diane Blair, who passed away in 2000. Blair’s husband Jim, also deceased, had helped Hillary with the cattle futures deal that turned her $1,000 “investment” into a nearly $100,000 payday 10 months later. While these records touched on a wide range of issues, from Hillarycare to national security, press reports focused heavily on the so-called “sex files” – Bill Clinton’s sexual abuse of female victims and Hillary’s concerted campaign to threaten, intimidate, and destroy them.
For those of you who have been supporters of Judicial Watch since the days of Bill and Hillary, you know that Judicial Watch was active in seeking the truth about Bill Clinton’s abuse of women, and in seeking justice on behalf of his victims.
Judicial Watch defended Gennifer Flowers, who was subjected to a smear campaign masterminded by Hillary Clinton, and carried out by Clinton hacks George Stephanopoulos and James Carville, after she revealed a long-time affair with then Governor Clinton in 1991. Ms. Flowers quickly became a casualty of the Clintons’ rise to power.
JW represented Dolly Kyle Browning, who wrote a semi-autobiographical novel about her long-time affair with Bill Clinton. The former president fought tooth and nail to prevent the book from being published as he saw it as a threat to his political ambitions.
JW came to the aid of Juanita Broaddrick, who was raped by Bill Clinton in 1978, when Clinton served as Arkansas Attorney General (the state’s top law enforcement official). Ms. Broaddrick was then subjected to a retaliatory IRS audit many years later when she publicly disclosed the incident.
And then there’s Kathleen Willey, who was groped and sexually assaulted by President Clinton in the Oval Office on November 29, 1993, the same day Ms. Willey’s husband committed suicide. JW earned a key victory for accountability when U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth ruled that President Clinton violated the Privacy Act in orchestrating the release of letters from Willey to the President in an effort to discredit her. We also uncovered, and the Court noted, that Hillary Clinton approved of this smear campaign.
As I say, with the Clintons, what’s old is new. Incidents of Clinton corruption, even decades old, cannot yet be dismissed as an unpleasant chapter in American history. Instead, they serve as warning signs of corruption yet to come as long as they remain in power. (And with Hillary plotting for an eight year run in the Oval Office, they show no signs of slipping into retirement.)
And that is the message Ms. Willey delivered recently in an interview with Fox News Channel’s Megyn Kelly. The following are a couple of key excerpts:
Hillary Clinton is the war on women. And I think that she needs to be exposed for all of the terror campaigns that she’s raised against women who were in the wrong place at the wrong time with her husband. And it’s been going on since before they were married. That’s how she handles it…The easiest way for her to handle scandals is to ruin the women who just happen…to cross paths with him. And that’s horrible, and they do a good job at it.
…if she’s going to run on women’s issues, like she says she is, and she’s going to accuse Republicans of this war on women, I think she needs to be exposed for the war that she’s waged against people — waged against people like me…she has choreographed every single investigation and every terror campaign against every single woman practically who she thinks might be a problem. That’s how she handled it. How can you be a champion of women’s rights and turn around and do what she’s done to women like me? It just doesn’t make sense.
This is certainly consistent with Judicial Watch’s investigations. Hillary certainly had her share of accomplices inside the Clinton inner circle, Carville and Stephanopoulos among them, but she was their puppet master.
Time has a way of softening the public perception of politicians, even those that have committed reprehensible actions while in power. This is why approval ratings rise for many presidents after they leave office.
You can bet that Kathleen Willey and women on the wrong side of the Clintons will be subject to additional attacks as Hillary preps the battlefield for a presidential run. Let me tell you this: I support Kathleen Willey. I support Juanita. I support Gennifer. And I support Paula. And I encourage you and other Americans to support these women from the coming Clinton assault.
In the meantime, Judicial Watch is on the case. One of our investigators was just down in Little Rock looking at Hillarycare documents and we have multiple lawsuits on Benghazi and personal corruption issues for the Clintons from Hillary’s time at State.
Clinton corruption isn’t in the past, it continues.
Judicial Watch Urges Congress to Consider Transparency ASAP
When Congress mandates the production of a report that documents the activities of the federal government, the American people ought to have easy access to these reports. Congress may ignore the information, but vigilant American patriots will not. After all, these reports include critical information regarding how our tax dollars are spent. But if you’ve ever tried to get your hands on one of these reports, you know the process of tracking it down can be an exercise in extreme frustration and futility.
Often, these reports are pushed off to the hinterlands of the Internet “.gov” never to be seen again, or stuffed in the book shelf of some government office collecting dust.
For this reason, Judicial Watch joined other “good government” organizations to urge House leaders to fix the problem by considering legislation known as the “Access to Congressionally Mandated Reports” (HR 1380), originally introduced by Congressional Transparency Caucus Co-chair Representative Mike Quigley (D-IL).
The following are excerpts from the letter addressed to Reps. Boehner, Pelosi, Cantor and Hoyer:
We, the undersigned organizations, are writing to encourage the House to consider the bipartisan Access to Congressionally Mandated Reports (H.R. 1380) during the week of February 24th, when other measures touching upon executive branch oversight and transparency also will be considered, or at the earliest opportunity thereafter…
…Under the legislation, any report required by law to be submitted to Congress that is releasable under the Freedom of Information Act must be posted on a website managed by the Government Printing Office. The reports would become publicly available within 30 days of their transmission to Congress. Unlike now, where reports are often impossible to find, ACMRA creates one central repository for all reports that would be easily searchable by subject matter, submitting agency, the law requiring the report, and additional key terms.
Congressionally mandated reports contain a wealth of information on federal activities. A comprehensive accounting for all mandated reports to Congress, including whether they have been received in a timely fashion, will further efforts to make government more transparent and accountable.
The letter can be read in full here.
The bill was reported favorably by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. It also has the support of the Committee on House Administration. However, the last action taken to advance the legislation occurred in May 2013.
We have a difficult enough time as it is forcing the release of information pertaining to the activities of government officials – information that is often improperly kept under lock and key. The American people should not have to troll through the labyrinth of government agency websites to obtain information that is supposedly “publicly available.”
If you’d like to add your voice to ours, it’s not too late! February 24th is still a few days away. Please contact House Leaders and urge them to consider this important legislation. You can reach the House switchboard at 202-334-3121. Or you can click here to get the contact information for Congressional leaders.
And now read on for another “call to action.”
Don’t Let the IRS Silence You!
Two weeks ago, I told you about a new Obama IRS campaign to kill the conservative movement with proposed regulations and paperwork. This week I’m telling you what you can do about it.
Judicial Watch recently launched a new web initiative to allow conservatives and conservative organizations to voice their objections to new Obama regulations that would prevent them from carrying out their core missions in the months leading up to federal, state, and local elections. Many organizations are taking actions – from Judicial Watch to, believe it or not, the ACLU – to stop this assault on free speech.
The administration dismisses these new policies and procedures as mere “tweaking” of the language in existing federal regulations. But, as I explained two weeks ago, this “tweaking” is sinister in its intent. The purpose is to destroy the conservative movement in the United States. (Click here to review the thorough discussion I included in my Update piece two weeks ago on the language changes and what they mean.)
Here’s our message in a nutshell:
President Obama’s Internal Revenue Service has quietly announced new rules… seemingly designed to silence the growing conservative grassroots and Tea Party movement in America. Our First Amendment rights are in jeopardy. Please join us in fighting back now!
These new IRS rules will:
- Keep citizens from holding their public officials accountable
- Silence citizens and chill the very purpose of grassroots groups
Tell the IRS:
- It is impractical, burdensome and unacceptable for the IRS to interject itself into the inner workings of every citizens’ group in the country
- The IRS is supposed to be collecting revenues, not snooping and trampling on the First Amendment rights of citizens
- American citizens don’t need permission from the IRS in order to be active in grassroots movements
- To stop unfairly attacking the Tea Party and other 501(c)(4) groups
The IRS is now allowing public comments on these rule changes. So, if you’re as outraged by this as I am, please click here and submit your comment. (If you like, for reference, you can visit our campaign webpage to see some sample comments. You can also view the letter JW sent to the Office of Management and Budget registering our objections.) You must submit your comments by next Thursday, February 27th!
Remember, President Obama called for a “year of action” during his State of the Union speech. He, of course, was referring to his delusional belief that he can operate outside of the U.S. Constitution and impose his will via executive fiat. We, however, can use it as a rallying cry to take whatever actions we can to stop him.
Judicial Watch Gets Map of Military Fleet Positions during Benghazi Attack
I close this week with some more excellent reporting by our Corruption Chronicles blogger Irene Garcia and a reminder that you should make JW’s Corruption Chronicles blog a part of your regular reading regimen. (See www.judicialwatch.org/blog.)
This week, we alerted Americans to a critical piece of information uncovered by Judicial Watch, relating to the government’s Benghazi lies – this time involving the false claim that there was “nothing that could have been done” to save Ambassador Chris Stevens and the others murdered during the attacks on the U.S. Consulate in Libya. Irene’s full report follows:
The U.S. military had a multitude of forces in the region surrounding Libya when terrorists attacked the Special Mission in Benghazi and murdered four Americans, according to an unclassified Navy map obtained by Judicial Watch this week.
The map features the Navy fleet positions in the North Africa Area of Responsibility (AOR) on September 11, 2012, the day Islamic jihadists raided the U.S. Special Mission in Benghazi. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, the first diplomat to be killed overseas in decades, and three other Americans were murdered in the violent ambush.
Dozens of vessels were stationed in the region on that day, including two aircraft carriers (Dwight D. Eisenhower and Enterprise), four amphibious ships, 13 destroyers, three cruisers and more than a dozen other smaller Navy boats as well as a command ship. Carriers are warships, the powerhouse of the naval fleet with a full-length flight deck for aircraft operations. During the Benghazi attack, two carriers were based to the east in the Arabian Sea, the Navy map shows.
Two amphibious assault ships (Iwo Jima and Gunston Hill) were situated to the east in the Gulf of Oman and one (New York) was in the Gulf of Aden, the map shows. A fourth (Fort McHenry) was located on the west side of the African continent in the Atlantic Ocean. Amphibious ships resemble small aircraft carriers and have aircraft strips for vertical and short take-offs and landings. The destroyers are scattered throughout the region, but the closest appear to be four (Cole, Forrest Sherman, Jason Dunham and Aboon) in the Mediterranean Sea north of Libya. The rest of the fleet includes cruisers, minesweepers, patrols and a command ship.
The map was provided to Judicial Watch by retired Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Randall R. Schmidt, who is investigating how the military responded to the Benghazi attack. Schmidt flew jet fighters during his active duty and says there’s no reason the military could not have efficiently responded in Benghazi. Schmidt got the map after filing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Navy asking it to identify the location of all its assets in the region on September 11, 2012.
In a letter attached to the map, the Navy writes that the Iwo Jima was the closest large amphibious ship to Benghazi on that day, but fails to mention the exact distance. The letter does mention that the USS Enterprise, the aircraft carrier that appears on the map to be the closest to Libya, was located approximately 3,350 nautical miles from Benghazi. “Assuming a 20 knot transit speed and no Suez Canal delays, the transit would take approximately 168 hours or seven days,” the Navy says in the letter to Schmidt. The USS Dwight D. Eisenhower “would require additional transit time from its position in the Arabian Gulf,” the letter further states.
“Destroyers could have responded to the attack,” Schmidt said adding that the military also has “rapid reaction forces” in the region as well as “armed predators.” Aircraft could have also been deployed, according to Schmidt, but the Department of Defense (DOD) has refused his requests for records involving the air fleet on that day. “The point is there were enough forces to respond,” Schmidt says.
Coincidentally, a Congressional report released this week explores the DOD reaction to the attack. Published by the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, the report says that the military’s response was “severely degraded because of the location and readiness posture of U.S. forces…” The panel also attributes the weak military response to a “lack of clarity about how the terrorist action was unfolding.”
Nevertheless the committee blasts military commanders for not taking “all possible steps to prepare for a more extended operation.” It also chastises White House officials for ignoring the “dramatically deteriorating security situation in Libya and the growing threat to U.S. interests in the region.” As a result U.S. personnel in Benghazi were woefully vulnerable because the Obama administration didn’t “direct a change in military force posture,” the new report states.
Judicial Watch has been a leader in investigating the Benghazi terrorist attack and has published two in-depth reports on the deadly raid. Read them here and here. JW has a number of pending lawsuits and public records requests related to the incident and it was JW that obtained the first photos depicting the devastating aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the U.S. diplomatic and CIA facilities in Benghazi as well as details of the inexperienced foreign company hired to protect the American compound. The State Department paid the virtually unknown British firm $794,264 for nearly 50,000 guard hours, according to the records obtained in the course of JW’s ongoing Benghazi probe.
Judicial Watch’s report has earned widespread press coverage, including TheBlaze and Townhall.com. Obviously Benghazi remains a topic of high interest to the public, as much as the Obama administration would like for us to forget all about it. JW will continue to seek answers. Much more to come.
Until next week…
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