Scandalpalooza - Why It Matters

It's been a rough week for the supporters of big government.  Three major scandals have broken, and they aren't over yet.  Here's a recap of what is known:

IRS targets conservative and Jewish groups

Starting a couple years ago the IRS targeted political opponents, using the tax code as a weapon.  They disclosed private information to political groups, they required extremely excessive information to be provided.  The requests were made not by low level IRS employees, but in many cases were signed by the director of the department which oversees tax excempt organizations.  The administration admits they knew last summer and fall, and intentionally withheld information about the investigation until now, after the election last fall.  The president claims to not have known about it until the media reports came out a week or so ago.

Benghazi

Whistleblowers have come forth to directly contradict an already implausible story from the administration about the events and who knew what.  Requests for more security were ignored.  Stand down orders were given to prevent help from arriving.  The president went to bed instead of remaining engaged as the events unfolded, which prevented necessary orders from being given to save the lives of those 4 Americans.  Reportedly the reason why the ambassador was in Benghazi in the first place was that our government was running guns to the Syrian rebels.  That would be against international law, so it's no wonder that the administration is trying to hide the truth.

Seizing Phone Records of Journalists

To investigate a leak, the Justice Department seized phone records of journalists without a warrant.  The Attorney General had no idea how many orders he has signed which authorized the Justice Department to do that.  If you heard the sworn testimony of Holder before Congress, you have to wonder if he knows much of anything, because of all the times he answered that he didn't know the answer to a question.

Why it matters

Proponents of big government want you to believe that it would help make things better, be efficient, and be all about the greater good.  The problem with that idealistic concept is that it never works out that way in real life.  David Alexrod unintentionally made the best argument I've seen in a while in support of small government when he said that the government is just too big for the president to manage.  If that is the problem, then in order to stop the corruption and out of control agencies we need to drastically cut the size of government down to something manageable.  If we can't keep track of things now, we certainly can't make government any bigger. 

One of the most important things we can do for accountability of our government is to support and encourage whistleblowers who are willing to tell the truth about what is going on.  When our government doesn't think it needs to be accountable to the people and the Constitution, that is a problem.  When the government is willing to cover up and tell lies about what they are doing, when they say that what they are doing is not a scandal and not illegal, that is a government that doesn't think it is accountable.  A government not accountable to the people is a tyrannical government. A government that covers up it's activities and tries to tell you that what it's doing is not a problem is not one you can trust.

Remember, it wasn't the crime that brought down Nixon.  It was the coverup.