If you were impressed with Paul Ryan’s retort to Jim McDermott today in the House hearing on the IRS scandal, get your seatbelts in place for John Eastman’s ferocious, angry rebuttal to two other Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee. Eastman chairs the National Organization for Marriage, a group supporting the traditional one-man-one-woman definition that somehow founds its confidential IRS data in the hands of its biggest opponent, Human Rights Campaign. Eastman made the most of his time, to an ovation from the crowd (via The Corner):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=eSgFIo1kPG8
John Eastman, chairman of the National Organization for Marriage, addressed Representative Earl Blumenauer of Oregon first. Blumenauer had just finished arguing that the groups before the committee were political and should not be considered social-welfare organizations.
“It’s your kind of statements that have empowered IRS agents to make determinations about which organizations qualify for the public good and which don’t,” Eastman said to a round of applause. “The notion that defending traditional marriage doesn’t qualify as a defense of the public good is preposterous.”
Later, Eastman spoke to Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas. “How sad it is that efforts to educate about our Constitution have become a partisan, political issue that you think people ought not to get tax-exempt status for that,” Eastman said.
I’ve interviewed John Eastman a few times while guest-hosting for Hugh Hewitt, and while he’s always a gentleman on the air, I’d be careful about picking a fight with him. Eastman comes prepared, and doesn’t hesitate to fight back.
After seeing the responses from McDermott, Blumenauer, and Doggett, it’s clear that Democrats came to the hearings with an it’s-your-fault-that-you-applied-for-a-tax-status-that’s-perfectly-legal-when-progressives-do-it defense of the IRS. How’s that working out for them? Judging by the applause in the chamber, making the Democratic Party a human shield for the IRS will make them as popular as … a tax audit.
Let’s let Becky Gerritson, whose group was one of three to get a signed Lois Lerner letter as part of the harassment resulting from their application, have the last word on the Democratic Party’s decision to shield the IRS:
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