On his show Monday, Glenn Beck offered his take on reports in the conservative media that suggested there had been a coordinated effort between the IRS and the Obama administration to target Tea Party groups.
Playing the role of then-IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, who made 157 visits to the White House since Obama took office, Beck held a mock conversation with a White House official — who was also played by Beck.
"They sat around for 150 meetings, and this never happened," Beck said, before launching into the dialogue (or monologue, depending on how you look at it).
As The Atlantic's Garance Franke-Ruta pointed out, at least three-quarters of those scheduled meetings were to discuss health care, since the IRS is charged with implementing much of the Affordable Care Act. Plus, she noted that Shulman didn't even attend all those meetings — he signed in for just 11 of them.
Still, Beck was unconvinced that the meetings were harmless.
"Are you telling me seriously, seriously, that conversation, or a conversation something like that didn't happen?" Beck asked of his re-enactment, in which he discussed death panels and Obama's purported distrust of Jews. "Of course it did."
