As we consider the political and legal implications of the IRS’s targeting of Tea Party and Patriot groups, it’s worth taking a trip down memory lane. Watergate offers worthwhile comparisons.

Oct. 10, 1972: FBI agents establish that the Watergate Hotel criminal break-ins conducted during the months leading up to the successful re-election of Richard Milhous Nixon were part of a “massive campaign of political spying and sabotage conducted on behalf of the Nixon reelection effort,” according to The Washington Post.

Jan. 30, 1973: G. Gordon Liddy and James McCord, Nixon aides, are criminally convicted of conspiracy, burglary and wiretapping, while five other men pleaded guilty.

April 30, 1973: H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, top White House staffers, and Attorney General Richard Kleindienst resign, and John Dean, White House counsel, is fired.

Months of congressional hearings, investigations, resignations, firings and blatant lies ended with the U.S. House Judiciary Committee passing articles of impeachment, resulting in the first and only resignation of a U.S. president on Aug. 8, 1974. The American people watched despicable acts of political maneuvering, criminal activity and absolute corrupt leadership end with a bi-partisan show of rebuke and remedy.

Until recently, history would’ve likely reserved the caption “most corrupt U.S. president” for Richard Nixon. But Barack Obama seems determined to take over that mantle.

The next paragraphs won’t discuss the Benghazi terrorist attack cover-up less than two months before Obama’s re-election, or the new developments of the Fast and Furious gun-running scandal that resulted in a dead U.S. Border Agent and another cover-up involving former Attorney General Eric Holder and Valerie Jarrett. There won’t be a review of the “you can keep your plan” lie of Obama’s signature legislation called ObamaCare. And we won’t get into the complete and deliberate lawlessness in allowing illegal immigrants to flood our borders.

Instead, let’s focus on the IRS scandal, which Watergate reporter Bob Woodward says still features “lots of unanswered questions.”

That scandal turned into a shrug of the black robed shoulders of a federal judge this week excusing malicious targeting of groups of citizens because of their faith, their political leanings, and their national identity in the Middle East.

Discovered through congressional hearings, reporting, investigation and some admissions, the IRS did harass and direct audit reviews toward hand-picked groups whose educational activities worked perpendicular to the schemes of the “progressive” Left during the 2012 election year.

These victims of IRS abuse were groups working to increase the voter participation of conservatives based on their efforts to educate about the Constitution; mobilizing professing Christians to engage in a critical presidential election; and supporting Israel, America’s “partner in peace” and the only government in the inferno of the Middle East that honors the democratic republican form of government of citizens electing their own representatives.

On Thursday, Washington, DC, District Judge Reggie Walton put his thumb on Lady Justice’s scale in siding with an out-of-control federal agency that was clearly involved in an abuse of power during an election year.

The 43 right-of-center, Christian and pro-Israel groups were victims of a legal system denied an opportunity at remedy in the justice system. Judge Walton shielded the IRS bullies from answering for the years-long delays in granting tax-exempt status to deserving groups. Walton reasoned the persecuted groups eventually received what they sought. Therefore, no harm, no foul.

Not once in these opinions or rulings was there a denial that such abuse actually occurred. The evidence has always favored the victims and exposed the vile motives and actions of the IRS and the benefactors of such corruption.

Jump back to those July 1974 articles of impeachment issued by the House Judiciary Committee. There were three articles of impeachment. Article 2 charged Nixon with “conduct violating the constitutional rights of citizens, impairing the due and proper administration of justice and the conduct of lawful inquiries, or contravening the laws governing agencies of the executive branch and the purpose of these agencies.”

That “conduct” was specified:

> “He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavored to obtain from the Internal Revenue Service, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, confidential information contained in income tax returns for purposed not authorized by law, and to cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner.

> "He misused the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Secret Service, and other executive personnel, in violation or disregard of the constitutional rights of citizens…”

In 1974, the attempt to use a federal government agency to harass and destroy political enemies was punished as illegal, corrupt and beneath an American leader.

In 2014, the actual act of abuse occurred, is covered up, excused and justice is dismissed because, well, you got what you wanted … even though it was three years too late.

Why does it appear that those whose speech is pro-Constitution, pro-family, pro-Israel, and, sadly, pro-America are less protected than those of the strong-armed, anti-American Left?

Two reasons: In taking a bit of license with Edmund Burke’s quote, those who don’t know history, or refuse to remember it factually, are doomed to repeat it. Second, while our elected “leaders” speak of courage to act, many don’t actually belong to the subphylum of chordate animals – they lack a backbone. Either way, the Obama administration is the most lawless and corrupt in our nation’s history, and it is trampling our rights in service to a banal and craven political agenda.