Comment Re:Not trutly bias, not punitive. More like profil (Score 1) 719
If TEA Party members and people who belong to groups with "Patriot" in the name were statistically more apt...
No. I don't have to prove that it was *good* profiling for it to be profiling. It can be bad, inaccurate and stupid profiling too.
Bad profiling happens all the time. It's still profiling. What makes it profiling, is that someone - *rightly or wrongly* - suspected a group of people with certain characteristics would be more likely than the average to indulge in certain behaviors. And that's what I see as likely being behind these behaviors - not vengefulness.
Which makes even more sense given the additional information you point out - that this was for nonprofit groups after the election. That would have zero usefulness for the Obama administration - if you believe the Tea Party was a threat to Obama, the time for Obama to use his world-running conspiracy powers would have beeb to do this would have been **before** the election.
And separately, the idea that this "effectively shut down political opposition" is just silly. If anything, the Tea party and other right-wing groups have stepped up their opposition to Obama to even greater butthurt tantrum levels.