The Keystone Kops Korruptibles - that's what what we should tag the unholy alliance among the IRS, the Department of Justice, and congressional Democrats who are all seeking to undermine the oversight committee's investigation into IRS targeting of conservatives.

The bi-partisan idea that the IRS behaved wickedly is long behind us. As the scandal has grown, so have partisan efforts to scotch the investigation and attempt to hide wrongdoing by the administration.

Investors Business Daily:

Of particular interest to us has been Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., ranking member on Rep. Darrell Issa's House Government Reform and Oversight Committee, who has made every effort to keep the committee from finding out the true extent of IRS corruption and abuse of power in its targeting of conservatives.

As we've noted, emails released by Issa, a California Republican, show that Cummings' Democratic staff had requested information from the IRS' tax-exempt division, the one headed by Lois Lerner, on True the Vote, a conservative group that monitors polling places for voter fraud and supports the use of voter IDs, something that Cummings opposes.

"The IRS and the Oversight Minority made numerous requests for virtually identical information from True the Vote, raising concerns that the IRS improperly shared, protected taxpayer information with Rep. Cummings' staff," the Oversight panel said in a statement.

According to Issa, Cummings and his staff sought "copies of all training materials used for volunteers, affiliates or other entities" from True the Vote.

Five days later, True the Vote received an almost identical request for information from the IRS.

As we reported, Holly Paz, the deputy of Lois Lerner who headed the IRS division handling tax-exempt organizations, had forwarded True the Vote's 990 forms (on which nonprofit groups report their financial information) to Cummings' staff.

Now we have Brian Fallon, a former aide to New York Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer and a communications aide to Attorney General Eric Holder, who mistakenly called Issa's office thinking it was the office of Cummings and asked for help in leaking documents to selected reporters for the purpose of creating media spin before Issa and his committee could make them public.

As Jonathan Strong reports at Breitbart News, now the subject of an IRS audit, a letter sent by Issa to Holder about the call "describes Fallon as 'audibly shaken' when he realizes his request to leak documents to help get ahead of news stories about them was mistakenly made to the very office he was seeking to undermine."

Not very smart. Nor are they very subtle. But they proceed with the extreme confidence that no one except Republicans will call them out for their illegal activities - which means the press can safely bury the story.

In fact, what should have been front page news with calls by media for an immediate investigation into Cummings, Fallon, and the IRS became a one day inside the beltway story that disappeared immediately.

You have to wonder when President Obama's "smidgen of corruption" statement becomes inoperable.