ARE HOUSE GOP LEADERS SUBVERTING THE IRS IMPEACHMENT EFFORT? There was a hearing of the House Judiciary Committee this week to consider whether to impeach IRS Commissioner John Koskinen. After all, Koskinen misled – out in the real world, that is pronounced “lied” – to Congress about Lois Lerner’s email.

Rep. Jim Jordan, the indefatigable Ohio Republican leading the impeachment effort, has determinedly made the case at every opportunity before colleagues and the American people via the media. Even so, it increasingly appears that House GOP leaders are balking at the idea of actually doing something consequential – rather than merely symbolic – on behalf of the constitutional integrity of Congress.

Take Thursday’s judicial panel hearing, for example. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Jason Chaffetz, a Utah Republican, said he favors censure of Koskinen, even as Judiciary panel chief Bob Goodlatte, a Virginia Republican, conspicuously refused to call the hearing by anything involving the word “impeach.”

Chaffetz told Katie Watson of the Daily Caller News Foundation’s Investigative Group, who covered the hearing, that he believes Goodlatte favors censure and that he views it as a step in the impeachment process. That apparently is supposed to satisfy Jordan and others who think the time to act is obviously now, not later.

“Right now, the rights of the legislative branch are being trampled on,” Jordan told TheDCNF. “And one of the best ways we can reassert that is by moving forward.”