Pleading the Fifth to the IRS?

IRS Exempt Division head, Lois Lerner

Lois Lerner, the head of the IRS Exempt Division gave some interesting "non-testimony" at  the House Government Oversight Committee hearing on the IRS Investigations of Targeting Conservative Groups, Chaired by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA 49th).    

Lerner's attorney had publicized that she would invoke her Constitutional Fifth Amendment privileges of not potentially incriminating herself through testimony.  Yet Lerner gave an impassioned opening statement which was an apologia proclaiming her innocence. 




And then Lerner clammed up, refusing to take questions from Congress by invoking her Fifth Amendment rights. 

Representative Trey Gowdy (R-SC 4th), a former Federal Prosecutor, insisted that Lerner had waived her Fifth Amendment privilege with her opening statement as well as authenticating documents.  Chairman Issa dismissed Lerner and her counsel, with the possibility that she may be called back to testify. 

Newt Gingrich raised an interesting item of intellectual jujitsu--

This celebrity oriented culture ought to ask Wesley Snipes and Lauren Hill how that strategery (sic) works out in the real world.