It’s hard to know where to start in dissecting the House Intelligence Committee’s questioning of acting Director of National Intelligence Joseph Maguire, particularly the disgraceful performance of Chairman Adam Schiff. So I’ll ease into it by quoting former independent prosecutor Ken Starr, in a Thursday night interview with FOX News’ Shannon Bream:
“I think we need a little dignity in Washington,” he said, “on both sides of the aisle. It would be helpful if we just said, ‘Mr. Chairman, we call you on this. You call the President because of his tweets, or whatever; why don’t you show some dignity, especially since you knew you were playing to the crowd?' I just think it’s this constant...” and then he trailed off, maybe because it’s hard to end that thought with a word that can be used on TV. Then he went on: “What I would say is, let’s have a full debate instead of the kind of show that we had today [Thursday], where I think the vice-admiral [Maguire], who has had such an exemplary career, was calumnied [maliciously defamed] in a very, I think, vicious way, and it was very unbecoming to the House of Representatives and the Intelligence Committee to do that...Today was an oversight hearing, but it’s masquerading as impeachment.”
Mr. Starr was much more diplomatic and polite than I feel like being at this point, and I’m pretty well known for being diplomatic and polite. Schiff's cringeworthy exhibition put our whole legislative branch in the worst possible light. Schiff was at his shiftiest; he should look back at this and be embarrassed and deeply ashamed, but he won’t be. Based on his opening statement –- the one he laughably defended later as a “parody” –- which put words in the President’s mouth that we know he never said and completely misrepresented his phone call with Ukrainian President Zelensky, Schiff personifies the scummiest, slimiest sleazebag attorney whoever inspired a lawyer joke.
What do you call Adam Schiff losing re-election? A good start.
And yet, if you look at his Twitter account, he’s got lots of followers who think he’s a true patriot (!) and the greatest thing since sliced ham. But let’s move on –- there’s so much in the news today about all this that I’d just as soon not dwell on that travesty of a hearing that he chaired.
One reason the Democrats are behaving this way now is that Trump, during “the” phone call with Zelensky, referenced a cybersecurity company called CrowdStrike, which was hired by the Democratic National Committee to look into allegations that Russia had hacked their computer server. Recall that then-DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz refused to turn over their computer hardware to the FBI for analysis. CrowdStrike handled it instead and issued their finding that, yep, it was the Ruskies, all right. The Obama FBI allowed this (they would), but Trump’s FBI and DOJ is focused on finding out exactly by what means the files were compromised and by whom. The “Russia” narrative could end up being shattered, replaced by some other perhaps very disturbing truth.
The closer Trump and the DOJ get to the real story of the Russia hoax, the more the Democrats will behave like junkyard dogs. They’ll push even more relentlessly for impeachment (or the strange business they’re doing now, “impeachment”) and lie even harder, though it’s hard to imagine after seeing Adam Schiff’s performance that anyone could do that.
Of course, Rudy Giuliani has been doing some investigating as well, and now we know our own State Department had requested that he be involved. The so-called “whistleblower” apparently didn’t know they had done that, as this person accused him in the complaint of damaging national security by talking with the Ukrainians. Giuliani has plenty of documentation that State asked him, though, in the form of numerous texts to and from State Department officials. And in a Thursday night interview with Laura Ingraham, he pointed out that a remark in the complaint about Giuliani’s meeting being a “direct result” of Trump’s July call with President Zelensky is not correct --- and can’t possibly be true, because Giuliani’s meeting took place three days before Trump’s phone call.
That’s not the only inaccuracy. Although the complaint seems well crafted –- so much so that it’s obvious to some analysts such as Fred Fleitz* that this person had a great deal of lawyerly help in filling it out, probably from Intelligence Committee attorneys –- Giuliani alleged 16 places on the official form where the “whistleblower” either got something wrong or lied. Rudy also made a great point about credibility when it comes to hearsay witnesses: that for obvious reasons it’s not about THEIR credibility, but the credibility of the people who are speaking to them. Why the IG noted that this person was “credible” when he or she was supposedly passing on information received from others, he doesn’t know.
*Speaking of Fred Fleitz, here’s an outstanding piece he wrote listing eight major points about the “whistleblower” complaint. We had it in Wednesday’s Evening Edition, but I wanted to make sure you saw it.
As for Giuliani, he reiterated what we’ve been talking about: that Ukrainian officials have insisted they had solid evidence of “collusion,” not between Trump and Russians but between Hillary’s campaign/DNC (same thing) and Ukrainians. “We believe George Soros is behind it,” Giuliani said, “because his company was involved in it...When Biden’s son’s case was dismissed, the other case the crooked new prosecutor had to dismiss was Soros’s case, which is why the Biden thing is relevant to ME...Had [Soros’s] case been allowed to go on, we would’ve had the evidence to refute the Mueller investigation on DAY ONE.”
Listening to Rudy, I can’t help thinking how fascinating it is the way all these people and their legal cases are connected and intertwined. It wouldn’t be surprising if the Soros connection were common to all, even to the point of funding the anti-Trump “whistleblowers.”
This is a very entertaining, long and wide-ranging interview, with Rudy in superb form. Did you know Kamala Harris is actually calling for the State Department to investigate HIM and those who worked with him and possibly have him disbarred? Giuliani says it’s because he’s uncovering details about various pay-for-play schemes, including the one involving the Clinton Foundation. He really lets fly in this conversation, and it’s great. Here’s the link…
Finally, John Solomon broke the game-changing news about Joe Biden that he’d promised on Wednesday. He’s turned up hundreds of pages of never-released documents and memos that contradict Biden’s story about firing the Ukrainian prosecutor looking into Burisma, the natural gas company that had, for some reason, put his son Hunter Biden on its board.
It turns out that there WERE open investigations into Burisma going on at the time the firing occurred; news reports stating otherwise are wrong. Also, the portrayal of Shokin, the prosecutor Biden fired who has been said to be so corrupt, is very different here. These documents raise serious questions about Biden’s ethics and honesty.
Solomon: These once-secret memos cast doubt on Joe Biden's Ukraine story
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