David Corn: Republicans Spent the First Day of Impeachment Hearings in an Alternate Reality

[babylonsister]

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/11/republicans-spent-the-first-day-of-impeachment-hearings-in-an-alternate-reality/


Republicans Spent the First Day of Impeachment Hearings in an Alternate Reality
They countered facts with conspiracy theories to distract from the incriminating testimony of two career diplomats.
David Corn

snip//


Taylor and Kent came across as sober professionals. They each explained they were nonpartisan career public servants and spoke calmly in a just-the-facts manner. Taylor painstakingly walked the committee through the chronology of the Ukraine scandal. And he provided a new bombshell: One of his staffers had overheard Trump call Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union and a key player in the “irregular channel,” and say that his top concern regarding Ukraine was prompting a Biden investigation—that is, not US-Ukraine policy. This diplomatic duo offered a strong and compelling case by merely reporting what they had seen and heard.

Yet nothing they said altered the altered reality of the Republicans. In fact, the committee’s GOP members spent much of the day trying to sidestep the core facts of the controversy and replace them with conspiracy hogwash to divert attention from the incriminating evidence. Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the senior Republican on the committee, set the table with an opening statement that was a stream-of-consciousness collection of FoxWorld buzzwords: Russia hoax, Steele dossier, Ukrainian meddling, the whistleblower. He claimed the impeachment process was itself a conspiracy mounted by the Democrats in a “cultlike” manner within a “star chamber” atmosphere. And going even further, Nunes denounced the FBI, “elements of the Justice Department,” and “now the State Department” for plotting against Trump. He was essentially accusing Taylor and Kent of joining the never-ending deep state scheme to destroy Trump. (At about the same moment, Trump sent out a fundraising email that claimed that Wednesday’s impeachment proceeding was a “Scam” and “a complete Fake Hearing (trial) to interview Never Trumpers.” Neither Taylor nor Kent are Never Trumpers, and Trump’s attempt to demonize independent witnesses in an investigation as partisan foes is the move of an authoritarian.

snip//

At this opening day, the Democrats’ stuck to their script, presenting fact-based witnesses who ably and dispassionately told their stories, presenting an account that the public can evaluate. The Democrats aim to tell a simple tale of obvious Trump wrongdoing. Republicans cannot abide by that. After all, the known facts are not on Trump’s side. So their big play is to deride the whole damn thing and say to the Democrats, you’re the ones abusing your power. Toward the end of the hearing, Jordan called special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation a fraud—yep, just a plot against Trump waged by you-know-who—and he complained the Ukraine investigation was nothing but a continuation of that effort. And Nunes described the notion that Trump pressured Zelensky for political investigations as “one of the mother of all conspiracy theories.” He was flipping reality, using false conspiracy theories to claim that the reality is actually a conspiracy theory. The Republican performance was hardly surprising. In some ways, they were less obstructive and more subdued than Democrats on the committee had expected. They griped about Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the committee chair, turning down their request to call the whistleblower as a witness, but there were no stunts. The hearing, though, was yet another demonstration of their blind loyalty to Trump and their now all-too-familiar embrace of a dangerous and demagogic tactic: smothering rationality with paranoia.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

1. they managed to blame Obama. Hillary's next.

[Bayard]

2. They already did

Hillary started the Steele investigation yesterday. I'm sure she was not surprised to hear it.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

3. I missed that little jewel ...

I confess to not listening to some of the worst of them, for example, Cowpile Nunes and Jacketoff Jordan.