Adam Schiff is a dead man walking. This sham, scam, and hoax of an impeachment inquiry is such an evident farce that Schiff may be the only man in America who doesn’t realize it.
Yesterday’s first hour was touted breathlessly by the Talking Snake Media as a “blockbuster.” More like block-busted.
The two star witnesses confessed that neither of them was on the smoking gun phone call that is at the root of this miscarriage of justice. Neither of them has ever met or talked with the president they are seeking to send into permanent political exile. Neither of them, in fact, had any first-hand testimony to offer.
All they could testify to is what somebody told them that he had heard from somebody else. That’s hearsay, which is inadmissible in a court of law and certainly should be inadmissible in the trial of the president of the United States. You could not convict a shoplifter on the evidence presented yesterday by Schiff’s prime witnesses.
Ken Starr, who knows something about impeachment, stated flatly, “No crime was proven today. There were a lot of terms used, extortion and bribery, but no crime. This is unlike Nixon and unlike Clinton.”
The new “blockbuster” information revealed yesterday was nothing more than what Ambassador Taylor said a staff member had told him about something he had overheard when somebody else was on a phone call.
Here’s how an exchange between Congressman Jim Jordan and Ambassador Taylor went.
First, Rep. Jordan read from a message sent by Ambassador Taylor to the Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland:
“Ambassador Taylor recalls that Mr. Morrison told Ambassador Taylor that I told Mr. Morrison that I had conveyed this message to Mr. Yermak on September 1, 2019, in connection with Vice President Pence’s visit to Warsaw and a meeting with President Zelensky.”
I dare anybody to follow that. It’s nothing but bureaucratic argle-bargle, full of word salad but signifying nothing. And this from Schiff’s star witness! (It is a mystery to me how Chris Wallace of Fox News could possibly believe this hearing was “damaging” to the president. His credentials as an unbiased journalist have been in question for some time now and yesterday he removed all doubt.)
But Jordan was not done filleting the witness:
“Ambassador, you weren’t on the call were you? You didn’t listen in on President Trump’s call and President Zelensky’s call?”
“I did not.”
“You never talked with Chief of Staff Mulvaney?”
“I never did.”
“You never met the president?”
“That’s correct.”
“You had three meetings, again, with Zelensky, and it didn’t come up?”
“And two of those – they never heard of about it as far as I know – there was no reason for it to come up.”
“And President Zelensky never made an announcement. This is what I can’t believe. And you’re their star witness. You’re their first witness. You’re the guy – you’re the guy. Based on this, based on – I mean, I’ve seen church prayer chains that are easier to understand than this.”
As long as we’re dealing with hearsay, and counting it as valid testimony (one Democrat said hearsay is actually better than first-hand evidence if you can believe it), how about this excerpt from yesterday’s hearing? The exchange refers to the July 25 phone call in which Trump supposedly put the extortionate squeeze on Ukrainian president Zelensky.
Q: You were with President Zelensky the very next day?
Taylor: We were. We had a meeting with him the very next day.
Q: And did President Zelensky raise any concerns about his views of the call?
Taylor: He said — so, right, so — so I, Ambassador Volker, Ambassador Sondland, were in his office, and we asked him, I think, how the call [went]. He said, “The call was fine. I was happy with the call.”
That’s ball game, right there.
Ukrainian foreign minister Vadym Prystaiko said today (Thursday) that Ambassador Sondland had “never” linked U.S. aid to Ukrainian investigations of the 2016 elections or Joe Biden’s role in stopping a probe of Burisma.
“I have never seen a direct relationship between investigations and security assistance,” Prystaiko was quoted as saying by Interfax. “Yes, the investigations were mentioned, you know, in the conversation of the presidents. But there was no clear connection between these events.”
That’s double-ball game, right there.
Chairman Schiff was in his customary high dudgeon over anyone who would divulge the name of the whistleblower and threatened any witnesses who would dare cross the line. He first told a bald-faced lie when he said in response to a comment from Jordan, “First, as the gentleman knows that is a false statement; I do not know the identity of the whistleblower and I am determined to make sure that identity is protected.”
Well, how in the world can he protect the guy’s identity if he doesn’t even know the guy’s name??
It’s common knowledge that the whistlebloviator (who likewise was only reporting what somebody had told him) met with Schiff’s staff, and it’s quite likely that a member of his staff helped him write up his hearsay accusations.
Both Google and Facebook are redacting the whistlebloviator’s name from their platforms. If Schiff wants to find out this guy’s identity, all he has to do is call up his aiders and abettors in social media.
The coup de gras moment, which should be etched in the nation’s memory forever, came when Rep. John Ratcliffe asked both Taylor and Undersecretary of State George Kent an obvious and important question: “Where is the impeachable offense in that call?” Both look startled by the question and had no response. Crickets.
Triple ball game.
The Urban Dictionary has a word for what happened yesterday. It is “traveshamockery” - a travesty of a sham of a mockery.
The impeachment is over. The fat lady has sung. Nancy Pelosi put Adam Schiff in charge so he would be the goat when this thing all blew up as she knew it would. Smart lady. She’s looking for a way to shut this carnival down as soon as possible.
If the House is stupid enough to send articles of impeachment over to the Senate, Sen. Richard Burr said Republicans are thinking about making the trial last for six weeks, six hours a day, right in the middle of the campaign. Six Democrat senators are running for reelection and the last thing they want is to choke on this shamburger at the perfectly wrong time.
Traveshamockery indeed.
The author may be contacted at bfischer@afa.net
