Political stunts distract from the legitimate impeachment inquiry
A World Series message for all those outraged by the latest shenanigans in Congress: Keep your eye on the ball.
Yes, it is outrageous that a gang of Republican House members rushed into a hearing held in a secure location, known as a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, at the Capitol on Wednesday.
Yelling “Let us in!,” the House members complained that hearings on the impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump shouldn’t be held behind closed doors.
In reality, dozens of Republicans are allowed to attend the hearings because they serve on the three relevant committees, and many have in fact attended and asked questions of witnesses. Don’t let the rushing gang confuse you: This was nothing more than a frantic attempt to distract from the facts of the investigation and delegitimize the congressional inquiry into whether Trump abused his power for personal political gain.
The Republicans who carried out the stunt know that, of course, and the president’s defenders continued their concerted campaign in the Senate on Thursday, when Sen. Lindsey Graham introduced a resolution condemning the inquiry for this supposed lack of transparency.
All of this is wrong, and the wild behavior of the president, who apparently condoned the Capitol invasion, and his defenders cannot ever go fully ignored. And it’s no coincidence that their antics have grown more frequent as the evidence against Trump continues to mount. But the matter at hand is simple: The committees must continue to investigate the prospect that Trump dangled military aid for Ukraine in return for an investigation intended to dig up dirt on a potential political opponent to help the president’s reelection campaign.
It is imperative that lawmakers get to the bottom of these allegations quickly but carefully, and then move to open hearings as soon as possible. That’s the ballgame.
— Newsday
A criminal probe into the origins of the 2016 Russian meddling investigation spells trouble
Attorney General Bill Barr first proved his value to President Donald Trump by pre-spinning the Mueller report to falsely “exonerate” his White House patron of collusion and obstruction.
Weeks after, calling for a review of the Russia probe’s origins, Trump gave Barr broad powers to declassify intelligence documents and question various members of the intelligence community, powers Barr proceeded to run with.
Last week the errand boy delivered his biggest favor yet: That Justice Department review reportedly blossomed into a full-on criminal probe; targets for questioning may include former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and ex-CIA director John Brennan, both fierce Trump critics.
We have no objection to a periodic, good-faith review of America’s intelligence and federal law-enforcement agencies and actors, given their sometimes dark history. But there’s no reason to believe a Barr-initiated investigation will be in good faith.
In his July 25 call, Trump repeatedly urged Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to reach out to Barr and Rudy Giuliani to orchestrate politically motivated investigations. Separately, Barr’s DOJ dismissed a CIA official’s criminal campaign finance charge referral arising from the Zelensky arm-twisting and tried to block the whistleblower’s complaint from getting to Congress.
His business cards say U.S. attorney general. He’s actually Trump’s hatchet man.
— New York Daily News
