In a matter of hours, Special Counsel Robert Mueller will spend his day testifying before two congressional committees. The most interesting will be his appearance before the House Judiciary Committee chaired by the pugnacious napoleonic New York Congressman Jerry Nadler. Mueller will also appear before the Intelligence Committee chaired by California’s lead Trump adversary, Congressman Adam Schiff.
Nadler made the round of the Sunday news shows with a message that President Trump has “clearly” committed “high crimes and misdemeanors” – the predicate for impeachment. He flat out claimed that the Mueller Report established that President Trump is guilty of obstruction of justice and even criminal conspiracy with the Russians – the latter charge totally repudiated by Mueller. As far as obstruction of justice, Mueller left that one hanging in controversy like a Florida ballot chad.
Nadler’s overstated claims are based on his visceral desire to impeach President Trump. He has been lobbying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to allow him to proceed.
If Nadler has all the evidence, why does he need Mueller to testify? The former Special Counsel already testified in public at a May 2019 press conference – and he said that if Congress compelled him to testify, he would go no further than what is written in his Report.
Like Nadler’s hearings featuring Watergate felon John Dean, this hearing is not to gain new information, but to stage another political dog and pony show. It is very simple. For two long years, the Democrats and their media allies proffered the story that Trump was guilty as Hell of criminal collusion, obstruction of justice and padding his golf score – the latter of which may be the only legitimate accusation. Since the Mueller Reports pulled the rug out from under their long, long false narrative, they have been doing everything possible to revive it.
Following the Report, Nadler & Co. clamored for Mueller to make a public statement. When he did, they did their best to spin his comments back to the old discredited narrative — but Mueller did not give them the solid ground they hoped to tread.
The anti-Trump folks seem to have a major misconception. They say that the public opposition to even hearings on impeachment – by about 60 percent – stems from their belief that the general public is not aware of the contents of the Mueller Report. We have not read it. Given the number of one-sided publicity Democrats and the media have given to the salient portions of the Report, the Democrats assumption is preposterous. We got it. We already know virtually everything that is likely to be restated during the Mueller hearing. It is once again the left’s contention that all disagreement with them is due to ignorance, evil and mostly both.
Most Americans have heard the Democrat case. They have heard about ten instances of alleged obstruction. They have heard about all those meetings between Trump operative, associates and casual acquaintances and Russians of some sort or another. Based on Democrat criteria, lunch at the Russian Tea Room in New York City would qualify as collusion.
Democrats are unwilling to face one potential truth – that most Americans have heard their talking points, understand the situation and simply do not agree with the impeachment-crazed anti-Trumpers. No one understands that better than House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has been dumping cold water on red hot impeachment advocates, like those ladies known now as “the squad” – more like a Democrat circular firing squad.
Nadler and his fellow Democrats make no secret of their purpose. It is not to garner more information, but to re-stage and regurgitate the old stuff. They now believe that hearing it from Mueller himself will make the critical difference – although we did hear it from Mueller himself already.
They are treating the Mueller Report like a stage show that failed in Peoria, closed after one day off Broadway, and now they want to take it to the Great White Way (no racism intended, please) as a big-time production using the same script written by Mueller that flopped previously. They do not even have a new cast. They believe that America will be enticed to give a standing ovation to a production the people walked out on in the past.
If Mueller is true to his word, he will provide the same information he offered up in his press conference. Nadler and the Democrats are hoping beyond hope that he does not do that. They want him to confirm that Trump criminally colluded with Russians and that Mueller elevates his ten examples of POSSIBLE obstruction to a legal charge.
Of course, that cannot happen since the folks at the Department of Justice determined the examples of POSSIBLE obstruction did not constitute sufficient evidence to charge Trump – and it was not based on an inability to officially indict the President. As far as the Mueller Report is concerned, Trump is in no legal jeopardy … none. That only leaves the extralegal political threat of an impeachment – and even that is unlikely prior to the 2020 General Election, with removal from office a virtual impossibility.
Nadler and Schiff obviously believe that a protracted impeachment hearing will cripple Trump during the 2020 presidential campaign. Pelosi seems to believe that such a hearing would interfere with Democrats getting out their positive messages, and would all but guarantee Trump a second term. Someone is very wrong.
The one advantage Nadler and Schiff have is the certainty of a fawning media that will declare their production to be a smashing hit under any circumstances. It is not an uncompromised advantage because most Americans do not believe the press these days – thanks to their extreme prejudicial reporting.
Republicans should send a “thank you card” to Nadler, Schiff, the ladies of the squad and the rabidly anti-Trump media for sucking all the air out of the room with regard to those positive issues they politically savvy Democrats want to pursue. As long as they keep focused on the aging Mueller Report and their false narrative talking points, Trump will come out a winner — despite his occasional efforts to blow the election.
So, there ‘tis.