If the public cared about substance, then what Adam Schiff, Chair of the House Intelligence Committee and Mueller’s most important interlocutor today, sets out in this tweet would be fatal to the Trump Presidency:
Schiff, as I’ve noted in this space several times, is a brilliant public servant who, in five minutes of what amounted to cross examination, asked questions like the trained prosecutor he is, eliciting all of those points with queries that could be answered by Mueller in only one way, with monosyllables if he liked. Yes. Correct. Absolutely. Agree. True.
We already knew all this, though, and Mueller was as careful and reluctant as everyone expected. While Nadler on the Judiciary Committee also scored some points, getting Mueller to affirm that contrary to Donald’s claims his report was most certainly not an exoneration of the President, it’s not like that sound bite will be playing on Fox and Friends. What we didn’t get, what we were never going to get, was Mueller stating flat-out that Trump committed crimes, would be under indictment right now but for that damnable Justice Department policy, could have been shown to have engaged in a conspiracy, at law, if he and his henchmen hadn’t lied and obstructed to the point that the crucial evidence couldn’t be gathered, and, as an aside, of course Bill Barr misrepresented the conclusions of his report before it was released to the public, setting the false narrative reported in the media before anyone knew what it really said.
Mueller comes from a world, long gone, in which facts matter, and his on-camera performance wouldn’t matter, and has obviously expected all along that his report would prompt Congress to do its job and impeach the miscreant in the White House.
We’ll see, but remember the mantra: Don’t get your hopes up.
the needlefish 