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The truth finally gains ground on a lie

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) with House members on Tuesday on Capitol Hill. (Andrew Harnik/AP)
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) with House members on Tuesday on Capitol Hill. (Andrew Harnik/AP)

By Dana Milbank Columnist Dec. 11, 2019 at 3:19 a.m. GMT+3 ~ Courtesy of Washington Post

The ceremonial Rayburn Room just off the House floor has twin chandeliers, twin fireplaces with twin mantels, twin mirrors and twin sets of candlesticks, and twin urns in twin niches. And it was here that Democrats on Tuesday unveiled their twin articles of impeachment: Abuse and Obstruction.

Plain and Simple.

โ€œOverwhelming and uncontested,โ€ said Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), standing with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and various committee chairs.

The latest updates in the Trump impeachment inquiry

No relitigating the Mueller report, no laundry list of grievances against President Trump. Just the known details of wrongdoing in the Ukraine affair. โ€œThe facts are not seriously contested,โ€ Schiff said.

โ€œSeriouslyโ€ was the operative word, for at that very moment, Rep. Doug Collins (Ga.), the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, stood nearby, preparing to contest the Democratsโ€™ claims in an unserious way. Outside the room where Democrats made their announcement, Collins gazed into a Fox News camera, listening to a live feed of the event and then giving Fox viewers his hot take.

He said Schiff is โ€œrunning a sham processโ€ and committing โ€œcomplete malpractice.โ€ He said House Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) is โ€œobsessedโ€ with violating his oath of office and โ€œhe drug (sic) everybody else with him.โ€ He said the Democrats have no โ€œevidence of factโ€ and โ€œno case.โ€ He claimed โ€œthe White House was willing to participate,โ€ its actions notwithstanding. This, Collins charged, is โ€œthe most partisan impeachment on the most less facts of any weโ€™ve seen.โ€

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The most less facts! But he didnโ€™t challenge any of them.

Observing this performance with a look of amusement was the bronze statue of humorist Will Rogers. Perhaps the cowboy philosopher anticipated Collins when he observed that โ€œonce a man wants to hold a public office, he is absolutely no good for honest work.โ€

Itโ€™s often said that a lie can travel halfway across the world while the truth is putting on its shoes. But the truth gained ground this week. For two years, Trump and his defenders howled about a politically motivated FBI spying on his campaign. This week, the Justice Departmentโ€™s inspector general concluded no such thing occurred. And while Attorney General Bill Barr continued to assert the fiction, FBI Director Christopher Wray bravely spoke out, calling Trumpโ€™s โ€œdeep stateโ€ conspiracy theory an โ€œaffrontโ€ and saying the FBI has โ€œno informationโ€ implicating Ukraine in election interference โ€” a key element of Republicansโ€™ impeachment defense. (Wrayโ€™s truth-telling earned a presidential attack on Twitter.)

Now Trump is launching similar smears against impeachment investigators. He threatened the โ€œtotally corruptโ€ Schiff on Tuesday, saying Schiff will โ€œhave to answerโ€ for โ€œcommitting this fraud.โ€

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The best response to a big lie is to repeat the simple truth โ€” and thatโ€™s what Pelosi and her chairmen did Tuesday. The rollout was a bit clumsy: Pelosi seemed momentarily to forget the name of Ways and Means Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.), and Foreign Affairs Chairman Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.) wandered in 10 minutes late.Opinion | Impeachment: Why so much is at stake

But Democrats were disciplined โ€” the articles didnโ€™t leak โ€” and succinct as they summarized โ€œTrumpโ€™s efforts to solicit foreign interference in the 2020 elections,โ€ which โ€œcompromised our national security and threatened the integrity of our elections.โ€ Both articles mention that Trumpโ€™s offenses are โ€œconsistent withโ€ previous behavior, without mentioning the Mueller findings.

Thatโ€™s as it should be, for the evidence in the Ukraine case is stark. As Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) summarized Monday, investigators learned that Trump: sent Rudy Giuliani to Ukraine for dirt on Joe Biden; directed two ambassadors to work with Giuliani; fired an anticorruption ambassador to Ukraine; told Vice President Pence not to go to the Ukrainian inauguration; had his staff chief withhold Ukraineโ€™s military assistance; refused a White House meeting with Ukraineโ€™s president; ignored his advisersโ€™ anti-corruption talking points; asked the Ukrainian president for โ€œa favorโ€ and for an investigation into opponent Biden; confirmed it publicly; asked China to do the same; and blocked investigators from learning more.

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And heโ€™s still doing it: Giuliani visited Ukraine last week to continue his quest for political dirt.

CBS Newsโ€™s Nancy Cordes asked House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Tuesday if Giulianiโ€™s antics are โ€œappropriate.โ€

โ€œThat is not the question that we have before us,โ€ he said.

ABC Newsโ€™s Terry Moran asked McCarthy if he agreed that itโ€™s โ€œperfectโ€ for Trump to ask a foreign leader to investigate Trumpโ€™s political rival.

โ€œThatโ€™s not whatโ€™s before us,โ€ McCarthy repeated.

In lieu of refuting these points, McCarthy angrily tossed a word salad at reporters: โ€œWhy do you fall into a trap of an idea when weโ€™re talking about the highest elected office in this land and in this entire world that theyโ€™re so brazen that they just the dislike that they will change the rule of law to impeach him?โ€

Thatโ€™s the โ€œmost less factsโ€ Iโ€™ve ever heard.

About Whispers from the North

Whispers from the Northย is an online platform that appreciates the ecological, cultural and socio-economic diversities of Northern Kenya. We also acknowledge that the lives of the communities of northern Kenya has been shaped by a number of intrinsic and extrinsic factors which have led to complex challenge that calls for a multifaceted approach.

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