Republican Herd

When you can’t counter facts and evidence, what do you do? You scream as loud as you can about the process, create a giant scene of faux outrage, and state a massive hissy fit. That’s exactly what Matt Gaetz led House Republicans to do yesterday.

Though Gaetz didn’t stampede a herd of cattle through the private impeachment hearing, delaying a witness from the Pentagon from testifying for five hours, he did find a bunch of poo-flinging monkeys in the form of fellow Republicans.

Republicans are crying about the Democratic-led hearings being held in secret, but they don’t have a leg to stand on. They say it defies precedent as previous impeachment hearings were public. But those impeachments reached the House AFTER the investigative process. What’s going on now is the investigative process, much like the Republican investigations into Benghazi and Fast & Furious, which also started in secret. After the investigative process, there will be public hearings. After Trump is impeached, he’ll have a trial in the Senate where yes, he will have a defense team. Granted, a very stupid defense team, but a defense team nevertheless.

Why hold the investigations in secret? One reason is so witnesses can’t collaborate from watching each others’ testimonies. The other reason is so House members don’t turn the hearings into a circus. Proving this point, yesterday, Matt Gaetz and a bunch of Republican clowns crashed a committee hearing yesterday.

Another complaint is that Republicans can’t participate or ask questions in these hearings. False and false. Forty-eight Republicans are on the committees in these hearings and they can ask questions. Here’s a fun fact: At least 13 of the Republicans staging the party-crashing yesterday WERE INVITED TO ATTEND THE HEARINGS! They’re on those committees. It’s like crashing a party you’re invited to. If they really wanted to take part in these hearings, then why didn’t they attend and question the witnesses instead of crashing it with idiot Gaetz and holding a pizza party? Yeah, they had pizza.

Another fun fact: These hearings are being held in a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, commonly known as a SCIF (in case you’re a Republican, that’s what we call an “acronym”). There are rules that cell phones are not allowed into these facilities. Yet, this will totally come as not a surprise to you, several of these stupid Republicans brought in their devices. Some even live-streamed and tweeted from inside the room. So much for Republicans caring about national security.

Even more fun facts: House leader Kevin McCarthy and Donald Trump knew beforehand this was going to happen, and they approved.

And yet, another fun fact: Gaetz and his staff handed out expired congressional passes to some uncredentialed reporters and the crew of HBO’s The Swamp, which is documenting Gaetz’s efforts to combat the hearings, which is a violation of House rules.

Matt Gaetz and his band of stupid brothers are fortunate they weren’t arrested, but many believe that’s what they wanted as it would have made a bigger scene.

Republicans are complaining about secret hearings over Trump corruption they believe should have remained a secret. When these hearings go public, they’ll do everything they can to suppress and shout down witnesses. If they think it’s bad now, wait. Their defense isn’t going to improve.

Expect more Republican stampedes in the future because all they have is bullshit.

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