After Hirono calls on Barr to resign, @LindseyGrahamSC interrupts her and angrily accuses her of "slandering" Barr pic.twitter.com/TE76l2hrd3— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2019
I have to admit much of this questioning, even by Democrats, proves the case for letting counsel ask questions of witnesses (as I recall being done during Watergate hearings) to establish facts, then letting Congresspersons grandstand and make speeches (something being done on both sides of the aisle).
Some are worse than others, some are better; but lawyers drilling into witnesses is a better way to go (and why Barr doesn't want counsel for House committees questioning him). However, it is not all darkness or light:
BREAKING: The AG made the exoneration about obstruction w/o knowing (at all, apparently) that one thing Manafort obstructed about in hopes of getting a pardon was sharing polling data w/someone his own deputy thinks was a Russian spy.— emptywheel (@emptywheel) May 1, 2019
(Listening live: Kamala Harris is proving her chops as a prosecuting attorney. Barr is closer to sweating than he's been since I started listening, during Hirono's questions/speech.) Like this, in fact:
Barr admits he did no work of his own before deciding to clear Trump of possible obstruction of justice charges pic.twitter.com/6bBQj90rru— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2019
The Mueller Report refers 15+ times to the Trump campaign sharing polling data with a Kremlin-linked Russian, beginning on page 7 of the Executive Summary.— Rep. Don Beyer (@RepDonBeyer) May 1, 2019
It refers to documentary evidence and testimony from Trump Deputy Campaign Chair Rick Gates.
Barr's response is shocking. https://t.co/ESlLyFb0ti
Turns out Barr isn't a particularly good defense attorney.
And we still don't know what the meaning of "is," is:Harris just did some of that prosecutor shit.— Rick Wilson (@TheRickWilson) May 1, 2019
And yes, we are in Wonderland: "Sentence first, Verdict afterward!"Kamala Harris asks Barr whether anyone at the White House asked or suggested that he open an investigation into anyone— Kasie Hunt (@kasie) May 1, 2019
Barr doesn’t answer
Barr: “I’m trying to grapple with the word ‘suggest.’”
Facts, after all, are stupid things. And Harris proved my point about who should ask questions:Attorney General William Barr just admitted, under questioning from @SenKamalaHarris, that he nor Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein reviewed the underlying evidence upon which Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report was based.— David Gura (@davidgura) May 1, 2019
Hmmmm.....Huge difference between veteran prosecutor Kamala Harris questioning AG Barr and just about every other windy senator, in both parties...— Susan Glasser (@sbg1) May 1, 2019
Ted Cruz bemoans that Barr has gotten "the Kavanaugh treatment" pic.twitter.com/z64YFBgDw9— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 1, 2019
That's funny:
Senator Kamala Harris's questioning of Attorney General William Barr was reminiscent of her questioning of Brett Kavanaugh during his Supreme Court confirmation hearings, @maggieNYT writes. Follow along as our reporters discuss Barr's testimony: https://t.co/CxSJFtaafJ pic.twitter.com/OjqA7QtNV8— NYT Politics (@nytpolitics) May 1, 2019
Yep. It is hard to see a whole lot of new factual ground being broken from now on.
The highlight was Mazie Hirono and I found that I could understand why people are impressed with Kamala Harris for the first time. She was great. Patrick Lehey was as ineffective as ever. I haven't gone back to see Sheldon Whitehouse yet, he's usually very good.
ReplyDeleteBarr doesn't stand up to a determined and smart questioner very well, does he. No wonder he's so scared of Nadler's format in the House.