RUSH: Now, I want to go back to what’s happening in this — you know what? This hearing here, Animal House makes this look like I don’t know what. You know, the Dean Wormer investigation of the fraternity? Makes that look legit. You know what these people are doing? I’ll just give you one thing I just heard and it was during the top-of-the-hour break. The first witness that was called was a lawyer, Democrat counsel by the name of Berke, Barry Berke.

I’d not seen him before during any of this. I haven’t watched it all. And then after Berke, we had the Republican counsel, Mr. Castor. Then they take a break, and they go for questioning. And this guy Berke, the opening witness, is now questioning the Republican lawyer. And Louie Gohmert is beside himself. (imitating Gohmert) “What the hell? This is a violation of House rule 665(b)14(z), what the hell are you doing there? How can this guy go down there, be a witness, and show up and be your interrogator?”

And the Round Mound of the Gavel is pounding the gavel. “Gentleman will suspend. Gentleman will suspend.” And Louie is, “Well, what the hell did he have to pay to be able to do –” And you should have seen the look that Nadler gave Gohmert and said, “The gentleman will cease casting aspersions on members.” But this is so irregular, I cannot – (laughing) the opening witness now becomes an interrogator of the Republican. The Republican’s not gonna get called up there to be an interrogator, guarantee you, ’cause the Republicans didn’t think of it.

But then there was this. This guy Berke now is asking Goldman. Now, Goldman is Schiff’s lackey. Goldman is the MSNBC contributor who served as Schiff’s lawyer during his committee hearings. That would be the Intelligence Committee. This is the judiciary. So now this guy Berke is asking Goldman, “In your experience as an esteemed lawyer, is it usual that you can expect someone to tell someone that they’re actually breaking the law during the call?”

And Goldman says, “Well, in my experience as a lawyer defending all kinds of reprehensible characters, I think it’s highly unlikely that, say in this case, the president would say to Mr. Lazinsky, ‘Look, I’m gonna break the law by asking you a question here, and I want you to do it anyway.’”

It’s not even hearsay. It’s worse than that. They are manufacturing conversations that didn’t happen. They are assuming — so let me rephrase this — I wanna make sure the power of this is understood. The first witness is now the lawyer questioning the Republican and a new Democrat lawyer. And he gets to Goldman, the Democrat lawyer, and he says, “Okay. In your experience as a lawyer representing people, is it likely that a perp, say, who has ill intent would identify this ill intent to somebody he’s speaking with on the phone?”

And Goldman says, “My experience is, dealing with these kind of people, that someone breaking the law in the middle of a phone call does not advise the other person on the call that he is breaking the law. So it’s unlikely that President Trump would have admitted he was breaking the law when talking to President Zelensky.” What, even though we know he was? What is this? This is worse than Schiff making up the contents of a call. This is these two Democrats off in fairy land imagining something that didn’t happen based on their knowledge and experience in previous cases and how perps behave.

(doing imitation) “No, it’s highly unlikely that President Trump, in this case I know that’s who you’re asking about, it’s highly unlikely that President Trump would say to President Zelensky., ‘Look. I’m gonna do something here that’s illegal. I want you to ignore that, and I want you to do it anyway. I guarantee you it’ll be okay.’ In my experience, perps do not operate this way. People engage in criminal behavior do not admit it when they’re doing it.”

It’s entirely manufactured. This thing never happened — they’re now getting into what it is they think is the mind-set of this sick and evil Trump. This question did not call for any evidence. It called for hearsay, and it called for speculation on the part of the lead Democrat lawyer, pure speculation beyond hearsay in an effort to convince people watching that Trump knew he was engaging in illegal activity but he was smart enough not to tell Zelensky that he knew it was illegal.

But we all know it was illegal and he was doing it, and this is why there’s no evidence for Trump doing it is because perps do not admit it when they’re in the process. That’s what they’re trying — Trump’s guilty, he knew he was guilty, and because he didn’t say he was doing something illegal is how we know he was doing something illegal. That was the point these jerks were trying to make.

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RUSH: This is the audio sound bite.  This is Louie Gohmert in disbelief that Nadler is allowing his first witness to then leave the witness chair and go back up to the committee chair and become an interrogator of witnesses.  This is how that sounded…

GOHMERT:  This is not appropriate to have a witness —

NADLER: (banging gavel) Does the gentleman have a point of order?

GOHMERT:  — be a questioner of somebody —

NADLER: (banging gavel) Does the gentleman have a point of order?

GOHMERT: — that was a witness when he was!

NADLER: (banging gavel) The gentleman will suspend. The… (sputtering)

GOHMERT:  It’s just wrong.  There is no rule nor precedent for anybody being a witness, and then getting to —

NADLER: (banging gavel) That is not a point of order. (banging gavel)

GOHMERT: — come up and question —

NADLER: (banging gavel) I have ruled and it’s not —

GOHMERT: — and so the point of order is he’s inappropriate to be up here asking questions.

NADLER:  That’s not a point of order!  He’s in accordance with Rule 66, with —

GOHMERT:  How much money do you have to give to get to do that? (chuckling)

NADLER: (banging gavel) The gentleman will not cast aspersions on members of the staff or the committee.  Mr. Berke has the time.

RUSH:  You should have seen the look that the Round Mound of the Gavel gave Gohmert when he said that. He stared him down.  Literally, folks, the first witness is now interrogating the Republican lawyer.  To the phones we go.  Federalsburg, Maryland, Mike, welcome to the program, sir.  Hello.

CALLER:  Hey, Rush.  Hello.  So tell me. These things are so outrageous. You’ve made the case time and time again. You spent your whole monologue talking about how outrageous is. It’s so over the top, you can’t even begin to explain what’s going on there.  We just hear a cut from Nadler gaveling down somebody over something that’s so absurd, it defies our imagination that it’s even occurring. And in the midst of all that — you’re right — you compare it to Animal House!  And I’m thinking, I put it to you, Rush: Exactly when do we see value out of this in the Republicans to continue being a part?  When do the Republicans need to walk away and say, “Enough is enough; we’re not gonna participate in it anymore”?

RUSH:  Well, you know, interestingly enough, there is a massive movement out there in social media for that exact thing to happen.  A lot of people are asking, “Why are the Republicans even giving this thing any dignity by being there?  This thing is such an obviously stacked deck. It’s not even a legitimate hearing. It’s nothing more than a political event with a bunch of hacks coming in advertised as witnesses and lawyers and so forth, that the Republicans ought to just get up and leave.”  I think it’s the optics of empty chairs that probably…

I would guess that they’ve discussed it.  I don’t know.  But I would guess it’s been discussed.  But they do lend it legitimacy by being there. Plus, I’m sure they feel they need to be there to help call out some of these outrages for people who are watching.  But give it the rest of the afternoon.  Remember the pattern here, ladies and gentlemen.  Remember the formula — and remember something else.  It’s hard to remember this, and even now some of you may disagree with my professional assessment here.  But this has blown up on them!

Every time they’ve gone public with any aspect of the Trump-Russia collusion coup, it has not gone well for them.  The Kavanaugh thing didn’t go well for them when they tried to take something made up public.  They finally put all their eggs in the Mueller basket.  There was nothing in the report.  There was nothing in the aftermath. So then they said, “We need Mueller, we need Mueller,” ’cause they had convinced themselves that the Mueller report did have things in it but that Bill Barr, the AG, had cornered the damn thing and had gone rogue on it and was misreporting what it said and that Bob Mueller was mad.

So they bring Mueller up to testify, and that blew up on them when he didn’t even know what was in his own report.  And now this, the polling data from these three battleground states, Trump’s approval numbers? It’s all on the rise.  You’re not alone when you see this thing as an abject circus.  The tendency is to think nobody else recognizes it.  The tendency is to think the Democrats are getting away with it.  But this hearing… I told you last week, they did this day on purpose to mask the IG report, to cover it up, to make sure it didn’t get any coverage in their house organs — CNN, New York Times, or what have yoBut this is a total circus, and anybody watching this… Remember, a lot of people watch cop shows now. A lot of people watch lawyer shows, a lot of people watch courtroom shows — and the amount of hearsay, the amount of speculation, the lack of any hard evidence here is abundantly clear.  The Democrats don’t have anything other than horror of the allegation, that Donald Trump was telling Ukraine to do an investigation of the Bidens or they wouldn’t get any money to defend themselves against Russia.

That’s pretty much the case, and that this is abuse of power and that it’s a cover-up and that Trump is obstructing Congress by not providing documents, instead going to court.  They don’t have anything when their lawyers have to lie about video excerpts they’ve edited, when their lawyers have to get into speculation and hearsay.  This is what raw hatred is.  It poisons you, folks, and these people are long gone.

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RUSH:  The full House voted last month, as part of their vote on the impeachment process, to allow Republicans to have a day of hearings.  And the Round Mound of the Gavel, Jerry Nadler, just denied them that, even after the full House voted last month to allow it.  Reuters has the story: “U.S. House Judiciary Chair Rejects Republicans’ Bid for Impeachment Witnesses.”

So Nadler’s not even allowing Trump witnesses at this hearing today, even after the Republicans had been promised — after a full House vote — that those witnesses could be called.  From the article: “The Democratic head of the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee,” the Round Mound of the Gavel, today “rejected Republican lawmakers’ request for eight witnesses to appear as part of the panel’s impeachment inquiry…

“The requested witnesses fall ‘outside the parameters of the impeachment inquiry,'” said Nadler. So in addition to all of the other outrages happening today, Jerry Nadler has denied a full House vote that permitted the Republicans a chance to call eight witnesses.  Nadler says today that after he found out who the witnesses are, that they are outside the purview.

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RUSH: Right now I just heard a smidgen of it, but Doug Collins seems to be moving in for the kill on Daniel Goldman, the MSNBC lawyer for the Democrats here, asking how the media was tipped off on various subpoenas and who did that. And Goldman, “I don’t think that’s how he did it, sir.”

“Oh, don’t give me that.” And then I had to come back here to the busy broadcast. So we’re finding this stuff as it goes, and again I just want to remind you the pattern. In the afternoon the entire tone of all this changes once the Republicans get their go at these people. And that’s a little bit of what’s happening now.

The Democrats, the bottom line is, they’ve got nothing. They’re standing on quicksand, essentially, as their foundation, and they are relying on their symbiotic relationship with the mainstream media to use the first two to two and a half hours of these hearings every day as long as they’ve been going on to make the case, and then they’re banking on the fact that what happens after the lunch break is not gonna be seen by nearly as many people, and even if it is it’s not gonna be reported on by the Drive-By Media. But these people are being made to look like amateurs here this afternoon. In addition to the tricks they’re playing by having an opening lawyer as a witness then go up and start questioning the Republican.

Now, here is the actual exchange between Barry Berke — he’s the first Democrat witness who then Nadler calls up to the committee as the counsel. So a witness who got a 30-minute opening statement uncontested and then got 30 minutes of questioning by Democrats now is up on the committee sitting next to Nadler asking questions. It’s unprecedented. A witness then becomes interrogator.

And here is the exchange where this lawyer, Barry Berke, talking to the MSNBC lawyer Goldman, this is the pure speculation hypothetical, projection, everything. It is a question — and they’re just making things up. This is the segment where they’re discussing how just it never happens that felons and lawbreakers tell other people that they’re breaking the law at the time they’re doing it. Not in my experience. It just doesn’t happen. Here’s the exchange. It runs about 36 seconds.

BERKE: Would you agree that if President Trump was acting corruptly, wrongfully, abusing his power, that it was unlikely he was gonna confess to President Zelensky that he was asking for the investigation explicitly to help his 2020 election prospects?

GOLDMAN: My experience is 10 years as a prosecutor you almost never have a defendant or someone who’s engaging in misconduct who would ever explicitly say, in this case, “President Zelensky I’m going to bribe you now,” or “I’m going to ask for a bribe,” or “I am now going to extort you.” That’s not the way these things work.

RUSH: A, that didn’t happen. B, they’re making it up. And because Trump didn’t do this, they’re saying he’s guilty of it. Because he didn’t do it proves his guilt. Let’s go back to the question. “Would you agree –” this is asking for an opinion, not a fact witness, this is just some guy that doesn’t even know Trump, the guy’s not in Trump’s orb, he is a Trump hating liberal Democrat hack lawyer from MSNBC who, by the way, was at the Southern District of New York during the Bush administration. “Would you agree that if President Trump was acting corruptly –” If? You mean, you still can’t go beyond if yet? And how many weeks in are we?

You have to parse this stuff, folks. I’m the guy that sees the stitches on the fastball here, and the curveball as well. “Would you agree that if President Trump was acting corruptly, wrongfully, abusing his power, that it was unlikely he was gonna confess that to President Zelensky, it was unlikely that he was asking for the investigation explicitly to help his 20 –” so what they’re getting at here since Trump didn’t do this, he’s obviously guilty of it.

Since he did not abuse his power, since he did not tell Zelensky that he wanted dirt on Biden for his 2020 campaign (imitating Goldman), “Oh,” says Goldman, “Oh, no, my experience, 10 years as a prosecutor, you almost never have –” Almost never? “– have a defendant who would ever explicitly say, ‘President Zelensky, I’m gonna bribe you.’” This is as bad as Schiff making up the transcript of the phone call.

These two guys don’t know anything on this phone call beyond that transcript. But they’re assuming that Trump is meddling in the 2020 election asking Zelensky. But he didn’t admit it. One of the defenses, “Trump didn’t ask this guy for any help.”

“Well, in your experience would a perp ask and identify that he’s trying to bribe the guy?”

“No, my experience is that people engaging in bribes don’t actually say that’s what they’re doing.” BS. I don’t know a person alive who’s being bribed that doesn’t know that it’s happening to them. You ever been blackmailed? You ever been bribed? You know it, right, when it happens to you? But these guys are, “Poor Zelensky, Trump wouldn’t tell him he was engaging in –”

But beyond that, it’s all made up. It’s all speculation, and this MSNBC lawyer is answering it on the basis of his 10 years of experience as a prosecutor. “You almost never have a defendant.” Trump’s a defendant now. “Oh, yeah, you almost never have a defendant engaging in misconduct who would ever, ever say, ‘Hey, Zelensky, I’m breaking the law, I’m bribing you, buddy. But I can’t tell you that, all right?’” It’s hopeless. These guys are slime, folks, they’re just abject slime. They are slugs.

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RUSH: Here is the exchange between the ranking Republican member of the Judiciary Committee Doug Collins today, Republican, Georgia.  He’s speaking to the Democrats’ MSNBC lawyer, Daniel Goldman.  He said, ” Somebody took the phone records that you asked for, took those numbers, then said, ‘Let’s play Match Game.'” By the way, is not amazing that the same people telling us that we can’t find out who the whistleblower is, that we must protect the identity of the whistleblower…?

“We have a moral duty to protect the identity! Why, the Trump administration might kill the whistleblower!” The same people unmask the phone numbers of Devon Nunes and John Solomon and others, same people! Adam Schiff. The same slimeballs.  So this is what Collins is asking about to the MSNBC lawyer.  “Somebody took the phone records that you asked for, took those numbers, then said, ‘Let’s play Match Game.’  Who ordered the Match Game from the members of the Congress and the press?  Was that you?”

GOLDMAN:  I don’t think anyone did, sir.

COLLINS:  Then how did you get them…? Okay, come on. That’s the most ridiculous item I’ve ever heard.  Who ordered them to actually match from members of Congress and the press?  Was it you or was it Chairman Schiff that said, “While we’re doing this, let’s see if this matches Chairman Nunes’ number”?  Somebody along the way just didn’t all of a sudden have an epiphany, unless you’re getting ready to throw a low-level staffer under the bus. So who did it? Was it chairman Schiff or was it you?

GOLDMAN: Ummm. (stammering)

COLLINS:  Be careful.  You’re under oath.

GOLDMAN:  I — I — I know I’m under oath, sir.

COLLINS:  Then answer the question.

GOLDMAN:  It doesn’t matter, and I will answer the question if you give me a second here. It’s not a simple answer.

COLLINS:  The same second that was not afforded to my witness, by the way.

GOLDMAN: (crosstalk) the questions.

COLLINS: Who decided to leak it, by the way? And while you’re thinking about how you’re going to answer that question — who decided to leak it, the information — why did you include it in the report?

GOLDMAN: That’s not a leak, sir.

COLLINS:  Who ordered it?

GOLDMAN: (silence)

COLLINS: Was it you or was it Chairman Schiff, and then why was it decided — except for nothing but smear purposes — to be included in the Schiff report?

GOLDMAN: (stammering) I — I — I’m not going to get into the deliberations of our investigation with you.

RUSH:  Right.  “I have nothing to tell you here.”  They want to know how the hell did these phone numbers get matched up to people.  Who did it?  Who authorized it, and then who released, ’cause it’s in Schiff’s report? This guy will not answer. (impression) “I’m not gonna get into discussions of our investigation with you.”  They got caught again, and they just will not explain how and what and why they did anything they’re doing.

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RUSH: Now this whole thing…In fact, I just watched another exchange, this time between the Round Mound of the Gavel and the MSNBC lawyer.  The Round Mound of the Gavel had to go in and do damage control. So he’s asking a bunch of leading questions about the phone metadata and the phone numbers that these people tagged and were following. What they were trying to do is, okay, they saw this number talking to this number for this length of time, and this number talking to that number for this length of time, and they want to find out, “Whose numbers are these?” 

They find out it was John Solomon, a journalist, and they find out it was Rudy and they find out it was some other people and so they put this in Schiff’s report, and that’s what Doug Collins asked about. “Who did this?  Who decided to match these numbers up with names?  Who decided to do this?  Is it you?”  So this guy wouldn’t answer Collins, but when the Round Mound of the Gavel got in there to try to clean it up, he kept using the word “scheme.” The MSNBC lawyer kept using the word “scheme.”

(impression) “Well, we found this number, and this number was involved with the scheme — and this number over here, that person ended up being involved in the scheme. The scheme?  The president’s scheme to serve justice! The president’s scheme to obstruct Congress. The president’s scheme to meddle in the 2016 election. These people were all involved in the scheme.”  So now Trump was engaged in a “scheme,” about which and for which there remains no evidence — and there remains no identifiable, impeachable offense. 

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RUSH: So the Democrats are probably gonna accuse Trump in an article of impeachment of obstructing Congress by not furnishing witnesses and documents. And yet when that weasel Goldman was asked by Collins, “Well, how did you match these numbers, how did you do this investigation?” “I’m not telling you that.” Oh, so they get to hide the way they’re doing things. The president doesn’t. That’s how this works?