Parallels between the Horowitz and impeachment investigations...

If one back and takes a close look at the two major stories of the day, you can see some amazing parallels, and some even more amazing hypocrisy. In both cases we have political allegations that seem to lack smoking gun evidence of the main allegation. In both cases the argument being made by the accusers is that the overwhelming circumstantial and other non-confessional evidence suggests guilt. A guy wearing a mask walks into bank with a gun, and walks out with a bunch of money during the same time period that the bank reports being robbed. Do you need a confession to prove he robbed the bank?

In theory, people never actually simply confess to things when they are being investigated. I would no more expect the members of the FBI to admit that their well known anti-Trump feelings had anything to do with the 17 major problems associated with the FISA warrants than I would expect Trump to come out and say he was blackmailing Zelensky for 2020 election help from his Ukrainian government.

It's interesting to watch the politicians switch sides in this argument. For the past weeks we have seen Republicans demand that there is no direct evidence of corrupt intent by the President, while Democrats have argued that there is more than enough circumstantial and non-confessional evidence to draw that conclusion. But in the hearings yesterday, you had the positions flipped. Democrats argued that a lack of confessional or smoking gun proof of bias, rules it out. Whereas Republicans argued the common sense in plain sight argument based on circumstantial and non-confessional evidence that they have been rejecting in the impeachment hearings. 

So what do you need to actually prove one or the other? 

One of the legal principals when it comes to proving bias (as it pertains to things like minority hiring, charges of sexism, housing discrimination) is whether or not someone can provide an alternative reasoning for their decision. If a employer or landlord fails to provide a legitimate explanation for why they didn't choose a equally well qualified minority, they leave themselves open to charges of discrimination. If that employer or landlord has any past history of bias, or any known negative feelings towards a class of person, that works against the person being accused as well.

When it comes to the FBI and the investigation into the Trump campaign, Horowitz admitted under oath that he was neither offered or was able to come up with on his own any alternative explanation as to why the FBI did not handle that investigation by the books, and why broke from FBI regulations so obviously and frequently (17 separate times). It "could have been bias" Horowitz argues, but that he couldn't conclude it for sure. However, lacking a clear alternative and knowing the anti-Trump sentiment that existed within the FBI ranks, that would have been enough (in many legal instances) to suggest or even conclude that it was bias. Certainly would have been enough had the FBI been a landlord and they had chosen not to rent to Trump. 

On the flip side, the impeachment situations is quite a bit different. There are, in fact, several alternative explanations provided for why Ukrainian aid had been delayed. While many on the left are reluctant to believe them, they are consistent with public statements made prior to, during, and after the time period in question. Trump not trusting world leaders and complaining about the United States carrying to much of the financial burden in Europe and the rest of the world is nothing new. Moreover, not supplying the aid is not actually illegal, or a mistake, or against regulations. Trump has the right to set terms and conditions with the aid.

There are more differences!

The major difference is that the FBI broke protocol, regulations, and in some instances they broke the law. If one could prove that the FBI ran afoul from their responsibilities due to some sort of collective desire to bring down an elected President, that makes a bad situation much worse. But the problems are there one way or the other. The bad actions happened.

But in the case of the President, nothing he did was technically against any rules or regulations and certainly was not outside of the law.  In fact, the aid was provided, and nothing was provided back from Ukraine in return. To prove that Trump was nefarious and actually ran afoul the law (short of a confession of some sort), you have to remove the possibility of any legitimate reasoning for his actions, and leave yourself with the only possible option being a corrupt intent.