An adult opinion on the Jan 6th hearing vs investigation

Why the DOJ Is Taking Its Time on January 6 Probe

THE New York Times bewails the comparative snail’s pace of the Justice Department’s reported investigation of former president Trump and his advisers in schemes to overturn the result of the 2020 election. Seems prosecutors are so “apparently plodding and methodical” that they frustrate . . . well, it’s not exactly clear who is frustrated except for the Times and its fellow partisans. For all its rebuking of the former president’s tactics, the paper has adopted his “people are saying” schtick for broaching topics that are of more interest to the Times than to most people. In truth, besides Democrats, the January 6 committee controlled by Democrats, and the media allies of Democrats, no one is wondering whether or why the Justice Department’s investigation is lagging behind the committee’s.

As I pointed out over the weekend: The committee, by adopting a slick, television-production approach that suppresses such inconveniences as cross-examination and opposing perspectives, has managed, in the eyes of some, to create the illusion of a detective story constantly turning up new revelations. Despite its TV-drama presentation, the committee’s summer episodes have not altered our basic understanding of January 6.

Yes, some of the committee’s new details are titillating. And because we already know what this puzzle looks like when fully assembled, the committee’s fitting the pieces together week-by-week may project the appearance of progress. But overall, the story never changes.

By contrast, the Justice Department is expected to come up with something that is genuinely new: criminal liability.

In so doing, prosecutors have to account for facts that don’t fit the committee’s political narrative — e.g., Trump’s statement in his Ellipse speech that the crowd would be “peacefully” marching to the Capitol, which the committee continues to ignore as if it didn’t happen; and the fact that Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick died of strokes that occurred after the riot, under circumstances where no causal connection between the riot and the strokes has ever been established, contrary to the committee’s disingenuous suggestion, repeated most recently last week, that he died of injuries sustained during the riot.

Unlike the committee, the Justice Department has to deal with such nuisances as judges, defense counsel, and cross-examination. In a criminal trial, if a federal prosecutor dared to point out, as the committee does with cavalier regularity, that witnesses have refused to testify based on their Fifth Amendment rights or lawful privileges, the judge would respond by declaring a mistrial due to government misconduct and referring the prosecutor for professional sanctions — because litigators well know that such assertions violate basic due process as construed by the Supreme Court for decades. Nor are prosecutors at liberty to allege without evidence that a suspect’s actions resulted in someone’s death; they know they have to prove it — unlike a partisan congressional committee, the Justice Department doesn’t get to float a grave accusation and impose on the suspect the burden to prove his innocence. Prosecutors can’t make unhelpful facts disappear by studiously omitting mention of them, and they can’t make up helpful facts for which they lack evidence.

Ahem... all too obvious to most of us. But not to those suffering from cognitive dissonance and who actually believe they are witnessing a real hearing or even a real trial. 

McCarthy goes on to talk about the fact that Democrats are trying to suggest that Jeffrey Clark pressured Georgia officials to not certify the state results (which also plays into the Georgia investigation by a partisan county prosecutor with a grand jury that cannot indict anyone).  As McCarthy points out the facts don't correlate with the allegations and last (but not least) the letter was never sent. 

But that is another common theme. Besides ignoring facts that undermine their narrative or bring up allegations that they cannot prove - the committee loves to literally bring up stuff that didn't actually happen!

In fact, the committee is rather stacked with this sort of "evidence". Things that "almost happened" or things that Trump was "going to do before he was stopped" by some hero or heroin looking out for the country's best interest. They refer to draft letters never sent, proposals never implemented, etc, etc... These are things that might make your average everyday TDS enhanced liberal get aroused when the committee brings them up, but they are also things that did not actually happen would never be part of a court case. 

In other words, much of the committee's hearings and findings are completely useless to an actual prosecutor. A prosecutor cannot call people to testify who "claim" to have been motivated by Trump to do something. A prosecutor cannot call people to testify about things that didn't happen. The prosecutor cannot bring in people to testify about what they believe Trump thought. The committee's bombshell witness (Hutchinson) has a snowball's chance in hell of ever seeing an actual witness stand in a real trial. 

At the end of the day, McCarthy is correct. Democrats are providing theater for the faithful 5% or so of the population who are very interested in this. But this sort of fake hearing is probably working against the DOJ as they try to continue their own investigation.