Judiciary Committee was a clown car

Former special counsel Robert Hur had to be asking himself, “I got a degree in English and American literature from Harvard and a law degree from Stanford, so why am I subjecting myself to questioning from these partisan pinheads?”

I was under the weather Tuesday, so I thought I would sit and watch the House Judiciary Committee hearing designed to — well, I don’t what it was designed to do. Here is USA Today’s brief list of takeaways.

After an hour, I was more sick than before.

I should have known better, because I have watched hearings before and I know the last thing they are interested in is the truth.

Both sides cherry-picked the report like stoop laborers.

The Democrats focused on the part of the report that said there was insufficient evidence to bring a guilty verdict.

Squad member Democratic U.S. Rep Pramila Jayapal, in questioning Hur, said the report “exonerated” Biden and when Hur tried to correct her, because it did not exonerate Biden, she yapped right over him and wouldn’t like him speak on her time.

It put me in mind of Donald J. Trump’s claims that he was “exonerated” when the impeachment failed. He was not “exonerated,” but he probably believes it as he believes a lot of crap.

Shirtsleeved Republican U.S. Rep Jim Jordan, the committee’s chair, claimed that Hur reported that Biden had broken the law.

The 388-page report did not say that and Jordan knows it.

A lot was made of Hur’s comment that Biden came across as “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.” Hur said he felt obliged to explain why he did not prosecute, and he seemed credible to me.

Almost every person who spoke was trying to spin the report to their advantage, zeroing in on the minutia, including contradictions in Joe Biden’s deposition.

Have you ever been deposed?

Many compare it to a colostomy,  but without the sedative.

The process is not so much a pursuit of truth. It is more like a carefully laid mine field in which lawyers hope you will explode.

Often the lawyers try to goad the witness into losing their temper and blurting out something damaging.

My lawyer warned me to keep my temper, and not to make jokes. I was half successful.

Yeah, I challenged the lawyer. I made fun of his questions, when he asked me the same question four times in 20 minutes.

“Do you have a memory problem, counselor?,” I said with a smile. “You keep repeating the same question.”

What he was trying to do was to get one answer to be a little different from the previous one — and then he pounces. He might accuse you of lying, or just being stupid.

I can’t say I heard every question by every Rep — I couldn’t stand it. But I heard enough to know that Diogenes was not in the room with his lantern.

Every time you allow all the clowns in the circus 5 minutes to speak, you know it’s going to be a waste of time.

How would I change it?

Each party should get to appoint one inquisitor who asks all the questions, and that person should not be an elected official, but a law expert.

That would keep the shameless grandstanding to a minimum, and perhaps reveal the truth.