Stalin Would Be Proud of Schiff
"Stalin Would Be Proud" is the title of a very good post at The Gateway Pundit . What TGP is referring to is Adam Schiff's 6 page memo on proper decorum in a Kangaroo Court. Specifically, Schiff is obliquely demanding that Eric Ciaramella not be mentioned by name, under pain of an ethics violation complaint. Here's the relevant portion of the memo:
Whistleblower Protection and Confidentiality. The Committee has a long, proud, and bipartisan history of protecting whistleblowers—including from efforts to threaten, intimidate, retaliate against, or undermine the confidentiality of whistleblowers.
Among other authorities, the Intelligence Authorization Act of 2010 and the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act include procedures for Intelligence Community personnel to make protected disclosures to inspectors general across the Intelligence Community and to the congressional intelligence committees. Among other things, Intelligence Community personnel are shielded from any action constituting reprisal or the threat of reprisal for making disclosures in accordance with these procedures.
The statutory framework also prevents obstruction of lawful communications by federal employees with Congress, and of congressional proceedings. And, as mentioned above, the Code of Official Conduct for Members of Congress requires that every Member “shall behave at all times in a manner that shall reflect creditably on the House.” The Committee on Ethics has historically viewed this provision as “encompassing violations of law and abuses of one’s official position.”
Notice two things.
In the first paragraph Schiff attempts to put across the idea that it's somehow a bad thing to "undermine the confidentiality of whistleblowers"--on a par with threatening, intimidating, or retaliating against them.
But in the very next paragraph he, um, undermines that attempted subterfuge by plainly and accurately stating that the Intelligence Authorization Act of 2010 and the Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act only shields whistleblowers from "any action constituting reprisal or the threat of reprisal for making disclosures."
Is mentioning a whistleblowers name a reprisal or threat? No. It's not. And Schiff doesn't dare make that bald assertion.
And, in fact, Eric Ciaramella isn't even a whistleblower, as defined by statute. As TGP concludes:
Stalin would sure be proud of Adam Schiff and his Soviet-style impeachment coup against Trump.
If the Republican members have even a single hair on their collective ass, each and every one of them will repeatedly mention Eric Ciaramella by name. Repeatedly and insistently. Every single one of them.
Is the USA now a banana republic or what?