How serious is this Whistleblower business? Today’s hearing with the Acting Director of National Intelligence began with Rep. Adam Schiff reading a fabricated transcript of the call between President Trump and Ukraine President Zelensky. Schiff later called it “parody.”

Zelensky is, by trade, a comedian. Schiff, by definition, is a joke.

And so is this alleged scandal. It’s hard not to feel for Acting DNI Joseph Maguire. Schiff and Nancy Pelosi, among others, called this honorable man, a former Navy SEAL, a criminal. And Democrats spent the morning been trying to rip him apart. Why? Because he listened to the binding opinion of the Department of Justice, and was trying to do things properly, deliberately and by the book. (And of course, because he agreed to work for Trump.) 

Maguire defended his handling of the whistleblower complaint. Rightly, of course, because he did what the law required him to do.

He also stood up for the alleged whistleblower, despite the factual errors in the complaint. He believes the whistleblower was acting in good faith, despite not knowing who it is. And despite, he admits, having no idea whether the allegations in it are true or not. Understandable. The whistleblower is under his charge. When you’re the new boss, the last thing you want to do is send a signal to your people you’ll abandon them at the first sign of trouble. 

On a lighter note, Maguire did make the day of many when he accidentally referred to Rep. Eric Swalwell as “Congresswoman.” 

The Complaint Itself

You can read the complaint here. 

The whistleblower claims Trump solicited information from a foreign government in order to affect the 2020 election. By asking for information about that foreign government’s admitted interference in the 2016 election. An interference that U.S. Attorney John Huber is currently investigating. 

Oh, but Trump also wanted information on Joe Biden, a “political opponent.” The guy who can’t remember where he is, when major events in his life occurred, can’t get through a single public appearance without a gaffe or shock, and is clearly not going to be the nominee. He’s no political opponent. However, he is a former VP who blackmailed the then-president of Ukraine to thwart a corruption investigation involving his son.

The new president won office by vowing to fight corruption. Both Trump and Kelensky want to drain their swamps. Newsflash: Working together on anti-corruption efforts is a good thing.

The whistleblower claims the White House “locked down” information about the president’s phone call. From who? Leakers? Imagine that. And this would be the same phone call that, in an unprecedented move, the president just released. Ben Shapiro is perplexed at the logic. 

So just to be clear, the big bombshell from the whistleblower report is that Trump covered up a transcript that he just released to the public yesterday?

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) September 26, 2019

The “White House official” objected to the call being stored in a secured storage system at the NSC. This, charge goes, is wrong because the call contained “nothing remotely sensitive.” You mean despite being a private discussion between world leaders discussing an ongoing investigation, to say nothing of discussing European Union nations?

The whistleblower also claims the State Department is upset at Rudy Giuliani for being involved in talks with Ukraine. That’s called “protecting your turf.” (If only there was as much concern about John Kerry continuing to talk to Iran with the goal of undermining U.S. policy.) 

The whistleblower says several officials were “deeply disturbed” by Trump’s communications with Zelensky. When aren’t hundreds or thousands of people in D.C. alone disturbed by something Trump has said? In all seriousness, this gets to the most amazing thing about this so called “whistleblower complaint.”

Or So They Heard

The first thing you find reading the complaint: This is no complainant. This is a collator.  This so-called whistleblower is tooting a whole bunch of other horns. Sean Davis at The Federalist collected the hearsay menagerie:

“I have received information from multiple U.S. Government officials,” “officials have informed me,” “officials with direct knowledge of the call informed me,” “the White House officials who told me this information,” “I was told by White House officials,” “the officials I spoke with,” “I was told that a State Department official,” “I learned from multiple U.S. officials,” “One White House official described this act,” “Based on multiple readouts of these meetings recounted to me,” “I also learned from multiple U.S. officials,” “The U.S. officials characterized this meeting,” “multiple U.S. officials told me,” “I learned from U.S. officials,” “I also learned from a U.S. official,” “several U.S. officials told me,” “I heard from multiple U.S. officials,” and “multiple U.S. officials told me.”

All we’re missing is “A little birdie told me.” As Davis goes onto say:

A review of the entire complaint shows it is not so much an example of whistle-blowing, an act that can only be done by the individual holding the whistle, but an elaborate gossipy game of telephone between unnamed individuals whose motives and credibility are impossible to ascertain.

Crazy? Maybe. Maybe Not

A former intelligence operative we spoke to put it this way: “A whistleblower is someone who needs protection because they are reporting abuse/neglect/illegality that they have personally witnessed, or have been ordered to participate in.” This is not what we have here. 

According to The New York Times, what we have is a CIA officer who worked “for a period of time” in the White House. Wanna lay odds this is one of Brennan’s loyalists? Have they dusted the complaint for John Brennan’s finger-prints?  Rush Limbaugh reported rumors the loyalist was specifically placed in order to undermine the Spygate investigation. That would have sounded crazy three years ago? Why? We know James Comey admitted to placing people in the White House in order to spy on Trump and his people. We know spies were planted to gather information on the Trump operation. And the Intelligence Community has personal motive. Between the FISA report and Huber investigation, the IC’s role in the framing of Trump and his campaign members is set to be exposed.

The clock is ticking. Hence, the “urgency” Schiff spoke about yesterday. 

Multiple Government Officials

Who were these “multiple government officials” who chewed the ear off the complainant? Do you have any idea what a broad statement that is? Does this include members or staffers from the House Intelligence Committee?  IC people still loyal to James Clapper and John Brennan?  Deep State Never Trumpers? Madge, the White House Cleaning Lady? 

The complaint is also loaded with references to mainstream media reports. If you were going to raise a red flag about something dire going on in your office, are you going to be sourcing mainstream media reports? But if you are creating a narrative … 

Does it read like a whistleblower complaint or a carefully crafted narrative meant for congressional consumption? How many outsiders helped craft the complaint?

As comedians like President Zelensky will tell you, timing is everything. What else was going on at the time of the president’s call? Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats had just stepped down. Coats was no friend of the President. Trump was hunting for a replacement. Adam Schiff publicly pushed Coats’ number two, Sue Gordon, for the job. Gordon was no friend of the president. Trump went instead with Maguire, a non-partisan former Navy SEAL, bucking Schiff. 

How many of fans of Coats and Gordon were upset? Grumbling around the watercooler, or at the Georgetown bars?

Between the upheaval at DNI and the pending revelations about the Obama-era IC, there are more axes to grind than at a lumberjack jamboree. 

You know Sen. Chuck Schumer’s threat to Trump: “You take on the intelligence community — they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you.” You mean, like collating second-hand information, twisting a phone call beyond recognition, labeling it “urgent concern” and watching it leaked to Capitol Hill and media partisans? That’s one way. Not a good way, but one way.

It grows oh, so familiar. 

Now Isn’t That a Familiar Move?

Schiff tweeted before today’s hearing that “we have been informed by the whistleblower’s counsel that their client would like to speak to our committee. … We’re in touch with counsel and look forward to the whistleblower’s testimony as soon as this week.” 

Devin Nunes and Mollie Hemingway compare this complaint to the Steele Dossier. Certainly. The sloppy work of a politically biased spy aiming to destroy one Donald J. Trump. (Or, to be fair, another “patriot” in the mold of Comey, taking upon himself to smash the traditional role of an IC operative and publicly question what a president says to another leader.)

But I see echoes of another fabled hit job. 

See if this sounds familiar:

1. An anonymous complaint that is very destructive toward the president’s goals.
2. Somehow damaging details from this anonymous complaint gets leaked to the press.
3. Democrats go into full outrage mode.
4. The complainant lawyers up and out of the countless lawyers around town picks one who happens to be a Democratic activist.
5. When the actual complaint is released, the story told, and it doesn’t match the initial reports and its full of holes. 
6. The complainant agrees to come before a congressional committee to share their truth. 
7. Let the circus ensue. 

Yep, this is as much a rehash of the Christine Blasey-Ford plotline as it is Russia Hoax Part Deux.

I’d say you can’t make this up. But as Adam Schiff proved this morning, they already are.

We are far beyond parody. 

 

Al Perrotta is the Managing Editor of The Stream and co-author, with @JZmirak, of The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration. You can follow him at @StreamingAl. And if you aren’t already, please follow The Stream at @Streamdotorg.