The gushing over Adam Schiff continued on Wednesday. While CNN hailed the “dazzling” and “remarkable” opening statements by the Democrat, ABC’s Terry Moran enthused over the “senatorial eloquence” of the “meticulous” Schiff.
Regarding Schiff’s two and a half hour address, Moran extolled: “Adam Schiff addressing the Senate sitting as a court of impeachment with a proper legal argument. It was meticulous and well organized. It was grounded in evidence, which he recited and arranged, as you said in a comprehensive narrative. At times, he tried to rise to a level of eloquence and to stir a sense of responsibility for the Senate.”
Clearly enraptured, Moran continued:
We heard him talk again and again about the responsibility to future times. That what is done here will have an impact on generations to come,on the delicate balances in the Constitution, on the power of the President and the Congress and how they have been arranged up until now. At one point, saying that if the Senate rejects the Democrats’s case that the President abused power, quote, “We will write the history of our decline with our own hands.” And I think we're seeing a clash of culture that's going to be right through this trial. Here is an argument made by Adam Schiff in a classic legal fashion.
Speaking of the Congressman, the dazzled Moran concluded, “Even rising to the level of senatorial eloquence, if there is such a thing.” All of this, of course, contrasted to Trump:
The kind of brash and proudly profane Trumpian rhetoric where argument consists of gainsaying your opponent or them names, Rethuglican [sic] or Dumbocrat [sic].
As far as liberal journalists go, Schiff is a star. MSNBC insisted he pulled off “one of the great performances” of all time.
A transcript of the exchange is below.
ABC impeachment coverage
1/22/20
3:39GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Terry Moran, one of the things we saw here from Adam Schiff, we have seen him at the hearings and press conferences. It seems clear that he and his team have honed down their argument. Still two and a half hours, but trying to turn it into a narrative, what they hope is a compelling narrative. He call it is about three days in July.
TERRY MORAN: That's exactly what I think we just saw for the past couple hours, two and a half hours. Adam Schiff addressing the Senate sitting as a court of impeachment with a proper legal argument. It was meticulous and well organized. It was grounded in evidence, which he recited and arranged, as you said in a comprehensive narrative. At times, he tried to rise to a level of eloquence and to stir a sense of responsibility for the Senate.
We heard him talk again and again about the responsibility to future times. That what is done here will have an impact on generations to come,on the delicate balances in the Constitution, on the power of the President and the Congress and how they have been arranged up until now. At one point, saying that if the Senate rejects the Democrats’s case that the President abused power, quote, “We will write the history of our decline with our own hands.” And I think we're seeing a clash of culture that's going to be right through this trial. Here is an argument made by Adam Schiff in a classic legal fashion.
Even rising to the level of senatorial eloquence, if there is such a thing. In contrast to the rhetoric that we live with every day. The kind of brash and proudly profane Trumpian rhetoric where argument consists of gainsaying your opponent or calling them names, Rethuglican or Dumbocrat. Or whatever. That now passes in many areas of our life as sufficient. Sufficient to resolve difficult questions of policy. This is a test of that older way of resolving issues. The older style of argument we just listened to for two and a half hours. And the bullet fast, bullet hard argument that is championed more than anyone in our public life by the President who is being impeached.
STEPHANOPOULOS: A test right now of the Senate.
