Is there any creature more pathetic in the entire collusion-gate, Mueller report saga than Rep. Adam Schiff. I think you could argue that MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow set the bar pretty low with her constant focus on conspiracy theorizing about the case, but she’s a commentator on the resistance network. Rep. Schiff is the consummate Democratic insider who really had more insight into this than most people. And yet, his legacy seems to be redefining failure as a moral victory for his team.

I was on a plane for 12 hours yesterday so I missed the Mueller show in its entirety but looking at the aftermath today, it seems clear there were no bombshells and Mueller didn’t do much to pump up Democrats. Rep. Schiff seems to have acknowledged as much today. He appeared on CNN to suggest that after the Mueller testimony he wasn’t convinced impeachment was such a good idea:

On CNN’s “New Day,” Schiff swatted away concerns that Mueller’s performance, which lacked any bombshell moments, was an impediment to Democrats’ investigative efforts, emphasizing the “substance” of the former special counsel’s testimony was “just devastating.”

“Should we put the country through an impeachment?” Schiff said. “I haven’t been convinced yet that we should, and going through that kind of momentous and disruptive experience for the country, I think, is not something we go into lightly.”…

“Yes, you know, the halting nature of his answers made questioning him a challenge,” the congressman said. “As a former prosecutor, it meant that, you know, you take each witness as they come, and it meant it wasn’t easy to get him to tell a narrative.”

On one hand, Schiff has said before that he wasn’t sure impeachment was a good idea, but the whole point of yesterday’s Mueller show was to give Democrats a chance to reset the narrative, one they felt had been stolen from them unfairly by AG Barr. That’s why Dems, and Schiff in particular, kept demanding that Mueller give this testimony as a final service to the country. But what he and Democrats got yesterday was not the lifeline what they were hoping for.  In fact, Rep. Schiff’s take (“it wasn’t easy to get him to tell a narrative”) is being very generous with Mueller’s performance. Other observers put it much more bluntly:

A frail old man, unable to remember things, stumbling, refusing to answer basic questions…I said it in 2017 and Mueller confirmed it today — All you pundits and moderates and lame Dems who told the public to put their faith in the esteemed Robert Mueller — just STFU from now on

— Michael Moore (@MMFlint) July 24, 2019

Getting back to Rep. Schiff, remember when this lamprey-with-eyebrows was telling the nation that he’d seen evidence of collusion. He rode that horse until the Mueller report shot it out from under him. Now his latest stunt to justify his own public fixations has failed. Here’s Schiff’s closing statement yesterday. This is what it looks like when you spend two years promising the resistance the moon and wind up delivering nothing more than an embarrassing hearing that impressed no one who wasn’t already convinced.