Even though he's a patient man, Elijah Cummings has his limits. All day Wednesday, as Michael Cohen entertained the House Oversight Committee with tales of trouble and woe and payoffs to porn stars, the Republicans on the committee had made a meal of the fact that "this committee's first hearing" under Cummings's leadership featured "a guy who already has lied to Congress." This none-too-subtle attempt at defending a corrupt president* by delegitimizing the functions of the committee used up what was left of Cummings's forbearance.

Already, the hearings had gone briefly off the rails when Rep. Rashida Tlaib accused Rep. Mark Meadows of using an African-American woman who works for the administration as a "prop" to prove that the president* was not a racist. (Good luck with that one, chief.) Tlaib said that doing so was racist in and of itself. Meadows went up the wall, and Cummings had to make peace between one of his principal antagonists and one of the more promising rookies of the new Democratic majority, which obviously was not how he planned to end the day.

He decided to make a closing statement. He decided on eloquence.

I've sat here and listened to all of this and it's very painful. You made a lot of mistakes, Mr. Cohen, and you've admitted that. You know that one of the saddest part of this whole thing is that some innocent people are hurting, too, and that's your family...I don't know where you go from here...We are better than this. As a country, we are so much better than this...It sounds like you're crying out for a new normal, to get back to normal. It sounds to me like you want to make sure that our democracy stays intact. I'm hoping that the things you said today will help us to get back there.

Cummings addresses the media after the hearing. Alex Wong Getty Images

I mean, come on, now. When you've got in the Washington Post, our president has made 8,713 false or misleading statement...It sounds like you got caught up in it and some kind of way...President called you a "rat." We're better than that...You know what hurt me? That picture of you leaving the courthouse and, I guess it was your daughter, had braces on. Man, that hurt me...

When we're dancing with the angels, the question will be asked, in 2019, what did we do to make sure we kept our democracy intact? Did we stand on the sidelines and do nothing? Did we play games, and I'm tired of these statements where, "Oh, this is the first hearing..." This is not the first hearing. The first hearing was in regard to prescription drugs. Remember? A lady sat there, and her daughter died because she couldn't get $333 a month in insulin. That was our first hearing. Second hearing, HR 1, voting rights. Corruption in government. Come on now. We can do more than one thing and we have got to get back to normal.

That's all the day was about, really. A reassertion of democratic forms and norms, institutions and prerogatives, and a reassertion that took place despite the best effort of the House minority to tamp it down. That was what the day was about. That is what the next election is going to be about. That's what the next five years are going to be about. The Second Reconstruction is underway.

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Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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