Intercept illustration/Getty Image.

Despite shameless, frantic, tantrum-throwing gaslighting by all - Trump shrieks his accusers are all "losers," one of the seven words he knows, hatchet man Barr dismisses his own report to charge the FBI acted "in bad faith," GOP toadies claim a towering mountain of evidence is "ambiguous" - the impeachment advances blessedly apace thank you very much, with even civil conservatives declaring the evidence against him "overwhelming." If you haven't the patience or stomach to follow it in depth, consider the concisely gut-punching testimony of Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), who in under five minutes summoned the ghosts of Watergate - especially Sen. Howard Baker's famous, "What did the President know and when did he know it?" - to lay out a razor-sharp Spark's Notes of Trumpian crimes. Mildly noting that nobody is asking Baker's question because "we know what the President did, and we know when he knew it," Swalwell first decimated hapless GOP counsel Stephen Castor's portrayal of a fictional "anti-corruption President," in truth mired in fraud, before pointedly launching a killer, knowing series of rapid-fire questions at Democratic counsel Daniel Goldman.

To wit: "Mr. Goldman, who sent Rudy Giuliani to Ukraine to smear Joe Biden?" Followed by, "Who fired the anti-corruption Ambassador in Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch?...Who told Ambassador Sondland and Ambassador Volker to work with Rudy Giuliani on Ukraine?...Who ordered his own Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney to withhold critical military assistance for Ukraine?...Who asked President Zelensky for a favor?... Who personally asked President Zelensky to investigate his political rival Joe Biden?...Who refused to meet with President Zelensky in the Oval Office?...Who stood on that same lawn and said that China should also investigate Vice President Biden?" and, finally, "As to anything that we do not know in this investigation, who has blocked us from knowing it?" Each time came the same, short, merciless answer: "President Trump." Swalwell finished up with a brutal flourish: “So as it relates to President Trump, is he an incidental player or a central player in this scheme?” “President Trump,” said Goldman, “is the central player in this scheme.” Man, these guys are good. We can't wait to hand the country, or what's left of it, over to them.

He knew everything, he directed everything, he was at the center of everything. pic.twitter.com/2c8SGrpdg7

— House Judiciary Dems (@HouseJudiciary) December 9, 2019