Rep. Adam Schiff, Democrat of California, announced on Wednesday that public hearings into the impeachment inquiry will begin at the end of next week, to which one can only reply, "Whooo, doggies!" One of the first witnesses to step in is going to be Bill Taylor, the former U.S. ambassador to the Ukraine, whose testimony to the House Intelligence Committee in closed session was released on Wednesday and, as has been the case with every transcript thus released, Taylor's hammered another 15 or 20 nails into the coffin.

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Was there a quid? Could it possibly be connected to a quo? Why yes, said Ambassador Taylor.

That was my clear understanding, security assistance money would not come until the President [of Ukraine] committed to pursue the investigation.

In addition, Taylor testified, the ubiquitous Gordon Sondland popped in to make sure that, contrary to public policy, there was no official record kept of the now-infamous July 25 telephone call between the president* and his counterpart in Ukraine.

In the normal, regular channel, the State Department operations center that was putting the call together would stay on the line, in particular when you were having a conversation with the head of state, they would stay on the line, transcribe, take notes so that there could be a record of the discussion with this head of state...When he wanted to be sure that there was not, the State Department operations center agreed. And they told us, they said in response to [Sondland’s] request, they said, we won’t monitor and we certainly won’t transcribe because we’re going to sign off.

From the moment his opening statement was released on the day he testified back in October, Taylor has been the witness who has stated most flatly that the quid met the quo and had a nice chat over vodka and herring. He also clearly has no interest in taking the fall for anyone, including the Secretary of State. I have no idea what the impact of the public hearings will be; much will depend on how much of a farce the Republican minority is willing to conduct. But Taylor has been, and will be, clear on what went on. According to Taylor, he told Mike Pompeo that he wasn't sure he would take the job.

I was concerned that there was—I think I put it—a snake pit in Kyiv and a snake pit here.

Bill Taylor, master of understatement, appears publicly before Congress on Wednesday, November 13.

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