House Democrats running a hearing on racism on social media was bound to be an embarrassing disaster. And that was before Rep. Ted Lieu, the most embarrassing House Dem not to be a CBC member, decided to run a gotcha routine on Candace Owens.

And before Rep. Nadler, trying to figure out how to monetize the post-Mueller landscape, decided to step in and defend him. That resulted in Nadler delivering a line that just begs for the Mark Twain treatment. "The witness may not refer to a member of the committee as stupid."

Nadler is defending Lieu. And calling Lieu stupid would be charitable, when he's using the hearing to posture. He's also, as Owens notes, wrong and was not paying attention. Owens was saying that Lieu and other Dems thought black people were stupid.

Nadler just assumed, naturally, that she was calling Lieu stupid. Why he jumped to that conclusion is a question Lieu ought to ask him.