Wednesday, June 29, 2022

The January 6 Show Trial Resorts to Hearsay

The Democrat January 6 Show Trial decided to take a page out of Ferris Bueller's Day Off and derided to run with a false yet salacious second hand claim based purely on hearsay:

Simone : Um, he's sick. My best friend's sister's boyfriend's brother's girlfriend heard from this guy who knows this kid who's going with the girl who saw Ferris pass out at 31 Flavors last night. Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

Pretty much the same level of reliability  has come from the carefully produced  January 6 Committee Testimony.

AP: Cassidy Hutchinson, Trump White House aide, now in spotlight

 Former aide: Trump tried to grab steering wheel from Secret Service agent after 1/6 rally

Cassidy Hutchinson a little-known former White House aide, described an angry, defiant president who was trying that day to let armed protesters avoid security screenings at a rally that morning to protest his 2020 election defeat and who later grabbed at the steering wheel of the presidential SUV when the Secret Service refused to let him go to the Capitol.

Hearsay by its very nature is disallowed in court, with a few exceptions, because testimony that based on what the witness heard from what he said that he said that she said is by its nature unreliable.

As is the case here: 

There's numerous problems with the "testimony".

Cassidy Hutchinson wasn't actually there and is relaying a story she heard from somoene else second hand. The originator of the unlikely story, unsurprisingly was not called to testify about it, because you know, potential perjury.  

You can draw your own conclusions to the story's reliability from that lack of the Committee calling a first-hand witness to testify to the occurrence of the event.

Trump apparently wasn't even in the Beast (A Black Cadillac) that morning  but in a Chevy Suburban limo and thus could not have grabbed at the wheel of the Beast, never-mind that he could not have reached it from where the dignitaries sit in the beast anyway, making the entire story implausible at best.

The Secret Service agents who were actually there are denying this ever happened.

So the January Sixth Committee is relying upon second or even third-hand hearsay of a salacious story that fits the Democrat narrative, even as it doesn't comport with reality and the people who were actually present state it never happened.

Can you say reliance on unreliable and inadmissible evidence to paint an Democrat-pleasing "Orange Man Bad" story?   Yep, I knew that you could.

Yes, the Sixth Committee is naught more than a show trial, complete with a television producer to try to up the ratings of this now literal show trial.  

Hearsay is fine for ratings for reality TV.   

For a serious investigation into the claim that this was an "insurrection",  it is not.  Then again, this never was a serious investigation, it's a Democrat show trial and nothing more.

8 comments:

Well Seasoned Fool said...

How many of the representatives are members of the bar?

Aaron said...

WSF: Enough of the Democrats on the committee that they should certainly know better, yet aren't letting that get in their way.

pigpen51 said...

No doubt the Democrats know exactly what they were doing. As you said, they were not presenting this to a court of law, but to the court of public opinion. Which is the only hope they have to salvage something come the midterms come November. Because they have made such a mess of things, starting with Afghanistan, and continuing to the pandemic and on to the economy that things do not look good for them.
Even the vice president has lower ratings than Dick Cheney did, and he shot someone in the face. When they put Joe Biden up for president, and then hid him in his basement for the campaign season, for the most part, I knew that if he won, he would either not serve the entire term of office, or would be just a figurehead. Well, we don't know about the first prediction yet, but the second one is pretty much confirmed, especially after seeing his cue/flash card the other day.

Matthew W said...

The Democrats know that it's a BS story, but they also know that once something is said in public, it becomes the truth to the morons (Democrat voters)

Roberta X said...

Federal rules on hearsay are not simple, and include exceptions that you need a law degree to parse; in any event, a Congressional hearing is not a trial.
http://www.columbia.edu/~mr2651/ecommerce3/2nd/statutes/FRE.pdf

Aaron said...

Pigpen51: They know what they're doing, basic "Orange Man Bad" and spread salacious crap to make the ignorant and non-critical thinkers think there was more to Jan 6 than the stupidity that actually did occur.

MatthewW: Yep, as always the lies gets around the world, in this case helpfully amplified by the MSM, before the truth can get its boots on. Notice how the denials form Secret Service and those who were actually there are not getting nearly the same coverage.

Aaron said...

Roberta X: It just so happoens that I am a klawyer and understand hearsay quite well. In short all is hearsay exdfeption for that which is not hearsay or a hearsay exceotion.

Here the testimony is not form a first hand wirtness, but form someone realyaing what soemone else saiud someone else said.

Hearsay is disliked due to its lack of reliability.

Here that lack of reliability of Ms. Hutchinson;s testimony is shown by the fact that those who were actually present are denying the claimed event ever occurred.

Further lack of reliability is indicated by how its rather well nigh physically impossible for anyone, much less Trump could have reached all the way from where the dignitary sits in the back of the vehicle to reach the steering wheel.

While you dislike Trump (and yep there's acceptable reasons for disliking Trump, but relying on false and salacious third hand reports made for a tv show is not one of them), your reliance on the thin and unreliable reed that is Hutchinson's testimony (such as it is, to claim Trump "crossed the Rubicon" is rather misplaced.

Matthew W said...

Aaron:
"Notice how the denials form Secret Service and those who were actually there are not getting nearly the same coverage"

The Secret Service of course has a process for allowing employees to speak in public (about work).
As much as we would like to think that the protection of POTUS is non partisan, who controls the department??????
So yes, the truth will take a long time to get out officially, and unfortunately like the "Charlottesville Lie", BlueAnon will never stop believing the lie when given the truth.