A lie is a weak little thing pitted against boundless inexorable Reality.

Chief Inquisitor Adam Schiff has said he does not know who “the whistleblower” is in whose alleged (unpublished) report to him – of a phone call by President Trump to the president of Ukraine – he claims there is proof that President Trump committed an impeachable crime.

What crime might that be? Asking for something in return for aid – for a “quid pro quo” – perhaps? [Can that be called a crime? Isn’t diplomacy all about quid pro quo?] Or how about bribery? Or even treason perhaps?

Schiff would have it known that it was a surprise to him to receive the report. He continued to disclaim any knowledge of who had authored it. He learnt, however, by some untold means, that the man (whom he called “the whistleblower”) had not actually heard the phone call he was reporting so couldn’t vouch for its accuracy. In which case, since the report wasn’t all that Schiff wished it to be, he  could and did compose his own version, one in which President Trump demands “reciprocity” and asks  the government of Ukraine to “dig up dirt” [on his political enemies, is implied].

Strangely, he read his version of the phone call to the House Intelligence Committee – and the media – one day after President Trump released the true transcript of it. 

Schiff admitted that his version was a “parody”. But driven on by his intense irrational hatred of the President, he insisted there were still solid grounds for impeachment even with only the real transcript to go on – plus the testimony of many witnesses he would call. Among them, he said, would be “the whistleblower”. There was no doubt, he said over and over again in one way or another, that “the whistleblower” would have to be heard from in person.

So an impeachment inquiry was launched by the House Intelligence Committee chaired by Adam Schiff.

Then Schiff changed his mind about calling “the whistleblower”. Not only would he not be called to testify, his identity – which Schiff went on claiming he did not know – was to remain strictly hidden. He was not even to be mentioned. The (false) excuse given was that it was against the law for the name of a whistleblower to be revealed.

One of the witnesses on whose testimony Schiff built his hopes of framing the President of the United States, was Ukrainian-born Lt.-Col. Alexander Vindman, one of only three people who had actually been there when the phone call was made and had heard what was said.

Vindman was Schiff’s lucky find. He was most likely Schiff’s chief witness. And he was artfully played: not called the first day of the inquiry but only the second day, and then not on his own but in company with one of the other two who had been present when the phone call was made, an adviser to Vice President Pence whose testimony was of no help whatsoever to Schiff.  

Vindman came to the hearing in his full dress military uniform. It declared his loyalty to America. In his testimony he stressed how honest, how honorable, how obedient to the rules he was.

Virtuous fellow that he is, he was so disturbed by what the President had said in that phone call that he made his concern know to a few other people – though any suggestion that he was a leaker, he said, was “preposterous”.

He too had consistently maintained that he did not know who “the whistleblower” was.

He played his part faultlessly, and all went as Adam Schiff wanted it to go.

Until this happened: 

We refer especially to what is said between the marks of 4.00 and 5.36 minutes.

The mention of an intelligence officer, though he is not named, scares Adam Schiff into interrupting with a stern order that “the whistleblower” must not be “outed”. Rep. Jim Jordan, masterfully disingenuous, expresses surprise at that. Why bring up “the whistleblower”, he asks. Both Schiff and Vindman, he reminds them, had said they didn’t know who he was. (And he slips in – as it were in parenthesis – that no one believes Adam Schiff doesn’t know who “the whistleblower” is.)

Vindman is saved from having to explain his silence about the secret name by his lawyer’s instruction not to utter the name of anyone in the intelligence services. It is Adam Schiff who gives away his own secret – that that very intelligence officer mentioned by Vindman is “the whistleblower”.

Schiff shows signs of confusion when Jim Jordan wakes him up to the realization that his lie has been exposed.

So now we are certain that Schiff does know who “the whistleblower” is, and why he is trying to lock him away out of sight.

The story must be something close to this:

Vindman leaked his version of the phone call to Schiff (directly or indirectly). Schiff, reading what he liked into it, wanted to treat it as a whistleblower’s report. Vindman on no account would allow himself to be known as either a leaker or a whistleblower. Someone else must be found to play the whistleblower role. Vindman would admit that he had imparted the information, but  only to people with “proper clearance” who had a “need to know”. So the person who would play the part of the whistleblower must be someone with “proper clearance”. Who better than an intelligence officer? Such a man was known to Schiff. And to Joe Biden. He was a Democrat who had been put to use few times before and would do nicely now. Schiff claimed that he would come forward with his testimony.

But when the impeachment inquiry actually began, he could not be called – because in fact he knows nothing. He is not a whistleblower; he is a plant, a flunkey. He would agree to have his name revealed to Democratic leaders  – Nancy Pelosi for instance – who would insist on knowing it. But his identity must be kept from common knowledge.

Adam Schiff doesn’t seem to think his plans through very well. He didn’t anticipate that Republicans would demand to question the so-called whistleblower in an inquiry. To prevent that he ruled that the Republicans would not be permitted to call any witnesses, and that “the whistleblower” was not to be mentioned during the hearings. Now he seems not to be reckoning with the probability that if President Trump is impeached by the House and sent to trial by the Senate, the man would be called to testify and his identity would have to be revealed.

And what if under cross-examination he were to tell the truth?

That possibility really could put his career, and even his life, in danger. Not from his political enemies who already know his name, but from his political friends and masters who do not want it to come out that his enemies have nothing to fear from him.