And so it begins

A Rally at the Trump Hotel by Kyle Tsui is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Republicans are going to get their wish.

For the past month, ever since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the beginning of the impeachment inquiry, Donald Trump and his GOP lickspittles have been excoriating the fact that the depositions are being held behind closed doors, in the basement, veritably out in Narnia. Last week saw the stunt where Matt Gaetz led a merry band of morons in storming the SCIF where a witness was about to be deposed.

Well, Pelosi is calling their bluff. On Thursday the full House will vote to formalize the impeachment proceedings, even though it's not needed. What does this mean? That that public testimony Republicans so want is about to happen.

Of course, they were hoping for the public testimony so that they could hop in and act the fool, as they always do, when questioning witnesses.

However, according to Politico, Pelosi has a plan for that.

One of the more significant changes, described by three Democratic sources, would allow lawmakers and staff to question witnesses for longer than House rules typically allow. Under existing House rules, lawmakers typically get five minutes apiece to question witnesses, with Republican and Democratic members alternating. The resolution would permit each side a longer, uninterrupted round of questioning that can be divided up among lawmakers and staff — similar to the way witnesses have been questioned in closed-door depositions.

House Democrats are going to give staff lawyers more time to question witnesses. When Democratic lawyers questioned Corey Lewandowski, he wilted beneath the pressure, not being shielded by his GOP allies.

With the beginning of the public, televised hearings, all transcripts from the depositions will be made public. All the hints we've been hearing about devastating testimony will see the light of day.

This is also putting a crimp in the Senate GOP's resolution, tabled by leading sycophant Lindsey Graham, to wag their fingers at the "illegitimate" House Democratic proceeding. Again from Politico:

The move has already led to a pause among Senate Republicans considering a resolution to condemn the House's impeachment process, who are divided over whether to continue pressing the proposal. The resolution was referred to the House Rules Committee and Chairman Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said he would need to see how Pelosi handled the inquiry this week before moving forward.

Pelosi has again run rings around the blundering GOP.  Based on the court ruling directing the Department of Justice to hand over former Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III's grand jury documents to the House which specifically said that the House didn't have to take a formal vote on starting impeachment, she didn't have to do this. But now this takes away any pretense that the regime was holding on to painting this process as fatally flawed. Although the Politico piece states that some vulnerable Democrats are leery of taking a public vote, the fact is that more than 218 Democrats have already come out in support of the inquiry. Pelosi wouldn't have done this had she not whipped the votes. On Thursday Democrats will snatch the wig off of Trump and his minions. Then we'll see what ludicrous motions they make to move the goal posts.

Good morning, patriots. The wind is at our backs. Unfurl the sails.