I think the alleged conventional wisdom is wrong. I think Dems retake the Senate BY Impeaching Trump

[friend of m and j]

71. I think the majority of the people in this country don't know what is in the Mueller Report.

They are surprised when someone tells them Trumps misdeeds and crimes that are laid out in the report. The people have to understand and be informed about what is going on. If they are not informed they will think Dems are bad guys going after Trump by filling Articles of Impeachment. In today's world the only way to inform them is through television. Television is not going to cover it in depth if the star witnesses are not testifying.

This article doesn't tell us how to get those witnesses to testify. A resolution of contempt of Congress will be litigated in the courts and be a long drawn out procedure.

Congressman Lloyd Doggett from Texas serves on the Ways and Means Committee, the Budget Committee, and the Joint Committee on Taxation and has served in the House since his election in 1994, He is pushing for the committees to use it's "inherent contempt" power to get the recalcitrant witness and agencies into the committee hearings. Under that concept a Congressional Committee Chairman can hold a witness who will not obey a valid subpoena in contempt instead of going to court and asking a judge to hold the witness in contempt. That power is "inherent" in the Committee's power to hold the hearings. The Chairman can order the Sargent at Arms of the House to use handcuffs if necessary to bring that witness to the Capitol and detain (jail) him until the Committee reschedules his testimony.

I think I posted something a while back about when I worked for Congressman Jack Brooks (served 42 years in the House) and and at the time I am talking about he was Chairman of the Government Operations Committee. Everyone who had been in or around the Capitol for very long were afraid of Mr. B. Shortly after Reagan's election Mr. B had some questions he wanted to ask David Stockman, Reagan's newly installed Secr. of the Treasury and scheduled him to testify before his committee (by subpoena I guess). Reagan's people were not familiar with Mr. B and his reputation for ripping a witness apart if he couldn't get straight answers from him. Stockman didn't show for the hearing and as Mr. B waited for him (chomping on his cigar which was always stuck in the side of his mouth) getting madder and madder by the minute. After about 30 minutes waiting he told the Sargent at Arms to take his handcuffs and drag that SOB over here to the Capitol and lock him up until I have time to reschedule him. It didn't take long before Mr. B got a call from stockman's office saying "The Secretary apologizes for his tardiness but was delayed dealing with some very important matters". Stockman showed up about 15 minutes later.

I didn't know anything about "inherent" contempt at that time. I just thought Mr. B had just lost his temper and wouldn't have been surprised if he had gone with the Sargant at Arms to bring Stockman back. But Mr. B knew what he was doing and that he had the authority. In fact I didn't know about a "inherent" contempt order until Congressman Doggett talked about it on Rahel Maddow show.

It is rerely used and is not the normal procedure for finding someone in contempt of Congress, but considering how the Republicans and Trump want to play the game and not follow "norms", I think it is time we pulled some non-norm tools out of the tool Box that Nancy is always talking about.