Shepard Smith began his Fox News program by blistering Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump over their calls to investigate the Biden family.

Before William Barr came along, Trump and his bagmen tried to hide their dealings with foreign governments who they tasked with doing the wet-work they need against his political rivals, but now it's all out in the open.

Smith said, "President Trump says it doesn't matter if he talked to the president of Ukraine about investigating Joe Biden. A whistleblower reportedly says the president made a promise to a foreign leader. A watch dog calls it of urgent concern, but Congress is still trying to find out what the whistle-blower knows."

He continued, "A report from the Ukrainian government reads in part, Donald Trump is convinced that the new Ukrainian government will be able to quickly improve images of Ukraine, complete investigation of corruption cases which inhibited the interaction between the Ukraine and the USA."

Smith reported that all the indications are the whistle-blower's complaints stem from Trump's direct conversation with the president of the Ukraine.

Smith then played video of Rudy Giuliani admitting vociferously that they wanted the Ukraine government to investigate the Bidens at Trump's behest.

After the crazed interview of Rudy finished, Smith said, "The subject matter about which they were speaking is a debunked conspiracy theory."

In roughly 3 minutes Shepard Smith encapsulated the entire conspiracy between Trump, Rudy Giuliani and the Ukrainian government.

And it's one in which impeachment proceedings should begin immediately if the evidence tells us this is what happened.

That's how you put a bow on a story, Shep.

Digby writes:

Apparently, there's a whole lot of possible wrongdoing in the IC these days:

The number of complaints made to a confidential hotline designed to allow the reporting of waste, fraud and abuse in the intelligence community has skyrocketed since Donald Trump took office, government records show.

According to the latest public report by the Inspector General of the Intelligence Community, the hotline received 563 contacts last year, up from 251 in 2016 and 369 in 2017.

The numbers for the latest fiscal year are on pace to be even higher: There were 297 complaints in just the first six months — from October 2018 through last March, according to the report.

The report doesn't describe the complaints or tally how many of those rose to the level of an "urgent concern"—a category of serious complaints that must be turned over to Congress. Officials involved in the process say that designation is rare.

With the new DNI sharing these complaints with Trump's top henchman, Bill Barr, and the White House whenever he wants to this seems like it might be a risky move. I'd be surprised if the numbers don't drop precipitously after this latest assault on the notion of executive accountability for anything. Who knows if these people will follow the whistleblower laws?

And anyway we all know they are all just Deep State Hillary Clinton stooges who are out to get the president. The only people who are telling the truth are those who are defending him in all circumstances.