Sunday morning talking heads

There are few constants in American politics anymore but among those few is the certainty of an Adam Schiff appearance on the Sunday morning chat shows. Ol’ Bug Eyes is the lead guest on “This Week,” where he’ll discuss all things impeachment. Among the inevitable topics: Tim Morrison’s upcoming testimony; Friday’s big court win for House Democrats on access to the Mueller probe’s grand jury material; the House GOP’s stunt in the SCIF earlier this week; and the timeline on impeachment, which Dems initially wanted to wrap up by Thanksgiving but which seems destined to carry over into December. And maybe beyond.

One question I’d like to see Schiff answer is whether Democrats will move to impeach once they feel their case on Ukraine is made or whether they’ll pause to look at other potential wrongdoing. The Mueller material is one possible avenue, but there’s also the fact that Trump officials seem not to want to give straight answers on whether anyone has been pressuring China during trade talks to investigate the Bidens.

Democrats could branch out even further if they like:

Trump called Mattis in summer 2018 and directed him to "screw Amazon" out of $10 billion cloud contract.

"Relaying the story to us during Small Group, Mattis said, 'We're not going to do that. This will be done by the book, both legally and ethically." https://t.co/wAdf7eH3GS

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) October 26, 2019

Amazon did end up being “screwed out of” that contract, with news breaking late Friday night that it had gone to Microsoft instead in a surprise. Democrats could slow down impeachment in order to look at all of this, knowing that the longer it takes, the stronger the Republican argument becomes for letting voters decide all of this next November. Whereas if Dems decide to ignore all of it in the name of speeding up impeachment, they’ll essentially forfeit any opportunity to look at it later. They only get one shot at impeaching Trump. Once the Senate acquits him on the Ukraine matter, any attempt to impeach him again will be scoffed at by voters as proof of Trump Derangement Syndrome by Pelosi’s caucus.

It’s mostly Democrats elsewhere on the dial this morning too, with Amy Klobuchar the star guest on “Face the Nation” and Eric Swalwell the top interview on “Fox News Sunday” for God knows what reason. Even the most prominent Republican scheduled (at least as I write this on Saturday) is Trump-skeptical: That would be Will Hurd, who’s retiring from the House this year and who’ll follow Schiff on “This Week.” Hurd may be in Trump’s corner on impeachment, though, as he’s one of the Republicans on the Intel Committee who signed a letter this week blasting Schiff for how he’s managed this process. Stay tuned. The full line-up is at the AP.