witness, john dean, on that panel. he's the cnn contributor, as you know. the ranking republican on the judiciary committee, congressman doug collins, he's calling this a mock impeachment inquiry. does he have a point? >> yes and no. i mean, calling john dean to testify to give context, he's not a fact witness in this case, is probably as subtle as a punch to the face. it's like calling ken starr if there was a president who was accused of sexual assault or impropriety in the future, it's not very subtle. so there is that notion. however, it's very important, because the role that john dean fulfilled was as the white house counsel. and remember, don mcgahn, as former white house counsel, is not testifying at this point in time. so to give context as to why it's important to hear from that person, the breadth of information available to them, that's extraordinarily important and he can provide just that. >> do you think, gloria, this is an effective staging point for full-scale impeachment proceedings? >> it's a staging point. whether it's effective remains to be seen. i mean, what they're doing is they're treading water right now. because they can't get the