analyst, paul barker. paul, where do you stand on this? is a special counsel a good idea. too late? what benefits does a special counsel ad? and what downsides does it bring? so, it s a special counsel. not an independent council, the decision of whether to bring charges will still be merrick garland s, but garland would have to inform what he did. it s really about the appearance of justice. the concern is if both trump and biden run for president, it will look like the biden administration is trying to neuter his political opponents. i don t think that s actually the case. because the attorney general would make his decision about whether to prosecute trump without consulting biden anyway. and it s not like trump would suddenly be hands off and criticizing the special counsel, he probably would criticize whatever body was investigating him. and call it political. right? that is such a great point.
the time in the world to target their political opponents. sean: what dunk of merrick did you think of merrick garland s, quote, reminder that they re not allowed to talk to members of congress, people like yourself, senators and congressman? that sounded to me like an intimidation effort to silence people that are whistleblowers in light of charles grassley admitting all these whistleblowers are coming forward? you bet it was. that s exactly what it was. and i tell you, sean, we ve had whistleblowers come to me and giving us what happened. what s happening with the afghan refugees. you got a lot of people right now who are good honest people in government and they can t believe what this administration s doing. you bet merrick garland and his corrupt leadership at doj is telling these people you sit down and shut up. he s basically threatening them. listen, these folks whistleblowers are protected under federal law.