All right. Consider the following, particularly Schiff's words in the final paragraph which were widely criticized.
"Drawing selectively from the president’s past statements, Schiff claimed that Trump believed Russia’s claims that Ukraine had interfered with the 2016 presidential election, ignoring U.S. intelligence agencies’ assessments.
"In fact, Trump has acknowledged for years that Russia “meddled” in the last presidential election, explicitly saying that he accepted the conclusion of U.S. intelligence agencies, though he says he did not think Russia’s intervention affected the outcome, and he also has long believed that “others” also attempted to influence the outcome.
I notice that the source you are linking to is brietbart. I found the article not only to be inconclusive but misleading. The author is criticizing Schiff primarily based on Schiff's portrayal of Trump's words at the Helsinki summit. And the thing you find as absurd is the last paragraph of your post, which was Schiff tying Trumps trust in Putin with wanting to force Ukraine to open an investigation into the DNC server and crowdstrike. So please allow me to show you why I believe Schiff is completely credible.
Keeping in mind that Russia either meddled or they did not meddle, I will point out that the mind that reasons upon falsehood ends up in a contradiction. That is to say it will claim two conflicting things as plausibly true in an equivocation, rather than honestly say that either it doesn't know what to believe or leans one way more than the other. It's important to remember that the question being asked at Helsinki is who do you believe? In this question the word "believe" means "trust in" since Trump is being told to believe two different things by two different parties. The fact is that to claim that you trust both equally is never an honest answer, but it is in fact dangerous to National security, particularly when you're the President of the U.S.A. choosing between Putin saying it's not Russia and U.S. intelligence saying that it is Russia.
Seeking to be gracious, it's important to sympathize by acknowledging that the question as posed put the President in a difficult position. I personally feel it could have been handled better by declining to answer rather than being forced to imply either Putin is a liar or that Trump trusts Putin more than American intelligence.
But the President did not do that. Instead he said many things that inclined any good listener to believe Trump trusted Putin over our own intelligence agencies. Please note how he began his answer by talking about how he wants to see the server and why didn't the FBI take the server and why did the Democrats tell the FBI to get out.
TRUMP:
So let me just say that we have two thoughts. You have groups that are wondering why the FBI never took the server. Why haven’t they taken the server? Why was the FBI told to leave the office of the democratic national committee? I’ve been wondering that. I’ve been asking that for months and months and I’ve been tweeting it out and calling it out on social media. Where is the server? I want to know, where is the server and what is the server saying? With that being said, all I can do is ask the question.
The question being posed, "
where is the server", is one that ultimately causes the mind to question the validity of the American intelligence community's ability to make a full and proper assessment without the server. Allow me to add that the cyber forensics experts, Crowdstrike, used imaging that copied the server hard drives and memories byte by byte, and they also most likely monitored the traffic for a period of time. According to the FBI experts in cyber security, Crowdstrike is one of the best American cyber security companies in the country and is regarded as a trusted and valued source of security for both the Defense department and intelligence agencies.
But the point remains that the question Trump poses implies doubt in the intelligence agencies assessment without having the server and does not imply any doubt towards Putin. This is important, because if in fact Trump is believing that the imaging of the server was somehow tampered with so as to frame Russia and fool the intelligence agencies, then he is promoting a conspiracy theory of massive proportions that favors Putin. I would also remark that in any clear understanding of psycho-linguistics it would be appropriate to note that even if the server was confiscated by the FBI, it would still not derail the cynical mind from considering that the server itself was tampered with since there is always a counter narrative to what is true. For scripture states that wherever good is, evil is present. Having said that, let us continue.
Trump:
With that being said, all I can do is ask the question. My people came to me, Dan Coats came to me and some others and said they think it’s Russia.
Note that Trump says Dan Coates and some others "think" it's Russia. This would imply they are not actually sure, once again introducing doubt in the American intelligence agencies assessment as definitive. Dan Coates had previously, before the summit, remarked in a New York Times interview that if he was meeting the Russian president, he would deliver a sharp message that the United States knows what the Russians are doing and that Mr. Putin’s government is responsible for the cyberattacks.
Trump:
I have President Putin. He just said it’s not Russia. I will say this. I don’t see any reason why it would be, but I really do want to see the server.
Here Trump appears to put some measure of trust in Putin's direction by saying he doesn't see any reason why it would be Russia, suggesting to the mind that it could be equally plausible that it was someone other than Russia, even perhaps a fat guy in his bed. He then implies that he really wants to see the server so as to be certain it is Russia, again casting doubt on the American intelligence agencies certainty. Days later Trump will claim that he meant to say he doesn't see why it "wouldn't" be Russia. However, that would be a sentence using a double negative claiming an absolute conclusion that it was definitely Russia, wherefore indicating he would not need to see the server unless he was proposing he needed to see the server before he believed it was someone other than Russia. Therefore the semantical changes in the reverse logic that occurs due to the correction, show the correction appearing as an attempt to now change what he originally thought rather than misspoke.
Trump:
But I have confidence in both parties. I really believe that this will probably go on for a while, but I don’t think it can go on without finding out what happened to the server. What happened to the servers of the Pakistani gentleman that worked on the DNC? Where are those servers? They’re missing. Where are they? What happened to Hillary Clinton’s emails? 33,000 emails gone — just gone. I think in Russia they wouldn’t be gone so easily. I think it’s a disgrace that we can’t get Hillary Clinton’s 33,000 emails.
Trump begins with an equivocation that he has confidence in both parties which is highly improbable since both opposing assessments can only co-exist as such with either one side being somehow mistaken or both sides mistaken in some type of a 50/50 scenario. But more telling is that Trump reveals his belief that Russia is more competent by giving other examples of where he feels American institutions failed America. The words clearly show a trust in Russia over America as pertains to the question who do you believe?
Trump:
So I have great confidence in my intelligence people, but I will tell you that president Putin was extremely strong and powerful in his denial today. And what he did is an incredible offer. He offered to have the people working on the case come and work with their investigators, with respect to the 12 people. I think that’s an incredible offer.
Here Trump first claims a great confidence in American intelligence but then undermines that by indicating how compelling he found Putin's denial saying Putin was extremely strong and powerful. He then finishes with praising Putin's incredible offer.
In summation and overall, Trump never expressed any reason to doubt Putin but he did express reason to doubt the American intelligence community over and over. And Trump is currently still promoting the conspiracy theory that the server is necessary, not so as to suggest to the mind that Putin is wrong, but to suggest that Putin is right.
"Schiff portrayed Trump as a puppet being controlled by Russia: “It’s not just a propaganda coup, it’s not just the undermining of our agencies. It’s also that the buy-in to that propaganda meant that Ukraine wasn’t going to get money to fight the Russians. I mean, that’s one hell of a Russian intelligence coup. … Has there ever been such a coup? I would submit to you that in the entire length of the Cold War, the Soviet Union had no such success.”
I see Schiff claiming correctly that Trump is only serving Russian interests when trying to get Ukraine to announce investigations into the crowd strike and DNC server conspiracy theory. This theory can only serve Russian interest in Ukraine by both driving a wedge between Ukraine and the United States and also between Democrats and Republicans.
This theory claims that Russia did not hack the DNC nor use WikiLeaks to help Trump win, but instead promotes the idea that Ukraine and the Democrats framed Russia, which fits the "Russian hoax" Trump narrative. The testimony of Russian expert Fiona Hill testified that this alternative narrative is a fiction presently being propagated and perpetrated by Russian intelligence. She also pointed out that to believe this theory is to dismiss the findings of the Mueller investigation, the Senate and house intelligence committees reports as well as all of the American intelligence community. Hence since President Trump is believing it, promoting it, and incorporating it into foreign policy decisions concerning Ukraine, Schiff accurately describes it as a Russian intelligence coup, in essence reversing the established American foreign policy which we have long held concerning Russia and Ukraine. To me it's quite simple, either I trust our own American intelligence community or I trust Putin. Schiff trusts our American intelligence over Putin and so do I.
