WASHINGTON -- At 3:00 PM, Henry Hyde emerged from his secret meetings with GOP moralists to address the press. Behind him were the stack of Ken Starr's so-called evidence boxes once-filled with hearsay from "witnesses," many of whom -- especially those favorable to Ken Starr -- are proven liars.

"Now, I have been somewhat upset by the thoughtless criticism that we have not called any witnesses," said Hyde. Somehow he must be thinking that people talking to a Grand Jury are "witnesses" that have been cross-examined by the defense.

They are not.

Hyde is angry because the Democrats have not called any "evidence" witnesses to defend the President -- or so he claims.

Hyde called the Republican case "compulsive" -- and then quickly corrected himself to say it was "conclusive." We almost puked with laughter at this all-too-telling Freudian slip.

Hyde blamed the "mood of the country" for the continuation of his lynch mob. "The people want it over quickly," he said.

He claimed that the Starr transcripts are honest, accurate, faithful and true! How can he know that?

Hyde is well aware that the issue has nothing to do with these witnesses. If the matter were perjury, then everything is already on tape. Hyde knows full well the President did not commit perjury -- he merely did not help his accusers to abuse him. He chose his words carefully so he would mislead the venal bastards -- but he never lied.

And Hyde continues to pretend to be fair. He expects the President to call "witnesses" to testify that he did not commit perjury. But that, of course, is a matter for a jury -- and therefore no witness can be called to rebut the President's own words. Yet the GOP carries on characterizing Clinton's words as perjury.

The Democrats characterize those words as misleading -- whether purposeful or not.

Hyde -- looking desperate -- brought out the not-so-quick-on-the-uptake Mary Bono, who gained her seat in Congress as part of her late husband Sonny's legacy. She claimed there is a "vitally important issue" in this witch hunt" "What do we expect from the Chief Executive?... Is it too much to expect the Chief Executive to tell the truth under oath? I certainly hope so, [and get this] - for my children."

Of course, if she cared about her children she'd be home taking care of them -- or so the Republicans say!

A reporter asks Hyde, a man who lied to his constituents every day for thirty years about being an adulterer, what the President could say tomorrow, inasmuch as the Committee has already drawn up articles of impeachment.

Hyde had no good answer. He said he is opposed to censure, but it is under discussion -- its isn't ruled out, but it isn't a "dead-bang" reality either.

Someone asked whether the article of impeachment will be both criminal and civil.

Another reporter asked this great question: "So, you are assuming the President is guilty unless he proves he is innocent?"

Hyde, liar that he is, said, "I haven't decided he is guilty of anything."

Someone asked what happened to the "tampering with witnesses" charge.

Hyde tried to slither out of the censure option -- however, he said he is pledging his opposition, but will not "go to the death" to resist it. And he also said he would feel sad if his committee vote was partisan.

He claims he has been "handicapped" by not having the leisure to do things properly.

Sure, because he set down the arbitrary timetable of "before Christmas" without even requesting approval of a single Democrat member on the Committee.

Hyde said he was disappointed that there were no witnesses "to the facts" called by the Democrats.

What facts, Henry?

Povich of Newsday asked whether Hyde, like every prosecutor in the world, feels bound not to indict someone when they are convinced that the accused will not be convicted -- to which Hyde said outright that he is not listening to the American people and is ignoring the sense of the Senate.

Yet Hyde himself had said his committee had to bipartisan in order to have credibility. Now he claims that only at the "trial" in the Senate is bipartisanship important.

Another reporter questioned Hyde's interpretation of his so-called facts. Hyde put out a primer on the 81 questions claiming there was "definitely" a contradiction on critical facts. Hyde pretended he didn't understand the question -- then said there was NO dispute about the facts.

Of course, he knew he was lying on that issue. He knows that the dispute about the gifts finally found at Betty Currie's home is at issue, what the President said to Monica Lewinsky is being challenged, and many more of his treasured "facts" are disputed.

The biggest surprise of the news conference is that the press was generally hostile. Hyde began to sense this and ended the press conference abruptly.

Minutes later, Rep. Bobby Scott (D- VA) jumped out to hold his own press conference. He started by going over all the constantly shifting GOP threats that had been laid out over the past month: first fifteen charges, then three, then one, then two, then three again. Scott talked about the inflammatory "81 Questions," which were simply snide and accusatory. He used the example of the question that read "We you affirm or deny that you are the chief law enforcement officer of the United States?"

What should the President answer? He is not. Yet, he is. In law, the attorney General is the Chief Law Enforcement Officer. To Republicans, it is the President -- but that's only because that's a convenient cudgel with which to bash him.

Someone asked how the White House will refute charges of obstruction, perjury and abuse of power. Scott rightly pointed out, "What are the allegations?... what perjury?... what abuse?... what obstruction?" His point: if he knew what the allegations were, he could help you.

Ergo, it is ridiculous to ask the President to defend himself.

Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee (D-VA) was next. "This week will be the week where the American People will hold a litmus test to this process." She said she is concerned about just what the allegations are: look what they did with the President's own lawyers, she observed, so far having allowed them four hours after four years. She added her concern that there had been no exculpatory evidence contained in Starr's referral report -- although it was certainly required by the IC statute.

Jackson Lee calls this prosecutorial abuse. She is correct.

She said, as she has on other occasions, that it is "time for healing" and called for censure -- as every legal scholar has testified is permitted under the Constitution. And, of course, it is.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) told the reporters that tomorrow's hearing will be a sham -- just as the others have been. She expressed disappointment with Hyde, and added, "but what he is doing now goes beyond anything I expected him to do." She told reporters that Democrats couldn't have called any witnesses because a meeting between the two sides regarding witnesses was never held. She said that Hyde is being driven by the "conservative caucus" and the "conservatives in this nation." Waters will spend her time, she said, comparing how Hyde treated perjury in Iran-Contra -- he allowed it as human -- and what he is saying now. She added that reporters can write their stories for tomorrow right now and put them to bed. Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee are "going to do as they are told", she said -- the moderates cannot go against them.

Congressman Gerry Nadler (D-NY) followed, saying Democrats on the committee asked that the hearing be fair, deliberative, and expeditious -- they had asked for three to four weeks for an evidentiary hearing which would have finished before Christmas. But the committee then waited two months instead of going forward, he said -- they held sham hearings on irrelevancies, Starr came in an reiterated his report, and then Hyde, who had said the President would have "all the time he wants" suddenly thinks that four days is too much! They have to do it in two days of fifteen-hour hearings. "For shame," he said -- adding that the GOP is doing this because there will be five more Democrats in the House next year, assuring a very close vote.

He asked Hyde to give the President four days -- and said the committee has plenty of time, but only if they want to be fair, and this chairman does not want to be fair.

He also made the point that the President's counsel are being asked to prove the insufficiency of the evidence, but that is upside down -- it was up to Starr to prove his guilt. And Starr had not done that.

The same reporter asked how the President will refute the charges. Waters could not predict what the President's lawyers will say. But then she made a point about the Lewinsky gifts under Betty Currie's bed: "She could have dumped them in the ocean." The gifts are not proof of obstruction of justice.

Scott pointed out that one of the allegations of perjury was the date on which the relationship with Lewinsky began, and explained that Hyde thought this was not perjury. If this collapsed so easily, will all the other allegations collapse as well, we ask?

Jackson Lee spoke to the point of Elliott Richardson characterizing the Pacific-like vastness in difference between the Nixon perjuries and the trumped-up allegations against Mr. Clinton.

Many Democrats have not even seen the witness list that the GOP has made up in secret get-togethers among themselves.

Again, the Republicans are burning themselves on their own cross -- it is almost as if God has hypnotized them into committing suicide.

Perhaps He has. We would understand.

But what no one -- among the Democrats or in the press -- has said is this: the Republicans are desperate now. They have decided to risk everything to "prove" the President is a "high criminal."

They cannot. And we're not even sure they know what's coming. Defeat. Across the federal board.

-- Mac MacArthur