Maybe I'm reading more into it than is necessary, but I was in the room with my late grandmother when she suffered a stroke. She was always very sharp and precise in her speech, even into her nineties and in retrospect, the very first indication that something was wrong was a similar sudden confusion on her part while talking. We initially thought she was just tired, and we were wrong.

I mean, was McCain really implying that there may have been similar contacts between the Clinton campaign and Russian operatives, as has been alleged with the Trump campaign? Given all his previous public statements regarding this matter, that made me sit up and actually take notice of his physical appearance on the Senate panel at that moment. And he looked as though he was struggling to maintain a cohesive train of thought.

The former FBI Directer said they had heard the Attorney General was going to recuse himself, but not only because he lied during his confirmation hearing, but for a variety of reasons.

Comey said, "We also were aware of facts that I can't discuss in an opening setting that would make his continued engagement in a Russia related investigation problematic."

A former federal prosecutor sends in this note.

May 9, 2017: CNN reports that grand jury subpoenas have been issued in Flynn investigation.

May 9, 2017: Trump fires Comey.

Did Trump find out about the subpoenas and continued investigation before the decision to fire Comey? This could be a key fact for Mueller's team to determine. If Trump was telling Comey to let Flynn go and then he finds out that, rather than letting him go, subpoenas start flying, that would be compelling evidence of intent to obstruct. Mueller will have to dig into internal White House communications (emails, texts, meetings) about what Trump knew about the Flynn investigation, when he knew it, and what he was saying about it to those in his orbit. Given what he was saying to Comey, you would have to imagine that he was saying a lot more to his inner circle.

Awsum.  The republican was even more speechless when he was totally unapologetic about it and explained he didn't want to do it himself because it would be like "feeding the seagulls"

Just awsum

All we have from the written statement

we did not have an open counter-intelligence case on him. We agreed I should do so if circumstances warranted. During our one-on-one meeting at Trump Tower, based on President-Elect Trump's reaction to the briefing and without him directly asking the question, I offered that assurance.

COMEY: A combination of things. I think the circumstances, the subject matter, and the person I was interacting with. Circumstances, first, I was alone with the president of the United States, or the president-elect, soon to be president. The subject matter I was talking about matters that touch on the FBI's core responsibility, and that relate to the president, president-elect personally, and then the nature of the person. I was honestly concerned he might lie about the nature of our meeting so I thought it important to document. That combination of things I had never experienced before, but had led me to believe I got to write it down and write it down in a very detailed way.

My take: McCain was trying to discredit Comey by trying to say that Comey cleared Clinton of wrongdoing but wouldn't clear Trump, and then affected not to understand that the two investigations were apples and oranges.

 The over-arching issue of Trump was for Comey to co-opt an investigation or otherwise encounter to call off the dogs.

To achieve the latter, Trump seemed to deploy all the tricks of his trade, White House dinner for two, flattery (great job, hope you stay on), pledge of loyalty and sharing of that "thing" between them, "hope" that he would let great guy Flynn go, and a call to just see how he was doing as he boarded an FBI helicopter.

 The coup de gras was the invoking of the Tony Soprano business model: nice job you have there, shame if something happened to it. And, followed by Tony, Rosenstein's and Sessions' (despite recusal) response to the Becket call of "will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest."  

Comey was taken aback and memorialized encounters because of the subject matter, circumstances, and the nature of Trump--he was concerned that Trump would lie. "lies, plain and simple." Others in the Administration were problematic as well: Pence was aware of questions about Flynn, contrary to Flynn's statements; Even before recusal, Sessions was not told of the content of the meeting to which he was excluded (and did not ask about it) because he may have been enmeshed somehow in the investigation.

The Republican senators took on a running defense of Trump, glomming onto Comey's statement that Trump was not under investigation, at the moment (leaving out, the at that moment part,  of an investigation of a campaign whose head was Trump); repeating previous questions (Susan Collins), and, of course, emails (Cornyn and McCain).

 Comey's release of some notes to a friend will be hailed as akin to actions of Reality Winner. The best of all, was the Republicans chiding of Comey for not standing up to Trump while they were all laying down for him.

Comey made it clear that a special counsel was needed, and puts great faith in Mueller.   Comey also suggested that Trump may be under investigation for obstruction. And, the illustration of flipping using Flynn's criminal liability was, perhaps, not unintentional.

 If Coats and Rogers had answered the questions put to them, yesterday, and indicated that Trump did, in fact, "hope" that something could be done to remove this cloud, the nation would be further along at this point.

I am glad they are forcing Tr*mp to put up or shut up on his bu11sh!t about the tapes.

Asked directly whether he was recording conversations in the Oval Office -- a claim he hinted at on Twitter last month -- Trump dodged. I am not hinting at anything. I will tell you about it over a very short period of time," Trump said, twice declining to elaborate.
He later said reporters were "going to be very disappointed when you hear the answer."
The noncommittal response leaves the door open to White House tapes, something that legal experts say would fall within the purview of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russia's 2016 election meddling and the Trump campaign's potential role.