I thought the law professors would give a very somber, neutral-seeming presentation of what they would characterize as law.

I am surprised that they spoke so severely and stridently and launched right into stating conclusions, applying the law to the facts, and expressing these conclusions in a tone I'm used to seeing in the movies, where hammy actors argue to a jury.

I thought — as I said 2 posts down — the idea would be for the 3 law professors called by the Democrats to provide cover for the Democrats by performing the theater of making everything sound like law and not politics and by speaking in a tone that would feel academic and sadly, grimly inevitable.

But they came on so strong, righteously angry and in an exaggerated tone, making assertions that the things Trump did are impeachable. They did not work to establish our confidence that they were operating in a scholarly zone that was truly their expertise. They did not give us reason to believe we should listen to them as expert witnesses.

What an awful display! And I'm not even counting the motions for who knows what and the roll call votes (which seemed to be the GOP strategy for making the show as annoying as possible). The first 2 witnesses — Noah Feldman and Pam Karlan — scolded and yelled. Michael Gerhardt was a bit milder, but he mumbled and stumbled, and I couldn't believe he brought up the musical "Hamilton."

It was not at all the "constitutional law seminar" that White House Counsel Pat Cipollone decried. It was an unwatchable harangue.

The GOP witness Jonathan Turley stepped back and made an important argument: You need to be careful that whatever you do is going to set a precedent that will be used against future Presidents. Also (and this was quite apt after listening to Feldman and, particularly, Karlan): Everyone is too angry and this isn't the sort of thing we should be doing in a state of high hysteria. Turley bolstered his testimony by assuring us that he didn't like Trump and didn't vote for him. That, ironically, made him the least political of the set of 4 professors, but it isn't quite fair that there's no one on the panel to balance Feldman and Karlan and simply make a scenery-chewing pro-Trump argument.