The Patriot Post® · Monday Short Cuts

The Gipper, Dec. 12, 1983: “I’ve learned in Washington, that that’s the only place where sound travels faster than light.” —Ronald Reagan

Perspective: “Trump antagonists, with the help of the media, used fear over Russia to try to reverse the results of a legitimate election. Nothing like this has ever happened in modern American history."—David Harsanyi

Horrifying thought: "The Russia episode demonstrates how, strangely, Nancy Pelosi is now one of the more restrained, politically astute progressives on the national stage. You can be entirely in the business of checking and defeating Donald Trump, or you can be in show business; Pelosi is in the former, Rachel Maddow is in the latter.” —Rich Lowry

Food for thought: “I don’t think the [Robert Mueller] report should be released at all and I’m frankly surprised that so many Republicans think it should be. … Remember that [Peter] Strzok was biased, that [George] Papadopoulos was set up, that the dossier was a political hit piece. So if the investigation was flawed from its inception, why is the report not also flawed?” —Trey Gowdy

Alpha Jackass: “Adam Schiff is a patriot. He has more integrity in his little finger than @realDonaldTrump or any of the Republicans in Congress today will have in their lifetimes.” —Rep. David Cicilline (Rep. Dan Crenshaw, a veteran who lost an eye defending this country on the battlefield, begs to differ.)

Braying Jackass: “The only reason Jussie Smollett thought he could take advantage of a hoax about a hate crime is … the toxic environment that Donald Trump created.” —Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel

Friendly fire: “An apology to Jussie Smollett: I’m sorry — you’re even more despicable than I thought you were, and so are the shameful prosecutors who let you off this repulsive fake hate-crime.” —Piers Morgan

And last… “They said, ‘No Jussie Smollett jokes.’ … What a waste of light skin. Do you know what I could do with that light skin? That curly hair? My career would be out of here! I’d be running Hollywood. What the hell was he thinking? You’re ‘Jessie’ from now on. You don’t get the ‘u’ no more. That ‘u’ was respect. You ain’t getting no respect from me!” —Chris Rock on Smollett, a nominee at the NAACP’s Image Awards Dinner