Chuck Schumer is shocked, I tell you. SHOCKED.

There’s a scene in the classic film “Casablanca” where Captain Louis Renault abruptly ends the festivities at Rick’s Café (at the urging of a Nazi commander), blowing his whistle and shouting that “everybody is to leave here immediately! This café is closed until further notice!”

Renault continues (to the obviously incensed Rick who wants to know why): “I am shocked, SHOCKED to find that gambling is going on in here!”

Meanwhile, the croupier approaches Renault with a pile of money and says, “your winnings, sir.” “Oh,” says Renault, “thank you very much.”

It’s a gem of a scene in the movie, and a stellar example of feigned outrage.

Good old Renault came to mind this week after I watched the post-White House meeting presser that Senator Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi held, where Schumer—in as much feigning as he could possibly muster—got up to the podium and said:

“To watch what happened in the White House would make your jaw drop.”

What happened, is this: Pelosi and Schumer had headed to the White House to talk about infrastructure spending this week. The day before the meeting, President Trump—having been vindicated by the Mueller investigation, whether Mueller wants to admit that or not—finds out that the Democrats were planning a meeting immediately prior to the White House meeting to discuss impeachment on the grounds of collusion, obstruction of justice, and the like.

This is despite the 2,500 subpoenas that they complied with, thirty hours of interviews with the White House Council, 500 search warrants, 500 witnesses, 50 orders authorizing use of pen registers… among other things. Oh yeah, and absolutely zero evidence to show for all of it.

As the president put it, the Democrat party can’t go down two tracks; that it’s either go “down the investigation track,” or “go down the investment track or the track of ‘Let’s get things done for the American people.’”

In other words, the president didn’t think it would be all that productive to meet with people who are literally overseeing a campaign to remove him from office on no grounds other than the fact that he was elected and Hillary Clinton wasn’t—while trying to talk about how to move the country forward. Again, these are the same people who have done everything in their power (despite it at times going in stark contrast to past policy positions) to stymie this administration.

Imagine a car with a boot lock on the tire. For Donald Trump to meet/work with the Democrats after they’ve sat there and held what practically amounts to coup d’etat meetings would be like asking someone to drive that car WITH the boot lock on while simultaneously trying to take the keys away from the driver. It’s not only impossible, but it’s an insult to the intelligence of the driver.

Is it really a shocker the President Trump did what he did?

But I’ve digressed.

I’d like to focus on Schumer’s mandible. You know, because it was dropping. Like this.

He was shocked, I tell you. SHOCKED.

Senator Schumer, did your jaw drop when Barack Obama was caught on a hot mic whispering to Russian president Dmitry Medvedev that “On all these issues, but particularly missile defense, this, this can be solved but it’s important for him [Putin] to give me space, and that “After my election I have more flexibility”?