>>come on, that is due diligence at start and running with the ball if you receive it....
You and I may think so, but the US has laws about not receiving or soliciting "things of value" from foreigners to influence elections. E.g. there are people baying at Trump Jr for meeting a Russian lawyer believing she had dirt on HRC. She didn't, but still they say it's "soliciting" so a crime. Meanwhile the HRC campaign and Democrats funded the Trump Pee Pee dossier based on paid testimony from Russians. Apparently that's OK because they used a couple of cutouts and went to court to try to stop Congress finding out who funded the dossier. Apparently the same Schiff who demanded Nunes should recuse himself, was one of those who went to court to try to hide the DNC's antics. Having tried to hide everything, now he wants to release his own memo with Gowdy predicting Schiff will be personally embarrassed by the fallout. That sort of conflict ought to lead to Schiff's own recusal rather than his all-out attempts to prevent the public learning what went on, but politicians are renowned for "do as I say, not as I do." I suppose we'll find out fairly soon.
"... They ne'er cared for us
yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses
crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to
support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act
established against the rich, and provide more
piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and
there's all the love they bear us."
-- Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act 1, scene 1