I feel the need to offer a sad scenario.

It is this: Do not hold your breath waiting for any Republican members of Congress to emerge as heroes during the public questioning of witnesses in the impeachment inquiry into Donald J. Trump.

Previous impeachment proceedings have produced congressmen and women who have crossed the aisle. I do not expect that event will occur at least in this phase of the impeachment inquiry.

Trump will get impeached by the House. That’s almost a lead-pipe cinch. The public hearings that commence on Wednesday will become a circus. How do we know that? Consider that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy has installed Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio on the House Intelligence Committee. Jordan has emerged as arguably the most vocal Trump sycophant in the House and I believe he will do all he can do to divert this probe away from the issue at hand.

And it is: whether Donald Trump abused the immense power of his office for personal political gain by seeking a favor from Ukraine in exchange for weaponry that Ukrainians want to use against their Russia-back insurgents.

Will any Republicans on the Intelligence panel step forward the way, say, they did during the Watergate hearings of 1973 and 1974? Nope.

Remember it was GOP Sen. Howard Baker of Tennessee who asked back then, “What did the president know and when did he know it?”

Then came the million-dollar question from fellow Tennessean, Fred Thompson, who was GOP legal counsel on the Senate select committee investigating Watergate: “Are you aware,” Thompson asked White House aide Alexander Butterfield, “of any listening devices in the White House?” Thompson, being the good lawyer he was, knew the answer would be “yes,” that Butterfield was aware of such devices.

It was effectively game over at that point.

If only there could be some political heroism emerge today.