I Did Not Expect This

We have been informed by the whistleblower’s counsel that their client would like to speak to our committee and has requested guidance from the Acting DNI as to how to do so.

We‘re in touch with counsel and look forward to the whistleblower’s testimony as soon as this week.

— Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) September 24, 2019

Also, Yes

I figured that Nancy Pelosi would oppose impeachment if Trump were caught on tape shooting someone to death on 5^th Avenue while anally raping a walrus.

To quote Humphrey Bogart, I was misinformed:

Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced on Tuesday that the House would initiate a formal impeachment inquiry against President Trump, charging him with betraying his oath of office and the nation’s security by seeking to enlist a foreign power to tarnish a rival for his own political gain.

Ms. Pelosi’s declaration, after months of reticence by Democrats who had feared the political consequences of impeaching a president many of them long ago concluded was unfit for office, was a stunning turn that set the stage for a history-making and exceedingly bitter confrontation between the Democrat-led House and a defiant president who has thumbed his nose at institutional norms.

“The actions taken to date by the president have seriously violated the Constitution,” Ms. Pelosi said in a brief speech invoking the nation’s founding principles. Mr. Trump, she added, “must be held accountable — no one is above the law.”

She said the president’s conduct revealed his “betrayal of his oath of office, betrayal of our national security and betrayal of the integrity of our elections.”

Ms. Pelosi’s decision to push forward with the most severe action that Congress can take against a sitting president could usher in a remarkable new chapter in American life, touching off a constitutional and political showdown with the potential to cleave an already divided nation, reshape Mr. Trump’s presidency and the country’s politics, and carry heavy risks both for him and for the Democrats who have decided to weigh his removal.

Cowardice in the service of the Blue Dog Caucus seems to be Pelosi's thing, so I am not sure what led her to do the right thing.

The most charitable explanation is to quote Churchill^*, and conclude that she would, "Do the right thing, once all other possibilities have been exhausted."

This should have happened months ago.

Of note is that she is not creating a select committee to investigate Trump, which would add something like 6 weeks to the timeline:

And Ms. Pelosi said she had directed the chairmen of the six committees that have been investigating Mr. Trump to “proceed under that umbrella of impeachment inquiry.” In a closed-door meeting earlier in the day, she said the panels should put together their best cases on potentially impeachable offenses by the president and send them to the Judiciary Committee, according to two officials familiar with the conversation. That could potentially lay the groundwork for articles of impeachment based on the findings.

(emphasis mine)

I am not sanguine about Nadler running the hearings, but the fastest way to get this show on the road is through the Judiciary committee.

^*This quote from Churchill is almost certainly false.