Even if Donald Trump’s servile senators ultimately block his ouster, we’ll always have Fiona Hill and her smart stinging smackdown of the Putin-appeasing Republicans who infested the House impeachment probe.

But to fully appreciate what Hill said yesterday – how sweet it was, to hear a smart woman skewer those male dolts – we first need to set the stage with some historical perspective.

Given the Trumpist Republicans’ determination to ignore the U.S. intelligence consensus that Russia invaded our ’16 election, and given its dearth of interest in foiling a similar invasion in ’20, and given its crackpot fealty to the baseless theory that Ukraine, not Russia, did the dirty deed three years ago, it’s almost impossible to remember that the GOP always used to be tout itself as the tough-on-Russia party, the hawkish national security party.

During the 1984 presidential campaign, it ran a widely heralded TV ad that advocated vigilance of the Russian bear: “There is a bear in the woods. For some people, the bear is easy to see. Others don’t see it at all. Some people say the bear is tame. Others say it’s vicious and dangerous. Since no one can really be sure who’s right, isn’t it smart to be as strong as the bear? If there is a bear.” Four years later, the GOP ran an ad that mocked Democratic candidate Mike Dukakis for looking tiny in a military tank; the message was that only Republicans were strong enough to fight Russia and win the Cold War.

But today, with its lockstep loyalty to Putin pet Trump, the party of Ronald Reagan (“Mr. Gorbachev – tear down that Wall!”) has morphed into the party of Neville Chamberlain.

That, more than anything else, appears to have triggered Fiona Hill’s ire. As a key intelligence community expert on Russia, having served in that capacity under three presidents of both parties, she was uniquely qualified to thrash Russia’s useful idiots on the House Intelligence panel. And as the humble-roots daughter of a coal miner and a nurse, she had no interest in abiding bullcrap. May her words live in America’s memory:

“(S)ome of you on this committee appear to believe that Russia and its security services did not conduct a campaign against our country – and that perhaps, somehow, for some reason, Ukraine did. This is a fictional narrative that has been perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services themselves.

“The unfortunate truth is that Russia was the foreign power that systematically attacked our democratic institutions in 2016. This is the public conclusion of our intelligence agencies, confirmed in bipartisan Congressional reports. It is beyond dispute…

“The Russian government’s goal is to weaken our country – to diminish America’s global role and to neutralize a perceived U.S. threat to Russian interests. President Putin and the Russian security services aim to counter U.S. foreign policy objectives in Europe, including in Ukraine, where Moscow wishes to reassert political and economic dominance…

“Right now, Russia’s security services and their proxies have geared up to repeat their interference in the 2020 election. We are running out of time to stop them. In the course of this investigation, I would ask that you please not promote politically driven falsehoods that so clearly advance Russian interests.”

Of course, the Republicans refused to listen. Heck, U.S. intelligence officials even signaled this week that the crackpot blame-Ukraine-for-2016 theory is a Russian disinformation plot. In other words, the Russians are (again) suckering the Republicans – who prefer to marinate in fictions, to remain deaf and dumb to verified facts. Within their hermetically sealed environment, tribal fealty trumps factual reality. Patriotism has been redefined as saving Dear Leader and “owning the libs,” and mere trifles – like Russia’s expansionist ambitions at America’s expense – are deemed to be acceptable collateral damage. In the wake of Devin Nunes’ crackpot theories, the MAGA cap has morphed into a tinfoil hat.

And since they had no grounds for refuting Hill, they gave up on questions and delivered little speeches. Congressman Brad Wenstrup droned on and on, mansplaining in free-form fashion about the Steele dossier, the taxpayer cost of the Mueller probe, feds who tried to “entrap” the ’16 Trump campaign, the “very partisan rules” of the House impeachment probe, “the coup to impeach the president,” the whistleblower, “the Democrat coup,” and more.

Finally, Fiona Hill spoke up, with a question posed by many women every day of their lives: “Could I actually say something?”

Fortunately for us, she’d already said plenty. Let’s quote one last fact-blast:

“I refuse to be part of an effort to legitimize an alternate narrative that the Ukrainian government is a U.S. adversary, and that Ukraine – not Russia – attacked us in 2016. These fictions are harmful even if they are deployed for purely domestic political purposes…If the President, or anyone else, impedes or subverts the national security of the United States in order to further domestic political or personal interests, that is more than worthy of your attention. But we must not let domestic politics stop us from defending ourselves against the foreign powers who truly wish us harm.”

Thank you, Ms. Hill, for your service.