At this point there is little doubt in my mind that trump and his campaign colluded with the russians, and that can be added to the clear obstruction of justice charge against him in the matter. Course, I doubt that anything will happen to him in terms of impeachment unless the gop figures out they would be better off with pence. And if they already have decided to dump trump nothing will happen until after the election this November.
My thinking is based on two things, trump’s attack on Cohen through the National Enquirer(in my entire life I never considered the possibility that the NE would be a sounding board for the potus); and now the release of Mueller’s questions, which obviously came from trump’s lawyers.
Chait concludes:
“Cohen drew close to Trump because he started using his (almost certainly ill-gotten) wealth to buy real estate in Trump Tower, a favored investment vehicle for many criminal figures. What adds an extra layer of danger to Trump is that the alleged crimes with which Cohen could be charged are all state crimes. That is important because Trump can only pardon people for federal crimes. New York’s state attorney general Eric Schneiderman is partnering with Robert Mueller, and seemingly has the capacity to credibly threaten Cohen with a very long prison sentence for a potentially very long list of offenses spanning the rest of his life.
In that case, the best defense Trump has left is to discredit Cohen altogether, and make the case that he is fabricating evidence against the president to save his own skin. In other words, the narrative we see in the National Enquirer is an indication that Trump is seriously desperate. Discrediting Cohen is a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency move that makes no sense unless Cohen has already flipped.”
They got him, but on a federal level I see nothing happening unless the gop does it themselves. However, I really believe that on the state level he could be in serious trouble.
Great article, but beyond scary in terms of going from cohn to trump and involving way, way too many dems.
“Amid the aftershocks of Donald Trump’s firing of James Comey last May, I went to see Angels in America at the same theater in London, the National, where I’d first seen it as a New York Times drama critic some 25 years earlier. The play didn’t transport me quite as far from the lamentable present as I’d hoped. The new production, now on Broadway, doesn’t radically depart in tone or quality (high) from the first. But the play’s center of gravity had shifted. While Tony Kushner’s epic had been seared into my memory by the frail figure of Prior Walter, a young gay man fighting AIDS with almost the entire world aligned against him, this time it was Roy Cohn who dominated: a closeted, homophobic, middle-aged gay man also battling AIDS but who, unlike the fictional Prior, was a real-life Über-villain of America’s 20th century. “The polestar of human evil,” as one character describes him. “The worst human being who ever lived … the most evil, twisted, vicious bastard ever to snort coke at Studio 54.”…..
So to return to Hillary Clinton’s flip rhetorical question: Why not go to the Trump-Melania wedding in 2005? These incidents are just a few of the many reasons why a former president and sitting United States senator with presidential ambitions should not have gone to this particular “fun, gaudy, over-the-top spectacle” in Palm Beach. But they just couldn’t stop themselves, any more than so many Democratic leaders of a quarter-century earlier couldn’t resist dressing up for Cohn’s fun, gaudy, over-the-top birthday gala at Studio 54. In the bipartisan New York political culture that nurtured Cohn and Trump, the statute of limitations for nearly every crime or outrage lasts about 48 hours. Nothing sticks; even repeated racist bygones can be bygones. Whether Hillary Clinton attended the wedding (Bill showed solely for the reception) because she’d taken Trump’s money, or because she wanted to be in the mix of power and celebrity no matter how tacky, or because she hoped there might be more favors to extract from Trump or someone else in the wedding party, doesn’t matter. Whatever the explanation, the then–New York senator, sitting in a reserved seat in the front row, lent a touch of civic legitimacy to Trump that the other glitzy celebrities on hand could not. He got what he’d paid for. He had written his checks knowing that the Clintons could be counted on not to bite the small hand that fed them — at least not until their own self-interest was threatened in 2016.”
“What is now known to the general public is that Israel had succeeded in placing a listening device in an ISIS safe house deep in Syria, at great risk, and was listening in on everything ISIS was planning from that location. Trump revealed this intelligence to Kislyak and Lavarov during that infamous Oval Office meeting … Trump essentially revealed the “crown jewels” of Israeli intelligence operational methods in Syria … istening device the Israelis had placed went dead shortly after”
The absolute moral depravity of the GOP is incredible. And the people that vote for them show their depravity on a constant basis. Deplorables is too good for them.
“But the indifference of (many) conservative proponents of “the rule of law” to the conventional definition of the phrase has never been more naked than during the Trump era. And last night in Arizona, Mike Pence gave his movement’s contempt for equality before the law some especially indecent exposure.
Speaking at a “tax policy” event in Tempe, the vice-president took a moment to welcome the criminally racist former sheriff of Arizona’s Maricopa County, Joe Arpaio, to the rally, praising him as a “tireless champion of strong borders and the rule of law,” and going on to say, “I’m honored to have you here.”….
But the indifference of (many) conservative proponents of “the rule of law” to the conventional definition of the phrase has never been more naked than during the Trump era. And last night in Arizona, Mike Pence gave his movement’s contempt for equality before the law some especially indecent exposure.
Speaking at a “tax policy” event in Tempe, the vice-president took a moment to welcome the criminally racist former sheriff of Arizona’s Maricopa County, Joe Arpaio, to the rally, praising him as a “tireless champion of strong borders and the rule of law,” and going on to say, “I’m honored to have you here.”…
Arpaio is a convicted criminal. And the myriad legal violations that he racked up during his time in the sheriff’s office cost Arizona taxpayers $140 million in fees for litigation and settlements. But he made “us” feel more comfortable by making “them” live in perpetual fear. And that’s more than enough to make Arpaio a champion of “the rule of law” to Mike Pence; and, perhaps, to make him Senate material to Republican primary voters in the Grand Canyon State.”
“But criminally racist profiling was among the lesser offenses on Joe’s (figurative) rap sheet. During his decades-long tenure as sheriff, Arpaio presided over (what he himself called) a “concentration camp,” where low-level offenders and undocumented immigrants were subjected to daily cruel and unusual punishments. In Tent City, men and women who’d been convicted of — or, in most cases, merely charged with — crimes like drug use, shoplifting, and working with false documents were forced to live outdoors, year-round. In the summer, they sweated through 130-degree temperatures; in winter, they shivered through frigid nights, barred, by rule, from wearing any form of jacket or coat; when it rained, water poured through holes in the tents, soaking them in their beds. Arpaio forced his prisoners to march in pink underwear, work in chain gangs, shower in boiling-hot water, and eat rotten food (the sheriff boasted about this last point). His guards routinely strapped prisoners into restraint chairs and then tortured them with stun guns. Multiple prisoners died from such treatment. At least 157 of all Arpaio’s prisoners died before they got out. At least a quarter of those deaths were the result of suicide — for nearly half of them, authorities provided no official cause of death whatsoever.”
“It turns out that the Republican sabotage of Obamacare hasn’t affected Democrats. Their uninsured rate has continued to fall. But among Republicans, the number of those without health insurance has nearly doubled, from 7.9 percent to 13.9 percent. That’s higher than it was before Obamacare.
At this point there is little doubt in my mind that trump and his campaign colluded with the russians, and that can be added to the clear obstruction of justice charge against him in the matter. Course, I doubt that anything will happen to him in terms of impeachment unless the gop figures out they would be better off with pence. And if they already have decided to dump trump nothing will happen until after the election this November.
My thinking is based on two things, trump’s attack on Cohen through the National Enquirer(in my entire life I never considered the possibility that the NE would be a sounding board for the potus); and now the release of Mueller’s questions, which obviously came from trump’s lawyers.
Chait concludes:
“Cohen drew close to Trump because he started using his (almost certainly ill-gotten) wealth to buy real estate in Trump Tower, a favored investment vehicle for many criminal figures. What adds an extra layer of danger to Trump is that the alleged crimes with which Cohen could be charged are all state crimes. That is important because Trump can only pardon people for federal crimes. New York’s state attorney general Eric Schneiderman is partnering with Robert Mueller, and seemingly has the capacity to credibly threaten Cohen with a very long prison sentence for a potentially very long list of offenses spanning the rest of his life.
In that case, the best defense Trump has left is to discredit Cohen altogether, and make the case that he is fabricating evidence against the president to save his own skin. In other words, the narrative we see in the National Enquirer is an indication that Trump is seriously desperate. Discrediting Cohen is a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency move that makes no sense unless Cohen has already flipped.”
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/04/has-michael-cohen-already-flipped-on-donald-trump.html
They got him, but on a federal level I see nothing happening unless the gop does it themselves. However, I really believe that on the state level he could be in serious trouble.
Great article, but beyond scary in terms of going from cohn to trump and involving way, way too many dems.
“Amid the aftershocks of Donald Trump’s firing of James Comey last May, I went to see Angels in America at the same theater in London, the National, where I’d first seen it as a New York Times drama critic some 25 years earlier. The play didn’t transport me quite as far from the lamentable present as I’d hoped. The new production, now on Broadway, doesn’t radically depart in tone or quality (high) from the first. But the play’s center of gravity had shifted. While Tony Kushner’s epic had been seared into my memory by the frail figure of Prior Walter, a young gay man fighting AIDS with almost the entire world aligned against him, this time it was Roy Cohn who dominated: a closeted, homophobic, middle-aged gay man also battling AIDS but who, unlike the fictional Prior, was a real-life Über-villain of America’s 20th century. “The polestar of human evil,” as one character describes him. “The worst human being who ever lived … the most evil, twisted, vicious bastard ever to snort coke at Studio 54.”…..
So to return to Hillary Clinton’s flip rhetorical question: Why not go to the Trump-Melania wedding in 2005? These incidents are just a few of the many reasons why a former president and sitting United States senator with presidential ambitions should not have gone to this particular “fun, gaudy, over-the-top spectacle” in Palm Beach. But they just couldn’t stop themselves, any more than so many Democratic leaders of a quarter-century earlier couldn’t resist dressing up for Cohn’s fun, gaudy, over-the-top birthday gala at Studio 54. In the bipartisan New York political culture that nurtured Cohn and Trump, the statute of limitations for nearly every crime or outrage lasts about 48 hours. Nothing sticks; even repeated racist bygones can be bygones. Whether Hillary Clinton attended the wedding (Bill showed solely for the reception) because she’d taken Trump’s money, or because she wanted to be in the mix of power and celebrity no matter how tacky, or because she hoped there might be more favors to extract from Trump or someone else in the wedding party, doesn’t matter. Whatever the explanation, the then–New York senator, sitting in a reserved seat in the front row, lent a touch of civic legitimacy to Trump that the other glitzy celebrities on hand could not. He got what he’d paid for. He had written his checks knowing that the Clintons could be counted on not to bite the small hand that fed them — at least not until their own self-interest was threatened in 2016.”
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/04/frank-rich-roy-cohn-the-original-donald-trump.html
Has Israel Stopped Sharing Intel With the Trump Administration?
Kevin Drum May. 1, 2018
https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/05/has-israel-stopped-sharing-intel-with-the-trump-administration/
“What is now known to the general public is that Israel had succeeded in placing a listening device in an ISIS safe house deep in Syria, at great risk, and was listening in on everything ISIS was planning from that location. Trump revealed this intelligence to Kislyak and Lavarov during that infamous Oval Office meeting … Trump essentially revealed the “crown jewels” of Israeli intelligence operational methods in Syria … istening device the Israelis had placed went dead shortly after”
The absolute moral depravity of the GOP is incredible. And the people that vote for them show their depravity on a constant basis. Deplorables is too good for them.
“But the indifference of (many) conservative proponents of “the rule of law” to the conventional definition of the phrase has never been more naked than during the Trump era. And last night in Arizona, Mike Pence gave his movement’s contempt for equality before the law some especially indecent exposure.
Speaking at a “tax policy” event in Tempe, the vice-president took a moment to welcome the criminally racist former sheriff of Arizona’s Maricopa County, Joe Arpaio, to the rally, praising him as a “tireless champion of strong borders and the rule of law,” and going on to say, “I’m honored to have you here.”….
But the indifference of (many) conservative proponents of “the rule of law” to the conventional definition of the phrase has never been more naked than during the Trump era. And last night in Arizona, Mike Pence gave his movement’s contempt for equality before the law some especially indecent exposure.
Speaking at a “tax policy” event in Tempe, the vice-president took a moment to welcome the criminally racist former sheriff of Arizona’s Maricopa County, Joe Arpaio, to the rally, praising him as a “tireless champion of strong borders and the rule of law,” and going on to say, “I’m honored to have you here.”…
Arpaio is a convicted criminal. And the myriad legal violations that he racked up during his time in the sheriff’s office cost Arizona taxpayers $140 million in fees for litigation and settlements. But he made “us” feel more comfortable by making “them” live in perpetual fear. And that’s more than enough to make Arpaio a champion of “the rule of law” to Mike Pence; and, perhaps, to make him Senate material to Republican primary voters in the Grand Canyon State.”
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/05/pence-praises-joe-arpaio-as-champion-of-the-rule-of-law.html
Sorry, screwed up that post. SHould include
“But criminally racist profiling was among the lesser offenses on Joe’s (figurative) rap sheet. During his decades-long tenure as sheriff, Arpaio presided over (what he himself called) a “concentration camp,” where low-level offenders and undocumented immigrants were subjected to daily cruel and unusual punishments. In Tent City, men and women who’d been convicted of — or, in most cases, merely charged with — crimes like drug use, shoplifting, and working with false documents were forced to live outdoors, year-round. In the summer, they sweated through 130-degree temperatures; in winter, they shivered through frigid nights, barred, by rule, from wearing any form of jacket or coat; when it rained, water poured through holes in the tents, soaking them in their beds. Arpaio forced his prisoners to march in pink underwear, work in chain gangs, shower in boiling-hot water, and eat rotten food (the sheriff boasted about this last point). His guards routinely strapped prisoners into restraint chairs and then tortured them with stun guns. Multiple prisoners died from such treatment. At least 157 of all Arpaio’s prisoners died before they got out. At least a quarter of those deaths were the result of suicide — for nearly half of them, authorities provided no official cause of death whatsoever.”
https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/05/republican-health-care-sabotage-has-mostly-hurt-republicans/
“It turns out that the Republican sabotage of Obamacare hasn’t affected Democrats. Their uninsured rate has continued to fall. But among Republicans, the number of those without health insurance has nearly doubled, from 7.9 percent to 13.9 percent. That’s higher than it was before Obamacare.
Tell me again why anyone votes for these guys?”
“Tell me again why anyone votes for these guys?”
Simple. Their hatred of teh swarthy president blunts any pain their party inflicts on them.