A Year of Robert Mueller

IN THIS POST WE COVER THE FIRST YEAR of the Robert Mueller investigation. He was appointed Special Counsel on May 17, 2017. 

We also provide background on Trump/Russian relations prior to and during the 2016 campaign.

We cover the second year in a new post, “Another Year of Robert Mueller  (Part II),” which we will update as need arises. It arises often.

In fact, a third installment eventually grows out of the second, “Another Year of Robert Mueller (Part III).”

I am guessing, Part IV will be titled something like, “The Trump Presidency Goes Down in Flames.”

Trump nemesis: Robert Mueller.

Donald J. Trump and the Russians

TO KEEP THE STORY of Donald J. Trump and the Russians straight, it helps to remember how the saga began.

The first proven lie does not come until February 2017. Dozens of previous lies have been proven since. Nor has anyone ever explained what that “original sin” lie was told by one member of the Trump administration (General Michael T. Flynn) to another (Vice President Mike Pence (a.k.a. “Vice President Jesus”). 

Why did Flynn have to lie to his own team?

At the time, a newly elected President Trump was swearing that no one involved in his campaign had ever met with any Russians about anything fishy. As one aide put it early on: “There’s no there there.” Trump was already well aware that that was a lie and a giant one.

THE “RUSKIE”

For our purposes, we will start our count here, one Russian flag, or “Ruskie,” to represent each proven lie. Flags will not always appear on the day the lies occurred, but rather as they fit into our narrative.

Each time you see this flag, from now on, it will represent one proven lie, told by Trump or members of his family, campaign team or administration, usually related to the Russians. Other egregious falsehoods will at times be awarded “Ruskies,” as they relate to the level of trust we can place in key characters in the story.

A “Ruskie” shall be awarded like an Oscar or Tony, only for people without shame. The greatest award of all shall be the rare “Grand Ruskie,” which can be won only for sustained lying above and beyond even the call of duty.

Humor aside, I pray the U.S. Constitution will survive.

*

If we could travel back in time—to Inauguration Day, January 20, 2017—here is what we would be told. Don Jr. had never met with any Russians. Jared Kushner was going to be too busy bringing peace to the Middle East to talk to any Russian bankers. Carter Page had been to Moscow but had never met with any top Russian officials. Michael Cohen, Trump’s personal lawyer, had never traveled to Prague, for the purpose of meeting with close associates of Vladimir Putin. 

    

                                                                                                                                 

(Only the claim about Cohen still remains unproven. Don Jr., Jared and Rick Gates had all had contacts with Russians.)

On that day James Comey was famous mainly for “outing” Hillary Clinton in regard to questions about her emails and her judgment. Very possibly, he had cost her the chance to be president.

First, we need background.

                                                    

                                                                           

2011

Vladimir Putin and his cronies are busy pillaging their country, piling up billions of rubles and stashing them in secret private bank accounts.

12/11/11: Thousands of pro-democracy activists gather in Moscow and other cities to protest rigged parliamentary elections.

“Putin is a thief!” they chant.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says protesters, “deserve the right to have their voices heard and their votes counted, and that means they deserve free, fair, transparent elections and leaders who are accountable to them.” Putin definitely does not like Clinton.

2012

The Obama administration has so far failed to achieve the “reset” in Russian relations it had hoped. 

Putin definitely doesn’t like Obama.

Konstantin Rykov, a Putin ally, begins promoting Donald J. Trump as a candidate in the 2012 U.S. presidential election. 

*

Trump himself is busy stoking the “birther” myth in a series of tweets and numerous public appearances.

(This will be pertinent later when we have to assess the veracity of what he says as candidate president.)

Trump will not finally admit until the fall of 2016 that President Obama was born in American. He will then blame Hillary Clinton for starting the “birther” myth and magically making him keep spreading it for years.

His supporters will fall for that, too.

Trump is lying all along about Obama’s birth certificate. We could give him a thousand lies here; but we’re going to be conservative and just call it one.

October 24: In a shameless play for publicity, Trump promises to donate $5 million to a charity of President Obama’s choice if he will release his college transcripts and passport and other records, proving he’s an American citizen.

“There’s a huge cloud hanging over this presidency,” Trump says. “This could be solved in a positive and easy manner.”

Not until February 2019 will we learn that when Trump was running for president in 2016 he would have his personal lawyer send threatening letters to his old schools, warning them not to release any of his school records or even talk about what kind of student he had once been.

(We don’t award “Ruskies” for hypocrisy, though.

In a poll taken after the 2016 election, 6 out of 10 voters who chose Trump (57 percent) said it was “definitely true” or “probably true” that Barack Obama was born in Kenya.

2013

January: Carter Page, who will later serve as adviser to the Trump 2016 campaign, meets with a Russian spy, posing as an attaché with the United Nations. Page passes on documents related to the energy industry, in hopes of landing a lucrative deal in Russia. F.B.I. agents, who are already tracking several Russian spies, determine that Page doesn’t realize he’s dealing with a spy.

Russian spy refers to Page as an “idiot.”

Victor Podobnyy, that spy, is recorded telling another Russian, “I promised him a lot. How else to work with foreigners? You promise a favor for a favor.”

He refers to Page as an “idiot.”

Spring, 2013: Emin Agalarov, a Russian pop singer and Rob Goldstone, his agent, who has dual U.S. and British citizenship and lives in New Jersey, approach Paula Shugart, president of the Miss Universe Organization. Could she help book a pageant contestant to appear in one of Emin’s music videos?

Shugart mentions the possibility of bringing the pageant to Russia. The singer suggests Moscow. He and his father will ultimately pay $15 million to host the Miss Universe pageant in their home country.

Eventually, Emin, Goldstone and Emin’s father, Aras Agalarov, meet Donald J. Trump in Las Vegas, where the Miss USA pageant is being held. Goldstone sits at dinner next to Michael D. Cohen, a Trump lawyer. As Goldstone later explains to the Washington Post:

Trump appeared to hit it off with Emin Agalarov. At one point during dinner, Trump loudly challenged the young singer: “‘Hey Emin! I’ll reduce the [pageant] fee right now by a million dollars if you tell me if you’ve ever slept with any contestants!’” 

Agalarov shot back: “Interesting. I’ll increase your fee by $5 million right now if you tell me if you’ve ever slept with any contestant.”

Trump responded with a smile, “We should just forget the bet.” The room cracked up.

A deal is worked out. The 2013 Miss Universe Pageant will be held in Moscow. What could go wrong?

6/11/13: Russian lawmakers pass legislation making it a crime to distribute literature that would be considered “homonormative.” It is now a crime to write about homosexuals as ordinary human beings.

Putin and his cronies insist they want to protect Russian children (not counting LGBT children, who are nothing but a bunch of perverts, weirdos and sinners, who will suffer damnation for all eternity because of the way they were born.) 

Sarcasm. Sorry.

President Obama and many Western leaders criticize the new legislation. Putin is reportedly furious.

Carter Page already on the F.B.I. radar.

6/13/13: The F.B.I. interviews Carter Page about contacts with Russians. He’s already on their radar—and his problems have nothing to do with Donald J. Trump.

 

Right-wing pundits will later lie about this repeatedly. They will claim that U.S. intelligence agencies were out to get Trump when they placed Page under surveillance again in 2016. Page already had a questionable history with Russians. Plus, they knew he had traveled to Moscow, met with top Russian officials—and then lied.

That lie is already counted.

10/17/13: On the David Letterman Show, Trump tells the host he has done “a lot of business with the Russians.”

The following month Trump explains to a reporter:

I do have a relationship [with Putin] and I can tell you that he’s very interested in what we’re doing here today [discussing the Miss Universe pageant]. He’s probably very interested in what you and I are saying today, and I’m sure he’s going to be seeing it in some form, but I do have a relationship with him and I think it’s very interesting to see what’s happened.

Also, there has long been a possibility of large piles of $$$$$$$$$$$$ to be made, including rubles.

11/9/13: Trump tweets: “I’m in Moscow for Miss Universe tonight—picking a winner is very hard, they are all winners. Total sellout of arena. Big night in Russia!”

11/20/13: Trump tweets: “Emin from Russia—a very talented guy [the singer has just performed at the pageant].”

“Emin” will be important later.

Remember that name. Emin Agalarov will reappear in June 2016. He will help broker a secret meeting between Paul Manafort, Jared Kushner and Don Jr. with Russians offering to provide dirt on Hillary Clinton. (See: 7/10/17.)

The crown is won by Gabriela Isler ( pictured below, with Agalarov, left, and Donald J. Trump).

2014

2/23/14: On this fine day we are treated to a typical Trump tweet. It is both insulting and comically lacking in any grasp of complex issues: “Russia beat the United States in the Olympics—another Obama embarrassment! Isn’t it time that we turn things around and start kicking ass?” 

Who knew Obama could cause U.S. athletes to lose at hockey and curling?

And who knew Russia was running a massive doping scheme? More than a thousand Russian figure skaters, distance runners and weight lifters will eventually be banned from future Olympics.

Christopher Steele, a former longtime British spy for MI6, expert on Russian affairs and fluent in Russian, is already gathering information about Russian bribery involving international soccer.

(He will eventually put together the famous Steele dossier.)

Okay, we were doping!

2/27/14: Russian forces invade Crimea, an area owned by the Ukraine but home to a large Russian ethnic population. 

War breaks out.

3/5/14: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lashes out at Russia, in response to the invasion of Crimea. “Now if this sounds familiar,” she says, “it’s what Hitler did back in the ‘30s. All the Germans that were ... the ethnic Germans, the Germans by ancestry who were in places like Czechoslovakia and Romania and other places, Hitler kept saying they’re not being treated right. I must go and protect my people, and that’s what’s gotten everybody so nervous.”

Putin is not pleased with the comparison.

3/21/14: Trump tweets respect for the Russian president: “[Vladimir] Putin has become a big hero in Russia with an all time high popularity. Obama, on the other hand, has fallen to his lowest ever numbers. SAD”

Summer 2014: Two Russian women, Aleksandra Krylova and Anna Bogacheva, tour the United States. Their orders are to take the pulse of the American people. According to a document in the hands of U.S. investigators, Putin already has plans for the 2016 election. The Russians will try to “spread distrust toward candidates and the [American] political system in general.”

The two women later report back to the Russian government on what they have found.

7/17/14: Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, flying from Amsterdam, carrying 298 passengers and crew, is shot down over the Ukraine.

A lengthy investigation ends when the Dutch government places blame on Russia for firing the missile that downed the jet.

2015

TRUMP GETS THE BUG to run for president despite the fact he has clearly never read the U.S. Constitution. 

3/5/15: Michael Cohen, Trump’s fixer and personal lawyer, sends Trump’s old high school and the colleges he attended letters threatening legal action if they release any information regarding Mr. Trump’s academic performance. Trump used to hint that something sneaky was involved because President Obama had not shown the American people his grades from Harvard.

6/17/15: Donald J. Trump rides down the escalator at Trump Tower. Melania looks fetching in a stylish white designer dress. 

“So, ladies and gentlemen, I am officially running for president of the United States,” her husband says.

Trump’s answer could be worth tens of billions.

7/11/15: By some freak of chance—or plotting—a young Russian redhead, Maria Butina, appears at a Las Vegas rally, where Candidate Trump will be speaking. There she is selected from the audience to ask him a question. If elected, she wonders, would he continue the economic sanctions aimed at Russia by President Obama, following the invasion and annexation of Crimea?

Trump’s answer could be worth tens of billions to Russian oligarchs whose funds had been frozen overseas as a result of the sanctions.

“I wouldn’t think you’d need the sanctions,” Trump replied. Not when he was in charge and the United States was “respected” again.

In Moscow they heard that answer and loved it.

$$$$$

(In July 2018, Butina, still living in the United States, is indicted for her work as an unregistered agent of the Russian Federation. She cops a plea and begins cooperating.) Butina is already lying in the summer of 2015.

7/24/15: Classified information is discovered on Clinton’s private email server. The F.B.I. opens an investigation.

The Washington Post is not yet “fake news.”

8/8/15: The Washington Post reports that the F.B.I. is investigating the security of Clinton’s server. This is the Post doing what the Post does best: Keeping tabs on the powerful.

No one calls this “fake news.”

11/3/15: Felix H. Sater, a close Trump associate (and convicted felon), emails Michael Cohen about hot prospects for building a Trump Tower in Moscow. “I will get Putin on this program and we will get Donald elected,” crows Sater. 

“Buddy our boy can become President of the USA and we can engineer it,” and “I will get all of Putins team to buy in on this.” 

♥$♥$♥$♥$♥$♥$♥

As David Cay Johnston will make clear in his book, The Making of Donald Trump, Sater is a shady character. 

He appears in federal court records in “a $40 million organized-crime stock swindle he confessed to in 1998…[a swindle that involved] using high-pressure tactics to get naïve people to buy worthless shares from Sater and his mob friends.” 

He also had a 1991 felony conviction for “stabbing a man in the face with the stem of a margarita glass.”

  

Sater and Cohen later deny any such contacts.

12/7/15: Speaking to ABC reporters, Vladimir Putin says Donald J. Trump is,

a very colorful person. Talent, without any doubt….But it’s not our affair to determine his worthiness—that’s up to the United States. But he is absolutely the leader in the presidential race. He wants to move to a different level of relations, to more solid, deeper relations with Russia and how can Russia not welcome that [emphasis added]—we welcome that.

Putin already ♥’s Trump.

“It’s always a great honor to be so nicely complimented by a man so highly respected within his own country and beyond,” Trump responds.

12/10/15: Three days later General Flynn, then a top campaign adviser, flies to Moscow for a speaking engagement. 

At a gala dinner he is seated smack dab next to Vladimir Putin. Flynn is paid $45,000 for participating but doesn’t report his fee as required by U.S. Army regulations. 

(That’s not the only time he takes cash from Russians.)

Later Flynn collects $530,000 from Turkish interests, while supposedly working in the interests of Trump and the U.S. There are reports he may have been offered as much as $15 million if he could help the Turks get their hands on the leader of the Gülen movement, blamed for stirring up a coup against the government of Turkey. (That leader had taken refuge in the U.S.)

   

Flynn never reveals the payoffs from the Turks or the Russians.

2016

3/21/16: In an interview with the Washington Post (not yet “Fake News”) Candidate Trump announces the names of his foreign policy advisers. Carter Page and George Papadopoulos both make the list.

Reuters reports: the Russians are warming up to the idea of Candidate Trump as the next President of the United States. On Russian TV, Dmitry Kiselyov claims that the Republican party elite has struck a secret deal with Democrats to derail Trump, in part because of his sympathy for Russia.

Kiselyov, who once said Russia could reduce the United States to “radioactive ash,” has a favorable opinion of the mercurial GOP candidate. “Trump,” he says, “is ready to find a common language with Putin.”

3/24/16: George Papadopoulos meets in London with a professor named Joseph Mifsud, who brings a “female Russian national” along. She is introduced as a niece of Vladimir Putin. 

They tell Papadopoulos they wish to arrange a meeting between Trump and his campaign and “Russian leadership.”

(Mifsud later disappears.)

Papadopoulos later denies having this meeting.

3/29/16: Paul Manafort joins the campaign. “Paul is a great asset and an important addition as we consolidate the tremendous support we have received in the primaries and caucuses, garnering millions more votes than any other candidate,” Trump says. “Paul Manafort, and the team I am building, bring the needed skill sets to ensure that the will of the Republican voters, not the Washington political establishment, determines who will be the nominee for the Republican Party.”

This may be the original sin. Manafort is dirty from his socks up. 

The F.B.I. learns early on that Manafort is talking to people agents believe are tied to Russian intelligence services. 

(He is.)

3/31/16: Trump meets with national security advisers, including Papadopoulos, who tells the group he has Russian connections. They can arrange a meeting between Trump and Putin. 

Key participants in that meeting forget they were there.

No one remembers anything about the meeting. We should probably count this as a lie for every person present; but let’s count it once.

4/26/16: Professor Mifsud, who has already met with Papadopoulos, tells him Moscow has a possible gift for the Trump campaign: thousands of hacked emails that might damage Hillary Clinton.

4/27/16: Candidate Trump gives his first major foreign policy speech. Russia and the United States, he says, should look for areas of mutual interest. “Common sense says this cycle, this horrible cycle of hostility, must end, and ideally it will end soon.”

That same evening, Papadopoulos emails the Russian foreign ministry, “That’s the signal to meet.”

Papadopoulos later denies this.

5/19/16: Manafort is promoted to campaign chairman and chief strategist. Trump thinks Manafort is great.

5/20/16: The National Rifle Association, at its national convention in Louisville, Kentucky, endorses Donald Trump for president.

In an email with the subject line, “Kremlin connection,” GOP operative Paul Erickson tries to broker a meeting between Putin and the Trump campaign. “Putin is deadly serious about building a good relationship with Mr. Trump,” he writes. “Ever since Hillary compared Putin to Hitler, all senior Russian leaders consider her beyond redemption.”

At the time, Erickson is shacking up with a young Russian redhead, Maria Butina. She will later be arrested as an unregistered agent of the Russian Federation. (See: 7/13/18, 7/18/18 and 8/4/18.)

5/21/16: On Facebook, a group called “Heart of Texas” has been urging people to attend a rally scheduled at noon for this day. “Stop Islamization of Texas,” the group’s posts warn. A protest will be held outside an Islamic center, opened fourteen years earlier, in downtown Houston.

One follower of the group responds: “Need to blow this place up.”

“Heart of Texas,” which has a quarter-million followers, later turns out to be one of at least 470 Facebook pages created by agents of the Russian government working to spread disunity in the U.S.

Young Russian “keyboard warriors,” are working 12-hour shifts to stir up trouble during the coming election.

Another 2,700 fake individual Facebook accounts are created with the same purpose: stir up anger in every way.

On Instagram, 170 fake accounts run by agents of Russia post 120,000 times.

On Twitter, 3,814 fake accounts are activated, as well as 50,258 automated “bot” accounts spreading disinformation.

Russians posing as Americans, hiding behind names like “Kate S. Milton” and “James MacMorgans,” create podcasts, post videos on Vine and blog on Tumblr about politics and life.

The New York Times later explains how a company, the Internet Research Agency, tied to Russian military, set to work:

In the company’s new department, some 80 young English speakers worked in shifts to feed Facebook pages and Twitter accounts imitating the snark and fury of outraged Americans. They stole photos, favoring attractive young women, for their Twitter profiles. They copied or created sharp poster-like commentaries on American life and politics, only occasionally slipping up with grammatical mistakes. They focused their efforts on pages that struck American nerves, with names like “Guns4Life,” “Pray for Police,” “Stop All Invaders,” “South United” and — mimicking Mr. Trump — “America First.”

Memes were a specialty—usually designed with a specific purpose: Damage Hillary, help Trump.

Many of the Facebook memes portrayed Mrs. Clinton as angry, corrupt or crazed. Mr. Trump was depicted as his campaign preferred: strong, decisive, courageous, willing to shun political correctness to tell hard truths. The Russian operation also boosted Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate who had dined with Mr. Putin in Moscow, to draw votes from Mrs. Clinton. It encouraged supporters of Mr. Sanders to withhold their votes from Mrs. Clinton even after he endorsed her.

6/6/16: Trump knocks out his last remaining opponent in the Republican primaries: “Lyin’ Ted” Cruz.

Trump’s former fixer and lawyer, Michael Cohen, claims in 2018 that top campaign officials and Don Jr. held a strategy meeting that day to discuss plans to meet with the Russians and see what dirt they could provide. Cohen also says Don Sr. was aware of and green-lighted the meeting.

Still not conclusively proven; but someone is lying, either Cohen or others.

6/7/16: Candidate Trump announces to the nation:

“I am going to give a major speech on probably Monday of next week [June 13] and we’re going to be discussing all of the things that have taken place with the Clintons.

“I think you’re going to find it very informative and very, very interesting. I wonder if the press will want to attend. Who knows? Hillary Clinton turned the State Department into her private hedge fund. The Russians, the Saudis, the Chinese all gave money to Bill and Hillary and got favorable treatment in return. It’s a sad day in America when foreign governments with deep pockets have more influence [emphasis added] in our own country than our great citizens.”

It is a sad day in America when foreign governments have more influence. Yes, how well we now realize.

6/9/16: A momentous day: Don Jr., Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort meet secretly at Trump Tower in New York City with Russians they believe are bearing gifts—frankincense, myrrh and dirt on Hillary.

This meeting will not be revealed for thirteen months, not till the free press, namely The New York Times, does its job. 

    

All three men “forget” having ever had this meeting until The New York Times breaks the story in July 2017. (We counted Don Jr.’s lie before.)

Rolf Mowatt-Larssen, a former C.I.A. officer who served as station chief in Moscow, later tells the Times, “The Russians aren’t reckless, and I don’t see them going through with this effort without thinking they have a willing partner in the dance.”

6/12/16: Three days after the Trump Tower meeting, Julian Assange appears on British television. He announces that WikiLeaks will soon be releasing emails damaging to Hillary Clinton.

6/13/16: Monday comes and goes. The major speech promised by Candidate Trump on Hillary Clinton fails to materialize.

6/14/16: It’s Flag Day. But members of the Trump campaign seem confused about which flag they’re honoring.

The Washington Post breaks the first story about Russian involvement in the hacking and release of damaging emails stolen from the Democratic National Committee. These emails do immediate damage to the Democratic Party, driving a wedge between Clinton and Bernie Sanders and his supporters.

This flag, ladies and gentlemen; you’re serving this flag.

6/15/16: Wikileaks begins publishing stolen Clinton emails, which it claims to have received from a Romanian hacker, Guccifer 2.0.  The lone hacker wants to make it clear. He or she has nothing to do with Russia.

Computer experts at CrowdStrike, working for the Democrats, say Guccifer is lying. Guccifer replies, “It seems the guys from CrowdStrike would say I’m a Russian bear even if I were a catholic nun.”

Several GOP candidates running for Congress ask Guccifer 2.0 for dirt on Democratic opponents. The “Romanian” is happy to oblige.

In July 2018, the Department of Justice issues a lengthy indictment against a dozen Russian military officers who—you guessed it—were behind the website, Guccifer 2.0. 

6/22/16: Additional Democratic National Committee emails, hacked by Russian agents, are released to WikiLeaks.

6/27/16: Clinton is getting beat up in the press. This is six months before “Fake News” is invented. 

Attorney General Loretta Lynch meets with Bill Clinton. They talk for thirty minutes. This meeting looks bad, like Bill is pressuring her to go easy on Hillary. The story is widely covered, including by CNN.

The free press is working.

7/5/16: In an unusual move, F.B.I. Director James Comey announces that he does not recommend criminal charges against Clinton. He does, however, call her decision to use a private email server “extremely careless.”

So far the only damage done by Comey is to Hillary. 

7/7/16: News begins to swirl about Russian meddling in the campaign. Trump is forced to address the issue. Asked about his relationship with Vladimir Putin, Trump responds, “I’ve never met Putin. I don’t know who Putin is.”

This is not what he said previously.

7/7-8/16: Carter Page is in Moscow, giving speeches on foreign policy. The Steele dossier will warn that while in Russia, Page meets with Igor Sechin, a Putin ally and Igor Diveykin, Putin’s deputy chief for internal policy.

Page is allegedly told that the Russians have compromising material on Hillary Clinton.

A lucrative oil deal is allegedly floated under Page’s nose.

7/20/16: Page meets with Sergey Kislyak, Russian Ambassador to the U.S., at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland. Page will later deny that he ever met with Russian officials during the campaign.

Page met with Russians on multiple occasions.

The “Deep State” fails because it’s a figment of the imagination.

July: The F.B.I. opens an investigation into Russian attempts to influence the election, including links to the Trump campaign. The fictitious “Deep State” which we will hear so much about later, fails, mostly because the “Deep State” is a right-wing figment of the imagination. 

This investigation remains secret until after the election. The F.B.I. does not want to intrude further in the electoral process. 

7/22/16: Guccifer 2.0 passes 19,252 stolen emails to WikiLeaks which publishes the trove three days before the Democratic National Convention.

The emails expose DNC staffers’ secret support for Hillary and antipathy toward Bernie Sanders. This drives a wedge between the wings of the Democratic Party, which later proves important in tilting the election Trump’s way.

7/25/16: Trump actually tweets: “The new joke in town is that Russia leaked the disastrous DNC e-mails, which should never have been written (stupid), because Putin likes me[.]”

Yes. We know he does.

7/27/16: In a televised speech, Candidate Trump urges the Russians to find 30,000 lost Clinton emails. All kinds of Clinton and DNC emails are soon leaking.

10/16/16: Michael Cohen arranges a $130,000 payment to silence a porn star primed to reveal a consensual sexual encounter with Trump in 2006. Melania Trump was recovering from the birth of her and Donald’s son Barron at the time. 

Stormy Daniels got paid.

  

Cohen and Trump cover up this affair. The future president is lying to his third wife.

DURING THIS PERIOD, when Melania was pregnant, as Trump reveals in the Access Hollywood tape, the future president was doing his best to lure other women to bed. He took one of his targets furniture shopping.  “I did try to fuck her,” he can be heard bragging. “She was married. I moved on her like a bitch.”

10/28/16: Director Comey announces that the F.B.I. is reviewing a fresh set of Clinton emails. These were found on Anthony Weiner’s computer. Weiner is famous at the time mainly for sending “dick pictures” to teen girls.

With just days till the election, Trump loves Comey.

10/31/16: With only days to go to till the election, Trump tells enthusiastic crowds that F.B.I. Director James Comey has done something great. The Bureau is reviewing a fresh set of Clinton emails!

“And it took guts for Director Comey to make the move [emphasis added] that he made in light of the kind of opposition he had where they’re trying to protect her from criminal prosecution,” Trump says. “You know that. It took a lot of guts.”

“A lot of people want him to do the wrong thing,” Trump suggests. “What he did was the right thing.”

Trump ♥’s Comey!!!!

11/8/16: Trump is elected president.

11/11/16:  Clinton blames Director Comey for her defeat. Trump has no reason to believe Comey is out to get him.

You have to be incredibly dense to miss this point. Many Trump fans and all the talking heads at Fox News eventually miss it.

Or at Fox they spin it, hoping Trump fans will miss it.

This could go down as, like, 50,000 lies for Fox News; but we aren’t counting Fox News lies. Trump, however, pushes the same narrative.

12/9/16: President Obama orders the intelligence community to review suspicious Russian activity during recent months. Any revelations before votes were cast might have raised a storm of protest. Right-wingers would have called it a craven plot to swing the contest in Clinton’s favor.

(Remember: Trump had been complaining constantly that the U.S. election system is “rigged.”)

Had news of this investigation leaked, damaging his chances, Trump might have asked his fans to grab their guns and start shooting liberals, Mexicans and Muslim-Americans.

Also: transgender persons using the wrong restrooms.

The Obama administration could have damaged Trump before the election.

12/16/16: General Flynn, senior Russian diplomat Sergey Kislyak and Jared Kushner meet at Trump Tower. No one involved remembers having had this meeting until the free press breaks the news.

  

Flynn and Kushner fail to reveal this meeting.

12/29/16: Flynn assures Kislyak that sanctions imposed by Obama will be rolled back once Trump takes over.

Flynn later lies to the F.B.I. about this meeting. Clearly, no one on the Trump team has anything to hide.

He also lies to Vice President Jesus.

For narrative purposes we’ll count this one later.

2017

1/6/17: U.S. intelligence agencies report: “Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the U.S. presidential election. Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the U.S. democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency.” 

President Trump insists the U.S. intelligence community is full of beans. He will continue to deny the truth for months.

Trump is probably lying; he may be simply stupid.

1/10/17: BuzzFeed publishes the Steele dossier, which paints a damning picture of Donald J. Trump. 

No one knows to this day how much of the dossier is true. 

Director Comey informs Trump of the existence of the dossier four days earlier; but Comey says the allegations contained cannot be proven.

We do know something about Christopher Steele. Steele has previously helped the F.B.I. break up a $200 million bribery scheme involving top international soccer officials. Steele also helped expose the Russian government’s role in the poisoning death of dissident Alexander Litvinenko. 

Critical allegations in the dossier—several of which have since been proven true—include this charge (still in doubt): that Trump “and his inner circle have received a regular flow of intelligence from the Kremlin, including on his Democratic and other political rivals.” 

Steele warns that Russian intelligence has compromised Trump, in part because of “perverted sexual acts which have been arranged/monitored by the FSB [Russia’s counterintelligence agency].” The Ritz Carlton Hotel in Moscow was known to be under surveillance. It was here the “golden showers” activity—prostitutes peeing on a bed where Obama once slept, to amuse Trump—allegedly occurred. More than one source tells Steele that Trump’s behavior had provided Russian authorities with ample material “to blackmail him if they wished.”

*

A sampling of the findings will provide a sense of how disastrous the dossier would be if validated:

Further evidence of extensive conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Kremlin, sanctioned at the highest levels and involving Russian diplomatic staff based in the US.

Agreed exchange of information established in both directions. Trump’s team using moles within DNC and hackers in the US as well as outside in Russia. Putin motivated by fear and hatred of Hillary Clinton. Russians receiving intel on Russian oligarchs and their families living in US.

According to sources, in a July 2016 meeting, Carter Page was told the Russians could release damaging information on Clinton—but also hinted they had damaging info on Trump. “Russians apparently have agreed not to use ‘kompromat’ they hold on Trump as leverage, given high levels of co-operation forthcoming from his team.”

If the Trump team played ball, Page was told there could be big money involved. This “included offer of large stake in Rosneft [Russia’s state-owned oil company] in return for lifting sanctions on Russia.

“Page confirms this is Trump’s intention.”

Page admits he traveled to Moscow but says he never met with top Russian officials. He later changes his story. We counted this lie already.

In other words….as “Deep Throat” told reporters during the Watergate investigation, follow the money.

$$$$$$$$$$$$

(For Russians facing U.S. sanctions there are hundreds of billions of dollars at stake.)

Steele’s sources tell him Aras Agalarov (his name will appear in the email chain related to the secret June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower) would know details about Trump bribes and illicit sexual activities in St. Petersburg. “Trump had participated in sex parties in the city too, but that all direct witnesses to this recently had been ‘silenced,’ i.e. paid bribes or coerced to disappear.”

Trump bodyguard Keith Schiller will later admit that he was approached during a high level meeting in Moscow in 2013 by someone he didn’t know about sending up five prostitutes to Trump’s room. 

He will claim he was “on guard” outside Trump’s hotel room until 2 a.m. and finally went to his own room. As far as he could tell there were no monkeys (or Russian whores) jumping on Trump’s bed.

Probable lie: We know Trump has no compunction about sleeping with porn stars, Playboy Bunnies, or anyone else he can lure into bed.

A Kremlin insider told Steele that a key role in the 2016 campaign’s effort to reach out to Russians “was being played by the Republican candidate’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen.”

Cohen was trying to cover up links that made Manafort vulnerable and hide the story of Page’s visit to Moscow. 

“According to the Kremlin insider, Cohen was now heavily engaged in a cover up and damage limitation operation in an attempt to prevent the full details of Trump’s relationship with Russia being exposed.”

Cohen was alleged to have had a secret meeting in Prague where discussion centered on how to “process deniable cash payments” including to anti-Clinton hackers “paid by both Trump team and Kremlin.”

Probable lies: a shitload;

Michael Cohen, Trump's fixer and personal lawyer.

1/13/17: As word spreads about a possible investigation into Russian meddling in the election, Trump tweets about “fake news” for the first time. As president he has since used this handy term in hundreds of tweets.

1/20/17: Trump takes the oath of office promising to do his best to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Apparently, he’s kidding.

1/24/17: F.B.I. agents visit the White House to interview General Michael T. Flynn. The agency already has questions about his behavior.

There is no record Flynn tells the president or any other high-ranking official about this interview. 

1/26/17: Flynn might not have told anyone about his interview. But Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates calls White House Counsel Don McGahn first thing in the morning. She says she has “a very sensitive matter” to discuss. He invites her to stop by and she warns him there are serious problems with Flynn’s F.B.I. interview. Claims Vice President Jesus and others are making in regard to Flynn’s conduct, intelligence agencies know “not to be the truth.”

Yates does not say Vice President Jesus is lying. 

Flynn is lying to Pence.

“This was a problem,” she later testifies, “because not only did we believe that the Russians knew this, but that they likely had proof of this information. And that created a compromise situation, a situation where the national security adviser essentially could be blackmailed by the Russians.”

1/27/17: McGahn calls Yates and asks her to return to the White House. They discuss Flynn’s exposure to indictment. In what every good American will realize is totally a coincidence and not in any way an attempt to obstruct justice, that same day Trump calls F.B.I. Director Comey and invites him to dinner. 

Comey will later tell a Congressional panel that the president suggested 6:00 at the White House. They agreed to 6:30.

Comey called his wife and broke a previous engagement.

He testifies under oath that it seemed strange Trump was inviting him to a private dinner. He was worried enough to begin keeping detailed notes. Comey says during dinner the president asked for “a pledge of loyalty.” 

Trump later denies this. “No. No, I didn’t. But I don’t think it would be a bad question to ask,” he tells reporters.

1/30/17: Taking decisive action, Trump fires…Sally Yates! Flynn remains National Security Adviser.

2/5/17: The Trump-Putin bromance turns steamy. When Bill O’Reilly asks the president about the Russian leader during an interview, O’Reilly refers to Putin as “a killer.”

Mr. Trump, who once praised Saddam Hussein for skill in handling terrorists (which meant gassing anyone he didn’t like), replies: “There are a lot of killers. You think our country’s so innocent?”

Trump + Putin = ♥.

2/9/17: Vice President Jesus learns Flynn lied to him. No one can explain why it took the president two weeks to clue in Pence.

Trump supporters can never explain why Flynn lied to Pence.

2/13/17: Flynn resigns, but only after it is made clear—because the free press reveals the story—that he lied to VP Jesus about his dealings with Russian agents. Oddly enough the president has known for eighteen days that Flynn lied and doesn’t fire him till the story breaks in the papers.

Definitely not “Fake News.”

This is the original proven lie; Trump supporters can never explain why Flynn would lie to Pence.

This lie has nothing to do with the “Deep State” or Comey and the F.B.I. supposedly trying to bring Trump down.

2/14/17: Meeting with Comey a day later, Trump asks him to drop the Flynn investigation. Comey prepares a memo stating the same and shows it to other top F.B.I. leaders. He thinks something smells funny.

PROBABLE LIE: Comey has nothing to gain from lying here. Clearly, Trump does.

Trump’s history shows lying comes as naturally to him as taking in carbon dioxide does to trees.

  

Speaking of lying, a check for $70,000 is handed over to Michael Cohen, as payment for his work covering up the story of Stormy Daniels and her one-night stand with Citizen Trump in 2006.

Technically, this lie isn’t about Russians; but it goes to show you how happy Trump and his minions are to lie when it serves their purposes.

3/17/17: Trump claims he was wiretapped by the Obama administration; leaders of both parties in Congress deny there is evidence. “No such wiretap existed,” Speaker of the House Paul Ryan tells reporters. Press Secretary Spicer tells reporters the president stands by his claim. It’s what he believes.

It’s like when a child claims he saw the Easter Bunny. It’s what the child believes.

No wiretaps occurred; it’s another lie.

3/20/17: Trump says everything involving Russian attempts to influence the election is “fake news.” (Later, he starts to capitalize the phrase.) Russia? He doesn’t even like Russian salad dressing. Where is Russia, anyway? 

Is that some “shithole” country in Africa?

Meanwhile, Comey informs Congress there is an investigation going on, including looking for “any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia’s efforts.”

3/22/17: The Associated Press reports that Paul Manafort once worked for a Russian billionaire and friend of Putin. He was paid as much as $12.7 million to “advance the interests of Russia.” 

Press Secretary Spicer tries to claim that Manafort “played a very limited role for a very limited amount of time” during the campaign.

Lie: Manafort was a driving force for five months. 

3/23/17: Manafort is revealed to have ties to a bank in Cyprus that laundered money for Russians. He used 15 different accounts and operated 10 different shell companies on the island. 

Manafort is a shady crook.

3/26/17: Roger Stone, longtime Trump pal, offers to testify in front of Congress. Did he contact Guccifer 2.0, a hacking group known to be a front for Russian intelligence agencies? Guccifer 2.0 is tied to the leaked Democratic National Committee emails during the campaign. 

Well, yes, he admits, maybe he did.

Stone insists Guccifer isn’t a Russian front. And who are you going to believe? Roger Stone? Or U.S. intelligence agencies?

They say it is.

Probable lies: Pretty much everything Stone says. 

Roger Stone at Trump Inauguration.

3/27/17: Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner gets a bunch of jobs in the administration. These include serving as top policy adviser and “primary point of contact” with leaders and ambassadors from many foreign nations. 

White House spokesperson Hope Hicks (a.k.a. “The White House Babe”) admits Kushner had a previously undisclosed meeting in December 2016 with the head of a Russian bank facing U.S. sanctions. 

Jared “forgot.”

Even more interesting, the bank once provided cover for Russian spying in New York City in 2014.

Kushner was lying when he said he forgot; we already counted this lie.

5/2/17: Hillary Clinton once again blames her loss on Director Comey’s announcement about her emails on October 28, saying, “If the election were on Oct. 27, I would have been your president.”

It wasn’t.

She isn’t.

5/3/17: We learn Sally Yates is preparing to testify in front of Congress. She will say she informed White House lawyers, “Flynn was lying when he denied in public and private that he had discussed U.S. sanctions on Russia in conversations with Russian Ambassador to the U.S. Sergei Kislyak.”

Trump & Co. will blame the fact Flynn was working in the White House on Barack Obama.

Why?

Because Flynn had a security clearance under the previous administration!

All Trump did was hire the man to serve in his campaign, after Obama fired him, and elevate him to National Security Adviser.

Definitely Obama’s fault!

5/8/17: President Trump wakes up constipated and lets rip with an angry, early morning tweet: “The Russian-Trump collusion story is a total hoax, when will this taxpayer funded charade end?”

5/9/17: In a bold move to end the “taxpayer funded charade,” Trump fires Comey. White House aides are at pains to point out that the president “acted based on the clear recommendations” of two men, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. 

Trump ♥’s Sessions and Rosenstein.

Kellyanne Conway assures Anderson Cooper that evening: “This had nothing to do with Russia, as much as somebody must be getting $50 every time the word is said, I’m convinced, on TV. This has nothing to do with Russia.”

“Nada.”

Lie: Conway says this has nothing to do with Russia. 

5/10/17: At a morning press gathering new Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders (a.k.a. “Press Secretary Pinocchio”) tells reporters that the president fired Comey only because of recommendations from Sessions and Rosenstein. They said Comey had lost the confidence of rank-and-file agents at the Bureau.

Trump has a meeting that afternoon with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak and Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. This meeting is kept secret for two days, in large part because the “fake news” people are banned from attending. 

Also, because the White House decides not to mention it and even after news leaks, decides to release photos, but crop Kislyak out of the scene. 

   

Sanders says Comey’s firing had nothing to do with Russians. The White House tries to crop Kislyak out of the pictures.

5/11/17: In an interview with Lester Holt of NBC, Trump explains his rationale for the Comey firing. Holt wonders: How much of a factor were the two letters penned by Sessions and Rosenstein?

“Oh, I was going to fire regardless of recommendation,” Trump replies. “I was going to fire Comey, knowing there was no good time to do it. And, in fact, when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said, ‘You know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story.’” 

That’s right. Comey was fired because of the Russian investigation.

In August 2018, the president will start tweeting that the interview with Holt was edited to change the meaning of what he said.

  

That lies is so dumb, you wonder: Who could be so stupid as to believe it? (On Twitter, when I check, the tweet has almost 70,000 likes.

5/12/17: The Russians prank the president, releasing photos of his meeting on the 10^th with Kislyak (not to mention a variety of other Russians, including representatives of Russian media).

Everyone in the photos appears to be having a great time. 

Part of the fun involves Trump telling the Russians he fired Comey because he was “crazy, a real nut job.”

A week later, The New York Times acquires a leaked document outlining what was discussed at the meeting. “I faced great pressure because of Russia,” Trump told his foreign pals. “That’s taken off.”

The White House kept this meeting secret as long as it could.

5/17/17: In the wake of Comey’s firing, questions about the investigation grow. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein decides to appoint Robert Mueller as Special Counsel.

Trump sycophants will later argue that Comey and Rosenstein were in cahoots to bring Trump down. Only complete idiots will fall for this line. 

At 7:21 p.m. the White House announces, in the wake of the Mueller appointment, that the president is “looking forward to this matter concluding quickly.”

In the meantime, the president will be fighting hard “for the people and issues that matter most to the future of our country.”

Trump seems calm and reasonable. 

Trump tells Holt he removed Comey because of Russia.

5/18/17: WTF! So much for “calm” and “reasonable.” Trump takes to Twitter at 6:52 in the morning to howl: “This is the single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history!”

5/24/17: The New York Times reports that U.S. intelligence agencies collected information during the 2016 campaign, “revealing that senior Russian intelligence and political officials were discussing how to exert influence over Donald J. Trump through his advisers.” The names of Flynn and Manafort were mentioned.

There was also “information about direct communication between Mr. Trump’s advisers and Russian officials.”

5/28/17: Politico reports: 

Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said Sunday that he and the intelligence community were “very concerned” about reports that White House adviser Jared Kushner discussed establishing secretive back channels with the Kremlin.

“I will tell you that my dashboard warning light was clearly on, and I think that was the case with all of us in the intelligence community, very concerned about the nature of these approaches to the Russians.”

5/31/17: The “fake news” folks at Vox join the fray. Vox reports, “Federal investigators are fixated on a mysterious December meeting between senior White House adviser Jared Kushner and Russian banker Sergey Gorkov.”

Kushner suddenly remembers he did meet with Gorkov but they only talked about…he can’t be sure…maybe gardening. 

PBS wonders why Kushner suggested in their meeting that a back channel to Russia be created…using Russian diplomatic facilities. 

Critics wonder why any private citizen would “try to set up covert communications with a hostile power like Russia, particularly after U.S. intelligence accused Moscow of trying to interfere in the 2016 election to help Trump.” 

Kushner is still lying.

June 2017: We won’t know this for months; but Trump issues an order to fire Mueller. White House Counsel McGahn threatens to quit rather than support the decision. 

Trump backs away from a legal precipice.

6/9/17: Having watched James Comey testify before Congress, as filtered through Fox & Friends, Trump tweets: “Despite so many false statements and lies, total and complete vindication...and WOW, Comey is a leaker!”

Most observers react differently, believing testimony shows Comey was fired because Trump wanted to kill the investigation.

Obstruction of justice comes to mind. So say articles in the Chicago Sun-Times, the Baltimore Sun, USA Today, The Hill, Time, National Review, and stories on CNN, NBC and even BBC News.

6/17/17: The New York Times reports that another member of the Trump campaign is under investigation. 

Rick Gates, an ally of Paul Manafort, survived his mentor’s demise after Manafort was accused of taking millions from Ukrainian leaders with Russian ties. 

During the time Manafort worked in the Ukraine, Gates would fly to Moscow to conduct business in his boss’s name. He would sign documents, including those related to shell companies in Cyprus, and funnel payments to Manafort and secret bank accounts. One client was Oleg Deripaska, who had been denied a visa to the United States, because of ties to organized crime.

(Gates later pleads guilty to eight felony counts.)

7/7/17: Trump is in Germany for the G-20 summit. In Poland, the day before, he gave the best speech ever given by an American president, according to…Trump. Because he cares about freedom, the president decided not to criticize the Polish government which has been subverting an independent judiciary, cracking down on journalists, and making “unwanted protests” (protests the government doesn’t like) illegal. These are all ideas the U.S. president can get on board with.

Together Trump and Poland’s leader, Andrzej Duda, commiserate on the woes of dealing with media outlets that won’t be cowed. Trump sends Mr. Duda a romantic tweet: “We will fight the #Fake news together!”

Trump + Autocrats = ♥.

Now, in Hamburg, Germany, he meets with Putin. Apparently, the two leaders hit it off. Trump does, however, “grill” the Russian leader on the “fake” Russian interference in the 2016 election.

He later provides reporters with a blow-by-blow description of how he held Putin’s feet to an Art of the Deal fire:

“I said to him, ‘Were you involved in the meddling with the election?’ he recalled. “He said, ‘Absolutely not. I was not involved.’ He was very strong on it. I then said to him, in a totally different way, ‘Were you involved with the meddling?’ He said, ‘I was not—absolutely not.’”

Problem solved! 

Special Counsel Robert Mueller can pack it up and go home.

POSTSCRIPT: On the plane ride home, the president is already working on a misleading letter to cover up the purpose of a secret meeting Don Jr. took with Russians in Trump Tower the previous June. In other words, he already knows that the Russians interfered in the election.

He is lying when he tells reporters he believes Putin; but this lie is only proven much later. 

This is where all pretense of presidential innocence is lost. Trump is lying about Russian interference in the 2016 election and knows his campaign was complicit. Had he made these statements under oath he would have been guilty of perjury. Instead, he’s “only” lying to the American people.

POSTSCRIPT: On the plane ride home, the president is already working on a misleading letter to cover up the purpose of a secret meeting Don Jr. took with Russians in Trump Tower the previous June. In other words, he already knows that the Russians interfered in the election.

He is lying when he tells reporters he believes Putin; but this lie is only proven much later. 

Best buds!!!

7/8/17: The New York Times reports that Don Jr. took part in a secret meeting with a Russian lawyer at Trump Tower in June 2016. Also attending were Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort. 

Suddenly, Jr. and Jared and Paul remember—hey—we did have a meeting!

When asked to comment, Jr. issues an official statement assuring the Times the meeting was mostly about adoption policy.  

It wasn’t.

The Times explains that the lawyer in question, Natalia Veselnitskaya, “is best known for mounting a multipronged attack against the Magnitsky Act.” 

This law was passed by Congress to blacklist human rights abusers. It so enraged Putin, “he retaliated by halting American adoptions of Russian children.” Veselnitskaya’s “activities and associations have previously drawn the attention of the F.B.I., according to a former senior law enforcement official.”

In his statement, Jr. tries to explain away the damage. “It was a short introductory meeting,” that’s all.

I asked Jared and Paul [Manafort] to drop by. We primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian government, but it was not a campaign issue at the time and there was no follow up. I was asked to attend the meeting by an acquaintance, but was not told the name of the person I would be meeting beforehand.

You kind of had the idea he wanted to add: “I could have been talking with Taylor Swift, for all I remember.”

That same evening, Mark Corallo, spokesman for the Trump legal team, issues a statement, hinting Jr. was set up. Veselnitskaya and an interpreter who came “misrepresented who they were.”

They did not disguise their purpose. They made it clear.

The Magnitsky Act, named after Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer who died in police custody, sanctions 44 Russian nationals and allows the U.S. to deny visas and seize any of their monies it may locate. 

In Russia you can be killed for reporting the truth. 

7/9/17: The New York Times reports that Don Jr. met with a lawyer the paper describes as “Kremlin-connected” after being promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton. 

Jr. issues a second statement in regard to the meeting he originally forgot he ever had. Suddenly, it’s all coming back!

“After pleasantries were exchanged,” Jr. claims,

…the woman stated that she had information that individuals connected to Russian were funding the Democratic National Committee and supporting Hillary Clinton. Her statements were vague, ambiguous, and made no sense. No details or supporting information was provided or even offered. It quickly became clear she had no meaningful information.

The conversation turned to adoption policies and the Magnitsky Act, which Jr. surmised was “the true agenda all along.”

Reince Priebus labels the story of the secret meeting a “big nothing burger.”

Still a lie; but this one has been counted.

Donald J. Trump Jr.'s burger.

7/10/17: Jr.’s story changes dramatically—again—after the Times informs him it has in its possession emails that blow giant holes in his second cover story. Jr. scrambles for safety like a rat leaving the S.S. Trump. 

What do you know! He has a string of emails he’d like to share. Here are keys from the thread:

From: Rob Goldstone To: Donald Trump Jr. June 3, 2016

Emin just called and asked me to contact you with something very interesting. The Crown prosecutor of Russia met with his father Aras this morning and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father [emphasis added].

This is obviously very high level and sensitive information but is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump – helped along by Aras and Emin.

What do you think is the best way to handle this information and would you be able to speak to Emin about it directly?

I can also send this info to your father via Rhona [Graff], but it is ultra sensitive so wanted to send to you first.

“Emin” is Russian pop star Emin Agalarov. “Aras” is his father, a wealthy real estate billionaire, sometimes called the “Donald Trump of Russia.” 

Goldstone is a British music promoter.

From: Donald Trump Jr. To: Rob Goldstone June 3, 2016, 10:53

Thanks Rob I appreciate that. I am on the road at the moment but perhaps I just speak to Emin first. Seems we have some time and if it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer [emphasis added]. Could we do a call first thing next week when I am back?

From: Rob Goldstone To: Donald Trump, Jr. June 7, 2016, 4:20 PM

“Emin asked that I schedule a meeting with you and The Russian government attorney [emphasis added] who is flying over from Moscow for this Thursday.”

A good deal of discussion follows—time of meeting—what day—plans change. Finally, it’s on. At 5:19 Goldstone adds, “I will send the names of the two people meeting with you for security when I have them later today.”

Don Jr. replies at 6:14: “Great. It will likely be Paul Manafort (campaign boss) my brother in law and me.”

At that point Donald Jr. forwards the entire thread to Kushner and Manafort.

*

Meanwhile, Christopher Wray, Trump’s nominee to head the F.B.I., sits for an interview with a Congressional panel. He is asked three times if the Russian investigation is a “witch hunt.” 

Wray thrice denies the premise.

7/11/17: The president rises early and starts retweeting links to Fox News. The story of the meeting with Don Jr. and—somebody—about something—is going to be cleared up! “My son, Donald, will be interviewed by @seanhannity tonight at 10:00 P.M. He is a great person who loves our country!”

On Hannity that evening, Jr. swears the whole story is out. Hannity and Jr. trade admiring glances. Both are huge fans of hair gel. The meeting was just Don Jr. and Jared and Paul and, okay, one Russian lawyer. 

Jr. says the whole story is out. Not even close.

 Lie: The whole story is not out.

7/14/17: The guest list for the meeting grows. In a second interview with Fox News, where all Trumps go when sad, Jr. forgets who else was there. Perhaps invitees hid under the conference table.

Okay, he says. There were two Russians. That’s it. Two! A Russian-American lobbyist named Rinat Akhmetshin is the second. NPR says he has been described “as a Russian ‘gun for hire’ and a former Soviet-era spy and has worked in the West for years as an advocate for Russian interests.”

Lie: There was a third Russian in the meeting.

7/18/17: How many people with ties to the Russian government were in the meeting with Don Jr.?

Okay, not one, not two, but three! Even Fox News can’t ignore the story. It turns out the newest participant in the meeting which Don Jr. forgot about—was a Russian-American, Ike Kaveladze, an expert on adoption and babies!

Hahaha. No.

Kaveladze works for the Russian oligarch Aras Agalarov, a man worth $1.96 billion. Agalarov is known for close ties with Trump, a man worth $3.5 billion and Putin. The Russian president has spent his time in office wisely. He has been saving his rubbles. One source estimates he may have a private stash of $200 billion.

♥$

Anyway, according to a story in Newsweek, Kaveladze was investigated in 2000, when he was:

…found by investigators with the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) to have helped move more than $1.4 billion on behalf of a large number of Russian and Eastern European clients through accounts with Citibank in New York and Commercial Bank in San Francisco.

Technically, his actions turned out to be legal. Still, investigators found he had filed papers to open 2,000 shell corporations and U.S. bank accounts in Delaware, “all on behalf of Russian operators that were used to launder offshore cash coming into the United States.”

 ♥$

7/20/17: The “Fake News” folks keep uncovering evidence that Russians were lurking in every nook and cranny of the Trump campaign. 

Investigators are reportedly studying records related to Trump’s finances at Deutsche Bank. To be fair, no evidence of wrongdoing has been uncovered. Still, Deutsche does have a lengthy rap sheet and once paid a $630 million fine for helping Russian criminal interests launder an estimated $10 billion.

Special Counsel Mueller is said to be digging into the financial records of Paul Manafort. 

Mark Corallo, the spokesman for Trump’s legal team resigns. He doesn’t really give a good reason. (See: 7/31/17.)

7/24/17: Is it possible Trump can bring Americans together: in the sense that almost everyone wonders if he’s nuts?

The White House has made his position clear. Trump does not want to impose greater sanctions on Russia—and would like to great rid of sanctions that exist—and buy Vladimir a pony.

Veto-proof vote in the House and Senate on sanctions.

Members of the House of Representatives see it differently. By a vote of 419-3, lawmakers agree to impose greater sanctions and tie Trump’s hands so he can’t remove them without approval.

To recap for Trump fans: the Senate came to the same conclusion—that Russians meddled in the election. The president might want to get rid of sanctions, whether or not it would be good for our country. On June 20 the Senate voted, 98-2, to pass a similar bill and tie up the guy in the Oval Office.

7/31/17: The Washington Post cites several sources aboard Air Force One when discussion turned to how to handle revelations about Don Jr.’s meeting with the Russian lawyer. Aides wanted to release a truthful statement, to get out in front of the story. No dice said the Liar-in-Chief.

Trump dictated a statement for Don Jr. saying that he and the Russian lawyer had “primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children.”

This is bullshit and the president knows it. So does his son. Two liars for the price of one!

According to the Post, top Trump advisers now worry the president’s actions leave him vulnerable to allegations of a cover-up.

“This was . . . unnecessary,” said one of the president’s advisers, who like most other people interviewed for this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal deliberations. “Now someone can claim he’s the one who attempted to mislead. Somebody can argue the president is saying he doesn’t want you to say the whole truth.”

(WHEN FIRE AND FURY IS PUBLISHED, author Michael Wolff claims, “Corallo, seeing no good outcome—and privately confiding that he believed the meeting on Air Force One represented a likely obstruction of justice—quit.”)

Not on the president's reading list. Actually, he doesn't have a reading list.

88/2/17: The White House acknowledges that the president did “weigh in” on the original and completely disingenuous statement issued in Don Jr.’s name. Press Secretary Pinocchio claims the president was only helping his son.

It was what “any father would do.” 

That is, assuming any father might be trying to hide a trail of collusion with agents of a hostile foreign power.

Sanders opens her mouth: you can pretty much assume lies spill out. The president’s lawyers later admit he dictated the letter.

8/10/17: The New York Times and other “Fake News” outlets report that the F.B.I. has conducted a search of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s home.

Fearing Manafort might destroy evidence if given advance warning agents show up at his house in the night, pick the front door lock and wake him up by knocking on his bedroom door.

8/27/17: An angry Lou Dobbs chastises Twitter for shutting down the rightwing website DCLeaks. This is “leftist Fascism,” he growls.

Twitter backs down and reinstates DCLeaks. Suddenly, all is right with the rightwing world.

(The site is shut down permanently in July 2018, after Mueller’s investigators link DCLeaks to a Russian military disinformation operation.)

9/8/17: Facebook admits Russian trolls bought ads and created fake personal accounts and issue pages in an effort to sway voters during the 2016 campaign. Their main goals: First, undercut faith in American democracy.

Second, insure defeat for Hillary Clinton.

Take Melvin Reddick of Harrisburg, Pa., as your first example. Pictured on Facebook, you could see him, baseball cap turned backwards, holding a cute little girl. And you could read posts from Melvin like this (June 8, 2016): “These guys show hidden truth about Hillary Clinton, George Soros and other leaders of the US. Visit #DCLeaks website. It’s really interesting.”

Not only was Reddick not a real person, the DCLeaks website was created by Russians, just days earlier.

9/18/17: Trump hasn’t complained about the “witch hunt” on Twitter since July 29. That could be because he’s increasingly worried as investigators discover brooms in various closets.

We learn that Special Counsel Mueller is working with the Attorney General of New York and may charge former Trump campaign aides—and possibly Don Jr. and Jared—with state crimes. Why state crimes? A president can’t use his pardon power to wipe away state convictions.

We also know Trump lawyers are arguing over how much evidence to turn over to Mueller and nervously walking the White House halls. They’re worried other staff members might be wearing wires.

October; date uncertain: Joseph Mifsud, the professor who first met with George Papadopoulos and offered dirt on Hillary Clinton, disappears. His whereabouts remain a mystery.

At one point he does change his WhatsApp status, simply, to: “Alive.”

10/19/17: Trump continues to undercut every institution that bars his path. He’s pissed about the investigation. He brings up the Steele dossier, first funded by Republican operatives early in the campaign. Information in the files may or may not be true; but several accusations have been confirmed. (There’s still no videotape of prostitutes peeing in the bed. But we can dream!) 

The President of the United States tweets that the F.B.I. might have been involved in nefarious practices. Did they pay for this “hit job” which might prove not to be a hit job at all?

He tweets: “Workers of firm involved with the discredited and Fake Dossier take the 5th. Who paid for it, Russia, the F.B.I. or the Dems (or all)?” 

Trump has no use for the Fifth Amendment, at least for now. (See: 5/7/2018.)

10/27/17: Trump is so excited he nearly pees his Depends. His name has been cleared! He has never seen a Russian. Even in Moscow he kept his eyes closed (except when entering the dressing rooms of half-naked Miss Universe contestants, an activity he always says he enjoyed).

The president watches Fox & Friends and then tweet-thanks the hosts for a heaping serving of pro-president propaganda.

Finally, at 8:33 a.m. Trump buckles down to the issue at hand. “It is now commonly agreed, after many months of COSTLY looking, that there was NO collusion between Russia and Trump. Was collusion with HC!” he tap-taps. Yes, devotees of Fox News! You can close the book on any investigation unless it involves Hillary. We’ll just lock her up and throw away the key….and…

Huh?

Multiple sources announce Mueller will issue indictments in the Russia probe the following Monday.

10/30/17: This is not one of Trump’s best days, even though he does tweet early in the morning that there was “NO COLLUSION.”

Say what you will, Paul Manafort, 68, just got indicted for money laundering and lying all day, every day, and lying in baby talk.

Naturally, Press Secretary Pinocchio says none of the indictments have anything to do with the president or his squeaky-clean campaign. Manafort only worked for Trump for, oh, five minutes.

Also indicted: Rick Gates, 45, a Manafort protégé. Gates remained with the campaign up to Inauguration Day and beyond.

Gates is young. He has a wife and little children to worry about. He cannot relish spending the next twenty years in an orange jumpsuit. Gates has plenty of reason to cooperate with the Mueller team. My guess is that he already is.

(Note: This was later confirmed.)

*

Meanwhile, George Papadopoulos, now described by Press Secretary Pinocchio as a nobody in the campaign, pleads guilty. Trump surrogates start insisting the young man was a “coffee boy,” of no import in the campaign. The president tweets about some guy named “George,” as if he never laid eyes on the man.

Yet we know Candidate Trump did inform the Washington Post that Papadopoulos was a top adviser on his team. As late as August 2016 a campaign adviser (unnamed in his guilty plea) was suggesting “George” take a trip to Moscow and look into a deal with Russians to get dirt on Clinton.

That means the next target of investigation may be that top campaign adviser mentioned in the coffee boy’s indictment. Different sources suggest “George” might have been talking to Sam Clovis, co-chair of the campaign. Or he might have been talking to Cory Lewandowski, another former campaign manager. If we are to believe Sean Hannity and the assorted liars on the Team Trump, all “George” was asking about was did the Big Bosses want one lump of sugar or two?

Papadopoulos was no coffee boy.

We know the F.B.I. interviewed Papadopoulos a week after Trump took office. Agents caught him in several lies, leading to charges of obstruction of justice. If this sounds familiar it should. “George,” the coffee boy, lied about meeting with Russians. Who else lied about meetings with Russians?

Flynn. Kushner. Don Jr. and Manafort.

Papadopoulos, center, at left of table.

11/12/17: Trump is off on a trip to Asia and still sucking up to Putin. Trump tells reporters he asked Putin again. Did you meddle in the U.S. election? Putin says no.

Case closed.

Trump + Putin = ♥♥♥♥♥.

Meanwhile, the president describes former heads of the F.B.I., C.I.A. and the former director of National Intelligence as “political hacks.” He thinks all of them are lying. Only Putin is telling the truth.

  

Putin lies to Trump—again. Trump says he believes him. Again!

11/30/17: It turns out, over the summer, that the president did his best to convince Republican lawmakers to help him with the investigation. Senator Richard Burr, head of the Intelligence Committee, says Trump spoke to him about how he’d like Congress to conduct its business. “It was something along the lines, ‘I hope you can conclude this [investigation] as quickly as possible.’”

Burr says he responded, “When we have exhausted everybody we need to talk to, we will finish.”

Trump asked other senators, including Milksop Mitch McConnell and Roy Blunt, to end the investigation swiftly. Blunt says he was lobbied by the president during an Air Force One flight to Springfield, Missouri. 

Trump, he said, told him “to wrap up the investigation.”

12/7/17: We learn that Don Jr. was “grilled” for eight hours by the House Intelligence Committee. Alas, Jr. refused to answer questions about what he and his father said, discussing the infamous June 2016 meeting with representatives of the Russian government who offered dirt on Hillary.

Anyway, Don Jr. now says he can’t answer any questions about the discussion he had with good old Dad. Why, House committee members wonder? Client-attorney privilege, Jr. explains.

This seems odd. Don Jr. is not a lawyer. Don Sr. is not a lawyer. (Don Sr. is not even a very good president).

12/12/17: Trump starts his day off rage-tweeting:

Despite thousands of hours wasted and many millions of dollars spent, the Democrats have been unable to show any collusion with Russia - so now they are moving on to the false accusations and fabricated stories of women who I don’t know and/or have never met. FAKE NEWS!

This claim is promptly undercut when People magazine begins posting pictures of the president with several of the women who have accused him of inappropriate sexual conduct. 

  

The president claims he has never met any of the women who accuse him.

2018

1/3/18: The President of the United States wakes up in a chipper mood. He yawns once, feels the cold side of the bed where Melania used to sleep, and grabs his iPhone to tweet some sweet Trump love. “Such respect for the people of Iran as they try to take back their corrupt government,” he types. “You will see great support from the United States at the appropriate time!”

(Just don’t ever try to immigrate to the United States.)

Bannon suggests Don Jr. and Jared committed treason.

Trump’s day takes a malodorous turn when skunks begin spraying each other. Skunk #1, Steve Bannon, once a Trump campaign strategist, is quoted in a new book, Fire and Fury. Among other gems he calls Ivanka “dumb as a brick.” 

Bannon suggests that her husband and brother Don Jr. may have committed treason by holding the now well-documented meeting with representatives of the Russian government in June 2016.

Naturally, when a skunk sprays Trump, Skunk #2, he sprays back ten times harder. Trump works on a series of drafts of a statement blasting Bannon. He says Bannon had nothing to do with his November victory. Bannon never had one bit of influence while working in the White House.

And when Bannon lost his job, he “lost his mind.”

1/8/18: The “Sloppy Steve Apology Tour” commences. Bannon says he is sorry he criticized members of the Trump family and got quoted in a book. He says he was wrong when he claimed Don Jr., Jared and Paul Manafort were possibly guilty of treason when they took the meeting with the Russians. Bannon says Don Jr. wasn’t “unpatriotic” after all. That’s not what he meant—even if it is what he said.

“Donald Trump Jr is both a patriot and a good man,” he insists.

Once it becomes clear he might lose his job at Breitbart, Bannon realizes he was wrong about Don Jr. and Jared Kushner. “My comments were aimed at Paul Manafort,” he explains lamely, “a seasoned campaign professional with experience and knowledge of how the Russians operate. He should have known they are duplicitous, cunning and not our friends.”

1/10/18: For fifty-five minutes, as cameras roll, Trump runs a cabinet meeting and seems…normal. He promises to sign any bill Congress brings him to protect the DACA “Dreamers.”

He wants a “bill of love.”

(I, for one, wonder if maybe Milksop Mitch has slipped a mickey into the president’s Diet Coke.)

Of course, just as water runs downhill and Earth revolves around the sun, Trump can’t act normal long. His bile rises again when he learns Senator Diane Feinstein has released transcripts of testimony given months ago by GPS Fusion founders to a Senate investigating committee. (Fusion is involved with the Steele dossier in case you don’t remember.) 

Naturally, Vladimir’s Secret Santa feels he must lash out. You know what’s coming!

Trump Tweets!

The single greatest Witch Hunt in American history continues. There was no collusion, everybody including the Dems knows there was no collusion, & yet on and on it goes. Russia & the world is laughing at the stupidity they are witnessing. Republicans should finally take control [emphasis added]! 

What does the president mean when he says he wants Republicans to take control?

If that doesn’t sound ominous to you, it should.

1/18/18: Can we assume Donald woke up lonely again in bed? This is not his best day, now that In Touch magazine is running a 5,000 word interview with Stormy Daniels, a porn queen who says she slept with Trump in 2006.

*

In other news, Sen. John McCain is the second GOP senator to take the president to task for attacking the free press. 

In an opinion piece for the Washington Post, he writes:

[The president] has threatened to continue his attempt to discredit the free press by bestowing “fake news awards” upon reporters and news outlets whose coverage he disagrees with [emphasis added]. Whether Trump knows it or not, these efforts are being closely watched by foreign leaders who are already using his words as cover as they silence and shutter one of the key pillars of democracy.

“For decades,” McCain continues, “dissidents and human rights advocates have relied on independent investigations into government corruption to further their fight for freedom.”

“The news is what you can prove.”

That’s still true in America. And that’s good. We want Fox News to cover the Benghazi story. We want the free press to unmask the creepy behaviors of Harvey Weinstein and Bill O’Reilly. We want CNN to put hard questions to Trump and his surrogates and not feed us a diet of stories of Trumpian greatness. At the state and local level we want a free press to unmask crooks in the New York statehouse, to comment on the misdeeds of the Missouri governor, to give Chris Christie a thumping for masterminding Bridgegate. Unless we have our heads up our civic posteriors we want the free press to follow leads in the Russia story and see where it really ends.

We can’t know yet where that is. No one can. Still, the news isn’t “fake” a Washington Post reporter explains.

“The news is what you can prove.”

1/24/18: Trump is packing his bags for a trip to Davos, Switzerland, where he will deliver a big speech at the economic summit. First Lady Trump is not packing her sexy under-garments—or anything else.

She isn’t going. She has a sudden “scheduling conflict.” That conflict is known as Stormy Daniels, whose story continues to come out in the news.

Speaking with reporters later in the day, Trump is asked if he’s ready to talk to Robert Mueller. He assures them, “I‘m looking forward to it, actually. I would do it under oath,” he adds.

“I would like to do it as soon as possible.” (See: 5/7/2018.)

Hearing the news Senator McConnell faints dead away. Other right-wing voices howl warning. Rush Limbaugh comments that same night. “Don’t do it,” he tells the president. “I don’t care what format. I don’t care what circumstance. Don’t do it. There’s nothing to gain. Especially if they’re off the ‘collusion’ business, there’s nothing to gain by talking to Mueller.”

1/25/18: The New York Times reports that Trump wanted to fire Robert Mueller last summer. This makes Sean Hannity furious. On his nightly show he calls the story “fake news.” His sources cannot confirm the Times story. Boy does that piss Hannity off! He warns loyal Fox News fans the Times is “trying to distract you.” The president would never think of firing….wait………what?

Hannity is informed, on air, that, yes, Fox sources are confirming the story. What can a right-wing shill do in this situation?

Hannity quickly cuts to a car chase.

1/26/18: The Big Topic on cable news is the “perjury trap” which the president might step into if he talks to Robert Mueller.

One right-wing thinker who is taking no chances regarding the perjury trap would be Patrick Buchanan. He warns that Trump must avoid the trap at all costs. “If the president’s legal team lets Trump sit for hours answering Mueller’s agents, they should be disbarred for malpractice.” 

Yes. Trump should avoid answering questions. That is good strategy.

On Fox News, Judge Napolitano warns the president—who is no doubt watching Fox News. Napolitano explains to viewers that Mueller and his team know “exponentially more about the case than Trump does, and Trump has no way of knowing what evidence Mueller may already have.”

Damn it!

Evidence!

1/30/18: Trump supporters try out a brand new argument in the Mueller investigation. The president should refuse to answer questions. Period. He has absolutely nothing to hide.

So why bother testifying!

1/31/18: Remember the famous Trump Tower meeting with Don Jr. and other Trump campaign officials, with a bunch of Russians?

The New York Times reports Mark Corallo will talk with Mueller’s investigating team. Corallo, once spokesman for the president’s legal team, will describe a previously undisclosed conference call with President Trump and White House aide Hope Hicks. Hicks (a.k.a. The White House Babe), he has told colleagues, made it clear that emails Don Jr. had sent and received about the meeting “will never get out.” Only a few people received them. So….couldn’t they just, um….

Hearing this, Corallo feared Hicks was contemplating obstruction of justice—destruction of evidence. 

Soon after, the president supervised the drafting of a statement that obscured the purpose of that meeting, which, to reasonable people might sound like a further attempt to obstruct justice.

“We primarily discussed a program about adoption.”

According to two people with knowledge of the discussion, “Mr. Trump was insistent about including language that the meeting was about Russian adoption.” Don Jr. then insisted on one change. The final statement read:

It was a short introductory meeting. I asked Jared and Paul to stop by. We primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian government, but it was not a campaign issue at that time and there was no follow up.

Don Jr.’s change? 

It was to include the word: “primarily.” But it wasn’t. The meeting was arranged for the purpose of gathering dirt on Clinton.

Corallo was apparently so concerned by the call with the president and The White House Babe he notified White House lawyers, jotted down notes to memorialize it, and shared concerns with Steve Bannon.

Probable lie: The White House Babe seemed ready to make evidence disappear.

2/2/18: Cancel the investigation! Congressman Devin Nunes releases a three-and-1/3-page memo, proving everyone who works for Trump is an innocent lamb. All the top officials with the F.B.I. and Department of Justice are lowlife crooks. According to Nunes, one member of the Trump campaign, Carter Page, was placed under a FISA warrant without cause in 2016.

This proves people like General Flynn and George Papadopoulos, who have pled guilty, are innocent.

As for Don Jr. and Jared, this means the secret meeting they had with Russian government agents no longer matters. 

You can trust Devin Nunes—even if he did once have to recuse himself from the Russian investigation.

True, it probably stings a little when the largest newspaper in his home district, the Fresno Bee, labels him, “Trump’s stooge.” 

Lie: Every judge on the FISA courts was appointed by a Republican president. The judges have no reason to go after people in a Republican campaign, unless they broke the law.

2/3/18: Trump wakes up in a chipper frame of mind. According to no less a legal authority than himself, the Nunes memo proves that he is innocent of all wrongdoing in regard to Russia. He tweets:

This memo totally vindicates “Trump” in probe. But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!

2/5/18: A single tweet allows the president to call five Americans liars. What are all five lying about? The Russian investigation!

That tweet: 

“Little Adam Schiff, who is desperate to run for higher office, is one of the biggest liars and leakers in Washington, right up there with Comey, Warner, Brennan and Clapper! Adam leaves closed committee hearings to illegally leak confidential information. Must be stopped!”

2/13/18: Tuesday turns out to be a bad day for Donald J. Trump. Michael Cohen, his personal lawyer, admits he paid Stormy Daniels—the porn star—$130,000!

Don’t worry, though! Cohen paid out of his own pocket. He claims he was not reimbursed.

“The payment to Ms. Clifford was lawful,” he says, “and was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone.”

If Cohen is telling the truth, that would mean no campaign finance laws were violated, which would be a good thing if you’re a lawyer and don’t want to be disbarred. Still: You paid a porn star for silence. This would not be a good look if you were President of the United States and trying to convince the American people you would never lie about dealing with Russians.

Also, if you were the First Lady, you might not think who paid the porn star or how was actually the issue. You’d be thinking: Porn star! My husband’s lawyer paid off a porn star!

WTF!!!!!

  

Cohen is lying about how and by whom the money was paid; Trump knows he’s lying and doesn’t correct him.

*

On Capitol Hill, six heads of U.S. intelligence tell a congressional panel the Russians clearly meddled in the 2016 election. Christopher Wray, the head of the F.B.I. tells the panel, yes, they did. 

Mike Pompeo of the C.I.A. agrees.

Admiral Mike Rogers of the National Security Agency concurs.

Robert Cardillo of the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency and General Robert P. Ashley Jr. of the Defense Intelligence Agency chips both say yes. 

Six heads of U.S. intelligence agree: the Russians meddled.

Finally, Dan Coats, head of National Intelligence, has his say. Of course, the Russian interfered, he warns. They will try again. “There should be no doubt that Russia perceives that its past efforts have been successful [emphasis added] and views the 2018 midterm U.S. elections as a potential target for Russian influence operations. Frankly, the United States is under attack.”

For months the president has been insisting the Russians never meddled in the election.

2/17/18: Special Counsel Mueller indicts thirteen Russians and three Russian organizations for meddling in the campaign. Charges included conspiracy, identity theft and failing to register as foreign agents. 

Mueller also charges that several Russians, posing as Americans, “communicated with unwitting individuals” [emphasis added] associated with Trump campaign “to seek to coordinate political activities.”

The president insists there has been no proof of collusion.

Still, individuals associated with his campaign were unwitting tools of the Russians. They might not have been crooks.

They were definitely fools.

                      
      

You get the idea: one lie for each indicted Russian or Russian company lurking behind the scenes in this story. Now ask yourself: When have you ever heard President Trump talk about getting to the true bottom of this gigantic mess?

2/26/18: A new poll indicates that 75% of Americans now believe charges filed by Special Counsel Mueller should be taken seriously. Most tell pollsters they should be taken “very seriously.” The same poll shows that 58% of Americans trust Mueller whereas 57% do not trust the president.

Even the First Lady has to be having a tough patch. The New Yorker has reported on another alleged affair involving her husband back in 2006. This time the target of Donald’s affections was a Playboy Bunny named Karen McDougal. 

The magazine explains:

McDougal, a slim brunette…had been named Playmate of the Year, eight years earlier. In 2001, the magazine’s readers voted her runner-up for “Playmate of the ’90s,” behind Pamela Anderson. At the time of the party [at the Playboy Mansion where they met], Trump had been married to the Slovenian model Melania Knauss for less than two years; their son, Barron, was a few months old. Trump seemed uninhibited by his new family obligations.

McDougal later wrote that Trump “immediately took a liking to me, kept talking to me - telling me how beautiful I was, etc. It was so obvious that a Playmate Promotions exec said, ‘Wow, he was all over you—I think you could be his next wife.’”

We learn from multiple sources that McDougal (like Stormy Daniels) was paid good money to keep her mouth, if not her legs, closed in the days leading up to the election. McDougal received a check for $150,000 from a company owned by a Trump friend.

Trump had another affair while married to his third wife. 

McDougal dressed for work.

3/7/18: In more bad news for Trump and his closest circle, Sam Nunberg, who got the 2016 campaign off the ground, agrees to testify before a Grand Jury. Two days earlier, Nunberg, who had been subpoenaed as part of the Mueller investigation, was threatening to rip up the court order on national TV. 

He wasn’t going to “waste 80 hours of his time” complying with a records request and said Mueller would be crazy to arrest him. 

On sober second thought he decided to cooperate. Also, he admitted to reporters he would soon be entering rehab.

Mueller is seeking documents and electronic records, from November 1, 2015, till the present, involving Nunberg and:

Stephen K. Bannon

Michael D. Cohen

Rick Gates

Corey Lewandowski

Paul Manafort

Carter Page

Keith Schiller

Roger Stone

The White House Babe (Hope Hicks)

And…..President Donald J. Trump!

*

We also learn, George Nader, a Lebanese-American gentleman is now cooperating with Mueller’s investigation. Nader often works as an adviser to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed and the United Arab Emirates. 

Normally, Nader travels in rarefied circles.

On January 17, however, he was stopped by F.B.I agents at Dulles International Airport in Washington, D.C. They handed Nader a subpoena, relieved him of his electronic devices and questioned him for hours. This meant he missed his connecting flight to Mar-a-Lago, where he hoped to help the president celebrate his first year in office.

What did the F.B.I. want to know? And what is Mueller asking Nader about now? One possibility is that Nader funneled money from the U.A.E. into the Trump campaign. That would be felonious.

Nader also attended a meeting in the Seychelles Islands (population: 94,677) in January 2017. If you’re like most Americans, you’re going to have to look up where those islands are. Nader found them. So did Erik Prince, founder of Blackwater Security, a man who was serving as an informal adviser to the Trump transition team at that time. Who else flew to the islands at exactly that same time? Kirill Dmitriev, representing Vladimir Putin!

You can guess where this is going. Dmitriev managed a powerful Russian trust, sanctioned by President Obama.

According to The New York Times, Nader has since been questioned repeatedly about a variety of meetings, including at least one with Jared Kushner and Stephen K. Bannon at the White House.

*

Switching topics slightly, we hear hints of fresh legal problems for members of Team Trump.

Priebus and McGahn concerned about witness tampering.

Both Reince Priebus and Donald McGahn and their lawyers were concerned enough about approaches made to them by Mr. Trump—since both are witnesses in an investigation—to report questionable contacts to Special Counsel Mueller. Priebus’s contact might be benign. McGahn’s encounter is more problematic and occurred this past January, after he had given sworn testimony, and after The New York Times ran an article about the president’s attempt to fire Mueller in June 2017.

Based on talks with people briefed on both meetings, the Times reported:

After the article was published, the White House staff secretary, Rob Porter, told Mr. McGahn that the president wanted him to release a statement saying that the story was not true, the people said.

Mr. Porter, who resigned last month amid a domestic abuse scandal, told Mr. McGahn the president had suggested he “might get rid” of Mr. McGahn if he chose not to challenge the article, the people briefed on the conversation said.

Mr. McGahn did not publically deny the article, and the president later confronted him in the Oval Office in front of White House chief of staff, John F. Kelley, according to the people.

The president said he had never ordered Mr. McGahn to fire the special counsel. Mr. McGahn replied that the president was wrong and that he had in fact asked Mr. McGahn in June to call the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, to tell him that the special counsel had a series of conflicts of interest that disqualified him for overseeing the investigation and that he had to be dismissed.

Or to put it plainly, if McGahn was correct, the president asked him to lie about what happened last summer.

  

Take your pick: either Trump is lying or McGahn is; and remember: Priebus, Porter and Kelly are all potential witnesses.

Nader is also a witness.

3/12/18: The GOP-controlled U.S. House Intelligence Committee releases its long-awaited report. Yes, the Russians did interfere in the election!

The village idiot already knew that.

No. The Russians didn’t care who won. (The F.B.I. and C.I.A. would demur.) “We disagree with the narrative that they were trying to help Trump,” Rep. Devin Nunes, the head of the House committee, says.

Republicans weren’t going to find anything they didn’t want to find.

Certainly, we know the president is thrilled with these “findings.” He tweets his joy, all in caps:

THE HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE HAS, AFTER A 14 MONTH LONG IN-DEPTH INVESTIGATION, FOUND NO EVIDENCE OF COLLUSION OR COORDINATION BETWEEN THE TRUMP CAMPAIGN AND RUSSIA TO INFLUENCE THE 2016 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.

This might impress the president and his fans but Nunes and the Republicans weren’t going to find evidence of anything they didn’t want to find. And they really, really didn’t want to find any evidence that would harm the president.

*

In London a nerve gas agent has been employed to poison a former Russian double agent and his daughter. Prime Minister Theresa May blames the Russian government for what she calls an “indiscriminate and reckless” act, which left hundreds of bystanders and first responders subject to contamination.

Asked if the White House is willing to condemn Russia, Press Secretary Pinocchio thrice weakly responds, saying the U.S. supports Great Britain, our closest ally. The word “Russia” is frozen from her lips.

3/17/18: Trump spends a quiet Saturday morning in the White House. Just before lunch he warms up and renews his assault on the rule of law. 

His second tweet of the day reads:

As the House Intelligence Committee has concluded, there was no collusion between Russia and the Trump Campaign. As many are now finding out, however, there was tremendous leaking, lying and corruption at the highest levels of the FBI, Justice & State. #DrainTheSwamp.

Like the cornered rat he increasingly feels he is, Trump keeps squeaking. Finally, he lets loose a furious Twitter blast:

The Mueller probe should never have been started in that there was no collusion and there was no crime. It was based on fraudulent activities and a Fake Dossier paid for by Crooked Hillary and the DNC, and improperly used in FISA COURT for surveillance of my campaign. WITCH HUNT!

Gates lied about this before.

Second, we learn that Trump’s personal lawyer, John Dowd, floated the idea of presidential pardons to Manafort and Michael Flynn last summer, before either had decided to cooperate with the Mueller team.

Of course, none of this proves criminal intent. It just appears that way.

*

Aubrey O’Day makes tabloid headlines, hinting broadly that she had an affair with Donald J. Trump…Jr. The former contestant on The Apprentice had previously floated the idea that a song she wrote, “DJT” was about the young Pussy Grabbing Jedi.

The FISA courts had plenty of supporting evidence; and all four judges involved were Republicans.

And try to pay attention: How many people would now have to be lying in a “scheme” to frame Donald J. Trump? You could assume there are dozens of major players, most with heretofore sterling reputations, supported by documentation, and often speaking in the name of hundreds of federal agents and investigators.

Or you could figure: Trump is lying.

“Truth would you teach, to save a sinking land,

        All fear, none aid you, and few understand.”                                                             Alexander Pope

3/18/18: Sunday morning, Trump is at it again. First, he tunes to Fox News. At 7:02 he tweets: “Wow, watch Comey lie under oath to Senator G when asked ‘have you ever been an anonymous source...or known someone else to be an anonymous source...?’ He said strongly ‘never, no.’ He lied as shown clearly on @foxandfriends.”

(At this point, if Fox & Friends claimed bagels were sentient, Trump would tweet agreement; and his loyal fans would support him.)

At 7:22 Trump denies that notes former F.B.I. leader Andrew McCabe says he took after meetings with the president actually exist. 

Say what you like about any mistakes McCabe might have made, but remember Trump is a man who can insist he never had an affair with a porn star, but if she does have evidence and spills it, he’s going to take her to court for $20 million. 

Trump’s tweet-denial reads: “Spent very little time with Andrew McCabe, but he never took notes when he was with me. I don’t believe he made memos except to help his own agenda, probably at a later date. Same with lying James Comey. Can we call them Fake Memos?”

You can call them “fake memos” if you want. In court, a judge would almost surely call these contemporaneous notes “evidence.”

It doesn’t help the president’s case when it is revealed a third top official at the F.B.I., Dana Boente, also kept notes.

Those notes back Comey’s story up.

Trump almost has to be lying again; but, technically, it isn’t yet proven.

3/19/18: Trump starts a new week the same way he ended the last, tweet-raging about the Mueller investigation.

We can assume his mood does not improve as the day progresses. The stock market takes a tumble after Facebook is revealed to have been duped into allowing a data-mining operation to steal the personal information of 50,000,000 users.

And what was the name of the company that did the mining? Cambridge Analytica!

Who used that firm during his or her campaign for president?

Trump did.

Who decided using Cambridge would be a good idea? Jared Kushner and Brad Parscale, who headed up the Trump campaign’s digital operations. (Parscale has already been tapped to fill the same role in 2020, if all these sleaze bags manage to stay out of jail by then.)

What kind of characters run Cambridge Analytica? Of course, there had to be a Russian-American, Aleksandr Kogan, involved. Professor Kogan lied to Facebook, the site now says, and got his digital foot in the door.

Strategic Communications Laboratories: Propaganda for sale.

Channel 4 News in Britain, where Strategic Communications Laboratories Group (SCL), the parent company of Cambridge, is located, recently began investigating company practices. An undercover reporter “posing as a fixer for a very wealthy client” from Sri Lanka was sent to seek help from Chief Executive Alexander Nix of SCL. 

Here’s how Nix explained [punctuation follows British rules] the way the company worked—all at the right price:

In one exchange, when asked about digging up material on political opponents, Mr Nix said they could “send some girls around to the candidate’s house”, adding that Ukrainian girls “are very beautiful, I find that works very well”.

In another he said: “We’ll offer a large amount of money to the candidate, to finance his campaign in exchange for land for instance, we’ll have the whole thing recorded, we’ll blank out the face of our guy and we post it on the Internet.”

Offering bribes to public officials is an offence under both the UK Bribery Act and the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Cambridge Analytica operates in the UK and is registered in the United States.

…Mr Nix told our reporter: “…we’re used to operating through different vehicles, in the shadows, and I look forward to building a very long-term and secretive relationship with you.”

Along with Mr Nix, the meetings also included Mark Turnbull, the managing director of CA Political Global, and the company’s chief data officer, Dr Alex Tayler.

Mr Turnbull described how, having obtained damaging material on opponents, Cambridge Analytica can discreetly push it onto social media and the internet.

He said: “… we just put information into the bloodstream of the internet, and then, and then watch it grow, give it a little push every now and again… like a remote control. It has to happen without anyone thinking, ‘that’s propaganda’, because the moment you think ‘that’s propaganda’, the next question is, ‘who’s put that out?’”

Mr Nix also said: “…Many of our clients don’t want to be seen to be working with a foreign company… so often we set up, if we are working then we can set up fake IDs and websites, we can be students doing research projects attached to a university, we can be tourists, there’s so many options we can look at. I have lots of experience in this.”

Just for the fun, who would you guess worked with Cambridge on this side of the Atlantic Ocean, possibly in an illegal way, to shape the 2016 election? How about one-time Trump campaign manager Cory Lewandowski!

And, yes, him too: “Sloppy Steve” Bannon.

Signs of trouble for the president continue to multiply. Senators Lindsay Graham and John McCain, two Republicans with principles intact, warn him not to fire Mueller. “If he tried to do that, that would be the beginning of the end of his presidency, because we’re a rule of law nation,” Graham says. 

Congressman Trey Gowdy, famous for leading the Benghazi investigation and by no means a “hardened Democrat,” says if the president is innocent he “should act like it.”

If you haven’t noticed he isn’t.

FUN FACT: According to The New York Times, during the 2016 campaign Cambridge Analytica shared office space with Trump’s San Antonio-based digital operation and the head of SCL, the parent company, took credit for his election. 

On November 9, 2016, Nix explained, “We are thrilled that our revolutionary approach to data-driven communications played such an integral part [emphasis added] in President-elect Donald Trump’s extraordinary win.”

FUN FACT #2: Trump’s campaign paid Cambridge $5.9 million in five separate payments and then tried to deny any links. Last October, Newsweek questioned that stance.

Donald Trump’s campaign blatantly down-played the role data firm Cambridge Analytics played in helping the president win last year and even ignored the campaign’s own boasts following the election after the firm was linked to a collusion effort [emphasis added] with Russians.

 

The Trump campaign pretends they knew nothing about Cambridge. Almost six million dollars says they did.

3/20/18: The Big Orange President calls Shirtless Strongman Putin to congratulate him on winning an election in which leading opposition candidates were barred from running.

Donald

♥’s

Vladimir

Senator John McCain responds correctly:

[A]n American president does not lead the free world by congratulating dictators on winning sham elections. And by doing so with Vladimir Putin, President Trump insulted every Russian citizen who was denied the right to vote in a free and fair election to determine their country’s future, including the countless Russian patriots who have risked so much to protest and resist Putin’s regime.

Press Secretary Pinocchio admits that the president did not mention Russian meddling in the election. Nor did he ask about the use of a nerve agent in an attempted assassination of a leading Kremlin critic on British soil.

Nope. Congratulations, Vlad!

3/21/18: John O. Brennan served for twenty-five years with the C.I.A. He left government service, and then returned, serving as head of the agency from 2013 to 2017. In theory, he could be another liar picking on poor Donald. 

After Trump ordered Andrew McCabe fired (just hours before he became eligible for an F.B.I. pension), Brennan tweeted his response:

When the full extent of your venality, moral turpitude, and political corruption becomes known, you will take your rightful place as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history. You may scapegoat Andy McCabe, but will not destroy America ...America will triumph over you.

“A serious threat to US national security.”

So, if you watched Fox, you had to figure: 

1) McCabe was a liar. 

2) James Comey was a liar. 

3) Brennan was a liar. 

4) Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper was a liar.

A fifth “liar,” retired four-star General Barry R. McCaffrey, had harsh words for Trump the same day. “Reluctantly,” he tweeted, “I have concluded that President Trump is a serious threat to US national security. He is refusing to protect vital US interests from active Russian attacks. It is apparent that he is for some unknown reason under the sway of Mr Putin.”

Well, what does McCaffrey know? 

All he has are three Purple Hearts, two Silver Stars for valor, and two Distinguished Service Crosses on his record.

3/22/18: John Dowd, Trump’s lead defense lawyer, suddenly resigns. Sources tell reporters Dowd believes he cannot control his client. Trump reportedly believes Mueller is the Anti-Christ.

Ironically, just eleven days earlier, the president had fired off a pair of tweets to attack the Fake News people at The New York Times:

The Failing New York Times purposely wrote a false story stating that I am unhappy with my legal team on the Russia case and am going to add another lawyer to help out. Wrong. I am VERY happy with my lawyers, John Dowd, Ty Cobb and Jay Sekulow. They are doing a great job and.....

...have shown conclusively that there was no Collusion with Russia..just excuse for losing. The only Collusion was that done by the DNC, the Democrats and Crooked Hillary. The writer of the story, Maggie Haberman, a Hillary flunky, knows nothing about me and is not given access.

Trump lies when he says he was happy with his lawyers and insists the Times story was “Fake News.” It wasn’t.

3/27/18: Speaking of lawyers, Trump continues to have trouble finding topflight lawyers to defend him in the Russian investigation.

Trump, however, is telling aides he can hire any lawyer he wants, including Saul Goodman, from “Better Call Saul.”

3/29/18: Rick Gates now admits he was aware an individual he was communicating with during the Trump 2016 campaign had ties to Russian intelligence.

This goes to the question of how much you can trust your average Trump. Like father, like son, we know Don Jr. lied to his wife.

3/30/18: Friday, as first reported by the British newspaper, the Guardian, Trump campaign figure Ted Malloch, was intercepted at the Boston airport after a flight from London. Malloch was separated from his wife, served a subpoena, and had his cellphone confiscated by the F.B.I.

Why would Malloch be of interest to the Russia investigation? Malloch has close ties with Nigel Farage—who has close ties with Julian Assange of WikiLeaks—who helped expose the damaging Clinton/Democratic National Committee emails—which helped Trump win the election.

In an email response to the Guardian story, Malloch,

described himself as a policy wonk and defender of Trump, [and] said the FBI also asked him about his relationship with Roger Stone, the Republican strategist, and whether he had ever visited the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where the Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has resided for nearly six years.

…Malloch said the federal agents who stopped him and separated him from his wife “seemed to know everything about me” and warned him that lying to the FBI was a felony. In the statement Malloch denied having any Russia contacts.

The biggest lying asshole of all.

We soon learn that Stone is nervous. Thursday night, Sam Nunberg, once the brains behind the Trump run for president, says during a TV interview that Stone had tried to “curry favor with Trump by suggesting he had met with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange prior to the 2016 presidential election.”

This did not sit well with Stone. He quickly took to Instagram to blast his former friend and ally. Nunberg, he said, was a “psycho,” “a cocaine addict” and a “lying asshole.”

There are times it appears that President Trump has surrounded himself with lying assholes; and he’s the biggest lying asshole of all.

4/1/18: The Treasury Department announces sanctions on 17 more Russian officials, 12 companies, 7 Russian oligarchs and 6 Lords-a-Leaping. 

Among those sanctioned: Oleg Deripaska and eight of his companies. Any connection to anyone in the Trump 2016 campaign? 

Deripaska and Paul Manafort had been doing business for years prior to Donald J. Trump’s run for the money…I mean...president. 

$$$$$

Alexander Torshin, also sanctioned, worked through the N.R.A. to set up a meeting with Don Jr. during the campaign. 

A third gentleman on the list is Suleiman Kerimov, accused of smuggling cash into France in suitcases, $20 million at a time, and laundering it by purchasing villas. Why might that ring alarm bells in Trumpistan? NPR explains:

The Treasury Department’s singling out of Kerimov for allegedly smuggling cash out of Russia followed a report this week by CNN that said Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller’s office has been interdicting wealthy Russians as they fly into the United States in order to interview them about potentially transporting cash.

If Russia funneled money to American political campaigns or organizations as part of its attack on the 2016 election, one way it might have done so is by simply smuggling paper dollars in order to avoid electronic transfer records.

Foreign contributions are barred in U.S. elections…

One way in which illicit money allegedly moves out of Russia is via real estate. A rich person buys property in the West—in London, New York or South Florida—without living in it. Instead, hot real estate markets in those places make it simple to resell a condo or a mansion and free up legitimate cash. In Kerimov’s case, he was allegedly using this scheme in the south of France when he was arrested in Nice last year.

In 2008, Donald Trump sold an estate he had purchased for around $42 million in Palm Beach, Fla., to Russian tycoon Dmitry Rybolovlev for $95 million.

Who else was on a January 2018 Treasury Department list for possible sanction? Rybolovlev was one. Aras Agalarov, who helped broker the infamous meeting in Trump Tower, would be second. Sergei Gorkov, a Russian banker who met with Kushner during the transition period before Trump took office, would be third. Gazprom, a Russian oil company and Rosneft Oil—tied to Carter Page, the Trump aide who became a target of the FISA court—would make four and five.

There are so many potentially corrupt links and conflicts of interest it takes Politico seven charts to include them all. 

There are so many potential lies involved that we’ll just stick a big Russian flag here and continue with our story.

4/9/18: The day starts badly for President Trump, when F.B.I. agents bearing search warrants raid the office, home and New York City hotel suite of his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen.

“A terrible mistake for the country.”

This is not a good look for the President of the United States. The Chicago Tribune and every reputable news outlet in America pick up the story. “This search warrant,” former U.S. attorney Joyce White Vance tells a reporter, “is like dropping a bomb on Trump’s front porch.”

As you might expect, Trump lashes out at everyone involved in the raid. First, he goes after Jeff Sessions. Speaking to reporters, the president vents. “The Attorney General made a terrible mistake when he did this and when he recused himself, or he should have certainly let us know if he was going to recuse himself, and we would have used a—put a different attorney general in,” Trump groans. “So he made what I consider to be a very terrible mistake for the country but you’ll figure that out.”

Keep this in view. Trump believes the job of the Attorney General is to protect him from investigation. If Trump gets in legal trouble it’s somehow “a very terrible mistake for the country.”

Trump continues angrily:

So I just heard that they broke into the office of one of my personal attorneys, a good man and it’s a disgraceful situation. It’s a total witch-hunt. I’ve been saying it for a long time. I’ve wanted to keep it down. We’ve given I believe over a million pages worth of documents to the special counsel. They continue to just go forward and here we are talking about Syria, we’re talking about a lot of serious things with the greatest fighting force ever and I have this witch-hunt constantly going on for over 12 months now and actually much more than that. You could say it was right after I won the nomination it started. And it’s a disgrace, it’s a real disgrace. It’s an attack on our country in a true sense [emphasis added]. 

Pause for a moment and consider the president’s fury. First, federal agents didn’t “break in” to the office. They executed a court-ordered warrant. 

Second, it’s not about the documents turned over. It’s a warrant aimed at gathering evidence authorities have probable cause to believe Cohen may be about to hide or destroy. 

Third, it’s not “an attack on our country.” This was a raid in pursuit of evidence of possible crimes committed or in planning.

This is not hard to grasp. The rule of law—enshrined first in the Magna Carta in 1215—back when kings believed they could rule with impunity, protects all of us from abuse by government officials.

We need to guard against the subversion of the rule of law by this president—and any other president to come.

It’s a lie to say that agents “broke into” Michael Cohen’s office. They had probable cause; and they had a warrant.

4/10/18:  Trump wakes up angry. He can’t kill the Stormy Daniels story. His personal lawyer just got raided. The president’s first order of business is to tweet: “Attorney–client privilege is dead!”

As usual, he doesn’t have his facts straight.

The F.B.I. did seize documents and records involving communications between Trump and Cohen. But special agents at the Bureau will have to peruse these materials and make sure attorney-client privilege is not undermined. 

Attorney-client privilege is not protected in cases when attorney and client are conspiring to commit new crimes. 

Attorney-client privilege is not dead. 

4/11/18: I think we can assume the president spent another restless night in the White House. Trump has serious issues to consider. For starters he must carefully study a strike against Syrian military targets….

…or not…

It turns out the president is fuming about “an attack on our country in a true sense,” and by that we mean...Russians?

Nooooo…he means the F.B.I. raid on his lawyer, Michael Cohen’s office, home and hotel suite.

What do we know about the lawyer in question? Cohen has long been referred to as Trump’s “pit bull.” In December 2015, with Trump already running for office, Cohen was excited to see a news story quoting Vladimir Putin, saying Trump was “talented” and “very colorful.”

Cohen viewed that story through the same lens anyone who works for Donald J. Trump would. Namely: green-colored glasses. This was a chance to cash in! Cohen emailed a friend who had been talking extensively with the Russians in an effort to close the deal and build a Trump Tower in Moscow. 

“Now is the time,” Cohen told Felix Sater. “Call me.”

Sater was working on drumming up Kremlin support. Negotiations progressed to where Candidate Trump signed a letter of intent to build in the Russian capital. Then the deal stalled.

Cohen reached out to the Russians again in January 2016.

Now remember: His boss is running to become the President of the United States. And what is the focus here?

Money.

$$$$$$

Cohen contacted Vladimir Putin’s private secretary to ask about getting a tower built. According to Cohen nothing lucrative could be arranged. “I decided to abandon the proposal less than two weeks later for business reasons,” he said, “and do not recall any response to my email.”

In addition, we now learn that the president had to be talked down from the White House roof Tuesday—not to mention last December. The raids aimed at his lawyer left Trump in a rage.

According to one White House source, behind the scenes the president was acting like a loon. Asked by reporters on Monday if he intended to fire Mueller, Trump responded, “We’ll see what happens.…Many people have said ‘you should fire him,’” he claimed. Then he went with the clincher: “Again, they [the investigators] found nothing and in finding nothing, that’s a big statement.” 

Of course, if we’re being honest—always a problem for the president—no one knows what the F.B.I. has found in Cohen’s case, including, for now, the F.B.I.

Press Secretary Pinocchio announces to reporters that, of course, the president can fire Mueller any time he wants to.

Trump knows Cohen is lying when he says negotiations for a deal in Moscow ended in January 2016. He doesn’t correct his lawyer’s story.

*

For once there are rumblings among Republicans, however gingerly they express them. Sen. Charles Grassley, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, is at the forceful end of the spectrum. “It would be suicide for the president to want to talk about firing Mueller,” he warns.

Sen. Milksop Mitch is waiting to be enrolled in the Witness Protection Program and cannot be reached for comment.

Speaker of the House Paul Ryan gives it up and announces he will be retiring at the end of his term.

4/12/18: Fresh details continue to surface regarding the F.B.I. raids on Michael Cohen’s office, home and hotel suite. For example, we learn the warrants also included a safety deposit box.

There are hints that law enforcement officials believe Trump’s lawyer may have coordinated the release of Hillary Clinton’s hacked emails for the same day the Access Hollywood tape broke.

A third hush money deal revealed.

Questions abound. Did this release involve coordination with Russian entities which may have been involved in the hacks? (See: 4/14/18.) Was a $150,000 payment from a Ukrainian businessman to Candidate Trump (funneled through Trump’s charitable foundation), in return for a 20-minute skyped “speech” by Trump, influence buying by a foreign entity in the lead-up to the election? It looks surprisingly similar to the $150,000 that ended up in the hands of Karen McDougal, the former Playboy Playmate, around that time. McDougal, in case you’re getting your scandals mixed up, is the Bunny who alleges she had a ten-month affair with Trump starting in 2006.

Her story was paid for, ostensibly, by David Pecker, publisher of the National Enquirer, and then killed.

Pecker, Cohen and Trump are longtime friends.

Apparently the raid on Cohen’s office has shaken loose the story of a third hush payment. A Trump Tower doorman confirms he was paid $30,000 in days leading up to the 2016 election, not to talk about a housekeeper and Donald J. Trump’s love child. Who paid and buried the story?

$$$

Pecker and Cohen!

What this all means, if you try to sort it out, is that possible crimes committed include: bank fraud, wire fraud, multiple campaign finance violations, ethical lapses serious enough to get Cohen disbarred and, most serious of all, an on-going conspiracy to cover up all the other crimes.

Who might be involved in a criminal conspiracy? Donald J. Trump.

      

Cohen, Pecker and Trump are all lying; we just don’t find that out until later. Technically, this has nothing to do with Russia. Again, you have to decide who you think is telling the truth. And, god damn, these people lie all the time!

  

4/14/18: Have we mentioned payoffs lately? Well, besides the doorman who got a measly $30,000 not to talk about Trump and the housekeeper’s baby? If you want to get paid to keep your mouth shut, clearly the man to see is Michael Cohen. We now know Cohen has been involved four payoffs. The whopper, so far, was coughed up not to help out Trump but a top fund raiser for the Republican National Committee. This payoff went to silence a second Playboy Bunny. 

Cost: $1.6 million!

$$$

It turns out this payoff went to a Bunny impregnated by Elliott Broidy. Broidy was—until the news hit Friday—a bigtime fundraiser for Trump and deputy finance chair for the RNC.

A current member of that same committee, perhaps not much longer, is Cohen.

A third pillar of conservative respectability, and the finance chairman, was Stephen Wynn. Wynn exited in January after multiple women came forward to accuse him of forcing sex upon them. This included one victim who turned up pregnant but was paid $7.5 million in hush money to take a long hike.

      

These are not “Russian” lies; but consider who we are dealing with here. These people will lie about anything: The doorman lies about the baby. Broidy lies about the other baby. Wynn is a predator. Cohen lies to protect them.

*

Force to assess all of this evidence and to decide what one thinks of the president himself, how does the average American separate the sheep from the sex-crazed goats?

It turns out Broidy was vice chairman of Trump’s inaugural committee. And there’s also this: Last October, Broidy and Trump met at the White House to discuss subjects of interest to the United Arab Emirates, for whom Broidy sometimes works. Among other concerns, leaders of the U.A.E. hoped Trump would fire Secretary of State Rex Tillerson—which he soon did—because they believed Tillerson was too friendly with their neighbor and rival Qatar.

Then—just for fun—the U.A.E. signed a deal with Circinus, L.L.C., Broidy’s security company, and paid out $200 million.

$$$$

At the time, Broidy was working closely with George Nader, an adviser to the U.A.E. Nader, a Lebanese-American businessman, was once charged with child pornography in the U.S. but dodged conviction on a technicality. Then he got convicted for real in the Czech Republic, and spent time in jail.

There are allegations—as yet unproven—that Nader may have steered Emirati cash to…of course…the Trump campaign in 2016. (See: 3/7/18.)

Broidy has been in the headlines before, although not for anything as titillating as boinking a Playboy Bunny at a high per-boink rate. In 2009 he was forced to plead guilty when it was proven he made at least $1 million in illegal gifts to New York State officials in order to win a $250 million pension fund deposit for an investment firm he oversaw. According to The New York Times those gifts included “trips to Israel and Italy, payouts to official’s relatives and girlfriends [emphasis added] and an investment in one [girlfriend’s] relative’s production of a low-budget movie called Chooch.”

$$$

  

Nader lies about child pornography. Broidy lies about pension funds. These are the people the President of the United States likes to hang with.

So who should we believe is telling the truth in this whole sorry saga of Trump and the Russians—with the Playboy Bunnies thrown in?

James Comey is the liar who threatens America.

To make that decision all the more difficult, on Friday, the RNC (yes, the same crew who brought you all the sexual abuse above), kicked off a campaign to prove James Comey is the liar who threatens America.

Here’s a screenshot of the RNC link:

Last, but absolutely not least, guess who may in fact have taken a trip to Prague in 2016—as reported in the Steele dossier—the dossier which according to everyone who ever worked for Trump is chock-a-block filled with lies?

First hint: This man once claimed, “I have never been to Prague in my life.”

Second hint: Christopher Steele, who compiled the dossier, said sources warned him this man was involved in a conspiracy to coordinate ties with the Russians to help the Trump campaign.

Yes, it’s Michael Cohen!

According to McClatchy, Mueller’s team has uncovered evidence that Cohen traveled first to Germany. This would show up on his passport. He then crossed the Czech Republic border later, which would not.

Again, our national dilemma is clear. If Mueller has evidence Cohen was in Prague and Cohen says he was never in Prague, well, who do we believe??? The guy in charge of paying off porn stars?

His boss, who we know cheats on all his wives?

Or the former head of the F.B.I., a decorated war hero, Robert Mueller? That would be the guy once confirmed by a U.S. Senate vote of 100-0.

Did you know the U. S. Senate could agree, 100-0 on any topic, including: If an asteroid the size of Madagascar was speeding toward Planet Earth and NASA could launch a rocket to stop it, NASA should?

Well, in Mueller’s case, they did.

This allegation about Cohen traveling to Prague remains unproven to this day.

It may be a real case of “Fake News.”

4/16/18: Some days you don’t know whether to be terrified or bemused. Cohen has had only three legal clients in the past year. One would be Trump. Second would be Elliott Broidy.

The third turns out to be none other than Sean Hannity, pillar of conservative respectability at Fox News.

I admit: I am hoping there’s another Playboy Bunny involved.

4/19/18: Did we just say “another Playboy Bunny?”

We did—and another Playboy Bunny, Barbara Moore, surfaces and says she had a lengthy affair with Trump around the same time Marla Maples, his future second wife, was pregnant with Donald's baby.

And we’re not done yet!!! A Bunny friend of Moore’s says she once watched while Bunny Moore and Trump had sex.

  

Trump lies to Marla about the affair; Trump lies to Moore about being engaged. If you haven’t noticed, Donald J. Trump lies rather frequently.

4/20/18: Besides bingeing on Fox News and wondering when Melania is going to dump his orange ass for all the lying about porn stars and Playboy Bunnies x 2, what is the President of the United States up to today? He’s fuming every time he hears the name “James Comey.” He rages every time he thinks about Comey’s memos, which Comey says outline talks he and Trump had about the Russia investigation.

For months, Trump insisted those memo’s didn’t exist. Comey never took notes while they were together!

Comey just made them up later to cover his F.B.I. butt.

At one point, Trump went for a lying-sack-of-presidential-poop bluff. He could prove Comey was lying. In a tweet he hinted that the White House had actual tapes of their talks.

Several weeks passed. Trump laid low. Apparently, he was lying in wait to catch Comey in a “perjury trap” of his own. (See: 1/26/18.)

Okay. No. Trump finally admitted he was stuffed with goose poop. If there were tapes…. um, he didn’t have any.

Now the Comey memos have been released. They don’t directly implicate the president in any collusion with Russians.

Trump allies suddenly insist the Comey memos are real. You know what that proves? It’s GOP magic! What Trump claimed did not exist now exists and the memos prove Trump is innocent.

   

Trump supporters are lying for him. The memos prove Comey took notes on conversations with the president just as he said. Trump lied when he acted like he had tapes.

*

In related news, the Senate Judiciary Committee votes 14-7, to move forward with a bill to protect the Mueller investigation.

Milksop Mitch says he sees no need to bring the bill to the Senate floor; but the fact four Republicans, including committee chairman Chuck Grassley, sense danger tells us much about the fear Republicans secretly harbor in regard to the nut job occupant of  the Oval Office.

Grassley is clear about the need for protection for Mueller and any special counsels to come:

Because special counsel investigations only occur where there is a conflict of interest within the executive branch, special counsel investigations are usually matters of great national concern. And Congress, by exercising its oversight powers, can help the American people to have confidence that these investigations are conducted efficiently and independently.

4/21/18: Something unusual takes place on this day; but we won’t know how unusual for almost a year. (See: 3/13/19.)

At the time, the President is still tweeting out his undying love for former lawyer, Michael Cohen.

In fact, when The New York Times publishes a story indicating that Cohen might flip on the president, Trump calls the reporter a “Crooked H flunkie,” claims the Times is using “non-existent ‘sources,’” and refers to his former fixer as, “Michael, a fine person with a wonderful family.”

But no way will he flip.

Continuing the thought at the end of the tweet shown above, Trump is sure: “Most people will flip if the Government lets them out of trouble, even if.... ....it means lying or making up stories. Sorry, I don’t see Michael doing that despite the horrible Witch Hunt and the dishonest media!” 

 

Behind the scenes, some of the clearest signs of obstruction of justice will eventually be revealed. Plus, the “dishonest media” have the story right.

4/26/18: In a 29-minute long rant on April 26, during a phone call to the Three Stooges at Fox & Friends, Trump insists no campaign funds were ever used in any way, shape or form to pay off Stormy the porn star. 

Trump’s rambling diatribe sounds so unhinged even the Stooges become alarmed. Finally, Brian Kilmeade decides to cut the man off. 

“We’ll see you next Thursday, Mr. President,” he smiles into the camera. “We know you have a lot to do.”

By this time, the president has already signed several checks to Cohen in an effort to keep the story of the porn star payoffs from exploding. So he’s actually lying to the fools at Fox News.

4/27/18: President Twitter Thumbs is so excited he has to tap out the news! The Russian investigation is over.

He’s cleared!

According to the final report of the GOP-controlled House Intelligence Committee, Trump never saw a Russian walk into the Oval Office, never talked to Putin about anything except the World Series, nor did he have any kind of sex whatsoever with Russian hookers or watch them urinating.

The committee has released its report, which, to be honest, they could have written without doing any investigating at all.

Trump tweets:

Just Out: House Intelligence Committee Report released. “No evidence” that the Trump Campaign “colluded, coordinated or conspired with Russia.” Clinton Campaign paid for Opposition Research obtained from Russia- Wow! A total Witch Hunt! MUST END NOW!”

Someone should probably tell him that this investigation was so inept the Republicans couldn’t have proved the president ate cheeseburgers in bed, even if they caught him with a half-eaten sandwich in one hand and ketchup stains down the front of his golden presidential PJ’s.

*

On the other hand, the free press continues to do what the free press does best. It keeps digging for truth.

New emails show that Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer who met with Trump’s son, Trump’s son-in-law and Trump’s campaign manager at Trump Tower was not at the June 2016 meeting just to talk about adoption. 

In an interview with Richard Engel of NBC News, she admits she has not been entirely truthful. Previously, she had said that she “wasn’t an agent for anyone” the day she showed up offering dirt on Hillary Clinton. “I am a lawyer, and I am an informant,” she now tells Engel. “Since 2013, I have been actively communicating with the office of the Russian prosecutor general.” 

That makes her an informant for the Russian equivalent of our Attorney General.

Veselnitskaya lied about who she was representing and why she showed up at Trump Tower.

Trump explains to a crowd at a rally in Michigan that same day—as he preps to run again in 2020 by ignoring the job in 2018—that this proves he’s really, really innocent of colluding with Russia!

It was always clear who the “woman lawyer” was working for.

Here’s an actual sample of his goofy logic. “I guarantee you, I’m tougher on Russia,” he tells cheering fans.

In fact, have you heard about the lawyer? For a year, a woman lawyer, she was like, ‘Oh, I know nothing.’ ...Now all of a sudden she supposedly is involved with government. You know why? If she did that, because Putin and the groups said, ‘you know this Trump is killing us. Why don’t you say that you’re involved with government so that we could go and make their life in the United States even more chaotic.’ Look at what’s happened. Look at how these politicians have fallen for this junk. Russian collusion. Give me a break.”

This may come as a shock to those who love Donald J. Trump with a love beyond reason. But it was always clear the “woman lawyer” in question was working for the Russian government. It’s just that for two years everybody in the Trump administration refused to admit it.

It says in the emails to Don Jr. who Veselnitskaya is working for. (See: 7/9/17.)

Trump lies about not knowing Veselnitskaya was representing the Russian government.

4/28/18: Edward Levi, appointed by President Gerald Ford to lead the Department of Justice in the wake of the Watergate scandals, once made clear his understanding of his role. “Our law is not an instrument of partisan purpose.”

It cannot become “anyone’s weapon.”

Griffin Bell, appointed by President Jimmy Carter, stood on virtually the same spot. His department, Bell said, was “a neutral zone in the government, because the law has to be neutral.”

By comparison, Trump has made it clear the rule of law is an impediment. If he had his way, he said during his campaign, he’d lock Hillary Clinton up as soon as he finished reciting the oath of office.

Earlier this month he warned that former F.B.I. Director James Comey should be thrown in jail.

On this fine spring day, infuriated (once again) after watching his propaganda pals at Fox News, he blasts former director of National Intelligence James Clapper for “leaking” information to CNN, having “wavered” (according to Fox) in testimony before Congress that he had not. 

This, says the president, means Clapper is “a lying machine.”

*

Now, consider how Trump views the Department of Justice. In an interview last December with The New York Times, Trump made it clear what he thought the job of the DOJ was. First he whined about his Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Sessions’ failure to protect him from investigation.

If only Sessions would do for him what he imagined—in a clear case of projection—Attorney General Eric Holder had done for Obama!

“I have great respect for that.”

“I don’t want to get into loyalty,” Trump responded to a question about whether or not he had ever asked law enforcement officials for loyalty, “but I will tell you that, I will say this: Holder protected President Obama. Totally protected him. When you look at the things that they did, and Holder protected the president. And I have great respect for that, I’ll be honest.”

In other words: forget the rule of law.

Trump would have great respect for anyone in the Department of Justice if they “totally protected him.”

4/29/18: In an article titled “The End of Intelligence,” written by former C.I.A. head Michael V. Hayden, The New York Times allows Hayden to focus on some of the boldest lies of Candidate and now President Trump. 

Hayden notes:

Candidate Trump claimed he watched a video of thousands of Muslims in New Jersey celebrating the collapse of the Twin Towers on 9/11.

He said the father of Ted Cruz had a hand in the assassination of President Kennedy. 

Trump hinted that Justice Scalia had been murdered—that a pillow had been found on his face.

In July 2017, President Trump claimed—after a disastrous speech to the Boys Scouts—that a Scout official had called him to say it was “the greatest speech ever made to them.”

How bad was the president’s lying? 

Hayden writes that David Press, an intelligence officer who once gave daily presidential intelligence briefings, asked him if he thought Trump could even “distinguish between truth and untruth.”

Hayden is blunt: “We in the intelligence world have dealt with obstinate and argumentative presidents through the years. But we have never served a president for whom ground truth really doesn’t matter.”

He goes on to note that White House aides reportedly call Trump the “two-minute man.” And we’re not talking sex.

Get your mind out of the gutter.

We mean “briefings.” Previous presidents often received 60-page intelligence briefings daily. Trump wants his five pages or shorter.  Trump would be happy if his briefing papers read simply: “Donald Trump is the absolute best president ever and his hair looks great and he’s not even a little overweight!”

A visit to the C.I.A. to see a friend retire allowed Hayden the chance to meet many young agents and left him with a sense of hope. “Still, I wondered whether the officers I saw at the ceremony realized how much we are now counting on them. They know we traditionally rely on their truth-telling to protect us from our enemies. 

“Now we need it to save us from ourselves.”

  

We know the story of Moslems celebrating in New Jersey was a lie, as was the story about Ted Cruz’s father. They don’t involve Russians; but if you have to assess the veracity of Donald J. Trump, you know what he’s like.

5/1/18: The sun rises over Washington. Trump awakes. Trump learns The New York Times has published an article about forty-nine questions the Mueller team would like him to answer.

Trump tweets. Trump tweets angrily.

It’s what Trump does:

So disgraceful that the questions concerning the Russian Witch Hunt were “leaked” to the media. No questions on Collusion. Oh, I see...you have a made up, phony crime, Collusion, that never existed, and an investigation begun with illegally leaked classified information. Nice!

Trump tunes in to Fox News. This riles him further.

Again he tweets: “It would seem very hard to obstruct justice for a crime that never happened! Witch Hunt!”

A “perjury trap” is when you ask Trump questions and he lies.

In reality, Trump should be happy to see any questions in advance because pretty much every man, woman and child on his legal team lives in fear he will testify under oath. The fear is that—no matter how carefully they might try to prepare him to meet with Mueller’s team—he won’t be able to avoid stepping into what his handlers call a “perjury trap.”

A “perjury trap,” as far as this humble blogger can tell, is where you ask the president questions about allegedly illegal activities and he does what he always does. He lies with abandon.

POSTSCRIPT: For a list of the possible questions Mueller would like the President of the United States to answer, follow this link.

5/3/18: It appears the Trump legal team may be giving up. Ty Cobb resigns. Don McGahn is looking for the exit. Rudy Giuliani, only recently added to the team, apparently just says, “F--- it!”

He’s just going to blabber along. 

In his first real day on the job, Rudy lets slip during an interview with Sean Hannity that Trump did know about the hush money payment to Stormy Daniels—but don’t worry, he paid Cohen back. Everything was cool and no campaign finance violations had occurred!

Even Hannity seemed momentarily stunned. This was going to require a creative new round of lying, to replace all the lies Giuliani had just blown to flinders. 

Hannity was happy to lie for Trump, as long as cable ratings remained high. But even his rabid viewers might start to notice eventually, that the president had been lying, at the very least to his wife.

Rudy added helpfully that Trump paid Cohen back by putting him on a $35,000 monthly retainer, “with a little profit and a little extra margin for paying taxes.” Four months, maybe five? That would come out to a pretty good payday of $175,000, or $130,000 for Stormy and $45,000 for Cohen. 

The president “didn’t know about the specifics of [the payment], as far as I know,” Rudy continued, “but he did know about the general arrangement that Michael would take care of things like this. Like I take care of things like this for my clients. I don’t burden them with every single thing that comes along.”

In another interview later in the day, Rudy stuck his other foot in his mouth. Cohen had actually been paid a total of $460,000, he said.

Or was it $470,000?

Trump knew about the payments. He had already been signing most of the checks; and Don Jr. signed the ones he didn’t sign himself.

5/4 and 5/5/18: Various members of the Liars’ Club start the weekend trying to explain which lies currently are the officially accepted lies. Did the President of the United States know about the hush money payment to Stormy Daniels or didn’t he? In February, Cohen assured the American people Trump did not. Cohen claimed he paid the settlement out of the goodness of his nearly bottomless legal heart.

Pressed by the free press to explain, Cohen next claimed he used a home equity loan to raise the cash.

Don’t worry, though, he was not reimbursed.

Eventually, reporters forced poor Press Secretary Pinocchio to answer questions in regard to the hush payment. Oh, no, Sarah Sanders said, the president never knew about the payment. And the president would never have sex with a porn lady. The president always keeps his weenie in his pants.

Sanders did blurt out, famously, that the Daniels case had already been won “in arbitration.” So that was the end of the matter: although people did wonder how Trump knew about the arbitration if he had never heard of the payment.

Well, no matter! Stormy had signed a non-disclosure agreement. The courts had ruled that she couldn’t talk about the affair she never had, for which she was paid $130,000 not to talk about at all. If she did talk she knew she’d be facing penalties of $1 million every time she opened her mouth about an affair that never occurred.

At this point you figured even Pinocchio had to be going home at night hating her job, knowing she was forced to stand up and claim a giant pile of hippo dung was a beautiful sculpture.

Eventually, representatives of the free press cornered the head of the Liars’ Club on Air Force One. Did Trump know anything about the payment to Daniels? 

“No. No,” President Trump said.

Then why did Cohen make the payment, a reporter inquired?

“You’ll have to ask Michael Cohen,” the president continued. “Michael Cohen is my attorney and you’ll have to ask Michael Cohen.”

Honestly, you had to imagine that only complete fools could be falling for this crap. Still, ardent Trump fans believed what he said. He could have stood and drooled uncontrollably for five minutes.

They wouldn’t have cared.

Unfortunately, for the Liars’ Club, the alibis continued to unravel. Had Cohen worked in any capacity for the Trump Organization during the 2016 campaign? This could lead to questions about campaign finance violations if the answer proved yes. “No,” the members of the Club cried out! In fact, no one at the Trump Organization could believe anyone would ask such a mean question. 

Stormy Daniel’s lawyer, Michael Avenatti, quickly noted that at least one email sent by Cohen, related to the hush money payment, came from his address at the Trump Organization. Another court filing related to the Daniels case was signed by Jill A. Martin, a second lawyer for the Trump Organization. Hey, no big deal, all the Trump enablers at Fox News replied.

Martin was merely filing out legal papers on her free time.

Just for fun.

*

If empty heads in red MAGA hats were already spinning, the following morning Rudy showed up on Fox & Friends and gave them a fresh twist. Giuliani tried to stick another foot in his mouth—only he was already out of feet. This time he offered up the nugget that Cohen might have gotten a great deal in the hush money settlement with Daniels. “My God, this is cheap,” Rudy said Cohen must have thought at the time. “Let me get this signed up and signed off.” Why this was almost “pocket change” for a man like Trump. As Rudy saw it, $130,000 was nothing to worry about when it came to keeping a porn star lady from spilling the beans. Just imagine, he asked the three horrified hosts, “if that [story] came out on October 15, 2016, in the middle of the last debate with Hillary Clinton.” Trump might not be president today!

But, that wasn’t Trump’s real motivation. Oh, no. According to Rudy, he only wanted to spare his wife hurt.

By now the total price included $130,000 to Stormy and another $330,000 or $340,000 to Cohen and to pay ancillary expenses.

Could the story get more bizarre? It could. Thursday morning the president had to do some tweet-lying himself. First he tweeted that any hush money paid “had nothing to do with the campaign.” Then he admitted his personal attorney had received a monthly retainer, as Rudy had said:

…from which he entered into, through reimbursement, a private contract between two parties, known as a non-disclosure agreement, or NDA. These agreements are.....

...very common among celebrities and people of wealth. In this case it is in full force and effect and will be used in Arbitration for damages against Ms. Clifford (Daniels). The agreement was used to stop the false and extortionist accusations made by her about an affair,.....

...despite already having signed a detailed letter admitting that there was no affair. Prior to its violation by Ms. Clifford and her attorney, this was a private agreement. Money from the campaign, or campaign contributions, played no roll in this transaction.”

Having launched himself on this tweet-lying rampage at 5:46 a.m. the president finished in time for a bowl of Rice Krispies at 6:00. 

Pinocchio Sanders was now tasked with cleaning up Rudy’s messes. In one press conference she was reduced to saying six times that she was not misleading the public. She had been providing “the best information I had at the time.”

By Saturday morning a fresh layer of possible lies had been added to the growing manure pile. According to The New York Times, Allen Weisselberg, chief financial officer of the Trump Organization had “known since last year the details of how Mr. Cohen was being reimbursed, which was mainly through payments of $35,000 per month from the trust that contains the president’s personal fortune, according to two people with knowledge of the arrangement.”

For those of us who care about the U.S. Constitution and still believe absolutely in the rule of law, if even half of this is true, the questions are far more important than who did what, in matters of sleazy sex. If Trump would lie about this, and lie without restraint, why would anyone not come to the conclusion that he and his sorry crew would lie about anything, particularly Russians, to save their sorry asses?

    

Take your pick: Pinocchio is lying to the press because she knows the president did know about the payments; or the president is lying to Pinocchio and telling her he didn’t. And the people at the Trump Organization knew all about the payments, as we eventually learn when we see all the signed checks. (See: March 1, 2019.)

5/7/18: The Rudy Giuliani Traveling Circus continues to make the TV talk show rounds. Now he claims that the president still wants to testify in the Mueller probe. Rudy insists, however, that the president shouldn’t have to. But if he did he’d probably plead the Fifth Amendment.

No one, least of all Rudy, could say what Trump knew about the payoff to Stormy Daniels, or when he knew what he knew, or answer inquiries about other possible payments. In yet another disastrous interview, Rudy responded to a question by George Stephanopoulos on the show This Week. 

Could Lawyer Cohen have made more payments to more women?

“I have no knowledge of that,” Giuliani winced and blinked. “But I would think if it was necessary, yes.” 

Even the glibbest of liars, Kellyanne Conway, told Jake Tapper on CNN that same day she had no idea if similar payoffs were made to anyone else. For once she didn’t dare risk a definitive “no.” “They didn’t cross my desk as campaign manager,” she dodged. “And I would also tell you that I’m happy to answer these questions, but I have limited visibility into what Mayor Giuliani is talking about, because, politely, he is the president’s counsel. I am the president’s counselor,” she said.

Different liars, different jobs.

*

We also learn that Senate investigators want to know if Jill Stein’s Green Party got money from the Russians during the 2016 campaign.

Stein, of course, siphoned off votes mostly from Clinton—since Trump supporters believe global warming is a hoax and think Americans should buy more guns and blast animals until entire species go extinct.

Possible lie: Stein took money from the Russians; no proof yet; but interesting.

5/12/18: So far, when it comes to draining the swamp, the Trump administration may not be any worse than previous administrations—but it’s certainly no better. Unfortunately, there seems to be an added disposition to help various Russian individuals and Russian entities. 

CNN reports:

A former senior campaign and transition aide to President Donald Trump recently inked a deal to help a Russian oligarch's conglomerate shed sanctions the Trump administration slapped on them last month.

Bryan Lanza, who is in regular contact with White House officials, is lobbying on behalf of the chairman of EN+ Group, an energy and aluminum firm presently controlled by Oleg Deripaska, according to several sources. Deripaska is a billionaire who is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin and was the target of US sanctions imposed last month.

Deripaska, in in case you forget, is considered to have close ties with Russian crime syndicates and was once accused in British courts of having ordered the murder of an uncooperative banker. And have we mentioned that Paul Manafort and Deripaska had a long history of close business ties?

Any other Russians we should mention?

CNN continues:

Former New York Republican Rep. John Sweeney has made more than $200,000 lobbying on behalf of a European pipeline venture owned by Gazprom, the state-controlled Russian natural gas company, according to federal lobbying disclosures. The New York Republican previously worked on Trump's campaign and assisted with administration hires during the presidential transition. Sweeney declined to discuss details about the clients he represents.

The swampiest creature of all would be Cohen. Fresh documents show he began selling services to the highest bidders almost as soon as Trump finished swearing to uphold and defend the U.S. Constitution. Within 24 hours, AT & T had agreed to pay him at least $200,000, in hopes he could help smooth a path to an $85 billion merger with Time-Warner. 

The Swiss pharmaceutical giant, Novartis, did Cohen one better, forking out $1.2 million in return for his help. 

No story about the Trump administration is complete unless you add a few Russians. Cohen also took $500,000 from a company called Columbus Nova and other entities controlled by Viktor Vekselberg, a close ally of Vladimir Putin. The good news (defining “good” broadly) is that Vekselberg is known as the “nice” Russian oligarch. He has never been known to have rivals bumped off or arrested.

$$$$$

5/15/18: According to Vice President Jesus, the Russia investigation has gone on long enough. Special Counsel Mueller has been at it a year.

An entire year! Tooooo loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong!!!!

Since your busy blogger has an actual brain and can conjure up actual memories, let’s turn back in time to when conservatives loved the Benghazi investigation. That one lasted two years, four months.

The Whitewater investigation spilled over into an examination of Bill Clinton’s sexual misdeeds. How long did that last? Four years, one month and six days, if you count only the part after Ken Starr took over. 

Remember how Fox News stood up for the right of President Clinton not to have to testify under oath—how it was all a “perjury trap!”

Remember how Fox said Ken Starr couldn’t be trusted to run the investigation because he was a Republican!!

No, you do not. Fox loved that investigation. If Sean Hannity had his way it would continue to this day.

In any case, the Mueller team continues to go about its work quietly and deliberately, turning up new leads still. Viktor Vekselberg, yet another Russian oligarch, was recently stopped at a New York-area airport and questioned about payments to Trump’s personal lawyer, Mr. Cohen. In related news, we learn that a surprising number of Russians attended the Trump Inauguration. No wonder Trump thought it was the largest inaugural crowd ever.

Vekselberg was one. (Federal campaign filings indicate two of his American business partners donated $1.2 million to festivities.) 

Russian pharmaceutical executive Alexey Repik and his wife were there. 

So were Natalia Veselnitskaya and Rinat Akhmetshin, two of the Russians who participated in the secret June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower.

Last, but not least, Russian banker, Alexander Torshin attended. Torshin is famous for:

A)   joining the National Rifle Association

B)    attending five N.R.A. national conventions, including the one in 2016, where he met Donald J. Trump Jr.

C)   possibly funneling money to the N.R.A. to be used in the campaign

D)   reportedly holding the dual posts of banker and “godfather” of a Russian crime syndicate and specializing in both roles as a money launderer.

*

In other Russian-themed news, we learn the Mueller team has interviewed Thomas Barrack, a close personal friend of the president. Barrack was chairman of the Trump Inauguration Committee. 

Anything else interesting? 

We do know Barrack was investigated by the Italian government, which wanted to know about a complex scheme to funnel money through Luxembourg (motto: “We may be a postage-stamp size nation, but we are a giant tax haven.”).

In the process, Italian authorities believe Barrack and his pals may have evaded $190 million in taxes. 

5/16/18: The first year of the Mueller investigation ends the way it all began, with more lies by Trump, his associates, and members of his administration. First, Trump has to file paperwork and admit he paid back Michael Cohen in 2017, after his personal lawyer gave $130,000 to Stormy Daniels.

This means, that in regard to the Stormy Daniels story, Cohen has been lying for months; Trump has been lying too.

These lies have been counted.

The American people might not care about a consensual sexual encounter between Citizen Trump and a porn star in 2006; but when the President of the United States lies about it aboard Air Force One, that’s more serious.

And if you lie about a porn star to stay out of trouble with your wife, what lies are you willing to employ when it comes to the Russians? First, the good news on that subject, at least for the president: Rudy Giuliani tells reporters that Robert Mueller has agreed that under Department of Justice guidelines a sitting president cannot be indicted. A president might bludgeon his wife to death. He might traffic in child porn. He might collude with Russian agents. He could not be indicted. He might be guilty but he’d have to be impeached.

Secondly, but not such good news for the president, F.B.I. Director Christopher Wray speaks before Congress. 

He says (again) that the Russian investigation is not a witch hunt.

In testimony today, Sen. Patrick Leahy asked Wray if he stood by his past statement—that the investigation was not a witch hunt.

“Yes,” Wray responded. He did not elaborate or hedge. So, it’s official. It’s not a witch hunt, according to Trump’s own pick to head the F.B.I.

The president says it is too a witch hunt. Technically, this might count as 1,044 lies, since he continues to repeat the claim.

Meanwhile, the Senate Judiciary Committee releases thousands of pages of testimony related to the secret June 2016 meeting, with Don Jr. and Trump campaign officials and agents of the Russian government.

The transcripts show that Don Jr., who was not under oath, spun a tenuous tale. First, a participant in the meeting remembers the president’s son starting off by saying, “I understand you have some information for us.”

When conversation veered off topic, Don Jr. was quick to refocus everyone. “What have you got on Hillary” he wanted to know.

Later, Don Jr. would claim the meeting was mainly about Russian adoptions. That would be a lie.

Under oath, it would be perjury.

Why didn’t Don Jr. contact U.S. intelligence agencies?

Members of the committee wanted to know why Don Jr. took a meeting with the Russians in the first place and never contacted U.S. intelligence agencies to warn about a foreign power’s attempt to interfere in U.S. elections. Well, Jr. offered lamely, the campaign had not received the hoped for dirt on Hillary. 

So why contact anyone? 

No harm in meeting with the Russians—hoping to get dirt on Hillary—not if it didn’t lead to the dirt the campaign wanted.

In fact, asked in July 2016, if there was any truth to the claim, coming from the Clinton team that Russians were trying to help his father, Don Jr. replied with indignation. “Well, just goes to show you their exact moral compass,” he told CNN’s Jake Tapper. “They’ll say anything to be able to win this. This is time and time again, lie after lie….It’s disgusting; it’s so phony.” 

That’s now another proven lie and a particularly brazen one.

In other highlights from his testimony, Don Jr. said he couldn’t remember who he called and spoke with at a blocked number for four minutes just before the meeting, who he spoke with briefly at a blocked number during the meeting, or who he spoke to at a blocked number for eleven minutes that same evening. It might have been a pizza delivery order. It might have been his father. It might have been his mistress. No. Scratch that. Don Jr. lied about that, too.

It might have been Pope Francis. Don Jr. responded repeatedly to such questions, “I don’t recall.”

Likely several more lies.

What about a purposely misleading statement issued in July 2017, a year later, after the free press got wind of the initial meeting? That was the statement which said the meeting was primarily about adoption.

Did Don Jr. talk to his father about the statement? He did not recall. Did his father help craft it—which would indicate, if nothing else, a desire to cover up the truth about working with the Russians?

Don Jr. could not remember.

*

The Hill reports that Jason Sullivan, Roger Stone’s media assistant, had been called to testify before the Grand Jury.

And the Senate Intelligence Committee announces its bipartisan conclusions. The Russians clearly interfered in the 2016 election, members of the panel agree, and clearly did so with the intention of harming Hillary Clinton and advancing the prospects of Donald J. Trump. Vice Chairman Mark Warner puts it plainly: “The Russian effort was extensive, sophisticated and ordered by President Putin himself for the purpose of helping Donald Trump and hurting Hillary Clinton.”

But wait, there’s more!

Christopher Wylie, a whistleblower, informs a Senate panel that Cambridge Analytica targeted certain groups of voters through social media. Sophisticated voter suppression tactics were employed to convince voters not to show up at the polls or used to undercut their support for certain candidates. Wylie suggests that the professor at the center of the Facebook data breach might have allowed the Russians to get hold of the personal information he had gathered on millions of Americans. That professor, Aleksandr Kogan, made numerous trips to Russia—possibly for legitimate reasons, since he sometimes worked at St. Petersburg University.

Still, you had to wonder how many connections to Russia, tangential and essential, there are in this continuing Trump tale.

A disease of dishonesty…a cancer that he’s spreading.

Former C.I.A. Director John Brennan sums up his concerns for reporters. He labels the president’s ongoing efforts to denigrate law enforcement agencies and investigators as “despicable.”

On Nicole Wallace’s program on MSNBC he says the president suffers from “a disease of dishonesty that afflicts him and metastasizes in so many ways. It’s a cancer that he’s spread…hurting this country.”

There you have the crux of the matter: Trump and his pals, both here and in Russia, are doing damage to this country.