February 4, 2019: Trump Inaugural Committed Under Investigation - Artic Region Heating Up

 

2/4/19: No one has seen Rudy Giuliani in public for days. This leads to wild rumors. Trump has fired him after a series of “misquotations” that make it sound like Trump is a liar. (Because he is.) Rudy has quit, having told friends that working for Trump is impossible because the president is a pathological liar. (True.) Old Horndog has run off with another mistress, having tired of his current mistress. That would be the mistress for whom he left his third wife. And his third wife just so happened to be his mistress when he was cheating on his second. (True, save the first sentence.) 

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Federal prosecutors subpoena documents from Trump Inaugural Committee.

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Anyway, no one has seen Rudy, just when the president is going to need every lawyer he can find. 

We learn today that federal prosecutors have subpoenaed documents from Trump’s inaugural committee. 

The reason given in court is an interest in possible money-laundering and illegal gifts from foreign powers. Only one individual is named specifically in the subpoena: Imaad Zuberi. He’s described by The New York Times as “a former fund-raiser for President Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.” 

You know if Fox News covers the story, they’re going to highlight that phrase and milk it for fifty shows.

Mr. Zuberi headed to court.

 

The Times adds that Zuberi “was seeking inroads with Trump” and his company donated $900,000 to the inaugural committee. 

Another entity that the subpoena seeks documents on is Stripe, which created technology to help process credit card transactions. According to published reports, the company counts Josh Kushner, the brother of Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, among its investors. Josh Kushner is not named in the subpoena, and a spokesman for him declined to comment. 

 

Follow the money. Again. 

We know Josh and Jared’s dad has spent time in prison for financial misdeeds. We know Jared has had shady backdoor meetings with Russian bankers. We know leaked records show that Jared managed to avoid paying federal income taxes in at least five years during a stretch of eight, from 2009 to 2017, despite being worth an estimated $324 million. So, you can see why a liberal blogger might smell a number of rotting fish in Team Trump’s wastebasket. 

Once again, in the story of the Trump presidency, we need to follow the money and see where we end. (For the fate of Mr. Zuberi, see: 1/7/20.)

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Among other questions authorities are trying to answer: Was the list of donors the committee submitted to the Federal Election Committee accurate and complete? Thomas Barrack, who chaired the committee, is a longtime pal of President Trump. And if you follow the legal threads obsessively, you know Barrack is “famous” for having been named in an investigation by Italian authorities. It was thought Barrack might have been involved in a criminal conspiracy, after he was accused of orchestrating a scheme to evade $190 million in taxes. 

This evasion involved Barrack’s real estate company – selling a seaside resort in Sardinia – to interests in Qatar – for $670 million. According to The Guardian, the investigation included “wiretaps,” never a good sign for those suspected of wrongdoing. Investigators were trying to follow a money trail which wended its way north, through Luxembourg, a notorious tax haven. Then the money traveled east, to the State of Delaware, where you can charter any shell company you like, and no one will look too carefully into what your company actually does. Finally, the money turned around and headed back to Europe. Having arrived at its destination at last: Deutsche Bank, favorite bank of money-launderers, it was ready to be deposited and spent. 

Among other interesting aspects of the story, we learn that Paul Manafort is “a longtime friend” of Mr. Barrack. The two enjoyed yachting in the Mediterranean after Manafort was booted from the Trump campaign.

 

Barrack was also the first major business figure to endorse Trump in his run for president. He called the candidate “intrinsically and academically first class.” He described his friend as “kind, compassionate” and “empathetic.” “Donald’s natural alliance is with the little guy,” Barrack added – accurately, if we assume the “little guy” has the clout to purchase a seaside resort in Sardinia. Barrack has also worked closely with the Saudi royal family and has argued that the only way to solve the crisis in Syria is to work “with Russia and not against them.” 

We know Rick Gates, who has already admitted to a number of felonies, is cooperating with investigators. We know he worked for the inaugural committee. We know he worked after that for Barrack, up until the day he was indicted. We can assume that Mr. Barrack is sweating a bit. (See: 7/28/19.)

 

BLOGGER’S NOTE (7/26/21): Barrack will be indicted, after Trump leaves office. He’s charged with serving as an agent of foreign governments, without registering as such, or, in a nutshell, selling U.S. foreign policy when he can.

 

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The warmest century in the Artic in the last 115,000 years. 

IN OTHER BUSINESS PERSONS-turned-government-leaders news, Trump nominates David Bernhardt to be next Secretary of Interior. Bernhardt’s main qualification is that he has strong ties to the oil and gas industry and never saw a spot of land he didn’t think would look much better with an oil rig pumping crude to the surface and maybe spilling a few barrels now and again. 

As for the Endangered Species Act, f**ck those stupid animals! Bernhardt considers the act an “unnecessary regulatory burden.” 

In related news, which you absolutely know President Trump and his new pick for Interior missed, scientist studying ancient plant samples on Baffin Island issue stark warning. Melting ice in the Arctic has revealed plants frozen and continuously hidden from view for the last 40,000 years. 

Simon Pendleton, lead author of a study of the melting and the recently revealed plants, estimates that the past century in the Arctic has been the warmest of the last 1,150 centuries, or the warmest period in 115,000 years. 

For extra fun, scientists warn that melting ice could revive ancient diseases. In one study, from 2015, experts found that a 30,000 year old virus Mollivirus sibericum could infect modern amoeba. You might not care about infected amoeba; but that’s not where the danger stops. “If we are not careful,” says Jean-Michel Claverie, one of the study’s authors, “we run the risk of one day waking up viruses such as smallpox that we thought were eradicated.”