June 17, 2018: Trump Pals Caught with Their Conspiracy Pants Half Down

 

6/17/18: The Washington Post reports – and Roger Stone and Michael Caputo suddenly admit – that Stone met during the 2016 campaign with a Russian individual who was offering dirt on Hillary Clinton. 

Caputo: forgot he helped arrange the meeting.

____________________ 

Amnesia afflicted everyone associated with the campaign.

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Caputo now remembers arranging the meeting after a man going by the name of “Henry Greenberg” approached Caputo’s Russian-immigrant business partner, at an art showing in Miami in the spring of 2016. 

The Stone-Greenberg meeting may not have borne fruit, save to alert Russian intelligence that the Trump team was willing to play ball. Greenberg asked for $2 million for his pile of dirt. Stone claims he turned him down, telling the Russian, “You don’t understand Donald Trump. He doesn’t pay for anything.” 

Stone wasn’t saying no because it would be wrong to allow a foreign adversary to tilt a U.S. election. 

He was saying no because Trump was cheap. 

Afterward, Caputo texted Stone to ask: “How crazy is the Russian?” Caputo realized who Greenberg meant to represent. 

Stone explained that the Russian had asked for big money and labeled the meeting “a waste of time.” 

Caputo responded: “The Russian way. Anything interesting?” 

“No,” his pal replied.

Stone: forgot he had a meeting with a Russian who wanted $2 million.

 

Here’s what seems odd. Stone has long denied meeting with any Russians during the campaign. Both Stone and Caputo could have brought this meeting up during testimony before Congress. Both “forgot” they helped arrange or had the meeting. Even the pattern is odd. The meeting with Greenberg was set up not long after George Papadopoulos met in secret with what he believed were people with direct links to Vladimir Putin and had dirt on Clinton. Papadopoulos “forgot” about his meeting. For lying about it, he got indicted and plead guilty. 

Stone’s meeting with Greenberg came two weeks before Don Jr., Jared Kushner, and the now-incarcerated Paul Manafort agreed to take a meeting specifically arranged with the understanding that agents of the Russian government would provide dirt on…Hillary Clinton! Typical of the amnesia that afflicted everyone associated with the 2016 campaign, Don Jr. quickly forgot about the meeting. 

Jared forgot. 

Paul forgot.

Kushner: forgot about the meeting with another Russian.

Don Jr.: forgot the same meeting as Jared.

Manafort: a triple play; he forgot the same meeting.

He's currently in jail.

 

When Greenberg was contacted by the Post for the story, he denied that he and Stone had met. Not long after, he texted the Post and admitted, okay, they did. Now that he thought about it, he could remember what Stone said two years ago. Greenberg didn’t understand Trump. He wouldn’t give him $2 million. “He doesn’t pay for anything,” Greenberg said Stone said. 

In other words, no dirt was passed – no harm done – and no campaign laws were broken or even slightly bruised. 

 

Caught with their Conspiracy Pants at least half down. 

Stone told the Post he met with Greenberg alone. Greenberg said he was accompanied by a Ukrainian friend named Alexei, who had previously worked for the Clinton Foundation and had dirt he wanted to share. 

Caught, as it were, with their Conspiracy Pants at least half down, both Stone and Caputo claimed that when they talked to Congressional investigators sometime back, they forgot all about this unimportant meeting where someone with Russian connections asked for $2 million. In fact, Caputo claims the meeting was an F.B.I. setup. So he’s the victim in all of this. 

As for Mr. Stone, he insisted in a videotaped interview given to the Post last year: “I’ve never been to Russia. I didn’t talk to anybody who was identifiably Russian during the two-year run-up to this campaign. I very definitely can’t think of anybody who might have been a Russian without my knowledge. It’s a canard.” 

See any pattern?