July 31, 2017: Foreign Policy Gibberish from Donald, D.C.'s Wizard of Oz

 

7/31/17: As not predicted by Anthony Scaramucci, new White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly fires Anthony Scaramucci. (See 7/28/17.) 

____________________ 

“We’ll handle North Korea. We’ll be able to handle North Korea. It will be handled. We handle everything.”  

President Trump

____________________ 

 

A Rasmussen opinion poll has Trump’s approval rating at 39%, his disapproval rating at 61%. In Trumpistan, of course, this qualifies as “Fake News” because no one who voted for Trump likes it. 

Again, those of us who possess semi-adequate reasoning skills might note: four days after Trump’s inauguration, Rasmussen was the one poll that had him rated most favorably: 57% approval, 43% disapproval. 

A Gallup poll on July 31 also shows Trump down, 37%-59%. 

In other words: more and more Americans are coming to realize Trump is the D.C. equivalent of the Wizard of Oz. 

Speaking of frauds, during an afternoon cabinet meeting, the president tells reporters not to worry about North Korea. In his usual lucid fashion, he explains, “We’ll handle North Korea. We’ll be able to handle North Korea. It will be handled. We handle everything.” 

Who says this man can’t handle complicated policy!

 

* 

LAST, BUT DEFINITELY NOT LEAST, 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, the Post reports, wanted to release a truthful statement, to get out in front of the story. 

No dice said the Liar-in-Chief. 

Trump personally dictated a statement in which Trump Jr. said that he and the Russian lawyer had “primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children” when they met in June 2016. This is according to multiple individuals with knowledge of the deliberations. 

That false statement, issued to the New York Times as it prepared an article, emphasized that the subject of the meeting was “not a campaign issue at the time.” 

According to the Post top advisers are worried that 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.”

 

Think Watergate.

 

BLOGGER’S NOTE (6/28/22): See: 7/7/18 for initial developments related to the story, and 7/8/17 for the first denial. Also, keep in mind that when Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer in the meeting was indicted on unrelated charges, she fled to Russia. She’s never coming back. Unless Trump gets reelected in 2024. 

 

BLOGGER’S NOTE #2 (July 5, 2022): It’s fun to go back and look at what Trump first said about people he hired – and what he said after they realized he was in way over his head and offered up criticism. In the clip on North Korea, he predicts that General Kelly, “will go down, in terms of the position of chief-of-staff, as one of the greats ever.”

 

Honorable men and women, like Gen. Kelly soon ran afoul
of a boss with no other guiding principle than self-interest.

After Gen. Kelly stepped down from his post, Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham went to bat for the president. “I worked with John Kelly,” she told reporters, “and he was totally unequipped to handle the genius of our great President.” (See: 10/26/19.) 

Gen. Kelly spoke up again during Trump’s first impeachment, defending Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, who had testified that the president placed personal interest ahead of U.S. national security, in demanding Ukraine investigate the Biden family. We teach young officers “to always tell the truth, to tell truth to power,” Kelly said. Col. Vindman “ did exactly what we teach them to do from cradle to grave.” 

When Vindman heard Trump tell President Zelensky he wanted to see the Biden family investigated, that was like hearing “an illegal order.” “We teach them, ‘Don’t follow an illegal order. And if you’re ever given one, you’ll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order, and then tell your boss.’”

 

Now it was Kelly’s turn to face President Trump’s wrath. “When I terminated John Kelly, which I couldn’t do fast enough, he knew full well that he was way over his head. Being Chief of Staff just wasn’t for him,” the president tweeted. Kelly, he continued, “came in with a bang, went out with a whimper, but like so many X’s, he misses the action & just can’t keep his mouth shut, which he actually has a military and legal obligation to do.” 

It’s interesting to note that the president claims he couldn’t get rid of the general “fast enough.” Kelly took the White House job on July 31, 2017. He remained in his position until January 2, 2019. None of Trump’s three other chiefs-of-staff (Reince Priebus, Mick Mulvaney, and Mark Meadows) lasted even a year. (See: 2/13/20.)

November 20, 2017: Trump Saves the Elephants...from Trump

 

11/20/17: The President decides to save the elephants after his administration decides to kill the elephants. 

In an effort to cut down on pesky regulations, the federal government announces that big game hunters will be allowed to bring back trophies from exotic African hunts. This will include various elephant parts. The National Rifle Association supports the change, saying it would be a “signficant step forward in having hunting receive the recognition it deserves as a tool of sound wildlife management.” 

(Yes, sound management: for example, the history of the American bison, c. 1873, or the carrier pigeon, 1914.)

 

This policy change is so terrible – the logic so absurd – even Laura Ingraham on Fox News can’t choke it down. When other Fox commentators criticize the change, Trump realizes that if Fox can’t go along with such stupidity, he might be wise to look at the new policy for the first time. 

This “horror story,” he suddenly exclaims, must be stopped! Trump saves the elephants from Trump.

Don Jr. saving an elephant by shooting an elephant.
 
It all makes so much sense!

January 3, 2018: The Skunks Spray One Another

 

1/3/18: Trump’s day spirals downhill when skunks begin spraying each other. Skunk #1, Steve Bannon, once a key campaign strategist, is quoted in a new book, Fire and Fury. Among other gems, he calls Ivanka “dumb as a brick.” Bannon suggests her husband Jared (Skunk #2) and brother Don Jr. (Skunk #3) may have committed treason by holding the now infamous meeting with representatives of the Russian government in June 2016. 

Also attending: Paul Manafort, Skunk # 5 (who doesn’t do any spraying.) 

____________________ 

Bannon suggests Don Jr. and Jared may have committed treason.

____________________ 

 

Naturally, when a skunk sprays Skunks #2, #3 and #4 (Donald J. Trump Sr.), Skunk #4 sprays back ten times harder. The president works on a series of drafts of a statement blasting Bannon. Finally satisfied, he insists Bannon had nothing to do with his victory in November. Trump won the election all by himself. Bannon never had a shred of influence while working in the White House. When Bannon lost his job, Trump says, he “lost his mind.” (See: 1/6/18.)

March 29, 2018:

 

3/29/18: The Mueller “WITCH HUNT,” as Donald calls it, continues, even though nobody who ever worked for or currently works for Mr. Trump ever did anything wrong or even thought about doing anything wrong. Besides, why can’t the president just pardon everyone involved? 

In recent “Fake News,” we learn: 

Rick Gates, Paul Manafort’s right-hand man, has admitted he knew an individual he was communicating with regularly, during the 2016 campaign, had ties to Russian intelligence. 

Mueller now believes Manafort knew. You can find these nuggets in recently released court documents.

 

Next, the “Fake News” people report that Trump’s personal lawyer, John Dowd, floated the idea of presidential pardons to Manafort and Michael Flynn, who like Gates, has plead guilty and is cooperating with the Mueller team. 

Legal experts agree. Any discussion of pardons should have been handled not by Trump’s personal lawyer (representing Trump, the individual) but by White House Counsel Don McGahn (representing the office of the President of the United States, and in adherence to the United States Constitution). 

Of course, none of this proves either collusion with the Russians or criminal intent since. It just looks that way. 

In Congress, that realization appears to be having an effect. Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina has joined Democratic colleague Chris Coons of Delaware in a call to pass legislation to protect the Mueller investigation and ensure the truth is ferreted out. In a joint statement, the two men explain: “We have heard from constituents – Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike – who agree that Special Counsel Robert Mueller should be able to conduct his investigation without interference. This should not be a partisan issue.”

 

* 

AUBREY O’DAY makes tabloid headlines of her own, hinting broadly that she also had an affair with Donald J. Trump…in this case, Don 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. 

Now, with people wondering why Don Jr. and his wife are divorcing, rumors swirl. BuzzFeed runs a story based on O’Day’s social media footprint. In 2011 she was tweeting about waking up in a room filled, wall-to-wall, with her favorite flowers, white lilies. “U gave me a garden of love baby,” she cooed. 

“Will he still love me when he’s free?” she wondered that December. Or would he go back to “the poison?” 

In the spring of 2012, she was “Heading 2 my fav sushi spot in the city w my ny bff, then sprinting 2 the Trump 2 get back in bed w/my babe...or maybe I’ll just stay in bed.” In fact, by May, she had so many “homies at the Trump” she could rely on them to give her warnings “on all the enemy creatures [emphasis added].” 

By October, with her romance suddenly on the rocks (apparently because Don Sr. stepped in to quash the love) poor Ms. O’Day was trashing the clan in general. In one tweet she said: “Ted Bundy’s lecturing on feminism… no, wait, it’s just Trump talking the morality of marriage.” 

(Bundy was an infamous serial killer.) 

Sources say, at one point, with his wife pregnant with their third child, Don Jr. told her he would be leaving her for Aubrey. The plan was derailed when Sr. stepped in and told Jr. “to knock it off.” 

On Election Night 2016, with Trump Sr. sweeping to victory, O’Day tweeted pointedly: “[M]y story I didn’t tell is worth millions now.”

Ms. O'Day looks exactly like the kind of woman Don Jr. would pick for an affair.

July 7, 2018: No Deal with North Korea - and Nineteen Reasons to Believe Candidate Trump Jumped in Bed with the Russians

 

7/7/18: Trump continues to learn that diplomacy is a bitch. Having announced that North Korea was no longer a nuclear threat, and that all Americans could slumber in peace, he sends Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to North Korea so Kim Jong-un can hand over all his nukes. 

 

No deal with North Korea. 

Apparently, it comes as a surprise to the North Koreans that they are no longer a threat to the U.S. Pompeo assures reporters after the meetings end that talks were “productive.” “These are complicated issues,” he admits, “but we made progress on almost all of the central issues.” 

The North Korean Foreign Ministry releases a different assessment: “The attitude and demands from the U.S. side during the high-level talks were nothing short of deeply regrettable. ...The issues the U.S. side insisted on during the talks were the same cancerous ones that the past U.S. administrations had insisted on.”  For good measure, the North Koreans described the U.S. negotiating position as a “unilateral and gangster-like demand for denuclearization.”

 

* 

BACK HOME, the president spends another “productive” day tweeting. His attention turns to the Russian investigation. It’s a “Rigged Witch Hunt,” he says. He rambles on about “the missing DNC Server, Crooked Hillary’s illegally deleted Emails, the Pakistani Fraudster, Uranium One, Podesta & so much more.”  

Why weren’t they investigated! 

At this point you begin to wonder what other extraneous issues Trump will dump in the mix. Who the hell is “the Pakistani Fraudster?” What does he or she have to do with the fact that all the following statements are true: 

1.     Trump’s first National Security Adviser, General Flynn, lied to Vice President Jesus about a meeting with Russians. He has pled guilty to one felony and continues to cooperate with the investigation. 

2.     Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos lied about contacts with Russians. He pled guilty and continues to cooperate. 

3.     Roger Stone admits he met with a Russian offering dirt on Clinton; but the Russian wanted $2 million to share it. 

4.     Michael Cohen admits negotiations to build a Trump Tower Moscow continued until at least June 2016. 

5.     Felix Sater, working for Trump in Moscow, suggested giving Putin a $50 million penthouse apartment in the proposed tower, to sweeten the deal. 

6.     In June 2016 Don Jr., Jared Kushner and Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort took a secret meeting with representatives of the Russian government offering dirt on Mrs. Clinton. 

7.     Originally, all the men mentioned in #’s 1-6, “forgot” they had such meetings and contacts.

 

When The New York Times revealed the meeting, noted in #6, all three men remembered: Oh, that meeting! 

8.     Don Jr. appeared on Fox News to set the record straight. He assured Sean Hannity that the meeting was a harmless affair and everyone talked mostly about adoption policy. 

9.     The president helped draft a letter that made a similar claim – that the meeting was “primarily” about adoption policy.

 

The New York Times notified Don Jr. it had in its possession emails proving the meeting had been set up primarily for the purpose of receiving from agents of the Russian government, dirt on Hillary Clinton. 

10. Press Secretary Pinocchio denied that the president had drafted the letter claiming the meeting was primarily about adoption. 

11. Steve Bannon called the meeting at Trump Tower “treasonous.” 

12. Later he backed off and said Don Jr. and Jared weren’t treasonous. Only Manafort. 

13. Manafort has been indicted on a long list of crimes. 

14. Manafort’s top aide, Rick Gates, was indicted for most of the same crimes. He pled guilty and decided to cooperate with investigators. 

15. Trump’s lawyers eventually admitted that the president did draft the misleading letter (#9 above) about the purpose of the meeting at Trump Tower. 

16. Manafort gets hauled into court a second time. His $10 million bail is revoked and he gets sent to jail. 

17. Now he’s charged with witness tampering. 

18. Michael Caputo and Roger Stone, who denied for two years having had anything to do with any Russians during the 2016 campaign, suddenly remember they did set up a meeting (Caputo) and meet (Stone) with a Russian offering to sell dirt on Hillary. 

19. Last, but not least – and remember, this is but a sampling – the Senate Judiciary Committee releases its bipartisan report. Among its key findings: The Russians did interfere in the 2016 election. The Russians did work to damage Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning. The Russians did hope Donald J. Trump would be the next president.

 

U.S. intelligence agencies had plenty of reasons to start an investigation into contacts between members of the Trump campaign and various Russians with links to Vladimir Putin.

July 27, 2018: In Trumpistan, a "Fine Person" Suddenly Morphs into a "Pathological Liar."

 

7/27/18: After weeks of bobbing and weaving, the president’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, appears poised to turn on his old boss. First, a tape was leaked (see: 7/25/18), showing that in the months leading up to the 2016 election, Candidate Trump knew all about a secret payoff to keep a Playboy Bunny’s story about his and her affair out of the press. 

 

____________________ 

“A fine person with a wonderful family…who I have always liked & respected.” 

President Trump, describing Cohen in April

____________________ 

 

Now multiple sources confirm that Cohen is prepared to state that Trump knew about the infamous secret meeting at Trump Tower in June 2016. 

Naturally, the president’s response to this threat comes Friday morning in three tweets (6:26, 6:38 and 6:56 a.m.). 

Again, we will summarize, because if we combined all Trump’s tweets into one book, it would be a massive and very stupid book. So: “highly conflicted Robert Mueller and his gang of 13 Angry Democrats,” “rigged Witch Hunt,” “stupid and unfair to our Country” and one that bears repeating: 

.....I did NOT know of the meeting with my son, Don jr. Sounds to me like someone [Cohen] is trying to make up stories in order to get himself out of an unrelated jam (Taxi cabs maybe?). He even retained Bill and Crooked Hillary’s lawyer. Gee, I wonder if they helped him make the choice!

 

That allusion to taxis relates to possible tax evasion by Cohen, related to business in New York City. 

(Not that Trump would ever dodge taxes, himself.) 

In what will likely shape up as a battle of he said-he said, the American public may be forced to decide which fellow to believe. It’s a tough call. Both Cohen and Trump are truly shady characters.

 

Then again, as recently as April, the president bemoaned an F.B.I. raid on Cohen’s office – called it “disgraceful” – “an attack on our country” – and insisted Cohen was a “good man.” It was terrible what the “Fake News” New York Times was doing to this fellow, the president wailed. Cohen was “a fine person with a wonderful family…who I have always liked & respected.” 

In May, Rudy Giuliani went to bat for Trump’s aggrieved lawyer pal. It was unclear at that point if Cohen would flip. Rudy was all roses and chocolates. Cohen, he said, was an “honest, honorable lawyer [emphasis added, unless otherwise noted].” 

On July 8, Giuliani chimed in again. Would Cohen flip on his boss, a reporter inquired? No sweat, Rudy responded, “I have no concern that Michael Cohen is going to do anything but tell the truth.”  

Now that it appears Cohen is preparing to flip, the tune Trump and his tootling band want to play has changed. From “Star Spangled Banner” to “The Rogue’s March.” 

In an almost laughable interview on CNN, Giuliani sets out to trash Cohen’s reputation. Horndog Rudy, famous for cheating on assorted wives, says the rat has been “lying for years.” Cohen’s a “pathological liar.” He’s “not creditable.” He’ll put out “a string of lies.” Cohen is “an incredible liar.” And this time you can totally believe Rudy G., a man of his word. 

Not of his wedding vows. 

 

Okay, we’ve all been lying. 

If you love Trump – and you’d like to believe Cohen is the biggest liar in the club – you must ignore the fact that Don Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort “forgot” they had a meeting with the Russians. Then you must pretend Don Jr., with help from dad, never drafted and signed off on a false letter about the purpose of the meeting. Next, tell yourself that Jay Sekulow, a lawyer for Team Trump, never insisted “The president didn’t sign off on anything. He was coming back from the G-20 [summit in Europe]. The statement that was released on Saturday was released by Donald Trump Jr., I’m sure in consultation with his lawyers. The president wasn’t involved in that.” 

Next, pretend Mr. Sekulow never repeated this claim two more times, to complete a rare liar’s trifecta. 

Finally, pay no attention to the fact that Press Secretary Pinocchio assured reporters her boss could not tell a lie even if he tried. In terms of that misleading letter, “The president weighed in, as any father would, based on the limited information that he had,” Sanders said. “He certainly didn’t dictate, but like I said, he weighed in, offered suggestions like any father would do.” 

That was also a lie. 

How do we know? In January 2018, in a confidential letter to Special Counsel Robert Mueller, Sekulow and John Dowd, another Trump lawyer (since kicked off the team) admitted: Okay, we’ve all been lying. Trump did dictate that misleading letter. Well, what can you do! He’s president. 

He can pardon himself.

July 30, 2018: A President May Not Thwart an Investigation into His Own Conduct

 

7/30/18: The battle to bolster the crumbling credibility of President Trump continues to falter. In one poll a majority of Americans, 54 percent, now believe he acted illegally or unethically in dealing with the Russians during the 2016 campaign. Only 36 percent think he did not. 

Team Trump turns on Michael Cohen.

____________________ 

“I’ve got a scoundrel on my hands.” 

Rudy Giuliani

____________________ 

 

Sensing danger on several fronts, Horndog Rudy turns up once again on Fox News. He’s there for one reason: to trash the reputation of Michael Cohen. Rudy explains that he has been listening to dozens of tapes that Trump’s former lawyer secretly made. Suddenly, it hits him, he tells the hosts of Fox & Friends. “I’ve got a scoundrel on my hands.” 

Most rational Americans assume he means Trump. Most rational Americans aren’t watching Rudy on Fox.

 

Giuliani decides to mention a new report, which hasn’t yet appeared in print or on TV. Apparently, Cohen is prepared to tell investigators that that Don Jr., Jared, Paul Manafort, Rick Gates, “and possibly two others,” attended a strategy session on June 6, 2016 [emphasis added], in which they discussed plans for the meeting scheduled for June 9, with agents of the Russian government. No one has ever heard of this June 6 meeting before. Yet, Rudy is at pains to say the president wasn’t there. Giuliani is clearly implying that the meeting did occur. Otherwise, there would be no need to stress that then-Candidate Trump wasn’t there. 

A few hours later, realizing he’s shat the bed on TV, Rudy calls Fox News and tries to explain his explanation. This time he gets Harris Faulkner on the phone. Oh, no, he tells her, he wasn’t unclear. He has been saying all along that there was no collusion. But if there was (and there wasn’t), it won’t matter. 

Because collusion is no crime!

 

How does Old Horndog know? He has been looking through the federal statutes just to be sure. 

For once, Giuliani gets his facts straight. If “collusion” is no crime, however, “fraud” and “conspiracy” are. The Oxford Dictionary and Thesaurus gives this definition first, for the word “collude:” “come to an understanding or conspire together, esp. for a fraudulent purpose.” 

If we go to “conspiracy,” the Oxford Dictionary has this: “a secret plan to commit a crime or do harm, often for political ends; a plot.” 

One of the synonyms listed: “collusion.” 

Rudy insists no such meeting – as he says Cohen was about to allege occurred on June 6  – ever occurred. He tells Ms. Faulkner, who is clearly baffled by Rudy’s verbal dance, that he contacted the lawyers of four of the six men supposedly involved. All said the story, if it does come out, would be untrue. 

(Lawyers always claim their clients are innocent up to the moment juries decide they’re not, and often long after.)

 

Old Horndog goes on to say that the Mueller probe is not entitled to ask his client, the President of the United States, any questions about “obstruction of justice.” Why not? Rudy insists that the U.S. Constitution gives any president the right to remove the head of the F.B.I. 

Again, that’s true. 

The Constitution does not give a president or any other member of the federal government the right to act in such a way as to thwart an investigation into possible criminal behavior in which they are subject.

January 9, 2019: Trump, the "Big Orange Enchilada"

 

1/9/19: The president’s big, beautiful Oval Office speech, on the need for a border wall, lands with a Trump Thud. 

No one is moved by what he says and most of us know he’s lying from first syllable to last. He doesn’t mention terrorists pouring across the border – because the “Fake News” folks have been catching his surrogates lying about the numbers all week. Was it 3,000 terrorists pouring in from Mexico? Or 40,000? Or a billion? Trump and his toadies couldn’t make up their minds. 

They all agreed it was a lot! 

We know Don Jr. and Don Sr. lied about the purpose of the June 2016 meeting.

 

The Big Orange Enchilada. 

Meanwhile, if you were hiding in your Safe Room, loading your weapons to repel lepers and people carrying smallpox – you might have missed critical developments in the Russia probe. 

First, the Grand Jury empaneled by Special Counsel Mueller has been extended for six months. 

That means when Trump sticks his head out of the White House on February 2, he’s going to see his fat shadow and know there’s six more months of Mueller. 

Second, we learn that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein has decided to step down once a new Attorney General is in place. We know that William Barr, Trump’s choice to take over at Justice, is scheduled for Senate confirmation hearings next week. At first blush, the president must be excited to think that another nemesis is bowing out of the Russia fight. Yet, before the Big Orange Enchilada (see: Watergate, for reference) breaks out the champagne he might want to puzzle out what this means. It’s a distinct possibility that Rosenstein knows the investigation is guaranteed to draw Trump blood – and copious amounts. He may see the chance to be a stronger voice in defense of the rule of law on the outside of government than in, giving warning about what he, Mueller and others already know.

 

The bullets keep flying past the president – and just missing. But the law of averages says, metaphorically, that Trump can’t dodge them all. Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee (HIC) have announced that the first witness they call back and place under oath will be his son, Don Jr. 

 

Staffing up the always-critical Joint Committee on the Library! 

Republicans helped stall that process till the end of January, by refusing to name any of the members they’d place on HIC, meaning no official business could be conducted until they acted. They did attend to more serious matters, staffing up 23 other committees, including the Joint Committee on the Library. And you thought Congress couldn’t get anything important done. 

Why might Don Jr. be sweating through his shirts of late? We need to go back to the infamous Trump Tower meeting (June 2016), which he and everyone else involved forgot about holding. One participant, Paul Manafort, has already been convicted on ten felony counts. Now a second, Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer who attended, has been indicted. 

If you’re a Trump lover, keep in mind this wasn’t Mueller’s call. This investigation comes out of the Southern District of New York, a federal attorney’s office headed up by a Trump appointee. This case may not be tied to the Mueller probe, but it hints at where Mueller is going. Veselnitskaya is accused of obstruction of justice. Allegedly, she was covering up a trail of Russian money-laundering.

 

Money-laundering! Of course! A highly-secret court challenge, believed to be related to a demand for documents filed by Mueller and his team, has now reached the U.S. Supreme Court. The case involves a “mysterious foreign-owned company” that has so far refused to comply with a subpoena for documents. The lower courts have said that a fine of $50,000 per day shall be imposed, so long as the company remains in contempt. The company appealed. 

Now the U.S. Supreme Court has rejected that appeal, without a single dissenting vote. 

I try to be realistic in my assessments. I still don’t see evidence to impeach the Big Orange Enchilada. 

But I’m getting the sense Mueller may have seen enough. 

I will, however, venture a guess. I am guessing the company is Deutsche Bank. It could be the Bank of Cyprus, where Manafort and Russian oligarchs used to hide their loot. Or it could be any number of Russian money-laundering fronts. My money, never laundered, is on Deutsche Bank. 

 

Get your senses checked: You may be dead. 

I am going to say this development is definitely NOT good news for President Trump and his pals. 

That brings us back to Manafort. In a filing blunder this week, his lawyers failed to redact portions of a court document that offers a window into what Mueller and his team already know. If you don’t read the documents, whereas I’m retired, so I do, you don’t realize that Mueller always knows more than targets of the investigation realize. Here we learn that Manafort shared polling data with the Russians, while leading the Trump campaign. Mueller is alleged to have evidence that puts Manafort in a secret meeting with Konstantin Kilimnik, a former Russian intelligence officer, in August 2016 and another secret meeting in Madrid in early 2017. This passage of data would likely have been meant to aid the Russians in refining their efforts to disrupt U.S. elections. 

I know, I know. “NO COLLUSION,” as the Big Orange Enchilada likes to tweet. But if you don’t sense 

CONSPIRACY, you had better have your eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin checked. 

None of your senses are working and you may already be dead.

 

* 

THERE ARE also reports that Manafort expected to be paid as much as $2.4 million for the polling data in his hands. His alleged intent was to feed it to two Ukrainian oligarchs, with whom he had previously worked, who would pass it on to their Russian buds. 

Payday for Paul Manafort!