Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Last Call For The Whole Kitchen Sink

Well, everything happened after my 4:00 PM post, so let's get down to it.  First of all, as I noted earlier today, former long-time Trump attorney Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to eight counts in federal court.  The new part from this afternoon is that Cohen's pleas included a direct implication of Donald Trump in a federal crime.

Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump's former personal attorney, pleaded guilty in Manhattan federal court Tuesday to eight criminal counts, admitting that "in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office" he acted to keep information that would have been harmful to the candidate and the campaign from becoming public during the 2016 election cycle
The charges against Cohen, an attorney for Trump until earlier this year and a member of his inner circle throughout his presidential campaign, bring an end to a months-long investigation by the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York.

Again, this is Trump being implicated by Cohen in the commission of a federal crime.  This is, frankly, where Donald Trump should resign.  Of course, that won't happen.  Elsewhere, there was all sorts of legal news for the GOP.

Paul Manafort's jury came in with 8 guilty convictions and 10 deadlocked counts, and while prosecutors are still deciding on whether to retry Manafort on the other 10 charges, the 8 convictions are enough to put him away for life.

A jury has found former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort guilty on tax and bank fraud charges — a major if not complete victory for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III as he continues to investigate the president’s associates.

The jury convicted Manafort on eight of the 18 counts against him and said it was deadlocked on the other 10. U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis declared a mistrial on those charges.

Manafort stood impassively, his hands folded in front of him, and showed little reaction as the clerk read the word “guilty” eight separate times. As through most of the three-week trial, Manafort showed no apparent emotion as he looked at the six women and men who convicted him.

President Trump reacted to the verdict by denouncing Mueller’s investigation.

“It doesn’t involve me ... it’s a very sad thing,” the president said after arriving in West Virginia for a political rally, adding that the Manafort case “has nothing to do with” Russian interference in the 2016 election.

“I feel very badly for Paul Manafort,” Trump said. “Again, he worked for Bob Dole, he worked for Ronald Reagan. He worked for many people. And this is the way it ends up.” 

Even if he gets off lightly, he's still facing a decade-plus at the minimum and the rest of his life more than likely.  Oh, but speaking of Republican campaign finance violations, it seems our old friend Rep. Duncan Hunter is the next in the dock.

Rep. Duncan Hunter and his wife, Margaret, were indicted Tuesday on charges related to the misuse of $250,000 worth of campaign funds for personal expenses and the filing of false campaign finance records. 
The charges of wire fraud, falsifying records, campaign finance violations and conspiracy were the culmination of a Department of Justice investigation that has stretched for more than a year, during which the Republican congressman from California has maintained his innocence. 
The Justice Department said the Hunters are scheduled to be arraigned Thursday morning in federal court in San Diego. 
Republican Party leaders had long worried that with a potential indictment looming, Hunter's traditionally safe district, which makes up much of eastern San Diego County, could be at risk of Democratic takeover in November's midterm election. 
Hundreds of thousands of dollars in unusual charges on Hunter's campaign credit card had come under scrutiny, including among other things, an Italian vacation, dental work, purchases at a surf shop, and huge tabs at bars in restaurants in the San Diego and Washington, DC, areas. Among the most mocked charges was airfare for a pet rabbit to fly with the family, which an aide said was mistakenly charged to the wrong credit card.

So that's another major pickup opportunity for the Dems in November.  His opponent, Ammar Campa-Najjar, is definitely deserving of some help from folks.

Oh, and Larry Kudlow, Trump's economic adviser of the week or whatever?  Hosted a party with white supremacist asshole and founder of VDARE, Peter Brimelow.

The publisher of a website that serves as a platform for white nationalism was a guest last weekend at the home of President Trump’s top economic adviser, Larry Kudlow.

Peter Brimelow attended the gathering, a birthday bash for Kudlow, one day after a White House speechwriter was dismissed in the wake of revelations that he had spoken alongside Brimelow on a 2016 panel.

Brimelow, 70, was once a well-connected figure in mainstream conservative circles, writing for Dow Jones and National Review. But over the past two decades, he has become a zealous promoter of white-identity politics on Vdare.com, the anti-immigration website that he founded in 1999.

While Brimelow has long personally rejected the label of “white nationalist,” he acknowledged to the Harvard Crimson in 2016 that his website does “certainly publish a few writers I would regard as ‘white nationalist’ in that they stand up for whites just as Zionists, black nationalists do for Jews, blacks, etc.”

So they're not just crooks folks, they're stupid, racist crooks to boot.

What a day.  This is when the dam broke, guys.  I'd like to say that "this is when history was made, when we look back, this was the day it ended for Trump" but tonight Trump was in Charleston, WV screaming about witch hunts and Chris Farley on a day where his former campaign manager was convicted and his personal lawyer implicated him in a federal crime, they still yelled "Lock her up!"

If you don't vote in November to remove the GOP, you're the reason why we'll have these scumbags forever.

I'm sure of that.

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