Months ago, we learned that in 2006, Donald Trump had an affair with Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal. The affair was only one part of the story – after their affair ended, McDougal tried to tell her story to the National Enquirer. The Enquirer paid her $150,000 for the exclusive rights to her story… and then they didn’t publish it. It was part of AMI’s scheme with Trump, this “catch and kill” media strategy, wherein AMI paid for the exclusive rights to Trump’s mistresses stories, then refused to publish them. It’s part of all the shady sh-t Michael Cohen was working on, and partly why the FBI raided Cohen’s home and office months ago, because of all the behind-the-scenes payments and shenanigans to McDougal and Stormy Daniels. The official Trump line was always that Cohen was off, doing his own thing, and Trump had no idea what was being done. That was blatantly a lie.
So what’s new? Well, it seems like there’s a tape! LORDY. On Friday, the NYT and Washington Post both reported that Cohen had secretly recorded a conversation about a “hush payment” to Karen McDougal between himself and Donald Trump, and that tape was one of many seized by the FBI in the raid. It appears as if Trump’s legal team tried to get ahead of this information by leaking it and confirming it on Friday, then Rudy Giuliani tried to spin it as a good thing, like everything about paying off a former mistress was above-board and done completely by the books.
Personally, I don’t really care a lot about the McDougal case, but it feels like this is a “canary in the coal mine” for a lot of different stories which will come out in the months to come. Cohen has lots of tapes, and seemingly all of them were seized by the FBI. Cohen’s legal predicament grows more dire by the day, and it’s more than clear that he’s going to roll over on EVERYBODY to avoid a long jail sentence. The McDougal situation – while awful, unseemly and deplorable – is merely a drop in the bucket. Here’s how Trump tried to spin it:
Inconceivable that the government would break into a lawyer’s office (early in the morning) – almost unheard of. Even more inconceivable that a lawyer would tape a client – totally unheard of & perhaps illegal. The good news is that your favorite President did nothing wrong!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 21, 2018
I’m so glad my favorite president Barack Obama did nothing wrong. Can you even imagine what would have happened if Obama’s personal lawyer had tapes of Obama talking about paying off a mistress? The GOP would have impeached him WITHIN MINUTES. Like, the news would have come out and the articles of impeachment would have been brought to the floor within the hour. As for the rest of Trump’s tweet… “the government would break into a lawyer’s office (early in the morning)” = the FBI served a legal and valid search warrant. “Perhaps illegal” = completely legal.
Also: Axios had a story about how Cohen is currently focused on Trump’s “fitness to be president.” A source told Axios: “It’s one thing for him [Cohen] to be concerned about his suitability to be president. It’s quite another thing to be concerned about his [Trump’s] loyalty to his country.” Basically, Axios is vibing on the fact that Cohen is going to spill all on Trump and the Russians because NOW Cohen believes that Trump is a traitor to America. Welcome to the party.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Getty.
And as evidence has shown us, evidence means nothing in this poorly written dystopian nightmare we call life. He co-signed Putin while maligning his own intelligence agencies and will (will not sorry o misspoke) change a thing.
Once people decided they’d ignore the evidence around climate change, because it didn’t suit their worldview, it was pretty much downhill from there.
Am sure there are many many more taped conversations, Trump is cornered and is kicking out at anything and everyone. That House of Cards is really starting to shake.
Oh yeah – will definitely also have calls recorded between Trump and Putin.. cannot wait…
Would Cohen have been on those calls? I don’t dispute that such calls have about a 98% chance of existing, but I don’t know that his fixer would have been party to them.
That said, I bet he’s got some really excellently dirt on that execrable pile of waste trump, some just gross, some quasi-legal, and some totally illegal. Should be fine when we get to hear it all.
Also I can’t believe that that dum dum trump released his own audio. What a moron.
Inconceivable? He keeps using that word and I do not think it means what he thinks it means. I was watching CNN as the story broke and felt like I was walking on a cloud all weekend. Anything that annoys or threatens the orange menace gives me energy.
Pretty sure someone else wrote that tweet. Trump never learned “i before e except after c.”
Beat me to it.
Cohen could give a sh*t about 45’s worthiness as a president or his loyalty to the country. He’s playing both sides because he knows it is the safest route.
If he gives Mueller just enough, he’ll make a deal to walk away clean. If he doesn’t, he knows 45 is going to pardon him. He’s not going to see jail time. None of them will.
Can’t be pardoned if indicted and convicted on the state level, right? Mueller appears to be sharing cases with non federal prosecutors.
Mueller referred Cohen to NY because it didn’t fall under the scope of his investigation. So far the only case he’s kept is Manafort.
No, he knows Trump will NOT pardon him. That he has indicated he would flip for Mueller means he does not hold loyalty to Trump over everything else. Trump has written him off and will do nothing to help Cohen.
IQ45 was never going to pardon him, members of the Trump family were initially paying Cohen’s lawyers fees but I believe they stopped and that was around the same time the Cohen said he would co-operate with investigators/Mueller.
Just remember, Cohen had MANY tapes and only a handful of clients.
I hope he has something filthy on Sean Hannity.
Did we ever find out for sure who client number three is?
Just saw on Twitter that there are 12 recordings!
This guy keeps playing both sides. He’s the boy who cried wolf at this point.
Tapes sunk Nixon – let’s hope the same here. Some scandalous dirt of the sexual nature on Hannity would be nearly as satisfying,
There was also a Congress in place that took those tapes seriously. That is not the case here. This is not Watergate and it never will be.
The past two weeks, with Donald spouting love about Vladdie, have been about normalizing the Russians to his base. They’re fine, Russia’s fine, Putin is a snugglebug! Ok they lent me half a billion dollars so I could buy a couple of golf courses and pretend they make money!
Donald knows his involvement with Russia is going to come out, and he wants the deplorables to say there’s nothing wrong with it when Mueller indicts Jared, Ivanka, the doofus twins, and hopefully Cheeto himself.
My first reaction to the tweet was EXACTLY the same! 😀 I’m also glad my favourite president Barack Obama did nothing wrong.
I don’t think we will be able to stand the magnitude of this sure sh!# storm. I’m guessing it’s a lot..
Are these pay offs illegal? If not then it’s just outrage in a tea cup at this point, they will have to find something a lot more damning (illegal) to make a dent in Trumpdom.