November 18, 2019--Big Stuff

"He only cares about the big stuff. He doesn't give a shit about Ukraine."

Last week so said Gordon Sondland, Trump's million-dollar, pay-for-play ambassador to the EU who was having a gay old time galavanting around Europe on the taxpayers' dime until he realized that his casual testimony before the House impeachment committee was likely perjury and if it was proven to be so might land him in the slammer for a decade or more. 

Not exactly his retirement plan. He had been thinking that if he flattered Trump enough and served as his all-purpose butt boy he, rather than Rudy, would wind up Trump's second-term secretary of state.

Forget that. Now for him, with what happened to Roger Stone vividly in mind, it's all about saving his own skin. So expect him to spill the beans as he amends his testimony for a third time later this week. I expect him to throw Trump under the bus before Trump does this unto him. 

So, forget the million he contributed to the Trump inauguration. He'll never miss it. It will be worth it in the stories he'll have available to share with his West Palm Beach drinking buddies.

Also, expect soon to hear from John Bolton and of course private attorney Rudy. Bolton has already begun to open up and it is reliably reported that America's Mayor is under criminal investigation and likely will want to cut a deal. That will require him to turn on Trump.

Speaking of Rudy, I've been thinking about his serving Trump pro bono. For someone totally obsessed with power and money--especially the latter--what's it about that he's not charging for his work for Trump?

The answer leads to Ukraine. It also explains why Trump has been so devoted to destroying the reputation of our former Ukraine ambassador, Marie Vovanovitch, and why he has been so obsessed with undermining the reformist administration of President Volodymyr Zelensky before it can even get launched.

Ambassador Sondland is wrong--Trump does give a shit about Ukraine because it is a place where Trump feels he can off load the evidence that he and the Russians colluded to fix the 2016 election and pin the blame on Ukraine. This would please Putin and allow Trump to remove the sanctions imposed on him while simultaneously assuring that corruption is encouraged in Ukraine because from Paul Manafort's and Rudy's examples he is aware that a corrupt Ukraine is an ideal place to make, steal, and launder big money. 

This suggests that big money is the "big stuff" ambassador Sondland had in mind.

February 19, 2019--Master of Distraction

Being the master of distraction can cut two ways. With Trump, adept at this dubious art, it does and then some.

Take the National Emergency.

Trump was on the ropes. The Democrats in Congress (read Nancy Pelosi) were dug in. They were not going to give him even "one dollar" for his Wall. If he didn't agree to compromise (read "fold") the government would come to a halt and as with the December shutdown, Trump would lose politically and again see his poll numbers tank. They were heading then to the low 30s, pretty much for him a potential 2020 electoral disaster. 

The media covered this wall-to-wall. Even Trump's enablers on Fox News and talk radio (read Laura Ingraham and Rush Limbaugh) were restive and cranky, with Ann Coulter, hitting him literally below the belt, when she called him a "weenie."

So Trump rolled out his thus far most ambitious distraction--he made up and then declared a national emergency, knowing, but not really caring, that it will take forever to get through the courts and ultimately wind up with the Supremes who will likely declare it unconstitutional. Even Clarence Thomas might see things that way. Actually, ignore that--there is no way that he will. But expect Roberts to assure that minimally it will be a 5-4 decision.

In truth, for Trump, the more time it takes to work its way through the judicial system, the more we will be taking about nothing but,  which is his hope. It's about distraction and that's the definition of distraction--talking about something else.

As we saw on Friday the media immediately switched from obsessing about the battle Trump was having with Congress and began talking about only the emergency. To help them and to fill time they rolled out professors of constitutional law, former federal prosecutors, and Pulitzer Prize winning columnists. 

I said to Rona, if this keeps up for another two weeks I'm going to learn so much about the law that I'll be prepared to take the Bar Exam.

But there were a couple of sub-headlines buried on page 16 that ground on relentlessly. Stories that were not about the constitutional crisis but rather about Robert Mueller's investigation. 

At about the same time Trump was holding his rambling, sing-song news conference in the Rose Garden where all the questions were about the "emergency," Mueller prosecutors were in court calling for the presiding judge to sentence Trump's former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, to 24 years in prison. Effectively a life sentence for the 69 year-old Manafort. 

So expect that we will soon be back to paying 24/7 attention to Trump's legal troubles. Troubles exacerbated ironically by his use of the national emergency distraction because even some Republicans feel Trump by declaring it abused his power. Which is an impeachable offense. It was one of the charges against Nixon.

Thus, the default on all of this is the Mueller investigation. It is not going away. It is ultimately distraction proof.

For example, it is reported that Manafort is already singing like a canary and Roger Stone may be the next to flip.