TWGB: Wheels Within Wheels

 

I joke from time to time that we aren't ever leaving the 2016 election, and it's not actually that funny--we're in 2024, but the Trump hush money trial feels like old home week, what with characters from earlier in the Trump Saga popping back up. This week, we will hear from former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, who plead guilty to a campaign finance violation regarding Stormy Daniels, Last week, in a story that was overshadowed by the trial, former 2016 Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort decided to step back from his involvement with the 2024 Republican National Convention--for which he was going to work for free, as he did for Trump's campaign. 

"Free" for a value of "access to our political infrastructure" which actually does have value. 

We are never leaving 2016. The Russian disinfo op that tried to blame Ukraine for the DNC hack that profoundly affected the 2016 election (in Trump's favor?) still has echoes in the Trump impeachment and the current-day GOP House still trying to impeach Joe Biden. The story of what happened to Stormy Daniels, now a little bit better understood as coerced sex--a situation not much different from the "casting couch" or the cartoonish image of a boss chasing a secretary (just imagine it in the White House) reminds us of all the stories we just barely heard in 2016 in the wake of the Access Hollywood video, which were drowned out by Wikileaks.

We're probably not going to hear anything from Trump's jailbird friend Allen Weisselberg but it looks like he got paid to stay shtum. Yes, Trump's hush money scandals have their own hush money scandals. Which isn't even that new of a story, but apparently just how Trump runs his business. (Just look at all these NDA's and legal counsel arrangements. That's Trump trying to keep potential mavericks on the ranch. And yes, that means, in a way the RNC and Trump's superPAC are basically paying a form of "hush money". And there are rumors of all kinds of arrangements over the years)

TrumpWorld was funneling payoffs all the damn time, says CREW.

Now, Trump is still making fresh crime news all the time, like the Trump Tower Chicago thing where he probably owes $100 million to the IRS over "debt parking" or in this case, faking a loan and pretending his left hand doesn't know what his right hand is doing and taking tax credits in both columns. Or seeming to offer an actual out loud quid pro quo bribe solicitation to the oil industry. 

He's a serial crook. Just like he's a serial sex pest and adulterer. Just like he's a pathological liar. Forget his lies that somehow all of his current trials have anything to do with President Biden--this man has been under investigations for years. 

Why is he a candidate for office, and what kind of people could support him? Now, after two impeachments and four indictments? After being an obvious Putin stooge, an insurrectionist, and a national security liability of the most treacherous kind?  Not so long ago, a random yell or a boat trip with a mistress could get a candidate blown out of the water--and here we are. 

Has he really lowered the standards for a Republican candidate so entirely? Shouldn't that be very fatal to that party after all? How many people even now are helping him cover up his assorted crimes or trying to squalch investigation or crimes? (I'm looking at you, Mick Johnson and Aileen Cannon.)  

I really feel like future generations will be studying the Trump Crime Era for ages to come.