Vance's departure adds intrigue to an ongoing probe into Trump and the Trump Organization, which has spanned two years....
Adds intrigue... or subtracts intrigue!
Investigators are now in the process of combing through millions of pages of tax returns, work papers and communications related to the returns, as well as financial statements and engagement agreements from January 2011 to August 2019.
So long, suckers!
Meanwhile, The New Yorker just came out with "Can Cyrus Vance, Jr., Nail Trump?/Insiders say that the Manhattan District Attorney’s investigation has dramatically intensified since the former President left office. 'It’s like night and day,' says one. According to another, 'They mean business.'"
Even before the Trump case crossed his desk, Vance had largely decided not to run for reëlection. He and his wife, Peggy McDonnell, felt that he had done much of what he set out to do.... ...Vance is sixty-six, and the pressure of managing one of the highest-profile prosecutorial offices in the country has been wearying.... He told me that, although his larger-than-life predecessor, Robert Morgenthau, held the office for thirty-five years—retiring at age ninety—he himself was ready to give the next generation a shot.... He had decided to keep his intentions quiet until after the Supreme Court ruled on Trump’s tax records, partly because he feared that some of the more outspokenly anti-Trump candidates for his job might alienate the conservative Justices. His decision to leave midcourse, however, exposes the case to the political fray of an election. Some candidates have already made inflammatory statements denouncing Trump, and such rhetoric could complicate a prosecution.What a mess!
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121 comments:
Anyone in our corrupt democrat party FBI looking in Biden family corruption?
nah.
No one knows what Vance knows!
THE WALLS ARE CLOSING IN!!
They don't like Trump. So they search through every aspect of his life to see if they can find a crime to charge him with.
Yea, a great system they have there in New York City.
"Sentence First–verdict Afterward!"
THE FASCISTS ARE CLOSING IN!!
I'm sure they will find something, but it will be unconvincing.
As awful a political hack as Vance is, he will surely be missed when he is replaced by some super woker who will simply further the exodus from and demise of NYC
Tax Records: Tar Baby.
I wonder how much of NYState tax monies have been thrown down the hole for this.
Back in the real world.
These taxes are prepared, submitted, and signed, by lawyers. They often are prepared with the assistance and approval of IRS tax lawyers, that have offices in Trump headquarters. While you can argue in court the tax code was misinterpreted, it is impossible to claim a crime was committed.
Real tax persons are never interviewed because they would blow up the narrative.
Exploratory investigations by prosecutors based on political animus are unethical. Trump did business in New York for decades without interesting sleazy Democrat prosecutors.
Democrat elites use Trump as an excuse for abandoning the Constitution, the law, ethics and decency. The rank and file are either blissfully ignorant or equally immoral, otherwise there would be no Democrats.
Are they investigating a crime or investigating a man in hopes of finding a crime?
Putting America first is a high crime and misdemeanor at all levels in the Commie-Pinko party, fed, state and local.
This is banana republic stuff... El Jefe arrests the former president on some... trumped-up... charge.
Up next... currency changes and confiscation of private wealth.
I get so disgusted by the horse-race focus of the media. When was the last time you saw a piece of political reporting that actually examined the policy to try to discern whether it would help? When did they look at a Trump prosecution with an eye towards whether there is any actual criminality in it?
No, it's always which political party does it hurt, which political party does it help? Justice and the American people be damned.
We're all just going to ignore the Hunter Biden scandal, correct? What about the fact that evidence was tampered with during impeachment #2? Our brave media firefighters seem to have zero interest in any scandal that doesn't involve Trump.
What crime is Trump suspected of committing? Investigations are not supposed to happen unless there is some proof of a crime. Some indication. Since nobody thought to investigate Trump until he became President it would seem that this is a fishing expedition meant to put Trump in prison because he leads the political opposition to the ruling junta. That is the situation we are in. These people intend to rule.
The dems are obsessed with how much money Trump has and how he earned it. OK. So why are they not as interested in how politicians who have served in public offices their whole careers became multi millionaires?
All these breathless articles about how this time, this time Trump is going to take the fall, we got him, put me in mind of Charlie Brown taking a run at a football.
Criminal probe? What crime? How is it okay for hostile political opponents to be allowed to comb through your private papers 'looking' for something..anything to charge you with? Surely the weaponized IRS would have found something hinky along the way by now.
Is this prosecutor well-versed in the tax code or real-estate?
In the meantime the Clintons and the Bidens and anyone else taking dirty money from Ukraine and CHYna, skate.
Is everyone happy living in a Banana Republic?
At least Javert knew a stolen loaf of bread was involved.
I am Laslo.
Maybe Vance has accepted a position in Joebama's administration.
The process is the punishment, I guess. Not everyone is a billionaire. They're making an example of what happens to someone who gets elected without permission. No more outsiders, is the message. Our system has become completely corrupt.
How is this more significant than two impeachment trials?
"This time we got 'em!"
_XC
They've spent years investigating him and found nothing. Somehow, Donald Trump is the cleanest guy in politics.
Donald. Trump.
Any reasonable person *ought* to be very uneasy with a system in which a prosecutor "comb[s] through millions of pages of tax returns" just looking for something. No articulation of "here's what we think he did and here's the preliminary evidence to support that belief" -- just a deep dive into complex financial records looking for something they can use to put up a charge of wrongdoing.
That's today's USA, I guess.
Defund Congress
it is impossible to claim a crime was committed.
I keep asking and apparently the goal is tipping off his lenders off that he defrauded banks for loans by overstating assets and telling something different to the IRS in the 1120 balance sheet something something oh I forget what it is
"They don't like Trump. So they search through every aspect of his life to see if they can find a crime to charge him with."
Sounds legit.
So they're going through the same stuff the IRS has already gone through?
The desperate search for something, anything.
Modern Day Salem Witch trials.
With so much blood in the water, he wants to be Governor. Feeding frenzy.
By the way, when somebody in an earlier thread mentioned pregnancy flight suits, I thought that was sarcasm. This morning I found out that it wasn't. We are doomed. I, for one, welcome our Chinese overlords.
It's time to do the same to every single Congress Critter and former President. We all know they got rich by F*CKING us all over. Fair is fair.
I told a relative in 2016 that I didn't think presidential candidates should have to release their returns because I didn't think that I should have to release my returns. That was scoffed at, of course, but now we're down the road to where my neighborhood prosector gets my returns, and my relative thinks that's fine. Where does my relative stop?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5LeYDW2LsM
Browndog said...
Felony election interference charges have now reached a grand jury in Georgia. This is why American communists keep winning. They don't just steal an election. They charge the person they stole it from with the crime of trying to steal the election.
I wonder if he knows there's nothing there, and wants this to be someone else's problem.
"Lavrentiy Beria, the most ruthless and longest-serving secret police chief in Joseph Stalin’s reign of terror in Russia and Eastern Europe, bragged that he could prove criminal conduct on anyone, even the innocent.
“Show me the man and I’ll show you the crime” was Beria’s infamous boast." (OxfordEagle.com)
Not so far removed from what's happening here.
iowan2 said...These taxes are prepared, submitted, and signed, by lawyers. They often are prepared with the assistance and approval of IRS tax lawyers, that have offices in Trump headquarters. While you can argue in court the tax code was misinterpreted, it is impossible to claim a crime was committed.
Real tax persons are never interviewed because they would blow up the narrative.
I think that about sums it up.
Bob Boyd said... [hush][hide comment]
The process is the punishment, I guess. Not everyone is a billionaire. They're making an example of what happens to someone who gets elected without permission. No more outsiders, is the message. Our system has become completely corrupt.
I added emphasis. This is lawfare, which we also saw in the election fiasco. The intent is to try to drive him into bankruptcy with these legal attacks but I doubt it will work. Nonetheless, an army of lawyers is getting rich on tax money.
A bit off topic, but I would encourage any and all to read the charges against the Jan 6 protestors. With a few exceptions, it's seventeen different ways to say trespassing.
https://www.npr.org/2021/02/09/965472049/the-capitol-siege-the-arrested-and-their-stories
Maybe try giving a Democrat politician a parking ticket once in a while and we might take this seriously.
Vance can’t dance
Cy Vance Jr has always been a very political creature, no big surprise given his upbringing, in a very political job. But he has shown a knack for turning a blind eye to those with powerful connections, e.g. Harvey Weinstein (sex abuse) and Beth Israel Hospital (elder abuse).
Impeachment did not work. So we are watching the method by which an American Gulag is built. Threaten a man and his family until he signs a confession to a crime (plea deal). And brag publicly about Stalin's power.
Vance had largely decided not to run for reëlection
What's with the umlaut - CNN style guide? Seems un-American.
Evidence of a crime is not a factor in any indictment of Trump. They can manufacture that, just like the impeachments.
It's purely a political calculation. Is Trump's base still large enough and loyal enough to raise hell or not?
Fact is, right now, it's Merrick Garland's call. There will either be several indictments from different jurisdictions or none at all.
This is what you get when you cozy up to racists and conspiracy mongers, promote racial stereotypes, put kids in cages, enact Jim Crow lite, ban abortion, the list goes on.
It's like you people think it's unfair and unethical for the dims to use the system to the fullest extent of the law. Big boy pants time. Romper Room is over. Work harder, show up. Life isn't fair.
The funny thing is that it's media and entertainment libtards themselves carrying your water. Tucker is dragging you down to fill his coffers.
Police-state tactics to discourage businessmen from running for political office.
Humperdink beat me to the Beria quote
Dick formerly from Cooksville WI now Venice Fl
Are these actions legal? It smacks of corruption to me. Trump upset too many apple carts in New York and in the Deep State to be allowed another chance at the White House. So tie him down like Gulliver in a legal morass until he cries uncle. It seems petty when the current Governor and NYC Mayor have so recklessly destroyed much of the New York economy.
Since at least the creation of the Erie Canal, New York City has drawn the country’s movers and shakers. Now, maybe, not so much. Watch out New Yorkers. As Eric Lampard ably demonstrated, the dairy industry moved from New York State to the Badger State when a bunch of Wisconsin entrepreneurs saw their chance and took it. The blockchain may disrupt Wall Street. Comparative advantage is not necessarily locked for that long.
"Putting America first is a high crime and misdemeanor at all levels in the Commie-Pinko party, fed, state and local."
That's a non-sequitur, as Trump always puts himself first. No one and nothing else takes precedence in his hierarchy of needs, wants, and objectives.
If prosecutors have specific allegations of a crime or crimes Trump has committed, with plausible witnesses and/or evidence, they should proceed with their investigation. If they are merely fishing without specific objectives in hopes of finding something with which to charge him, they are abusing their office. Back when John Gotti kept getting acquitted at trial after trial, until he was finally tried and convicted, I thought it was terrible and dangerous that the prosecutors were going after him over and over. That is simply a case of the government using its power and resources to repeatedly hound individuals who cannot possibly fight them off forever, until the government finally achieves its goal.
Professional politicians get rich by pay-to-play schemes or by family corruption.
Examples are Hilary Clinton and Joe Biden.
"reëlection"
I hate the New Yorker.
Effing Democrats sure don't act like a party that legitimately won an election, do they?
My understanding is that Trump is alleged to have sworn to one value for his business to the taxing authorities and a higher value to banks for credit approval.
My understanding that this is not only normal but anything else would make no sense.
The bank is interested not in the real estate but in the value of the ongoing business, to judge whether it's fit to carry the loan.
The taxing authorities want the value of the buildings and land, whether there's a business there or not.
The second is always a lot smaller than the firsts.
That would be the most significant fishing expedition ever looking for nebulous charges to tie Trump up on in court that no impartial jury will ever convict on.
The IRS and the NY tax department have been in possession of those records the whole time and have themselves gone through them with a fine tooth comb- and never referred Trump for prosecution. A bunch of lawyers who aren't tax specialists are going to find something?
So he's going to be running for governor? or Mayor?
What a mess!
You know that scene in Jurassic Park where they encounter that giant pile of dinosaur crap? This is the equivalent of a bird using that mound as a fly-by toilet. I'm not sure how you noticed.
Oh well.
Howard said...
This is what you get when you cozy up to racists and conspiracy mongers, promote racial stereotypes, put kids in cages, enact Jim Crow lite, ban abortion, the list goes on.
Wow!
Howard has morphed from annoying little twit to someone who is completely out of touch with reality.
That pretty much describes today's Democrats, sad to say.
Well Vance is a white guy so his days, as a Dem bigwig, were numbered anyway. I can't wait till the BIPOC Dem bloc dethrones Nancy & Chuck. It won't be long.
The Trump tax stuff is basically wish casting. It keeps the base excited and feeling happy that Trump may finally get what's coming to him. The problem is not unlike what happens when the dog finally catches his tail. Democrats are secretly hoping the base will have moved on by then.
Over the years Trump's taxes were prepared and audited by professionals, no doubt involving Big Four accounting firms. Since the early 80's Trump has been a high-profile guy and virtually synonymous with exuberance and gilded phoniness. He's been deeply involved in mucky New York real estate development, where many con men and hucksters and mobsters ply their trades. If that wasn't enough, he got involved in the mucky casino business in New Jersey. In his career he's had several failed businesses. Probably the worst time in his life, when he had most to fear financially and personally, was in the 90's. His exposure back then to lawsuits, bakruptcy and even criminal prosecution was immense.
Are we really supposed to believe the IRS and NY tax authorities haven't been scrutinizing his tax records for decades with fine tooth combs? Of course they have been. What will the Manhattan DA discover about this super-high-profile person that wasn't discovered before?
Rationalizing is an attempt to justify one's own or another's behavior with plausible reasons, even if these are not true or appropriate.
Some people will go to any end to rationalize state violence against Orange bodies.
It's like you people think it's unfair and unethical for the dims to use the system to the fullest extent of the law. Big boy pants time. Romper Room is over. Work harder, show up. Life isn't fair.
The Dims long ago passed the "fullest extent of the law." If they had been limited to that standard, Trump would be in his second term. The politicians don't have to "work harder." They have something to sell and the people like Bezos have a lot more money to buy. QED
TBF, there's enough horseshit around Trump that there *has* to be a pony somewhere.
It keeps the base excited and feeling happy that Trump may finally get what's coming to him"
Boy, does it ever! I run into them in FB comments - *hoping and praying* that this time they finally got him! Lol
Not a Trump fan, but nobody should be applauding this. "Let's comb through your life to see if we can uncover evidence of a colorable crime that we can charge you with as punishment for other things we don't like about you." This is a big reason we have the Fourth Amendment. I get why it doesn't apply, here. But there should some standards to make sure that tax audits aren't used as an end-around to selectively target unpopular people.
Why would want to slog through a 5-10 year ordeal. First, 99.9% of the documents must be read and set aside as irrelevant, a painstaking and time consuming effort.
Second, they must find criminal wrong doing, not simply the argument over the interpretations of tax as is usual review/audit by IRS. The IRS is already auditing DJT. If they, the experts, had found criminality, they would have already referred it federal prosecutors.
Even if they find a fraud or conspiracy to commit fraud (a 1-3 year process) they will then start a criminal proceeding that will take years to complete. All of it will be a major resource drain with a low probability of success.
I can only hope some Republican or independent prosecutor starts investigating Democrats and demanding the last decade of their tax return in hopes of finding anything. The tax returns of Joe and Hunter Biden might be a good place to look.
Tax returns. He has a bunch of tax lawyers, presumably didn't do the taxes himself, and most likely somebody will just demand some back taxes.
Also, Howard is *totally onboard* political persecution by the justice system purely based on his impression of what a politician has done.
Investigators are now in the process of combing through millions of pages of tax returns, work papers and communications related to the returns, as well as financial statements and engagement agreements from January 2011 to August 2019.
Cause there just HAS to be something there, something that we can use to GET him! Hey investigators! It is "ham sandwich" time! Find me my ham sandwich so I can drive a stake through #OrangeManBad once and for all!
P.S. There may actually be something there that is actionable and that deserves action BUT these asshats have spent SO much political and emotional energy trying to "get Trump" that whatever they do eventually find or make up will really not have been worth the effort. Everyone that HATES the idea of Trump will still HATE him and those that don't still won't.
WRT Cook's statement that Trump doesn't put America first because he always puts himself first... I'll concede it for the sake of argument, though based on the fact that he willingly campaigned for a second four years of being cut off from his businesses, being mocked daily by the entertainment industry (who used to welcome him) and the smart set (who used to party with him), being excoriated by the news media, being unable to make a move of any kind without its being interpreted in the worst possible light, having his family subjected to these same crass privations, being undercut by supposedly non-partisan bureaucrats at every turn and called a "racist," a "misogynist," a "homophobe," despite his decades of basing his treatment of everyone on each individual's behavior rather than on any immutable trait... I don't think I'd concede that point for real.
But for the sake of argument, let's say it's true that Trump always and only puts himself first. It seems from his actions that the America of jobs and opportunities still ranks high on his list of priorities. Name a Democrat politician who puts America higher than, say, fifth.
If this keeps up, we can expect our beloved newspapers to dust off the "standing headline" they use to describe how "political justice" is meted out in shithole countries:
"Former President Shot While Trying to Escape"
"Can Cyrus Vance, Jr., Nail Trump?"
No, but he can certainly drop a deuce on Remnick.
He covered for epstein weinstein et al in fair gotham
He actually went after the victims of the latter.
I think that at a minimum, the Democrat establishment wants to keep an investigation ongoing in order to try to discourage Trump from running for any office. They want to trumpet that he is "under criminal investigation", which may still make an impression on a few clueless voters.
First: Find the target.
Second: Find the crime.
How positively Soviet!
I am a career prosecutor. It is an absolute violation of ethics for a prosecutor to announce (in advance of their own election yet!) that they will target an individual for investigation until they find some crime with which to charge him. Ethics 101.
You would think that any article on this investigation would include a discussion of the ethical implications. I haven't seen one yet. OTOH, it makes me ill to even think that this is happening in America, to the delight of half the population.
With dsk a private security contractor was who discouraged him from filing charges
Vance is going to run for Governor.
I am sure that they could find something with such complicated tax filings that Trump has.
Maybe even a Ham Sandwich.
Their desire to "nail" the President - while letting Bill Clinton slide on multiple rapes - is pure Democrat Party.
How you noticed how a dog will walk away from the mess he or she has made on the carpet. The "what who me?" look of nonresponsibility can be transferred to Cyrus Vance's face.
Jr’s accountants, like the Russia probe guys, came back with bad news. Nothing actionable there.Worse, Trump has better accountants.
This is exactly why I would like to see the 16th Amendment repealed and a end brought to the Federal income tax. We could move to an indirect tax like a consumption tax or value added tax. These also have their flaws but do not require collection of personal information and are easier to implement, collect, and audit. Since graduating from college I only worked in two states, TN and TX, neither of which has an income tax (TN did have a tax on interest and dividend income but it has been repealed; also the TN inheritance tax). In both states I paid only sales tax and property tax. No personal information was collected from me on my personal finances. So, I was secure in knowing the state could never sift though my finances to look for something.
Something Mark Cuban said in 2016 about his own and Donald Trump's tax returns:
"I have no idea if my tax returns are more or less complicated than Donald Trump’s. I truly don’t know what is on my tax returns. The people that work for me know and understand that I don’t like to pay taxes, but I’m not against it either. I truly believe that its patriotic to pay taxes. So I tell them to be very conservative in making choices. But what I do hate is how much of that money is wasted on bureaucratic overhead. But that is a blog post for another day.
"For me, the days before my taxes are due go something like this: all my tax returns from what seems like all 50 states and all the federal forms are lined up around a long , long, long dining room table in my house. The signature pages are tabbed. Then I spend the better part of 45 minutes signing them till my hand cramps.
"Do I read any of them ? Not a one. I have to trust the big tax accounting firm I hire to get it right."
That's the way it is for everybody as rich as Cuban or Trump with business affairs as complex as theirs.
Howard's revealing a lot more of his deranged, vindictive and stupid self than he is about Donald Trump.
None of it good.
Since nobody thought to investigate Trump until he became President it would seem that this is a fishing expedition meant to put Trump in prison because he leads the political opposition to the ruling junta.
All of the establishment mechanizations surrounding the Trump administration is always, in part, large or small, messaging to any OUTSIDER, regardless of political bent, that any attempt to clean up the money machine of Washington D.C. will be met with exactly the same actions. President Trump was exposing the graft. Ukraine was one example. The $billions of Ukraine aide was being funnelled back into the pockets DC establishment, their families and cohorts. Hunter Biden was just the surface thousands in DC get rich of foreign aide that is spent hiring NGO's staffed by political families.
DC is terrified someone is going to keep pulling on this lose thread.
Trump must be obliterated because he made us go so far outside American political norms. No, sorry, HE was so outside political norms, the walls must finally close in.
@ 11:49
Thanks for the Mark Cuban quote.
Perfect real life explanation of how the world operates. I don't have complicated taxes, but because dad farmed, a local lawyer did his the farm taxes and he consented to mine as a favor. As they got more complicated, I took direction from the lawyer, not the other way around. I could have $5k receipts for business expenses, but the lawyer would advise against using them, in favor of a different tactic to attain better tax results, but would never get red flagged by IRS.The lawyer always promised if there was an audit, he would take care of the inquiry and if tax and penalty assessed, he would pay the penalty, and I would pay the tax.
That's what Mark Cuban, and President Trump do also. Follow the direction of the experts you hire.
The propaganda media will not explain the facts, but keep pushing the narrative.
From what I've heard (and Scott Adams has reiterated), if a guy like Trump uses a reputable accounting/tax firm and there are discrepancies that are a matter of opinion and interpretation that are not pure fraud, the worst that would happen to him personally would be some sort of fine.
If the IRS hasn't found anything, I'm not sure Vance will either...
Howard said...
This is what you get when you cozy up to racists and conspiracy mongers, promote racial stereotypes, put kids in cages, enact Jim Crow lite, ban abortion, the list goes on.
This story is about Donald Trump. Why are you bringing up Joe "Malvolio" Biden?
Are they investigating a crime or investigating a man in hopes of finding a crime?
"Show me the man and I'll show you the crime." - Lavrentiy Beria
Trump always puts himself first.
That kind of attribution of deep motives to people is way too metaphysical and impossible to prove.
Also, way too categorical. If Trump had to find a moment when he put someone or something ahead of himself, he probably could.
For three years, Trump's presidency benefited the country. Then he ran into the same kind of troubles other leaders of countries did.
That is more significant than any unfounded speculation about how his mind works could be.
The charge that Trump told the banks a different value of his holdings vs. the state is a load of crap. The banks are not going to take his word, they'll do their own appraisal. Same of the state tax authorities. They'll assess Trump's properties to determine his property tax. He can always appeal that assessment, but in the end, it's the state's final assessment that rules.
That's why we the banks appraise and the state assesses properties.
Anyone who's applied for a loan and owns property knows this difference. In fact, there's appraisals for purposes of obtaining a loan and for selling a house. These two appraisals are for different purposes and will have different values. Just ask your real estate agent.
The most obvious explanation is that Vance knows there's nothing there, and he's leaving the mess to someone else to dig out from.
Re: bleh:
Are we really supposed to believe the IRS and NY tax authorities haven't been scrutinizing his tax records for decades with fine tooth combs? Of course they have been. What will the Manhattan DA discover about this super-high-profile person that wasn't discovered before?
Eh, prosecutors can be quite creative in "interpreting" the law when it suits them. Even if they lose in court, getting to an arrest and joy of staging the public humiliation of the "perp walk" is still a victory of sorts. I think its abhorrent, but law enforcement have been engaging in this sort of BS longer than I've been alive. Some of my colleagues who used to be in the federal government reminisce fondly over how bureaucrats creatively reinterpreted old statutes and regulations to ban practices they disapproved of after Congress declined to pass the laws they wanted, and all I can think when I hear these stories is how everyone involved should have fired summarily. But these are the kinds of acts that are celebrated. I think enforcement today is (thankfully) more responsible than it was back in the 70s, but that's still the culture of law enforcement in the US today.
You saw a bit of this with, e.g. the EPA's decision to regulate carbon dioxide under the 1963 Clean Air Act (amended in 1990) even though the CAA wasn't a particularly good fit for what they wanted to do. But at least that went through a proper notice and comment procedure, as opposed to having some random prosecutor wake up one day and say, "Hey, I think carbon dioxide is a pollutant under the CAA, so let's prosecute some people for running plants that emit carbon dioxide." Or having senior law enforcement say, "I don't like that fellow, Flynn; anything we can do? I know, let's investigate him under the Logan Act!"
What's frightening is not the process being used to punish Trump; it's how many people I personally know who approve of it.
I mean, people I've known for 40 years have now become my enemy. There's no other way to look at it.
A considerable amount of evidence against Harvey Weinstein was presented to Vance's office. Vance declined to prosecute. He didn't think the evidence was sufficient. Harvey had donated $10,000 to Vance's re-election campaign. Vance runs unopposed, but the money undoubtedly came in handy for some purpose or the other.....This past history should be considered in making judgments on Vance's commitment to justice and due process. I'm untrained in legal matters, but Vance certainly looks like a scumbag.
If the IRS hasn't found anything, I'm not sure Vance will either...
This isn't about finding anything. If there was anything to find it would have been found by Mueller.
The underlying purpose of the tax returns is to show the public that Trump isn't as rich as he claims to be and that he hasn't paid taxes using (legal) tax dodges.
The Vance investigation's purpose is to set a narrative that Trump is a crook. They aren't going to find evidence in any documents that Trump did anything illegal however. Trump doesn't write emails, he doesn't write letters, he talks on the phone.
They are looking for things they can go after the accounting firms and law firms that Trump uses, in the hope that they will flip and tell of a narrative of secret phone calls, and nefarious deeds, at which point they will charge Trump with conspiracy.
The issue they are running into is that Trump doesn't use small time lawyers (with the exception of Michael Cohen it appears) for his taxes. Those law firms and tax accountants aren't going to flip so quick for the Manhattan DA. They are going to fight back. Michael Cohen was too sleazy for his "flipping" to be worth anything.
I suppose they may also want to find just enough evidence to subpoena Trump and hope that he does a Martha Stewart in the interview, but Trump isn't going to fall for that. That was Chuck's hope as well with the Stormy Daniels affair. It just isn't going to happen.
Show me the crime and I'll show you the ham sandwich.
@MadisonMan said...
Tax Records: Tar Baby.
I wonder how much of NYState tax monies have been thrown down the hole for this.
So Uncle Remus Vance shouldn't attempt to use the "tar baby" doll to catch Brer Trump because that means drifting into difficult political situations.
It seems to me that not permitting The Donald to continue getting away with his racketeering endeavors, including cheating on his taxes, is well worth directing employees already on the AG payroll to work on the Trump prosecution since such an action is for free. Admittedly Vance hired not-so-free forensic accounting experts with FTI Consulting "to look for anomalies among a variety of property deals, and to advise the district attorney on whether the president’s company manipulated the value of certain assets to obtain favorable interest rates and tax breaks."
Additionally Cyrus Vance Jr has hired former federal prosecutor, Mark F. Pomerantz, who has deep experience investigating white-collar and organized crime cases (he prosecuted former Gambino crime family boss John “Junior” Gotti and other mobsters in the 1990s), as a special assistant district attorney to work solely on the Trump investigation.
But nothing ventured, nothing gained. A week ago, NY AG Laticia James announced that NY state and Manhattan recovered a total of $105 million dollars from Thomas Sandell's hedge fund for tax fraud.
gadfly:
"It seems to me that not permitting The Donald to continue getting away with his racketeering endeavors, including cheating on his taxes..."
******************
An empty and entirely unsupported assertion, from an "empty vessel" personified.
"The underlying purpose of the tax returns is to show the public that Trump ... hasn't paid taxes using (legal) tax dodges.
He hasn't paid taxes he doesn't owe? Sad.
Trump must be obliterated because he made us go so far outside American political norms
Not just politics. Recall that his policies undermined sustainable prices in the pharmaceutical and medical industries. They undermined lack of accountability (e.g. Every Child Left Behind) in the academic industry. They undermined shared/shifted responsibility through labor arbitrage, environmental arbitrage, democratic gerrymandering. They undermined Obama/Biden-era policies of wars without borders, coups with cause, transnational terrorism, and [catastrophic] [anthropogenic] immigration reform. He stood up to diversity dogmatists, feminists/masculinists, and the politically congruent. He stood up to community leaders and reached out to stakeholders for revitalization, rehabilitation, and reconciliation. He stood up to progressive aggression by the CCP. He stood up for Americans, first, and working with neighbors, second. He was notably American: Pro-Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.
Cyrus Vance Jr. is one of those guys who you just know has a closet full of skeletons, while he's running 'I Will Destroy You' probes on people who are not friends of the Democrat Party. Not sure this is what the job of the DA is supposed to be, but it is the current role of multiple DAs around the country. New York. San Francisco. LA. St.Louis. Chicago. Philadelphia.
He hasn't paid taxes he doesn't owe? Sad.
You know and I know that won't be the story. It will simply be that he didn't pay taxes.
It seems to me that not permitting The Donald to continue getting away with his racketeering endeavors, including cheating on his taxes, is well worth directing employees already on the AG payroll to work on the Trump prosecution since such an action is for free
I love this. Tax money is "free."
Everyone in NY government a dunce...even those not running for re-election.
Change my mind.
A late-term abortion... cancellation? More than 16 trimesters in progress with hunters, judges, and protesters presenting self-incriminating evidence of diversity, political congruence, and representing the special and peculiar interests, foreign and domestic, corporate and for-profit non-profits. A persecution wielding a double-edged scalpel with "benefits".
How's FBI doing on Hunter's laptop?
"'Trump must be obliterated because he made us go so far outside American political norms.'
"Not just politics. Recall that his policies undermined sustainable prices in the pharmaceutical and medical industries. They undermined lack of accountability (e.g. Every Child Left Behind) in the academic industry. They undermined shared/shifted responsibility through labor arbitrage, environmental arbitrage, democratic gerrymandering. They undermined Obama/Biden-era policies of wars without borders, coups with cause, transnational terrorism, and [catastrophic] [anthropogenic] immigration reform. He stood up to diversity dogmatists, feminists/masculinists, and the politically congruent. He stood up to community leaders and reached out to stakeholders for revitalization, rehabilitation, and reconciliation. He stood up to progressive aggression by the CCP. He stood up for Americans, first, and working with neighbors, second. He was notably American: Pro-Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness."
Well...and some folks believe in reincarnation, too.
wait jane mayer, who still hasn't gotten the egg of her face, (that's not egg) from her collaboration with avenatti on the swetnick matter, that's our trusted outlet, who covered for the gitmo detainees that led us to bin laden, oh never mind,
To understand this story, you need to understand the following (narciso gets it, but he is a little too cryptic, so I am gonna help out) ...
(1). Cyrus Vance is a not-very-bright guy who was helped along from childhood at scoring valuable real-world points that are valuable to people with great ambitions in the legal world (high school, college, law school, that first job out of law school that he basically stole from someone who earned it because he had connections, and son on).
That is not bad, that is not good. We all are who we are.
(2). Cyrus Vance knows he is a mid-wit.
That is good, self-knowledge is good.
(3). The unoriginal, mid-wit lawyer who would be selling cars if not for the people who gave him unfair breaks over the years, actually does
think of himself as sort of a royal saint ---- he loves his own opinions, and he thinks that he is one of the Good and Great among us. That being said, he knows the woke people are after him (for woke reasons) and he also knows that actual people who understand the law, and the American hatred of the use of the law, which should be impartial, as a partisan tool to attack, in an unfair way, people who got more votes than the wielder of the law wanted to get - i.e., our midwit Mr Vance, J.D., knows he incurs disdain from people who KNOW he is after Trump ONLY BECAUSE he (Vance) is a partisan hack. He knows the only way history will forgive him is if he is refrains from continuing as a partisan hack out of his own free will ---- people like that.
(4), Hence, his retirement makes sense. He knows he will go down in history as a nobody, but at least he will be a less repulsive nobody by having declined to persist in his abuse of the law than he would have otherwise.
Off topic, but think about this: Kamala Harris is on record as believing Tara Reade was sexually assaulted by Joe Biden, which would make Joe Biden a sexual predator, Tara Reade a victim, and Kamala Harris as someone uniquely positioned to achieve justice for victims of sexual crimes.
When I was a kid, my uncle served in the army with Spiro Agnew, and he liked Agnew and Nixon both. One of my best friends, for years, used to walk her dog in front of the little house in Arlington (not even a house, a townhouse, not even a duplex, one of four houses) ---- BACK IN THE DAY OUR VICE PRESIDENTS WERE NOT ON RECORD AS BELIEVING THE PRESIDENTS THEY SERVED UNDER WERE SEXUAL PREDATORS, but that is where we are.
How times change, my friends!
The Chinese, too, are good hearted people.
Don't bother telling me I don't know what I talk about.
I KNOW HOW BLESSED PEOPLE ARE WHO DO NOT KNOW WHAT THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT,
and, once in a while, I have been soaked in a rain storm, and I have prayed to GOD WITH THANKS for letting me know that RAIN STORMS ARE OUR FRIENDS.
That being said, I do know what I am talking about, and there are billions of people in the world, and the odds of anyone saying anything interesting or relevant that would make me reassess what I know about the poor little man with his poor little job he got when others were more qualified because of who his little dad was (who in his turn was given jobs that should have gone to others, who worked harder for it) are NEAR ZERO but that is ok, the odds of anyone being able to be KIND TO SOMEONE THAT ONLY YOU CAN BE KIND TO are ALWAYS (in this world) not that large, if the person who IT IS YOUR GIFT TO BE KIND TO were to read my comments, that person would not think HEY I WANT TO SAY THE MEANEST THING I CAN THINK ABOUT SAYING ABOUT STEPHEN COOPER ..... NO MY FRIENDS THAT PERSON WOULD SAY ( give me a call, tell me you will give me a loan, if we are lucky enough to meet in person, TELL ME YOU ARE HAPPY THAT GOD CREATED ME and that we are friends)
I am one of those rare humans who has no problem at all communicating with animals.
SO SO MANY TIMES I have said something here, and some human has said, BUT STEPHEN C., I DON'T LIKE YOU, and I always thought, yeah, well, GOD LOVES US ALL, (contingent on our knowledge that we have to repent for the bad things we do ---- even Jesus, alive and walking in the old days in the country he was born in, would not talk long to people who DID NOT REALIZE THAT WE ALL HAVE SOMETHING TO REPENT FOR,,, well there are a few exceptions, John the Baptist, Joseph who is THE PATRON of those who want to live a good life, Joseph's wife MARY who never tires of her prayers that all of Eve's children repent) I DON'T CARE IF YOU THINK I AM CRAZY---- trust me, I have looked in the eyes of many many creatures who have thought, from time to time, GOD DID NOT LOVE THEM and I ALWAYS SAID ....
YOU ARE WRONG
GOD LOVES US ALL
and the ones who understood were happy, and the thought never crossed their mind to doubt the WORD OF GOD which is, GOD LOVES US ALL.
Trust me, if you think you are a bright atheist, or a super smart agnostic, well .... trust me, the best thing you can do is make more friends, be kind to more animals, be that person who is the person who took care of, and loved, a creature who never before knew what it was to be someone who someone cared about.
Remember, to understand this world, you need to be aware where the good-hearted people are, and where they are not.
la nuestra ultima esparanza esta la injusticia de Dios
anyway, if I have helped you understand, and if you are grateful, you are welcome.
if not ---- well it is not my fault you do not want to understand the world you live in. Be kind, don't curse or use foul language, and forget you ever read a single word I ever wrote. You would only be wasting your time if you did otherwise with respect to your reactions to my humble attempts at enlightening you, amirite?
"They mean business" God help the fools.
La gracia de dios, not injusticia.
Yes his father was lyndons secretary of war then carters defense secretary the model for sherman mccoys father
narciso - agreed, but that was a quote from don colacho, I forgot the quote marks
I'd explain it to you, Gadfly. But I really don't think you have the capacity to understand it. It's not an indictment of you. You've just never been in the financial situation where you had to deal with taxes not covered by a 1040EZ. In the meantime you just keep on giggin' for that pony. It's gotta be in there somewhere.
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