I'm trying to read "How Michael Cohen’s Big Mouth Could Be Derailing the Trump Prosecution" (NY Magazine).
Key witness Michael Cohen and his pathological need for media attention have not been making things easier.... He clearly thinks very highly of himself and seems to have little awareness of his limitations.... He appears constitutionally incapable of telling the same story twice in the same way.... He is also obsessed with taking down his former boss Trump... [H]e could be confronted with inconsistent or problematic past statements....
“One of the things that I think will come out of this investigation,” Cohen [said in a TV interview], “other than the potential indictment of Donald Trump, is a lot of information about how the Southern District of New York dealt with me in my specific case.... [My lawyer] has so much information about the weaponization of the Justice Department against me...."...
Either he committed the offenses at issue and has accepted responsibility for them, a fundamental prerequisite for a crucial cooperating witness, or he was unfairly railroaded and forced to plead guilty despite being innocent of some or all charges....
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I have been a secondary part of preparing many court cases in mental health cases. This DA problem strikes me as only a little unusual, to have witnesses that aren't going to help that much, but you wish they were better. My impression is that the media attorneys, who do not ordinarily prepare cases for a hearing, have been the ones who kept advertising what a lock it was to send Trump to jail, jail, jail, while the "working" attorneys sat silent and felt set up.
Or is that just my impression as an outsider?
Who's Alvin Bragg? Apparently the Stormy Daniels "case" stinks so badly, the Trump-hating federal prosecutors wouldn't touch it. They may still be working on Trump's alleged fraud against banks, or something. So Bragg drops the latter, supposedly pushes the former, lawyers quit on him, and he's going to lean heavily on the testimony of Michael Cohen. "L" sign in front of your forehead Mr. Bragg.
What are the chances that Michael Cohen took one for Team Trump and baited the prosecutors into pursuing a loser of a case?
There is no crime here. It's a political setup. Bragg should be disbarred. If he really was a DA he would be prosecuting actual crimes starting with violent crimes. He should also empanel a grand jury to see if Andrew Cuomo should be indicted for the nursing home deaths that he as governor was in part responsible for.
Cohen is a clown. The SDNY went after him in an effort to get Trump, but Cohen ended up not having anything to give them.
He is a less sleazy version of Michael Avenatti.
Damn. I thought they had him for sure this time. I had ironclad assurances from certain commenters that would be the case. Oh well, they'll get him next time.
Well, they have to blame someone, you know. Blaming Trump for fighting off bogus charges wasn’t working, and blaming the diversity hire is a nonstarter, so blaming Michael (“No, I’ve never been to Prague. Why do you ask?”) Cohen may be their best remaining option.
But how in the Hell can you screw things up so badly that the very epitome of a sleazy New York ambulance chaser comes off as sympathetic?
BTW, doesn’t Stephanie Gregory Clifford (aka Stormy Daniels) owe Donald Trump $130,000?
"Either he committed the offenses at issue and has accepted responsibility for them, a fundamental prerequisite for a crucial cooperating witness, or he was unfairly railroaded and forced to plead guilty despite being innocent of some or all of the charges."
Ya think? It's such a disappointment when the patsy who you needed to roll on the whale has nothing to give you. Even on the phony "crime" you were trying to leverage.
Maybe this NY Magazine guy should have paid more attention when they were raiding Cohen's office to try to find dirt on Trump. And when he was bleating to the media whatever he could to try and save his ass.
The difficult fact is that Trump has done nothing wrong except be elected president by millions who were sick of being lied to and all the corruption of both parties. The Stormy Daniels thing was an effort in blackmail probably inspired by her felon lawyer, Avenatti. All the evidence was a photo, one of hundreds taken at a golf tournament. The Russia Hoax set American foreign policy back the Cold War when there was a chance of cooperation similar to the fake "reset" that Hillary botched. Trump is a tragic hero who is probably too damaged by the lies to be elected again. All we have is a George Bush lookalike being run by the GOP donor class.
He is also obsessed with taking down his former boss Trump
At least they all have that in common. Has it occurred to any of them that this may be the problem?
hello?
Seens incapable of telling his story the same way
Gosh, you know why that is? Because he's lying. If you're telling the truth, you have ONE STORY. The TRUTH. When lie and make things up, you forget what you made up.
That's why interrogators ask you the same questions over an over. If you're telling the truth, you give the same answer over and over. People telling the truth find it fucking annoying. People who are lying, however, start getting the details wrong. Made up Story 1 differs from Made up story 10 and Made up story 15.
Cohen had this weird arrrogance and delusional belief in his own greatness. you see it a lot in Lawyers. They think they're as great as their clients, and get angry when their "partner" doesn't come to their rescue.
Trump's big error was getting a business degree, and not a law degree. If he'd been a lawyer, he'd would've had a must better understanding of attorney's and never hired cohen or barr.
Cohen was always dishonest and flip-flopped from a liberal D to a Trump supporter. He was on "Team Trump" because of self-interest. When it became more advantageous to betray Trump, he went the opposite.
What are the chances that Michael Cohen took one for Team Trump and baited the prosecutors into pursuing a loser of a case?
Not zero, but 3D chess has never struck me as either Trump's or Cohen's forte. Never blame intelligence for what is just as easily blamed on stupidity.
At the risk of repeating what everyone else has already said (I know, I should just read the comments...). It sounds like he is just a very unreliable witness. This says more about the quality of the case than anything else. It also speaks volumes about Trump's seeming inability to pick good representatives. I mean, it's one thing to be betrayed by the Republican party's highly credentialed good old boys, but when you align yourself with obvious shysters like this guy...
He is also obsessed with taking down his former boss Trump...
So.. all the people who are obsessed with taking down Trump are frustrated by this one guy who's obsessed with taking down Trump, whose antics are interfering in their attempt to take down Trump?
Is that about right?
Cohen might be an uncontrollable liar, but there's something unseemly about a journalist throwing around the world "pathological." Is it really "media attention" that Cohen seeks? I've never seen an interview with him. He tells changing stories that make their way into the media, but reporters talking about him would appear to be more of a side effect than his goal.
"pacwest said...
Damn. I thought they had him for sure this time. I had ironclad assurances from certain commenters that would be the case. Oh well, they'll get him next time."
That's what happens when you get your witness from ACME.
Road Runner escapes Wily Coyote again!
That room. You know, the one where the walls have been closing in.
That must have been one big MF room when this all started.
I was once attacked by a fraudster, asserting that I was the subject of an important legal case. When I directly contacted the relevant district, the person on the phone denied that I was party to any case there.
You get one guess as to the district which was specified by the fraudster.
rcocean: "If he'd been a lawyer, he'd would've had a must better understanding of attorney's and never hired cohen or barr."
Trump has the (typical) cynical real estate developer attitude toward lawyers and the law. In my experience, they seek out the kind of lawyer that is willing to work within that cynical framework. That's why his judgement when it came to Attorneys General was so flawed.
Mason G: "So.. all the people who are obsessed with taking down Trump are frustrated by this one guy who's obsessed with taking down Trump, whose antics are interfering in their attempt to take down Trump?
Is that about right?"
That sounds rather spot on.
The problems with Bragg's case are these:
The alleged crime is a misdemeanor in state law and the two year statute of limitations on misdemeanors has run out for an event that alleged to have taken place in 2016.
The alleged crime is a felony in Federal law but the NYC DA cannot prosecute Federal crimes.
The alleged crime was already examined by the Federal DOJ who declined to prosecute so Federal prosecutors have already passed on it.
For these reasons Trump could sue NYC for millions and millions if Bragg prosecutes. Bragg will feel like the whale who swallowed Jonah if he even indicts Trump. (Why am I thinking about whales? A mystery)
So he is like every other democrat and the democrat media who has been lying and changing their story to corruptly incarcerate trump.
It’s Michael Cohen’s fault that the DA insists on pursuing a loser case for political reasons?
There’s nothing new about DAs letting politics drive prosecutorial decisions, but usually it’s done quietly in a back room. Bragg’s problem is he’s uncouth enough to let us watch the sausage being made.
At least the walls are still closing in. We’ll always have the walls.
Paraphrasing William Jacobson at LegalInsurrection, the Trump witch-hunt is going to come down to Garland's DOJ be willing to charge him with obstruction regarding the documents stored at Mar-A-Lago. Given the way Garland hasn't resisted a single looney left-wing Democrat obsession to date and appears to have green-lite that particular episode, I suspect that they will, and all hell is gonna break loose at that point.
“People telling the truth find it fucking annoying. People who are lying, however, start getting the details wrong. Made up Story 1 differs from Made up story 10 and Made up story 15.”
Are we talking about Cohen or Biden?
I maintain that one of the sure signs of a genius at work is to continually see results that are viewed as unexpected, and to continually get a myriad of consequential reasons why the results are one-off, probably explainable (by a vast array of contradicting reasons), and why it will never, ever, happen again - because the 'genius' is stupid, wait, vain, wait, corrupt, wait, fat, wait, a criminal, wait, gauche, wait.....
You never base your case around the word of a man who is not only a known liar but a convicted one.
Thank you for joining today's installment of "Lawyer Tips for the Oblivious." This series is designed for the education of law school graduates from Harvard, Yale, and similar top-rated institutions that accidentally forgot to teach their students any law courses.
Without liars with "a pathological need for media attention," the media wouldn't able to feed its Trump Derangement Syndrome.
Mason G has it right.
Trump has a genius for hiring clever fellows who are then given enough rope to hang themselves without involving Trump.
It's as true now as it was when I said it years ago: if Cohen had anything useful against Trump he would never have served a moment in jail, and would probably be in Congress by now.
Christopher B: "Paraphrasing William Jacobson at LegalInsurrection, the Trump witch-hunt is going to come down to Garland's DOJ be willing to charge him with obstruction regarding the documents stored at Mar-A-Lago. Given the way Garland hasn't resisted a single looney left-wing Democrat obsession to date and appears to have green-lite that particular episode, I suspect that they will, and all hell is gonna break loose at that point."
Precisely.
The only way I'd ever vote for Trump is if he's in prison on Election Day. (Not that it would matter, as I live in an ultra-blue state.)
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