May 9, 2024

"Daniels smirks as she looks at celebratory tweets she sent on March 30, 2023, the day Trump was criminally indicted for the first time."

"She posted about drinking champagne and selling 'Team Stormy' merchandise.... So many of Stormy Daniels’s retorts are versions of 'so did Trump.' He calls her 'horseface,' so why can’t she call him an 'orange turd'? He sells his merchandise, so why can’t she sell hers?... Watching Susan Necheles attempt to pull Stormy Daniels apart, I am reminded of a point we made in coverage about Trump not long ago. His goal is not to make people think he’s pure so much as his goal is to suggest his antagonists are all impure.... The defense’s playbook is very clear: Portray Daniels as a money-grubbing, sleazy, dishonest operator who tried to use Trump to get fame and riches from the anti-Trump resistance.... Trump is leaning forward and staring at the screen showing the exhibits of Stormy Daniels’s merchandise, including t-shirts and comic books. He is seemingly very interested in her efforts to make money off of her account of the liaison with him. Necheles brings up a '$40 Stormy Saint of Indictments Candle,' with Daniels draped in a Christ-like robe. Trump recently made news by hawking a Bible for $59.99...."

From the NYT live-blog of the cross-examination.

ADDED: "He is seemingly very interested in her efforts to make money off of her account of the liaison with him" — that makes it sound like a challenge for the contestants on an episode of "The Apprentice." Imagine him coolly assessing the merchandising effort. Perhaps in some secret way, in his businessman/showman mind, he admires her dogged effort to work with what she had.

26 comments:

RideSpaceMountain said...

"Portray Daniels as a money-grubbing, sleazy, dishonest operator who tried to use Trump to get fame and riches from the anti-Trump resistance"

From what I've heard, Christine Blazey-Ford lives pretty well now. That home she had with an underwater mortgage is taken care of and while large numbers of friends - and all of her family - have since ceased association with her, wouldn't you know it that she's made new ones.

There's a lot of prosperity to be had attacking Trump. Judas got scammed with his 30 pieces of silver, what a dope.

rwnutjob said...

Daniels...a money-grubbing, sleazy, dishonest operator who tried to use Trump to get fame and riches from the anti-Trump resistance.

No lies detected

Iman said...

Nutty and Slutty ain’t a good look, Spunk Bank.

Enigma said...

All I have to say is "Really?" Case dismissed.

We live in unserious walking-on-thin-ice times. Whatever evils are attributed to Trump, they were all done by Kennedy, LBJ, and Clinton first. Obama innovated by actively leveraging the deep state for partisan advantage. And with the rise of TDS, Biden's handlers put every government evil into a sleaze blender.

Quoting Nixon in 1974:

"I have concluded that because of the Watergate matter I might not have the support of the Congress that I would consider necessary to back the very difficult decisions and carry out the duties of this office in the way the interests of the nation would require". Nixon also stated his hope that, by resigning, "I will have hastened the start of that process of healing which is so desperately needed in America." Nixon acknowledged that some of his judgments "were wrong," and he expressed contrition, saying: "I deeply regret any injuries that may have been done in the course of the events that led to this decision."

Healing? He he. He merely gave the insiders ideas for more effective warfare.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Nixon%27s_resignation_speech

William said...

I read through the comments. The NYT reporters claim that Trump's interaction with Stormy Daniel is central to the case. Is it? I thought the bone of contention was whether the payment to Stormy was a legal expense or a campaign expense or something like that. It's very complicated and hard to understand if you're not a lawyer. The nature of Trump's relations is a boner of contention but not the bone of contention....Isn't it obvious that she signed the NDA for money and then reneged on that agreement because she saw the chance for another payday. I don't see how she fits into the feminist pantheon.

Original Mike said...

"Trump is leaning forward and staring at the screen showing the exhibits of Stormy Daniels’s merchandise, including t-shirts and comic books."

I bet Chuck has the entire Stormy collection.

mikee said...

Someday far in the future a grandchild will inherit a collection of such memorabilia from a deceased woke TDS grandma, and wonder what the heck old grannie's kink collection was all about.

RideSpaceMountain said...

"he admires her dogged effort to work with what she had."

For those among the millions of us that have seen her naked, she would've probably been more successful hawking mugs and t-shirts. But doggedness is in the eye of the beholder.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

The defense’s playbook is very clear: Portray Daniels as a money-grubbing, sleazy, dishonest operator who tried to use Trump to get fame and riches from the anti-Trump resistance....

I guess they must be doing a good job of it. The News Barbies on CNN are doubling down on how Daniels is a heroine of Hillary Clinton caliber!

rehajm said...

I don’t know if I’m more disturbed by adults being titillated by this lawfare or by Democrats relishing it. The same people who to a woman dismissed Clinton sex scandals as a love triangle or ‘just sex’.

Dave Begley said...

"Every trial is a contest of credibility." Judge Lyle E. Strom

Sydney said...

“Necheles brings up a '$40 Stormy Saint of Indictments Candle,' with Daniels draped in a Christ-like robe. ”
I despise those secular “saint” devotional candles. Talk about replacing religion with ideology! I know the Left thinks they are being cleverly amusing in a transgressive way, but to me it’s the Left showing who their idols are. Stormy was likely behind her own candle design, but candles to Hillary, Obama, Michelle Obama and RGB are equally disturbing.

rhhardin said...

Money-grubbing but not sleazy and dishonest. Just a normal woman.

rhhardin said...

Stormy Daniels as a MeToo leader would be good.

Skeptical Voter said...

What's a girl to do when she gets up off her back and has to find an honest way to make a living? And it's tough to compete--you've seen one stripper or porn star and you've seen them all. So now the poor thing has to construct a narrative that sells--at least to Alvin Bragg.

Achilles said...

Pretty soon the Democrats are going to be saying "He might get off on the hush-money trial but At least we will get him for stolen documents!"

"Well at least we still have Fannie!"

<.<

>.>

^.^

Mica said...

Is it possible that his interest in her attempts to make money are related to her owing him a lot of money?

Mary Beth said...

$40 Stormy Saint of Indictments Candle

Too bad Gwyneth Paltrow beat her to the "smells like my vagina" candle name. That would have been more suitable. This other feels like it's mocking people who buy religious candles more than it's mocking Trump. It's hard to out-tacky Trump, but I think she's done it.

n.n said...

Justice, social justice, or a queer and peculiar lifestyle?

Iman said...

Daniel’s says an extremely large opossum tried to kill her pimp/husband in New Awlins…

mccullough said...

She owes Trump $500,000. No doubt he’s interested in her income streams.

It’s her in Debtors Prison.

Big Mike said...

I am reminded of a point we made in coverage about Trump not long ago. His goal is not to make people think he’s pure so much as his goal is to suggest his antagonists are all impure....

@ Althouse, that you included this in the text of your post tells me that I am absolutely correct in my assessment, on the other thread, that you do not understand Republicans, much less Trump. It’s not that you lack the intelligence, but you’ve spent most of your adult life living in an extremely left of center city and working as a professor for one of the (perhaps the) most liberal school in the Big Ten, so you have accumulated your biases. You may imagine that you demonstrate “cruel neutrality” when you are anything but neutral.

For the record, Trump is not running on the “impurity” of his opponents — they fall all over themselves to demonstrate that daily. He is running as the person who is best qualified to undo the damage to the American economy inflicted by the Biden administration. And I think he’s right, both about the damage and his qualifications. After all, I was around in 2019. So were you.

Mark said...

I'm sure that Trump is very happy to see this line of defense and the lawyers are very happy to take his money.

But this only works if jurors are sympathetic to the defendant. And the fact is that no one is sympathetic to Trump. Everyone either believes or just assumes that they had the sex.

Old and slow said...

Who CARES if they had sex or not? That is not at issue here. An account entry was purportedly mislabeled, and through a bit of creative legal alchemy, that has been turned into a felony or 34. I don't understand why his legal team is even deigning to engage on this topic. He paid her not to talk about this, she reneged on the deal. Everyone agrees to those facts.

Michael said...

When does the crime part start?

JAORE said...

" The News Barbies on CNN are doubling down on how Daniels is a heroine of Hillary Clinton "

Same team that thought Avenatti (sp?) would be a GREAT candidate because he blasted Trump.

I sense a pattern.