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[smjjames]

Trump may also just be desperately trying to keep this under the public radar.

In short: Manafort gave private polling data to Russian agents during the 2016 campaign, and Mueller feels confident he can prove that in court.

If you wanted a smocking gun regarding Russian collusion, this isn't quite it, but it's very close.

Well, it's not quite a smoking gun regarding Russian collusion for Trump, but it's a smoking gun as far as Manafort goes.

The big question is what did Trump and his team know and when, and possibly whether his team tried to shield him from things like that. When the explaination comes out of the Mueller report, it's not going to be a simple explaination as much as everybody would like one, it's going to be a complex branching chain of events.

[Teneb]

the smocking pun

the Grail of gunsmockers.

[PTTG??]

I wish we could go back to the innocent halcyon days of presidents getting impeached for lying about BJ's.

Bill Clinton lied during testimony, which is far different than lying to the public at large.

Criticizing Clinton for lying about sex acts is old hat. Criticize him for Glass–Steagall if you want to talk policy.

[sluissa]

Yea, I was like 'Get to the point already!' about halfway through, hence my comment about whoever wrote it doesn't know how to write a good speech, or maybe it was hashed out in a hurry, but I suspect a good speechwriter would still make a better one if they were in a hurry. I think it would have been better if he wasn't following a script, or at least more entertaining.

As I also said, it sounded, if anything, like trying to build a case for doing a national emergency, which it could plausibly have been written down for in case he decided to do that, but he ended up not.

You know, I heard it differently. It followed, very closely the form that other speeches and addresses tend to follow. Go listen to almost any state of the union address from the last couple of decades. This could be a slice out of one of those easily, in form, if not in content.

If you're going to knock the speechwriter on this one, you have to knock political speech writing in general. This was a rare example of Trump actually sounding like a politician and actually following a more or less normal script.

That said, this isn't what people expect from Trump, it's uncomfortable, unusual, and aside from that, just plain boring when compared to his usual antics.

Waste of everyone's time, but at least the whole boring spectacle was only about 20 minutes, even when you add in the Schumer-Pelosi Show afterwards.

[Trekkin]

Well, if you want Trump's usual antics, he's loudly storming out of shutdown negotiations now. There's also this piece, from which I'll quote below:

“You’re using people as leverage. Why won’t you open the government and stop hurting people?” Schumer said.

According to the source, Trump replied: “Because then you won’t give me what I want.”

[PTTG??]

It sounds like it might be much easier to control Trump if people just lied.

He asks, "I'll sign anything you give me now if I get a wall in 30 days."

Just say OK. Lie to him. He won't remember it in 30 minutes, let alone a month.

[bloop_bleep]

I wish we could go back to the innocent halcyon days of presidents getting impeached for lying about BJ's.

Bill Clinton lied during testimony, which is far different than lying to the public at large.

Criticizing Clinton for lying about sex acts is old hat. Criticize him for Glass–Steagall if you want to talk policy.

I'm explaining why Clinton getting impeached is not valid precedent for impeaching Trump for lying to the public.

[Doomblade187]

It sounds like it might be much easier to control Trump if people just lied.

He asks, "I'll sign anything you give me now if I get a wall in 30 days."

Just say OK. Lie to him. He won't remember it in 30 minutes, let alone a month.

I mean, presumably Mitch has already tried this.

[Dunamisdeos]

EDIT: Nope, crap post. Disregard.

[Trekkin]

It sounds like it might be much easier to control Trump if people just lied.

He asks, "I'll sign anything you give me now if I get a wall in 30 days."

Just say OK. Lie to him. He won't remember it in 30 minutes, let alone a month.

It would be easier if he ever said that, but he doesn't. He says "gimme my wall." Then he storms out of the room if he hears anything but "yes." It's how he's always operated: he's always had Daddy's money to fall back on, so he's had no incentive to accept anything but total capitulation.

I suspect that's also why McConnell is staying out of this pending Trump's public support for something: there's literally no way to negotiate with him.

[Max™]

Has anybody pointed out that Manafort has the bestest lawyers and when they were redacting shit from a document for the court they apparently didn't realize that highlighting text in black on a computer by no means makes it unreadable, because my gods we're not even two weeks into this year and I'm fucking completely and fully dumbfounded at the benny hill type of shit going on in D.C. already.

[Frumple]

Dunno if it's been mentioned yet, but I definitely noticed it. You'd think competence that basic would be a standard thing, but apparently not for whatever barrel bottom they've dug through to find people to represent these chucklefucks.

[hector13]

Trump is going to pardon him anyway.

[sluissa]

Dunno if it's been mentioned yet, but I definitely noticed it. You'd think competence that basic would be a standard thing, but apparently not for whatever barrel bottom they've dug through to find people to represent these chucklefucks.

There was some suggestion in the paranoid twitterverse that it might have been intentional. They caught the lawyers passing info to Trump's team earlier, so this time they're just "Ooops"ing the info out into the public where Trump's team can gather it.

Not sure I buy it, incompetence is so much simpler a solution, but it's an interesting angle.

[Trekkin]

Trump is going to pardon him anyway.

I think this has gotten much less likely for two reasons.

First, pardoning someone removes their Fifth Amendment right to avoid testifying about whatever crimes they did, since they can't incriminate themselves if their actions are no longer criminal by Presidential fiat. That matters now that the Democrats have subpoena power. In this case, it would effectively signal that there are more crimes involving Trump to which Manafort has yet to admit (because otherwise why pardon him?) while also giving the House a green light to ask him about them.

Second, it would give the obstruction of justice investigation an entirely new dimension. Remember, Trump's legal team wants at all costs to keep him from ever having to say anything under oath; apart from all the other reasons, all their mock interviews have been nightmares. This would be like firing Comey all over again.