The discovery that Michael Cohen recorded his conversations with Donald Trump seems marvelously fitting: lawyer who specializes in protecting scuzzy clients from potential blackmail keeps tapes that he could use … for blackmail. But while reminding people of Trump’s multiple affairs with porn stars and Playboy models may provide a new act in the national grand guignol, it’s also Trump’s safe ground. With even some Republicans looking seriously, for once, at Trump’s fawning relationship to Vladimir Putin, retreating to the land of locker room talk and infinite Christian Right forgiveness could be just what Trump wants.
Talking about Cohen allows Trump to get back to his standard shtick of attacking the action of investigators (who didn’t “break into” anything, but merely opened a door after presenting a valid search warrant) and to get back onto ground where he feels comfortable: The way he treats women like interchangeable sexbots who he can buy off until he’s ready for wife No. 4.
The recording definitely represents behavior on Cohen’s part that’s way outside what would be expected of any reputable attorney. The comments from Trump remind everyone that he’s a sleazeball. But … that’s the point. Trump wants to talk about this topic. Because it’s not that other topic. That one that has to do with his utter subservience to Vladimir Putin. That’s why he’s practically begging people to chat this up, as CNN reports.
President Donald Trump's lawyers have waived attorney-client privilege regarding a secretly recorded conversation he had in September 2016 with his former longtime lawyer Michael Cohen in which they discussed payments to an ex-Playboy model who says she had an affair with the President, according to sources familiar with the matter.
Since well before taking office, Trump hasn’t just led the press on a merry romp through a series of unending scandals, but that race has often been circular. In a way, it’s almost admirable how he’s turned the fine art of being a universal jackass and liar into a kind of armor.
If Russia was Trump’s only scandal, the press might congregate there and public attention might be focused. If Trump’s affairs were at center stage too long, even some on the right might start to think about just why they were giving this guy a break on decades of capital-S Sleaze. Money-laundering could be a thing. A feckless foreign policy. An economy that’s run on momentum that is now looking ahead to a road full of Trump-applied mines. Any one of those things might be enough to cause Trump troubles, but all of them together gives the media a sort of collective amnesia as they drop yesterday’s hot topic for today’s crisis.
Donald Trump is a slimebag. That is just a given. He will cheat and has cheated on everyone he ever knew, both in business and his personal life. If he made a promise, he broke it. That’s just a given, and the press would really do better to just page three all these stories and move on.
Because Trump still sold out America to Russia. He did it before the election when he worked with Russia to get stolen material and encourage more thefts. He did it after the election when he covered up evidence presented to him about Russian involvement and worked to end more investigation. He’s still doing it as he stands up to hand Putin slices of Europe, all of Syria, and the certainty of a weakened U.S. and weaker NATO.
That’s page one news, and it should stay there.