I found a purely unintentional error in my diary. It must have been auto-corrupt. I apologize.
This is another simple diary. Ari Melber and Anderson Cooper called the cross examination of Michael Cohen by Todd Blanche about a phone call "a bloodbath" and Sue Craig boosted the significance of the cross examination on this one phone call. All three exaggerated the significance of the cross examination about the phone call beyond all recognition.
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Michael Cohen said that this one phone call in October of 2016 was about paying Stormy Daniels. Todd Blanche found evidence that Michael Cohen said that a prank call was discussed on this one phone call and the call lasted 97 seconds. Todd Blanche , raising his voice, asserted that it was a lie (this was not a question) and then asked him if he could admit that it was a lie. Michael Cohen replied, "No sir" and explained that both were true, and that this was a quick confirmation that we were going through with the payment in addition to mentioning the prank call. This is what these Republican talking points stenographers are saying was a bloodbath.
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In point of fact, this did not damage the narrative that the prosecution has already established in large part because there is no other rational narrative that makes sense or is consistent with ALL the witnesses and the document and the tape.
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There are people who want to "call balls and strikes" and give credit to the defense whenever possible. The problem is when they give credit to the defense when they have not done anything significant because they don't have a plausible alternative narrative for the $420,000.
There is no way to reasonably deny that in reality the $420,000 was paid to Michael Cohen in order to repay Michael Cohen for his $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels because of P-35 which is a receipt of a wire transfer from Michael Cohen to Stormy Daniels because the $130,000 appears on that document and so does the phrase "grossed up" which is handwritten onto the document as is other addition to get to $420,000. So clearly in the real world, that $420,000 was made to repay Michael Cohen for his payment to Stormy Daniels.
Therefore, you have to come up with an alternative explanation for why Donald Trump believed that he was paying the $420,000. If Donald Trump paid Michael Cohen $420,000 because he believed that Michael Cohen earned it in his work as his attorney, then Michael Cohen would believe that Donald Trump owed him an additional $420,000 since P-35 makes it undeniable that the $420,000 was repayment to Michael Cohen for paying Stormy Daniels.
Let's suppose that Donald Trump believed that he owed Michael Cohen $420,000 for legal work that Michael Cohen did for him. Then, Michael Cohen must have done a lot of legal work for him. Let's suppose that Donald Trump was paying Michael Cohen $420/hr which is far more than is plausible. Then Michael Cohen would have done 1,000 hours of work for Donald Trump. That is 40 hours a week for 25 weeks, full time for almost half a year. There is no way that Michael would have done this amount of legal work for Donald Trump and not feel entitled to be paid for it. Where is there evidence of Michael Cohen being paid for this additional legal work and where is there evidence of this amount of legal work being performed by Michael Cohen at this time?
If Donald Trump were paying Michael Cohen for something else, then why is it Michael Cohen didn't demand payment for that?
The problem is that clearly in the real world the $420,000 was payment to Michael Cohen for paying Stormy Daniels. So, you now need a second reason that Donald Trump believes is valid for paying Michael Cohen $420,000 if your argument is that Donald Trump didn't know that the $420,000 was really to repay Michael Cohen. That's a problem because if Donald Trump believes that he owes Michael Cohen $420,000 for some other reason, then Michael Cohen would believe that Donald Trump owed him an additional $420,000.
There is no plausible alternative narrative for the defense. Michael Cohen's testimony is supported by Hope Hicks, David Pecker, the tape, and P-35. Michael Cohen's narrative fits well with the testimony of David Pecker and Hope Hicks both of whom said in different ways [Hope Hicks said Michael Cohen couldn't spend any money without Donald Trump's approval and David Pecker made it clear that the payment was to repay Michael Cohen for his payment to Stormy Daniels] that the payment was to protect the campaign and the taped recording shows that Donald Trump was aware of and approved of paying Stormy Daniels to be silent about their encounter to prevent this story from coming out and hurting his chances of winning the election and P-35 connects the $420,000 that Michael Cohen was paid and the $130,000 Michael Cohen paid to Stormy Daniels.
Therefore, reality must be that the $420,000 was a repayment to Michael Cohen for the $130,000 that he paid Stormy Daniels. But the defense has to argue that Donald Trump didn't know that this was the case. So, if repayment of Stormy Daniels wasn't his motive for paying Michael Cohen $420,000, what was his motive for making that payment ? Why is it that Michael Cohen didn't feel that he was owed an additional $420,000?
Therefore, making Michael Cohen to be a degenerate, unrepentant liar and a terrible, awful human being does not detract from the credibility of Michael Cohen's testimony in regard to the prosecution's narrative because that narrative is the only narrative that makes sense and the defense team doesn't have a reasonable alternative narrative or any alternative narrative at all.
A poster doesn't understand why Katy Tur hosts the people she does. Here is Cocob's , (one of my favorite posters), post:
Between Ari Melber and Katy Tur what is going on with MSNBC? He gives air time to some of the creepiest people. I understand getting other point of views but he seems to want too push another narrative. Itβs worse than both sides do it.
My response was:
It has been alleged that Ari has a personal conflict that he, Ari, created for no reason with Michael Cohen. It began when Ari hosted Michael Avenatti to discuss this case. Ari seems to believe that by putting Trump supporters and those hostile to the prosecution that he is providing some sort of valuable service to his viewers. I can't see that at all. Occasionally, Katy Tur gets off track. Chris Hayes did it before with an admirer of Vladmir Putin whose own posts discredited the false claims she made against President Biden. This person lost Ronan Farrow. If you have lost Ronan Farrow, then you have lost the plot in this space. Chris Hayes lost my trust at that point. I'm not Darcy of Pride and Prejudice, but ....
Sue Craig tried to characterize her frame of the cross examination as calling balls and strikes, but the goal for the defense has to be to show that there is reasonable doubt that the defendant committed the alleged crimes and the cross examination didn't come close to that because there is no rational alternative narrative that the defense has given for the jury to consider. Since they didn't and, in my view, can't provide an alternative narrative to the narrative the prosecution has presented to the jury, then this becomes a minor and ultimately trivial error at worst. That cannot reasonably be construed as a bloodbath.
They must somehow believe that by treating right and wrong alike and putting on people for and against the existential threat to democracy, they are proving that they are unbiased and, therefore, MAGA will now watch their show. This delusion will prove to be false.
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I think Katy Tur and Ari Melber do this for similar or even identical reasons. I have watched Ari more, so I felt more comfortable talking about Ari. My reply may not be directly responsive to the question posed.