Among the more surreal things that have happened this weekend is Rudy Giuliani moving his lips. Here he is explaining why Trump is not guilty of obstruction of justice:
“A president firing somebody who works for him, if he does no other corrupt act other than just fire him, can’t obstruct justice because that’s what Article Two of the Constitution gives to him solely. Not Congress. Not anybody else. If, for example, a president said, ‘Leave office, or I’m going to, you know, have your kids kidnapped,’ or, ‘I’m going to break your legs.’ Obstruction—I prosecuted a lot of obstruction cases.â€
Whatever you say, Rudy.
Rudy got on the Sunday bobblehead shows to complain about the Buzzfeed story that Trump ordered Michael Cohen to lie about the Trump Tower Moscow negotiations. Then Rudy admits the Trump Tower Moscow negotiations continued until Trump was elected.
Seemingly using the opportunity of the disputed Buzzfeed story, Rudy Giuliani is now conceding a maximal version of President Trump’s attempts to get a multi-hundred million dollar payday from Vladimir Putin for the length of the 2016 presidential campaign. Giuliani quotes Trump saying that negotiations for the Moscow Trump Tower deal were “going on from the day I announced to the day I won.â€
During the time Trump was singing Putin’s praises on the campaign trail and getting Putin’s help with hacking and information campaigns, Putin was dangling a few hundred million dollars in front of Trump.
But that’s okay, Rudy says, because he is 100 percent sure that Trump didn’t tell Cohen to lie to Congress, although he can’t say for sure what discussions Trump and Cohen might or might not have had about the Trump Tower project or Cohen’s congressional testimony. And, anyway, since there was no deal in the end, it didn’t matter.
The defense lawyer characterized the Trump Tower Moscow letter as an “active proposal†that did not constitute a deal or a business. He compared it to the proposals under consideration by his security consultancy, which continues to develop lucrative contracts abroad while he represents the president for free, drawing ethics criticism, since since foreign governments may see him as a conduit to the Oval Office.
“It’s like my business,†Giuliani said. “I make proposals to do security work, probably got six of them out right now. If you were to ask me what countries am I doing business in, I’d just tell you the two I’m doing business in. Not the other six, because I may never do business there.â€
Putin’s dangling of a few hundred million dollars in front of Trump had no affect on Trump’s campaign, I assume. Or on the Republican platform.
I keep hearing pundits surmise that Rudy is getting out in front of bad news by "volunteering" bad acts that the president has done. I don’t think its that complicated, I think Rudy is just an imbecile. This is if you remember the man who as Mayor put the NYC emergency command center in the world trade center after it had been the target of multiple terror attacks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Da9sc6YDBo
I think Rudy has deteriorated mentally since his mayor days. Not to say he didn’t do some scummy things as mayor, but he wasn’t that much of a bumbler at speaking.
Don't forget Rudy's appointment of Bernie Kerik as police commissioner. I mean, how many people get to be incarcerated in a jail that's been named in their honor before they became one of it's inmates? It took some doing on Rudy's part to pull that feat off.
Replace Rudy's example, "or I’m going to, you know, have your kids kidnapped" with "because you won't let Flynn go, and I need/expect loyalty," and Rudy effectively counters his own argument. Makes me wonder who really ran the mob out of NYC so long ago.
Telephone.
Telegraph.
Tell -a-Rudy.
Today, he 's stupid AND evil.
As Mayor, he was just plain ol' evil – which was the plan.
This "starter-Fascist" took all of the credit for the laws and rules that reduced crack busts, shootings, drug deaths, and murders. All of that actually started under David Dinkins*, Rudy's predecessor!
What Rudy added to NYC was to abuse those were already abused. He went after "squeegee-men," the homeless, the mentally ill, sex workers, junkies, and others who he and his backers thought were human garbage littering NY's streets.
Rudy's NYC was like a police state. I lived there, I know. But I was white, so "everything was all right!" I still hate Rudy for all of the hate and fear that he spread. But especially for stomping on the downtrodden.
Of late though, Rudy looks like an actor playing an ancient bridge-troll in a movie.
UH-OH! This actor has forgotten his lines!
But he remembers that most sacred and ancient of all theatrical rules: The show must go on! And so Rudy, like any dedicated but badly trained actor who's at a loss for his next line, starts babbling stuff from external clues, hoping to remember that next line… or… OR ANY DAMN LINE DAMMIT!!!!!
Everyone can see that today's Rudy has diminished mental acuity. Everyone except Rudy, of course..
No one loves Rudy. Not anymore. Not family members. Not friends. Except, of course, for tRUMP, and "Fox and Friends."
And so, if called to appear on Fox to defend tRUMP, well, "the show must go on!", right? Even if Rudy can barely remember the plot of the play – let alone his lines!
* WHOA! David Dinkins is still alive, and is 91.
The story of an illegal conspiracy is what Trump may have promised Putin politically while Putin had the power to make or break a deal worth hundreds of millions to Trump. Repeatedly, Trump claimed he had nothing to do with or in Russia. I think there's a clip of Trump saying he turned down doing deals in Russia at the same time he was negotiating with people in the Kremlin.
If there was nothing dishonest about what Trump was doing, why did Trump repeatedly lie about his involvement.
Other point – Rudy continually says Cohen is a 'proven liar' – compared to Trump's lies about his business dealings in Russia?? WTF?
Will everyone please give Rudy a break. They have to get someone on, and I am so sick of the likes of Lindsey, Sarah, and Kellyanne I can puke. And that one skin headed dude, he is frightening. Lately he has taken to fake hair which looks self applied using a Sharpie. At least Rudy admits that "Truth isn't the truth". Sometimes he even messes up and gives out information he has to walk back for days or weeks. So his mouth runs like a 25 yr. old and his brain works like one with advancing dementia, it syncs up once in a while. On the Giuliani 9-11 scale he is rated much closer to a 9 than to an 11, but that is still pretty close to a 10. Besides, if he criticism improved him, would he still be the sorry corrupt mess he is now? I rest my case. What a cute picture. You've got to love those eyes.
Bernie,
Separated at birth?
Rudy, and Max Schreck (the actor who played "Nosferatu" in Murnau's 1922 classic).
Hmm…
Actually, Rudy might scare me more!
I wonder if Rudy ever heard the expression… Loose lips sinks ship? Next thing you know Rudy will be signing a confession for Trump.
Twit -filter's still working, 'cause this twit got filtered.
Trump is such a horrible client that Rudy is the best he can do. He's one of Trump's "best people."
<i>During the time Trump was singing Putin’s praises on the campaign trail and getting Putin’s help with hacking and information campaigns, Putin was dangling a few hundred million dollars in front of Trump. </i>
This has to be the dumbest statement of the week. At last report, Cohen and the rest of the Trump menagerie had no contact what-so-ever with the Kremlin baring one pathetic cold call to some, probably completely bewildered, flunky.
It would be more accurate to suggest that Trumpian delusional fantasies were propelling a stupid investment deal that the Kremlin and Putin never heard of until the news hit the New York Times.
@ Doug
While I don't see any evidence of Putin's involvement in the deal, I have no problem believing that Trump, etc. may have been doing illegal things (maybe a bit of bribery in the Moscow city gov't?) in pursing the deal. When speaking of Trump "honest deal" is an oxymoron.
We also have to remember that Trump is a reflexive liar. He may have lied automatically, just out of habit.
"A Russian official has confirmed that Donald Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen talked to Kremlin officials but says the records have disappeared, reports NBC News."
No, JRK this was not a deal with Moscow city officials. The unproven report is that Cohen was offering Putin the 25-million-dollar penthouse of the Trump Tower Moscow project if Putin green-lighted the deal. (That's bribery, even for a businessman and illegal.)
If you think Cohen made a 25-Mil offer without Trump's OK, I'm not going to break it to you gently. Kermit the Frog is actually a cloth puppert.
Was Putin interested in Trump? Here's what was said in Helsinki:
“President Putin, did you want President Trump to win the election and did you direct any of your officials to help him do that?”
Putin: “Yes, I did. Yes, I did. Because he talked about bringing the U.S.–Russia relationship back to normal.”
There's evidence that Trump was receptive to meeting personally with Putin, a meeting proposed by the guy who bragged he knew in advance of the DNC emails the Kremlin stole.
The face that there is no record of the substance of the meetings between Trump and Putin is alarming. US officials in Trump's cabinet don't know what was discussed. Trump took the written notes from his interpreter to ensure no proof on the US side of what was said.
Flynn and Kusner got busted for secret meetings where they were trying to set up a "back door" method of communicating with the Kremlin, sufficiently encrypted that the CIA would not know what was being said.
I get seriously upset when I hear someone suggest that that was going on during the election was Trump's coffee boy talking to a Moscow city coffee boy about cream and sugar.
tRUMP would give Putin a $50 million penthouse suite?
LOL!
Don't make Russians laugh!
NO!
Putin would TAKE 51% of tRUMPS's condo units, and do with them whatever he wished!
Putin: “Yes, I did. Yes, I did. Because he talked about bringing the U.S.–Russia relationship back to normal.”
Yeah, and what could back to normal mean aside from the removing of sanctions and quieting the voice of opposition to the annexation of Crimea?
Yeah, Swami. Removing sanctions, giving up Syria and Ukraine are Putin's "Quid". The dangle of a few hundred million in Trump Tower Moscow is the "Quo" of the "Quid pro quo" which would be criminal. I'd love to know if Mueller has proof of what's now in plain sight. Knowing and proving are two different things. I suspect that's the main theme of discussions in the Oval Office.
<i>The unproven report is that Cohen was offering Putin the 25-million-dollar penthouse of the Trump Tower Moscow project if Putin green-lighted the deal.</i>
I think if you check it was "Gee maybe we can offer Putin a penthouse" speculation by Trump's idiots including Cohen who had never met Putin. These boys were not be best and brightest, Again the Russians probably first read about it in the New York Times.
"Let's have a US presidential candidate try to bribe the President of the Russian Federation".
If the offer had actually reached Putin he probably would have fallen off his chair with laughter. He has a good albeit rather wry sense of humour and sense of the absurd.
I thought it was fifty million as c u n d gulag says.
$50 million? $25 million? Maybe Putin would have been eligible for the 50% dictator's discount.
@ Billikin
Ah, since Putin would not have been paying….
More likely Trumps crew were running a scam pretending a $25 million penthouse was worth $50 million. Sounds a lot like something Trump would do.
If I am correct and should they have pulled off this whackadoodle deal, one wonders at the wisdom of cheating the President of the Russian Federation.