Behind Mueller's Redactions, An Outline Of Trump-Russia Scandal

[DonViejo]

Terry H. Schwadron

December 10, 2018 3:36 am

Throw all the prosecutorial sentencing reports together that emerged yesterday about Michael Cohen and Paul Manafort, stir gently, and what do we have? The commentary was so quick to get to the details, that it is useful to pull back and see the whole picture:

These are two bad guys who committed crimes, small and large, and they will get real jail time. Cohen will get a bit of relief in his sentence for cooperating partially, but not a magic wand dismissal of prison time. Manafort is facing up to 15 years for crimes so far after he blew his chances for leniency by lying to the special counsel’s office to whom he had promised cooperation.

Trump committed felonies for hush-money payoffs to women for sex in violation of campaign finance laws, according to the U.S. government. That would sink anyone who isn’t the President of the United States, but Trump will hold himself above the law, by saying the president cannot be indicted.

What happens next is anyone's guess or more the business of politics than of law. From Trump himself, there was a tweet, of course, saying these filings cleared him of any wrongdoing despite the words in the document. We need to start hearing from Republican leaders, but with Democrats taking over the House, these documents will prompt endless hearings and necessary discussions about Trump’s involvement, up to the impeachment discussions that many Democrats are trying to avoid. And with a new attorney general nominee, we will go through more questions about letting the special counsel finish his work.

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