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> Trump did not have any material activity in Russia, and it ended as it became clear Trump would be taking on a political nomination anyhow. Michael Cohen tes

> Trump did not have any material activity in Russia, and it ended as it became clear Trump would be taking on a political nomination anyhow. Michael Cohen testified that their claims of doing this was a lie, and they continued their business dealings after having claimed to have ceased as a candidate. If they didn't feel they were doing anything improper, why did they lie to the American people and during subsequent testimony?

adventured 8y ago
> If they didn't feel they were doing anything improper, why did they lie to the American people and during subsequent testimony? One good reason would be that appearances are extremely important in nearly all circumstances, especially when running for office or while in office. People often lie for very dumb, shallow reasons, because of their fear of how something might look. Trump is all about image after all and always has been. His brand has always been his primary business.
sonnyblarney 8y ago
They lied for political reasons. Cohen's lie was simply to 'move back the date' of the end of the discussions from August, to mid Spring. It was a campaign kind of lie, a lie of perceptions. Cohen et. al. wanted to simply make it clear that the 'end of Russia discussions' was well before the nomination, and not near to it, purely for optics. That's why it's an utterly stupid thing to do. It was a stupid, needless like, just to avoid some possible bad news, that Cohen is going to go to jail for. To me - this summarizes most of the Trump shenanigans: Trump and his crew of clowns do not have the sophistication to orchestrate anything with Russia! Trump is 'just a guy'. He has a few family members, who are not professionals, help him out with stuff. This is not a 'operationalized, rigorous entity'. It's not like a bank, with policies, procedures, professional managers. It's just a loud-mouth real-estate guy 'making deals' over the phone. That's it. I do not trust Trump one big, and it's good there is added scrutiny, and absolutely 100% the Russians will try to take advantage of Trump - in the same way they would try to take advantage of any president if they could. But there's no attempt to undermine America, to do secret deals with Russian intelligence, no exchanging of secret information to alter the campaign. None of this. Trump I think is a bad statesmen, who as a little to close to Russia for comfort, but there's no real smoking gun here, just a little bit of 'Cheech and Chong'.
- NotAnEconomist 8y ago
  > Cohen et. al. wanted to simply make it clear that the 'end of Russia discussions' was well before the nomination, and not near to it, purely for optics. "Purely for optics." Why would the optics look bad? Because what they did was a way in which corruption often happens, eg a foreign government rewarding someone for losing an election but causing a political disturbance, and they lied about it because they knew it would look bad during an investigation. We can see the Chinese rewarding the Trumps with various favors, eg trademarks, for an example of how this kind of corruption actually happens, and why people would have been suspicious of the Trump dealings. You're correct: each misdeed of the Trump organization could be explained by bumbling -- a coin-flip between incompetence and malice. Unfortunately, there's a large number of such questionable practices, and the intersection of a high number of overlapping events is actually a large degree of certainty. The simplest explanation is the preferred: Trump is a career criminal, who committed multiple kinds of crimes during the presidential election, ranging from campaign finance violations to colluding with Russian intelligence operatives. He did this not because he's some kind of deep-sleeper agent from Russia, or whatever media narrative has formed, but rather because he's an out-of-touch sociopath who has been sheltered by wealth and legitimately doesn't understand why breaking national security law to enrich himself is wrong. But he did it, along with the other crimes, and knowingly orchestrated the whole series of crimes. As he's been doing for years, through the Trump Foundation, Trump University, his frequent defrauding of contractors, etc. So yes, he "colluded", but out of stupidity and incompetence, not thoughtful malice.

adventured 8y ago

> If they didn't feel they were doing anything improper, why did they lie to the American people and during subsequent testimony? One good reason would be that appearances are extremely important in nearly all circumstances, especially when running for office or while in office. People often lie for very dumb, shallow reasons, because of their fear of how something might look. Trump is all about image after all and always has been. His brand has always been his primary business.

sonnyblarney 8y ago

They lied for political reasons. Cohen's lie was simply to 'move back the date' of the end of the discussions from August, to mid Spring. It was a campaign kind of lie, a lie of perceptions. Cohen et. al. wanted to simply make it clear that the 'end of Russia discussions' was well before the nomination, and not near to it, purely for optics. That's why it's an utterly stupid thing to do. It was a stupid, needless like, just to avoid some possible bad news, that Cohen is going to go to jail for. To me - this summarizes most of the Trump shenanigans: Trump and his crew of clowns do not have the sophistication to orchestrate anything with Russia! Trump is 'just a guy'. He has a few family members, who are not professionals, help him out with stuff. This is not a 'operationalized, rigorous entity'. It's not like a bank, with policies, procedures, professional managers. It's just a loud-mouth real-estate guy 'making deals' over the phone. That's it. I do not trust Trump one big, and it's good there is added scrutiny, and absolutely 100% the Russians will try to take advantage of Trump - in the same way they would try to take advantage of any president if they could. But there's no attempt to undermine America, to do secret deals with Russian intelligence, no exchanging of secret information to alter the campaign. None of this. Trump I think is a bad statesmen, who as a little to close to Russia for comfort, but there's no real smoking gun here, just a little bit of 'Cheech and Chong'.

NotAnEconomist 8y ago
> Cohen et. al. wanted to simply make it clear that the 'end of Russia discussions' was well before the nomination, and not near to it, purely for optics. "Purely for optics." Why would the optics look bad? Because what they did was a way in which corruption often happens, eg a foreign government rewarding someone for losing an election but causing a political disturbance, and they lied about it because they knew it would look bad during an investigation. We can see the Chinese rewarding the Trumps with various favors, eg trademarks, for an example of how this kind of corruption actually happens, and why people would have been suspicious of the Trump dealings. You're correct: each misdeed of the Trump organization could be explained by bumbling -- a coin-flip between incompetence and malice. Unfortunately, there's a large number of such questionable practices, and the intersection of a high number of overlapping events is actually a large degree of certainty. The simplest explanation is the preferred: Trump is a career criminal, who committed multiple kinds of crimes during the presidential election, ranging from campaign finance violations to colluding with Russian intelligence operatives. He did this not because he's some kind of deep-sleeper agent from Russia, or whatever media narrative has formed, but rather because he's an out-of-touch sociopath who has been sheltered by wealth and legitimately doesn't understand why breaking national security law to enrich himself is wrong. But he did it, along with the other crimes, and knowingly orchestrated the whole series of crimes. As he's been doing for years, through the Trump Foundation, Trump University, his frequent defrauding of contractors, etc. So yes, he "colluded", but out of stupidity and incompetence, not thoughtful malice.