February 28, 2018: Clueless in the Saddle, Binary Choice, Villain or Fool?

“Life often presents us with a binary choice: go right or left; it is right or wrong: it is or it isn't.

                             ----from "The Quotations of Chairman Joe"

Michelle Goldberg, writing in last Tuesday's New York Times, placed in stark relief the case against Donald J. Trump. Robert Mueller, she notes, had just indicted Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and his assistant Rick Gates on multiple counts of “money laundering and conspiracy against the United States”. (1)

The Trump campaign would have us believe that this was all pre-tRUMP, but recent evidence is emerging that money laundering continued throughout the campaign.

It appears that money having dried up from Manafort and Gates' Ukraine sources following the overthrow of the Kremlin-backed regime for whom they were working and raking in millions in the process, the two—particularly Manafort—found themselves in desperate financial straits.

Nevertheless, tRUMP finds himself confronted by Manafort offering his campaign services even though he is (a) desperate for cash and (b) has done no domestic political work in the United States for a decade or more. He has no political track record save helping to prop up an authoritarian regime and he has no extensive political connections in the United States. The answer appears to be: (1), he is well-dressed and appears to be as he represents himself: a man of great wealth, and (2) perhaps more importantly, he offers to work for tRUMP for free. This is a combination guaranteed to mesmerize our erstwhile Caesar.

“Immediately, Manafort sought to use his role in the campaign to repair his relationship with (Russian Oligarch Oleg Deripaska to whom he owed a great deal of money) Deripaska. In April, as the Washington Post reported, he emailed an employee in Kiev about his new job, and wrote, apparently in relation to Deripaska, 'how do we get whole?' In July, Manafort offered to give Deripaska private briefings about the campaign”. (2)

Then, about this time, there is the question of the reversal engineered by Manafort with, according to a delegate on the platform committee, the explicit understanding and instructions from Donald J. Trump that the party reverse itself and abandon the support of the pro-western Ukrainian government and support Moscow.

“It's certainly possible”, writes Goldberg, “that Trump himself didn't personally connive with Russia for campaign help. Perhaps, through a combination of carelessness and miserliness, he unwittingly allowed his campaign to be infiltrated at the highest levels by both alleged and admitted criminals with Russian ties, such a scenario, however, would not be exculpatory”. (3)

Indeed, Manafort's accomplice Rick Gates has pleaded guilty, as has several other campaign operatives The question, as put by Senator Howard Baker in the Watergate hearings, is 'what did the president know and when did he know it?'.

“Perhaps Trump didn't realize that his campaign was being run by alleged Russian money launderers, that at least tow of his foreign policy advisers had entanglements with Russian intelligence, and that his campaign had a heads up about Russian plans to dump stolen Clinton emails online. None of last week's new information proves that Trump is too disloyal to his own country to be president. But the only alternative is that he is too clueless.(4)

Confronted with this inescapable binary choice, I chose the former. Caesar Disgustus will, when the dust finally settles on this wretched administration, be shown the traitor that he is. It is becoming increasingly clear that both the candidate and those about him are eyeball deep in racketeering and money laundering; that they have conspired with a foreign adversary against the United States. Caesar Disgustus' appeal to the Russians to continue to hack his adversaries is a clear indication of his acceptance of the practice and encouragement of it, regardless of the law. His responding to suggestions by the Russians that he cry foul in the event of an electoral defeat is likewise an indication of close collaboration. The myriad ties of campaigning operatives and hangers-on from Papadopoulos, to Roger Stone, to Manafort, Gates, Kushner and his own Son, reveal the level of involvement. It is impossible to believe that Disgustus didn't have intimate knowledge of what transpired. He knows he's guilty, and that's why he has gone to such great lengths to discredit those hot on his trail.

In the end, after sufficient time to wreak whatever possible vandalism, he will be shown the door. The binary question posed by Goldman offers a binary solution: Either Disgustus will replace Benedict Arnold as our greatest national villain or he will go down in history as our greatest national fool.

“an' Br'er Putin, he jus' laugh and laugh”

Impeach and Imprison

______________________

1. Goldberg, Michelle. “Conspirator, or Just Clueless?” The New York Times. Tuesday, February 27, 2018. Page A19
2. ibid
3. ibid
4. ibid