The administration’s media point person for discussions following the Hanoi Summit between President Trump and Chairman Kim Jong-un is National Security Advisor John Bolton.
Ambassador Bolton appears on the Sunday talk circuit to discuss the ongoing negotiations. As anticipated none of the interviewers focused on the Chinese aspect at all. Don’t look for President Trump to respond to Chairman Kim directly; instead watch how President Trump’s entire team responds to China. Chairman Xi Jinping controls Kim Jong-un.
Likely Treasury (Mnuchin) and State (Pompeo) will focus on DPRK sanctions violations; likely USTR (Lighthizer) and Commerce (Ross) focus on hard-line trade position; likely USTR, Commerce and State focus on tech issues (Hauwei and 5G) and pressure allies. All of these targeted approaches rightly focus on China (cause), not North Korea (symptom).
Mrs. Michelle Malkin delivered a strong call-to-arms at CPAC surrounding the insufferable Big Club’s republican corporate agenda toward immigration.
Wolverine Speech and Transcript Below:
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[Transcript] Good afternoon. Thank you to CPAC for the invitation. My name is Michelle Malkin. I identify as an American. A proud, unhyphenated, unapologetic, fully assimilated American. My pronouns are U.S.A.
America is good and America is great. Of these basic truths, there is or should be little dispute among us here. But two questions loom large: 1) For how long will the America we grew up in remain good and great? And 2) To whom shall we entrust the existential responsibility of securing the goodness and greatness passed down peacefully for generations?
I wish I could stand here and chirp happily to you about positive news. Yes, unemployment rates are at historic lows, regulations and taxes are being cut, some stellar judges have been confirmed, and the reckless, feckless liberal media has finally, finally self-immolated like a slow-motion downing of the Hindenburg.
Yes, we have much to thank President Trump for as he battles the Beltway swamp, the deep state, the administrative state, and the fake news fourth estate. But there is no sugarcoating America’s long-term forecast. We face fearful odds. The game is rigged. The playing field is manifestly unlevel.
My first book Invasion in 2002, exposed how border failures and systemic non-enforcement of our visa program rules created a national security crisis that led to 9/11. My last book, Sold Out, which I co-authored in 2015 with former American computer programmer-turned-labor lawyer John Miano, documented how Big Business and Big Government created an economic crisis by exploiting the H-1B tech worker visa program and other foreign employment visas for cheap labor.
I’ve been accused of being a grifter for wanting to inform and educate citizens about these destructive rackets. But it’s the GOP sellouts in bed with open borders – like the ones who hijacked the tea party movement to shill for amnesty – who are the real grifters cashing in and practicing deceit at the expense of their base.
Our shining city on a hill has become a much-abused doormat to the world. Building the border wall is just half the battle. The numbers tell all. Our future is dimmed. The odds are fearful.
We currently grant one million legal permanent residencies to people from around the world every year. The number of green card holders is expected to increase by 10 million by 2025. That’s more than the current combined population of Dallas, St. Louis, Denver, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Atlanta. Now multiply that number by at least three and a half.
Thanks to our chain migration system, created in 1952 and expanded exponentially by Congress in 1965 and 1990, these new immigrants can sponsor their entire extended families: parents, spouses, adult children and their children, and siblings and their children. Princeton University researchers found that recently admitted immigrants sponsored an average of 3.45 additional relatives each.
An estimated 85,000 refugees and 20,000-plus asylees enter the country annually through an overwhelmed system so rife with fraud and abuse that the process is jokingly dubbed “refugee roulette” by immigration lawyers. In total, from fiscal year 2008 to 2017, the U.S. gave green cards to more than 2 million migrants for various humanitarian claims – a population larger than the city of Philadelphia.
Nearly half a million more immigrants in that time frame got in through the diversity visa lottery. Illegal aliens are eligible if a legal family member wins the jackpot. Tens of thousands are pouring in from terrorism breeding grounds through the lottery unvetted, unmonitored and unassimilated. Thanks again to chain migration, immigration lotto winners’ spouses and unmarried children under 21 all get passes into the country, too.
Nearly half of all illegal aliens in the country have violated the terms of their short-term visitor or work visas. More than 10.8 million people received such visas alone in fiscal year 2015, including 500,000 foreign university and graduate students on academic visas and nearly 700,000 total foreign guest workers (both skilled and unskilled, not to mention their spouses, many of whom are allowed to work here as well).
Congress has repeatedly mandated a nationwide visa entry-exit system to track legal short-term visa holders. But one has yet to be built—even in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, which were perpetrated in part by several illegal alien visa overstayers. E-verify has been stalled. Sanctuary cities metastasized. And BOTH parties are to blame – yeah I’m looking at you, Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, the Bush family, Mitt Romney and the ghost of John McCain.
This unrelenting inflow of new green card holders, short-term foreign visa holders, legal temporary workers, refugees and asylees is supplemented by 13 to 30 million illegal aliens who expect amnesty and chain migration privileges from Washington despite breaking immigration laws governing everything from border jumping to ID fraud, benefits fraud, tax fraud, and marriage fraud, to human and drug trafficking, to employment rules, deportation orders, and visa overstays.
The feds have proved themselves serially unwilling and incapable of handling the lapses, backlogs, overload, and yes, invasion. The numbers tell all. Open borders anarchy, multiplied by endless chain migration, amnesty, and cheap labor pipelines, endangers our general welfare and the blessings of liberty. By every clear measure, the war is not on immigrants but on American sovereignty.
I’ve been called white for stating the facts. I’m not white. I’m just right. Both native-born and immigrant families like mine, which revere the rule of law, common traditions, constitutional principles, one identity and one tongue, have been replaced by militantly unassimilable and hostile generations…of future Democrat voters whose tribal allegiance to the Left has only hardened over time.
It’s insane that we have elected Republicans on Capitol Hill doing the bidding of the illegal alien DREAMer racket. Until and unless we reclaim the right of self-determination over the numbers, we are doomed.
My fellow Americans, we stand at the bridge as Horatius stood at the narrow bridge over the Tiber River alone facing fearful odds as hordes of Etruscans marched towards him and cowards cut and run behind him. Like his enemies, our enemies are both foreign AND domestic.
Inside are flimsily defended borders, we are not at peace, or rather, the radical Left is not at peace with us. From the comfort of TV green rooms, Beltway backrooms, corporate boardrooms, and conference ballrooms, it may not look like civil war is imminent. But threats and outright violence against ordinary, law-abiding people are now regularized features, not random bugs, of political life in these dis-United States.
College students are being punched, elderly citizens are being harassed, MAGA hat wearers are being kicked off planes and assaulted in school hallways and restaurants, conservative speakers are being mobbed and Molotov cocktailed, ICE agents and their families are being targeted, pro-lifers are being kicked and menaced, pro-Trump, anti-jihad moms on social media are being monitored and doxxed.
The madness is beyond parody.
Last week, social justice media warriors whipped up hysteria over a Mar a Lago pastry chef’s Instagram posts. Where are the sanctuary spaces for law-abiding conservatives who simply want to exercise their rights to free speech and peaceable assembly?
The divide in this country is between decent people who stand up for America and dastardly people who want to bring America to its knees.
We certainly should make common cause with others across the aisle who shares our values, but we should not rush to embrace those whose fundamental aim is to smear and destroy us all. That’s suicidal. Which is why I cannot stand here and stay silent about the role Van Jones has played in attempting to silence the Right.
My objection is not to his support for criminal justice reform. I have dedicated much of my own time, energy, and money to fighting wrongful convictions, false allegations, and prosecutorial and forensic misconduct. Next time you need a conservative to talk about criminal justice reform, call me. You don’t need someone who’s going to spew fake news pro illegal alien propaganda to talk CJR to conservatives.
Fact check: The most recent research by the Federation for American Immigration Reform found that illegal aliens are up to 5.5 times more likely than Americans to be incarcerated in state prisons compared to Americans and legal residents.
But my most vehement objection is to this stage being used to lend legitimacy to the George Soros-funded organization Color of Change, which dedicated to censoring and sabotaging right-leaning groups for championing the free market, opposing radical Islam, and exposing open borders.
Seven years ago, Van Jones’ group pressured Pepsi, McDonald’s, Intuit and other companies to cut ties to the mainstream American Legislative Exchange Council(ALEC), a half-century-old association of state legislators who believe in “the Jeffersonian principles of free markets, limited government, federalism, and individual liberty.” What was ALEC’s crime? Crafting model legislation on voter ID to protect election integrity, immigration enforcement measures and self-defense legislation to strengthen Second Amendment rights.
Color of Change and the smear machine racket known as the Southern Poverty Law Center use the same playbook to marginalize and criminalize mainstream conservatives, anti-jihad groups, and immigration hawks as “hate groups” and push us out of the public square.
They conspire with payment processors and Silicon Valley to deprive the Right of our voices and our ability to make a living. So many speaking up and fighting on the front lines for liberty and security are being detwittered depaypaled defacebooked deplatformed – people like Laura Loomer and Gavin McInnes and the Center for Immigration Studies and Robert Spencer and so many others.
Many are in this room. Stand up if you are one of them. Many have been forced to beg for money to help them fight in court to restore their reputations. Many have been barred from this room.
Nice is not enough. Logic and facts and appeals to decency and fairness are not enough. Bemoaning double standards is not enough. Ultimately our future will not be secured in a Fox News anchor chair or a think tank office or on a cruise ship or at a cushy GOP retreat. The future is on the frontlines. At the edge of the bridge.
Then out spake brave Horatius, the captain of the Gate. To every man upon this earth death cometh soon or late. And how can man die better than facing fearful odds, for the ashes of his fathers and the temples of his Gods.
Instead of throwing allies under that bridge, movement conservatives who have preached so comfortably here in the Beltway about defending America while preserving the status quo need to help provide financial and moral support to the disrupters willing to fight fire with fire.
Maybe it’s providence that I am privileged to speak here on the 7th anniversary of Andrew Breitbart’s death. He was a disrupter. We need more disrupters. We need legislative action at the local and state level.
We need politicians who will DO SOMETHING to stop the sowers of hate and their handmaidens. Use the tools at your disposal. Don’t just stand there. DO SOMETHING.
Diversity is NOT our strength. Unity is. Our common purpose is the common defense of our nation. Good people make America great.
The Canadian government shocked the professional financial and economic media with their latest fourth quarter GDP release showing the economy has essentially come to a grinding halt at 0.1% growth. [Compare to U.S. GDP growth of 3%]
The Canadian Q4 GDP growth isn’t one percent, it’s one-tenth of one percent: 0.1%, essentially halted; but everyone discussing this is missing something very important.
[FP] Canada’s economy practically came to a halt in the final three months of 2018, in a much deeper-than-expected slowdown that brings the underlying strength of the expansion into doubt.
The country’s economy grew by just 0.1 per cent in the fourth quarter, for an annualized pace of 0.4 per cent, Statistics Canada said Friday from Ottawa. That’s the worst quarterly performance in two and a half years, down from annualized 2 per cent in the third quarter and well below economist expectations for a 1 per cent annualized increase.
While a slowdown was widely expected in the final months of the year due to falling oil prices, it’s a much bleaker picture than anyone anticipated with weakness extending well beyond the energy sector. Consumption spending grew at the slowest pace in almost four years, housing fell by the most in a decade, business investment dropped sharply for a second straight quarter, and domestic demand posted its largest decline since 2015. (read more)
The financial punditry go on to give multiple reasons for the drop and all of them are factually accurate. However, there’s a key aspect that I cannot find discussed in any analysis of the data.
A very specific key aspect.
First, let me say CTH does not want to see the Canadian economy falter; not even a little bit. By disposition CTH wants to see economic abundance for everyone, especially our close friends and allies. But stand back, look at the bigger, BIG, picture, the media always avoid discussing…. you’ve got to ask yourself how can Canada be slowing down at the exact same time the USA economy is skyrocketing?…. There’s a connection.
Again, all of the currently expressed financial reasons for the slowdown are accurate; I am not disputing them. However, it’s what they are not discussing that really matters.
In the third paragraph of the FP article I highlighted a partial sentence: “business investment dropped sharply for a second straight quarter.” That means sharp drops in business investment for Canada in the time-frame July 2018 through December 2018.
Now pause, and reference the U.S. fourth quarter: “Consumer spending continued to grow solidly and, most encouragingly, business investment growth recovered sharply after a dip in the third quarter. Despite big external headwinds and financial market volatility in the fourth quarter, U.S. firms are not retrenching sharply on capex.”
Astute economic followers will note what the background is.
♦In July, August, September (Q3) of 2018 the new NAFTA negotiation was in the final stages. The U.S. and Mexico had already come to the terms; Canada was the outlier having to re-join an agreement in September where they previously abandoned negotiations.
♦On October 1st, 2018, the first day of Q4, the USMCA was unveiled. Now the U.S., Mexico and Canada were all committed. Throughout the fourth quarter, all business interests had an opportunity to review the much anticipated USMCA outcome and details.
Multinational corporations, domestic corporations, U.S. and Canadian businesses were all looking for the same very specific detail: What happened with the NAFTA loophole?
Within the new USMCA the critically important NAFTA loophole was closed.
Over the past three decades both Canada and Mexico structured key parts of their independent trade agreements to take advantage of their unique access to the U.S. market. Under the existing NAFTA, Mexico and Canada generate billions in economic activity through exploiting the NAFTA loophole.
China, Asia (writ large), and the EU enter into trade agreements with Mexico and Canada as back-doors into the U.S. market. So long as corporations can avoid U.S. tariffs (and rules of origin that pertain to those tariffs), by going through Canada and Mexico they would continue to exploit this approach.
By shipping parts to Mexico and/or Canada; and by deploying satellite assembly facilities in Canada and/or Mexico; China, Asia and to a lesser extent EU corporations exploited a NAFTA loophole for rules of origin on finished goods.
Through a process of building, assembling or partially manufacturing their products in Mexico/Canada those foreign corporations could skirt U.S. trade tariffs and direct U.S. trade agreements. The finished foreign products entered the U.S. under NAFTA rules.
Why deal with the U.S. when you can just deal with Mexico, and use NAFTA rules to ship your product directly into the U.S. market?
This exploitative approach, a backdoor to the U.S. market, was the primary reason for massive foreign investment in Canada and Mexico; it was also the primary reason why candidate Donald Trump, now President Donald Trump, wanted to shut down that loophole and renegotiate NAFTA.
At the conclusion of Round #6, just before giving up on Chrystia Freeland for good, this was the direct issue at the heart of a very frustrated U.S.T.R. Lighthizer’s strongly worded response to Canada:
[…] In another proposal, Canada reserved the right to treat the United States and Mexico even worse than other countries if they enter into future agreements. Those other countries may, in fact, even include China, if there is an agreement between China and [Canada]. This proposal, I think if the United States had made it, would be dubbed a “poison pill.” We did not make it, though. Obviously, this is unacceptable to us, and my guess is it is to the Mexican side also. (read full remarks)
This loophole was the primary reason U.S. manufacturers relocated operations to Mexico. Corporations within the U.S. Auto-Sector could enhance profits by building in Mexico or Canada using cheap parts imported from Asia/China. The labor factor was not as big a part of the overall cost consideration as cheaper machined parts and imported raw materials.
If the U.S. applied the same tariffs to Canada and Mexico we apply to all trade nations, then the benefit of using Canada and Mexico -by those trade nations- is lost.
Corporations will no longer have any advantage, and many are likely to just deal directly with the U.S. This was the reason Trump, Lighthizer and Ross to retained Steel and Aluminum tariffs on Canada and Mexico until they agreed to the new USMCA rules.
When Trump took away the flawed NAFTA market access; and when Trump removed the ability of Mexico and Canada to broker themselves for economic benefit; there was no longer a financial benefit behind corporations investing in Canada. Under a binding trade pact between the USMCA partners, the NAFTA flaw is closed.
As a direct outcome billions of investment dollars are now being removed from any future consideration into Canada.
That’s the overarching reason for the Canadian GDP to halt.
Here’s the proverbial $64,000 question: Can Canada re-engineer their economy and actually begin to “make” products again, not just simply “assemble” foreign products from other nations?
Can Canada reverse three-decades of specifically structured economic policy decisions that were centered around this “assembly” (brokered) economy?
Can the environmentalists be put back into a box while heavy manufacturing and raw material development are reconstituted?
Can the environmentalists allow natural resource development? Oil development, mining operations, lowered overall energy costs, etc?
Can Canada somehow lower national energy costs so that Heavy manufacturing might consider restarting? (NOTE: heavy manufacturing requires massive energy use.)
Can Canada find any industrial development investors who would be willing to take a chance on all the above?
See the problem?
The Canadian economy is not likely going to get better without a radical shift in Canadian political perspectives and outlook(s).
Then again, perhaps that’s really why Justin and Chrystia were so damned set on protecting their “cultural industries” (ie. media) from competition.
Well, we cannot say we have not seen this Decepticon maneuver before. The open-border, pro-amnesty, globalist Koch Brothers have announced, yet again, they will take action in the 2020 primary races to remove any/all nationalist-minded blue-collar populist (MAGA) candidates…. in an effort, once again, to install their Wall Street globalist crew.
This is where the Koch Brothers join in common cause with Tom Donohue and Mitch McConnell. The Big Club is nothing if not entirely predictable:
OXON HILL, Md.— The Koch political network for the first time plans to intervene in GOP primaries as part of a deliberate 2020 strategy to reverse years of essentially rubber-stamping the Republican Party in general elections.
Unhappy with Republicans and Trump on issues ranging from trade, to immigration, to deficits and debt, the Koch groups are scaling back their support for the GOP out of concern that they had become an organ of the party. Phillips said the network still plans to make a substantial investment in federal and state campaigns over the next two years. (read more)
The UniParty outline here is one of the political dynamics CTH has discussed for over a decade. At its core elements the issue is Wall Street -vs- Main Street. Each time the CoC and/or Koch’s start to realize Main Street is a threat to their multinational financial objectives, they pour money into defeating Main Street candidates. It really is that simple.
Those who have been politically engaged for a long time will note the previous threat, prior to Donald Trump, was the Tea Party. After the 2010 Tsunami of Tea Party republicans, the Koch’s took swift action in 2012 to crush the rebellion. Frustrated with the sheer political corruption of it all, and not willing to cede ground to their interests, Senator Jim Demint vacated his office.
By the time 2014 rolled around, the Kochs and Tom Donohue joined together and Mitch McConnell gave free reign to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to destroy the remnants of the rebellious Tea Party politicians.
How Mitch McConnell Crushed the Tea Party: (Part 1 SEE HERE) and (Part 2 SEE HERE). They’ve never tried to hide what they are doing, it’s just that too few people actually believed how bold they would be about doing it. Those prior links are not to CTH articles, they are to CNN articles where Donohue and McConnell bragged about their success.
Look deep into the specifics of each series of events and you will clearly understand the frustration that remained in middle-class America. That frustration gave rise to candidate Donald J Trump and the Tea Party common sense populists, once again rallied to confront the Wall Street multinational and globalist political enterprise. The Tea Party evolved into Trump’s MAGA base.
For the Big Club there are trillions at stake, and they want multinational control. Globalism.
For Donald Trump he agrees. Yes, there are trillions at stake; only at the heart of all MAGAnomic policy he wants the middle-class to have control. Economic nationalism.
So we fight.
Within that fight the various representatives of the Big Club, in this case the Koch Brothers, step forward to use their financial influence to push back against nationalism.
And so it goes…
Our fight would be much more effective if people actually understood the nature of the enemy that opposes us. It’s not just leftists, it’s also the big club republicans; I call them Decepticons (deceptive conservatives).
Longtime Trump attorney Michael Cohen tells the House Oversight Committee that President Donald Trump is a conman, liar and racist who broke campaign finance law by paying hush money to prostitutes. Republican lawmakers did nothing but challenge Cohen’s credibility. Did they miss an opportunity to challenge his facts during his damning testimony? Bill Whittle Now is a production of the Members at http://BillWhittle.com
Okay, now USTR Robert Lighthizer’s cautiously worded enforcement testimony starts to take on a fuller context. When Ambassador Lighthizer was testifying before the mostly decepticon House Ways and Means Committee, he started to outline his newly designed trade enforcement mechanism… but he stopped; he didn’t want to reveal too much.
Now listen to Larry Kudlow describe “enforcement”. WATCH:
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If you watched the USTR testimony you would have seen how the “enforcement” mechanism within the U.S-China trade negotiations was the priority for Lighthizer’s focus; and he specifically mentioned “layered” enforcement triggers, specific to each sector, and issue.
CTH has never seen a U.S. Trade Representative so structurally willing to clear-cut the entire bamboo forest if needed. Lighthizer is intensely focused on enforcement.
Congressional reps were focusing most questions around Chinese purchases of U.S. goods. Lighthizer was blowing through those questions like annoying gnats. That’s not the focus of his structural engagement with the Chinese team. Lighthizer is going much deeper, into issues of much greater consequence than simply purchases via imports/exports.
While increased Chinese purchases to lower the deficit are a part of the goal, they are a very small part of the goal. The protection of U.S. intellectual property; the removal of non-tariff trade barriers; the protection of U.S. ownership rights as Americans operate inside China; the confrontation of currency manipulation, and the sector by sector enforcement provisions are Lighthizer’s primary objective.
If you overlay the comments by NEC Chairman Larry Kudlow (above), with the insightful commentary about ‘enforcement’ by USTR Lighthizer earlier, we can see the picture emerging.
Lighthizer wasn’t specific, Kudlow gave more detail.
What Kudlow is outlining is what Lighthizer hinted toward.
Each of the sectors within the U.S-China trade agreement will have their own specific multi-staged enforcement mechanism that triggers one-way tariffs if China violates the terms; and China cannot retaliate.
Each trade sector will be protected on: [1] intellectual property rights (copyright, patents etc); [2] non tariff barriers (artificial Chinese regulatory hurdles); [3] private ownership external to the controlling reach of Chinese state-owned dictates; [4] as well as financial access and larger currency manipulation schemes.
Within each trade sector; and upon each protected aspect; Lighthizer is building-in a multi-tiered tariff system that would immediately punish the Chinese State-Owned system (all companies therein) with staged, one-way tariffs and countervailing duties that cannot be avoided and China cannot retaliate against.
In essence, and in practice, it sounds like the sector-specific American product protection means: if China violates the sector-specific terms, any terms, the equivalent (or closest equivalent) Chinese product would automatically cost more…. and the U.S. product would cost less. An enforcement system giving U.S. producers and owners an immediate benefit; and giving China an immediate punishment.
[This would also likely apply to U.S. companies with Chinese controlling interests.]
This sounds like the enforcement framework within a heavy MOU; that is then guaranteed to transfer into the final, legal and binding agreement; and be applied to every element, within every sector, across the entirety of the U.S. commerce relationship with China.
Lighthizer described “steps” and “layers” of this protection at every level, and across every element, of commercial engagement with China. However, Lighthizer didn’t describe the punishment; it sounds like Larry Kudlow did.
The appearance of long-time Trump confidante Lynne Patton at the congressional testimony of former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen created a considerable stir amid Washington DC. However, the context of her appearance takes on even more drama when considered against Patton’s Facebook post from January 18th of this year:
Lynne Patton: […] 3) Many of you may already know that I considered Michael Cohen to be one of my very best friends. Countless people can confirm that we were virtually inseparable during my employment at Trump – and that he is, single-handedly – responsible for introducing me to the Trump family and effectively changing my entire life. I would be lying if I didn’t admit that my heart still breaks for him and for his family, with whom I had grown extremely close.
4) What many of you may not be aware of is the fact that I can personally confirm that the ONLY reason Michael Cohen “turned on” the President of the United States is because Mueller threatened to throw his wife in jail for up to 30 years. Period. She is the co-guarantor of a $20M personal loan that Mueller discovered Michael secured back in 2015 by falsely inflating the value of his taxi medallions – effectively making her part & parcel to the federal charge of “Making False Statements to a Financial Institution,” to which Cohen ultimately plead guilty. This is also the reason why Cohen’s longtime taxi medallion partner, Evgeny “Gene” Freidman, was granted immunity. (read more)
This is a rather stunning statement. However, it holds the elements of truth and explanation as to why the Special Counsel, Robert Mueller/Andrew Weissmann, would pass off their assembled Cohen prosecution to the Southern District of New York.
If this leverage against Cohen’s wife to gain virtually unlimited legal and political cooperation is true; and it does follow a pre-established pattern of unethical prosecutorial conduct previously displayed by Andrew Weissmann; then many of the issues surrounding the behavior of Michael Cohen do begin to make sense.
Interestingly, this type of unlawful coercion and threat to compel a guilty plea and cooperation from a defendant are specifically prohibited:
In fact, when Michael Cohen appeared before Judge Andrew Carter on November 29th, 2018, part of the plea questioning from the court goes directly to this issue.
The judge specifically asked Cohen, twice, if any threats or promises were made to Cohen in exchange for his cooperation. [TRANSCRIPT]:
If it is accurate that prosecutors leveraged the potential prosecution of Mr. Cohen’s wife in order to gain his plea agreement – then not only were those threats unethical, demonstrably prosecutorial misconduct and potentially illegal, but also Michael Cohen’s denial therein means he would have lied to the court in his plea hearing as noted above.
However, this could explain how much control is being exerted over Cohen for maximum political value. Remember this same prosecution twice agreed to defer Cohen’s imprisonment to afford him time to testify to congress.
Additionally, immediately after the guilty plea by Michael Cohen his advisor/spokesman, Lanny Davis, then changed the legal team in preparation for further exploitation by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Elijah Cummings and democrat politicians in congress.
WASHINGTON […] Lanny Davis, Cohen’s legal adviser, announced that Michael Monico and Barry Spevack will replace Petrillo, a former federal prosecutor, and his associate, Amy Lester.
Petrillo, who worked for years in the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York, had represented Cohen through his cooperation with federal prosecutors, including special counsel Robert Mueller. Cohen hired Petrillo on June 19, 2018, replacing white-collar defense attorney Stephen Ryan.
A source familiar with the shakeup told The Daily Caller News Foundation that the change is being made because the focus for Cohen is now on “Washington and Congress” rather than with prosecutors in New York. (link)
[…] 9) Lastly, given that Michael Cohen is barred from discussing the Russian investigation when he testifies before the House Oversight Committee, it’s safe to conclude that his testimony … will effectively amount to nothing more than political theater and partisan fodder for late night hosts simply to embarrass a sitting President over past behavior he may or may not have engaged in as a private citizen.
10) In closing, Michael Cohen always wanted to be famous. Sadly, he has gotten his wish. I personally stopped communicating with Michael when it became known in May 2018 that he was defrauding various companies (from a Korean defense firm to a global pharmaceutical company) for millions of dollars by falsely claiming he could leverage his connection with the President to their favor. (more)
Final thought… Yikes, if what Patton claims is accurate, well, what does that say about the guy in charge of the Mueller process, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein?
The appearance of long-time Trump confidante Lynn Patton at the congressional testimony of former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen created a considerable stir amid Washington DC. However, the context of her appearance takes on even more drama when considered against Patton’s Facebook post from January 18th of this year:
Lynne Patton: […] 3) Many of you may already know that I considered Michael Cohen to be one of my very best friends. Countless people can confirm that we were virtually inseparable during my employment at Trump – and that he is, single-handedly – responsible for introducing me to the Trump family and effectively changing my entire life. I would be lying if I didn’t admit that my heart still breaks for him and for his family, with whom I had grown extremely close.
4) What many of you may not be aware of is the fact that I can personally confirm that the ONLY reason Michael Cohen “turned on” the President of the United States is because Mueller threatened to throw his wife in jail for up to 30 years. Period. She is the co-guarantor of a $20M personal loan that Mueller discovered Michael secured back in 2015 by falsely inflating the value of his taxi medallions – effectively making her part & parcel to the federal charge of “Making False Statements to a Financial Institution,” to which Cohen ultimately plead guilty. This is also the reason why Cohen’s longtime taxi medallion partner, Evgeny “Gene” Freidman, was granted immunity. (read more)
This is a rather stunning statement. However, it holds the elements of truth and explanation as to why the Special Counsel, Robert Mueller/Andrew Weissmann, would pass off their assembled Cohen prosecution to the Southern District of New York.
If this leverage against Cohen’s wife to gain virtually unlimited legal and political cooperation is true; and it does follow a pre-established pattern of unethical prosecutorial conduct previously displayed by Andrew Weissmann; then many of the issues surrounding the behavior of Michael Cohen do begin to make sense.
Interestingly, this type of unlawful coercion and threat to compel a guilty plea and cooperation from a defendant are specifically prohibited:
In fact, when Michael Cohen appeared before Judge Andrew Carter on November 29th, 2018, part of the plea questioning from the court goes directly to this issue.
The judge specifically asked Cohen, twice, if any threats or promises were made to Cohen in exchange for his cooperation. [TRANSCRIPT]:
If it is accurate that prosecutors leveraged the potential prosecution of Mr. Cohen’s wife in order to gain his plea agreement – then not only were those threats unethical, demonstrably prosecutorial misconduct and potentially illegal, but also Michael Cohen’s denial therein means he would have lied to the court in his plea hearing as noted above.
However, this could explain how much control is being exerted over Cohen for maximum political value. Remember this same prosecution twice agreed to defer Cohen’s imprisonment to afford him time to testify to congress.
Additionally, immediately after the guilty plea by Michael Cohen his advisor/spokesman, Lanny Davis, then changed the legal team in preparation for further exploitation by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Elijah Cummings and democrat politicians in congress.
WASHINGTON […] Lanny Davis, Cohen’s legal adviser, announced that Michael Monico and Barry Spevack will replace Petrillo, a former federal prosecutor, and his associate, Amy Lester.
Petrillo, who worked for years in the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York, had represented Cohen through his cooperation with federal prosecutors, including special counsel Robert Mueller. Cohen hired Petrillo on June 19, 2018, replacing white-collar defense attorney Stephen Ryan.
A source familiar with the shakeup told The Daily Caller News Foundation that the change is being made because the focus for Cohen is now on “Washington and Congress” rather than with prosecutors in New York. (link)
[…] 9) Lastly, given that Michael Cohen is barred from discussing the Russian investigation when he testifies before the House Oversight Committee, it’s safe to conclude that his testimony … will effectively amount to nothing more than political theater and partisan fodder for late night hosts simply to embarrass a sitting President over past behavior he may or may not have engaged in as a private citizen.
10) In closing, Michael Cohen always wanted to be famous. Sadly, he has gotten his wish. I personally stopped communicating with Michael when it became known in May 2018 that he was defrauding various companies (from a Korean defense firm to a global pharmaceutical company) for millions of dollars by falsely claiming he could leverage his connection with the President to their favor. (more)
Final thought… Yikes, if what Patton claims is accurate, well, what does that say about the guy in charge of the Mueller process, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein?
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This is a library of News Events not reported by the Main Stream Media documenting & connecting the dots on How the Obama Marxist Liberal agenda is destroying America
