Judgment Day is Drawing Nigh
After weeks of testimony — not to mention years of actual experience — it all comes down to who is the real GLOAT.
The only thing certain as 12 Manhattan jurors begin deliberations is that Donald Trump defense attorney Todd Blanche will be remembered for a new acronym — coined with little regard to the fact that his client clocked in with over 30,000 lies in four presidential years.
The most frightening thing about the events taking place before Justice Juan Merchan is how little difference it will make, *if polls are to be believed*.
Take for example, the words of actor Dennis Quaid:
“He may be an asshole but he’s my asshole.”
Or the “analysis” by CNN Republican talking head Matt Gorman about Trump’s hold on a sizeable minority of the American public:
“He had the Number 1 show on television.”
But polls and focus groups* do bear out a stunning reality. One quarter of independent voters in Georgia, Nevada, Wisconsin and Michigan would be MORE likely to vote for the nation’s first Convict-in-Chief. And up to a third of that subset would back him in Pennsylvania, Arizona and North Carolina.
Gorman may be on to something.
Blanche offered a few whoppers of his own during a closing summation, insisting there’s “not a shred of evidence” that Trump committed criminal fraud by falsifying business records in what prosecutors painted as a scheme to buy the silence of Stormy Daniels and prevent the meltdown of his 2016 presidential cammpaign weeks from the finish line.
He was correct about there not being “a shred” in that Trump, CFO Allen Weisselberg and chief prosecution witness Michael Cohen didn’t take a voluminous amount of paperwork to a shredder. Including the multiple $35,000 checks to Cohen signed by Trump.
Few will dispute Cohen is a strong candidate for the GLOAT title. Trump’s self-described “fixer” was the bully’s bully. He even told the truth about it — on the witness stand:
“It was fantastic,” Cohen said of his experience at the Trump Organization. He called it “an amazing experience in many many ways. There were great times. There were several less than great times, but for the most part I enjoyed the responsibilities that were given to me.”
Prosecutors never tried to hide Cohen’s unsavory past, offering up that unshredded paperwork — not to mention witnesses like Trump loyalist Hope Hicks — to corroborate Cohen’s new-found truthfulness.
And Assistant District Attorney Joshua Steinglass pointedly noted how Cohen came to the stand:
We didn't choose Michael Cohen as a witness … We didn't pick him up at the witness store … The defendant chose Michael Cohen. He was his fixer.”
So as we wait for the verdict — which will clearly hinge on the jury weighing the balance between Cohen’s character and a veritable library of invoices, texts and emails — we’re left to ponder what this may mean for the upcoming election.
The Biden campaign, which has shied away from any mention of the activities that Trump has falsely accused them of rigging, for the first time trotted out someone to speak to the army of cameras surrounding the courthouse.
And if Trump’s activities have frequently been compared to those of a mob boss, who better to speak than goodfella Jimmy Conway, better known in real life as Robert De Niro.
“We New Yorkers used to tolerate him when he was just another crappy real estate hustler masquerading as a big shot,” De Niro said. “I love this city. I don’t want to destroy it. Donald Trump wants to destroy not only the city but the country, and, eventually, he could destroy the world.”
De Niro also reprised a bit of his role in Taxi Driver, exchanging many [bleeped] words with a Trump acolyte who he must have asked “you talkin’ to me?”
And so we wait for the ratings to come in.