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Saturday, June 10, 2017

Follow the Lawyers...

You ever see one of those movies where the cops catch one of the little fish in a criminal conspiracy and stuff him in an interrogation room? He's the foot soldier who killed an FBI agent on orders from the big bad because he wouldn't stop the investigation. 

The cops are badgering the guy to make a deal, and are starting to make some headway when all of a sudden the lieutenant walks in and stops the interrogation, saying, "Your lawyer is here."

And the foot soldiers says, "But I don't have a lawyer." And the lieutenant says, "Well, you do now."

We find out that the lawyer was hired by the big bad who ordered the hit. This lawyer isn't really representing the foot soldier. He's representing the big bad, making sure that everyone in the conspiracy stays on the same page, that the story is consistent and that no one turns on anyone else.

The same scenario is happening in the Trump-Russia investigation. The lawyer's name is Marc Kasowitz, and he represents Donald Trump and his Russian co-conspirators:
Marc E. Kasowitz’s clients include Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch who is close to President Vladimir Putin and has done business with Trump’s former campaign manager. Kasowitz also represents Sberbank, Russia’s largest state-owned bank, U.S. court records show.
Other juicy details:
In 2008, Forbes magazine listed Deripaska as the ninth-richest man in the world. In 2006, the United States revoked his visa to enter the country, citing possible ties to organized crime. He has denied those links, claiming the allegations are part of an effort to smear him.

Kasowitz represents Sberbank in a 2016 lawsuit that is still in its preliminary stages. An owner of a Russian granite-mining business accuses the bank of conspiring with competitors to dismantle his company and seize its assets. The bank has not responded in court filings.

Sberbank was one of the sponsors of the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow produced by Trump, who owned the competition. The deputy head of the bank at the time was Sergey Gorkov, who met with [Jared] Kushner in December. Gorkov, a graduate of the academy of the Federal Security Service, or FSB, the domestic successor of the former Soviet KGB intelligence bureau, was named to head VEB in February 2016.
It's not clear who the big bad is in this movie. Is it Deripaska, the mob boss? Is it Gorkov, the banker? Is it Putin, the puppet master behind it all?

In all these scenarios Trump is the bumbling foot soldier who was caught red-handed murdering the FBI agent on the trail of the conspiracy.

In the movies, when it becomes clear that the lawyer is just setting up the foot soldier to take the fall, the fall guy gets his own lawyer and rats on the big bad in exchange for a lesser sentence. It rarely works out well for the foot soldier, who usually winds up with a shiv in the back while awaiting trial.

The Russians meddled in the US election to prevent Hillary Clinton from becoming president, to sow chaos in American politics and to weaken this country. They have succeeded in all their goals.

Now Trump is under investigation, waiting to see if there's going to be an impeachment trial. He's scared out of his tiny mind, wondering who's holding the shiv and when they'll strike.

Republicans in congress, take note: do you want to be added to the list of the Trump's co-conspirators, or help get justice for the FBI agent?

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