An Epic Mistake by Paul Manafort

[DonViejo]

June 5, 2018 at 8:33 am EDT By Taegan Goddard

The Atlantic: “Robert Mueller’s allegation that Manafort attempted to tamper with a witness permits us to peer inside Manafort’s mind, as it has functioned in a very different set of circumstances. When it comes to Manafort’s own deep problems, his moment of legal peril, he seems unable to muster strategic thinking. He has shown himself capable of profoundly dunderheaded miscalculations.”

“It’s hard to understand how he could have attempted the scheme described by Mueller in the midst of the highest-profile most-scrutinized criminal inquiry of the century. But that alone fails to capture the depths of his blundering.”

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https://politicalwire.com/2018/06/05/an-epic-mistake-by-paul-manafort/

[TimeSnowDemos]

1. It's easy to understand

The pressure of his guilt and the overwhelming nature of the evidence against him - and that's just what we know about - is causing him to make mistakes.

This is what panic looks like.

And hey, whatever was on offer from Trump obviously wasn't good enough.

[manor321]

10. Exactly

It is annoying that these journalists just can't imagine how guilty these people are.

[Demsrule86]

2. Arrogance...in my opinion.

He thinks he is smarter than everyone including his lawyers who are now in jeopardy of losing their law licenses.

[jberryhill]

4. Why are his lawyers in jeopardy?

[Demsrule86]

7. If they had knowledge of this, than they suborned perjury and will be disbarred.

[jberryhill]

9. That's a big "if"

It is highly unlikely that his lawyers had anything to do with it.

Everyone has a Sixth Amendment right to an attorney. Manafort wouldn't be the first criminal defendant to be accused of violating conditions of his release, and the likelihood that his attorneys had anything to do with it is approximately nil.

There is no hint or suggestion in Mueller's filing that they had anything to do with it, so why make stuff up?

[Demsrule86]

11. It is an 'if' ...I have no idea how likely it is...there are plenty of mob styled lawyers

who have been disbarred and even prosecuted for this. I have a right to my opinion. It is a discussion...so I will say what I please. I never stated this as a fact. Have a nice day.

[jberryhill]

12. Okay

"He thinks he is smarter than everyone including his lawyers who are now in jeopardy of losing their law licenses."

I had no idea that was stated as an opinion, since it is not one shared by the people who are prosecuting Manafort.

[Jersey Devil]

13. knowledge of what?

I don't know what Manafort did that constitutes "tampering", but there would be nothing wrong with his lawyers contacting witnesses to see what they might have to say. If that is all the lawyers did then they did nothing wrong. My guess is that they had no idea Manafort was sending encrypted messages attempting to get the witnesses to lie, which I think is the allegation.

[Demsrule86]

14. It is tampering with witnesses actually and they can be disbarred.

[MrsCoffee]

3. He is counting on a pardon.

Definitely arrogance.

[Blue_true]

19. With him cornered like a rats, Trump giving him a pardon is as bad as Trump

giving himself one.

[mercuryblues]

5. Manafort is fucked

and doesn't realize how fucked he is. It comes as no surprise that he is blundering. He is used to giving orders to people to fix things, not doing it himself. He didn't care if they were caught breaking the law, as long as the outcome was favorable. His minions were expendable. He is forced into a corner without minions to take the fall.

There is another suggestive fact that Mueller posits in passing. Manafort’s witness tampering scheme featured a co-conspirator. Mueller doesn’t name the accomplice. But it’s not hard to discern his identity based on Mueller’s description. Manafort tried to contact his Hapsburg group collaborators through his old Russo-Ukrainian aide, Konstantin Kilimnik.

By any rationale standard, Manafort should have long ago jettisoned his relationship with Kilimnik. On two separate occasions, Mueller has described Kilimnik as having “ties to Russian intelligence.” Put differently, in the middle of a scandal featuring collusion with the Russian state, it seems Manafort relied on an asset of Russian intelligence to abet a plot to tamper with a witness. That’s hardly the work of a strategic genius.


https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/06/paul-manafort-loses-his-cool/562034/

[dembotoz]

6. In trump world he could get away with such stuff

The biggest problem trump et Al has is that they have gotten away with corruption for so long the think they can

If no one ever holds ur feet to the 🔥, why worry about the fire.

[Demsrule86]

8. We agree on this. I don't understand why Trump was indicted years ago.

[dembotoz]

15. in hindsight all the signs of corruption was there for years and the authorities did nothing

Bernie madoff same damn thing.
Guess when you are rich the rules are different.
And he would threaten to sue anyone and everyone. and he had the resources to do it.
Who has the resources to take on a trump with his rooms full of lawyers.
So he just gets away with more and more

[Demsrule86]

16. Which really makes me mad...as I have a close family member who lied on mortgage documents

and spent almost two years at Club Fed in Jersey...not saying he didn't do it...did it to help his Mom...and the feds gave him a choice, plead guilty or your elderly Mom goes to jail. I don't absolve what he did...but it seems the color of justice is green.

[dembotoz]

18. Yep

[Lucinda]

17. Arrogance...or maybe he wants to get popped?