Patterico's Pontifications

2/13/2018

Trump’s Lawyer: Yeah, I Paid $130,000 to Stormy Daniels

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 9:30 pm



Stormy Daniels 600px

Gee, whatever for? She told us there was no affair!

Maggie Haberman at the New York Times has the scoop:

Michael D. Cohen, President Trump’s longtime personal lawyer, said on Tuesday that he paid $130,000 out of his own pocket to a pornographic-film actress who had once claimed to have had an affair with Mr. Trump.

In the most detailed explanation of the 2016 payment made to the actress, Stephanie Clifford, Mr. Cohen, who worked as a counsel to the Trump Organization for more than a decade, said he was not reimbursed for the payment.

“Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly,” Mr. Cohen said in a statement to The New York Times. “The payment to Ms. Clifford was lawful, and was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone.”

The Wall Street Journal reported on this payment last month, but this is the first we’ve heard that Cohen was involved. Haberman says that, according to Cohen’s statement, he gave a similar answer to Common Cause after they “filed a complaint saying that the payment, which was made through a limited liability company that Mr. Cohen established, was an in-kind contribution to the Trump campaign.”

But no such thing happened. And Cohen never expected to get anything in return.

He just gave $130,000 to a porn star for … who knows what reason. And that is what happened, and stop asking questions about it. The End!

[Cross-posted at RedState and The Jury Talks Back.]

174 Responses to “Trump’s Lawyer: Yeah, I Paid $130,000 to Stormy Daniels”

  1. If daleyrocks were here, he would appreciate the important journalistic principles behind the photo.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  2. Blackmail money, generally, is recoverable.

    Just how f’ked-up are these f’king Trump people?

    nk (dbc370)

  3. Those um, important journalistic principles are the signs of um, a true professional.

    Dana (023079)

  4. Totally believable.

    Totally.

    Believable.

    I sure all you attorneys would do the same for one of your clients, right?

    Right? Um, guys?

    *crickets*

    (As an aside, isn’t this kind of a dumb story to make up – even apart from epic failure of the laugh test – since it precludes any claim of attorney-client privilege?)

    Dave (445e97)

  5. I sure all you attorneys would do the same for one of your clients, right?

    $5.00 for a coffee, a donut and bus fare when they were let out of lockup.

    nk (dbc370)

  6. Fake Boobs

    mg (765e6a)

  7. Fake Boobs

    …get Spanky all hot and bothered.

    Dave (445e97)

  8. Fake Boobs

    Fake as they come. Perfect for a guy like Trump.

    Patterico (89c78f)

  9. This story, and nk’s comment, do leave me with some questions.

    At what point does blackmail become blackmail (i.e. a crime)?

    It’s not really clear to me – if the threatened disclosure is truthful – why offering to exchange non-disclosure for a payment or other consideration should be a crime at all. Exclusive rights to information of various kinds are traded routinely in many different types of business. If the party who doesn’t want the information disclosed finds the price unattractive, they can simply decline the offer; the situation is then the same as if no offer had been made in the first place.

    A repeating cycle of demands (“Pay me $100 or I’ll tell.” “OK, here it is.” “Now pay me another $200 or I’ll tell.” “…”) would be a different kettle of fish, and seems like a form of fraud.

    Dave (445e97)

  10. That’s courtesan on courtesan crime. Or would a lawyer be more of a Chief White Eunuch?

    …in the words of the Ottomanist Halil İnalcık “the sole mediator between the Sultan and the world outside the Palace”.

    Pinandpuller (498995)

  11. A pair of mulligans; the Perkins Axiom in play.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  12. This changes everything!

    Up until now, I was certain that Trump was a paragon of Virtue!!

    LOL!!!

    Seriously, who cares?

    I hope he did have an affair with her.

    Aarradin (00193a)

  13. @4.I sure all you attorneys would do the same for one of your clients, right?

    Client services; pro bono for pro boning.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  14. I hope he did have an affair with her.

    I hope so, too. Who needs impeachment when there’s AIDS and hepatitis C?

    nk (dbc370)

  15. we know George W. Bush’s perverted and lecherous war hero daddy has had way more trouble keeping it in his pants than President Trump that’s for sure

    and we know Bill Clinton likes to rape girls with his herpes penis

    but what do we know about President Trump?

    we know he’s doing a very good job being president, and that it’s a good thing for America

    I love him a lot

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  16. 13, that’s called the Casey Anthony payment plan.

    urbanleftbehind (d74249)

  17. Stormy looked a tad chunkier after the SOTU on Kimmel’s couch.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  18. But I suppose that a guy who had sex with landmines (that would be Mr. President) would sneer at AIDS and hep C.

    nk (dbc370)

  19. Is ‘Silicone Valley’ or ‘Floppy Discs’ Stormy’s Secret Service code name?

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  20. This changes everything!

    Up until now, I was certain that Trump was a paragon of Virtue!!

    LOL!!!

    Seriously, who cares?

    I hope he did have an affair with her.

    Aarradin (00193a) — 2/14/2018 @ 1:30 am

    Reports are that the alleged affair occurred while Trump’s wife was pregnant with their son Barron.

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  21. It is important to note that Trumpalos are #NotACult.

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  22. If the dumb Russians had left out the peeing on the bed part, everybody would believe that Trump did in fact consort with Russian hookers as related in the Steele dossier. Easily. Without question.

    nk (dbc370)

  23. cowardpig war hero John McCain had an affair while his wife was in the hospital

    a SEX affair oh my goodness

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  24. Aaaarrrradin would have quivered with indignation had even a baseless rumor circulated that Obama was unfaithful. No admission of a huge payoff would have been necessary.

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  25. Not that it would make a difference to Trumpkins. He could shtup a hooker on Fifth Avenue, and they’d still support him.

    nk (dbc370)

  26. And he may already have.

    nk (dbc370)

  27. I heard that Jeffrey Dahmer cooked and ate his lovers, happyfeet. I’ll give Trump credit for not doing that. For now — who knows what kind of meat is in meatloaf, really, and catsup can disguise a lot of weird flavors.

    nk (dbc370)

  28. What this thread needs is a huffy comment from shipwreckedcrew.

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  29. the thing about meatloaf is by definition you cut it with some kind of carb

    this is no good you see

    what are we poor

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  30. 30: But I’m sure it was the first affair he ever had.

    shipwreckedcrew (56b591)

  31. How’s that.

    shipwreckedcrew (56b591)

  32. How about this:

    She says they never had an affair.

    Schiff says the changes to the memo were substantive.

    You can’t bring yourself to trust either partisan in the Schiff v. Nunes pissing match.

    I’ll wait for the “Donald and Stormy, the Movie” before deciding if she’s lying.

    shipwreckedcrew (56b591)

  33. You can do better than that, swc. Put your hands on your hips and get mad! Demand to know what I think I proved with this thin evidence. Offer a wholly implausible counter-scenario. Make false assertions and refuse to retract them. You know: do that thang you do so well!

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  34. Well, he said he “facilitate[d]” the payment, he didn’t say he made the payment.

    Here’s the key line: “In a private transaction in 2016, I used my own personal funds to facilitate a payment of $130,000 to [Daniels]. Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with [Daniels], and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly.”

    And he didn’t say whether Mr./President Trump was a party to transaction.

    SteveMG (ea62d2)

  35. I do believe in admissions against interest. If Sdhiff came out and said Nunes nailed it, I’d tend to believe Nunes nailed it.

    The illogical and off-base analogy is warmer but you can still do better. There are plenty deeper depths of dishonesty left for you to plumb. Work in it.

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  36. Here’s an article that would be worthy of a post and about 1000 comments from readers.

    Or you can just keep up with your “NeverTrump” entertainment.

    shipwreckedcrew (56b591)

  37. Well, he said he “facilitate[d]” the payment, he didn’t say he made the payment.

    Here’s the key line: “In a private transaction in 2016, I used my own personal funds to facilitate a payment of $130,000 to [Daniels]. Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with [Daniels], and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly.”

    Lol this is great. “I was not reimbursed for this payment that I never made made but merely facilitated.” Now that’s an implausible counter-scenario! swc, learn from this and improve.

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  38. Here’s an article that would be worthy of a post and about 1000 comments from readers.

    Or you can just keep up with your “NeverTrump” entertainment.

    It’s too bad Barack Obama put up those barriers to starting a blog or you could write about this yourself.

    Patterico (c3b99c)

  39. Who is a bigger threat to the “America” you know and love — Donald Trump’s presidency, or the ChiComs?

    You answer might be revealing.

    shipwreckedcrew (56b591)

  40. I have it on good authority that Stormy Daniels had the affair with Michael D. Cohen and that’s why he paid up.

    What? What? The voices in my head aren’t a good enough authority?

    Fred Z (05d938)

  41. Up until now, I was certain that Trump was a paragon of Virtue!!

    LOL!!!

    Seriously, who cares?

    I hope he did have an affair with her.

    Mike Pence

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  42. Cohen can always claim he was in Prague talking to Rooskies when they demand a timeline from him.

    BuDuh (ea52a0)

  43. Shipwrecked response is revealingm

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  44. To use Obama’s expression: “And lest we get on our high horse,” at least it is an amicable breakup unlike one involving a bridge.

    AZ Bob (f60c80)

  45. Trump discovered frolicking in Russian safe house for transit of human trafficking

    SO?

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  46. What does Hammity say about the appropriateness?

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  47. Dana? Aren’t you poutraged, for now?

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  48. @41…That depends to whom the question is directed, shipwreckedcrew. To me the bigger threat is the ChiComs (or any Coms), to the comrades who post here, Trump. But then, “the America they know and love” doesn’t yet exist which is why they see Trump as a threat. Sadly, since Trump is no more than a NY democrat sooner or later he will revert to his natural proclivities and become a NYCom.

    Rev.Hoagie (6bbda7)

  49. It’s the grubbiness, you Trumpkins and Trump supporters. The New York gutter melding with the Hollywood sewer. The f’ked up no-class trashiness of it.

    nk (dbc370)

  50. So going to the depths of will folks two months ago was about what

    https://www.politico.com/story/2018/02/14/trump-polling-democrats-republicans-407315

    narciso (d1f714)

  51. Even teh Reverend has no qualms.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  52. Meanwhile……

    Senator Rand Paul
    @RandPaul
    In case you didn’t think Congress was absurd before, Senate Democrats are now filibustering the open immigration debate they asked for, and are refusing to put their bill on the floor.

    harkin (75fedf)

  53. Too late Harkin. Momementum..

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  54. “Susan Rice is far from the brightest bulb on the tree, but she was well aware that by concealing facts ostensibly relating to national security from her counterpart in the new administration–General Michael Flynn–she was, at a minimum, violating longstanding civic norms. If she actually lied to Flynn, she could have been accused of much worse. So Rice wanted to be able to retrieve her email, if she found herself in a sticky situation, and tell the world that she hid relevant facts about Russia from the new administration on Barack Obama’s orders… What were the secrets that Obama wanted to keep from the new administration? We can easily surmise that the fact that the Steele memo was paid for by the Democratic Party; that the FBI had to some degree collaborated with Steele; that the Clinton campaign had fed some of the fake news in the dossier to Steele; and that Comey’s FBI had used Steele’s fabrications as the basis for FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign were among the facts that Obama and his minions didn’t want Michael Flynn and Donald Trump to know. Susan Rice, we can infer, was told to keep these secrets, and if anyone ever asked why she had failed to disclose them to Michael Flynn and others on Trump’s team, or even lied to those people, she would have the defense that President Obama ordered her to do it. There may be more to it than this. The redacted paragraph likely contains more information about what it was that Rice wasn’t supposed to tell the Trump team. One of these days, we will learn what was blacked out.”

    http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/02/why-susan-rice-wrote-an-email-to-herself.php

    Colonel Haiku (1d71cc)

  55. 52.It’s the grubbiness, you Trumpkins and Trump supporters. The New York gutter melding with the Hollywood sewer. The f’ked up no-class trashiness of it.


    Really, nk? Like that crap was invented by Trump? Puleeze. That “grubbiness” as you put it has been a marriage of like minded leftists since the 1960’s. Where have you been?

    Rev.Hoagie (6bbda7)

  56. Two words: Maggie Haberman.

    Colonel Haiku (1d71cc)

  57. You Trumpty Dumptys are beside yourselves with the distractions.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  58. I hope you guys remembered to remember for Valentine’s Day.

    Rev.Hoagie (6bbda7)

  59. Meanwhile in other news, an Iranian defense official is claiming teh West sent Jewish lizards as nuclear spies…

    Colonel Haiku (1d71cc)

  60. I wonder if Devin Nunes puts release of the Dem memo up for another vote, would Adam Schiff vote against it today?

    He’s now saying he’s not willing to make any revisions, but they are still looking at possible redactions, in order to get it released.

    shipwreckedcrew (56b591)

  61. Really, nk? Like that crap was invented by Trump? Puleeze. That “grubbiness” as you put it has been a marriage of like minded leftists since the 1960’s. Where have you been?

    And you think that’s a defense of Trump? That he’s as grubby as any Leftist?

    nk (dbc370)

  62. Trump never invented, improved, researched or thought anything original.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  63. Well they rounded up all the dolphins, good bye and thanks for all the fish.

    Schiff for brains has nothing, but they paid for that nothing, so like justice league they need to milk it.

    narciso (c29e78)

  64. Todays DREAMER and Diversity Update™

    A North Carolina toddler was killed while riding in an ambulance after an illegal alien allegedly smashed his car into the emergency vehicle on February 11.
    Jose Martin Duran Romero, 27, allegedly crashed his car into the side of an ambulance in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, early on Sunday. Inside was a three-year-old boy and his mother, Lyndsay Ann Oakes, who were being transported to a local hospital for an undisclosed medical emergency, according to the Daily Mail.

    The child was killed. His mother received non-life-threatening injuries that were later treated at the hospital. The driver of the ambulance and a paramedic also suffered minor injuries from the crash.

    Winston-Salem Police reported administering a breathalyzer test to Romero two hours after the crash. Officials said the suspect registered more than two times the legal limit for driving under the influence.

    Rev.Hoagie (6bbda7)

  65. But this is a cheap shot..heh.

    In a 1990 divorce deposition, under oath, Ivana Trump swore that in a fit of rage, Donald raped her because of the pain he was suffering resulting from his scalp reduction surgery in 1989.

    Donald’s scalp reduction, also known as alopecia reduction (AR), is most successfully performed on patients with balding on the crown on the head, according to HairtransplantMentor.com “The procedure, which essentially cuts out the patient’s bald spot, follows these steps: Under anesthesia, the surgeon cuts away the balding area of the scalp. Usually a portion somewhere between the crown and the vertex transitional point is removed. The remaining skin (which is able to grow hair) is sewn back together.”

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  66. Of course as hank between the real story is with Mrs dube the Wendy Davis of louisiana

    narciso (c29e78)

  67. Trump has been President for a year. Why was that illegal still in the country?

    nk (dbc370)

  68. So, The Donald isn’t above messing around with hot chicks. Wow! What a curious pastime.

    The Boy Scout Handbook recommends cold hip baths or did back in the days before the gods released me from that peculiar curse.

    And, of course, the usual noisy tribe of ‘sinless’ holier than thou virtue signaling hypocrites can’t but elbow each other out of the way to cast the first stones.

    Yet, it remains the one positive thing that can aleays be said in defense of The Donald: at least he ain’t light in the loafers.

    ropelight (e06aeb)

  69. Because for the dems it’s the argument clinic, as with the stimulus, they want an open ended bucket of chum.

    narciso (c29e78)

  70. Of course if you think Trump is a disgrace to the country and it’s absurd that he’s president then you want the liberals to win.

    You know those liberal? The ones who are moral relativists and have no principles except attaining power.

    Because us Trumpsters are not like that. No sirree, we reject that type of thinking.

    SteveMG (ea62d2)

  71. As for the Chicoms, Trump already bent the knee to them, or did you forget his trip to China, China, China?

    nk (dbc370)

  72. Because you always have some jackalope judge to cover for him, like the baseball infielder with the late reality star wife and 20 lbs of coke

    narciso (c29e78)

  73. And you think that’s a defense of Trump? That he’s as grubby as any Leftist?


    Apparently you misconstrued my pointing out that Trump did not invent “grubbiness” as some sort of a defense for him. I did not say that, nor did I mean that, nor did I even suggest that.

    As far as Trump being as “grubby as any Leftist” I did say up thread at # 50 ” Trump is no more than a NY democrat sooner or later he will revert to his natural proclivities and become a NYCom.” What more do you want, nk? I support Trump as long as Trump supports America. When he stops, and he will as a democrat without any morals, I will then stop supporting Trump. But right now, today, Trump seems to be doing what I as an American and as a conservative and as a patriot want him to do. Therefore, as I see it anyone not supporting Trump while he is supporting America is not supporting America.

    B!tching and moaning about Trump’s personal crap is for his political enemies (who, BTW are your enemies too) and are of no consequence for those of us who want to keep the fascist commie democrats out of power. Don’t side with the people who think the Commissar of Propaganda and Agitation wins a gold medal for diplomacy even as she is in charge of brainwashing people and punishing those who “fail to comply”.

    Rev.Hoagie (6bbda7)

  74. Narciso, thanks for the partial obfuscation re #78.

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  75. Isn’t this a shocking violation of legal ethics (meddling in the intimate personal affairs of a client without permission or even consultation) and shouldn’t Cohen be disbarred for it?

    Dave (2e830f)

  76. 80

    What do you make of his gibberish? It’s like the certainty of partial knowledge.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  77. Of course if you think Trump is a disgrace to the country and it’s absurd that he’s president then you want the liberals to win.

    De logic she no follow.

    Patterico (115b1f)

  78. 73.Trump has been President for a year. Why was that illegal still in the country?


    77.As for the Chicoms, Trump already bent the knee to them, or did you forget his trip to China, China, China?

    Looks like you’ve become a Trumpophobe, nk. That nagging in the brain that stps you from realizing Trump isn’t “literally Hitler”, isn’t rounding up journalists for execution and yet still isn’t perfect.

    Your problem, like that of most Trumpophobes is that you seem to expect more than Trump can or is willing to give. Trump has done a lot of good, conservative things that no one, NO ONE would have done if elected instead of him. I’m thankful we got this much instead of what Hillary would have wrought. Everybody knows Trump by now so we don’t need a daily rehash of his short falls. Let the left’s brain explode daily, why let yours? I come to see the comrade’s daily brain farts and laugh. You should sit back and enjoy the discomfort and agony Trump causes all the little leftists every day he takes a breath. I do. MAGA.

    Rev.Hoagie (6bbda7)

  79. I didnt know Chuck DeVore had an east coast cousin – what say Wray about the Chinese becoming the new Irish of the NYPD?

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  80. ? I come to see the comrade’s daily brain farts and laugh

    You laugh with him, not at him.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  81. Of course if you think Trump is a disgrace to the country and it’s absurd that he’s president then you want the liberals to win.

    That’s the Trump apologists response to complaints about Trump. That is, criticism of Trump equals support for the left.

    Yes, it is illogical but I hear/read it all of the time. Just go to Ace’s site.

    SteveMG (ea62d2)

  82. 87

    Nothing new. Critiques of Dubyas War was framed as support for terror and not for troops.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  83. But I’m certain Hoagie was objective..

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  84. 89.But I’m certain Hoagie was objective..


    I am no more objective about politics than you are, comrade. I’m just honest enough to admit it.

    Rev.Hoagie (6bbda7)

  85. Aaaarrrradin would have quivered with indignation had even a baseless rumor circulated that Obama was unfaithful.

    You mean this?
    http://dailycaller.com/2018/02/13/comey-obama-secret-meeting/

    Or, is that too lowbrow a subject to blog about?

    random viking (6a54c2)

  86. https://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/feb/13/court-orders-full-restoration-daca-program/

    The court once again making stuff up to support their desired position. The President needs to tell them to take a hike. Judges and Presidents are not legislators.

    NJRob (b00189)

  87. I blame Obama for Trump.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  88. Fish rot from the head.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  89. Nothing new. Critiques of Dubyas War was framed as support for terror and not for troops.

    Dubya’s war? The resolutioh authoring force was overwhelmingly supported by both parties. And, y’know, Saddam Husine had something do with the cause of the conflict, right? Just a little?

    You calling it “Dubya’s” war is the same type of thinking by the Trump supporters that you supposedly oppose.

    SteveMG (ea62d2)

  90. Yes, many fell by the AUMF sword. All are guilty save one lone democratic senator.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  91. And the “Trump is like Hitler” crowd on the left is just as appalling. No, they’re worse.

    Read Bruni’s column today condemning those who equate Trump with Kim. Then read the comments where the Trump haters say he IS as bad as Kim but he’s just not able to murder everyone.

    That’s nuts.

    SteveMG (ea62d2)

  92. You have an honorable mention..just one.

    List_of_Congressional_opponents_of_the_Iraq_War

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  93. That seedy altverse version of Carrie Underwood doesn’t appeal in the slightest.

    Obama was the form of the destructor, and a year after he was removed, he is still corrupting the institutions,

    narciso (c29e78)

  94. That coats is spouting this latest version of reefer madness, makes me take him less serious on other matters, is crowdstrike the single source for everything?

    narciso (c29e78)

  95. 102, that some sort of femme Chris Gaines-like diversion? Link?

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  96. Just first impressions,

    narciso (48ecae)

  97. You would think your red state colleague streiffs observations would be worth a note.

    narciso (48ecae)

  98. Link came from narcos arse.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  99. Ben, He might be the dorky, barely bilingual, Dilbertian accounting guy at one of the Spanish networks down there. I know how it feels as I have been called fake Mexican by former (now dead, but not by my hands) co-workers. Now Im the contrarian (anti-bike) transportation guy who doesnt get the millenials and doesnt bother with the metoos.

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  100. 108. Urban

    Millennials. My guess is they feel so much less hope toward future and sector their thinking to a fact immunity. You can’t explain emotions logically.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  101. Trump is crude, vulgar and a demagogue. But he’s not an American Hitler, he’s not going to nuke the world, and he’s not the same as genocidal mass murderers if he only had the chance to be one.

    Many Trump supporters have abandoned principles for power (in this view, the left must be defeated at all costs) but many Trump opponents on the left – aided by a disgraceful media – have abandoned common sense for hysteria and lunacy.

    SteveMG (ea62d2)

  102. But I do appreciate Narciso’s laserlike focus on these sorts of things:

    “Ranch” or typical Bowie/PGC hijinks gone awry?
    http://www.yahoo.com/news/suspect-held-suv-stopped-shooting-nsa-gate-133424268.html

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  103. 111

    Lone Nut

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  104. So the lawyer did her, huh?

    MJN1957 (6f981a)

  105. The quiet after the Netanyahu-Putin call shows once again who’s the real boss in the Middle East. While the United States remains the region’s present absentee –

    https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/putin-s-call-with-netanyahu-called-time-on-israel-s-syrian-strikes-1.5809118

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  106. Many years ago, my older brother — an orthodontist in the Dallas/Fort Worth area — and his wife were building themselves a new house. They sold their existing house much sooner than they’d expected, though, in a very good deal that closed several months before their new house (the construction of which had been somewhat delayed anyway) was ready. So they rented a very nice house for four months, as part of which they paid a security deposit equal to a month’s rent, which I think was somewhere between three and four thousand dollars. When they moved out, their landlord refused to give them (as state law clearly requires) an unambiguous statement of alleged charges against their security deposit, and simply kept the whole thing. So on my brother and sister-in-law’s behalf, I sued the landlord in the court of appropriate monetary and geographic jurisdiction, in Fort Worth.

    To our surprise, the landlord hired one of the very best old-line Fort Worth law firms, one whose lawyers I’d frequently heard of and occasionally worked with or against on much, much larger and more complicated civil litigation. Although they’d assigned a just-licensed young lawyer to the case, I was surprised to see anyone at that firm handling any kind of landlord-tenant litigation, frankly, because I figured the landlord would probably spend more than the amount of the security deposit on their legal fees, even at the lower rate of the firm’s most junior lawyer.

    Neither side did any pretrial discovery, and I set the case for bench (non-jury) trial at the earliest available date. I had made one phone call to my opponent, immediately after he filed his answer, at which I’d made a one-time-only demand for the full amount of the deposit, but with nothing tacked on for my own time expenditure (although the governing statute does allow recovery of attorneys’ fees by a successful tenant-plaintiff) or even the filing and service fees. The defense lawyer rejected that demand and made no counter-offer: “See you in court.”

    My sister-in-law was very stressed by the notion of having to testify on the stand about her housekeeping. She is almost certainly, without exception, the most conscientious and diligent housekeeper I know, in fact. And I was confident that after she took the stand, she’d steady herself and that she and my brother would both be very formidable witnesses in testifying that they’d left the rental property in immaculate condition, in several respects (including the condition of the yard and landscaping) considerably better than it was when they’d moved in. They’d taken a couple or three dozen very clear photos of its condition at both move-in and move-out, in fact, to bolster their own testimony — which, if you’re taking notes, is always an excellent idea if you’re renting property somewhere.

    So I started my case — we had the burden of proof as plaintiffs and went first — by calling my brother to the stand, duly authenticating the lease, the proof of payment of the deposit and its amount, and the photos. But I didn’t go into as much detail as I’d already planned to go into with my sister-in-law, who was better positioned than he was to testify from personal knowledge about all the tiniest details of the property’s condition. So my direct exam of my brother took perhaps only fifteen minutes. And just as I had very much hoped when I structured my minimalist direct examination of him, my young opponent then spent the next fifteen minutes flailing around very badly, asking leading and accusatory questions that my brother easily deflected and indeed turned back on him. As my opponent ran out of gas on one of the least effective cross-examinations I’d ever seen, the judge interrupted him and declared a fifteen minute recess, with an instruction to the lawyers to come back to his chambers.

    “Why exactly are we here, Mr. Brown?” the judge gruffly asked my opponent as soon as we were seated around his desk. My opponent opened his mouth as if he was about to say something like, “For a trial, judge!” But the judge’s stare just withered this poor kid, and it all came tumbling out: “Judge, my client, the landlord, is the nephew of one of my firm’s senior partners, and they assigned this case to me with instructions to just go try it and win it, and they assured me that these folks” — gesturing to me and by implication my brother and sister-in-law — “probably wouldn’t even show up for trial. I didn’t know they’d have pictures and everything. My client isn’t even here in the courthouse right now; I told him not to bother coming to court until after the lunch break.”

    “Does he have any photos or other evidence to support the deductions he claimed he was entitled to take from these folks’ security deposit? Because he kept the whole thing, right?”

    “Yes sir, the whole thing,” admitted my opponent, “and no sir, we have no photos or other evidence, and really, after hearing Dr. Dyer’s testimony, I’m not aware of anything my client himself will be able to say to rebut him directly.”

    “And y’all haven’t even heard from Dr. Dyer’s wife, my sister-in-law,” I piped up, “and you know what they say about hell, fury, and a good housekeeper scorned, Judge. She’s pretty angry about having to be her, but I’ll try to calm her down some.”

    The judge shook his head, clearly not remotely satisfied, and more than a bit miffed, at my opposing counsel’s answers. “I’m going to extend this recess for another 10 minutes, Mr. Brown,” he said, “during which time I suggest you get on the phone with someone — your client, your bosses back at C____, H_____ [his well-regarded Fort Worth law firm], or whoever — and when we resume, either you better have come up with an impressive new defense that won’t waste my afternoon, or you and your client and your firm are not going to like much how this case comes out.”

    I shrugged and said, “It was a no-offer case, judge. They left us no choice but to take this case to trial.”

    “Yes, that fits with what I’m seeing, unfortunately,” said the judge. “See y’all back in the courtroom in 10 minutes.”

    “I need to make some phone calls,” my opponent whispered to me as we exited.

    “You’ll find me at counsel’s table,” I replied, “but that earlier offer really was one-time-only, and it’s no longer on the table.”

    “I know, I know,” he muttered, grey-faced. I didn’t ask, but it was painfully obvious to me that this was his first trial ever; and he’d screwed the pooch royally, but mostly because of an unjustified reliance that his firm surely wouldn’t be sending him out to defend the indefensible. I figured the landlord’s uncle, the senior partner, was the one truly to blame for my opponent’s discomfort.

    Eight minutes later he came back into the courtroom. “My client has agreed to refund the full deposit by cashier’s check this afternoon, plus pay your filing fees and service costs,” which were another $200 or so. “And I’m offering to pay $1500 in legal fees, but I can’t pay that until the end of the week, when I get paid.”

    “Do what, now?” I said, genuinely startled. “You’re proposing to pay $1500 out of your own pocket, Mr. Brown? You really ought not be making a habit of that, if you don’t mind me giving you some unsolicited advice.”

    “I know, I know,” he said, genuinely miserable. “But it’s my fault we didn’t settle. If I’d done my job the right way to begin with, I’d have figured out that my client had no defense before this morning, even though I was working with an instruction to only spend the minimum amount of time necessary on this file.”

    “Is your firm getting paid?” I asked him. He shrugged. “I dunno, but I don’t think so. I think Mr. ____ [the senior-partner uncle] has us doing this as a favor.”

    I rubbed my chin for maybe fifteen seconds, thinking about my own duty to my client, my sympathy for this young lawyer, my scorn for the senior-partner uncle (who’d probably been lied to by his nephew, the landlord, and hadn’t probed at all to test those lies), and my duties to the system.

    “I don’t think I can turn down your offer,” I said, “because it would indeed make my clients whole, and we probably wouldn’t do any better even if we pushed to a ruling and won outright. But,” I added, “I’ll need a written commitment to the back-end payment by both you and your client, with your client’s agreement to make good on the additional $1500 in fees if for any reason you can’t or won’t.” He nodded and said that sounded reasonable and would be no problem.

    “And,” I continued, “I really can’t be a party to you making a settlement payment on a client’s behalf out of your own pocket unless and until I have your solemn reassurance — I’ll take your word, I don’t need this in writing, but I’ll need you to look me in the eyes — that you’ve fully disclosed what you’re doing to your uncle and to your regular supervisor at the firm.”

    He stared glumly at his feet. “Yeah, I get that too. I’ve told [the uncle] already, but I’ll go phone the partner I regularly report to and tell him as well. Can you ask the judge for another five minutes of recess?”

    Now, what I hoped was that by involving someone else at the firm, I would trigger the firm into stepping into the kid’s shoes and paying me the $1500 in fees between then and the end of the week. I thought they’d dealt the kid a bad hand; I think he might have been sharp enough on his own to have figured out before trial that they had no leg to stand on, and that it was the instruction from Uncle Senior Partner — probably something to the effect that his nephew the landlord was a good-old boy and not to worry, everybody leaves something worse than they found it when they leave a rental property — which had affirmatively led the kid off the path.

    But no, when I got the $1500 check at the end of the week, it was drawn on the kid’s personal checking account.

    *****

    I’m thinking that Michael D. Cohen likely was not a just-licensed lawyer who was misled by one of his own bosses and his client into a situation where Mr. Cohen felt himself personally responsible for the client’s potential liability. I’m thinking that regardless of what he says now, Mr. Cohen likely got back from Ms. Daniels not only a receipt, but a release and a comprehensive nondisclosure agreement along with it. I’m thinking that Mr. Cohen is no altruist, and that he fully expected, when he went out of pocket, that he would more than get back, through further fees and additional future business from the Trump Organization, the cost of tamping down this particular bimbo eruption. And I’m thinking that he’s a particularly brazen kind of mouthpiece, of flexible ethics and little fundamental integrity — exactly the kind of lawyer Donald Trump has historically preferred.

    All of which is to say: I felt sorry for poor Mr. Brown. But Mr. Cohen is scum.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  107. he’s not going to nuke the world

    And you are confident of this … why?

    “I think – I think, for me, nuclear is just the power, the devastation is very important to me.”
    – Donald Trump, walking us through his genius-level understanding of nuclear war

    The devastation is very important to him.

    Dave (2e830f)

  108. 114, that rundown made me think of Medley-Recruiting Seargent by the Pogues and how difficult a sell combat on behalf of Israel against Russia might be to some of the Trump coalition.

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  109. Maggie Haberman at the New York Times has the scoop:

    Ohhhhhhhhhh… that Maggie Haberman.

    “We have had here tee up stories for us and have never been disappointed.”

    https://theintercept.com/2016/10/09/exclusive-new-email-leak-reveals-clinton-campaigns-cozy-press-relationship/

    In other words, a hyperpartisan, which you loathe unless it’s the anti-Trump variety.

    random viking (3cfbca)

  110. Stones for sale! Get your stones here! Who’ll be the first?

    Umm.. Who wants to be first? What’s the matter with you guys?

    Special discount! I’ll pay you to cast the first stone! 100% guaranteed tribal dopamine rush!

    Ah that’s better. There ya go nk. There ya go pat. Can’t both be first, but max nix amiright?

    phunctor (034f5b)

  111. Where I got the rizzotto press from, of course the real story concerns Mrs dube, who pushed alt underwood to the fore front.

    The lawfare crew ate up against bibi, couldn’t get him on the thyssrn sub deal.

    narciso (d1f714)

  112. Is Politico endorsing the reintroduction of slavery?

    https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/02/13/immigration-visas-economics-216968

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  113. Give them to Trump, phunctor. He could use a pair.

    nk (dbc370)

  114. Ben, no big deal, that used to be a fat girl’s job.

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  115. Cohen the Bagman, Beldar?

    nk (dbc370)

  116. Ah that’s better. There ya go nk. There ya go pat. Can’t both be first, but max nix amiright?

    Yeah, I’m sure they’ve BOTH set up shadow corporations to pay porn stars hundreds of thousands in laundered hush money PLENTY of times.

    The hypocrites!

    Dave (2e830f)

  117. Leviathan is always in favor of cheap labor, urban. They aren’t discriminatory.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  118. Btw.

    Who is tending the strawberry patch this year? Lettuce DIY.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  119. Yes, but the Politico article could be simplified to mean what used to be the goal of a young WOP (in the general sense, not specific to Italian) male – woo the heck out of an often unattractive or “gorda” American girl without other prospects and get yo’ papers. A female sous chef is often carne entre los perros behind the kitchen line and the salsa dance scene was composed more of green-card seekers than of standard issue pickup-artists (PUAs).

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  120. I’m guessing that in some new and wholly unrelated, completely different, we’ve-all-forgotten-about-that-Daniels-case matter, Mr. Cohen’s firm charged the Trump Organization something like $130k in fax transmission and reception fees, nk. Just another line item.

    If Cohen paid the consideration for the settlement and NDA out of his own pocket, that makes Trump merely a third-party beneficiary of whatever promises Stormy made about never suing him again and never disclosing anything. It actually makes Trump look more sleasy than if he’d just paid up himself in the eyes of any fair-minded observer. That makes Cohen a brazen, unethical, and stupid bagman, yeah.

    Beldar (fa637a)

  121. Cohen’s admission surely opens up a huge new can of worms, doesn’t it?

    In addition to ensuring that Bob Mueller will need to conduct a thorough investigation of Ms. Daniels’ (ahem) assets, it also throws open all of Trump’s legal fees and payments to scrutiny, no?

    Dave (2e830f)

  122. 129
    Like cholo bakers @ Mira Lago?

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  123. In my mind, because of synchronicity, I’m going to believe that Ms Daniels was paid out of Trump’s inauguration fund.

    Davethulhu (fab944)

  124. Hopefully, the prez and his wife reached an understanding over a decade ago and then managed to leave it in the past and move forward. If it happened.

    That’s what adults do. Now on to the next salacious bit of bumfuzzlery!

    Colonel Haiku (1d71cc)

  125. Hey they were throwing sewage on either haley or hicks a few weeks ago.

    narciso (d1f714)

  126. Hopefully, the prez and his wife reached an understanding over a decade ago and then managed to leave it in the past and move forward. If it happened.

    That’s what adults do.

    Hookers, too. They can’t expect their “daddy” to just have one girl in his stable, now, can they?

    nk (dbc370)

  127. President’s Day coming up.

    The best US presidents, as ranked by presidential historians. (it’s a tradition)

    “The golden age of the American presidency, according to this survey, is 1933-1969,” writes presidential scholar Richard Norton Smith. “Five presidents from this era each rank in the top 10 which tells you something about the criteria that historians tend to use. It reinforces Franklin Roosevelt’s claim to be not only the first modern president but the man who, in reinventing the office, also established the criteria by which we judge our leaders.”

    Collect your vomit bag. Keep it handy.

    THE STANDARD BY WHICH MODERN PRESIDENTS ARE MEASURED by liberal lickspittles is FDR.

    Lucy Page Mercer Rutherfurd (April 26, 1891 – July 31, 1948) was an American woman best known for her affair with future US President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

    Lucy Mercer was born to wealthy parents who lost most of their fortune and separated in the years following her birth. Mercer then worked briefly in a dress store before taking a position as the social secretary of Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin’s wife, in 1914. Mercer and Franklin are believed to have begun an affair in mid-1916, when she was 25 and he was 34, and prior to his paralytic illness. The relationship was discovered by Eleanor in September 1918, when she found a packet of their letters when unpacking his luggage upon his return from an inspection trip to the war zone in Europe while Assistant Secretary of the Navy near the end of the First World War in September 1918. Though Eleanor offered Franklin a divorce and Franklin considered accepting, political, financial, and familial pressures caused him to remain in the marriage. Franklin terminated the affair and promised not to see Mercer again.

    Mercer soon married wealthy socialite Winthrop Rutherfurd (1862–1944), a widower then in his fifties, but despite her marriage and Franklin’s promise, the two remained in surreptitious, albeit infrequent contact in the three decades that followed. Especially during the War years, Franklin’s daughter Anna Roosevelt Halsted arranged for her father to meet with his former mistress,[1] more frequently after Rutherfurd’s death in 1944. Mercer was in Warm Springs, Georgia, at the “Little White House” the President’s long-time cottage and retreat, at the time of Roosevelt’s death in April 1945. He was having his portrait painted, at Mercer’s request, by the artist Elizabeth Shoumatoff in the living room – with Mercer and two female cousins attending. While sitting at a card table by the fireplace, reading an upcoming speech, Roosevelt said, “I have a terrific pain in the back of my head.” He then slumped forward in his chair, unconscious. Madame Shoumatoff, who maintained close friendships with both Roosevelt and Mercer, rushed Mercer away to avoid negative publicity and implications of infidelity. Mercer’s presence in the house was not mentioned in the immediate press reports nor in any of the early published biographies.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucy_Mercer_Rutherfurd

    Did you catch that?
    Might have gone by too fast for some of you sons of beaches.
    The best gold standard President that ballot box stuffing ever inflicted on our country, which all others are weighed against, died sitting next to his hor.

    papertiger (c8116c)

  128. It’s a good thing Mike Pence has no self-respect. Otherwise, he’d probably be pretty pissed about being made to look like an utter fool … again.

    First there was:

    “I’m just not going to comment on the latest baseless allegations against the president.”
    – Mike Pence, three weeks ago

    and now:

    “I’m just not going to comment on the latest pretty much confirmed allegations against the president.”
    – Mike Pence, today

    OK, I made that last one up.

    (As an aside, isn’t it special that a heart-warming human-interest story about love, deviant sex and laundered six-figure cash payments – like this one – breaks on Valentine’s Day?)

    Dave (445e97)

  129. Excuse me.

    Died in office sitting next to his hor.

    Okay. Better.

    papertiger (c8116c)

  130. He was a paraplegic so your diatribe seems flaccid.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  131. That was a clean beat in 1932 and onward (though there was this famous telephone users poll which claimed Alf Landon was going to clean his clock in ’36). JFK is the gold standard that ballot box stuffing produced, but for Ted Cruz’ dad’s plotting, he was robbed of the opportunity to die in a smilar to FDR less relaxed everywhere but down there manner.

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  132. Pence sees it as humility. It’s the root word for humiliation.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  133. Excuse me.

    Died in office sitting next to his hor.

    So did Hitler. Trump isn’t dead yet so we don’t really know who he’ll be sitting next to, but the odds are that it will be Melania, unless he has divorced her too and found a new hor by then.

    nk (dbc370)

  134. nk, what if its the one DACAN chick he decided to save? Or does he go out Gateway Pundit style?

    urbanleftbehind (5eecdb)

  135. You or I look at it, and think that’s a pay off. That’s being bribed.

    Naw. In the age of Clinton, $130k from a lawyers pocket, with a tracible paper trail, that’s language.

    That’s communication.

    That’s an insurance policy saying, “Stormy, you don’t have to run around nervous looking for a Drudge report like your life depended on it. You’re not going to be found dead in a duffle bag, or mysteriously suicided.”

    papertiger (c8116c)

  136. Give them to Trump, phunctor. He could use a pair.

    He’d just start banging them together, invent flint knapping, and have nukes by Friday.

    phunctor (034f5b)

  137. Better than Roosevelt in every measure.

    Since FDR is the criteria by which all modern presidents are measured, that make President Trump simply the best. [YouTube] Undisputed.

    (Bush is rated 34th)

    papertiger (c8116c)

  138. He was a paraplegic so your diatribe seems flaccid.

    Ben burn (b3d5ab) — 2/14/2018 @ 11:10 am

    Not according to the newsreels circa 1933~1944.

    papertiger (c8116c)

  139. He got polio in 1921

    https://fdrlibrary.org/polio

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  140. Trump isn’t dead yet so we don’t really know who he’ll be sitting next to, but the odds are that it will be Melania, unless he has divorced her too and found a new hor by then.

    Melania is well past her sell-by date. I’d say the smart money is on Daddy’s Little Girl.

    (Yes, that’s a statue of birds f*cking that they’re sitting next to)

    Dave (445e97)

  141. @152. “Hope” springs eternal. Won’t be surprised to learn our Captain has sampled her strawberries, too. It’s ‘All In The Family’… and Archie Bunker was from Queens, too.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  142. 153

    I’m glad you said strawberries instead of cherry

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  143. Stormy Unleashed: Porn star who alleged Trump affair: I can now tell my story:

    Stormy Daniels, the porn star whom President Donald Trump’s personal attorney acknowledged paying $130,000 just before Election Day, believes she is now free to discuss her alleged sexual encounter with Trump, her manager told The Associated Press Wednesday.

    Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, believes that Trump attorney Michael Cohen invalidated a non-disclosure agreement after two news stories were published Tuesday: One, in which Cohen told The New York Times that he made the six-figure payment with his personal funds, and another in the Daily Beast, which reported that Cohen was shopping a book proposal that would touch on Daniels’ story, said the manager, Gina Rodriguez.

    “Everything is off now, and Stormy is going to tell her story,” Rodriguez said.

    I think there’s also a book title there: “Everything is Off Now: The Stormy Daniels Story.”

    Beldar (fa637a)

  144. $130,000 is such an odd number.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  145. It’s 10k a month and a 10% gratuity.

    Pinandpuller (fc5dd7)

  146. Melania is well past her sell-by date. I’d say the smart money is on Daddy’s Little Girl.

    (Yes, that’s a statue of birds f*cking that they’re sitting next to)

    Dave (445e97) — 2/14/2018 @ 11:53 am

    Are you a fan of the film Demolition Man? There’s a lot of speculation about the relationship between Spartan and Huxley.

    Pinandpuller (fc5dd7)

  147. $130,000 is such an odd number.

    Another thing puzzling me – why the need to set up a fake corporation?

    Was it perhaps so that the $130K was not convertible to liquid funds immediately, to ensure that Ms. Daniels could only cash in after a period of time?

    If you just want to pay somebody a large sum of money, and keep it absolutely secret, creating a corporation seems like a counter-productive complication.

    Another clear possibility is a tax dodge, and indeed, one has to wonder if there are any actionable loose threads in this regard.

    Dave (445e97)

  148. “Stormy is going to tell her story.”
    Has he been a bad boy? Spanky might just have to get (another) spanking!

    But wait! He reportedly likes those!

    https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/14/politics/stormy-daniels-michael-cohen/index.html

    Tillman (a95660)

  149. I’m sure that the folks who supported Bill Clinton all those years are the most shocked by the unexpected revelation that Donald Trump is a sleaze.

    Kevin M (752a26)

  150. Blabbermouth client with blabbermouth lawyer.

    Kevin M (752a26)

  151. $130,000 is such an odd number.

    Actually it’s an even number.

    /Sammy

    Kevin M (752a26)

  152. He reportedly likes those!

    It’s very important that the magazine applied to his naughty bottom has his picture on the cover, though.

    Fortunately, he printed a bunch of fake Time magazine covers with his picture on the cover as fake Man of the Year, and since he was forced to take them down from all his golf properties, they are available for use.

    Dave (445e97)

  153. Kevin: Chappiquiddick?

    Ben burn (b3d5ab)

  154. @159. Well, if it was paid to her through a LLC -like via the Caymans or Bahamas perhaps that was an exchange rate in US$ for sterling or such to an overseas account. It’s just an odd total for a payoff.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  155. have we ever had a school shooting during the olympics before

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  156. Enquiring minds want to know!!!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  157. I think there’s also a book title there: “Everything is Off Now: The Stormy Daniels Story.”

    And the movie: “Five Percent Off: When Stormy Met Cohen”. Yes, yes, it is a Jewish/circumcision joke.

    nk (dbc370)

  158. The only thing Stormy’s negotiating is the price.

    crazy (d99a88)

  159. 170… funny stuff, nk!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  160. Of course, Cohen will play it backwards so that it looks like Stormy is giving him the money. That is a lawyer joke.

    nk (dbc370)

  161. That is a lawyer joke.

    You guys are a million laughs!

    Dave (445e97)


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