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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Republican Party should just cut to the chase and change its name to the Trump Organization
One of the moments from Cohens testimony which has really stuck in my mind is when he told the Republicans who were roasting him in an effort to defend Trump, I did the same thing that you're doing now, for 10 years.
Cohens job was to lie, smear, intimidate, threaten, and cover up in order to protect Trump. He testified that Trump mostly did not explicitly order him to engage in thuggish behavior it was simply understood by everyone who worked for Trump that your job was to protect the boss and carry out his wishes, and you should do that by any means necessary. Like a mob kingpin or medieval king.
Cohen is right to say that the modern Republican Party is just doing the same thing he did. They dont have any policies or ideas that would make the country a better place their entire reason for being is to protect the boss and attempt to carry out his wishes by whatever means necessary. No matter how crazy or useless those ideas may be (like, say, building a giant wall across the entire southern border.)
They will lie, smear, intimidate, threaten, and cover up all in the hopes of currying favor with the boss, or avoiding his wrath.
They are all the Trump Organization now.
unblock
(52,243 posts)I don't want the next republican clown to be able to say well, "Donnie's gone, I'm not that guy" while they do largely the same crap.
It's the fascist party, or the banana Republican Party.
FiveGoodMen
(20,018 posts)(Many of whom actually self-identify that way)
TrishaJ
(798 posts)but I would make one change to make a point:
Banana Republic Party
Sort of like "Democrat" Party, which really pisses me off...
LiberalLovinLug
(14,174 posts)Many of these Republicans will pivot 180 at some point (either that or go all in on a full blown fascist state with Trump as President for life)
And when they do we can't let them slide. Lindsey Graham will be one of the first in sure to be bleating "if only I had known what a liar he was...."
What I maddenly predict is that the MSM news will not be our friend. They will want to get back to the old "both sides are the same" mantra as soon as possible. I can see the stories already... Republicans have learned their lesson, and have admitted that perhaps they may have misjudged the situation and they promise, Scout's honor, to be better from now on.
C_U_L8R
(45,003 posts)Bernardo de La Paz
(49,002 posts)They made him as the pinnacle of 40 years of framing, disinformation, lying, propaganda (Fox & hate radio), cheating, dirty tricks, and collusion.
They created him, enable him, and protect him. The Trump-Republicon Party owns him.
American Fascist Party. That is what they are.
Hermit-The-Prog
(33,349 posts)After indictment, the court will peel back the orange disguise and chase the strange critter off his head and then we will all see that dirty Donald is really HYPNOTOAD!
GOPers are under the evil influence of an alien being.
Either that or they really are amoral, power-mad gangsters.
somaticexperiencing
(313 posts)rusty fender
(3,428 posts)Trumps Own Party
Doesnt really have a ring to it. How about
TOPPTrumpasss Own Penis Party
Thats better
onecaliberal
(32,861 posts)mcar
(42,334 posts)changed its name to the President Donald J Trump Republican Club. I'm not kidding.
LiberalFighter
(50,942 posts)certainot
(9,090 posts)Cohen needs to be asked about why Trump wanted Sam Nunberg to study talk radio in 2014 and if the talkers they listened to were in states the russians targeted for trolling.
if they're going to get hannity in for questions on his recent comments from the trump interview they can also ask him if he was getting paid.
From Operation Trump, by Gabriel Sherman April 3, 2016:
Throughout 2014, the three (Roger Stone, Michael Cohen, and Sam Nunberg) fed Trump strategy memos and political intelligence. I listened to thousands of hours of talk radio, and he was getting reports from me, Nunberg recalled. What those reports said was that the GOP base was frothing over a handful of issues including immigration, Obamacare, and Common Core. While Jeb Bush talked about crossing the border as an act of love, Trump was thinking about how high to build his wall. We either have borders or we dont, Trump told the faithful who flocked to the annual CPAC conference in 2014.
does cohen know about payments to limbaugh and hannity? were they working for trump to help him win the primaries?
Why would cheapskate Trump pay for anyone to listen to 1000s of hours of talk radio? If he didnt pay for it directly from Trump funds, how did he pay for it?
Talk radio king Limbaugh is a Trump friend and provides sanitized transcripts of his show to help keep other talk radio hosts and GOP politicians and media on the same page so its unlikely Nunberg listened to a lot of Limbaugh. Unless they were really stupid.
Most of the national talkers follow the Limbaugh lead in interpreting news and events. The most logical reason for listening to that much talk radio would be to get a flavor of issues talked about in different states.
In a Washington Post piece a Russian talked about working for a trolling operation in late 2014.
You got a list of topics to write about.
Did Manaforts friend Stone, who used talk radio in Florida to attack Al Gore and recount efforts as far back as 2000, use talk radio to coordinate Russian trolling in Tea Party and Republican obstruction and attacks during the Obama administration?
There is circumstantial evidence that the Kremlin has used talk radio at least as far back as 2008 and the McCain campaign, co-chaired by Paul Manafort, when Limbaugh withheld his support until minutes after McCain chose Sarah Palin for VP.
Dems need to ask Cohen, Nunberg if Trump study of talk radio in 2014 was to coordinate w/Kremlin.
Questions that Democrats investigating Trump could to ask Nunberg, but Cohen might also know some answers:
did Trump order that?
if not, who?
if it was your mentor Stone, did he give any indication he had done this before?
how do you know Trump was getting your reports?
who, in what states, were you asked to listen to?
did you include Limbaughs daily transcripts in your analysis?
what were you asked to listen for?
in what form did they want your reports? Paragraphs, lists, talking points, topics?
who did you give those reports to?
who ended up with your reports?
did it get further analysis after yours?
did the analysis leave the Trump organization?
was there any mention of Russian involvement?
was there any mention of social media coordination?
who paid for that listening?
how, in what form were you paid?
kentuck
(111,098 posts)politicaljunkie41910
(3,335 posts)anyone, and they have no trouble overlooking his gi-normous lies day in and day out, about the most mundane and easily verifiable things.
spanone
(135,841 posts)at best.
+100
pwb
(11,275 posts)?
Jakes Progress
(11,122 posts)TheBlackAdder
(28,205 posts)certainot
(9,090 posts)turn it on any time and you'll hear everything criminal and unamerican and undemocratic the cons do excused and rationalized in multiple ways so the base can pick and choose
Initech
(100,079 posts)zentrum
(9,865 posts).....The Family.
NoMoreRepugs
(9,431 posts)They are the reason the cult exists.
pangaia
(24,324 posts)But as soon as trumps usefulness disappears, they will throw him under the bus. It is what dirty people do.
The Wizard
(12,545 posts)Ku Klux Klan?
KY_EnviroGuy
(14,492 posts)I see this whole Republican shitshow a bit above the current fray as nothing more than their invisible billionaire masters exercising control over their bought and paid for politicians and vast media networks.
This carefully concealed web of influence executed through dozens of think tanks alien to most Americans in concert with their propaganda media groups will continue to make our lives miserable so long as we have worsening, outrageous economic inequality wrought by uncontrolled capitalism.
From my viewpoint the Republican Party, the UK's Tory Party and many other right-wing parties around the globe may as well merge into one big group and called The Worldwide Plutocracy Party. In essence, they already have.
Those guys allow us to play in a bucket of peanuts in the shell while they're getting T-bones and finest of wines that we paid for....