Death row is a little less barbaric than a public execution.

Was it negligence, cover-up, arson — I don’t anything about other than there was a big fire. This is the first I heard about a power company.

Yes. Well the first two basically point to arson since the negligence was informed by profit, it's not like anyone's running around with a gas can and a match but they might as well have been.

Not to mention that the billions that the company is "losing" will not be directly paid for by them and is far less than what they would "lose" had they not filed for bankruptcy.

Luke Perry had what they’re calling a massive stroke.

90210 <3

Are we sure it isn't Bryan Cranston? I mean this can not be Luke Perry now.

https://pixel.nymag.com/imgs/daily/v....w330.h330.jpg

^ Yep, this is the significant take-away from Cohen's public hearing: a lot of circumstantial detail suggesting that Trump was filing false financial information, that he knew about the wikileaks dump and the Don-plus-Russians meeting in advance. Also Cohen presented signed checks that are tantamount to proof that Trump is guilty of campaign finance violations.
Previously, Cohen lied to Congress to protect his boss but the circs are different now and for Cohen to be lying again would be a huge risk for himself with no obvious benefit, so I personally found his testimony pretty convincing.

In true MB style, which means zooming in on an insignificant detail, did anyone else hear Chairman Cummings say, "I recognise myself" ? I liked that so much that I might start using it to give my posts a bit more authority.

That's some avant-garde reasoning. I don't really consider the validity of his statements tbh but he 1000% has the air of someone who would do anything to cover their ass as well as someone who's dumb enough to lie about things that they don't have to lie about.

^ "Avant-garde reasoning" :laughing: That's very polite of you. Thanks.

Yes, for years Cohen has been a devious lying bully so his recent penitant performance should be viewed with scepticism. None the less, having survived as Trump's fixer for a decade suggests that he is anything but dumb, and with the example of Manafort before him, he must be aware of the grave perils of lying to Congress. I'm sure he was doing a fair amount of ass-covering, but at various points in his testimony he suggested names of people who might corroborate what he was saying. Rather than branding Cohen with the childish,"Liar Liar Pants on Fire", which is what the GOP tried to do before Cohen even opened his mouth, I hope the committee will adopt an approach of cautiously assessing the content of his testimony item by item: perhaps true/perhaps not/ worth investigating.

It would have been fun to be on the GOP side grilling him. I would have pushed hard on the activities he committed for personal gain without telling Trump as a testament to his lack of loyalty toward clients he was supposed to serve, like taking money from AT&T and the Saudis as a "White House consultant" but then...not doing any actual consulting. He also ran all those social media campaigns on other people's money for personal benefit. Nobody "directed" him to do those things.

Instead these wingnuts took a "but he's a liar111" route which doesn't impress anyone if you can't get specific. On the plus side though, the pointless squabbling appears to have caused Cohen to commit perjury at least twice (when he was asked about the fraudulent statements he made to get bank loans for his own personal real estate deals and also the whole White House job thing).

It'll be interesting to see what some of these other people he named bring to the table. Assuming we get to hear all of them before Trump gets re-elected lol.