Michael Cohen’s Testimony

I watched the CBS coverage for an hour on Wednesday morning. After that, I had to turn it off, because it was so uncomfortable. I have empathy for Cohen. He did some ‘very bad things’ on behalf of his client, Donald Trump. Now, after ten years of ‘blind’ loyalty, his eyes have been opened, and now he’s singing like a canary in a coal mine.

And it’s mostly believable. (My only reservation was Cohen’s assertion that he didn’t want to work in the White House. Why wouldn’t he?)

Shades of Dean

This takes me back to the Watergate scandal… That was compelling viewing, too. And many interesting phrases came out of those hearings, my favourite being, “…at that (and this) point in time.” Anyone before that time would have said, ‘then’ as opposed to ‘now’.

President Trump thinks that being the head of government in the United States gives him an automatic ‘Get Out of Jail Free” card. But he’s not playing Monopoly, except in his own mind. Nixon didn’t go to jail, either, but he had to resign to make it all go away. Have we learned anything about history? Has Trump been paying attention?

When it comes to select committee testimony, in the USA and Canada, the best witnesses are lawyers. John Dean was credible in the 70’s, Michael Cohen is, too. Let’s not be too quick to call him out for lying before “at that point in time.” That was then, and this is now.

And the President cannot grandstand his way out of trouble…