Infrequent visits to karaoke bars have all resulted in the same result for this writer. Friends, family, strangers, and bouncers alike all highly recommended that I “keep my day job.” Well, their point is understood to a point. Yesterday, if you had a day job good for you. Those job responsibilities hopefully kept you safely away from a live stream or TV and therefore from watching the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight Committee hearings.
The plea deal guilty Michael Cohen, aka Donald Trump’s decade long plus personal lawyer, took an oath to tell the truth to answer questions from blood thirsty Republican and Democrat Representatives. It was the same pledge he took a while back then summarily lied through his pearly whites.
His 30 minute long (unprecedentedly long some said) opening manifesto only occurred after a vote to postpone was rejected by the majority Democrats. It seems like the Republicans didn’t take too kindly to the prior night’s coaching and prepping session Cohen took part in with honorable reps, Adam Schiff among them. And so Cohen began his 1800 second assault on anything his attorney, Lanny Davis (the Clinton family’s honorable lawyer and confidant) and he could think about to poke, jab, and stab at President Trump. The speech touched on racism, womanizing, Stormy Daniels, hush money, repayments, son’s of Trump, Russian collusion (except he couldn’t call it collusion because of that silly under oath thing), payoffs, Trump Towers, and the like.
It even painted a picture of a Donald Trump picture, er portrait. Cohen orated that Trump instructed Cohen to insure that a straw bid occur at an auction where Trump’s portrait was up. As the last item in the auction a 60k bid secured the piece and secured the fact that it was the highest price paid for any portrait offered. Cohen told us in this rundown that Trump has a big ego. The hearings likely cost taxpayers far greater than 60k a minute. So America paid about 180k to learn that Trump has a high opinion of himself. Quite revealing isn’t that?
Then the fun really began. Democrats asked if Cohen knew of any Trump drug use. They asked if he ever provided money to any woman for “personal healthcare.” Each of the Republican reps spent their five minutes calling Cohen a convicted felon, known liar, jealous lawyer, and scorned “White House employee want to be.”
What substance came of all of it? Little. The Russian collusion theory should now be put to rest once and for all. But it won’t be. Trump reimbursed Cohen over 12 months for silencing Stormy days before the election. Shameful perhaps. Criminal? Nah. Paging the Mueller Investigation. Mr. Mueller what have you?
When it was all done Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings eloquently and passionately told the honorable committee’s rank and file, Cohen, and a worldwide TV audience that “WE ARE BETTER THAN THIS!” He also asked that we leave our democracy in a better place than we found it. It sounded like he wanted to Make America Great Again.
Was this entire day the first step, launched by the Lanny Davis aided Cohen speech towards finding something/anything to eventually vote to impeach Donald Trump? Perhaps. Perhaps.
And perhaps it is once again a loud, Cummings loud, reminder that votes really, really matter. The American people voted Trump into office in November 2016. The American people voted and enough Democrats won in November 2018 to flip the House to the Democrats. The Oversight Democrats voted to make disgraced and disbarred Michael Cohen their star witness to dig dirt on you know who. It was these same Democrats that voted to not postpone the hearings with the coaching so fresh in Cohen’s mind. If the House stayed red there would have been no Cohen testimony.
Will the next big vote that matters eventually be cast by the House to attempt to over throw Trump? Or will it be in the general election in November of 2020 to vote for or against Trump? Cohen warned us in his closing remarks that if it were the latter that he had concerns that the transition from Trump to “fill in the blank” could be accomplished peacefully. Over Cohen’s right shoulder Lanny smiled. Mission accomplished.
We looked carefully at how the committee conducted itself in its “day job.”
We hope that they can sing.