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Hey, Look: More Evidence That Broidy May Have Been Covering for Trump in That Playmate Affair
Trump would not get back to the White House until 4:45 p.m., but he still found time in his busy schedule that day for one more meeting. That get-together was with a wealthy Republican fundraiser and lobbyist, Elliott Broidy. Broidy, who had been convicted in 2009 of bribing public officials, had spent all of 2017 investing enormous amounts of time and money to acquire what his business partner George Nader termed “this priceless asset” — a private meeting with the president of the United States.
In fact this asset could be given a quite precise price. A remarkable investigative report from the Associated Press describes what appeared to be a particularly brazen quid pro quo:
Those consulting contracts, according to Broidy’s own correspondence, were what the December 2 meeting was about. And, a few days later, Broidy got his payoff: The U.A.E. awarded his company a deal worth up to $600 million over the next five years.
Here is some additional context that now seems especially noteworthy: Just two days before that meeting, on November 30, Broidy wired $200,000 from his Bank of America account to Real Estate Attorneys’ Group, a California firm. On December 5, REAG transferred that money to attorney Keith Davidson. Davidson was at the time supposedly representing the legal interests of Shera Bechard, a Playboy model with whom Broidy now claims to have had an affair. (Bechard fired Davidson shortly afterward, when she became convinced that Davidson was actually working in concert with Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s personal attorney, to protect Cohen’s client’s interests rather than hers.) That $200,000 was supposed to be the first of eight quarterly payments that “David Dennison” agreed to make to Bechard, in order to buy her silence about an affair and a subsequent abortion. All this was laid out in an NDA recovered from Michael Cohen’s office when it was raided last month.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/05/more-evidence-that-broidy-was-covering-for-trump-in-affair.html
In fact this asset could be given a quite precise price. A remarkable investigative report from the Associated Press describes what appeared to be a particularly brazen quid pro quo:
He had ingratiated himself with crown princes from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, who were seeking to alter U.S. foreign policy and punish Qatar, an archrival in the Gulf that he dubbed “the snake.”
To do that, the California businessman had helped spearhead a secret campaign to influence the White House and Congress, flooding Washington with political donations. Broidy and his business partner, Lebanese-American George Nader, pitched themselves to the crown princes as a backchannel to the White House, passing the princes’ praise — and messaging — straight to the president’s ears.
Now, in December 2017, Broidy was ready to be rewarded for all his hard work. It was time to cash in.
In return for pushing anti-Qatar policies at the highest levels of America’s government, Broidy and Nader expected huge consulting contracts from Saudi Arabia and the UAE, according to an Associated Press investigation based on interviews with more than two dozen people and hundreds of pages of leaked emails between the two men.
Those consulting contracts, according to Broidy’s own correspondence, were what the December 2 meeting was about. And, a few days later, Broidy got his payoff: The U.A.E. awarded his company a deal worth up to $600 million over the next five years.
Here is some additional context that now seems especially noteworthy: Just two days before that meeting, on November 30, Broidy wired $200,000 from his Bank of America account to Real Estate Attorneys’ Group, a California firm. On December 5, REAG transferred that money to attorney Keith Davidson. Davidson was at the time supposedly representing the legal interests of Shera Bechard, a Playboy model with whom Broidy now claims to have had an affair. (Bechard fired Davidson shortly afterward, when she became convinced that Davidson was actually working in concert with Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s personal attorney, to protect Cohen’s client’s interests rather than hers.) That $200,000 was supposed to be the first of eight quarterly payments that “David Dennison” agreed to make to Bechard, in order to buy her silence about an affair and a subsequent abortion. All this was laid out in an NDA recovered from Michael Cohen’s office when it was raided last month.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/05/more-evidence-that-broidy-was-covering-for-trump-in-affair.html
20 replies
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Be interesting to see the reaction of very righteous, aggressive anti-abortion evangelicals, if Trump gets thoroughly exposed as the actual Broidy playmate impregnator/nda, etc. See how much TrumpDump crap the evangelicals can swallow. 
the rich boys are paying for mega-church stained glass windows, private jets for preachers, and lots of trips to the Holy Land.
And, they each get little plaques with their names engraved on them on a wall in the church.
........
"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
(snips from Wikipedia)
In 1870, along with his mentor Döllinger, Acton opposed the moves to promulgate the doctrine of papal infallibility in the First Vatican Council, travelling to Rome to lobby against it, ultimately unsuccessfully. Unlike Döllinger Acton did not become an Old Catholic, and continued attending Mass regularly; he received the last rites on his deathbed. The Catholic Church did not try to force his hand. It was in this context that, in a letter he wrote to scholar and ecclesiastic Mandell Creighton, dated April 1887, Acton made his most famous pronouncement:
It's good stuff for me to read periodically to knock me off my mental high-horse........
(snips from Wikipedia)
In 1870, along with his mentor Döllinger, Acton opposed the moves to promulgate the doctrine of papal infallibility in the First Vatican Council, travelling to Rome to lobby against it, ultimately unsuccessfully. Unlike Döllinger Acton did not become an Old Catholic, and continued attending Mass regularly; he received the last rites on his deathbed. The Catholic Church did not try to force his hand. It was in this context that, in a letter he wrote to scholar and ecclesiastic Mandell Creighton, dated April 1887, Acton made his most famous pronouncement:
But if we might discuss this point until we found that we nearly agreed, and if we do agree thoroughly about the impropriety of Carlylese denunciations and Pharisaism in history, I cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men, with a favourable presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption it is the other way, against the holders of power, increasing as the power increases. Historic responsibility has to make up for the want of legal responsibility. Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority, still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority. There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it. That is the point at which the negation of Catholicism and the negation of Liberalism meet and keep high festival, and the end learns to justify the means. You would hang a man of no position like Ravaillac; but if what one hears is true, then Elizabeth asked the gaoler to murder Mary, and William III of England ordered his Scots minister to extirpate a clan. Here are the greatest names coupled with the greatest crimes; you would spare those criminals, for some mysterious reason. I would hang them higher than Haman, for reasons of quite obvious justice, still more, still higher for the sake of historical science.
It's good stuff for me to read periodically to knock me off my mental high-horse........
the stories of Italy's crooked Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and being amazed that anybody could let someone that sleazy and crooked become the leader of a country.
Boy, did I have a lot to learn! 
........
Sad.
