Pierce: Paul Manafort May Have Something Much Wor

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Pierce: Paul Manafort May Have Something Much Worse Than Prison to Be Afraid Of



Paul Manafort May Have Something Much Worse Than Prison to Be Afraid Of

Or, perhaps, he's banking on a pardon. Why else would he cross Robert Mueller again?

BY CHARLES P. PIERCE
NOV 27, 2018

Paul Manafort is in trouble. No, really. He's in more trouble than he was before, which was considerable. A compulsive operator, he has managed to maneuver himself into a corner. Robert Mueller and his team believe that Manafort never has stopped lying to them, even in the middle of plea negotiations, and even after the plea was, you know, negotiated. ...

The question, of course, is whether Manafort is completely stupid, overwhelmingly confident that he will be pardoned, or simply frightened by something even more terrifying than the prospect of spending his declining years in the federal sneezer—something like, say, a lovely bowl of strontium-90, served up to him by a concerned former overseas client.

I used to laugh the latter explanation off. I don't do that anymore. Something is happening in Manafort's brainbox that dwarfs in his mind anything Mueller can do to him....

Meanwhile, the Guardian found another spot on the coffin into which to drive a nail. This latest tale involves Julian Assange, onetime squatter-in-residence in the Ecuadorian embassy, and a man who exchanged his reputation as a messianic truth-teller for a career as a common ratfcker....

Well, if a foreign intelligence service goes out of its way to memorialize that you showed up at their embassy dressed like Ward Cleaver, you're really busted, I'd say. (Where was the ostrich jacket? At the cleaners?) At the very least, this brings the heat closer to Number One Son, Sluggo.

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politic...plea-deal/

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