Donald Trump’s claim that Michael Cohen’s payoff of two paramours was a “civil” rather than a criminal offense just clanged into the iron bars of reality, as Cohen was sentenced to three years in federal prison after pleading guilty to his role in the scheme. (AMI, the corporate parent of the National Enquirer, also admitted its role in the felony but was not charged.) In a scene that would have made riveting TV if this were a reality show instead of reality, Cohen gave an emotional speech acknowledging his crimes:
“I blame myself for the conduct which has brought me here today, and it was my own weakness and a blind loyalty to this man that led me to choose a path of darkness over light.”
Mr. Cohen said the president had been correct to call him “weak” recently, “but for a much different reason than he was implying. It was because time and time again I felt it was my duty to cover up his dirty deeds rather than to listen to my own inner voice and my moral compass.”
Only Donald Trump could turn a two-bit bully like Michael Cohen into a sort-of sympathetic character.
One big scene that did make the reality show was the White House visit from Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer to talk to Trump about his insistence on his wall, which is holding up budget negotiations and has Trump talking of a government shutdown. As Ezra Klein points out, Trump doesn’t want the wall. he wants a public fight about the wall, so he did all this on live TV, where Nancy Pelosi showed why Democrats who want to dump her don’t appreciate why Republicans demonize her — she doesn’t back down from a fight. In fact, she wiped the floor with him, challenging him to put up or shut up in a way Hillary never managed to pull off. Trump claimed victory, of course — if he’d been in charge at Pearl Harbor he would have declared victory from the smoking ruins of his fleet — but she put the wood to him immediately. It was all for show, of course, but Trump hadn’t planned on losing the showdown.