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Ok so I just watched his entire five episode series on OnDemand ‘The Hunt for the Trump Tapes With Tom Arnold.’ It was pretty entertaining though he doesn’t actually locate the alleged tapes of Trump using the N word. I mean I love Arnold’s passion and manic energy-in I think episode three he even put together a pretty impressive protest rally outside of Mark Burnett’s headquarters demanding Burnett-the Producer of the Apprentice-stop hoarding the tapes.
The crowd put together a pretty catchy chant actually ” Release the tapes, Mark Burnett, of Trump saying bad things on the set.’ Listen, my presumption is that the tapes surely exist. I mean we’ve seen Trump say some pretty racist things in plain sight. His father marched at a KKK rally in the 1920s. Trump himself pretended to have never heard of the KKK during the 2016 primary.
FN: In retrospect 9 months later I will adjust this: it’s not clear if they exist or not. We still haven’t seen the tape itself though Omarosa got Katrina Pierson on tape saying the tape does exist. You can argue that with all the hype-not to mention Arnold’s fevered search-if the tape exists we’d have seen it by now.
That may be correct though OTOH it could be that Trump’s legal team-and his buddy Mark Burnett-have kept it buried. It’s also arguable there’s been too much focus on this tape-it’s beyond blindingly obvious Trump’s a racist wether the tape exists or not and maybe that gets lost in the obsession with just 1 more example of his blindingly obvious racism
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In a particular season of Celebrity Apprentice-after the original Apprentice started to have hard times, he actually wanted to do a White and Black team. There’s my African-American.
During his pilgrimage to find the elusive N word tape, Arnold got some well meaning and gentle advice from both Arnold Scnwarznegger and Penn Jillette that he ought to forget this obsession with the tapes. But I don’t agree it’s a worthy crusade. True, it’s already pretty clear he’s a racist, but still this sort of empirical evidence nevertheless would be a bombshell-we knew-many of us knew in any case-that Trump is nowhere near as rich as he claims-on his disclosure as President he’s only listed as having $1 billion and change and most of what he does have came from his Daddy.
Still it’s a huge bombshell to have that NYTimes story that confirms that he’s not that rich, got his money from Daddy, and is a tax cheat having bilked NY to the tune of almost half a $billion in inheritance taxes.
So I think Arnold’s crusade to find the N word tape is a worthy goal. But he really ought to speak to Omarosa who was a major star on The Apprentice and has access to a lot more people than Arnold is regarding the show. Indeed, according to the tape Omarosa released in September, Trupster Katrina Pierson seems to have admitted that the N word tape does exist.
FN: While it’s true that empirical evidence is helpful at some point you can argue you lose sight of the forest for the trees. You could get caught in a trap where UNLESS you find the tape somehow this proves Trump IS NOT A RACIST. Still I would not suggest anyone interested stop investigating this. At a minimum Omarosa should be questioned-she raised the expectations-why have we heard nothing about the N word tape or the ‘hundreds of tapes’ she had promised? Was she bluffing? In Chapter A I asked if she was muzzled but she was on Deutsch last night-saying nothing revelatory true.
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So if you really want to find it speak to Omarosa speak to Katrina Pierson. Indeed, while Arnold on Twitter claimed to have spoken to people who knew for a fact of the tape’s existence but he didn’t speak to any of them during the show-if they exist. Indeed, he didn’t even speak to folks like Michael Cohen who he’d taken pictures with recently or Al Sharpton which would have been pretty interesting.
Cohen really could have some great information-depending on wether he’s still willing to speak as freely as he used to-there are signs from Lanny Davis this is no longer the case.
FN: Cohen is now in prison serving time for crimes he did at Trump’s direction and to Trump’s benefit while Trump is hailed as the ‘President’ and praised outrageously by the press he so demonizes.
No matter what your politics are, I have to say that I appreciate the access @realDonaldTrump gives us on a regular basis and the ability to ask any question. @PressSec @johnrobertsFox pic.twitter.com/CLutdtZRlj
— Kyra Phillips (@KyraPhillips) July 19, 2019
She ought to hang out with Rod Rosenstein and form a lavishly praise the dictator society.
When Arnold interviewed Felix Sater I was practically tearing my hair out. This was a primo opportunity for information but Arnold clearly didn’t know the right questions to ask. When Sater mentioned the Trump Tower in Moscow project he hand waved it away-he wanted to know about the N word tape.
I mean Arnold has this access to someone like Sater but simply doesn’t know what to do with it. I mean the chances that Sater knows anything about the N word tape is very remote-has had nothing to do with The Apprentice. Arnold then pivoted to asking if the ‘pee pee tape’ exists.
Again, this is not something Sater necessarily knows anything about-for what it’s worth, he opined that it didn’t happen. But in a way, Arnold has wandered into a GOP trap in any case-as if to prove Russian collusion you have to prove the existence of the pee pee tape-which may well could not exist.
FN: Which is perhaps the parallel situation with the N word tape-to prove Trump’s a racist you need the N word tape-ergo if it doesn’t exist he s not a racist. Then it’s TOTAL EXONERATION FOR THE PRESIDENT!
NO COLLUSION NO OBSTRUCTION NO RACISM!
The Trump loyalists immediately honed onto that allegation as it was so salacious-though as noted in a previous chapter, salacious doesn’t necessarily mean false-deliberately ignoring the fact that a dossier like this is a work of raw intelligence where you hardly expect it to be 100% correct. While at this point the pee tape has neither been proven or disproven, many key aspects of the dossier have actually since been proven.
As for the pee tape aspect of Kompromat, we still don’t know either way. Trump argued that as a germaphobe it was absurd but the allegation wasn’t that they peed on him but the bed-thereby symbolically defiling where the Obamas used to sleep when they stayed in Moscow.
Trump certainly doesn’t want pee on himself-he might get a kick out of it being symbolically spilled on Obama.
Trump’s body guard, Keith Schiller, did admit that the Russians offered Trump girls that night though he asserts they turned the offer down.
4/ Keith Schiller needs to be in front of a grand jury—and he needs to be there for about 12 hours. He knows exactly what Trump did in Moscow, and when, and with whom. And the story he told Congress isn't just shaky—it's prima facie evidence of an intent to mislead investigators.
— Seth Abramson (@SethAbramson) March 10, 2018
Ie-regarding the question of if there’s a pee tape Keith Schiller likely knows the answer.
Anyway it’s an entertaining miniseries-will Arnold be doing more or is that it? If so he really should take a consultant with him to these interviews-a knowledgable interviewer could have done a lot with Sater or other interviews that Arnold has the passion but not all the knowledge necessary to really get to the bottom of it.
P.S. An ancillary question is what happened to Omarosa? Is she out of tapes already, biding her time, or have Trump’s lawyers intimidated her from revealing more for the time being?
As Rachel Maddow says, watch this space.
UPDATE: Here is what a friend on Twitter says has gone down. He’s pretty knowledgeable on things Felix Sater.
https://twitter.com/felix_sater/status/1050444083825541120
Sater supposedly cooperated with Mueller but apparently this cooperation doesn’t extend to the House Democrats a few weeks ago-he missed a hearing with them and his excuse was he overslept?!
The Dems them subpoenaed him and he’s now again scheduled to testify
According to this friend he thinks this is the real Felix Sater:
— Felix Sater (@realFelixSater) April 4, 2018
hey hey, why u no return my calls ? Bayrock documents r in circulation, can't cover up any more.
— Felix Sater (@realFelixSater) May 13, 2017
If this is Felix Sater, he’s approvingly RTing people like Seth Abramson, Scott Dworkin, and Ted Lieu.
(THREAD) The evidence that Trump business partner Felix Sater is a cooperating individual in the Mueller probe is now overwhelming—and if he is, he's the most dangerous witness against Trump Mueller has (and that *includes* Flynn and Papadopoulos).
I hope you'll read and share. pic.twitter.com/e4c6UR5Fy6
— Seth Abramson (@SethAbramson) January 2, 2018
FN: Another important area for the House Dems questioning of Mueller this Wednesday-presumably Schiff’s committee which is focusing on Trump campaign contacts with the Russians will cover this.