The U.S. could be in a quagmire that like makes Brexit look
like a puddle if Donald Trump is elected.
What would it do to Wall Street, Congress and the people in
general if Trump was wearing orange. It has happened before.
Though so far only a president, the late Richard Nixon, was
ousted, his vice President Spiro T. Agnew was ousted.
And Agnew made it through their first four years, but not
their second term.
He had committed extortion, tax fraud, bribery and
conspiracy while serving as governor of Maryland and in other government jobs
in the state. It was only a measly $100,000, peanuts by today’s standards.
Nixon didn’t pardon
him, being under investigation himself for the much more serious Watergate.
Some scholars believe Trump could pardon himself if convicted in the Florida Gate
or other scandals, and name Mike Pence President. Congress would selected a new
vice president.
Imagine the fiasco, because in Agnew’s case nothing was
known of his crimes when he was elected and served five years.
Trump is already under investigation, and set to go on trial
for the fraud at Trump University. And news sites have listed dozens of other
potential scandals he could be held responsible for.
In Floridagate he is accused of bribing Florida Atty. Gen.
Pam Bondi $25,000 to drop the Trump University case.
It will go on trial in other states around Election Day.
Mere statements of fact cannot even come close to all Trump
got away with.
A quotation from H.L. Mencken, about someone else, put it
this way:
"No man ever came to market with less seductive goods,
and no man ever got a better price for what he had to offer." The true
American Hustle – turn all attention former First Lady’s problems with emails.
Can Americans really not care? Even after reading this list
of ripoffs.
The Many Scandals of Donald Trump: A Cheat Sheet
The Republican nominee’s charitable foundation made a large
gift to a Florida politician right before she dropped a damaging investigation.
But what else has the foundation done?
“As the old saying goes, those who give to glass foundations
shouldn’t throw stones. Or something like that. In any case, after hitting
Hillary Clinton hard over the Clinton Foundation, Donald Trump is under fresh
scrutiny for his own foundation.
Washington Post reporter David
Fahrenthold has been reporting for months on the dearth of actual
giving that Trump has done, despite repeated vows to donate to charity over the
decades, but the story that’s broken through concerns a donation that Trump
made to “Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, a Republican, in 2013. At the
time, Bondi’s office was deciding whether or not to pursue a fraud case against
Trump University
and the Trump
Institute. According to an aide, Bondi personally spoke with Trump,
soliciting a donation to And Justice for All, a group backing her reelection.
The Trump Foundation cut And Justice for All a $25,000 check, and four days
later Bondi dropped the investigation.
“There are two questions at play here. One is the appearance
of a quid-pro-quo. While Trump and Bondi say there was none, this is also
precisely the mode Trump has described in the past. “As a
businessman and a very substantial donor to very important people, when you give,
they do whatever the hell you want them to do,” Trump told
The Wall Street Journal in July 2015. “As a businessman, I need
that.” He reprised those boasts early in the GOP primary, positioning himself
as the only candidate honest enough to say how the game was played—and the only
one rich enough to be exempt from it. Now, however, he’s singing a different
tune.
“Improper influence or not, the donation was illegal. The
Trump Foundation, as a nonprofit, cannot give to political causes. Making
things more complicated, the Trump Foundation recorded the incorrect recipient
as the gift. “Eventually, it had to pay a $2,500 penalty to the IRS. Even then,
it has not recouped the money, as is required.
“That’s not the end of the story. The liberal watchdog group
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has filed a
complaint with the IRS, accusing the Trump Foundation of violating
another rule by using charity to benefit a group’s leader. Meanwhile, The
Huffington Post reports that Trump’s help for Bondi didn’t stop with
that $25,000 donation. His family gave more to her, and he also hosted a
fundraiser at his tony Mar-A-Lago in Florida—charging less than market rate,
and less than he charged his own campaign to host events there. …
“The breadth of Trump’s controversies is truly huge, ranging
from allegations of mafia ties to unscrupulous business dealings, and from
racial discrimination to alleged marital rape. The stretch over more than four
decades, from the mid-1970s to the present day. To catalogue the full sweep of
allegations would require thousands of words and lump together the trivial with
the truly scandalous. Including business deals that have simply failed, without
any hint of impropriety, would require thousands more. This is a snapshot of
some of the most interesting and largest of those scandals.
The Beauty Pageant Scandals
“Where and when: Various, 1992-present
The dirt: The Boston
Globe’s Matt Viser reports on the mess of the American Dream pageant
in 1992. After years of attending beauty pageants—Trump seems to have always
enjoyed the company of beautiful, scantily clad women—he decided he wanted to
get in on the business himself, meeting with George Houraney and Jill Harth, a
couple that ran the American Dream pageant. It was an ill-fated effort. Harth
and Houraney alleged that Trump started making passes at her almost
immediately. On one occasion, Trump allegedly asked them to bring some models
to a party. Harth alleges Trump groped her at the party. In a limo afterwards,
another model said she heard him say that “all women are bimbos” and most “gold
diggers.” Trump reportedly joined another model in bed, uninvited, late at
night. On other occasions, he forced Harth into bedrooms and made passes at
her, she said. But after the contest, Trump broke off dealings. Harth sued
Trump, alleging sexual misbehavior, while the couple together sued him for
breach of contract. In the suit, they also alleged that Trump had kept black
women out of the pageant.
“The upshot: The couple settled with Trump for an unannounced
sum, and Harth dropped her suit. Trump has denied all the allegations. “But it
wasn’t Trump’s last turn in the pageant business. A few years later, he bought
the Miss Universe pageant, which also includes Miss USA and Miss Teen USA.
“Honestly, when I bought [Miss Universe], the bathing suits got smaller and the
heels got higher and the ratings went up,” he boasted to
Vanity Fair later. In 2012, he won a $5
million suit against a former contestant who claimed the contest was
rigged. By 2015, he operated Miss Universe as a joint venture with NBC, but
after he slurred Mexican immigrants at his campaign launch, Univision and NBC
both announced they would not air the pageant. Trump bought out NBC’s share,
then promptly sold the company. He sued Univision but settled in
February. The terms were undisclosed.
Racial Housing Discrimination
“Where and when: New York City, 1973-1975
The dirt: The Department of Justice sued Trump and his
father Fred in 1973 for housing discrimination at 39 sites around New York.
“The government contended that Trump Management had refused to rent or
negotiate rentals ‘because of race and color,’” The New York
Times reported. “It also charged that the company had required
different rental terms and conditions because of race and that it had
misrepresented to blacks that apartments were not available.” Trump called the
accusations “absolutely ridiculous.”
“The upshot: The Trumps hired attorney Roy Cohn, who had
worked for Joe McCarthy and whom Michael Kinsley once indelibly
labeled “innocent of a variety of federal crimes.” They sued the
Justice Department for $100 million. In the end, however, the Trumps settled
with the government, promising not to discriminate and submitting to regular
review by the New York Urban League—though crucially not admitting guilt. The
Times has much more on the long history of allegations at Trump-owned
properties
Mafia Ties
Where and when: New York and Atlantic City, 1970s- ?
“The dirt: Trump has been linked to the mafia many times
over the years, with varying degrees of closeness. Many of the connections seem
to be the sorts of interactions with mobsters that were inevitable for a guy in
the construction and casino businesses at the time. For example, organized
crime controlled the 1980s New York City concrete business, so that anyone
building in the city likely brushed up against it. While Trump has portrayed
himself as an unwitting participant, not everyone
agrees. There have been a string of other allegations, too, many
reported by investigative
journalist Wayne Barrett. Cohn, Trump’s lawyer, also represented the
Genovese crime family boss Tony Salerno. Barrett also reported a series of
transactions involving organized crime, and alleged that Trump paid twice
market rate to a mob figure for the land under Trump Plaza in
Atlantic City. Michael Isikoff has also reported
that Trump was close to Robert LiButti, an associate of John Gotti, inviting
him on his yacht and helicopter. In one case, Trump’s company bought LiButti
nine luxury cars.
“The upshot: Though Trump has been questioned in court or
under oath about the ties, he’s never been convicted of anything. A New Jersey
Division of Gaming Enforcement report
after Barrett’s 1992 book on Trump generally found no mafia-related wrong-doing
on Trump’s part. Trump Plaza was fined $200,000 for keeping black employees
away from LiButti’s table, at his behest, and for the gift of the cars, though
Trump personally was not penalized.
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