Aquila89 wrote:According to
The Wall Street Journal, Trump's lawyer Michael Cohen paid porn star Stormy Daniels $130,000 a month before the election in exchange for her not talking about an alleged (consensual) sexual encounter with Trump in 2006.
Cohen really needn't have bothered. Trump voters didn't care about his "grab them by the pussy" line, and they didn't care about the allegations of sexual assault against him. Why would they care if he cheated on with his wife with a porn star? Many of them would probably think it makes him cooler. As for the evangelicals; James Dobson claimed that Trump
recently converted to Christianity (though Trump never said this, he always claimed to be a Christian). So it doesn't matter what he used to do; he found Jesus and was born again, all is forgiven.
Here's an "according to the Wall Street Journal" article that isn't paywalled.
https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2018 ... eport.htmlTrump met Stephanie Clifford, whose goes by the name Stormy Daniels in films, at a golf event in 2006 — a year after Trump’s marriage to his wife, Melania. According to the Journal’s report, Clifford began talking with ABC News in the fall of 2016 for a story involving an alleged relationship with Trump, but reached a $130,000 deal a month before the election, which prevented her from going public.
Trump’s longtime attorney Michael Cohen arranged for the payment through Clifford’s lawyer, Keith Davidson, the Journal reported.
[...]
Just days before the 2016 election, the Journal published a story stating that the National Enquirer — run by David Pecker, a fervid supporter of Trump — had paid $150,000 to silence former Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal about a sexual relationship she allegedly had with Trump a decade ago.
*huh-huh huh* David Pecker *huh-huh huh-huh*
From IMdB, Daniels (her acting name) was in
The 40 Year Old Virgin, so she obviously can reach beyond being only an adult film star, not that that's a bad thing. She played the role of "pornstar". Maybe that's more like a cameo... sort of like Donald in Home Alone 2.
That got me scrolling through Trump's IMdB page. He's done quite a few 'Donald Trump (as Donald Trump)' cameo gigs. However, in 1994, he did
The Little Rascals in the role of "Waldo's Dad". The more you know...
I tend to not care that much about the sex lives of politicians and other celebrities unless it's downright creepy or outright illegal (I'm looking at you, Weiner, as one of many, many people who really wished to not ever have to utter such a phrase), but, fuck it, it's Trump.
This isn't at all surprising for a thrice-married, serial cheater who allegedly forced himself on a People reporter at Mar-a-Lago whilst a very preggers Melania was in the building, and made his famous brags to Billy Bush. A character as salacious as Trump tends to attract salacious news copy. In fact, a character as salacious as Trump used to revel, if not outright plant, salacious reports about himself. There is probably a part of him which wants the world to know he banged a porn star while married, and didn't really process that it would be a bad thing for the world to know until someone explained it to him. So, you play by the sword, and all that.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/porn-star ... hotel-roomThe Daily Beast had also been in protracted talks with Daniels about arranging an interview after three sources—including fellow porn star Alana Evans—told The Daily Beast that Daniels and Trump were involved. She ultimately backed out on Nov. 3, just five days before the 2016 election.
What I get from that is twofold; it's not just the Journal who was looking into this, and it went from a great story to a non-event just before the election.
Cohen on Friday did not address the alleged payout to Daniels but provided the following statement to The Daily Beast: “These rumors have circulated time and again since 2011. President Trump once again vehemently denies any such occurrence as has Ms. Daniels.” The attorney also provided a letter dated Jan. 10, 2018, allegedly signed by Daniels, that denied any “sexual and/or romantic affair” with Trump or the receipt of any “hush money” from Trump.
The letter is nice. Trump also has one from his doctor claiming he would be the healthiest POTUS ever, to which Teddy Roosevelt's grave reacted with a mighty chuckle of derision. Letters really are quite lovely, especially since nobody really takes the time and effort to write them these days. Also, call your mother.
Daniels’ story would have come on the heels of the porn star Jessica Drake coming forward in late October 2016 to accuse Trump of kissing her without consent and offering her $10,000 in exchange for sex in 2006. Then, on Nov. 4, 2016, the Journal unearthed documents revealing that the Trump-friendly rag National Enquirer had shelled out $150,000 to Playboy centerfold Karen McDougal for a tell-all about her alleged 10-month affair with The Donald from 2006 to 2007. They never ran the piece.
Oh, okay... the Enquirer didn't pay McDougal hush money, they just payed her for exclusivity on a story they didn't run. Very subtle, Pecker.
*WINKy WINKy*
If Drake and McDougal are to be believed, their encounters with Trump took place in the months after Melania gave birth to the Trumps’ youngest son, Barron, in March 2006.
Gross. I mean, like, grosser than just the gross of regular serial cheating. To put my pop-psych hat on, major life events do tend to exacerbate troublesome behaviours in troubled people. Dropping the pop-psych had and being more realistic; Donald Trump is a pig, and has always been a pig of the epic proportions which money, fame, entitlement, and massive narcissism, tend to exacerbate.
“Stormy calls me four or five times, by the last two phone calls she’s with Donald [Trump] and I can hear him, and he’s talking through the phone to me saying, ‘Oh come on Alana, let’s have some fun! Let’s have some fun! Come to the party, we’re waiting for you.’ And I was like, ‘OMG it’s Donald Trump!’ Men like him scare me because they have so much power and this was way before his presidential nomination. So I bailed on them and turned my phone off.”
Evans said she talked to Daniels the next day, apologized for bailing, and asked her how the night went. “She tells me, ‘All I’m going to say is: I ended up with Donald in his hotel room. Picture him chasing me around his hotel room in his tighty-whities.’ I was like, ‘Oh I really didn’t need to hear that!’ Then she said he offered her keys to his condos in Florida, and I was like, ‘Wow guess you had a good night,’ and that was the last we ever spoke of it.”
Well, now - that is not a mental image I need.
Yup - not surprising. Fun to read, but given it's all consensual, I kinda figure 'whatevs'. The Enquirer pay-out angle does remind me that it must be nice to have very rich supporters who are happy to drop $150K to cover-up embarrassing things about one's past. It's like steroids in sport - sometimes the winner is the simply the cheating-ass, dirtbag, athlete with the best doctors.
On its own, I don't see this behaviour as something which, in my mind, is problematic when considering his ability to do his job (being POTUS, that is - who knows what he
thinks his job is). However, it's difficult to not include it in the litany of events which are really starting to pile-on to the possibility that this boy isn't just making himself an even BIGGER asshole on a near-daily basis, but rather, dude has some seriously misfiring wiring in his noggin which could very-well endanger everyone on this planet.
JFK playing happy-time with his willy was one thing. Not exactly representative of an outstandingly moral human being, from certain perspectives, but given what we know about Trump, imagine if he were faced with the Cuban Missile Crisis. Not only can I not conceive of Trump being able to make his way through such a crisis, I see the possibility of him making enough ill-advised maneuvers to generate the next Cuban Missile-esque crisis. I hope like hell Pence and the cabinet have at least a tacit plan to yank the 25th amendment rug out from under Trump before he can feverishly stomp on his biggest red button.
A quantum state of signature may or may not be here... you just ruined it.