The value of this book is that Cohen was a first-hand witness (with receipts) to TrumpWorld crimes.
During Michael Cohen’s testimony before Congress on February 27, 2019, Congressional Republicans hurled childish Trump-like insults at him.
He looked them over and said, “I am responsible for your silliness because I did the same things that you are doing now. I protected Mr. Trump for 10 years.” He then issued a warning: “People who follow Mr. Trump blindly will suffer the same consequences I’m suffering.”
Cohen’s book, Disloyal, expands and explains.
Cohen doesn’t expect us (liberals, Democrats, and Trump critics) to like him, but he hopes we’ll learn from his experience how TrumpWorld operates.
The Lure of Money and Power
For 10 years, Cohen was an ‘active and eager participant’ in Trump’s ugly behavior:
Cohen explains why people lie and cheat for Trump:
It’s a Faustian bargain: Grovel at Trump’s feet, and be rewarded with power, and invited into a world of wealth and glamour.
Cohen was susceptible to the allure of Trump-style power. Since childhood, he was fascinated by mobsters and attracted to their power and methods, in which he found “glamour.”
. He actually wanted to be a gangster – lawyer.
Cohen explains how Trump brings people into his web of lies and deceits.First Trump tells a lie. He knows it’s a lie. You know it’s a lie. If you go along, he has you. Then he tells another. He subtly signals to people what lie they are supposed to tell, and bestows his favor when they comply. Eventually people start believing their own lies because Trumpworld reinforces them
To quote Yale Professor Timothy Snyder, Trump creates a story and forces us all to become actors in the play.
Trump has an “unerring eye” for the kind of person who he can reel in:
Andy McCabe, Preet Bharara, and James Comey described this same process whereby Trump tells a lie and invites you to join them. Here’s where Comey described it as Trump eating your soul in pieces.
Comey, McCabe, and Bharara refused. They spoke the truth, so Trump set out to destroy them. Cohen accepted the lie in exchange for power.
Cohen became Trump’s right-hand man because he was willing to lie and cheat:
Cohen was amazed by Trump’s ability to lie to a person’s face. He described the acts Trump put on to win the Evangelical vote. According to Cohen, Trump has no ideology other than accumulating wealth and power.
This is exactly how Prof. Stanley describes fascism.
Fascism It’s all about hierarchy and power, and the cynicism of thinking that for everyone, it’s all about hierarchy and power. Cohen describes how Trump employs fascists tactics, almost as if Trump read Stanley (but really, Stanley studied how fascists do it.)
Trump + Putin = Love
After explaining that Trump had no trouble cheating in the 2016 election or accepting help from Putin (which for Trump would have been “business as usual”) Cohen explains why Trump loves Putin. Read this entire passage:
And this:
Yes, Trump is compromised. Yes, Trump does Putin’s bidding willingly because he wants to. Both of these things can be true, particularly if the compromising material consists of Trump’s willingness to secretly partner with Putin to promote Trump’s personal interests.
The ending was quite dramatic: After ten years of loyalty and devotion, Cohen was arrested for crimes committed mostly while working for Trump, and at Trump’s direction.
The arrest took Cohen completely by surprise. I mean, he was shocked.
It seems to have never occurred to Cohen that he was breaking laws. I know that sounds stupid—he knew all along he was lying and cheating and hiding important stuff like payments to porn stars— but I’ve seen it before in my work as a defense lawyer. I recall sitting across the table from a man who said, “I knew I was pushing the envelope. But I had no idea I was violating 5 federal statutes.”
Part of the intoxication of being in Trump’s world was the feeling that rules don’t matter.
Cohen describes the cynicism of thinking everyone cheats. If everyone cheats, the person prosecuted has been singled out for political reasons. He thought he was targeted. If they got him (he thought) they can get anyone.
Narrator: Wrong! Most people don’t do this crap:
Trump’s response to Cohen’s arrest was a version of “I hardly know him.” Cohen was hurt and shocked.
The summer before Cohen (famously) told a Vanity Fair reporter that he would take a bullet for Trump. “And I meant it,” Cohen wrote. “But not if Donald Trump pulled the trigger.”
Cohen understood that he was expected to stay quiet, go to prison, and work on remaining in Trump’s good graces.
But Cohen—hurt and angry by Trump’s reaction—walked. He cooperated with Mueller and testified under oath before Congress. He pleaded guilty and went to prison.
Cohen describes how prison guards, who were pro-Trump (and took the cue from Trump) found little ways to make him miserable in prison, for example, shining a light on him every half hour when he was trying to sleep.
Cohen also describes the moment when he was unfairly slapped back in jail in a clear case of retaliation when he would not assure the Barr-DOJ that he would not publish a tell-all book. The judge released him after finding that the DOJ’s treatment of him was “retaliatory.”
This is the book Trump didn’t want released.
I see in Michael Cohen a weak and limited person who was unable to withstand evil. (Are my years as a defense lawyer showing?)
Millions. Cohen was a successful personal injury lawyer before meeting Trump. This moved him into a whole new world. As a fringe benefit, he loved being part of the thrilling jet-setting glamorous world of high stakes and power. He’s sorry now.
I think this is correct: The hold he has on them is essentially their own weakness, which means he gets control of people unable to wrest free.
Trump eats their souls.
The problem goes back pretty far in human history.
