Pierce: If Manafort Is Guilty, Would He Flip on Trump?

[mcar]

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a56929/will-manafort-flip/

LINCOLN, NEBRASKA—Even out here, hard by the missile silos, we noticed that, when it comes to Paul Manafort and Donald J. Trump, like Donkey Kong, it is on. There was the early-morning FBI raid on Manafort's house, and "early-morning FBI raid" is never a phrase in connection with which you want your name connected in a headline. At almost the same time, the National Enquirer, the most diseased of the house organs at the beck and call of the president*, teed up Manafort with one of its typically nuanced front pages:

Yeah, I'd say that Manafort has been simultaneously thrown over the side and under the bus. There's a certain raw predatory glee in which this president* dispatches inconvenient people that is fascinating in a purely clinical sense. But it doesn't make for good government, and it sure as hell doesn't help you when there's a special prosecutor on your trail and when the person being dispatched probably has a paper trail that leads straight up your spinal column.

Manafort always was the key. The guy made a career lobbying for really terrible people, eventually (and inevitably) lobbying for really terrible people connected to the crooked Russian oligarchy. The FBI's forensic accountants must be looking at his books the way that the Leakeys looked at Olduvai Gorge. My guess is that, very soon, it will reach the point at which Manafort would roll on the Archangel Gabriel to keep from spending several centuries in jail. He will have to give the prosecutor something, and he knows why the Enquirer piled on during the worst day of his life. This bird can sing.

[Sanity Claws]

1. Manafort is probably concerned about the Russian mob and oligarchs, not Trump

His life is at stake if he pisses off the Russian mob and oligarchs. Trump is just collateral damage and basically irrelevant to his calculations.

[Wounded Bear]

2. No honor among thieves...

I suspect he'll do what he can to save his ass. Trump certainly doesn't do much to instill any loyalty in his minions.

[HopeAgain]

3. I always assumed that is why Manafort left the campaign when he did...

The timing seemed to be that they were trying to stave off attention to the man's foreign dealings. Trump generally thinks of himself and his people as being untouchable, so I assumed the matter would turn out to be indefensible even to those idiots.

[malaise]

4. If he sings like those blackbirds on our trail this morning

the Con is up shit creek without a paddle

Off to the greatest page for thee

[mcar]

8. He's got to know the Frog King would flip on him

in a New York minute.

[democratisphere]

5. Flip in a New York minute.

[awesomerwb1]

6. Depends on what the charges are.

And then what kind of sentence he's looking at. If he's potentially looking at decades in the slammer, than yes.

He's very wealthy. So if a light sentence, he'll serve 2 years or less out of 5, 7? There'll be lots of money for him when he gets out.

[SonofDonald]

7. It's all about the money, not loyalty.

These human stains will sell their grandmas soul for lunch money, it's all they are about, money and nothing else.

Manafort will turn on 45 the moment it will be in his favour, and I think that moment is here.

I can't wait.

[Kathy M]

9. What is he guilty of ? We do not know anything yet .... Am I th only person who

thinks Manafort working front and center during campaign is just the opposite of how he has worked for 30 to 40 years ......

I do not believe everything is as what is being assumed ...... let the investigations take their course .

also ...Mueller had interview with Trump the day before he was named Special Council .

Maybe I am the odd one who looks at things from different angles and not a narrow path .......