I don’t know whether there is any kind of coordination with the Trump legal team, or whether former Trump Mar-A-Lago attorney Timothy Parlatore, or whether he’s belatedly trying to make his peace with Satan, but either way, what we’re seeing is an inspired mindf*ck.
When Parlatore first left the Trump team, he was bitingly acerbic about multiple members of the Trump Florida defense team, especially the legal Port-O-San Boris Epshteyn. But in recent cable and network news interviews, Parlatore has deferred from dishing any more dirt, simply stating that he has already said all he has to say on that subject.
Parlatore appeared tonight on The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC, and it was clear from the start that O’Donnell had lovingly prepared for this interview with his staff. He had Parlatore in the chair for close to a half an hour, and Lawrence didn’t disappoint.
For a half an hour, O’Donnell, who prepared carefully, treated Parlatore like a personal bop doll, one of those blow up dolls with a sand base, where you knock them down, and they op right back up again for a left uppercut. And yet, through it all, every time O’Donnell tried to skewer him, Parlatore just popped back up, a benign look on his face, and calmly provided a possible alternative interpretation to O’Donnell’s previous hypothesis. Because that’s what his questions were, hypotheses and nothing more.
If you watched the interview, like Teri and I did, you came away high fiving and dancing on the ceiling for how O’Donnell had just demolished a high dollar Trump defense attorney. But when I sat back for a moment and replayed the interview, I realized how we all couldn’t have been more wrong.
Because if I’m a member of the Trump defense team right now, I’m popping champagne corks, and dancing around a May Pole. because a former team member has just given the Trump defense two gifts for free. And it’s the kind of help you can’t buy with ads or press conferences.
Here’s how it works. Parlatore hasn’t just hit MSNBC. He’s making the rounds of all of the mainstream media outlets, who love him since they see him as a disgruntled former Trump lawyer with an axe to grind, and they want him to grind it on their air. But it isn’t working out that way.
Parlatore is actually serving two purposes at the same time for the Trump defense team. First, by calmly responding to antagonistic questions about Trump’s culpability in the documents case, Parlatore is getting a preliminary draft of the Trump defense teams possible defense for Traitor Tot. This gives them a chance to see how it’s playing in the mainstream population. And if nothing else, it’s sowing seeds of doubt of the prosecutions case into the minds of a potential jury pool.
Second, Parlatore has just given FUX News and the Trump defense team a golden goose. For all of their travails, FUX just can’t seem to quit Trump. It’s like the high school cheerleader who loves the delinquent greaser. But Parlatore has just given FUX a prefect chance to do His Lowness a solid.
Mark my words. By the time that FUX and Friends hits the air in the morning, the producers and editors will have crafted carefully edited segments that show O’Donnell sneeringly thinking he’s taking Parlatore down, only to have him respond with a word salad response that sounds to blubbering imbeciles like a world class refutations of O’Donnell’s assertion. This restores Trump’s base with the belief that it’s all a witch hunt, and allows El Pendejo President to trim the sheeple for more fundraising.
Never forget one simple thing. Donald Trump is a creature of the media. He has spent 45v years using it to his advantage, and he sure as hell knows how to manipulate it. And it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if he found a Manchurian Candidate rogue lawyer to spread the party line dressed as a Trump opponent. Just remember one thing. When you break it down, Parlatore’s responses held absolutely no legal water whatsoever. But that doesn’t mean that everybody else out there knows it. Don’t touch that dial.
The new media. You don’t have to BE plausible, you just have to sound it or look it-specially so for just a quick glance.
That works in ‘the court of public opinion’, but not in a real court of law, as Trump et al are finding out.
Whoever wrote this article must not have been paying attention to the interview the first time around. Despite Larry’s usual spun up, on-the-verge-of-meltdown statements, as well as talking over the interviewee, Parlatore countered every question, and statement, with facts. No wonder MSNBC rarely has dissenting voices on the air. Facts foil their agenda.
Facts? No. Parlatore misrepresented (on multiple outlets) what the PRA says. And in any case it doesn’t apply to the charges Trump is facing in FL because the indictment is limited to CLASSIFIED Documents & not other Presidential records/papers. What Parlatore says on TV isn’t something he’d try in court, at least not after getting slapped down by a judge the first time he tries it. No, it’s like the election litigation cases where Trump lawyers would make all kinds of b.s. claims on TV but NEVER in open court in front of a judge!
I too worried about how the right willl use this to their advantage, especially since my fears about the case being tried down in FL appear to be coming true. You’re damned right Team Trump has been popping corks tonight. Actually more along the lines of Randy in the trailer at the end of the South Park Over-Logging episode. Let’s just admit it now. Trump’s gonna walk due to jury nullification and in part because of how Fox and others will edit all this and hopelessly taint a jury pool already predisposed to have more than one person who will hang the jury. Because in large part DOJ if afraid of accusation of not being fair to Trump. Hey, prosecutors have a client too – we the people! WE are equally entitled to a fair trial and the burden of proof is on us. AND we have to have a unanimous vote from the jury to win a conviction! But as I said elsewhere, they could let Trump pick the judge (Judge Cannon!) and even the jury with the prosecution shut out of it, hold the trial in the ballroom at Trump’s club and promise the jurors will be “properly thanked for their service” with a year’s free membership at that joint and Trump & his MAGA, and Fox and the rest would STILL scream the whole thing had been rigged against him!
I don’t know whether to be pi$$ed off or depressed.
His worshipers will believe anything. Jack Smith will slice and dice the attempts to defend the traitor tot like a Ginsu knife. And it will be the most delicious, satisfying meal for everyone. Mmmmm.
Or let the idiots run with the rope… freedom… urrck! Fools run on Red Bull, sugar, easy money and women, and stupidity. Best make plans. Prepare for worst and hope for the best. Again
Murf, I completely agree. I’ve seen Parlatore on 3 different shows and each time all I could think is this guy is an apologist for Trump. He maintains that tfg didn’t get adequate time to respond for demands for the documents and he was treated unfairly. Grist for the lie mill. Why is MSNBC giving this liar so much air time?
It is not just the oligarchs and craporations that destroyed this country–MSM was complicit in all they did. Should we finally decide to start the revolution against the olis and craps, may it be soon, we also need to take out the MSM. We can come up with a better fourth estate surely.
I became alarmed in the first few minutes of the interview. I was not happy when I went to bed. All I could think about was Lawrence’s shaking hands. Both were well prepared, but not being a lawyer, I couldn’t know how much of what the hack for Trump was saying was true, of any of it was. Lawrence should have had this guy first and then one of MSNBC’s many lawyers on to refute the hack’s assertions.
I doubt if Parlatore’s media appearances will have any impact on peoples’ opinions, which seem set at this point. It’s possible that he’s hoping Trump will rehire him for the actual trial, once Trump realizes that his current batch of lawyers are incompetent and can’t prevent him from getting indicted.
Up to now, Trump has ignored the conventional wisdom of staying quiet and following the attorney’s advice. We shall see if he continues on that path.
Parlatore may not be on the legal team, but he’s still working for the former guy, doing PR.
Karen, I agree. Nothing will turn the cult members into rational human beings. Nothing this liar says will fool anyone who has paid any attention over the past 7 years. What about the fence sitters? Well…if you are on the fence after watching this fascist for 7 years, then you are in the first group. Add in there’s still a year and a half to go. Never celebrate until the deal is done. Never despair until the deal is done.