THE "P" WORD

When I was a young grade-schooler, I asked my father why there was no sound to the letter "p" in the word "pneumonia." He  laughed, and said "in some words the 'p' is silent, like the 'p' in 'toilet'." I confess I didn't "get" that for a while, and when I did get it I didn't think it was very funny. But my father did, and that was good enough for me.

I am reminded of that "joke" by the Flynn sentencing the other day. Flynn, you recall, had been an uber supporter of Trump. He appeared at many of Trump's rallies, leading the audience in the offensive "Lock Her Up" chant, and was seen as a hard-right adviser to the President-elect. During the transition, he was directed to contact the Russian Ambassador and deliver several Trumpian messages. At least one of those messages, it is reported, was at the behest of Jared Kushner. The other details of who crafted the messages Flynn delivered are, at this time, muddy, at least to all of us outside of the Mueller team.

Flynn thereafter lied about the substance of his conversation with the Russian Ambassador. He lied about it to the press, he lied about it to the Vice President, and to other people in the administration. And when the FBI called and asked if they might pay him a visit in his west wing office, (Flynn was at that time the National Security Adviser) he said, "Sure, come ahead, happy to speak with you." So the FBI paid him a visit and he lied to them too.  

There are a number of mysteries involved in Flynn's conversation with Ambassador Kislyak. Not only are we in the dark about precisely who instructed him to talk to the Russians about the subject of sanctions, it is a great mystery as to why Flynn thereafter lied about that, especially since, as the former head of the Defense intelligence agency, he had to know that his telephone conversation with the Russian Ambassador was recorded by the FBI. But but lie he did.

When confronted with his crimes of lying to the FBI (and failing to register as a foreign agent for Turkey) Flynn folded, signed a cooperation agreement, and pleaded guilty to one count of lying to the FBI. That count had a maximum sentence of five years, but carried a sentencing guideline recommendation of six months.

At the time of sentencing, Flynn had fully flipped. His cooperation was described as being "almost 100% complete." And he must have given the Mueller team lots of good stuff because Mueller praised his cooperation to the sentencing judge and recommended a no-jail sentence. 

But then a bizarre thing happened. Flynn's lawyers submitted a pre-sentence memorandum in which they suggested that Flynn had been deceived by the Feebs in the manner of their questioning of him. Futhermore, they complained that the agents failed to warn this three-star general and former top security official that lying to the FBI was a crime. In other words, Flynn's lawyers trashed the Mueller team and the FBI.

How remarkable! What a coincidence! President Trump was desperately trying to escape from his own criminality by trashing the Mueller team and the FBI too.

Strange, huh?

The District Judge did not react kindly to Flynn's weaseling attack on the FBI. In fact, he was furious. He put Flynn under oath and made him admit that the FBI did nothing wrong, he did lie to them, and he knew it was a crime to do so. The judge indicated that Flynn's crimes were very serious, bordering on treason, and he was inclined to give him jail time. Flynn accepted the judge's offer for a 90-day delay to give the General the opportunity to "complete" his cooperation with Mueller. 

The press has largely focused on the judge's demeanor as a rebuke to Trump's attack on the FBI. It certainly was that.

But I saw no discussion in the print medium or on television about the apparent gross misjudgment by Flynn's lawyers to attack the FBI. They already had "no jail" in the bag, yet the NYTimes headlined the story as the lawyers' effort to secure "leniency" for their client. Were the lawyers really so dumb? Did they think they could do better than the "zero" Mueller had recommended?

Nah. The Flynn lawyers, though in court, were not playing to the judge, but to the Big Cheese. By publicly supporting Trump's attack on the FBI, they were doing the same thing that Manafort had done: cooperating with Mueller openly, but one way or another, giving aid to a Trumpian cause. 

Hmm. While Trump had only foul things to say about his former lawyer Michael Cohen for flipping, (he suggested that "flipping" was so evil it ought to be against the law, and he called Cohen a "rat," for doing so), Trump nevertheless praised flipper Flynn as being a fine person and wished him good luck at his sentencing!

So we are back to the "P" word.

No, Flynn's lawyers were not trying to reduce Flynn's court-imposed sentence: they were making nice-nice to the boss, sending a message reinforcing the pardon discussions earlier had with Trump's lawyers.

Did they miscalculate? Yup. In the end, Flynn will sing some more, and probably escape jail or perhaps get a 30-day sentence. 

But there is no way, I suggest, that Trump dares to pardon Flynn before November 3, 2020, if then. In the Trump world, loyalty flows only uphill, and Donald is going to have to issue a satchel-full of pardons to his crime family. And who knows, maybe to himself!

Then, if there's room, maybe Manafort and Flynn. Maybe.

A bientot.