Still No Crime, Pathological Testimony & Eyes on CPI - Top 3 Takeaways – May 15th, 2024
- Where’s the crime? On Tuesday after the second day of testimony by the prosecution’s star witness, the still convicted liar and perjurer Michael Cohen, there was still one not-so-minor detail in this case. There still is no crime. The most remarkable aspect of Cohen’s two days' worth of testimony is this. Even if you took at face value everything Cohen said as true there’s still one not-so-insignificant detail. Where’s the crime? The prosecution nor Michael Cohen have laid out an actual crime committed by Donald Trump. There are 34 felony charges that have been brought against the former and perhaps future President of the United States in this case and with the star witness on the stand they’ve yet to present the case for even one. That’s not an opinion. There has not actually been anything presented during the case that’s a crime. It’s not a crime to pay for NDAs. It’s not a crime to have your attorney arrange for the payments and the details. It’s not a crime to take your attorney’s advice on how to do it. It’s not a crime to pay your attorney back for having done this. It’s not a crime for a bookkeeper, who isn’t you, to label those payments as “legal expenses”. The only crimes attested to by Michael Cohen in the court room were those which he’s already pled guilty to having committed himself. What’s even more interesting is that the prosecution repeatedly had him answer questions as to if the material he had testified to, like the recorded phone call with Donald Trump were legitimate, and if they had been modified in anyway. Those questions and Cohen’s answers were seemingly to reinforce the narrative that the material presented was the smoking gun evidence under which the jury should then use to convict Trump. It’s remarkable. Because what the prosecution appears to be trying to do is to win on narrative, not on what the law is and what’s actually a crime. The narrative being that Trump wanted to cover unseemly stuff up to win the 2016 election which worked. So, in essence convict Trump of being the big bad Orangeman who associated with unseemly characters like Stormy Daniels and used unseemly characters like Michael Cohen to get it done. Convict him for having become president in 2016 and stop him from becoming president again this year. And again, I say that because as I said yesterday, whatever the intelligence level of these jurors on balance may or may not be, however informed on balance, these jurors may or may not be, there are two in particular that are especially problematic for the prosecution. The two attorneys on the jury. They’re at a minimum, reasonably educated on the law. It’s a tall ask of even potential anti-Trump jurors to know the law, ignore the law and to convict on narrative because you don’t like the guy. That in a nutshell is the prosecution's case since we learned that Cohen was the prosecution’s last witness.
- Consider the source. The cross examination opened with one very broad theme. He’s not a nice guy. He’s not a credible guy. He’s a guy who personally profits off producing content bashing Trump nearly daily and selling merchandise that depicts Trump going to jail daily...but only after having previously called him “Kind, humble and honest”. After having said that Trump’s family was his surrogate family. After having said that that he would “take a bullet for president”. After having said that he “missed President Trump in 2017 (because of his having become president)”. We learned that he started doing regular TikiToks at night because he said he couldn’t sleep and going on TikTok and bashing Trump evidently helped him sleep. At this point people know what they know about Michael Cohen. What’s interesting is that if you take piece by piece what was elicited in yesterday’s testimony there’s a phycological profile of a pathological person who was presented. Here’s the definition of a pathological person: extreme in a way that is not normal or that shows an illness or mental problem. That is what came to mind as I was reading the cross-examination proceedings yesterday. I’m not sure if that was the intent of the defense or simply a byproduct of the questions but at least for an analyst like me that’s what I was left with. I’m not sure how much that really matters, though clearly the entire point of the defense is to present him as an unreliable witness but then again as I’d already mentioned he’d never presented the jury with a crime that was committed (which is the prosecution’s job to do but with which it was his role to prove). It’s just all so bizarre.
- Eyes still on the CPI. A month ago my message heading into the consumer inflation report was about all eyes being on the CPI as it had the potential to confirm that inflation accelerated each month of the first quarter of the year...which it did. Which recalculated economists' expectations for inflation throughout this entire year. Now the question is if the reacceleration trend is still in play starting the second quarter of the year. The answer btw, will almost certainly be yes. Yesterday’s PPI, the Producer Price Index, which is the read on wholesale inflation, was brutal with wholesale inflation having reaccelerated to the highest rate since March of last year. There’s little chance that April was any easier on your wallet. Did you notice cheaper prices? I certainly didn’t. Expect today’s CPI to come in blazing hot as well and for the people who manage to make a career out of being wrong (most economists), recalibrate expectations for rate cuts yet again for this year. Specifically, the idea that interest rates are coming down this year is a pipedream unless there’s a significant recession. Eyes are still on the CPI and most importantly it’s impact on us every day.