Paul Manafort's Lawyers Make Redacted Words Invisible Like F-35 Plane

Who's a Russian intelligence asset? Who's a Russian intelligence asset? IS PAUL MANAFORT A RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE ASSET?

Far be it from us to call Paul Manafort's lawyers A IDIOT. Haha, just kidding, CLOSE BE IT TO US to call them that, because we're gonna call them idiots right now. 

IDIOTS.

Manafort's lawyers were due to submit their response to special counsel Robert Mueller's report that Manafort had breached his plea agreement by pulling a bunch of Manaforts, i.e. lying, continuing to commit crimes, and so forth. That stuff is pretty much all that man has in this world, far as we can tell.

The submission was due by the end of the day Monday, and when it hadn't appeared, people were confused. Did they miss the deadline? Did they file it under seal and not tell anybody? Turns out it's the second thing, but the judge decided the public should get to see a redacted copy of the filing. So off to the redacting workshop Paul Manafort's lawyers went, and they scrubbed and scrubbed until the bad words just disappeared, but it turns out they fucked it up, because in the original version of the filing, all's you gotta do is highlight the text and copy/paste it into a new document and ABRACADABRA the redacted words appear! (They have now refiled, because good catch, boys .)

Thank God they didn't have to try to convert Word docs to PDF! 

But they made news, oh yes they did! The main scoops from the redacted parts of the filing are that Paul Manafort had a secret meeting in Madrid during the campaign with his Russian spy buddy /business partner Konstantin Kilimnik, that Manafort was sharing internal polling data with Kilimnik on the 2016 election, and that they also discussed a "peace plan" for Ukraine.

Let's read this thing from the beginning and see what we find, yeah?

First of all, Manafort's lawyers swear that any big lies he told during his "cooperation" were an accident . They also would like you to know that as a result of being in jail, Manafort has "depression and anxiety," and also gout. (Not a joke! Nonetheless, we bet he's faking. Maybe he's hiding a phone in his no-no spot like Sister Ingalls in "Orange Is The New Black," ergo walking is tough. Or maybe he actually has gout.) Additionally, he has been given exactly zero field trips outside of his visits with the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) and the grand jury (unfair!), and when he goes on those, he has to get up at DARK THIRTY in the morning, like come on, can't an international criminal watch a little "Fox & Friends" before he goes and sees Robert Mueller? JEEZ. Anybody can see how this would lead Manafort to accidentally lie a lot.

For an example of Manafort's accident lies, (REDACTED), the filing says that after he was reminded, "Manafort 'conceded' that he discussed or may have discussed a Ukraine peace plan with Mr. Kilimnik on more than one occasion" and that "after being told that Mr. Kilimnik had traveled to Madrid on the same day that Mr. Manafort was in Madrid, Mr. Manafort 'acknowledged' that he and Mr. Kilimnik met while they were both in Madrid."

No big deal, right? Except, would that be the same "peace plan" Michael Cohen allegedly handed to Michael Flynn during those nine seconds in early 2017 when Flynn was national security advisor? The one that was just amazing , from the Russian perspective? Or was it a different one that would also benefit Russia? Just curious. (We know it would benefit Russia because All Paul Manafort Work Are Benefit Russia. ) So many Ukraine peace plans! All of which seem to lift the sanctions on Russia, because it is always and forever ALL ABOUT THE SANCTIONS, STUPID. (For the record, Felix Sater, who co-wrote the peace plan Cohen passed to Flynn says this filing wasn't talking about his plan.)

Also, we think we'd remember if we had a liaison with our Russian spy buddy in Madrid, but we are a simple warblogger and not an international man of mystery like Paul Manafort. Maybe he's met with so many Russian spies he's like "Fuck if I know. Madrid? Sure why not. Did we fuck?" The filing notes that Manafort didn't initially recall all these things because he was so busy at the time, what with running Trump's presidential campaign and also traveling a whole bunch to do conspiracies with Russians to steal the election for Trump. (OK, we are teasing, the filing doesn't say that last part out loud . But is it normal for the person running an American presidential campaign to be DISCUSSING "PEACE PLANS" FOR UKRAINE WITH AND TRYSTING WITH RUSSIAN SPIES IN MADRID, IS THAT FUCKING NORMAL?) (Also,UPDATE: Because Manafort's lawyers are bad at writing briefs, on top of being bad at redacting, there was initial confusion over when the Madrid trip was, because the way it was written, it sounded like the Madrid trip happened during the campaign. Apparently it happened in January or February of 2017, as the lawyershad to clarify, because they are bad at writing.)

Next up, (REDACTED), Manafort's lawyers say he didn't remember "sharing polling data with Mr. Kilimnik related to the 2016 presidential campaign," also because he was so busy with the 2016 campaign. That doesn't even make sense! Manafort didn't remember a specific thing, because his mind was so very obsessed with that very same thing ?

Also, remember when Paul Manafort talked about giving secret briefings on the 2016 election to "Putin's favorite oligarch," Manafort's former boss Oleg Deripaska, as a way to "get whole" with Deripaska, because he was massively in debt to him? We are just wondering if that internal polling data was part of that! We are also wondering what Kilimnik The Russian Spy might have done with that internal polling data. Did it go to Deripaska because it's a little known fact that Oleg Deripaska is the incognito Nate Silver of Russia, a man who gets raging love boners when he reads polling data? Or did Manafort hand it over TO A RUSSIAN SPY because THERE WAS A FUCKING ONGOING RUSSIAN OPERATION TO RATFUCK THE AMERICAN ELECTION FOR DONALD TRUMP, AUTHORIZED BY VLADIMIR PUTIN AND OVERSEEN BY A HANDFUL OF HANDPICKED OLIGARCHS? After all, the Steele Dossier does   allege that Manafort was the American point person on the election-stealing conspiracy, at least until the press started reporting on his creepy Russian ties and they had to kick him off the campaign.

We should also note here that we still don't have a good answer for why Paul Manafort, a man in massive debt, was shoved in to run the Trump campaign for free immediately after he quit doing ratfucking work for pro-Russian politicians in Ukraine. Ooh, we have a guess! Maybe he was acting as a Russian agent. 

No collusion. No collusion. You are the collusion. Etc.

Oh, also, by the way, remember that oligarch Dmitry Rybolovlev, who's connected to all the foreign ratfuckers who offered Donald Trump Jr. a proposal to ratfuck the election for Daddy on August 3, 2016, in Trump Tower, to be bankrolled by the Saudis and the Emiratis? You know, the meeting Erik Prince set up! Oleg Deripaska is connected to those ratfuckers too. 

Anyway, good Manafort filing, Manafort lawyers! We have enjoyed this information you meant to redact! Keep shootin' for the moon and you'll land in the stars!

The rest of y'all get an OPEN THREAD now.

[ Manafort filing ]

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