A game of speculation

Would you like to play a game?

When I last spoke on these pages, I cautioned that we didn’t know what or if anything would be discovered in the FBI’s raid on Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate.

It was in very short order that we discovered things were found.

It wasn’t just any ordinary, random things, but serious things – things that were marked as Top Secret and regarding our national security interests. These were things that private citizens are not meant to have.

Donald Trump is no longer president. He is, effectively, a private citizen, and he has no right to these documents. Why did he feel he had the right to not only remove those things from the White House as he exited, but to hold them for 19 months, even after multiple requests to return all the materials he’d taken, to the National Archives?

Why did he lie about having returned everything?

Because it’s what he has always done: LIE.

He is, however, a liar with a purpose, and none of it is for our national good. As it has always been with the despicable Trump clan, his lies and deception are self-serving. He is benefitting from putting our nation at risk.

So let us briefly recap the events of the raid on Trump’s residence, before we begin our game.

On Monday, in the pre-dawn hours, the FBI conducted a lawful search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. They were armed with a warrant, signed off on by a federal judge. 20 boxes of documents were removed from the property (and keep in mind, Trump had insisted that everything had been returned). Of those boxes, 11 were labeled as “sensitive” and “top secret.” These were the types of documents meant only to be stored in secure government facilities.

Among the other materials found, there were binders of photos (and I’m guessing they weren’t snapshots of the Trump family picnic), some handwritten notes, walking pustule Roger Stone’s executive clemency, and not-so-oddly, information on French President Emmanuel Macron.

For those curious about the Macron info, his opponent in the most recent election was a Putin loyalist, Marine Le Pen. She’s the French, female version of Donald Trump. Damaging information on Macron could only serve Putin.

On the warrant, it names specific charges that the former president may be facing. The federal statutes that prompted the warrant are 18 U.S.C. § 793, 2071, and 1519. This means Trump is being investigated for violating the Espionage Act (which is punishable up to death, but very unlikely to go that far, these days), mishandling federal records, and obstruction of an investigation, by falsifying federal documents.

Of course, Trump and his mindless cabal are out in force. The notion that he can declassify anything he wants is the height of stupidity, but it’s what we’ve gotten used to from Cult 45 for the last 7 years.

One interesting theory that has been floated is that the feds seemed to know what they were looking for, and where to find it. With that in mind, could there have been an insider feeding information to the authorities? After all, if the past, agonizing years have taught us nothing, it’s that loyalty, with Donald Trump, is a one-way street. He expects it. He does not give it, without some personal payoff. Wouldn’t it seem likely that at least one insider with intimate details of Trump’s movements see the need to save themselves from complete ruin?

The more we find out, the more that likelihood increases. Given that as our base, let us examine which Trumpian rat is most likely to have jumped ship. Who could be working to save their own necks from the noose?

I have what I feel are 3 strong suspects, so let’s get into it.

1)      Mark Meadows. What we know about Trump’s former chief of staff is that recent reports indicate Trump’s lawyers have advised him to cut off communications, but as is his want, he has not completely heeded that advice. Herr Drumpf is in need of constant ego-stroking, and Meadows proved to be a most loyal bootlick during his tenure. And while we know of Meadows’ outward devotion to his former boss, he’s been oddly absent in recent weeks.

We know Meadows has been sought by the members of the January 6 Committee, and reportedly, has already turned over quite a hefty collection of documentation, related to the events of January 6, 2021.

As the chief of staff, Meadows was privy to the inner workings of the Trump White House in the days surrounding the Capitol riot. His former aide Cassidy Hutchinson delivered bombshell testimony to the Jan. 6 committee in June about Trump's behavior following the election. She testified that Meadows was present during a number of key meetings in which Trump allies discussed ways to overturn the election.

"The reason [Meadows] is valuable is also the reason he is in jeopardy: He was basically at Trump's right hand throughout all these exercises and participated in key meetings and phone calls," former White House attorney Ty Cobb told CNN.

He was Trump’s right-hand man, and now he’s gone ghost. It can’t just be the January 6 inquiry. At the very least, you would expect to see him follow the pattern of Trump loyalists in attacking the FBI and DOJ for last week’s raid, but there’s nothing. His last social media post was on August 3rd, where he commented on the untimely death of Rep. Jackie Walorski.

If Meadows is cooperating with the January 6 Committee, is it a far stretch to assume he’s cooperating in other matters, as well? There’s a reason Trump’s legal team are cautioning him to put some distance between himself and Meadows.

The probability that Meadows is the mole is somewhere between 50% to 80%.

2)      Jared Kushner. Let’s put aside the creep-factor that is Jared Kushner. We’ll ignore that he looks like he was carved out of soap and brought to life like a golem, except without the warmth. Trump’s son-in-law, and former senior aide has found himself, post-White House, enriched to the tune of $2 billion, thanks to the benevolence of the Saudi royal family. Particularly, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (but you can call him Prince Bone Saw].

The question on everyone’s mind is why would the Saudis invest that kind of money into a man who has shown no real business prowess, taking the bulk of the risk on themselves? Kushner’s company, Affinity, was formed after he left the White House, and the Saudis quickly invested.

If it smells rotten to you, you’re not alone. The House Oversight Committee has launched an investigation into the deal. Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) contacted Kushner to inform him of their intentions to examine this transaction.

The probe will focus on whether Kushner’s personal financial interests improperly impacted U.S. foreign policy while he served in the White House under his father-in-law, former President Donald Trump, Maloney wrote in the letter.

“Your support for Saudi interests was unwavering, even as Congress and the rest of the world closely scrutinized the country’s human rights abuses in Yemen, the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi assassins tied to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Saudi Arabia’s crackdown on political dissidents at home,” Maloney wrote.

Did Kushner, who daddy-in-law basically gave over the reigns of control, in regard to decision making in Middle East affairs (as well as a host of other items he had no experience with), cut a sweet deal for looking the other way after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, at the orders of Prince Bone Saw?

Maybe, but if he’ll make a deal with them, wouldn’t someone of such dubious character also be capable of turning on an in-law, if it meant deflecting some of the heat from himself?

Kushner will make a deal, if it helps him. So much of what he might be willing to spill depends on just how precarious his own legal future may be.

Kushner as the squealer is somewhere between 30% to 60%.

3)      Ivanka Trump. This one is the dark horse, for sure. On one hand, you’d like to believe there’s actual family devotion and affection between a daughter and her daddy. On the other hand, the Trumps are all selfish, conniving, cutthroat creeps. I’m not going to say there was something unnatural and wrong about that relationship, but show me a dad that says about his daughter that the thing they have in common is they both like sex, or that if she wasn’t his daughter, he’d be dating her, and, well… you get the picture. Dysfunction.

Ivanka is the favored, pampered child. She has her father’s air of arrogance and entitlement. She is more polished than her oafish brothers, but by all accounts, she got the attention that they did not. We won’t speculate further as to why.

What would happen if Daddy and his roaming fingers were sent away? Ivanka would likely take over the helm of whatever will be left of the Trump Organization, after New York Attorney General Leticia James is finished turning it inside out. A woman of Ivanka Trump’s learned ruthlessness and cold ambition would likely relish the idea of ruling over the ashes, with an eye on capitalizing on the name and building it back up in her image.

And let’s not forget, Daddy Trump buried Mommy Trump on his golf course and is charging her estate membership fees. If there is even an ounce of affection for her mother, wouldn’t she take some satisfaction in striking back at him?

The probability of Ivanka Trump ratting out her dad is about 25% to 35%.

Who knows if we’ll ever find out who rolled on Trump and gave him up to the feds? There’s a chance we won’t, or at least, not in the near future, but until that time, feel free to make your own predictions.