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| The Process has begun |
But
halfway around the globe, an entirely different legacy for Trump was
thrust to the fore by his longtime personal attorney and fixer — that of
an alleged con man, liar, racist and, ultimately, criminal.
Michael
Cohen’s explosive testimony to Congress was not only potentially
humiliating for Trump. It also portrayed the president as an unreliable
and dishonest man at the very moment he is conducting diplomacy with the
world’s most erratic and untrusting dictator. And it propelled Trump’s
presidency into greater legal and political peril.
On a day when two events of potentially lasting
importance played out simultaneously some 8,300 miles apart, the
spectacle in Washington overwhelmed the one in Hanoi.
This
reality came into sharp relief as Trump sat down with Kim for a
one-on-one chat before dinner here on Wednesday evening. Trump had just
boasted of his warm relationship with the North Korean dictator, whom he
called “a great leader,” when a reporter asked for his reaction to
Cohen’s testimony. Trump did not respond and simply shook his head. But
shortly thereafter, that reporter and three others were banned by the
White House from covering the dinner because of what Trump press
secretary Sarah Sanders called “sensitivities to the shouted questions.”
Cohen’s
testimony added to the investigative morass that has consumed Trump’s
presidency and served as a reminder of its continual state of turmoil.
Although he sat in a hearing room addressing the House Committee on
Oversight and Reform,
Cohen might as well have been talking directly to
his former boss when he said:
“I have fixed things,” he said, “but I am no longer your fixer, Mr. Trump.”
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