Today's Trump-Russia Thought

The likelihood that the Russians essentially own Donald Trump is an under-appreciated element to this whole story. After a string of bankruptcies following the collapse of his Atlantic City casino venture, Trump could not get financing. Enter hundreds of millions in investments in Trump ventures from oligarchs from the former Soviet republics who needed a way to launder stolen money.

Former DNI James Clapper's compliment to Putin this week on skillful management of his unwitting (and witless) asset in the Oval Office was dead on. Trump has  consistently acted to protect his personal financial livelihood. He knows where his bread is buttered and who butters it. The Russians can knee-cap Trump not just politically but financially whenever it suits them. How else to explain Trump's oddly obsequious behavior toward Putin/Russia when he bullies everyone else so relentlessly?

Trump's personal legal vulnerability in the Mueller probe centers around an obstruction of justice case that makes itself (efforts to get Comey to let Flynn go, firing Comey, admitting to firing Comey to stop the Russia probe). It is also hard to imagine Trump isn't vulnerable to joining Manafort in the money laundering Hall of Fame for his financial dealings with oligarchs noted above.

The Trump-Russia end game looks like it will come down to the irresistible force of Mueller's prosecutorial expertise versus the immovable object of GOP defense of Trump's corrupt undermining of American democracy. The tipping point may come with what 538, Sabato, RCP and other pollsters predict will be a wave election in 2018 flipping either or both houses of Congress. GOTV efforts in 2018 will be critical to holding Trump accountable for his crimes.

Democratic control on the Hill would result in either the death or crippling of Trump's administration by investigation. Unlike the endless GOP misuse of that tool versus Hillary Clinton, those investigations would have the virtue of being about actual crimes.