Tag Archives: Michael Avenatti

national news

Legal loudmouth gets more bad publicity

What do you know about this?

Michael Avenatti, the loudmouth lawyer who once represented Stephanie Clifford — aka Stormy Daniels — has been arrested and charged with trying to extort $20 million from Nike Corp.

I don’t whether to laugh or . . . laugh some more.

Avenatti became a talk-show staple while he was representing Clifford/Daniels, the adult film actress who allegedly had a sexual relationship with the future president of the United States, Donald Trump. She received a $130,000 payment to keep quiet about the alleged encounter, even though Trump said it didn’t happen. Well, go figure.

Avenatti got so much mileage from his representing the future president’s one-night squeeze he considered running for president of the United States in 2020. He has scrapped those POTUS plans.

He has been accused of threatening Nike with negative publicity if it didn’t pay him the dough.

This clown is entitled to his presumption of innocence. I’ll grant him that presumption.

Still, there’s another part of me that secretly is cheering federal prosecutors on in their quest for a conviction. Why? Let’s just say Avenatti pi**** me off with his constant talk-show blathering about Trump, his client and how he intended to savage the president were he to run as a candidate for the White House.

His moment in the limelight looked for all the world like someone seeking to capitalize on the proverbial “15 minutes of fame.”

Check out the complaint, which is contained in this link.

It’s a doozy.

national news

Avenatti won’t run for White House . . . hooray!

I cannot let the day pass without acknowledging my joy at the news that Michael Avenatti, the loudmouth lawyer and cable talk show blowhard, won’t seek the Democratic Party’s nomination for president of the United States.

Avenatti was an unknown lawyer before he agreed to represent a woman named Stephanie Clifford, who’s better known as Stormy Daniels, the adult film actress who alleges she and Donald John Trump engaged in a one-night tumble in a hotel room in 2006.

She then took a $130,000 payment from Trump to stay quiet — about an event Trump said didn’t happen. Go figure, man.

Well, Avenatti thought he would parlay his instant celebrity status into a presidential candidacy. Now he says he won’t do it. He has talked to his family and decided he has better things to do. The allegation that he struck a woman also might have had something to do with his decision to pass on a presidential campaign.

Count me as delighted to know we won’t have to listen to Avenatti make political pledges he can’t — or won’t — honor. I just wish he would forgo all those cable news show appearances. I am weary of the sound of his voice and the sight of his face.

legal news

Avenatti’s standing takes a header? Too bad, dude

So now there are reports that a loudmouth lawyer is feeling the pain of a plummeting public standing.

Cry me a river, will ya?

The lawyer is one Michael Avenatti, who I believe is the least sympathetic public figure this side of Donald John Trump Sr. He represents — for now! — Stephanie Clifford, aka Stormy Daniels, the adult film actress/stripper who has alleged that she and the future president of the United States had a one-night fling about a dozen years ago. She got a $130,000 hush money check to stay quiet — about an event that Trump says didn’t happen. Go figure.

Avenatti has been a cable talk-show staple since Clifford/Daniels burst onto the scene. To be totally candid, this guy annoys me in the extreme. He shows up everywhere. He is on a first-name basis with all the leading talking heads. He clearly has established himself as being part of the most dangerous place on Earth: between Avenatti and a TV camera.

Well, now his stock is plunging.

Stormy Daniels says he isn’t representing her correctly. He is doing and saying things in public without her permission. Daniels says she is considering dumping him as her personal counsel.

What’s more, he was accused briefly of striking a woman in a “domestic dispute.” Avenatti, who is estranged from his wife, denied it vehemently. The local district attorney then decided to forgo filing a formal felony criminal charge against Avenatti. The Los Angeles city attorney’s office, though, is still pondering whether to pursue a misdemeanor case against him.

And then there’s this: Avenatti is — or was — considering running for president in 2020 as a Democrat. His modus operandi reportedly is to become the Democrats’ pit bull in a fight with Donald Trump.

If they go low, according to the Avenatti Doctrine, we go even lower; we fight ’em tooth and nail, hammer and tong; strap on the brass knucks; let’s get ready to rummmmmble!

I want this guy to vanish. I am tired of hearing his voice, of looking at his mug, of listening to him proclaim how he is always right and everyone else is always wrong.

Say good night, counselor.

national news, political news

Avenatti becomes a royal pain in the … wherever

Michael Avenatti began driving me crazy some months ago when he was seen everywhere, talking to every talking head on TV about a client of his, a woman who goes by the name of Stormy Daniels.

She is the adult film actress/dancer who took a $130,000 payment from the former lawyer for Donald Trump to keep her quiet about a one-night stand she said she had with the future president of the United States in 2006.

Avenatti has become a ubiquitous presence on TV.  Good grief, the guy seems able to be everywhere all at once! How does this clown do that?

And then he entered the battle to keep Brett Kavanaugh off the Supreme Court. He now represents a woman who contends that the newly sworn in justice assaulted her years ago.

You know, I am going to buy into the argument that Avenatti’s late entry into this discussion might have doomed efforts to keep Kavanaugh off the court.

Avenatti has become a politician. He has stated his desire to consider running for president of the United States in 2020. He is making political speeches. He is saying Democrats need to deal with Trump with even more bile and vitriol than the president dishes out to his political foes.

I’m trying to connect the dots. A lawyer signs on to represent a high-profile client; then he starts sounding like a possible presidential candidate; and then he jumps into another high-profile fray, this time involving a nominee to the highest court in the United States.

What’s this guy’s motive, other than to boost his clientele, make a name for himself and, well, fatten his wallet?

Avenatti very well might be a first-rate lawyer. He says he is. All the time. To any talk-show host who’ll have him on the air.

Me? I’m sick of listening to this clown.

media news

‘Don’t call me a celebrity?’ Sorry, bub … you are one!

Michael Avenatti cracks me up.

The lawyer who is pondering a run for the presidency in 2020 has scolded the media for calling him a “celebrity.” He bristled at the idea of the media labeling him something he most certainly has become.

Avenatti represents Stephanie Clifford, aka Stormy Daniels, the porn actor who alleges she and the future president of the United States, Donald Trump, had a fling in a hotel room years ago. The president paid her hush money to keep her quiet, but denies the tryst occurred … go figure.

Avenatti has stepped into the public spotlight by being everywhere, seemingly at once. That, by my definition, makes him a celebrity.

Oh, no, he answers. He is a lawyer with an 18-year career. He has represented “Davids against Goliaths.”

I guess this means that if decides to run for president, he’ll tell us he isn’t a politician.

He then will fit the definition of two terms he doesn’t like.

Too bad, counselor/celebrity and maybe — politician.

I mean, if the shoe fits …

national news, political news

Wanting a presidential candidate with policy chops

I just watched a snippet of Michael Avenatti delivering a sort of campaign stump speech to some listeners in Iowa.

The high-profile lawyer is considering a run for the presidency. His only claim to fame/notoriety to date has been that he represents Stormy Daniels, the porn star who says she and the future president, Donald Trump, had a fling in a hotel room back in 2006 — and that the president paid her $130,000 to keep quiet about it.

Avenatti is her mouthpiece. He also is a blowhard, a celebrity who’s trying to parlay his celebrity status into something that requires a lot more of those who seek high public office.

Does that remind you of anyone else? Of course it does!

I’m a bit old-fashioned. I want presidents to have some public service experience. I want them to demonstrate a commitment to the public. I want them to be well-versed, well-spoken and well-educated on policy and on the nuance of government. I do not want some showboat to prance onto the political stage and bellow, “Vote for me because I am not a politician!”

The 2020 election will feature, more than likely, a large field of Democratic candidates, the size of which of might rival the number of 2016 Republican candidates who sought to succeed Barack Obama as president.

Given the electoral success that Donald Trump experienced in 2016, I am pretty certain that the opening-day field of Democratic contenders will include its fair share of carnival barkers, goofballs and unqualified showboats.

That is how I consider Michael Avenatti, who well might be a great lawyer, but who is about as qualified to serve as president as the guy who’s in the office now. Which is to say he is patently unqualified.

My hope is that Democrats can produce a newcomer, someone who isn’t much of a presence at this moment on the political horizon.

That all said, I hope Avenatti sticks to lawyering and clears the field for candidates who actually know what they would do were they to get elected president.

political news

‘President Avenatti?’ For real?

Say it ain’t so, counselor.

Michael Avenatti, whose only claim to national notoriety rests with his legal representation of a porn star who alleges she had a one-night stand with a future president of the United States, says he is considering a run for — gulp! — the presidency of the United States.

Oh … my … goodness!

Do you know what this tells me? It tells me that Donald J. Trump’s election as president in 2016 cements the notion that anyone can be be elected to the highest office in the land. Prior qualifications don’t matter. It doesn’t matter whether they have prior public service experience. Nor does it matter if they understand fully the complicated machinery that constitutes the federal system of government.

Avenatti was, shall we say, on no one’s radar prior to emerging as Stormy Daniels’s lawyer.

“I’m exploring a run for the presidency of the United States, and I wanted to come to Iowa and listen to people and learn about some issues that are facing the citizens of Iowa and do my homework,” Avenatti told the Des Moines Register.

As the saying goes: Only in America.

national news, political news

Another campaign kicks off? Seriously?

“Our troops didn’t die in Yorktown, didn’t take Normandy beach, didn’t rebuild Europe and secure the postwar peace that you are now destroying, Mr. President, for you to live as a Manchurian candidate in our White House.”

Who do you suppose made this statement today?

OK, I’ll give it up. It came from Michael Avenatti, the lawyer who represents Stormy Daniels/Stephanie Clifford, the porn star who alleges she took a one-night tumble in a hotel room about a dozen years ago with Donald J. Trump Sr.

Why do I even mention this? Why devote any blog space to this guy?

Because he annoys me. That’s why.

Avenatti is becoming the ubiquitous lawyer who seems to my way of thinking to be more interested in promoting his own interests than in protecting the interests of his most famous client.

Avenatti delivered some kind of speech today in front of the White House in which he called Trump a “Manchurian candidate.”

I need some help on many matters. One of them involves whether the content of Avenatti’s speech has anything to do with Daniels/Clifford’s beef with Donald Trump.

Yes, Trump deserves criticism. I’ve delivered my share of it from this forum. Yes, Avenatti also is entitled to criticize the president as well. His public celebrity status, though, is due to his legal representation of a woman who received a hush-money payment from a guy who once was the president’s lawyer/Mr. Fix It.

I am believing now that Michael Avenatti is branching out.

Is there another political career in the making before our eyes?

I’m tired of this guy already.

legal news

Stormy’s lawyer talks too much

Allow me a brief moment to say something critical about the lawyer who represents the woman who has said that she and Donald Trump had a one-night sexual encounter in 2006.

Michael Avenatti is Stormy Daniels’s lawyer. Daniels — whose real name is Stephanie Clifford — is the porn star who alleges the tryst with the man who would become president of the United States. She also received $130,000 in hush money to keep her quiet about the encounter, which Trump — believe it or not — denies ever occurred.

As for Avenatti, he talks too much. He is becoming an annoyance, at least to me. He shows up on late-night talk shows, on Sunday morning news shows, during the week, day and night. He is everywhere.

He yaps, yammers and yowls about Trump, about his “Mr. Fix It,” lawyer Michael Cohen.

I know how this works. Lawyers who get hired to represent high-profile clients often see their entry onto the public stage as their ticket to legal prominence. They end up becoming celebrities all by themselves.

It helps, as it does in Avenatti’s case, that they’re media friendly. He’s on a first-name basis with every interview who asks to talk to them. George, Chuck, Chris, Margaret, Rachel, Lawrence, Anderson, Don … you name ’em, Avenatti is their “best friend” while chatting it up about Stormy/Stephanie’s case against Trump.

Don’t misunderstand me. I believe Daniels’s account of what happened. I also believe that she got the money to keep quiet. I also disbelieve the president’s denials. I came to those conclusions not long after this story broke.

The porn star’s lawyer doesn’t need to persuade me of anything.

I just wish he’d shut his trap and do his job, whatever it entails, behind the scenes … and away from the spotlight.