Stephen Colbert dances on Paul Manafort's miserable day
Stephen Colbert began Wednesday's Late Show with the troubles surrounding Boeing's 737 MAX passenger jets. "The only people not grounding the MAX 8s were the United States," until President Trump joined the rest of the world late Wednesday afternoon." Colbert showed Trump's announcement and imagined what he might mean by "grounding" jets, and it got a little Freudian.
"It's important to realize that we all make mistakes," Colbert said, but few of us make as many mistakes as Paul Manafort. "A lot of people were shocked last Thursday when despite a sentencing range of 19 to 24 years, Manafort got 47 months in prison," he said. "It was the most unexpectedly light sentence since Leatherface got community service. But today was Round 2 for Manafort," and one of the big questions was whether he would serve both sentences concurrently or consecutively. "Now, it might sound impossible to serve two sentences at the same time, but I think Manafort's up to it," Colbert said, "because he served two countries at the same time."
Manafort got 60 months, 30 of them concurrent with his other sentence, plus another 13 months, and Colbert made a show of calculating the damage. "Yeah, he's screwed," he concluded. "Manafort's facing a total of 7 1/2 years in prison. So someday, Manafort's gonna have to walk up to the biggest guy in the yard and say, 'Mr. President, can I have a pardon?' Literally minutes after Manafort was sentenced today, Manhattan's district attorney said 'Hold my beer,' because New York State issued an indictment charging Manafort with 16 crimes" — and Trump can't pardon any of these. Colbert did a little dance to that news, then ended on the overheated speculation about Robert Mueller's Trump-Russia report. Watch below. Peter Weber
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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.
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