I don't really agree that it was necessary. But I'm no lawyer and definitely not qualified to be a judge.
In today's U.S, you could be hired to the Supreme court! Don't sell yourself short. Just don't go around speaking that Mexican, it scares people.
Do you stand for the national anthem? YES? How'd you like to get a lifetime appointment to a place on the federal bench?
I agree that in a normal case, you could keep the 3rd client a secret. But the level of media scrutiny on this case forces judges to make decisions that are in the best interest of the court and judicial process. And the judge is in no position to keep that a secret. The judge can't make a ruling of this magnitude without having legitimacy in the eyes of the public.
I concur. These are not normal proceedings because these are not "normal" times... ...or presidencies, as it were... One of the consequences of people seeing a conspiracy around every corner is the need (especially in our legal and judicial proceedings) to be as open and declarative as possible about whatever facts are gleaned...no matter how minute...in practically any debate, discussion or deliberation of virtually any topic of public interest...six degrees of separation notwithstanding... ...more science, it seems, for those so desperate to conflate fact with fiction: "Every action has an equal and opposite reaction." Or colloquially: '"...tell enough lies, and eventually somebody slips up and tells the truth..." Or in Negrospeak: "...if you busy diggin' a hole to bury somebody in, you better dig two..."
Much like professional wrestling, winning on wrestling technicalities is sadly far from the point. The Derp state may end up winning when it comes to the folding chairs to the backs of our flummoxed heads. Love Derp State, but it's not especially new, if that matters.
To paraphrase was Hannity just said: Michael is not my lawyer. I never paid him for the legal advice that I sought from him and assumed would be protected by attorney client privilege despite him not being my lawyer. I had nothing to do with him his motion to block the release of my name even though I asked him to block the release of my name.
I am a lawyer and I tend to agree with you based on what I have heard but in fairness there could be a lot more that isn't known.
Basically Wood didn't ask about the third client until Cohen's attorneys asserted privilege on behalf of this client. They basically used the unknown third client as a way to try to get all of their documents back to protect this client's privilege. The nature of the unnamed client was that they were such an important person and unrelated to this issue that the court should weigh that individual's privilege over the government's need to go through the documents. This caused the judge to say "well, tell me who this client is and why they have such importance" and that sparked the arguing over why the client's identity should be protected. Basically what I think is happening is that Michael Cohen is a bad attorney who doesn't have a great attorney and they made a not-good-attorney's attempt to use an anonymous client's privilege as a way to shut this down and it failed. Honestly it was probably done in coordination with Hannity. Wouldn't surprise me if Cohen and Hannity cooked up this whole thing hoping they could use it to block the documents from getting reviewed.
cryinglaughing.jpg You pretty much nailed it. Too funny! "I thought I had attorney client privilege even though I wasn't his client and he wasn't my attorney." Oh, man. too good.
SEAN HANNITY: ALL THE TIMES HOST DEFENDED MICHAEL COHEN WITHOUT REVEALING HE WAS TRUMP LAWYER’S CLIENT http://www.newsweek.com/hannity-cohen-defended-client-lawyer-888068
