Trump Campaign Chairman Paul Manafort talks to reporters on the floor of the Republican National Convention at Quicken Loans Arena, Sunday, July 17, 2016, in Cleveland. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

A New York judge has just dismissed a laundry list of state charges against former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort.

New York Judge Maxwell Wiley dismissed state charges against former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort Wednesday on double-jeopardy grounds. Manafort was scheduled to appear in criminal court Wednesday on charges of mortgage fraud and other financial crimes filed in New York state court by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, Jr.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office plans to appeal the decision. “We will appeal today’s decision and will continue working to ensure that Mr. Manafort is held accountable for the criminal conduct against the People of New York that is alleged in the indictment,” Manhattan district attorney spokesman Danny Frost said in a statement.

If you recall, Mueller’s lead thug, Andrew Weissmann, apparently had a raging hard-on for Manafort and used his perch inside of the Russia Hoax investigation squad to prosecute a case against Manafort that had been declined for prosecution by the Justice Department some years before. As far as I can tell, the only reason that Mueller’s team took the case was because a) it gave Weissmann some kind of a crotch-tingle, b) Manafort knew people who had Russian names and that meant the rubes in the press would buy a link to the Russia Hoax, and c) it was an easy scalp to claim from a high-ranking campaign official because by the time Manafort was indicted it was already known that the entire Russia-collusion story was total bullsh**.

Manafort was convicted on eight counts of financial shenanigans in the Eastern District of Virginia and pleaded guilty to two more counts in a proceeding in DC. He netted 73 months, less time served, making him eligible for release in December 2024. But because of rumors swirling about that Trump might pardon Manafort, a politically motivated New York Attorney General had him indicted on 16 felony counts by a New York grand jury…the charges covered the same events of which Manafort had already been convicted. Ordinarily, a state may pursue state charges for the same offenses that have already been tried in federal court. However, in this case, New York had a law which seemed to forbid such an act.

Bottom line, New York was not concerned with justice, they were concerned with extracting the maximum amount of vengeance against Manafort because of his association at Trump. Part of their plan was to use Manafort’s pre-trial confinement in Riker’s Island as a way of inflicting extrajudicial punishment and he was only saved from this by the Federal Bureau of Prisons deciding to keep him in the federal detention facility.

Throughout the 2016 presidential campaign I will not take a backseat to anyone in my criticism of Paul Manafort. In 2016, if you searched Google for “alleged Russian mob fixer” you would find my articles (interestingly, my Manafort pieces literally do not appear in Google right now if you use a site search).  So congratulations NeverTrump, congratulations to the heartless, vindictive bullies in the New York Attorney General’s office for trying to put a guy in prison for life for some convoluted process crimes, you’ve actually made me have sympathy for an odious creature like Paul Manafort. In fact, you’ve caused me to believe that the cause of justice would be best served by President Trump pardoning Manafort and then dancing the Electric Slide around the Oval Office in celebration just to rub you stupid, ugly noses in it so maybe, just maybe you’ll remember this humiliation if you are ever again tempted to engage it this douchebaggery.