State of Monday: Trump vs. 'Epstein'
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Good morning, Dear Readers,
Starting off the week with a heavy left foot.
Pla-TOON … MARCH!
TRUMP VS ‘EPSTEIN’
“I shouldn’t have to pay another parking ticket until at least 10 people who visited Epstein’s island are served with warrants.”
Was a comment I made to a close group of friends in Washington, DC, over the weekend. The discussion was about how we should all be reacting to the reality, rapidly setting in, that it’s highly likely the only scalp the public will get in the Epstein case is Ghislaine. (RELATED: Sign up for State of the Day)
I had heard during the week Trump was internally rather dismissive about the case. He followed this up with several statements, one in support of Attorney General Pam Bondi, another explicitly ordering his audience to “stop talking” about Jeffrey Epstein.
“He doesn’t seem to understand that Epstein has become an avatar for unaccountable, uber wealthy elites committing heinous crimes and getting away with it,” I remarked late last week to a close friend who covers the White House. “In other words, exactly the kind of structure Trump got elected to challenge.”
And that is the challenge for Trump. In death, Epstein achieved bizarro world Obi Wan Kenobi status with Trump’s most ardent followers.
“Strike me down, [and] I’ll become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.”
He became *air quotes* “Epstein,” a thing far bigger than he ever would have been had he remained alive.
Enter Tucker Carlson.
“The Epstein story is so uniquely infuriating,” Tucker said at TPUSA’s SAS conference over the weekend. “What is it about Jeffrey Epstein that’s so infuriating to people, so infuriating that it’s actually causing seismic political problems?”
“I’ll tell you what it is, it’s the frustration of normal people watching a certain class of people get away with everything every single time. That’s what it is.”
That is indeed what it is.
And this ground is well trod. Let’s go through some examples.
It’s almost certain that famed British diddler Jimmy Seville, whose exploitation of minors was just as bold and deranged as Epstein, had help. Police, producers, media personalities were all implicated. Did any of them get prosecuted? Nope.
Do we think the entire industry knew and at least some of them helped Harvey Weinstein? Almost certainly. What about Bill Cosby? Likely the same.
We can do other crimes too. Bernie Madoff’s operation probably had dozens of co-conspirators. I think the housing crisis only got one major indictment. Do you honestly think the only people who knew Theranos was a scam were Elizabeth Holmes and her paramour Sunny Balwani, the sole indictments in the case?
Finally, while the bodies still drop by the thousands and the entire country reels from decades of easy access to opiates, not a single person in the Sackler case went to jail. Not one.
Ball all these up and you’ve got hundreds of elite criminals of unimaginable wealth causing untold harm to normal people walking free still to this day.
The other commonality among all these cases is their association with and close proximity to both national and international figures of high influence.
So when Donald Trump finally up and demands we “stop talking” about it, nobody should be surprised when half the country thinks it’s a giant op.
Even if “Epstein” wasn’t an intel operation, if he was simply one among many criminal enterprises that cozied with influential people, at the very least, Dear Reader, we’ve been had yet again.
Perhaps Trump, who certainly knows more than we do, thinks it’s not as good a use of time as buttoning up immigration, the economy, trade and so on. Fair enough.
Symbols are powerful things though, and in death and continued mystery, “Epstein” is as powerful as they get.
WHAT I’M READING
BINGO!
‘It’s About Accountability’: CNN’s David Urban Lays Out Why MAGA Won’t Drop Epstein Demands
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Speaking of another conspiracy theory, this one is a close second.
Biden Says He Had To Use Autopen Because He Simply Granted Too Many Pardons
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Might as well end on a third conspiracy theory, eh?