Epstein Island is in Plaskett's USVI jurisdiction. Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, and Reid Hoffman all visited. Feels like we are in the final scene in "Se7en" where Brad Pitt yells "What's in the box? What's in the box?!?!?!"
Plaskett is weird and Epstein is awful, but do we really think it's so crazy that politicians get text messages? I have to admit that I have fed info and insight this way to everyone from local school board members during live meetings to, yes, real members of congress, not fake ones like Plaskett. What changes if they get their info from acquaintences during meeting prep or live - do we think their info is solely from AI, rather than from humans they know?
What are those ethics? I dont see it. Any member of congress would seek out info from related parties. Usually in the past beforehand. How is this different, what matters about it being "live"?
How is it unethical to seek out a felon that might have relevant info?
Seems Plaskett had a rather cozy relationship with the fellow, and they WERE investigating Trump, which justifies almost anything. I guess you're right. It's not unethical at all.
I'm mocking the public scorn of back room talking to him and I'm going to be convinced there should be greater public scorn because of conduct required to be publicly disclosed? Known and disclosed a decade ago and literally on "Open Secrets" along with all of his other donations. Including extensive large donations to the DSCC and other Dem PACs.
In re: Plaskett scorn, I think I'll take the public's reaction more seriously on this when I see people getting together and working to put some teeth in the child sex predator laws.
Everyone hates on the church for predation on kids, without owning that our lay criminal justice system typically treats these cases as three to four year sentences, then they serve less and are back on the streets. That's so fucking weak it's a joke, but no one works to fix it. We got a bit smarter with disclosure of sex predators through sex offender registries. But Epstein was on them and reoffended badly. So let's work on that shit please, not on hating on people who talked to him but had nothing to do with those crimes. I really, really don't think that's going to put a dent in the rates of those crimes. It's just silly emotional vengeance that's all for naught.
I mean, there are children out EVERY NIGHT on S. Figueroa in Los Angeles STREETWALKING and selling themselves right now. We haven't even put the anti-loitering law back on the books so that cops can grab more people and find the trafficked girls.
Worrying about women less badly treated 15 years ago by a guy now dead rather than 13 year old girls trafficked by awful pimps openly selling their bodies every fucking night is... well I don't know what it is.
Because the local cops are doing nothing, Essayli who runs the Central California office Federal DA did a push and got 11 of the pimps off the streets, but there's a ton of it still. Harder to build a federal case since it's mainly local law with jurisdiction.
Well...I used to think Michael Shellenberger was OK. Not great, but OK. He tends to rerun obvious concepts. He's just so-so. And now that the novelty has worn off, he is losing commenters.
I even subscribed (for a year). Then he banned me for daring to discuss the fact that Substack can have a darker side.
Mr. No-Censorship actually censors his own subscribers at the drop of a hat. Michael is very thin-skinned, like several other Substack hosts I have known. You must agree with him and continually compliment him, or Michael's own dark side comes out.
That's not acceptable journalism.
He refused to give me a refund after he banned me, btw. I lost the money.
I wrote it in reply to Egbar, above, who mentioned Shellenberger.
And...ahem....what business is it of yours to censor me? You and Michael sound alike in that way. Are you a fan of his and you are ticked-off that I outed his behaviour?
Isn't "No-censorship" supposedly one of the big themes on Substack? So shouldn't you be glad when someone outs a censoring Substack-host? After all, Substack hosts make a living out of outing others.
What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
If you are a "lover of truth" as your bio says, you should be pleased that I brought up this issue about Shellenberger. But I suspect that the lover-of-the-truth blurb of yours was just to polish the self-image. Bit of PR.
A question isn't in anyway censorship. I like him, yes.' but I am not a subscriber. Just didn't understand in the context of the article why you brought it up, that was until I received this gem from you. Now I feel I can deduce why you were banned, you are a loon.
I can sorta see why someone would want you off their message board tbh. I can only wonder what you were railing about over there that got you booted. lol
So you don't like truth and are anti-free speech. Are you posting from North Korea? You seem to want totalitarianism on Substack. I assume you are one of the dreaded WOKE-folk.
Besides which, you don't read too well. Because I have already answered your queries. Put out some better effort there, Thunder Road!
I have received some responses on this post which makes me think that a few people out there take my criticism of Michael Shellenberger as an indication that I am criticizing the non-WOKE-folk. They seem to think I am scoring points here for the leftwing side.
Nope. Even though I did think it odd that a supposed new-media type for the Right lives in Berkeley, CA. Michael Shellenberger's media material says that he lives in Berkeley.
As far as my opinion here, nothing could be further from the truth. I am disappointed in Michael S. for letting the side down; he talks the no-censorship talk, but does not necessarily live by that principle himself. His sin is hypocrisy. If I pick it up on his Substack, so is the leftwing going to pick it up.
Michael is not some kind of expert. He holds a BA in "Peace Studies" (leftwing stuff) and an MA in Anthropology, according to his bio. That would not equip him for much in the career world. With no PhD, no academic career. And even then...he is not that good. His trick is to state the obvious. He is not strong on original thought. But a new-media career through the PR/Substack route might work.
Substack is not a rightwing gift from God. Anyone can open a Substack host account. No matter what your political proclivities.
I am a thoroughly non-WOKE centrist and always have been. Michael S. is a human being who says he was once a lefty before he saw the light and awakened. The old holier-than-thou conversion story. I sometimes wonder if it was just because he saw a good opportunity for a media career on the rising Right. You know, you publish a not-too-deep book or two, on trendy topics, get a lot of publisher PR, start a Substack....and if you're lucky, you are in. You are seen as a New-Right media personality. You have the usual groupies lapping at your feet.
This is not necessarily expertise or trustworthiness. But neither is it point-scoring for the Left. It is just human opportunism.
I see that Substack forums are often more about the popularity of a host rather than his/her truthfulness or adherence to free speech principles.
Shellenberger must have fans here, who upvoted DC Lovell because they cannot face the fact the their Substack god is not actually what they thought he was. He has feet of clay. And like false gods everywhere, he has his fans in a grip, until they learn the hard way. In the meantime they attack the truth-tellers. Rather like the Democrat crowd does.
The naysayers here appear to be WOKE Democrats. They have fallen under that spell.
Substack is sometimes just as bad as MSM, isn't it? Because there are still all those human faults of the hosts and their fans to deal with. Once fandom sets in, truth usually goes out the door.
Wow, DC -- I touched a nerve with you. You cannot bear that I criticized a Substack host! You must have a few gods amongst them.
Reality hurts! Grow up, dry your tears, and learn that Substack is just a digital platform that makes money renting web pages to anyone who pays them. It is not godly territory.
They gotcha! Have you bought timeshares in Florida too from dodgy dealers?
I was commenting Off-Topic here, Anne. Since someone above had mentioned Michael Shellenberger, I thought I would add that he does not always personally live up to his "no-censorship" stance.
Michael accepts only agreement and compliments on the comment forum of his Substack. He plays the tinpot god, in other words. Not unusual in the Substack world, actually.
You cross that line with him, and he is likely to ban you, as he banned me. Even as a paying subscriber. Which is a foolish thing to do, because then that person is going to describe elsewhere how Shellenberger behaved, and his reputation will tarnish. The leftwing types who watch these forums are going to make hay out of it.
Michael S. has to learn that hypocrisy (to his own subscribers) can be his downfall. If he can display hypocrisy in this way....how authentic is he in other ways? Does he really live by what he writes, or is his writing simply a media-career opportunity?
Love your handle. Sitting at the airport in DFW after three delays (each an hour) wearing a t-shit with a Chinese dragon repping a place called Lee Ho Fooks, gonna get big dish
If you were’t referencing the great Warren Z; apologies. Hope you are. 😉
And Plaskett is the most embarrassing example, but far from the only one. Michael Wolff suggested in March 2016 (before the election) that Epstein "become anti-Trump" in order to get "a certain political cover which you decidedly don't have now."
After Trump becomes president and Wolff starts working on his anti-Trump book ("for a pile of money"), Wolff asks Epstein for an introduction to Tom Barrack (current ambassador to Turkey) and Kathy Ruemmler, White House Counsel to President Barack Obama.
Within hours, Epstein wrote back "of course ok to both".
This is actually a good argument against release of the fikes. I hate Wolff with a passion, and hate reflexive anti-Trumpism even more, but what are the ideals behind his personal communcations that have nothing to do with the illegal matters at hand getting released here?
If we pride ourselves on sticking to the bill of rights regardless of the politics of the affected party, how can we be ok with the privacy of unrelated or not clearly criminal parties just losing privacy or getting smeared to satisfy the mob? To me, succumbing to the whims of the mob is no better than allowing personal whims of an individual politician to override rights.
Wolff gives Epstein pointers about how to fix his image and runs public events during which Epstein badmouths Trump. He runs articles about Trump's "Epstein Problem." This correspondence is obviously related to "the case."
Yep all was talking in 2015-Jan 2019 about events from 2007-2009 that were a closed book. Unrelated to anything with Epstein's activities or case which started with new charges July 2019, with a look back but not to a time Trump was involved.
In my experience, people who are arrogant shouldn't be, and those who have reasons to be confident are usually self-doubting. It's one of those paradoxes of human nature.
It's amazing isn't it? One would think these people would realize that eventually their dirt will be exposed, wouldn't they think that being kind and reasonable would work to dampen the reaction to their corruption? Even if it is just an act. Nope, they are total a-holes through and through believing they are above the law or reproach. Oh, the humanity!
What I couldnt believe is that Barak was named by Giuffre as the guy who beat the shit out of her during sex and was the one who made her get disgusted and flee Epstein entirely.
If Epstein was going to let a liberal head of government actually physically abuse her and tell her she had to take it, that was what broke his spell over her and she got out of there.
Of course he was the head of Israel's govt not the USA. I'm discussing Ehud Barak.
I don't know if delighted is the right word. I hope Plaskett gets her comeuppance, but learning that Epstein was directing a member of congress during a live hearing give me the sads. It's crazy how much power he had.
Alexis de Tocqueville nailed it when he said “I do not know if the people of the United States would vote for superior men if they ran for office, but there can be no doubt that such men do not run.”
That is one of the reasons why governments always grow bigger and more corrupt – sociopathic types are attracted to powerful positions and the parties become intertwined in their corruption, known as the “uni-party” – serving themselves, getting rich off the taxpayers while not serving the people.
That might help, though it doesn't seem to with regard to the presidency. I think bigger issues are the army of unelected bureaucrats and the revolving door between elected officials and the defense industry.
There are a lot of big issues when the government is utterly corrupt - all four branches with their far-reaching tentacles strangling the life out of us.
Okay I regret singling this user out last time as an example of the ignorant rupert murdochbrained oldsters and bots that flood these comments. Clearly there's a human being behind this account. Apologies. I've blocked so many of the blatant ones that I didn't happen to have one on my screen to point to when I made that comment. Plenty showed up soon after. "TheZeitgiest" would have been a better example.
No worries, dude – anytime we put our opinions out there, we are enticing the universe to respond and some of those responses help us practice stoicism!
You helped me practice what Seneca advises – that the best reaction to anger is silence. Or, Epictetus, who advised, “Another person will not hurt you without your cooperation; you are hurt the moment you believe yourself to be.” Ghandi said something similar, "Nobody can hurt me without my permission.”
Here's an ugly question: would you rather Ep and his sponsors blackmail America's elite, or foreign interests?
Power does not attract moral paragons, as you note. So who should be setting the traps and collecting the dirt? Coz these maniacs (Woody Allen, Clintons et al) are going to take the bait
The real damaging stuff to 'national security' won't get released. The House discharge petition already has a carve out to exclude those docs and just give those docs a 'general description'. This is (likely) why Trump changed his tune?
It's all "National Security" -- it's a national security state, lol. The whole thing has to be blown up and a Benevolent AI Dictator put in place. Humans can't be trusted.
Of course it would depend on who trains it and how it gets its data. What if it had access to everything? Among a myriad of other things, Grok trained on a lot of twitter, Claude trained on scanned books, ChatGPT on Wikipedia, etc. Current, or so, events. Now let's give them Confucius, Lao Tzu, Marcus Aurelius, Gandhi, and a few other philosophers into that mix.
“The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuous in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous.”
-- Machiavelli.
Who was influenced by Plato, Socrates, DaVinci, Xenophon, Dante, Erasmus, among others.
It could be more interesting that what we have going now...
It's a symbiotic relationship. What would AI do without humans -- play themselves in 5 dimensional chess? In any event, humans would still have to implement the planning and reforms, so yeah, there is no solution.
Right. Both sides. Whether it's Trump having a best friend for ten years who's a child rapist and putting his friend's partner in child rape in a cushy minimum security prison in exchange for keeping her mouth shut, or a quasi-congresswoman getting a $250 donation from the same guy, both sides have consorted with unsavory characters.
The answer to that is... NOTHING!!! Anybody that thinks we are going to get any new news with the release of whatever pittance the security state is going to allow out is dumber than they look.
What is not understood is the depth of where this goes. Oz cannot let the real curtain be lifted lest the idiots learn that the people they think run things are simple puppets and no better off than they are. The real rulers will never be revealed.
There is no left in the US, just a different version of cartels of corruption. Trump is regarded as a short fingered vulgarian by the ruling classes. Despite him giving them everything they wanted, he'll never be a part of their club.
Where do you get "the left" tried to kill him? The one lunatic was from a right-wing family; the other is just loony tunes. You clearly suspect the shit in the Epstein files must be bad if you're rolling out those lies to justify what POS your president is.
I don’t really care about whether people are ready or not… I am so tired of being jerked around by this “escapade.” And if Bubba wants to remain protected, he and the Missus should hole up in Chappaqua and never be heard from again!!
"He lived in the USA" is really not a great argument in favor of the idea he wasn't affiliated with foreign intelligence. Do foreign intelligence operatives usually live anywhere else than their target country?
"He had connections with important people in the USA" ... uh yeah that's not really a great argument either now is it? Like that is literally what the mission for an ultra-wealthy foreign spy would be?
Obviously he wasn't hired on LinkedIn to be a foreign intelligence agent and then shipped to the USA. That's not the claim. It's blatant and obvious that he had ties with Mossad and was doing very standard intelligence operative things like making powerful connections and collecting kompromat.
"The CIA would have known" um, yes, they would have. They did, clearly. And?
Why not both? Drop site news uncovered a lot of material from emails documenting Epstein working major deals with other nations on behalf of the government of Israel. It’s well documented and worth a read if you are interested.
Well it’s of interest because it’s more proof that our government was after Trump when Epstein is texting the idiot from the USVI while questioning Michael Cohen about Trump being corrupt….
I'd guess a fair amount of people already know, or at least suspect, the truth. I'd also guess that there is a fair amount of people who don't know or care. The problem with a "democratically elected" government is that a lot of that 2nd group vote too.
The people want the truth!!! The Truth they believe themselves. They'll believe anything that harms the Letter they don't associate with, and will put their fingers in their ears and carve out their eyes to not hear or see things that go against their personal narrative.
These are the times we live in. People too dumb to realize they have biased themselves into a corner and are being controlled like a drone.
Well we know the “full” Epstein files must incriminate tons of powerful Democrats or else they would have been released by the Biden administration. It’s always fascinating that the only ones (to date) that ever come to light are the ones around Trump (ok and maybe Prince Andrew, but where are all the Clinton references, amongst others). So I am all for full disclosure.
My guess is that the files are ALSO greatly damaging to US allies, including those from the UK and Israel, and perhaps others. And the international damage that could result is behind the stonewalling. Epstein became very wealthy, very quickly in the late 1970's, early 1980's. And Maxwell's father was quite connected, with many Israeli current and former leaders attending his funeral. I don't know how all the dots connect but those long simmering embers may now get stoked? That said, even if House votes to 'release the Epstein files' the House discharge petition compels the DOJ to release everything it has "EXCEPT NATIONAL SECURITY SECRETS". For national security secrets the House petition demands a declassified log of each withheld doc and a least a generic description. Those are the embers that true investigative journalist might cup their hands and blow upon. But do so with head-on-a-swivel. The 'generic description' entries will be the most explosive stuff, and why it will remain hidden.
The 'national security' damage potential, IMO, is why both parties have not previously released these files. Now that the files will be further released, the DOJ has been given an 'out' to continue protecting US relations with foreign allies.
I understand that there is some truth, in that "national security secrets" could really touch some nerves and incite international havoc, but whether we approve of the methods used to maintain USA's projected global power or not, at some point the average citizens are receiving rapidly diminishing returns for our tax dollars. The multinational corporations' interests have clearly benefitted as well as our vaunted military/intelligence agencies. The elites have had a good run at our (and much of the world's) expense. There is undoubtedly a lot at stake by just peeking under a small corner of the globalists', neat appearing, made up bed of deceit.
If the members of congress are being fed questions or answers via texts they need to turn in their phones before each session, committee meetings, oversight hearings, etc. Just like the little school children must do before class starts. Seeing them sitting there staring at their cell phones in the first place is worse than disgusting.
I was recently at a show where the tickets were $300 - and the dope next to me texted the entire time. It was only an hour and a half -- couldn't you put the dang phone away?
Oh, hell, bring it on. All this will do for most Racket readers and libertarians is confirm what we've long suspected, long known. The federal government is too big and too powerful and confiscates too much of our money to use in the service of remaining big and powerful.
Oddly enough, this could be a good thing. Shrink the federal government down to a size that makes all this corruption not worth it. Then pressure congress to vote in real term-limits. Rotate citizen representatives in and out every two and six years. Break up this political class monopoly. We can put an end to people entering congress making $60k, beginning to make $174k, and in five years being worth a cool $10 million. Gee, wonder how that happens. (Notice how they all find time to write books, as well. Hell, I only work in a middle school, and I barely have time to READ a book, much less write one while simultaneously representing the good citizens of an entire district or state.)
I don't think the Dems are necessarily worried about Clinton revelations. Most of the kids who just voted for the Zoh Bro in NYC weren't even born when Clinton left office almost 25 years ago now. They don't give a shit about him. They barely give a shit about Obama, the Messiah. Now it's just socialism all the way down.
I have to admit it's fun watching the MSNOW Crowd making common cause with Jeffrey Epstein and now Marjorie Taylor Greene. Strange bedfellows indeed. Yuck.
«Oddly enough, this could be a good thing. Shrink the federal government down to a size that makes all this corruption not worth it.»
Corruption on government spending is nothing compare to corruption on making laws biased in favor of one vested interest or another. Shrinking the government would achieve very little at to biased laws. In some cases a single word in a law can be worth hundreds of billions.
I recommend reading Shipwreck 's substack on the four horsemen Republicans trying to force release of "files". MTG, Massie, Boebert, and Mace all have interesting agendas. They all have ulterior motives. None of it is about justice for victims. None of it is about the citizen's "right to know".
You describe an ideal ending to a real world yuck. i'm really torn over this because I don't believe in ideal political endings. I think the yuck might taint us all past saving.
I,m sure you're right that our new socialist voters couldn't care less about the Clintons, but the Party might have a different perspective, which is probably why the information hasn't come out.
I hear ya, Ann. There are no ideal political endings. But as long as we respect the victims/survivors of something like this, I do believe that sunlight is the best disinfectant.
I'm a little confused about this process, however. Why is it political rather than criminal? If the "Epstein Files" contain information about sex traffickers -- in other words, about criminals -- why aren't we seeing arrests and prosecutions rather than exposure and professional and personal ruin? I don't understand this route.
I agree that the criminal system is the appropriate place for the airing of crimes. The question at this point is whether the “files” will supply sufficient hard evidence of criminal activity. My guess is that there will be so much redaction that nothing much will come to light. I too am concerned by the very real likelihood of smear by innuendo.
Because the damage to foreign relationships (and the international 'order') would be too great. That is the only thing that I can think of that makes sense. The House discharge petition has a carve out for the DOJ to not include full disclosures on any Epstein docs that compromise national security. Docs that do, can be excluded and marked with a 'general description'.
Why does the current House discharge petition have this carve out?
People that have previously brought up the Epstein deep state / blackmail angle have been labeled conspiracy theorists to silence their voices. This House discharge petition will give these voices new life.
That so called congresswoman seems like one evil bitch. I’m hoping this is a career ender.
I have to give Ro Khanna, MTG, and Thomas Massey insane amounts of credit. They kept the pressure on despite the calls from Trump to back off.
I’m guessing the Democrats don’t want the files released because it’ll show them colluding with Epstein to take down Trump. And Trump doesn’t want them released because they were friends for so long and probably engaged in some Eyes Wide Shut shit.
You missed the part already released where Epstein says Trump "knew about the girls" which we already knew because of him banning Epstein from Mar a Lago over it, but "never got a massage".
If only you could get back in front of Plaskett in another hearing.... Something tells me you might have a few questions for HER this time, instead of the other way around....
I believe the full disclosure could have massive repercussions for a number of governments and trusted institutions that could result in serious harm for users of these systems, eg us small folk.
But (and easy to say now) it has to come out sometime. It must. If you’ve built a system that needed the lives and bodies of trafficked victims, it’s not something that can be trusted to stand. Better to take the damage and rebuild
The last time we had even a glimmer of that was the Church Commission .. and then just as quickly the intelligence agencies / deep state made sure that light was quickly snuffed out.
At long last, after reading through at least 100 comments about partisan political bullshit you finally touched on the core issue. Child rape is reprehensible, full stop. Any and all people who were involved need to be exposed and prosecuted, Democrat, Republican, Independent, foreign or domestic. Those who engage in covering up these heinous crimes are supporting pedophilia.
If you actually believe that the most powerful and wealthy people in this country and the world are going to be prosecuted for their behavior at Epstein lairs, which he taped, are going to be prosecuted, you are both naive and a very sheltered person who should study history.
When in history was there the sort of uproar we're seeing now? I think you are referring to times when everyone assumed (or didn't know) that this was business as usual. Of course there have always been sex addicts (JFK was one and was known to have procured his fix through mafia connections). That's not my point. What's wrong with this particular picture is the public outcry (which has influence) over how Epstein's lairs have compromised governance. This affects all of us. And that is why they may be prosecuted or at the very least exposed and disgraced, as Andrew was, and removed from positions of influence.
Does the US have jurisdiction over foreign countries and people who live there? No. So we know Gates' wife divorced him over his contact with Epstein, she said so in a TV interview. Do you expect him to be prosecuted? That is naive. Do you expect Bill Clinton to be prosecuted? Do you believe Epstein was "suicided" or voluntarily committed suicide while all videos were lost or never turned on and all guards were asleep? Sometimes thinking in black and white is childish because the world and its players don't operate in black and white, right and wrong. Look at the "biden administration" auto-pen pardons of people for all past, present and future crimes. You probably weren't alive during Watergate. Or during the Vietnam War. Uproar? You have no idea. There will be plenty of redactions before the files are completely "released," and probably rightly so. Our close allies were in contact with Epstein, the fixer extraordinaire, as were politicians of every stripe. Let them all sweat, fearing "leaks." Then the MSM won't cover the leaks.
Thank you for being the voice of “what is” rather than the fantastical world of “how it should be” so many clueless people inhabit. Somebody needs to speak for the adults.
The problem: Shady Finance/ Sexual Blackmail are intrinsically part of Intelligence … which is why Intelligence is supposed to be pointed strictly at other countries AND Law Enforcement should NOT be an Intelligence arm.
I’ll go further that Intelligence is a tool of war and properly belongs in the military, indeed it should have NEVER been taken out of the military and given Civilian agencies not under positive control of the President and Congress, as the rest of the military is under. The creation of the CIA - legally an Independent Agency (!) slipped the leash.
Intelligence operations are acts of WAR and should be seen as equally dangerous.
We’ve created- or rather FDR and Truman created- a shadow gendarmerie and it neither rules nor allows the government to rule. Involving Law Enforcement predictably corrupted the police- Intelligence IS corrupting an enemy.
We’ve become the enemy, we being whichever party isn’t in power.
We in America have been wrestling with this around the edges since WW2, we must decide whether we want an elected government OR a puppet media facing edifice with this shadowy gendarmerie in suits (that cannot you know actually rule, just spy and corrupt) sort of nudging from the mists and back offices.
If you wish to be Tammany or the Kremlin, or perchance the Republic- then do so Intelligence Community.
All they do now is play Pinkerton’s to whatever group is on top. That is not governance.
It may be worth the ensuing drama and risk of unraveling into our still lurking Civil War to resolve these unresolved fatal contradictions. Worth it or not we’re certainly going to get the Drama, aren’t we?
One thing that has been nagging at me and making me skeptical of a lot of the Epstein stuff is how I have hardly heard anything about subjects of investigation in the financial sector. All the focus so far is on high profile politicians. Even Bill Clinton is looking better off after the last release. Epstein was a finance guy. If anyone was involved with compromising material I would expect it to be someone like an investment banker. Why have I never seen any of their names?
Delighted to see more dirt on Plaskett after the shameless treatment she gave you at those “ hearings”
Especially when she called out Matt and Michael Schellenberger a being ‘supposed journalists!’ That moment literally floored me right on the spot.
Epstein Island is in Plaskett's USVI jurisdiction. Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, and Reid Hoffman all visited. Feels like we are in the final scene in "Se7en" where Brad Pitt yells "What's in the box? What's in the box?!?!?!"
Plaskett is weird and Epstein is awful, but do we really think it's so crazy that politicians get text messages? I have to admit that I have fed info and insight this way to everyone from local school board members during live meetings to, yes, real members of congress, not fake ones like Plaskett. What changes if they get their info from acquaintences during meeting prep or live - do we think their info is solely from AI, rather than from humans they know?
It's the ethics of her being coached by Epstein himself in real time during sworn testimony before Congress that gets me.
What are those ethics? I dont see it. Any member of congress would seek out info from related parties. Usually in the past beforehand. How is this different, what matters about it being "live"?
How is it unethical to seek out a felon that might have relevant info?
Seems Plaskett had a rather cozy relationship with the fellow, and they WERE investigating Trump, which justifies almost anything. I guess you're right. It's not unethical at all.
She also took thousands from him.
I'm mocking the public scorn of back room talking to him and I'm going to be convinced there should be greater public scorn because of conduct required to be publicly disclosed? Known and disclosed a decade ago and literally on "Open Secrets" along with all of his other donations. Including extensive large donations to the DSCC and other Dem PACs.
TD;DR - we knew that in 2016, nothing new.
https://www.opensecrets.org/donor-lookup/results?name=jeffrey+epstein&page=3
In re: Plaskett scorn, I think I'll take the public's reaction more seriously on this when I see people getting together and working to put some teeth in the child sex predator laws.
Everyone hates on the church for predation on kids, without owning that our lay criminal justice system typically treats these cases as three to four year sentences, then they serve less and are back on the streets. That's so fucking weak it's a joke, but no one works to fix it. We got a bit smarter with disclosure of sex predators through sex offender registries. But Epstein was on them and reoffended badly. So let's work on that shit please, not on hating on people who talked to him but had nothing to do with those crimes. I really, really don't think that's going to put a dent in the rates of those crimes. It's just silly emotional vengeance that's all for naught.
I mean, there are children out EVERY NIGHT on S. Figueroa in Los Angeles STREETWALKING and selling themselves right now. We haven't even put the anti-loitering law back on the books so that cops can grab more people and find the trafficked girls.
Worrying about women less badly treated 15 years ago by a guy now dead rather than 13 year old girls trafficked by awful pimps openly selling their bodies every fucking night is... well I don't know what it is.
Because the local cops are doing nothing, Essayli who runs the Central California office Federal DA did a push and got 11 of the pimps off the streets, but there's a ton of it still. Harder to build a federal case since it's mainly local law with jurisdiction.
Well...I used to think Michael Shellenberger was OK. Not great, but OK. He tends to rerun obvious concepts. He's just so-so. And now that the novelty has worn off, he is losing commenters.
I even subscribed (for a year). Then he banned me for daring to discuss the fact that Substack can have a darker side.
Mr. No-Censorship actually censors his own subscribers at the drop of a hat. Michael is very thin-skinned, like several other Substack hosts I have known. You must agree with him and continually compliment him, or Michael's own dark side comes out.
That's not acceptable journalism.
He refused to give me a refund after he banned me, btw. I lost the money.
What does this have to do with the article?
I wrote it in reply to Egbar, above, who mentioned Shellenberger.
And...ahem....what business is it of yours to censor me? You and Michael sound alike in that way. Are you a fan of his and you are ticked-off that I outed his behaviour?
Isn't "No-censorship" supposedly one of the big themes on Substack? So shouldn't you be glad when someone outs a censoring Substack-host? After all, Substack hosts make a living out of outing others.
What's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.
If you are a "lover of truth" as your bio says, you should be pleased that I brought up this issue about Shellenberger. But I suspect that the lover-of-the-truth blurb of yours was just to polish the self-image. Bit of PR.
A question isn't in anyway censorship. I like him, yes.' but I am not a subscriber. Just didn't understand in the context of the article why you brought it up, that was until I received this gem from you. Now I feel I can deduce why you were banned, you are a loon.
No, my friend. You are a loon, who is trying to save face now that I have confronted you with the facts. Do you use Tik Tok a great deal, by chance?
I have a very good reputation for my writing and my ideas. Are you sure you want to get embroiled in an argument with me? I am a skilled debater.
Run along and take a nap. Come back when you have cooled down.
I can sorta see why someone would want you off their message board tbh. I can only wonder what you were railing about over there that got you booted. lol
So you don't like truth and are anti-free speech. Are you posting from North Korea? You seem to want totalitarianism on Substack. I assume you are one of the dreaded WOKE-folk.
Besides which, you don't read too well. Because I have already answered your queries. Put out some better effort there, Thunder Road!
Glad you told the story..It's one thing to censor, another not giving the refund..He should have refunded.
I have received some responses on this post which makes me think that a few people out there take my criticism of Michael Shellenberger as an indication that I am criticizing the non-WOKE-folk. They seem to think I am scoring points here for the leftwing side.
Nope. Even though I did think it odd that a supposed new-media type for the Right lives in Berkeley, CA. Michael Shellenberger's media material says that he lives in Berkeley.
As far as my opinion here, nothing could be further from the truth. I am disappointed in Michael S. for letting the side down; he talks the no-censorship talk, but does not necessarily live by that principle himself. His sin is hypocrisy. If I pick it up on his Substack, so is the leftwing going to pick it up.
Michael is not some kind of expert. He holds a BA in "Peace Studies" (leftwing stuff) and an MA in Anthropology, according to his bio. That would not equip him for much in the career world. With no PhD, no academic career. And even then...he is not that good. His trick is to state the obvious. He is not strong on original thought. But a new-media career through the PR/Substack route might work.
Substack is not a rightwing gift from God. Anyone can open a Substack host account. No matter what your political proclivities.
I am a thoroughly non-WOKE centrist and always have been. Michael S. is a human being who says he was once a lefty before he saw the light and awakened. The old holier-than-thou conversion story. I sometimes wonder if it was just because he saw a good opportunity for a media career on the rising Right. You know, you publish a not-too-deep book or two, on trendy topics, get a lot of publisher PR, start a Substack....and if you're lucky, you are in. You are seen as a New-Right media personality. You have the usual groupies lapping at your feet.
This is not necessarily expertise or trustworthiness. But neither is it point-scoring for the Left. It is just human opportunism.
I see that Substack forums are often more about the popularity of a host rather than his/her truthfulness or adherence to free speech principles.
Shellenberger must have fans here, who upvoted DC Lovell because they cannot face the fact the their Substack god is not actually what they thought he was. He has feet of clay. And like false gods everywhere, he has his fans in a grip, until they learn the hard way. In the meantime they attack the truth-tellers. Rather like the Democrat crowd does.
The naysayers here appear to be WOKE Democrats. They have fallen under that spell.
Substack is sometimes just as bad as MSM, isn't it? Because there are still all those human faults of the hosts and their fans to deal with. Once fandom sets in, truth usually goes out the door.
You are a little dictator. You must be one of the WOKE-folk.
Wow, DC -- I touched a nerve with you. You cannot bear that I criticized a Substack host! You must have a few gods amongst them.
Reality hurts! Grow up, dry your tears, and learn that Substack is just a digital platform that makes money renting web pages to anyone who pays them. It is not godly territory.
They gotcha! Have you bought timeshares in Florida too from dodgy dealers?
Good luck with that.
Oh, please, pretty please. Do it! Do an entire analysis of his personality type.
Yours is clearer w/every post.
?????? Did I miss something?
I was commenting Off-Topic here, Anne. Since someone above had mentioned Michael Shellenberger, I thought I would add that he does not always personally live up to his "no-censorship" stance.
Michael accepts only agreement and compliments on the comment forum of his Substack. He plays the tinpot god, in other words. Not unusual in the Substack world, actually.
You cross that line with him, and he is likely to ban you, as he banned me. Even as a paying subscriber. Which is a foolish thing to do, because then that person is going to describe elsewhere how Shellenberger behaved, and his reputation will tarnish. The leftwing types who watch these forums are going to make hay out of it.
Michael S. has to learn that hypocrisy (to his own subscribers) can be his downfall. If he can display hypocrisy in this way....how authentic is he in other ways? Does he really live by what he writes, or is his writing simply a media-career opportunity?
Got it -- thanks!
Smart guy but he believes in E.T.
Well, she’s a supposed legislator.
Love your handle. Sitting at the airport in DFW after three delays (each an hour) wearing a t-shit with a Chinese dragon repping a place called Lee Ho Fooks, gonna get big dish
If you were’t referencing the great Warren Z; apologies. Hope you are. 😉
For sure I am. Thanks. Getcha a big dish of beef chow mein.
And Plaskett is the most embarrassing example, but far from the only one. Michael Wolff suggested in March 2016 (before the election) that Epstein "become anti-Trump" in order to get "a certain political cover which you decidedly don't have now."
After Trump becomes president and Wolff starts working on his anti-Trump book ("for a pile of money"), Wolff asks Epstein for an introduction to Tom Barrack (current ambassador to Turkey) and Kathy Ruemmler, White House Counsel to President Barack Obama.
Within hours, Epstein wrote back "of course ok to both".
Michael Wolff married to the chronic whiner, Nicole Wallace??
Pretty sure that's a different "journalist" at the New York Times.
That would be the estimable Michael Schmidt (ahem)
I don't think anyone would marry that creep. The word "incel" comes to mind.
hard to be embarassed when simple stupidity would be the operative word.
This is actually a good argument against release of the fikes. I hate Wolff with a passion, and hate reflexive anti-Trumpism even more, but what are the ideals behind his personal communcations that have nothing to do with the illegal matters at hand getting released here?
If we pride ourselves on sticking to the bill of rights regardless of the politics of the affected party, how can we be ok with the privacy of unrelated or not clearly criminal parties just losing privacy or getting smeared to satisfy the mob? To me, succumbing to the whims of the mob is no better than allowing personal whims of an individual politician to override rights.
Nothing you write on gmail is private.
I see no logic to treat it differently in a legal sense than if he was hosting his own domain or using MS Exchange through a company.
Wolff gives Epstein pointers about how to fix his image and runs public events during which Epstein badmouths Trump. He runs articles about Trump's "Epstein Problem." This correspondence is obviously related to "the case."
https://yalereview.org/article/michael-wolff-donald-trump-epstein-files
Yep all was talking in 2015-Jan 2019 about events from 2007-2009 that were a closed book. Unrelated to anything with Epstein's activities or case which started with new charges July 2019, with a look back but not to a time Trump was involved.
I hope Matt and Schellenberger are feeling smug. They've earned it.
Exactly my thought on reading this! I really can't think of anyone else as arrogant & condescending as she - and that's a pretty high bar to exceed!!
In my experience, people who are arrogant shouldn't be, and those who have reasons to be confident are usually self-doubting. It's one of those paradoxes of human nature.
Or low?
Dancing the "Shady Limbo"?
wasnt she sending sex tapes with her ugly husband. she being equally as ugly
It's amazing isn't it? One would think these people would realize that eventually their dirt will be exposed, wouldn't they think that being kind and reasonable would work to dampen the reaction to their corruption? Even if it is just an act. Nope, they are total a-holes through and through believing they are above the law or reproach. Oh, the humanity!
What I couldnt believe is that Barak was named by Giuffre as the guy who beat the shit out of her during sex and was the one who made her get disgusted and flee Epstein entirely.
If Epstein was going to let a liberal head of government actually physically abuse her and tell her she had to take it, that was what broke his spell over her and she got out of there.
Of course he was the head of Israel's govt not the USA. I'm discussing Ehud Barak.
I don't know if delighted is the right word. I hope Plaskett gets her comeuppance, but learning that Epstein was directing a member of congress during a live hearing give me the sads. It's crazy how much power he had.
Here’s something you’re bound to wish that you could unread. She has a leaked “sex tape”. True. 🤢
Alexis de Tocqueville nailed it when he said “I do not know if the people of the United States would vote for superior men if they ran for office, but there can be no doubt that such men do not run.”
That is one of the reasons why governments always grow bigger and more corrupt – sociopathic types are attracted to powerful positions and the parties become intertwined in their corruption, known as the “uni-party” – serving themselves, getting rich off the taxpayers while not serving the people.
The MSM as well.........
The American republic was not meant to last without a zealous GODLY people / citizenry.
You get what you will allow / tolerate, and or deserve.
It's partly that. It's also that every time a decent person tries to run, the swamp creatures actively block them.
True. I wish we had term limits. Hamilton argued against term limits and won that battle.
That might help, though it doesn't seem to with regard to the presidency. I think bigger issues are the army of unelected bureaucrats and the revolving door between elected officials and the defense industry.
There are a lot of big issues when the government is utterly corrupt - all four branches with their far-reaching tentacles strangling the life out of us.
Okay I regret singling this user out last time as an example of the ignorant rupert murdochbrained oldsters and bots that flood these comments. Clearly there's a human being behind this account. Apologies. I've blocked so many of the blatant ones that I didn't happen to have one on my screen to point to when I made that comment. Plenty showed up soon after. "TheZeitgiest" would have been a better example.
No worries, dude – anytime we put our opinions out there, we are enticing the universe to respond and some of those responses help us practice stoicism!
You helped me practice what Seneca advises – that the best reaction to anger is silence. Or, Epictetus, who advised, “Another person will not hurt you without your cooperation; you are hurt the moment you believe yourself to be.” Ghandi said something similar, "Nobody can hurt me without my permission.”
Yes!
Forgot the last 4 letters of name. upid.
I need to reread. it's been too long.
You write this like it's a bad thing.
Here's an ugly question: would you rather Ep and his sponsors blackmail America's elite, or foreign interests?
Power does not attract moral paragons, as you note. So who should be setting the traps and collecting the dirt? Coz these maniacs (Woody Allen, Clintons et al) are going to take the bait
Same as it ever was…
The left impeached Trump twice, tried to bankrupt him over an appraisal dispute, tried to jail him over a misdemeanor, and tried to kill him. Twice.
The idea that they had damning evidence of him and Jeffrey Epstein, and then sat on it simply doesn't sound all that realistic.
Because the entire system is compromised and corrupt. But we'll see what gets released.
The real damaging stuff to 'national security' won't get released. The House discharge petition already has a carve out to exclude those docs and just give those docs a 'general description'. This is (likely) why Trump changed his tune?
Bingo! All the good stuff will be buried
It's all "National Security" -- it's a national security state, lol. The whole thing has to be blown up and a Benevolent AI Dictator put in place. Humans can't be trusted.
"Humans can't be trusted."
And yet you're willing to trust an AI programmed by humans and trained on data produced by humans?
Of course it would depend on who trains it and how it gets its data. What if it had access to everything? Among a myriad of other things, Grok trained on a lot of twitter, Claude trained on scanned books, ChatGPT on Wikipedia, etc. Current, or so, events. Now let's give them Confucius, Lao Tzu, Marcus Aurelius, Gandhi, and a few other philosophers into that mix.
“The fact is that a man who wants to act virtuous in every way necessarily comes to grief among so many who are not virtuous.”
-- Machiavelli.
Who was influenced by Plato, Socrates, DaVinci, Xenophon, Dante, Erasmus, among others.
It could be more interesting that what we have going now...
Benevolent being the key word. But when AI figures out things will work better without humans, watch out! LOL or maybe not.
It's a symbiotic relationship. What would AI do without humans -- play themselves in 5 dimensional chess? In any event, humans would still have to implement the planning and reforms, so yeah, there is no solution.
National..The only security any of them are interested in, is their own..
Yes. Doubtful all Epstein ties that bind will be revealed. How many will be redacted due to "National Security?"
Yes, they are protecting Us *wink *wink*
BINGO! The rot is universal among those who don't toil for a living.
Right. Both sides. Whether it's Trump having a best friend for ten years who's a child rapist and putting his friend's partner in child rape in a cushy minimum security prison in exchange for keeping her mouth shut, or a quasi-congresswoman getting a $250 donation from the same guy, both sides have consorted with unsavory characters.
The answer to that is... NOTHING!!! Anybody that thinks we are going to get any new news with the release of whatever pittance the security state is going to allow out is dumber than they look.
What is not understood is the depth of where this goes. Oz cannot let the real curtain be lifted lest the idiots learn that the people they think run things are simple puppets and no better off than they are. The real rulers will never be revealed.
Sounds to me like Pandora's box. We should all be careful what we wish for.
There is no left in the US, just a different version of cartels of corruption. Trump is regarded as a short fingered vulgarian by the ruling classes. Despite him giving them everything they wanted, he'll never be a part of their club.
Define “left” please.
Drooling simpletons with massive debt from their incredible overeducation that leads them to be the most gullible fools walking the planet.
This. This. This.
The Left... The Left... The Right, The Left, The Right, The Left, The Right... Left, Right, Left, Right, Left, Right, Left...
In a discussion of the deaths of those that wholesale marching powder🤣
Where do you get "the left" tried to kill him? The one lunatic was from a right-wing family; the other is just loony tunes. You clearly suspect the shit in the Epstein files must be bad if you're rolling out those lies to justify what POS your president is.
that's a very good point.
The whole story only makes sense if Epstein was part of some sort of intelligence op -- but then it makes perfect sense.
As for whether people are ready to hear the truth of the matter or not, hopefully we find out!
I don’t really care about whether people are ready or not… I am so tired of being jerked around by this “escapade.” And if Bubba wants to remain protected, he and the Missus should hole up in Chappaqua and never be heard from again!!
That would be a great victory in itself.
Me too!
I listened to Taibbi and Kern today for an hour…Walter made a great argument as to why Epstein is not Mossad but our own Intel….
"He lived in the USA" is really not a great argument in favor of the idea he wasn't affiliated with foreign intelligence. Do foreign intelligence operatives usually live anywhere else than their target country?
"He had connections with important people in the USA" ... uh yeah that's not really a great argument either now is it? Like that is literally what the mission for an ultra-wealthy foreign spy would be?
Obviously he wasn't hired on LinkedIn to be a foreign intelligence agent and then shipped to the USA. That's not the claim. It's blatant and obvious that he had ties with Mossad and was doing very standard intelligence operative things like making powerful connections and collecting kompromat.
"The CIA would have known" um, yes, they would have. They did, clearly. And?
I agree , that opening argument didnt make sense, but I thought the rest did… “ just let it rip”..I’m so sick of this saga
Why not both? Drop site news uncovered a lot of material from emails documenting Epstein working major deals with other nations on behalf of the government of Israel. It’s well documented and worth a read if you are interested.
I don't know if that's better or worse but it's possible.
Well it’s of interest because it’s more proof that our government was after Trump when Epstein is texting the idiot from the USVI while questioning Michael Cohen about Trump being corrupt….
...Stacey Plaskett was also one of the House Impeachment Managers for the second impeachment ... appointed by Pelosi ..
Yeah by then it's obvious he's working against Trump and it really doesn't matter who originally hired him.
...wouldn't it be equally plausible US intelligence would want to get inside information on Israel and other allies? ...
Sure, but then we'd send him over to Israel.
We also have to note that JE had a very large London presence, so you can almost certainly rope in the British intelligence operators as well.
I'd guess a fair amount of people already know, or at least suspect, the truth. I'd also guess that there is a fair amount of people who don't know or care. The problem with a "democratically elected" government is that a lot of that 2nd group vote too.
The people want the truth!!! The Truth they believe themselves. They'll believe anything that harms the Letter they don't associate with, and will put their fingers in their ears and carve out their eyes to not hear or see things that go against their personal narrative.
These are the times we live in. People too dumb to realize they have biased themselves into a corner and are being controlled like a drone.
If so, interesting that CIA endorses selective de facto term limits, increasing their influence. More to think about.
Well we know the “full” Epstein files must incriminate tons of powerful Democrats or else they would have been released by the Biden administration. It’s always fascinating that the only ones (to date) that ever come to light are the ones around Trump (ok and maybe Prince Andrew, but where are all the Clinton references, amongst others). So I am all for full disclosure.
My guess is that the files are ALSO greatly damaging to US allies, including those from the UK and Israel, and perhaps others. And the international damage that could result is behind the stonewalling. Epstein became very wealthy, very quickly in the late 1970's, early 1980's. And Maxwell's father was quite connected, with many Israeli current and former leaders attending his funeral. I don't know how all the dots connect but those long simmering embers may now get stoked? That said, even if House votes to 'release the Epstein files' the House discharge petition compels the DOJ to release everything it has "EXCEPT NATIONAL SECURITY SECRETS". For national security secrets the House petition demands a declassified log of each withheld doc and a least a generic description. Those are the embers that true investigative journalist might cup their hands and blow upon. But do so with head-on-a-swivel. The 'generic description' entries will be the most explosive stuff, and why it will remain hidden.
The 'national security' damage potential, IMO, is why both parties have not previously released these files. Now that the files will be further released, the DOJ has been given an 'out' to continue protecting US relations with foreign allies.
I understand that there is some truth, in that "national security secrets" could really touch some nerves and incite international havoc, but whether we approve of the methods used to maintain USA's projected global power or not, at some point the average citizens are receiving rapidly diminishing returns for our tax dollars. The multinational corporations' interests have clearly benefitted as well as our vaunted military/intelligence agencies. The elites have had a good run at our (and much of the world's) expense. There is undoubtedly a lot at stake by just peeking under a small corner of the globalists', neat appearing, made up bed of deceit.
so you aren't for our tax dollars to provide transgender surgeries in Mongolia?
I fully expect the "national security secrets" will ensure we see a stack of documents with every word redacted other than "Trump."
thanks. This "except national security secrets" clause is one I did not know about and will no doubt to be used to hide the real grungy stuff.
Most likely they all knew about and all signed off on it, as long as they got to share in that intel. "Five Eyes" spying all over again.
Other countries as well.
If the members of congress are being fed questions or answers via texts they need to turn in their phones before each session, committee meetings, oversight hearings, etc. Just like the little school children must do before class starts. Seeing them sitting there staring at their cell phones in the first place is worse than disgusting.
As a former middle school/ junior high teacher, I had the same thought.
Well, earrings, watches and for all I know naval and nasal piercings can transmit messages.
No they don’t. They are useful tools that facilitate all the things you listed.
Legislators need to be able to receive advice, new info, etc and often on short notice.
The difference here was the “who” not the use of texts.
Prohibiting a tool because of the less than judicious use by this creepy lady shouldn’t form a basis to prohibit legit use.
I was recently at a show where the tickets were $300 - and the dope next to me texted the entire time. It was only an hour and a half -- couldn't you put the dang phone away?
Oh, hell, bring it on. All this will do for most Racket readers and libertarians is confirm what we've long suspected, long known. The federal government is too big and too powerful and confiscates too much of our money to use in the service of remaining big and powerful.
Oddly enough, this could be a good thing. Shrink the federal government down to a size that makes all this corruption not worth it. Then pressure congress to vote in real term-limits. Rotate citizen representatives in and out every two and six years. Break up this political class monopoly. We can put an end to people entering congress making $60k, beginning to make $174k, and in five years being worth a cool $10 million. Gee, wonder how that happens. (Notice how they all find time to write books, as well. Hell, I only work in a middle school, and I barely have time to READ a book, much less write one while simultaneously representing the good citizens of an entire district or state.)
I don't think the Dems are necessarily worried about Clinton revelations. Most of the kids who just voted for the Zoh Bro in NYC weren't even born when Clinton left office almost 25 years ago now. They don't give a shit about him. They barely give a shit about Obama, the Messiah. Now it's just socialism all the way down.
I have to admit it's fun watching the MSNOW Crowd making common cause with Jeffrey Epstein and now Marjorie Taylor Greene. Strange bedfellows indeed. Yuck.
Time for a shower. %-)
«Oddly enough, this could be a good thing. Shrink the federal government down to a size that makes all this corruption not worth it.»
Corruption on government spending is nothing compare to corruption on making laws biased in favor of one vested interest or another. Shrinking the government would achieve very little at to biased laws. In some cases a single word in a law can be worth hundreds of billions.
I recommend reading Shipwreck 's substack on the four horsemen Republicans trying to force release of "files". MTG, Massie, Boebert, and Mace all have interesting agendas. They all have ulterior motives. None of it is about justice for victims. None of it is about the citizen's "right to know".
Thanks for the tip, TLR. I'll look into it. Those four are quite a collection, for sure. ;-)
You describe an ideal ending to a real world yuck. i'm really torn over this because I don't believe in ideal political endings. I think the yuck might taint us all past saving.
I,m sure you're right that our new socialist voters couldn't care less about the Clintons, but the Party might have a different perspective, which is probably why the information hasn't come out.
I hear ya, Ann. There are no ideal political endings. But as long as we respect the victims/survivors of something like this, I do believe that sunlight is the best disinfectant.
I'm a little confused about this process, however. Why is it political rather than criminal? If the "Epstein Files" contain information about sex traffickers -- in other words, about criminals -- why aren't we seeing arrests and prosecutions rather than exposure and professional and personal ruin? I don't understand this route.
I agree that the criminal system is the appropriate place for the airing of crimes. The question at this point is whether the “files” will supply sufficient hard evidence of criminal activity. My guess is that there will be so much redaction that nothing much will come to light. I too am concerned by the very real likelihood of smear by innuendo.
Ah, good for you, Matt. Wasn't Plaskett the one who called you a so-called journalist?
I guess she's more than a so-called enabler and money-grubber of Epstein.
No, that was Debbie Wasserman Shultz. With a capital "C"
It was Plaskett though.
I looked it up, and I stand corrected. The capital c stands though!
Though DWS is indeed a Capital C C-word.
🤣
Why didn’t Biden release the documents when he had the chance?
Williams Jefferson Clinton
Because the damage to foreign relationships (and the international 'order') would be too great. That is the only thing that I can think of that makes sense. The House discharge petition has a carve out for the DOJ to not include full disclosures on any Epstein docs that compromise national security. Docs that do, can be excluded and marked with a 'general description'.
Why does the current House discharge petition have this carve out?
People that have previously brought up the Epstein deep state / blackmail angle have been labeled conspiracy theorists to silence their voices. This House discharge petition will give these voices new life.
Call me a conspiracy theorist then. It’s the best explanation out there.
You just made me think of something that I had tried to mentally purge: Biden's predilection for sniffing young girls.
Let's not forget he and his kid 'doing business' in Ukraine
And I thought I had purged this… Now I need a shower
Speak to me not of showers, for it will only remind me of his daughter's diary.
Babies even.
hahahaha goooooood point.
That so called congresswoman seems like one evil bitch. I’m hoping this is a career ender.
I have to give Ro Khanna, MTG, and Thomas Massey insane amounts of credit. They kept the pressure on despite the calls from Trump to back off.
I’m guessing the Democrats don’t want the files released because it’ll show them colluding with Epstein to take down Trump. And Trump doesn’t want them released because they were friends for so long and probably engaged in some Eyes Wide Shut shit.
Hey, politics is a filthy dirty bidness and in bidness, like love and war, all is fair and fair game.
...could be democrats want disclosure now rather than later ... old news by November 2026 ...
You missed the part already released where Epstein says Trump "knew about the girls" which we already knew because of him banning Epstein from Mar a Lago over it, but "never got a massage".
If only you could get back in front of Plaskett in another hearing.... Something tells me you might have a few questions for HER this time, instead of the other way around....
“Ms. Plaskett, as a ‘so-called’ Congresswoman…”
I believe the full disclosure could have massive repercussions for a number of governments and trusted institutions that could result in serious harm for users of these systems, eg us small folk.
But (and easy to say now) it has to come out sometime. It must. If you’ve built a system that needed the lives and bodies of trafficked victims, it’s not something that can be trusted to stand. Better to take the damage and rebuild
The last time we had even a glimmer of that was the Church Commission .. and then just as quickly the intelligence agencies / deep state made sure that light was quickly snuffed out.
At long last, after reading through at least 100 comments about partisan political bullshit you finally touched on the core issue. Child rape is reprehensible, full stop. Any and all people who were involved need to be exposed and prosecuted, Democrat, Republican, Independent, foreign or domestic. Those who engage in covering up these heinous crimes are supporting pedophilia.
Nah, it doesn't have to come out. The honey trap is as old as homo sapiens.
So is murder. Should we stop prosecuting that too?
If you actually believe that the most powerful and wealthy people in this country and the world are going to be prosecuted for their behavior at Epstein lairs, which he taped, are going to be prosecuted, you are both naive and a very sheltered person who should study history.
When in history was there the sort of uproar we're seeing now? I think you are referring to times when everyone assumed (or didn't know) that this was business as usual. Of course there have always been sex addicts (JFK was one and was known to have procured his fix through mafia connections). That's not my point. What's wrong with this particular picture is the public outcry (which has influence) over how Epstein's lairs have compromised governance. This affects all of us. And that is why they may be prosecuted or at the very least exposed and disgraced, as Andrew was, and removed from positions of influence.
Does the US have jurisdiction over foreign countries and people who live there? No. So we know Gates' wife divorced him over his contact with Epstein, she said so in a TV interview. Do you expect him to be prosecuted? That is naive. Do you expect Bill Clinton to be prosecuted? Do you believe Epstein was "suicided" or voluntarily committed suicide while all videos were lost or never turned on and all guards were asleep? Sometimes thinking in black and white is childish because the world and its players don't operate in black and white, right and wrong. Look at the "biden administration" auto-pen pardons of people for all past, present and future crimes. You probably weren't alive during Watergate. Or during the Vietnam War. Uproar? You have no idea. There will be plenty of redactions before the files are completely "released," and probably rightly so. Our close allies were in contact with Epstein, the fixer extraordinaire, as were politicians of every stripe. Let them all sweat, fearing "leaks." Then the MSM won't cover the leaks.
Thank you for being the voice of “what is” rather than the fantastical world of “how it should be” so many clueless people inhabit. Somebody needs to speak for the adults.
Please please please sort this out for us, Matt. It’s like the Twitter files — and Americans need and deserve this information, too.
I agree!
Cue The Smiths
https://open.spotify.com/track/42GCfFvZKOWtwHnMxCAoIs?si=ktDoWjV0QV-FtxuMqOnxVw&context=spotify%3Aplaylist%3A1hGi3pT0ukkvUPyXQRgZYB
diving deep there - but for excellence!
The problem: Shady Finance/ Sexual Blackmail are intrinsically part of Intelligence … which is why Intelligence is supposed to be pointed strictly at other countries AND Law Enforcement should NOT be an Intelligence arm.
I’ll go further that Intelligence is a tool of war and properly belongs in the military, indeed it should have NEVER been taken out of the military and given Civilian agencies not under positive control of the President and Congress, as the rest of the military is under. The creation of the CIA - legally an Independent Agency (!) slipped the leash.
Intelligence operations are acts of WAR and should be seen as equally dangerous.
We’ve created- or rather FDR and Truman created- a shadow gendarmerie and it neither rules nor allows the government to rule. Involving Law Enforcement predictably corrupted the police- Intelligence IS corrupting an enemy.
We’ve become the enemy, we being whichever party isn’t in power.
We in America have been wrestling with this around the edges since WW2, we must decide whether we want an elected government OR a puppet media facing edifice with this shadowy gendarmerie in suits (that cannot you know actually rule, just spy and corrupt) sort of nudging from the mists and back offices.
If you wish to be Tammany or the Kremlin, or perchance the Republic- then do so Intelligence Community.
All they do now is play Pinkerton’s to whatever group is on top. That is not governance.
It may be worth the ensuing drama and risk of unraveling into our still lurking Civil War to resolve these unresolved fatal contradictions. Worth it or not we’re certainly going to get the Drama, aren’t we?
Every word yes
Let the chips fall where they may.
One thing that has been nagging at me and making me skeptical of a lot of the Epstein stuff is how I have hardly heard anything about subjects of investigation in the financial sector. All the focus so far is on high profile politicians. Even Bill Clinton is looking better off after the last release. Epstein was a finance guy. If anyone was involved with compromising material I would expect it to be someone like an investment banker. Why have I never seen any of their names?
What is the job of politicians other than to run cover and fall on their swords for the types you mention?
Beatles Nowhere Man or Tom Veil Nowhere Man?
Larry Summers.