The Madness of King Donald. The 25th Amendment Watch List, Third Edition and Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 98th edition. The Perverts and Fellow Travelers Issue.

July 19, 2025.

 

I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people, not at all referring to the immoral of this world or the greedy and robbers or idolaters; for you would then have to leave the world.

But I now write to you not to associate with anyone named a brother, if he is immoral, greedy, an idolater, a slanderer, a drunkard, or a robber, not even to eat with such a person.

For why should I be judging outsiders? Is it not your business to judge those within?

God will judge those outside. “Purge the evil person from your midst.

St. Paul to the Corinthians..

The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump 2003 birthday wishes to Jeffrey Epstein, part of a book compiled for Epstein's birthday by his paramour and fellow procurer Ghislaine Maxwell included a Trump made drawing of a naked woman, with "Donald" written over the figure's genitals and apparently somewhat mimicking pubic hairs.

I'm not going to post the drawing.

Of course, Trump, in Trump fashion, has declared it to be a fake.  And now he's suing the Wall Street Journal.

This all followed an increasingly desperate effort on Trump's part to divert attention from this story. Rather than try to set out the reasons that the story won't go away, I'll just link in this analysis with Ezra Klein, with which I agree.

Trying to get ahead of this, and I think that he'll find by suing the Journal he set himself behind, he's also ordered the release of the Epstein grand jury testimony.

Not the supposed "Epstein files", but the grand jury testimony.   That's frankly not what people have been asking for, but its offered out as red meat for the dogs in hopes that they'll satiate themselves and go away.

It doesn't look like they will.

His most loyal supporters, of course, have simply built this into their conspiracy theory, although in a way in which the logic train derails pretty quickly.  Trump isn't hiding anything. . . it was the Democrats. . . .

Um, okay. . . 

I have a feeling the 25th Amendment schedule has been moved up.

The simple fact of the matter is that Donald Trump has a forty year history of hanging out with kiddy diddling creeps.  That didn't start with Epstein.  Maybe you could hang around in a pornographic atmosphere for 40 years and not inhale anything, but it wouldn't be easy.  And once the rot sets in, and the poison is available, it tends to corrupt.

Hugh Hefner was always a creep.  But he was married when he started off on his path of dissipation.  He wasn't rapey at first.

And its been clear for a long time, for those who have cared to look even a little, that Trump is a deeply immoral man, and he's surrounded himself, in many instances, by those who are likewise deeply immoral.

Trump has 5 kids with 3 women.

Elon Musk has 14 kids with 4 women.

Pete Hegseth has 7 kids with 3 women.

Linda McMahon is being sued for enabling child sexual abuse. 

Trump's affinity for young women has been denied by his defenders, but his own words convict him. Trump, with Howard Stern on the topic of a teenage Lindsay Lohan, stated:

TRUMP: What do you think of Lindsay Lohan?

STERN: She's hot.

TRUMP: I've seen a close-up of her chest. Are you into freckles?

STERN: Imagine having sex with this troubled teen?

TRUMP: She's probably deeply troubled—and great in bed.

From the same interview:

TRUMP: How come the deeply troubled women, deeply deeply troubled.

STERN: Right.

TRUMP: They're always the best in bed. For some reason what I said is true. I mean they're just unbelievable.

STERN: I can tell.

TRUMP: You don't want to be with them for the long term—but for the short term, there is nothing like it.

How is it that this administration, lead by a serial polygamists, who hasn't given any indication he's reconsidered the morality of his conduct, and who is now floundering like a fish on the deck on the Epstein scandal, can be seriously regarded as some sort of Christian leader? 

Well, that was always baloney in the first place.  Nobody can identify a Christian denomination that Trump is actually a member of.  He was a Presbyterian growing up, but he's disavowed that religion.  He's sort of generic American Evangelical at best, which makes sense as by and large American Evangelicalism has dumped a lot of Christianity, particularly in the sexual area. . . as long as its conventional.

Populist right wing America has long accommodated itself to deep sexual immorality, but only of a conventional kind.  Far less than a century ago it was difficult for Americans to obtain a divorce, and divorce was looked down upon.  Now people who have repeat marriages, or who are living together outside of marriage, have no problem identifying themselves as right wing American Evangelicals.  St. Paul may have cautioned people about all sexual immorality, but in the American Civil Religion, that doesn't apply to sex between a man and a woman, apparently.

Unless, it turns out, that woman is under 18 years old.  That, it turns out, is a bridge too far.

Of course, there's no reason to believe that Trump ever saw any lines as blurred, or any lines at all.  Maybe he didn't bed teenage girls, but he hung around with those who did.  That alone is wrong.

But we don't know, of course, what we don't know.  If we were detectives, and assigned this as a set of facts to investigate, we'd sure suspect that quite a bit of kiddy diddling was going on in this circle of very wealthy "pals".  Indeed, their money alone would make it easy for them to get away with things for a long time, or perhaps indefinitely.

It'd make a great film noir, albeit a creepy one.

If it all feels like something deeply fake has been and is going on here, it's also now admitted that Trump's constant claims to perfect health are fake.  He has chronic venous insufficiency.  It won't kill him or anything, but it doesn't suddenly appear either.  He is an old man, with an old man's disease.  He's had it for awhile.

Old, and under stress, Trump's rambling "weave" has become so normal that people don't even pay attention to it anymore.  On Tuesday, Trump interrupted an energy and innovation event in Pennsylvania to “brag” about his uncle, John Trump, claiming that the at MIT professor had been particularly impressed with student Ted Kaczynski.

Dr. Trump died in 1985, before Kaczynski was identified as the Unabomber.  And Kaczynski didn't go to MIT.

Trump went after  Fed chair Jerome Powell and was upset that Biden appointed him. . . except he didn't appoint him. Trump did.

Trump's routinely claiming that petroleum prices have gone way down at the pump.  They haven't.

Okay, what's this have to do with the 25th Amendment?  Well, it's that bridge too far thing.  I've long predicted that Trump would be removed from office under the 25th Amendment before the November, 2026 election.  I think this speeds that up.  Trump's utility to the NatCons is almost done with.  The Big Ugly Bill was passed, and spending on things the NatCons disapprove of has been cut.  ICE  and the Border Patrol are getting a massive funding boost, and that's going to see mass deportations really ramp up.

Of all of Trump's supposed agenda items, the ones that NatCons really care about have been pretty well advanced.  None of them have achieved what might be regarded as full success, but they've gone a lot further than they had a right to hope for.  Trump's ongoing association with them, however, isn't going to advance them any further.  Indeed, as people begin to feel the impact of funding cuts, they'll start to get angry.  If it turns out that Trump was fishing in the shallow end of the female pool, it's completely done with.

In fact, the best thing that could possibly happen for the NatCons would be if Trump turns out to be a Dirk Diddler with an eye for girls who should be looking for prom dates.

Eh?

Well, here's why.

I've always maintained that Trump has no real allegiance to anything other than Trump.  NatCons certainly do, however.  NatCons have always known that their vision, which is relatively new in American politics, had very little chance of rapidly advancing as they had no chance of finding a Francisco Franco who could get elected.  They're smart, and they also realized that they could coopt populist discontent, something that ironically the Democrats had a chance of doing with Bernie Sanders.  And right wing populism legitimately shares some common goals with National Conservatism, which is nationalistic, ethno-nationalistic, and isolationist.

Where the two depart, however, is that populism is always a very shallow stream.  Most populists would be happy if "Mexicans" were sent home, and everyone had to be a "Christian", in a fashion that didn't include the Apostolic Faiths, and which didn't really make you "go to Church" on Sundays, or which held that the spouse you married three spouses ago is your real spouse.  NatCons, however, have  much more intellectual view on everything, and they espouse "traditional values" in the fashion that Franco, or if you prefer, Belloc, would have recognized, and they'd legislate towards that end.

That man isn't Donald Trump, it's J.D. Vance.  

The rest of the NatCon agenda is dead in the water if the Republicans don't hold the House and the Senate in 2026.  It can't be cemented if Vance isn't elected in 2028.  The GOP won't hold the House, at a bare minimum, if the "Trump agenda" becomes any more unpopular than it already is, and it will.  It's becoming increasingly likely that the Republicans will lose the Senate.  There's no way on earth that Vance can win the 2028 election as a stand alone Presidential candidate.

But if Trump were to go after the impact of the current legislation starts to sink in, the taint might stick to him.  That would give the GOP a chance, albeit only that, to ride things out until 2028.  And Vance might have a chance if he became President due to a Trump removal.  And, the way things work, that might given NatCons a fellow traveler in the Oval Office for a solid ten years, as Vance could complete the last two years of Trump's term and eight years of two terms on his own.

In terms of "removal", I mean that.  That's what will have to happen. Trump isn't going anywhere voluntarily.  And hence, the 25th Amendment comes in.

Gosh, we'll hear, the stress of things just caught up with the old fellow.  

Or gosh, we didn't know he was a diddler.

July 20, 2025

Not too surprisingly, women with a connection to this story have resurfaced, including Stacey Williams, who was a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model featured in the pornography, um, swimsuit, issue at some joint in the 90s.  She was also Epstein's girlfriend in the early 90s, showing some bad judgment on her part.

Anyhow, she states that Epstein took her up the Trump tower where Trump groped her while he and Epstein talked, liking it to “some sort of sick bet or game” between the two “close friends".  Several of her friend corroborated the story and she offered to take a polygraph tests, although such tests are frankly worthless.

Trump predictably denied this, but it's worth remembering that he has been convicted for the sexual abuse of E. Jean Carroll.

It's also worth remembering that starting in the last decade it became common to support the women making these difficult accusations.  And there are others against Trump.  Williams doesn't seem to fit into the category of somebody we'd instantly doubt.

At what point will people take this seriously?

July 21, 2025

The president is trying to present himself as if he’s doing something here and it really is nothing,

* * * 

It’s not going to be much, because the Southern District of New York’s practice is to put as little information as possible into the grand jury. 

Sarah Krissoff, former Epstein prosecutor, regarding the release of the Epstein Grand Jury material. 

This material, which may be as little as 60 pages in length, is not the same as internal FBI or prosecutorial files, and therefore is unlikely to satisfy the demand for what the government has on Epstein.  Indeed, it's more likely an effort to simply end the controversy by doing very little.

Trump's current mental state, in my view, is heavily impacted by advancing dementia, although he's never been a good guy. What Tommy Tuberville's excuse is, however, I don't know.

Tuberville stated this past week that Trump's chronic venous insufficiency might be due to "battling radicals".

Is Tuberville actually that stupid?

At least in terms of what he says that hits the press, Tuberville says some really remarkably idiotic things.  Maybe he's just one of those guys that says dumb stuff without thinking about it, making him seem dumber than he really is.  Be that as it may, with Marjorie Taylor Green and Tuberville both in Congress right now, the GOP has a couple of figures that are just stunningly unqualified for their jobs intellectually, if what they say is what they actually think.  Tuberville, for his party, gives unintended evidence for the worst stereotypes of football coaches, particularly for somebody like me who doesn't like football.

cont:

Apparently Donald Trump is posting a random video of a girl in a bikini catching a snake on social media.

Oh, that's not weird. . . 

July 23, 2025

Mike Johnson sent the House home for an extra long vacation rather than make them face a vote on the Epstein files.

Like that's not odd . . . 

Well that must mean that nothing is embarrassing in them, right. . . right?

Oh, some of these folks will have "town halls" on their month plus long break. . . it'd be a shame if they were asked about the Epstein files.. . 

Apparently Sen. Lummis doesn't agree with the recess.

Lummis Calls For Cancellation Of August Recess

She wants them to stay in session so they can make appointments that haven't been made.  While I'm not at all happy with the illegitimate Trump Administration, she certainly has a point. Six months in and there's still hundreds of unfilled offices.  This will be a huge problem by next year, if it keeps up, for Maga's as the next Congress is going to be Democratic.

Trump's talking up his latest nutty conspiracy:

Barack Hussein Obama is the ringleader. Hillary Clinton was right there with him and so was Sleepy Joe Biden, Comey, Clapper. They tried to rig an election and they got caught. And then they did rig the election in 2020. And then because I knew I won that election by a lot, I did it a third time and I won in a landslide.

There must be some sort of statute of limitations on blaming Obama for everything.  And by this point, isn't this thin gruel for Republicans?  Literally everything is Obama's fault, according to Trump and the satellites in his orbit.

This is somebody nobody else can do. I can get the drug prices down… 1000% 600% 500% 1500%. Numbers that are not even thought to be achievable.

Donald Trump.

Those numbers aren't thought to be achievable as that would mathematically mean pharmaceutical companies would have to pay you to take drugs.

On Jerome Powell:

He has these think tanks. The build buildings for people who think. It’s really not thinking. It’s a little bit of a combination of thinking. It’s something you sort have or don’t have… He ought to raise interest rates.

Donald Trump. 

July 24, 2025

It appears that the Wall Street Journal learned a lesson from the tactic deployed by The Atlantic, and held stuff back from its first report on Trump and Epstein.  At least one insider is indicating that there's a lot more to come, which if true, would explain why Trump is currently bouncing off the walls.

Yesterday the WSJ revealed that Bondi had briefed Trump on what's in the Epstein files back in May and that his name does occur frequently.  The files also reportedly contain child pornography which is why, reportedly, Bondi determined not to release the information as she did not wish to reveal the names of the victims.

This doesn't mean that Trump is associated with child pornography, and we'd note again that so far what Epstein seems to have dabbled in was ephebophilia, not pedophilia, which doesn't mean that he wasn't, as Trump has indicated, a "creep".  But things just keep looking worse and worse for Trump.

Indeed, Jon Stewart hilariously noted this on his show, comparing the situation to the most recent Top Gun movie, which I have not seen, with fighter countermeasures being deployed.

I haven't looked, but if there aren't new variants of the bunker scene in Downfall circulating, I'd be amazed.  Those in fact would be apt as Trump is desperately pulling out everything to deflect attention from the Epstein story, even suddenly going after the Washington Commanders, demanding that they go back to being called the Redskins.  His most dangerous action, however, is now a serious attempt to go after former President Obama on some wild conspiracy theory.

That latter move is not only desperate, it's dumb.  Trump is now setting a precedent that prosecuting a former President is perfectly legitimate. . . with it being obvious that if he lives through his term, which is unlikely due to his advanced old age, he could be prosecuted as well.  That increases the incentive, we'd note, for him to try to advance an excuse that he can run for a third term in order that he can attempt to guaranty that he'll die in office.

A move to prosecute Obama, it should be noted, is a full blown step from democracy into fascism and its impossible to pretend otherwise.  I've resisted the claims that we're now in a fascist state, as we're not, but at that point, we are.  Trump appears perfectly willing to take us there.

This also ramps up the 25th Amendment pressure.  Trump is in a full on panic.  His loyal lieutenant, Wilhelm Keitel, oops, Mike Johnson, seems willing to stay in Berlin, oops, loyal to his Leader, and do whatever is necessary to hide what's in the files even up to the extent of sending the House home so it couldn't vote in releasing the files, but this drama isn't going away.

The files should be released.  Yes, that will reveal the names of young women who were defiled by the rich, but the fact of the matter is that keeping their names secret is protecting their abusers at this point. And that reemphasizes that Trump's female accusers have, for the most part, been silenced as well.

Robert Reich's look at the story:

What did he know, and when did he know it?

From Watergate to Epsteingate

So, as a final matter, what is in these files and who is being protected?  The conclusion that nobody is, is impossible.  Trump is clearly panicked, and we now know his name shows up multiple times, but in what context.

Whatever it is, it's impossible to not conclude that Trump himself is being protected due to proof of a grossly immoral act or character, or that some very wealthy and powerful people are being so protected.

Frankly, it's also impossible not to conclude that these files are going to be scrubbed.  Congress may be in recess, but the Administration isn't.  That would be a crime, but the current administration doesn't have much of a problem committing crimes.  If whatever is in these is bad enough to attempt to prosecute a former President, it's bad enough to take the lighter fluid and Zippo to.

July 25, 2025

Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche met with Ghislaine Maxwell yesterday on the renewed Epstein scandal.

Maxwell was the "girlfriend" and then assistant procurer of Jeffrey Epstein.  The relationship started off when she was in a period of financial distress, but never developed to what she seemingly likely hoped, a marriage, as Epstein was frank that he liked teenage girls for sex partners, and that wasn't going to change.

Which does, frankly, bring up the creepy "enigma's never age" line of the Trump birthday wish poem.

At this point, if Maxwell comes out and says that Trump had no interest in the high school and junior high set, it won't matter, as people will believe that the politicized Department of Justice is doing Trump's bidding.  And she's not going to say otherwise, would be my prediction.

Jerome Powel somewhat gently took Trump to school in a public meeting at which they were both present, with Trump floundering like a fish on the deck when Powell corrected him on a building under construction, and mostly complete, whose budget was approved, apparently back in 2015.

August 4, 2025

What the crud?

Okay, I know what the Sweeney jeans ad is, as I looked it up due to all the news about it.  But I was clueless on the Jaguar ad. I'm now aware of it, as I looked it up.

And then there's this weird obsession with Taylor Swift.

Trump is almost 80 years old.  I'm nearly 20 years younger than he is and I don't know what's going on in advertising most of the time.  That Trump seems to, and that he cares, is weird.

And while Sweeney is hot, Trump pointing it out is just creepy. As for her party affiliation, I'm also a registered Republican and obviously completely disrespect Trump.   I don't have any idea what Sweeney's political views are, and neither does Trump, who spent most of his life in the Democratic Party.

August 6, 2025

I've been fighting with them for a long time about allowing the water to come down from the pacific northwest. We actually opened up that water pretty strongly, we got a lot of opposition from the governor. We opened it up anyway and the water is coming down ... they've gotta allow full water.

This statement is simply amazingly stupid.

And speaking of stupid:

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) today announced the beginning of a coordinated wind-down of its mRNA vaccine development activities....

This will result in deaths.   

Related threads:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 99th edition. A second Perverts and Fellow Travelers Issue.

Labels: Crime, Ephebophilia, Epstein Scandal, Hebephilia, Hypocrisy, Ross Douthat, Sex, The Press, The rich and the poor, The wealthy, Zeitgeist

Last editions:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 97th edition. The Epstein Connections.

Labels: Donald Trump, Epstein Scandal, flap de jour, Sex, Teenagers, Women, Zeitgeist

The Madness of King Donald. The 25th Amendment Watch List, Second Edition.

Labels: 2020s, 2025, Donald Trump, Health, Joseph Biden, Mental Health, Stupidity, The Madness of King Donald, Weird

Additional Labels: American Civil Religion, Christianity, Health, homosexuality, Hugh Hefner, Immigration, Marriage, Mental Health, Predictions, Racism, religion, Sex, The relationship between men and women

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 97th edition. The Epstein Connections.

REPORTER: Why do you think your supporters in particular have been so interested in the Epstein story?

TRUMP: I don't understand it. He's dead for a long time. He was never a big factor in terms of life. I don't understand what the interest and fascination is. The credible information has been given. It's pretty boring stuff.

Uh huh.  He doesn't understand it. . . 

Oh yes he does.

Let's start with this. There may be more on the Trump/Epstein connection that I had known.  Ed Krassenstein reports on Twitter, with some comments by me, note the following:

Trump personally hosted a private party at Mar-a-Lago in 1992 attended only by himself, Jeffrey Epstein, and 28 young women, according to Trump associate George Houraney. (Which wouldn't necessarily mean that they were underaged).

Trump’s name appeared in Epstein’s black book with at least 14 phone numbers, per Vanity Fair.

He flew on Epstein’s plane at least seven times, and Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell flew on Trump’s jet in 2000—alongside a very young girl brought by Epstein. (But Trump was not on the plane at the time).

A 14-year-old girl, groomed by Maxwell, was introduced to Trump at Mar-a-Lago, per sworn testimony from an Epstein victim. (Which is super creepy, but doesn't mean that  Trump bedded her).

Another woman accused Trump of raping her at age 13 during an Epstein-hosted party, even claiming Epstein and Trump argued over “who would take her virginity.” She later dropped the suit after alleged threats. (But this might not be true, and isn't verified). 

In 2000, after Epstein was accused of propositioning another underage girl at Mar-a-Lago, Trump still told New York Magazine that Epstein was “a terrific guy.”

Trump publicly wished Ghislaine Maxwell “well” after her arrest for trafficking minors.

Epstein called Trump his “wingman” in a recording, saying they shared a taste for young women. (But that isn't Trump acknowledging the same).

Former model Stacey Williams says Trump groped her in 1993 during a meeting arranged by Epstein.

Trump and Epstein were frequently seen together in New York and Palm Beach throughout the 1990s and early 2000s.

And it doesn’t stop there—Trump surrounded himself with others deeply tied to Epstein:

Alan Dershowitz, Trump’s impeachment lawyer, was accused of sexual misconduct by Virginia Giuffre, who said Epstein forced her to have sex with him. Dershowitz also defended Epstein in court. (Dershowitz denies the rape).

Alexander Acosta, Trump’s Labor Secretary, was the prosecutor who gave Epstein his sweetheart deal in Florida—granting him and his co-conspirators immunity. Trump later rewarded him with a Cabinet post.

Steve Bannon, Trump’s former strategist, worked on efforts to rehabilitate Epstein’s public image after he was accused of trafficking minors.

Roger Stone, one of Trump’s closest advisors, defended Epstein publicly and downplayed the abuse allegations.

George Nader, connected to Trump’s 2016 campaign, was later convicted of possessing child pornography and linked to Epstein investigations. (That doesn't really mean anything in regard to Trump).

William Barr, Trump’s Attorney General, has no direct link to Epstein—but his father hired Epstein to teach at a private school despite Epstein having no degree, raising long-standing questions. (This also means nothing).

What's it all mean?  Perhaps nothing whatsoever. 

But there's a really severe smoke situation going on here, so no wonder people are looking for a fire.

Trump, with his GOP Senatorial lackies, is fighting tooth and nail to keep secret something they formally accused the Democrats of hiding.  The Democrats indeed introduced a bill to open the files, and its going down in defeat.

There's some reason for that.

Okay, now the Democrats are trying to open the files up.

The old Republican story, which I heard from a loyal Trumpy just this past week, was that the files were hidden by Biden as they showed that Bill and Hillary Clinton had improper relations with Epstein.  It all fit into the Q Anon conspiracy theories. 

Donald Trump, who wants the press to quit paying attention to this, advocated for the files to be opened, but now wants to keep them closed.

Maybe Bill (I doubt Hillary) had some dalliance on Epstein Island, although there's no proof of that whatsoever.  But Trump's connections with Epstein are really clear.  Trump's desire that people look away also speaks volumes. 

Trump (and fwiw Bill) fit into the statistical group of men that are more likely to fish in the shallow end of the pool, that being men who have had more than eight sexual "partners".  I can't recall where I read that, and I'm not going to look it up, but with each added partner over one a man's sexual drive becomes more disordered, and after that point, no doubt varying by individual, the drive really becomes totally self focused and there's a heightened incidence of screwing teenage girls.

And Trump has in fact acted in a rather direct manner in this category once before, when at age 1997 he walked into the Miss Teen USA dressing room and stated: "Don't worry, ladies, I've seen it all before."

I'm sure he'd seen it all before, that's not hardly the point.  

Indeed, Trump reported on the incident.

I'll go backstage before a show and everyone's getting dressed and ready and everything else. And you know, no men are anywhere. And I'm allowed to go in because I'm the owner of the pageant. And therefore I'm inspecting it.

* * *

Is everyone OK? You know they're standing there with no clothes. And you see these incredible looking women. And so I sort of get away with things like that.

One of the former contestants said Trump groped her.

Of course, Trump denies all of this, and the pageant has somewhat too, saying that it was exaggerated. 

But here too, odd associations creep in. When Trump became involved in pageantry, in his 30s, John Casablancas was a figure in the whole thing.  A personality in the modeling profession, Casablancas hosted events where he and others allegedly propositioned teenage models, although nobody says Trump did.  Casablancas was married three times, all to models, and at the time of his third marriage he was 50 and the bride. . . 17.  She was close, it might be noted, to the age of his children, who were 22 and 14 at the time.  And it seems relatively well established that he'd had an affair with another teenager before that, who was 16.

So here we have Trump, who is on his fourth marriage, and a marriage to a model, who has a sexual track record that's not admirable, and who hung out, since his 30s, with men who were into screwing teenagers.

So why the focus on Epstein?

Well, it raises questions about Trump.

And he's sure acting like a man who has something to hide. . . 

Maybe he doesn't.  But opening up the files at this point is the only way to show that.

Last edition:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 96th edition. The Epstein Files.

Labels: 1980s, 1988 Election, 2020s, 2025, Bill Clinton, Crime, Donald Trump, Hugh Hefner, Pamela Jo Bondi, Playboy Philosophy, Scandal, Sex, Sic transit Gloria Mundi, Standards, Teenagers, The written word, Virgin Islands, Women, Zeitgeist

Saturday, July 11, 1925. Spain and Morocco agree to cooperate.

France and Spain, each occupying different portions of Morocco, agreed to cooperate in the Rif War against their common enemy, the Riffians.

It was, of course, a Saturday.

Seventeen year old Phyllis Green of London's Peckham High School for Girls broke the world record for the women's high jump, becoming the first female competitor to jump higher than five feet.

Last edition:  

Friday, July 10, 1925. Echoes.

Labels: 1920s, 1925, Court, Evolutionary Biology, law, Tennessee, The Press, USSR, Zeitgeist

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 96th edition. The Epstein Files.

“In brief, my lord, we both descried

(For then I stood by Henry’s side)

The Palmer mount, and outwards ride,

Upon the earl’s own favourite steed:

All sheathed he was in armour bright,

And much resembled that same knight,

Subdued by you in Cotswold fight:

Lord Angus wished him speed.”

The instant that Fitz-Eustace spoke,

A sudden light on Marmion broke:

“Ah! dastard fool, to reason lost!”

He muttered; “’Twas nor fay nor ghost

I met upon the moonlight wold,

But living man of earthly mould.

O dotage blind and gross!

Had I but fought as wont, one thrust

Had laid De Wilton in the dust,

My path no more to cross.

How stand we now?—he told his tale

To Douglas; and with some avail;

’Twas therefore gloomed his ruggéd brow.

Will Surrey dare to entertain,

’Gainst Marmion, charge disproved and vain?

Small risk of that, I trow.

Yet Clare’s sharp questions must I shun;

Must separate Constance from the nun—

Oh, what a tangled web we weave,

When first we practise to deceive!

A Palmer too!—no wonder why

I felt rebuked beneath his eye:

I might have known there was but one

Whose look could quell Lord Marmion.”

Marmion, Sir Walter Scott.

The reason that late procurer Jeffrey Epstein remains in the news is that the Republicans made the "Epstein files" a big deal.

That's the only reason.

I don't believe that Trump had Epstein murdered.  I don't believe the really bizarre conspiracy theory that the Clintons did either.  Even at the time that was asserted, however, I thought that it made a lot more sense that Trump would have offed Epstein than the Clintons, but I don't believe that either happened.  

Epstein and Trump knew each other, and that association (I don't know if Trump has any actual friends at all, I somewhat doubt it) was more than casual.  Epstein claimed to know that Trump liked to screw the wives of Trump's "friends" and that he first had carnal knowledge of Melania aboard the Lolita Express.  At least based on what is out there, Epstein never claimed that Trump dabbled with the underaged.  Trump did claim that Epstein like women "on the younger side", which can mean a variety of things.  Author Michael Wolff  claimed that Epstein claimed he had photos of Trump with topless "young women" sitting on his lap, which again doesn't mean they were underaged.

There have been, however, some accusations, and that's what they are, accusations, that went beyond that.  "Katie Johnson" claimed that she was raped by Trump in association with Epstein.  Was she?  How would we know, the suits were never advanced, and the allegations are so extreme that there's plenty of reason to question them.

And other women claimed they were abused by Trump, while teenagers, on Epstein's island.

But still, all of this may just prove what we already know.  Trump can be proven to be a creep, but that doesn't mean he's a pedophile, if the women's claims are disregarded (which generally, we tend not to do with accusatrices).

Having said that, there's the smoke and fire matter.  People related rumors about the Hefner mansion for years before the full truth of its horrors were told after his death.  Hefner was a rapist, under the current definition, based on what one of his female house guests related to have witnesses in terms of compelled sex.  James Brown was violent towards women there.  Bill Cosby, who turned out to be a rapist, frequented it.

Can you really have an island dedicated to sexual trafficking and not descend into rape?  Can you really circluate underaged girls and not have them compelled into sex? 

During Biden's administration, the populist far right, which got ahead of Trump in its conspiracy theories, whipped itself into a frenzy with the belief that Democrats were a secret cabal of pedophiles, and that the Epstein Files would reveal a vast number of important Democrats who were involved .  As soon as the files were released, we were told, the lid was going to be off this horrific discovery.  Trumpite figures adopted releasing the Epstein files as one of the things they were going to do.

After the election, Pam Bondi did in fact release part of the FBI files on Epstein, which is seemingly now forgotten even by Bondi.  She claimed she had an Epstein client list on her desk that she was reviewing, with the information set to be released.

Now the list is lost, or maybe never existed.

Hmmm. . . 

Well, if a list existed, it's being hidden, and given the way the Trumpites approached this, there's real reason to wonder why.  They cried for the information, it didn't get released if there was a list, and it should be.  Is it lost?

If it is, how did that happen?

We're also told a list never existed, and it might not have.  That would have been smart for Epstein, and Epstein was no dummy.  How much of a list would he have needed?

Well, maybe some sort of list.  Knowing the high rollers being supplied with teenage girls would, I suppose, perhaps be easy enough, but you'd think you'd write this stuff down for self protection if nothing else.

All of which fuels more conspiracy theories.

Chances are there was no client list.  Epstein probably packed a list of perverts around in his head.  Probably most of the girls he supplied were young, but not underaged, probably. 

But now, we'll never really know.

What we do know is that somebody was lying.  Bondi, for example, either had a list and "lost" it, or she never had one.  Others who suggested there was all sorts of smoking gun material that would come to light, if they didn't lie, were in the neighborhood of lies.

But then, Trump has lied so often that people have become numb to it.

Gary Hart had to drop out of the 1988 Presidential election when an affair he engaged in, involving a boat called Monkey Business, came to light.

My, how our standards have fallen.

Last edition.

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 95th edition. Making us a more barbaric society.

Labels: Barbarians, Crime, Immigration, mehr Mensch sein, Modernity Is Barbarism, Sudan, The Second Trump Administration, Zeitgeist

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 93d Edition. Porn industry retstricted, Supreme Court weigh in as Wyoming requires age verification on adult sites, Dudes in the lady room, and on women's teams, Trump helping where no law or help was needed.

Porn industry, Supreme Court weigh in as Wyoming requires age verification on adult sites: As of Tuesday, Wyomingites' access to some corners of the internet was restricted by a new law requiring age verification for viewing pornography.

Funny I saw a bunch of reporting on this just the other day, none of which noted that Wyoming was a state that had such a law. . . no doubt as it didn't until yesterday.

I'm not going to shed any tears for the porn industry. 

In other sex, sort of, news, a dude who looks like a dude went to the lady's room accompanied by the press (including a dude) and hoped to get arrested.

Transgender woman protests new law with visit to a Wyoming Capitol bathroom: Rihanna Kelver used the women’s restroom at the Wyoming Capitol building Tuesday in defiance of a new law prohibiting transgender people’s use of public facilities.

On the same day, the University of Pennsylvania banned dudes in women's sports.

UPenn Bans Trans Athletes From Women's Sports Same Day Wyoming Law Goes Into Effect

Chuck Gray got help from his hero:

Trump Administration Seeks To Defend Wyoming’s New Citizenship Voter Law

Last edition:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 92nd Edition. Immigration. How did we get into this mess?

Labels: Agrarianism, Bracero Program, Cheap Food Policy, Cristero War, Distributism, Economics, Immigration, It was because of World War Two, Plutarco Elías Calles, Punitive Expedition, Yeoman's Fourth Law of History, Zeitgeist

Blog Mirror: The “Luckiest Generation” Got Started in the 1940s

 

The “Luckiest Generation” Got Started in the 1940s