Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

The “burn-it-down” people are good with that until they become part of the kindling.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Jesus watching the most hateful people claiming to be his followers

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

The lights are all blinking red.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

You cannot shame the shameless.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?

The National Guard is not Batman.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it is not glory.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, door #2)

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

We will not go back.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Stupidity vs. (Worse Than) Malice

Stupidity vs. (Worse Than) Malice

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I’ve enjoyed watching Trump squirm and rage for weeks as he tries and fails to make questions about the Epstein files go away. But until this week, I figured it was more likely his motive for refusing to release the files was to avoid humiliation (for example, speculation that the Third Lady may have originally been a short-term rental) than to conceal heinous sex crimes.

As satisfying as it’s been to hear about bungling henchmen like Bondi, Patel and Bongino biting and scratching each other like coked-up trash pandas in a burlap sack, I figured it was more likely they were inept fools who got caught up in lies they told to conspiracy loons for political gain rather than incompetent accessories attempting to cover up their boss’s terrible crimes.

Now, I’m not so sure.

We’ve known for years Trump is a leering creep, an adjudicated rapist, the kind of pervert who barges into dressing rooms to ogle teen girls and brags about his gross sexist exploits. He’s been publicly creepy with random prepubescent girls and even his own daughters forever. (Of course, he’s been accused of much worse than that with minor girls.)

Perversely, all of these barrels of sewage were poured into a toxic pie pan and baked under a mottled orange crust, and 49.81% of U.S. voters elected to eat the shit confection anyway for reasons.

But this week there’s something new: the weird comments and follow-up responses about Epstein poaching teenage spa staff (by my count at least the third story Trump has told about what precipitated his falling out with Epstein). The implications are damning. We can all agree he had to have known what Epstein was doing with those girls, right?

Trump: People were taken out of the spa, hired by Epstein… I told him we don’t want you taking our people, whether it’s spa or not spa. He did it again, I said out of here.

Reporter: Was one of the stolen people Virginia Giuffre?

Trump: I think so. He stole her.

[image or embed]

— Acyn (@acyn.bsky.social) July 29, 2025 at 2:25 PM

Epstein allegedly made his fortune as a “financier,” even though he had no particular qualifications for that job. For what purpose did Trump think Epstein “stole” his “property”? Did he think Epstein hired teen girls as finance interns? Trump knew what was going on, and his only objection was that Epstein took what Trump saw as “his.”

That’s not all.

A couple of days ago, CBS News dropped a story on the Epstein jailhouse video, and it’s way more problematic than we knew. Eight minutes are missing, not one as Bondi initially told us. Experts who analyzed the video for CBS also say what the FBI released is almost certainly screen recordings stitched together rather than footage of the raw recording.

The evidence doesn’t support the conclusions Bondi and Bongino told us it proves, such as that no one but the snoozing guards could have accessed Epstein’s cell without being recorded. Everything Bondi and Bongino told us is bullshit, and sloppy, hastily slapped together bullshit at that.

Also, here’s a good question:

So anyone else find it interesting that Susan Necheles, the one person on Trump’s defense team who seems to have no role in his administration, is currently representing sex traffickers that were tight with the Trumps?

Or is that just me.

— Senate Gabe (@senategabe.bsky.social) July 30, 2025 at 6:35 AM

Here’s who Necheles is representing:

NEW YORK, Dec 11 (Reuters) – Two real estate agents known for promoting flashy properties in New York and Miami have been arrested on sex-trafficking charges, federal prosecutors said on Wednesday, accusing them of raping dozens of women.

The Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s office accused brothers Oren Alexander, 38, and Tal Alexander, 37, the co-founders of the luxury real estate brokerage known as Official, as well as their brother Alon Alexander, 37, of drugging and sexually assaulting women for more than a decade starting in 2010…

“The defendants used their wealth and positions to create and facilitate opportunities to sexually assault women,” Damian Williams, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney, told reporters. “This office is determined to investigate and prosecute anyone who engages in sex trafficking, no matter how powerful or wealthy or famous you may be.”

The accused men were Trump supporters who attended a White House event during Trump’s first term and were involved in property sales in South Florida along with Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner. That’s a hell of a coincidence, no?

Anyhoo, all these weird, rich, perverted criminals are making a believer of me. Release the goddamn files, and let justice be done though the heavens fall.

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

147Comments

  2. 2.

    Steve LaBonne

    You’d think that after Nixon’s example they would have learned that a “modified limited hangout” just makes things worse for them.

  4. 4.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    (for example, speculation that the Third Lady may have originally been a short-term rental)

    Well “Rent to Own”, which would explain the odd way the MAGA talk about her.

  5. 5.

    davek319

    All fired DOJ hotshot gumshoes, report to the Shadow Government kiosk for your revenge tour!

    Oh. That number was disconnected after November 5th, 2024.

  7. 7.

    Steve LaBonne

    @WaterGirl: Choice tidbit from one of the White House tapes.

    Nixon: “You think, you think we want to, want to go this route now? And the – let it hang out, so to speak?”
    Haldeman: “It’s a limited hang out.”
    Dean: “It’s a limited hang out.”
    Ehrlichman: “It’s a modified limited hang out.”

  8. 8.

    Fair Economist

    My interest in the Epstein files, most particularly the financial records, has been really piqued by all this. And I feel bad for forgetting how newsworthy it was that Epstein made half billion dollars as a “financial advisor” without any skills at, well, financial advising.

  9. 9.

    MattF

    Bear in mind that Trump will never (as in NEVER) admit anything. (Once in a while I wish ‘blink’ was still an HTML option.) It’s clear that the truth, whatever it is, is very bad.

  10. 10.

    lowtechcyclist

    I hadn’t seen that pic of Ivanka on Donald’s lap before.  It’s creepy AF.

  12. 12.

    Suzanne

    Epstein allegedly made his fortune as a “financier,” even though he had no particular qualifications for that job. For what purpose did Trump think Epstein “stole” his “property”? Did he think Epstein hired teen girls as finance interns? Trump knew what was going on, and his only objection was that Epstein took what Trump saw as “his.”

    I listened to a podcast about this yesterday, and I was so weirded out by this. It’s an aspect of this case I had never considered. Is he seriously pissed because he lost a low-level employee?! This comes down to something that petty?!

  13. 13.

    feebog

    Each denial or revelation by Trump keeps this story popping up like a game of whack-a=mole.  The Orange Shitgibbon can’t keep his big mouth shut.

  15. 15.

    Melancholy Jaques

    @Steve LaBonne:

    If Nixon had had FOX and today’s FTFNYT & WaPo no one would have ever known about Watergate and Bob Woodward would have had to work for a living.

  17. 17.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Fair Economist:

    And I feel bad for forgetting how newsworthy it was that Epstein made half billion dollars as a “financial advisor” without any skills at, well, financial advising.

    Yeah, that’s one thing that’s gotten my attention lately.  Is there any step in his career that makes any normal kind of sense at all?  Even his teaching position at a private school – he was a college dropout at the time.  But somehow he impressed Bill Barr’s dad enough to get that job.  Was he procuring girls for people from the get-go?

  21. 21.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Suzanne:

    Did you ever hear the comment FFOTUS made, when Tiffany was literally an infant, about how she would have big boobs?!

    Yeah, weird, but that photo? She looks barely thirteen, she’s barely dressed, and there she is on daddy’s lap.  If I was single and had a grown woman dressed like that willingly on my lap, I’d take it as warmup for more serious action later.  Someone underage would be right out.

  22. 22.

    eclare

    On Colbert’s show last night, he showed the camera view of the entrance area where Epstein was held along with a drawing of that area of the jail.  Epstein was not held in a cell that was shown in that camera view. His cell was up a flight of stairs in the back.

    I still think he killed himself, but the details and coverup make me wonder.

  25. 25.

    Betty

    @Fair Economist: There seems to be reliable reporting at NARATIV. com suggesting that Epstein’s money first came from funds embezzled by Robert Maxwell, Ghislaine’s father. Subsequently there is evidence that he was involved with Israeli and Russian intelligence to assist with blackmailing powerful people, producing more money to be laundered. Trump is known to have been rescued through Russian money. Likely to be more important to Trump than the sex stuff. Wyden has to keep digging.

  27. 27.

    lowtechcyclist

    @eclare:

    On Colbert’s show last night, he showed the camera view of the entrance area where Epstein was held along with a drawing of that area of the jail.  Epstein was not held in a cell that was shown in that camera view. His cell was up a flight of stairs in the back.

    I still think he killed himself, but the details and coverup make me wonder.

    Based on what we’ve been shown so far, there’s really no way to know.  Bondi also needs to be testifying under oath, given her assertions that the camera proves that nobody else could’ve killed him.

  28. 28.

    ruckus

    @Steve LaBonne:

    These are entitled people. They have money, they have some level of power and they abuse that power and that money.

    They buy what they want, when they want it, and because they have money they can better hide who and what they are. Never forget, we humans are animals, we have needs and desires, and some who have more than enough money will use that to buy whatever they want. WHATEVER THEY WANT. Others will just take what they want. Never forget that we are animals, living, breathing, animals. And for some, that concept of money and power that it can bring it is their right to take or buy whatever they want. Not all humans act this way but that money can hide and help them get what they want, good, bad, indifferent. Some see money as the key to humanity. Not everyone with money does this but with money makes it easier to remain looking OK, all the while not being OK. It’s not that having money does that to everyone, but it does do it to some. And of course there are people that do this without a lot of money. It’s humanity, in all it’s good and all it’s pure shit. We have that word for it – entitled.

  29. 29.

    Betty

    @eclare: The journalist, Julie Brown, has made this point repeatedly on MSNBC. She says the report on Epstein’s death noted that none of the cameras in his area were working despite the fact that he was on suicide watch. One theory is that he was encouraged and assisted in committing suicide.

  30. 30.

    Facebones

    I figured it was more likely they were inept fools who got caught up in lies they told to conspiracy loons for political gain rather than incompetent accessories attempting to cover up their boss’s terrible crimes.

    Now, I’m not so sure.

    Yeah, this is almost exactly my thought process. I had always though that Epstein killed himself and that all the lurid conspiracy theories were just people refusing to accept that a sex trafficker had run out of favors and offed himself rather than spend life in prison. And now, all the wild lies that right wing influencers kept shouting had come back to bite them. (The Epstein Files were a nothing burger, but after hyping it up for years they couldn’t convince their base of that.)

    But every day, Trump says another insane and self-incriminating thing that makes me wonder if he didn’t just strangle Epstein personally. (There is that “orange blob” on the video, after all…)

    I’m glad something is sticking to Trump, but it’s frankly bizarre that it’s this and it’s taken this long.

  34. 34.

    RevRick

    @MattF: Whatever is in Epstein’s records, Trump, by the way he’s behaving, feels it represents an existential threat. The more he denies and lashes out, the guiltier he looks.

  39. 39.

    Dave

    @eclare: I tended to lean towards killed himself with some encouragement or at least enabling but was killed in a cover up is starting to look more and more plausible.

  42. 42.

    waspuppet

    When you start thinking about Trump less as a client of Epstein’s and more as a supplier, partner and/or competitor, as the saying goes, a lot of things that don’t make sense suddenly make sense.

  43. 43.

    Chetan Murthy

    @lowtechcyclist: She looks barely thirteen, she’s barely dressed

    There’s a pic of Li’l Donnie with his kid, she’s dressed ….. well, I’ll just say, like a girl twice her age who’s workin’ for a livin’, and it’s definitely creepy-looking.  Over at LG&M somebody pointed out that the hair salon work alone had to have run >$100, back in the early noughties.  She couldn’t have been 10: I guessed 8.

  44. 44.

    ruckus

    @Suzanne:

    This comes down to something that petty?!

    It very much can.

    Not everyone with money feels entitled to whatever the hell they want. I worked in a professional sport and have met people with money. And a few with MONEY. Not everyone with MONEY feels that they can buy whatever they want. But some do, and expect that with all their money they can buy that whatever they want. And as we see  in this instance, they often get what they want. Is this better than people without MONEY taking what they want? I don’t think so. Some think it is OK, because they paid for it. What’s that song, money don’t buy everything?

  45. 45.

    Princess

    It’s worth asking also whether Epstein and Trump were fundamentally engaged in the same business — renting child sex slaves to awful men — and whether the falling out was because Epstein was encroaching into Trump’s own business model, but Epstein could offer a glamourous private island while Trump was just doing it out his spa at cheesy Maralago.

  47. 47.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Suzanne: @ruckus: I would beg to differ: This is Trump we’re talking about: he didn’t know the names of low-level employees, that’s not how he rolls.  Why did he say “yes” about Guiffre now?  B/c she’s in the news now, and that’s how bullshitters roll — he’s trying to get ahead of this story, is all.  Epstein groomed&recruited the girl back in 1999/2000.  Trump banned Epstein from his club in 2007.

    You can look at the timelines from various media, and it’s clear that it wasn’t due to any sort of “he stole my people”.

  48. 48.

    Scout211

    In case it hasn’t been posted yet, Virginia Guiffre’s family had a press conference yesterday.

    The family of a key survivor of Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse urged President Donald Trump on Wednesday not to consider clemency for the late financier’s co-conspirator and confidant, Ghislaine Maxwell.

    The family of Virginia Roberts Giuffre, a sexual abuse advocate who died by suicide in April, made their plea to Trump in a public statement after he told reporters that Epstein, a convicted sex offender, “stole” Giuffre from his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, where she worked as a locker-room attendant at age 16 during the summer of 2000.

    Giuffre’s family called Trump’s admission “shocking” and questioned whether he was aware of Epstein’s and Maxwell’s actions.

    “It was shocking to hear President Trump invoke our sister and say that he was aware that Virginia had been ‘stolen’ from Mar-a-Lago. It makes us ask if he was aware of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal actions, especially given his statement two years later that his good friend Jeffrey ‘likes women on the younger side . . . no doubt about it.’ We and the public are asking for answers; survivors deserve this,” the family added.

    . . .

    In the statement, the family also said it was “convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell who targeted and preyed upon our then 16-year-old sister, Virginia, from Mar-a-Lago, where she was working in 2000, several years before Epstein and President Trump had their falling out.”

    The Justice Department declined to comment when it was asked about the statement.

  51. 51.

    Josie

    I read an article some time ago about the three Alexander brothers. I don’t remember where I saw it, but it detailed what they had done, and they are truly disgusting people. I’m not surprised that they might be connected to Dear Leader.

  52. 52.

    Jackie

    @eclare:

    I still think he killed himself, but the details and coverup make me wonder.

     

    A couple of days ago, CBS News dropped a story on the Epstein jailhouse video, and it’s way more problematic than we knew. Eight minutes are missing, not one as Bondi initially told us.

    I believe Epstein committed suicide, but NOT VOLUNTARILY. I’ve believed this since the beginning.

  56. 56.

    ruckus

    @Parfigliano:

    Anything is possible.

    But. This is a person that was knowingly doing illegal things and getting paid seemingly very well for it. I’ve often wondered how well some with money can hide a lot that would not be anywhere near positive for them if they got caught. We might be seeing the answer to that question. They sometimes can be seen, and caught. It’s likely easier in today’s world, where hiding is/can be much more difficult.

  58. 58.

    West of the Rockies

    @Baud:

    Didn’t the hacktavist group.Anonymous put out a video weeks ago claiming they would release a cataclysmic (for those in power) bit of info that would devastate Trump?  I’m aware of no such info dump.  Is Anonymous really just a goofy distraction posing no real threat?

  59. 59.

    Captain C

    @Dave: Yeah, I would have thought it was more something like Bill Barr saying to him something like, “Your life as you knew it is over, Jeff, but at least a rich man like you can buy some level of comfort in here.  I’ll make sure they send you some extra sheets…”

    I’m not sure anymore.  I also agree that there may be some really bad financial info in those files that FFOTUS thinks will destroy him (I mean, most people seem to think he’s a pedo and rapist and it doesn’t seem to bother him or his cult; look at the time he was roasted and blocked jokes about him lying about his wealth but was fine with jokes about him lusting after Ivanka).

  62. 62.

    ruckus

    @Facebones:

    Money can buy things. Not all the things money can buy are good. I mean we all like money and more is easy to like. Too much is even easier.

  64. 64.

    Hoodie

    @Princess: Eh, I’m more inclined to think Trump knew Epstein’s particular affinities and didn’t want his association with Epstein to be close enough to cause reporters and investigators to start sniffing around his own activities.  He didn’t actually care what Epstein did as long as it didn’t bring the heat down on Trump.  The only question Trump ever asks is “can I get away with it?”
    Although I wouldn’t put it past him to test the line, he’s probably streetwise enough to avoid the pedo stuff,  as that’s the kind of thing you can’t easily bullshit your way out of.  But there is a whole universe of other debauchery he could have shared with Epstein.   It’s not like he felt any duty to prevent what Epstein was doing with young girls except where he had his own proprietary interests.

  66. 66.

    Bupalos

    Yeah, as soon as I heard the Trump-deformed phrase “whether it was spa or not-spa” I kind of rounded the corner into thinking there are likely some prosecutable crimes scattered around under the rocks and stones here. Or I guess I mean there would be, in the event that the justice system became functional.

    Still, scandal or prosecution is not the political problem for Trump. It’s that he has to deliver on the Epstein/Qannon/Elite-conspiracy stuff, and he can’t and won’t. And every additional mention of Epstein is a reminder that he can’t and won’t. It’s the functional end of his political persona.

  68. 68.

    Mike in Pasadena

    @Facebones: Have not confirmed this recently, but from discovery of the break in at DNC HQ to Nixon’s resignation took years.

  70. 70.

    hueyplong

    Considering the pure bad faith and incompetence of our suspects, I’d be interested in knowing the odds on making a bet that Epstein, who surely faced an undesirable future, was provided with the opportunity and the means to kill himself and took advantage of it, but when the guard(s) showed up to collect the body, they found that he’d not quite finished the job, i.e., was not quite dead yet, which no doubt would have led to awkward conversations followed by more awkwardness as the task was awkwardly completed.

    Any similarity to a Monty Python sequence would have been inadvertent, except for the malice and buffoonery.

  71. 71.

    catclub

    The TACO trade is still on:

    Trump agrees to pause higher tariffs on Mexico for 90 days

  72. 72.

    catclub

    @Mike in Pasadena: Have not confirmed this recently, but from discovery of the break in at DNC HQ to Nixon’s resignation took years.

     

    That would be two years.

    Epstein poached Mal-a-Rago workers in 2000, Trump finally did something in 2007. Epstein first pass frmo Acosta was in 2007-8?

    Actual case was 2017? 2019?

     

    Nixon case was lightning speed by comparison.

  73. 73.

    trollhattan

    @catclub:

    He’s back to threatening Brazil with 50% tariffs because they’re being mean to his dictator buddy, Bolsonaro. “How dare you enforce your stupid laws!”

  74. 74.

    catclub

    @Bupalos: ​
     

    I kind of rounded the corner into thinking there are likely some prosecutable crimes scattered around under the rocks and stones here.

    Trump regularly had illegal aliens on staff and stiffed them as much as possible. This is not news anymore.

  75. 75.

    FDRLincoln

    I am a civilian employee in a county jail and I have been trained to run suicide watches. I have CONDUCTED suicide watches. You don’t take your eye off the inmate, EVER.  That is drilled into us.

    You write down on a piece of paper what the inmate is doing. Even if they are sleeping. Every 15 minutes minimum, you write down what they are doing. If they talk to you, you write down what the conversation was about. If they walk around the cell, you write it down. If they are sleeping and roll over, you write it down.

    If you need to go to the bathroom or get a cup of coffee, you call for a relief. If you start getting too bored and need a break to stretch your legs, you call for a relief.

    That’s how we do it in our facility. Oh, and if a camera or something is broken, WE GET IT FIXED.

    I don’t know if Epstein was murdered. I think it likely he really did commit suicide, but was able to do so because the facility was run by incompetents with substandard training, or he was allowed/encouraged to commit suicide.

  76. 76.

    Steve in the ATL

    On the subject of money, I am sitting at a car dealership having things done to my car that only a dealership can do.  For any B-J bargain shoppers out there, there is a car in the lobby that is marked down with a sign that proudly states “you save $19,559!”, making the car practically free at only $178,031.

    I’ll always happy to be of service to my fellow jackals.

  77. 77.

    Hoodie

    Everything Bondi and Bongino told us is bullshit, and sloppy, hastily slapped together bullshit at that.

     

    Is that really new?  It’s not surprising they’d do this given that they’ve been able to get their idiot base to swallow all types of  whoppers over the last decade.  Trump (and his cronies) may have thought he could just reverse himself on the Epstein files just like the many other ridiculous reversals he’s done in the past.  The jury’s still out, of course, he may just have to keep throwing out lies until the questioning MAGAts finally suffer amnesia and wake up one day knowing the Epstein files have always been a Dem hoax.

  78. 78.

    ruckus

    @Chetan Murthy:

    He has money. Very likely not as much as he claims but he doesn’t live on the street and sleep in alleys. I worked in a professional sport and have met people with money and people with MONEY. Some are normal humans with big bank accounts. Some are nowhere near normal humans. They feel they are entitled to whatever the hell they want, because they have MONEY. Humanity is NOT one and only one concept of being. There are reasons we have the word entitled and the concept of entitlement. Valid reasons

    I’m not saying you are wrong, just saying that when dealing with people with MONEY, there can be differences between them and people with some money. And not everyone with MONEY is bad, it’s just that with MONEY it’s far easier to purchase whatever the hell one wants – good or not so good.

  80. 80.

    Steve LaBonne

    @Hoodie: Some of them will do that but I don’t think the ones who are really into QAnon can. They have built their whole identities around expecting The Storm. They aren’t going to quietly accept being told “never mind”.

  81. 81.

    rikyrah

     

    I just… need to express my continued rage against everyone whose actions in 2024 brought us to our current hellscape. 😡😡

     

    I don’t have any forgiveness.

     

    It’s just not possible. Not with the continued evil that they roll out on a daily basis.

  82. 82.

    Steve LaBonne

    @rikyrah: You’ll have a lot of co-signers on that. I’m so grateful to be retired so I don’t have to deal with Republican coworkers. I would get myself fired for sure.

  85. 85.

    JustRuss

    @FDRLincoln:That’s how we do it in our facility. Oh, and if a camera or something is broken, WE GET IT FIXED.

    My team manages a LOT of cameras on our campus.  They’re cheap, easy to replace, and pretty much never die.  Epstein may or may not have suicided, but there’s definitely a cover up, and everyone involved needs to be put on the stand and grilled, starting with Barr.  Too bad we don’t have a functioning congress.

  86. 86.

    Betty

    @hueyplong: I saw pictures of the cell after the fact. Lots of sheets lying around but nowhere to hang them from other than the bunk bed. So help may have been needed to finish the job.

  90. 90.

    trollhattan

    @Steve in the ATL: ​
    Driving a thing from Bavaria I’m acquainted with similar once-in-someone-else’s-lifetime deals. Helps keep me humble.

    When the kid was younger she loved getting inside the Really Deluxe showroom display cars. They let her and she could dream. I liked car shopping with her. (She became pretty hardcore about ones I was not allowed to get because reasons.)

  91. 91.

    Suzanne

    @Betty:

    Lots of sheets lying around but nowhere to hang them from other than the bunk bed. So help may have been needed to finish the job.

    Distressing fact (and a trigger warning): many people in jails and behavioral hospitals die by suicide by strangulation/hypoxia, not by actual hanging. There have been documented cases in which people took their sheets or their clothes around their necks, somehow attached them to something (even just wedging under a door), and rolled back and forth in the floor to tighten the ligature.

    ETA: when I do behavioral hospital design, all of this stuff is at the forefront of my thinking, and it is upsetting.

  92. 92.

    A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)

    What is a trash panda? I’m guessing  a raccoon.

  93. 93.

    ruckus

    @p.a.:

    I’ve said this here before, I worked in professional sports, on the motor vehicle side of it and while it cost money, it didn’t require anywhere near multi millionaire money. Not even close.

    But, because of doing that I’ve met monied individuals. I’ve also met MONIED individuals. Boiled down we seem to fall into very few segments of humanity. Pompous arrogance is one of those segments. And not one you should want to belong to, and which also does not require money to be in. But it seems to sometimes help.

  95. 95.

    oldgold

    This morning in the  in the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals oral arguments were heard as to Trump’s authority to set tariffs. The general consensus is that it did not go well for Trump. And, given the Constitution and relevant statutes, it clearly should not have.

  96. 96.

    Suzanne

    @Betty: Anyway, I’m sorry to get graphic about it, but it is absolutely plausible for him to have died by suicide in that cell, at least from a physical-environment perspective.

    I have never found it implausible that he may have been “encouraged” to do so, either.

  97. 97.

    Steve LaBonne

    @oldgold: It’s ultimately going to to come down to what 6 people do and they are people with well documented contempt for the law and the Constitution.

  98. 98.

    hueyplong

    @Steve LaBonne: You could argue that they’ve put themselves in a box with Trump.  As you say, they’ve demonstrated their contempt for law/precedent, so Trump simply won’t buy an argument that they had no choice but to rule against him.  He knows damn well they’ll only rule against him if they want to.

    The legal road ahead appears to be a dark one.

  99. 99.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Hoodie:

    He didn’t actually care what Epstein did as long as it didn’t bring the heat down on Trump. The only question Trump ever asks is “can I get away with it?”

    That’s always been my take.

    We can all ‘irresponsibly speculate’ about the rest because it’s easy with Hair Furor but it doesn’t necessarily mean much.

    That being said, no matter how low the bar is set for the Orange Fart Cloud, he *always* finds a way to slither under it.

  100. 100.

    JaySinWa

    Timeline says Trump is lying about his reason for kicking out Epstein.

    bsky.app/profile/alexshephard.bsky.social/post/3lv4ruh723225

    From part of the thread:

    Contemporaneous reporting from 2007 claims Epstein was blackballed from Mar-a-Lago for going after a teenage masseuse but strongly suggests—if we take Epstein’s claim that he was there recently at face value—that reporters sniffing around is what actually got him banned pagesix.com/2007/10/15/s…

    SEX CASE

    ‘VICTIMS’ LINING UP
    LAWYERS for Manhattan billionaire investor Jeffrey Epstein – who’s agreed to plead guilty to soliciting underage hookers – are bracing for a slew of lawsuits from as many as 40 yo…

  104. 104.

    mappy!

    Questions, questions…

    Why was a 16yo girl hired to work in Mar-a-Lago’s Spa?

    Epstein was poaching staff.  Was staff pointed out? Was someone helping Ghislaine?

    …and, if there were prominent Dems in the Epstein orbit, why weren’t they outed weeks ago, months ago, years ago? That kind of deflection would have sent the Gaggle off and running 24/7. Of course anything that comes out now that isn’t focused on Taco is probably going to be of suspect origin and well past the sell date…

  106. 106.

    Miss Bianca

    @Princess: OMG. Every time I ask myself, “how could this whole imbroglio possibly get sleazier”…someone manages to come up with the “sleazier” take.

  110. 110.

    Baud

    @JaySinWa:

    Timeline says Trump is lying about his reason for kicking out Epstein

     

    The fact that his lips are moving says he’s lying.

  111. 111.

    JoyceH

    @mappy!: ​
     

    That’s what I thought – how many attractive teenage interns does a spa need? I wonder if it’s a deflection on Trump’s part, because a much more abundant supply of pretty teenagers would be at Trump’s skeevy modeling agency, where they were shipped in from Eastern Europe.

    I think some enterprising reporter needs to take a long hard look at that ‘modeling’ agency. Because besides the seediness of bringing in powerless girls and then exploiting them and cramming them into overcrowded apartments and charge them the earth for their little corner of a room, Trump never talks about it. He talks about his clubs and resorts, he talks about his casinos and pageants, but never so much as a peep about the modeling agency. And that thing ran from 1999 until shortly after Trump was inaugurated.

  112. 112.

    Miss Bianca

    @JoyceH: I agree. A friend of mine has been pounding the “why the hell aren’t they looking at that modeling agency” angle for years now.

  114. 114.

    sukabi

    @lowtechcyclist: there were a few stories out when Trump first ran and he was connected to Epstein that detailed Epstein’s “skill” at “connecting underage girls with college frat boys”… he’d supply the girls and drugs for their parties…. got caught and that’s how he met and “impressed the Dean, Bill Barr’s dad, so much he was hired on to teach.”

  116. 116.

    ruckus

    @Chetan Murthy:

    Timelines are not the entire story. They almost never are.

    Some people lie like they breathe, constantly. Some have little actual clue they are lying. They just don’t want to know – they want to benefit. Most of us have met people like this, I worked in pro sports (as said here a few times…) I’ve for sure met at least 2 or 3, who expect that they get anything and everything they want. I call it pompous arrogance. Sometimes I’ve added in the F word in the middle. That’s because some weren’t as good at that lying bit. They didn’t have the skill to lie as often as they breathe.

  117. 117.

    hitchhiker

    I’ve been listening to Julie K Brown’s book again. Perversion of Justice, which is mostly about how she came to write the series for the Miami Herald that led to Epstein’s downfall. It’s obvious, looking at it now, that there are still a ton of unanswered questions about how exactly he skated for so long.

    She’s a very unlikely person to have brought him down, and it’s truly satisfying to hear her tell how it happened. I first played the audible when it was published, and at the time I was a little impatient with her diligence in giving back stories to all the players (Miami cops, herself, e.g.) but listening to it now I appreciate that she did it that way.

    It feels important to remember, in these fucked up times, that sometimes very ordinary people try their best to do right even when they know what sort of monsters they’re up against. And once in a while, they win.

  118. 118.

    Ramona

    @Betty: I too thought that Epstein had been on suicide watch when he died. I recently read that he’d been just removed from suicide watch which he’d been put on after a first attempt thwarted by his first roommate who was a disgraced cop.

    The writer Wolff in one of the many interviews I’ve seen him on YT said that Epstein’s lawyer had conveyed to Wolff what was believed to be his last communication to the outside world. Wolff had inquired of Epstein how he was doing and Epstein conveyed the message, “Okay, just hanging around.”

  119. 119.

    Ramona

    @Betty: I too thought that Epstein had been on suicide watch when he died. I recently read that he’d been just removed from suicide watch which he’d been put on after a first attempt thwarted by his first roommate who was a disgraced cop.

    The writer Wolff in one of the many interviews I’ve seen him on YT said that Epstein’s lawyer had conveyed to Wolff what was believed to be his last communication to the outside world. Wolff had inquired of Epstein how he was doing and Epstein conveyed the message, “Okay, just hanging around.”

  121. 121.

    Ramona

    @Jackie: At gunpoint? That might explain the possible lack of a perpetrator’s DNA on him assuming of course that they checked for DNA.

  122. 122.

    Ramona

    @JustRuss: Were the cameras malfunctioning or was the problem in the recording system? It’s possible that the guards could observe the image the cameras were providing but the recording system was not receiving the image. This would make it harder to realize there was a malfunction. If recording was triggered by a motion sensor, people might have assumed that the lack of recorded video was because no motion was detected.

  123. 123.

    cmorenc

    @Jackie:

    I believe Epstein committed suicide, but NOT VOLUNTARILY. I’ve believed this since the beginning.

    Epstein did have potently plausible motive for committing suicide: not just the steep fall from a luxurious multi-centimillionaire lifestyle to life in prison, but knowing that child molesters tend to get vile regards and harsh treatment from other prison inmates.   That said, I agree with your assessment that there was likely someone on the inside at the jail willing to encourage and assist Epstein to hang himself, and make sure it happened out of view of jail cameras.

  124. 124.

    Princess

    @Hoodie: If your view on this is correct, WTF was Trump doing hiring a 16 year old girl to work in his Maralago spa as a masseuse? I think you’re giving Trump too much benefit of the doubt.

  125. 125.

    Bokonon

    @rikyrah: It’s just not possible. Not with the continued evil that they roll out on a daily basis.

    Check out today’s news, about how Trump is going to build a massive gilt-encrusted ballroom onto the White House, with construction starting in September.  A perfect place to stage massive fundraising events, is it not?  In gross abuse of the Hatch Act?

    All this, after Trump also went about stealing a cool $1 billion from a Pentagon fund intended to upgrade missile silos, so that the gifted 747 from the Quatari royal family could be overhauled … and then re-gifted to Trump’s presidential library.

    That’s just this week.

  126. 126.

    columbusqueen

    @lowtechcyclist: The Wexner connection is why I have personal beef with this. That creepy SOB helped old Les take over my home town, & was hiding in the shadows during the ’94 fight to merge New Albany & Plain Township. Dad & I, along with the rest of the family, fought for it because we felt longterm residents should have a voice in future development. We lost. Sometimes I wish Epstein was still alive so I could personally rip his balls off as payback..

  127. 127.

    hitchhiker

    @columbusqueen:

    Sometimes I wish Epstein was still alive so I could personally rip his balls off as payback..

    There would be a very long line of people right there with you.

  128. 128.

    columbusqueen

    @MattF: Which is why she did what she did. Daddy’s little princess was determined to claw back the money & status she lost when he died,& didn’t care who she destroyed in the process.

  129. 129.

    The Unmitigated Gaul

    Remember when John Dean first testified against Nixon before the Watergate Committee?

    His testimony was pivotal in shifting public opinion and leading to further investigations.

    Who will be John Dean in Epstein-gate?

  130. 130.

    The Unmitigated Gaul

    @Captain C:  Tom Haden to Frankie Five-fingers in The Godfather 2:

    “Frankie… you know, in the old days of the Roman Empire, the men who betrayed their friends would go home and open their veins.”

  131. 131.

    burritoboy

    I have to come to gravitate towards what Epstein was offering people – especially the ones not interested in criminal sex – was some form of money laundering and criminal tax evasion. (Not to underplay the criminal sex part, which should always be foregrounded.) The amounts of money flowing through Epstein’s hands were far higher than would be produced solely by the criminal sex ring.  It’s completely plausible – and, I think, quite likely – that what Trump worries about is not some provable explicit personal involvement in the criminal sex.  But instead, Trump might be worried about possible deep involvement with Epstein’s money laundering and tax evasion activities.  I.E. it might be less that Trump is provably a pedophile himself, but rather that Trump was provably profiting from money laundering partially derived from sex trafficking, and that he knew that’s where the profit was coming from. (And provably profiting by very large amounts.) Which would mean that he was himself a sex trafficker, but also involved on a large scale with all kinds of additional different organized crime activities, including among other things Epstein’s sex trafficking, but possibly also including involvement with Russian organized crime, large scale drug cartels, and other activities.  And this money-laundering aspect might be quite easy (comparatively) to prove, while it would/will likely be very difficult to prove that he himself took part in pedophilic crimes personally, especially now that it is so many years after those crimes may have occurred.

  135. 135.

    dnfree

    Has anyone mentioned that Kamala has a book coming out?  This is from Daily Beast.

    Kamala Harris is preparing to launch her new book, which documents life behind the scenes during her historic presidential campaign. Titled 107 Days—in reference to its astonishingly short duration following Joe Biden’s decision to exit the race—it is set to be published by Simon & Schuster in September, and promises to be packed with “candor.” S&S CEO Jonathan Karp said Harris “addresses everything we would want her to address,” but did not offer any insight into whether this included her thoughts on Biden’s fitness for office, per AP. The former vice president, who ruled herself out of running for the 2026 California Governor race this week, announced the book via video on social media. “One hundred and seven days traveling the country, fighting for our future – the shortest presidential campaign in modern history,” she said. “Since leaving office, I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on those days, and with candor and reflection, I’ve written a behind-the-scenes account of that journey. I believe there’s value in sharing what I saw, what I learned, and what it will take to move forward.” Harris would have made history as both the first woman and the first woman of color to become president, but was ultimately defeated by Donald Trump in the 2024 election.

  137. 137.

    currawong

    Try to imagine Trump, visiting Moscow in the 1980s, having the strength of character and morality to avoid a KGB honeytrap. He’s been trapped and filmed and compromised ever since.

  139. 139.

    BellyCat

    @burritoboy: Sure. Sex crimes are difficult to prove without video. Whether there is video or not remains an open question as long as this goes on. Let the refusals to release all videos continue!

  140. 140.

    ruckus

    @Betty:

    Long ago I was a mental health counselor in a city clinic.

    Most people really didn’t need a lot of counseling, they needed a ear, someone to listen. Help them explain to themselves a solution to an issue, one that is hard to share with those they were close to.

    Some on occasion needed a hell of a lot more. We also had to attend sessions to explain our clients and what they needed and what we could and did do for them. The best thing one could do for some (not all that many) was to find and get them professional help.

  141. 141.

    ruckus

    @Suzanne:

    This comes down to something that petty?!

    Surely you jest. djt has been a petty little man (A wide bodied little man) his entire life.

  142. 142.

    Timill

    @Suzanne:

    Is he seriously pissed because he lost a low-level employee?! This comes down to something that petty?!

    As has been said, that timeline doesn’t really work. My guess would be that Epstein dumped Trump because he caught DJT screwing Ghislaine.

  143. 143.

    Kayla Rudbek

     

     

    @Steve LaBonne: counting down the years and months until I can retire over here (fortunately my particular area of law tends to run 2:1 Democratic:Republican).

    Unfortunately one of the better free blogs for intellectual property law has an extremely strong Republican bias and the field is small enough that I will probably run into most of the bloggers there at a legal conference sooner or later. I am going to have to bite the bullet and start paying for the other IP blogs and IP specific news sites so that I don’t crack my teeth to powder when I catch up on what’s happening.

  145. 145.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @oldgold: the Federal Circuit may actually make a correct legal decision for a change? Did someone drug the entire panel of judges? And if so, what were they drugged with, so we can keep on feeding it to them?

  146. 146.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @Steve LaBonne: although they rarely take any appeals from the Federal Circuit. But since this 1) doesn’t involve patents so they actually have a chance of understanding the subject matter and 2) they can show that they’re in the tank for the Felon-in-Chief, they probably will take the appeal if the Federal Circuit actually gets it correct for a change.

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