When we think of the Epstein files, we think of grown men, perhaps including Donald Trump and other leading American men, seducing underage girls – children. And that by itself is a horror. But that’s not the whole story here.
I was reminded of that recently when I re-read an article by Jessica Yellin, who co-writes the News Not Noise newsletter with Rohan Montgomery. The rest of the story has to do with the most recently released Epstein files, which show a convicted and continuing sex offender – a child rapist! — moving easily among America’s richest and most powerful men, up to and including the president of the United States, Donald Trump, well into his first term.
But it goes even deeper than that. The open acceptance of that sort of sleaze is not limited to Trump and friends. It seems to be a growing trend. Consider the case of Matt Gaetz.
Making a long story short, Gaetz (R-Fla.) resigned from Congress after it was learned he had used illegal drugs while Congress was in session, and had paid for sex, including paying a 17-year-old homeless girl trying to raise money to pay for braces. However, instead of hanging his head in shame, he’s considering running for governor of Florida.
The point isn’t that he may run for governor. The point is that there are enough politically connected solid citizens out there who are willing to openly support that sleazebag for governor to make his candidacy a real possibility. Would enough Floridians support him to make his run worthwhile? We’ll see.
The same thing could be happening with Trump. Even if the Epstein files were to be released and prove Donald Trump is a pedophile, would his base care? They don’t seem to care that he’s openly committed at least a dozen impeachable offenses, some of them many times; that he is blowing up boats and murdering people off the coast of Venezuela because he believes they are carrying drugs intended for America; that he is having his goons arrest American citizens and send them to prisons in other countries, not even their home countries, because their skin isn’t white; that he is an adjudicated rapist who is proud that he can “grab women by their pussies”; that he promised to reduce prices but instead they are soaring; that he is deserting our longtime allies in Europe and Canada in favor of kowtowing to Russia’s Vladimir Putin; that he has appointed ludicrously unqualified people to important governmental positions; that, well, etcetera seemingly ad infinitim.
So, would Trump’s followers stay with him even if the Epstein files were to prove he is a pedophile?
Many would, but I believe not enough would to make much difference. He’ll retain the true believers in his cause, those who want to replace our democracy with fascism and want Trump to be our first dictator. Others will stay with him because they believe outlets like Fox and Newsmax are telling them the whole truth, because they think Trunk is “sticking it to the man” and that’s all they care about, because they fear him, because they know this is not the person they voted for buy don’t have the guts to admit they were wrong, or because they don’t have any idea about what is going on in this world. I can’t think of any other reasons,
But add all of them together and I still don’t believe there will be enough of them to make much difference. The midterms are less than a year away, and every House member and 33 senators will be up for reelection. I would wager that very few of them will want to tell their constituents they support a proven pedophile, and now a president who is instigating everything we fought World War II to avoid. They already see what’s been going on across the nation – biggest protest rallies in history, Trump’s popularity plummeting to record-low levels in poll after poll, off-year elections in which Democrats clobbered Republicans everywhere and showed the polls are right.
So that’s the good news in all this slime that’s happening around us. Trump has crossed a line that he cannot cross back. Instead of being a king whose support every candidate craves, he is rapidly becoming an albatross around their necks
from which they desperately want to escape.
But maybe it’s too late for that. I will believe until proven wrong that there are far more people in this nation who prefer a democracy run by decent people to fascism run by scumbags like Trump and friends, and come November they will vote MAGAs into oblivion.
Dream a bit. A Democrat-led Congress could impeach and convict Trump and even perhaps some of his Cabinet members and appointees. They could restore sanity to the government, rehire important people who Trump had fired, increase the number of justices on the Supreme Court, and so much more.
As for Trump and friends, I believe they will end up in the American Government Hall of Shame junkpile. It has happened to powerful people in Washington before, such as Sen. Joseph McCarthy, President Richard Nixon, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. And here comes a slew of new names: Pam Bondi, Pete Hegseth, Kristi Noem, Kash Patal, Russell Vought and, of course, on top of the heap, Donald J. Trump, who foreseeably could be in a federal prison a year from now.
And then there are all those billionaires who supported Trump’s huge tax breaks for them. What good can you say about billionaires who stuff their pockets with money they know is coming from the poorest among us, including those who live below the poverty line, and from people whose lives were sacrificed by a cutoff of health care. Since nobody can really earn all that money, maybe their greed and heartlessness will lead the rest of us to impose a 100 percent tax on all income over $1 million a year,
At heart, I believe we are in for better days, and they’ll be coming sooner rather than later. I have no inside information; I just believe that what I see developing will continue to develop. I do not predict anything, but I do see an open path we can follow, and if we follow it we will win.
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