Epstein Scandal Won’t Go Away. CBS: Colbert Must Go Away. Encouraging: Manhattan Statement on Higher Education. The Way We Live Now & More
The Swamp is awash in Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy theories, which, unlike the late pedophile, refuse to die.
The Left dares to hope this time they’ve got him. Not Epstein, Donald Trump. President Trump has ordered the release of “pertinent” documents in the Epstein case. Not that this is going to satisfy anyone.
The latest development in the Epstein saga is that Trump sent Epstein a “bawdy” letter on Epstein’s 50th birthday. Ms. Must is delighted to see the old-fashioned word “bawdy” in use, but the allegation, made on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, isn’t the thickest gruel she’s ever seen.
The alleged Trump letter was discovered in a letter-bound album put together by Ghislaine Maxwell, now in federal prison for her role in the scandal, to commemorate the birthday party. The report says:
The president’s past relationship with Epstein is at a sensitive moment. The Justice Department documents, the so-called Epstein files, and who or what is in them are at the center of a storm consuming the Trump administration. On Wednesday, after angry comments about how the files are a hoax created by Democrats, President Trump lashed out at his own supporters for refusing to let the matter go.
The letter bearing Trump’s name, which was reviewed by the Journal, is bawdy—like others in the album. It contains several lines of typewritten text framed by the outline of a naked woman, which appears to be hand-drawn with a heavy marker. A pair of small arcs denotes the woman’s breasts, and the future president’s signature is a squiggly “Donald” below her waist, mimicking pubic hair.
The letter concludes: “Happy Birthday — and may every day be another wonderful secret.”
The president denies that the letter is his. He vows to sue the Wall Street Journal. Townhall’s Matt Vespa calls the letter story a “total trainwreck,” adding that reactions have been “hilarious.” There have been calls for a Special Counsel to investigate the Epstein scandal. AG Pam Bondi is now accused of being “deep state” for not finding the smoking Client List (do pedophiles keep client lists?) and releasing it. An editorial in the Wall Street Journal applauds the president’s rejection of a Special Counsel:
Donald Trump, skeptical of special counsels. Who would have guessed? That’s a joke, since Mr. Trump’s first term was derailed by the Robert Mueller investigation into alleged Russian collusion in the 2016 election. Despite not finding much, Mr. Mueller’s inquiry turned into a lengthy potboiler that kept Washington and the nation on the edge of its seat for nearly two years.
That’s pretty much what would happen under any special counsel to investigate the Jeffrey Epstein investigators. Forget about any immediate disclosure of anything new.
President Trump has always had a magic way with his base. This time he is angry with the elements of MAGA that buy the notion that there’s been an Epstein. He’s never talked to his base this way before. Peggy Noonan writes that Trump’s supporters see the refusal to release the documents as a failure to drain the swamp (it’s an interesting column—and, hey, you don’t have to agree with everything Noonan says to find it interesting).
At the risk of being a party pooper, Ms. Must refers you to Douglas Murray, who asks, “How many voters really care about Jeffrey Epstein?” (But Tucker Carlson apparently does care.) The White House announced that President Trump was diagnosed with “chronic venous insufficiency.” In a break with tradition, the White House appears to have been prompt and candid about the president’s condition.
Okay, the Epstein conspiracy theories were sort of expected.
But the Colbert Conspiracy? Senators Adam Schiff and Elizabeth Warren are demanding—demanding, I say!—to know why Stephen Colbert was fired as CBS’ “Late Night host. Could it be to appease Trump, who just won a $16 million suit against CBS’ parent company? Warren wants to know. CBS released a statement saying that the decision was “a purely financial decision,” which The Atlantic quickly questioned. And here I’d thought it was because he isn’t funny. Winner: Greg Gutfeld!
“Happy Independence Day, NPR” is the headline on former NPR editor Uri Berliner’s Free Press piece. Berliner, who lost his perch at NPR by a candid but hardly inflammatory TFP critique of NPR, celebrates public broadcasting’s being on its own after the $9 billion recissions bill eliminated its taxpayer funding:
The vote is a victory for Republicans who have long had National Public Radio (NPR) in their sights. But it is also a victory for those of any political stripe who believe the government has no business funding the media.
This is not the universal take on the left. Inconsolable Brian Stelter says the loss of public funding for NPR will be “devastating to rural areas.” Presumably because farmers will no longer be able to drive around their corn fields listening to left-wing pap? By the way, there’s no law that says NPR can raise funds to make up for the loss.
Jill Biden’s “work husband,” Anthony Bernal, had pleaded the Fifth Amendment when called to testify by the House Oversight Committee, which is investigating former President Biden’s mental decline. Nevertheless, writing in the U.K. Telegraph, Fred Lukas says that the “true scandal of Joe Biden’s cognitive decline is about to be blown wide open“:
Ultimately, this isn’t just about Joe Biden, a career politician. It’s about the system that allowed him to be propped up like a figurehead, while key decisions may have been made without his understanding or approval. If the elected leader of the country wasn’t the one directing major policy or approving decisions, the American people were deceived.
What legacy media once insisted was partisan conspiracy theory has now become too serious to ignore.
Don’t miss Senator Corey Booker’s railing against a Trump judicial nominee before a dramatic walkout by Senate Dems. Meanwhile, Karl Rove asked in his Wall Street Journal politics column, “Can anything save the Democrats?”
We might also ask: Can anything save higher education?
A group of academics, intellectuals, and civic leaders has just released the Manhattan Statement on Higher Education, which the invaluable Chris Rufo sets forth at City Journal. Worthwhile reading, and you’ll recognize the names of many signatories. Speaking of higher education, veteran political sage Michael Barone argues that the Dems will not be able to count on a growing pool of the college degreed forever: it’s shrinking, and many professions have dropped the degree requirement. Do you consider this good or bad news?
I had a terribly distressing experience yesterday. I called an old and dear friend; somebody I’ve known since the eleventh grade, which is longer ago than I’d like to admit. We chat several times a year. “I don’t know you anymore,” this friend said immediately. What? Yes, “people being snatched off the streets,” and I apparently didn’t care. This was wretchedly fresh this morning when I read Charles C.W. Cooke’s “Everything That Is Going On“:
On Monday, a writer at the New York Times became so convinced that the car in front of her was full of ICE agents coming to “take someone” that she began to panic. As it turned out, the vehicle wasn’t full of ICE agents; it was “an airport limo picking up a passenger.” Still, the mere fact that she had incorrectly thought otherwise — the fact that she had been “obliged to run through such a mental triage,” as she put it — was Extremely Telling. She is tired. Like the rest of us, she is just so tired. Nobody, especially not writers for America’s august paper of record, wants to be forced into hallucinations.
