The Democrats have been releasing damning emails from the Epstein files, which is a good start. There’s nothing too surprising in them, though. We already knew Trump and Epstein were pals, we’ve always known that Trump was a nasty little sleazebag with a thing for underaged girls, and the right-wing side of the electorate has been able to ignore that all along, so I expect nothing to change. Also, the Republicans are playing the victim card and howling about it was all innocent banter and Trump didn’t do nothin’, anyhow.
Except that conservatives are hypocritically complaining about emails that expose the president for what he is, and simultaneously fishing through the emails that make Democrats look bad. I’m all for it! Expose all the dirtbags, no matter what side of the aisle they sit on.
For example, Larry Summers, good buddy to Bill Clinton and ex-president of Harvard, was quite chummy with Epstein.
Former Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers maintained a close personal relationship with convicted sex criminal Jeffrey E. Epstein until just months before his death in August 2019, according to emails released by Congress on Wednesday.
The cache, released by Republicans on the House Oversight Committee, details how Summers and Epstein regularly corresponded about women, politics, and Harvard-linked projects. They appear to have maintained a close correspondence as late as March 2019 — just months before Epstein’s arrest and death.
Some of the emails are casually venal, as when Summers tried to cajole huge financial gifts to specific projects at Harvard.
The correspondence reveals that Epstein had planned to donate $500,000 to Poetry in America — a television show and digital initiative spearheaded by Harvard English professor emerita Elisa F. New, who is married to Summers. In 2016, Epstein donated $110,000 to Verse Video Education, the non-profit organization which funds the initiative.
Cool. It’s quite the inbred tangle of scholars they’ve got there at Harvard.
We also get the slimy side of Summers, as he asks Epstein for dating advice.
In dozens of emails, Summers — corresponding from his personal account — also appears to have written to Epstein with ease about his personal life. At times, he confided in Epstein about his relationship with an unnamed woman, referring to the topic and his requests for advice as the “dear Abby issue.”
He recounted a conversation between himself and the woman to Epstein, telling him that at one point it had turned tense.
At one point, he told Epstein, the woman brushed him off with the phrase “I’m busy.” Summers told Epstein that he responded to the woman by telling her “awfully coy u are.” Summers then asked her, “Did u really rearrange the weekend we were going to be together because guy number 3 was coming,” he wrote to Epstein.
“I dint want to be in a gift giving competition while being the friend without benefits,” Summers recounted to Epstein, adding that “she must be very confused or maybe wants to cut me off but wants professional connection a lot and so holds to it.”
Epstein supported Summers’ response, saying that the woman was making Summers “pay for past errors” but “no whining showed strength.”
Oh, ick. He was trying to arrange a weekend together with this woman (remember, he’s married), and she clearly wanted nothing to do with it. Epstein praises him for his strength. Come on, this was a homely, middle-aged man hitting on a woman, not a profile in courage.
And then there is the sexism, a trait that we’ve known Summers to have for many years.
In an October 2017 email to Epstein, Summers appeared to joke to Epstein that women were less intelligent than men — and suggested that having “hit on” women should not damage one’s career prospects.
“I observed that half the IQ in world was possessed by women without mentioning they are more than 51 percent of population….” he wrote to Epstein, without elaborating further.
The message invoked one of the most controversial episodes of Summers’ career — his 2005 remarks at an economics conference suggesting that innate differences between men and women might help explain the underrepresentation of women in science and engineering at elite universities.
Yeah, fine, throw Summers under the bus. If you can hurl Bill Clinton under there at the same time, I’m not going to complain…I’m probably going to cheer. But please understand you can’t condemn Summers for being a sexist asshole without also condemning Trump.
There are emails between a NY Times reporter Landon Thomas and Epstein during the Hillary-emails period where Epstein offers photos of Trump with girls at Epstein’s parties and another where the reporter warns Epstein that another reporter is investigating him. The NY Times reported nothing.
Also, Epstein was at Mar a Lago for thanksgiving right after Trump was elected the first time, long after Trump claims the relationship was over.
Summers’s passing reference to wanting a professional connection a lot in regards to the woman he was “dating” is interesting. Sounds like a real good chance of sketchy power dynamics with a subordinate to me; all the more reason for a bit of bus throwing.
Exactly my stance on the Epstein files: Purge everyone implicated from polite and political society. Any Democrat caught in it doesn’t deserve to participate in society, much less politics.
The Trump White House is digging in its heels over these files. Makes me, and everyone else with a functioning brain, ask the obvious question : if there’s nothing to hide, release them all. Otherwise, you guys look guilty as hell. What did Trump do, rape a 13-year-old?
I’m all for removing skeevy men from positions of power.
Remember when Al Franken was forced to resign from the Senate when it became apparent that he had a habit of playing grab ass when taking photos with women?
This is literally sex trafficking of minors, and I’m actually fine with sex offenders getting permanently removed from society as a form of public health and safety . Predatory trash certainly doesn’t deserve to hold high office.
I am completely at peace if it happens that Clinton goes under the bus along with dumpster.
I’ve thought Larry Summers was an uber-creep for at least a few decades.
So long ago that I can’t even remember when or why I started to really dislike him.
Got that one right at least.
We keep hearing about who was not on pedo island. When do we get a list of folks who did visit.
John Watts @ #4: “What did Trump do, rape a 13-year-old?” As you may well know, Trump was on Howard Stern’s show in 1996 when Stern got Don talking about how young he would go. He tentatively drew the line at 13, although my interpretation of his manner was that Don was prepared to go younger but caught himself…almost like someone off camera was waving frantically to shut him up.
It doesn’t matter who did what and where, they all fucking knew. They don’t snitch anymore than anyone else, and besides they are to rich to give a fuck.
We already know Bill Clinton is a slimy human, doesn’t matter what comes out about him.
I read earlier today the House has to pass the bill to release the Epstein files, then the Senate must do the same thing and then President Trump must sign the bill. Doesn’t sound like there is much of a chance this will come to past.
Trump has made it so politicians can practice the lowest form of human decency and yet people still vote for them. Our politicians have turned their lives into a reality show; The Housewives of (name your town).
Trump could absolutely veto releasing the Epstein Files assuming both the House and Senate approve the measure first.
It will be illuminating to see how many House GOP members are willing to vote yes before it goes to the Senate. It takes 2/3rds of the House to override a presidential veto.
Scientific American has reported: Jeffrey Epstein E-mails Reveal Depth of Ties to High-Profile Scientists. I have read it all, but there’s a paragraph just on Laurence Krauss. There’s also some thing about correspondence with Noam Chomsky.