23 thoughts on “Your Schadenfreude monitoring open thread”

  1. Just for the benefit of anyone coming to this in the future, the last three entries in the Plus ça change… thread are also on this topic.
    Apologies to those here for not making it a thread initially. Unfortunately, I was on my phone and didn’t have easy access to create a new thread. (Probably ought to fix that….)

  2. The concluding paragraphs from the Guardian piece:

    Despite the importance of the Epstein files to the Maga and QAnon movements, Lewis thinks that “it’s unlikely this outrage will last”.
    “The culture war will move on to its next target … and the rage machine will follow with conspiracies and vitriol,” said Lewis. “It’s much easier to be angry at an immigrant than to wonder whether you’ve been lied to for the last eight years.”

    I hope he’s wrong, but, after reading his words, I think he’s right. How many times has tRump contradicted himself over the last 10 years?
    It’s quite a contradiction, though, to go from “This thing will implicate all the Dem pedos” to “The Dems made the whole thing up.” Does it matter in the long run to MAGA/QAnon?

  3. hairshirthedonist: I would love to be wrong, but I think not. The blood-and-bone MAGAs are not (IMO) sentient in a traditional sense: they are outrage-tropists, who respond automatically to the Outrage du Jour. Doesn’t matter if it directly contradicts yesterday’s Outrage du Jour.
    No object permanence, no problem!

  4. One thing that could make this thing a lasting problem for L’ Orange is his own reaction to the current MAGA outrage. If he would just shut up about it, it would probably blow over. But he seems to be intent on attacking his critics, even those within the MAGA-sphere. We’ll see.

  5. “But he seems to be intent on attacking his critics, even those within the MAGA-sphere.”
    Consciousness of guilt, I hear it’s called.

  6. You know how AI is starting to run into this phenomenon, where it gets fed its own output, and over time the quality of what it generates keeps degrading?
    Looks like people do that, too.

  7. “It’s much easier to be angry at an immigrant than to wonder whether you’ve been lied to for the last eight years.”
    I think this is where the Lewis goes wrong. They don’t have to struggle with the idea that they’ve been lied to. They just have to maintain their outrage at the Elites for covering this up. Doesn’t matter that Trump might have lied to them (ya think he might have?). All that matters is that they are heavily invested in the idea of a conspiracy to cover up massive Elite morality. And that now there is a chance to drag it into the open.
    In the end, they’re more wedded to their conspiracy beliefs than they are to Trump. And massively more so than to anybody else in his administration. Hence the immediate demands for Bondi’s removal. I agree with hsh that his best course would be to just shut up about it. Let the ravening hordes focus of the rest of the administration, and throw them to the dogs as necessary. But he’s probably incapable of that. His loss is the country’s gain.

  8. “It’s much easier to be angry at an immigrant than to wonder whether you’ve been lied to for the last eight years.”
    I think this is where the Lewis goes wrong. They don’t have to struggle with the idea that they’ve been lied to. They just have to maintain their outrage at the Elites for covering this up. Doesn’t matter that Trump might have lied to them (ya think he might have?). All that matters is that they are heavily invested in the idea of a conspiracy to cover up massive Elite morality. And that now there is a chance to drag it into the open.
    In the end, they’re more wedded to their conspiracy beliefs than they are to Trump. And massively more so than to anybody else in his administration. Hence the immediate demands for Bondi’s removal. I agree with hsh that his best course would be to just shut up about it. Let the ravening hordes focus of the rest of the administration, and throw them to the dogs as necessary. But he’s probably incapable of that. His loss is the country’s gain.

  9. I agree it may not move the needle enough on the MAGA people, but still, every development shows Ubu has not understood how unhelpful so much of this is to him:
    From 2 hours ago in the Guardian:
    Trump doubles down on ‘Epstein hoax’ and says Republicans pursuing it are ‘stupid people’.
    The president then was asked what evidence he might have seen to change his stance on the Epstein case, which this morning he called a “hoax”.
    Trump doubled down on his claim that it’s a “big hoax,” but did not provide evidence to support this claim. He also claimed the Epstein case was “started by the Democrats,” but again cited no evidence (though he did mention the Steele Dossier, a report on Trump’s 2016 campaign that alleged cooperation with Russia?).
    “Some stupid Republicans and foolish Republicans fall into the net and try to do the Democrats’s work,” Trump said.
    “They’re stupid people,” he continued to say about Republicans who believe there is more to be revealed about the Epstein case.

  10. At a guess, there are a fair few powerful men who enjoyed what Epstein had to offer, from both parties. Trump is one of them.
    It didn’t occur to him before that a real investigation would be bad for him, because he’s stupid and entitled.
    He’s now saying that any “credible” information should be released. “Credible” here means “not implicating Trump”.

  11. I think Trump simply believed that if he said that the evidence was not conclusive, his followers would rally around that. I think he’s genuinely surprised that there are MAGA fanatics that are not following their cues.
    The problem that he has, I think, is that there are two major MAGA factions (with some overlap – it’s a continuum). There’s the P2025 crowd that are in it for the Christian Nationalism and there’s the QAnon crowd that are deeply invested in the “elite pedophile ring” narrative. The QAnon faction, and the people in the middle of the mix that are committed to both are all going to balk at Trump’s avowals and assume that someone in the mix is a Deep State plant. My bet is that they land on Bondi for that, which would be fine for Trump so long as she doesn’t keep an insurance copy to leak if he comes after her.
    My other bet is that they are eventually going to land on the narrative that the Biden administration tampered with the evidence in some way that made it unreliable, and they will use that narrative everywhere that does not involve oaths and the risk of perjury charges.
    But it’s not going to simply go away, and it will take time and constant massaging to make the new narrative take hold.
    I know that the mainstream Dem attitude is that all this conspiracy crap is bad and should not be encouraged, but this is a real fault line that could be a wedge issue. I’d et the infighting rage, and work to poke holes in the Trump cover story that there is nothing to be seen. All that is required is to remain skeptcally agnostic and ask questions. They’ll do the rest themselves.

  12. this is a real fault line that could be a wedge issue. I’d et the infighting rage, and work to poke holes in the Trump cover story that there is nothing to be seen. All that is required is to remain skeptcally agnostic and ask questions. They’ll do the rest themselves.
    Here’s hoping. And here’s also hoping that they don’t find a way to just destroy any evidence that does exist….

  13. Here’s hoping. And here’s also hoping that they don’t find a way to just destroy any evidence that does exist….
    At this point you have to assume that there are many people who have seen the evidence – some in the Biden administration, and some, possibly Patel and Bongino, in the Trump administration.
    The evidence could go missing, but to the people who have built influencer careers out of Epstein conspiracies, that would likely just fuel the fires of speculation.
    And if I were Bondi, I’d be sure to stash the evidence somewhere that Trump couldn’t get to it, rather than destroying it. Given all that we have seen from Trump in the past, the only way to protect yourself is to have leverage. If she were to get rid of it, she would have no leverage.

  14. And if I were Bondi, I’d be sure to stash the evidence somewhere that Trump couldn’t get to it, rather than destroying it. Given all that we have seen from Trump in the past, the only way to protect yourself is to have leverage. If she were to get rid of it, she would have no leverage.
    Yeah, good point. It’s not as if all these “super loyal” toadies don’t know what kind of scummy guy they are dealing with, and will act accordingly.
    Time will (hopefully) tell, but currently my own bet would be that there is no real evidence that Trump personally took advantage of the opportunities offered by Epstein (have you all followed the recent case of Jes Staley and his exchange with Epstein? “That was fun. Say hi to Snow White for me” Epstein: “What character would you like next time?” Staley “Beauty and the Beast”), but maybe he is being pressured by another person who is in the files, and in a position to threaten him in some way. As I say, I hope we will find out some time.

  15. The evidence could go missing, but to the people who have built influencer careers out of Epstein conspiracies, that would likely just fuel the fires of speculation.
    And if I were Bondi, I’d be sure to stash the evidence somewhere that Trump couldn’t get to it, rather than destroying it.
    And she doesn’t even have to stash the evidence. A copy of the evidence would be just as good, maybe even better, for convincing the conspiracy theory enthusiasts that it’s real. “The Elites destroyed the original. But we’ve gotten a copy out and we’ll destroy them with it!”
    Of course, the minute there’s one copy out, there will be a dozen (hey, I said the first minute) variations splashing across the Internet. No doubt Trump will feature in at least some of them.

  17. The Epstein narrative is an article of faith among the Believers and a very profitable story arc that never gets old for a host of podcaster/influencers. The howls from them are because Trump just … took that story away from them and replaced it with nothing. Now he’s rummaging through his Bag of Tricks and throwing anything that comes to hand out there. It’s a hoax! Written by Democrats! Who suppressed it but now want to release it to attack me! This is no fissure or turning point. They will continue to make up stories, the cries for the Tsar to do something will fade, leaving the circus running it’s course. Why Trump has shot himself in the foot for no coherent reason will provide endless speculation with him at the center, where he likes it.

  18. I know that the mainstream Dem attitude is that all this conspiracy crap is bad and should not be encouraged
    I just don’t get the Dems sometimes. Just because there are people who turn this into a wild conspiracy story that can be used for partisan purposes doesn’t mean that there is no there there.
    It was the same with the sexual assault allegations against Clinton. A more principled attitude would be beneficial.

  19. Just because there are people who turn this into a wild conspiracy story that can be used for partisan purposes doesn’t mean that there is no there there.
    Agreed. The wild conspiracy story was that there was a vast deep-state cover-up to protect a large satanic pedophile network of elite Democrats that Epstein was at the center of. What’s not at all unlikely is that Epstein trafficked underage girls for himself with help from Maxwell, as was proved in court well enough for both of them to be convicted.
    Beyond that, the more clients you propose they had, the less likely it is to be true. And whether there was a written list of clients I would consider a toss-up. Maybe or maybe not. There’s also the question of that list, if there was one, being obtained in the investigation.
    A list isn’t the only evidence that could implicate other participants in the sexual exploitation of underage girls, so what else might there be?
    This story gets to that:
    https://abcnews.go.com/US/jeffrey-epstein-key-victims-attorney/story?id=123805543
    Excerpts:

    “Jeffrey Epstein was the pimp and the john. He was his own No. 1 client,” Edwards told ABC News. “Nearly all of the exploitation and abuse of all of the women was intended to benefit only Jeffrey Epstein and Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual desires.”
    Edwards describes the enigmatic Epstein as living, essentially, two separate lives: one in which he was sexually abusing women and girls “on a daily basis,” and another in which he associated with politicians, royalty, and titans of business, academia, and science.
    “For the most part, those two worlds did not overlap. And where they overlapped, in the instances they overlapped, it seems to be a very small percentage,” Edwards said. “There were occasions where a select few of these men engaged in sexual acts with a select few of the girls that Jeffrey Epstein was exploiting or abusing — primarily girls who were over the age of 18.”

    Concluding with:

    But for Edwards, the primary concern should be for the survivors of Epstein’s abuse — and he worries that the victims are an afterthought in the ongoing Washington power struggle.
    “I think some [victims] believe that the government protected him, and there’s this outrage because they believe that [Epstein] was always more important than they were, and that’s why this was allowed to go on for so long. So if there was evidence that his political or other connections assisted, I think that they would want to know it,” Edwards said. “But more so, they just want this to die off. And they see it’s not dying off because of the way that it’s being handled right now. In fact, somehow there’s more attention to it today than there was when he was abusing them.”
    For the well-being of the survivors, Edwards is hopeful there will soon be a resolution that will allow the victims to move on.
    “I just wish everybody would step back and remember real people were hurt here, and let’s try to do what’s in their best interest, as opposed to politicizing this whole thing and making it the right versus the left,” he said. “All of that is hurting the people who are already hurt.”

  20. Acosta, fed prosecutor that let Epstein off with a wrist slap on Federal charges, then got a Trump Sec. Labor job.
    FL state charges could have happened, except “guess who? Pam Bondi” was FL atty general.
    Epstein “suicided” during Trump’s first term, Bondi now saying “nothing to see here” with fiddled video.
    It’s as if someone had deliberately did a lot of work to make it really, Really, REALLY look like a high-level conspiracy.

  21. I’ve just watched a Daily Beast interview with Tina Brown, who commissioned and ran, when she was still with the Daily Beast, the first really detailed series (6 parts) by Conchita Sarnoff in 2010 on the Epstein case . She says, among other things, that her bet is also that Ubu himself was not into underage girls, despite his long, sleazy relationship with Epstein, but that she wonders whether one of the reasons he may want to keep any “list” secret is so that he has leverage, or kompromat, on some of the people mentioned in it. Also credible, IMO.

  22. It’s as if someone had deliberately did a lot of work to make it really, Really, REALLY look like a high-level conspiracy.
    Of course, it doesn’t take much work to make a conspiracy look like a conspiracy. And how likely is it that the incompetents involved could manage to fake one convincingly? Or even do a lot of work to try to?

  23. I’m just watching an hour long Channel 4 Dispatches documentary on the Ubu-Putin relationship. Very interesting compilation, with good sources, drawing a lot of stuff together, some of which we knew, but with more details. I don’t know if you can get this stuff in the US (or Germany etc), but I reckon if you can you might find it worthwhile:
    https://x.com/C4Dispatches/status/1945861731344880003
    In case it helps, it’s called ‘Trump: Moscow’s Man in the White House? Dispatches’

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