The shutdown began with the recesses of the house, in order to avoid seating a duly elected representative, whose vote could trigger release of the "Epstein Papers" and has only gotten worse since then. She remains unseated by Speaker Johnson. opinion.
Obviously Trump and the Republicans are pushing to suppress the Epstein files now that the narrative of a widespread and exclusively Democratic pedophile cult has broken down and the Epstein affair isn't as useful as propaganda, but the premise that literally everything Trump has done is an attempt to distract from Epstein is ludicrous. It just isn't that important.
It's obvious that even the worst case scenario wouldn't negatively affect Trump in any meaningful way. He won't lose his political or business contacts - all of those bastards were part of it too. He won't get impeached (again.) He can't take another term (legally.) His own base has already either stopped caring or else decided to toe the party line.
And how has it "taken down" a prince? Prince Andrew is still a prince. He's still rich. He still has connections. Trump would be no different. None of these people can actually be held accountable in any meaningful way within the bounds of the law.
We aren't quite there yet. Trump is still respecting Federal court decisions against him (though appealing them). If he starts blatantly ignoring those, then yes, we will be where you say.
What absolutely galls me is people like Mike Johnson claiming to be Christian and then covering up for this pedophile.
In other words, everything; his world and all around it collapse in a heap.
The conspiracy theory, so massively promoted, that Epstein's clientele consisted mostly, or entirely, of Democrats has enormously backfired. The distractions from it are now on a worldwide scale, including destruction of "The People's House".
Mike Johnson has frozen the House of Representatives and illegally refused to seat an elected representative who could tip a vote on disclosure.
Alan Dershowitz, who represented Epstein, said: [0]
> key documents in the Epstein case are being “deliberately, willfully suppressed” to protect certain individuals. He claimed to know both the names and the officials suppressing the information.
> Pressed by Spicer on whether those individuals were politicians or business leaders, Dershowitz replied, “They’re everything.”
[0] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/dershowitz-claims-he-sa...
I don't think that's how that works, but regardless, Trump's "birthday message" for Epstein along with his history of allegations has me convinced he's absolutely in the files. No one has ever been more in the files than Donald Trump.
Whataboutism doesn't work when your guy is categorically worse.
So I guess consequences are possible. I don't know if this is meaningful.
And I don't know if anything's going to happen to Trump. Andrew was a prince, who's going to punish the king?
Sorry - CEO of America. We don't have kings here.
[0]https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/oct/30/prince-andre...
A pretty good deal for being “kicked out” though. [0]
[0] https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cnveqgj957dt?post=asset%3A6300...
They should have had a purge day for all of the royals after the Queen died.
But, like I said, still quite a good deal for getting “kicked out”, especially being paid for it of the pocket of the person who felt the need to do the kicking...
pcaharrier•3mo ago
It's in the second to last paragraph, but I thought this seemed like a pretty significant and interesting concession.
barbazoo•3mo ago
throwawayqqq11•3mo ago