Our newsroom, every time we publish, stands briefly poised between two fortnights, one just past, and one to come. Two weeks ago, the calendar caused that transition to occur on Halloween, the day—or night—when the mundane rubs up against the mystical. Some subtle synergy between those cycles apparently induced a state of irrational editorial exuberance.
For a brief, joyous moment, certain members of the staff were convinced that the nation was about to break out of its moral, political, and economic crash dive, and begin to level off; the Republic would soon be spared, before it augers in.
A real-world event sparked this extravagant hope: on Halloween, our President held a 1920s-style, Great Gatsby-themed extravaganza, complete with scantily-clad dancers, at his lair, Mar-a-Lardo, even as tens of millions of Americans—many of them full-time workers; some of them active-duty military personnel—were staring hunger in the face because the Life of the Party, El Presidente himself, was refusing to tap emergency funding for SNAP benefits.
With this sort of depravity going on in public, and given his well-known disregard for the law, could anyone rule out the possibility that Trump was behind the Louvre heist? Is it really so far-fetched to think he would covet the French Crown Jewels for display in the White House’s new Marie Antoinette Ballroom?
Under these circumstances, we could only conclude that the nation had finally reached rock bottom. How could the state of affairs descend any further, or become more sordid? Ergo, the long-awaited General Strike must be close at hand! Accordingly, to improve the paper’s long-term fiscal stability, certain assets were discreetly invested in the manufacturing sector, namely, pitchforks and torches.
Needless to say, in the days since, the atmosphere in the newsroom has undergone something of a re-set. But, the fortnight was far from a total disappointment, and the old motto still prevails: Nil Desperandum!
Though they did not mass at the castle drawbridge to hurl imprecations at the ruling class, voters around the country did show up at the polls, and decisively repudiated the status quo wherever they could. Democrats won up and down the ballot, in counties across the country—and in the middle of the country. The status quo got a solid kick in the pants—including within the Democratic Party.
Unfortunately, just a week later, eight Democratic senators reverted to the mean and caved on the government shutdown. Shockingly, fully 25 percent of them represent New Hampshire. How mortifying.
Even here, though, there’s a glint of gold glimmering amid the swale of sewage that is our national gummint. Congress going back into session means swearing in Rep. Adelita Grijalva [D-Ariz.].
If elected Republicans are as eager as they claim to expose those who commit sex crimes against children—which seems rather reckless, given the political alignment of the majority of known perps*—her signature will be the deciding 218th on a petition to release the long-sought Epstein Files. So, that investment in farm implements and antique lighting apparatus may pay off after all—with a bipartisan customer base, to boot!
That looming flood seems already to have sprung a damning trickle. On Wednesday, the House Oversight Committee made public three emails it obtained from the Epstein estate.
In one of them, to Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein calls Trump “the dog that didn’t bark. [VICTIM] spent hours at my house with him.” Doing what, one can’t help but wonder. Giving advice on a modeling career?
In another, Epstein writes to writer Michael Wolff, “of course he knew about the girls as he asked ghislaine [sic] to stop.”
Finally, Wolff advised Jeffrey Epstein, in 2015, that CNN was going to interview Trump about his relationship with the convicted sex trafficker. Epstein asked Wolff for advice. Wolff answered, “I think you should let him hang himself.”
These emails represent only about 0.013 percent of the 23,000 documents the committee is reviewing. Even so, they were enough to cause the ketchup to hit the wall.
On Wednesday afternoon CNN reported that FBI Director Kash Patel, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and Deputy AG Todd Blanche, aka “The Ghislaine Whisperer,” met in the Situation Room with two Republican Members of Congress, Lauren Boebert and Nancy Mace—both of whom just happen to have signed the petition to release the Epstein Files.
We’d have died before watching “The Apprentice,” but we’d stand in line to see this deal being made.
* New York Post, Tuesday, November 11: “A Long Island drug dealer sprung from prison by President Trump has now been convicted of sexually abusing his kids’ nanny and threatening a congregant at his synagogue. Jonathan Braun, 41, landed a 27-month sentence in Brooklyn federal court Monday for violating the terms of his 2021 presidential pardon with fresh crimes.”