Doth Protest Too Much 🤮 🤡 😱 ✡️🌻😱 🤮 🤡 

The Epstein Chronicles:  Jeffrey Epstein was a despicable, serial abuser of underage girls with a lot of prominent friends who knew what he was up to and likely participated in his sordid activities.  He spent some time in a cushy Florida prison cell after receiving an inexplicably light sentence before being incarcerated in New York after the gravity of his crimes finally caught up with him.  He died under mysterious circumstances, likely by suicide but maybe not.  There’s no question that Trump was one of his friends, he used to brag about their bro-bonding saying that one of the cool things about Epstein was that like him, he enjoyed the company of “young” women.  Additionally, Alexander Acosta who served as Labor Secretary during Trump’s first term was forced to resign amid scrutiny over his handling of Epstein’s Florida case. The Trump party line has long been that he severed his connections with Epstein years before he engaged in his most horrendous activities and for the longest time despite the many photos of Trump partying with Epstein that assertion gave Trump license to claim that the FBI, Obama, the Clintons and a whole bunch of deep state Democrats were hiding Epstein’s client list and that were he reelected he’d make sure that the list saw the light of day. Somehow or other, his MAGA base, many of whom are the same Q adherents who believe that Hillary Clinton ran a pedophile ring out of a Washington DC pizza parlor, bought into Trump’s shtick even though Trump was president when Epstein was incarcerated in New York and when he died and could have released the much sought after “list” at that time.  Last week the Epstein affair surfaced again bigly, this time because Dan Bongino, the former right-wing podcaster who is, or at least was, Deputy FBI Director, got into a fight with Attorney General Pam Bondi after she said she couldn’t release the Epstein client list that she’d previously claimed was on her desk because it didn’t exist. Reports are that he also butted heads with Chief of Staff Susie Wiles.  An enraged Bongino threatened to resign if Bondi didn’t resign first adding that FBI head Kash Patel, also a former podcaster who’d spent years talking about the list, would follow him out the door.  Conspiracist Laura Loomer jumped into the fray also calling for “Blondi” to resign and a number of other prominent right wingers followed because the large Q wing of the MAGA party is convinced that there’s a list and they want to see it now.  Late Saturday, Trump weighed in with a lengthy, unhinged even by Trump standards, Truth Social post.  He stood up for Bondi, asserted there was no list, but if there was it was the invention of Obama, crooked Hillary, and former CIA director John Brennan.  To further emphasize his support for Bondi who clearly was following his orders, he included her on his Sunday FIFA World Cup traveling squad.  Kash Patel who must have been told to shut up or else now says he has no plans to leave the FBI but Don Bongino who was a no-show for work on Friday is MIA, may soon return to his more lucrative pod cast roots, unless of course he’s currently incarcerated at Alligator🐊 Alcatraz alongside a whole crowd of migrant workers who shouldn’t be there and the “tourists” taking pictures of the Alligator sign, the same types who would have taken pictures of themselves by the notorious Auschwitz Arbeit Macht Frei entrance back in the day. Whether or not Epstein committed suicide, the odds are that the guy who kept a detailed log of everyone who ever flew on his pedo-plane did have a client list or a black book of some sort and Trump’s details are there because he doth protest too much.  The pundit class insists that the Epstein list battle marks the beginning of the break-up of MAGA and the end of Trump.  Sadly, that’s probably just more delusional wishful thinking.

Not Fake News:  Bondi wasn’t the only Trump cabinet member taking heat this weekend.  DHS head Kristi Noem who together with Melania and Tom Brady also traveled with Trump to the FIFA World Cup final is mired in her own mess.  She spent part of her weekend defending FEMA’s inadequate response to the Kerr County, Texas camp Guadalupe River flood tragedy where 129 died and around 160 remain missing and of course she called out the NY Times for what she called a “fake news” story.  The story she dissed is that on July 5^th as the tragedy was unfolding, FEMA fired the staff responsible for answering calls from those affected by the disaster.  As a result, the percentage of unanswered calls jumped from 1% on July 4 to 65% on July 6.  Noem who’d recently implemented a policy requiring her signature on any expense in excess of $100,000 also sat on requests for assistance, delaying the arrival of search and rescue teams by days. For his part, Trump with Melania in tow, showed up in Texas over the weekend where he said no one could have anticipated that the flood plain would flood even though it’s called a flood plain for a reason and repeatedly floods. Moreover, FEMA had previously warned that it likely would flood again and had put some of the camp buildings on a list of endangered facilities that should be moved, a list they were curiously removed from.  Lawsuits incoming? Trump also called a reporter evil for asking whether alerts had gone out on time.  As to those alerts, County and State officials who should have known better apparently opted not to spend the money to improve the notification system because that’s the Texas way which is likely why Governor Abbott pushed back suggestions that anyone look into the flawed decision making that contributed to the tragedy.  Absent from the Trump visit was the current head of FEMA who replaced Trump’s previous head who was fired for publicly disagreeing with Trump’s plan to get rid of FEMA altogether.  Trump is now hinting that he won’t totally disband FEMA kind of like he’s now sending Patriot Missiles to Ukraine after they endured days of civilian targeted bombing by Russia. Oh, and in case you are wondering climate change isn’t a thing, at least in Trump world and Texas. And Putin isn’t a nice guy, at least this week.

Peeps: Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s wife announced that she’s divorcing him for “biblical grounds” and “recent discoveries.”  His infidelity has long been an open secret but those “recent discoveries” could be interesting especially since the communications director for the Republican National Senate committee described what Paxton has put his wife through as “truly repulsive and disgusting.”  Paxton who is all in on Christian values (ahem)  is polling way ahead of current Senator John Cornyn who he is primarying because so far MAGA has his back. Whether his wife’s divorce petition will impact his lead remains unknown, for now.  Reports are that Iowa’s Joni Ernst who is up for reelection in 2026 is thinking about throwing in the towel.  Ernst who claimed to have reservations about Pete Hegseth nevertheless voted for his confirmation to avoid being primaried by a Trump supported candidate and also because she was getting death threats. That’s the same Pete Hegseth who Thom Tillis who since he is not running for reelection now says he regrets supporting.  The Senate is due to vote on the nomination of Emil Bove for a lifetime appointment to serve as a judge on the US Appeals Court for the Third District, something that will tee him up to be a Trump nominee for SCOTUS. Bove is the Trump lawyer who according to whistle blower testimony and an email trail told staff at the DOJ that it was okay to disregard judicial rulings.  During his Senate confirmation hearing, Bove didn’t remember saying any of that and also refused to rule out Trump running for a third term or condemn the January 6 rioters. On the subject of judicial rulings, a California based federal court judge ordered the Trump administration to halt indiscriminate immigration stops and arrests in seven California counties, those are the stops that target people merely for being brown or speaking Spanish.  Noem says the decision is not a problem because DHS doesn’t profile which is at odds with what Tom Homan, her gestapo-esque guy says.  Bove hasn’t weighed in on where he stands and whether or not he’d abide by that ruling.      

And:  Tariffs are back in the news.  Forget about buying anything from Canada.  Even Myanmar got one of the threatening form letters.  They, however, were pleased because it’s the first time in a long time that they’ve received any official communication from the US since they’re on banned country list. Maybe if we weren’t busy disbanding the State Department someone in the White House would have known that. Lastly, expect more investigations into anyone associated with the Biden administration because that’s how Trump is going to divert from Epstein.       

#BringThemAllHomeNow