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Vanessa Schmithorst's avatar

I'm getting tired of the disparaging of people with subject matter expertise as "elites". Centrists as well as rightists have to do this, because people with expertise tell them their viewpoints are wrong (and they are).

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V J's avatar

all I can do is list the three I blame; the trepidation that lives in my soul.

first the white women who voted this person in the first time ( otherwise , we would not have to

deal with his twisted mind now, The U S Senate ( most, but not all ) from one particular side.

both terms, not using their power, I picture them as tiny moldy jars of jelly . and then I blame trump and his mommy for taking to her bed and not recognizing how much he needed structure ( and other things ? ) Deep in my soul, I blame and fear those Ivory Towers at the top, the court,

why doesn't logic take place and punish the truly evil/ill. More to come, from ' them ' . not all.

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Susan Simon's avatar

I have a nagging feeling that he’s suddenly too sanguine today about releasing the files; he simply got the go-ahead from Blondi that his name had been thoroughly expunged and it’s fine now to expose everyone else.

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Martin A's avatar

Excellent piece. As far as Trump

retreating on the Epstein files it's

obviously a calculated move.

He can get ahead of it and create

an appearance that he's in the clear,

and with the expectation some will

take the bait.

He's doing so with confidence the

DOJ will protect him, and it will.

He also knows it will go on the

attack for him. He used to have

Roy, but now has a different group

and the full power of corrupt government

attorneys.

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Djb's avatar

Bondi won’t allow them to be released because of the ongoing investigation Trump called for and will be the fall guy again. I’m sick of her Stepford wifery! What exactly does he have over her?

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MAH's avatar

I wonder if they'll simply remove anything in the files that references Trump or other Republicans...what's to stop them from doing that? Can they do that?

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joel bernard's avatar

"....it was important to stress to their supporters the limits of what they could do."

The very model of the modern major Democratic Party.

Do these self-absorbed, highly paid "strategists" not understand why loyal Democrats have increasingly looked to Bernies, AOCs, and Mamdanis for leadership?

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BlueOntario's avatar

"And this is to say nothing of the fact that various documents and records might have conveniently gone missing in the course of Bondi and Patel’s exhaustive review."

Ya think?

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Tom Burst's avatar

“the house oversight committee can have whatever they are legally entitled to.” Translation: Trump will release nothing until ordered to do so by SCOTUS, which will probably not take up the case. Those files will not come out until Trump is out of office—probably not even then.

Too many guilty rich and powerful people don’t want them released. I can’t believe what I just wrote! I am agreeing with the conspiracy nuts.

But, we can’t let off on the pressure. The files may be what gets Trump dumped.

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Fern Drootin's avatar

Excellent analysis. Thank you.

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Jane's avatar

Far from being distracted, we've learned that Americans are capable of wanting Medicare and accountability for child sex traffickers at the same time. Amazing.

While I am thankful for Ro Khanna's work on this, I do feel that every article about Epstein, his confederates and his clients should include a "thank you" to Julie K. Brown. Without her, this story would have ended with the 2008 sweetheart deal.

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Susan Kemmerling's avatar

Would you leave your daughter alone with anyone who is helping Trump. He is letting Steven Miller's ICE goons arrest anyone and then let these people suffer in conditions not fit for a cockroach. I have no respect for anyone who is seeing what I am seeing with more insight due to security clearance or standing next to him and not calling for him to be arrested for crimes against the American people. I will never forget that these people aided him in these crimes. I am just a vote. I will use it. I will keep protesting. No one should be able to be so guilty and get away with it.

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Laura T's avatar

I need a better definition of elite. Much like the word woke. I feel like it’s been stolen by the political class and turned into an insult, but I also feel like it mainly refers to the level of one’s education. I have a JD, my husband has a PhD. For a long time we made academia type money and then he left academia for the private sector and now we make better money. I cannot think of a situation in this world where I would ever end up knowing any of the people who knew Jeffrey Epstein. But at the same time when I read about Your average Trump voters’ problem with Democrats it’s because we apparently come off like hyper educated elites who know nothing of the world‘s real problems and who are not struggling to make ends meet, but it doesn’t mean that we have lots of extra money in the way that these people do. I know this: in a post Trump world hopefully anyways I cannot countenance going back to being anti-education. Anti-expertise. The idea of that makes me want to vomit. So maybe it would be nice to have an actual podcast or something where you guys discuss just what it means to be elite. I grew up upper middle class with parents with middle class attitudes because they in turn had grown up lower middle class. I was middle class as a young adult, now I am again upper middle class. I came from a family that valued education and I still value education. There’s a difference between that kind of elite and billionaires. I don’t think I’ve ever even met a billionaire. Let alone been anywhere close to that stratosphere. But if you have education and you’re not living paycheck to paycheck as a Democrat these days, it feels like if you open your mouth, you will risk being accused of being an elite. So please clarify what it means to be running on an anti-elite platform. Editing to clarify for anybody making assumptions. We are not a dual income household. I practiced law for one year before I couldn’t stand it anymore and then my epilepsy got worse so right now if I didn’t have my husband, I’d be in big trouble regarding health insurance And possibly living under a bridge for how much all of my treatments have cost.

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Weiwen's avatar

In general, liberals and progressives will eventually welcome centrists, if and only if they are willing to fight. And I mean the other side, not start intra-caucus fights. We'd complain about the centrists, but winning will prove sweeter than ideological purity. You just gotta find me these centrists. Fetterman and Sinema were wastes of space. Manchin was not, but only because we absolutely couldn't otherwise have got a WV Senate seat.

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CE's avatar

The burn bags have been working overtime. We’ll see nothing of interest. However….someone, somewhere, someone a little lower on the food chain that Patel and Bondi, will know if anything is destroyed. And they’ll go public. Wait for it…..that will be the scandal.

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E.K. Hornbeck's avatar

Hope so, I can't believe they will ever release something truly damning.

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Jim Stewart's avatar

Great insight, thanks!

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