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Episode Two Hundred Seventy Four: 2025, The Year In Review · The Death Of Journalism

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to episode two hundred and seventy four The Death
0:03
Speaker 1: of Journalism Podcast.
0:04
Speaker 2: My name is John zig Larami, your host.
0:06
Speaker 1: On this our last show of the year, we update
0:08
Speaker 1: you on several major stories from last week, including everyone's
0:13
Speaker 1: desperate search for an Epstein narrative.
0:15
Speaker 2: That won't make them look like an idiot.
0:17
Speaker 1: A citizen journalist in Minnesota takes the conservative media by storm,
0:23
Speaker 1: a new level of insanity in the world of college sports,
0:27
Speaker 1: and I'll review this year that was twenty twenty five.
0:34
Speaker 1: Once again, we are releasing The Death of Journalism Podcast
0:37
Speaker 1: a day early because of the New Year's holiday, thanks
0:41
Speaker 1: to our executive producer, Mike Agavino. I hope you had
0:44
Speaker 1: a great Christmas. We had a good one in the
0:46
Speaker 1: Zigler household. It was a significant Christmas for obvious reasons
0:51
Speaker 1: when your oldest daughter, Grace is thirteen and your younger daughter,
0:56
Speaker 1: Diana is eight. And as you probably could tell from
0:59
Speaker 1: our interview with Diana in the last episode of the podcast,
1:03
Speaker 1: her Christmas slash Santa belief level was at best thirty percent.
1:08
Speaker 1: I think she was in the hedging her bets era
1:12
Speaker 1: of Christmas. She believed a little bit. I'm not going
1:15
Speaker 1: to pretend that she was positive that the whole Santa
1:18
Speaker 1: thing is a scam. But she clearly had great skepticism
1:23
Speaker 1: about the whole situation. But she was smart enough and
1:27
Speaker 1: transactional enough. Diana's very transactional grace is very, very emotional.
1:33
Speaker 1: Diana's transactional I think she realized it was in her
1:36
Speaker 1: best interest if she had any doubts to kind of
1:40
Speaker 1: keep them under wraps as much as possible. She said
1:44
Speaker 1: on this podcast that she was really hoping for a labooboo.
1:49
Speaker 1: A labooboo, which is I don't even understand the fascination
1:52
Speaker 1: with these things, but they're the one of the hottest
1:54
Speaker 1: Christmas gifts. Even my wife Alison wanted the laboobo, and
1:58
Speaker 1: shockingly enough, Santa did in fact come through with a
2:03
Speaker 1: labouobu for Diana that raised her belief level from about
2:07
Speaker 1: thirty percent to maybe thirty five, maybe forty percent. But
2:10
Speaker 1: I'm pretty confident that by eleven months from now that
2:15
Speaker 1: belief level will be at or near zero. It's possible
2:20
Speaker 1: we may get one more year where she's completely pretending,
2:24
Speaker 1: mainly because she understands the value of pretending.
2:29
Speaker 2: At My wife wants the.
2:31
Speaker 1: Pretending to continue and Grace once they pretended to continue.
2:35
Speaker 1: In fact, Grace is still angry at me, which I
2:38
Speaker 1: am absolutely flummoxed by that. When she asked me a
2:41
Speaker 1: couple of years ago about Santa Claus, I very very gently,
2:46
Speaker 1: I mean very very gently, and strategically let her down
2:50
Speaker 1: easy on that whole situation.
2:52
Speaker 2: This is a huge divide between.
2:56
Speaker 1: Me and my daughter Grace, because I actually think I
2:59
Speaker 1: handled the situation as well as anybody possibly could have,
3:02
Speaker 1: and she's still upset with me.
3:04
Speaker 2: And you know, the.
3:05
Speaker 1: Main difference between Grace and Diana on the whole Christmas
3:09
Speaker 1: Santa issue is that Grace loved Santa and still loves
3:15
Speaker 1: Christmas more than anybody I've ever had direct contact with.
3:20
Speaker 1: I mean, we have photographs of Grace when she was four,
3:24
Speaker 1: five six, and my goodness, the way she looked at Santa,
3:28
Speaker 1: it was it was literally magical.
3:31
Speaker 2: She was obsessed with Santa.
3:33
Speaker 1: So bringing her down it's the hold, the old adage.
3:36
Speaker 1: You know, the bigger they are, the harder they fall.
3:40
Speaker 1: The larger the rise, the bigger the crash, right, And
3:43
Speaker 1: so because Grace was so into Christmas and so into Santa,
3:48
Speaker 1: it was much more difficult to try to let her
3:50
Speaker 1: down easy. Diana has never been nearly as obsessed with
3:54
Speaker 1: Christmas and Santa's. She's much more cynical, she's much more
3:58
Speaker 1: level headed. As A said, she's much more transactional, and
4:02
Speaker 1: her friends are still in the belief realm. So I
4:06
Speaker 1: think that's partially why she didn't go to zero percent
4:10
Speaker 1: as of yet. But I'm a realist and my wife
4:13
Speaker 1: hates me for this because I'm always mentioning, you know,
4:17
Speaker 1: this is probably the last time this will happen. This
4:19
Speaker 1: is probably the last time this will happen. Sometimes I'm wrong,
4:23
Speaker 1: often I'm not wrong. But we've experienced essentially a twelve
4:27
Speaker 1: year run of the Santa Era of Christmas in the
4:32
Speaker 1: Ziggler household, and that twelve year run is probably over.
4:36
Speaker 1: It's been a heck of a run, a lot of
4:39
Speaker 1: great memories, some hardships, a lot of emotions. December twenty
4:44
Speaker 1: sixth is a horrendous day. Interestingly, December twenty sixth was
4:49
Speaker 1: terrible this year, but not as bad as it's been
4:51
Speaker 1: in the past, and I think.
4:52
Speaker 2: That's partially proof that we're.
4:56
Speaker 1: Heading out of the Santa era, because again, you know,
4:59
Speaker 1: the rise wasn't as high and therefore the fall and
5:02
Speaker 1: December twenty sixth wasn't as hard, and so it's my
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Speaker 1: guess that this is the end of that twelve year run.
5:09
Speaker 1: And when you think about it, you know, with the
5:11
Speaker 1: whole Christmas season at least in our household, being at
5:14
Speaker 1: least a month long, I mean, it's a good solid
5:18
Speaker 1: month of Christmas related activity from Thanksgiving to Christmas.
5:22
Speaker 2: And you have a twelve year run that's.
5:24
Speaker 1: A full year of your life that's dominated by Santa
5:27
Speaker 1: Claus that is now probably at its end, and Christmas
5:33
Speaker 1: will never be the same again, you know, went next year,
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Speaker 1: Grace will be fourteen, Diana will be a very cynical nine,
5:40
Speaker 1: and we're very.
5:41
Speaker 2: Close to the era where, you know.
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Speaker 1: Christmas becomes completely without its magic. I've used the analogy before.
5:49
Speaker 1: I think it's a very good one. That's pretty much.
5:52
Speaker 2: Where we are with college football now.
5:54
Speaker 1: You know, college football, the Santa era of college football ended,
5:59
Speaker 1: and I believe in college football. And we'll talk more
6:02
Speaker 1: about college football later in this episode. With the Bulls
6:05
Speaker 1: season and the playoffs coming up this weekend with the
6:11
Speaker 1: New Year's holiday, you know, to me, we've killed Santa
6:16
Speaker 1: in college football now. I think that there is a
6:20
Speaker 1: grace period, and I don't know how long that grace
6:22
Speaker 1: period is going to be. Where a lot of the
6:25
Speaker 1: fans either don't realize that Santa has been killed or
6:30
Speaker 1: are pretending that Santa hasn't been killed. They're in the
6:33
Speaker 1: pretend era, and that pretend era can last a year
6:37
Speaker 1: or two when it comes to Santa Claus. How long
6:39
Speaker 1: it's going to last when it comes to college football,
6:42
Speaker 1: I don't know. It might be longer because people are adults.
6:47
Speaker 1: Even though they're adults, they're more invested in the whole
6:51
Speaker 1: Santa Claus era of college football, and the uniforms are
6:54
Speaker 1: still the same, are mostly still the same, even though
6:57
Speaker 1: they don't wear shoulder pads or a lot of them
6:59
Speaker 1: were in shorts.
7:00
Speaker 2: Now it's factual football pants. But I digress.
7:03
Speaker 1: The point is I do think that there's an interesting
7:06
Speaker 1: analogy to be made, and I'm not the only one
7:09
Speaker 1: that has made it, and for me, you know, when
7:12
Speaker 1: you look at it as completely transactional. Now in college
7:15
Speaker 1: football and college sports in general, there's no magic, there's
7:19
Speaker 1: no romance there. College football was built on magic and romance.
7:23
Speaker 1: We're now in the post magic and romance era. And
7:26
Speaker 1: that's where we are in the Zigler family when it
7:29
Speaker 1: comes to Christmas, and it's never going to be the same,
7:32
Speaker 1: and you know, maybe it'll be easier in some ways,
7:35
Speaker 1: but it probably also won't be as much fun. And
7:38
Speaker 1: so we went out on a good note. We got
7:41
Speaker 1: lucky with some really horrible weather here in southern California,
7:45
Speaker 1: but none of our festivities were dramatically impacted by that,
7:49
Speaker 1: And so overall, if this was the last Christmas of
7:53
Speaker 1: its kind, it was a good one, and I hope
7:55
Speaker 1: you had a good one as well.
7:57
Speaker 2: Now it's not a.
7:59
Speaker 1: Natural transitional, though maybe it is to go from your
8:04
Speaker 1: kid's last real Christmas to an update on the Nick
8:08
Speaker 1: Reiner story where Nick Reiner killed his parents. But that's
8:12
Speaker 1: what I'm gonna do, because I have been taking a
8:15
Speaker 1: somewhat controversial position on the Nick Reiner murder of his
8:19
Speaker 1: two parents, his father Reiner and his mother Michelle, in
8:25
Speaker 1: that I have been blaming, understandably with very limited evidence,
8:29
Speaker 1: but I think enough to at least raise the question.
8:33
Speaker 1: I have been raising the issue of Rob Reiner's very
8:36
Speaker 1: very liberal parental policy regarding his son Nick, who apparently
8:42
Speaker 1: went back to rehab about seventeen times, and maybe I
8:48
Speaker 1: did so too soon, but I posted about this on
8:50
Speaker 1: social media.
8:51
Speaker 2: I took some heat for that.
8:52
Speaker 1: I don't care. That's fine. You know, I'm a big boy.
8:57
Speaker 1: I have asbestos skin. But I've been continuing on this
9:02
Speaker 1: theme because I think it's important.
9:04
Speaker 2: I think we should at least learn.
9:06
Speaker 1: Something from this epic tragedy, this horrendous thing that happened.
9:11
Speaker 1: Even if Rob Reiner and his wife weren't rich and famous,
9:14
Speaker 1: it would be a horrible, horrible story. But to lose
9:16
Speaker 1: an American icon like Rob Reiner because their son decides
9:21
Speaker 1: to murder them in their own home for no apparent reason,
9:26
Speaker 1: where he once again is having a drug relapse, is
9:29
Speaker 1: just horrendous. And what can we at least learn from that?
9:33
Speaker 1: And the evidence to me is growing almost to the
9:36
Speaker 1: point of being overwhelming that this liberal parental philosophy did
9:42
Speaker 1: play a role.
9:42
Speaker 2: Now, I'm not going to blame.
9:43
Speaker 1: It without all the facts one hundred percent on Rob
9:48
Speaker 1: Reiner and his liberal parental policy or strategy, but at
9:53
Speaker 1: least it has to be considered a factor. And when
9:57
Speaker 1: I say the evidence is becoming overwhelming, I want to
9:59
Speaker 1: play an clip from Nick Reiner on a podcast called
10:04
Speaker 1: the I believe it's the Dopey Podcast or something like that.
10:08
Speaker 1: I'm not one hundred percent sure when this happened, but
10:11
Speaker 1: putting all the pieces together, I think it was within
10:14
Speaker 1: the last few years.
10:15
Speaker 2: I don't think this was all that old.
10:18
Speaker 1: He made several podcast appearances where he talked about his
10:22
Speaker 1: drug addiction, and he did so in a very flippant fashion.
10:26
Speaker 1: We played a clip that was consistent with that last
10:29
Speaker 1: week on this podcast, The Death of Journalism, and I
10:33
Speaker 1: want to play another one right now because this one,
10:36
Speaker 1: to me much more directly goes to this issue of
10:41
Speaker 1: the parental philosophy of Rob Reiner. And if you listen carefully,
10:45
Speaker 1: the host and Nick Reiner at one point towards the
10:49
Speaker 1: end of this clip, you can almost hear now. Obviously,
10:52
Speaker 1: the foreshadowing here is incredibly eerie and depressing, but you know,
10:58
Speaker 1: and obviously hindsight is twenty twenty. But when you listen
11:02
Speaker 1: to this knowing what you now know that the voice that.
11:06
Speaker 2: You're about to hear killed his parents in their.
11:10
Speaker 1: Own home with a knife, it becomes really chilling on
11:15
Speaker 1: one end, but also I think very telling, because you
11:19
Speaker 1: can almost hear the host and Nick Reiner contemplating the
11:24
Speaker 1: issue of how you treat someone with addiction and whether
11:29
Speaker 1: or not you're punitive. They actually use the word punitive,
11:32
Speaker 1: And we've played a clip previously on this podcast of
11:35
Speaker 1: Rob Reiner saying you can't punish people who have problems. Well,
11:40
Speaker 1: how did that turn out in this particular case. Now,
11:44
Speaker 1: do we know that that's prominently or you know, even
11:48
Speaker 1: partially the reason for this. We don't know that for sure,
11:51
Speaker 1: but it's more than a legitimate question, especially when the
11:54
Speaker 1: evidence keeps building up. And I believe this is another
11:57
Speaker 1: key piece of evidence in that argument that at the
12:01
Speaker 1: very least we ought to be considering the role of
12:05
Speaker 1: the liberal parental philosophy of Rob Reiner and how it
12:08
Speaker 1: ended up in this horrendous tragedy. And here was Nick
12:11
Speaker 1: Reiner on that podcast sometime within the last few years.
12:15
Speaker 3: So basically I was like, if I'm alone, any number
12:18
Speaker 3: of terrible things can happen. It's best for someone to
12:21
Speaker 3: know about this. And my parents had already been through
12:23
Speaker 3: a long process of in and out of rehabs with me,
12:26
Speaker 3: so you know, like they'd see me do coke and heroin.
12:30
Speaker 3: So I didn't feel like saying I was on acid
12:32
Speaker 3: be too big of a deal. So I walked into
12:35
Speaker 3: my parents' room. The lights were off, they were asleep,
12:37
Speaker 3: and I said, guys, I have something to.
12:41
Speaker 2: Tell you, and they're like, WHOA, what is it?
12:43
Speaker 3: And I was like, I took acid tonight. My mom
12:47
Speaker 3: was like, oh, I can't deal with this.
12:50
Speaker 2: I'm going to bed, and.
12:51
Speaker 3: She like ran downstairs and went and slept on the couch.
12:54
Speaker 3: And then I'm with my dad in the lying in bed,
12:56
Speaker 3: tripping my off thinking about the eve on House.
13:00
Speaker 2: Of Horrors, and He's like, calm.
13:02
Speaker 1: Down, buddy, it's okay you I used to do this
13:06
Speaker 1: in the sixties.
13:08
Speaker 2: You'll calm down eventually.
13:09
Speaker 3: It won't be forever. And I was just trying to, like,
13:12
Speaker 3: and he just talked me down for like eight hours straight.
13:17
Speaker 3: And they never grilled before it. They never, you know,
13:21
Speaker 3: and it just so I was like if I were
13:23
Speaker 3: parents and my kid came and volunteered information like that,
13:27
Speaker 3: that that's like a really good way they handled it.
13:29
Speaker 2: Instead of being punitive, you know what I mean, they
13:31
Speaker 2: just were like helpful.
13:33
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
13:36
Speaker 2: So he just you sat in the you and you
13:38
Speaker 2: were laying in bed, were in the same room as
13:40
Speaker 2: your dead or.
13:40
Speaker 3: Yeah, we were lying side by side on a bed.
13:42
Speaker 2: Oh my, you're coming off at the ceiling. Well, I
13:44
Speaker 2: told me about the sixties. Oh my god, that's wild, dude.
13:48
Speaker 1: Now, to me, that's almost as clear as it can get.
13:52
Speaker 1: And I realize again it's twenty twenty hindsight. But and
13:57
Speaker 1: I'm not even I want to make clear, I'm not
13:59
Speaker 1: blaming for his own murder. I'm just saying that, Hey, look,
14:05
Speaker 1: this tragedy has occurred.
14:07
Speaker 2: Maybe we could learn something from.
14:09
Speaker 1: This, Maybe we could at least be able to discern
14:13
Speaker 1: perhaps this wasn't the right way of handling the situation.
14:17
Speaker 1: And this is not all that unique a set of circumstances. Yes,
14:21
Speaker 1: we're dealing with very rich and very famous people, but
14:25
Speaker 1: you know, this kind of thing has happened before, not
14:28
Speaker 1: maybe not to this level of drama, but it's certainly
14:33
Speaker 1: not an unusual situation to have somebody, especially a son
14:37
Speaker 1: of a rich, famous person, have all sorts of problems
14:40
Speaker 1: with addiction. And you know, when you have a spoiled kid,
14:44
Speaker 1: and obviously Nick Reiner was an extremely spoiled kid, and
14:48
Speaker 1: they don't get punished, and then they get a movie
14:50
Speaker 1: made with their dad depicting their life as an addict,
14:55
Speaker 1: and you get all sorts of praise and hosannas for that.
14:58
Speaker 1: You know, in retrospect, it's not all that difficult to
15:01
Speaker 1: understand how something this horrendous could potentially happen. And I
15:06
Speaker 1: said last week that I'm willing to make the prediction
15:10
Speaker 1: that Nick Reiner is going to be a free man
15:15
Speaker 1: sometime well before he's an old man. And I don't
15:19
Speaker 1: know exactly how long. It could be twenty years, it
15:21
Speaker 1: could be thirty years. But given where we are in California,
15:25
Speaker 1: where we're going in California, and our view of addiction
15:29
Speaker 1: and the way the media, some media outlets are just
15:33
Speaker 1: basically pretending that this didn't even happen, that just somehow
15:37
Speaker 1: Rob Reiner and his wife Michelle has died of natural
15:40
Speaker 1: causes or something. There's been almost no outrage. I've explained
15:45
Speaker 1: why I think that is the case. There's a lot
15:48
Speaker 1: of reasons for that, but I just want to point
15:50
Speaker 1: out that one outlet, in particular, TMZ and Harvey Levin
15:56
Speaker 1: have been going out of their way.
15:58
Speaker 2: Let's be clear.
15:59
Speaker 1: You know, obviously this is right in TMZ's wheelhouse. They
16:03
Speaker 1: cover Hollywood News, that's how they began, that's how they
16:06
Speaker 1: became famous. Harvey Levin and TMZ, in my estimation, had
16:12
Speaker 1: been going out of their way to almost defend Nick Reiner.
16:16
Speaker 1: Now they'll never say they're defending Nick Reiner, but they're
16:20
Speaker 1: giving all sorts of credibility to this idea that this
16:23
Speaker 1: happened because of the addiction and what kind of drugs
16:26
Speaker 1: he was on. And there's very little outrage towards Nick
16:31
Speaker 1: Reiner himself for having committed this horrendous murder. And this
16:35
Speaker 1: the entire theme, the entire perception that's being created, is
16:42
Speaker 1: that he's not totally responsible for what he did. Now,
16:45
Speaker 1: I don't know what Harvey Levin's game is. Harvey's a
16:48
Speaker 1: smart guy, He's extremely mockyvellian. Is he looking for the
16:54
Speaker 1: Nick Reiner interview or is it possible that he's friends
16:59
Speaker 1: with Nick attorney?
17:01
Speaker 2: I don't know.
17:02
Speaker 1: All things are possible, but I just wanted to point
17:05
Speaker 1: out that I'm particularly disturbed by the way that TMZ
17:08
Speaker 1: seems to be almost campaigning for Nick Reiner's defense, which
17:12
Speaker 1: only has me further convinced that Nick Reiner is not
17:15
Speaker 1: going to spend the rest of his life in prison.
17:16
Speaker 1: For this, as pathetic and as telling as that is.
17:20
Speaker 1: Now another update of a story that we talked about
17:22
Speaker 1: extensively on the last episode of the podcast has taken
17:26
Speaker 1: a hilarious turn, and that is the whole Candace Owens
17:31
Speaker 1: Charlie Kirk Real Housewives of Maga County situation where this
17:37
Speaker 1: has just really exposed the Megamedia as the shit show
17:40
Speaker 1: that it really is a bunch of fraudulent grifters who
17:44
Speaker 1: are not concerned with the truth, that are only really
17:47
Speaker 1: concerned with their own power, how much money they're making,
17:51
Speaker 1: and that's really.
17:52
Speaker 2: All it is.
17:54
Speaker 1: Is not an exercise in trying to find and disseminate
17:57
Speaker 1: the truth about anything. And Candae Owens is the worst
18:00
Speaker 1: of the worst. She's been lying constantly about this idea
18:05
Speaker 1: that somehow there was a vast conspiracy to kill Charlie Kirk.
18:09
Speaker 1: It makes no sense, there is no real theory to it.
18:12
Speaker 1: Everything she has said has been either totally proven false
18:17
Speaker 1: or has not come close to being proven true. And
18:20
Speaker 1: she's been attacked rightfully by Ben Shapiro. Unfortunately, she's been
18:24
Speaker 1: supported either directly or indirectly by Megan Kelly and Tucker
18:29
Speaker 1: Carlson and Steve Bannon, and even and.
18:34
Speaker 2: Jason Whitlock, which is just pathetic.
18:37
Speaker 1: And even jd Vance, in my opinion, kind of sort
18:41
Speaker 1: of whether indirectly or by happenstance or whether it was
18:47
Speaker 1: intended or not, has essentially called for a cease fire
18:51
Speaker 1: on Candae Owans and has embraced Tucker Carlson. So I
18:55
Speaker 1: would even put jd Vance somewhat in this category, which
18:58
Speaker 1: is incredibly Disturbing'll be the most significant element of this
19:02
Speaker 1: whole equation given the fact that he's the presumptive Republican
19:05
Speaker 1: presidential nominee in twenty twenty eight, and slowly but surely,
19:09
Speaker 1: I've been seeing people turn against Candice Owens online. I
19:14
Speaker 1: think Megan Kelly has probably lost some of her audience.
19:18
Speaker 1: A lot of people have had their eyes opened about
19:20
Speaker 1: Megan Kelly. That's been gratifying to me, because, like Tucker Carlson,
19:24
Speaker 1: I have been trying to tell you, and I shouldn't
19:27
Speaker 1: say I like Tucker Carlson, but I've told you about
19:30
Speaker 1: Tucker Carlson being a fraud many years ago. A lot
19:33
Speaker 1: of people didn't believe me, and I think I've been
19:36
Speaker 1: further proven correct by this whole situation. There but also
19:41
Speaker 1: with Megan Kelly. I think I've been vindicated on Megan Kelly.
19:44
Speaker 1: I told you for years that she is a shape shifter,
19:47
Speaker 1: that she's a fraud, that she's all about herself, she's
19:50
Speaker 1: not about the truth. I don't know what her perceived
19:53
Speaker 1: self interest here is.
19:55
Speaker 2: I really don't.
19:56
Speaker 1: I've come up with a few theories, but none of
19:59
Speaker 1: the really makes a lot of sense to me. The
20:01
Speaker 1: closest theory, at least to me, that makes sense, is
20:05
Speaker 1: that Megan wants to like Candace, is probably either afraid
20:10
Speaker 1: of Candace or wants to glob onto her audience, or
20:13
Speaker 1: is afraid that part of her audience is Candace's audience.
20:16
Speaker 1: And then she makes that mistake with the interview with
20:19
Speaker 1: Ben Shapiro where she is apparently ignorant of what Candace
20:23
Speaker 1: Owens is doing, and then she calls Ben Shapiro a liar,
20:28
Speaker 1: And now she's invested in that not being incorrect when
20:32
Speaker 1: it comes to the implications of what Candace Owens has
20:35
Speaker 1: been saying regarding Erica Kirk and turning point usay and
20:39
Speaker 1: the assassination of Charlie Kirk.
20:42
Speaker 2: Now we've all talked, we talked all about all.
20:45
Speaker 1: That before and in a lot of ways, I think
20:48
Speaker 1: this has really vindicated my view of the right wing
20:50
Speaker 1: media in so many different ways. And I've been vindicated
20:53
Speaker 1: in my attacks on Candace because she keeps changing her
20:56
Speaker 1: story and coming up with more and more nonsense. She
20:59
Speaker 1: keeps digging the hole deeper and deeper, and she's just
21:02
Speaker 1: totally and completely wrong on this. And it's not close.
21:06
Speaker 1: But here's where things get absolutely hilarious. That we go
21:10
Speaker 1: from the absurd the sublime to the ridiculous, and that
21:15
Speaker 1: is that the latest quote unquote maggot commentator to attack
21:20
Speaker 1: Candae Owens is none other than Alex Jones. That's right,
21:26
Speaker 1: ladies and gentlemen, we have reached the highest level of
21:31
Speaker 1: absurdity that one could possibly attape. And that is that
21:36
Speaker 1: Alex Jones, the guy who was found liable for over
21:41
Speaker 1: a billion dollars, over a billion dollars for lying about
21:48
Speaker 1: the Sandy Hook case and claiming that somehow all those
21:52
Speaker 1: innocent children that were murdered in cold blood in their
21:55
Speaker 1: school were not really murdered, and he was found owned libel.
22:02
Speaker 2: He's he has a.
22:04
Speaker 1: Settlement against him or judgment against him for over a
22:07
Speaker 1: billion dollars. Actually several different judgments that that total up
22:11
Speaker 1: over a billion dollars. He's a complete fraud, a phony,
22:18
Speaker 1: he's under oath, said.
22:20
Speaker 2: That he is an actor.
22:23
Speaker 1: Okay, he's a nut, he's a liar, He's a conspiracy
22:30
Speaker 1: crack plot of the highest order. And yet Alex Jones
22:35
Speaker 1: apparently maybe he's either on or off his medications. I
22:39
Speaker 1: don't know, but he has suddenly decided that it's he's
22:43
Speaker 1: gonna take it upon himself to substance, substantively attack the
22:49
Speaker 1: conspiracy insanity of candas Owans, and he has posted multiple
22:55
Speaker 1: videos and multiple.
22:58
Speaker 2: Attacks against Canada.
23:00
Speaker 1: They've gotten into it on X, debating each other hilariously
23:06
Speaker 1: and somewhat depressingly. It appears as if Alex Jones has
23:09
Speaker 1: actually lost some audience. Who knows how much, but it
23:12
Speaker 1: appears as if some of his core audiences is now
23:15
Speaker 1: calling Alex Jones a sellout because he's not on board
23:20
Speaker 1: with the Candas Owns, Charlie Kirk conspiracy. I mean, these
23:23
Speaker 1: people have lost their fucking minds. And I don't know
23:27
Speaker 1: what's driving Alex Jones. I really don't. I've stopped trying
23:31
Speaker 1: to figure him out a long time ago. But I
23:35
Speaker 1: mean talk about a blind squirrel finding the a cord
23:39
Speaker 1: or a broken clock being you know, right twice a
23:42
Speaker 1: day when Alex Jones comes out against your conspiracy theory
23:48
Speaker 1: or whatever you want to call it, because I don't
23:50
Speaker 1: even think it qualifies as a theory what candae Owars
23:52
Speaker 1: is doing. But when Alex Jones is openly attacking you
23:56
Speaker 1: as a conspiracy theorist, you might want to re evaluate
24:00
Speaker 1: your life. Cantas owns, because there's never been a conspiracy
24:05
Speaker 1: theory that Alex Jones didn't like. I posted on Twitter
24:09
Speaker 1: that this was so absurd that it was a bit
24:13
Speaker 1: like if OJ Simpson came back from the grave to
24:17
Speaker 1: attack Nick Reiner for having the gall to slaughter two
24:22
Speaker 1: people in Brentwood with a knife.
24:24
Speaker 2: I mean, that's the best analogy I can come up with.
24:27
Speaker 1: Because in this analogy, obviously Alex Jones is Oj, since
24:31
Speaker 1: he's done this previously on multiple occasions, attacking Candis Owans
24:36
Speaker 1: for doing the same basic kind of crime that he did.
24:40
Speaker 2: Obviously she's the Nick Reiner here. I mean, he just
24:44
Speaker 2: can't make this up.
24:46
Speaker 1: You cannot possibly make this up that somehow Alex Jones
24:50
Speaker 1: would be the person that would stand up he's not
24:54
Speaker 1: the hero that we deserve, but he's the hero that
24:58
Speaker 1: we're getting paraphrase, the dark Knight Alex Jones coming to
25:02
Speaker 1: the rescue to take out Candas Owan's I mean.
25:05
Speaker 2: It's just to me.
25:06
Speaker 1: There is no first of all, no funnier, but also
25:11
Speaker 1: no more obvious proof of how fundamentally and totally broken
25:16
Speaker 1: the right wing or the MAGA media industrial complex is
25:21
Speaker 1: than the fact that Candice Owens has somehow gotten loads
25:24
Speaker 1: and loads of attention, made tons of money. I'm sure
25:29
Speaker 1: she's added followers in some circles, probably added credibility for
25:35
Speaker 1: making up a story about a massive conspiracy involving Charlie
25:40
Speaker 1: Kirk's assassination or revolving around Charlie Kirk's assassination that involved
25:45
Speaker 1: turning Point USA and implied that Erica Kirk was at
25:49
Speaker 1: least in on it with regard to the cover up,
25:52
Speaker 1: and somehow that didn't destroy her career at least not yet.
25:56
Speaker 1: And who comes to attack her not Mega Callen, No, no,
26:01
Speaker 1: not Magan Kelly is supposed to be the voice of reason,
26:04
Speaker 1: not Tucker Carlson who used to be the voice of
26:06
Speaker 1: reason when he was on Fox News Channel. Oh no, no,
26:10
Speaker 1: not not even JD. Vance, the Vice President United States,
26:13
Speaker 1: the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, the person most prominent with
26:17
Speaker 1: the MAGA movement, although he's now thinking about abandoning the
26:22
Speaker 1: MAGA movement, he said he's no, nine hundred cent surey
26:24
Speaker 1: He's going to continue to support Trump, which is also
26:27
Speaker 1: rather bizarre and hilarious. But the person who stands up
26:31
Speaker 1: strongest against Cannis Owens for in this world is Alex Jones.
26:37
Speaker 1: Alex Jones, seriously, and yet Cannis Owens is not stopping folks.
26:44
Speaker 1: And boy was I right when I said that the
26:48
Speaker 1: whole meeting between Erger Kirk and Candis Owens, which Megan
26:51
Speaker 1: Kelly has taken credit for behind the scenes, was a
26:56
Speaker 1: total setup job, and that Erga Kirk was probably at
27:01
Speaker 1: best naive to even take the meeting because there was
27:05
Speaker 1: no good scenario to come out of that. And Cannas
27:09
Speaker 1: Owens is a snake, and she played Erica Kirk totally
27:12
Speaker 1: played her. And now here she's armed with even more
27:17
Speaker 1: attention and credibility, at least in the minds of the
27:19
Speaker 1: conspiracy nuts because after aw, you know, she met with
27:23
Speaker 1: Erkar Kirk for four and a half hours and who
27:26
Speaker 1: knows what she learned there, and obviously they're taking her seriously.
27:30
Speaker 1: Would they be taking her this seriously if she was
27:33
Speaker 1: just a crackpot, well they shouldn't be, but they did.
27:38
Speaker 1: And so many of these arguments that Candas tries to
27:41
Speaker 1: use to try to explain why everyone's attacking her are
27:45
Speaker 1: just so ridiculous. You know, the whole idea that my
27:50
Speaker 1: enemies and the nature of their attacks proved that I'm right,
27:53
Speaker 1: I'm over the target. This is why conspiracy theorists never
27:58
Speaker 1: have to admit that they're wrong, because they could always say,
28:02
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, the level of at tax is so
28:05
Speaker 1: strong and coming from sources that I don't like, so
28:08
Speaker 1: therefore it must be proof of a further conspiracy to
28:13
Speaker 1: silence the person who's telling the truth. It's just total bullshit,
28:20
Speaker 1: And I am still hopeful. I know I'm known as
28:23
Speaker 1: a pessimist, but I actually always claim that I'm sometimes
28:27
Speaker 1: overly optimistic. I actually think that it is could theoretically
28:32
Speaker 1: combine with the whole you know, the wife of French
28:36
Speaker 1: president Macaron is actually a man and maybe his father.
28:40
Speaker 1: Situation where she's facing a lawsuit, I would like to
28:44
Speaker 1: believe that this is all setting up for the end
28:47
Speaker 1: of Candace Owans at some point. It's not gonna happen
28:50
Speaker 1: today or tomorrow, but maybe sometime, hopefully in twenty twenty six,
28:55
Speaker 1: we are eventually rid of the Candace Owens problem.
28:58
Speaker 2: But part of me.
29:00
Speaker 1: Also says, she's too big of a celebrity now. These
29:03
Speaker 1: people will never want to admit that they're wrong. There's
29:06
Speaker 1: just too many people that are enticed by these conspiracy theories.
29:11
Speaker 1: And it's you know, I've never really mentioned it because
29:14
Speaker 1: I think it's so obvious that it's not even worthy
29:16
Speaker 1: of being talked about. But I should at least acknowledge
29:21
Speaker 1: just how utterly absurd and somewhat telling it is that
29:26
Speaker 1: conspiracies became so large in twenty twenty five that Candice
29:31
Speaker 1: Owens could actually get away with this, Because this is
29:35
Speaker 1: a dynamic that, again, to me, this is obvious, but
29:38
Speaker 1: maybe it's not to the average person.
29:40
Speaker 2: We have never lived.
29:42
Speaker 1: In a world where conspiracy theories could be so popular
29:49
Speaker 1: and so lucrative, when at the same time, conspiracy theories
29:56
Speaker 1: because of social media, are almost impossible it's able to
30:00
Speaker 1: pull off. That's the dichotomy there that's so amazing. We
30:06
Speaker 1: should be living in an era where nobody believes in
30:09
Speaker 1: massive conspiracies anymore, because it's never been easier to rat
30:16
Speaker 1: out the conspiracy. We don't live in a world where
30:21
Speaker 1: there's only, you know, a handful of media outlets that
30:24
Speaker 1: can completely control the narrative.
30:27
Speaker 2: So if somebody was really part of.
30:29
Speaker 1: A massive conspiracy, they could easily go rogue. It's impossible
30:34
Speaker 1: to keep a massive secret anymore because of social media.
30:38
Speaker 1: Yet somehow, at the very same time when conspiracy theories
30:43
Speaker 1: should be dead, for you know, in large scale conspiracies
30:48
Speaker 1: should be dead or the very least be looked at
30:51
Speaker 1: with extreme skepticism because the world has changed in such
30:56
Speaker 1: a way that make conspiracies almost impossible to pull off,
31:00
Speaker 1: at the very same time, they've never been more lucrative,
31:04
Speaker 1: They've never been more popular, and in some ways that's
31:09
Speaker 1: like the ultimate proof of just how completely fucked we are,
31:13
Speaker 1: how totally broken everything is, how everything is completely upside down.
31:19
Speaker 1: To use another analogy, it's a bit like they've kind
31:23
Speaker 1: of died down recently. But in the last few years
31:27
Speaker 1: there was this spate of television shows searching for Bigfoot,
31:32
Speaker 1: and I became kind of an expert of this because
31:34
Speaker 1: my daughter Grace, although she never talks about it anymore,
31:37
Speaker 1: though she still says that she's a believer in Bigfoot.
31:41
Speaker 1: My daughter Grace, a little bit like her obsession with Santa,
31:44
Speaker 1: was really into Bigfoot, and she and I used to
31:47
Speaker 1: watch Bigfoot videos online all the time. She used to
31:52
Speaker 1: come into my room and say, hey, Dad, can we
31:54
Speaker 1: look for Bigfoot videos? And of course I would go
31:58
Speaker 1: along with her, and I would always a little bit
32:01
Speaker 1: like Santa. I would never say either direction, you know
32:05
Speaker 1: that I thought that it was total bullshit, But I
32:07
Speaker 1: would try to get her to ask questions about what
32:11
Speaker 1: she was seeing and you know, and oftentimes we would
32:14
Speaker 1: debunk some of these videos together. But there was a
32:16
Speaker 1: lot of professional television shows that were devoted and still
32:21
Speaker 1: are devoted to finding Bigfoot, and a lot of the
32:24
Speaker 1: are extremely popular. Now, how this would happen at the
32:28
Speaker 1: exact same time when everybody got a cell phone and
32:32
Speaker 1: the Bigfoot myth should be put to bed forever, because
32:37
Speaker 1: how is it that everybody now has a camera with
32:40
Speaker 1: them at all times and we don't have any evidence
32:42
Speaker 1: of Bigfoot. It's a very similar dynamic to how strange
32:48
Speaker 1: and upside down it is that you would think that
32:50
Speaker 1: this would end bigfoot, the bigfoot industry forever. Well, you
32:54
Speaker 1: would think that social media and X alone would end
33:00
Speaker 1: in the conspiracy industry forever. But it's been exactly the opposite,
33:04
Speaker 1: one hundred percent of the opposite. And Candice Owens is
33:07
Speaker 1: the perfect infuriating.
33:10
Speaker 2: Proof for that.
33:11
Speaker 1: But she's not the only proof, because the Epstein's story
33:15
Speaker 1: is clearly in this realm, I mean the Epstein scandal,
33:20
Speaker 1: which is real. He was a criminal, which is why
33:24
Speaker 1: he killed himself in a federal prison. The conspiracy element
33:30
Speaker 1: of this story has gotten so far out of any
33:34
Speaker 1: resemblance of reality that it has gotten to the point
33:39
Speaker 1: where it's too big to fail. People are believing a myth.
33:44
Speaker 1: Major media outlets are promoting this myth, invested in this
33:50
Speaker 1: myth that somehow there was this massive sex trafficking operation
33:55
Speaker 1: where incredibly powerful and rich people were being blackmailed, and
34:02
Speaker 1: that this is how Epstein got all of his money,
34:05
Speaker 1: and that all these powerful people are being protected and
34:09
Speaker 1: maybe that's why he died in prison, maybe he was
34:11
Speaker 1: murdered in prison, which I said a thousand times makes
34:15
Speaker 1: no goddamn sense at all. And so now we have
34:19
Speaker 1: the most recent release of the so called Epstein files,
34:23
Speaker 1: much of which was redacted. So because it's redacted, no
34:26
Speaker 1: one has to acknowledge any sort of defeat or ever
34:29
Speaker 1: admit that they were wrong, because obviously the good stuff,
34:33
Speaker 1: the stuff that would have proven that they were right,
34:36
Speaker 1: is the part that was redacted. And I am one
34:39
Speaker 1: of those that is in the camp that there's obviously
34:42
Speaker 1: way way too much redacted. I'm not going to try
34:45
Speaker 1: to claim that that's not true. However, I have theorized
34:49
Speaker 1: that a lot of the redactions are for the opposite
34:53
Speaker 1: reasons that those that are promoting the grand Conspiracy theory
34:59
Speaker 1: want to be reality. They want those reactions to be
35:03
Speaker 1: protecting the rich, powerful people. And I am suggesting that
35:08
Speaker 1: there's another alternative scenario that makes way more sense, and
35:13
Speaker 1: that is, by and large, those reactions are to protect
35:17
Speaker 1: the so called accusers or survivors of Epstein. And look,
35:25
Speaker 1: I can't prove it. I may never be able to
35:27
Speaker 1: prove it, because I'm not sure we're going to ever
35:29
Speaker 1: see all this material in a an unvarnished and transparent
35:36
Speaker 1: way to the level where anyone can be confident that
35:40
Speaker 1: we've gotten to the full truth. But everything that we've
35:44
Speaker 1: seen so far is one thousand percent consistent with my
35:49
Speaker 1: theory on this entire case from day one, everything including
35:56
Speaker 1: what we've learned about some of these accusers and some
36:00
Speaker 1: of these stories, the garbage, as I put it, that
36:05
Speaker 1: we're inevitably gonna be part of the grand jury materials
36:09
Speaker 1: or all the other documents that were related to this case.
36:14
Speaker 1: I mean, it's unbelievable the level of bullshit in a
36:19
Speaker 1: lot of this stuff. I mean, we had a letter
36:23
Speaker 1: that Epstein allegedly sent to Larry Nasser, the US gymnastics
36:30
Speaker 1: pedophile doctor, that the Left went crazy over, that was
36:35
Speaker 1: in these Epstein files major news organizations because it happened
36:40
Speaker 1: to implicate Donald Trump in an alleged rape.
36:45
Speaker 2: And the letter's a complete fake. It's a total fraud.
36:51
Speaker 2: It was obviously a fraud.
36:53
Speaker 1: It was sent I think three days at Epstein killed
36:57
Speaker 1: himself in prison.
37:00
Speaker 2: It's not his handwriting. It didn't happen.
37:04
Speaker 1: It's one of several totally bogus fake stories that made
37:10
Speaker 1: its way into the file. Why because the file has
37:17
Speaker 1: to include every bit of information that the authorities got
37:22
Speaker 1: on this case, which by the way, should go to
37:24
Speaker 1: their credibility. I mean, if they were trying to protect Trump,
37:28
Speaker 1: this thing would have been destroyed a long time ago,
37:31
Speaker 1: if that's really was their only priority. But the fact
37:35
Speaker 1: that it wasn't a rational world should increase their credibility,
37:40
Speaker 1: at least visavie Donald Trump. But there were other crazy
37:46
Speaker 1: stories in there, because guess what, I know this is
37:49
Speaker 1: hard for people to understand. When did this occur? Well,
37:53
Speaker 1: this happened in twenty nineteen. That's when Epstein killed himself
37:59
Speaker 1: in prison. The story exploded at that point, exploded with
38:06
Speaker 1: all sorts of conspiracy theories because if he was murdered,
38:09
Speaker 1: and I've said this a hundred times, if he was murdered,
38:13
Speaker 1: which he was not, then you can at least get
38:17
Speaker 1: out of the batter's box on this massive sex trafficking
38:22
Speaker 1: or whatever you want to call it conspiracy to protect
38:25
Speaker 1: rich and famous and powerful people, because in order to
38:29
Speaker 1: pull off a murder in a federal prison that's pretty extraordinary.
38:32
Speaker 1: There has to be a huge motivation and there has
38:34
Speaker 1: to be a remarkable ability to make that happen with
38:38
Speaker 1: no one getting caught. Now, again, that's not what happened,
38:41
Speaker 1: but if you believe that's what happened. I get it,
38:45
Speaker 1: But guess what once this story explodes in twenty nineteen,
38:49
Speaker 1: what's happening in twenty twenty, and is already known to
38:53
Speaker 1: be happening in twenty nineteen, Trump's running for reelection. So
38:59
Speaker 1: every fuck can crackpot, especially every liberal crackpot out there,
39:04
Speaker 1: is concocting stories connecting Epstein and Trump.
39:09
Speaker 2: This happens in every high profile case that ever.
39:12
Speaker 1: Is one of the worst things that authorities ever do
39:16
Speaker 1: in a super high profile case is open up a
39:20
Speaker 1: tip line.
39:21
Speaker 2: I've seen this dozens of times on.
39:24
Speaker 1: Datelines in twenty twenties and forty eight hours in a
39:27
Speaker 1: massively high profile case. As soon as they open a
39:30
Speaker 1: tip line, they get bombarded with bullshit because there's a
39:35
Speaker 1: lot of crazy people out there that want to be
39:37
Speaker 1: involved in a high profile case. They want their fifteen
39:40
Speaker 1: seconds of fame where they have an agenda. I mean,
39:43
Speaker 1: so oftentimes they'll be looking for some male suspect and
39:49
Speaker 1: really pissed off xys will be claiming that their ex
39:52
Speaker 1: husbands fit the description. Gee, I wonder why that happened.
39:57
Speaker 1: I mean, so inevitably, your gut to get crazy shit,
40:02
Speaker 1: and that is in large part what the Epstein files
40:05
Speaker 1: is made of, which is I'm sure why there was
40:08
Speaker 1: resistance in revealing all this and releasing all this, and
40:12
Speaker 1: I think Trump understood this more than anybody now.
40:16
Speaker 2: Did Trump not want to be embarrassed by some of
40:18
Speaker 2: this stuff.
40:18
Speaker 1: I'm sure, and he had a very long relationship with Epstein.
40:23
Speaker 2: It apparently ended.
40:24
Speaker 1: I've always been a little confused under exactly the circumstances
40:28
Speaker 1: that it did, but it clearly ended at some point,
40:30
Speaker 1: well before it was, you know, very well known that
40:34
Speaker 1: Epstein was this horrible I don't even want to necessarily
40:39
Speaker 1: use the word sex trafficking, but from my understanding, from
40:43
Speaker 1: what I could tell and what has been I think
40:46
Speaker 1: bolstered from the release of these most recent files, Epstein
40:50
Speaker 1: was correctly charged with having sex with underage girls who
40:56
Speaker 1: he had hired as prostitutes. That's the core allegation. That's
41:00
Speaker 1: what Epstein at one point pled guilty to and got
41:03
Speaker 1: what is now referred to as a sweetheart deal. Although
41:06
Speaker 1: I'm not necessarily sure given the circumstances of the time,
41:09
Speaker 1: that that's really what happened. But in retrospect, we now
41:12
Speaker 1: look at everything through the prism of him being this
41:15
Speaker 1: horrendous pedophile and this incredibly famous and powerful criminal, and
41:22
Speaker 1: so therefore everything takes on a completely different look. It's
41:27
Speaker 1: been viewed with magic powers. The larger this story gets,
41:31
Speaker 1: by the way, one of the things I have I
41:34
Speaker 1: don't know if I should say learned or maybe my
41:36
Speaker 1: thinking has evolved on this in going through the portions
41:41
Speaker 1: of the Epstein files that I have read, and that
41:45
Speaker 1: is in this I kind of kicked myself for not
41:48
Speaker 1: realizing this sooner. I actually think that the sex crimes
41:52
Speaker 1: against Epstein, as terrible as they are, I mean, I'm
41:55
Speaker 1: not going to diminish them having sex with underage girls
41:59
Speaker 1: even though they came to him voluntarily as prostitutes.
42:03
Speaker 2: That is wrong.
42:03
Speaker 1: That is criminal, that should absolutely positively be punished to
42:08
Speaker 1: the full extent of the law.
42:10
Speaker 2: No issues with that.
42:11
Speaker 1: I actually think that there's an argument to be made
42:16
Speaker 1: that the authorities went after him on that because they
42:19
Speaker 1: were having trouble proving the financial crimes. I think it's
42:23
Speaker 1: the financial crimes that really started the authorities going after Epstein.
42:28
Speaker 2: And in a weird way.
42:29
Speaker 1: This is not a perfect analogy, but this is the
42:31
Speaker 1: whole getting al Capone on tax evasion almost maybe the
42:35
Speaker 1: opposite of getting al Capone on tax evasion. They went
42:39
Speaker 1: after Epstein because they knew he was a crook financially
42:44
Speaker 1: and that this was the easiest way to get him.
42:47
Speaker 1: That seems to be a narrative that makes sense based
42:51
Speaker 1: upon a lot of what we're seeing in these Epstein files.
42:55
Speaker 1: But as far as the issue of protecting the accuser
43:00
Speaker 1: or the survivors of Epstein, I once again refer you
43:03
Speaker 1: to Michael Tracy, Independent journalist investigator. We had him on
43:08
Speaker 1: this podcast a few months ago. The interview didn't go great,
43:12
Speaker 1: even though it was long and it was interesting, but
43:15
Speaker 1: Michael and I had it out over the issue of
43:18
Speaker 1: whether or not Epstein killed himself in prison.
43:21
Speaker 2: I'm positive that he did. I've always been positive that
43:24
Speaker 2: he did.
43:24
Speaker 1: There's nothing in these files that provides any information at
43:28
Speaker 1: all other than the fact that he did kill himself.
43:33
Speaker 1: But for some reason, Michael Tracy doesn't want to take
43:35
Speaker 1: that position. I don't know whether or not the release
43:38
Speaker 1: of these most recent files has changed that or not,
43:41
Speaker 1: but Michael Tracy has been very, very good on the
43:44
Speaker 1: nuts and bolts and who these people.
43:47
Speaker 2: Are and what their stories are.
43:49
Speaker 1: And if you're interested, you should go to his Twitter
43:52
Speaker 1: or his ex fee because he has been going through
43:56
Speaker 1: the release of the Epstein files and has found some
43:59
Speaker 1: really amazing information about some of these accusers and survivors,
44:03
Speaker 1: these people who some of whom have gone to these
44:05
Speaker 1: press conferences where the media has been lapping up these
44:09
Speaker 1: stories and have absolutely contributed to the narrative that there
44:13
Speaker 1: were all, you know, dozens and dozens of these women
44:16
Speaker 1: that were brutally abused, and everyone's just presuming that they
44:21
Speaker 1: were abused sexually and they were underage, and that they
44:25
Speaker 1: were captive on Epstein Island or some sort of allegation
44:29
Speaker 1: like that, and the reality is just not at all
44:33
Speaker 1: consistent with that. A lot of these women were clearly adults.
44:37
Speaker 1: They clearly either liked Epstein or they pretended to like Epstein.
44:43
Speaker 1: They went out of their way, even very very late
44:46
Speaker 1: in this whole process, even just before he died, with
44:49
Speaker 1: very supportive messages proactively to him. They there was never
44:55
Speaker 1: any actual criminal allegation involving them because they were acting
44:59
Speaker 1: as prostitutes and they were clearly well above the legal age.
45:04
Speaker 1: And a lot of this feels a lot like the
45:07
Speaker 1: Sandusky story. Actually, some of the stories of Michael Tracy
45:11
Speaker 1: has documented, are at least as bad, if not worse,
45:15
Speaker 1: more dramatically and obviously bullshit than some of the Sandusky
45:19
Speaker 1: stories because of the age and the nature of the
45:23
Speaker 1: careers of the women involved. Now again, I want to
45:26
Speaker 1: make it clear this is not put all Epstein accusers
45:31
Speaker 1: or survivors in the same category.
45:34
Speaker 2: They're not.
45:35
Speaker 1: But these are some of the people that the media
45:38
Speaker 1: has lauded here and has put blanket protection on as
45:43
Speaker 1: an Epstein accuser survivor.
45:45
Speaker 2: And these people got paid.
45:48
Speaker 1: Two stories in particular that Tracy has documented. One woman
45:52
Speaker 1: got five million dollars, another woman got three and a
45:54
Speaker 1: half million dollars. There's no allegation of any criminality. But
46:00
Speaker 1: here's another connection to Penn State. Penn State was given
46:04
Speaker 1: away free money in order to make sure that they
46:07
Speaker 1: were shielded from media criticism. Well, the financial institutions that
46:12
Speaker 1: Epstein was dealing with, they were incentivized to give away
46:15
Speaker 1: free money to anyone that claimed any sort of connection
46:18
Speaker 1: to the Epstein case because they were getting media criticism.
46:23
Speaker 1: They weren't vetting anybody, they were just hey, we need
46:26
Speaker 1: to get rid of this problem. These are rich financial
46:29
Speaker 1: institutions and they're just going to pay people willy nilly
46:33
Speaker 1: so that they don't get any more criticism that they
46:36
Speaker 1: don't have. This somehow melt down their core corporate brand.
46:41
Speaker 1: And there were multiple financial institutions that dealt with Epstein
46:45
Speaker 1: that felt like it was in their best interest to
46:48
Speaker 1: do a penn state and to just give money away.
46:51
Speaker 1: And this is a large part of how this story
46:53
Speaker 1: spun out of control, because now you have all these
46:57
Speaker 1: people who are incentivized to believe even mythology, and then
47:01
Speaker 1: you hold a press conference and there's all these women,
47:04
Speaker 1: and anybody ever did the freaking math on this, they'd
47:07
Speaker 1: realized that the ages don't match with the allegation. Some
47:11
Speaker 1: of these women were even close. They were very clearly
47:14
Speaker 1: adults in their twenties or even thirties, and they clearly
47:19
Speaker 1: came to Epstein voluntarily because they were being paid to
47:22
Speaker 1: do that.
47:23
Speaker 2: Again, I'm not defending any of.
47:25
Speaker 1: That behavior, but we need to understand what the core
47:28
Speaker 1: allegation here was to understand how ridiculous the overall narrative
47:33
Speaker 1: has become and how people, even serious people, have become
47:37
Speaker 1: invested in a total myth, a fairy tale. There's no
47:43
Speaker 1: evidence to support any of this, and at this point
47:47
Speaker 1: there should be.
47:48
Speaker 2: Massive amounts of evidence. We've gotten almost.
47:51
Speaker 1: Almost to the core of the core of all the information.
47:56
Speaker 2: Related to this case.
47:57
Speaker 1: Now, there are a lot of people who have invested
48:01
Speaker 1: in the conspiracies who are very much like, you know,
48:05
Speaker 1: a child on Christmas. I remember my daughter Grace. This
48:08
Speaker 1: was a few years ago, back in the last days
48:12
Speaker 1: of her Santa Claus belief, where she's desperately looking for
48:15
Speaker 1: one last gift under the tree. She doesn't want Christmas
48:19
Speaker 1: to be over. And this feels very much like that phenomenon,
48:23
Speaker 1: where we haven't found anything that at all gives credibility
48:29
Speaker 1: to any of these conspiracy theories. So we're gonna rely
48:32
Speaker 1: on the idea that well, all the good stuff was
48:35
Speaker 1: redacted and.
48:37
Speaker 2: Maybe we'll just never know the truth. And then we
48:39
Speaker 2: find out.
48:40
Speaker 1: And this was so weird that the DOJ did this.
48:43
Speaker 1: The DOJ announces that they have found about a million
48:48
Speaker 1: more documents, a million more documents. But here's the key phrase,
48:55
Speaker 1: possibly related, possibly related to the Epstein case. And this
49:04
Speaker 1: of course gave rise to you know, allelujah, oh my gosh.
49:09
Speaker 1: Some of these conspiracy theorists literally referred to it as
49:12
Speaker 1: a Christmas gift. By the way, once again I asked,
49:15
Speaker 1: if this really was a massive conspiracy by the DOJ
49:18
Speaker 1: to protect Trump or all these powerful rich people, then
49:22
Speaker 1: why did they suddenly find these million documents. I would
49:26
Speaker 1: argue that we got a lot of incompetence here, and
49:30
Speaker 1: what what's probably transpired is they have found a million
49:35
Speaker 1: quote unquote documents, many of whom are probably probably and
49:40
Speaker 1: I have no inside knowledge of this, no understanding this.
49:42
Speaker 1: I'm just going by basic common sense. A lot of
49:45
Speaker 1: this stuff either is not related, which is why they
49:48
Speaker 1: said possibly related. A lot of the stuff is probably
49:53
Speaker 1: duplicates of what we are they already have and maybe
49:56
Speaker 1: what we've already seen. And some of the stuff just
49:59
Speaker 1: has nothing to do with the Epstein case. It just
50:03
Speaker 1: somehow got grouped in with it. I mean, if you
50:06
Speaker 1: do a search, this is not a perfect analogy, but
50:09
Speaker 1: do a search for a name on Google, right, if
50:13
Speaker 1: it's a common name, you're gonna get literally millions of hits.
50:18
Speaker 1: The vast, vast majority are not gonna be related to
50:21
Speaker 1: the name that you put in the search. Again, that's
50:23
Speaker 1: not a perfect analogy, but I think that's probably what's
50:27
Speaker 1: going on here.
50:27
Speaker 2: My strong suspicion.
50:29
Speaker 1: Is that there's nothing earth shattering, and these million documents
50:34
Speaker 1: just like there's probably nothing earth shattering in the parts
50:37
Speaker 1: that have been redacted.
50:39
Speaker 2: If I'm wrong about.
50:40
Speaker 1: That, unlike the conspiracy theorists, I will be the first
50:43
Speaker 1: to acknowledge that. But I don't think I will, because
50:47
Speaker 1: I think we would have at least had an indication
50:49
Speaker 1: of that by this point.
50:52
Speaker 2: And let's just review because this is really important.
50:55
Speaker 1: Despite the fact that we now have a large portion
50:58
Speaker 1: of the Epstein files publicly disseminated, there is still no
51:03
Speaker 1: evidence that Epstein was murdered, and there's more evidence than
51:07
Speaker 1: ever that he killed himself. I mean, we it's that
51:10
Speaker 1: pretty obvious that he either tried to kill himself one
51:14
Speaker 1: time before he was successful at it, or he did
51:18
Speaker 1: a dry run. That's clear from these Epstein files. So
51:25
Speaker 1: the only evidence that we have on that front from
51:28
Speaker 1: this file release supports the idea that he committed suicide
51:33
Speaker 1: and not that he was murdered. Not a shred of
51:35
Speaker 1: evidence that he was murdered, And the murder is at
51:38
Speaker 1: the heart of all these conspiracy theories. Without the murder,
51:44
Speaker 1: you all of a sudden lose the logic to the
51:48
Speaker 1: extent that it existed for almost the entire sex trafficking
51:54
Speaker 1: massive conspiracy theory, because if he killed himself, then there's
51:59
Speaker 1: no powerful force silencing him.
52:04
Speaker 2: He silenced himself.
52:05
Speaker 1: By the way, if he killed himself, it also destroys
52:08
Speaker 1: the idea that he had blackmail information on Trump, because
52:12
Speaker 1: nobody kills himself in a federal prison facing federal charges
52:16
Speaker 1: when they have blackmail information on the president of the
52:19
Speaker 1: United States.
52:20
Speaker 2: You would never do that.
52:22
Speaker 1: So the fact that there's no evidence of a murder
52:26
Speaker 1: in these files is key, But nobody is even saying
52:30
Speaker 1: that in the media because they don't want to kill
52:32
Speaker 1: Santa Claus. I mean, that's really what.
52:35
Speaker 2: It's all about.
52:36
Speaker 1: That no one wants to admit that there's no Santa
52:38
Speaker 1: Claus here, but no murder evidence.
52:41
Speaker 2: And here's another little.
52:42
Speaker 1: Tidbit that didn't get any media coverage because it doesn't
52:46
Speaker 1: fit with the conspiracy narrative. There's no evidence of any
52:51
Speaker 1: sort of video system within Epstein's estate that could have
52:57
Speaker 1: been used to create the blackmail That was a large
53:02
Speaker 1: part of what was always suspected and probably just concocted
53:06
Speaker 1: out of thin air that somehow Epstein had this sophisticated
53:10
Speaker 1: video system, and he would get these prominent, powerful men
53:15
Speaker 1: in these compromising positions.
53:17
Speaker 2: And he would have video of them having sex that
53:21
Speaker 2: was out there.
53:22
Speaker 1: In fact, I think even Pam Bondi speculated about that
53:25
Speaker 1: at some point. Of Course she's clueless in so many
53:28
Speaker 1: different ways, but that was a huge part of this narrative. Well,
53:31
Speaker 1: according to the files, the authorities found no evidence, none
53:37
Speaker 1: of any sort of sophisticated video system that could have
53:41
Speaker 1: been used to blackmail people who were visiting Epstein in
53:47
Speaker 1: various residences, including Epstein Island. So much like no evidence
53:52
Speaker 1: of murder that destroys a huge component of the conspiracy theory,
53:59
Speaker 1: no financial evidence of a conspiracy. The New York Times,
54:03
Speaker 1: to their credit, did a huge deep dive into Epstein's finances,
54:08
Speaker 1: which I understand, I get it. How did he make
54:11
Speaker 1: all his money? That seems weird, right, How did it occur? Well,
54:17
Speaker 1: the New York Times, whether they realize that or not,
54:21
Speaker 1: actually debunked a lot of the conspiracy theory, or the
54:25
Speaker 1: at least the foundation of the conspiracy theory by coming
54:30
Speaker 1: to the conclusion that a lot of this was just
54:33
Speaker 1: basic fraud, lying, smoke and mirrors and luck. I think
54:38
Speaker 1: that's the most the exact words that they used to
54:41
Speaker 1: describe how Epstein got his money. No evidence of massive
54:47
Speaker 1: blackmail operations, no connections to foreign governments or foreign intelligence.
54:54
Speaker 2: Nothing like that.
54:56
Speaker 1: So we're in a situation, a case where the the
55:00
Speaker 1: absence of evidence is evidence of absence, especially when we've
55:04
Speaker 1: gotten to this point, this very imperfect and incomplete point
55:09
Speaker 1: of transparency with regard to the Epstein files. So I'm
55:13
Speaker 1: not one hundred percent willing or able to declare victory yet,
55:18
Speaker 1: but I'm getting darned close. I'm at least at ninety
55:21
Speaker 1: maybe ninety five percent. Of course, there will be no
55:25
Speaker 1: defeat ever declared by those that were wrong, who lied
55:29
Speaker 1: to you. And they came from the right, they came
55:33
Speaker 1: from the left, they came from fringe media outlets, they
55:36
Speaker 1: came from mainstream outlets. I mean, even people I respect,
55:40
Speaker 1: and I respect almost nobody in the media have dabbled
55:44
Speaker 1: in this whole Epstein conspiracy narrative. And I have never
55:49
Speaker 1: been more convinced, never been more convinced, that the core narrative,
55:55
Speaker 1: the Epstein conspiracy, sex trafficking op to blackmail rich and
56:02
Speaker 1: powerful people, is flat out false. It's a myth, it's
56:08
Speaker 1: a fairy tale. It did not happen in any extensive fashion.
56:14
Speaker 1: And I hope all the information eventually comes out. But
56:17
Speaker 1: I'm also more than realistic enough to realize the conspiracy
56:22
Speaker 1: theorists at best will just move on pretend it never happened.
56:26
Speaker 1: No one will ever admit that they were wrong. That's
56:29
Speaker 1: part of the joy of being conspiracy theorist.
56:33
Speaker 2: You never have to.
56:34
Speaker 1: Admit that you were wrong, because you can always just say, well,
56:38
Speaker 1: you know, they hid the real information, even though in
56:41
Speaker 1: this particular situation that makes no sense, because there's all
56:45
Speaker 1: sorts of information being revealed by the Trump DOJ that,
56:49
Speaker 1: at least at first glance, is embarrassing to Donald Trump.
56:53
Speaker 1: And of course I'll say it one more time, why
56:56
Speaker 1: did the Biden DOJ never do anything about this? Is
57:00
Speaker 1: a e Trump because there's not a shred of evidence
57:03
Speaker 1: Trump ever did anything wrong or criminal related to Jeffrey Epstein.
57:08
Speaker 1: And I've said that from the beginning, and on that point,
57:12
Speaker 1: like so many others, I believe I have either been
57:14
Speaker 1: completely or at the very least mostly vindicated, And on
57:18
Speaker 1: the Trump point, I think I've been completely vindicated. I
57:21
Speaker 1: don't think there's any chance at all that Trump is
57:23
Speaker 1: gonna be legitimately implicated in any of this.
57:27
Speaker 2: Of course, if.
57:28
Speaker 1: I'm wrong, I'll be the first to admit it, but
57:30
Speaker 1: I'm pretty confident that that's never gonna happen. Thanks for
57:33
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