Here’s a handy list of the things that Donald Trump has wanted you to think about over the past 10 days or so, in rough chronological order:
1) Changing the name of the Washington Commanders back to the Washington Redskins. Trump said if they don’t do it, he will block the team’s stadium deal.
2) Changing the name of the Cleveland Guardians back to the Cleveland Indians. Trumps said this would “honor Native Americans.”
3) Getting Coca-Cola to use cane sugar in its products instead of corn syrup. Trump claimed that he’d spoken to the company about the matter, but Coke officials said they hadn’t heard from Trump until after he made the claim in a press conference.
4) Revoking the citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, which Trump threatened to do for her “crimes against humanity,” which apparently means criticizing Trump. The Supreme Court has ruled that citizens may only lose their citizenship by voluntarily relinquishing it. But, you know, think about it.
5) The Unabomber. Trump said his uncle taught Ted Kaczynski when the legendary terrorist attended MIT. Two problems: Kaczynski never attended MIT, and Trump’s uncle was dead before ol’ Ted became notorious. But hey, give it some thought.
6) Thousands of pages of just-released Justice Department files relating to the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King in 1968. Because it might take the press a while to read them all? Who knows?
7) Hundreds of pages of just-released Justice Department files relating to Hillary Clinton’s email server investigation in 2016. Because it’s “Crooked Hillary” time again. Paging Jesse Watters!
8) “Pencil Neck” Senator Adam Schiff’s mortgage on a house in Maryland, which somehow provoked Trump to urge his Justice Department to “bring [Schiff] to Justice.” There were no obvious irregularities and the case was “difficult to take seriously,” according to the Washington Post.
9) Former President Barack Obama’s “treason” and his “cheating” in the 2016 election (in which he wasn’t a candidate, and which Trump won). This out-of-nowhere attack featured Trump posting a bizarre AI video of Obama being cuffed and arrested, which led to increased threats being leveled at the former president and his family. Which is almost a new low for Trump. Almost.
Now, a handy list of things Trump doesn’t want you to think about:
1) Jeffrey
2) Epstein
3) Jeffrey Epstein’s client list
4) The Justice Department’s Epstein files
5) That creepy birthday letter from Trump to Epstein that The Wall Street Journal reported on, with lines such as: “We have certain things in common, Jeffrey,” and, “Enigmas never age, have you noticed that?” And, “May every day be another wonderful secret.” Gee, I wonder what they’re talking about.
To watch Trump unravel over the past couple of weeks has been to observe a master-class in how not to defuse a scandal. None of his usual distraction tactics have stuck, leading him to amp up the content level from trivial to near-criminal, and making him look more and more desperate — and guilty.
And now, other Republicans are feeling the heat, so much so that House Speaker Mike Johnson sent members home a week early for their summer recess to avoid insistent calls from Democrats (and some Republicans) for the Justice Department to release its Epstein files.
Johnson hopes that by September all of this will just go away, but that doesn’t seem likely. An Economist/YouGov poll last week showed 69 percent of Americans think the federal government is hiding something about Epstein. And 81 percent of the public wants the complete Epstein files released. Eighty-one percent!
But Trump has one more thing he’s going to want you to think about instead: the soon-to-be-revealed (and edited) testimony of Epstein’s pedophile partner, Ghislaine Maxwell, currently doing 20 years in federal prison. The assumption by most observers is that, in exchange for a pardon from Trump, Maxwell’s testimony will conveniently reveal a number of prominent Epstein clients — with one notable exception. It’s Trump’s latest attempt to divert the public’s attention from his Epstein mess. Don’t get distracted. Maxwell is a vile sex-trafficker, as guilty as her boyfriend. But as they used to say on The X-Files: “The truth is out there.”