Episode Focus: Jeffrey Epstein Special
00:00:00
Speaker
We've had three weeks of content, so you know what that means. It's time for a news extravaganza. And what a week it's been, with the leading news being Jeffrey Epstein 24-7. Which is why this isn't really a Newsweek, given all we're going to be talking about is Jeffrey Epstein. So the news episode has been postponed. Hold on. This is news, though. I mean, the entire week's been a news cycle of Jeffrey Epstein's stories. There's nothing more newsworthy than discussing the conspiracy news about Epstein.
Epstein News Overshadowing Other Events
00:00:25
Speaker
Yeah, but it's not really a news episode if all we're talking about is one topic. That seems more like a special report, which seems more like a normal episode of the podcast. Okay, but just because there's hardly any other news doesn't mean this isn't a news episode. It's just that there's so much news about one topic that we're probably not going to have time for stories about... we have mysterious explosions in Janoska or the Department of Corrections letting the Christchurch terrorists send letters to supporters overseas.
00:00:52
Speaker
Yeah, well, that seems more like a metaphysical issue. I mean,
Is This a News Episode?
00:00:55
Speaker
really. It's not a passion, nonsense to your whole philosophy thing. People don't listen to this podcast to learn things about metaphysics and epistemology. They have to talk about how Jeffrey Epstein wanted to cryogenically freeze his penis for future years. Which is now old news. Which is why you've got to catch people up on the latest news in a news episode. So it's August the 15th, 2019, and this is... Not the news. Except it isn't. Int.
00:01:20
Speaker
So did you just negate my negation? No, yes, maybe. Who knows? Roll the theme! No, not our theme.
00:01:47
Speaker
The Podcaster's Guide to the Conspiracy, brought to you today by Josh Addison and Dr. M. Dent. Hello and welcome to The Podcaster's Guide to the Conspiracy in what may or may not be a news episode. That script was torn from real life. Torn from the pages of history. We are actually in a slight state of disagreement as to whether or not this actually counts as a news episode.
00:02:13
Speaker
Actually, I think given that the patron bonus episode is also a news episode, this means this is not a news episode, don't manage to force your hand by basically not doing a special topic for the patrons, meaning that next week will be the news, which will probably be updates on G3 Epstein, but also other things as well. Fine, you foiled me with your cunning loopholes. That's why they call me Edwin Foyle.
00:02:40
Speaker
I thought you were going to say someone loophole. I could have made some sort of... Edwin Lupine, loophole as foil. He's going to try and contrive some sort of a vulgar sexual reference around the use of the phrase loophole. But anyway, it was not to be... So yes, we're going to be talking about Jerry Epstein. You're mum's a loophole.
00:03:01
Speaker
It's getting there. It's getting there. Your mum's my loophole. That's better. There we go. That's the sort of smut I was looking for. Good wholesome smut, not like the sort of smut that Jeffrey Epstein apparently was known for.
00:03:17
Speaker
I have to deal with that,
Choosing Epstein Over Other News
00:03:18
Speaker
aren't we? We are a little bit, yes. Things may get mildly distasteful, but I think we can stick to mostly talking about the most recent events in the conspiracy theories around them. Yes, yes. So I don't think we have any announcements or what have you. No brand spanking new patrons? No. No. No, just this dispute about whether this is a news episode, which I kind of crushed. I'm afraid you actually won that one. I'll have to give you that.
00:03:43
Speaker
So then I suppose we should just get into it if there's nothing else.
00:03:50
Speaker
We should. That reminds me of communion wine for a moment there. Given it's whiskey, and communion wine is usually red wine, it's the port finish on the whiskey. Reminded me of sacraments, cackling sacraments. Either you have slightly odd taste buds or you went to a slightly odd church.
Conspiracy Theories Around Epstein's Death
00:04:14
Speaker
Both. Let's talk about Jeffrey Epstein.
00:04:22
Speaker
So I'm assuming we don't need to tell you that Jeffrey Epstein was found dead in his prison cell. I think it was like a Saturday morning American time, so probably Friday night our time.
00:04:33
Speaker
Yes. We can skip ahead a little bit. You probably know who Jeffrey Epstein is. You probably know that he died recently. And you probably know that people started slinging conspiracy theories the exact instant his death became public knowledge. And indeed, when his death became public knowledge... His subject to the conspiracy theory of his own. But we'll get to that eventually. So where to start?
00:05:03
Speaker
There's people have been getting into conspiracy theories pretty much straight away. People who who claim to not normally be into conspiracy theories are getting into it. Yeah. So actually, let's have a brief break to talk about I'm not a conspiracy theorist. But yes, now, this is the podcast's guide to the conspiracy theory.
00:05:23
Speaker
No, just go to the conspiracy. There's no theory involved. Although actually there is going to be because there's a lot of engaging conspiracy theory now. We are a podcast which is devoted to looking at conspiracy theories through the lens of the thesis of particularism, which says that conspiracy theories are simply theories about conspiracies and the evidence decides whether a conspiracy theory is warranted or unwarranted.
00:05:48
Speaker
So there's nothing wrong with saying, I'm a conspiracy theorist, you don't need to put a butt at the end. If you're going to then justify your belief in a conspiracy theory, you need to provide arguments and evidence for that particular conspiracy theory. But there's nothing prima facie wrong with being a conspiracy theorist.
00:06:07
Speaker
Now, this is confronting to a lot of people at the moment, because a lot of people want to believe a conspiracy theory about the death of Jeffrey Epstein, but are embarrassed to express it because of the embarrassment from the I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but style locution.
00:06:24
Speaker
Now, I think it's reasonable to at least be suspicious about Jeffrey Epstein's death, even if it turns out I don't think his death is particularly suspicious myself. Because Jeffrey Epstein was a famous individual who was famous for having rich and powerful friends,
00:06:46
Speaker
He was a famous individual because he engaged in a rather interesting elite activity, pedophilia and child trafficking. And he...
00:06:58
Speaker
seems to have had a prior suicide attempt, which some people think was an attack upon his life in prison. So all of these factors are the kind of thing that go, his death is the kind of thing which at least prima facie looks really unusual and ought to be explained.
Suspicion in Epstein's Death
00:07:17
Speaker
Now the explanation of Jeffrey Epstein's death may well be a conspiracy theory, or it could turn out to be suicide, or it could turn out to be a cock up by the prison system in the US, which would be shocking if that turned out to be true.
00:07:32
Speaker
But his death is suspicious. It needs explanation. Explanations are being proffered. The job of people like ourselves, and I'm including our audience here, is to work through the evidence to work out what is the best thing to believe. So there's nothing wrong about suspecting that maybe there's a conspiracy here as long as you can provide evidence for that claim. And we're going to try to provide some evidence for and against the conspiracy theory over the course of this episode. I think we are, yes.
00:08:03
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, there seem to be several factors, a bit of a perfect storm when it comes to the sorts of things that people... What was it in that film? Clooney? Was it Clooney in Warburg? Maybe, yeah. Indeed, who's been drawn into it? Well, yes, precisely. Yes, it seems partner claims to have had some dalliance with George Clooney, but anyway.
00:08:24
Speaker
The various factors that have made a whole lot of people sit up and go, hang on. I mean, so, yes, he's famous, wealthy, well-connected, and indeed is apparently known to have said that he has dirt on numerous famous and powerful people.
00:08:42
Speaker
I suppose actually we should talk about why Epstein is famous.
Epstein's Influence and Connections
00:08:46
Speaker
So Epstein is a wealthy financier who also enjoys a bit of the old child sex. Well, he's dead because he's dead now, allegedly, although we'll get onto that as well, who held very illustrious parties, inviting the richest and the finest people in the land to attend those parties. Was he the one who had the plane?
00:09:08
Speaker
Yes, the plane and also Orgy Island. So he was rich, powerful and very connected. He gave a lot of money to educational and financial institutions around the world, which of course meant that he kept on being invited to prestigious dues. So
00:09:26
Speaker
When people are worried about his association with other famous people, whether it be Steven Pinker or George Clooney, it's because he did hang out with a lot of very powerful, very rich people, including former President of the United States and the current President of the United States.
00:09:45
Speaker
So, this is not the death of a nobody. This is not the death of a mid-level celebrity. This is the death of someone who is very well connected to most of the powerful people in the English-speaking world.
00:10:00
Speaker
Yes, and not just connected to them, but supposedly had fairly unsavory relationships to some of them, given that he has been jailed in the past and was in jail up until last week, for apparently being a sort of a
00:10:20
Speaker
is fixer the right word, being someone who could arrange for illicit and 100% illegal activities if you had the connections and the money to get into it. And that, of course, then gives him large amounts of dirt on anyone who did avail themselves of his services, you know, basically perfect blackmail material. So it's not just that he was a notable and well-connected figure. He is a notable and well-connected figure who certain other
00:10:50
Speaker
Notable and well-connected figures would probably be quite happy if he were to disappear. So you like the recently retired Prince Andrew who retired from public life as of today and was heavily implicated in the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.
00:11:08
Speaker
And so at the moment, given that Trump is the current president, there's been lots of lots of stories about the relationship between Epstein and Trump. Lots of, you know, videos of them at parties and the stories about the unions and very awkward dancing. Then Epstein arranging parties that appeared to have only he and Trump and a whole bunch of young models at them and so on and so forth. But yes, I mean, Clinton, Bill Clinton was a famously rode that plane, rode the plane. Yep.
00:11:38
Speaker
So it's from all sides of the political spectrum, if we're talking about Americans, they're all pretty much fairly righty anyway. That's true. Even the Democrats are a right wing party compared to our policy. By international standards, yes.
00:11:55
Speaker
So, yeah, I mean, that's kind of count one. He's a notable figure, so anytime a notable figure dies suddenly or possibly mysteriously, people want an explanation. But not only that, he's a notable figure who could be considered a liability to certain other very powerful people.
Controversies Around Suicide Watch Protocols
00:12:12
Speaker
And then we get into the circumstances of his death. Officially, well, I don't know if there's been an official, like they haven't officially announced cause of death, have they? No, no, they have not. At least not at time of recording. No, but it certainly appears that his death is being reported as a suicide. And then that has jumped out at people because hang on, wasn't he on suicide watch?
00:12:34
Speaker
Now the thing about suicide watch, Joshua, the thing about suicide watch is that you don't actually keep people on suicide watch for long periods of time, because keeping people on suicide watch leads to a sense of a loss of autonomy, which increases the chances of someone subsequently committing suicide.
00:12:53
Speaker
Yes, suicide watch. Strict, the most severe kind of suicide watch means not letting the other person out of your sight for a single second. It's having someone there watching you all the time. Having had a relative of the suicide watch in the last year, it's very, very confronting.
00:13:11
Speaker
And so they like to step it down as quickly as possible because, yes, having complete loss of personal autonomy is likely to add much more psychological stress. So if you're worried about someone being suicidal, while it's immediately maybe putting a stop to it, it's only going to be exacerbating the situation in the long or even in the short to mid term. So they do step it down as quickly as they can once they feel able to. Or de-escalate, as they say in the trade.
00:13:40
Speaker
And that is apparently what had happened to him. It seemed to him that he had apparently actually been taken off suicide watch, hadn't he? Although he was still being monitored. Supposedly, I've heard every 15 minutes or every half hour. Yes, last I heard was every half hour.
00:13:55
Speaker
hour, but it turns out in this particular case, they haven't checked on him for about four hours. Yes, and so that's the other thing. Immediately, as with any event, the internet was suddenly full of experts. I'm an expert. Just not on this topic. Not on the suicide of Jeffrey Epstein, no. So you had people immediately claiming
00:14:18
Speaker
that there was absolutely no way it could have been suicide because he was in this maximum security prison they had. Who else was there? El Chapo. They've had other fairly high-profile prisoners there. It's sort of the best of the best. They don't make mistakes. They know what they're doing. He would have
Prison Conditions and Negligence
00:14:34
Speaker
been under all this guard and so on. It would have been completely impossible for him to commit suicide. Then you get other people saying, well, actually, no, it was perfectly possible for him to have committed suicide because this is what actually happens and so on and so forth.
00:14:44
Speaker
And then other people saying, yes, OK, this was a high profile, big, important sort of... What exactly was it? Manhattan? It's the MCC. Metropolitan, Metropolitan Correctional Centre. The MCC is, you know, big, high profile, important, large.
00:15:04
Speaker
fancy ISU grey, I expect. Running out of adjectives here. But the point is... Sorry, I'm just focused on the fact it's MCC and what I'm thinking, Disney are not going to want to license that for their next Marvel film, the Marvel Correctional Center. No, probably not. It's where they'll put the ghost of Thanos. I have no idea. Probably. I don't know where I'm going with this. No, you don't, you don't. I've almost even seen an MCU film in a long time.
00:15:33
Speaker
No, if they're not your thing, they're not your thing. They're not? No. What was I saying? No, because the MCC was apparently such a well-known institution, people have said that you couldn't commit suicide there, but then other people have said, well, actually,
00:15:50
Speaker
You're basing it on sort of the movie version, the law and order Dick Wolf version of the legal system or the criminal system. As opposed to the chronically underfunded American system of prisons, which are not good at the best of times, but are particularly bad when they're not well funded.
00:16:09
Speaker
Yes, so immediately talk came out that the prison was understaffed, the people, the staff there were overworked and therefore had been cutting corners and so supposedly the stories are now out that surveillance footage shows that the guards hadn't checked on him at the half hour schedule and had simply falsified the log records to say that they had.
00:16:30
Speaker
And in fact, it had been a couple of hours since he was last checked on before he was found. So certainly he had the time to have taken his own life if he wanted to. But Josh, the killers also had the time to do what they were doing without being inspected or surveilled. Well, that's the other thing, yes. I mean, it does kind of go both ways.
00:16:51
Speaker
Let's talk about the prior suicide attempt. Because that seems to be one of the things people have leaned on. So Jeffrey Epstein several weeks ago is said to have attempted suicide. So he was found in his cell unconscious.
00:17:07
Speaker
with wounds around the neck which might have been an attempt at strangulation or may have been evidence of an assault. Various news reports claim that Epstein claimed to have been assaulted. Other news reports say no, authorities are investigating it to see whether it is an assault because Epstein claimed to not remember what happened at the time. I believe it's all an open question as to exactly what occurred.
00:17:35
Speaker
And last I heard it hadn't been confirmed whether or not he actually had a cellmate at the time either. So yeah, that's still that one's still a little bit up in the air. And whether or not you believe it was a suicide attempt or an assault does certainly color what you might want to think about.
00:17:52
Speaker
So if you think it was a prior suicide attempt that is evidence of suicidal ideation and evidence of suicidal ideation, particularly given the psychological stress Epstein was undergoing with the thought of imprisonment, a trial, more imprisonment and the like might make you go, well, maybe he did take his own life.
00:18:15
Speaker
Or if you think it was an assault and thus planned by people in the prison or orchestrated by people outside the prison, then that makes you go, hmm, it is suspicious that he then died, isn't it? On the other other hand,
00:18:31
Speaker
you could imagine a scenario where it was assault. He may not have been suicidal initially, but then getting assaulted like that would have given him the idea, if I go to prison, this is what it's going to be like for me for the rest of my life, which could have then made him more suicidal than he had been in the first place. In fact, there are lots of varieties when it comes to the conspiracy theories, aren't there?
Murder Theories and Corruption
00:18:56
Speaker
are. For starters, straight up conspiracy theory number one, he was murdered. It wasn't suicide. It was merely staged to look like suicide. Agents of whichever powerful person you happen to prefer killed him and certainly made it look that way.
00:19:13
Speaker
There are lots of, much as with, say, the 9-11 conspiracy theories, where there's a whole range of spectrums in between, say, the Bush administration orchestrated the entire thing, made it all happen on purpose, all the way down to they simply capitalised on an event they had no control over. There's a wide range of positions in between, he was murdered by people who wanted him silenced, he took his own life with no outside aid.
00:19:41
Speaker
for instance, middle ground, which is he was gently encouraged to commit suicide. He was known to be suicidal and therefore guards were bribed or otherwise persuaded to look the other way, allowing, you know, it's possible you could say he did commit suicide but was helped along the way somehow. Encouraged to do it.
00:20:07
Speaker
And then I understand there are some reports that there was neither suicide nor murder. Yes, some people claim he's faked his death or his death has been faked. There are two varieties here. One is that Epstein faked his own death to then leave the prison and possibly go back to his orgy island or live somewhere outside the States and live out his life in anonymity.
00:20:36
Speaker
Others claim his death was faked so he could be moved to Guantanamo Bay and moved into Gitmo. Isn't that what all the QAnon people think is going to happen to all the people when the day comes? It's true. They do think that Gitmo is going to be filled with the elite pedophiles that Donald Trump is ferreting out in the American system. And it is largely QAnon people who are claiming that Epstein's death has been faked and he has been moved to Gitmo.
00:21:06
Speaker
Yes, the whole QAnon thing, maybe we'll save that to later because I think there's still stuff we can talk about specifically around Epstein's death and the conspiracy theories there. One little wrinkle was that apparently his death
00:21:22
Speaker
was mentioned on 4chan a good half hour 40 minutes before it started showing up on news networks. Now some people have taken our 4chan as where your alt-righty, nutty, QAnon-y people hang out a little bit. Not quite as bad as 8chan but still.
Early Reports and Ongoing Investigations
00:21:38
Speaker
So maybe you know where your conspiracy theorists go
00:21:43
Speaker
Is that a big deal, or is that simply the speed of the internet these days, how especially it turned out that this was correct, but if word had got out, rumours travel much faster than even news agencies.
00:21:58
Speaker
Yes, I mean, I always think of what happened when Osama bin Laden's death was announced by the White House. So there was an announcement there was going to be a White House press briefing on the day. People on Twitter were going, I wonder what's that about? They then trawled through news reports.
00:22:18
Speaker
rumors coming out of military bases and the like and they very quickly centered on the notion it was going to be an announcement about the death of Osama bin Laden about 45 minutes before the White House press briefing occurred and it turns out that yes there are people online who are paying attention to a whole bunch of rumors and to kind of underground news networks who are able to get the jump on the conventional news.
00:22:46
Speaker
So no, there's nothing particularly unusual about a commenter on 4chan who might have special access to someone making that particular announcement. It doesn't necessarily show premeditation or knowledge of a plot. It simply means that someone in the chain of information has slipped up and someone on the internet has got hold of that slip up and publicized it before it was meant to be announced to the world.
00:23:12
Speaker
Yes, I mean, apparently the guards and their supervisor were immediately sort of
00:23:18
Speaker
put on leave or what have you, so who knows? All it requires is one person to go, Jesus, you'll never believe what happened to that. To text their partner or to text a friend going, oh my God, Jeffrey Epstein is dead, and for that shit, and that person to then go, I'm going to tell all my friends, and then someone to go on 4chan, I've just heard that. Which is, yeah, seems to have been what happened. So, other issues around this.
00:23:48
Speaker
Motive seems to be one of the key factors behind the conspiracy theories. There were people who had motive to get Jeffrey Epstein to be quiet forever. But what actual effect will his death have on the case?
00:24:05
Speaker
That's a good question because there are a lot of folk lawyers out there who are making all sorts of claims about what this means. Some people are saying the case is now closed because Epstein is dead and there's no one to prosecute. Other people are saying no, it just makes it much easier for the authorities to investigate because Epstein can no longer protest against people going through his goods and his estate.
00:24:31
Speaker
At this stage, it looks like the investigation is going to continue. There's also going to be an investigation into his death and the failures that led to said
Epstein's Past Legal Leniency
00:24:40
Speaker
death. Although, of course, people are going, well, if it was a conspiracy, all they'll do is cover that up. But no, at this stage, his death is not going to have an effect upon the investigation. Although maybe it means that certain people aren't going to be called up as witnesses. So maybe some people have closed things down.
00:25:01
Speaker
to stop having to poo to themselves in court. Now, of course, what's interesting about this is that, as I mentioned in the Patreon episode last week, some of us had been suffering a bit of a Mandela Effect about Jeffrey Epstein, because for people like me who, I was fairly sure he was prosecuted for crimes over a decade ago, why is this in the news now? I kind of thought we already knew about this.
00:25:30
Speaker
It turns out it's not the Mandela Effect. Jeffrey Epstein was convicted for crimes back in 2008 and spent some time in prison. How much time did he spend in prison? Well, it was meant to spend 10 years, but you know how probation works in good behaviour. So he spent about 13 months.
00:25:49
Speaker
He didn't even spend 13 months full time in prison, no. He got day release six days a week for 12 hours a day so that he could leave his prison to go and work in his office. And when he was on site, he was actually running apparently a non-profit in the old infirmary where the deputies who were guarding him had to wear suits and act as secretaries.
00:26:19
Speaker
So, people have pointed out that the last time Epstein was prosecuted and spent time in prison. And it was for essentially the same sorts of things he was being prosecuted. Yeah, except it turns out that when he was prosecuted,
00:26:34
Speaker
the prosecutor decided to find the least offensive thing he had done, and only prosecute him for that, giving him this really lenient sentence that was made even more lenient by the prison authorities, who gave probation and early release, which kind of allowed him to have a very, very sweet deal at the time. And so,
00:27:02
Speaker
My concern about the conspiracy theory that Epstein was killed by the authorities is the last time Epstein was up on charges, they gave him a very, very sweet deal and he said nothing.
00:27:21
Speaker
Why wouldn't you think they would do the same thing again? Why kill him this time when you know that if you give him a sweet deal, he will simply spend his 13 months not even really in prison? I mean, after he left prison, he had to register as a sex offender in New York.
00:27:40
Speaker
He was all allowed to go and spend time on his Caribbean island, go out on long shopping trips, go walk along beaches. It turns out that prison for rich people, particularly the ultra rich and the ultra wealthy, turned out to be a pretty sweet deal.
00:28:00
Speaker
Yes, I've seen someone on Twitter was saying, hey, remember when the Panama Papers came out and we found about the rich people's secret tax haven islands and nothing was really done? Well, now we found out about their secret underage sex island. And we're not doing anything about that. So, yeah, I mean, it does seem there's quite an about face. I mean, of course, you could say then that
00:28:21
Speaker
Because there are so many people, as we say, from different areas who could be implicated by Epstein, that maybe it was one crowd sort of gave him the sweetheart treatment, sweetheart deal last time. And this time it was a different and thoroughly more ruthless crowd who thought they'd better settle things their way. Who the hell knows? But yeah, it is something that needs to be taken into account when you're talking about these conspiracy theories.
00:28:46
Speaker
that I note you put down here. The law firm that represented him in the 2008 case included one William Barr.
Political Influence on Investigation
00:28:55
Speaker
That would be Attorney General William Barr.
00:29:02
Speaker
is at this stage leading the investigation into the death of Jeffrey Epstein, which is leading people to be very concerned, given his prior connection to Epstein and prosecution against, well, working with law firms during the prosecution of Epstein.
00:29:19
Speaker
So, yeah, there are concerns that maybe prominent members of the Trump administration are not the kind of people who should be involved in subsequent investigations of the fate of Jeffrey Epstein. Yes, I mean, Barr has apparently said federal prosecutors' investigation into those who might have facilitated Epstein's alleged sex abuse of minors will continue even if Epstein himself can no longer be prosecuted. But yes, people have sort of
00:29:47
Speaker
Given him the old side eye. They sure have. Given how things turned out last time and given his shenanigans around the Mueller report and everything as well. Certainly, Barr appears to have shown great loyalty to Trump and if Trump was one of the people who could be in trouble due to the Epstein case, yes, people do wonder exactly how that's going to turn out.
00:30:14
Speaker
But that's not all. You've got the conspiracy theories around exactly what happened, the conspiracy theories around the cover-ups and all the other ones. You can't have a good story these days without getting conspiracies around the Russians, though, and their armies of Twitter bots.
00:30:30
Speaker
It's true, they do have armies of robots on the internet ready at a press of a button to be deployed against, well, anyone. So apparently people who track these things reckon that immediately after Epstein's death, the top trending topics being promoted by Twitter bots included Epstein's suicide, Epstein's murder, and good old Clinton death count. It's back, baby! Yeah, and even being retweeted by PR hacks in this country like Matthew Housin.
00:30:59
Speaker
Well, was he going specifically Clinton Death Count? He was, yeah. And I can't quite tell whether it was satire or seriousness. If it was satire, it wasn't even very good satire. No. And obviously we've talked about the Clinton Death Count before because it's a bit of a classic.
00:31:15
Speaker
A bit old school, that one. And I think most people who actually look at, I mean, first of all, the supposed list of people who the Clintons have had killed is fairly amorphous and it's hard to get a quote unquote official list.
00:31:31
Speaker
Only the Clinton Foundation would provide it. Yeah. But what lists there have been seem to be very tenuous in terms of this person was known to the Clintons. Sometimes to the extent that it even goes to this person knew this person who we thought was killed by the Clintons. So they sort of get points removed and a lot of these supposedly suspicious deaths don't appear to have anything suspicious to them and so on.
00:32:00
Speaker
It fled up briefly with the whole Seth Rich thing, which you've talked about plenty. And now Jeffrey Epstein, although Epstein seems to have associations with both the Democrats and the Republicans. So why the Clintons as the people behind it? I don't know. They're not actually in power at the moment. No, yes, but people hate them on the right anyway. They do. I don't think we need to look too far for a motive there.
00:32:30
Speaker
So there are numerous angles. I think another interesting one, though, is the whole sort of, that we talked about a bit at the beginning, the mainstreaming a little bit of conspiracy theories. This case, more than many others in recent times, appears to be the one that's getting people saying, I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but this seems to be the example that has lots of people saying, well, you know, actually,
00:32:55
Speaker
Yeah, so this is a lot like what happened with the death of UN weapons inspector David Kelly around the time of the invasion of Iraq, where he apparently walked out into the woods and committed suicide, having said he had information disastrous to the UK's claim that there were reasons to suspect there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And at that time, going back to 2003, people are going,
00:33:22
Speaker
Yeah, I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but this is a bit weird. And we're getting the same thing here, which is leading to some people being really, really irate that people are discussing conspiracy theories openly.
Epstein's Real Conspiracies
00:33:36
Speaker
And then I think there's a little bit of no, I'm the qualified expert, I only get to talk about conspiracy theories, you don't get to talk about conspiracy theories style reactions.
00:33:45
Speaker
But yes, it is kind of mainstreaming conspiracy theories in the same respect that when the Duty Politics saga occurred here, and John Key tried to go, well, it's just a Nicky Hager, he's one of those conspiracy theorists, and the public response was, well, that might be true, but what about this story? Isn't there something to it?
00:34:04
Speaker
Has anybody got in touch with you about the Epstein businesses? No, not at all. Not at all. Apparently, I'm not in his address book, so no one's calling me. Because, I mean, for our international listeners, he has been something of a spokesperson at times when a conspiracy issue has come up and someone wants a sound bite. I have been asked to provide that bite in sound form. But not this time.
00:34:29
Speaker
So, we're approaching the end of our time limit, I think, but... So, we should have pizza. We should have pizza from Colin... From a gate. ...Ting Pong, from the gate and the... We mentioned QAnon at the beginning, and I said we'd have to come back to them, and we really do, because obviously, conspiracy theories, leaving all the ones we talked about aside,
00:34:53
Speaker
This all started because of a conspiracy. The Epstein is up on conspiracy or was up on conspiracy charges. He was part of a conspiracy to engage in illegal acts involving underage sex and the sex trafficking of underage people. That's an actual that's a proper conspiracy, no doubt about that. And it's interesting that any theories about this conspiracy
00:35:20
Speaker
sound awfully like a lot of the QAnon stuff. Or David Icke and the elite pedophile. The cabal of wealthy and powerful people who can essentially live above the law have been involved in sex trafficking and underage sex. That's the kind of thing that the QAnon folks keep talking about. And indeed, David Icke, and yet they never really talk about Epstein.
00:35:46
Speaker
Do they? I mean, it's always been, certainly in the case of QAnon, it's all the people they don't like, the ones, the democratic ones, the lefty ones. And yet, Hepstein seems to have certainly played both sides of the fence. Coin? Coin? Galden? Whatever it is. I don't know. Whatever the analogy is, he's played both sides. Exactly. Well, at least he did. At least he's in Getmar, or in France. Who knows?
00:36:14
Speaker
Yeah, there's something really interesting here.
00:36:17
Speaker
It's been a long standing kind of rumor about political elites and going all the way back to the ancient Roman to probably even further. I just happen to know about the Roman example of political elites engaging in child sex. So the Emperor Tiberius was famously accused by patrician writers after his death of having sex with young boys, swimming with the minnows. The minnows of these young boys would swim between his legs and suck
00:36:45
Speaker
Suck them off. You should read Saturnia Caesar 12 Caesars. It's very titillating. So there's been these long-standing rumors about elite pedophile networks. People used to make the same claim about Helen Clark in this country that not only was she a secret lesbian running the country, but she was facilitating Labour Party sex camps where people would have sex with young children, etc, etc. It turns out that
Blackmail and Secrets
00:37:13
Speaker
There are elite pedophiles who have been operating at the highest echelons of society, Jimmy Savile in the UK, Jeffrey Epstein in America, and associates, and we have this kind of weird thing. Are Ike and the QAnon people with their pizza gates? Were they onto something?
00:37:35
Speaker
Or is it largely a coincidence that this has been this long-standing rumour of elite pedophiles in our society operating behind the scenes, and it turns out in this particular case there really are. And of course this kind of can be unpacked in a variety of different ways, in that
00:37:57
Speaker
It's possible that everybody who was rich and powerful knew about several in the UK and Epstein in America, because it seems at least in Epstein's case, he was also running a very effective blackmail technique of luring people into having sex with minors and then going, it's fine. Look, I won't say anything about it.
00:38:22
Speaker
You loan me some money or invest some money in one of my schemes which will keep offshore and I'll never ever talk about it. And so it's quite possible this was a known secret.
00:38:38
Speaker
as a kept secret from the public, but no one amongst members who were involved in Epstein. But of course, because they had been blackmailed and the shame of being caught out for what they did meant they would never talk about it. So maybe it was a largely known thing. A lot like the rumours about R. Kelly in the music industry. Yes, which we've talked about more than once and recently as well. In a patron bonus episode.
00:39:04
Speaker
And yeah, R. Kelly, people have been making references to his predilection for underage women for decades, since the 90s, I'm sure. And until recently, it's never really gone anywhere. So it's just kind of been joking. R. Kelly likes him young. It's like, no, he doesn't. He likes him illegally young. We know this.
00:39:33
Speaker
And it's taken forever for anything to happen there. So people about Jeffrey Epstein is less of a celebrity than R Kelly, certainly. So in that situation where lots of people know that people have a vested interest in keeping it secret, maybe there are people like David Icke who have some connection to the rich and the poor.
00:39:55
Speaker
powerful given previous work as a BBC sports journalist etc etc and people within the Q community who hang out with other people with rich and powerful friends. It's also quite possible that many of the people in Epstein's circle literally had no idea what else was going on at those parties. They were simply invited along, they were hobnobbing with the rich and powerful and were unaware that some people were having underage sex behind closed doors.
00:40:25
Speaker
And maybe it is just a coincidence that people made rumors about elite pedophile networks for a long period of time. But no matter whether it's a coincidence or people knowing things, people like your David Ikes
00:40:40
Speaker
and your people who believe in the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, or promoters of it, like Mike Czivić on Twitter, are using what's happened here to go, look, we were right the entire time, if we're right about this, we must be right about the other stuff too.
Episode Wrap-up and Future Plans
00:41:01
Speaker
So, I mean, yes, a single death nevertheless has a whole lot of issues and related issues around it, enough indeed to fill an entire episode, which I guess it turns out, you're right, wasn't a news episode after all. Not at all. Even though it is actually news.
00:41:20
Speaker
It's topical. It's newsworthy. It just isn't the subject of a news episode because a news episode requires us to talk about multiple news cases. Right. So I guess that's what we're going to do next week then.
00:41:31
Speaker
Yes, unless someone else favours dyes. Yes. Which works out because there's still one week left in August anyway, isn't there? It can be the news one for August. It all works out. Everything's fine. I mean, there'll be a... We have to work out whether we then do two weeks of content and then a news episode after that. We'll find some ways to even... Life finds a way. It'll work out in the aggregate. We won't be doing September news in October. That would be ridiculous. That would be madness personified.
00:41:59
Speaker
patrons get news. They do. They get exciting news because we're going to talk about a potentially nuclear powered intercontinental ballistic missile. The Russians may have accidentally blown up on their own soil. We'll be talking about how the Christchurch
00:42:15
Speaker
Terrorist has been sending mail to people on 4chan, which is turning out to be a bit of an awkward issue back here. Just a little bit, yes. James O'Kee from Project Veritas has shot himself in the foot figuratively once again. And what's happening with QAnon and Q themselves now that 8chan is either gone or at least very, very hard to access.
00:42:44
Speaker
So if you're one of our patrons, you can download the bonus episode and find out all about those things. If you're not one of our patrons and you'd like to be, you could pop over to patreon.com or go to where this website is, where this podcast is hosted at conspiracism.popbean.com and use their native patronage thing. Although I think patreon is probably easier, isn't it? It is, yes. It's a bit more mainstream.
00:43:08
Speaker
So do that if you aren't and if you don't feel like becoming one of our patrons. That's just fine. We are more than happy to simply have you as our listeners. We still love you. We still love you. Just not as much. You know, everybody has a favourite child. We don't admit it. Yeah. And we've got several favourite children now.
00:43:26
Speaker
So, I believe that is all we had to talk about in this main episode. So we are going to start recording and then immediately start recording a bonus episode. But for all the rest of you, have yourselves a good day.
00:43:50
Speaker
You've been listening to the podcast's Guide to the Conspiracy, starring Josh Addison and Dr. M.R. Extended, which is written, researched, recorded and produced by Josh and Em. You can support the podcast by becoming a patron via its Podbean or Patreon campaigns. And if you need to get in contact with either Josh or Em, you can email them at podcastconspiracyatgmail.com or check their Twitter accounts, Mikey Fluids and Conspiracism.
00:44:51
Speaker
And remember, the truth is out there. But not quite where you think you left it. You know, the one thing that we didn't actually resolve... What did happen to Jeffrey Epstein's penis? Yes, he had said he wanted his head and penis removed after his death and cryogenically frozen.
00:45:12
Speaker
We have to assume that they will have honoured his wishes, or do they not honour the wishes of a person in prison when it comes to pushing their penis in a deep phrase? Truly, this is the most important issue around your free Epstein suicide, and quite frankly, I'm a little ashamed we forgot to mention it in the main episode. This needs further investigation, Josh, to the Learjet.