Melania Panicking After Epstein Cross-Examination Goes Nuclear She Can't Hide

0:00David Rothkopf:Ever wonder who's out there making the world go round? It's truckers. Who unites baristas with coffee beans? Truckers. Who unites dogs with their favorite chew toy? Truckers. That's why Progressive offers truckers even more protection with Cargo Plus coverage to keep truckers moving right along. Quote truck insurance today in as little as eight minutes at progressivecommercial.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Coverage subject to policy terms, limits, and conditions. Not yet available in California, New York, and Virginia. Ever notice how life's best stories don't happen in your living room?

0:33David Rothkopf:They happen on the open road, out on the water, or parked under the stars. At Progressive, they get that you want to focus on the experience, not worry about the what-ifs. That's why they offer quality insurance designed for your ride, whether that's a boat, RV, or motorcycle. Adventure with confidence. Visit Progressive.com and see how easy it is to protect your favorite way to get away. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Not available in D.C. Prices vary based on how you buy.

1:29The files are rather pesky and they are blowing up in Todd Blanche's face on Capitol Hill this week. Let's play the clip. In the room, I have been there. This is what I had to do to transcribe, to show what is true. What is true is that the president has lied about being on Epstein's plane and the unredacted files prove that. There's a lot in here. I am shocked at this. There's also this set of files in the file. This is investigation into the potential co-conspirators of Jeffrey Epstein. I almost use up all the blank ink in the hallway because it's all covered up. The fix is totally in on this thing with Todd Blanche carrying the water for Trump.

2:17And joining me to discuss this is national security analyst, political commentator, and world-class MAGA basher, my friend, David Rothkoff. David, what do you make of the Epstein files? Do you think they're just pesky and never going away?

2:31David Rothkopf:No, I think they're much bigger than we actually think they are. I get this entirely from Trump's behavior and Blanche's behavior and everybody else's behavior, because there are a lot of ways they could have made this go away, right? They could have redacted less. They could have revealed more. They could have done what they said they were going to do in terms of revealing them. And they don't. And so why not? What is underlying all of this? And there are two things that I think seem most likely. One is Trump did some really awful stuff, right? Trump did some criminal stuff with young girls. And he's been accused of that.

3:10David Rothkopf:But I think he's afraid that it's going to lead into a place that could have, you know, the darkest kind of ramifications for it. I also think, and here I'm, you know me, I'm not very conspiracy theory drawn, but somehow the relationship between Melania and Epstein, I think, is a real, like, exposed nerve. And there are a couple of these releases recently that come from this model that she used to be friends with. And when I read them, I think, wait just one minute here. Is Melania putting a lot of pressure on him? Does she not want us to get into the truth about her past and who she was and what her relationship was with all of this?

4:01David Rothkopf:Anyway, I think this is sort of, you know, part of the origin story of Trump as a comic book villain, right? This is like the worst of the worst of Trump. And that's why, you know, he's got an entire government apparatus devoted to hiding it, to obstructing justice. That's why his personal lawyer is now the acting attorney general, because he is scared shitless of what is going to come out here. I completely agree. And I would have, I'm with you. I'm not a huge conspiracy theorist. And if I would have heard that some former friend of Melania said, oh, Melania used to be a hooker, I'd be like, oh, whatever, you know, big deal.

4:40David Rothkopf:What a shock that would be. Right. But when Melania did the surprise press conference talking about humility and all of these things, I was just like, okay, she used to be a hooker. I mean, a hundred percent Epstein pastor down to Trump. That's what makes me believe it. When they go out, like when Trump says, I aced my cognitive exam. I'm like, clearly he failed it. Because why on earth would you be saying that? Well, and why on earth would you be taking one every three months? I mean, you know, clearly his doctors are worried about something and it's that he's losing his marbles. But, you know, the obscene thing won't die because it can't be killed.

5:22David Rothkopf:You know, that there is something alive deep within it that just can't be suppressed. And Trump keeps burying it. And it's like the end of the movie Carrie, where you're walking by the gravesite and a hand comes up

5:38David Rothkopf:out of the ground. I think that's kind of where we are. And I think, I mean, I was speaking of, you know, gravesites, you know, whatever happened to Ivana Trump? You know, I mean, here's this weird story that the wife of the president, quote, fell down the stairs, that old Russian thing, you know, fell off a balcony, fell down the stairs, and they buried her in a golf course. You know, and it's like, what? Exactly. There's so much shit. And they just do, they commit so many crimes and do so many outrageous things. it's hard to keep up with him but we can just go back like i totally forget about that you know the documentary the staircase about the guy and the wife and the trial so that's kind of in everybody's sight but i mean obviously that's fishy as hell as well and she accused him of rape which you know he is an adjudicated rapist his first wife is the one who said that he read mein kampf which is i'm not surprised that he read nazi and hitler literature i'm just surprised that he reads.

6:45Yeah.

6:46David Rothkopf:Well, look, he's never read a book, right? He thinks putting Mein Kampf beside the bed is kind of an aphrodisiac, which that's what's fucked up about Donald Trump. Yeah. He thinks it makes him look like some big, strong, dangerous man. And, you know, I think part of the problem he's got right now is he's losing that completely, right? I mean, he's shitting in his pants and he smells bad and he can't stay awake and, you know, the hands and everything else. And he's like, I'm over. Nobody's going to look at me again. I can't be that manly man that I once was. And, you know, which brings me to something else.

7:22David Rothkopf:But I've got you here. I've been thinking about this a lot because you are the first person to zero in on this. And if I may, I've just been watching a lot. What is it with the Republican Party and their obsession with manhood? I mean, this whole thing when they go after Tallarico and it's like, well, he's a vegan and he, you know, he's the, and Stephen Miller, that speaking of manly men, Stephen Miller is like, oh, yeah, he's the first trans candidate. it. And it's like, it's like a collective of guys who like measured themselves in the gym one day and all came up short and are desperate. You know, they're obsessed with it.

8:06Here's my observation. Okay. These men are happiest in homosocial relationships. They're always around other men. They fired the women that worked in the cabinet. You know, those are the first four to go, the women that carried the water for the patriarchy are the first to drown. They are obsessed with trans issues. They are obsessed with genitalia. They are specifically obsessed with gay stuff. The president of the United States himself on the campaign trail gave the microphone a blowjob with striking familiarity to doing such an act. And you can imagine any other candidate simulating a blowjob on a microphone, that would be the end of their political career.

8:48He talks about the size of Arnold Palmer's cock. He goes on and on about to the UFC wrestler. You're hot. This guy from Saudi Arabia is hot. I like young men. This quarterback from the New York Giants is hot. What a good looking guy. I'm just like, I mean, you guys, it's okay to come out of the closet. The sad thing about this, David, the people who would be the most accepting if these people came out of the closet in a tone would be the gay community. and it's just it's wild like benny johnson moses mike johnson uh lindsey graham josh holly have you seen that image of him trying to kiss his wife i mean it's like it's like he's kissing a vomit or something i've never seen somebody so repelled it's just they're just so homosocial slash obsessed with gay stuff this right here david look at that that's pretty hot

9:47David Rothkopf:But I mean, it's so weird. And, you know, it gets back sort of to this Epstein thing. There is something so dysfunctional about the United States in the sexual part of its brain. You know, it is like we have a real deep cultural problem going on here. and it's manifesting itself in a lot of weird ways. You know, you're right. Donald Trump was introduced by Jackson Dart, who is the quarterback for the New York Giants and who will never sell another jersey in New York again because he embraced Trump. And Trump's like, look at his thighs. Look at his thighs. I mean, are you kidding me? That's the takeaway.

10:36way, there was this Christian pastor on Newsmax the other day, and he plays a video of James Tallarico. And his response after seeing the video is James Tallarico wearing frilly panties. And I thought, you saw this video of this guy speaking about it, and you immediately visualize him in frilly panties. That says far more about you thinking about men in panties than it does about James Tallarico, who was hilarious. I remember the scandal a few months ago that James Tallarico followed only fans models. So he's either too straight, too trans, too this. But here's the thing that Democrats miss out on.

11:14The people who talk about culture wars all the time are the freaky MAGA people who are so insecure in their religion, in their individuality, in their politics, in their moral compass, most importantly, in their sexuality and in the bedroom. And the Democrats need to start talking about why are they always talking about gay stuff? Why is Donald Trump always telling men how hot they are? Why is he always talking about thighs? Why is he giving microphones blowjobs? And then go to talk about affordability. Play offense on it. It would be so refreshing.

11:44David Rothkopf:It would be refreshing. And it would also have the added advantage of being the truth. These guys, you know, these guys are weird. They behave in a weird way. They are obviously screwed up about their own sexuality. and they're afraid. I think they're afraid of the fact that the Democratic Party would embrace them. They're like, oh, I don't want to be a part of a party that would embrace the gays because, well, what are they going to say about me? It's a little bit like all these red states that are getting all this welfare money from the US government, all this stuff. And they're like, oh, yeah, we hate that stuff because it reveals how much they need it.

12:24David Rothkopf:It reveals their own weaknesses. And, you know, MAGA and the GOP is really about hiding the character flaws and weaknesses and doubts within the people who are its principal spokespeople. I mean, Lindsey Graham. I mean, I don't know. We don't have to say any more. Right. But but but it's true with with all these Ken Paxton. I mean, how do you even pick a guy like that? You know, to be a candidate, his wife divorced him on biblical ground. I don't even know what that is. But, you know, he's obviously, his criminal case was about ripping off his friends. His wife kicked him out because he obviously, you know, was whatever he was doing.

13:17David Rothkopf:It's not in the Bible, whatever he was doing. And yet Trump's like, yeah, that's the man for me. And they're going to lose. Texas is going to go blue. Tallarico is going to be a senator. And part of this is going to bring Donald Trump that much closer to the one thing that he really fears from a Congress. And that's an impeachment that results in a conviction. Because there's no pardoning that. There's no Supreme Court immunity around that. And he knows that he's committed crimes. I completely agree. Speaking of incompetent senators and gender affirming care and freaky Republicans, the senator from my state, whom I refer to as Senator Boosterbox, now has Christy Noem's job, the wife of Big Titty Brian.

14:09I call him Senator Boosterbox. I'm talking about Mark Wayne Mullen. And Mark Wayne Mullen has been in front of congressional hearings, Senate hearings, and they ask him if he will commit to following court orders. And here's what he says. Will you or will you not implement court orders? If we didn't think that if we didn't think courts were politicized, then I would probably be able to answer that. But we see courts over and over again that use their bench for their political opinion, not just the rule of law. And we can see that because we see how many times our... You can choose which court orders you obey based upon whether you believe that point to be politically...

14:51No, no. Don't put words in my mouth.

14:56David Rothkopf:David. Look, first of all, I'm going to get in trouble. If I were in the room with these people, I'm going to smack these people. Every single one of these Trump cabinet secretaries who get in front of these hearings and talk down to the people who are funding them. Now, by the way, I don't think it says a whole lot about them. If I were a Democrat and somebody talked to me that way, I'd be like, okay, that's it. You're not going to get funded. We write the checks. They would do something. It's like Scott Besson today. You know, same kind of thing. There's a hearing and Elizabeth Warren starts saying, well, the president said invest in NVIDIA, and he then invested in NVIDIA and he made a lot of money.

15:42David Rothkopf:Do you think that's a problem? And best it is, get your own house in order. And he's like, you know, talking back to her. But secondly, you know, Mullen, this is one of those questions. They asked another one today to Marco Rubio in a hearing. They said, did Trump win the 2020 election? There ought to be a trap door under these seats. If you can't answer, you know, if you're presented with a simple basic fact and you can't answer it, hit the button, go through the floor into the pit of sharks or whatever it is from the James Bond movie. You know, and the same is true with Mullen. If a court tells you you can't do something, you say we don't do it because that's how the rule of law works in the United States and America.

16:32David Rothkopf:You don't get to choose which judges you think are activists and which judges you think are fair. But this is the whole MAGA approach to these things. And unfortunately, who justifies it the most? The Supreme Court, which yesterday came down the pike with one of the ugliest rulings, allowing Alabama to gerrymander, you know, essentially to take away Black voters' right to express themselves at the ballot box. And they did it in an unsigned shadow docket ruling that goes against all their past rulings. And all I would say to anybody is, you got a minute, go read Sonia Sotomayor's dissent to this thing, because she took them apart, because it is against the rule of law and it is against order in the United States.

17:24David Rothkopf:And she made the case in the clearest, simplest language, short sentences, because what that court is doing is every bit as corrupt and dangerous as what Trump is doing. I completely agree. And the reason why he's governing as though he will as though he will never face accountability is because that they ruled in his favor with the immunity. But I like to diagnose these problems and then talk about how the Democrats, not the do nothing Democrats, but the progressive Democrats can message this. And I just feel like there is a huge messaging opportunity here that the Republicans are pathological liars.

18:03They tell you they are the party of law and order. Yet they pardon all of these January Sixers that then go out and molest and rape little kids. I mean, it just seems like every time I open up my phone, there's some J6ter that.

18:16David Rothkopf:And they just gave one of them a high national security job. Yeah. And when asked about this January 6th slush fund he was going to set up, somebody at the Department of Justice said today, well, we'll find other ways to give them their money. They're not just partnering them. They're paying them. They are paying people for having launched a coup against the United States. And you're absolutely right. Right. You know, we're not speaking in long, difficult words here. These are simple sentences. They are corrupt. They are paying people who launched a coup against the United States. You talk about the Supreme Court.

18:53David Rothkopf:What did we learn last week? Oh, Sam Alito's son got a job at the Treasury Department. And Sam Alito kept ruling on cases in front of the Treasury Department while his son has this kind of do-nothing job because they just wanted to give something else to the Alito family. You know, the best thing that progressive Democrats can do is tell the truth in short sentences that people will understand and just rely on the facts because these guys are corrupt. They're the most corrupt ever. These guys are twisted, and they are twisted in ways that are hurting millions of Americans. They are responsible for millions of deaths overseas, for suffering of tens of millions of people in the United States.

19:45David Rothkopf:They are screwing us 15 ways to Sunday. And you've got to talk about it instead of the do-nothing Democrats whose first response is to say, well, you know, in order to win in November, we've got to meet them halfway. but keep them fucking halfway. These are fascists. What do you want to do? Be a 50 % fascist country? You don't compromise with people who are evil. You don't compromise with people who are doing the wrong thing because that is a victory for evil. And that's the most important thing we can do here. We just got to call out what we see. And you have always been such a great champion of this.

20:27David Rothkopf:Ken Paxton is going to get beaten if we tell the world who Ken Paxton is. If we tell the world that the Republican Party in Texas, moments after he got elected as the candidate, had to take down their own ad saying that crime had risen dramatically in Texas under him. Right. You know, right. You know, I mean, it's all there. We just shouldn't tiptoe around it. I saw today there's a Washington Post story about a couple of centrist dem congressmen who want every Democrat to sign a pledge. I'm a capitalist, not a socialist. Oh, for fuck's sake. Are you serious? I'm serious. Front page of the Washington Post today.

21:10David Rothkopf:And it's like, are you fucking kidding me? You know, they want to wage a war on the progressive wing of the Democratic Party when you have the most corrupt president in history destroying the rule of law in the United States, undermining our institutions, destroying our alliances around the world, waging illegal wars, inviting pandemics to pop up again and spread and kill millions of people because they don't believe in science. and they want to go after AOC or Mom Donnie because he thinks that people ought to have health care or they ought to have free education. Holy shit. Well, we need to let the world know these people are MAGA with a D by their name, and they are fascist collaborators, if not full-blown fascists themselves.

22:03But you spoke about Texas, and I worry about the elections in these red states. I worry about the secretaries of state, attorney general, governor in a Texas because these people are so obsequious to Donald Trump. They will do anything to service him. And this appointment, this recent appointment of D &I to replace Tulsi Gabbard is really concerning to me as it relates to election integrity. Pop this up. A democracy docket says Trump tapped loyalist Bill Pulte, a top housing official to serve as the acting director of national intelligence. He has no experience. He's basically a Trump ass kisser.

22:48I mean, worse than all of the people that are already seated at the table. And Senator Mark Warner, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the appointment sharpened his worry that Trump and his allies will try to steal or subvert the midterm elections. David.

23:07David Rothkopf:Absolutely right. First of all, the job of director of national intelligence is one of few jobs where it explicitly calls for a certain kind of experience for somebody to have the job. It explicitly says in the description of the job, to get confirmed for this job, you've got to have intelligence experience. This guy has none. But Trump's done this workaround where he goes and becomes an acting director of national intelligence. And so then you have to say, well, why would you give the job to somebody who has no intelligence experience? And there are only a couple of reasons. One would be to make the United States a greater risk and to help our enemies, including Trump's sponsor, Vladimir Putin.

23:46David Rothkopf:But let's set that aside for a second. He is definitely putting the U.S. at risk by neutering the intelligence community in the way that it does by putting somebody brain dead and inexperienced on top of it. But you have to ask, why would Trump do that? And the answer is, well, if your mission is to advance intelligence gathering and do intelligence analysis, well, then, of course, you hire somebody with experience in that area. But if your mission is to stay in office and protect yourself against enemies who want to prosecute you for crimes that you actually committed, then you hire somebody who's willing to use the intelligence community to commit dirty tricks or to undermine the credibility of elections.

24:37David Rothkopf:And we recall among the last things we saw Tulsi Gabbard do was go to Atlanta, Georgia and participate in this bizarre effort to try to gather up voter rolls there. And the answer, the question is, why was she there? And the answer is because there was this theory that other intelligence groups had somehow grabbed our voter rolls and were manipulating election results. It's completely unfounded. But by going there, she could say, well, we were looking into that. And it calls into question the results of the elections. And what you know is this. Bill Pulte knows nothing about intelligence. But if Trump says, destroy files that are bad about me, he'll do it.

25:25David Rothkopf:And if Trump says, give me files that cast doubt about some of my enemies, he will do it. And if Trump says, I want a credible argument that foreign powers are trying to put their thumb on the scale so I don't win, show me how the Iranians are beating Republicans in the November election, Bill Pulte is going to come up with some kind of bullshit because he doesn't care about the law because he knows Donald Trump will pardon him. He knows that's It's part of the deal in this, this, these guys. And Trump's like, do what I say. You'll get rich later on. And in the meantime, I will ensure that you never run afoul of the law, even if all you do is break it.

26:10David Rothkopf:And that's, that's where we are with, with, with acting director of national intelligence, Bill Pulte. God, it's so painful because you're so spot on. All right. Shifting gears slightly. Trump and Netanyahu and Iran and Lebanon and all this shit. Let me play this video for you of Trump. Play the clip. Tim, you said, are you effing crazy? What are you effing doing? I helped you stay out of jail. Is that true? Did you speak to him in those terms? I did. I wouldn't say angry. I was a little bit perturbed at his constantly fighting with Lebanon. And, you know, at some point, I said, maybe we got to stop this.