☕️ SEMI TRANSPARENT ☙ Tuesday, July 8, 2025 ☙ C&C NEWS 🦠

A breaking news C&C Special Edition: the White House confirmed the DOJ's "Cased Closed" memo is real. But nobody else is talking. Amidst the uproar of hot takes, what does it all mean?

Good morning, C&C, it’s Tuesday! Once again, our regular news cycle has been abruptly co-opted by yesterday’s confirmation that the strange, unsigned, undated DOJ memo was somehow real. Without any official comment from the involved parties, we remain in the hot takes phase; but this particular issue, which threatens to tear the MAGA coalition apart, requires immediate attention. A special Epstein memo edition.

🌍 WORLD NEWS AND COMMENTARY 🌍

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Yesterday around noon EST, White House Spokeslady Karoline Leavitt confirmed the weird DOJ memo was real. Later, the Washington Post ran a story headlined, “Justice Department says no ‘client list’ exists in Epstein sex-trafficking files.” You have to admit they picked a pretty funny cover photo for the story:

CLIP: Press Sec Leavitt —crossless— explains away Bondi’s “client list” comment (1:25).

I doubt Pam is smiling much this morning. Furious conservatives are rhetorically tearing her a new digestive orifice in an inconvenient spot. “Pam Bondi looked the American people in the eye and said she had Jeffrey Epstein’s list. Now she says there never was a list,” conservative radio host Erick Erickson said on Twitter yesterday. “Pam Bondi should be fired for lying to the American public repeatedly.”

She’s one step away from being compared to Hitler— or even that cockroach, Fauci.

Ms. Leavitt, indulging in Orwellian Washingtonian doublespeak (rare for her) (1:55), mostly just regurgitated meaningless talking points from the memo itself. She did not explain why the memo was leaked to Axios instead of being published to the DOJ website. She did not explain why the memo looks different from normal DOJ memos,* or why it was undated and unsigned, and didn’t even include a contact name for press inquiries. (* E.g., DOJ doesn’t usually include hyperlinks in the text, but puts them in footnotes).

It's a ghost memo! Maybe Casper wrote it.

But wait— it gets crazier. To set the table, can we all just agree this is a major story? Ugh, I hate to do this to everyone, but let’s first examine how WaPo handled it.

🔥 Despite repeatedly referring to the strange DOJ memo and quoting it extensively, WaPo never linked to the source document. Where is it? Outer space? The Dark Web? Biden’s garage? That’s not a joke; can it be found anywhere on the DOJ’s website?

Next, what hellish office did the foul missive issue from? There’s no quote from any DOJ spokesperson confirming who wrote the memo or even which agency. The paper didn’t even say —get this— when (what date) it actually issued. It leaned into the passive voice so hard it would make my old grammar teacher blanche in horror: “the memo was released.” By whom, idiots?

It makes my brain hurt. Hello, WaPo— remember the fundamentals? Who, what, when, where why? Journalism 101, first day.

WaPo treated the memo as if it fell out of a random chemtrail into Axios’s lap in a pool of blue water. Oh well, it’s just unverifiable. What can they do? Well, they could have asked Pam. But the story never quoted the Attorney General a single time. Bondi, despite being the center of the controversy, said nothing in her own voice or even through a DOJ spokesman.

Why hang poor Leavitt, the White House press secretary, with this? She speaks for the Oval Office, not the DOJ.

More than 25% of WaPo’s article was devoted, not to the memo or the response, but to attacking critics as “right-wing pundits,” “conspiracy theorists,” and “Trump supporters.” It was unremarkable narrative framing, but notably, the paper spent more time discrediting doubters than explaining the memo’s findings or the actual news.

That’s a diversion tactic. Talk about who is angry, not why they’re angry.

Tellingly, WaPo never, not once, mentioned a single disputed fact that riles the critics. There are so many facts, but how about the dozens of accusers, some of whom testified under oath that powerful men were involved? Or the conflicting autopsy findings, including Epstein’s broken hyoid bone? (In forensic pathology, a fractured hyoid bone is strongly associated with manual strangulation.) Or the sleepy guards, the broken cameras, the inexplicable decision to pull Epstein off the suicide watch right before he self-deleted, and on, and on, and on.

Not credible evidence

None of those ill-fitting facts interested the paper whose slogan is: Democracy Dies in Darkness.

The article quoted Karoline Leavitt, who said that, when Bondi told Fox the “client list was on her desk,” she was just referring to “the entirety of all the paperwork.” That’s a silly stealth retraction, couched as a clarification, without directly confronting the contradiction. And it’s not very persuasive. People can listen for themselves; Bondi’s original comment (linked in yesterday’s post) is widely available.

Now. How about this so-called ‘memo?’

🔥 I suppose we can understand why the memo was unsigned. Nobody wanted their name attached to this monstrosity. But they didn’t attach any facts to it, either. The memo sanctimoniously opens with “As part of our commitment to transparency…” and then immediately descends into murky bureaucratese, as if transparency means burying the lede under six feet of institutional disclaimers, passive voice, and privacy hedging. It’s like saying “I promise to be honest” and then handing you a 12-page EULA written in ancient Hebrew.

The memo, which begins with a smug “commitment to transparency,” proceeds to ignore every single inconsistency that fuels public doubt. Not just the conspiracy theories, but the hard, forensic, undisputed facts. If DOJ has, in fact, “fully reviewed” the file, then where are the satisfying answers? Instead, the memo scoldingly advised, “Perpetuating unfounded theories about Epstein serves neither to combat child exploitation or bring justice to victims.”

Unfounded? Is that a joke? Multi-volume books have been written about Epstein. (See, e.g., Whitney Webb.) Are we supposed to be satisfied with one-and-a-half pages of conclusory dismissal? Trust us, we looked into everything.

Not credible evidence

The memo’s language is classic lawyer double-talk: “There was also no credible evidence found that Epstein blackmailed prominent individuals as part of his actions,” the memo stated. Not no evidence. Just no credible evidence. Light years lie between those two statements. It doesn’t deny that blackmail occurred. It just asserted that, in the subjective view of someone, the evidence wasn’t credible. But who? Who decided the blackmail evidence didn’t meet the credibility threshold?

Don’t hold your breath waiting for expanded answers. “It is the determination of the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation that no further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted,” the memo stated coldly. But “appropriate” and “warranted” are not legal standards. They are subjective vibes disguised as policy. The memo cited no statutes, no FOIA exemptions, no specific risks. Just vague hand waving at prosecutorial discretion, with all accountability diffused across two massive agencies.

But … we live in a time of social media. What do the parties themselves say? So far— bupkis.

🔥 Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel, and Deputy Director Dan Bongino —who each manufactured careers riding Epstein skepticism— are not normally shy about posting their thoughts on social media. They’re social media power users, professional communicators, and online fire-breathers. But guess what they’ve said about this mega-blockbuster development?

Bondi’s last post was four days ago, a generic Independence Day puff-tweet. Same with Kash Patel. Bongino last posted on July 6th about a dumb NY Times hit piece, but then silence (except for re-tweets about unrelated stuff). It feels coordinated. Are they under a gag order? Did they all agree to wait for the flames to die down before commenting? Surely they know this is indefensible. Parroting bureaucratic boilerplate won’t cut it this time.

Is a rebellion unfolding inside the Trump Administration? Are Patel, Bondi, and Bongino refusing to comment?

One can almost feel sympathy for the trio of new law enforcers, each brought in with reputations as truth-tellers, fighters, and narrative-breakers. Now they’re being asked to stand silently behind a curt, faceless, undated, intellectually calorie-free memo that waves away the entire Epstein saga with lawyerly euphemisms and without a single name attached.

President Trump has also refrained from mentioning the growing scandal. But yesterday, he posted this clever bit of distraction sort of defending his officials:

He probably shouldn’t have included “politics” and “corrupt leadership.” The comments were lit. The best interpretation is not just backlash, but a five-alarm credibility wildfire raging within the MAGA base, threatening to spread into a new political insurrection.

So what, at this early stage, before any of the involved parties have yet weighed in, can we make of this atrocious situation?

🔥 This is not the end of the Epstein saga— it is merely the beginning of its next, more dangerous chapter. Let’s indulge in some exceptional hot-taking, and try to build a brief outline of the plausible scenarios that could explain what we’re seeing, starting from the most benign and working toward the most politically explosive.

Possibility 1: There Really Is No Credible Evidence

To be clear, I do not believe this. But we should acknowledge the slim theoretical possibility that Epstein did not kill himself, and that the DOJ never recovered solid evidence of the blackmail operations because it never happened. It would require concluding all the whistleblowing victims are liars, each and every one, but still. Maybe Epstein’s sprawling network of planes, properties, private islands, surveillance equipment, and well-connected “guests” was, somehow, innocuous. It’s possible. I suppose.

Instead of a lone gunman, Epstein was a lone pervert.

No credible evidence

Maybe Epstein really was just doing all his ‘friends’ generous favors by flying them around and nothing happened except Epstein’s own dalliances. Maybe his fixer, Ghislaine Maxwell, convicted of sex trafficking, ran the operation to satisfy Epstein’s voracious appetites and not those of his pals, ‘investment clients,’ and bankster donors. Perhaps he hired all those teenage girls because he was frugal about paying wages.

Probability: 0.5%. (Rounded up from a tiny number with so many zeroes it takes too long to type.)

Possibility 2: Somebody Got to Them

Bondi, Patel, and Bongino have all repeatedly sworn that there was a blackmailing operation and that Epstein’s suicide stunk to high heaven. But once they finally clawed their way inside the marble halls of power, they may have been co-opted by irresistible forces and even their own oaths.

On this blog, I have predicted before (and I still believe), that we will never see the client list. It would take a miracle of unimaginable proportions. The list is too explosive, too politically damaging, and too valuable to just toss it out for public consumption. If, as many believe, it implicates powerful top political figures —including the Royal Family and Israeli power-brokers— including here in the U.S., it could conceivably destabilize many or most Western governments.

No credible evidence

In other words, disclosure could, in fact, be a legitimate national security issue. And we know by evidence that American intelligence agencies submerge morality far below national security, seemingly every single time. The same agencies that ran MKUltra, lied about WMDs, covered up torture programs, and claimed Hunter Biden’s laptop was Russian disinformation would absolutely seal the Epstein file in the name of “strategic stability.”

Having sworn to uphold the United States against all enemies, Bondi, Bongino and Patel may be bound to cooperate in the lie, however personally distasteful. Or, they might face certain and imminent threats that they and/or their families will be instantly murdered if they take a single step toward breaking ranks. Or both.

They may have been reassured that the government would commit every available resource to rounding up the “real” perverts, like the ‘764’ freaks that convince unstable kids online to self-delete. That jailing tens of thousands of baby-raping pedophiles would legitimately offset freeing a few aging billionaires who committed a handful of ‘statutory’ and ‘nonviolent’ crimes with semi-consenting 17-year-olds over international waters.

No credible evidence

In this scenario, Bondi, Patel, and Bongino may have been hauled into the inner sanctum, and shown the full picture —intel, classified ops, blackmail counterplays, international leverage— and convinced (or coerced) to take the “higher view.” It’s the cost-benefit argument from hell:

Look, the public wouldn’t understand. They want drama and televised arrests. But we’re doing the work— the real work. And if you go off-script, you destroy it all. Think of the greater good.

This kind of insidious moral compromise, coupled with realistic threats of personal harm, is exactly how the deep state works.

Probability: 25%.

Possibility 3: Trump is Working a Bigger Play

In this scenario, the bizarre memo might resemble the earlier Epstein binders. It could be a feint, a trade, or a tool that President Trump is using to achieve something else that justifies the cost.

Remember, Epstein was arrested during Trump 1.0. Trump didn’t like what was happening; he clearly put the kibosh on the deep state’s flying brothel of horrors. And though he lacked full control of the #Resisting government, his DOJ was in a position to hoover up every file, hard drive, photo, logbook, and blackmail tape before the story got memory-holed.

Trump may have found himself in possession of a treasure trove of global leverage. Not just over domestic swamp creatures, but royals, technocrats, intel assets, bankers, and foreign politicians. You can imagine the advice he’d have gotten.

Imagine what you might do with all that power.

Maybe Epstein’s death wasn’t about hiding secrets. Maybe it was about ending the operation permanently— like Old West justice in a designer prison jumpsuit. A clear message to anyone thinking about reviving the network.

In this scenario, Trump Always Wins isn’t just a meme. Maybe Trump isn’t always winning because he plays 4-D chess better than his deep state enemies. Maybe he’s successfully draining the Swamp and corralling the European Union because he holds all the trump cards. And maybe this memo release is part of a grand chess move in the bigger Epstein game. Maybe he made some kind of massive deal, and his part of the bargain was to publicly end any further investigation.

CLIP: Theories about Trump using Epstein blackmail evidence (3:42).

Is it the Art of the Deal? Maybe it was something as simple as this:

Whether this scenario comforts or horrifies you depends entirely on how much you trust Trump’s motives and judgment. If the truth were ever revealed —if we could see the full board, the pieces in motion, the stakes— we might even agree the trade was worth it. Or maybe we’d conclude the price was too high.

Because this is Trump we’re talking about, and he never plays just one game at a time or does anything without a reason:

Probability: 35%.

Possibility 4: We Have No Idea What We’re Talking About

As bizarre, backward, and politically self-wounding as this DOJ memo seems, we must —however begrudgingly— admit the most likely possibility is that we simply don’t have enough information yet. None of the principals —not Bondi, not Bongino, not Patel, not Trump himself— has uttered a single direct word about the memo.

That silence could signal guilt, disagreement, complicity, or collapse. Or it could signal that something else is going on— something we can’t yet see. Maybe it isn’t a betrayal. Maybe it’s a staging maneuver. Maybe it’s a disaster unfolding in slow motion. We just don’t know.

Epstein is undoubtedly one of the most important stories of our generation. It’s the Rosetta Stone of elite corruption— a case intersecting nearly every electrified rail of conservative, populist, and justified MAGA distrust: globalist depravity, the deep state’s immunity, two-tiered justice, media collusion, basic right and wrong, and child exploitation— and the sickening sense that the worst people in the world are the ones setting the rules.

And all of that is even without dipping into the feverish realms of the Clinton-Obama-Podesta pedophile conspiracy swamps.

It all converges on one name: Epstein.

So why would Trump —who started the Epstein ball unwinding in the first place— now torch it all without a very good reason? When something makes zero political sense, we should probably assume we’re missing the play. I cannot believe the Trump Administration is “in on it.” But even if they are, this is still an unaccountably inelegant way of landing Epstein’s political plane.

Probability: 50%.

No credible evidence

🔥 At this early date, we remain mired in the Epstein fog of war. Whatever this memo is —a brush-off, a signal, a smokescreen, or a sacrificial play— one thing is already clear: it hasn’t settled anything. It didn’t calm the waters; it launched a turbo hurricane of backlash. It didn’t silence the critics; it handed them fresh artillery. It didn’t rebuild trust; it cracked the foundation before the concrete was even dry.

If anything, the developing story confirms that the Epstein scandal still has a beating heart, buried under layers of sealed files, vanished tapes, shattered bones, and public betrayal. The memo appears to be trying to close the book, but it only turned the page— to a darker chapter, a page written in passive voice and printed with disappearing ink.

It won’t work. They know it. And we know they know. So we’ll wait, impatiently, with terrific anticipation, because something else is coming.

Have a terrific Tuesday! Tomorrow we’ll get back to a whole slate of encouraging news and an Epstein update, in case anyone starts talking. Bring your mugs back for a refill of essential news and commentary.

Don’t race off! We cannot do it alone. Consider joining up with C&C to help move the nation’s needle and change minds. I could sure use your help getting the truth out and spreading optimism and hope, if you can: ☕ Learn How to Get Involved 🦠

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