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- [00:00]
A
I think he's going to fire Marco Rubio. I mean, Rubio has now become the standout figure in this administration. When you become the contrast gainer against Donald Trump, you're finished. When it begins to look like you are the person who is really in charge, you're done. You cannot do this around Donald Trump and he just won't let you. He'll kill you, Just chop off your head. Hi, I'm Michael Wolf. Where I'm here with Hugh Docherty. Joanna Coles is, I think, as most of you know, in the uk, in Yorkshire, dealing with her ailing mother. So Hugh is filling in today and Hugh has just returned from the UK where so handicap the Prime Minister. How long does he have? Does he have any time left at all?
- [01:09]
B
I think very little. I think he's probably still Prime Minister while people are listening to this, but not for very much longer. Many of his ministers are resigning and urging him to go. So there will be some sort of reckoning, I think, within the next few days.
- [01:29]
A
And so a few days, 24 hours, 72 hours, 48 hours. What do you think?
- [01:36]
B
I would go for 78 hours. But don't go down Polymarket yet. 72 hours. His rival, Andy Burnham has been spotted on a train. A moment like Lenin in 1917
- [01:52]
A
from the Finland Station. So in other words. But let's get. I want to pin you down on this. He's done.
- [02:01]
B
Oh, I don't think there's any doubt now. Over. He is toast. Put a fork in him. It's only a matter of the exact timing.
- [02:09]
A
If Keir Starmer is about to go, I have a theory on whose neck is also on the block. Oh, I think. And there's been a lot of talk recently about who does Trump favor, Marco Rubio or J.D. vance for the Republican nomination in 2028? I think he calls them the kids or something and he's playing them off against one another.
- [02:44]
B
On Monday night at the White House, he asked the audience who did they prefer and was going by a sort of volume test.
- [02:53]
A
Yeah, no. You know, so here is. So I have watched Trump operate now for way, way too long. Ten years in which Donald Trump has dominated my life. And I think that I've gotten pretty good at. Because he does the same thing over and over and over again. Pretty good at being able to chart the Donald Trump course. I think he's going to fire Marco Rubio. I mean, Rubio has now become the standout figure in this administration. I mean, this is against a lineup of what do we call these people the sycophants in no accounts trunks. And I mean every.
- [03:44]
B
You had the worst word on your
- [03:45]
A
Instagram, Aslix and as licks. Oh, my God. Of course, you have to be an ass lick. And leaving only Marco Rubio, and it doesn't really matter what you think of his politics, leaving him as the only guy who seems to show up for work every day and to sit down at a desk and. And to be capable of addressing what's on his desk at any given time. And that's now actually spread as a kind of meme of Marco Rubio taking all jobs in this administration.
- [04:24]
B
We've all seen the memes. There's even a meme, I should say, that was circulating in the UK of Marco Rubio becoming the British Prime Minister. That's how well known this meme is, that it has crossed oceans.
- [04:37]
A
Okay, this is fatal in Trump world. This is absolutely fatal. When you become the contrast gainer against Donald Trump, you're finished. When it begins to look like you are the person who is really in charge, you're done. I remember in the first administration when Steve Bannon appeared on the COVID of Time magazine. President Bannon, or was it Trump's brain? At any rate, the message was clear and at that moment, and even Bannon recognized at that moment that his fate was real.
- [05:27]
B
And Bannon you obviously know far better than I do. But Bannon had really.
- [05:30]
A
I know him far better than everybody.
- [05:32]
B
Well, that's. Is that a boast?
- [05:35]
A
You're. It's, you know, just part of my circle of the people. So somehow I have come to know, for better or worse.
- [05:44]
B
Bannon had tried to stay behind the scenes quite effectively for a while, hadn't he? He'd been reluctant about posing for photos. He hadn't really gone down that road. But the opposite here, the opposite with Rubio. He's deejaying, he's doing the questions at the podium. He's everywhere.
- [06:04]
A
No. And you cannot do this around Donald Trump. He just won't let you. He'll kill you, Just chop off your head. So the fact that Rubio has put himself out there as the guy in charge, President Rubio is so I've.
- [06:23]
B
I handicapped Starmer, and I'll stand by 72 hours.
- [06:28]
A
Can you handicap this? Because we're in a little softer situation. Four months.
- [06:33]
B
Four months. Four months would take us right up to the midterms.
- [06:40]
A
You know, I think we will see a lot of action just before the midterms because they're going to be panicked and so it is going to beand. He is not going to want if theytwo things, he's not going to. If they do well in the midterms, he doesn't want anyone else to claim credit for that. And prior to the midterms, in trying to improve their position, he's going to make changes, he's going to do things, he's going to look to change the subject, and Marco Rubio is going to get his head chopped off with a
- [07:17]
B
new meme of Marco without a head on the White House sofa. You saw it here first.
- [07:23]
A
Yeah.
- [07:25]
C
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- [08:33]
B
Marco Rubio is supposed to be in charge of foreign and foreign policy, national security policy. So that's all about one thing, really, isn't it?
- [08:41]
A
Yeah, no, and it's, you know, we are. He's going to blame. Marco Rubio is going to be blamed for Iran. Absolutely. I mean, the real reason is that Marco Rubio is upstaging Donald Trump. But the pretext will be Iran, where they're going to need somebody. Somebody's going to have to take the blame for. For Iran. It's not going to be Donald Trump who deserves the blame. And let's come back because we're at this really interesting moment in the Iranian. Do we call it diplomacy in the war? Let's just. We're at war with this, with the Iranians.
- [09:26]
B
We're also at war with the meaning of war.
- [09:30]
A
So the Iranians came back the other day with, with a negotiating position, which was a straightforward. Here's a mud in your eye. I mean, essentially, they said to Donald TrumpRemember. And Donald Trump has now has brought us to the point of the Iranians have to capitulate because they have been obliterated, because they have nothing left, because we have all of the power. And they came back and they essentially said, you know, yes, we'll come to a peace agreement with you if you give us literally everything we want. So nothing. And so Donald Trump, I mean, it's essentially, essentially they've reversed the roles here. They are in the Trumpian role completely. They feel they have the freedom and the ability and are happy in the arrogance to be absolutely unreasonable.
- [10:38]
B
It might be worth saying. We got figures. We were recording this on Tuesday morning, and there were devastating figures this morning about inflation, that the consumer price index has hit 3.8%. That's greater than the average wage gains. So people are absolutely not feeling as well off. And that's all because of one thing, the price of fuel.
- [11:00]
A
No, I mean, the inflation is a key measure. Donald Trump became the president in 2024 largely because of inflation. That was the issue. So we are back again. And the Iranians understand. The Iranians understand how much pressure Donald Trump is under. The corner that he is in and largely the corner that he's in. Inwell. Actually, you can go down the list of things from the basic health of the economy to the cruelty, the ice cruelty, to almost every aspect of the issues in front of this administration. But of course, the war, the war is of his own making. And you can go back and look at this and just everything is a blunder. His failure to consult, his failure to appreciate that the Strait of Hormuz was a strangle point which the Iranians could grasp. His failure to understand that the nature of warfare, the post Ukraine warfare, had profoundly changed. His failure to understand just about everything, which has put him into a near mortal corner in this war. He can't get out of it. He can't find his way out of it.
- [12:39]
B
Amazingly, it seems the Iranians have an absolute understanding of each aspect of this. I mean, they are literally. Well, they're in there. They're inside his head. They seem to have realized his weaknesses in a way that opponents have rarely been able to get a bead on Trump like that.
- [12:59]
A
Yeah, you know, I'm not sure. And, you know, one of the things that a lot of people and a lot of people in business in New York and the real estate world have always talked about is that Trump is easy to read because he does the same thing over and over again. Because. Because his insecurities and weaknesses are. So he wears them on his sleeve. And also because in a fundamental flaw, and it still remains one of his fundamental flaws, he doesn't or cannot pay attention to the details. And obviously the Iranians, because it is life or death for them and actually it has been the death for many of them. It all depends upon the details. They are reading this. He is incapable of reading it.
- [13:51]
B
And he should have advice from Marco Rubio, you would think. But is he listening? Is he.
- [13:59]
A
Well, no. I mean, as we've discussed so many times, he doesn't listen to advice. I mean, that is the other thing. He is incapable of listening to advice. I mean, he is incapable, we don't have to go that far. He is incapable of listening, period.
- [14:16]
B
But you've discussed this many times. Of course, many times.
- [14:19]
A
No, I mean, it is one of the overt and shocking things about Donald Trump which anyone who has ever spent any time with him not only appreciates but finds it, you know, just a jaw dropping circumstance that he never, ever, ever shuts up.
- [14:44]
B
There's also this point about inflation and cost of living and its ability to hurt him. There are some psychologically hurting figures in these new CPI figures and one of them is that tomatoes of all things are up 40%, which is kind of like the egg figure that he rode so effectively. But it seems like, and in this case it's because, partly because of bad weather, but partly because of tariffs.
- [15:13]
A
Yeah, well, you know, I mean, I think what everyone finds, and that's the affordability issue, is that everything is up. I mean, that it costs one's to live. One's life is significantly more expensive than it has been. And there is the sense that it gets more and more expensive. This is not the, I mean, this is, if you're in charge, this becomes a mortal aspect of your ability to continue to stay in charge. And it's a Keir Starmer, I mean, it's one of the things that he is running against and it's almost this broader thing which, which gets into, okay, this is a moment of populism. Yes, yes, yes. And that's certainly true. But there is this other thing and it's a structural thing that all of these issues that face postmodern industrial societies are really hard to fix.
- [16:27]
B
Right.
- [16:27]
A
So if you become the guy, the point guy, Starmer or Trump or Biden before that, you're going to get the wrath of people who say you're not solving these problems, especially if they voted for you, especially. And we can have some, I mean, I Hate to have sympathy for Donald Trump, but we can have some sympathy for the fact that these problems really are hard to solve. They may not be problems that that can be solved. So therefore somebody has somebody, nevertheless, somebody is going to have to pay for them.
- [17:03]
B
Joanna is going to be watching this, saying, hold on, I go away for half an hour and already we're expressing sympathy for Donald Trump. Only by mistake. Only a tiny bit. Only a tiny bit.
- [17:14]
A
You know, I mean, it's an interesting thing. If there were a politician who could somehow explain this, who could say, yes, I'm in charge, but, you know, this is the limits of what can be done here. Having said that, you got to do something.
- [17:33]
B
Yes, but we are in fact going to see Trump meeting a politician later this week who is somewhat unconstrained by elections and somewhat unconstrained by the need for popular support. Because he's going to China.
- [17:51]
A
Yes. And he is going to meet with the premier. You know, I remember in the early in the first administration, there was getting Trump to say the name Xi was impossible. I mean, it wasi mean, there were weeks spent on this Xi Xi, and they couldn't get him. I mean, it was, this is. Say it like the pronoun she.
- [18:28]
B
He doesn't believe in pronouns, famously,
- [18:32]
A
but
- [18:32]
B
he's conquered that difficulty.
- [18:34]
A
But let's bring this back to the. Because I think this is an important moment because part of the Trump rise to power, the first Trump administration, this Trump administration, a central theme has been to deal with the China issue. China gutted the American heartland. The industrial landscape, China became rich. The Chinese became richer as the Americans became poorer. That had to be addressed. We didn't trust the Chinese. The Chinese were using all of the tools at their disposal, essentially state sponsored capitalism, which is an odd term, but that's basically what it was. The Chinese would subsidize their industries at the expense of, of the US Industry and of the Europeans also. That had to be stopped. There would be no growth in the United States, no real growth, especially for the Trump base, the working man, the US Working man, unless China were stopped. Unless we could have, that would be the only way we would have a chance at any kind of reindustrialization. Now, in the course of this, this is the first Trump administration, we're now coming to the end of the first half of the second administration. The theme, there's the Trump theme of wanting to stop the Chinese, but the actual theme is that the Chinese, their power and influence and, and wealth has only expanded. So on that count, Trump has failed at every point.
- [20:44]
B
So he hasn't been to China in 10 years. It's almost 10 years, I should say, since he was last in China. And as you rightly say, Michael, China's got more powerful, China has got richer. What is he going to. What is he going for? What's in his mind about what this trip is about? Because we haven't really heard an explanation or a speech or a position or the traditional ways in which people might communicate. We haven't heard.
- [21:17]
A
Why is he going?
- [21:18]
B
Well, there's.
- [21:18]
A
Yeah, I mean, there's a couple of things. First, there is, as with all things, the distraction. And he's going to go to China and he's going to be fighting feeded in all kinds of ways, and they're going to lay on a big spread and big parades and he loves the parades. And that will play to not only his vanity, but to taking up media time and media space. So pay no attention to Iran or inflation or, or dare I say anything else. So that's one part of it then. The other part of it is Trump. I can make a deal. I can always make a good deal. I'm the deal guy. You know, again, that's that other thing. It's kind of like his marriage. I'm married to the most beautiful woman, although we don't live together, we don't speak, and she clearly hates me. And the deal stuff is sort of like that. It's a complete invented myth, you know, and even in the Trump mythology or the reverse mythology, that anyone who is familiar with what he did when he ran the Trump Organization is that someone else always did the deals. I mean, he couldn't do the deals. He has. You know, the thing about doing deals is that you really do have to pay attention to the details, right?
- [22:56]
B
All of it. Detail,
- [22:59]
A
which he never does. So there's enormous worry. He's going to China and he's going. And by the way, he has come to believe it's not as if he says, I really can't do the deals on somebody else. He really thinks he can do the deals. So there's an enormous fear that he's going to China and he's going to give away the store. And part of that is that he has this idea of bringing Chinese investment into the US and. Notably, this is how China has expanded its influence around the world.
- [23:42]
B
This is kind of like the Belt and Road initiative that they have this idea of. They go in, they invest, and essentially, therefore, those things are pretty close to being Chinese properties.
- [23:53]
A
So he is talking about bringing in like a trillion dollars in Chinese investment.
- [23:58]
B
That's his number now is a trillion.
- [24:00]
A
Right.
- [24:00]
B
It used to be it was a million, then it was a billion, now it's a trillion.
- [24:04]
A
Yeah, no, I'm sure he's going to sue me for a trillion dollars soon.
- [24:08]
B
Look for.
- [24:11]
A
So that's what he's going to do. That's going to be his big announcement, the big takeaway. I got China to give us all this money when it's not China giving us all this money, it's China buying America, basically.
- [24:28]
B
And he's already had warnings about this even from his own, roughly speaking, his own side. Laura Ingraham, who is on, you know, is a pro Trump voice on Fox to some extent, but really a kind of traditional, I think you've pointed out before, more of a voice of what Rupert is saying.
- [24:48]
A
Yeah, no, no, Laura would be Rupert's voice.
- [24:51]
B
Yes, yes, she has been. She was using her platform to say this seems like a mistake.
- [24:56]
A
Yeah. And Rupert would be, you know, would be one of those, those old. Actually he's in trouble on two fronts here, both from traditional Republicans and from MAGA Republicans on this. I mean, this is going to be what comes out of this is going to be, this will be one of the pivotal issues to look at the Republican of how the Republican Party, both the center and the right, how they respond to this because they're both united in China is the bad guy. And he's going to come out of this and say China is the good guy, they're our partner now.
- [25:48]
B
And he previously, he publicly sucked up to Xi. He's a great guy. He's a genius. Presumably from xi's point of view, this is the situation you want. Right. Somebody completely wants to make a deal with you and says nice things about you before you go in there.
- [26:08]
A
I mean, so you have both the Iranians and the Chinese trying to deal, who are effectively dealing with Trump from a position of strength rather than weakness, which is a total reversal and a
- [26:24]
B
reversal of 80 years of American foreign policy as well, obviously.
- [26:28]
A
Yeah, no, and it goes to this other thing. What is Trump doing making foreign policy? This is the person you've elected. To do a vital job which he has no capacity to do and which
- [26:48]
B
those people are well aware of as well.
- [26:51]
A
And it's this other thing. We get to the come back to the Keir Starmer problem. All of these people in power don't have the ability to make the dramatic changes that people want. So therefore, we elect people who promise dramatic changes because. But they promise dramatic changes because they can't fully appreciate or they're flim flam people that it's impossible to make dramatic changes. Therefore, they get elected and Nigel Farage will probably become the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. InI mean he'll get his shot at this. And likewise Donald Trump, who are not people capable of doing the, of attending to the fundamental details of government, the kind of details that hold things together.
- [27:56]
B
Well, we're going to see in a couple of days, but I wanted to talk to you as well.
- [28:00]
A
You don't think Nigel Farage is going to become the Prime Minister?
- [28:03]
B
I would actually handicap Nigel Farage as not becoming Prime Minister. I think he is too closely associated with Trump and that the center left consensus in the UK is or the country has a broader center left consensus than the US does. So I think, my guess is that it would be difficult for him to get enough support to be Prime Minister.
- [28:32]
A
And just to point out to the American audience that Nigel Farage's Reform Party just. They smacked everybody, everybody else.
- [28:42]
B
They're the single most popular party and they just picked up a lot of local elections. The UK doesn't have states, but it does have local authorities. They call them councils and they picked
- [28:54]
A
up sort of like the midterms.
- [28:57]
B
It's kind of a midterms. And they did very well. I think if I'm from what I people were talking about and I should say I spent some time in Scotland, where I am from, which has its own internal politics about breaking up with the UK or not. But I think Nigel Farage has a ceiling and the way that the UK electoral system works, that ceiling might actually be too low for him to get into. Number 10 Downing street, the home of the UK's Prime Ministers.
- [29:30]
A
I've been listening to this for a long time now, essentially 10 years that Nigel Farage was. Had reached his ceiling. You may be right, but I'm.
- [29:42]
B
I don't think he's even reached the ceiling yet. I think he's got more to go, but I think that there might just be enough tactical voting and a combination of the sort of intricacies of the electoral system that could keep him out. But I could be wrong.
- [29:57]
A
No, and just turn to the. Nigel Farage like, like Donald Trump is not someone who has any evident ability or any interest in managing the details of government.
- [30:16]
B
Absolutely. Absolutely. Exactly the same characteristics.
- [30:20]
A
So in China, what you go to China, I mean, this is a very technical, it's a very technical process on how you produce an Advantage and don't incur a disadvantage in this negotiation. I mean it's like any negotiations. It's like a business negotiation which Donald Trump is supposed to be expert on, which he is a complete just a. Has always been, has been unable to sit in the chair long enough to complete a deal.
- [30:59]
B
And he's going to be up against in China. It's worth pointing out somebody who has made himself leader for life. So in theory has infinite time or something close to infinite time. And the same trade negotiator has been doing the trade negotiations for China leading their delegation for the last decade.
- [31:17]
A
No, absolutely. Have come the scene around Trump will be. I mean there are America. I mean he's gone over number first thing with a whole parcel of business guys. What's that about? I don't know.
- [31:29]
B
Emotional support, CEOs
- [31:33]
A
and then there will be professionals in the room with him. But he undermines these people at every point. I mean he is never. It's not as though Donald Trump is on the same page as his team. It's the team and it's Donald Trump and then it will be and then it is about Donald Trump's vanity, Donald Trump's ego. Donald Trump' swhatever came into Donald Trump's mind at any given point.
- [32:01]
B
I assume he's going to his phone with them. We would think being truthing relentlessly. And when you go to China and I've never been to China. You've been to China, Michael.
- [32:16]
A
I haven't.
- [32:16]
B
No, actually I have.
- [32:19]
A
Embarrassing to admit.
- [32:20]
B
I know it's slightly embarrassing for me, but I was going to say that I have sent reporters to China as an editor and the thing you have to make sure is they don't take their phones, they don't take their laptops, they're given new burner clean pieces of electronic equipment. But we assume that Donald Trump will not be taking that advice. Yeah, I mean it's just to his preparations.
- [32:47]
A
The entire thing, the entire idea of sending Donald Trump to China to negotiate a historic, potentially a historic deal is frightening.
- [33:01]
B
Well, you'll be back later in the week to break that down. But we did want to talk about something else which is your latest substack on Howl. Michael's absolutely must read substack. And this is part eight in your Epstein diaries. Yes, and I think it's, it's worth there's a lot to discuss in it actually. It's. But I just say to everybody, go and read it. Well, the QR code on on screen. So you know, go have a Read. And there's so much to think about. But let's talk about.
- [33:36]
A
Sure. No, because it is kind of a divergent view, no doubt a controversial view. I mean, it's my attempt to kind of parse what happened here. And we're in the Epstein story. One of the kind of fundamental pillars of it at this point is the deal he cut with the justice department in 2008, which sent him to jail for an 18 month term, not on a federal charge, but on a state charge. And that has looked at in the narrative as it's developed that that is a. That sentence was ridiculously lenient. And it therefore, therefore, because it was so lenient obviously was the product of hidden hands and deep state and the conspiracy that would ultimately, that would grow and grow and grow over time. And so I take a new look at that and identify a couple of elements of, of this. First thing that it was that the charges against Epstein. And this is again, it's complicated. And one of the things that happens over time is this becomes one of the more complicated legal cases of the age. And the case was taken from the local authorities by the, by the Justice Department. And it was always unclear that they would have the power to do that. They charged him under trafficking statutes. But you could equally as you could certainly argue that it shouldn't have been in a federal case. This is a local case. And everybody. The crime occurred in Palm beach. It involved, you know, and this is either a hot button issue that this was that this was. And he was charged with prostitution. Prostitution is a local crimer. Was charged with soliciting. But even, I mean you should say
- [36:10]
B
that was soliciting underage. The phrase that was used was soliciting an underage prostitute.
- [36:15]
A
Yeah, but even then it's a thing because he was originally charged with. By in Palm beach just with soliciting. It wasn't underage. And then that's part of the rationale for the feds stepping in. And you can argue this almost at every step, which people have. And this is why conspiracies develop. But the other aspect of this, which I highlight in this piece is the amount of money that suddenly started to be spent in this case. And part of the conspiracy theory would be that, well, yes, that's why he got a lenient sentence because he bought it, he paid for it. But the thing about the money, and the money in this case is greater than, than certainly any sex abuse case ever and actually greater than most criminal cases ever, is that the money changes everything.
- [37:28]
B
And you make a Very pointed comparison, which I think takes us back to being inside Trump's head. He had a specific model here, his former friend and now nemesis, Donald Trump. The idea of engaging in the fight he had taken from Trump.
- [37:47]
A
Yeah, no, I mean, he was, I mean, Jeffrey Epstein disdained almost everything about Donald Trump, but admired his ability to engage, to battle with the system.
- [38:00]
B
And you're, you know, one of the things that's worth talking about here, I think, is we talk a lot about Epstein after his conviction, after the 2008 conviction has become the focus and sort of the test of people is, you know, did they continue to do business with him? Were they seeking his advice, were they seeking his company? But you were talking to him before the conviction at a time when I imagine many people didn't know that this was coming. They didn't appreciate it.
- [38:33]
A
Well, they didn't know this. And there's also the thing, and I'll get into this in future installments of this, the Epstein that we now know, the monster that we appreciate, is a developing story. So even after 2009 or 2010, when he gets out of, out of prison, it's not really clear that he is certainly not then the person he will become perceived as. Now, should he have been. Well, this is again another complicated aspect of this that involves both the facts of what happened and the narrative that's applied to this. But one of the things in this, and I think very few people appreciate this detail of the 2008 plea, is that part of the plea is that he pledged to compensate all of the victims in this case, and the victims to be defined are undefined. There's no list of the victims. It is essentially open ended. He agrees to compensate them, he agrees not to challenge their claims, and he agrees to pay their attorney's fees. So suddenly you have this open ended fund of money. Now, in the end, there will be to date, and this is, and we're by no means finished with this, there's as much as $500 million that has been paid out in this case. And so one of the things, and this is trying not to take a position on who's right, who's wrong, who has the moral high ground, who is just putting all of that aside is just the money changes everything. So the money is like having a camera in the room. People are not going to act like they would without the camera in the room. This is kind of a fundamental premise of modern life, and the same is true with money. So you cannot be a neutral participant, a neutral witness, given all of the money that is available here.
- [41:11]
B
There's one thing I want to raise with you about this, this account, which to me was a new fact about Epstein, which again raises some parallels to Trump. You say that he had a library of references to a 1970s television show which starred George Peppard, or Peppard, I should say Peppard. Peppard, better known to people of my generation as Hannibal from the A Team. But to Epstein, he was Banachek going around and.
- [41:45]
A
Yeah, you know, I mean, the thing.
- [41:46]
B
And it's kind of trumpy, right, the 70s TV thing.
- [41:50]
A
Well, that was, I mean that was a particular show and you know, the other show that he was, that he had was sort of in his mind a cult show for him was. Was a more recent blacklist.
- [42:07]
B
Right.
- [42:08]
A
So in each of these cases, I mean, Jeffrey Epstein was a made up figure. I mean he didn't. Jeffrey Epstein doesn't exist. Which is another way in which the conspiracy comes to play. Well, he must have been. Somebody must have been backing them. He must have been the front for somebody. Except for the fact that he wanted you to believe that. Yes, I mean it was in everything. Jeffrey Epstein didn't exist. And then he turned himself into this figure, this Jeffrey Epstein figure that had no relationship to what he would have otherwise ordinarily, in what would seem to be a logical world, have been. And again, this goes to the conspiracy. He must be a conspiracy, except for the fact that he was trying to make you think he was the product of a conspiracy. But Banachek was a character in the 1970s in which he lived in a big house, had people attending to him, you didn't know where his money came from. And Epstein saw himself like that in Blacklist with James Spader. James Spader is a kind of master criminal who the government has to call on to solve all crimes or something like that. I mean, it's ridiculous, but again, it is this made up figure that's. Jeffrey Epstein was at all times writing his own story. He wanted you to think, I mean, he wanted you to think that he was this sexual something or other. I mean, he surrounded himself with these young women all of the time. I mean, let me technically point out that certainly in my experience, the young women did not seem under. I mean they seemed like 19 or 20, they seemed like models. So it was always calling attention to himself, calling attention to what you would otherwise think if he were trying to hide, he would not have called attention to.
- [44:22]
B
There's one thing that I think jumped out at me about all of this as well is that your analysis is much less based on conspiracy than on. In fact, it's not based on conspiracy, obviously, but it's based on the slippery nature of reality. And this kind of ties back to Trump and China that there were so many people negotiating and it becomes so complicated that actually.
- [44:50]
A
No. And it goes back to really character. And it's right to bring up Trump. I mean, Trump, Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump created themselves at the same time. Why did they like each other? Because part of the bond was that they were both creating these myths about themselves and then they ultimately came into conflict and arguably mortal conflict. But they are in, within, in that framework, absolutely the same kind of person. You can probably even go that they are the same person.
- [45:25]
B
Well, I just want to say, got to go and read it. It's fascinating. There's lots of people who want to ask questions about your time with Epstein. It's all here, it's all on Howl and.
- [45:39]
A
Yeah, no, there are.
- [45:40]
B
It's not all on Howell yet, but there is more coming.
- [45:42]
A
Yeah, no, I mean, I am going to tell this entire Epstein. And again, the interesting thing about the Epstein story has largely been told, entirely been told by people who did not know him, because the people who did know him have been. Are too afraid to talk. So my view is really the only view so far from someone who has actually observed him over quite, quite a number of years.
- [46:15]
B
Well, must read QR code is back on the screen. People should go. And I'm sure, Joanna, next time we'll have lots of feedback as well on this. Michael, been a pleasure to join you.
- [46:27]
A
Well, thank you for being here.
- [46:29]
B
Thank you for taking me inside Trump's heads.
- [46:31]
A
Thank you to our producers, Ryan, Heather, Rachel and Neil.
- [46:38]
C
So the good news is we have so many Bee Beasts tier members now, there are too many names to read out and we really appreciate your support.