How Trump Has Made History in the Worst Way | The Daily Beast Podcast

I think what President Trump said this week objectively qualifies. as not only the worst thing he's ever said. But possibly the worst thing any American leader has said in modern memory. We're going to murder a whole civilization. No one will forget. No one in that part of the world will forget that for generations. It will always have been true that the leader of the United States. said that he is someone with a kind of emotional intelligence.

to understand what will hurt, what will provoke. He has he has the abuser's psyche to know what exact thing to say. Well, most cause you pain. I'm Joanna Coles, this is the Daily Beast podcast. And while everyone is exhaling with relief that the end of civilization. has not yet rained down upon Iran, we haven't forgotten. part of the reason for this war to distract from the Epstein files.

So we're going back into them today with unanticipated us. and looking at what he says is the most overlooked. Epstein exchange of emails with a German. philosopher called Josh Kobach. I hadn't come across these emails before. And what they reveal about Epstein and his network is remarkable. But just before we get to the conversation, please smash. the subscription button on your podcast wherever you get your podcasts.

We really appreciate your support because we are independent media, so we can bring you these conversations, but your subscribing really helps us. Okay, and then let's get into it. And and we are back. Donald Trump may think he's distracting from the Epstein files, but we're going to do a deep dive into what you say is the most overlooked. Epstein. We won't be distracted.

We will not be distracted. But just before we do, you had a very interesting analysis. in your Substack, The Ink, which I encourage everybody to read. I find it really, really compelling reading. And you always have an interesting take on what's going on. But you had specific observations about the two Crazy. Truth socials that he posted, one on Easter. Sunday saying, you crazy bastards, open the straight. And then classic Easter style message that's sick for those who celebrate.

Yeah. And then on Monday, where he said it's going to be the end of civilization. for Iran. So what did you find specifically. Trump in in those. truth socials? I mean, I think one of the things we've all learned over the last decade. is to temper superlatives and to avoid saying. something is the worst depravity, because there will always be others. And and it's often not true.

I think what President Trump said this week. objectively qualifies. as not only the worst thing he's ever said, but possibly the worst thing any American leader. has said in modern memory. And consequentially. So the I'm going to read the exact language. Yeah. This was just, yesterday morning now. So we're recording this on Wednesday morning. This was fast moving, developments.

The president of the United States. wrote, A whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again. And it goes on from there. And. There's so many things going on here. And we did a close read at the. ink of this entire passage, because I think it's important, as. idiotic and facile and dangerous as his language is. Language is always revealing. As a language person, there's always clues in it.

There's always and there's a lot happening here. So first of all, the American policy, bipartisan policy, going back decades on, Iran has been. good people, good civilization. One of the great cultures of the world, hijacked by a bad regime, an unfortunate. 50 year blip in a glorious millennia old culture that has given the world.

beautiful music and art and food and much besides, language, poetry, architecture. And that has been the American policy, right? When you talk about a hijacking of a plane, you're not blaming. the passengers. You're saying the plane should be going on its normal destination. These are decent people in the plane. A couple hijackers have unfortunately taken over the plane. That has been the American view, consensus view on Iran, a great civilization. being hijacked by a regime.

And with this post, the president, the United States. completely departed from that policy and basically impugned, first of all, what he calls a whole civilization, which will he said will die tonight. Now, of course, we know, you know, Taco Trump always chickens out. He didn't end up going through with that, thank the heavens. But to but to say we're not going after a regime. We're not going after regime change.

We're not going after a leader, we're not going after an ayatollah. We're not going after a government, we're going after we're going to we're. going to murder a whole civilization. No one will forget that. No one in that part of the world will forget that for generations, it will always have been true that. the leader of the United States said that. Do you think that Donald Trump actually knows what he's saying when he. throws these things out often? Clearly typed with great ferocity and fury.

and fastness, great speed? Do you think he actually even knows what he's saying when he says. something like that on this kind of thing? Yes. You know, I don't think he knows what he's saying when he gets into, you know, when he made a tweet about finer points of policy or this in that, but he is someone with a kind. of emotional intelligence to understand what will hurt, what will provoke. He has he has the abuser's psyche to know what exact thing to say. Will most cause you pain? What will most cause flattery?

He knows, by the way, when he's dealing with his Iran. How do you know who he's who is? Whose own popularity? He sort of has some order for he knows how to suddenly dial it. And so Trump is very capable of calibration. I find it very hard to believe. he doesn't know the difference between a regime and a civilization. And I think he knows exactly what he is doing there because he hasn't. said this before. This was a new thing, and, you know, and then the second half of that sentence. never to be brought back again, this was the less analyzed part of the sentence.

Everyone focus on this whole civilization will die tonight. Well, the again is very important because as you know, again, ism is a. crucial part of Trump's worldview. The idea of lost greatness. What was great. shall be made great again, like like America, make America great again. And of course, what he's really offering is for white people. and men often, the restoration of lost privileges.

What was once yours then unfortunately got shared. You had to be shared will be yours again. White guys will be able to have what they once had. Men will be able. to, you know, behave with the impunity that they once behaved in the office. You know, white people will be able to have, you know, unfettered dominion that they once had. That's such a good line. They want the rest. Or he's promising the restoration of white men's privileges. That's the whole movement. And so, again, is crucial.

So when he says a whole civilization will die tonight never to grow up again, what he's again. doing is saying, and this is a really important. policy departure to understand he's not he's moving away from the hijacking idea, which is good civilization, great civilization, hijacked bad leaders. and saying, actually, even if these leaders are gone. and removed, one of them is already dead. Even if this entire government were to be gone,

even if we're projecting when he's in never to be brought back. 50 years in the future, when all of this is swept away, there is nothing in this civilization. There's no seeds, no potentialities, no buried ideas, no suppressed ideas, nothing in kind of in aspic that is waiting, that can rise again, that is worthy of rising again. In other words, the present United States. is more clearly and starkly. than maybe any time in our lifetimes calling for genocide.

And the genocide of, people. But civilization is also a culture, a set of ideas, a history, a physical landscape. The UN has a very elaborate description of the law of genocide. And as you know, it's a very difficult area of the law, even though we all know it when we see it, we know when entire places are being raised and bombed.

Proving genocide is not as simple as seeing those images, because genocide requires the proof of intent. And one thing that people who do that kind of thing are good at. is concealing proof of intent, which is not that hard. to not that hard to conceal if you're a powerful leader. So it's extraordinary. that Donald Trump actually, without ending up doing the thing and hopefully it stays that way.

Did the thing that is so hard in prosecuting genocide crimes. against humanity. Normally, he declared the intent. to eradicate a civilization in public. He provides The Hague with evidence of what he plans to do. Yeah, this is like when people surrender to the police. in order to spare them the investigation. Wow. Okay, so. a lot of people are saying this war.

is just a distraction. It's whack the dog from the thing. that we know keeps coming back to haunt Donald Trump, which is his very close friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, something that you have been digging into relentlessly. And you've used the Epstein files as a prism through which. to understand the elite, how they operate, how they operate. outside of the of the normal rules.

And you had a fascinating piece in the Inc, about an academic at MIT, a German academic who is offered a job by Joey Ito, who's then head of. MIT Media Lab, later gets brought down by his association with Epstein. But it's a fascinating exchange between, how do I pronounce his first name, Josh Cobb?

Bach on how MIT isn't going to pay him enough money. He's written to Joe Ito and said, I can't come with my family. It's a family of four from Berlin. I can't move to Boston for. I think they're offering him $60,000, which. seems very little, I agree, for a, a family of four. And he's coming from Berlin, so Joey Ito connects him with Jeffrey Epstein, and Jeffrey Epstein basically says, okay, I'm going to pick up your bills. And they then enter into a fascinating email exchange.

Can you pick it up from there? And then I want to read. some of the email exchanges because they're kind of extraordinary. They are I mean, first of all, just on your point on distraction. It strikes me when you were saying that the Donald Trump. is killing Iranian schoolgirls. to silence American schoolgirls. Know. That's fascinating. Yeah.

Just that's that's what he's doing. He's bombing an entire country, threatening an entire civilization and. and killing Iranian schoolgirls, among many others, to keep. Girls of that age. or who were that age in this country. Now, women in many cases, from telling their stories of what they experienced at the hands of men. in this Epstein circle, a circle that included him,

I've spent, as you know, months. now in, in, in the kind of deep text. of the Epstein files and trying to really understand. what I think is this glimpse. of an operating system of power, as we talked about last time, for this Epstein class series. And, you know, I have read. as many emails as I as I can at some point,

you know, you get to a point where you feel like you've seen. most of what really needs to be seen, the diminishing returns. And then not long ago, a few weeks ago, I came upon an email. And so, you know, there's a kind of boredom that settles in a little bit. I got that, I got that, I got that, and then I saw this email a few weeks ago. and you, you know, as if a caffeine jolt, it was like a quadruple espresso reading this, emails like, whoa,

what is this? You know, and. and you don't have help processing it in real time, kind of looking around at nobody in my in my office thinking like, am I reading this? Is this and and it, you know, we ended up calling this. the most overlooked Epstein email. And I believe it is. And I really encourage people to read the piece, read the underlying email. So, Yasha Buck, as you say, considered an incredibly bright mind. in the field of, of of kind of philosophy.

I like a kind of philosopher of computation. and cognitive science in these kinds of things, and one of these kind of roving intellects of the kind. that many people in the Epstein circle were. They had one field, but they kind of, you know, were like cross-pollinating thinkers, and is recruited by MIT. First of all, just those initial emails, not not the dramatic. one that I'm talking about, just the initial ones is so striking. MIT is offering money, as you say. It's not enough for his family.

And then Joey Ito's like, but don't worry, there's a solution to bridge the gap between the amount of money. you need, which he claimed is $100,000 a year, and what MIT can pay you. And that's some random rich guy pedophile, right? Well, he doesn't say pedophile. He doesn't say that there's a random rich guy that can help you. I'm gonna connect. I'm getting the money. So. Yeah, but it's just like people at home may not realize. that these August academic institutions are deciding whom to hire,

and they just have, like, random. forget it's even just with even if it was just another random rich guy. So it's a strange arrangement. It's a weird arrangement. because you would think that they would actually have some kind of fund. where they have done a background check on the people who are paying. into the fund think, and that there would be some way of applying to the fund, and they would. say, yes, you're going to do something that we haven't done before. This is really valuable. Of course, 60,000 isn't enough for an act. A leading academic from Germany to bring his family over and live here.

And instead, Jerry Ito tosses it to Epstein, who's like, yeah, yeah, I'll pick it up. I'll pick up the excess. And so what that then sets up is, you know, we all know Jeffrey Epstein. kept around a kind of harem of young women and girls, many of whom he. abused and trafficked and raped. I think what's less well known that I tried to highlight in this piece. is he also kept around a kind of mental.

harem of, like, academic bro's. who were kind of like, you talk about kept women. These are like, kept scholars. Oh that's interesting. What a great take on it can scholars. And so, you know, if I'm paying the extra 40 grand. that you're not getting from MIT, you kind of become my scholar a little. And so I started reading the emails between. Buck and and Epstein before the there really.

And in fact, I had noticed their correspondence. before the really dramatic one, which I'll, which I'll share about in a moment. I had noticed that a while ago, and it was mostly, requests for money was it was two kinds of things. So when you become so, so with that kind of MIT transaction, like becomes. one of these kept, kept academics in in Epstein's mind, harem. So now there's two kinds of emails that you really see between them. before the dramatic one. Okay. And can I just point out so so we've actually.

got you put in your note, or in your essay about this, Ito wrote to Bach telling him that. Jeffrey said he'll figure out a way. to cover the difference outside of the MIT relationship. Can you talk to him directly about that. which is also MIT sort of stepping back? And then Bach having to pick up the relationship on his own. So to your point, there's no institution actually organizing this.

And to your point about Cat scholar, it's Bach having to reach out to Epstein, and then he's much more vulnerable to what Epstein wants. Although. that was what was said in the emails. But then, interestingly, what ended up happening and I don't know what the. why the discrepancy Epstein did end up donating. As it says, there are 300,000 to MIT, right? That were that was specifically for, the hiring of Bach and the MIT report, by Goodwin Proctor. Yep.

Said that that quote, the Media Lab hired. Bach in large part because I've seen subsidized the cost. Right. So, by the way, you're sending your kid to college. You may not realize that some of the academics at that college. are not being retained. because the university has objectively. decided that they're the best person and they're worth whatever that it's. because a certain rich guy, in this case a pedophile.

Happens to be personally willing. to foot 40% of a bill for a guy. that that person is now. in a university where your child may be attending. Well, they may be your child's advisor. We ought we should just be aware that apparently this is how some of the best. universities in the world make decisions about who to expose your children to. And also the shocking thing for me is this is MIT. It's not some university nobody's heard of in a state. that isn't thought of as leading in education.

And it's not poor and it's not poor. It's not poor to two kinds of emails. One is so the ones from Epstein to Bach, kind of follow a form. that is common between Epstein and many others in his mind. Haram. Which is. kind of like hasty, as as Bach describes it, like dyslexic. queries.

And as I was reading them, I realized. these are the same kinds of emails that Epstein would send to his centurion, like Amex, Centurion, Travel Concierge, or the same kind of email he might send to a hotel concierge. So I realized these were kind of mind concierges, right? So just the same way, like you and I have, we have to book a flight. We got to go on Expedia or Trivago. and search things and whatever, right, and look at different options. But people in this world can send like a one line thing.

I got to be in Paris in April and then they have concierge as well. It turns out they use. mind concierge is also so, so and I've seen might write to him. Have you heard much about the new idea in linguistics of blah blah blah? And then a book would just, you know, write like a, like a thousand word rigorous, like a paper. But it's like a personal paper just for you. Right? Right. It's a brilliant description. And then you know that Epstein is reading that, assuming he's not dyslexic or he's having it read to him by Apple,

and then he is performing that smartness at his next interview. Exactly. And he's saying, hey, he's calling Ehud Barak, right? Yeah. I have this new thought on linguistics, right? Yeah. It's very important. And for these guys in this world, to the more grotesque. they are, the more important it is for them to seem smart. I think smart feels like the penance for good times. Well, and it's also the cover that we don't think smart people do this, right. I think smart people are not going to have an industrial sized.

network of under-age girls they are raping. That's not what smart people do. And he uses the badge of MIT and of Harvard. Remember, he's always wearing the Harvard sweatshirt, which is such a towel for. someone who didn't even go to college to indicate, hey, I'm top of the league. I'm top of the league. Yeah, I'm top of the league up here. And then meanwhile, there's all this kind of unpleasant business going on down here. So. So Buck becomes kind of one of these mind concierges for Epstein.

Hey, what are you hearing about this? Sometimes I've seen. Will there be, like, any new thoughts? Any new thoughts? But but by the way, with by the way, if I had a kept scholar. Right, that's how I would email them to write an amazing thing. A personal scholar, right? No, no, I'm always asking our interns and all the young people in the office. what's new? What's new? What are you reading? What are you watching? Tell me about it. Because you're, you know, you're a whale sucking up plankton. So? So that was from from Epstein to to to back. That was the thing. And then from back. Back to Epstein.

What do you what do you think that half of the emails were. Yeah. Requests for money requests. It wasn't just the substance MIT thing. Then it's by the way, my kids private school tuition bill came. Can I forward you that I just like straight forwarding private school bills. Rent bills. Right. Very transactional in, Silicon Valley, you know, so, so the harum. was kind of in the mental haram, was it was in full effect.

You're you're one of my cap scholars. I can kind of, you know, ping you for new thoughts. whenever I want that I can then repurpose for Ehud Barak. It's almost like he wants mental Adderall. Yeah, that's a very good way to put it. Right. Because he didn't take drugs. He didn't drink, as far as I know. And so he needs stimulants. Also, like I've made this point last time and I'm going to use this display again. There's a really good technology. out there available for people who want new thoughts.

Right. And it's called books. It's a it's it's it's it's a, it's maybe an impeached. as a, as a way if you want new thoughts. Have I got have I got an invention for you. Right. But that's not how these people get new thoughts. Because actually what they want is not new thoughts. They want the kind of thoughts that are, as. you said, currency to be. As soon as I get it from back, I can retrain it in this network. to get clout. Books don't do that. Books actually just grow you well.

And also the other thing about books is they take silence and they take time. And you have to sit with it, whereas someone firing you back an email. or even better, getting on the phone and saying, hey, do you know about this? It's faster and you can translate it. And also the other thing about a book is. I might be reading a book, and actually I remember this when, Walter Isaacson's. book on Steve Jobs came out, almost everybody I knew working in. tech would memorize some of the phrases that Steve Jobs had.

And then weave them into their ordinary conversation as if. other people wouldn't realize, oh, you've been reading the Steve Jobs. book, and the problem with books is everybody's got access to a book, whereas. if you're if you've got a mind hurry, man, I love the description of it. They're giving you thoughts that I had Barack or Bill Clinton. or whoever else you have around your table isn't going to come up. with the same thought, because they don't have access to it.

Again, it's about access. It's about access. It's about exclusivity, and it's about it's like one. it's a podcast with one with one listener. Yeah. Right. That's that's what, that's what. That's what he wants, by the way. I mean, you think about all the things. rich people spend their money on, like that's. comparatively one of the better things that they spend their money for sure. For sure. Trying smart people. telling you interesting things about the world, like on the spectrum. It's not that's not the worst thing they spend money on, but it was this kind of toxic relationship.

So that was the that was the general exchange between Bach. and I've seen and I had seen that actually. going back to November and had sort of made note of it. And I think I mentioned it in my New York Times piece in November, just in passing. And so I actually just went back in J mail, which is this incredible platform that has organize all the obscene. emails to search for that correspondence. that I have basically already seen to dig it up. And, and then I realized there's. actually thousands of emails between them, I think. So I started, you know, and then I realized, oh, I actually have not seen all of this.

I thought I'd seen much more than I had. So I started into all of it. And that's when I came upon the truly. dramatic kind of motherlode email, between them and this is where. Jeffrey Epstein asks Bach for his opinion. of Jeffrey Epstein and Bach in a very dramatic way. I think it's fair to say gives it to him. It's a very striking thing. So it starts with a conversation.

And I. don't know if they had had an offline conversation that that kind of leads. It seemed a little bit like maybe they had, where Bach actually says. I'm not particularly good. at sensing how people see me. And by the way, this is a world in which a lot of guys in a Virginia Giuffre. and nobody's called the Epstein. survivor wrote an incredible book called Nobody's Girl, describes. a lot of these guys as being kind of socially obtuse, unable to talk to women. They couldn't do the old fashioned thing, which is like chatting up a lady right?

And so we think of Larry Summers, who who is, is arguably brilliant but also socially awkward. Bill gates, exactly the same. Leon Black, exactly the same Elon Musk. Well, there was Elon Musk hanging out with Jeffrey Epstein. trying well, trying to that's right. There was a whole thing about when can I come to the island? Which day will be the best party? These are not men who have ever let anyone do that better. And after a conversation with them, right, right. You're like, how can I get eye contact?

Because they can't do that. Yeah. So Virginia Giuffre was very clear that the value you could think about guys. for whom the provision of young women or girls is, is not a, you know, they might be appetitive guys, but like they got it. They can do it themselves. Right? Right. They don't need Jeffrey to have money like. there's let's just say a lot of men, who are interested in this kind of thing are able to take care of this themselves. Right? With the money they have, with the places they're able to go,

a lot of men are able to take care of these needs consensually. So this group. that was interested in hanging around Epstein. and in some cases partaking were a particular kind of men who probably. were not able to, as she writes, access this the old fashioned way, which is like figuring out things to say to someone that maybe lead to more, an age old technology. that I highly, highly recommend to people.

So they needed. nonconsensual serving up on a platter. And, and she writes very movingly. about and powerfully about this in her book. So Yasha starts. with this kind of idea, this kind of shared idea, understanding. they have that I'm not really good at knowing how people see me. He says to Epstein. You have helped me grow in my understanding of myself over these years. Through through our friendship and relationship, I've become better at it.

But I'm curious if you are aware of how people see you, or do you care? How do you think about it? And Epstein writes back, you know, I'm not particularly good at, sensing, and I don't really care. And at any time I do try to care, it often backfires, which then segue. into a weird story about hitting on a college student. Right. And who doesn't? Who says she's a woman and she says, I don't want your money. I can't be bought. Which turns into it. by which you know, which turns into a thing about like his good intentions.

backfiring, which is a strange interpretation of that story. And then Epstein says, and this is really unusual territory, having spent. a lot of time in these emails, these are not introspective people. To be introspective as these kind of people. would be to to have to sit with what you've allowed yourself to become. And I don't think that's, you know, and anybody's interested in this world. But he says, I have thick skin. I'm tough. I can hear it if you if you, he says to Epstein, says to your back,

if you if you have a perspective on how how you think people see me, what you think they see in me, what you see in me, how others see me that maybe I'm unaware of. Tell me. Hit me with it. And I can tell you, having read these emails again, I have not read every email, but I've read enough to. So I doubt there's another moment in these emails where there is such. an invitation that was really not generally what was going on here. You know, that kind of male vulnerability is is scarce in general in, in the world.

Right. And it was scarce coming from, if scarce, are still coming from Epstein. So he asked Spock, like, hit me up with your diagnosis. Now, Buck, being a kept scholar in the Epstein. mind harem, being like on the Epstein payroll, as it were, being, you know, this very Germanic. philosopher man who is constantly being told in these circles how bright is. being a kind of scientist of the mind and, and these kinds of things and being.

Yeah, socially obtuse in the way where, you know, there's a kind of literalism to him that maybe part. how his brain works, maybe part of a Germanic culture thing. A lot of people responded to this piece being like, like this is like a very German, blunt German email. Josh Bock. answers him. With an email that is longer than the Declaration of Independence. More words. The declaration of Independence.

That I think is the. not just the most overlooked obscene email, but, the most. breathtaking because it starts from the premise of he says. And you're welcome to quote at any. Yeah, yeah, I will, I will quote. Yeah. But he basically says the outset, I don't have. like huge secret and proprietary nuts. They're not these guys are not especially close.

It was like a patron thing. They don't live in the same place as far as I know, this was a. relatively distant relationship, right? I've seen it, but it was a very transactional relations. But it's not intimate, right? There's also a big status difference between them. Right? He was a servant in the kind of Epstein orbit. He wasn't a peer the way I like young black was right like that. Right. And so he says very clearly what I'm about to tell you about my assessment of you. is not based on some, like, deep personal proprietary knowledge. It's sort of like what's around.

It's based on the common sense of what I hear, what I sense. Right. And so this is very important because. in the. Epstein's circle, as we talked about last time we spoke, the general defense. has been well, I knew this part of him, but I didn't know that. Right? I had no idea. I had no idea. Yeah, right. I knew about the academic pretensions. Didn't didn't know about the raping. I knew about the, you know, like braggadocious, whatever. But I didn't know about the trafficking. I knew about the, you know, financial like shenanigans.

But I didn't know that he had, like, a rape island. What Bok basically says is, I'm going to tell you not what I know. exclusively, because I have some deep well of knowledge about you. I'm going to tell you, like, what's in the air, right? Can I read the can I read part of it then? We discussed beforehand and we decided I would read it in a. in a German accent, which I spoke about for all the viewers. When I say we, we need it. We need it. Well, I think it's the first sentence of your Wikipedia entry introduces.

your as sex offender, which, due to contemporary America's. fascinating difficulty of dealing with all things sex, really establishes a strong prior on your being a pariah. It is also pretty much the only thing people outside of your circles know you for. So we're starting with. these guys have been now associates or whatever you'd call it for some time.

And he's saying, you know. You're quite known as a sex offender. Like. Right. No, no, no secrets here. And then very quickly. And this is such a fascinating move for a guy who, you know, has a reputation as a brilliant thinker. Yep. This this being a sex offender becomes evidence of America's. fascinating difficulty of dealing with all things. sex related, as opposed to, like, an objectively terrible thing.

In other words, the problem here quickly goes from being a sex offender. So, like America is so weird about sex. I can then read the next bit of that. By the way, I really appreciate how you, in a German accent made Pryor and Pariah rhyme. I don't think I don't think that you should be ignored or forgotten. Okay, so what? Because this is the most fascinating email in terms of how he I mean, it really reminded me of Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment,

where he's trying to become he's looking at it from 30,000ft above, because obviously he's having to wrestle with the fact. this is the guy who pays me to be in America. He's a sex offender. Well, other people compartmentalize it and put it somewhere else. And so I'm trying to do that too. And it's that sense of morality doesn't apply to them, which I think. is also part of of what you have written about in terms of the Epstein circle,

once people get to know your in person, I got I also got so good. I don't mean to make light of it, but how else does one deal? That's the only way to bring in these things, right? Let's have a special rule for Germany. You can do the accent. Well, yeah, I yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. Once people get to know. your in person and are interested in you, they tend to compartmentalize. the topic as a somewhat difficult to accept aspect of an important friend, or treat it as somehow interestingly dark and edgy.

It seemed to never have been without right approval. and very rarely not been an issue at all. Even when it is balanced against your sharp, original and interesting mind. So what's happening here is a shattering of this defense. that all these people have made, that no one knew. I'm so sorry. No one knew. It's the first line of his Wikipedia entry, and.

and he's basically saying he's describing. mental processes. He has seen people engage in. to confront, deal with, rationalize, process, metabolize. their knowledge of who Epstein was. So the idea didn't have this process he's describing of some compartmentalize it, some view it as an edgy thing he's describing. Let's just be clear, real mental processes that he has.

evidently seen and experienced people go through other people besides himself, other friends, other associates, other MIT people, whoever he knew and encountered. He is describing an actual phenomenon that he has observed happen in the world. in which people are in this circle and find ways of justifying it to themselves. Well, and these are leaders in the world. These aren't just random people. This is the president or former president of Harvard, Larry Summers. It's the film director, Woody Allen, who is, you know,

beloved by a whole liberal elite of moviegoers. It's Leon Black who co-founded Apollo, one of the biggest. private equity companies globally. These are not people who, who are excited to meet a rich person who don't meet any other rich people. Their lives are awash with rich people. That's what's so striking. And and yet what Mark is describing is the way that Epstein.

somewhat uniquely called these people and people who, as you and I both know as journalists, when you're when you're trying. to get interviews with people like this, when you're trying to get at, it's hard. These are people who are very guarded normally very protected. You got to go through a layers. even at your level of seniority in the profession it's not right. Except apparently with this guy that this guy. found his way in to the inner sanctum of, of these people's lives. And Bach is describing the process of compartmentalization or in some cases,

a kind of sense of, you know, you're my edgy friend is Larry Summers, you know. Right, right. Wrote to him to Epstein once, how is life among the lucrative and louche? Well, and Peter Attia writing to him, the longevity expert, you know. Oh, your life is so outrageous. I want to tell you, worst thing about being friends with you. is that, you know, I can't tell people how. Yeah, because it's so outrageous. And this is the line that made me think of Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment,

where. he's thinking about murdering the old woman because he wants. to sort of push the morality boundaries and they don't apply to him. And he says, if people are able to think outside of moralistic terms, they may simply mark you down as an a fibber. I didn't know this word, a Faber file, but are bound to notice a few quirks. So this is we got a pause on this. This. Okay. Clearly.

Can we just discussed this word I said before? I didn't know this word until I saw it. There. But I have since learned that in those. obscure corners of our society and of the internet, where people find it important to be defenders of Jeffrey Epstein, a lonely, a lonely position, there is this distinction that Josh Kobach, one of the premier thinkers in the world, we are told, makes here.

Right. So if people are able to think outside of moralistic terms. Right. Very important. First of all, very important line, I don't know, I don't like to be lectured by Germans to think outside of moralistic terms. Things always get hairy, right? When you're told to, you know, when Germans are like, we don't need to worry about morality for a second. There's got to be a to be a little worried. What he's saying there, essentially, without using the other word,

is maybe you're not a pedophile. You're in a fibber file. Now, if you at home. don't spend too much time on Reddit or for channel whatever. Let me bring you up to date on what I had to come up to date with. If ever file is this term for people. who are not into children per se and a pedophile, they're not. They're not into five year olds. They're into like geriatric children. They're into like.

teenage girls above, I don't know, 15, 16, 17, 18 they're into and they're telling. and they're telling them it's an inherently defensive term. where people are saying, I this is not I'm not in a six year olds. Right? I'm in the 16 year olds who. seem like women. And by the way, I'm 55 or I'm 60. And it's this distinction that's completely just to be. For the record, if you're under 18, you're a child.

If you're 17.75 you're a child, you can't vote just because. you've hit puberty like 18. In our system matters. And by the way, it correlates with a lot of biological and brain. development things. It's not an arbitrary number. Our entire society sort of. based on that number. But in the telling of some of these kind of defenders of Epstein. and others, there's a distinction between,

like the truly grotesque people who, you know. Want to rape six year olds, you know, and people who, you know, are interested in like high school girls. So now you have this German philosopher. and like supposedly brilliant thinker. who is providing, I guess, what a scholar. like Josh Kobach is expected to produce, which is ideas.

that might be soothing to a man like I've seen, which is, you know, you're not a pedophile, you're an A. If we can think outside of moralistic terms. Right. Big F, right. So compartmentalizing and, comparative shopping, underage girls. Yeah. You know, in the kids, you're just in the geriatric teens. It is an astonishing,

correspondence. And and it goes on. There's a line here, which I, I just was laughing out loud. at in terms of their exchange, where Epstein says to him, give me some new ideas, give me some new ideas. And one of the ways that, Bach responds is a lot of. people are coherent ists instead of foundational ists. And you're just like, what? What are you talking about? And you can imagine Epstein saying at one of his dinners,

a lot of people are coherent ists. You know, we're not all foundation analysts. and everybody else around the table going, oh, God, God, I'm not very smart. I'm not smart enough to be here. I need to earn my place to be here. We've all been at dinners like that where people are being pretentious, but you can see where Epstein is being fed from. And as you say, his his kept scholar. who is soothing him about his behavior, which he hasn't. even had to tell, Bach about Bach's read about it on Wikipedia.

Yeah. And based on what he's saying in the email, as I, as I read it is. also describing a process he has seen other of, of, of rationalization. that he has witnessed. other people going through to be able to play it back to Epstein of, you know, this email's fundamentally about here's the common sense about you. Right. It's not it's not like here's my take on you. It's here's my take of how. the world sees you, how other people we know in common.

See you. And then it lands, you know, in this place that I think is so striking. So he's he's now laying out here's everybody knows about you. Here's how they process you. And then he says, here's how I think. here's here's the problem you have. And I don't know if you can read that part where he says, at the end of the day, you have, you know, you're this unrepentant, right.

And, and, and evolving, connoisseur. of immature girls. Right? And it gives them an excuse. And he says, if you just continue to be known as that, and he says, if you continue with as an unrepentant. and under evolving connoisseur of immature girls. Now, back in his public statement, sense has said, well, I didn't know. any of this was ongoing. I thought it was all in the past. So then why are you saying.

all these years later, towards the end of Epstein's life, that he's unrepentant and on evolving? If you thought it was all in the past? I put this question I should say to Yasha Buck. I reached out to him, he refused to respond to any of my questions, but he did write back to me, taking a swipe. at my kind of work, suggesting it was kind of below the quality. of the kind of serious thinking,

that he does. He said, you know, I don't I'm not interested in, like, culture war topics and judging people from near and afar, which seems to be the main area of your reporting. If the charge against me is that I have written about things. in the territory of the culture war that is American politics and life, which is to say, the war. over who we are in this country, in the war over our culture. and the war over what America is going to become between.

people who have different kind of cultural affiliations and views. I plead guilty so that I've written about that extensively. Unevolved and unrepentantly myself. Right. For two decades. And if the charges that I. That I judge people, I do, that's my job. I don't do it, Vassili. I do it, you know, generally after talking to them. But Josh Kobach was not was not man enough to, to, to show up for an interview. But. Well, and that's interesting in itself.

And also what you're doing here is using the evidence. I mean your, your close reading, a long explicit email exchange. And we have here. your relationships to young women appear not to be on equal footing, but. but dominating and submissive. with little apparent, regard for hurt feelings. Now I'm sounding like Melania and which was not my intention. And then I think it goes. Yeah. While from there this is a shocking and amazing, powerful and devastating insight.

While you are direct, while you are brutally honest and direct with men. Two you don't come across. as reveling in the power difference, interacting with men, or making an example of that intellectual and personal limitation. in front of others. It is as if I think, he says, it is as if you are attracted to women, as long as they are not two women, but you don't like them very much. While individual women gain your respect, it seems to be.

much harder for them than for men. It is as if they are inherently less trustworthy. You are attracted to women, but you don't like them. and you are attracted to girls, not women. And when I wrote this, so many, I got so many comments on this piece. from women. whose reaction to that passage was, that's my experience of a lot of men.

A lot of this does not apply to all men or a lot of men, but that part, the feeling of, Men want you around. for one set of things, but fundamentally don't like. you don't like interested in you as a person or as an equal. The number of women who responded that. Yeah, that's kind of my experience of men in general, was very sobering, jolting. Sad. Yeah. That is sad. That is very sad.

So let's move to the bit where Bach. pivots to giving him advice, redemption advice, redemption advice. Because this also is shocking. So he says, you know, right now, basically the status quo is you're. known as an unrepentant and an evolving connoisseur of immature girls. I mean, what a what a phrase. First of all, as a writer, as it, you know, hats off, I guess. And he says there may be some path.

to redemption for you here, but it would have to be, quite specific. And one of the paths he lays out. And here, I should say, Joanna, that it's not clear to me whether he is. inventing the kind of narrative, the kind of story. that that may not be true, but that if it were true, it would help Epstein, or it's not clear if he's actually referring. to some kind of backstory that Epstein.

confided in him that he is now airing. It's really it's not obvious. He says, given American boxes, given kind of American mores, culture, whatever. If you were to have a kind of back story. and share a back story where you. were yourself abused by. an adult female caregiver when you were a child, in the current kind of. American like trauma informed and trauma obsessed culture,

you would you might be able to pull your way out of this hole. by having a kind of story that would make people more sympathetic to you. Again, I'm not sure whether that is referring to an actual thing. that happened to Epstein that I've seen or claimed. happened to him, that he told back, or he's just inventing, like algorithmically, like, here's the kind of story that would seem to work in this culture. Well, and we also don't know if there were telephone calls. So if you're writing and you receive an email from box saying, hey, dude, everybody says you're a pedophile, it's the first line of your, Wikipedia page.

But if you think about it and break it down, you're not really a pedophile. You're a kind of geriatric pedophile, which is slightly different. You might pick up the phone and go, I love this kind of thing. Or, hey, how's it going? Or or so we don't know what other correspondence is going on in. as far as I can tell, this big email. that you and I are parsing did not get responded to by email. Again, I could be wrong. There's a lot of things in there, but as far as I can tell,

this was the end of the thread, so I don't know if it continued in person. or on the phone or, but they had exchanges after it, so it was not like it ended the relationship. Right. All right. The easiest explanation for your unusual choice of partners. and the nature of your relationships to them is obviously childhood abuse. If most of these people suspected you suffered something unspeakable. at the hands of an adult female caregiver, and it took you decades to work through it, understanding.

that someone likely abused her so turned against you, they would be able to feel they understand you and you would feel more acceptance. Some people might even realize. that you paid a much higher price than your purported victims. Think about this. So whether again, this is a real story, not a real story, we don't know. But the move here is to say, given box kind of he's giving up, in a way, a cultural read.

Right? Here's how the machinery of American society works. And it seems like an insightful read, by the way, you could imagine that. Jeffrey Epstein 60 minutes I was abused, you know. Well and in fact confessional Steve Bannon sat down and they talked through. what what would it be like. And Steve Bannon pretended to be the 60 minutes interview. Do you remember that? I didn't see that one. Yeah. There's a whole thing about how Bannon went in.

I heard Barack was that, you know where it is. It's in Michael Wolff's book two famous. There's a specific chapter on Bannon sitting there. and giving him advice on how to behave in front of the media, because he's. hoping to do a 60 minutes interview where he then rehabilitates himself. So. So part of what's going on there is based on box analysis of, you know, America loves a good trauma story right now, and here's how you could. get in there.

But then the move at the end of that passage is to say, if you if you do what I'm saying, you could end up framing yourself as, as a more of a victim suffered more. than the women. Right, right. Who trafficked in racist. Yeah. And the industrial nature of it. And again, I'm sure a lot of people watching this at home to not have your box. degrees and credentials, maybe not his IQ,

his accolades, appointments at all, these fancy places. He's a fancy guy. But I imagine. almost everybody watching this somehow would have the sense. not only did not send an email like that, but to not have thoughts like that, to not think. even in the deepest recesses of your mind, the Jeffrey Epstein blaming. a nanny. would somehow turn him into someone who had suffered more.

than the legions of girls and women. who were trafficked and raped by him. But in this. circle that he maintained, I guess this is how people thought he was at. Jeffrey Epstein was a real victim. This is where this email ends. You could be the real victim here. You could you could frame yourself as having suffered more. than these girls and women. And so at some level, I understand the reactions I got to the piece.

from so many women who were like, this is not just an Epstein thing. It's not just the Josh Kobach thing. There is a way that so many men. view us every day at work, every day. at home, in some cases, every day on the street, walking down the street in which we are. eye candy and which were fun to keep around.

But at some deep level. we are not liked and not valued. Where is Josh at Josh about? No hiding from my questions. Hiding from your question, I sent him a detailed list of questions. I even sent him a question. that I thought a conscientious person. would feel like answering because it could help others. I said if there was a young, you know, young person,

as you were when you first made contact with Epstein, who was sort of. being offered this bargain, what advice would you have for them. in terms of getting into such a relationship or not? I don't know, I think it's. it could be public serving to answer questions like that. Even if you have to come off a little worse, you might help. actual people who are in their own versions of whatever. these dilemmas are today. But again, Josh Kobach,

chose to impugn my reporting in journalism. I apparently write too much about culture wars and make judgments about people. Again, I'm not going to stop doing that because some German scholar. who likes to think outside of moral term moralistic terms. and thinks there's a difference between liking teens and liking kids, thinks I should not do the kind of work I do. Is he still teaching at M.I.T.? I don't think he's at MIT anymore.

I think he moved to Silicon Valley, which is where I've seen. was getting these rent requests from and the private school requests. I don't know if he's now affiliated. You know, he's he's very I he's kind of an a philosopher of AI. And these kinds of things. So this was, you know, some of these emails were ten, ten, 11 years ago. Obviously the field that he was in, I, he was only getting $60,000 from MIT. to study those things back then. One would imagine that he's getting money much more lucrative.

Like the thing. that he has said his life to study has now become the biggest topic in the world. He did write. We should note, although he didn't answer my questions. He did write on his own Substack, a kind of, you know, about the Epstein affair, kind of, you know, and he just sort of claimed, like, I knew that he'd had a conviction, but I was told he was reformed, and I had no reason to believe that any of this was ongoing.

Maybe I'm not a brilliant German. academic with that kind of, you know, brilliant training that he has. I'm maybe like, you know, incompetent. at squaring the distinction between I knew of no ongoing. I just thought this was a thing in the past and ongoing thing. and then privately telling you, I've seen you are an an evolving. and unrepentant connoisseur of immature, girls. And we have no idea if he. was introducing Epstein to students at MIT.

Right. Would you consider having your back on the. Oh, I was just I was just going to look directly at the camera and invite him on. I would love to talk to Mr. to hair back. We should find him approximate. Don't they have they layer they put they layer the title. That's a doctor back. Yeah. Yeah. If you know him or you know where he is or you work at a company with him, please let us know, because we would love to interview. We should have the two of you while he has a child, you know, like,

oh, he has a family. He has a family. I would imagine having a child, having a child is such a hopefully. one is against these terrible things even without having to have a child. But I know from my myself having children. such a radicalizing experience. about just the fragility and delicacy and beauty and immaculate skin. and and and innocence, innocence, innocent children. And so I would hope that someone like Josh Kobach would say, look, I'm. willing to damage my own career prospects and reputation to come forward and share.

my mistakes and what I knew in the hope that it would save one future child. If you're not able to do that, what is the value. of all your German philosophizing? Oh, it's. I don't mean to laugh, but it's such a good line. What is the value of your German philosophizing if you're not prepared? I didn't study as far as him, but philosophize about. the love of knowledge. It's about getting to the truth.

Well, I think there was. There was a lot of, as you say, he was, he was a thinker for higher. He was a thinker for higher. And and. Excellent. Having you on a really fascinating read in your Substack, The Ink. And I highly recommend it. And you have to come back when you've gone into even more Epstein files. On a quick note, Joshua Bach has not been accused of sexual abuse or misconduct.

He also told a German newspaper this February. the grave accusations that Epstein was confronted. with after his second arrest were very shocking to me. I had never observed any hint of such crimes or legally questionable behavior, and I would have broken off all contact had I done so. Well, I found. it absolutely fascinating, the idea of having.

brains on call an intellectual harem so that whenever you knew. you were having Bill gates come around, or I had Barack, you had people that you could call up and say, hey, what's new? What's the latest thinking? And then just spout it out, repeat it, to people coming, and then they just think you're brilliant. Because how many times have you heard people say about Jeffrey Epstein? Oh, he was so smart. It was so entertaining. He was so up to date on the current thinking. Well, that's how he did it. By having intellectuals on tap.

And he was paying for them. So Joshua Buck, if you're out there, please get in touch, come on the podcast. and tell us what it was like being supported by Jeffrey Epstein. If you have been, thank you for watching. Please don't forget to press the subscription button. We are independent media, which is how we can bring you conversations. like this, which I think is a unique conversation. Actually, I don't think anybody else had that, and definitely not with my really bad German accent. You don't need to comment on that, but do tell us what parts.

of the conversation you responded to the most. We love reading the comments, and I know Anand did very much last time he was on. So the good news is we have so many beast tier members now. There are too many names to read out and we really appreciate your support. Thanks to our production team Devin, Roger Reno, Ryan Murray, Rachel Parsa, Heather Pizarro, Neil Rosen house.