
Hell hath no fury like a congresswoman scorned
Submerged in this New York Times profile of Marjorie Taylor Greene are two revelations that, while perfectly in keeping with who Trump is and has always been, are nonetheless shocking:
First: Donald Trump believes that if you cross him, your children deserve to die.
In November, Greene received an email threatening her son: “Derek will have his life snuffed out soon. Better watch his back.” The subject line was "Marjorie Traitor Greene," the lame, but still incredibly dangerous nickname Trump had bestowed upon her the day before. Greene shared the contents of the email directly with Trump. In response, Trump allegedly insulted her, at length. Greene responded that regardless of their issues, children should be off-limits. Trump told her that she'd brought this upon herself.
So yes, if true, that's the President of the United States explicitly saying that if you break with him, your children deserve to die. And it likely is true. Why likely? Because the White House has not denied the exchange -- and "Deny" is chapter one of the Trump playbook. But because this happened over text, the administration knows Greene has the receipts. So instead of saying it didn't happen, a spokesperson dismissed Greene's concerns about Trump's complete and utter indifference to the mortal jeopardy in which he'd placed her son as "petty bitterness."
If this news broke about any other man, you would call for his banishment from politics forever. Because it's Trump, you just say, well, that's Trump being Trump, without even pausing to consider the horrific nature of what "being Trump" entails. The media is culpable as well, of course -- this should be a front-page story by itself, but instead it's just an anecdote in a longer piece. But ultimately, it's our fault. When not giving a damn becomes the norm, consciously or not, the media accepts that we don't give a damn.
Which is why I'm asking you to give a damn that the President of the United States told a Congresswoman that he didn't give a flying fuck if his rhetorical attacks directly inspired one of his fans to murder her son.
Second: Donald Trump has actually admitted that he is holding back the Epstein files to protect his "friends"
When Donald Trump confronted Greene about her calls to release the Epstein files, she told him she didn't understand why he was so firmly against it despite his administration's earlier promises. According to Greene, he told her: "My friends will get hurt."
"My friends will get hurt."
If you believe Greene, that is the whole ballgame: Trump is flat-out saying that he is breaking the law he himself signed because following that law would hurt his friends. He is admitting that he is protecting the associates of a child sex trafficker. Because, again, the child sex trafficker's associates are his friends.
Normally I'd agree that Greene is not the most reliable narrator. She's a former QAnon conspiracy theorist. An election denier. A believer in Jewish space lasers. But this is different. All of that other junk helped her politically, and whatever blowback she got she was able to withstand ***because she stood with Trump***. With this, she's ending her political career -- temporarily at least, but maybe forever. She is also putting herself and her family at risk. Yes, sure, people on the internet are saying she's positioning herself for a run at Georgia governor, but that positioning only works in her favor if enough Republicans believe she's telling the truth -- and actually care about the truth she's telling. That shouldn't be a huge gamble, but it is, and we all know it.
This is different from the nonsense she's pushed. In this day and age, far more respectable politicians than Marjorie Taylor Greene feel liberated to peddle absolutely batshit conspiracies in every conceivable forum, because conspiracies excite the base, and conspiracies are often too amorphous to effectively squash. This, though, is a hyper-specific factual allegation against the President of the United States, arising from a conversation that actually did happen.
Per the Times, during that same conversation, "when [Greene] urged Trump to invite some of Epstein’s female victims to the Oval Office, she says he angrily informed her that they had done nothing to merit the honor. It would be the last conversation Greene and Trump would ever have."
Apparently, finding the courage — at considerable risk to your reputation and safety — to speak out against the man who trapped you in a child sex slavery ring does not merit you the honor of meeting adjudicated sexual abuser Donald Trump in the Oval Office, but penning the 1999 rap-rock hit "Bawitdaba" does.

Official White House Photo by Molly Riley. Jacket by noted Italian designer IROC Firebird Camaro.
You don't have to believe Greene. But if you dismiss her without even considering why she might be telling the truth, well, I suppose that's in keeping with the general behavior of Trump fans since 2015, but it is nonetheless shocking.
