The latest release from the Epstein files has ensnared a whole lot of people. While just having had contact with him does not mean that someone also indulged in his sex-obsessed pedophilic life, his brazenness about his sheer sleaziness means that no one had any contact with him emerges unscathed.

In the UK, prime minister Keir Starmer is in deep hot water over the fact that Peter Mandelson, the person he appointed as ambassador to the UK, is a grifter who, while he was a cabinet minister, was willing to pass on secrets to Epstein and work with him against the very policies that his own government was pursuing. Mandelson had already been twice sacked from former Labour cabinets and yet Starmer seemed to think that he was a great pick, Today it was revealed that Starmer knew that Mandelson had been keeping in touch with Epstein after the latter’s conviction and appointed him anyway.

Keir Starmer has confirmed for the first time he knew about Peter Mandelson’s longer-term relationship with Jeffrey Epstein before appointing him US ambassador, saying the former peer had “lied repeatedly” about the extent of his contact with the child sex offender.

Questioned repeatedly at prime minister’s questions, Starmer said Mandelson had “betrayed our country” in his dealings with Epstein.

“He lied repeatedly to my team, when asked about his relationship with Epstein before and during his tenure as ambassador,” the prime minister said. “I regret appointing him. If I knew then what I know now, he would never been anywhere near government.”

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Questioned repeatedly by Kemi Badenoch, the Conservative leader, about what he knew regarding Mandelson’s ties to Epstein before appointing the peer US ambassador, Starmer acknowledged he knew – as had been reported in the media – that Mandelson and Epstein were in contact after the disgraced financier’s 2008 jail term for child sex offences.

Badenoch asked: “Can the prime minister tell us, did the official security vetting he received mention Mandelson’s ongoing relationship with the paedophile Jeffrey Epstein?”

Starmer replied: “Yes, it did. As a result, various questions were put to him.” Mandelson had responded with lies, he said.
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On Tuesday, the Metropolitan police said they had formally launched a criminal investigation into the claims that Mandelson leaked market-sensitive information, after documents from the Epstein files appeared to show the then business secretary sent confidential details of internal discussions in the aftermath of the financial crash.

Starmer seems to be on very thin ice. His continued support for his chief of staff Morgan McSweeney, who is seen as being close to Mandelson and having been key to his appointment of Mandelson as ambassador, is not going to help. Mandelson assisted Starmer in his pursuit of eliminating left-wingers from the Labour party.

Labour MP Brian Leishman said: “Mandelson is not the only architect of the toxic culture of factionalism that has infected the party. The exclusion of committed socialists and trade unionists from standing is disgusting, but not surprising.”

Labour NEC member Jess Barnard said: “So as trade union members and socialists were being suspended and blocked from standing, the friend of the world’s most famous paedophile was handpicking candidates for safe seats.”

Why had Starmer gone with Mandelson, with all his known faults, to be the ambassador? John Crace has a cynical opinion.

Keir had reckoned that with an amoral slimeball in the White House there was something to be said for having an amoral slimeball as ambassador. A meeting of minds. Peter would have been happy telling Donald Trump how marvellous he was for years. But this had blown up in Starmer’s face.

That is not all.

Noam Chomsky, an icon of the left and someone whom I have long admired, also seems to have been enamored of Epstein and unconcerned by his odious reputation. His co-author Vijay Prashad has denounced the association

Vijay Prashad – a journalist, author and the director of the Tricontinental Institute for Social Research – wrote that he was “heartsick” over the new correspondence between Chomsky and Epstein.

“When the photos and emails appeared, I was immediately disgusted by Epstein’s paedophilia, and so by Noam’s friendship with him,” he wrote on Tuesday. “There is no defence for this, in my view, no context that can explain this outrage.”
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In late February 2019, Epstein told an associate that he had gotten advice from Chomsky over how to navigate “the horrible way you are being treated in the press and public”.

That was 11 years after Epstein had pleaded guilty to procuring a person under 18 for prostitution – and months before he would reportedly die by suicide while in federal custody awaiting sex-trafficking charges.

“The best way to proceed is to ignore it,” Chomsky wrote, according to text signed under his first name that Epstein sent to a lawyer and publicist. “That’s particularly true now with the hysteria that has developed about abuse of women, which has reached the point that even questioning a charge is a crime worse than murder.”

Then Bill Gates, trying to rehabilitate his image as a philanthropist after his ruthlessly predatory actions as head of Microsoft that enabled him to create his vast wealth by destroying rival companies, has been criticized by his ex-wife Melinda French Gates for his association with Epstein, saying that he has a lot to answer for.

In emails, Epstein wrote that Bill Gates had come to him to facilitate trysts with married women and to get medication to treat an STI from “sex with Russian girls.”

Epstein also claimed that Bill Gates wanted to try to give that STI medication to Melinda French Gates in secret.

“To add insult to the injury you then implore me to please delete the emails regarding your std, your request that I provide you antibiotics that you can surreptitiously give to Melinda and the description of your penis,” outlined one angry email from Epstein.

Gates is just one of a whole slew of tech titans who continued to be part of Epstein’s circle even after his conviction for pedophilia. The article lists a who’s-who of major players. These people just did not seem to care about what a disgusting person Epstein was.

And of course, you had to know that other despicable people like Elon Musk and Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor would appear again and again.

In January 2011, [Mountbatten-Windsor] appears to thank Epstein for sorting out a financial problem for his ex-wife and reveals he is going on his annual retreat. “This week is all about me. Time to put something back into me before the rest of the world starts sucking it out in all their greed and demands,” an account named “The Duke” writes.

One particularly grubby allegation, contained in a 2011 legal document, is that Epstein and the then prince asked an exotic dancer for a threesome at the financier’s Florida home in “early 2006”, with the woman’s lawyer accusing the two of having “prevailed upon her to engage in various sex acts” during the alleged encounter. Lawyers also claimed the party at Epstein’s West Palm Beach home had included girls “as young as 14 years old” who were “dressed provocatively”.

The unnamed woman claimed “she was hired to dance, not to have sex” and “she was working as an exotic dancer, but she was treated like a prostitute”. “After the men had satisfied themselves, they invted [sic] my client to take a trip with them to the Virgin Islands. She declined their invitation. She was then chauffeured back to the strip club,” the legal letter continues. It says the woman would be content to keep the alleged encounter confidential “in exchange for a payment of 250,000 dollars”.

Mountbatten-Windsor has already received some slaps on the wrist such as having some of his titles removed and asked to move house. It is not clear what more will be done to him by King Charles. Maybe reducing his name to just Andy Mountbatten to get rid of the Windsor connection?

Mind you, this is all from just the highly redacted documents that have been released by the Trump administration. You can be sure that the highly partisan department of justice was given a list of people whom they were told to protect, including of course Trump himself. With this gang, you are safe in assuming the worst.