Trump and Lincoln

This is what is called a political cartoon, a type of editorial cartoon, which is a graphic with caricatures of public figures, expressing the artist's opinion. They first appeared in 1734. Today they are a prominent form of editorializing.

The cartoons frequently speak more truth than the individuals in the panels.

J.D. Crowe on alabama.com wrote: "This is an opinion cartoon."

Then he captured why it was drawn. And remember, this was before the explosion of George Floyd demonstrations across the country.

On May 3, 2020, Trump held a "Fox News virtual town hall" in front of the Abraham Lincoln Memorial, with no one there.

Crowe said, 

Trump was using the power and dignity of the most lauded president in history for ... something. The word parasite came to mind as I watched Trump, dwarfed by Lincoln, talking with two Fox News commentators. They invaded the sanctity of arguably the most revered president in history - for a political campaign, yes. But for what reason, exactly?

“If it seems odd to stage a town hall with no in-person audience at the Lincoln Memorial, a site for huge rallies and events in more normal times, you’re missing the point: President Trump’s plan for Sunday night is packed with strategic signaling,” Axios reports.

“We wanted a powerful image of American strength and the idea of what reopening looks like,” a White House aide told Axios.

Trump, The Great Divider, often compares himself to Lincoln, The Great Uniter. He claims contending with the coronavirus pandemic makes him a “war time president", just like Lincoln as he kept the country together through the Civil War.
And then it came.

“I am greeted with a hostile press the likes of which no president has ever seen,” Trump claimed, in response to a question about why the president often bullies the press. What can’t he just answer their questions without all the hysterics?

“The closest would be that gentleman right up there,” he said while pointing at Lincoln’s statue. “They always said nobody got treated worse than Lincoln. I believe I am treated worse.”

Yep. With Lincoln as the backdrop, 45 whined that he is treated worse than the 16th president - the one who was assassinated.

To Trump, having to answer reporters’ questions must be a fate worse than death.

On June 12, 2020, as Deadline headlined: "Donald Trump, In Fox News Interview, Has Puzzling Exchange Over Abraham Lincoln’s Legacy: 'He Did Good, Although It’s Always Questionable.'"

Asked about what Trump had done for Black people, he told Harris Faulkner:

I think I’ve done more for the black community than any other president. And let’s take a pass on Abraham Lincoln, because he did good, although it’s always questionable, you know, in other words, the end result.

Harris responded, “Well, we are free, Mr. President. He did pretty well.”

“We are free,” Trump answered. “Well, you understand what I mean? You know, I got to take a pass on a Honest Abe, as we call it.”

Then Faulkner replied, “But you say you say you’ve done more than anybody.”

Trump went on to talk about signing criminal justice reform legislation in late 2018.

“Criminal justice reform. Nobody else could. I’ve done it. I did it,” he said. “I didn’t get a lot of notoriety. And the fact the people I did it for then go on television and thank everybody but me and they needed me to get it done. And I got it done.”

As the Twitter commentator TJ noted, 

Trump's wavering re Lincoln [above] actually makes perfect sense (in his world). He's saying the end result (freeing the slaves) was good, but by also saying what Lincoln did was "always questionable," he's pandering to the Confederacy folks in his base, implying without actually saying anything that Lincoln could have done something different to get that result. He's trying to say "slavery bad" but not "Confederacy bad," despite the fact that the point of the Confederacy was ensuring states' rights to have slavery.

 

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As we have moved through the last few months, Trump has used Lincoln often and editorial cartoonists are using this raw material in their cartoons. Some examples are below.

Remember, these are "opinion cartoons."

June 19: Tulsa Danger

UPDATE:

President Trump bowed to pressure on Friday night and announced that he would delay his upcoming campaign rally in Tulsa, Okla., rather than hold it on the day that honors the end of slavery in the United States and is considered a major holiday by many Black Americans.
The rally was originally set for next Friday, or June 19, the date known as Juneteenth, which marks the day in 1865 when Union soldiers arrived in Texas and read the Emancipation Proclamation announcing that slaves had been freed, the last of the Confederate states to officially receive the news, reported The New York Times.

Trump's campaign said they would hold the Tulsa rally on Saturday, June 20, 2020.

While I predicted June 17th would be a date to watch, it is becoming clearer that more danger may exist ahead for June 19, 2020.

One early commenter (Ra1119bee) at my posting "Take Heel on June 17" mentioned, "Also The Law of the Three is in play as well. So if your target is 17 then: June 14, 15, 16, and June 18, 19, 20 are all possible dates with the same 'energy' as your Target Date."

The 19th is now in focus.

The President of the United States appears to be creating a situation of theater of his own design. The choices for his proposed event is full of twilight language.

On Wednesday, June 10, 2020, the White House announced that President Donald Trump will host his first rally in months on Friday, June 19, 2020, in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

CNN observed: "The decision to hold a rally in Tulsa, a city with a checkered racial history, on June 19, or Juneteenth -- the day that marks the end of slavery in the United States -- is especially striking as the nation undergoes a conversation about racism in the wake of George Floyd's killing at the hands of police officers."

Juneteenth (a portmanteau of "June" and "nineteenth"), also known as Freedom Day, Jubilee Day, and Cel-Liberation Day, is an American holiday celebrated on June 19. On June 19, 1865, the Emancipation Proclamation (signed by President Abraham Lincoln) — which had been issued on January 1, 1863 — was read to enslaved African Americans in Texas by Gordon Granger. Texas was the last Confederate State to have the proclamation announced, after the end of the American Civil War in April of that year. Texas was the most remote of the slave states, and minimal fighting meant there were few Union troops present to enforce the Emancipation Proclamation until after the war ended.

The holiday is considered the "longest running African-American holiday" and has been called "America's second Independence Day," notes the media and the Encyclopedia of African American Popular Culture (2011).

Andy Thomas' The Republican Club, with Trump, Abraham Lincoln (sitting as he was when assassinated), Ronald Reagan (a target of an assassination attempt), and others, with Kamala Harris (?) coming forth in the background. It was featured on 60 Minutes in 2018. This painting was installed in the White House by Trump. See here.

Sen. Kamala Harris, a California Democrat who is widely viewed as a top contender to be Joe Biden's vice presidential pick, blasted Trump's decision to hold the rally there on Juneteenth.

"This isn't just a wink to white supremacists—he's throwing them a welcome home party," Harris tweeted Thursday [June 11, 2020]." 

Picking Tulsa seems like tossing dynamite on a fire, for another reason too, CNN wrote:

"In 1921, Tulsa was the site of a massacre of hundreds of African Americans during racial unrest in the historic section of the city known as 'Black Wall Street.'" 

The Tulsa race massacre (also called the Tulsa race riot, the Greenwood Massacre, or the Black Wall Street Massacre) of 1921 took place on May 31 and June 1, 1921, when mobs of white residents attacked black residents and businesses of the Greenwood District in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It has been called "the single worst incident of racial violence in American history." The attack, carried out on the ground and from private aircraft, destroyed more than 35 square blocks of the district—at that time the wealthiest black community in the United States, known as "Black Wall Street". More than 800 people were admitted to hospitals and as many as 6,000 black residents were interned at large facilities, many for several days. Source.

White America suffered from universal amnesia until HBO broadcast a new television series in 2019. Watchmen (2019), the acclaimed TV series on HBO, was based on the characters of the graphic novel of the same name. The series' producer, Damon Lindelof, was inspired to open the pilot episode with depictions of the white riots of the black massacre, and based the series on racial tensions after reading a 2014 Atlantic article by writer Ta-Nehesi Coates. Many aspects of the series' plot, centers on the legacy of the graphic novel and the massacre in an alternate timeline in the present day in Tulsa, where racial conflict remains high. The popularity of Watchmen was considered to be the first exposure to the Tulsa race massacre via the entertainment industry as its history was generally not widely discussed and had not been depicted in that form before.

This graphic from HBO's series Watchmen appears to broadcast the number 19.

HBO brought the Tulsa massacre alive, in a time when face masks were worn. It was an extremely prophetic series.

Tulsa has a history that is generally ignored. Coates wrote in the Atlantic article: "Terrorism carried the day. Federal troops withdrew from the South in 1877. The dream of Reconstruction died. For the next century, political violence was visited upon blacks wantonly, with special treatment meted out toward black people of ambition. Black schools and churches were burned to the ground. Black voters and the political candidates who attempted to rally them were intimidated, and some were murdered. At the end of World War I, black veterans returning to their homes were assaulted for daring to wear the American uniform. The demobilization of soldiers after the war, which put white and black veterans into competition for scarce jobs, produced the Red Summer of 1919: a succession of racist pogroms against dozens of cities ranging from Longview, Texas, to Chicago to Washington, D.C. Organized white violence against blacks continued into the 1920s—in 1921 a white mob leveled Tulsa’s “Black Wall Street,” and in 1923 another one razed the black town of Rosewood, Florida—and virtually no one was punished."

My research on adjusting the awareness from the 17th to the 19th was reinforced by such incoming comments, as by JDM: "I would look at June 19th. The MAGA rally in Tulsa is likely to be a flashpoint. See also tons of predictive programming from last fall's Watchmen television adaptation, which begins with the Black Wall Street [white] riots [and black massacre] and is set in Tulsa."

In the spring of 1921, a white mob leveled “Black Wall Street” in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Here, wounded prisoners ride in an Army truck during the martial law imposed by the Oklahoma governor in response to the race riot. (Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis)

City of Tulsa leaders and other dignitaries dedicated the John Hope Franklin Reconciliation Park at 415 North Detroit, Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 2010. Reconciliation Park features elements that tell the story of the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. The park is named for Franklin, the son of a race riot survivor. He became a leading scholar on black history. He died in 2009, shortly after the groundbreaking on the park.

Meanwhile, syncs from the George Floyd killing remain to be explored. See, for example, this video here.

Consider the counterfeit twenty dollar ($20) bill for which George Floyd reportedly was taken into custody. An Andrew Jackson bill. I am a bit shocked by the non-comments on the coincidence of it being a Jackson bill.

Jackson was a brutal slave owner who owned 300+ individuals in his lifetime, and he was known to pay extra rewards for the extensive whipping of his captured runaway slaves.

Also, as President Jackson, he was responsible for the Indian Removal Act.

A mounted Andrew Jackson statue is situated significantly in Lafayette Park, the location which had to be cleared of peaceful demonstrators for Trump's photo opportunity on May 31, 2020. The Fayette Factor again.

NASCAR issued a short statement on June 10, 2020 at 4:45 PM:

“The presence of the confederate flag at NASCAR events runs contrary to our commitment to providing a welcoming and inclusive environment for all fans, our competitors and our industry. Bringing people together around a love for racing and the community that it creates is what makes our fans and sport special. The display of the confederate flag will be prohibited from all NASCAR events and properties.”

Meanwhile, more statues were toppled:

Columbus statue in Boston was beheaded.

Confederate President Jefferson Davis statue was towed away in Richmond, Virginia.

The BBC reported, in part, this summary:

Statues of Confederate leaders and the explorer Christopher Columbus have been torn down in the US, as pressure grows on authorities to remove monuments connected to slavery and colonialism.
A statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis was toppled in Richmond, Virginia, on Wednesday night.
Statues of Columbus in Boston, Miami and Virginia have been vandalised.
***
A number of Confederate statues on Monument Avenue in Richmond have been marked with graffiti during the protests.
Richmond also saw a statue of Italian explorer Columbus pulled down, set alight and thrown into a lake earlier this week,.
A three-metre tall (10ft) bronze statue of Columbus was toppled in Saint Paul, Minnesota, on Wednesday.
The Columbus statue in Boston, which stands on a plinth at the heart of town, was beheaded.
Many people in the US celebrate the memory of Columbus, who in school textbooks is credited with discovering "the New World", the Americas, in the 15th Century.
But Native American activists have long objected to honouring Columbus, saying that his expeditions to the Americas led to the colonisation and genocide of their ancestors.
***
Many cities and organisations have taken steps to remove Confederate symbols, which have long stirred controversy because of their association with racism.
Last week, for example, Virginia's Governor Ralph Northam announced that a statue of Confederate General Robert E Lee would be removed from Richmond.
However, a judge has since granted a temporary injunction stopping the removal.
Stock-car racing organisers Nascar announced on Wednesday it was banning Confederate flags, frequently seen at races.
US President Donald Trump has meanwhile rejected calls to rename military bases named after Confederate generals, saying they remain part of America's heritage.
He tweeted: "The United States of America trained and deployed our HEROES on these Hallowed Grounds, and won two World Wars. Therefore, my Administration will not even consider the renaming of these Magnificent and Fabled Military Installations."
* * *
On Thursday, Bristol City Council said it had retrieved the statue, which will be taken to a secure location before becoming a museum exhibit.
Earlier this week, a statue of noted slaveholder Robert Milligan was removed from outside the Museum of London Docklands.
And, during a Black Lives Matter protest in London last weekend, a statue of Sir Winston Churchill in Parliament Square was sprayed with graffiti. Source.

CNN carried a tally of Confederate statues removed since George Floyd's death here. See also the Wikipedia lists, here and here.

Example: In Tampa, Florida, Memoria In Aeterna ("Eternal Memory"), monument is comprised of two Confederate soldiers: one facing north, in a fresh uniform, upright and heading to battle, and the other facing south, his clothes tattered as he heads home humbled by war. Between them is a 32-foot-tall obelisk with the image of a Confederate flag chiseled into it. It was first erected in 1911 at Franklin and Lafayette Streets, and was moved on September 5, 2017, to the Brandon Family Cemetery.

The Coming Wave of Pandemic Suicides?

During a news briefing on March 23, 2020, President Donald Trump said:

People get tremendous anxiety and depression, and you have suicides over things like this when you have terrible economies. You have death. Probably and — I mean, definitely — would be in far greater numbers than the numbers that we’re talking about with regard to the virus.

Trump followed this with a comment the next day at a Fox town meeting, when reflecting on what would happen in the US if the coronavirus shutdown continues:

You are going to lose a number of people to the flu, but you are going to lose more people by putting the country in a massive recession or depression. You are going to lose people. You’re going to have suicides by the thousands.

There is some confusion here between "depression" (with a mental health or clinical meaning) and "Depression" (an economic term from the 1930s). At various points in Trump's comments, he appears to have been predicting the society, in the midst of a financial depression, would become mentally depressed, and people would begin killing themselves out of despair.

Spanish Flu 1917-1920

What can we learn from the lessons of the misnamed "Spanish flu"?

The Spanish flu proved to be peculiar for several reasons, most noteworthy of course due to the high morbidity (as many 500 million were infected) and mortality (around 50 million deaths). It also came in waves. In the US, there were four such waves: first in spring 1918, again in August 1918 (epidemiologically the most devastating of the four), yet again in winter 1918/1919, and a final return in early 1920. Finally, the disease was unlike most flus in that it decimated even the traditionally more robust segments of the population (ages 20-40), taking the lives of many within 3 days of showing symptoms. Psychiatric Times.

Classically, during the pandemic of 1917-1920, it was not the downturn in the economy, nor the flu itself that impacted the suicide rate. It was the impact of the deaths, survivor guilt, and the underlying isolation that those battling the flu felt that "caused" suicides.

Specific examples turn up in the literature.

The Spanish flu virus "traveled west and south, arriving at Camp Grant, Illinois, on Saturday, September 21, 1918, with 70 hospital admissions," noted The Military and the Influenza Pandemic of 1918-1919.

Ten days after the epidemic struck, hospital admissions began to fall but pneumonia took hold, and Camp Grant's daily death toll began to climb. It reached double digits on October 1 with 14 deaths, then 30 the next day, 46 the next, and 76 on October 4. The mortuary was designed to handle only four deaths a day. On Friday, October 4, with more than 100 bodies in the mortuary camp, officials negotiated with local undertakers to take the bodies at $50 each, but when someone produced a flatbed truck to remove the dead, the Army quickly provided more dignified closed trucks. The number of dead broke 100 on October 5 and reached a horrifying high of 117 deaths on October 6. The last day the Camp Grant death toll exceeded 100 was October 9, but the decline was too late for its commander. Col. Charles B. Hagadorn, a West Point graduate and career officer who had served in Russia and the Panama Canal Zone, was acting camp commander when influenza struck. Although Camp Grant's sickness and death rates were no worse than other camps and better than some, fellow officers later told reporters that Hagadorn had been showing the strain of the epidemic. Troubled as more than 500 soldiers died of pneumonia under his command, on October 7, he committed suicide with a pistol shot to his head. In the end, Camp Grant suffered 10,713 influenza victims, including 1,060 deaths in a population of 40,000. Source.

One individual case is used to illustrate this.

James Niven (12 August 1851 – 30 September 1925) was a Scottish physician, perhaps best known for his work during the Spanish Flu outbreak in 1918 as Manchester's Medical Officer of Health. Following his retirement in 1922 he suffered from depression and committed suicide on 30 September 1925 at Douglas on the Isle of Man. A dramatization of the Spanish flu period in Manchester was transmitted on BBC television as Spanish Flu: The Forgotten Fallen on 5 August 2009 and again on 25 September 2012. On 17 March 2020, "The flu that killed 50 million" documentary was televised, and Niven and his work featured heavily.

The emotional stresses during historical influenza epidemics are impossible to measure in statistical terms, but the suffering of bereavement from the sudden loss of loved ones cannot be ignored. The mortality toll of the 1918–1920 pandemic was not only high but also involved an unusually large proportion of victims between twenty and forty years of age. One consequence was a markedly high number of young widows and widowers and the orphaning of small children.

A significant rise in suicides was reported from several countries across the globe. In the U.S., an increase of one unit in excess flu mortality (one more death per year per 1,000 population) increased the rate of suicide by 10 percent. That statistic takes into account the possible confounding role on the suicide rate of World War I casualties (which proved not to be significant) and the decline in alcohol consumption between 1910 and 1920 (which acted to lower the incidence of suicide). Many suicides can be related to mental disturbances resulting from the fear of contracting the disease (a stricken person could be dead in three days) or stress of infection with the flu itself. However, the unbearable loss of a spouse, children, or close relatives also contributed, as did a fall in social integration due to school closures, cur-tailment of public events, and so on. Source.

In my book Suicide Clusters (Boston: Faber and Faber, 1987), I pointed out that the suicide rate and the occurrence of suicide clusters was so high, Sigmund Freud held the first modern youth suicide prevention conferences in 1920, in Austria.

The documented connection between viral pandemics and psychological stress dates back more than 100 years ago, when Karl Menniger linked the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic with changes in psychiatric complications. The influenza virus most commonly affects the respiratory system, but the burden on neuropsychiatric diseases are under-recognized, he said.

A major study was conducted in 1920 in the United States to determine the impact of the influenza pandemic of 1918 on subsequent rates of suicide. Researchers concluded that the pandemic caused suicide to rise.

Historical demographer Svenn-Erik Mamelund, PhD, in his 2003 paper, "Effects of the Spanish Influenza Pandemic of 1918-19," pointed out that Spanish flu survivors reported sleep disturbances, depression, mental distraction, dizziness, and difficulties coping at work, and that influenza death rates in the United States during the years 1918-1920 were significantly and positively related to suicide.

COVID2019

What will be the legacy of the novel coronavirus of 2019-2020?

Dr. Shailinder Singh who is a psychiatrist working in a psychiatric emergency room in a New York City hospital told ABC News:

This is an unprecedented event for the vast majority of people. It is certainly reasonable to expect the risk of suicide increasing secondary to the economic and social fallout.

One of the solutions for the pandemic -- social isolation -- could prove disastrous for deaths by suicide.

"Social distancing and isolation are triggers for people with mental health issues," said Singh.

Add social distancing to the availability of guns, and a perfect storm is being created for a future wave of suicides.

The FBI reported a 73% increase in background check applications for gun purchases in March 2020, compared to March 2019. Guns are more lethal than any other suicide method, and the United States has the highest percentage ownership of guns in the home.

Stay tuned. We could face some rough times ahead. In the meantime, remember all who have passed this way.

Designed and carved by Tene Waitere, a cenotaph was erected in New Zealand at the Te Köura marae, or meeting place, in memory of Maori who died in the 1918 pandemic.

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National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

1-800-273-8255

Epstein's Enigmatic Temple

Update

On the same day Jeffrey Epstein was arrested on arrival at a New Jersey airport on sex trafficking charges, federal agents bashed in the door of his $77 million Manhattan mansion and seized evidence to aid in his prosecution. But the multimillionaire’s Virgin Islands hideaway, where the wealthy hedge fund manager allegedly trafficked girls for sex and entertained politicians, businessmen and scientists, seemingly remained untouched by the law.

That changed on Monday, August 12, 2019.

FBI agents — accompanied by Customs personnel, local police and New York City officers, according to a Virgin Islands source — fanned out in golf carts across Epstein’s estate on Little St. James Island. They scooped up evidence just two days after Epstein was found dead in his jail cell of an apparent suicide while in federal custody in Manhattan.

***

There will be many mysteries to discuss for conspiracy theorists, political pundits, and alternative media journalists in the coming weeks in the wake of the 8/10/2019 death of Jeffrey Epstein. But one riddle that stands out is the twilight meaning to be found in Epstein's enigmatic "temple."

One item Epstein left behind that defies explanation, thus far, is his mysterious blue-striped temple. Those who have investigated the structure found that while it previously featured a gold dome, it flew off in 2017 when the hurricanes Irma and Maria devastated the region.

The blue-striped structure sits on a lookout point on the southeastern edge of Little St. James Island, which Epstein purchased in 1998 for $7.95 million. The building is surrounded by an expansive terrace painted bright white with red shapes. 

The base is painted with broad, vivid blue horizontal stripes, and supports a large, golden dome. The entrance consists of an arched, seemingly wooden door equipped with black metal hardware. The sides appear to be cut with large windows, including a full-length one in the rear. The front is flanked by statues painted in gold; one of them appears to be the trident-wielding Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea, while two others look like birds perched on the corners of the roof. It is surrounded by a line of palm trees and a terrace with a labyrinth motif. Finally, the exterior seems to incorporate an optical illusion, to create the impression that the exterior windows and door are set within carved flanges. Source.

Rumors abound that it is a gym, a piano room, or a sex slave hideaway.

People have attempted to figure out what the overall reason for the "temple structure" is. Since Epstein was Jewish, that may have been a clue. But it is unlike any Jewish temple.

In many ways, the "domed temple" was like a mosque, similar to the Dome of the Rock, the Islamic shrine located on the Temple Mount in the City of Jerusalem. The cubic base and dome seem to refer this to Islamic architecture, but figures holding tridents, appearing to be Poseidon would be a form that is strange for a mosque.

Tridents raised by Poseidon-like figures.

Domes are found worldwide, of course. In the new film Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, a scene includes the famed Cinerama dome, designed by Pierre Cabrol and R. Buckminster Fuller, where the dome appears blue at night.

Editor Andrew W. Griffin alerted me to a similar looking geodesic dome, formerly a bank, in Oklahoma City, entitled the Gold Dome.

Neither of these domes-as-buildings are anything like Epstein's temple.

Research by online theorists have found that the Little St. James Island's structure compares favorably with the bath houses found in Aleppo, Syria, which are painted like mosques.

An Allepo mosque - or is it another bath house?

Footage was obtained of the use of underaged females (not shown below) in these bath houses.

The exterior painting is mirrored inside.

The Epstein "Temple" has become a meme.

The residents of the Unites States Virgin Islands have their own names for Epstein's island ~ "Pedofile Island," "Island of Sin," and "Orgy Island." Epstein himself use to call it "St. Jeff's Island." He also purchased the nearby Great St. James Island in 2016 for $18 million, located off the east end of St. Thomas.

His death extends his mysterious legacy.

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Additional information from PDXWiz:

St. James links to

1) The Saint James Church Massacre, in Cape Town, South Africa, in 1993. 11 people were killed, including 4 Russian sailors visiting as part of a church outreach program. One of the gunman later participated in two robberies of cash vans (like armored trucks with money), while an armed parishioner who fired back and wounded a gunman became involved in the anti-gun control movement.

Notice the 11.

2) St. James Day Battle, August 4th and 5th, *1666*, between English and Dutch forces. Simultaneously happening were the Great Fire and Great Plague of London. (Notice the Number of the Beast in the year.) One of the Dutch Admirals, Cornelis Tromp, was involved in politics later as a supporter of the House of Orange. (You'll notice the similarity of Donald Trump and references to his hair and looks as being orange.) Accusations of negligence followed; his brother-in-law planned a coup but fled the country. A supporter tried to stab a political rival of Tromp's, and another rival was later killed; Tromp was said to be involved.

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General background. 

Jeffrey Edward Epstein was born on January 20, 1953, in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, to Jewish parents Pauline (née Stolofsky, 1918–2004) and Seymour G. Epstein (1916–1991). His parents were married in 1952, shortly before his birth. Pauline worked as a school aide and was a homemaker. Seymour Epstein worked for the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation as a groundskeeper and gardener. Jeffrey Epstein was the older of two siblings. Epstein and his brother Mark grew up in the working-class neighborhood of Sea Gate, Coney Island, Brooklyn.

We have been here before. Often. What happens when a well-connected person dies by suicide?

Former porn star Jenna Jameson took to Twitter on July 16, 2018, following the posthumous publication of an interview with Parts Unknown host Anthony Bourdain in which Bourdain sharply criticized the Clintons. In her tweet, Jameson suggested that Bourdain’s criticism might have led to him being “suicided.” Source.

Fayette Factor?
Epstein attended local public schools, first Public School 188 and then Mark Twain Junior High School nearby. In 1967, Epstein attended the National Music Camp at the Interlochen Center for the Arts. He was a talented musician who learned to play the piano when he was five. He graduated in 1969 from Lafayette High School at age 16 having skipped two grades. Later that year, he attended classes at Cooper Union until he changed colleges in 1971. From September 1971, he attended the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University, but left without receiving a degree in June 1974.

Intriguing we should find the Fayette Factor in Epstein's story.

Dalton Connection?
Epstein started working after the summer of 1974 as a physics and mathematics teacher at the Dalton School in the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Epstein taught at the exclusive private school from the fall of 1974 until he was dismissed in June 1976. While teaching at the school, Epstein became acquainted with Alan Greenberg, the chief executive officer of Bear Stearns, whose son and daughter were going to the school. Greenberg's daughter, Lynne Koeppel, pointed to a parent teacher conference where Epstein influenced another Dalton parent into advocating for him to Greenberg. Greenberg, impressed with Epstein's intelligence and drive for financial success, offered him a job at Bear Stearns.

Then we turn around, and the Dalton name (= "living in the valley") springs up in Epstein's narrative too.

Intelligence Agent?
Epstein stated to some people [in the early 1980s] that he was an intelligence agent. Whether this statement was truthful or in jest is not clear. During the 1980s, Epstein possessed an Austrian passport that had his photo but a false name. The passport showed his place of residence in Saudi Arabia. U.S. Florida District Attorney Alexander Acosta who handled Epstein's criminal case in 2008 stated that he had been told that Epstein "belonged to intelligence", was "above his pay grade" and to "leave it alone".
During this period, one of Epstein's clients was the Saudi Arabian businessman Adnan Khashoggi, who was the middleman in transferring American weapons from Israel to Iran, as part of the Iran-Contra Affair in the 1980s. Khashoggi was one of several defense contractors that he knew. In the mid-1980s, Epstein traveled multiple times between the United States, Europe, and the Middle East. While in London, Epstein met Steven Hoffenberg. They had been introduced through Douglas Leese, a defense contractor, and John Mitchell, the former US Attorney General.

Are we surprised that some people are seriously speculating that Epstein is still alive and his body has been spirited away to a Mideastern country? By Mossad?

Suicide?
Epstein died of an apparent suicide by hanging on August 10, 2019, while imprisoned at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City. Prison officials found his body in his cell at 6:30 a.m. Three weeks previously he had been found unconscious in his jail cell with injuries to his neck. After that incident, he was placed on suicide watch. However, he was not on suicide watch at the time of his death, leading some prison experts to express bafflement and shock that he would be taken off suicide watch at such a time. U.S Attorney General William Barr ordered an investigation by the Department of Justice Inspector General in addition to the FBI investigation, saying he was "appalled" by Epstein's death in federal custody. Epstein was 66 years old.

More questions than answers = a storm of conspiracy theories.