NYTimes: Trump Shares Unfounded Fringe Theory About Epstein and Clintons

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President Trump arriving on Friday in Morristown, N.J.

BERKELEY HEIGHTS, N.J. — President Trump used Twitter on Saturday to promote unfounded conspiracy theories about how Jeffrey Epstein, the financier accused of sex trafficking, died in a federal prison, even as the administration faced questions about why Mr. Epstein had not been more closely monitored.

For years Mr. Trump has brashly — and baselessly — promoted suspicion as fact and peddled secret plots by powerful interests as a way to broadcast his own version of reality. Those include the lie that former President Barack Obama was not born in the United States and that millions of votes were illegally cast for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.

Hours after Mr. Epstein was found to have hanged himself in his Manhattan jail cell, Mr. Trump retweeted a post from the comedian Terrence Williams linking the Clintons to the death. Mr. Epstein “had information on Bill Clinton & now he’s dead,” wrote Mr. Williams, a Trump supporter. In an accompanying two-minute video, Mr. Williams noted that “for some odd reason, people that have information on the Clintons end up dead.”

There is no evidence to substantiate the claim, which derives from groundless speculation on the far right, dating to Mr. Clinton’s early days as president, that multiple deaths can be traced to the Clintons and explained by their supposed efforts to cover up wrongdoing.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/10/us/politics/trump-epstein-conspiracy-theories.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. Trump projects more than Bell & Howell.

Who would want Epstein dead a whole lot more than Clinton?

See, we can have our conspiracy theories, too.

[Cha]

2. Translation.. trump LIES

his fucking head OFF.

[dhill926]

3. well...the asshole does seem to be...

projecting a bit much. Feeling some heat are ya...

[ancianita]

4. The NYT headline is weird. Horse racey sounding. "Theory" is not usable with people,

This headline language amplifies language misuse and political weirdness, or calculation, I can't tell which.

"Theory" isn't applicable to people, nevermind the played out alt-right fetish with the Clintons. There is no "fringe theory." There's fringe gossip, rumor or conspiracy.

[BigmanPigman]

5. I have read several DUers say they are canceling their

NY Times due to their biased reporting this week. They will be more than happy to give us another 4 years of this BS.

[ancianita]

7. I've had it delivered everyday for 30 years and can tell you it's really changed lately.

[BadgerMom]

6. That was my first reaction as well.

I cancelled the Times in 2017, so I’m no longer a fan. But they did call it a lie in the body of the article. For what it’s worth.

[ancianita]

8. One problem is that, if it's the "paper of record," perhaps we've got bad news burnout.

Another problem for me, personally, is that this death is a sordid, ugly human event in the context of news on a whole network of crime that's caused much human suffering.

I feel that it elevates paranoid conspiracy of the right to the level of "all the news that's fit to print" and worse, puts it on the front page. It seems nuts.

I know the alt-right aren't their audience, but when they see this, I'd bet they're proud of the elevation that's similar to "good people on both sides" outlook on the national stage.

Either the NYT's politics are changing, or are too calculated for me to accept.

I hope I read the editors get roundly criticized in the op-eds soon.

When science and the best gets kicked out of government service to us, I'd at least like to stand up for the language world they work in.