6 ms·

Jeffery Epstein Met with Reid Hoffman, Larry Summers and Woody Allen

52 points by wootland 3y ago

Simulacra 3y ago
Why is this all coming out now?
mc32 3y ago
And apparently Noah Chomsky who says it's no one's business to ask why he met with mr. Epstein after Epstein was convicted as a sex offender.
- snapcaster 3y ago
  Yeah huge L for chomsky, bummer always enjoyed his stuff even if I almost never agreed with it
- hospitalJail 3y ago
  I wish we could detach people from their work. I was/am abrasive unfortunately, I'm working on it, but I still suck. I especially cannot handle when people give false knowledge, I will make a fool of myself if I see someone lying or misleading. I also run a popular website, specifically educating people on a niche field of education. I've seen people write off all the data collected and conclusions because of my personal behavior. I don't even disagree about my personal behavior. Just leave my scientific contributions out of it. I will be dead and people will be reading my conclusions, while I'm alive, it seems to always come up(in online discussions).
  - VagueMag 3y ago
    Chomsky's work really isn't all that great though. His work on linguistics has essentially been revealed as nonsense and his political analysis is firmly in the realm of the "compatible left": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35764773 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35764773
- 0xDEF 3y ago
  [flagged]
- happytoexplain 3y ago
  It's unfortunately an unwinnable situation, from an external perspective. You shouldn't have to defend yourself by explaining personal details of your life just because you once met with a wealthy businessman who turned out to be a criminal, especially one who made a point of making as many connections as possible, and especially considering that people will furiously point the finger at you if you even so much as smell like you might be one of their political enemies. On the other hand, that's also a convenient excuse if you really did happen to collude in his crime.
  - Clent 3y ago
    These people were associating closely with a known predator. They don't get to play it off as innocent mistake. They empowered him. Lie with pigs...they are either pedophiles or pedophile enablers. Some got bacon, these rest are covered in mud, as they deserve to be.
  - InitialLastName 3y ago
    > who turned out to be a criminal Who was already a convicted criminal, and was very visibly using his networks to defend himself against that conviction.
- AraceliHarker 3y ago
  Given that MIT received a large donation from Eppstein, it wouldn't be too surprising that Chomsky, an MIT employee, had a meeting with him. Given Chomsky's current age, I think it would be unfortunate and unprofitable to question him. He does not have the same vitality and lucidity now as he did when he was interviewing Foucault. If you want to know more about Eppstein, you should go to Joichi Ito.
vannevar 3y ago
Aside from being a pedophile, Jeffery Epstein was an incredibly wealthy man. He met with thousands of people. They weren't all pedophiles. That was part of his scam, to forge relationships with a lot of important people so they'd be less likely to believe the stories about his sexual predation. He banked social proof and used it to deflect scrutiny.
- belter 3y ago
  What about the famous persons who met with him after he was a convicted sex offender? "Jeffrey Epstein Was a Sex Offender. The Powerful Welcomed Him Anyway." - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/13/nyregion/jeffrey-epstein-new-york-elite.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/13/nyregion/jeffrey-epstein-...
  - version_five 3y ago
    This was before cancel culture, metoo and whatnot. People are a lot more sensitive now. He had served his sentence (even if in retrospect it was ridiculously light). The fact that so many different people associated with him is evidence that obviously it wasn't in any way culturally unacceptable at the time.
    - HarryHirsch 3y ago
      "I'm sorry, I cannot comment on the matter until it has been officially hushed up."
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
    - Teever 3y ago
      I'm pretty sure ostracizing sex criminals was common place before 2016.
      - exolymph 3y ago
doitLP 3y ago
https://archive.ph/4CyWK https://archive.ph/4CyWK
system16 3y ago
As much as I have no sympathy for any of these billionaires and celebrities, Epstein's entire modus operandi was getting himself associated with as many of these people as possible to insulate himself. So while yes, I think there is dirt on some of these people, just being associated with Epstein through way of a meeting, photo at an event, or invite, is not the loaded gun many want it to be.
- 015UUZn8aEvW 3y ago
  The Summers connection described in the article is a little more than a chance meeting at an event. In addition to their earlier ties, the article says that he and Epstein met more than a dozen times after Epstein's conviction and prison stint. Summers reached out to Epstein to raise money for his wife's $1M online poetry nonprofit (LOL) and Epstein donated $110k. The nonprofit eventually donated a large amount to an anti-sex-trafficking organization to make up for taking the Epstein money, but the fact that they solicited the money after Epstein's conviction suggests that their backtracking was more for PR than for actual concern about his history.
HideousKojima 3y ago
>Woody Allen I mean is anyone shocked that a known child abuser met with another? "Death is a funny thing. Not funny haha like a Woody Allen movie, but funny weird like a Woody Allen marriage" - Norm McDonald
Bostonian 3y ago
If the rich and famous guys who knew Epstein abused girls as he and Ghislaine Maxwell did, I would expect civil lawsuits and criminal prosecution. The lack of such suits suggests to me that Epstein's acquaintances did not offend as he did.
- VagueMag 3y ago
  Or it suggests the victims have been silenced with a mix of out-of-court settlements and threats. Some victims have testified that Ghislaine Maxwell would explicitly and openly threaten their lives in the event they spoke with any authorities. Maria Farmer reported Epstein to the FBI in the 1990s and the investigation was spiked.
ksherlock 3y ago
I still don't understand where the money came from 1. Get fired from your job as a school teacher for having sex with students 2. ???? 3. Profit! Sometime there's a reference to "estate planning" or "tax planning", etc, but that doesn't seem like "buy an island" kind of money. (And I'm sure the wealth was exaggerated but still there was plenty of money)
- 015UUZn8aEvW 3y ago
  Yeah, despite all of the publicity, the Epstein story is really still underreported.
- VagueMag 3y ago
  The only publicly known and documented source of Epstein's wealth is gifts of stock and real estate from Les Wexner. Any claims to the effect he was some sort of legitimate "financier" (which is still the widespread perception) are completely unsupported by evidence, which would be abundantly available in the form of trading and other financial records.
  - acdha 3y ago
    He was limited partner at Bear-Stearns, and involved in a number of financial ventures so I think there’s more to it than just Wexner but given that this included at least one massive Ponzi scheme (Towers Financial Corporation) I think it’s very reasonable to question how many of those ventures involved scams or money laundering.
    - VagueMag 3y ago
      The SEC went hard after Steve Hoffenberg, Epstein's partner in crime at Towers, but somehow Epstein managed not to land in any legal trouble over it whatsoever. A truly charmed life.
      - acdha 3y ago
        Yeah, I’m not saying anything about his life looks innocent but rather than he had more opportunities to accumulate wealth than just Wexner. Some of those would have been perfect money laundering vehicles (e.g. I “invest” in your fund and don’t complain when the management fees are high) so it seems like there should still be an investigation into still living partners. It’s entirely possible this is the more mundane “rich people taking care of their drinking buddy” corruption, too - there’s certainly tons of precedent for that.
AraceliHarker 3y ago
If Epstein had such a connection with such a big man in so many fields, Melinda Gates wouldn't have had to divorce Bill Gates because of his relationship with Epstein.

52 points by wootland 3y ago

Why is this all coming out now?

mc32 3y ago

And apparently Noah Chomsky who says it's no one's business to ask why he met with mr. Epstein after Epstein was convicted as a sex offender.

snapcaster 3y ago
Yeah huge L for chomsky, bummer always enjoyed his stuff even if I almost never agreed with it
hospitalJail 3y ago
I wish we could detach people from their work. I was/am abrasive unfortunately, I'm working on it, but I still suck. I especially cannot handle when people give false knowledge, I will make a fool of myself if I see someone lying or misleading. I also run a popular website, specifically educating people on a niche field of education. I've seen people write off all the data collected and conclusions because of my personal behavior. I don't even disagree about my personal behavior. Just leave my scientific contributions out of it. I will be dead and people will be reading my conclusions, while I'm alive, it seems to always come up(in online discussions).
- VagueMag 3y ago
  Chomsky's work really isn't all that great though. His work on linguistics has essentially been revealed as nonsense and his political analysis is firmly in the realm of the "compatible left": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35764773 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35764773
0xDEF 3y ago
[flagged]
happytoexplain 3y ago
It's unfortunately an unwinnable situation, from an external perspective. You shouldn't have to defend yourself by explaining personal details of your life just because you once met with a wealthy businessman who turned out to be a criminal, especially one who made a point of making as many connections as possible, and especially considering that people will furiously point the finger at you if you even so much as smell like you might be one of their political enemies. On the other hand, that's also a convenient excuse if you really did happen to collude in his crime.
- Clent 3y ago
  These people were associating closely with a known predator. They don't get to play it off as innocent mistake. They empowered him. Lie with pigs...they are either pedophiles or pedophile enablers. Some got bacon, these rest are covered in mud, as they deserve to be.
- InitialLastName 3y ago
  > who turned out to be a criminal Who was already a convicted criminal, and was very visibly using his networks to defend himself against that conviction.
AraceliHarker 3y ago
Given that MIT received a large donation from Eppstein, it wouldn't be too surprising that Chomsky, an MIT employee, had a meeting with him. Given Chomsky's current age, I think it would be unfortunate and unprofitable to question him. He does not have the same vitality and lucidity now as he did when he was interviewing Foucault. If you want to know more about Eppstein, you should go to Joichi Ito.

vannevar 3y ago

Aside from being a pedophile, Jeffery Epstein was an incredibly wealthy man. He met with thousands of people. They weren't all pedophiles. That was part of his scam, to forge relationships with a lot of important people so they'd be less likely to believe the stories about his sexual predation. He banked social proof and used it to deflect scrutiny.

belter 3y ago
What about the famous persons who met with him after he was a convicted sex offender? "Jeffrey Epstein Was a Sex Offender. The Powerful Welcomed Him Anyway." - https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/13/nyregion/jeffrey-epstein-new-york-elite.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/13/nyregion/jeffrey-epstein-...
- version_five 3y ago
  This was before cancel culture, metoo and whatnot. People are a lot more sensitive now. He had served his sentence (even if in retrospect it was ridiculously light). The fact that so many different people associated with him is evidence that obviously it wasn't in any way culturally unacceptable at the time.
  - HarryHirsch 3y ago
    "I'm sorry, I cannot comment on the matter until it has been officially hushed up."
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - Teever 3y ago
    I'm pretty sure ostracizing sex criminals was common place before 2016.
    - exolymph 3y ago

doitLP 3y ago

https://archive.ph/4CyWK https://archive.ph/4CyWK

system16 3y ago

As much as I have no sympathy for any of these billionaires and celebrities, Epstein's entire modus operandi was getting himself associated with as many of these people as possible to insulate himself. So while yes, I think there is dirt on some of these people, just being associated with Epstein through way of a meeting, photo at an event, or invite, is not the loaded gun many want it to be.

015UUZn8aEvW 3y ago
The Summers connection described in the article is a little more than a chance meeting at an event. In addition to their earlier ties, the article says that he and Epstein met more than a dozen times after Epstein's conviction and prison stint. Summers reached out to Epstein to raise money for his wife's $1M online poetry nonprofit (LOL) and Epstein donated $110k. The nonprofit eventually donated a large amount to an anti-sex-trafficking organization to make up for taking the Epstein money, but the fact that they solicited the money after Epstein's conviction suggests that their backtracking was more for PR than for actual concern about his history.

HideousKojima 3y ago

>Woody Allen I mean is anyone shocked that a known child abuser met with another? "Death is a funny thing. Not funny haha like a Woody Allen movie, but funny weird like a Woody Allen marriage" - Norm McDonald

Bostonian 3y ago

If the rich and famous guys who knew Epstein abused girls as he and Ghislaine Maxwell did, I would expect civil lawsuits and criminal prosecution. The lack of such suits suggests to me that Epstein's acquaintances did not offend as he did.

VagueMag 3y ago
Or it suggests the victims have been silenced with a mix of out-of-court settlements and threats. Some victims have testified that Ghislaine Maxwell would explicitly and openly threaten their lives in the event they spoke with any authorities. Maria Farmer reported Epstein to the FBI in the 1990s and the investigation was spiked.

ksherlock 3y ago

I still don't understand where the money came from 1. Get fired from your job as a school teacher for having sex with students 2. ???? 3. Profit! Sometime there's a reference to "estate planning" or "tax planning", etc, but that doesn't seem like "buy an island" kind of money. (And I'm sure the wealth was exaggerated but still there was plenty of money)

015UUZn8aEvW 3y ago
Yeah, despite all of the publicity, the Epstein story is really still underreported.
VagueMag 3y ago
The only publicly known and documented source of Epstein's wealth is gifts of stock and real estate from Les Wexner. Any claims to the effect he was some sort of legitimate "financier" (which is still the widespread perception) are completely unsupported by evidence, which would be abundantly available in the form of trading and other financial records.
- acdha 3y ago
  He was limited partner at Bear-Stearns, and involved in a number of financial ventures so I think there’s more to it than just Wexner but given that this included at least one massive Ponzi scheme (Towers Financial Corporation) I think it’s very reasonable to question how many of those ventures involved scams or money laundering.
  - VagueMag 3y ago
    The SEC went hard after Steve Hoffenberg, Epstein's partner in crime at Towers, but somehow Epstein managed not to land in any legal trouble over it whatsoever. A truly charmed life.
    - acdha 3y ago
      Yeah, I’m not saying anything about his life looks innocent but rather than he had more opportunities to accumulate wealth than just Wexner. Some of those would have been perfect money laundering vehicles (e.g. I “invest” in your fund and don’t complain when the management fees are high) so it seems like there should still be an investigation into still living partners. It’s entirely possible this is the more mundane “rich people taking care of their drinking buddy” corruption, too - there’s certainly tons of precedent for that.

AraceliHarker 3y ago

If Epstein had such a connection with such a big man in so many fields, Melinda Gates wouldn't have had to divorce Bill Gates because of his relationship with Epstein.