This week on What Rough Beast, Stephen and Virginia go deep on the Epstein conspiracy. Here's what we covered:

* How Epstein represented a new class of ultra-wealthy who exempt themselves from democratic norms and why this scandal has traction when Trump seemed "Teflon"

* Virginia's first-hand experience with John Brockman's Epstein-funded EDGE organization and the "intellectual dark web"

* The physics envy pipeline from quantum mechanics to finance via IQ fetishism

* How neo-Darwinism provided intellectual cover for predatory behavior

* Why Trump supporters care more about "cover-ups" than actual crimes and whether cognitive fatigue could provide an off-ramp from Trump loyalty

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