We are living through an era of professional gaslighting so refined it could qualify for a Ph.D. in psychological warfare.

The latest example? After years of establishment indifference, we are now being told -- loudly, breathlessly -- that Jeffrey Epstein’s legacy of elite depravity is the national scandal of the hour. Apparently, six years after his death, this is now urgent. That Donald Trump crossed paths with Epstein is supposed to be more damning than the years Epstein was welcomed by the Clinton inner circle, the Gates orbit, and the upper crust of academia, finance, and intelligence.

Let me offer a parable.

There is a mouse in the room. Its name is Epstein. The media is pointing at it, stomping its feet, shrieking: “Look at this dangerous mouse!”

Just behind the mouse stomps an elephant -- huge, festering, impossible to ignore if you simply look. This is the face of the biggest federal scandal since the Kennedy assassination. It is the defining image of the Deep State: a shadow bureaucracy led by Brennan, Clapper, Comey, and others, manipulating “the presentation” -- not to be confused with facts.

Tulsi Gabbard, now Director of National Intelligence, has implicated former President Obama directly, and the evidence supports her. The elephant is real. It is the coordination of the Deep State, shaping narratives that, for reasons unspoken, are embraced wholesale by legacy media.

Today, the media fixates on the firing of a Deep State Labor Department official. They dig obsessively for any mud to fling at Trump. Why? “Trump Derangement Syndrome” is no longer a sufficient explanation. This is about protecting the machine. But why?

Compare Hillary Clinton’s destruction of her private server and the hammering to bits of subpoenaed phones. The media shrugged. Why? Aren’t they supposed to report the news? Same with the Hunter laptop from hell, the Biden family’s foreign business schemes, the jaw-dropping wealth accumulation of congressional lifers -- none of it hits the radar. This is the elephant and the machine.

The mouse is a distraction.
The elephant is the system.
The machine is the shield.

It is no longer “conspiracy” to say the Deep State exists -- it is observation. It is measurable. The federal government has failed multiple audits involving trillions in unaccounted-for dollars. Nobody is fired. Nobody is prosecuted. Agencies like the Pentagon, HUD, and State are black holes of spending. Contractors feast, middlemen thrive, and entire careers are built not on results, but on keeping the machine humming for insiders. And Americans? We yawn. We scroll. We buy the next outrage.

We are no longer governed. We are processed.

This isn’t a government of the people. It’s a machine for the distribution of favors, immunity, and wealth -- among the protected class. That is why Epstein didn’t matter until now. That’s why Hillary can BleachBit servers, lie to Congress, and rake in $100K per speech. That’s why Biden’s documented lies and his family's shady foreign deals provoke less interest than a Trump typo.

But heaven forbid Trump fill out a form improperly.

We’ve become numb to scale. Numb to volume. A $500 hammer here, a $2 trillion boondoggle there. The Pentagon misplaces $6.2 trillion? Shrug. Hunter Biden makes millions in Ukraine while his dad shapes policy? Shrug. Bureaucrats retire with six-figure pensions after decades of managing failure as “public servants?” Shrug again.

And now, like a bad B-movie reboot, the Epstein plotline is dragged back into the spotlight -- as the headline event. Somehow, the Deep State's vast corruption is treated as a distraction from Epstein. It’s almost admirable, in a clinical-psychopath kind of way.

Let’s not play dumb. The system isn't just corrupt, it is self-aware. It protects its members, demonizes threats, and launders its failures through distraction. And like all declining empires, it cloaks its rot in the language of justice and democracy. The same DoJ that ignores arson, looting, and political violence in blue cities suddenly finds religion when a Republican sneezes in the wrong direction.

The same agencies that fumbled 9/11, Iraq WMDs, Russiagate, and the Hunter laptop now ask for your trust -- again.

Here is the truth: Epstein was a grotesque man with grotesque friends. But the reason his story is being reactivated now is not justice. It’s cover. It’s projection. It’s the oldest trick in the political playbook: accuse your enemies of the crimes you are terrified might be traced back to you.

Be careful what you wish for.

Because if the Epstein list ever truly breaks open -- if the full extent of who flew where, and why, and who knew what ever comes to light -- then the same people hurling accusations today might find themselves holding the dynamite with the fuse already lit.

It is getting harder to hide that elephant behind the mouse.

Rick McDowell is a writer of political philosophy, American history, and essays on the mind. His other thoughts can be found at https://americanperspective.today.

Image: Public Domain