Would it be irresponsible to speculate?

The Jeffrey Epstein matter could end up being a wet firecracker, but Gabriel Sherman seems to think it's likely to blow up like a Saturn 5.

For those of you who have been avoiding the gossip columns, let's begin with the known True Facts.

1. A boatload of prominent men spent time at his various houses, including the Manhattan and Florida Mansions, and are otherwise known to have associated with him including taking free private jet rides. These include financiers, business executives, politicians, academics. This happened both before and after his conviction and wrist slap sentence for soliciting prostitution in Florida.

2. Dozens of women claim he sexually abused them when they were anywhere from 13 to 16 years old. Some of these claims are the basis for the previous conviction, others for the new indictment, and apparently numerous additional women have come forward to investigators since the new indictment was announced. (At least one has publicly claimed that a certain famous person abused her as a gift from Epstein, but I'll say no more as the claim is of questionable credibility.)

3. Epstein may not be as wealthy as he claims to be but he is unquestionably pretty damn wealthy. The mansions and the private jet and private island are real.

4. Nobody seems to know where his money comes from. His claim to run a "billionaires only" hedge fund is generally regarded as non-credible by people in the financial industry.

5. Former Secretary of Labor Alexander Acosta, who as U.S. Attorney gave Epstein the sweetheart deal which also, inexplicably, immunized any and all co-conspirators, told officials who were vetting him for the cabinet job that he cut the deal because “I was told Epstein ‘belonged to intelligence’ and to leave it alone.” That was apparently good enough for the Trump White House but WTF? Who told him that?

So you can probably come up with your own fantastical scenario which is the same one a lot of people have already come up with: that Epstein's real business is blackmail. The questions remain however, if this is true, whether:

1. Investigators from the Southern District of New York have evidence for this including the identities of the individuals he has blackmailed, and

2. If they do, will the evidence ever become public? Somebody or somebodies had enough clout to prevent it from happening in 2008, and I don't know what has changed since then to make justice blind.

According to the Sherman article linked at the top, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has a huge trove of documents resulting from discovery in a civil suit by one of Epstein's accusers, which he implies will blow the lid off. I am a bit skeptical. If these exist, the SDNY also has them but they have not, as far as we know, indicted anybody but Epstein. Perhaps they are preparing their case and giving people a chance to talk with them. On the other hand they work for William Barr.

So if the rocket never goes off, lots of people are still going to believe that there's a continuing cover up and public cynicism will just get deeper. If it does, however, this could be a transformative moment in the culture, perhaps salutary, perhaps very dangerous.