Intro
Welcome to The Cameron Journal Newsletter. Each week, Cameron Lee Cowan wraps up the headlines with commentary, helping you navigate today’s media narratives, how they are affecting our Culture, Lifestyle, and Society.
The World is Hard, This is Not
If you’re new here, my name is Cameron Lee Cowan M.A. MFA, and I’m the Creative Director here at The Cameron Journal. You can learn more about me on the about page. I do research and commentary on politics, culture, and the world around us. Each week I send out the latest news narratives, the latest videos from The Cameron Journal and commentary about the week’s events.
Remember, The World is Hard, This is Not.
Update from Cameron
Happy Saturday everyone! I’m so sorry to have missed the Newshour this week, I was not in a place where I could do a good job on Monday. My Father’s funeral was on Friday and while I was unable to attend, he was deeply in my thoughts. His memorial page is rather sparse, which was rather sad; I think. I will have to visit his grave this year. But it has been on my mind. I’ll tell you what else is on my mind: cold! It has been freezing here in New England, and I’m over it. There is a deep pile of plowed snow behind my car that is now basically ice and I haven’t even bothered to try to excavate my car. I think we’re hoping for warmer temperatures before we try to dig.
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The News Narratives of the Week
Don’t forget to join me on Monday for The Cameron Journal Newshour!
A quick note before we start, I did see that the FBI raided the Fulton County Election commission and seized 700 boxes of ballots from the 2020 election. President Trump has been trying to prove (unsuccessfully) that the 2020 election was “rigged” for years. I don’t have any meaningful information to pass along yet but when I do, we’ll have a whole story on it. However, meanwhile, Jack Smith was interviewed by the House about his findings about President Trump’s criminal actions around the 2020 election, particularly the fake electors’ scandal (which was overshadowed by J6). And you can watch a clip of that.
The Latest Epstein Files Drop
Last night, the Department of Justice dropped the “final” batch of documents in the Epstein files and people are still going through it all but here’s what we know so far:
Here’s what we know so far:
We have allegations against Trump
Bad redactions, Melania’s friendship with Ghislaine Maxwell and more
Israel/Moussad Connections, Bill Gates STDs, and Pizzagate references
The DOJ did not include graphic videos and images
I will say that much of what is covered is quite shocking. There are connections to all sorts of people, many expected and known a few surprises, like Melania’s friendship with Ghislaine Maxwell. The connections between Epstein, Ehud Barak (former PM of Israel), and Alan Dershowitz are not surprising but proves up much of what we already suspected.
I’ve long maintained that the problem with the Epstein files and investigation is that implications too many people and exposes too much, like the part where there are emails about arranging for the assassination of a Hamas terrorist leader. There are connections to the UAE and there’s even talk of looting Libya and various assets to benefit MI6 (UK intelligence). The national security implications of much of this are profound. Epstein admits he likes a torture video at one point. Elon Musk is inviting himself to parties and even gets handed off to Ghislaine at one point because Epstein didn’t want to deal with him.
And that doesn’t even touch some of the sex stuff which I hesitate to reveal, but it does appear that multiple people in this circle, including Trump and others were interested in and are alleged to have sex with children as elucidated in the documents (linked above). So far, it is only screenshots, and we all need more time to go through all of this, but the sex crimes alone are vile. I’m sure that more stuff regarding Bill Clinton will come up along with others as these latest files are combed through and added to existing databases.
The bigger question is if any prosecutions come from this? Frankly, I doubt it. The only reason we have the information that we have is due to Jeffrey Epstein become a meme on the internet and President Trump turning this into a political issue. We have emails and some evidence, but my guess is that there isn’t a ton of evidence beyond that, and it would not stand up in a court of law. That’s just my opinion as a non-lawyer, but I’ve been in this business long enough to know that if someone isn’t catching charges even though “it seems obvious” it usually because evidence is missing, compromised, or just not available. It is frustrating to say the least.
The big takeaway (in my view) is that this would have all gone away if it hasn’t been for people on the internet, pizza gate and all of those things that led up to this moment. Epstein would have been arrested and quietly sent away or killed (as he was) and that would have been the end of it. Now, we have to deal with the fallout of finding out that many prominent public figures are connected to a pedophile, rapist, and sex trafficker who was in the business of providing underage girls to elite people and possibly collecting intelligence for Moussad. And we have to deal with the fact that one of the central figures is currently President, one was President 26 years ago, and the connections to various elites on both sides of the Atlantic goes deep on that basis.
What do we do now?
There will be calls to impeach President Trump, but those won’t go anywhere fast, at least until the midterms. Prosecutions for Bill Gates, Alan Dershowitz and Bill Clinton will grow louder, but then we run into a question of evidence, standing, statues of limitation and much more. While I do something happens around this I have the sinking feeling that nothing will happen.
Alex Pretti and the Narrative
I was unable to do the newshour on Monday and so I didn’t get a chance to go through all the video, but I’m sure that everyone knows that Alex Pretti, a nurse (who had quit his job recently) was shot by ICE in Minneapolis after an altercation with some other women who were being harassed by ICE. It is unclear how the women were there, but it could have been to protest ICE action in the area. We’ve all seen all the videos and there have been legal breakdowns on the interaction from Legal Eagle and others on Youtube. Obviously, just like Renee Good, narrative is very important and everyone has already pre-selected their side. I’ll give you the first example of this.
To prove that he was some kind of unhinged maniac, this video was posted about him attacking ICE officers about 10 days before his death. You can see another angle in this video which is being purported as the reason he was not a “peaceful protestor.” Also, his involvement in Signal (communication app) groups for tracking and resisting ICE has seemingly given some people clearance for why he deserved to be shot. As if mere resistance to overwhelming state power is a reason for execution on the public street.
I don’t agree with what ICE is doing, and I am glad that there is resistance, and more Americans are beginning to come around on that topic. Net approval of the President has slipped and now a majority of Americans disapprove of his job so far, and much of that is powered by immigration.
I do find it mildly entertaining that the NRA hasn’t issued a stern press release about 2A rights considering Pretti was a legal gun owner and has a right to carry a gun at a protest. He was using his Second Amendment rights as intended: a stop against government power but when it came down to it, everyone who has been shouting about government tyranny has fallen silent and the reason is quite simple: they agree with what the government is doing.
Greg Bovino has announced that the media shouldn’t say bad things about ICE and that Pretti was radicalized by a media and others who were demonizing ICE. Apparently, when the big boot of government power comes into our lives we have to simply give up. Where was that energy during the pandemic when the position was reversed?
In a bit of change in all of this, Trump has sent Tom Homan up to Minnesota to calm tensions and to get ICE back on track with immigration enforcement. However, his choice is rather particular and peculiar at the same time. As we know, Homeland Defense Secretary Kristi Noem has been responsible for all of this and remarked that she has been working under the direction of President Trump. Homan is an interesting choice because he was frozen out. Here’s a little article round-up about that very thing.
However, the entire situation in Minnesota is emblematic of the problems we have with modern political discourse. For people who think the best course of action is to simply stay out of the way of ICE, nothing will prove that ICE did something wrong beyond being incompetent. Still others are angry at the media and the Left for “selective outrage” as someone pointed out, “What about all the people who were killed by illegal immigrants? Where’s the outrage for that?” Both of these things are important, but this “whataboutism” is purely driven by media narratives. The idea that there should be protests against immigrants because of crime rather than against a far more powerful state. The reason is a matter of power. Immigrants are somewhat powerless to the whims of our society. Meanwhile, how the state treats relatively powerless people matter a great deal, both legally and morally.
Being “anti-immigration” is a political position held by people in the country, and so right-leaning outlets will report every moment where an immigrant commits a crime to show that immigration is a massive issue and is killing people. Conversely, other outlets who do not want to show that because they “support” immigration and those stories don’t come out from those outlets. This system then gets blended into social media where those of us in the online chattering classes add our two cents which range from “dangerous migrants taking over cities” to “rates of immigrant crime are quite low” and variations in between.
Ergo, everyone already knows how they feel about immigration and that often extends to how we view people fighting against ICE. We’ve already seen this play out with the protests at the ICE detention centers in Los Angeles and the people who were killed during those protests and how the government responded. Minneapolis is the latest flashpoint in a conversation about immigration in this country and a general feeling that there is simply too much immigration happening and a feeling that many of the problems of the country can be solved by deporting illegal immigrants (who seem to get a lot of benefits) and restricting future immigration.
This also dovetails into the social program corruption currently being investigated around the country. Conservatives and others will ask that if Blue state governors have nothing to hide, then why all the fuss? Because they know, that anything found will further reinforce the narrative that all Blue states are corrupt (which President Trump has been pushing for a decade) and that illegal immigrants get more help than citizens. This even extends into the outcry against H1-B visa holders as well. Unfortunately, this moment is being pulled on by at least 3 different news narratives, and we all know what happens in a three body problem.
It leads to an unstable era.
Something to sip your favorite drink with tonight.
Articles of Interest
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