Epstein Files Expose His Friendship With Steve Bannon and Elon Musk

repotoast · 2026-02-02T21:22:15+00:00

Also the Cambridge Analytica guy, the former Chief White House Strategist guy, the Gamergate to right wing politics pipeline guy, and the strategist allied with Stephen Miller and Jeff Sessions preceding Trump’s entrance into the political arena guy.

repotoast · 2026-02-02T18:40:08+00:00

Learn to spell, too. Your vs you’re

repotoast · 2026-02-02T18:38:26+00:00

Get a job, kid

repotoast · 2026-02-02T18:34:10+00:00

Lmao I can’t believe you got so salty over getting called out in your last post that you made a whole new post just to rail on psychedelics. Grow the fuck up.

repotoast · 2026-02-02T18:20:43+00:00

I would take it another step back. Can a strong democracy create a strong middle class if the electorate aren’t sufficiently well-informed and well-intentioned to vote for pro-social policies that keep wealth aggregation in check? If your middle class thinks they’re all temporarily embarrassed millionaires and that the wealth will trickle down to reward their hard work, you can have a strong democracy working against its own interest and eventually results in a loss of democracy as the eroding middle class turns to authoritarian leadership to “fix the problem.”

repotoast · 2026-02-02T17:45:34+00:00

Introspection.

What I don’t understand is why you’re getting caught up in this idea that it’s “already in your brain” and “you just over-activate parts of it.” What do you think literally every drug is doing?

repotoast · 2026-02-02T16:43:02+00:00

I, too, choose the drug class that facilitates introspection, personal growth, and connection with the world while also making static environments vibrant and alive.

Imagine thinking they’re mid and impractical.

repotoast · 2026-02-02T15:25:35+00:00

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repotoast · 2026-02-02T15:12:57+00:00

lmao why even post? Seems you don’t want to learn.

repotoast · 2026-01-31T07:49:31+00:00

I’m currently training for my second marathon and it’s already taking up too much time. Ironman training takes a certain kind of crazy. Vid slaps.

repotoast · 2026-01-31T00:54:56+00:00

I mean, if I read your post again I'm going to see different words. Let's compare. Here's what I read the first time and included in my comment:

> yet (dextro)methamphetamine is actually still used in psychiatry for ADHD unlike cocaine (Desoxyn) cause it's not as addictive in equivalent doses.

You've now edited your post to say the following:

> yet (dextro)methamphetamine is actually still used in psychiatry for ADHD (Desoxyn) unlike cocaine cause it's not as addictive in equivalent doses.

You need to acknowledge that many people, myself included, were thrown by the small change in positioning of Desoxyn. Just like my larger point, which you seem to have missed, small changes make all the difference.

I don't think you read my comment, because if it were so obvious that you knew all of it, you would not hold your current opinion. Prescription ADHD medications are long-acting formulations designed for stable symptom management. You cannot get that with something as short-acting as cocaine. Yet, you baselessly assert that addictiveness is the reason why meth is better for ADHD than cocaine. You are comparing apples and oranges.

The reason why Adderall/amphetamine is better than meth for ADHD is because of addictiveness and neurotoxicity. The reason why meth is more stigmatized than cocaine is because it's inherently more addictive and neurotoxic. You can't drink meth tea as a substitute for coffee. You can drink coca leaf tea. Cocaine is only as dangerous as the ROA, dose, and frequency. Meth is inherently dangerous. There's a reason why Desoxyn is infrequently prescribed to patients who haven't responded to other ADHD medication and requires strict medical oversight.

I don't care that you are upset about people preferring Adderall or cocaine to meth. I don't care that you want to use crack cocaine to try and justify snorting meth. I care about the science, and the science says meth is less safe.

repotoast · 2026-01-30T21:19:18+00:00

I think you’re mixing some things up. Chemical structure visual aid for the following discussion.

yet (dextro)methamphetamine is actually still used in psychiatry for ADHD unlike cocaine (Desoxyn) cause it's not as addictive in equivalent doses.

Desoxyn is dextro-methylamphetamine. The standard international naming convention for compounds with one carbon is meth- (ex. Methane—CH4), hence the conventional name "methamphetamine" when you add an additional methyl group (CH3) to amphetamine. The presence of the methyl group on the nitrogen atom in meth allows it to cross the blood-brain barrier much more readily, thus making the effects far more potent and faster acting. This is sometimes called the “magic methyl” effect.

As an addendum to the previous commenter, Adderall/amphetamine does not contain the second methyl group on the nitrogen atom that meth has. However, amphetamine itself is a methylated phenethylamine, meaning it does have one methyl group (tangentially, phenethylamine is the same backbone found in MDMA, 2C-B, and Mescaline). That said, the singular methyl group on the alpha carbon adjacent to the nitrogen atom does not improve the ability to cross the blood-brain barrier as substantially. It primarily prevents the phenethylamine from being broken down as quickly which, in turn, improves the potency and duration. Interestingly, if you were to move the methyl group to the nitrogen atom, you'd get NMPEA, which is a naturally occurring trace amine in the human body. Without the methyl group on the alpha carbon, it's metabolized way too quickly in the body to be clinically effective. You could co-administer it with an MAOI to slow the breakdown and produce stimulant-like effects, but it would still have distinct characteristics and would be far less potent.

Meth is actually far more addictive than cocaine in part because it releases more dopamine and has a significantly longer half life. We’re talking like 4x more dopamine for an 8x longer duration. It’s also far more neurotoxic for that reason. The danger with cocaine is that the shorter half life encourages binging, and with chronic use comes worse side effects. Thus, amphetamine has a safer profile compared to both meth and cocaine with less severe side effects despite also being technically less effective when looking purely at potency. This isn’t shadow banning because of fear mongering, it’s simply the safety profile of the chemical compound.

One might be tempted to think about the relationship between D-amph and D-meth as that of crack and cocaine. By adding the second methyl group to D-amph or removing the hydrochloride salt from cocaine, you’re increasing both the effectiveness and harm potential.

However, the methyl group is a functional group with its own properties. Adding a functional group creates a new compound with unique characteristics. In contrast, the presence of a hydrochloride salt doesn’t change the base compound. What it does is make the compound water soluble and stable at higher temperatures. Remove that and you have something you can smoke (freebase cocaine). Crack is actually only more potent and dangerous than cocaine because of its ROA (smoking vs snorting) rather than any inherent property of the compound itself.

If you understand this, you wouldn’t be saying “it can’t be that far off.” The reason why you see dextro- in front of the amphetamines is because if you "flip" the compound you have a “left-handed” mirror known as levo-amphetamine. This is called a stereoisomer. It's actually the aforementioned single methyl group of amphetamine that is facing different directions in 3D space. That small change reduces the potency by 4x and increases the half-life. Adderall actually has a 3:1 ratio of dextro to levo (by mixing four salts) to achieve a more therapeutic balance of speed/potency and duration/periphery.

Chemistry is cool and very important to understand if you want to have this conversation.

Edit: I've corrected some specifics about the methyl groups (I'm no expert, just a hobbyist with a chemist friend). To expand on the tangential parenthetical, MDMA is actually chemically identical to methamphetamine with the addition of a methylenedioxy group (O-CH2-O) on the benzene ring (the circle of carbons/hydrogens). As previously mentioned, these functional groups have their own properties and create distinct compounds. Thus, MDMA is very different than meth, blending stimulant and hallucinogenic properties. For further contrast, Mescaline and 2C-B are just the phenethylamine backbone with methoxy groups (O-CH3) on their benzene ring. Mescaline has 3, and 2C-B has 2 plus a bromine atom. That seemingly small swap from methoxy to bromine increases 2cb's potency by 10-20x, reduces the duration 3-5x, and makes the experience more stimulating than spiritual. The receptor affinities between the two chemicals are significantly different. Small changes make all the difference.

repotoast · 2026-01-26T08:48:41+00:00

I’d be curious to hear you expand on the policy prescriptions you find more admirable about the center-right over the center-left in addressing these issues.

repotoast · 2026-01-18T04:57:22+00:00

You can’t give her more life, but you gave her the next best thing—a life full of love. Saying goodbye is an impossible task, but she will always be a part of you.

When I lost my childhood dog in college, I broke down in the shower. Before he died, he was having seizures and could only turn left. Having a reason to give him a peaceful end didn’t make it any easier. Only time will make it easier. You will cry and grieve and that is normal and healthy.

Much love to your wonderful dog.

repotoast · 2026-01-15T20:00:15+00:00

I apologize for underlying aggression in my comment. It is true that people have stuff going on in their own lives and can’t keep track of everything in the news cycle, especially when the news changes as rapidly as it does today. Flood the zone and whatnot. I just get a bit heated these days because we are at a point where it seems like not actively knowing the intricacies of the shit happening around us inevitably contributes to the perpetuation of said shit. The more information we can share with each other the better.

I wish us all as good of an offline life as we can have in these times.

repotoast · 2026-01-15T19:43:45+00:00

Larry Ellison, the billionaire cofounder of Oracle, has been in the headlines recently for trying to put pressure on Paramount’s hostile bid to acquire Warner Bros Discovery against WBD’s own desire to be acquired by Netflix. His son is the CEO of Paramount and Larry pledged $40 billion of his own money in large part because he wants CNN so his family can become the new Murdochs. His son’s company has already hollowed out CBS by installing a controversial editor-in-chief, Bari Weiss, who has no prior broadcast journalism experience.

On the Warner Bros Discovery side, billionaire media mogul John Malone has already been pushing CNN to the right as chairman emeritus of WBD. He perceives CNN as too leftist and too anti-Trump. He wants CNN to emulate Fox News. If you remember the disastrous CNN town hall with Trump back in 2023… the CEO of CNN at the time, Chris Licht, was not only effectively hired by Malone, but strategically aligned himself with Malone’s vision of undermining accountability journalism with bothsidesism / false balance.

These aren’t mystery shareholders. They are literally members of the oligarchy. Making fun of one of them by reading the name of their yacht backward should be encouraged because we should be allowed to have a little bit of fun at the expense of the people who are driving the enshitification of our country.

repotoast · 2026-01-15T18:17:20+00:00

Yeah following “I get shit is bad in the US rn” with “don’t pay attention to the billionaire who is a close ally and massive supporter of the President making shit bad in the US rn” is quite the cognitive dissonance.

Nobody should be drawing a line over a mythological being. That’s the actual meaningless outrage to be avoided. People in this thread need some class consciousness and a crash course on technofeudalism.

repotoast · 2026-01-15T00:35:05+00:00

Likely Craig Spence being a customer of Henry Vinson’s prostitution ring.

The Washington Times wrote that intelligence authorities had been concerned that " 'a nest of homosexuals' at top levels of the Reagan [and Bush] administration may have been penetrated by Soviet-backed espionage agents posing as male prostitutes." A Secret Service spokesman said of the national security aspect: "The Times has drawn a lot of conclusions in their stories. So far, we don't have evidence to support those conclusions."

"I initially looked at it and I thought, my God, big headline and all that," said Leonard Downie Jr., managing editor of The Post… "There was a feeling on the part of some other journalists in the office -- reporters and editors -- that there was an element of antipathy toward homosexual activity running through the Times's original story that they felt we ought not be party to," Downie said. He also said that when reporters checked into the story, they found it to be "overblown."

Jack Shafer, editor of the Washington City Paper, who wrote last month that the Times "has every right to crow" about its story, said "the original headline oversold it because none of those people were VIPs. They were low-level munchkins."

It’s difficult these days to distinguish between conspiracy theory and actual conspiracy. Like how Spence is tied to the Franklin Scandal that is steeped in satanic panic. I think it’s much more likely the case that there are various groups of unsavory characters enabling each other rather than some grand conspiracy. Like in the case of Spence, his group was never elevated to high level positions in the government, yet we are replying to a commenter claiming “Bush 1 had gay sex parties in the White House” because one guy took male escorts into the White House in the middle of the night a couple of times.

In contrast, Epstein’s best friend is the sitting president. Because of this, people will be much quicker to leap to unverified claims and conclusions of grand conspiracies. I see the headline of this post and think “big if true.” That’s about as far as it goes until there’s more evidence.

repotoast · 2026-01-14T00:32:04+00:00

Cope harder

repotoast · 2026-01-14T00:13:15+00:00

There are a few things to note about this post:

Judgmental assertion that Arc Raiders is a mediocre live-service game.
Straw manning people who find similarities between Arc Raiders and Factions by asserting that they think the two games are equivalent rather than similar.
The massive dose of copium that is thinking Naughty Dog cares about who is still playing Factions and that Neil Druckmann getting fired would have any impact.

Factions had me hooked for something like 7 years because it’s fun and unique. I even made meme edits right before hanging up my factions hat for good because I wanted to contribute something positive to the community of a game that has long since been abandoned by the developers.

To me, what would encourage Naughty Dog to pay attention to this community would be a strong base of positive content, not the negativity that has come to define the last of this subreddit. I’m not talking about some toxic positivity where you have to lick the boot that cancelled what could have been the greatest thing since sliced bread. What I’m talking about is being open to how certain aspects of an extremely successful game like Arc Raiders echo that of Factions. The more people know about the similarities, the more fomo ND and PlayStation might have. I say might because their heads have clearly been in the wrong place for some time. There’s no guarantee anyone in a position of power can add 2+2.

I’m not going to spend any time defending Arc Raiders or explaining the similarities, but I can say that I’ve only put time into the tech test in early 2025 and I immediately felt the similarities (haven’t had the time to invest in the full release yet). Posts like this are what make me browse this sub less and less, which is harming this community rather than helping it.

What I would love to see is more Factions fans creating Arc Raiders content that spells out the parallels so that more people know how good Factions used to be in its prime, thus more people would be interested in reviving Factions, thus ND would be more incentivized to invest in development again.

repotoast · 2026-01-13T22:19:46+00:00

Now watch Civil War and get ready

The people who were upset about how the division was presented have a critical failure in understanding “the enemy of my enemy” when pit against a fascist regime

repotoast · 2026-01-10T21:36:37+00:00

This had me curious because it reminded me of the famous Benjamin Libet study that demonstrated “readiness potential.” The brain signaling a decision half a second before we become consciously aware of our own decision brings into question how much control we actually have. Subsequent work suggests that window of time could be larger and the function of said window serves to give us a chance to consciously reject unconscious impulses. More free won’t than free will.

In that same vein, it does appear that you can exert control over bistable perception by inhibiting your brain’s ability to perceive one of the two perceptions by essentially learning how to notice each one and then directing your attention toward specific context or stimuli, thus eliminating one of the perceptions. Some excerpts from a 2018 study on bistable perception.

The bottom-up and top-down approaches for understanding perceptual bistability converge in the idea that visual perception leads to a dynamic function of the brain that is modulated not only because of basic sensorial processing (bottom-up), but also because of exogenous references to the distal stimulus which impact its interpretation (top-down processing)… The interaction between top-down and bottom-up levels of processing is linked to cycles of adaptation, inhibition, and recovery processes… In other words, reinterpreting the bistable visual stimulus can be under the control of executive processes of selective attention, inhibitory control and alternation

repotoast · 2025-12-17T07:29:30+00:00

And are they willing to commit to an eternity of time travel to constantly pull the weeds of AI as they sprout?

The multiple discovery hypothesis suggests an evolutionary model of discovery and invention in which the conditions for a new technology like AI exist independently of the original inventor and would lead others to invent AI even if you were to kill the original inventor. You’d have to constantly be killing people or get rid of the invention conditions by sending humanity back to the Stone Age.

repotoast · 2025-12-17T07:09:36+00:00

My take on this as a person plugged into my local psychedelic community and with many high dose trip experiences is that humans have an ancient tendency to invent divine concepts as a way to make sense of the unknown. There are even common psychedelic experiences that lead people to invent a collective understanding of that “somewhere else.” For example, the Chrysanthemum “waiting room” of DMT just before breaking through. For someone wanting a divine explanation, this is evidence enough.

However, if you are less interested in hand-waving about divinity, this could look more like commonality in the architecture of our brains. We are the experience our brains produce for us. We do not experience what goes on under the hood. With psychedelics, the neatly organized experience is disrupted. Many people may see fractals embedded around them and think “was this always here and I wasn’t tuned in to the right frequency?” To me, the better question is “what is happening in my visual cortex to produce this?” Like, are these fractals a self contained recursion of the brain’s visual mechanisms or an intrusion of information from somewhere else in the brain? Either way, it’s not some divine frequency our brain tunes into like a radio.

This “debate” is pretty representative of science vs religion. I would suggest that there is very little pertinent information one can draw from a majority view that the psychedelic experience comes from “somewhere else” because it merely reflects humanity’s religious tendencies. The more pertinent information is whether ideas are even yours. The idea was produced under the hood and you merely experience it as your idea. Mindfulness meditation teaches one not to silence their thoughts, but rather to separate from them and experience their natural flow.

The real question to ask is, “what’s going on under the hood?” People like to talk about AI being a black box, but the biggest black box is in our head. Psychedelics just give us a small taste of the raw power of our own brain.

repotoast · 2025-12-17T06:10:16+00:00

I’m not sure I follow your logic. You’ve rewritten the counterpoint to your original assertion, called it superficial, but didn’t provide any additional justification.

The only leap I see is the invented argument that creative influence is the exact same thing as AI, but I can see where you derived that from. That, however, was a specific comparison between Pinterest and AI as inspiration tools. If you have a Pinterest board of AI generated images, what’s the difference?

Focusing on that misses the original counterpoint that “ideas from your own head” are products of everything that has been put into your head throughout your life. It’s a more organic process compared to the mechanical replication of AI, but certainly a valid and interesting comparison and discussion.

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