Irma: It's clobberin' time -- and guess who's getting clobbered! Plus: Jeff Epstein's "occult temple"

Update: I just saw some video footage from St. Martins. Good LORD. Absolutely beyond belief. Truly horrifying. If a Hollywood special effects specialist came up with a visual like that, I'd tell him to tone it down in order to maintain credibility. Some eighty thousand people live on that island: Weep for them, not for Donald Trump, whose estate on the island may have been damaged beyond repair.

We now return to the post I wrote early this morning , although the tone of this piece now seems a bit too jaunty. Apologies.

Guess who's in the path of Hurricane Irma? Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein. More precisely: Their properties are in the path of the monster hurricane.

Trump's mansion on St. Martin is in harm's way. He's been trying to sell the place for quite a while, and has even slashed the asking price...

In August, its listing price was slashed from $28 million to $16.9 million, according to the Washington Post. (Ethics experts have worried a buyer could seek to curry favor with Trump by overpaying.)

Such things have happened previously, or so I seem to recall.

After Irma has rearranged the furniture, Trump may not be able to find a buyer willing to pay anything like the low, low price of $17 mill. Savor the irony: The man whom climate change deniers call "God Emperor" will probably lose millions after being walloped by Irma, a storm which (some say) demonstrates the reality of man-made climate change.

Jeffrey Epstein is not a climate change denier. He's a genuine science geek who has played host to none other than Stephen Hawking. Yes, the famed physicist really did visit Epstein's private island -- Little Saint James, part of the Virgin Islands just east of Puerto Rico.

Little Saint James is probably getting slammed as I write. Here's a picture of Epstein's quaint bachelor pad on the north end of the island:

If you're a weirdness fan, you may want to scope out a rather unusual building on the southwest corner of the island.

 
A few wacko theorists have labeled this building Epstein's "occult temple", although I doubt that it is any such thing. I've read plenty of articles about Epstein, and they all indicate that he believes in science, not mysticism.

And yet: Larger photos prove that there is a golden larger-than-life-sized figure atop the roof, next to the dome, just above the red ladder. I don't know who the figure is meant to represent. Some people even claim that one can draw a perfect equilateral triangle connecting Epstein's home, the domed "temple," and a third building located on the southwest corner of the island. I can't find a decent picture of this third building, although the roof is visible via Google Earth. (Judging from the shadows, I would say that most of Building 3 is below ground.)

The domed building does not appear in satellite imagery from 2009. Building 3 does not appear in satellite imagery from 2007. 

If any readers know the truth about the domed building and the third structure, I am all attention. Seems to me that if the storm ruins the dome, someone in a helicopter may be able to photograph whatever is inside the blue-striped cube. That suggestion is surely more reasonable than are the insane plans contemplated by these idiots.

Far be it from me to suggest that Epstein may have earned his mysterious billions in a legally questionable or unethical fashion. But speaking hypothetically, and in a purely general sense, it would seem that someone who has laundered money for Russian oligarchs just might have the means to rebuild after a natural disaster.

Although we have all heard claims that Epstein tends to favor the company of very young women from eastern Europe, we must not jump to the conclusion that he has ever had a business relationship with Semyon Mogilevich, the Russian mobster known for trafficking underaged women from eastern Europe. Despite Epstein's refusal to discuss just how he earns his billions or who his clients are, there is absolutely no reason to jump any conclusions about a possible Epstein/Mogilevich link. I implore you to forget all about that ridiculous idea.

However, I will note that the father of Felix Sater -- a key player in several recent Trump/Russia stories -- was part of the Mogilevich organization. This investigator seems confident that Trump partners Sater and Tevfik Arif both tie into the Mogilevich group; also see here. Sater was the one who boasted "“Our boy can become president of the USA and we can engineer it.”