The most damning revelation of the last few days of the Epstein coverup scandal is the report that there were over 4,700 wire transfers of money from Trump to Epstein.

Now, what could those have possibly been for? Evidence is pointing more and more to the fact that Trump wasn’t just a partaker of Epstein’s child trafficking network but a co-conspirator and investor, a player who played a vital role in making and keeping it happening.

This could turn out to be one of the most spectacular scandals in U.S. history. And it is not just about corruption and illegality, it is about the abuse of real people’s lives and moreover there is the element of the demise of Epstein in prison. In other words, murder.

It boggles the mind to look at the evidence that’s even out in the open now about all this. People who are not at this level of evil have a very hard time grasping it in its full implications. Just like people who are not hardcore nasty have difficulty figuring out why their adversaries who are nasty keep one-upping them. 

Clearly, the Democrats have this problem. They are not weak, but they are nice. They are more like what people are supposed to be like. They practice basic courtesy and manners, recognizing that they are virtues taught and applied to hold civilization together.

But Trump and Trumpians don’t play by those rules at all. They are ruthless and deceitful in ways that ordinary nice people simply aren’t. Is the answer to turn nice people into nasty ruthless ones? Do we really need lawyers coming on late night TV with their ads boasting how ruthless they are, because that gets results?

I don’t think so. The problem is to solve the problem of how to effectively counter sociopathic behavior and persons. The Founding Fathers, for one thing, faced similar types of problems. People didn’t stop being nice with the Reagan Revolution. 

There is an abundant record of shootings, knifings, poisonings as well as lying, raping and corrupting that marr our history as a nation right up to the present. The difference now is only a matter of degree. 

But you can imagine there are people in high places in this land who do not think that Hitler’s holocaust was such a terrible thing. And they go to church on Sunday, the kind of church that will allow their fantasies to rage on the promise that simply by showing up there they need not otherwise have a conscience.

One of the somewhat overlooked atrocities of this period is the ruling by the IRS that it’s now OK for churches and non-profits to get into the politics game. Not that they haven’t since the rise of the religious right in the 1970s, but this new sanction will help them be more overt about their prejudices in the political arena.

Polls seem to be showing that in these extraordinary times, people are deserting the church. Well, that is if you buy the notion of the malleable media and politicians who equate the so-called Christian Nationalist version with anything equivalent to legitimate faith.

In fact, there is a move back toward the embrace of real faith by a huge block of folks, including younger ones who seek authenticity and a non-exploitive community. Trump is causing many of us to find pathways to be not like him. 

It could be a special legacy for him that he unleashed something more pure and authentic in the population, something so revulsed by his behavior that it causes an entire generation and more to be uncommonly civil and generous toward all.

There are two endings to the phrase beginning, “It is always darkest…” One ending is, “Just before dawn.” The other is, “Just before it goes completely black.”

The direction we go, in fact, is up to the mental fortitude of a majority of us. As Abraham Lincoln said, “One is as happy as one decides to be.” Lincoln coined the phrase in his second inaugural address that is a key to everything. He spoke of the “higher angels of our nature.” 

They are there. Invoke them.