>Claiming that the issue was Epstein is what any smart legal / publicity team would do in this circumstance.

If a PR team was going to pick a fake reason to hide a blasé real reason, why would they pick the biggest scandal possible? I thought rich people tried to keep their personal lives out of the news. Saying that they had drifted apart naturally while the real reason was Epstein is something like what a PR counsel would do, that I could believe, but you're suggesting that they're making that trade in reverse.

Another point to bear in mind is that the legal team does not care what the public thinks because the public doesn't decide anything in court. Lawyers usually tell you to keep quiet about your case, to reduce the risk of saying anything in public that the other side can bring up in court to use against you. That's another thing that usually works backwards from how you're suggesting it is in this situation.

Melinda Gates is trying to get the best possible settlement from her divorce. The Epstein issue is obvious leverage. Melinda loses nothing by Bill being embarassed in public, and she gains a lot at the negotiating table.

I haven't watched enough mobster movies to be sure, but I think you might have the order of operations inverted on the blackmailing process. The Don doesn't release the photos then start blackmailing, he shows you the photographs, then blackmails you, then maybe releases them if he has a reputation to keep and you didn't pay.

Some of the information is public. Who knows how much there is behind it?

> If a PR team was going to

I think you need a PR team if you're going to start writing replies like this...

>The guy's work has directly...

The guy's money has funded people who work to do these things.

It's not all his money here. A major chunk of it is Warren Buffet's.

That, and there is no way to know that the people who he stole it from through anti-competitive practices wouldn't have funded even better things with it.