The Masks of Leftism and the Snake Oil Salesmen Who Wear Them

You can believe very little of what you see when it comes to Leftism and the people who practice it. Leftism is theater.

It is costume, lighting, and sound effects, designed to make lies feel like truth and villains feel like victims. The audience is meant to react emotionally, not think critically. That is why the so-called “racist video” the Left hysterically claimed President Trump posted evaporated the moment anyone bothered to examine what actually happened.

It was nothing close to what Democrats breathlessly described, and they knew it. Still, they rolled out the usual script, branding Trump a fascist within minutes, hoping repetition would do the work facts could not. The stunt collapsed on contact with reality, and Trump lost no ground at all. The crowd they were playing to has grown numb to the noise.

But the danger is not confined to open Leftists.

Conservatives must beware of the more insidious threat: Leftists posing as conservatives. These are the people who study the language of the Right, memorize the applause lines, and then monetize the trust of naïve supporters. The conservative movement has become a lucrative marketplace, and like any marketplace, it attracts con artists. Candace Owens has been outed. Marjorie Taylor Greene has been outed. And now we come to Steve Bannon.

This is how Leftism actually works. It is selfish, self-serving, and devoted to the worship of self. The god of Leftism is idolatry. Every Leftist either openly or secretly wants the spotlight, the reverence, and the power that comes with it. Principles are props. Loyalty is transactional. When you understand that, the parade of so-called Republicans who spend their lives attacking Republicans starts to make sense. Ana Navarro. Joe Scarborough. Michael Steele. The list is long, and the pattern is obvious. They did not drift away from conservatism. They were never anchored to it in the first place.

Steve Bannon was no exception.

He was a con man then, and he is a con man now. I said this years ago, after interviewing with him at CPAC, when we discussed issues facing the Black community. His comments had all the markings of a Leftist worldview: abstract, self-referential, and curiously detached from reality on the ground. Few people listened at the time. I did not press the issue, but I watched his sudden rise with disbelief. Here was the archetype: rich, old, white, and marketed as a nationalist savior. After he went to jail, I gave him a pass. I assumed the fascination was something like the old Tori Spelling phenomenon, fame without substance, and maybe I just was not seeing the appeal.

As it turns out, I was seeing it just fine. Bannon is a snake.

Department of Justice and House Oversight records now show sustained coordination between Steve Bannon and Jeffrey Epstein from 2017 to 2019. Let that sit for a moment. The man who branded himself as the anti-elite crusader was privately entangled with one of the most infamous elites on the planet. In 2025, Bannon loudly advocated for the full public release of the Epstein files, portraying himself as a warrior for transparency and accountability. He demanded a special prosecutor and framed the documents as the key to exposing deep state corruption. In hindsight, the performance looks less like courage and more like camouflage.

When the disclosures finally came, they detonated in his own hands.

The January 30, 2026 DOJ release, made under the Epstein Files Transparency Act signed by President Trump in November of 2025, dumped nearly 3.5 million pages into the public record. Buried inside were hundreds of texts and emails between Bannon and Epstein, spanning politics, media, travel, and strategy, along with a video interview Bannon himself conducted with Epstein. This was not a passing acquaintance. The records depict an ongoing partnership during Trump’s first term, with Bannon offering advice on image rehabilitation while Epstein facilitated introductions and logistics as Bannon pushed his so-called nationalist agenda.

One exchange is particularly chilling.

On video, Bannon casually questioned Epstein about his sex offender classification, asking in a mock-serious tone whether he was a “class three sexual predator.”

Epstein corrected him, saying he was “tier one,” the lowest level, and Bannon accepted the clarification without meaningful condemnation, moving right along as if discussing parking tickets. The familiarity was unmistakable. The moral gravity of Epstein’s crimes barely registered.

Even worse is what the files reveal about Bannon’s real view of President Trump. Publicly, Bannon cultivated the image of an unwavering ally. Privately, his tone was something else entirely. In one exchange, Epstein joked that Donald Trump Jr. had called his father a “regifter,” suggesting “re grifter” would be more accurate.

Bannon’s response was a single word: “Brilliant.”

In another instance, Bannon went further still, floating the idea of invoking the 25th Amendment to remove President Trump from office. This is not principled dissent. This is duplicity.

The reaction online has been predictably brutal, and deservedly so.

One commenter summarized the absurdity perfectly: “Epstein was working with Steve Bannon on a global populist movement before his arrest. You can’t make this up. The anti-elite crusader taking advice from the most elite pedophile on Earth.” Another wrote that the records confirm a two-year coordination on strategy and funding, calling it a deep architectural sync where Epstein mapped the moves and Bannon executed them. Hyperbolic language, perhaps, but the underlying point lands. When self-proclaimed patriots are syncing clocks with Epstein, something is deeply wrong.

Leftism always tells on itself. It cannot help it.

The masks slip eventually, because the ideology demands self-worship above all else. Steve Bannon preached populism while mocking the man who empowered him. He demanded transparency while hiding his own entanglements. He played the hero while privately rooting for the downfall of the president he claimed to serve. This is not a deviation from Leftism. It is Leftism in its purest form.

Now the question is simple. What happens next? Will Bannon’s audience finally see him for what he is, or will the cult of personality override the evidence? Leftism depends on selective blindness. Conservatism cannot afford it. Let’s see how these revelations impact Steve Bannon, and more importantly, whether conservatives finally learn to stop mistaking loudness for loyalty.