Despite the Sixth Amendment - the right to a defense - superlawyers such as David Boies have been criticized for pulling out all stops assisting their clients.
Forever will resonate Jason Farrow's outing of this in The New Yorker. However, the reality is this: Boies' law firm continues to be in demand. Unlike the warrior in the film "John Wick 3," Boies has not had imposed on him an "excommunicado."
But the legal defense is only a part, perhaps a relatively small one, in the parallel universe that those with significant resources can operate.
Before, during, and after that win in the court of law could come what John Naughton The Guardian essentially labels as "reputation laundering." The analysis fingers the MIT Media Lab as the platform for the attempt to restore Jeffrey Epstein's brand.
Rebranding, just like many defenses in the court of law, requires strategic genius, money, and its own kind of morality. The latter mirrors capitalism's notion of paying for a service.
In reputation laundering that payment is usually high. Over the years, Epstein donated large sums to the MIT Media Lab and motivated those on his global network to also contribute.
According to current norms, society now demands that process be transparent.
Had the MIT Lab disclosed in detail those financial windfalls, perhaps members of the media, including Ronan Farrow again in The New Yorker, wouldn't have this issue to cover.
Actually, it's an ideal one for the ambitious media. More recently, Harvard has also been outed as accepting Epstein's contributions and appointing him as a "fellow" (a kind of professor) in the psychology department. At a time when many have become weary of national politics, this particular story has legs.
The U.S. Constitution guarantees the defense.
But there is no constitutional guarantee that the influential institutions in society will continue to allow reputation laundering. Businesses, such as public relations firms, could be, yes, be stamped with an "excommunicado" decree if they accept a rebranding assignment for what is perceived as a questionable cause or an enemy of the people.
The Verge is among the communications sources which reported that disgraced media tycoon Roger Ailes was planning a comeback. After his non-compete provision with Fox News ended, he, assisted with venture capitalist Peter Thiel's funding, was envisioning a rival to Fox. That would be another kind of conservative cable network.
Likely, a moving part in that would have had to be reputation restoration. Could Ailes' long-time personal public relations representative Bob Dilenschneider been assigned that project? Could that mission of reinvention be pulled off?
Many Ailes watchers never counted him out to time travel to an undiscovered planet of accomplishment. What seems unthinkable simply might be conceived within a framework lacking imagination and push.
It was before prison that the Nixon Administration lawyer Chuck Colson seemed to begin to self-launder his reputation. He found and shared spirituality. When he died the obituaries hailed his contribution to humanity.
What could be crossing the minds of those not perched on the top rungs of the socio-economic ladder in America is deep resentment. They assume that they are locked out of the shot at reputation laundering. On the agenda for ending inequality could be tutorials on the art of rebranding.
But that hostility may arise from a lack of a capacity to envision what's possible. In reality, nobodies pull off every day overcoming how they initially are perceived and treated.
The warm and fuzzy term for that is "The American Dream." Like Colson, it was in prison that Malcom X laundered his reputation. The transition was from street thug to respected leader.
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