Bob, Carol, Ted & Alice – Trump Version: Pam Bondi, Kash Patel, Dan Bongino & Jeffrey Epstein

Jul 14, 2025 05:49 PM EDT, Mon

Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice

Plot

After a weekend of emotional honesty at an Esalen-style retreat, Los Angeles sophisticates Bob and Carol Sanders return home determined to embrace complete openness. They share their enthusiasm and excitement over their new-found philosophy with their more conservative friends Ted and Alice Henderson, who remain doubtful. Soon after, filmmaker Bob has an affair with a young production assistant on a film shoot in San Francisco. When he returns home, he admits his liaison to Carol, describing the event as a purely physical act, not an emotional one. To Bob’s surprise, Carol is completely accepting of his extramarital behavior. Later, Carol gleefully reveals the affair to Ted and Alice as they are leaving a dinner party. Disturbed by Bob’s infidelity and Carol’s candor, Alice becomes physically ill on the drive home. She and Ted have a difficult time coping with the news in bed that night. However, as time passes, they grow to accept that Bob and Carol really are fine with the affair. Later, Ted admits to Bob that he was tempted to have an affair once, but did not go through with it; Bob tells Ted he should, rationalizing: “You’ve got the guilt anyway. Don’t waste it.”

During another visit to San Francisco, Bob decides to skip a second encounter with the young woman, instead returning home a day early. When he arrives, he discovers Carol having an affair with her tennis instructor. Although initially outraged, Bob quickly realizes that the encounter was purely physical, like his own affair. He settles down and even chats and drinks with the man.

When the two couples travel together to Las Vegas, Bob and Carol reveal Carol’s affair to Ted and Alice. Ted then admits to an affair on a recent business trip to Miami. An outraged Alice demands that this new ethos be taken to its obvious conclusion: a mate-sharing foursome. Ted is reluctant, explaining that he loves Carol “like a sister”, but eventually acknowledges that he finds her attractive. After discussing it, all four remove their clothes and climb into bed together. Swapping partners, Bob and Alice kiss fervently, as do Ted and Carol, but after a few moments all four simply stop.

The scene cuts to the couples walking to the elevator, riding it down, and walking out of the casino hand-in-hand with their original partners. A crowd of men and women of various cultures and races congregate in the casino parking lot, wherein the four main characters exchange long stares with each other and with strangers, reminiscent of the non-verbal communication shown in the early scene at the retreat.

Conflict between Pam Bondi and Dan Bongino goes public, adding to Team Trump schisms

The president said prominent members of his team “get along with each other” and “love each other.” There’s overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

July 14, 2025, 8:40 AM EDT By Steve Benen

In his latest Faux News interview, Donald Trump sat down with Lara Trump, his own daughter-in-law, and reflected on one of the key differences between his first and second terms. “We have really good people this time, and they get along with each other,” the the president said, adding, “They love each other … and it’s smoother. I think it’s smoother.”

Perhaps the Republican was confusing his team for some other administration — because there’s all kinds of evidence that contradicts the idea that prominent members of his team “get along with each other” and “love each other.” NBC News reported:

FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino is considering leaving his job after a heated confrontation with Attorney General Pam Bondi over his frustration with how the Justice Department has handled the Jeffrey Epstein files, according to a person who has spoken with Bongino and a source familiar with the interactions that Bongino and FBI Director Kash Patel have had with Bondi.

“Bongino is out of control furious,” the person who has spoken with the FBI deputy director said. “This destroyed his career. He’s threatening to quit and torch Pam unless she’s fired.”

I won’t pretend to know what might happen next in this saga, though the president appeared to throw his support behind Bondi over the weekend — a day after Bongino failed to report to work to work amid speculation about his whereabouts — suggesting a dramatic shake-up at the attorney general’s office is not imminent.

But let’s not miss the forest for the trees: The conflicts among Trump administration officials are intensifying and working their way to the public.

In addition to the “heated confrontation” between Bondi and Bongino, there are also reported tensions between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Richard Grenell, the White House envoy for special missions. Those reports come on the heels of tensions between Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

  1. This schism comes on the heels of Elon Musk and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent getting into a heated shouting match at the White House. Meanwhile, Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick have been at odds with White House trade adviser Peter Navarro; and Musk, during his tenure, also clashed with Navarro, Duffy and Rubio.

It led The Associated Press to recently report, “The infighting and backstabbing that plagued President Donald Trump’s first term have returned as a threat to his second, with deepening fissures over trade, national security and questions of personal loyalty.”

That AP article was published in April. There’s reason to believe things are worse now.

As we’ve discussed, throughout American history, there have been administrations with rival factions, but those divisions usually take time. On Team Trump, the cracks are bursting into view just six months after Inauguration Day.

In theory, a strong president could intervene, resolve differences, unite his or her own team, and establish a clear vision for his or her administration to follow. In practice, however, Trump appears content to play the role of President Bystander, watching these divisions get even worse.

There’s an old expression: A fish rots from the head down. I mention this because these kinds of failures of leadership have a tendency to spread — and amid reports of tumultuous infighting at other federal agencies, there’s reason to believe it’s already spreading.

This report updates our related earlier coverage.

Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MSNBC political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”

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