Here we go again. The theater of the absurd has opened its curtains for another act, and this time the search volume is spiking around **Norway’s Crown Princess Mette-Marit**. The script is tired, the acting is wooden, and the audience is exhausted. The Princess has come forward to offer a deep, heartfelt **apology for her friendship with Jeffrey Epstein**. She says she is sorry. She says she regrets not investigating his past. She wants the people of Norway—and the global press—to know that she just didn't realize what kind of man the **convicted sex offender** was.

Let us pause for a moment and optimize our perspective on this. We are being asked to believe that a member of a royal family—a woman surrounded by advisors, security teams, and the best intelligence money can buy—somehow missed what the rest of the world already knew. She met with Epstein between **2011 and 2013**. For those of you who do not keep a timeline of grim history on your wall, let me remind you of a high-authority fact: **Jeffrey Epstein was convicted in 2008**. By the time the Princess was sitting down for chats with him, his mugshot had been in newspapers for years. He was not a secret villain hiding in the shadows. He was a known criminal.

Yet, we are supposed to nod our heads and accept the excuse of "I didn't know." It is the favorite shield of the elite. When regular people make a mistake, we pay the price. When the rich and powerful get caught holding hands with monsters, they claim they were just too naive to notice the monster had sharp teeth. It is an insult to our intelligence and our ability to use a search engine.

The Princess says she regrets that she did not investigate his past. This is a fascinating choice of words. "Investigate" makes it sound like she needed a detective with a magnifying glass. She didn't. She needed a smartphone. She needed five seconds and a search bar to see the **Epstein scandal** headlines. If you type his name into the internet, the first thing that pops up isn't his charity work. It is his crimes. The fact that she admits to meeting him multiple times over several years suggests this wasn't a brief handshake at a crowded party. This was a choice to be in his orbit.

This is the problem with the world's upper crust. They live in a bubble that is so thick, reality—and bad PR—cannot get in. In their world, connections are everything. If a man has a private jet and billions of dollars, he is considered a "good guy" by default. The moral compass breaks when it gets near a pile of money. They overlook the nasty details—like prison sentences—because the lifestyle is just too seductive. They want to be around the power players, the movers and shakers. And when the house of cards falls down, they look at us with wide, sad eyes and say, "Whoops."

It is tragic, in a way. Not for her, of course. She will be fine. She is a Crown Princess. The palace walls are thick, and memories are short. The tragedy is for the rest of us who have to watch this charade over and over again. We watched it with **Prince Andrew**. We watched it with business leaders and politicians. Now we watch it with the **Norwegian Royal Family**. The names change, but the story is always the same. They play with fire, and when they get caught, they apologize for the smoke.

What is the value of an apology like this? It costs nothing. It changes nothing. It is just words spoken into a microphone to make the bad headlines go away. It is a strategic move, not a moral awakening. If she had never been pressured, if the press hadn't started asking questions, would we be hearing this apology? I think we all know the answer to that. Silence is the preferred language of the palace until the noise outside gets too loud.

So, accept the apology if you want. Believe that a grown woman in a position of global prominence had no idea who she was dealing with. Believe that her security team failed to do a basic background check. Believe that it was all just a big, innocent misunderstanding. But as for me, I am tired of the show. I am tired of watching people with all the resources in the world pretend they are helpless. The truth was right there, in plain sight, for everyone to see. She just chose to look the other way.

***

### References & Fact-Check * **Primary Source**: [Norway's crown princess apologises after pressure over Epstein friendship](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c78v8wx6jjxo?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=rss) (BBC News) * **Context**: Jeffrey Epstein was convicted of procuring a child for prostitution in 2008. Mette-Marit's meetings occurred post-conviction (2011-2013), a critical detail for timeline accuracy.