BBC Newsnight announced this morning that they’d landed an exclusive interview with Prince Andrew about his friend, the dead rapist pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. And they clearly have enough here to turn it into a one hour special on Saturday night. 

The first advance clip from the interview will air on BBC tonight at 10pm. According to the Guardian, “the interview was a result of six months of negotiations with the royal household, with an agreement that there would not be any advance vetting of the questions”. It took place yesterday at Buckingham Palace and reporter Emily Maitlis has said that it was a “no holds barred” discussion. I am encouraged that it’s a female journalist who has the assignment. There’s a better chance for solid follow-up questions when there’s a woman’s perspective in the conversation. 

But the fact that this is happening at all is a story in and of itself. As we’ve seen, it’s unusual for the royal family to have to “answer to” this kind of scandal. Their way is to ignore, to avoid. They consider themselves to be above questioning – and this may not be official investigative questioning from law enforcement but it is a form of questioning, because if they’re talking to Prince Andrew about his friendship with dead rapist pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, well, there are some f-cking questions. And he had to sit there and if not answer them then at least hear them. Can you imagine? Prince Andrew with his fancy airs and his privilege suffering what he’d consider to be the indignity of taking a line of questioning about SEX TRAFFICKING and MINORS and accusations from women, including Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who claim that they were forced to perform SEX ACTS for him. 

Remember, these are people who side-eye you when you use the wrong fork or curtsy without enough knee bend or wear nail polish that’s too dark or don’t wear hosiery with a dress. And now, one of their own, with centuries of noble blood coursing through his veins, is on television responding to allegations of having sex with girls while cavorting with a mysterious multimillionaire all over the world on private islands and private jets?!

The level of mortification, you know? 

It’s MORTIFYING. 

But also, it’s desperate. Because as mortifying as it is, the fact that they’ve already exhausted all other options, including his finger size, and have now come to this …  

You know how they say that in a courtroom you should never put the defendant on the stand to be cross-examined unless it’s a last resort? 

So if we’re talking about what’s considered not a good look and the shame of the royal family – is it really Prince Harry and Meghan Markle? Or is it this buffoon with the fat fingers who has to sit down with a journalist AT BUCKINGHAM PALACE (!) to talk about rape and billionaire orgies?!? 

And further, how much coverage will this Prince Andrew interview get on Sunday and Monday? When Harry and Meghan’s documentary aired a few weeks ago and the two spoke about mental health and struggling with the British tabloid’s relentless attacks, it was front page for days and it was all over the morning news programmes too. Piers Morgan went apesh-t over it. 

We can all agree that associating with a now dead rapist pedophile and being accused of participating is much worse than whatever it is they were mad at Harry and Meghan for, right? And so at the very least, there should be just as much reporting on this Prince Andrew interview – if not more? After all, he was hanging out with Jeffrey Epstein when he was a Registered Sex Offender, staying at his New York home after he was released from prison for solicitation of underage prostitution, answering the door when girls were coming and going, and getting foot massages from Russian girls. Surely that will warrant at least one mouth-foamy rant from Piers and many, many pages in the Daily Mail and the Sun?