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Broadcasting from the United States of America, this is WRMI, Okeechobee, Florida,
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Radio Miami International.
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You're listening to Quorum Radio. Well, folks, on Quorum Radio,
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we're sitting down with Fueled Surprise winning writer Dan Lusaller
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to discuss his book, The Manchurian Journalist, Lawrence Wright, The
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CIA and the Corruption of American Journalism, and The old
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days of being a newspaper reporter. This man has some
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interesting stories. Our next folks after the music now with
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BJ Thomas hooked on a feeling you're listening to WRMI
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Global Radio. Stay tuned.
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When you hold me in your arms so tight you
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let me know everything's alright. I I'm hooked on a
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feeling I just stay addicted and hope I can.
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Endure All the good.
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Love when we're all.
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Alone Keep it up, girl, yeah, you turn me on I,
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I'm hooked on a feeling I won't believe it That
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you're in love with.
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Me All the good love when we're all alone Keep
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it up girl, yeah.
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You turn me.
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On I'm hooked on a feeling I'm high on believing
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That you're in love with.
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Me guitar solo Well, folks, it's not a surprise to
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anybody that our Central Intelligence Agency receives billions of dollars
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and sometimes uses that money creatively for all sorts of
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interesting objectives, one of which is maybe to influence the
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media just a little bit. And to discuss that, we've
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got Dan LaSala. He's with us. Very graciously agreed to
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come on to Quorum Radio. Let me just tell people
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about who you are. Dan LaSalle is the author of
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the book The Manchurian Journalist, Lawrence Wright, The CIA, and
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the Corruption of American Journalism. And he himself is a
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journalist whose lengthy newspaper career began as a teenage police
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reporter in the last days of Linotypes. He came of
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age amid hagiographic newsroom characters who believed shoe leather reporting,
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tight deadlines, and well-placed sources were journalism's touchstones. divinity. He's
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written for the New York Daily News and the New
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York Times and shared a Pulitzer Prize in 1983 for
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general local reporting. We have to know more about that.
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He won a National Public Service Award from the American
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Bar Association for exposing corruption in federal courts, and he's
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a member of the Scripps Howard Journalism Hall of Fame.
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He rides with his wife Nancy in the Rocky Mountain State, a.k.a. Colorado,
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for those who don't know state nicknames. He's currently working
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on an investigative documentary series on a cold case crime
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spree in Speedway, Indiana, 1978. And boy, is that an
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interesting case. And is competing a book exploring the American
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myth of Al Capone. That's a nice guy, right? Basically,
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who cared about the poor and soup kitchens and helping
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poor widows.
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Milk for babies, yeah. Exactly.
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Folks, his website is www.danluzader.com. That's Luzader spelled L-U-Z like zebra, A-D-D-E-R, Luzader, danluzader.com.
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His book, again, folks, is The Manchurian Journalist. Lawrence Wright,
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The CIA and the Corruption of American Journalism. Another trying
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day classic, and Chris Milligan is basically producing a lot
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of amazing, amazing works. Of course, one has to do
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with written by our Our friend here today, Dan Lozatter,
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am I pronouncing your last name right, Dan? Hey, I
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say Lozatter.
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So I'm saying Lozatter.
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So they did get a lot of ribbing in your day.
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But tell us about your early days of your career, Dan,
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reporting on action in the police blotter. How old were
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you when you first began to write the police beat?
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I was 19 years old, and I grew up in Middletown, USA, Muncie, Indiana.
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They had a very gritty daily newspaper there, Morning Daily,
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and they were they were sure to help, I guess.
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So they, they hired this teenager to come and do
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police beat. And the only thing I'd ever been
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to
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were church socials and, and, uh, and fish fries, you know,
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and that was my, my knowledge of the world. And
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within days I was out on the police beat chasing
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down cops and walking into crime scenes, seeing, seeing, uh, uh, uh,
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corpses in awkward repose and, and, uh, I really got
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excited about color for my stories, and I just kept
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after that same kind of attitude and chasing stories my
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whole career.
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What a trial by fire. What year did you begin this?
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You don't have to tell when you were born, but
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when did you begin your work? I was writing under
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byline in 1969, and I kept at it.
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I'm still doing it.
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Amazing. So can I ask you like a very pushy
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New York question?
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Sure.
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How much were they paying you in the good old days?
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I don't know, but gas was 28 cents a gallon.
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So whatever they were paying, at least get the tank full.
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And maybe, you know, and maybe a little bit more
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for some, you know, bacon and eggs in the morning.
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I don't know. I mean, would you be able to
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make ends meet? What did you do to make ends meet, man?
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Hey, shortly thereafter, I was a father and I was
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supporting a family with that. tiny little income, but I
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did a little freelance on the side and I also
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did some carpentry. I went to everything. I had a
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city editor. He was an ex-CIA agent and he was
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a gaunt and severe individual, but he really loved hardcore reporting.
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And so, you know, I would be out on the
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street and I would call him and he'd say, go
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do this, go down to the basement, the sub-basement of
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the city hall and And those perpetrators that you were
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chasing will be down there in a holding cell. You
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can interview them. They'll think you're a cop. So, you know,
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it was that kind of advice and that kind of
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encouragement that got me started doing wild kind of investigations.
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What those investigations were the most intense, in your opinion,
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and the most productive ones for you?
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There have been several. You know, one story that I've
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always liked was one I did on Deadlines. when I
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was working for the Indianapolis star on the investigative team.
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And I got a call one afternoon from the, from
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the number two guy in the department of correction. And
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he said that they had a hostage situation going on
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on death row. And I was, and I was the
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only guy that the, that the hostage takers would talk
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to because I'd written about prisons and done prison corruption stories, whatever.
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And so the, The guy says, well, can you have
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the newspaper's helicopter fly you up to Michigan City State
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Prison to go in and do some negotiating? And I said, well,
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they don't have a helicopter. They said, well, the state
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police helicopter is busy. So they sent a squad car
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and they did signal 10 all the way from Indianapolis
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to Michigan City. I like respecting the speed limit, you know,
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how fast you can be out. We definitely did. Lights
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and sirens all the way. But about four hours of
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negotiation with Ray Wallace, a guy on death row who
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orchestrated the hostage taking. And we spent that time talking
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about things that had gone on in death row. And
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he wanted me to come back and write about the
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conditions there. I said that I would try to do that.
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But we got all the hostages out. I still had
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15 minutes before deadline, so I made the Bulldog edition
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and bannered the top of the front page of the
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Indianapolis Star that day. And I was always really proud
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of the fact that we got the story in to
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rewrite before the last deadline. There's a corollary to that
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story that I used to tell in journalism class. That's
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when I taught part-time. When I was talking to Ray
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Wallace during the middle of the night, I said, Ray,
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you know, what got you in here? And he told
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me he had done a home invasion and then he
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had killed a family of four. The mother, the father,
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and then the two children. And I asked him, Ray,
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I said, you know, why would you kill the two kids?
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He said, I didn't want them to grow up without parents.
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You know, that hit me really hard because I was
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a parent and I thought about that a lot. And
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I thought about it when I was supposed to go back.
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and do more reporting on death row, and I just
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put it off and put it off and didn't go back.
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And so one day I got a call from a
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juvenile corrections guard who told me about the Indiana Boys
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School and abuses that were going on in the school.
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And I knew some people in the prison system that
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got me access to records. And they put me in
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a room with tons of records of the boys' school.
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And I was going through the files, and I found
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the file for Ray Wallace. And Ray Wallace.
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The same guy was on death row.
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And he'd been brutalized there. But that wasn't the most
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interesting thing. His roommate was Charles Manson at the Indiana
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Boys' School. And I discovered that. And so I sent
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Ray a note at the prison. And I said, Ray,
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I want to talk to you about the boys' school
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and Charles Manson. And he sent me back a two-word reply.
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And the first word started with F. Oh, because I
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hadn't gone back and kept my pride.
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He felt betrayed a little bit.
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He wouldn't talk to me. And I lost him.
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You know, I mean, how many, so you were working
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for that Indianapolis paper, right?
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Right, the start.
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How many miles away was that to the prison? About 100. Yes, honey.
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I mean, you know. It's hard, man. He probably wanted to, but.
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Well, I did, and I'd written a lot about the
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prison system. I was the only reporter, I think, in
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Indiana that was ever allowed inside Pendleton Reformatory during a riot.
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And I went through a cell house crawling underneath smoke,
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talking to inmates that were holed up in their cells,
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you know, eating sack lunches and then throwing them over
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the side so the rats could run around and finish up.
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Smoke filled Well I mean Concerned about Local pets I
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guess That's right That's right So Gosh Amazing I mean
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I mean What a story Just not to spend Too
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much time on that Because it's not The big story
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The book itself Yeah The CIA And Manchurian journalists Oh
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What else to remember About that hostage situation That is
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so fascinating I just didn't know We were gonna Well
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That type of Scenery.
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Well, you know, I had a contentious relationship with the
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leadership of the Department of Correction because I'd pointed out
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sexual abuse in the Indiana women's prison. I'd written about
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human rights abuses, drug trafficking, et cetera, going on in
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the prisons. And so they weren't really happy with me.
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So when I went in, they were very skeptical and
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they were, you know, not very helpful, but they were
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in a tight spot. They couldn't, you know, they couldn't
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conduct any negotiations and they were holding court these guards,
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three guards hostage. And there was a tier up above
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the cell doors where we were conducting the negotiations. And
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they would walk the hostages out every little bit and
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would hold a shiv to their throat and lean them
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over the railing. So I can see that we were
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talking about some serious things here.
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And so you kind of diffuse the situation. Is there
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anything that helped with that? I mean, that's just an
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amazing thing.
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You know, one thing that I think has helped my
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career as a journalist has been the fact that I listen.
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And I listened, and I listened to their complaints, and
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I heard the
anger in their voices. They were double-selling
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people on death row. Double-selling people? Yeah, two guys to
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a cell. And the conditions, imagine, in Michigan City, which
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was a 130-year-old prison, were not too comfortable. Not that
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you want to create too much comfort on death row,
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but people should be treated humanely, and they were not
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treated humanely.
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Wow.
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Okay, so there's a lot to be said for being
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a good listener, huh? Yeah.
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I think it's a key. If you're a journalist, one
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thing you want to do is listen and not assume
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that you know what the story is.
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Absolutely. So, one second. Humor me.
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My screen.
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Disappeared were my questions.
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So, you know, and by the way, you know, honestly,
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I mean, this is so fascinating. I've been blindsided by
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your career. It's not fair. I've had some fun. So anyway,
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I mean, can you go more than 20 minutes?
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I can go as long as you want.
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Oh, good, man. What a sport. Okay, so besides that one,
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that incredible story, what are the stories or standouts for you?
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I mean, you were involved with with, I guess, kind
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of like exposing corrupt judges and maybe prosecutors, right? Tell
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us about that.
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When I was a member of the investigative team of
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the Indianapolis Star, we did a series on the federal
241
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bankruptcy courts and corruption in the bankruptcy courts. And that
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was a big national series. That's why we won the
243
00:14:58.769 --> 00:15:03.899
American Bar Association Award for exposing that corruption. And my
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part of the project was trucking company bust-out scams. When
245
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trucking company bust out scams. So you take a trucking company,
246
00:15:16.690 --> 00:15:20.169
modest size, you take it into bankruptcy court, and all
247
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of a sudden some of its tractors and trailers disappear.
248
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And they wind up being shuffled off through a number
249
00:15:28.009 --> 00:15:31.529
of situations, through leases or whatever. You get this protected
250
00:15:31.590 --> 00:15:33.860
by attorneys in bankruptcy court, and you get a judge
251
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to sign off on the equipment being missing. And then
252
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you sell it off to.
253
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A cohort and then put new paint on it. So
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I was doing a company called leeway motor freight. They
255
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were over in Ohio and I was new to bankruptcy.
256
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Didn't know a lot about bankruptcy at the time, but
257
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I went into the courthouse and I said, I wanted
258
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to see the file on leeway motor freight. And the
259
00:15:54.700 --> 00:15:57.220
clerk looked up at me like I was wearing a
260
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strange looking hat or something. And he said, you want
261
00:15:59.799 --> 00:16:00.799
to see the file, right?
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I said, yeah.
263
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So he walked me down the hall and opened a
264
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room and there were thousands and thousands and thousands of
265
00:16:08.159 --> 00:16:12.669
documents in there. And he said, help yourself. So I
266
00:16:12.730 --> 00:16:16.090
started looking through documents and I found a list of
267
00:16:16.330 --> 00:16:20.350
missing equipment. I wound up climbing over a chain link
268
00:16:20.450 --> 00:16:23.009
fence and writing down numbers of where this equipment was
269
00:16:23.090 --> 00:16:27.330
going and where it came from, what it was leased
270
00:16:27.370 --> 00:16:29.929
to and tagged and found out that they were going
271
00:16:29.970 --> 00:16:32.799
to to a company that was running a truck driver
272
00:16:32.840 --> 00:16:38.659
training school. And that led to the follow-up after the
273
00:16:38.700 --> 00:16:43.269
bankruptcy series on a company called Superior Trucking Company. And
274
00:16:43.289 --> 00:16:47.389
they were running a scam. They were recruiting people for
275
00:16:47.470 --> 00:16:52.730
truck driver training out of welfare lines, guys with amputations
276
00:16:52.830 --> 00:16:54.950
and things like that. They were signing them up for
277
00:16:54.990 --> 00:16:59.080
guaranteed student loans. And then these guys would never show
278
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up for training. They were taking the money from the
279
00:17:00.960 --> 00:17:03.500
guaranteed student loans, and the poor guy on the welfare
280
00:17:03.519 --> 00:17:06.019
line was defaulting on a loan he didn't even know
281
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he had. And they did that to the tune of
282
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$ 900 million in fraud against the federal government.
283
00:17:12.950 --> 00:17:15.230
I saw something like that, too, in New York. I
284
00:17:15.250 --> 00:17:16.829
saw something like that. Yeah, go ahead.
285
00:17:17.390 --> 00:17:20.730
They owned a lovely
jet, and they flew all the
286
00:17:20.769 --> 00:17:24.170
members of the Senate Education Committee all over the country
287
00:17:24.269 --> 00:17:28.289
for free. And they called that plane the Senate shuttle.
288
00:17:29.089 --> 00:17:31.250
And this was going on while they were ripping off
289
00:17:31.269 --> 00:17:35.099
the federal government. So I exposed that stuff. And that
290
00:17:35.170 --> 00:17:38.359
sort of corruption was protected up and down the line.
291
00:17:39.059 --> 00:17:42.240
So that was also an education for me because I
292
00:17:43.720 --> 00:17:47.180
came to understand for the first time, really, how people
293
00:17:47.240 --> 00:17:51.289
retaliate against reporters when they don't like their reporting. So
294
00:17:51.349 --> 00:17:54.140
it turned out people were coming around, picking up my garbage.
295
00:17:54.299 --> 00:17:56.500
They were watching my house 24 hours a day. I
296
00:17:57.259 --> 00:17:59.579
think they were inside my house. I never found a wire.
297
00:17:59.980 --> 00:18:03.660
But eventually those folks that ran the company sued me
298
00:18:03.700 --> 00:18:12.410
for libel. And the case was dismissed after a judge
299
00:18:12.490 --> 00:18:17.279
that this company was using for favorable rulings was removed
300
00:18:17.299 --> 00:18:20.660
from the bench for cause in Indiana. And all of
301
00:18:20.700 --> 00:18:25.119
those libel problems went away.
302
00:18:25.160 --> 00:18:25.829
Wow.
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00:18:26.309 --> 00:18:30.190
You made yourself loved. I did. I was really popular.
304
00:18:30.210 --> 00:18:33.569
Looking back in the 70s and 80s, you began 1969.
305
00:18:33.549 --> 00:18:35.190
Tell us about how reporting was back then versus later
306
00:18:35.210 --> 00:18:36.210
when technology ruled reporting.
307
00:18:47.279 --> 00:18:50.769
You know, journalism had its problems in reporting, and there
308
00:18:50.789 --> 00:18:55.150
were always concerns and issues, I think, maybe of a
309
00:18:55.309 --> 00:18:57.630
smaller scale. But one thing that did exist was an
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00:18:57.690 --> 00:19:03.029
institutional system for developing stories, for getting information, for writing
311
00:19:03.069 --> 00:19:05.559
those stories with sound foundation. And we tried to keep
312
00:19:05.599 --> 00:19:08.920
things accurate. If we didn't get them accurately done, we
313
00:19:09.259 --> 00:19:12.779
wrote corrections. And that was just the normal course of things.
314
00:19:13.410 --> 00:19:19.660
The institutional knowledge that existed in newspapers gradually disappeared. You know,
315
00:19:19.680 --> 00:19:23.059
when I started as a reporter, other reporters took me
316
00:19:23.119 --> 00:19:26.920
under wing. They showed me how to get to things.
317
00:19:27.019 --> 00:19:30.819
They taught me the little tricks of interviewing and getting
318
00:19:30.839 --> 00:19:34.109
people to talk to you. That kind of institutional knowledge
319
00:19:34.119 --> 00:19:37.170
has gone out the window. Younger reporters don't really get
320
00:19:37.250 --> 00:19:40.769
that kind of mentoring that newsrooms provided because the newsrooms
321
00:19:40.829 --> 00:19:43.269
are largely gone. You look at the size of the
322
00:19:43.329 --> 00:19:47.970
Indianapolis Star and you can see the number of reporters
323
00:19:48.009 --> 00:19:52.400
that exist there around a kitchen table. In those days,
324
00:19:52.579 --> 00:19:55.140
there were six people in the newsroom, and there were
325
00:19:55.200 --> 00:19:58.869
five reporters in the investigative unit who had no rules,
326
00:19:58.950 --> 00:20:01.990
no restrictions, came and went as they pleased, never went
327
00:20:02.029 --> 00:20:05.829
in the newsroom. That was the kind of environment that
328
00:20:05.890 --> 00:20:09.450
existed back then, and slowly it has eroded. to to
329
00:20:09.490 --> 00:20:13.549
what we have today which is not organized systemized reporting.
330
00:20:13.710 --> 00:20:16.190
As it is remote guys i mean how do you
331
00:20:17.019 --> 00:20:21.099
get mentoring when you need it but you don't you
332
00:20:21.119 --> 00:20:23.420
think about yeah you think about all the all the
333
00:20:23.519 --> 00:20:26.619
skills that were passed on from one generation to another
334
00:20:26.660 --> 00:20:28.700
and then on to a third and fourth and beyond
335
00:20:28.720 --> 00:20:33.329
and that's just gone and so the you just I mean,
336
00:20:33.390 --> 00:20:35.569
it's great. You have a pie line. I'm famous. I'm
337
00:20:35.630 --> 00:20:36.829
an important guy.
338
00:20:36.869 --> 00:20:37.009
Yeah.
339
00:20:37.049 --> 00:20:39.049
But you know, you, you, you never learned a lot
340
00:20:39.069 --> 00:20:41.990
of basic things probably that other people in the, in
341
00:20:42.019 --> 00:20:45.440
the craft did learn, but weren't able to pass on
342
00:20:45.480 --> 00:20:47.059
because they just weren't rubbing elbows.
343
00:20:47.539 --> 00:20:47.619
Yeah.
344
00:20:47.640 --> 00:20:49.660
It's just so important to be in proximity to people
345
00:20:50.279 --> 00:20:52.859
and not just, well, where we're connected, we're all remote now,
346
00:20:52.940 --> 00:20:57.829
you know, we're saving money and losing everything. So, um,
347
00:20:59.009 --> 00:21:01.410
You know, you were able to work with some newspaper
348
00:21:01.470 --> 00:21:04.150
legends at the New York Daily News, the New York Times.
349
00:21:04.170 --> 00:21:06.470
I'm thinking about the Billy Joel song, you know, the
350
00:21:06.880 --> 00:21:13.200
New York Times, the Daily News. Tell us about, please,
351
00:21:13.240 --> 00:21:15.599
if you could, some of the people, the unforgettable people
352
00:21:15.640 --> 00:21:19.480
you get to know at these two New York newspapers.
353
00:21:20.539 --> 00:21:22.960
I can't say I got to know a lot of
354
00:21:23.000 --> 00:21:25.500
people because I was remote. Actually, I was in the
355
00:21:25.539 -->
00:21:30.079
Daily News newsroom a few times, but... And some of
356
00:21:30.099 --> 00:21:33.440
the characters that have worked at the Daily News that
357
00:21:33.500 --> 00:21:36.720
I've known and become friends with, Lucas Rivera, who was
358
00:21:36.819 --> 00:21:39.740
a reporter at the Daily News and likes to tell
359
00:21:39.779 --> 00:21:42.789
stories about Jimmy Breslin's advice to people about how you
360
00:21:42.829 --> 00:21:44.670
know when your story is ready is you stand up
361
00:21:44.710 --> 00:21:46.789
and you read it out loud. And if it sounds
362
00:21:46.849 --> 00:21:48.690
good to the ear, then it's okay to turn it
363
00:21:48.730 --> 00:21:49.849
into the city desk, right?
364
00:21:50.670 --> 00:21:50.990
Yeah.
365
00:21:51.529 --> 00:21:53.650
Those kind of folks. But, you know, I have met
366
00:21:53.710 --> 00:21:55.890
so many characters over the years and so many really
367
00:21:55.930 --> 00:21:59.210
interesting characters. I developed a relationship with a guy in
368
00:21:59.390 --> 00:22:03.920
Chicago who was, he owned a little warehouse, paint and
369
00:22:03.940 --> 00:22:09.619
tile warehouse in Melrose Park. And it turned out that
370
00:22:09.680 --> 00:22:12.809
he played Pinochle sometimes at midnight with a guy named
371
00:22:12.849 --> 00:22:16.170
Tony Accardo, also known as Big Tuna, who ran the
372
00:22:16.210 --> 00:22:19.670
Chicago Mob for many years. And as I got to
373
00:22:19.710 --> 00:22:21.569
know him better, I found out he was more than
374
00:22:21.650 --> 00:22:24.970
a Cardo's Midnight Pinochle partner. He was also Jimmy Hoffa's
375
00:22:25.019 --> 00:22:28.599
liaison to the Chicago Mob. And one of the stories— Really?
376
00:22:28.859 --> 00:22:29.339
Yeah, yeah.
377
00:22:29.720 --> 00:22:31.900
And so I got to know him very well. We
378
00:22:31.940 --> 00:22:34.039
hung out together quite a bit. I used to go
379
00:22:34.099 --> 00:22:37.930
to his warehouse and see the FBI send young guys
380
00:22:38.049 --> 00:22:40.509
in to buy paint and tile at the warehouse so
381
00:22:40.529 --> 00:22:42.450
they could get a look at the old-timers who were
382
00:22:42.490 --> 00:22:46.559
running the mob. And— So he told me that, you know,
383
00:22:46.700 --> 00:22:48.500
I would kid him for years. I said, let me
384
00:22:48.539 --> 00:22:51.200
write a book about your life. He said, you're never
385
00:22:51.240 --> 00:22:52.940
going to do that. But one day he called me
386
00:22:53.019 --> 00:22:54.720
up after I got out to Denver and he said,
387
00:22:54.740 --> 00:22:57.220
you want to write a book about writing about Al Capone?
388
00:22:57.880 --> 00:23:00.720
I said, well, everybody's written about Al Capone. He said, yeah,
389
00:23:00.740 --> 00:23:02.859
but they never told the truth about him. I said,
390
00:23:02.880 --> 00:23:05.269
what's the truth about Al Capone? He said, he never
391
00:23:05.329 --> 00:23:07.710
ran a Chicago mob. He worked for a guy named
392
00:23:07.730 --> 00:23:10.289
Jake Guzik. Jake Guzik was a guy that ran the
393
00:23:10.309 --> 00:23:12.910
Chicago mob. He was a Russian Jew. And all this
394
00:23:12.950 --> 00:23:16.210
stuff about the Italians running the Chicago mob was a
395
00:23:16.230 --> 00:23:19.200
bunch of crap. He said there were, excuse my language,
396
00:23:19.240 --> 00:23:24.759
but he said the real brains behind the operation was
397
00:23:24.799 --> 00:23:26.720
Jake Guzik. He says, I can put you next to
398
00:23:26.759 --> 00:23:31.329
Jake Guzik's son. He's still alive. And I spent three
399
00:23:31.369 --> 00:23:33.890
days with Jake Guzik's son talking about the way the
400
00:23:33.950 --> 00:23:36.150
mob was back in the days of Al Capone. And
401
00:23:36.190 --> 00:23:40.849
he was Al Capone's son's best friend. How old was
402
00:23:40.869 --> 00:23:43.359
Jake Guzik, by the way? Jake Guzik, when he died,
403
00:23:43.420 --> 00:23:45.890
was in his 50s. He was in his late 50s.
404
00:23:45.900 --> 00:23:49.319
He died in the 1950s, but Al Capone died before
405
00:23:49.359 --> 00:23:57.740
he did. But Guzik, he was a concert-quality pianist, actually.
406
00:23:58.420 --> 00:24:02.609
His father was a member of the Moscow Symphony Orchestra
407
00:24:02.650 --> 00:24:05.250
before they came to the U.S., and he became a
408
00:24:05.329 --> 00:24:08.349
concert-quality pianist, but he liked ragtime piano, and this was
409
00:24:08.430 --> 00:24:11.339
back in the teens and the early 20s. parts of
410
00:24:11.380 --> 00:24:15.079
the 20s. And he would go down to the first
411
00:24:15.140 --> 00:24:19.559
ward in Chicago and play piano, ragtime piano, at the
412
00:24:19.619 --> 00:24:22.059
clubs and the houses of prostitution down there. And he
413
00:24:22.099 --> 00:24:25.940
got to know all of the people involved. And gradually,
414
00:24:25.980 --> 00:24:30.559
because of his brilliance and his logistic brilliance, he rose
415
00:24:30.619 --> 00:24:31.980
to the top of the organization.
416
00:24:33.180 --> 00:24:34.920
You know, the Mafia today just lacks culture.
417
00:24:35.720 --> 00:24:38.960
Yeah.
418
00:24:39.000 --> 00:24:41.990
Right. My dad actually... my father and then my grandfather had,
419
00:24:42.549 --> 00:24:44.470
had a run on with Jimmy Hoffa. But it might
420
00:24:44.549 --> 00:24:46.490
as interesting as your story. So I won't, I won't,
421
00:24:46.970 --> 00:24:48.950
I won't bore you with the details, but it was interesting.
422
00:24:49.009 --> 00:24:52.589
And then nonetheless, so let's, let's look at, um, his book.
423
00:24:53.369 --> 00:24:53.589
Yeah.
424
00:24:54.299 --> 00:24:57.839
You know, the, um, the Manchurian journalist, Lawrence Wright, the
425
00:24:57.859 --> 00:25:00.400
CIA and the corruption of American journalism, Lawrence Wright. Oh
426
00:25:00.440 --> 00:25:03.460
my gosh. He was the prize winner and he becomes
427
00:25:04.759 --> 00:25:09.960
the target of David Sutter.
Tell us about Lawrence Wright and, um,
428
00:25:10.960 --> 00:25:13.319
It's both the Looming Tower Alligator and the Road to 9-11.
429
00:25:13.900 --> 00:25:18.529
I suppose it was based on faulty reporting or corrupted
430
00:25:19.369 --> 00:25:22.049
sources or what? The corrupting sources.
431
00:25:23.009 --> 00:25:26.130
Well, you know, I never expected to be taking a
432
00:25:26.150 --> 00:25:30.829
look at another journalist, but things happen unexpectedly. And I
433
00:25:30.869 --> 00:25:33.880
was freelancing and I got a call from a little
434
00:25:33.900 --> 00:25:37.019
magazine down in Florida that was interested in doing some
435
00:25:37.059 --> 00:25:39.220
investigative reporting and wanted to know if I would help
436
00:25:39.240 --> 00:25:41.400
them out. And it turned out to be owned by
437
00:25:41.420 --> 00:25:42.539
the Church of Scientology.
438
00:25:43.539 --> 00:25:47.299
Oh, my God. So, yeah.
439
00:25:47.619 --> 00:25:49.960
So, I went down to Florida and I talked to
440
00:25:49.980 --> 00:25:52.960
these folks at the Church of Scientology. And Lawrence Wright
441
00:25:52.980 --> 00:25:56.789
had written a book about the church, Going Clear. And so,
442
00:25:56.990 --> 00:25:58.769
they said, well, there's a lot wrong with this book.
443
00:25:58.849 --> 00:26:02.509
And he didn't really do any new reporting and whatever else.
444
00:26:02.750 --> 00:26:04.049
And would you take a look at it and write
445
00:26:04.069 --> 00:26:07.190
a story about that? So, I did. I took a
446
00:26:07.210 --> 00:26:09.150
look at his reporting on the church and I found nothing.
447
00:26:09.839 --> 00:26:12.099
some problems, some holes. I got to know some of
448
00:26:12.140 --> 00:26:14.480
the people in the Church of Scientology. I got to
449
00:26:14.500 --> 00:26:17.059
know them pretty well, actually. I spent time with David
450
00:26:17.079 --> 00:26:20.180
Miscavige and others, and I heard a lot of the
451
00:26:20.220 --> 00:26:22.150
stories about the Church and its history and how it
452
00:26:22.200 --> 00:26:25.150
differed from what Lawrence Wright had written. But then I started,
453
00:26:25.470 --> 00:26:27.549
you know, just like I do with everybody else, on
454
00:26:27.609 --> 00:26:30.910
an investigative piece, I look at the personalities involved, and
455
00:26:30.950 --> 00:26:33.109
I started taking a look at Lawrence Wright, and he'd
456
00:26:33.130 --> 00:26:36.880
written a memoir, and I started pulling that memoir apart
457
00:26:36.930 --> 00:26:40.369
and testing the accuracy of it. and started finding some problems,
458
00:26:40.430 --> 00:26:44.460
and then found something even more interesting, that his father
459
00:26:44.519 --> 00:26:48.460
ran a bank in Dallas. He was ex-military, and that
460
00:26:48.519 --> 00:26:52.500
bank was used as non-official cover for CIA operations in Dallas.
461
00:26:53.539 --> 00:26:56.099
And the man that Lawrence Wright's father was involved with
462
00:26:56.119 --> 00:26:59.309
was Robert Story, who was the chief executive trial prosecutor
463
00:26:59.349 --> 00:27:02.069
in the Nuremberg war trials, and also one of the
464
00:27:02.109 --> 00:27:06.220
founders of the intelligence community in this country. And Lawrence
465
00:27:06.259 --> 00:27:09.009
Wright had never mentioned a word about Robert's story or
466
00:27:09.049 --> 00:27:12.089
his father's history with Robert's story or his father's history
467
00:27:12.150 --> 00:27:15.349
with intelligence. And then I discovered that Lawrence Wright went
468
00:27:15.390 --> 00:27:19.730
to a little summer class at Radcliffe in Boston when
469
00:27:19.789 --> 00:27:23.750
he graduated from college. And that class was run by
470
00:27:23.789 --> 00:27:28.369
an operative for the Central Intelligence Agency. They got him
471
00:27:28.490 --> 00:27:32.970
a foundation gig at the University of Cairo, at the
472
00:27:33.009 --> 00:27:37.200
American University in Cairo. And I started looking at the
473
00:27:37.220 --> 00:27:40.759
American University and found out about their central intelligence ties.
474
00:27:41.460 --> 00:27:46.240
And basically what emerged was a story that encapsulates the
475
00:27:46.279 --> 00:27:50.900
fact that from World War II on, the Central Intelligence
476
00:27:50.980 --> 00:27:56.220
Agency had begun recruiting journalists, recruiting others within various parts
477
00:27:56.279 --> 00:28:02.839
of our domestic community to build friendships, and particularly with journalists.
478
00:28:02.980 --> 00:28:06.900
And Lawrence Wright had a long history of assistance in
479
00:28:06.960 --> 00:28:10.599
his career in becoming the journalist that he was. And
480
00:28:10.640 --> 00:28:13.140
so then I took a look at Looming Tower and
481
00:28:13.180 --> 00:28:16.400
began to point out there or look at the contradictions
482
00:28:16.460 --> 00:28:18.759
that were in there with what we knew and how
483
00:28:18.799 --> 00:28:21.480
well that book had been received in reviews by the
484
00:28:21.519 --> 00:28:25.480
New York Times. It had been lauded by many organizations
485
00:28:25.940 --> 00:28:30.529
as the most insightful history into 9-11 and to the
486
00:28:31.329 --> 00:28:33.970
situations with Al-Qaeda. But I found a lot of things
487
00:28:34.069 --> 00:28:36.460
in Lawrence Wright's book Justin Maddow.
488
00:28:38.130 --> 00:28:40.269
Right. So you guys are now fast friends, I'm sure.
489
00:28:41.029 --> 00:28:45.849
Well, he did send a post on X one day
490
00:28:45.910 --> 00:28:49.660
that said that if anybody was contacted by somebody named
491
00:28:49.700 --> 00:28:53.160
Dan Luzader, that he wasn't really a journalist. He was
492
00:28:53.740 --> 00:28:58.740
a PI working for the Church of Scientology. But it
493
00:28:58.799 --> 00:29:01.680
did inhibit my ability to talk to a few people
494
00:29:01.740 --> 00:29:02.369
I wanted to.
495
00:29:03.089 --> 00:29:07.349
What did Lawrence Wright get wrong about 9-11 and the
496
00:29:07.390 --> 00:29:12.769
CIA that, you know, presumably was misinforming him?
497
00:29:14.349 --> 00:29:19.650
I think the level of threat that the terror cells
498
00:29:19.910 --> 00:29:28.670
of al-Qaeda... represented in the U.S., the degree of encouragement
499
00:29:29.769 --> 00:29:36.369
of sort of a hyper hysteria about that. It was
500
00:29:36.430 --> 00:29:41.309
a tragic and horrid thing that happened on 9-11. Osama
501
00:29:41.329 --> 00:29:47.309
bin Laden's involvement in that, I think, is fairly well documented,
502
00:29:48.509 --> 00:29:54.190
although not everyone who was involved, I think, have been identified.
503
00:29:55.339 --> 00:30:00.460
But what Wright's account in the looming tower did was...
504
00:30:00.930 --> 00:30:06.279
It gave a false impression of the level of threat
505
00:30:07.000 --> 00:30:11.480
that might exist going forward. It endorsed the idea of
506
00:30:11.539 --> 00:30:15.950
the massive response that was made. And it also painted
507
00:30:15.990 --> 00:30:20.890
a portrait of conflict between the CIA and the FBI
508
00:30:21.410 --> 00:30:24.529
in how they shared information as one of the root
509
00:30:24.569 --> 00:30:31.750
causes for why this happened and that was the level
510
00:30:31.769 --> 00:30:36.450
of accountability, I think, that his book promoted. It didn't
511
00:30:36.529 --> 00:30:46.180
look deeper into other issues, and it didn't appear to
512
00:30:46.240 --> 00:30:51.640
me to be independent in the way that a good
513
00:30:51.680 --> 00:30:57.519
journalist should be, but leaned heavily on the CIA's version
514
00:30:59.380 --> 00:30:59.900
of events.
515
00:31:00.859 --> 00:31:03.220
Do you think it's possible, something I like to say waggishly,
516
00:31:03.279 --> 00:31:08.140
that not just the CIA, but the CYA was an
517
00:31:08.160 --> 00:31:12.000
important factor to take into account?
518
00:31:13.700 --> 00:31:16.519
I think definitely that's a factor that has to be
519
00:31:16.559 --> 00:31:18.500
taken into account.
520
00:31:18.519 --> 00:31:22.140
They wanted to protect themselves for being asleep in the switch, maybe?
521
00:31:22.160 --> 00:31:22.940
Yeah.
522
00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:26.160
There's a similar thing we hear about Israel on October
523
00:31:26.220 --> 00:31:28.779
7th as to why they.
524
00:31:30.400 --> 00:31:36.000
That event could occur without an immediate response, despite warnings.
525
00:31:36.400 --> 00:31:42.680
Why did this event occur when there was ample intelligence
526
00:31:42.700 --> 00:31:45.769
that indicated there was risk?
527
00:31:47.390 --> 00:31:50.029
To me, it just seems such a small country and
528
00:31:50.069 --> 00:31:55.150
such an advanced and top-level intelligence apparatus like what Israel has.
529
00:31:56.089 --> 00:31:59.869
Just to think that they couldn't respond. They wouldn't be
530
00:32:00.289 --> 00:32:06.609
immediately able to bring forces to bear
within minutes.
531
00:32:07.450 --> 00:32:08.390
To protect people.
532
00:32:09.150 --> 00:32:10.869
Yeah, it shocks me. I don't know, by the way,
533
00:32:10.930 --> 00:32:16.799
what the response time was, but apparently it was greatly
534
00:32:16.859 --> 00:32:23.819
disappointing for the poor victims. Yeah, that's amazing. So, is
535
00:32:23.839 --> 00:32:28.609
there anything else about Lawrence Wright and his His activities
536
00:32:28.690 --> 00:32:30.390
as a journalist and working with the CIA that do
537
00:32:30.410 --> 00:32:33.619
you think maybe he was egregious about, you know, that
538
00:32:33.650 --> 00:32:36.740
he really let down his audience? I mean, he was
539
00:32:36.799 --> 00:32:38.400
a Pulitzer based on this book, right?
540
00:32:39.240 --> 00:32:45.900
He did. And, you know, I think what is indicated
541
00:32:45.980 --> 00:32:50.660
by the fact is that Lawrence Ray didn't get to
542
00:32:50.700 --> 00:32:53.779
his position as a journalist yet. just on the strength
543
00:32:53.839 --> 00:32:59.880
of his good repertorial skills and his craftsmanship in writing,
544
00:33:00.740 --> 00:33:05.160
as he has argued. He got there because of an
545
00:33:05.180 --> 00:33:08.490
elite network of individuals who put him in a place
546
00:33:08.509 --> 00:33:12.970
that other people don't easily get to. He was part
547
00:33:13.009 --> 00:33:17.779
of a little summer course run by a CIA operative
548
00:33:18.099 --> 00:33:22.640
who was recruiting people in the publishing industry, in the
549
00:33:22.700 --> 00:33:27.660
newspaper industry, in magazines. She was involved with individuals from
550
00:33:27.700 --> 00:33:31.109
Rolling Stone, with individuals from the New York Times, with
551
00:33:31.990 --> 00:33:38.339
all level of publishing and publishing. and the media in
552
00:33:38.400 --> 00:33:44.220
ways that created a culture. And Wright became part of that,
553
00:33:44.680 --> 00:33:47.099
and he hid that from his readers.
554
00:33:48.240 --> 00:33:54.019
I mean, he knew about Operation Mockingbird. And by the way,
555
00:33:54.759 --> 00:33:59.940
was this an outgrowth of Operation Mockingbird, what happened between
556
00:34:02.119 --> 00:34:06.390
journalists and the CIA regarding 9-11? Was this something based
557
00:34:06.470 --> 00:34:10.409
on what Operation Mockingbird did and began establishing by way
558
00:34:10.449 --> 00:34:13.750
of ongoing contacts and sources?
559
00:34:13.769 --> 00:34:21.969
I think long before Operation Mockingbird was an operation, there
560
00:34:22.030 --> 00:34:29.210
was an attitude and an imperative to control the conversation
561
00:34:29.230 --> 00:34:36.800
about communism, the Cold War, what America was, who we were,
562
00:34:37.159 --> 00:34:39.800
and what we should believe. And I think that all
563
00:34:39.860 --> 00:34:48.840
started way back during the OSS with the intelligence system
564
00:34:49.900 --> 00:34:53.530
that was developed. And part of
that came out of
565
00:34:53.610 --> 00:34:57.570
the federal narcotics bureau, which was the predecessor to the DEA.
566
00:34:58.510 --> 00:35:02.179
And the Federal Narcotics Bureau, before the war, had intelligence
567
00:35:02.760 --> 00:35:08.619
working throughout the country. And the OSS came in and
568
00:35:08.679 --> 00:35:14.550
patterned themselves after and used the FBN's intelligence sources to
569
00:35:14.590 --> 00:35:19.989
begin their own intelligence network. And so we've had this
570
00:35:20.349 --> 00:35:24.150
cozy relationship that's gone on that dates back to people
571
00:35:24.190 --> 00:35:27.809
like John McCloy, at the end of World War II
572
00:35:27.829 --> 00:35:34.179
and Robert Story and others who were extremely influential in
573
00:35:34.360 --> 00:35:40.199
helping craft the idea of presenting our capitalist democracy in
574
00:35:40.239 --> 00:35:45.179
a certain way and using the media, whether it was newspapers, magazines, books,
575
00:35:45.900 --> 00:35:47.960
or Hollywood to do so.
576
00:35:49.079 --> 00:35:49.340
Wow.
577
00:35:49.380 --> 00:35:53.300
Well, before we go deeper on your book and Lawrence Wright, um,
578
00:35:53.889 --> 00:35:56.570
Can I make a little digression into the Church of
579
00:35:56.590 --> 00:35:58.949
Scientology and David Miscavige? Oh, yeah, sure.
580
00:35:59.349 --> 00:35:59.530
Go ahead.
581
00:35:59.550 --> 00:36:00.090
Tell us about that.
582
00:36:00.670 --> 00:36:03.130
Well, I had a good number of meetings with David
583
00:36:03.150 --> 00:36:08.989
Miscavige in various parts of the world, actually. Australia and
584
00:36:09.949 --> 00:36:15.050
here in the U.S. And we had private meetings in L.A.
585
00:36:15.530 --> 00:36:18.929
I went out to L.A. after I had done some
586
00:36:18.969 --> 00:36:21.349
freelance work for them and actually served for a while
587
00:36:21.449 --> 00:36:26.710
as executive editor of their magazine. I was trying for
588
00:36:26.730 --> 00:36:30.289
about two and a half years, two years.
589
00:36:31.289 --> 00:36:32.389
What's that new publication?
590
00:36:32.809 --> 00:36:39.030
It's called Freedom Magazine. And Freedom Magazine had an interesting history.
591
00:36:39.110 --> 00:36:42.719
I mean, it had actually done some pretty incredible investigative
592
00:36:42.780 --> 00:36:45.820
work over the course of its lifetime. And it was
593
00:36:45.920 --> 00:36:49.139
run by journalists. One journalist who had worked for Jack
594
00:36:49.239 --> 00:36:52.929
Anderson was a longtime editor of Freedom Magazine. And Freedom
595
00:36:52.969 --> 00:36:56.139
Magazine had done some exposés on Central Intelligence Agency and
596
00:36:56.179 --> 00:36:58.340
a lot of things that were not related directly to
597
00:36:58.360 --> 00:37:02.420
the church. But later on, the magazine was turned more
598
00:37:02.460 --> 00:37:06.300
into a house organ and basically arguments about the church
599
00:37:07.010 --> 00:37:11.210
and
promotion of the church activities. And I wanted to
600
00:37:11.269 --> 00:37:13.849
take it more back into the investigative direction. We never
601
00:37:13.949 --> 00:37:16.849
really got there, but we did a few investigative pieces
602
00:37:16.929 --> 00:37:18.340
that were fairly good.
603
00:37:18.380 --> 00:37:18.880
But the....
604
00:37:20.480 --> 00:37:23.940
Course of events i met people that were i met
605
00:37:24.699 --> 00:37:28.780
the executive trustee of l ron hubbard's estate who had
606
00:37:29.010 --> 00:37:32.710
traveled with hubbard for for a good part of of
607
00:37:32.769 --> 00:37:35.929
hubbard's uh uh tenure as head of the church of
608
00:37:35.989 --> 00:37:37.730
scientology and what was his.
609
00:37:37.670 --> 00:37:43.420
Name did he uh um uh not much on the.
610
00:37:43.320 --> 00:37:45.619
Spot you know you both got to get this out
611
00:37:46.119 --> 00:37:48.760
yeah anyway it'll come to me in a second the
612
00:37:48.900 --> 00:37:51.500
uh Uh, Norman Starkey was his name.
613
00:37:51.659 --> 00:37:52.219
Norman Starkey.
614
00:37:52.420 --> 00:37:53.119
Norman Starkey.
615
00:37:53.460 --> 00:37:56.539
I mean, so this is like, you're not a.
616
00:37:56.539 --> 00:37:58.679
Member of the church, are you?
617
00:37:59.059 --> 00:37:59.619
No, no, no.
618
00:37:59.699 --> 00:38:02.030
I'm, I'm a casual Episcopalian.
619
00:38:03.309 --> 00:38:08.309
Okay. So, um, you know, I mean, so many people
620
00:38:08.329 --> 00:38:11.570
left the church's ontology talking about people are kept in
621
00:38:11.590 --> 00:38:16.800
the hole. They're basically treated like garbage. David Miscavige is
622
00:38:16.909 --> 00:38:23.050
extremely violent. And, uh, you know, assaults people like I
623
00:38:23.090 --> 00:38:27.510
wouldn't have a certain frequency. Um, and, um, people are
624
00:38:27.530 --> 00:38:32.349
just basically have a lot of, uh, tales of abuse, um,
625
00:38:32.389 --> 00:38:36.670
tales of escape, you know, it's doesn't seem like a,
626
00:38:37.610 --> 00:38:40.309
an institution that would, you know, feel comfortable with using
627
00:38:40.329 --> 00:38:43.769
the word freedom and it's flagship magazine title, you know?
628
00:38:44.409 --> 00:38:45.679
Right. Right.
629
00:38:47.010 --> 00:38:50.949
And so that is a perception that has been pretty
630
00:38:51.010 --> 00:38:55.780
broadly established across the American culture that Scientology is an
631
00:38:56.010 --> 00:38:59.920
organization that is a cult and it does bad things
632
00:38:59.960 --> 00:39:03.559
to people, etc. But you know, one thing that my
633
00:39:03.599 --> 00:39:06.420
experience has taught me is that the public perception isn't
634
00:39:06.480 --> 00:39:10.460
always necessarily accurate. But a lot of reporters are willing
635
00:39:10.500 --> 00:39:12.880
to go along with that public perception from the outset.
636
00:39:14.420 --> 00:39:18.139
My approach has been I want to know whether that's
637
00:39:18.179 --> 00:39:20.039
true or not. And I applied the same thing to
638
00:39:20.079 --> 00:39:23.489
when I was covering prisons. Public officials in the state
639
00:39:23.510 --> 00:39:25.309
of Indiana would tell you that there was never a
640
00:39:25.349 --> 00:39:28.630
human rights violation or the drug traffic was bad or
641
00:39:28.670 --> 00:39:31.519
they were providing good rehabilitation. services for people in prison.
642
00:39:31.539 --> 00:39:33.659
But when I got in there, you know, it didn't
643
00:39:33.699 --> 00:39:36.949
look like that. And the story I heard about Scientology,
644
00:39:36.989 --> 00:39:40.150
when I got inside, it didn't look like that. So
645
00:39:40.909 --> 00:39:44.849
I was given the opportunity to ask any question I wanted,
646
00:39:45.710 --> 00:39:49.389
to go anywhere I wanted, And they would provide documents
647
00:39:49.449 --> 00:39:51.800
to me to back up their arguments. And that was
648
00:39:51.860 --> 00:39:55.119
my deal. If I ask a question, I want an answer,
649
00:39:55.159 --> 00:39:57.340
and I want it backed up. And they did that
650
00:39:57.840 --> 00:40:02.440
over and over again. So I toured that.
651
00:40:02.460 --> 00:40:02.840
What's that?
652
00:40:03.579 --> 00:40:09.510
I toured the gold facility where the trailers were supposed
653
00:40:09.550 --> 00:40:13.289
to be, where people were held hostage and were brutalized
654
00:40:13.389 --> 00:40:17.570
and assaulted, etc., I didn't see anything like that. I
655
00:40:17.630 --> 00:40:20.610
talked to hundreds of people in Scientology about what their
656
00:40:20.650 --> 00:40:23.349
attitude was about being a part of it or not
657
00:40:23.389 --> 00:40:25.510
being a part of it. One of the arguments that
658
00:40:25.550 --> 00:40:29.230
was made about Scientology was that people couldn't leave and
659
00:40:29.670 --> 00:40:33.550
they had to escape. A lot of those stories were,
660
00:40:33.840 --> 00:40:37.360
I think, created out of whole cloth because I never
661
00:40:37.400 --> 00:40:40.250
saw anybody held hostage. could walk out on the street
662
00:40:40.269 --> 00:40:42.369
anytime you wanted to. You could have a cell phone
663
00:40:42.389 --> 00:40:42.869
if you wanted.
664
00:40:43.650 --> 00:40:43.889
Good.
665
00:40:44.050 --> 00:40:46.719
So, right, but I mean, did they have a minder
666
00:40:46.800 --> 00:40:48.900
that was like kind of a guide that would accompany
667
00:40:48.940 --> 00:40:51.360
you to, as you went from place to.
668
00:40:51.300 --> 00:40:51.880
Place, or what?
669
00:40:52.500 --> 00:40:55.039
Well, a good part of the time, but I was,
670
00:40:55.059 --> 00:41:01.659
you know, I've I went to Hungary. I toured the church.
671
00:41:01.760 --> 00:41:07.739
I hung out with local members. I moved through situations
672
00:41:07.780 --> 00:41:10.980
there and elsewhere. There was not someone that was constantly
673
00:41:11.019 --> 00:41:14.090
at my shoulder, although on
one occasion when I was
674
00:41:14.159 --> 00:41:21.909
in England at the manor there, the headquarters, I had
675
00:41:21.929 --> 00:41:26.360
a couple of young people with me, and I They
676
00:41:26.389 --> 00:41:29.170
went one direction, I went another, and one of them remarked, oh,
677
00:41:29.199 --> 00:41:34.679
my God, we've left a reporter loose on the grounds. But,
678
00:41:34.719 --> 00:41:38.449
you know, I pretty much had open access to most
679
00:41:38.530 --> 00:41:44.429
anything I wanted to see, and that was instructive. I
680
00:41:44.489 --> 00:41:48.949
met people across the country, people that were believers. You know,
681
00:41:48.989 --> 00:41:51.840
people can believe what they want, and I endorse the
682
00:41:51.940 --> 00:41:56.170
idea of religious freedom to people. people making up their
683
00:41:56.210 --> 00:41:59.150
own minds. But there is a lot of distortion about
684
00:41:59.170 --> 00:42:01.210
the history of the Catholic Church. It doesn't mean, or
685
00:42:01.289 --> 00:42:04.489
Catholic Church, the Church of Scientology and the Catholic Church,
686
00:42:04.920 --> 00:42:08.539
but it doesn't mean that all of those stories are
687
00:42:08.599 --> 00:42:11.239
untrue or from the perspective of the person involved that
688
00:42:12.019 --> 00:42:14.380
there were not situations that were bad. But I never
689
00:42:14.440 --> 00:42:19.440
saw any indication of violence or talked to anyone that
690
00:42:19.599 --> 00:42:24.300
showed any indication of violence except people in circumstances involving
691
00:42:24.340 --> 00:42:28.739
individuals who were making those accusations on occasions had engaged
692
00:42:28.820 --> 00:42:29.559
themselves in.
693
00:42:31.079 --> 00:42:34.960
So, okay, at any point, did you talk to ex-members
694
00:42:35.039 --> 00:42:36.639
of the church? I did.
695
00:42:36.659 --> 00:42:44.110
Yeah, a good number of ex-members. Yeah. And I reviewed their,
696
00:42:44.340 --> 00:42:49.210
the documentations and things, films. I spent a lot of
697
00:42:49.250 --> 00:42:51.889
time reviewing those kinds of things.
698
00:42:52.750 --> 00:42:53.070
That's right.
699
00:42:53.130 --> 00:42:53.369
Okay.
700
00:42:54.590 --> 00:42:56.159
Okay. So, so I want to ask you a question
701
00:42:56.179 --> 00:42:58.579
about David Miscavige. He's done like one interview or maybe
702
00:42:58.599 --> 00:42:59.699
he's done more interviews.
703
00:42:59.420 --> 00:43:00.340
That we just don't know about.
704
00:43:00.659 --> 00:43:04.739
Um, did, um, besides that interview I think he did
705
00:43:04.760 --> 00:43:08.030
with Ted Koppel and oh gosh, I was like, what
706
00:43:08.449 --> 00:43:10.449
was it? 1994 is a long time ago.
707
00:43:10.849 --> 00:43:11.530
A long time ago.
708
00:43:12.050 --> 00:43:14.170
And see, why doesn't he do interviews? I mean, he's, he's,
709
00:43:14.510 --> 00:43:18.369
he's the head of the church. Uh, he's, you know,
710
00:43:18.389 --> 00:43:21.119
he obviously the church of Scientology wants new members. Um,
711
00:43:21.820 --> 00:43:23.340
You would think that that guy would be, you know,
712
00:43:24.559 --> 00:43:26.619
get as much exposure as possible.
713
00:43:27.179 --> 00:43:31.409
Why doesn't he? I think maybe the history with the
714
00:43:31.469 --> 00:43:36.269
media is part of one of the reasons. And, you know,
715
00:43:36.309 --> 00:43:39.590
I think what a lot of people don't know about
716
00:43:39.650 --> 00:43:44.659
Scientology is the very difficult road they had to establishing
717
00:43:44.739 --> 00:43:49.000
themselves in various countries around the world and the kinds
718
00:43:49.059 --> 00:43:52.190
of things that were done about Scientology where they were
719
00:43:52.230 --> 00:43:56.219
treated like a cult in Germany, in England, in Australia,
720
00:43:56.860 --> 00:44:00.179
other places. At one time in Australia, if you possess
721
00:44:00.219 --> 00:44:03.480
Scientology materials, it could lead to your arrest or your
722
00:44:03.559 --> 00:44:06.260
children being taken away from you or your children not
723
00:44:06.300 --> 00:44:10.500
being allowed to attend public schools. In England, they restricted
724
00:44:10.539 --> 00:44:13.320
people's ability who were members of the church to fly
725
00:44:13.360 --> 00:44:16.480
in and out of the country. then there have been
726
00:44:16.500 --> 00:44:21.489
a lot of repression of the church and the church's ideas.
727
00:44:23.610 --> 00:44:28.010
So, you know, the- I'm sorry, go ahead.
728
00:44:29.429 --> 00:44:32.690
I was just going to say that, you know, the
729
00:44:32.889 --> 00:44:36.769
attitude that's been long expressed toward the church, I think,
730
00:44:36.789 --> 00:44:41.170
is part of the reluctance of Miscavige to come out
731
00:44:41.230 --> 00:44:43.960
and do those kinds of interviews. In the interview he
732
00:44:44.000 --> 00:44:45.880
did with Ted Koppel, actually, I thought he did a
733
00:44:45.920 --> 00:44:46.659
fairly good job.
734
00:44:47.539 --> 00:44:49.760
Actually, I will say this. I think he acquitted himself very,
735
00:44:49.800 --> 00:44:55.780
very well. Probably spent lots of time preparing for it. But,
736
00:44:57.079 --> 00:45:03.119
you know, I think it's an important factor, let's say,
737
00:45:03.659 --> 00:45:08.619
an important consideration in this whole treatment of Scientology that
738
00:45:08.679 --> 00:45:11.619
they supposedly infiltrated the government at many levels, right?
739
00:45:12.239 --> 00:45:15.039
They did. They did infiltrate the government.
740
00:45:16.019 --> 00:45:17.599
And the CIA as well, right?
741
00:45:18.219 --> 00:45:20.320
But when you go back into the story of what
742
00:45:20.409 --> 00:45:23.829
actually happened there, which probably most people don't know, is
743
00:45:24.449 --> 00:45:27.090
that there was something called the Guardian's Office, which in
744
00:45:27.130 --> 00:45:29.230
the
wake of all of the attacks on the church
745
00:45:29.369 --> 00:45:36.789
was developed by L. Ron Hubbard's wife to protect the church.
746
00:45:37.409 --> 00:45:40.849
But it became something of a franchise for her. And
747
00:45:40.909 --> 00:45:45.949
she was the person essentially behind putting employees into the IRS,
748
00:45:46.460 --> 00:45:51.840
the FBI, other agencies where they could gather documents to
749
00:45:51.900 --> 00:45:56.039
show that the government was improperly attacking the church. And
750
00:45:56.639 --> 00:45:58.969
of course, they had the big IRS case going on forever.
751
00:45:59.670 --> 00:46:04.809
And so they did infiltrate. They were discovered. They were prosecuted.
752
00:46:05.510 --> 00:46:08.550
And people actually went to jail over that. But the
753
00:46:08.590 --> 00:46:13.489
guardian's office then later was disbanded, and it was disbanded
754
00:46:13.550 --> 00:46:18.409
by Miscavige because of those excesses and that abuse. And
755
00:46:18.469 --> 00:46:21.230
he is the one that launched the negotiations with the
756
00:46:21.349 --> 00:46:25.550
IRS that lasted for a couple of years and resulted
757
00:46:25.860 --> 00:46:29.179
in trainloads of documents from the Church of Scientology being
758
00:46:29.239 --> 00:46:31.980
turned over to the IRS, something that you won't really
759
00:46:32.059 --> 00:46:36.199
read about in Lawrence Wright's book about Scientology because he
760
00:46:36.219 --> 00:46:38.900
took an opposite point of view, that the Church was
761
00:46:39.489 --> 00:46:42.610
so vigorously threatening to sue the IRS that they couldn't
762
00:46:42.670 --> 00:46:45.789
keep up with all the lawsuits, which is an argument
763
00:46:45.829 --> 00:46:48.969
that may sound good to the people not well-informed about
764
00:46:48.989 --> 00:46:52.210
how these kind of court cases work, but that wasn't
765
00:46:52.269 --> 00:46:55.769
what happened. They turned over documents that included, they showed
766
00:46:55.829 --> 00:47:00.159
me a piece of paper with some loose coins taped
767
00:47:00.619 --> 00:47:03.519
to the piece of paper to account for a few
768
00:47:03.559 --> 00:47:04.500
cents of missing money.
769
00:47:05.030 --> 00:47:10.940
David Miscavige. I understand you met him several times. That's amazing.
770
00:47:11.440 --> 00:47:15.280
I had numerous conversations with him. I had meetings with
771
00:47:15.320 --> 00:47:20.119
him to discuss matters about the church with other individuals,
772
00:47:21.579 --> 00:47:24.769
conversations about their magazine and what it was supposed to
773
00:47:24.809 --> 00:47:27.230
be and what it was supposed to do. I was
774
00:47:27.550 --> 00:47:29.449
with him in the back room of.
775
00:47:32.000 --> 00:47:35.500
Church in Detroit when he was getting ready for his presentations.
776
00:47:35.820 --> 00:47:40.510
I was there with him in Australia when they were
777
00:47:40.570 --> 00:47:44.909
opening their new church. We
had a lot of conversations.
778
00:47:44.949 --> 00:47:50.750
They weren't necessarily all one-on-one, but we talked about issues
779
00:47:51.639 --> 00:47:54.199
and things that were raised and the negativity toward the
780
00:47:54.239 --> 00:47:58.000
church and how that was perceived inside and what their
781
00:47:58.019 --> 00:48:02.250
argument was that contrasted that. And not just David Miscavige,
782
00:48:02.269 --> 00:48:06.590
but the attorneys for the church and the upper-level people
783
00:48:06.630 --> 00:48:12.409
that were there that were engaged in the day-to-day. And
784
00:48:12.530 --> 00:48:17.190
also the people that drove celebrities back and forth. I
785
00:48:17.210 --> 00:48:18.090
got to know them well.
786
00:48:18.989 --> 00:48:24.500
So these were like in-person meetings or on the phone
787
00:48:24.519 --> 00:48:24.800
or what?
788
00:48:25.639 --> 00:48:27.639
No, most always in person.
789
00:48:29.000 --> 00:48:29.820
What is he like?
790
00:48:32.210 --> 00:48:36.269
He's a very personable individual. You know, I was in England,
791
00:48:36.309 --> 00:48:41.230
and I was allowed into a private meeting with some
792
00:48:42.030 --> 00:48:47.809
local individuals in East Grinstead. And that local community has
793
00:48:47.849 --> 00:48:51.349
been supported by the Church of Scientology since Hubbard founded
794
00:48:51.389 --> 00:48:55.289
his organization there and was part of that community in
795
00:48:55.329 --> 00:48:57.960
East Grinstead. And he had a conversation. He went to
796
00:48:58.059 --> 00:49:00.300
school there. He had a conversation with his former coach,
797
00:49:00.320 --> 00:49:05.489
who had become mayor of East Grinstead. And, you know,
798
00:49:05.739 --> 00:49:11.250
he is personable. He's warm. He draws people to him.
799
00:49:12.010 --> 00:49:15.050
And at the same time, when it comes to the church,
800
00:49:15.090 --> 00:49:23.199
he can be very open. And I can see how
801
00:49:23.280 --> 00:49:28.260
in some cases people might suggest that he could have
802
00:49:28.360 --> 00:49:33.159
an aggressive response. But I don't see that. I never
803
00:49:33.199 --> 00:49:36.659
saw it. In my conversations with him, I did see
804
00:49:36.679 --> 00:49:39.869
him on a couple of occasions, talk to people directly
805
00:49:39.929 --> 00:49:42.809
about what they had done and should have done instead.
806
00:49:44.269 --> 00:49:49.030
But nothing I hadn't ever seen in a newsroom. And
807
00:49:49.070 --> 00:49:50.940
certainly more mild, perhaps.
808
00:49:52.820 --> 00:49:53.079
Sure.
809
00:49:53.139 --> 00:49:55.659
So when was the last time you were in touch
810
00:49:55.679 --> 00:49:58.019
with him? Is this something that goes back on a
811
00:49:58.079 --> 00:50:02.389
couple of years, months? Yeah, it goes back to decades ago.
812
00:50:03.260 --> 00:50:07.639
It was, I think, when I finished up the book
813
00:50:07.739 --> 00:50:14.250
in 2021, 2022 was the last time I actually was
814
00:50:14.309 --> 00:50:18.909
there with people from the organization in LA.
815
00:50:19.949 --> 00:50:22.170
So Tom Cruise, that was somebody, of course, he's an
816
00:50:22.369 --> 00:50:25.860
important person in the church. Did you ever have the
817
00:50:25.880 --> 00:50:27.679
opportunity to meet with him, deal with him?
818
00:50:28.449 --> 00:50:30.889
I never did. I was in the same room with
819
00:50:30.949 --> 00:50:34.929
him once. I never actually got to talk to him. But,
820
00:50:35.409 --> 00:50:39.489
you know, I think there's a widely distorted picture of
821
00:50:40.510 --> 00:50:44.050
his place within the church. He's a member. He supports it.
822
00:50:44.489 --> 00:50:47.610
He believes in the ideas. He's a friend of Miscavige.
823
00:50:48.929 --> 00:50:54.139
But celebrities are not part of the governing body of
824
00:50:54.159 --> 00:50:59.940
the church. They don't participate in that way. And they support,
825
00:51:00.380 --> 00:51:08.090
they encourage others, they endorse those parts of the philosophy
826
00:51:08.150 --> 00:51:11.429
that they like, but they don't make decisions on the
827
00:51:11.469 --> 00:51:14.909
day-to-day operations of the church.
828
00:51:15.940 --> 00:51:22.599
Some people will say Scientology is growing, stagnating, treading water.
829
00:51:22.639 --> 00:51:25.550
What are your thoughts about that? how big it is
830
00:51:25.909 --> 00:51:28.070
as an institution regarding members.
831
00:51:29.050 --> 00:51:31.150
I know that the church has put a lot of
832
00:51:31.230 --> 00:51:34.489
effort into growth around the world, and critics say, well,
833
00:51:34.530 --> 00:51:38.889
they're opening churches, but there's nobody in them. There were
834
00:51:38.909 --> 00:51:40.269
quite a few people in them when I went to
835
00:51:40.309 --> 00:51:45.429
visit them. So I don't know about the accuracy of that.
836
00:51:45.659 --> 00:51:49.940
I'm not in touch with various congregants, but I do
837
00:51:50.679 --> 00:51:56.340
know that Um, when they've opened churches, they've done so
838
00:51:56.440 --> 00:51:59.800
in places where it may be difficult for them and
839
00:51:59.820 --> 00:52:02.760
they realize that and they address it as they go.
840
00:52:03.460 --> 00:52:08.300
They use the systems that everyone else uses. Um, they
841
00:52:08.320 --> 00:52:13.980
lobby for their, their right to be. And they, um,
842
00:52:14.340 --> 00:52:20.789
and they're fairly sophisticated at it. Um, they use, they use, uh, uh,
843
00:52:21.570 --> 00:52:26.530
attorneys and, and others with, with solid credentials. And, um,
844
00:52:27.809 --> 00:52:30.590
and they're not, they're not blindly going along, uh, uh,
845
00:52:31.929 --> 00:52:36.380
making mistakes, uh, at least in my, my perception or
846
00:52:36.420 --> 00:52:38.460
what I learned from the church.
847
00:52:38.500 --> 00:52:44.280
So they, they, um, they've got still lots of people
848
00:52:44.300 -->
00:52:47.679
in government that, that, uh, let's say, are allies of
849
00:52:48.000 --> 00:52:51.719
Scientology still, or do you think that chapter has kind
850
00:52:51.739 --> 00:52:52.340
of waned?
851
00:52:53.159 --> 00:52:55.099
I think, well, I think it was an isolated thing.
852
00:52:55.159 --> 00:52:57.840
It was an effort by the church to fight back.
853
00:52:58.480 --> 00:53:00.639
They were going to find out what the government knew
854
00:53:00.679 --> 00:53:04.360
and why they were on the enemy's lists, and they
855
00:53:04.489 --> 00:53:08.090
considered it suppression. So they did what they did, violated
856
00:53:08.130 --> 00:53:12.679
the law, held accountable for it, and that led Those efforts,
857
00:53:12.719 --> 00:53:14.639
I think, were cleaned up. I don't think they do
858
00:53:14.679 --> 00:53:19.639
those sorts of things now. And I think when that happened,
859
00:53:19.699 --> 00:53:22.139
I think it was isolated to some individuals for whatever
860
00:53:22.179 --> 00:53:26.739
their enthusiasm was for protecting the church. They overstepped their bounds.
861
00:53:28.300 --> 00:53:28.760
Yeah, right.
862
00:53:29.800 --> 00:53:30.010
Right.
863
00:53:30.050 --> 00:53:33.269
So then Shelly Miscavige, did she get together with you
864
00:53:33.349 --> 00:53:39.519
and David over shrimp and champagne or that never happened? Who?
865
00:53:40.699 --> 00:53:47.289
Shelley Miscavige. I never met her. I was doing this tongue-in-cheek.
866
00:53:47.329 --> 00:53:47.730
That part.
867
00:53:48.170 --> 00:53:50.389
Yeah, well, you're a guy who writes limericks.
868
00:53:51.170 --> 00:53:55.110
Yeah, exactly. Going back to your book, A Maturing Journalist,
869
00:53:58.010 --> 00:54:02.190
how did American journalism really get corrupted? Is it really
870
00:54:02.210 --> 00:54:06.309
fair to say that when getting a story means getting
871
00:54:06.349 --> 00:54:09.179
a source... And the source is going to want something
872
00:54:09.280 --> 00:54:11.920
back And the source is also going to be there
873
00:54:12.000 --> 00:54:18.070
Coaching the development of the story Feeding the storylines You know,
874
00:54:18.469 --> 00:54:21.730
it's just It's going to happen It's hard to police
875
00:54:21.750 --> 00:54:24.769
your sources You have to be somewhat skeptical But then again,
876
00:54:24.809 --> 00:54:26.469
you know You get somebody at a high level in
877
00:54:26.489 --> 00:54:31.369
the CIA They're going to tell you stuff And they're
878
00:54:31.389 --> 00:54:33.889
going to tell the whole story And you don't have
879
00:54:33.949 --> 00:54:35.929
access to the whole story Because you don't have access
880
00:54:35.949 --> 00:54:39.380
to all the facts Right? I mean, is it, how
881
00:54:39.400 --> 00:54:44.340
fair is that, you know? Are you picking on the CIA, Dan?
882
00:54:44.719 --> 00:54:45.059
Am I?
883
00:54:45.539 --> 00:54:48.300
I would think, I would think that because most of
884
00:54:48.340 -->
00:54:51.639
what I'm dealing with is history, you know, and that's
885
00:54:52.380 --> 00:54:54.800
what has been fascinating to me about this book and
886
00:54:54.820 --> 00:54:58.389
this process is there were not a lot of sources
887
00:54:59.030 --> 00:55:01.389
coming to me saying this is the way it was.
888
00:55:01.949 --> 00:55:07.079
This was archival research. A lot of what went into
889
00:55:07.119 --> 00:55:10.440
this was archival research. I went back to Amherst and
890
00:55:10.519 --> 00:55:15.679
pulled out the personal papers of John McCloy, who was
891
00:55:15.780 --> 00:55:19.360
so influential on American history but doesn't get a lot
892
00:55:19.400 --> 00:55:23.519
of notice these days. He was head of the Rockefeller Foundation.
893
00:55:23.559 --> 00:55:25.389
He was head of the Ford Foundation. He was head
894
00:55:25.429 --> 00:55:28.780
of the Council on Foreign Relations. He was the governor
895
00:55:28.820 --> 00:55:31.599
for the occupation of Germany in World War II. He
896
00:55:31.639 --> 00:55:34.409
was a guy who helped craft the intelligence network that
897
00:55:34.489 --> 00:55:37.750
existed after World War II. And part of that intelligence
898
00:55:37.809 --> 00:55:43.670
network was making sure that what Americans heard about American
899
00:55:43.769 --> 00:55:47.190
ideals and democracy and those sorts of things lined up
900
00:55:47.269 --> 00:55:49.960
with the anti-communist stance that the government took.
901
00:55:50.900 --> 00:55:51.260
And so.
902
00:55:52.130 --> 00:55:56.650
So journalists who were willing to help with that process,
903
00:55:57.070 --> 00:56:00.559
who were willing to help weed out certain stories from
904
00:56:00.619 --> 00:56:04.219
the American public, stories that really we should have heard
905
00:56:04.260 --> 00:56:08.199
about or should have known about, or stories we only
906
00:56:08.239 --> 00:56:12.780
got bits and pieces of through the daily reporting, those
907
00:56:12.840 --> 00:56:15.320
things didn't tell us the whole story about what was
908
00:56:15.360 --> 00:56:20.239
going on. The CIA was prohibited from doing intelligence operations domestically.
909
00:56:21.010 --> 00:56:22.670
They have ignored that rule.
910
00:56:23.369 --> 00:56:23.869
They have.
911
00:56:23.889 --> 00:56:26.070
Don't they use proxies?
912
00:56:26.329 --> 00:56:32.159
They use foreign proxies like MI5 and... Well, they use
913
00:56:32.219 --> 00:56:36.360
other proxies, but they use individuals who have allegiances or
914
00:56:36.420 --> 00:56:40.320
had allegiances at one time to the OSS, the beginning
915
00:56:40.360 --> 00:56:41.900
of the intelligence service.
916
00:56:43.280 --> 00:56:46.019
During World War II. They had the help of people
917
00:56:46.059 --> 00:56:49.639
who were ex-military. There was a situation in Indianapolis when
918
00:56:49.699 --> 00:56:52.739
I was investigating the company that I mentioned, Superior Training,
919
00:56:53.119 -->
00:56:56.030
Director of Training School. There was a guy that worked
920
00:56:56.110 --> 00:56:58.949
for an accounting firm. He didn't know how to run
921
00:56:58.969 --> 00:57:01.110
a calculator. He didn't know how to run a typewriter.
922
00:57:01.170 --> 00:57:04.949
He didn't do any of that stuff. But he was
923
00:57:04.989 --> 00:57:07.969
undercover for the FBI, and he was closely associated with
924
00:57:07.989 --> 00:57:11.639
the CIA. He got in touch with me. fed me
925
00:57:11.739 --> 00:57:15.079
some records that helped me in my pursuit, although I
926
00:57:15.139 --> 00:57:19.519
didn't know then why he was doing that. But the
927
00:57:19.559 --> 00:57:23.280
records were legitimate, and they helped the story. But as
928
00:57:23.360 --> 00:57:26.239
I began to research further, I began to understand that
929
00:57:26.639 --> 00:57:31.059
there were elements in Indianapolis that reached into the intrigue
930
00:57:31.099 --> 00:57:35.500
behind Iran-Contra. And some of those things involved political people
931
00:57:35.579 --> 00:57:41.900
and political situations. So the the use of the Central
932
00:57:41.940 --> 00:57:49.269
Intelligence Agency to literally step into the stirrups of the
933
00:57:49.449 --> 00:57:54.909
Drug Enforcement Administration and to run or to oversee drug
934
00:57:54.949 --> 00:57:59.969
enforcement activities in this country occurred because they wanted to
935
00:58:00.130 --> 00:58:04.250
develop intelligence sources within these drug networks for use in
936
00:58:04.289 --> 00:58:09.880
other circumstances. They did that with the Chagras in Texas. Sorry,
937
00:58:10.559 --> 00:58:14.329
I fell with whom? The Chagras. Lee Chagra and his
938
00:58:14.389 --> 00:58:18.849
brother in Texas who were running major marijuana operations and
939
00:58:18.929 --> 00:58:23.289
were tagged as responsible for the killing of a federal
940
00:58:23.329 --> 00:58:29.019
judge in Texas. Neither were ever prosecuted for that. Woody
941
00:58:29.039 --> 00:58:34.559
Harrelson's father was the trigger man in that case. Oh, really?
942
00:58:35.789 --> 00:58:41.929
But these elements of central intelligence agency working within universities,
943
00:58:42.469 --> 00:58:47.190
working within the media, working within the private sector to
944
00:58:47.230 --> 00:58:55.829
help protect our capitalist democracy, I think has been sort
945
00:58:55.869 --> 00:58:59.199
of an untold story about our intelligence community and what
946
00:58:59.239 --> 00:58:59.610
it became.
947
00:59:00.769 --> 00:59:02.840
Right, so, I mean, okay. I mean, I can understand that.
948
00:59:02.920 --> 00:59:05.880
I mean, it's not necessarily, obviously, why it would be
949
00:59:05.900 --> 00:59:08.369
a bad thing. I mean, we're talking about a free
950
00:59:08.409 --> 00:59:10.860
society where people are free to give the middle finger
951
00:59:10.880 --> 00:59:13.559
to the United States, to its values, to its culture,
952
00:59:13.579 --> 00:59:17.440
to its history, to its institutions, to the establishment. And,
953
00:59:17.460 --> 00:59:22.090
you know, you look at, you know, during the Cold War,
954
00:59:22.110 --> 00:59:25.510
you know, the misery of living in the Soviet Union.
955
00:59:25.550 --> 00:59:28.050
I mean, since it's amply documented, it wasn't really an
956
00:59:28.530 --> 00:59:31.780
enjoyable existence for people. Somebody would be on a bread
957
00:59:31.820 --> 00:59:33.940
line for three hours and finding at the end that
958
00:59:34.139 --> 00:59:36.380
there's no bread left. How about some bread?
959
00:59:36.400 --> 00:59:36.559
Right.
960
00:59:36.599 --> 00:59:40.250
So, I mean, it's, you know, I just think it's very,
961
00:59:40.269 --> 00:59:42.449
very important that the government has to put its best
962
00:59:42.469 --> 00:59:47.570
foot forward. And speaking on behalf of its values within
963
00:59:47.590 --> 00:59:51.269
the government, sometimes we wonder what those values are as
964
00:59:51.530 --> 00:59:54.929
they evolve. But getting back to poor old Lawrence Wright,
965
00:59:56.190 --> 00:59:59.469
if he had to give like a three-minute or two-minute
966
01:00:00.130 --> 01:00:03.510
you know, dressing down. Yeah, I'm Lawrence Wright. Just give
967
01:00:03.550 --> 01:00:06.130
it to me good, you know. What would you say
968
01:00:06.150 --> 01:00:09.969
to him in person that why he became the subject
969
01:00:10.110 --> 01:00:13.719
of the focus of your book, The Manchurian Journalist? What
970
01:00:13.760 --> 01:00:17.119
were the roots, the goods on Lawrence Wright that really
971
01:00:17.780 --> 01:00:21.500
the American public, you know, need to hear if they
972
01:00:21.519 --> 01:00:25.619
haven't read your book? I think it's a lack of transparency.
973
01:00:25.639 --> 01:00:25.719
Okay.
974
01:00:26.250 --> 01:00:28.489
And I think that's one thing journalists ought to offer
975
01:00:28.590 --> 01:00:34.889
to those they're writing for and about is transparency. I
976
01:00:34.909 --> 01:00:37.250
think it's important for us to know who our journalists are.
977
01:00:38.070 --> 01:00:41.380
And I think it's incumbent upon journalists not to hide
978
01:00:41.409 --> 01:00:45.460
their background or those favors they might have been granted
979
01:00:46.179 --> 01:00:49.460
or those people in their background who might have promoted
980
01:00:49.500 --> 01:00:54.860
their careers who have other agendas besides a good, free,
981
01:00:55.059 --> 01:01:03.219
independent press. in which journalists are expressing their skills by
982
01:01:03.280 --> 01:01:10.400
recording factually what's going on. The problem with the Central
983
01:01:10.440 --> 01:01:14.659
Intelligence Agency doing domestic work in the United States is
984
01:01:14.719 --> 01:01:21.199
they influence political processes and they influence public perceptions about
985
01:01:22.579 --> 01:01:23.159
the world.
986
01:01:22.980 -->
01:01:23.460
We live in.
987
01:01:24.059 --> 01:01:28.179
And so influencing those public perceptions domestically seems to me
988
01:01:28.599 --> 01:01:30.360
to be an anti-democratic value.
989
01:01:31.239 --> 01:01:34.460
Oh, yeah. I think you remember all the 50 some
990
01:01:34.780 --> 01:01:41.429
odd intelligence experts who think that Joe Biden's son's Hunter
991
01:01:41.449 --> 01:01:45.889
Biden's laptop has earmarks of Russian disinformation. John Brennan, thank
992
01:01:45.909 --> 01:01:50.309
you very much. Very concerned, but that's a good example, right?
993
01:01:51.400 --> 01:01:56.530
That's one good example. There's many other good examples out there. Lately,
994
01:01:56.550 --> 01:02:01.289
I've been focusing more on the aspect of corruption. And
995
01:02:01.309 --> 01:02:05.090
we see this blatant level of corruption going on in
996
01:02:05.130 --> 01:02:08.710
front of us. And we don't think about the roots
997
01:02:09.250 --> 01:02:12.820
of all that. And I think we don't think about
998
01:02:13.820 --> 01:02:18.139
how long and how institutionalized corruption has become in this country.
999
01:02:18.750 --> 01:02:22.699
and the favoritism that exists that results in problems for
1000
01:02:23.030 --> 01:02:23.960
common people.
1001
01:02:24.900 --> 01:02:26.880
Oh, yeah, sure. I mean, it's, yeah. I mean, I'll
1002
01:02:26.900 --> 01:02:32.139
just say that, you know, there's, I think there's a
1003
01:02:32.980 --> 01:02:36.690
money network that is so powerful. Maybe Trump is dismantling it.
1004
01:02:36.719 --> 01:02:41.320
He's a man with many, many faults. But USAID, I mean, remember,
1005
01:02:41.389 --> 01:02:45.889
I spoke to William Colby before he died. Funny but true.
1006
01:02:45.909 --> 01:02:48.389
I actually reached out to him. He was, talk about transparency.
1007
01:02:48.610 --> 01:02:50.530
His number, his name and number was in the phone book.
1008
01:02:50.550 --> 01:02:52.090
And I found it. I was in Columbia at the time.
1009
01:02:52.769 --> 01:02:54.510
And I called him. I spoke to him for a
1010
01:02:54.530 --> 01:02:56.250
couple of minutes. And I wanted to be his agent
1011
01:02:56.590 --> 01:02:59.809
to do a, to give a paid seminar in Columbia.
1012
01:02:59.949 --> 01:03:03.840
Long story short, turns out his wife worked for USAID.
1013
01:03:04.500 --> 01:03:07.000
Tell you something. And it was interesting. And, but then
1014
01:03:07.699 --> 01:03:11.460
it comes out that, hey, maybe USAID would receive over
1015
01:03:11.500 --> 01:03:14.300
time billions of dollars, if not hundreds and hundreds of millions.
1016
01:03:16.110 --> 01:03:19.340
they will influence people in the public sphere, you know? And,
1017
01:03:20.159 --> 01:03:25.539
you know, NPR, National Public Radio, and let's face it,
1018
01:03:25.940 --> 01:03:31.269
I'm a conservative. And they know it. And I think
1019
01:03:31.309 --> 01:03:32.809
it's safe to say they won't give me the time
1020
01:03:32.849 --> 01:03:37.369
of day in many, many places simply because, oh, he
1021
01:03:37.389 --> 01:03:39.670
voted for Trump. Oh, he's bad. Oh, you can't let
1022
01:03:39.710 --> 01:03:41.400
him in there. But, I mean, the journalists have an
1023
01:03:41.409 --> 01:03:44.440
important job to do. You may not always like what
1024
01:03:44.480 --> 01:03:47.409
they report, but It's really, really important to have somebody
1025
01:03:47.429 --> 01:03:52.150
like Seymour Hersh digging deep in Fort Benning, Georgia and
1026
01:03:52.190 --> 01:03:55.409
finding out all the dirty details about my line. Yeah.
1027
01:03:55.809 --> 01:04:00.429
That's a bottom, you know? But, I mean, it's important
1028
01:04:00.449 --> 01:04:03.079
to recognize something that there has been, and people say, well,
1029
01:04:03.099 --> 01:04:06.440
why did Trump talk? It's horrible. Oh, he's toxic. It's
1030
01:04:06.480 --> 01:04:09.480
the worst thing. He's an attack on democracy. He's like
1031
01:04:09.539 --> 01:04:12.960
battery acid poured over the Mona Lisa. Okay. Do you
1032
01:04:12.980 --> 01:04:19.570
know why? the Trump presidency surged, Trump as a candidate
1033
01:04:20.030 --> 01:04:23.250
and his platform surged, is because we felt so screwed
1034
01:04:23.869 --> 01:04:29.340
and so patronized by the ruling elites that we felt
1035
01:04:29.380 --> 01:04:31.619
like we just didn't have a place at the table anymore.
1036
01:04:32.559 --> 01:04:34.860
And so that's why it happened, you know, and people
1037
01:04:34.900 --> 01:04:36.659
in the Ivy League and all that. And, you know,
1038
01:04:36.679 --> 01:04:41.809
we just felt like we saw all the patronizing, condescending
1039
01:04:41.829 --> 01:04:47.110
people leaders in institutions that we just felt like we
1040
01:04:47.139 --> 01:04:49.659
were all, we're pissed upon, you know?
1041
01:04:50.719 --> 01:04:54.590
And I see that and I recognize that as true.
1042
01:04:55.030 --> 01:04:59.530
How dysfunctional does government have to become before there is
1043
01:04:59.590 --> 01:05:06.849
an eruption by the people that result in change? And
1044
01:05:06.889 --> 01:05:09.449
I think a lot of people who endorsed Trump were
1045
01:05:09.510 --> 01:05:12.150
looking for change and looking for an end to chaos
1046
01:05:12.889 --> 01:05:16.050
within the government, from both sides, from the Democrats, from
1047
01:05:16.090 --> 01:05:21.900
the Republicans. And the solution, I don't think, really fit
1048
01:05:21.940 --> 01:05:28.300
the problem because if you want government to work efficiently
1049
01:05:28.360 --> 01:05:32.670
and orderly and in the best interest of everybody in
1050
01:05:32.710 --> 01:05:37.170
this country, then you don't endorse the kind of blatant
1051
01:05:37.190 --> 01:05:41.119
corruption that's going on in the midst of this presidency.
1052
01:05:41.590 --> 01:05:44.989
I mean, the thing is, I will admit this, this
1053
01:05:45.030 --> 01:05:49.230
surprised my brother from Delaware, who, what I think, and
1054
01:05:49.250 --> 01:05:52.809
Joe Biden and all that. Although it's funny because her
1055
01:05:52.889 --> 01:05:55.320
wife's family from Delaware, they did not like Joe Biden.
1056
01:05:55.739 --> 01:06:01.820
But one time I told my brother a story about
1057
01:06:02.420 --> 01:06:04.519
Donald Trump's pilot who got fired because he said, hey,
1058
01:06:04.539 --> 01:06:06.440
this plane's got problems. And the guy who told it
1059
01:06:06.460 --> 01:06:10.090
to me was like a former pilot A high-level executive
1060
01:06:10.210 --> 01:06:14.150
or person working for the John Birch Society told me
1061
01:06:14.489 --> 01:06:16.090
that he went to Mass one day and he met
1062
01:06:16.190 --> 01:06:17.150
Clem's pilot and.
1063
01:06:18.929 --> 01:06:19.789
Got to be friendly.
1064
01:06:19.909 --> 01:06:22.769
And one time he saw him again after church. He said, well,
1065
01:06:22.789 --> 01:06:27.699
you know, how's Trump doing? Oh, man, he fired me. What? What? Yeah,
1066
01:06:27.739 --> 01:06:31.699
I told him the campaign plane had some really big problems.
1067
01:06:31.760 --> 01:06:34.219
And I don't know politics, Mr. Trump, but I do
1068
01:06:34.239 --> 01:06:36.659
know planes. And this plane, you got to do an overhaul, man.
1069
01:06:37.059 --> 01:06:39.820
Or it could be I'm safe. And he fired him. Now,
1070
01:06:40.639 --> 01:06:43.500
I bring this to light because of the fact that
1071
01:06:44.239 --> 01:06:49.949
it's really bad to not welcome bad news. And if
1072
01:06:49.989 --> 01:06:53.849
you don't welcome bad news, you create a culture whereby
1073
01:06:53.949 --> 01:06:56.110
people will not give you the true news. They'll give
1074
01:06:56.150 --> 01:06:58.610
you polished news. They won't tell you the truth. And
1075
01:06:58.630 --> 01:07:02.969
the worst thing for a commander, a general, a colonel,
1076
01:07:03.849 --> 01:07:05.710
is a yes man who doesn't tell you the truth
1077
01:07:05.750 --> 01:07:08.570
about what's really going down with the troops. And then
1078
01:07:08.590 --> 01:07:10.289
people get killed. People get hurt. So it's important to
1079
01:07:10.309 --> 01:07:12.780
be able to go to somebody and say, hey, this
1080
01:07:12.800 --> 01:07:15.739
is pretty bad. Let me tell you why. And open
1081
01:07:15.800 --> 01:07:19.599
up the microphone to people who give a counter-narrative. It's messy,
1082
01:07:20.059 --> 01:07:22.019
but we need to have that, man. We really need
1083
01:07:22.039 --> 01:07:26.260
to have that. And sadly... It's not just, you know,
1084
01:07:26.460 --> 01:07:28.679
the counter-narrative of what's really going down with Donald Trump.
1085
01:07:29.460 --> 01:07:31.610
It's been decades of the counter-narrative of what's really going
1086
01:07:31.639 --> 01:07:36.449
down with all the 15 presidents in our memory and
1087
01:07:36.469 --> 01:07:39.250
their administrations and what's been going on and the stupidity
1088
01:07:39.769 --> 01:07:44.150
that's been ignored or hushed or suppressed, you know, for
1089
01:07:44.170 --> 01:07:45.809
so many years because of the fact that you're rocking
1090
01:07:45.829 --> 01:07:47.690
the boat, man. Don't do that, you know. You'll lose
1091
01:07:47.710 --> 01:07:50.489
your job. But, I mean, it's an important thing. I'm
1092
01:07:50.670 --> 01:07:56.070
glad you wrote this book. And But also You have
1093
01:07:56.090 --> 01:07:59.070
to recognize I think your profession Is a damn difficult
1094
01:07:59.110 --> 01:08:01.650
profession Because You gotta get Dude you gotta get some
1095
01:08:01.710 --> 01:08:03.510
stories And they gotta be big And you know And
1096
01:08:04.309 --> 01:08:06.570
by the nature of it You know you've got Your
1097
01:08:06.610 --> 01:08:08.670
boss at home Who says You're sleeping on the couch
1098
01:08:08.690 --> 01:08:14.190
man You're not making enough money As a reporter Get
1099
01:08:14.210 --> 01:08:17.050
some Break some big stories And get a promotion And
1100
01:08:17.069 --> 01:08:19.380
maybe you know Triple your salary At some point You
1101
01:08:19.399 --> 01:08:21.989
know anyway By the way folks We've been on But
1102
01:08:22.020 --> 01:08:27.939
the very fascinating guy is Dan Lussater. The Manchurian journalist,
1103
01:08:27.979 --> 01:08:30.180
Lawrence Wright, the CIA and the corruption of American journalism.
1104
01:08:30.619 --> 01:08:35.710
His website is www.danlussater.com. It's been great having you on
1105
01:08:35.729 --> 01:08:38.390
Quorum Radio. Dan, any other books besides this? Forgive me
1106
01:08:38.409 --> 01:08:40.989
if I'm remiss and I can't call all your titles.
1107
01:08:41.529 --> 01:08:44.810
Well, I wrote a collection of columns, but I am
1108
01:08:44.850 --> 01:08:46.109
working on a book right now on.
1109
01:08:48.229 --> 01:08:52.220
This case of corruption, police corruption, political corruption in Indiana
1110
01:08:52.340 --> 01:08:56.060
in 1978 around a series of murders and bombings in
1111
01:08:56.079 --> 01:09:02.920
the Speedway, Indiana, outside the United States. we're working on
1112
01:09:03.340 --> 01:09:09.340
a book and podcast and documentary film on this project.
1113
01:09:09.420 --> 01:09:13.380
And it's very interesting in how the parallels of corruption
1114
01:09:14.300 --> 01:09:18.550
in 1978 teach us lessons about today and what.
1115
01:09:19.930 --> 01:09:20.189
down.
1116
01:09:20.859 --> 01:09:24.909
Great being on with Dan LaSauder, author of the Manchurian Journalist,
1117
01:09:24.949 --> 01:09:27.729
Lawrence Wright, the CIA and the Corruption of American Journalism. Folks,
1118
01:09:28.270 --> 01:09:30.729
we got some incredible guests on Quorum Radio. Dan has
1119
01:09:30.750 --> 01:09:32.229
been one of them. Thanks a million for being on
1120
01:09:32.250 --> 01:09:33.430
the show, Dan. I hope we can do it again.
1121
01:09:33.449 --> 01:09:34.430
My pleasure.
1122
01:09:35.060 --> 01:09:39.800
You're listening to Quorum Radio. Hey folks, have you seen SpiritDaily.com
1123
01:09:39.890 --> 01:09:44.510
and its amazing and mysterious news stories? SpiritDaily.com has testimonies
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01:09:44.550 --> 01:09:47.869
about miracles, articles about strange occurrences both from the present
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and from the past, and the Christian angle to current events, news, science, spiritual,
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and even physical health. Also... Read spiritdaily.com as the accounts
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expelling demons from time to time. But more importantly, you'll
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01:10:10.890 --> 01:10:14.810
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01:10:14.949 --> 01:10:18.569
And for exclusive content, subscribe to Spirit Daily Reports. Help
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01:10:18.630 --> 01:10:22.199
Quorum Radio. Go to spiritdaily.com. That's spiritdaily.com.
1135
01:10:26.819 --> 01:10:34.939
They say there's always magic in the air But when
1136
01:10:35.189 --> 01:10:41.470
you're walking down the street And you.
1137
01:10:41.170 --> 01:10:49.069
Ain't had enough to eat The glitter arrives And you're
1138
01:10:49.109 --> 01:10:55.010
nowhere They say the.
1139
01:10:59.489 --> 01:11:01.390
Thank you.
1140
01:11:01.970 --> 01:11:03.529
Thank you.
1141
01:11:21.189 --> 01:11:26.640
And one day I won't even shine your shoes on
1142
01:11:26.939 --> 01:11:35.520
Broadway They say that I won't last long on Broadway.
1143
01:11:36.180 --> 01:11:39.520
On Broadway I'll catch you.
1144
01:11:39.100 --> 01:11:43.949
With my bus home, they all say.
1145
01:11:54.710 --> 01:12:00.420
And I won't be till I'm a star on Broadway.
1146
01:12:00.840 --> 01:12:01.819
On Broadway.
1147
01:12:24.090 --> 01:12:28.859
I know they are Cause I can play this here
1148
01:12:29.060 --> 01:12:37.329
guitar And I won't be till I'm a star On Broadway.
1149
01:12:52.279 --> 01:12:55.710
I'll make you laugh.
1150
01:12:55.850 --> 01:13:01.189
Everybody, everybody's gonna know me.
1151
01:13:02.140 --> 01:13:04.060
Oh, I've been down the wrong way.
1152
01:13:04.380 --> 01:13:04.439
Oh.