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May 14, 2009 - No Agenda
01:24:53
97: Brain Damage
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Adam Curry, John C. Dvorak.
Tracking the sliver of overlap between information and real news, this is your bi-weekly Gitmo Nation publication.
This is No Agenda.
Coming to you from the Crackpot Command Center in the southwest quadrant of Gitmo Nation East, known as the United Kingdom, I'm Adam Curry.
And from Gitmo Nation West, actually northern Silicon Valley, the place that doesn't exist, but it's nice and sunny and hot for some unknown reason.
I'm John C. Dvorak.
In the morning.
Yeah, baby!
Hit me one more time!
In the morning.
Yeah.
I feel good.
It's okay.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I got everything set up.
You know, I had some time to prep, because I'm not doing an EVO today every single day anymore, so I got some time.
Finally.
Look out!
Daily source code return is next.
There will be people that want that.
Yeah, there are people that want that.
There are people who are very angry at me.
Well, then why don't you crank out a couple of shows just to promote us?
Well, the daily source code is different.
That's kind of like my mistress on the side, John.
I have to treat her with a different type of respect.
So, a bunch of swine flu stuff came in this week.
Also, but at the top of the news, I think, is Obama, like I guess it was either yesterday or the day before yesterday, gave the commencement address at Arizona State, which anyone who knows colleges in the United States knows is a party school.
It's John McCain's backyard, of course.
Right, which I guess is adding insult to injury.
Oh, yeah.
Although, you know, the thing is, I'm always wondering about, you know, why is he doing this?
And because it's like, why would you go to some school like Arizona State?
No offense to you, Arizona.
I know a lot of people from Arizona State.
I've been there.
I saw you, too, at their lovely stadium.
It's a beautiful place, but, you know, it's still in the Pac-10, the conference in which it belongs.
It is the party school.
And...
So did you see this said commencement speech?
Yeah, I saw it.
Goddammit, I saw it!
It's the same speech he's given.
By the way, I got tipped off by somebody.
I'll have to dig them up.
I think I mentioned them in the...
I have a blog...
Entry, I think.
I don't have to think about how I dealt with it.
But whatever.
Maybe I just saved it for the show.
Anyway, the point is that he was the trifecta, you know.
Obama did his big three.
Education, what are they again?
Healthcare.
Healthcare and...
The big three.
They're so big, we can't even remember them.
I just got up.
Healthcare economy, perhaps?
I don't remember.
Something with money?
It's pathetic.
It takes me like two hours.
I'm like an old Model T. Until I warm up, I've got nothing going on.
The oil is still a little bit thick.
It was the same old, same old with him.
But what was weird was at the beginning of the thing, Obama's like, they're introducing all these special students who are either...
Came from weird backgrounds and they got their degree or their straight A. And then they had a bunch of doctoral people that come out and they had some really, some old woman announcing them.
And she was up on this podium and she's looking over her glasses and she looks so ominous.
She's going to beat someone up.
She looks just like, I don't know.
Was Todas there?
I didn't see him.
Do you know who I'm talking about?
It's something.
Teleprompter of the United States.
Oh, no, it was.
Yeah, that's what's funny.
When you first saw the stage, there's these two, you know, the two prompters, you know, the back and forths were there and they were real obvious because the lights were reflecting off of them funny.
But anyway, the thing that was weird about the whole thing, and people should try to catch this, and I'm sure it's going to be on YouTube, is that hopefully you can catch the whole thing, because at the beginning they're bringing out these people, and some black girl comes out, because she got straight A's, or she came from some...
I don't know what her background was, but it was weird.
She was kind of cute.
And Obama starts eyeballing her.
No, really?
Like really eyeballing her?
I'm telling you.
He's eyeballing her.
And so she comes and she stands there and then Obama's like staring at her from a distance.
Really?
And it's like real obvious on this thing.
It's almost uncomfortable to watch.
He's just like laying into her with just kind of a creepy stare.
And she looks over at him and she's like...
Dude, stop staring at me.
Seriously.
Maybe that's why she was on stage, John.
Maybe there's something going on there.
Well, whatever the case was, he was giving it to her.
And I just thought that it was slightly creepy.
I saw yesterday, I was watching CNBC, and I haven't really watched in a while.
And the president came out, and I guess they're very close, or he was giving a push to some health care legislation.
So they're in the, it looked like maybe the Rose Garden or whatever.
And there was Pelosi, Speaker of the House, was next to him, and a couple other jabronis.
But here's what was interesting.
So Obama does this whole thing.
It's a no questions press conference.
And he's like, you know, this is great.
And, you know, we're really going to do this.
We have to do this this year.
We have to do this this year.
He's repeating it over and over again.
He said, all right, thank you very much.
And then Pelosi says, excuse me, Mr.
President.
He's like, what?
It's like, yeah, I just want to say something.
And she gives him the biggest public blowjob I've ever seen in my life.
It's like, without your leadership, you have done more for healthcare since healthcare began in 1951.
What has he done?
Nothing!
But this is the whole point.
So first of all, doesn't the president get the final word?
Doesn't it completely undermine his power if you then step up to the microphone and say, excuse me, I just wanted to say one thing here?
It was wrong.
Yeah, it's like she's conferring him.
But it was, I felt like, whoa, man.
And you could see he was not pleased with that move.
And then so he did have the final word.
Okay, thank you very much.
That's it.
And then he turns around and he bolts.
He's got to deal with this woman somehow.
Whoa, does he ever.
That was, I'd just say, a huge faux pas.
But man, it was lip smacking.
Hmm.
World-class BJ from Pelosi.
Okay, the trilogy is Health, Education, and Energy.
Oh, right, of course.
Reduce our dependence upon foreign oil, which, of course, we can easily do just by using our own oil, of which more and more is found.
Well, natural gas.
We've got natural gas.
We've got this.
We also have a lot of reserves, and we have untapped reserves, and we have unknown reserves, and we have wind power.
Yes.
Anyway.
Anyway, so he usually does the health, education, energy, and then he throws in the fourth one, which is the economy.
Kind of a little ditty on the side there.
Hey, can I ask you a question, John?
Sure.
This actually started when I was in San Francisco.
I was having my shoes shined.
Oh, really?
Yes.
Someone's trying to call me.
I hate it when they do that.
Don't you know I'm doing a show?
Yeah, on Second and Market, there's a guy who's been there for 25 years.
I just love that old-fashioned...
You see him in New York still, but the experience, if you have the time and you have the shoes, to just sit down on a street corner with your feet up and a guy just totally loving your boots...
That sounded very wrong.
Is this the guy around the corner?
Second and market.
He's right on that corner.
Shushan Joe.
This guy, he's from New Orleans originally.
He's been in San Francisco for 50 years.
Real Creole-type black guy from New Orleans.
So he's a guy who observes a lot.
I like talking to people, but this kind of guy, I like it.
Yeah, this is like your butcher who told you that the top drug dealer in Afghanistan is Karzai.
Oh, I had some good talks with the...
That's not the butcher, it's the convenience store.
Ahmed.
Yeah, that's a different story.
So anyway, and we're just watching the girls stroll by, obviously.
And then he says, man, this is just out of control.
I said, what are you talking about?
He said, look at the size of these kids in these strollers.
And look what they've done to strollers to be able to actually carry these loads.
He said, these kids are five, six years old.
Whatever happened to hurry up?
Catch up, kid.
Come on, walk with me.
And I can't stop noticing it.
I see kids who are just too big.
They can walk.
They can totally walk.
They're in strollers and these mothers are just pushing them along and the strollers have gotten bigger and robust and they're all-terrain vehicles by now.
And no wonder, because these huge kids have to sit in them.
What is going on?
This should stop.
That's an interesting observation.
Well, it was his observation, but once he brought my attention to it, I'm like, crikey, you're so right.
Yeah, he's looking at stuff.
It's interesting because usually those trends sneak up on you and you wouldn't have noticed it, but he apparently did.
Yeah, and you could tell that he was disgusted by it.
He's like, whatever happened?
When I was a kid, it was like, don't straggle.
Hurry up.
Right.
Kids 12 years old, they're pushing them around.
I'm telling you.
I'm telling you.
This is not good.
Good work, America.
Well, it's not just America, because I'm seeing the exact same thing here in Gitmo Nation East.
The exact same thing.
It's a trend.
Yeah, it's a trend.
And maybe it's a worldwide trend.
That's even worse.
Could be.
Could be.
A bunch of lazy kids.
Well, that's what we're turning them into.
Yeah, that's not a very good start in life.
You know, whatever happened to, you know, go out and skin your knees and hurt yourself and come back and just try not to break anything because there's too many forms to fill out, kid.
I guess those days are over.
Oh boy, you've hurt me.
Okay, well, let's get to a couple of things here.
Let's start with this one.
I want to get to some items before I get to real news.
By the way, I want to congratulate you.
Our audience, we've gotten the critical mass, not so much with the money, but we have with the talent that we have accumulated so far as our producers.
I concur, yes.
And our moles.
We have artists that are working for us, and we have people out there that are doing stuff.
Yeah, important stuff.
Looking around.
Slipping us.
And they kind of confirm our theories.
Oh, yeah.
Here we go.
Hit me.
This is from Steve O., New York City.
Hey, John, I'm a pharmacist in a busy New York City pharmacy.
Every says every, but ever since this coming apocalypse pandemic was announced, we've been selling Tamiflu by the boatload.
We couldn't get enough of it.
We even had physicians and surgeons coming in and placing their orders for five and ten packs.
Wow.
I'm in agreement with you regarding to having a pack on hand when traveling, but I also think people should have antibiotics with them as well.
All too often, people come in from traveling abroad and need antibiotics and other meds and have to go to a city emergency room just to see a doctor, some vacation.
Just a couple of observations about the swine flu deal that I've noticed.
All the Tamiflu that we are getting is short dated.
Oh, really?
AKA expiring soon.
I feel that this is a stockpile of drugs that were unable to move them by the avian flu scare a few years back.
Well, we know this for a fact.
We know that they've had this stuff.
Roach needed an excuse to unload it before it was expired.
Also, the timing of this flu coincides with the allergy season in this part of the country, as well as other parts.
People come in with a runny nose, sore throat, and cough, and think they have the flu.
They go to the doctor and get a Tamiflu script and think they will be all better.
Even though I tell them that a hallmark of the flu is a fever, they either do not believe me or think I'm wrong.
I went to school for over seven years to do this, and all I do is this is day in and day out.
This is all I do day in and day out.
But the public would rather believe the liberal media whores.
Damn them liberal media whores.
We need a jingle.
We need a jingle for that.
Hello.
We do.
Actually, we need a jingle for liberal media whores.
Keep up the great no-agenda work.
Let me tie into that, because if you think that was eloquent, Well, except for my reading of it.
Yeah, that kind of blew.
Chris Scowler.
Title of this email, Coincidence.
Don't know if this is just a sick coincidence, but 2007 was the Chinese year of the chicken.
Bird flu pandemic devastates parts of Asia.
2008, Chinese year of the horse.
Equine influenza decimates Australian racing.
2009, Chinese year of the pig.
Swine flu pandemic kills hundreds of pigs around the globe.
And it gets worse.
Next year, 2010, Chinese year of the cock.
I'm very worried.
I'm so worried now.
Jeez.
Isn't that weird, though, with the chicken, horse, pig?
I guess you could shoehorn anything into anything, but caca, of course, is another form of chicken, so that would be another...
You don't say.
Yeah.
So anyway, well, I think that's what it is.
So...
Meanwhile, I got another guy who noted that in Mexico, a number of these 150 are more dead from this swine flu.
It turns out that a lot of them never even had the requisite fever.
Yeah, or the vomiting.
They were dying from something.
Yeah, they had pneumonia or whatever.
There's something up.
So that's the whole thing.
And by the way, I want to give you the credit for when we first started bringing the story, you without, before we had a shot at even analyzing it, you called it as a fraud instantly.
Yeah.
I came up with more of these, with the theory as to why.
Yeah.
But, by the way, and I want to mention the people who keep claiming that everything, you know, that's Curry and Dvorak or Curry and mainly you.
Everything is a conspiracy, you know, a conspiracy.
You know, if some one company decides to hire a PR agency to get rid of some inventory and they go through a process to do so, even though it may frighten the public, let's say, uh, It's not a conspiracy.
These things aren't necessarily conspiracies.
These sometimes are marketing ploys.
If I go out and do some crazy thing by myself for my company, it's not a conspiracy.
These are conspiracy theories.
The ones that may involve the government in bed with the industry to do this and that, and the Bilderbergers and all that other kind of BS, that would be maybe a conspiracy.
But for the most part, we're just talking about Generally speaking, especially in the case of the Tamiflu, a simple marketing strategy to get rid of inventory.
And I was reading somewhere, I know I didn't save the article, but worth mentioning that there's now an Indian company who is going to start flooding the market with a generic Tamiflu.
I would have thought they still had those rights, that they couldn't do that.
Well, that's a good question.
Now, if that's the case, that would be another good reason for Roach to get rid of it.
It makes even more sense, doesn't it?
Yeah, because it's going generic.
Horse while we can.
Well, that would mean Relenza's probably going to be out of phase two.
Let me take a look.
I don't know.
Oh, by the way, I remember I kept saying that I had Tamiflu, that the doctor gave it to me once for a urinary tract, and you were like, that doesn't make sense.
It hit me today.
It wasn't Tamiflu.
It was another drug at the time people wanted to have in their possession.
It was Cipro, and that was at the time of the anthrax scares.
Right.
So I was incorrect about that.
So, um...
You got it?
On Relenza?
Well, I'm looking at Tamiflu.
I think Relenza actually predates Tamiflu, but I'm not sure.
I'm looking at these articles, and nobody...
You know, this is one thing that, by the way, you don't find...
Now that I think about it, because I'm looking at a USA Today story on the patent, you don't find a lot of news items by the mainstream media that actually give you the date.
You know, it's like this...
The patent runs out on January 15th.
It might be of some value to the public because if you're paying like $10 a pill, which is not unusual for these things, these types of drugs that are patented, it might be a good thing to wait a day if you knew that the patent was running out this month.
Because now you see this with a bunch of ads they have on television, which they shouldn't even have.
Saying, you know, don't forget to ask for the original, you know, because this is when the patent starts to run out on these drugs.
They start advertising them as, you know, extra special.
Don't let the doctor give you generic.
Which, by the way, should be busted.
Yeah, that should be illegal.
The government agency should bust people.
It's either a drug that's based on a chemical that's very specific.
A generic drug should be exactly the same.
It should work exactly the same.
Or it's obviously not manufactured properly.
Somebody's either in violation of manufacturing standards or somebody else is lying.
And the public doesn't know.
Oh, I guess this is the original.
I have to still have the real expensive stuff because the generic's not as good.
Yeah, isn't that outlawed?
Isn't that banned somehow from them marketing against it that way?
I'm not seeing any evidence of it.
Hmm.
Well, this is clearly all a part, or ACTA is going to solve a lot of these problems for the pharmaceutical industry.
And there are some massive moves afoot when it comes to intellectual property.
So if you don't realize how this works, and there's been some very important drugs in just the past few years, including the beta blocker...
This name evades me for a moment.
The patent runs out and then anyone can make this drug, which, by the way, also means drugs that can be distributed to people in poor countries who have no access to this because it's too expensive.
So it's a good thing that there's this expiration and I believe that they are continuously trying to extend those dates.
It's a fractal of the music industry.
If I can just deviate for a moment.
Very important ruling by the House Judiciary Committee yesterday.
They passed a bill, 21 to 9, the vote, that will levy a new fee on local radio stations for music aired free to listeners.
If enacted, 50% of the new fee will go directly into the coffers of the major record label companies.
Three out of four, incidentally, which reside outside the United States.
And so it looks like this is the final neck chop for radio.
Yeah, that means there's more talk radio, ladies and gentlemen.
That's right.
Here we are.
- Yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck, yuck.
In the morning.
Hey, everybody, welcome.
Now that you can't afford to play any songs on the radio anymore, it's A.C. and J.C.D. In the morning.
Cougar.
Alright, so here's that Indian company.
I still can't get the date.
It's weird.
Here's a website called Patent Baristas.
And this is very interesting.
This ran in October of 2005.
Let me just read this.
In a new twist in the Tamiflu drama being played out across the globe, it's now being reported that Jai Lead Sciences, which apparently is the developer of Tamiflu, is believed to have terminated its agreement with Roche, which has the exclusive marketing right on the drug.
Now generic manufacturers like India's Sipla, which is the one you're talking about, are wondering who holds the patent rights on the drug, and they want to start making it.
So something's screwy.
There's a back story about this flu, about Tamiflu, and all the rest of it, and the crazy stuff that's going on that is not just...
I mean, we have to go through blogs to kind of piece it together.
What is the media doing?
It's so obvious what has happened.
They've injected this into the air, or however it was done...
Well, did you hear the latest?
There was another story that just ran, which says that something...
God, I just got blogged, by the way, on the Dvorak.org slash blog.
Check it out.
It talks about some guy who broke down this virus and claims there's no way this thing was created.
Oh, exactly.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
No, I did read that.
Oh, absolutely.
And, John, ever since I was a young kid, I've had this thought, this...
And I'm saying like, you know, formative years, 13 to 15, is when I start thinking, you know, I was becoming aware of media and how it worked and I was becoming a part of it.
And I was like, it seems so amazing that these guys always time their advertising buys right around the fact when everyone is completely shit out with the flu.
I think, you know, and I've always thought if I had a company, I can see how incredibly tempting it would be to shoot something into the air and then have the solution, problem solution.
And people wonder if the computer virus...
But then people have the audacity to call me a crackpot and a conspiracy theorist when companies are fucking with you all day long and you know it.
I'm talking about the computer viruses and antivirus software.
Same thing.
Same thing.
We talked about Symantec.
It's the same thing.
They work for the government.
They work for the government.
That's their biggest client.
Hmm.
Alright, enough of that.
And you don't have to defend yourself.
Everybody knows you're crazy.
I love you, baby.
And now, back to real news.
Yes, two important pieces of real news.
Tonight, the second preliminary round of the Eurovision Song Contest.
Yeah, this is not very, you know, we talked about this some time back, but Americans are unfamiliar with this event.
You're going to have to re-explain it.
Why is it so big?
Because it was one of the first pan-European satellite broadcast initiatives that came back on a yearly basis.
So very analogous to the Oscars and later the Grammars.
How about this very analogous to the World Cup, you think?
No, not the same.
I'm talking about in terms of country versus country.
You know, we're going to beat those bastards in France.
You know, the Germans want to do that.
Or the British think they're going to win the World Cup.
No, no.
I think it might have been that.
No, I don't think it was.
It was more exciting.
You don't think there's any country-to-country rival?
No, no, no.
There's none in this competition?
Nobody cares?
No.
People care because it's too funny to watch.
Because this is like the antithesis to the Top 40 chart.
Everything that is lame, stupid, cheesy, and pretty much everything is gay on this show.
And it's funny to watch.
It is absolutely hilarious to watch.
So it's become counterculture.
Of course people are happy, but...
I've never known differently than people say, oh, I think they're the best and they're going to win.
It was never about our guys that got to win, because each country that is a member of the European Broadcast Union, so it's not even technically just Europeans that are in it.
Israel participates, and there are all kinds of different countries.
But it used to be a really exciting thing because it would start off with the Eurovision tune, which everyone can hum.
Everyone knows it.
And then you had the satellite thingy, like, oh yeah, man, we're hooked up, we're connected, everyone's watching it live.
And that was the genesis.
In the United Kingdom...
Although this will be the first year he's not doing it ever since I was aware of Sir Terry Wogan doing the commentary, the reason to watch in the United Kingdom was always the commentary from Terry Wogan because he would just sit there getting hammered, completely hammered on whatever he drinks, it's good, and would just take the piss out of every single contestant.
And seriously, it's so incredibly funny.
You think he's the model for these shows that are syndicated now?
Interesting.
No, I think very few people outside of the United Kingdom...
No, I'm just saying, but from the guys like, what's his name, who's the guy who produces American Idol...
Oh, Simon Cowell?
Yeah, there could be something in there.
I think he saw him and said, you know, that's a good bit.
I think I can do better than that.
I can be a bigger jerk.
No, because Terry Wogan's not a jerk because you agree with him.
I was like, you're so right, Terry.
I agree with Cowell lots of times.
Oh, okay.
And Terry would always say, now, watch for the feathers.
You won't believe what's going to happen.
He would give away all the surprises.
It's like he's a total spoiler on everything.
And then, of course, when the U.K. come around, who haven't won in 20 years because the product they've delivered is so crap, he would just be taking the piss out of the U.K.'s entry.
It's beautiful.
Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.
Too bad he's not doing it this year.
I'll really miss him.
So that's big news in Gitmo Nation East, and apparently it's also, according to Ponder, who Twittered me this, it's blasphemy day in Ireland, and he requests us to say something grossly insulting.
To the Irish?
I don't think so.
To God, I guess.
I don't know.
I don't feel like it.
I think he's just egging you on.
He's probably got a bet down on it.
Don't do it.
I'm not falling for it.
Well, since you talked about Twitter, right?
Yeah.
So here we go.
More real news.
Oh, I'm sorry.
And now, back to real news.
Now, I always admire someone who goes out of their way to get some press coverage with some sort of a crackpot statement that they'll make publicly.
So here's the headline.
This is sent out over the MMD Newswire, which is a public relations distribution network.
Headline, Twitter use causes serious, in quotes, brain damage, media expert says.
Social media expert and author David Seaman offers the clear.
David Seaman?
Claims that...
How can you take that guy seriously?
S-E-A-M-A-N. Yeah, yeah, whatever.
Claims that frequent Twitter use causes the equivalent of brain damage.
Quote, we're seeing 30 and 40-year-olds acting like overly emotional teenagers on Twitter, Seaman said.
It's not all that healthy.
Twitter also takes complex ideas and boils them down to overly simplistic sound bites, according to Seaman, who is annoyed by the service's 140-character text size limit.
Unlike television, who of course is so in-depth and so healthy for you.
Basically, Twitter has some good uses, but it's making us all a bit stupider.
Stupider.
Did he say stupider?
That's what it says.
Stupider.
It made him stupider with that word.
That's beautiful.
Well, along the lines of brains, and this of course flows into our conversation from the last show, neuroscientists think they've identified the part of the brain that causes Tourette's syndrome.
The condition that causes random ticks, including compulsive obscenity.
How long before we can hack that part of the brain?
So, apparently, if you use an MTI, a magnetic transfer imaging technique, to scan the prefrontal area of the brain, of the 19 Tourette sufferers, as well as 20 control subjects, they found alterations in the...
Here it comes, John, because I know you were a brain surgeon in the past.
A frontostrict...
Fuck...
Frontostratial circuitries.
I could probably pronounce the word if I could see it, but that's okay.
And what are they going to do about it?
Hold on, let me Skype you this word.
I don't think anybody would want, except for the guys who cuss a lot, when they did that special on Tourette's, nobody bitched about it too much.
They just lived with it.
Yeah, exactly.
Well, let me see what they can do.
So, changing the architecture of the front lobe lead to disinhibition of the cingulate gyrus and abnormal basangalia...
I'm fucked.
I'm a sick man.
What is this?
Why did you choose to read this story?
I'm a sick man.
I need help.
I want one of those MTIs.
It would be kind of cool to see my brain firing up in strange places.
That could be fun to do.
There's a joke there.
I'm not going to use it.
Go ahead.
No.
Okay.
Frontostriacial, yeah.
Frontostriacial.
Yeah, I think you had it.
Hey Adam, in regards to Sunday's show where you discussed the Clean Water Restoration Act and the fact that all water in the U.S. is subject to Congress, this raised a couple of points in my head.
One, I've just read through the United States...
In the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, I have found no reference to a fundamental right to water.
The closest thing to a right to water in this document is located in Article 25, where it states, everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food.
The question is, is water a part of food?
But more importantly, if the human body is made up of 50% plus water, does that mean that if you are inside the borders of the U.S., Congress now owns half your body?
I think that's an excellent question, since they'll own all water on the planet.
Makes nothing but sense.
That's a total New World Order move, I'd say.
Makes sense.
Hey, are you made of water?
I'm sorry.
We own you.
Come this way.
Hey, John.
Hey, John.
Yes.
Could you turn on your speakers?
Okay, I did.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It's still loud.
I still hear myself slapping back.
Uh...
Let's see.
There's a good thing.
People should give some advice.
If you get to watch the PBS show, I think it's running on different local PBS stations.
It's a series called Behind Closed Doors.
I've seen the promo for that.
It's a multi-part series, I think.
Yeah, it's a multi-part series, and it's weird because it's a new model for a documentary.
I've never seen this quite done this way before.
It's essentially combining dramatic interpretation with actual documentary evidence, plus actual interviews with people who might then be played as a character.
And it's mainly about Stalin.
And it's absolutely, and Stalin and Churchill, and by the way, if you're one of those people that don't, and there are people like this that dislike Churchill, you'll love this series.
They just give it to him.
And it's very interesting.
It actually makes everybody look like a bunch of idiots except Stalin, but it makes him look like a psychopath, which of course he was, obviously, of some sort.
Anyway, it's outstanding.
It's totally riveting.
It's got great pacing.
It's just really hard to put down.
It's just an amazing series, I have to say.
Is this currently running on PBS? Yeah, they had an episode last night.
But I think you'll be able to track it down if you're trying hard enough.
Cool.
There's also a front line that ran this week on Madoff, and if you get a chance to see that, that's worth watching, too.
For no other reason than to watch.
They have brought a lot of people that got scammed by them and lost all their money and now live in apartments.
Boxed cardboard boxes.
It's very interesting, their take on things.
They're just, I don't know.
Can you burn a copy for me?
Yeah, if I pick it up, if it plays again, I'll burn a copy for you.
You remember as a part of the bailout, John, I think the, I forgot which one, but the, one of the $800 billion bailouts, there was this Homeowner Hope program.
We actually went through the website and we looked at, because this was in order to make loans affordable for people again.
Yeah.
And we kind of figured out how it works.
Essentially, your monthly rate is lowered.
Yeah.
It could be several hundred dollars.
In some cases, even a little more extreme, up to $1,000.
But, of course, you actually wind up paying more over a longer period of time.
So it's like a refinance, if anything, but not necessarily in your favor long term.
So there was an interesting article in Forbes, which is talking...
And the article itself isn't really what I found interesting.
New Troubles for a Troubled Washington Mortgage Plan.
So one of the companies, and we even saw this on the homeownerhelp.gov, whatever website, that it was purely a marketing site.
So there's a company from Melville, New York called Lend America.
This is one of these outfits that I guess the guy has a TV infomercial and, you know, get your part of the bailout now and, you know, one of those guys.
Nick...
What is it?
I think it's Nick Bratsophilus.
I'm terrible with reading today.
So the loans that Lend America made under the program, 50 of them, are being investigated.
They're being held up pending ongoing federal investigations.
But the news in the article was...
That's unbelievable.
Senior federal housing officials say 51 of the loans made under the program, 50 were made by Lend America.
Let me wing that by you again.
Of this program, 51 loans were made.
50 of them are under investigation.
Well, there's two things that come immediately to the front.
One, 51 loans, that's it?
That's it.
51 loans is all that has been made under this homeowner help program, according to Forbes, who I guess might have some of the facts right.
Yeah, actually, Forbes is good about that.
51?
51?
That's ridiculous.
How's this helping anybody?
I thought they had hundreds of millions were set aside for this.
Hundreds of millions of dollars and only 51 loans were made?
Can we just say fail?
Doesn't sound right.
Well, I don't know.
Just another one of these things.
I mean, the whole thing is this.
I mean, Obama's got too busy giving speeches at ASU. To deal with any real news.
Pakistan's falling apart.
They got the Taliban taking over the place.
They're going to grab a nuke.
They're going to drop it on Islamabad.
Oh man, this is what I was talking to Ahmed about at the grocery store.
And the guy is now visibly upset when I walk in.
Not at me, but he knows that we're going to talk about shit.
He's like, it's so out of control.
He said, right now in Kabul, people are blowing themselves up left and right.
There's fucking shootings all day long right in the middle of the street.
He's like, now it's utter, utter chaos.
And he showed me pictures, because his brother just came back.
He showed me pictures.
Look, here's the U.S. command, and they're sitting down here with the Taliban, and they're negotiating the drugs deal.
All they're doing, it's only for the drugs.
The guy is flipping out.
His whole family is there.
It's become the most unsafe place on earth.
This is not the way it's being portrayed to us in the media.
We just get another surge.
Why are we sending everyone to Afghanistan when the problems clearly are in Pakistan?
Clearly.
We can't send our troops to Pakistan because they're our ally and they won't let us.
I've got to find this.
There was a quote from...
Who's the guy who runs the army?
What army?
Pakistan's army.
I don't know.
That I don't know.
I know they keep showing him on TV all the time.
Oh, don't worry.
Everything is fine.
Here it is.
I got him.
You're not going to believe it.
Now, this is from...
Oh, shit.
Of course, now the link is gone.
Oh, don't give me that shit.
Oh, no.
It goes to Tourette's.
Oh, no.
This is so wrong.
Wait a minute.
Maybe I can still salvage it.
You have to save page as.
And I want to tell everybody out there to do this.
You run into a really good article that seems a little sketchy because it's like, why are they telling me this?
Go up to the upper left-hand corner under File and put Save Page As...
And it would be, then you'd scroll down where it says webpage complete and then click on that.
The page gets saved as a complete copy of the page with all the ads and everything.
And it's saved to a file.
I keep them all separate from the rest of my documents so I can always access them if I need them.
And then when one of these situations occurs, like Adam's experiencing, you won't have the problem...
Because stuff does get pulled off the internet, and it never gets archived.
There's a couple of articles I've been wanting from the London Times back in 2001 that I can't find, that I had documented.
That's when I got the clue about save page as, when something's really outstanding, you've got to do that.
And by the way, for anybody out there...
Thank you.
For anybody out there who is sending us tips and info, at least for me, please put no agenda on the subject line someplace so I can search these things easier.
Because somebody will write me and then I have trouble finding the...
John, thank you.
I've now recovered the article, and I knew you were doing that.
I appreciate it.
This is from the Press Trust of India.
They call themselves India's premier news agency.
Washington, May 11th.
In a new revelation, Pakistan president, I'm sorry, Asif Ali Zardari, Said the CIA of the United States and his country's ISI together created the Taliban.
Here's the quote.
I think it was part of your past and our past and the ISI and CIA. They created them together.
He apparently told an NBC News channel in an interview, which I've not been able to retrieve...
In the interview which was given to the NBC, so maybe it's an Indian NBC, on May 7th, Zardari also accused the U.S. of supporting the military rule of Perez Musharraf, who was alleged to be taking the side of the Taliban.
So here's the guy saying that the ISI and the CIA created the Taliban, which I believe historically is true.
Well, it's possible at least.
Because that would have made sense, because the Taliban was seen as you create a fundamentalist organization that can then control the mess that was over there at one time when the Russians were invading.
And, you know, why not?
You'd come up with some crackpot scheme like this.
Again, this, of course, harkens back to the Legacy of Ashes book that you cited before.
Exactly.
Which essentially is just a book documenting all these botches and blunders.
I don't think that's in there, though.
Not like...
Well, there is a lot about...
No, I'd have to go look.
I actually gave my copy away.
I have to go look at it.
But what really blew my mind...
You probably...
You know what?
You live in Gitmo Nation West.
You probably did not hear that the David McKiernan...
Who was the top U.S. general in charge of, in command essentially of everything in Iraq, was relieved of duty and replaced.
Did you catch this?
Yeah, that was kind of mentioned just as a quick news item.
Okay.
So how did that strike you when you heard that, that he was relieved of command and replaced by U.S. Special Forces Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal?
Did you sniff anything on that?
No, I did not.
I just figured it was just, you know, that's our guy and that's Bush's guy.
Let's get rid of him.
Here's the story.
Apparently, Nancy Pelosi was in Iraq, I presume in the green zone, and she was there.
Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Where else would she go?
Well, it was a surprise visit to coordinate with Iraqi officials about the containment of the Kurdish regions, which you hear nothing about.
There's a lot of crap going on there right now.
Of course, we're focused all over the map.
But what happened is, there was a shootout, and this is just a source, right?
So I don't know how true it is, but man, it...
There was a shootout.
Five U.S. soldiers were killed.
Oh yeah, that was a big story here.
Okay, but you know who they apparently were killed by?
By other dissident U.S. soldiers who were freaking out.
No, it was one guy.
We were told it was one guy.
Yeah.
Well, no, it was more than one guy.
But Pelosi was there.
Let me give you the story the way it's presented over here.
You can tell us what you're getting over there.
It goes like this.
Some guy goes in to get some help because he's freaking out about something.
And he goes into the hospital facility to get probably some drugs or who knows what, nobody says.
He goes in there and he causes a fuss about something, gets pissed off, and he gets so agitated that some of the military police took his weapon away from him because he was either brandishing it or who knows what.
So he runs off and goes and gets another weapon and comes in and shoots up the place and kills five guys.
And then he gets killed and that's the end of it.
That's the story.
And that's pretty much it.
And all the follow-up is little news items about, oh, the stress over there is bad.
He's had his third tour of duty and that's too many tours for anybody.
And, you know, he was going to be, although he was going to be out of Iraq in August.
So that's basically all we got.
And we just take that as face value.
It seems reasonable that it could happen that way.
Well, so this seems to be...
First of all, this is being reported by other sources to me as a deliberate attack on the Speaker of the House.
And it all stems from...
Iranian artillery and helicopter gunships that have started attacking Iraq's Kurdistan region.
Now the Israelis are all bent out of shape.
This ties right into the release of that spy, Roxana Saberi.
Right?
The U.S.-Iranian journalist?
Did you catch that at all?
Oh, right, right.
She was released.
Here's the way that story was presented here.
This girl was over there.
She's like an Iranian student, or she was a journalist or something, and she was floating around.
Probably doing some, maybe not, but they arrested her and accused her of being a spy and they were going to give her 20 years in jail and that became a big civil rights issue and everybody's bent out of shape about it and now I guess they're releasing her.
So, she was released, according to the same source, because of agreements that President Obama has signed.
So there's stuff going on, and I think we're just completely being lied to.
I don't think we have any idea what's happening, but there are forces at work, and shit is changing, and so apparently...
So wait, now, there's two things you mentioned that are kind of interesting that I'm not following.
I'm not getting any information on, thus I'm not following.
One is the Kurdistan or the Kurd area of Iraq having some...
Right, okay.
We haven't heard nothing about this.
I mean, we haven't heard anything about what's going on in Kurdistan or Kurd, whatever you want to call it.
I mean, the Kurds call it Kurdistan.
That would be interesting to find some...
Maybe we have a listener that would clue us into the Kurd situation because we don't know, at least here.
Right.
And the other thing is, if there's an attack on it, you think it was like an attack on Pelosi, and it ended up with this cover story about the guy going crazy?
Yeah, well, I think that this is happening all over the world now.
I believe that what happened in the Netherlands was an attack on the Queen.
Maybe not...
Maybe a warning shot more than an attack.
But yeah, I absolutely believe that those things are happening.
Let me read from this article.
And I don't want to tell you where it's from, because you'd only poo-poo it.
Not being understood by the American people is that Obama has, for the first time since the presidency of John F. Kennedy, launched an all-out assault against the powerful Israeli lobby, and that many experts say has corrupted American foreign policy and led to their disastrous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan...
Which a new survey by the Boston Review shows over one-third of American people blame the Jewish people for the current global financial crisis as well.
So there's obviously a very skewed article.
But that's the slant that's being taken here, is that it's...
Are you reading this from Prison Planet?
No.
No, I'm not.
All right.
I'm not.
You should actually tell us where you're reading it from.
Well, read it first and then tell us the source.
Well, I always put the source in the show notes.
Oh, okay.
Never mind then.
It's always in there.
So you can go right to the show notes and you can check it out.
But it has some very good links to, for instance, that survey by the Boston Review.
I don't even know the Boston Review, if that's worth anything.
But it's a good article, and basically what it's saying is...
We're in so many conflicts and so many different moves and deals that are being made as we speak, but we're completely oblivious to it.
That's kind of the essence of the article.
And it makes sense because you could easily believe the attack on Pelosi story as you could just some guy who freaked out and went nutty.
Five soldiers, by the way, being killed by one guy is pretty extreme.
Yeah, and some more injured.
Yeah.
Well, somebody knows the real story there, but I'm sure they've all been signed and taken into a room and told not to talk.
But, yeah, it does sound dubious, because once one gunshot is fired amongst soldiers that are war-hardened, I mean, these guys are going to be...
They all mess around, baby.
They're going to be, right.
They're going to be ducking cover and, you know, grab a gun and let's start firing back.
Yeah, it is actually not to mention it.
Unless the guy came in with a submachine gun and caught it.
Well, we don't even know that.
We don't even know that.
We don't know anything.
We have zero news.
Zero news.
And what the hell was Pelosi doing in the green zone?
What was so important?
It can only be if a power person had to show up to do something, and I would say make a deal about something.
You know, Pelosi's like becoming the second government.
She's got to watch herself.
She's the kind of person that will find herself with two to the head and a gun in her right hand.
She could easily become part of the body count.
I'm not saying...
I agree with you.
I think she's on very, very thin ice.
She has to be careful.
With that whole thing with Obama?
Why is she playing this game?
I mean, it seems to me that she's just getting a little carried away with being the boss.
Well, it feels to me like...
When I look at her, it feels to me like this is what can happen with power.
This is a powerful woman who was given more power, and she's just flipped out.
She's gone beyond.
And she must have some powers behind her which give her this confidence.
Oh, they're probably egging her on.
Yeah.
Go ahead, you can do that.
Go, go, go do it.
Yeah, that'll get him.
Come on, go, go.
You're the boss anyway.
Come on, you're the one that runs everything.
You run the show.
Come on, Nancy.
You run the show.
Don't kid yourself.
That guy's just, you know, by the way, you know, Congress has got just as much power as the executive office.
And this guy's weak.
He's weak.
Yeah, he's weak.
He's weak.
And look at your hair.
It's strong.
It's very strong.
You have Samson hair.
Meanwhile, talking about that, there was a story that also ran, which is similar.
Now, you mentioned the two-day-head suicide that we do have on the blog about how a number of Democrats, including Feinstein and others, who has got her tit in a ringer for some dirty dealing, all say that the CIA is after them.
Did you see that?
No!
That's something I should be saying.
The CIA is after me, John.
Help me, Johnny boy.
Who's saying this?
Politicians?
Yeah, these Democrats.
Let me go to the piece.
We've got a lot of good pieces, by the way.
Who's investigating this claim that swine flu virus is created and blah, blah, blah.
Let's go.
There's another one, Student Hoaxes the World on Wikipedia.
Oh, yeah.
I had that one as some real news.
You should read that because that's fun.
It's sad because Jean-Michel Jarre passed and I didn't even know what happened.
I had to read about Jean-Michel Jarre dying, fantastic musician, one of the early synthesizer pioneers.
He was one of the earliest synthesizers.
VJs in the truest sense of the word.
He had visual light displays and lasers.
This guy did some amazing shit, and he passed away.
No one knew about it until this story surfaces that some kid, what is it, he wrote a quote?
He wrote a poem the guy supposedly wrote, but the kid wrote it, and he attributed it to this guy and slipped it onto Wikipedia.
And let me guess, how many really authoritative organizations cut and pasted this blindly?
Apparently a lot.
That just goes to show.
So Democrats charged Tuesday at the CIA's release documents about congressional briefings on harsh interrogation techniques in order to deflect attention away from itself.
I think there's so much embarrassment, quote, it's from some quarters of the CIA that people are going to try to shift some of the responsibility to others.
That's what I think said Carl Levin, Democrat, Michigan, who sat on the Senate.
In other words, what it is, these guys who sat on the commission that would listen to them tell you, well, we're waterboarding, and all these people that were sitting there going, okay, well, knock yourself out.
And then now because, oh, it's bad, we should indict everybody, since they take the other side, the CIA says, well, yeah, really?
Here, here's some documents.
Tell us what you didn't know back then.
Yeah, exactly.
And Pelosi right up front.
Yeah, she's one of them, but I think they're nailing the senators first.
Well, good.
I truly believe the CIA is still Bush-Clinton controlled.
I mean, those guys have been running that shop for so long.
It's shit, man.
Bush Sr.
basically created the whole thing.
It's his puppy.
It's his family.
It's his...
It's his whole department.
Those guys don't just all of a sudden work for the President and the Constitution.
Are you kidding me?
That's not how it works.
Why would they?
What's the point?
Well, that makes a lot of sense then with President Obama now saying, oh, we're not going to release any more pictures of detainee abuse.
I mean, now everything's shutting down.
Now the transparency has gotten cloudy.
Well, it's been getting that way since day one.
Yeah, but it takes people a while.
We're going to release this, and then what changed?
I mean, who came and had the meeting and told Obama, look, here's the deal.
Here's the way the game's played.
Hey, Obama, look, listen.
Why don't you hear, hey, here, here, here's a ticket to Phoenix.
Take a ride down to...
Yeah, that's why don't you take a ride, Sonny.
Take a ride down to Phoenix and give a speech.
And we'll go fix things back here.
Don't you worry about it.
You don't need to worry about your pretty little head.
I could just hear Rahm Emanuel saying it that way, too.
Hey, oh, oh, baby.
You just go on over to...
You know what?
It's lovely this time of year in Phoenix.
You'll like it.
Oh, boy.
Okay, so what else we got?
Here's one.
Back to real news.
At least I punched it.
Yes, you did.
You punched it.
I'm just going to read you the headline.
Okay.
Woman dies from using jackhammer as sex toy.
Hey now, hooga!
And that one, Deb, by the way, came in from Johnny Green.
I have seen this article.
I think it's been around.
Johnny Green.
So is there any detail on what kind of jackhammer?
Was it pneumatic?
Was it...
I don't think it's important.
You know, that's just like details that are unnecessary.
The headline is all you need, really.
Isn't that the truth?
Oh, dude, big-ass, big-ass real news!
And now, back to real news.
Katie Price, known as Glamour Model Jordan...
I'm sure you've heard of her, John.
Oh yeah, I've heard of Jordan.
Who of course has been married to the former boy band singer and successful in his own right, Peter Andre, are splitting up.
This is huge.
This has just captured the attention of the entire nation.
They actually released a statement through their agent.
Because people thought this has to be a publicity stunt.
They do this all the time when they're about to do another reality show.
But no, this time it's for real.
They are splitting up.
Yes, she's choosing horses over here.
But this doesn't even show up on the radar over here, of course, because we don't care.
Most of these types of people are very local.
You will care about this.
This is from The Telegraph.
This is great.
I am so...
I probably...
Oh, don't tell me another 404...
Jesus...
Unbelievable.
I'm a dick that I didn't save these.
Okay, I know the story.
There are now actual posters that are being posted in Gitmo Nation East.
If you feel that someone you see on the street or your neighbor...
Oh yeah, we blogged this already.
Let me just get it out and then you can do the details.
Why don't you bring up the article from your blog.
If you feel that these people are wearing too much bling, you should report them.
No, actually I don't remember that specifically.
No, the poster says too much bling.
Really?
Yeah, let me find it.
Now I've got to go and find it.
So wait a minute.
You're telling me that somebody walking down the street with a bunch of jewelry or, say, a clock around their neck or a bunch of big rings that are made out of fake gold or whatever, or they just have a gold tooth that says, you know, eat shit on it across their mouth, something like that, that would constitute too much bling and it should be reported?
The latest original and some say ridiculous method of policing in Britain comes from the Gloucestershire Constabulary.
In a partnership with Crimestoppers, the Too Much Bling Give Us a Ring campaign has just been launched in hopes to put an end to ill gains by making regular people contact police officers once they suspect someone is wearing bling they can't afford.
How would they even know if it's real or not?
I mean, you can buy fake bling.
You've got to see the picture.
Anywhere.
You know, go to Canal Street in New York City, especially around, I think it's around Amsterdam, Broadway, one of those streets is an area where you can ballast stuff.
Well, this also just may be another part of the actor that's coming.
You know, it's a huge crackdown, and maybe it's all about even fake bling.
Look at this poster.
Look at this poster with a little diamond bling ring.
Too much bling?
Give us a ring.
Is someone you know living a lavish lifestyle from the proceeds of crime?
Don't stand for it!
Report it!
Wow.
Kitmo frickin' nation, man.
That's unbelievable.
No, we did not blog this.
It's going to be blogged as soon as we're done with the show, though.
What did you blog, then?
Too much bling.
This has got to be an April Fool's joke.
No, I don't think it is.
I don't think it is.
Huh.
Don't stand for it.
This is worse than, you know, when I was a kid.
I remember, you know, when...
Oh, here we go.
I remember when I was a kid, we used to get, in grammar school, we used to be, you know, told how horrible it is in Cuba because people turn in their neighbors for crimes, you know, everyone's spying on each other, and Cuba's a terrible place because, you know, you're told to turn your neighbor in.
Damn commies, yeah, damn commies.
Those damn commies make people turn in their neighbor.
And we all went, oh, that's terrible, why would anybody do that?
It's because they're commies.
They're damn commies.
Well, there you go.
So meanwhile, of course, we're doing this to do an extreme.
Too much bling.
So in other words, don't wear any jewelry at all.
It's nuts.
No, you can't wear fur.
You can't wear jewelry.
You can't wear sneakers made by underprivileged children.
And you can't go naked, by the way.
That, of course, is the ultimate offense.
What's left?
What's left?
Just an armband?
With an armband and a jockstrap.
Another premium item.
The no agenda jockstrap.
I'm liking that.
With a cup pouch.
And we can...
Cups sold separately.
Cod pieces would also be hot.
I'll say that again.
So let me read this story.
Cod pieces are hot.
That's a t-shirt.
Here we go.
What's the name of the guy who...
Cameo.
We'll talk about it later.
I just want to read this article from Reuters.
We're sent in by Ivan Silva, who says this is underreported news.
Instead of reading it, let me just summarize.
They've decriminalized drugs in Mexico.
Really?
Well, that's a solution.
Mexico Senate approved a bill on Tuesday decriminalizing possession of small amounts of narcotics for personal use in order to free resources to fight violent drug cartels.
The bill proposed, in other words, to save money, which was my argument about doing the same thing in California, because we don't have any money, and this is a wasted effort anyway.
The bill proposed by conservative president, Felipe Calderon, would make it legal to carry up to 5 grams of marijuana, 500 milligrams of cocaine, and tiny quantities of other drugs such as heroin and meth.
Hey!
Puga!
The Mexico's Congress passed a similar proposal in 2006, but the bill was vetoed by Calderon's predecessor, Vincente Fox, under pressure from the USA. Heh.
So that should solve all the problems.
You watch.
Problems will go away in Mexico.
Done.
Well, there was an article in the New York Times, by the way, not to harp on this issue, but there was an article in the New York Times talking about the decriminalization of drugs in Portugal, and apparently after doing it, drug issues have waned.
There's less people addicted.
There's less drug use.
It's all gone down.
Well, this is exactly what we talked about when I discovered it in the first place.
So there you have it.
But, you know, this is bringing more and more credence to your crackpot theory that the U.S. government's essentially in the drug business.
In the drug business.
And I'll just explain it one more time.
The way I believe it works is Wall Street was set up specifically, because we learned all this.
We learned this firsthand.
You may not bring $10,000 into the country, or take it out of the country for that matter, Without, or the equivalent in stocks, bonds, paper, etc., without notifying the government.
Every entity, every body has to adhere to this rule except for publicly listed companies.
They can accept money from anywhere without that going through IRS channels, without that being notified.
And they have their own money banking networks.
This is what Iridium does.
They handle a lot of the banking.
There's all these backbones, all these networks and how money is transferred and it's not through the regular system.
Now, if you take into account the mountains of evidence, the witnesses, the former officers who have come forward, and just Google MENA, Arizona, Mike Echo November Alpha, MENA, Arizona, and you will see how involved Clinton was in this use of military and you will see how involved Clinton was in this use of military aircraft to bring drugs If you haven't seen the fantastic movie with Denzel Washington, American Gangster, it's based on a true story.
They brought in drugs in coffins of dead boys and girls.
The Wall Street system and I believe a large part of the American economy runs on drug money.
And the war on drugs was set up to pump even more money into the system.
I mean, hey, we might as well make it on both sides.
You know, we're making it with actually bringing the drugs in.
Well, we might as well make a couple billion over here with our own defense companies by saying that we're combating it when really we're probably only shipping those arms out and trading them for more drugs.
And it's horrible, but it's what the economy runs on.
You cannot legalize marijuana, possibly, because it's not a very efficient drug when it comes to value from money.
You need a lot of it to make a lot of money, and so it's not as portable as cocaine or heroin or ecstasy, for that matter.
I know people who are in the ecstasy-making business in the Netherlands.
I mean, it's not hard to figure out who's doing this stuff.
And these are very...
A couple of parents of one of Christina's girlfriends back in the British School of Amsterdam, they were totally running an e-pill company.
They were doing $100 million a year, John.
And I know exactly how they whitewashed it.
Always be on the lookout for studios and musicians.
That's a good way to whitewash your money.
And it's a fact.
And we should wake up and understand that that's what's happening.
And just with the knowledge of it, we can attack the problems differently.
It's so stupid.
So stupid.
Well, let's look at the logic of this argument.
And indeed, there are money laundering operations everywhere you look.
That's no doubt about it.
And I actually am suspicious of large Las Vegas casinos.
Oh, well, yeah, another perfect way to launder money, of course.
It's a cash business.
I have been given tours of places, and I've been in the back rooms where they have all the cameras.
It's actually quite interesting to get into the bowels, because there's actually a whole different world You open a door and you're in another whole underground place where there's...
It's like backstage at Disney.
It's wild.
But anyway, there are rooms in all the casinos, the high roller rooms, and they'll show you what they are and they'll say, this room brings in $700 million a year.
And it's locked.
And, yeah, only, you know, if you're somebody from Saudi Arabia, you can get in there to play with, you know, somebody from Australia who's a gambler.
And, you know, somehow the results in $700 million.
I just find the whole thing to be...
Yeah, okay.
But now let's go back to this argument of yours.
If you decriminalize drugs, how would that change anything except it would save us the money of the prisoners and the law enforcement costs, which is killing us?
Oh, yeah, but I'm not looking at that.
I'm looking at who are the people that are benefiting from this, and this is...
Wall Street companies, CEOs.
It's not who you expect.
It's not really Denzel Washington, although he traveled in exactly the same circles.
This is high-level politicians, government officials who've been there forever.
They're all a part of the system.
And it's been a great cash cow for a long time.
They don't give a shit about the economy.
They don't care about you and I. All they care about is themselves.
And they're hooked.
There's no substitute for this.
I'm sure it used to be coffee and tea and other light, mild drugs back in the day, which people love to have monopolies on.
Think about the monopoly they've got.
They've got the factory, which is Afghanistan.
90% of all opiates come from Afghanistan.
It's the only place where they apparently can grow it properly or whatever.
So, they don't care about the economics of it.
They only care about the price.
And, of course, if it's decriminalized, then I believe the price will change drastically and they're not prepared to accept that.
That's what the theory is, but I don't see that that's actually true.
I can see where somebody might fear that, well, it's decriminalized so the price should go down.
You don't think that would happen?
Maybe it wouldn't.
There's got to be a right, but if they control the supply...
Yeah, and then you say, well, you're either going to pay $100 for this or you're not getting it.
Hold on a second.
If you decriminalize, and we have to be aware of what's going on, If you decriminalize, it depends on what kind of decriminalization.
So possession would be one, distribution would be another.
I don't think Portugal has decriminalized distribution and holding with intent to distribute.
No, not at all.
If they did that, well, then it would be all over because then I could go to Afghanistan and we'd start up the no-agenda opium farm.
Yeah.
Not a bad place to retire.
We'd have to be in the Taliban, though.
Yeah.
I just spit out my tea.
It's about time.
Can you see us in Taliban outfits?
Yeah, that black turban and the big beard.
Of course, I'll have a...
Since I can't grill many, you know, my facial hair is so sketchy that it would be like this guy, you know, they would be questioning me constantly.
You would look so fake as a Taliban.
You would look so lame.
I don't think you could pull it off, man.
Who's this pale guy?
Pale-faced Taliban.
That's some album art we're looking for.
Could someone please do that album art in the next 15 minutes so we can put it up as a part of the show?
Yeah, it's a black turban and a big beard.
That's what the Taliban is earmarked by.
In the chat room, someone...
I love it when you look at this anagram.
God is gold, oil, and drugs.
Oh, that's cute.
So, here's one I got from one of our listeners.
Cocaine.
Northfield is the same zip code as Winnetka, where Rumsfeld is from, and Stepan Company is the one company licensed to import cocaine and the extracts.
It's still used in Coca-Cola, which is not...
It's a Rumsfeld company?
No, it's just coincidental that it's in the same area where Rumsfeld is from.
Sure.
Coincidental.
Like the year of the pig swine fluke.
So he's got the Coca-Cola, I guess, Wikipedia.
Of course, he got it from Wikipedia, so it's questionable.
Yeah, very.
Since Pamperton called for five ounces of coca leaf per gallon of syrup, a significant dose in 1891.
If it's just the leaves, though, that means it probably had all the other beneficial chemicals in it.
Coca-Cola is probably pretty damn good, I would think, with this dosage.
Have you ever smoked opium?
No, I never have.
And me neither.
I was just curious.
I think, yeah.
I don't know where you'd even do it.
I guess there's probably still opium dens.
I've seen one when I was up near the Golden Triangle.
I stayed doing a documentary.
I stayed with a Burmese hill tribe.
I think I told you this before.
All the women running...
Yeah, where's the horn honking?
It's...
You mean this one?
Okay, now you can...
Now you continue with your repeated story.
All the women basically run the village because the men are all in the opium den.
It's really what it is.
You walk in, these guys just completely...
There's no chicks.
There's no fruit baked.
Baked and flipped over thrice, I tell you.
Completely, completely baked.
And that's all they do all day is just sit there and get baked.
Eh, it's sad.
I guess it's really addictive.
Yeah, well, that's probably, yeah, and I'm sure it has some benefits.
After 1904, instead of using fresh leaves, Coca-Cola started using spent leaves, the leftovers of the cocaine extraction process, with cocaine traces left over at a molecular level, supposedly.
To this day, Coca-Cola uses an ingredient, a cocaine-free coca leaf extract, prepared at a Stepan Company plant in Maywood, New Jersey.
Those New Jersey plants.
This Wikipedia is possible.
Uh-oh.
Fail alert.
I'm sorry.
We screwed this up, didn't we?
Netpierre just DM'd me on Twitter.
Jean-Michel Jarre is still alive.
It was his dad who died.
Okay, now I feel stupid.
We could have launched an entirely new piece of bullshit that people would be repeating in mainstream media.
Can you just see him playing clips of his songs?
You're like, oh, he'll be severely missed.
And as heard on No Agenda, big fan Adam Curry said, quote, I will really miss his work.
Sorry, people.
At least we have instant feedback.
I love it.
I love it.
Twitter changed something that people are all up in arms about.
Something about the friend following or something.
Did you catch that at all?
I'm sure it will be a topic not to be discussed on Twit this Sunday.
I don't know, but I lost 10 followers today.
There's something going on.
They changed something.
What they did essentially is took a feature away, and that's always going to give you a lot of noise from the user base.
But there was something about how you could discover people and now replies won't turn up unless you follow those people.
It's weird.
I don't know.
Who cares?
I do.
I don't know why.
Because it's...
It's become the big thing in celebrity-ville.
I mean, article after article, they're just all over the place.
Oh, everyone who's a celebrity now is in Twitter.
But that's good.
Which means it's going to be dead, by the way.
This is the beginning of the end.
These people are fickle.
No, it's not.
The concept is fantastic.
I think Identica will get some traction.
I told you this.
We're going to get all these Twitter clones that will work exactly the same.
They'll work with your existing software, maybe one update so you can enter a different server, and you'll have...
You'll have the real new celebrity Twitter, which may be the original.
Then you'll have the geeky Twitter, the sex Twitter, where you can just sex each other up.
I see a universe of Twitters, personally.
Could be.
That would be another one of you.
I'm not going to say it's not possible.
So here's the thing.
Let's see what we've got here.
Bilderberg started today.
Yeah, yeah.
In Athens.
Do we have any insight on it?
No, nothing.
I'm just reading Prison Planet.
While you're reading that, I'm going to go back to wine and food news just for a second for people because they always want us to say something.
Okay.
Wine and food news.
We need a jingle.
Wine and food news.
If anybody likes cognac, there's a new cognac out there.
There's a British guy who used to work at Berry Brothers and Rudd, which is that wine store in Mayfair that I keep telling you to go get me something and you just basically shine me on and refuse to do it.
He quit.
I guess he worked for his consultant.
There's a picture of mine on the website.
Anyway, I guess he's gone to Cognac and he's scrounged up a lot of really old stocks that are here and there and he's produced a line of Cognac called Park.
P-A-R-C or P-A-R-K? P-A-R-K, which is his name.
And I think his name is Dominic Park.
And you can go to their website, which is Park Cognac, I think.
And you can see a picture of him, and you go, oh, brother.
And he looks like a Monty Python character.
Anyway, you can get an XO, which is really the sipping cognac you want, because it's essentially designed to be sipped.
But also, it's older, and it's got all the qualities that cognac develops.
For about $65, you can get an XO from Park.
Maybe 75 at the most.
That is the equivalent easily of any of the other XOs selling for 130 or 140 or 150.
And in fact, it may be better than all those.
It's an absolutely outstanding product.
I was stunned.
Stunned by how good it is.
In fact, I was so stunned that I rarely do this, but I went to his website and I sent him a compliment.
Whoa!
Stand back.
Right.
It actually was real work.
Wow.
So, anyway.
So, take a look for Park Cognac.
I think you won't regret it.
Actual work involved.
Actual work involved.
That's good.
This is something that would be bloggable.
I think you'd like it.
Judicial Watch.
I love those guys.
I think their entire business, which doesn't really seem to be a business, is...
Sending out Freedom of Information requests.
And they have received a number of documents, which makes this whole bank bailout and the TARP fund seem very much like a Sopranos episode.
Available now online, and there will be links in the show notes at noagenda.mevio.com.
Not only the signature on a piece of paper from each of the bank CEOs, but the actual talking points when the Obama administration forced, mind you, forced the banks to take money from the government.
Have you seen these?
Yeah.
You didn't like them?
About what?
Well, the fact that our government did this.
I thought this was true.
What?
Are you talking about that they forced the banks to take money?
Yeah, but they made them sign contracts.
Yeah, no, this is pretty well known.
Did you read these contracts?
I didn't read them, but I know that they're pretty onerous.
That's why some of the banks said, look, we don't want to do this deal.
Some of them currently, like Wells, is trying to give them the money back because of this contract.
They think it sucks.
Well, they're signing four points, basically.
And so this is the first one, which signed by, was this the Bank of America, literally written in the contract, $10 billion.
Major financial institution participation commitment, hello, in support of the U.S. financial system and the broader U.S. economy.
The, and then name of, CFO, agrees to four points.
One, issue preferred shares in the amount of, in this case, $10 billion, to the U.S. Treasury under the terms and conditions of the TARP Capital Purchase Program announced today.
Two, participate in the FDIC program guaranteeing new issues of...
Eligible senior liabilities by banks and bank holding companies in transaction amounts as announced today under the systemic risk exemption invoked by the FDIC, U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve.
Three, expand the flow of credit to U.S. consumers and businesses on competitive terms to promote the sustained growth and validity of the U.S. economy.
And four, continue to work diligently under existing programs to modify the terms of residential mortgages as appropriate to strengthen the health of the U.S. housing market, which, as we know, resulted in 51 loans.
This is pretty amazing stuff, that they were forced to sign this commitment.
Well, I don't see anything in there that's...
The fact that they're forced to sign it.
Well, yeah, that's not good.
No, that's fascism.
Well, this has been a fascist country for a while.
Thank you.
At some level.
I mean, you know, we've always...
Thank you.
Point made.
When you say it, then it's true.
Point made.
Done.
Move on.
Johnnypedia, ladies and gentlemen.
Johnnypedia.
Right there.
Johnnypedia.
When John says it, you know it's true.
And what I do know is true is that Bubba has been doing a great job of keeping us posted here and there in his various outlets.
Yes.
Bubba, absolutely.
And we've had a number of fantastic contributors to the program.
And we have some good artists that are helping us out.
Yep.
So let me mention some people that gave us $50 or more.
Ah, hold on a second.
If you don't mind, I'd like to bring us this little notification.
In a whirl.
Ah, shit.
We are the Knights of the No Agenda Knights of the No Agenda.
Knights of the No Agenda and we suck.
That's right.
Knights of the No Agenda and we suck.
We need Mark Russell.
Anyway, so there's one person out there laughing at that.
Probably a guy named Mark Russell.
John Kilburn.
By the way, we got no $100 things this week, and it was actually kind of a disappointing turnout.
I think we have to hound our listeners more.
And I hate to do that, by the way.
John Kilburn, $50.
Joshua Brickner, $50.
Kyle Miller.
$50.
Elaine Hengem, who I believe is a librarian, by the way.
Oh, yeah, me too, man.
Smoking hot librarian with the hair up in a bun and the horn-rimmed glasses and then in slow motion, then she kind of whips her head around as her hair falls loose.
She takes the glasses off and then she straddles me.
Yes, I know exactly what you're talking about.
Hi, Elaine.
Thanks.
We really appreciate it.
Well, maybe she'll make a recording of that and crack up.
That's her ringtone.
That's her ringtone.
Good idea.
We should do that.
Just on the show, we should just say certain things that would make great ringtones.
John, John, 90% of what you say is ringtone worthy, my friend.
Calvin Perry.
Now, here's one that's a little off the wall.
$64.21.
What does that mean, do you think?
Hand it over again.
What is it?
$64, this is Calvin Perry, $64.21.
I have a feeling you know what it means.
I don't.
He may have actually written and said it, but I don't remember it.
While you're doing the next one, I'll do a quick Gmail search, see if that pops up.
And then we have another one, John Matthews, another $50.
And this one, Ben Brucella, B-R-U-S-C-E-L-L-A, he gave us...
Two donations, and there must be some significance to this in that you can try to figure this one out.
$59, and then $1.
What do you think that...
I'm not sure.
Okay, now, insofar as the odd numerological stuff is still coming in, and we have...
Unlike the past two.
Not at all odd.
Numerological.
Yeah, we'll never figure those out.
902.
Maybe it's from 90210.
Maybe he should have given us $902.01 would probably be a really good donation.
We'll make a jingle if anyone gives us 90210.
Okay, 1701.
We got another 1701.
We got one before and we were kind of baffled by it, but now we know what it is because a number of people wrote in and said, 1701 is the designator on the Star Trek Enterprise.
Of course.
How could we have missed it, John?
I'm wondering myself because I knew the number looked familiar.
Yes.
Is that what's on the side of the USS Enterprise?
Yeah, that's the ship number.
Tail number.
Yeah, tail number.
1414.
Any idea?
No.
707.
We got two 707s from two different people, which could be a Boeing 707.
I don't know.
It's a nice number.
707 just by itself is a nice number.
It's a good number.
And then $24.95, which just sounds like some...
That sounds like we got a discount.
Yeah, it sounds like a price.
Wait, there's more.
There's more.
Do you get a set of knives, Ginsu knives?
You get three sets.
These things are so cheap, we have to give them away.
Lovely.
So people who want to donate, especially if you're interested in getting a big call out, go to Dvorak.org slash NA. And one of our followers, Father Frank in Chicago, made an interesting suggestion, which is that for people who want to be nice, but they really can't afford just giving us $1,000 because they can't, there may be some way we could put like a $50 a month or a $50 a week thing, and people can do it the slow way, the slow, painful way.
Oh, like layaway.
Yeah, layaway.
Yeah, no agenda layaway program.
Yeah, I like that.
There you go.
Yeah, that's a pretty good idea.
So we may do that.
Well, John...
Noagenda.com slash NA. I could talk with you for hours, my friend, as you know.
But I'd like to keep some powder dry for Sunday.
We've got a few more items, including the clean plate anecdotes, which we still haven't gotten to.
Okay, write that down.
It's written down.
It's here on the computer on a post-it note.
Okay, I've got Moon Rising, which I need to talk to you about.
The Buffalo pilot who failed five check rides.
And you know about the tapes out on that crash in the middle of nowhere with the girl pilot saying she doesn't know what she's doing.
Oh, really?
Is that on the blog?
I haven't heard those yet.
No, it's not on the blog, but look it up.
Okay, will do.
Yeah, just keep the notes.
That was a fast show.
Yeah, but we're still 124, you know, so it's time to end it.
Yep.
Coming to you from the southwest quadrant of Gitmo Nation East in my covert crackpot command center, which seems to be less and less crackpot with every day that passes.
I'm Adam Curry.
And from northern Silicon Valley, the place that doesn't exist yet, it has actual temperatures.
I'm in the Buzzkill Bunker.
I'm John C. Dvorak.
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