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March 25, 2020 - Rudy Giuliani
01:04:45
200+ Ships EMPTY and AVAILABLE, Rudy Giuliani's EXCLUSIVE Guest Shares on Common Sense Ep.18
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It's our purpose to bring to bear the principle of common sense and rational discussion to the issues of our day.
America was created at a time of great turmoil, tremendous disagreements, anger, hatred.
There was a book written in 1776 that guided much of the discipline of thinking and brought to us the discovery of our freedoms.
Of our God-given freedoms.
It was Thomas Paine's Common Sense, written in 1776, one of the first American bestsellers, in which Thomas Paine explained by rational principles the reason why these small colonies felt the necessity to separate from the gigantic Kingdom of England and the King of England.
He explained their inherent desire for liberty, freedom, freedom of religion, freedom of speech, and he explained it in ways that were understandable to the people, to all the people, not just to the educated upper class.
Because the desire for freedom is classical.
The desire for freedom adheres in the human mind and in the human soul.
Today we face another time of turmoil, of anger, and very, very serious partisan division.
This is exactly the time we should consult our history, look at what we've done best in the past, and see if we can't use some of that to help us now.
We understand that they created the greatest country in the history of the world, the greatest democracy, a country that has taken more people out of poverty than any other country on Earth.
They weren't perfect men and women, and neither were we.
But a great deal of the reason for America's constant ability to self-improve is because we're able to reason.
We're able to talk.
We're able to analyze.
We are able to apply God-given common sense.
So let's do it.
Rocco is a very, very distinguished American, originally born in Italy, but an American citizen.
Very, very successful, one of the most successful Italian immigrants in our country, if not the most successful.
He owns right close to home the New York Cosmos.
He owns the fifth largest cable company in America, Mediacom, which many of you, I'm sure, are familiar with.
And he owns a football club, or what we would call a soccer club, in Florence, A.F.C.
Fiorentina.
And I'm going to let him tell you about his experience and what he's doing about the terrible plague that has hit Italy.
We know Italy is the Thank you, Mayor Giuliani.
third or first worst hit country.
And we'll have Rocco explain it.
But let me begin this way.
Rocco, thank you very, very much for joining us.
Thank you, Mayor Giuliani.
I call you Mayor Giuliani because you've been one of my heroes.
Oh, you're too kind.
In my career, you know, in this country and following you, I've been growing up in the
Bronx, gone to school in Manhattan, worked in Brooklyn.
And it's interesting, you know, that we're talking about Italy right now, but we have two great Italians like you.
Well, of course, yes.
Well, everything points back to Brooklyn, I've found.
And the Bronx, yes.
There we have Anthony Fauci.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, that's a senator, you know, is probably as important
as any other person, American.
Well, of course, yes.
Of America through this crisis.
And he's also a Brooklyn boy like you.
Ha ha ha ha ha.
Well, everything points back to Brooklyn, I've found.
And the Bronx, and the Bronx.
And the Bronx, yes, the home of the Yankees.
So, Rocco, I understand about 30 days ago, You were in Florence watching your team play.
Right.
Tell us what that was like and tell us in your own words what has happened.
It was a little more than a month ago, a month and a week maybe, but we were in Genova watching my team Quarantina, which is from the city of Florence, playing Sampdoria.
We won big time that game.
And then we were in Milan, picked up the plane, come back to New York.
And we were scheduled to go back in two or three weeks with my wife.
By the way, in the last seven months, seven, eight months, we have taken eight trips back and forth, always spending a couple of weeks in Italy.
And then all hell broke loose because, as you are now aware, Italy became the epicenter of this crisis in Europe.
We have more deaths right now.
In Italy, then China.
We have close to 6,000.
I think they're going to come out with the new numbers, Mayor.
Yes.
We're speaking Monday today, and they're going to come out with the new numbers in about an hour.
Right.
But I think we're very close to 6,000 deaths in Italy.
Oh my goodness.
But it's serious for a country as small as Italy.
So how did you first find out about it, Rocco? You came back to the United States,
must have been happy that your team won. You always have a wonderful time in Italy,
I know that, I always do. So you came back and then what happened?
Yeah, no, I go to work, by the way. No, I've seen, I think I've been to one or two museums
in the last six months.
So I've been to Florence, got plenty of museums.
I go there to work and spend time with the team.
I found out because in subsequent weeks, It was all this delay, whether the team's going to be able to play or not, whether they're going to be playing in front of crowds or not.
We sent our team up to Udine, which is in northern Italy, towards the Austria border.
And an hour before we were supposed to start playing the game, you know, they said no, the game should stop.
We came back, I played, then a week later we got restarted again.
And to make a long story short, I think that's where our team, you know, began getting affected.
It was not as serious, you know, when I left to Italy, just the way it was not as serious in America, you know, two or three weeks ago.
But it soon, you know, took a life of its own.
And today, as I mentioned, we have close to 60,000 cases and close to 6,000 deaths throughout the country of Italy.
What kind of strain would that be for Italy, particularly the 6,000 beds for patients?
Yeah, the 6,000, that's not bad.
Oh, 6,000 people died, okay.
How many are in the hospital, do you know?
Uh, no, I do not know that, uh, specifically, but let me, let me, uh, let me say a good part and a bad part about this whole thing, all right?
First of all, and it's a, it's a refresh of what may happen in the U.S.
Uh, the Quarantina team, Has had 12 people infected by this disease of those people
six are in the hospital I've been in the hospital and if you do some averaging, you
know, it's got 60 million people and and you extrapolate and assume, you know that
Yeah, we have a close to a 3% hit ratio in our in our family in quarantine
That's pretty significant in a country with 60 million people.
1.8 million infected people.
I don't think it's that high, but I also, Rudy, I also don't think it's as low as 60,000.
It's way, way more people infected because I believe we have not had any serious situations in our club in the sense that, you know, there's people close to, you know, having, you know, serious, serious So, the denominator doesn't make sense to me, if you follow me.
I think there's way more than 60,000 people infected, and then it begins making sense as to, you know, comparing it to quarantine as to why the dead people are nearly as high as they are.
You know, a dead to infected ratio of 10% is not realistic, doesn't make any sense.
Right.
Based on what the doctors are saying, based on everything that I'm reading.
So I think, you know, to put people, you know, the good part, the bad part is that we have more infected.
The good part is that the death rate is not as severe as these numbers coming out of Italy indicate.
So let me ask you this.
You have undertaken a very ambitious program to help, and I think that's wonderful because Italy is one of our strongest friends and allies.
There are tremendous, obviously, connections between Italy and America.
Italian-Americans are a very, very big part of the United States.
So, tell us what you've done with... I think you're doing it yourself and you're doing something along with the Viola family, isn't that right?
Right.
So, about a week ago we started this GoFundMe website where my family contributed $250,000 as a start.
And then... God bless you.
And then we began accepting contributions, small and large, from various donors, both
here in the US and in Italy.
And right now, we're at 550,000 euros, I should say, not dollars.
And I plead for anyone that loves Italy, for anyone that's got any Italian blood or not, you know, to please help out.
And the website is ForzaEcquore, ForzaEcquore, I'm sorry, ForzaEcquore, sprint and heart.
ForzaEcquore.
Forza a quarter and I would urge anyone you know that wants to make a small big whatever contribution to go to his website We'll put that up.
We've already been dispersed to the local hospitals around Florence and the overall, you know, Tuscana region as we increase the dollar amounts.
I heard, Mayor, that your ancestors come from Pistoia, Monte Cattini a Telle, which is very, very close to Florence.
So for anyone that's ever gone to the city of Florence, For anyone that's ever been in Tuscany or any part of Italy, frankly, you know, now's the time to contribute.
I want you to know, Mayor, that the Columbus Foundation just came up with $10,000 that they want to contribute to the hospital chains that we're making the contributions to.
And the money will be used for the necessary stuff, the equipment, the gowns, the mascherine.
You know, the facemasks, the ventilators, any equipment that's surely needed in the system today because everyone is stressed in Italy, including the frontliners, the medical profession, which is the most critical part of this whole thing.
Well, that's also the priority that we have here right now, which is to keep our medical professionals, the doctors, the nurses, the EMTs, and then our law enforcement people, to keep them healthy so that they can continue to take care of us.
So I would urge people to contribute.
America has... I mean, I know a lot of people feel, well, we have our own problems and they're going to be very difficult.
But America is a big country with the biggest heart in the world.
And we can always find a little something to help another country, particularly one like Italy.
And I urge people to make the contribution.
All they have to do is go online to Forza e Cuore, Strength and Heart.
Would that get them there?
Yeah, or the Viola channel.
Viola.
V-I-O-L-A channel.
And that will go to the website.
The Viola channel.
But we'll put that in writing so people can see it, and I will make a contribution as soon as I get off to urge my fellow Italian-Americans to do the same.
And my family, my grandfather's family, came from Pistoia, right near Montecatini.
His name was Rodolfo, hence my name is Rudolph.
But my grandmother's family came right from the city of Florence.
So they may be rooting for our team.
And I have some relatives on my grandfather's side there, and I'll have to check in with them.
They now live near Pistoia.
It's amazing. It's amazing, you know.
So they may be rooting for our team.
The way you root for the Yankees here, your family may be up...
Oh, my father, I mean, if my father was alive, he'd be one of your hats.
He was a big proponent of Florence, and my mother was a big proponent of Naples.
And although neither one of them ever went to Italy, I mean, they were born in the United States,
the only thing they ever thought about was what was better, Northern Italy or Southern Italy?
I don't know.
And they come up with the craziest things.
Right.
I come from Calabria, as you probably know.
I was in Calabria a few years ago.
Beautiful, beautiful country.
So was my wife.
We were both born there.
I'm an immigrant.
I came here at the age of 12.
But let me, if you will, if you'll let me, let me just ask...
Please, say what you believe is necessary.
This is very, very important.
Let me just ask, look, Italy has been an ally of the U.S.
for many centuries, decades, right?
One of America's greatest friends.
And right now, as I read the papers, I understand what's happened.
And by the way, the U.S.
has multiple military bases in and around Italy, including in the port of Naples.
Right.
And, you know, Italy is getting a lot of supplies, doctors, materials from China, from Russia,
and from Cuba very recently.
They sent to Italy a plane load of doctors.
And I would hope that the American government also finds some ways of helping out the situation in Italy.
I know we have major problems in the U.S.
also.
But, you know, it would be nice if the government steps up a little bit and helps out one of its You know, major allies.
That's been the case for the last 70, 80 years.
I think in a situation like this that's worldwide, although your first obligation has to be to your people, you've got to be able to find something to put aside to help others.
And also I would say to my fellow citizens, even those who are not of Italian background, that Italy is just one of the great treasures that we have for our history, our culture, It's a country that really gives more to beauty than I can think of any other country.
And it's a poor country in many ways.
Anything you can find is helpful, even the gesture.
I remember on September 11th, Rocco, I was one day into it, had no chance to think about anything other than there was this, from the first moment there was this thought in my mind, all these families are going to be left without a father, possibly a mother, the breadwinner.
And I said, I've got to make them all whole.
I've got to make them all whole.
But how can I do it?
I mean, we used to lose a firefighter, and we would be able to raise a lot of money for that one firefighter, or two.
But now I had... I didn't even know, at that point, I didn't even know how many.
I thought it was about 600.
It ended up being 373.
But how am I going to be able to do this for 600 firefighters?
And who knew how many police officers?
And the day after I called GE, And the new head of GE volunteered $10 million just for the firefighters and police officers.
And that one organization that I set up raised $324 million.
It all went to the firefighters and police officers' families.
So America's got a big heart.
These Italian people are suffering.
Working with them, we can learn a lot.
A lot of the modeling we're doing, you know, is based on Italy and China, South Korea.
This is a little bit of guesswork.
This is a new virus.
So we're all in this together.
And Rocco, I can't tell you how much I admire How you've come forward and been a leader here.
And I have great respect.
I think everyone knows the Viola family.
I have great respect for them.
They're wonderful people.
So I hope that Forza A Cuore is a great success.
And I hope to be able to talk to you, you know, periodically.
Maybe you could give us an update on the condition in Italy, periodically, if you don't mind.
Yeah, absolutely.
I hope in a good way that Italy becomes a test case rather to follow and take the good and learn from the bad too because there's been some mistakes made.
When this thing started in Italy, you know, given the fact that we did not know, you know, what the impact would be, we didn't close up the borders the way we should have maybe.
We didn't close up the communities the way we should have.
So it allowed for this thing, you know, to spread faster than otherwise.
But the Lombardy region, with the capital being Milan, that's the heart of the commercial financial center of Italy.
And that's really, really, really terribly affected.
Hopefully, you know, when I come down south, you know, all the way down, you know, you know, Italy is right.
And that island of Sicily.
Because if the region with the best medical, you know, the hospital facilities, the doctors and so on, it's really in the Alberta region.
If they're getting overwhelmed right now, right?
Think of Milan as New York, right?
If they're getting overwhelmed at the medical facilities, imagine what would happen in other
parts of Italy that are poorer if this thing hits down the bottom.
So now, hopefully we've learned from the situation in Italy, and hopefully we have reached a
peak in Italy, that things will get better, as they did in South Korea, as they did in
China.
And it opens up, you know, a window, a heaven, you know, opens up, you know, for other countries that come after Italy to learn from the mistakes that might have been made so we don't have the same situation in the city or in the rest of the world.
Well, that would be something that is going to happen.
The question is when.
And I think if people contribute and get involved and America gets involved and we work together, we can make it happen faster.
So I will keep checking in with you, Rocco.
And once again, my admiration for leading this effort and for bringing the Viola family in and your family.
God will reward you for it.
Thank you, Mayor.
Thank you, Rocco.
Hey, God bless you too, alright?
And everyone... Yes, everyone here has hope.
We're gonna get through this.
We're gonna get through it together.
Thank you.
God bless.
So that was a very illuminating interview with a very, very fine man who's stepped up and donated a good deal of money to the country of his origin and to a country that's very much connected to the United States.
Italy is a tragedy, as is China and it looks like Spain and the United States and so many others.
But Italy was one of the first.
It now has surpassed China.
Right now, and these numbers probably will change dramatically and be higher by the time we're on the air, but right now there are about 60,000 cases in Italy, 60,000 in a country that's a relatively small country.
There are about 5,400 deaths, 5,400 people that have died.
They're running at about 600 or 700 a day.
That's a lot of people dying in a day.
There were a couple of days of decline, We've got to see if that remains.
That would be good news if it were the case.
They only have recorded 7,000 recoveries, but I assume there are a lot more than that that's just not being recorded properly.
It's hard to know when there's a recovery in a 14-day period.
What can we learn from Italy?
What we can learn from Italy is that you've got to move to this very, very strict separation.
That's the way I describe it, quickly.
Closing down large gatherings like the Fiorentina soccer team.
Maybe should have been closed earlier.
Reminding people that they have to keep distance.
There's got to be social distancing because of the way this disease spreads.
I think we can learn a lot from Italy.
any doubt about your situation or even just to be careful that you don't pick it up to
the extent that you can do it.
And then if you do it in a reasonable way, maybe it doesn't have to be done as a major
thing for the whole country.
I think we can learn a lot from Italy.
I think that a lot of our modeling about what we're predicting comes obviously from China,
from Italy, from South Korea, from Spain, to see what we're going to encounter.
We'll see you next time.
We did start much earlier than Italy doing things that maybe will have an impact.
We closed our borders to people that might be at risk much, much earlier.
Italy didn't do that.
We began this program of self-isolation and social distancing and being careful about contact.
Probably a little bit earlier, but roughly at about the same time.
So let's hope that our situation is going to be better than Italy's.
And there's one other factor that I should mention that is a big, big factor.
Italy is the second oldest country in the world.
I think that it's The population of 65 and over is somewhere around 24%, whereas in the United States it's about 16%.
So, since this is a disease where the mortality, fatality rate for people over 60 is much, much higher than people below, That might also have an impact.
And our health care system is different than Italy.
So all those things have to be factored in.
But we've got to watch these other countries because they're going to tell us, at least to give us some of the risks of where we may go and we can prevent them.
Again, if you have a chance and you can see your way clear to making a donation, Even if it's a small one, I know there's a lot of economic stress on us now.
To Italy, it'd be a good thing.
And at the same time, pay attention to it, because we may learn things that will help us.
We'll be back in a short while.
For those of you who know me, in addition to law and politics, I'm passionate about the Yankees, baseball, football, all sports to watch, and cigars to relax, And socialize.
The revolution was led by one man, and one man alone, Marvin Shankin and Cigar Aficionado Magazine.
Marvin had been rating wines quite successfully for Wine Spectator Magazine, and he brought the rating system to cigars.
Even now, the first thing I do when I get my magazine is I go right to the ratings page.
There it is.
Hmm, 93.
91.
Oh yeah, I'll go for that one.
Then there'll be 94.
92.
Problem is you gotta get there fast, because they go fast.
We're back, and we're back with a very, very important and a very interesting guest, and I guarantee you this is going to have to be a multi-part interview.
This man's life is so interesting that we're only going to touch on a small part of it.
He's going to be back a lot.
His name is Giulio Nasso, just like Giuliani, and he was born in Italy and became an American citizen.
He came here at two, so he's an American.
Two years old, yeah.
This is another one of those great American success stories, and I'm very proud to say Italian-American success stories, and you'll see how.
We're going to have him back because his career is fabulous.
He studied to be a pharmacist.
Mm-hmm.
So we'll go through that another time.
A whole growing up in Brooklyn.
Mm-hmm.
Me too.
Yep.
Flatbush.
What about you?
Borough Park.
Borough Park.
All right.
Slash Bensonhurst.
Bensonhurst.
Right.
Not far from Everett Field.
No.
No.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
So You became a pharmacist, and you had a pharmacy in Brooklyn.
Correct.
And that was your business?
I worked in the pharmacy since I was eight years old.
Right.
And then tell us what happened that sort of was like the breakthrough for you, and how you get to where you are now, where you can help us so much.
Well, Mayor, back then when I graduated pharmacy school, I worked in the pharmacy that I grew up in since I was eight.
When it was time to go to college, I didn't know anything else, so I went to pharmacy school.
When I got out of pharmacy school, I really said to myself, I don't know if I want to stay behind a counter for forty years.
So I went on and I got my Ph.D.
in Pharmacology.
What's the difference?
What would Pharmacology be?
Just like in any other profession, you have a graduate, B.S.
in Pharmacy.
And then at the time, the universities added another year of study because it was a five-year program to get a B.S.
And then you had to do another year in a specialty and you got your PhD equivalent.
In pharmacology or whatever you decided to get your PhD in.
Then did you open a pharmacy?
Like a regular... Yeah.
Well, the pharmacy that I grew up in as a little boy, when James Pharmacy, when he retired, he says, you know, now you got to take the store.
And when was that?
What year was that?
I started when I was eight years old, so it was 1960.
And that was in the Borough Park area?
No, that was in the tip of Borough Park.
That was on 18th Avenue and 61st Street and it was called James Farmasing.
So, okay, so then at some point you're running the place.
Yeah, later on.
And tell us the story about how you got into the shipping business.
One day, I was working behind the counter as a pharmacist.
We could do a movie.
This is a movie.
So a crew member came in from a cargo ship.
Right.
Because the pharmacy wasn't far from the wharfs.
This particular ship was docked in 57th Street and First Avenue in Brooklyn.
And we're talking about 19 Now I'm a pharmacist.
I'm not eight years old no more.
I started the company in 1974 and then registered it in 1976.
I did it while I was in pharmacy school.
So this is when we had a gigantic port in New York.
Correct.
Since gone.
Correct.
Probably the biggest in America.
Absolutely.
I could rattle off the names.
And I remember the old Brooklyn Navy Yard where they built like 75% of the ships for the Second World War.
That's correct.
I mean this was a ship building town.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
So go ahead.
So this crew member came in and he had a long list of items.
And the list was like 20 bottles of aspirin, 80 bottles of cough syrup,
burn ointment, gauzes, antibiotics, tetracycline.
on.
On every tanker commercial ship, there is a standard list that is put out by the World Health Organization.
Every commercial ship, whether it's an Italian flag vessel, a U.S.
vessel, they all have to follow those standards.
of what's on that list in order to pass safety so they could go out to sea.
So they have to basically have, they're medically supplied almost as if they're a hospital.
They have little hospitals.
As a hospital.
This would be true of the tankers, the commercial ships.
Correct.
This would be true of the cruise ships as well.
Correct.
Now, they don't have doctors.
They have telemedicine.
Who does it?
These commercial ships that are out there.
They have telemedicine?
Yeah.
What about the cruise ships?
Well, I'll tell you, the tankers there are linked into George Washington University Emergency Room.
That's what we do.
We connect them directly.
So if a crew member, and it happens every day, They fall, they get burns, they have a kidney stone, you know, and they're out at sea 14 days, sometimes 20 days.
So they do the telemedicine like we're doing a lot now during this crisis.
Right.
So you're very familiar with that.
Twenty-four, yeah.
So they'll get a call and they'll say, listen, somebody just fell.
They'll go, okay, go to the medical chest.
It's not a first aid kit.
There's everything there from morphine to everything you need to help a person in any type of a situation.
We'll talk about the tanker now.
Tanker.
No doctor, but every master needs to pass This course, based on, and this list is in that, they need to know how to start an IV.
They need to know how to... Basics.
Basics.
And a heart attack, etc, etc.
Would they be like EMTs?
It's like an EMT.
Right.
They have to pass that in order to be licensed as a captain.
And that's an international law, just like the pilot is.
So that brought you into the business, as a pharmacist, of supplying their needs.
Yeah.
Well, what happened was when this crew member came in with this huge list... Amazing how life works.
I said, we don't have 80 bottles.
I got three bottles of Cork syrup.
He says, you got to get this for me.
You got to get this for me.
I said, all right, give me an hour.
You know, so what I did was I got the delivery boys and my two younger brothers that are pharmacists and then became medical doctors.
Uh, they followed the brother, you know, that I had.
When I was a pharmacist, one was a junior pharmacist, the other guy was the delivery boy.
And then it went on and on and on.
So, so I got my younger brothers and two other boys that were working there.
I said go to every pharmacy, every key, back then we had key food, the key food supermarkets.
You just got everything there.
Just go get what you can.
So we got 20 bottles of aspirin, whatever it was, but it came from five different sources.
So at the end I gave him the receipts.
I says I was able to get 95% of everything.
He says, oh my God, thank you.
We were supposed to leave at 11 o'clock tonight.
They told us we weren't going to leave.
Now we're going to get charged with extra dock charges and extra towing, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
I said, OK, well, here you go.
So I'll never forget this, because that number is what sparked an idea in my head, Mayor.
The total medicines back then came out to a little under $200, you know, from this pharmacy, that pharmacy.
This was in the 70s.
This was actually 1974.
$200 to fully supply The things that they were lacking.
Not fully, but they didn't have sufficient for a 14-day voyage.
So we managed to get them the items that they needed to be in full compliance.
When he went to pay me at the $200, He kept going with $400.
I'll never forget it.
In my drug store, we used to put the neighbor on the credit.
When my patients would come in, they'd say, here's my check from the sanitation department, from the cops, the teachers.
We were a blue neighborhood.
Old Brooklyn.
Yeah.
So now he goes, $400.
I says, no, no, no, no, no, no.
You paid, I says.
He says, oh no.
He says, in our service, in our shipping industry, we pay for a service.
I says, you did a service.
You went out and got all these packages.
Oh, you did?
You did, yeah.
You saved his... Yeah, he saved the millions.
You saved his ship and then... I said I'm gonna save them maybe a half a million dollars that night because they lose time and... So basically they give you a bonus for... They give you a bonus.
Ah, I see what happened in that smart head.
So I said, Mayor, I said, well, look, all you got to do is give $20.
Back then, I says, all you got to do is give the boys $20 each.
They'll be happy.
He says, no.
He says, I want you to take the $400.
He was a very nice Greek first officer, chief officer, underneath the captain.
You probably bailed him out, because he was sent out to get these The point is that you go into this business.
It then involves cruise ships as well.
You supply the cruise ships, but the cruise ships have doctors.
Well, let's get to that.
We've got to go over this story in another time.
The point is that you go into this business.
It then involves cruise ships as well.
You supply the cruise ships, but the cruise ships have doctors.
And do they have operating rooms too?
Mayor, I could tell you that they have some of the best facilities because I started with
the whole evolution back in the 80s with Carnival, the first Carnival ship with Mickey Aronson.
And then from there, I started supplying as the ships... About 17,000 ships you supply now?
All over the world?
We have 17,000 commercial ships And 95% of the cruise ships that are floating all over the world.
And right now you got about 380 something that are just sitting there with crews and medically supplied.
Yeah.
Fully stocked.
There's 270 in the American Clear Association, which we're also members.
They all belong to the Clear Association, our cruise ships.
Actually, President Trump did his interview with Clear when he had all the CEOs a couple weeks ago.
So all the CEOs of these cruise ships, when he was offering assistance, et cetera, et cetera, they all had that conference.
No, I think it was vice president.
I don't think the American people realize, I didn't certainly, that these 287 cruise ships, they're all fairly large, but some really gigantic ones, I think you said there's one for 8,500 people.
Yes.
It usually has about 12 doctors, 24 nurses.
Correct.
280, what are the 200?
270.
87.
287 cruise ships.
Mm-hmm.
From, they're all fairly large, but really, some really gigantic ones, I think, I think
you said there's one for 8,500 people.
Yes.
It usually has about 12 doctors, 24 nurses.
Correct.
So that's a big hospital.
Well, it's a floating city.
That population is bigger than some of our counties.
Right, right.
So, they're just sitting there, and the doctors and the nurses There are a few that are still operating.
even during this hiatus.
That's part of the contract.
So they're sitting there literally doing nothing except maybe caring for some crew members
that might have the illness.
There are a few that are still operating.
For example, our American cruise ship that we service, the Pride of America in Honolulu.
It's a Norwegian cruise line ship.
And just yesterday we serviced them with 5,000 tests.
So if I were the mayor of New York or San Francisco or one of these cities, Boston, where you could bring a ship in rather easily, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Miami, think of how many cities are like that, New Orleans, I could call you, Jules, now, sir, and say, Jules, can you get me a ship or two?
Absolutely.
It might give me a capacity for a couple thousand more beds.
A couple thousand more beds plus a working hospital with the doctors there, the equipment there.
Everything.
They're probably going to be tied up, you believe, until about December.
My honest opinion, the industry is doing their statistics.
My honest opinion, being in the business for 46 years, I don't think they're going to book anything before September.
I really do.
Because the first thing that they have to do is convince the world That it's safe to go on.
That it's safe to go on.
Let me ask you that.
So suppose, just suppose you were able to make a deal with Governor Cuomo or Mayor de Blasio or maybe President Trump and you could get a couple of these ships in to New York or Philadelphia or Boston.
Would people be afraid because of the couple, two or three situations?
Would they be afraid to go on a cruise ship in order to be treated?
No.
I don't think so and here's why.
Here's what my opinion as a pharmacist and a pharmacologist.
I would first have the ship inspected.
Now, Rudy, keep, Mayor, keep in mind, okay, that not all the ships were affected.
Of course.
There's still some ships that are floating.
There's still some ships that are servicing in various parts of the world.
In the Rio, we got ships going out in certain other.
So, and not all the shipping companies had any issues.
Norwegian Cruise Lines operates almost 20-something vessels.
They had no issues.
I had a ship go out this weekend.
We're talking about only four or five, right, that had issues?
Yeah.
One was the Holland American, the Princess Diamond.
Right.
The Holland American in Cambodia.
The Princess Diamond in Japan.
In Japan.
Thailand.
We had one in Thailand.
San Francisco.
And the one in San Francisco.
The others weren't.
So what would be a good number we could put out there?
270, 280 that would be available?
Cruise ships?
Yeah.
I think you have at least 200 cruise ships that had no virus on there.
And they're in good enough shape that they could sail to a nearby port.
They could be docked in our docks right here.
We got a docks on 57th Street.
So has anybody taken advantage of this, Jules?
You're all the talk about hospital beds, hospital beds, hospital beds.
What I did is this morning, because, you know, I'm very close with the Italian government and the president.
I called his assistant and I said to him, I says, listen, MSC Cruises, which is Mediterranean Cruise Ships, they have 19 vessels, even down in Florida they're operating three, and the rest are all over the world.
I said, please tell the President that he should look into calling the CEO, MSC, Mr. Vargo, who's a friend of mine in Genoa, and see if you could work out a plan I don't know, at least, how you guys work it, but they're just sitting there doing nothing.
I would assume this would be at the mayor-governor level, because it's a different state.
Or the federal level.
Or the federal level, I guess, if they could make it available, like they've made the military ships available.
But if somebody, if a mayor wanted to get in contact with you, just call you.
Just call me.
You could make the contact form with the shipping line.
Immediately.
And then they would have to deal with the shipping line.
Then he'll put whoever they deal with in their administration to work out numbers.
You could short-circuit that.
I could short-circuit that, but I could also, more important...
As a professional, as a pharmacist.
Right, right.
You can make an evaluation for them.
I can make an evaluation for them and recommend the ships because we have all our products on those ships.
You got a card, Jules?
I'm sorry?
You got a card?
I'm going to put it up on a... You gave me one.
I'm going to put your card up.
You're going to get a lot of calls, I hope.
I hope these people wake up, wake up, wake up.
We're overwhelmed, but... When I heard that thing about a couple of days ago about we don't have enough hospital beds, we don't have enough hospital beds, I said to myself, I remember when we had to deal with the possibility of smallpox.
Bernie Kerrick and I found so many hospital possibilities.
It was endless.
Because, you know, we downsized hospitals.
Right?
So, Kings County Hospital used to hold 800.
It used to hold 800 people.
Right.
Down to like 250.
Goldwater closed.
And frankly, a lot of these people are not that sick.
It'd be kind of a nice environment for them too.
Absolutely.
Plus these ships are even better if you're going to do isolation.
These are big ships.
You could have two different isolation wards.
And frankly, a lot of these people are not that sick.
It'd be kind of a nice environment for them too.
Absolutely.
They even have housekeeping.
Because they use the pool.
I don't know if you can with this illness.
But this illness runs the gamut from being deadly and very painful to being virtually nothing.
So this is a wonderful offer.
We're going to put up the number.
We're going to tell people, serious people, to call you and try to help these cities who are looking for a temporary situation.
Now tell me, what happened with Italy?
Okay.
Italy is the first to... Yeah.
But you went to them.
Yeah, because for the past three years, I've been working on the 50th anniversary with both presidents.
It happens to be this year is their 50th anniversary of relationships, China-Italy.
So we started the first concert January.
January when, this year?
17th.
Was Bocelli part of it?
No, no, no, no.
It was all the Italian performers and all the Chinese performers.
You know, and President Xi recommended me because back on May 15th of this year, I produced for him and his wife in front of 48 heads of state.
The largest concert ever recorded in the history of entertainment.
What was it?
It was the Chinese-Asian Cultural Exchange.
And who performed?
Well, each country had their dance.
Then it was China, Singapore, South Korea and North Korea, Iraq, Iran.
I'm going to leave you a clip of it.
So there were 48 countries and 48 leaders.
So while I was producing the show with my son, I said, you know what?
We need a halftime here, you know?
We have to have a halftime here.
And to stop, because it's too much.
Right.
Right?
To break it.
And he says, what are you thinking?
I says, listen, I just wish I could get Andrea Bocelli here.
He's got nothing to do with the Asia group.
Well, everybody loves him.
I says, but, you know, we put him... I'll make him the highlight, the diamond of the event.
So he says, well, I don't know.
I got to get permission from the first lady.
I says, listen to me.
You just call her assistant now.
Does she want Bocelli?
Yes, I want the Bocelli.
Well, they called me to have Bocelli the two months before that when President Xi went to Italy for the state dinners, I had a request from the First Lady if I could have Andrea Bocelli sing for both presidents.
Well, maybe he should do a fundraiser for Italy.
Well, I'm going to talk to you about that.
You think about that.
No, I'm sorry, it works.
I was issued that.
Here's the way we have to sum this up.
So tell us a bit about Italy, the Vatican, and the advice you have, I guess for us, based on what you saw there, what you know about there.
Okay.
Well, in a few words, I have a very strong relationship with the Vatican because His Holy Father, they gave me the title of Cavalier of the Vatican.
Oh, congratulations.
Thank you.
Thank you.
That's a very, very honorary title.
Very important title.
As a result of that, my spiritual advisor there, Don Aldo is the number one exorcist for the Pope and for people, Don Aldo.
He has an organization that we... When you say exorcist, that gets people going.
Yeah, but people are afraid of that word, but all it means is to exit all negative energy.
I remember.
I wanted to be a priest.
It's one of the orders of the priesthood.
There are seven orders before you become a priest.
Subdeacon, deacon, priest being the final.
Exorcist, I think, is the third or fourth.
You're ordained as a young seminarian.
You're ordained to drive out the devil.
Sometimes when I Deal with some of these cases of mine, I feel like I'm fighting the devil.
I won't mention one particular one where we have a lot of devils.
So, from the advice, what would you say we should take from the Italian experience?
From the advice, what would you say we should take from the Italian experience?
I have great empathy for this reason.
We call it the novel coronavirus for a reason.
It's new.
Where's the vaccine?
Well, how can you make a vaccine if you don't know the disease?
Right.
We only found out about this in December.
That's December to January, January to February, February to March.
Three months!
Where's the vaccine?
I mean, okay.
Nobody knew that this was going to happen.
And if you tell me, well, you could predict it, then you don't understand flu, you don't understand coronavirus.
There are millions of strains.
So, sure, could it have been done better?
Yes.
Could China have notified faster?
Yes.
Would this still have been a terrible crisis?
Absolutely.
It's the virus that's the main problem, and some of it was handled wrong, some of it was handled right.
Now, you also think you can help with the Chinese government.
I'm very close.
And I want you to tell that if you feel comfortable telling us.
I could feel very comfortable telling you that I had the honor of meeting President Xi three times last year only.
Three times.
President Martirella, I left on February 17th when I was invited.
You left?
No, I was in Milan.
I was in Rome, in Italy, February 17th, because I was invited to the 150th anniversary of the Republic of Italy.
And you were with whom?
The president, Andrea, sang the Italian national anthem.
And I was very influential helping Italy and China with the Silk Road Treaty.
The what?
Silk Road Treaty.
Right.
China and Italy have amazing, amazing relationships.
So do you think that's one of the reasons that Italy was hit so hard, as well as the aging population?
You know... Aging, not Asian, aging population.
Mayor, being a pharmacist, being a pharmacologist, studying chemical warfare, nuclear warfare, biological warfare, the list goes on and on, okay?
I feel comfortable to tell you that I don't believe this started with a little Chinese man eating a mouse.
They've been eating mice for hundreds of years.
You know?
Theory.
So you don't think, I mean, the theory, one of the theories is it came from a bat, they ate the bat, they got the disease, right?
No, that's not my theory, that's what they're saying.
No, that's the theory that some people have.
That everybody's saying, yes.
So you tell me yours as we conclude and leave people in suspense.
My theory as a chemist and a scientist, alright?
And I want to create anything that's not true, Right.
But practicality and scientifically... Yeah, what does common sense tell you?
Common sense tells me that it's biological warfare.
By the Chinese?
Yeah.
No.
Not at all.
The Germans?
Who are the protagonists?
Let's say this.
Put a pin in that.
And I'll give you a prediction, but I don't think we should talk about this because it... Well, if you don't want to, don't.
No, I mean, it's just that everybody's already nervous about what's going on.
You're not saying that...
Are you saying the Chinese would do this?
Because they paid a heavy price for their biological...
There are a lot of theories, and I was present at them.
One of my theories is that President Xi was fighting for a year with the riots in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong, right.
At a certain point, he got fed up.
And mainland China, they have two systems.
One system is the communist system and the other system is what we have.
Right.
Capitalism.
That's done through two territories owned and operated by China.
Right.
One is Macau and one is Hong Kong.
Right.
I was told to come in December to the inauguration of China with the president to meet the ministers and leaders of Macau, which I did.
And President Xi went there.
He cut out a piece of the communist mainland portion that's still communist now.
Which is adjacent to Hong Kong, Macau, and then there's the mainland.
Right, right, right in between.
Yeah, right at that point you could go to, it's like a triangle.
Right, right.
And he said to them, I want you to build one of the biggest commercial financial centers on this extra land because Macau only had the casinos and, you know, it's like Vegas.
So, My theory?
When that happened, he ordered everybody, many people in China from the mainland, because the way the system works, you don't get billed from Communist China, even though the manufacturers are there.
The majority of the billing goes through the Hong Kongs.
So the invoices come from Hong Kong.
So what do you think happened?
What I think happened, my first theory was, That because of the instability of the finances going down in Hong Kong, being transported over.
I'm not blaming the Brits.
That's the last thing I want to do.
But my theory is that because of the capacity of the finances and drops, and were transferred over to Macau, right?
Hong Kong was governed And built for a hundred years by the Brits.
People in government there are still Brit linear, right?
And my feeling is that this was planted.
It's my theory.
Go ahead.
With my science background.
And I really believe that it also has something to do with Iraq and Israel.
How so?
How Iraq and Israel?
Well... Who?
From what I know... Iraq or Israel?
I'm sorry, Iran.
Iran and Israel.
You think it's Iran?
They were Iran and... Trying to develop a weapon against Israel?
They have it.
Weapon meaning the virus?
No.
I think they have it.
And my theory is that they're getting ready to do something with Israel.
When you say they have it, what's it?
The bomb.
Oh, I gotcha.
Okay.
There's no more reactors and we got this, we got that.
So how does that connect to the virus?
My theory.
Good!
Interesting theories.
You know, it's my educational, scientific, that I studied biowarfare.
That's what bothers me.
And we all know what happened to Ukraine.
They did a little thing and a guy blew up.
I could get a little piece of resin on an umbrella.
So, my theory is that Iran is planning to do this.
Coincidentally, we just happened to send 35,000-40,000 troops to NATO, which is online, but it doesn't tell you what.
It's exercises.
But my people in Europe are telling me something different.
And that's why they're all munkered down and not out in case that happens.
They'll blow that missile right out of the sky.
And there'll be a cloud.
It'll be Chernobyl.
It'll be what happened in Japan.
Well, let's hope that that isn't true.
That's not going to happen.
It's not going to happen.
There you go.
You get a chance to look at it.
It's not going to happen.
Let me one more time.
Gary.
Gary.
We have to conclude.
Sorry.
Let me one other time make this plea for you and for us.
Jules is making an offer that is very, very important.
He's saying that if you contact him or you contact me and I put you in contact with him, however you want to get to us, we'll give you that information.
He would be capable of producing a couple of ships that, let's say, they're hospitals.
They're floating hospitals.
Floating hospitals in a situation like this are very, very useful because we have to be thinking about isolation, but this would be comfortable isolation on a cruise ship that people pay thousands of dollars to go on, and you'd be treated well.
There are already doctors there, nurses there, medicines there, operating rooms there, examining rooms there.
The whole deal.
And meals.
And meals.
Cooks are there.
So this could be very, very helpful, given what Governor Cuomo described as like a competition.
Between states for this, there may be enough out there.
So, Jules, we're going to be back with you again.
But I want to tell you, thank you very, very much for that, for the contribution.
I hope, I hope, I hope more than just Italy takes.
Oh, we've got to go like that.
That's right.
Oh, no, like this, man.
Remember, we're two Italians, so it's hard to do.
And we like a hug.
Thank you so much.
I think you will find that this was a very extraordinary interview, a real practical piece of information and advice that Gilles Nasso brings to us, as well as some understanding of what happened in Italy.
And I really would urge the people out there who are looking for these resources, get a little more energetic and get a little more creative.
I'll tell you just a secret from when I was mayor.
If I ran into this crisis with hospital, with beds, My chief of staff and my first deputy mayor be in my office and they'd be told, you know, they said, well, we don't know about the beds.
We can't get beds.
I'd say, you get me the beds by tomorrow.
I said, well, we can't do that.
I said, well, you guys are geniuses, right?
So geniuses can do miracles.
Get me the damn beds.
Otherwise, I have a new deputy mayor.
We got the beds.
Great.
Yeah, I remember.
I remember, yeah.
I mean, the only way you get things done in business, the only way you get things done in an emergency is you got to put the pressure on.
And the first moment I heard this bed crisis, I knew this was really...
Failure to have planned this in advance.
Absolutely.
This should have been planned two years.
This deal with you should have been made two, three years ago.
Ready to go.
When September 11 happened, most of the things that happened, the deals had been made two, three years before because we used to have exercises.
And then in the exercises, the exercise where Dan O'Donovan is here with me is shaking his head.
In the exercises, we would know that we're missing beds.
And that would give something.
Oh, gee, you know, there's this guy Jules.
We'll call him.
That's the way things get done.
So thank you for coming forward.
Oh, thank you.
Now, he has a whole other life in Hollywood.
You wouldn't believe it.
But Hollywood and Staten Island, great combination.
And we're going to have him back on about that very shortly, as soon as we get our head above water, because that'll be very entertaining.
And Jules, you've got quite a career.
Can I plug my number one film on Netflix?
You plug it right away.
It's called Dark.
D-A-R-C.
It's a big action martial arts and it's on the top five charts.
On Netflix right now?
On Netflix right now.
D-A-R-C.
While you're locked up at home and you want everybody to watch it as a family movie.
And I don't get anything out of it because I just sold the rights.
So if they watch it, I don't want them to think... Oh, you're not going to get something out of it?
Would it be okay if you did?
We're not communists.
No, I know, I know.
From the Godfather.
We're not communists.
I love it.
Thank you very much, Jules.
I appreciate it.
What an honor.
And good luck.
And I hope they take you up on this.
This is a good offer.
And don't go on the streets.
Don't go jogging.
Stay in the house like the Italians.
And they're getting better.
The numbers are going down.
Yeah.
Thank God.
God bless you.
Well, that surely was a very interesting interview with Jules Nassau.
This is a man filled with ideas.
There's a whole other part to him we're going to get to next time, but this is quite a generous offer and quite an important offer of many, many hospital ships that could be used in this emergency.
Particularly used in a situation where we have to isolate people.
So I do hope, I do hope mayors and governors and responsible people call Jules or call me and we'll put you in contact with him.
There's no reason when there are practical solutions out there to be floundering around with where the hospital bed is going to come from.
Jules can take care of that very quickly.
Thank you very much, and we'll be covering this, as you know, very, very deeply, because, like everyone else, we're looking for as many answers as possible.
But I really assure you, with the medical profession and with the dedicated people we have in this country, we're going to get through this.
And we're going to get through this, and when we come through it, we're going to be a stronger country than we were before.
Thank you very, very much, and God bless you, and God bless America.
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