0:01See, this is a very important beef that I have. I hope you'll let me vent for a minute.
0:04>> Oh, you can do whatever you want, John.
0:06>> One of the biggest problems that we have in this entire Israel Palestine situation is the problem of Christian Zionists, most of whom are American evangelical Christians.
0:22Palestine used to be 10% Christian. It's now more like two or 3% Christian and most of those Christians have moved to the United States. Well, evangelical support for [snorts] the Israeli government has resulted in an ethnic cleansing and the and the destruction of Christian communities in in historic Palestine.
0:49So, what side are you on? Are you trying to save Christianity or are you trying to destroy Christianity? Because you're destroying it right now. And listen, and I'm going to take a lot of [ __ ] in your comments section for saying this. But listen, if your religion was created in somebody's basement in the 1800s, I don't want to hear your position on Israel and Palestine. I don't find it valid.
1:14>> Yeah. I I think that there's been people overlooking things. And I I think that the saddest part of this whole struggle is that in society, we seem to have an inability to separate people from their governments just at the at the simplest level. I mean, you spelled it out before. You're like, and Netanyahu's government wins with [ __ ] 27% of the vote. It's all the Orthodox Jews over there.
1:39>> Exactly. You know, there was a borderline, they were very close to civil war in the summer before October 7th, which is quite interesting timing by the way, where Netanyahu seized control of the judiciary. 5 weeks before they were ra people were in the streets.
1:55We were we were seeing we were seeing demonstrations especially in in Tel Aviv and Hifa that were unprecedented in scale. He was this close to being overthrown and having to call new elections.
2:09>> That's the thing, John. It's like we've on every angle of this, we've sacrificed humanity, right? We've watched thousands of people be killed and we fight about it over tweets. Let's call it what it is. Yeah, I'm guilty. I mean, I don't fight a lot on Twitter, but like I'm watching these tweets, too. So, I'm guilty of it just like everyone else.
2:32And we also generalize all the people involved. And these are such this is such a nuance situation when it comes to the people involved and who it is. And like you've now seen, you know, I have so many Jewish friends in America who don't [ __ ] with what Israel is doing at all.
2:50>> And yet they get dragged into this cuz it's like, you know, >> it's true. It leads to anti-semitism. I was having lunch in New York. I'm going to say the the weather was nice, so it must have been like May or June. sitting with a buddy of mine at an outside uh cafe and he happens to be Jewish.
3:08>> He's not Zionist or fist in the air. He just happens to be Jewish. So, we're talking about this uh about October 7th and the war about Israel's response to October 7th. and he said, "As a Jew, I really fear that Israel's heavy hand is going to result in increases in anti-semitism, especially in the United States." Well, there were these two women sitting next to us, both in their 80s, they told us later, >> and one of them finally said, "Excuse me, but I couldn't help but to overhear your conversation."
3:43She, the one said, "We're both Jewish, too, and we have the same fears. We are seeing an increase in ami anti-semitism, especially in New York, >> but it's because of the Israeli government's actions.
3:57>> Otherwise, most people wouldn't pay any attention >> to what's going on in in Israel.
4:02>> Wouldn't care. And and that's >> it wouldn't register with them.
4:04>> That's what's so like sometimes it feels like society is just being manipulated to break at all times. I've I've for a long time had this quote. I'm sure someone else came up with it at some point. I've just never cared to Google it. But, you know, at least it sounded smart the first time I said it. A divided society is a compliant society.
4:25And when you can divide people on one or two really emotional issues, you know, four or five years ago it was COVID and the [ __ ] vaccine and now it's Israel Palestine, you can distract from everything else that you don't want them to know about or you don't want them to focus on. And it's like, you know, I talk with people who are very hardcore Zionists and I talk to people who are very hardcore anti-ionist. And the commonalities I see in those conversations is that they will each make a separate point that is like, "Yes, agree 100%."
4:58>> But they're pointing at a problem that's over here. Yeah.
5:01>> And I'm like, "Right, >> yes, I agree with you. Now come back here. See how it works this way too, right here at home." And they're like, "Well, no, not whenever it comes to their issue, whatever it is, they're unwilling to see it there, but they'll see it everywhere else." And I'm like, "Guys, if we're, especially from an American perspective, this is my issue with this. You should be worried about the interests of Americans first and what's going on here first. It doesn't mean separate from the world. It doesn't mean become an isolationist, but like you should worry about what are the downstream effects here." So if China,
5:34Qatar, Iran, and Israel are all doing propaganda campaigns that involve body counts in the United States, I don't make a distinction between any of them.
5:44It's all the same thing. Why is it so hard for you Zionist and you anti-ionist to see you only see these three and you only see that one?
5:53>> It's the same [ __ ] >> It's the same thing.
5:56>> Yeah, I couldn't agree more. You know, one of the things too that has been a surprise for me, even if it [snorts] shouldn't be a surprise is is the difficulty that Americans have in even listening to people who with whom they disagree.
6:16>> Yeah.
6:17growing up my just like on my dad's side for anam as an example when my dad's parents came to the United States my my grandmother was a royalist right she supported the Greek royal family which wasn't Greek it was Danish and the king couldn't even speak Greek so he was overthrown which he deserved to be so [laughter] so my grandfather was a was a republic an with a small R. Um he supported the establishment of of the Hellenic Republic. Um and um and that's what the Greeks have now. Politically they both somehow became Democrats. On my mom's side, my grandparents didn't give two shits about politics in Greece and they
7:08became Republicans and most of their kids were Republicans. My mom was a Democrat, but my uncles voted for Wallace in ' 68 very very happily.
7:20>> And I remember my and I won't even say it because yeah, it's it involves some not very nice words, but uh they voted for Wallace, my two uncles, and um and then I I still remember being a little kid and seeing the Nixon now buttons that they that they had on. So, it just never occurred to me that there were people out there who wouldn't speak to other people just because they believe in one thing or don't believe in another. My best friends from high school, best friends. I mean, we're all in each other's weddings. We're godfathers to each other's kids.
7:53Dave McCrack and Dave's passed away, but Dave was a was a Republican, Gary Senko Republican, Guy Cabellis a Democrat, and Russ Kleta a Democrat. and it never mattered to any of us. And I just don't, you know, people say all the time, I can't believe you would go on Fox News.
8:11Why wouldn't I go on Fox News? I have a position on an issue like John Brennan.
8:17It happens to fit in with Fox News's editorial position, but maybe I can educate a Fox News viewer.
8:24>> Sure.
8:25>> If I go on tonight and I have my 20 seconds to speak my piece.
8:29>> Yeah. I think I think it's very deliberate from they whoever they >> Yeah. They they don't want us to talk to one another.
8:35>> They don't want us to do it.
8:36>> Mhm.
8:36>> Like for example, I'm sorry to interrupt you. I'm fascinated by this fissure that we're seeing right now uh among conservatives about Tucker Carlson's decision to interview Nick Fuentes.
8:49>> Okay.
8:49>> Okay. Why wouldn't you interview Nick Fuentes? If you think he's a turd with with repulsive positions, then expose him as a turd with repulsive positions, don't say, "Oh my god, I can never talk to him." No, writing him off can't talk to him. Talk to him and let him destroy himself with his repulsive positions.
9:11But this idea now, well, they have to cut off Tucker. He's no good anymore.
9:16And oh, the head of the Heritage Foundation said something nice about him, so now he has to resign. It's like, what's wrong with you people?
9:24Yeah, I think that part I think that part's crazy. I I do >> I would love to get your thoughts on this though because I look at this whole Tucker situation.
9:34It's very fascinating to me watching watching it happen because I think you're seeing a lot of laws of human nature play out. And >> what I mean by that is >> Tucker raised some points a year ago, year and a half ago, whatever that were valid points.
9:49>> Yes, sir.
9:50>> Apolitical in a lot of ways. We're talking foreign policy, things going on in the Middle East, asking Yes.
9:56>> very valid questions.
9:57>> And he's very wellinformed.
9:59>> He is wellinformed. And he got viciously attacked >> by people for it who sought to destroy him. Yes.
10:07>> And silence him. And one thing about Tucker is he's an emotional guy. Takes one to no one, you know. And so he reacts to those things and he fights fire with fire. And then the fire gets bigger and the fire gets bigger and the fire gets bigger and pretty soon, you know, you end up saying things just to set each other off. And I I think we've gone far past that point. I thought the attacks on him, calling him anti-Semitic were [ __ ] >> He's not anti-Semitic. See, but this is the thing. This is where that propaganda that you talked about a few minutes ago um enters in. It is that many Americans
10:45have been convinced that if you are anti- Netanyahu or if you are opposed to the present policies of the current Israeli government, you are anti-Semitic. In fact, a an Israeli friend of mine, a close Israeli friend of mine who served in the IDF and everything told me that they're actually taught to do that at school. That any criticism of Israel, they're supposed to label as anti-semitic so that people back off and people generally do back off.
11:14>> So, I can criticize any government around the world, even China now.
11:18Remember when that was a thing? You were racist if you criticized China. Now, they love you criticizing China, right?
11:23Like you can criticize any country around the world and it's not racist when you criticize their government, but when you criticize this one, it's racist.
11:31>> Yes, >> that's wrong. And you know, here's the thing about Tucker and Fuentes because I I am a free speech absolutist, right?
11:40>> And I think everyone should be allowed to talk. I think Nick Fuentes, I wildly disagree with who he is as a person, everything.
11:48>> But he's got a right to say whatever he wants to say.
11:50>> Free speech. He has a right to say what he wants to say.
11:52>> 100% agree.
11:53>> The question here, John, >> is if people just look at it on just this situation. Don't look at the whole buildup to it, which is absolutely relevant, but just look at it in this situation with Tucker.
12:04>> People are looking at Tucker going, why are you using your platform to talk to a guy like that? And I want to be careful how I say this as someone who has a platform and talks to people from all ends of the spectrum.
12:18[sighs and gasps] I think that when you do something like that, when you're Tucker Carlson, you are doing it and giving your enemies exactly what they want.
12:33Yeah, I can see that. I can see that.
12:36But on the other hand, too, look at this way. He does how many of these a week?
12:41Um, one, two, three. I don't even know.
12:44>> A lot, I'm sure.
12:44>> A lot. Um, this is just another one in a long line of guests.
12:51>> He's going to have somebody on that's going to be the exact opposite. Uh, [snorts] he's going to have on um the nun from uh Jerusalem, George Stephanopoulos's sister.
13:02>> Is that actually a sister?
13:04>> You know, I actually Googled it and it said that she is. I don't know. I don't see any kind of family resemblance. And you know, funny little funny little small world tidbit. George Stephanopoulos's grandfather was my parish priest when I was a little kid and he baptized me. And I remember George from Sunday school. He was a year two older than I was. Yeah.
13:26>> Yeah. Small world.
13:26>> Small world. Yeah.
13:28>> But uh and actually his dad married my brother and his first wife.
13:32>> Wow.
13:33>> Yeah. He was a priest here at the Holy Trinity Cathedral in New York.
13:37>> Oh, you Greeks.
13:38>> We all stick together.
13:39>> Yeah. We're all paria. We all enjoy each other's company. So anyway, um for me personally, I wouldn't have invited um Nick Fuentes just because I don't think I would have much to say to somebody like Nick Fuentes. But Tucker feels liberated since he left Fox News. He feels unencumbered by corporate structures and policies and he just decided that he was going to have on anybody who he thought would give him two or three hours of interesting conversation. Yeah. And I also because I'm also not a believer in bringing someone in there just to stick them through the ringer and you know CBS News, right? Which is why I wouldn't
14:20talk with >> Except for Ted Cruz.
14:22>> That was pretty funny.
14:23>> That was funny.
14:24>> That was kind of funny. Apac Ted.
14:26>> Yeah, Apac Ted.
14:27>> By the way, >> by the [laughter] way, trivia question.
14:30Who would who did Alan Dersitz say was the most talented law student he ever had?
14:34>> Oh, it has to be Ted.
14:35>> Yeah. I always thought that was interesting. You know, so many people believed that Ted was destined for the Supreme Court, not for Capitol Hill.
14:44>> He was a real thinker at Harvard Law School.
14:47>> Oh, he's a Listen, for as much as he got body bagged and thrown down the [ __ ] river. See the river sticks by Tucker Carlson right there? Like, >> he's a very smart guy.
14:58>> Very smart.
14:58>> Very smart guy.
14:59>> He was wrong on those issues, which is why Tucker beat him about the head and face.
15:03>> It was funny. Who I'd like to see next is Lindsey Graham.
15:08[laughter] >> It will never happen.
15:09>> We'll see if he even survives this primary.
15:11>> Yeah, I I I hope not. I don't know how that guy's ever survived any election in that state, >> but like maybe people wanted to see and and I actually I haven't watched the Tucker Fuentes sit down yet, so I really can't comment on it, so I I don't want to.
15:28>> It was a normal Tucker interview. It was a normal conversation and Tucker fully freely disagreed with a lot of what he had to say.
15:36>> All right. So, >> but let him speak.
15:38>> Let him speak. The the thing that I think about here because of how hot button the issue is and how much there is pieces of information that can be used to label going on. Like let's look at who you might look at as as people that are cringe and annoying, which might be like the hardest core Zionists who anything that they don't like is labeled anti-Semitic, which is a woke tactic. It is >> for them to use.
16:09If I were those people, what would I want Tucker Carlson to do?
16:16>> I would want him to interview Nick Fuentes. because now all I got to do is post that screenshot of that regardless of context, regardless of intention, regardless of what it is. And it's like I read this thing recently. I was talking about it with Mike Ritlin, but I recently read that in at the height of the Roman Empire's power when the generals would be at war in the midst of battle and the night before or the morning of a battle, they'd be gathered in their tent, you know, the three to five highest ranking generals to make a decision.
16:48They would have this exercise where they would ask themselves, if we were our worst enemy right now, meaning the guys across the battlefield who are going to fight us, if we were our worst enemy right now, what decision would we want us to make?
17:02>> That's brilliant. Yeah.
17:03>> And they would think of it would always land on like the most emotional [ __ ] you eye for an eye type decision. They'd be like, okay, let's do the opposite of that. And they won again and again and again and again. And it is so easy now to get angry at pe. It's human nature to get angry at people who attack you incessantly with lies and propaganda and [ __ ] You want to punch these people. I'm from New Jersey, trust me.
17:27Like I would not deal with it well.
17:29Yeah.
17:29>> But you got to like go into a room, scream into a pillow >> and think, what am I going to do with this so that I can rise above it? Do I want to be more Malcolm X or do I want to be more Martin Luther King? All due respect to Malcolm X, obviously had certain stances and whatever, very interesting guy in history. The more effective one was Martin Luther King and he deserves all the credit in the world for that because he rose above stuff at the in the hardest way >> as well. And it's like I get it.
18:00Everyone has a right to speak. I'm not saying don't go speak with Nick Fuentes or something like that, but when you do that, you have now opened yourself up to a whole new round of attacks that could have >> I appeared credibility.
18:13>> I agree. The reason why I wouldn't have had Nick Fuentes, well, it's severalfold.
18:20Um, and you know, a part of this is obviously my own bias. I see him as just some kid. He's just some loudmouth kid.
18:28Mhm.
18:29>> And many of his positions have been definitively debunked by historians over the years. I mean, there are still people alive who liberated Dahal, for example, >> or Bergen Bellson or whatever. And um I just don't see how it's possible that his base of support grows from what it is. And what it is is a bunch of angry white guys in their 20s. [clears throat] So I I just don't see what good it would do me to interview somebody like him.
19:05That's why I wouldn't do it.
19:07>> He's if you look at the it at it objectively, just like 30,000 foot view of why >> he's risen or whatever it is, obviously he is a very good speaker.
19:20>> He is >> he's very bright.
19:21>> He's very bright for sure. He has a sense of humor as well. He can talk to the camera for hours.
19:27>> He's disarming actually.
19:29>> Yes.
19:30>> Yes.
19:31>> That's the first time I ever saw him at any length in an interview and I was like, "Oh, he's he's actually a likable guy at first glance."
19:38>> At first glance.
19:39>> Yeah. Yeah. So, there's ways like if you wanted to look at it like, "Oh, the wolf coming in the hen house or something."
19:46That's how it happens when you have those other talents. But when society gets to a point, this is just my macro theory on it, but >> you look at a middle class that has been legislated away economically like that in a graph since the beginning of the 1980s.
20:02>> That's right.
20:03>> And you see chaos and chaos and chaos and chaos and chaos and lack of hope and people who are upset about their lives.
20:11They're carrying around college debt cuz they were sold a system when they were 15 and had no [ __ ] idea what it meant.
20:16>> Mhm. you turn that emotion in somewhere and you turn it into point it at the fingers of the elite people regardless of where they stand that you don't like.
20:25And when you have someone like Nick Fuentes who regardless of how he does it or what he says speaks to that kind of yes crowd and does it very effectively.
20:35That is how you get something like that to happen. And also this needs to be said because we've seen this on every side of all these issues whether you're pro or antie. Pick your favorite issue here. There are massive propaganda bot campaigns supporting both sides.
20:50>> You're absolutely right.
20:52>> Yes. Which is also dangerous and completely unregulated.
20:56>> What do we do about that?
20:57>> I don't know. Can you do anything about it? Like you can pass a law saying, you know, no more about B no more bots. And the Chinese are going to laugh and laugh. The Russians. Yeah. I don't I don't know if there's anything you can do.
21:12I remember Elon was like looking at that when he was trying to buy Twitter. They were >> Yeah, he said it was like 40% of Twitter users were actually bots or something like that.
21:21>> I think it was I think it was like 60%.
21:24We could check it. It was a high percentage and I haven't heard him talk about it a ton.
21:30>> No, >> but it's like I'm always clicking that on Twitter. That's the one where cuz like that's always just been my little private platform that no one >> I used to get most of my news from Twitter.
21:40>> Yeah. I mean, it's it's interesting, but like when you just look at the following, I'll click someone and I'll just be like, "Huh, >> November 2025, you know, >> up to 64%."
21:51>> Yep. Deep's got it. Up to 64% of the accounts were bots.
21:56>> So, it's like you also have massive and I see it on both sides of the issue. You will see you will see Ayal Yakobi tweet something out pro Zionist and it's got [ __ ] 10,000 likes in 10 minutes. You will see Ian Carol tweet out something. Ian's been on my show. Ian will tweet out something.
22:15It has 10,000 likes in 10 minutes.
22:17Neither of these make sense. Sorry. It doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make sense, >> right? And that's And by the way, that's neither of their fault, which everyone likes to try to say like, >> "Oh, you can prove that they're like running." They don't know. Yeah, I don't know these [ __ ] accounts that touch my >> I don't even manage my own Twitter account. I I have a guy that does it for me. [laughter] >> He called me last week. He said, "Hey, you crossed 100,000 subscribers." I said, "Hey, great." Is that Simon?
22:42>> Okay. Yeah, I'm a Simon doing that. Damn it. So, it's always Simon tweeting. I knew that already. [laughter] So, that's kind of funny. It's just >> when Simon sends his best regards, he called me in the car when he did. He's a good guy. I like Simon. But like, you know, to your point bringing up like the whole thing. We now make these we make content like you know the NFL playoffs or something. Yeah. And like so and so talk to so and so and yeah I fall in the trap too sometimes.
23:09>> Oh man, when I was in prison people used to get this uh this magazine >> like hip hop weekly or something like I think that's what it was called. And I mean, it's clearly just a madeup tabloid, you know, with these fake feuds and somebody was in the club and they threw money in the face of somebody else because of something that happened in Atlanta.
23:33I got kind of a kick out of it, but it these articles sometimes led to bloodshed. I remember two guys beating each other to the death over who had more money, Kanye or Jay-Z.
23:47It's like seriously you guys are going to go to solitary for that. [laughter] There are no better reasons to go to solitary. That's what you chose.
23:57[laughter] >> Oh my god.
24:00>> I mean, there's not a lot to do in prison. [laughter] >> No, >> I'll give them that.
24:05>> I saw a fist fight once over whether they should watch Love & Hip Hop Atlanta or 110th in Park or whatever the show was called.
24:15>> 120th in Park. Did you have to make your bones in a fist fight?
24:18>> No, >> you didn't.
24:19>> No. No. I minded my own business. I I made alliances with all the mafia.
24:23>> The racial groups. The mafia was the most important, >> right? Yeah.
24:26>> Who were you I I I always forgot. Who Who did you have a moment of silence for outside the house in Atlantic City after you were in prison?
24:34>> Oh, it was uh >> Scarfo.
24:36>> Yeah. [laughter] >> I was like, "Come on, guys. Come [laughter] on.
24:43stand here all day.
24:46>> You're like, I was in Pakistan 15 years ago taking down al-Qaeda [laughter] and now >> I'm I'm actually stopping in Philly on the way home. We're going to meet up for dinner.
24:55>> Oh, that's awesome. You going to Dante and Luigi's >> most likely.
24:58>> Oh my god, that's funny.
25:02Can't Your life you can't make it up.
25:04That's >> See, I'm friends with everybody.
25:06>> That's right.
25:07>> Everybody. Everybody's got something redeeming. Everybody.
25:10>> Everyone does.
25:11>> Not everyone. Okay, I will say I'll tell you a story and I'm going to plug my latest book as part of the story.
25:19>> Plug away.
25:20>> So, I've got a book coming out called uh Remains of the Day, a definitive guide to Washington DC's historic cemeteries.
25:28Go to rarebirdlit.com rarebirdit.com uh for the advanced autograph copies.
25:36So, Simon and Schusters publishing it.
25:38They liked it so much they commissioned four more. I'm almost done with the next one, which is Whispers in the Dirt, a definitive guide to the Mafia Graves of New York City.
25:48>> Okay, so I'm about 70% done. It's going to I'll be done. I'll be done by the end of the year and send it to the editor.
25:55So, I'm in the Bronx about two months ago just taking pictures. I'm with my girlfriend. We're taking pictures of different graves so I can put them in the book. And this was supposed the first one was supposed to be a field guide. It was it was supposed to be eight inches by five inches so that you can stick it in your back pocket, but they liked it so much they made it a coffee table book.
26:19So, you're going to have to like lug it into the cemetery with you. Anyway, back in prison, I said to one of the mob guys, "So, do you mind if I ask you what are you in here for?" And he goes like this. He goes, "They found a body in a barrel in my storage unit. I don't know how that body got in there. A 100 people had access to the storage unit." I said, "No, no, no judgment for me. I was just curious. No judgment." And I kind of laughed it off.
26:53So, I'm in the Bronx six weeks ago, whatever it is. No. And I'm like, who is this guy again? I had I had his name. I needed to take a picture of the grave. His name was Bonventry, the tall guy, right? He was like Janaro Bonventry. Janaro the tall guy.
27:12Bonventry. I forget his first name. So my girlfriend said, "Who is this guy again?" And I said, "You know, I can't remember. He was a driver, but I don't remember the story." So I pull up my manuscript and I said, "Uh, the tall guy Bonventry was a driver for this guy. He took the boss out for whatever. Um, the boss was killed. Bonventry was initially assumed to have been the hitman because they couldn't find him. They found his body 6 months later in a barrel in a storage unit in New Jersey. And I said, "Oh my god." It was the first time I put it together. It's the body from the barrel. But he didn't tell me the full
27:51story. The full story is the tall guy was too tall to fit in the barrel.
27:56[laughter] the hack a little bit.
27:59>> So he saw him in half.
28:01>> He sawed him in half.
28:02>> That's what we do in Jersey, John. We saw in half >> and the barrel was full of glue. And it took the corner something like 4 months to get the glue off to do [clears throat] the autopsy, which he's already saw in half. So how much more of an autopsy do you need?
28:19>> But then they they sort of pieced him together to put him in his coffin. And I was like, "Oh, dang. He was telling me the truth."
28:27Ah, >> where is this? Is this guy still in prison?
28:30>> No, he's out.
28:31>> Which is why I didn't use his name, >> right? [laughter] >> Where where in Jersey?
28:37>> Do you remember?
28:39>> Yeah. Uh, yeah. The It was in Newark, but but he was not a New Jersey Italian.
28:47He was a New York Italian.
28:48>> Got it. So, they brought him over here to >> Exactly.
28:52>> I have a chapter at the end of the book.
28:53I go cemetery by cemetery by cemetery and there are some like you know St.
28:57Stevens or Holy Cross or whatever that are just like overflowing with mob guys going back to you know Joe the Boss Maseria or the Clutch Hand or Lucky Luchiano who's got a magnificent private mausoleum. Um but I have a chapter at the end of the book on nontraditional burial grounds like the Gowanas Canal.
29:19Oh, >> where they're pulling bodies out of all the time.
29:22>> Or there's this there's in the Bronx there's this vacant lot that they called the mafia graveyard.
29:29>> Yeah.
29:29>> Um >> I got one in the Meadowlands here.
29:32>> The Meadowlands is a great example. So I've got like four, five, six of those that I'm going to I'm going to add at the end. [laughter] >> Okay. I'm in for that book right up my alley.
29:42>> I think it's going to be a good seller already for the one in Washington. I just love cemeteries. And I've talked to you about this before. Uh, I think I I if the if it's sunny out, I'll just go hang out in a cemetery for hours.
29:54>> You love cemeteries. You love Abraham Lincoln [ __ ] Yeah.
29:57>> What else is on the list?
29:58>> I lost the [ __ ] though.
29:59>> You did lose the [ __ ] >> Yeah. Thank God. It was way too expensive. Anyway, my I'm going to go visit my son uh tomorrow and um he said he loves the Lincoln stuff as much as I do. He said, "Dad, there's this enormous um antique mall in Indianapolis, and I think they have Lincoln stuff there, so we're going Indianapolis on Saturday.
30:21[laughter] >> Have fun." But anyway, um I was shocked when I went to Amazon and found that nobody had ever written a book on the cemeteries of Washington, DC.
30:36There are like a dozen books on Arlington Cemetery, but I thought, well, I'll write one.
30:41>> That's cool.
30:42>> Yeah.
30:43>> Right up your alley.
30:43>> And it's I I did purposely I did the biographies not of the most famous people in the cemeteries. Everybody knows about the famous people in the cemeteries. I chose the most interesting people in the cemeteries.
30:57>> Now, how do you define interesting?
30:59>> If John says they're interesting, they go in the book. [laughter] So, would you how would you go about your research with this? Did you go to the cemetery and like go read a name and say, "Well, let me Google this guy." And then eventually come up with something.
31:11>> That was part of it. I'm a big fan of the um website uh.com, >> which is immensely helpful. But what I did is if somebody looked like they might or could be interesting, I would just go to the Library of Congress and look up their original uh obituary.
31:28Meaning when you say look like they might be interesting, not just you're standing at their grave site and you're like, I like the way they wrote the name.
31:34>> No, like I Google a guy that I've never heard of and it says he was a Revolutionary War veteran. It's like, oh, that could be interesting. I'll check it out. I write write myself a little note. There's a guy just as one random example.
31:46>> I'll give you two random examples. But one, this little overgrown gravestone at Congressional Cemetery, the guy's all by himself. There's no wife. There's no kid. It's just him. the the stone is old. He died in 1838. Born in 1778, died in 1838.
32:04And he's among like a bunch of, you know, vice presidents and speakers of the house. I'm like, who is this guy? I never heard of this guy. I don't even remember his name now. He's in the book.
32:14I have to look it up. So, I went to the Library of Congress and I and I looked him up and oh my god, what a story. This guy was a midlevel nobody at the Department of the Treasury, right? He would just sit at his desk with his big ledgers and he would just write numbers.
32:33And then in 1812, the British invade Washington. They set the capital on fire. They set the White House on fire.
32:40It's chaos. The president runs to Mlan, Virginia on a horse. The first lady gets on a horse and she runs to Leburg, Virginia just to save themselves. The whole city's in flames. And this guy had the presence of mind to say, "I wonder if anybody's thought to rescue the Declaration of Independence."
33:00>> Nicholas Cage before Nicholas Cage.
33:03>> He gets on a horse while the British are shooting everybody, you know, gets in his horse, rides over to the building that housed the National Archives.
33:11There's the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and George Washington's military commission. and he rolls them up into a sheet, tucks them under his arm, and he rides out to Lowden County, Virginia, and puts them in the rafters of a friend's barn for three years.
33:28>> For they were there for three years.
33:30>> For three years. And then when the British are finally pushed out, he goes and gets him and he brings him back and oh my god, he's a big national hero.
33:40>> Except >> what's his name again?
33:41>> I have to look it up. God damn it, John.
33:43>> I know. I kicked myself. I I can find it while we're talking. So the problem was that as a person he was just a dick [snorts] >> and everybody hated him. All of his co-workers hated him. He he had no personality. He was just not >> Steven Pleasanton.
34:04>> Steven Pleasanton. That is him right there. Thank you.
34:07>> He looks like a dick. I'm not going to lie. Look at that picture. So, a group [laughter] of a group of people went to the Secretary of the Treasury and they said, "Look, we know he's a national hero and all, [laughter] but we just can't work with this guy, and if you don't fire him, we're going to we're going to resign."
34:23>> Oh, he got fired.
34:24>> So, they didn't want to fire him, fire him. So, they made him the director of the US Commission on Lighouses.
34:34And so he ended up not only helping to invent the franal lens which we use today which is like makes it 10 times brighter as the l because back then they were using candles right you can't see a freaking candle from a mile away in a ship but with this fraal lens that he helped to develop and for the first time since the founding of the country he actually balanced the budget of the US convention of lighouses see saving the declaration of independence He sounds a little oddest.
35:05>> He's a dick, >> right?
35:06>> Yeah. [laughter] >> Like what a dick.
35:10>> There's There's >> Shout out Steven Pleasanton.
35:13>> Yeah, good Steven. Good for Steven Pleasanton. 1776. I I found 1778 that he was born. Oh, 1855.
35:21>> Disagreeing with CIA.
35:22>> Yeah, I'm doing my Hey, and I just read my bio from Simon and Schustster the other day. Yesterday for the first time and it said uh >> journalist and historian John Kuryako. I was like, "Oh, okay.
35:34>> That's great.
35:34>> I'll take that." So, get this. I'm at uh >> I'm at Rock Creek Cemetery, which is the biggest and the nicest cemetery in Washington.
35:43[clears throat] >> 60 70 80,000 graves there. It's a goodiz cemetery. And um all the rich people are buried in the front like you know the the Woodwards and the Lothrops and the Blooming Dales and the you know, Goldfinles, whatever their name was. Uh whatever whatever the name was. All the people that that were rich in the 19th century that nobody can remember why they're important. So I go to the very back of the ceme I go to the very back of the cemetery and um there's a traffic island there that has this magnificent private family mausoleum. So I just wrote myself a note. It was the Butler family. And um
36:27and I went to look in the in the door of the mausoleum and the the tomb was glass inside. So you can see these very expensive bronze coffins >> that had the two butler brothers, their wives, a daughter, and a grandson who was like six when he died. So I wrote myself this note, went to the Library of Congress. Turns out these guys were fascinating.
36:54They wanted to be chemists. They wanted to go to college and be chemists. They were born right after the Civil War ended. Butler was their name. And when they got to be, you know, high school age, almost high school age, their dad was like, "Yeah, you're not going to be chemists. You're going to be bakers."
37:15>> Bakers.
37:16>> Bakers. Yeah. We don't have money to send you to college to be fancy chemists. they're going to be bakers.
37:20And he arranged for them an a uh an apprenticeship at a local bakery. They hated it. So when the baker finally retired, he turned over the business to them. They just hated they hated every act of being a baker.
37:38So they said to each other, "What if we invent this machine that will mix all this [ __ ] for us so we don't have to do it?"
37:47>> Oh [ __ ] So you power it with your feet like the old time sewing machines.
37:51>> So they invented the first mixer [snorts] and they patented it and they were able to sell it all the way out to the frontier which at the time was Cincinnati.
38:04So they start making some making some money thanks to this new fangled mixing machine, right?
38:12And then they said, "What if we invent another machine that cuts the dough so that every loaf is exactly the same size, shape, and weight?" And they made a conveyor belt with a an arm that came down and cut the dough. Revolutionized baking nationwide. They were able to sell that all the way out to like, you know, St. Louis and then later on to uh to Denver.
38:38And then they said, "What if we instead of using water to make the bread, what if we use milk? What would that taste like?" It made it very fluffy and light.
38:49Then they came up with this idea.
38:51Newspapers were becoming popular. And there were young boys that would actually deliver your newspaper to your house called a paper boy, right? And they said, "What if we hire boys to deliver bread to the houses? If you make an order by 3:00, we'll deliver the bread." So you could have it on your dinner table while it's still warm.
39:11>> And then they started making cakes and making pies and this and that.
39:16>> By the turn of the 20th century, they owned the entire city block behind what is today Union Station, train station, and they were millionaires many times over.
39:27>> Israel Butler, the older of the two brothers, decided to retire like right around the start of the First World War.
39:36His brother stayed on for another couple of years, but they finally sold the business to the National Biscuit Company, Nabiscoco.
39:47And um the only thing that they changed the the bread itself was very very popular, but it had this terrible name.
39:54I forget the name. It was like Mrs.
39:55McGillicu's delicious bread. That's not it, but it was something like that. So they um they sold it to Nabiscoco and um the only change that Nabiscoco made was they changed the name of the bread to Wonderbread and everything remained the same.
40:11>> Wow.
40:12>> Yeah. Like who ever heard of these people?
40:14>> Never in my life.
40:16>> I found the NFL's first black quarterback.
40:19Like you wouldn't even know that there was a black quarterback in the 50s.
40:23>> In the 50s. Wow.
40:25>> Mhm. He only threw like four passes, but still, why aren't we celebrating this guy?
40:29>> NFL.
40:30>> Yeah, absolutely.
40:31>> Yeah.
40:33>> How often do you go to cemeteries?
40:37>> At least weekly. If I'm overseas, I go almost every day.
40:42>> So, you like to The overseas cemeteries are actually interesting because they're always so different.
40:47>> So, completely different.
40:49>> I have this wonderful book I bought at at some obscure flea market or used bookstore. It's called death rituals of rural Greece.
40:59>> So there are almost no cemeteries in Greece because the the country is only like 2% arable.
41:06And so the the land that's good, they need to grow food on it. So there's this practice, it's been a practice for hundreds of years that you rent a grave for 5 years. So they don't embalm in Greece. They'll put you in the in the ground for five years. And then on the fifth anniversary of your burial, they dig you. The women of the village dig you up with the priest, the village priest. And then they take your by then you're just a skeleton. If you're not just a skeleton by then, that means you went to hell.
41:44>> Oh.
41:45>> And so they put you right back.
41:46>> I thought you were going to say it means you were buried alive. I was like, "Oh, shit."
41:49>> Yeah. It means It means you you went to hell. So, um, but just about everybody is is just bone by then. So, they take the skeleton apart, they wash it with red wine, the priest blesses it, and they put it in a little bone box and then in an ouary, a bone house just on here, I'll show you a picture. Um, just uh on on shelves until um until it's time to build a new church. And then they take all the bones out and they put them underneath the church under the foundation because >> can't we just cremate at that point?
42:28>> No, cremation's forbidden. Strictly forbidden. You can't cremate because >> you put the bones in a box, but you can't cremate.
42:35>> I know, right?
42:36>> You know these these rules that humans invent >> and you know what's funny is none of these rules are actually based in religion.
42:43>> No, it's it's some guy one day had a bright idea and said this is what we're going to do now as a religion.
42:49>> Yeah. Yeah. That's pretty much it.
42:51>> Is that's real? Oh my god.
42:53>> Oh, yeah. There you go.
42:55>> De's got it up. Can we blow up one of those pictures? Whatever one you want, De.
43:00>> The one Oh.
43:01>> Oh, so they put like the skull.
43:03>> The top top left is is more accurate.
43:06The one with the skulls is in Italy.
43:07That's an ashuary in Greece.
43:09>> That's so >> And you know, I've I've struck up a friendship with the guy. There's this um well the nice way of saying it these days is he's on the spectrum but >> he's an artist.
43:22>> He's he's not able to care for himself >> and so they gave him as a job just take care of the bone house. Right. So I go over there every time I go back to my ancestral island. I go to the village where my family's from and um and he lets me go through the the boxes and see if they're my grandparents, my great-grandparents or whatever.
43:44>> You opening them up?
43:46>> No, I mean if it's somebody that I know or I'm related to, I take a picture of the box and then I'll open it up just to, you know, give them a kiss on the skull or something.
43:54>> Oh, God. All right.
43:55>> That's my great-grandparents.
43:57>> All right. All right.
43:58>> So, uh >> just cut it cut it. You see the floor?
44:01>> You see the floor there?
44:04at the ouary in our village. There's a kind of a trapoor and there's an area underneath the floor. So, he let me go down there last time. And uh it goes back to the 19th century down there, but I mean, I can't go any further than that. The Turks burned all of our records, >> so we don't know really anything about where we come from.
44:25>> And then, you know, people are buried under churches. I did I did find one relative. This is my great greatgrandfather's brother um that I found in an oushuary in roads on the southern tip of the island.
44:43Come on. Where is he? He was a priest and so they kept him. They didn't they didn't bury him under the uh there he is. Oh, >> the perks of being a priest in this life, huh?
44:54>> Yeah. Um and then the next picture is a picture of him. [sighs and gasps] >> So you can he get lucky sometimes.
45:02Oh yeah. Yeah. High priest kind of guy.
45:05>> Yeah. Yeah. He was a he was a big deal.
45:07Yeah. I said to >> looks like you.
45:09>> Yeah. I said to my cousin who who also has an interest in our family genealogy.
45:14Um I said, "Yeah, you know, my grandmother told me he was uh eaten by a shark. He was diving for sponges and he was eaten by a shark." No.
45:21>> My cousin said, "That's not true."
45:23>> I said, "Oh, that's always the story we heard." He said the Turks executed him because he was teaching children how to speak Greek during the Ottoman occupation and they threw his body in the sea and the sharks ate him.
45:37But he said the Turks murdered him, >> which gives me just another reason to hate Turks.
45:42>> Wow.
45:43>> Yeah.
45:44The Ottoman Empire is one that's overlooked.
45:47>> And people are like, "Oh, no. It was okay in the Ottomans because if you just paid your taxes, you could freely practice Christianity. [ __ ] >> Yeah.
45:56>> What country are you from where they were so kind to you that if you paid your taxes, you could do your thing.
46:02What [snorts] a joke. [laughter] >> You're funny. You're just funny like how you you get so upset and then you go back to laughing right afterwards.
46:11[laughter] It's great.
46:13Well, I don't know how we got on that tangent about skulls and cemeteries.
46:17>> It was my book. My book.
46:18>> It was very, very interesting.
46:20>> The tall guy.
46:21>> But, you know, back to the to the world of the living, at least for now.
46:25>> Yeah.
46:26>> You know, in in some of our earlier conversations, we were talking about the different countries with nuclear weapons and obviously the the bombing that happened of Iran's facilities in June and everything, but what you know, >> may I add one other thing about that, >> please? Yeah.
46:42So, this is something that most Americans don't understand or haven't thought about and which most Israelis just deny because it doesn't fit into their worldview. But these Israeli attacks on Iran have now forced the Iranians to develop a nuclear weapon.
47:00>> Um, they had no u uranium that was that was weapons ready or weapons capable.
47:07And besides that, they don't have a delivery system. I would bet my next paycheck that that's what they're going to start developing now because if all they have to look forward to is continued Israeli bombing and assassination and infiltration, you know, the threat is existential for them, too. And so, they're going to have to do something to defend themselves.
47:28And the only thing that they can do at this point is to develop a nuclear deterrent.
47:34>> No. Why did you say earlier, cuz we got off this, that in hindsight then you think that that when the US ended up bombing this was okay?
47:44>> Because I think that the Israelis really would have used a nuclear weapon.
47:50>> That's the >> that's that's where the word existential comes from.
47:52>> Meaning you don't think that was just like a threat position?
47:55>> I think that they really intended to do it.
47:58>> Okay. So, this is something I've been thinking about a lot more recently, and I hate that I have to think about it, but I used to have this picture in my first studio at my parents house. There were two pictures on one of the walls. The top picture was of the nuclear bomb test at Bikini Toll. Oh, yeah. In >> a famous one, >> 47. Yeah, something like that.
48:20>> Something like that.
48:21>> And the one below it was the picture of Adam and the hand of God, but instead of the hand of God, it was a robot. And the idea is it was like a juxtaposition in my head of like the ability we invented to wipe ourselves out as a species at the time, you know, 80 years ago, whatever, >> versus the ability that's coming now where, you know, with AI and we don't know what it could be if that is another threat we build for ourselves that that that could wipe us out. And part of it was I was looking at AI as like maybe we can be hopeful here because for all the problems in the world, people have been
48:58prudent enough even in the worst of situations for 75 80 years to not hit that red button with a nuke. And we all have this mutual destruction kind of thing going on because so many countries have them. I will admit that over the past couple years, I've thought more and more and more about just how tenuous that might be and how realistic I hate even saying this, but how realistic it could be that at some point somewhere in the notsodistant future, somebody uses a nuclear bomb. So, two questions. One, >> how realistic is that? And two, if that does happen, and I guess it would depend on where as well, what is
49:43the aftermath of that look like, >> right?
49:46I think it's something that we do have to fear. I could see the Israelis using one on Iran. I could see the Indians and Pakistanis using them against each other. Um, what does the aftermath look like? I I suppose it depends. You know, we talk about tactical nuclear weapons, battlefield, battlefield nuclear weapons that supposedly, you know, aren't going to have the catastrophic fallout that Hiroshima and Nagasaki had or that a modern full-sized nuclear weapon would have, but I'm not sure that it really matters. Um, you know, if if we were having this conversation right after the Second World War, I'd say, "Wow, the world has
50:32learned its lesson. It's going to be mutually assured destruction. This is going to be a policy that's adopted by every country. Then we negotiated the nuclear non-prololiferation treaty."
50:43Those days are gone. You know, you got the North Koreans, the Indians, the Pakistanis, now maybe the Iranians, the Israelis.
50:52Do you trust any of those countries? Not really. None of them. So, I'm not sure what the aftermath would be. I suppose I suppose if the Indians and the Pakistanis went at it, they'd lob one on each other and that would be the end of it, right?
51:10>> What do you think the world would do in the aftermath of that?
51:13>> What could the world do? We're going to run to the United Nations and issue a very strongly worded statement. And that's really what it comes down to.
51:22>> That's it.
51:24>> And what are you going to do? Overthrow a government, attack a government because it's used a nuclear a nuclear weapon. What if it has more nuclear weapons? And then they use it against you or against your troops as they're landing or >> Yeah.
51:37>> Yeah. I don't know.
51:37>> I guess size of country obviously matters a lot too. So like if North Korea used one, all due respect, >> you know, which is a concern.
51:46>> Mhm.
51:46>> I mean, they're gone. I would I would think so. Yeah.
51:50>> And that like that's the one saving grace I think of in my head. I'm like if someone tried to do it to us, >> we'd have to respond.
52:03>> You're done. Like like if they did one here, which would be catastrophic to be very clear.
52:08>> They're gone.
52:09>> Yeah. I can't help but to think that if if we were to be attacked with nuclear weapons, we would have to respond using nuclear weapons. Terrible, terrible thing. But you have to respond.
52:20And I agree with you. If it were to be the North Koreans, tomorrow, North Korea wouldn't exist, >> right? Which is a, you know, [sighs] >> Yeah.
52:30>> It's impossible to fathom something like that. And, you know, >> World War II, people relitigate that all the time. And I understand that.
52:39>> Sure.
52:39>> I do. Certainly.
52:42>> I mean, that's that's a that's a crazy thing that had to happen.
52:48It hasn't happened since, you know, and and that's why, like when, [gasps] [sighs] you know, you have Israel threatening to use nuclear weapons, like, you know, they're a powerful country, but they're the size of New Jersey.
53:00>> Mhm.
53:01>> Like, how I I don't understand why they'd be so careless as to do that because it doesn't take much for them to be gone.
53:10>> No.
53:11>> You know, like what what is the what is the thought process there? And like now you even have insult to injury. You got like Jonathan Pard running for Knesset.
53:18>> Yeah. How do you like that?
53:20>> On a on a platform of we should be able to use nukes. Like are you [ __ ] >> Which was another issue that every single Israeli prime minister lobbyed for with every president. You got to release Pard. You got to release Pard.
53:34No, he's doing every day of the 30 years. And he did every single day.
53:39>> But then we let him go back. Or not back. We'll let him go there.
53:43>> And they gave him a parade and a hero's welcome and an Israeli passport and now he's running for the Knesset.
53:50>> Does that just like piss you off to no end?
53:52>> Yeah, very much so.
53:56I was having lunch with a guy, nice guy a few weeks ago who was like asking me about different things on this issue [laughter] and and at one point he said he said, "Well, doesn't MSAD have a have a policy that they don't spy on Americans?" And we were in Cypriani and I, you know, that's a very tightly packed place.
54:19>> And I just like I was very hung over, but I literally like fell off my chair laughing. Other people were looking at me and I'm like, "Yeah, I know. They totally have that policy." And he's like he's like, "Yeah, no. They they don't do I'm like, are you [ __ ] kidding me?
54:31They're like the number one threat of spying." He's like, "Name one." And I'm like And he wasn't even MSAD. He was military intelligence. It was like below MSAD.
54:40>> Yes. Very much below MSD.
54:42>> What the [ __ ] you know, and he was handled by what's his name? The dude who did the Ikeman drop.
54:47>> Oh my god, I didn't know that.
54:49>> Yo, yeah. Yeah. What the [ __ ] is that guy's name again?
54:51>> Oh my god.
54:52>> Uh, Raf Rafi Ravi Iton. Rafi Eton.
54:58>> Yes, I think that >> I think is his name. That was like his hand. That was Pard's handler who was, you know, a longtime >> massage guy and everything. But I'm like >> I was like, "All right, so that was right."
55:08>> I'm like, [clears throat] "Dude, you know what? One of the most compelling things you'll ever see is [laughter] when when you and Boo Damonte were on Danny Jones together and you were talking about that you two are from different eras at CIA and you both had the same experience of one of the first days once you're in there and have your job whatever it may be they take you to a room you're not allowed to say what it's called but call it the red room they're like here are the number one espionage threats and it's like Israel, China and Russia. Mhm.
55:38>> That's wild. You know, >> it's wild. And you can add Cuba and France.
55:44I've heard I've heard France goes crazy.
55:47>> You know, the French we had we had a little kurfuffle in the early 90s with the French.
55:53>> Oh, yeah.
55:54>> And they were very angry with us >> about what?
55:57>> Deservedly so. One of our young junior first tour guys got caught just going pushing a little too far. So they expelled him, they expelled the chief, and they expelled a whole bunch of people. And so for three, four years, we had a tough time. But the French were just such dicks about it that we ended up um getting orders that we weren't even allowed to transit de Gaul airport.
56:22And that was the only reason I ever was ever in France was just to catch a connecting flight at De Gaul to go here, there, wherever in the Middle East. Uh but a buddy of mine was I I forget where he was going. Somewhere in the Middle East and he he went No, it was in Africa. He was going to Africa and the only way to get to Africa was through Paris at the time. Now you can just go directly to uh Morocco and then onward from there. But they took his laptop. He had a he had a secure laptop. So they're like, "Turn it on." So he turns it on.
56:55Open it up. He's like, "I'm not going to open it up. I have a diplomatic passport. I'm on the diplomatic business of the United States. This is the the possess the uh the property rather of the US Department of State. I'm not opening it up. So they took it in a back room. He said they had a railroad spike fastened to a table and they just slammed it down on the railroad spike went all the way through the laptop and then they pulled it off and gave him his laptop back. So headquarters was like, "Okay, nobody can transit air uh de Gaul airport anymore."
57:23>> Wow.
57:24>> Yeah. They're just jerks about it. I've heard that they are incredibly talented intelligent.
57:29>> They're very talented. When I was overseas in uh Pakistan, my boss asked me if I would uh meet with a French intelligence officer. I said, "Sure." I was meeting with foreign intelligence officers almost every day. And you just trade, you know, hey, I heard there's a safe house over here. I heard, "Hey, they give me al-Qaeda safe house over there." And we just trade some information. So, uh, this French guy calls me and he says, "Meet me at the corner of, you know, A and B." I'm like, "Okay, you don't just want to meet at a restaurant or something." "No, no, meet me at this corner." So, I go to this corner. It's
58:05in a residential neighborhood. I'm like, "What? Does he live here? Like, why would he want me to come here?" And I'm standing on the corner and he comes peeling down the street, makes a quick right, reaches over and opens my door, and he's like, "Get in."
58:19And I said, 'Oh, no, no, no, no, no.
58:22[laughter] I said, 'I don't work for you and you're not using tradecraft on me. I said, 'I parked right over here. I'll meet you at the Pearl Hotel restaurant coffee bar. Not going to [ __ ] let you do a there's a term of art for the for the kind that kind of a pickup. No, no, no, no. You're not recruiting me.
58:43[clears throat] >> Yeah, we're going to have a cup of coffee and that's it. And then I never saw him again.
58:49after the coffee.
58:50>> So, they're tough.
58:51>> Yeah. And they're murderous, too. You know, they're murderous.
58:54>> Oh, yeah. If you're a member of, for example, of Greenpeace, they're going to blow your brains out if you try to, you know, take over a ship or throw paint on a ship or whatever. They kill a lot of Greenpeace activists.
59:06>> The French intelligence does. Yeah.
59:08>> Like not the paramilitary.
59:10>> No, no, no, no, no. They're happy to go out and kill people. And that's why that's one of the reasons why we're not we don't have more of a presence in the Sahel right now in Africa >> because it's all French. They were all French colonies and the French are there just killing all kinds of al-Qaeda people. Yeah, sure.
59:26>> Oh, so they're killing al-Qaeda people.
59:29>> Yeah, that's fine. I have no problem with that. Right.
59:31>> Mhm.
59:32>> So they're like the French headqu's nice. I mentioned in a podcast the other day that um I was giving a series of speeches all around the UK at the beginning of the year and um [clears throat] I had five speeches with my conversant being a a a professor of English literature. I had five speeches with a uh kind of a belist actor and then five speeches with a retired MI6 officer.
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