Cracktoberfest Part Three: The Iran-Contra Affair

In part three of Cracktoberfest, Prop leads the discussion with Robert about the the Iran Side of the Iran–Contra affair and how that somehow landed Jean from Wisconsin in the jungles of Nicaragua.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yo, what's up? Welcome to the Bastards Pod. This is
a weird voice to hear, right, you know, saying I

(00:21):
gotta come up with some sort of what do we?
What do we? What do we? What do we? Here goes?
You know, perfect me. I didn't perfect you. What do we?
What do we? What do you? What do you say?
I would do a prop intro, but nobody, nobody needs
to hear me. Try to sing. Uh. This is a

(00:44):
hood politics behind the Bastards crossover, behind the hood politics
behind us. It's like it's like like when they do
Gray's Anatomy and Station nineteen on on TV, but better. Yeah,
they used to do this in the nineties, like sitcom
eras all the time episode. Yeah, that's how technically the

(01:10):
X Files and The Wire are in the same universe
right there. Scully came through. Scully came through to get
a get a get a nice, nice little bump of cracked.
Speaking of crack. Yeah, that is a good introduction, and
we'll get me off talking about what a fun crossover
Holder and McNulty would have been. Um uh, yeah, we

(01:32):
are talking. We are getting behind the hood bastards because
we're talking about the crack epidemic and the Central Intelligence Agency.
It's like the perfect It's also a perfect crossover. A
perfect crossover, would think you'd need. I mean it is.
I will say I get a little frustrated, as we'll
be getting into in in my episodes whenever people are

(01:53):
like the C I a brock crack to the inner
City because guys, the NSC was a big part of
it too. Very you know, Ali North was not slacking
on this. Let's not give the CIA all the credit.
This is what you will learn. You know what I'm saying.
You need to give people put some respect on their name.
The NSC needs respect. Respect right now, that's branding right there.
Reverse You ready for this reverse Bastard? Ya say? I

(02:16):
am ready. Let's do it? Brow Okay, Sophie. How you feel?
I feel like I don't have a script, which means
it's like a normal Bastards episode, because Robert doesn't send
me the script when I asked him to send it
to me either. Listen, here's the thing. Uh, it's important.

(02:40):
I don't know when this is coming out, but I
think it's important to acknowledge that. Uh, this is the
day after Queen Elizabeth passed and probably doubling as one
of the greatest days on Black Twitter ever. Oh my god,
black Twitter in Irish Twitter. We're both just listen a cylinders.
It was just voltron of melanated people like people that

(03:05):
seasonate food, just all got together, had a barbecue and
was roast in the hell. And it's almost like y'all
asked for it, because did nobody ask y'all to make
her the symbolic figurehead of all that is the British empire?
Y'all made her debt. Yeah, people, people are doing this
whole thing where they're like, well, but she didn't really
do you know? She she she's not the one who

(03:28):
did all of the colonialism. Was like number one, she
was thirty one years old when her government put like
a million Kenyan people in concentration camp stern Uprising. Number one,
let's talk about her. Watch some of that in fact,
did happen while she wasn't charge. And number two, Uh,
it's funny because she is representative of a terrible government

(03:51):
and so let's laugh at it. And look, people are like, hey,
your country doesn't have anywhere to talk. You guys made
Donald Trump the president. Absolutely fine, Let's laugh when he
dies too. It will be also funny when he dies,
it'll be and and I'm like, yes, you're right, and
I would hope that you would participate in the jokes.
The point I'm trying to make is it was like

(04:13):
these were I saw a tweet that said, we're mourning
more than the death of a woman, but the death
of a world, and I was like, yeah, number one,
we not. And that's our point. That's why we're cracking jokes.
Pretty you made her the picture of six fifty years

(04:33):
of oppression. You did not me. So that's the case.
Then we got something to say. Yeah, I am fairly
certain that Ruyard Kipling, the poet laureate of the British Empire,
wrote a whole poem about how that world wasn't very good.
I'm pretty sure. I'm pretty sure. Yeah. Anyway, anyway, it
was one of the greatest days on Twitter. Let's get

(04:54):
back to what we're gonna talk about here. Uh so,
I guess i'll try to get try to start in yo,
he hey, uh, what do you know about what are
your feelings on cocaine? There? Uh? You know, look, I
think it's not my favorite drug. I think it's a
general rule overrated, certainly more expensive than over priced. Like,

(05:19):
if I'm going to do a stimulant, right, if I
really need to, like like keep myself wired, I'm gonna
roll right on down to the old wall grains. I'm
gonna get up pick up some Benza dregs and Hailer's,
the ones that have Ben's a drain in them. I'm
gonna pop that little cotton thing outside of the center.
I'm gonna dunk it in a water bottle, and I'm
gonna drink me some Bin's a drinks, some like classic
seventies speed, you know, and then I'm gonna drive for
thirty seven and a half hours. Um. But if I

(05:42):
want to, you know, I've had some good times on cocaine,
don't get me wrong. Um. And if you get the
opportunity to snort a line of cocaine off of somebody's ass,
you should take it. It's a worthwhile life experience. I mean,
I feel like I feel like when you add all
those additives, like this is my ass, I'm like, well,
I mean that's the difference story by it by itself,

(06:02):
I'd be like, ah, I mean, I'm from Los Angeles,
so it's like you walk into somebody's party and they're like, hey,
how you doing. What's up? Man? Welcome and make sure
you take your shoes off, you know, because it's Hollywood party.
And they're like, hey, coffee's over there, bars over there,
coke's over there. Will be cool. So it's like it's
so ubiquitous growing up and I've been able to be like,
oh cool on that room. I'm saying, I don't need

(06:23):
to go to the coke room. But if you add
that there's a booty to snort off. Yeah, there's we're
gonna be snorting off of someone's. Sure that's an experience, right, Yeah,
that's yeah. There's a thing like clubs in Berlin and stuff.
It's really fun to go to a club where you're
gonna be there for like thirty hours and like periodically
take trips to the bathroom you through your friends to

(06:44):
do lines. But if I'm gonna be doing lines in
like the bathroom of a club in Berlin, I would
prefer they'd be lines of ketamine than cocaine. Um, that's
where I stand on cocaine. You talk about drugs the
way underground rappers talk about rap, just like it's the
most obscure ship like what the what wait, guitar nerds

(07:06):
talk about like pedals and bands. The best place to
snort drugs that I've ever snorted drugs is the kit
Cat Club in Berlin. It goes down like five stories.
It doesn't close for three or four days at a time.
Great place to do lines in a bathroom. Absolutely number
one word sound that sounds like quite an experience. Yeah,

(07:29):
my German listeners are are nodding along and go yes. Absolutely,
that's the part of that's the part of German culture.
Don't nobody tell you about why the nerds was Google stepping,
you know what I'm saying. Yeah, it was downstairs running
just hit and get bumps and rails. I actually think
the club is made out of an old bomb shelter.
But don't don't quote me. I don't quote you. So yeah, cocaine,

(07:49):
you know, mixed opinions. Good. Well, Uh, I'm glad you
think that, because we're gonna talk about I ran contra
and yes, which ends with uh. That's the hard part
with with with with with Sometimes with the bastards thing
is like trying to figure out one who the bastard

(08:09):
is and uh and where to start the story, but
we definitely know that this ends with the loss of
Whitney Houston. This ends with, yeah, the destruction of South
Central and New York and the total flooding of our prisons,
So we know that it ends there, and it's it's

(08:30):
kind of rank and I think this is probably how
we wind up having the episodes released. I Ran contrast
kind of the middle of the story, right, because you
have this period where the CIA is fucking around with
some of the ideas that get turned into a Rand
contra that honestly some of them start like thirty or
forty years before this we'll talk about but yeah, this
is kind of this is the middle, and it's it's

(08:52):
the middle. So normally, I think, like it was difficult
when I was plotting out my episodes because it doesn't
connect to directly to the crack trade. Or it does,
but but it's hard to understand why it connects to
it if you don't have the first and the end
parts of it. But also, a Ran contra is a
fucking crazy story on its own, and you have to

(09:15):
tell it like that. So I think what we're doing
is smart. People will get the full context. But yeah,
let's let's dive in. I can't wait to talk about
my boy all the North. Oh man, we got something
future bastard star so look so yeah so yeah, so
crack attack this this this story what eventually cocaine Crack Cocaine,
I ran contra all this stuff that he's talking about,

(09:37):
Oliver North. It's almost like the at least for a
hook politics, or for any sort of still living black
or brown person that didn't necessarily live through like Jim
Crow era or civil rights movement if you're somehow younger
than that. This is sort of like this is the

(09:58):
backdrop that we all kind of underst and it basically
laid the playground the map for almost everything we talk about.
For a number of reasons. It's almost like it's almost
like how like in Game of Thrones, you've just accepted
that there are dragons in their world, like you know
what I'm saying, or you just or like like in

(10:18):
Lord of the Rings, like Middle Earth is just the
planet and there are things that like you know, the
characters aren't necessarily pointing at, going oh yeah, yeah, there's
such things as hobbits, you know what I'm saying, and
you know, and orcs are because of Saramon and there
was actually an ancient history. Like this is just the map.
So if for you to understand a lot of gang violence, crips, bloods,

(10:40):
all this stuff in the inner city, like this is
part of the map that's necessary. But what's so crazy
about it is is how it's connected to geopolitics. But
like like Roberts trying to lay out with y'all, is
where do you start this story? Do you start it
with World War two? Do you start it with the
Monroe doctor? Do you started with McCarthy? Is? Um, you

(11:03):
know what I'm saying because all of this stuff, the
reason why I ran contract had to happen is because
of these other contexts. Right, So let's go ahead and
dive in. You know, yes, yes, so uh, you know
you're coming out of World War two starting the Cold War? Uh.
And this might be reviewed for everybody, but you know,
the Cold War was ultimately a war of ideas, Like

(11:24):
whose idea gets to run the block? Right? Um, who's
gonna run the world? Whether it's you know, liberal democracies
or communist socialist regimes, cripts, bloods, vice lords, nor Daniel Sennos,
It don't make no difference. If you just live here.
You know what I'm saying, y'all all gangsters, It don't
make no difference, y'all just trying to run whatever turf

(11:46):
you have. And at the end of the day for
us as like regular civilians, just like just like in
the uds, like you really you repping where your mam
would pay a rent, Like I didn't choose this neighborhood.
We just happen to live here, you know what I'm saying.
And if that's the case, right, if you running this blog,
the last thing you want is the enemy to be

(12:09):
able to set up too close to home, right, that's
the last thing you want. So the way that like yeah,
you see, you see versions by the way of this logic,
and like why Russia did what they did in Ukraine,
right exactly this whole idea that you don't want the Yeah,
you don't want the enemy setting up like and it's
funked up what they're doing in Ukraine and what we're

(12:29):
about to talk about the the same. It's that's the
whole thing about Like we can't have y'all join NATO. Yeah,
you know what I'm saying, because that's the enemy, Like
y'all can't be clicked up with these people literally right
next door. You can't have that, which was ultimately what
happened through the sixties, seventies, and eighties and central in
South America. America was like, we can't be having no

(12:52):
Communists on our soil. Yeah, you know what I'm saying.
That's too close to home now, granted, And it's so
crazy because if you, if you, if you, you know,
knowing your stories, doing your Cold War history, if you
talk to Korean War, you know, Vietnam War, we was
cool with like compromise. We was cool with like going
places as long as it was over there. You know
I'm saying right, because you know North Korea, South Korea,

(13:15):
that was an agreement. It was like, okay, cool, y'all
can have North, will take South. You know what I mean,
y'all support them. We'll see who the prophet is, We'll
see how everything works out. And then but if full
start feeling froggy, you know what I'm saying, then we're
gonna come wrap our turf, right, which is the proxy
wars of that time. But uh, at the end of
the day, a lot of this situation stems from the

(13:39):
idea of I just want to be the biggest dog
on the blog. And I can't be letting nobody come
into our turf, right, And these two operations I ran
in contra ultimately was actually a very brilliant hustle. But
if you speaking in like criminal sense, it's pretty brilliant.
But it should have landed Ronald Reagan and Georgia. But

(14:00):
Senior in jail of other people did it? Yeah, a
lot of people should have went to jail. Ye. So
so look, so let's start, and this is the middle
of the story. So let's start in the middle of
the middle. Let's just get real weird here, get all
Tarantino on this mud. So I'm gonna start at October five.

(14:39):
There's so there's this cargo plane, a Soviet bought plane
with Soviet made a K forty seven's and mad weapons,
flying over the Jungles and Nicarapola. And the plane had
no plans on landing. It was just gonna drop its
cargo and fly on off. And the guy that was

(15:00):
flying it, um, we'll get to his name later because
it's it's the most just white bread American name ever. Right,
So he's flying over and he's about to drop these
weapons over this, uh, this jungle in Nicaragua. And there
was a young man named Jose Alaman who sees him
in the sky, reads the lick, and he like, you

(15:21):
ain't supposed to be over here, shoots the plane down
just from nick jungle. Probably shouldn't have done that. This
might not well for anybody. Yes, shoots the planes down.
Now the question is who is Jose rapping. Jose's repping
the Sandinistas. Now. The Sandinisis are a socialist party in
Nicaragua who overthrew a dictatorship in nineteen seventy nine. Why

(15:43):
this was such an issue was because this dictatorship was
really cool with the US Reagan and them like really
clicked with him. It was it was everything worked out.
You did Joe part I did mine. Everything was cool.
They were super supportive like that dude. But then the
Sandinistas came in, over threw this dude, and San Denisa's crime,
as far as America's concerned, is day socialists. And that's

(16:05):
too close, you too close, you too close to ourhood.
You can't be doing those socialist stuff over here, right,
So the Sandinistas were the ones that shot this fool down, right.
So the fool gets shot down. Uh, Jose Alaman turns
him into his big homies, the big homies. The Sandinistas
put this fool on TV right after he gets set down.
So they put this fool on TV in Nicaragua, and

(16:28):
they was like all right, hey, yo, gonna say y
I'm you know what I mean? Like, what's your name?
Tell the folk's your name? He was like, gene hass
And Foss. That's not a real name. Boy day was
gene Hassen Foss. That's not a real name. Crop with me.
They was like, like, like where you from? He was

(16:50):
like Wisconsin. Like mother hassing Foss from Wisconsin was getting
the fun out of there. You're not supposed to be
in Nicara. Well what do you do? Was flying a
plane for the cargo weapons over a jungle Nicaragua. They
was like, uh so, why don't you tell the people

(17:12):
why are you here? Gene Hassa Foss from Wisconsin goes, well,
the CIA told me to come here and drop off
these weapons for the contrast. He just tells him exactly
why you're right now. Your next question should be, uh,
who are the contrast now? If you are around my age? Uh,

(17:33):
the first time you ever heard of the term contrast
was a video game where you was gonna ep up
left left, up, up, down down left right left right
b A B A select start. Remember this, Robert, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I's tell you get thirty men on the Contra game.
Who knew that Contra was that? I have that tattooed
and a part of my body I can't talk about
on the on the go. It was a really important

(17:55):
moment in history. It's like you learned how to hack
a game like three men. Any Way, So the Contras
were the group of people who were trying to overthrow
the Sandinistas. They were a pro democracy, anti socialists, rebels, right,
So so this they where they build themselves as pro democracy.

(18:18):
Let's let's say the story. Yeah, yeah, that's that's the
claim they're making at this point in the story that
even though the Sandinistas have overthrown a dictatorship and the
government they put in place is going to have some
problems too, but the fucking Contra is a big part
of what they're doing. Is like, well, let's go back
to the way things were they when we had that dictator.

(18:40):
Because the dictator it was one of those dictator where
you've got elections but they're not real. You all know
the story. Yeah, it's it's kind of like, Okay, so
you're having problems at school, right with with some some dudes, right,
and you go ask the last person you should go ask, like,
you know, your cousin Mark. You know what I'm saying,
Your cousin Marks, like, are you need help? We'll get

(19:04):
your help. Yeah, do you hope to say? Here? But
it's like is this help? Is this juice worth the squeeze? Right?
Your cousin Mark is saying, Hey, I'm just doing this
because I'm your cousin. Man. I love y'all said everything straight. Now,
Cousin Mark is not necessarily the person you should be
clicking with. So anyway, Cousin Mark maybe expected Cousin Mark
maybe come back for a favor later. You know what
I'm saying. There's some phone calls you don't make because

(19:27):
they're gonna cost more than they're giving you. Right. Yeah.
So anyway, so they put the boy on on TV.
He was like, Yo, the c I A uh told
me to drop this stuff off. Now. I don't know
how familiar you are with civics laws or anything like that,
but that's pretty illegal. You can't just be you can't
just be dropping off weapons in a country like that. Right.

(19:48):
Uh so so wants to say, Ninisa's put this man
on TV for everybody to see. They like, all right, America,
you got something to say. Look, here go your boy. Right.
So the US Secretary of State a man named George Saltz,
who we will talk about a lot later. Oh boy,
yes we will, board member George. Don't you dare forget it? Yes,

(20:13):
this man comes to the podium and it's like, I'm
sorry for that man, but I don't know who he
is he was. It was like, uh, first of all,
if if a government official, this is any government comes
up after something like this happens and says we don't
know who that if they specifically go up to say
we don't know that man, that's their man. That that's

(20:36):
the way that all we know it. Right, Yeah, come on, man,
that's their guy. That's the boy. Yeah, he was like
that man a list? Did he have no military idea
on him? Was he part of the CIA? That's a
private citizen. That man decided on his own and he's
a free will to have military grade weapons that he
could fly over a country on a plane among us

(20:59):
not inspired. Yes, of course that's a lie, right, But
the NSC, which we will again talk about later, had
a code name called Project Democracy, which is what was
actually happening at that moment. And the leader and again
that we mentioned before, future pod star Oliver north Um,

(21:22):
knows that this is all CAPP and he's actually in
charge with all of this, and that is absolutely our guns,
that's absolutely our money, and that's absolutely what's happening. We
was giving weapons to the contract. Yeah, we got to
back up to figure out how we got there. So

(21:56):
let's introduce some players here. Uh, you know Robert Bud McFarland.
You heard it his dude, Oh yes, yes, Robert Bud McFarland.
He's the the NSC chair. He's the NSC chair. Yeah.
He used to work for Kissinger and Nixon and was
like totally admired them. And he is a he is

(22:16):
a when we talk about cold warriors, this man is
a hard core cold warrior. A you like, whatever you
have to do to stop the spread of communism is
justified kind of guy. Not a dude does not give
a shit about elections. You've given how you get it?
How you we out here. Yeah, And McFarland is also
one of the things that's interesting about him. He is

(22:37):
the guy, the first guy to centralize UM U S
intelligence like information UH to like through a computer system effectively,
Like they have this system of terminals UM in the
White House, and I believe also in the Pentagon that
every all UH like basically all intelligence from every agency

(22:58):
is getting routed through And he's the first guy who
does that. And when he centralizes the flow of that information,
he's also centralizing power for U S intelligence operations in
the NSC in a way that it hadn't been for
a while. And and yeah, and it's partially because of
this debacle. Yeah, it was like exactly what the left
hand doesn't know what the right is doing. Right, And

(23:19):
they're not, by the by the way, because we're so
used to these people lying all the time. When like
guys like Schultz get up and say, well, I don't
we don't know that guy, they're not always lying. You're
not always lying that they don't know that guy, because
that's a smart way to do it, right, if you're
the CIA or whatever, you don't necessarily want the fucking
UH sect deaf or the chief of staff the NSC
had to know what all your guys are doing. It's

(23:40):
better if they can honestly be like, yeah, I don't know.
And you also, we'll talk about this more in my episodes.
There's guys in the CIA who can honestly say, no,
we were not doing this because in there, from what
they know, they don't know that that's going on. Because
all of these people are lying to everyone, including each other.
That's the way that the intelligence industry works exactly. Yeah,

(24:00):
and it's yeah, it's plausible deniability. And listen, how I
survived living in the cities I've lived in was that
was like, don't tell me. I don't know, so I
don't want to know. Don't tell me, Like I don't
know how this food got here. I don't know how
you paid for that. I don't know why that like,
I don't know. You know what I'm saying, So when
you ask, it's an honest truth. I don't know who
that is. I never met that man. Yes, so who

(24:23):
Actually another a little tidbit about Bud McFarland actually took
his own life later on. Good for him. I mean,
I don't know how is he was gonna get out
of it it is critical support. Yeah. So but let's back
up even from this point. So we got Robert McFarland
or Bud McFarland as he's called. Uh. And you got
Ronald Reagan, you Oliver North, you got George was Senior.

(24:45):
But let's go back to October three in Beyrout, Okay.
And on this day, there's this marine barrack that's in
the middle of Lebanon right in bay that's just kind
of posted up to air quotes keep the Peace during
the Lebanese series Civil War. And it does a great

(25:05):
job of that. It does a great job. Yeah, yeah,
because by Routes, you know, since we got there, never
had any problems. You know, it was fine, right, doing great.
Today it's doing great, you know. And as a side
note with this story, I uh, man, I'm so off
the rails, but I think this is what I love
about this show. So it's speaking of how well they've
done it keeping peace in Beyroute. I remember I was

(25:26):
at this event up in the Colorado Mountains like this,
Like I was performing for these freakishly wealthy people. It
was a dope thing. It was like entrepreneurship for good like,
so these people are not like annoying wealthy, they're just
like wealthy wealthy, you know what I'm saying, like kind
of like the like oh you still work for money
kind of wealthy like that, that type of wealthy. Right.

(25:47):
So we were talking about I think it was like
either right before the pandemic, so it was like early
um and we were talking about what was happening on
the Syrian Iraq border with the Kurds and you know,
and just like some stuff was going on and I
was like, dang, that's crazy. And then it was this
one lady was like, wait, what are you talking about?
And she was clearly Arab. She's like, what are you
talking about? And I was like, well, dang, like you know,

(26:09):
what's what's happening in Syrian around border? And she was
like what, I haven't heard of that? And I was
like in my head, I completely judged her. And I
was like, see, you know what wealth, when you just
get rich man, you just like you just you just
don't never know what else is going on. And she
was like, oh no, I don't think you understand. I'm
from bay Rout. She was like there's always this. We've

(26:35):
we've been in Civil War my whole and it's always
like this. So I thought this was something that just
wasn't what it always was. And I definitely got corrected
because I was like, man, I judged this lady. She
didn't live through some of the worst, the worst. It's
another fucking fight on the block for her, And like
the knacks are different, It's another fight on the goddamn block. Right,
it's East el A shooting out, shooting out, fireworks. It's like,

(26:58):
that's just I don't even noticed anymore. So but during
this time, uh, one day, early in the morning, truck
comes barreling through their gates, boom, crashes into their barrack,
pounds of T n T blows the whole ship up,
at least two people dead. Right, total asymmetrical warfare, something

(27:19):
that like America hadn't seen before uh at the time, right,
And it was clearly obvious who did it. It was
like the most the worst kept secret in the world.
Hes blood, they hiding right there in that valley data
ones who did this, right and asymmetrical warfare For everybody
who doesn't understand it's it's it's a very simple situation

(27:40):
that like all of us in our lives have had
to do this at some point where you have somebody
that's just towering bigger than you, it's ridiculous to try
to square up with them. Yeah, you're not gonna You're
not Hesbah is not gonna like take on a couple
of hundred marines fully suited up with air support. But
if you m a fucking bomb under the erics, you
can achieve the same ends. If you works pretty well,

(28:03):
it works pretty well. Listen, if you were to mouth
off so bad and it would never happen. But if
you were a mouth off so bad to Sophie, and
Sophie decided, Okay, you know what, I'm gonna have to
fund this dude up right, which would never happen. But Sophie,
I would not tell I would. My suggestion to you
would be, you need to bite, you need to kick,
you need to grab bats. There is no such thing

(28:24):
as playing fair. He is twice show size. This is asymmetrical.
You do what you gotta do. You know what I'm
saying again, this would never happen. This is why Sophie
keeps that ryder truck packed full of explosives outside of
my house just in case, Just in case, that's right. Yeah,
so I also do have a lot of United States
Marines quartered in my home right on the other side
of that screen, one of them just like bro uh

(28:49):
so so yeah, so blew it up, did this and
like we said, Bud McFarland, former Marine super Cold Warrior,
is like, uh, we can't let this ride. Well and
fucking Reagan. So Reagan has just come to office after
pushing Carter out, and the thing he runs on is

(29:10):
all of these guys got captured in Iran and Carter
couldn't get him out, right, they had you attempt. He's weak.
He's made America Week on the national stage, and I'm
gonna I'm gonna make sure that Americans are protected overseas. Right,
this is a huge deal. And this is not the
only thing that Reagan's dealing with. There's like an unprecedented
surgeon attacks on US embassies when Reagan is in office,

(29:30):
I think more than under any other president. Like it's
going like this is a real problem for him because
he's he's staring at re election and this is like
fucking It's not a nine eleven level thing, but for
people of that era, it was like pretty close. This
is like a huge fucking deal. This was absurd. Yeah,
like that because because it was so, it was more

(29:51):
like the disrespect, like this is the audacity dog like
y'all don't no one respects your gangster no more. Right, So,
like you said, Bug mcfar in, George Schultz, we talked
about before. They all agree, They're like, man, we can't
let this, we can't let this ride. But there was
some dissenting voices. Defense Secretary Casper Weinberger, Right, he was like, listen,

(30:13):
y'all got a reasonable man in the administer the most reason.
He was like, listen, y'all gotta chi do y'all remember Vietnam?
Like do you like, do you really think America is
gonna let us go fight somebody else's war again? Like
I don't remember this ship went Vietnam, which has been
over for like ten years at this point. Yeah, like
it's very recent. You'll remember these boys. They was like

(30:36):
burning there was burning a draft cards like it was
a thing. Like, honestly, it's about as far it's about
for them. It's about the end of Vietnam is about
as far as the end of Like um, the US
occupation of Iraq on a big scalect isn't there, Just
like it's really really recent for them. Yeah. So they're

(30:57):
like listen, Dog, like, you can't just we just can't
do this without the public support. Right. So oh, Ronnie
is like, all right, I feel you. Uh, maybe we
should just bounce in. But Bud is like, listen, if
we bitch out, it's gonna happen again. Right, we cannot
bitch out like this. Uh. And so Bud continues to

(31:18):
stay in Reagan's ear and he's like, listen, I'm trying
to tell you we can't we we can't do this.
But Ronnie's like, nah, they right, I'm up for reelection,
like you said, like, let's go ahead and fall back, right,
So why they So they fall back, right, but when
America falls back, we don't really fall back, you know
what I'm saying. Like, so we may have removed the Marines,

(31:39):
but the c I a state because remember we still
had hostages out there, right, we still had hostages in
Iran and that were held by hesblah and hesblah. Again.
Worst kept secret is totally supported by the Irani government.
I had totally holmany right, Like it's just like it's
not a secret it's out in the open secret ye

(32:00):
like to day, like heah is is armed to a
significant extent and often functions is like an extension of
the Iranian military. It's a whole it's a whole thing, right,
it's a whole them are we all got our proxies um,
which doesn't mean that they're also like that there aren't
conflicts between like hesblah and the Iranian government because like

(32:20):
none of these are. The fact that someone's a proxy
doesn't mean that like they don't have their own ship
that they're doing the world is the world anyway? Whatever? Yeah,
they still and it's all it's worth note. One of
the fun things. There's a really wonderful book called Landslide
by my probably favorite journalist who writes books, Jane Mayer,

(32:41):
about the Reagan administration in this period, and one of
the things she'll point out is that, like, especially once
you hit like three four five, Reagan is starting to
have the early effects of Alzheimer's. And he's also just
because of his he's kind of his personality. He's kind
of this like amiable like man and not a very
intellectual guy. And so one of the things he's known

(33:02):
for by the people that he brings into his white house.
Is that like the most important thing is to kind
of be the last guy talking to him, because often
do so. There are conflicts between McFarlane and Weinberger and
Schultz where they're all like just like primarily the thing
they're doing is like scheming to get the most time
in their schedules sitting and having like five minute meetings
with Ronnie because the more of those you can pack in,

(33:23):
the better you can do of like getting it into
his little brain whatever it is you want him to do.
Like McFarland's calling him on the phone when he's not
supposed to be calling him on the phone. It's very funny, dude,
It's so funny. I got some of those stories in
my script here. We're just they they're doing exactly that, Like, uh,
do you talk to me? You know I'm about to
talk to right now, you know, because you know I'm
gonna'm gonna get it. I'm gonna get in there. Yeah yeah, yeah, no,

(33:44):
I'll send a note right now. Yeah. It's because you
want to be the last dude to give him the idea.
So yeah, so they're like, yo, if we bitch up,
you know what I'm saying, it's just like the shut
the funk up, you ain't gonna do ship. Like if
we don't do ship, they don't do it again. Right,
And five months later they absolutely did it again. So
in March of eighty four, there was a marine named
William Casey and was a Casey. Yeah, you know, William Buckley.

(34:08):
My fault. Sorry, Casey is the the he's the head
of CIA, William Buckley. So, William, but there's a lot
of these fucking guys, a lot of dudes. It's hard
to keep them together. But yeah, So William Buckley was
one of the CIA agents that stayed back after Air
Quotes America left and it was his job to work
with the special the Special Forces of Israel to try

(34:34):
to go get our hostages from Hesbllah out of Iran. Right,
So that was his role, right, and then one day, right,
And it's the specifics of this is what makes it
so beautiful. Everybody knows, or everybody should know. Like, if
you a spot, you probably shouldn't drive your own car
to work, you know what I'm saying, You should probably like,
you know, spend the block a couple of times, like

(34:55):
figure out other ways to go. You know what I'm saying,
you know, need to notice is a fucking bike. Yes, yes,
you should know that the streets is watching. You should
just know right well, the streets was watching this fool train.
You know. Everybody has off days, messed around and on
his way to work. The day that they was gonna

(35:16):
go run, they sting operation to get their folks out
that day. He gets captured. Rights, but it captures that
fool that day. Put the homie on camera, sends it
now to William Casey, the head of c i A,
and he like, what now, homie, what y'all gonna do? Right?
You know what I'm saying, y'all need to y'all need
to go head on home, you know. And the CIA

(35:38):
sees it, sends it to Old Ronnie and Bud McFarland is,
like I told Joe, asked, this is what was gonna happen, right,
We need to figure out what the funk to do,
you know, and they have this idea. Bud McFarland actually
has the idea. Bud goes, Okay, listen, there's nowhere in
the world. Everybody in Iran fuck with the Ayatollah and

(36:04):
there's no way they have to have enemies out there, right,
So if that's the case, what if we just tap
in with those people? Right? And while no one can
agree on what to do, a year past, six more
people get kidnapped, right while they trying to figure out
what the hell to do? Mad people are getting kidnapped. Right,

(36:25):
No one can figure out what to do. So so
they're like, Okay, well we gotta we gotta figure out something. Right,
Maybe there's somebody out there, like they said, that doesn't
really mess with them, right, So this food but in
July gets a call from one of his homies, one
of his homies that that is like tapped in in Israel.
This guy named who is probably my favorite character in

(36:48):
this story, good Boni far right, my favorite character. He
is such a beautiful con man and he has the
United Yeah, I'm so excited for this. Yes, oh so yeah,
so good Bota fart of me is like did you
see that did y'all see that Denzel Washington movie where
he was a pilot and he was always an alcoholic

(37:08):
and connected John Goodman, John Goodman so good in that movie. Yes,
the movie itself kind of but Midman as as a
drug dealer, Oh my gosh right or take so take
that image and and compare it and connected to the
image of Adam Sandler in that Jeweler movie where you're

(37:29):
just like just jumpy and like just like always got
us to grows weirdo. Yeah. Yeah, but somehow, obviously it's
been able to deliver you know what I'm saying, by
the skin of his teeth. Again, that's a call you
don't want to make unless you actually have to make it. Right.
So he was like, Yo, I heard about your situation.

(37:52):
I gotta connect from some people out there in Iran
that don't really mess with Hornanian them. So I kind
of feel like there's a way we could get your hostages.
I found them that said, Yo, we we mess with y'all.
We're gonna get you all hostages, but we're gonna need
something in return. Yeah, and Robert wants tell them what
they need in return. Well, you know, so they're around

(38:16):
is fighting. There's this whole war with the Rock and
it's not going great. Um, it's it's not going It's
actually the most similar war to the Irana Rock Wars
probably what's going on in Ukraine right now. Um and Iran.
You know, they get invaded, and they're on their back
foot for a while, but they start pushing the Iraqis
back with these human wave attacks and so then there's

(38:36):
this reverse in the war. But they can't really break
all the way through the Iraqi lines because Iraq has
pretty competent tank battalions and so they need. What they're
gonna need is fucking anti tank missiles. They're gonna need
these like new fucking badass anti tank and anti aircraft missiles,
these things called hawks um that can knock Iraqi bombers
out of this guy. Because Iraq is bombing Tehran on

(38:58):
a daily basis during the US right right now, we
need fucking and when we talk about like missiles, that's
the missiles they mean, it's the stuff that we're sending
Ukraine right now, right it's man portable anti armor and
anti aircraft missiles. We need heaters, We need Blicky's. We
need heaters you right, like, because like we got our
own situation here, we had no boy scouts fam handling

(39:19):
the heaters that like you only get from the United
or the Soviet Union directly, their own versions of this stuff. Exactly,
y'all got the good ship. We need the good ship. Right,
so they're like, so they have so good Bonnafarre like, look,
they got him, but you gotta sell them these weapons, right,
And if you're paying attention, which I'm pretty sure you are,

(39:41):
that kind of sound like we trade in West weapons
for hostages. It does sound a little bit of sound
like that, right, But the boy Bonafar is like, no, no, no,
no no no no no no no no no no, no,
no no no, that's not what y'all doing. You're not
giving weapons. You're not trading weapons for hostages. Fam Listen,
it'll work like this, will sell them the weapons, and

(40:02):
you just tighten us up on the back end. And
not wrong with you selling us weapons. We are homies,
like everybody know we sell it. Alleger gonna look the same, bro.
Listen they listen, it ain't gonna be It's no big deal.
Gone chill, everybody, relax it, relax, listen, sell sell us
the weapons, and that's what the paper will say. And

(40:23):
then we listen. It runs our homies. We could do
whatever we want with the weapons. You sell them. The
Alleger gonna look fine, bro, don't even trip. Nobody will know.
Everything cool, Everybody cool, everybody cool. Okay, good, right, So
the idea is like it will work, like this is real.

(40:46):
We'll get the weapons, get the missiles, get the hawk things,
put the heaters in boxes. Take that cargo plane the
Lisbon Portugal. Right, let let it go to Portugal. It'll
clear customs, everything's good, get stamps on it. Come out
of Lisbon, fly into Tehran where Gabonafar will be there
and he'll slang the weapons to the Rani, to the

(41:08):
Irani people. It'll look it'll be super perfect. They're gonna
get their weapons. They'll go in and they'll give your
hostages and send them hostages home. Um, which is of course,
in fact, trading arms for hostages. That's exactly what it is.
This is us negotiating with terrorists. But again, go Bonafar
is like, what do you mean You're not negotiating with terrorists.

(41:31):
We that's what we do with these weapons is our business.
And you know again, if you say it like that
and you've got somebody as smooth as good Bonafar, you
could be like, you know what, anybody you got a
friend that could convince you with anything? Do you got
one of them? Oh? Yeah, absolutely, I mean that's yeah,
that's why I've done a lot of the cocaine. All
the stuff you're talking about, right, is the friend that

(41:53):
will convince you of anything, you know what I'm saying.
So this is the friend that will convince you of anything.
But you should you should know good and well after
sitting in the amount of holding tanks you may have
set and sat in that maybe I should stop listening
to exactly nothing like the paper. Look, the paper looks fine, right,
So they run back, they tell ron They tell Ronnie
Ronnie Reagan. Ronnie like, well, shit, I mean run it.

(42:15):
I guess you know what I'm saying. Like it seemed
good to me. You know what I'm saying. Are we cool? Right?
And he like, okay, So covert operation. I don't sound
like at least Paperwork is concerned. It don't sound like
we've done nothing wrong. But for this to work, Ronnie
has to do run this thing that's called a finding, right,
which is a document, a confidential document. It is a

(42:36):
directive that says the President finds that this operation is
in the best interests of natural security. It's just a
stupid piece of paper. You gotta run it to Congress
so that nobody is not in the know, because the
last thing the government, like especially elected officials, they never
want to seem like they caught off guard that they
do a lot of this, like the fact that they

(42:57):
have to do all this in order to like legally
do something like this is because of the ship the
CIA got up to in the fifties and sixties and
seventies that like we talk about in the CIA episodes
where all of that those governments they overthrew the ship
that goes on in Argentina and guatemal Like that's results
in a bunch of committees because people find out about
it and they're like, are you guys just like destroying

(43:19):
countries without waking anyone? Wait? We did? What what you know?
Oh man? How many dogs? Just think about your parents
opening a door, which and you and a cop are
standing on your ports and they like, what dides little
food do get in the house? You know what I'm saying. Yeah,
that's both why a lot of this starts with the
NSC and not the CIA. You know, they're involved, but

(43:41):
it's it's McFarland who's driving a lot of what happens.
And it's also why there's the guy who's in charge
of the CIA, Bill Casey, his whole motivation, he was
like a heart. He was like a fucking boots on
the ground spook in World War two, like like doing
some like gnarly body shit. Um. And his whole motivation

(44:02):
in life is to get back to when the CIA
gets to do that kind of stuff again. Right, So,
like anyway, that's imagine that being much more fun when
you just didn't have to like tell anybody what you're doing,
and you could just overthrow governments and and Bill bill
Casey is reading about him is fun, but in like
a my like like in an L. Ron Hubbard way,
like how did he get away with all this? You did? What? Yeah?

(44:47):
So Schultz and why Burger are like, okay, this is
a huge mistake. But you know, Bud, I Ronnie's ear.
I guess we're doing this now, answered his man named
Don Rique, who's the presidential chief of staff. Right, but
by the way, let's all deal with the elephant in
the room. Ronald Reagan's uh chief of staff was Donald Reagan.

(45:10):
That's just okay, let's let's just we just sit with
that for just a second, sit with it, alright. I
can't make this ship up like this is like, yeah,
it's we're in a simulation. Like that makes you feel
like we're in a simulation. You can't let that happen, Ronald.
But of course, of course whatever. But I mean he's
an absolute dick hole. Like, well, we'll talk about him.
He's such a hole, all of these guys. Yes. Uh.

(45:34):
There was even a moment where this fool like tries
to get but like like dragged in public while he
tells the he tells the press that this fool was
cheating on his wife. He just just messy, just making
up ship. So anyway, while all this ship is going
down August three, Um, Ronnie tells this fool, Okay, everybody
on the ground, Okay, it's on. Let's do this thing right,

(45:56):
tap in with Israel. Let's tap in with the Israel
at least, let's get this thing cracking right. So is like,
all right, let's make it happen. Let's do what we
gotta do. Um, Let's make sure everything run. So the
thing starts running and run. Then things starts running, and
then they put Oliver north Is where he starts in place.
So Oliver Morth is the guy that's like, all right, hey,

(46:17):
can you oversee all this ship right now, everybody knows,
well not everybody knows. That's the hard part. Nobody knows
except for the CIA that you can't trust gabon Afar.
Matter of fact, this nig a blacklisted like like he already,
but don't tell nobody. Yeah, while the while everyone else

(46:39):
in the intelligence apparatus is like setting up a heat,
like pinning all of their hopes and dreams on this
man case. He's got like this list of times Gabona
Farre has fucked us over and then he's just like
not sharing what you like. The Reagan administration is if
you could just like turn your soul off for a
little while and not think about all the people who die,

(47:00):
it's extremely funny. It's hilarious, yes, because I'm like, fam
you okay, you're seeing all this happening. You're seeing artists
and you notice fool shady and you ain't saying nothing
like you're not a friend, you're not a team player,
Like how is you like like bro speak up right?
So anyway, there's this motivation people have lately to talk

(47:20):
about how like, well, you know, the government when you
get right down to it politics, all these guys it's
the same as like what gangs do. Um, they're just
wearing suits. They're just gang bangers and suits. But I
might argue, if you're a gang banger, you have to
be a lot smarter because these guys are sloppy as person.
So fast if you were like, these guys are the

(47:41):
messiest people. If if this situation happened on the streets
and you was part of the set and you knew
this full with shady, you would get you would get
what's called DP, which is disciplined. You know what I'm saying,
which means we've beena beat your ass. You know I'm saying,
because like you bust all in danger and you knew better,
Like speak up, you know what I'm saying. Like you,

(48:03):
like you won't get it, You're gonna get it bad.
So so it starts getting cracking, right. Uh. First shipment
goes in. It's kind of weird, you know, like I said,
it kind of worked, went off to Lisbon. Uh, you know,
goes off to Lisbon. Uh comes back down. They get
the thing they're so supposed to be, the plan was

(48:25):
supposed to be. Once you get your first shipment, you
need to send us Uh William Buckley, send our guy, right,
and this is like gnarly for because they've got pictures
of Buckley, you know, they think he's being tortured. I
think it turns out that he was just like got
sick and was not treated properly. So that's what they said.
They was like, they was like, so once the thing works,

(48:45):
it was like, uh okay, so we got this thing,
here's the arms dealer, let's send it off. And Iran
was like once they got their shipment, Iran was like,
uh ay, he too sick to travel. We can't send him.
And you wait, wait wait, wait, wait, wait wait wait
you got your weapons though, like we paid, were just
sitting you a lot of weapons. We need our dude.

(49:08):
And they're like, oh man, sorry, fam. You send the
next one though, Send the next order and we should
be cool. Right now. Anybody's antennas should come up here, right,
you understand what I'm saying. But since these fools are
bad at being gangsters, they send the next shipment. But
the next shipment goes wrong. Right, you were supposed to

(49:31):
send five hundred uh Hawk missiles, right, there's they're supposed
to send five hundred Hawk missiles. They only got a
hunted right, and they was like, I don't understand what's
going on. Did Israel, you know, change the price like
something's not Like the ledgers aren't working. Be Remember there's
so many middlemen, it's hard to figure out what's going on.

(49:53):
Then then there's another ship mint right in November, and
when this ship man happens, it gets sent back. It
goes So when this one's happening, it's supposed to go
to Lisbon. Lisbon doesn't clear the customs, right, so the
ship gets sent back. Oh wait, I'm skipping apart. I
forgot this. This actually parts even more crazy. When the
second shipment comes to Iran. When it gets there, it's

(50:18):
got is rarely tags on it. It's stand through the
Star of David. Because remember how the lick was supposed
to work. The stuff was supposed to actually be American missiles.
You're supposed to go into there, and then we were
pretending like we were selling Israeli missiles to them, but
they were really American missiles because that's what it Ran

(50:39):
asked for. It Ran asked for American missiles. But if
they come in there and they got to start David
on it, Iran like, are you working with us? I
didn't ask for y'all's missiles. We asked for American missiles.
This ship don't look right, you know what I'm saying.
I don't understand what's going on, but we're not giving
y'all nobody till we figured this ship out. Right in
America is still like, oh my god, we're still We're still.

(51:01):
Somebody's gonna find out what the funk we're doing. We
have to get this thing working right. We've given them
so many missiles. If we don't get anybody at all,
it's worse than if we just give them more missiles
until we get people. Yes, exactly, so they and it's
like you just still paint it beautiful. Sunk costs follas
like FAM. You're like if like any friend would tell you,
my g you're getting extorted. You understand I'm saying, like

(51:23):
you're getting you're getting sucked out this mug by everybody.
You understand what I'm saying. Like if I was you,
I wouldn't even try to figure out who's at fault.
It's just it's time to pull out FAM. Right, So
the one shipment gets sent back to Israel like it
doesn't clear customs. And remember, Israel ain't supposed to have
these weapons. This weapons that are on this freight train
ain't supposed to exist. But now Oliver North need help

(51:48):
because we gotta get these weapons out of customs without
nobody knowing, right. So who does he call? This food
calls the c I A, yeah, there you go. I mean, like,
what am I supposed to do? Right? So Bill Casey,
who running the CIA, knew the whole time, this dude

(52:09):
with shady right new the whole time you were supposed
to get clearance, right new, the whole time that none
of this it was supposed to happen. The CIA wasn't
even supposed to be involved in none of this stuff
because you ain't setting no papers in. But now I
gotta come say, he like, why you bring y'all messy?
Why you bring me into this? Right? But he's got
to do it. So he's got to pretend like, uh,

(52:31):
Reagan signed something maybe, and then he goes to get
Then he goes to to Reagan and he tries to
get a retroactive finding so like on some post data
checks type ship, like just just backdate this thing, right,
turn it in, but just back dated, so everything will
be cool. He gets him to do it right, But
this whole time, I ran got the tenters up. I ran, like,

(52:53):
this is something y'all trying to We think Israel trying
to play us. Right now, if you America and you're
dealing with people this volatile, you kind of want them
to think that it's not you. You know what I'm saying,
Like it works better in your favor for for Iran
to think Israel to shady ones. Yeah what I'm saying,

(53:16):
because because if not, they're gonna shoot up our people. Well,
and it looks better for everybody if it's if it's
going through the Israelis, it looks better for everybody. We
can always blame them. Uh, Everything's like the Israelis want
to be in this because they have a vested interest
in Iran getting better weapons. Because while Iran and Israel
like do all this very public fighting, Israel actually over

(53:37):
the years has kicked around a lot of weapons because
Iran is also the ancestral enemy of Iraq, and Iraq
they considered for a long time to be much more
of a threat to Israel. So anyway, yeah, so true.
So Iran thinks Israel's playing them for us as cool.
So you and I'm mad at us, You're mad at them.
So the question is do you do you kill the

(53:59):
deal like you said the sunken cost you killed a deal?
Or do you keep trying to get your people back?
And at this point, it's Israel that looked like they
messed up, not us. However, it's probably this fool who
we can't figure out, this fool Gabana farre right, who
is so far he just been in the wind. He'd
been casting checks and been like, well, I don't know

(54:20):
what to say, like I've I've done what we need
to do. So so so the American team, Oliver North
and them run back. They tell Ronnie like, okay, look,
here's here's the situation. What do you want to do. Ronnie,
being as smooth as he is, remember he's not smarty smooth,
Ronnie is like, okay, listen, I could probably explain away
the legalities of us doing this if we get caught,

(54:42):
I could probably finesse this right. But what I probably
can't finesse is letting six or seven hostages die in
the hands of Iran because I couldn't get them out. Yeah,
but He's like, okay, um, but you're right, dog, like
this ship and working. Let's go go tell Gavanafar it's

(55:03):
off right. So Bud McFarlane and Oliver North they fly
to the UK to meet with Kabana farre Um and
they like, look, dog, she ain't working. I don't know
what you're doing. They're not getting their weapons. The numbers
is getting messed up. Now. Lis been asking questions like
we're we just need to end this ship, right, Gabonafarre like, um, okay, listen, fam,

(55:24):
I don't think you know who you're dealing with. Like
you can't just end to deal with these people. Yeah,
like this just you You didn't. You didn't, you didn't
tangled with the wrong folk. And besides, we're good. I
got this because you gotta remember how Bonafar un. You're like, look, man, listen, y'all.

(55:45):
Just just chill, man, just chill. You're acting all froggy man,
you're acting all jumpy man. Act like you're like, act
like you belong somewhere. Will be all right, homie. You
can't just back out with these people. Their killers And
I've been dealing with killers for a while, so we
all right. So Oliver North is like, look, man, he

(56:09):
probably right we did. There's no Uh, I don't know
what else we could do. Homie like, I don't know
how we could do this. Um, and if Reagan is
still down, I think we should do this. But Reagan
ain't ain't ain't reveal his card yet, right, So there's

(56:29):
there's some other cards going on, and Bud it's like, look, man,
I can't. I can't work like this. I'm about to
roll out. But but Oliver North has an idea, you know,
two two purple heart Vietnam head ass has an idea, right,
But we'll get to that idea later. But now we're

(56:49):
gonna have to start the other thread. But before we
do that, let's uh do what do you guys? What
do you call these plug doubles? That's what you call them? Yeah? Um,
oh gosh, Well let me tell you about where I
can be plugged. Um. I wrote a book called After
the Revolution. You can find it on bookseller dot org
or whatever. You can find it on Amazon dot com.

(57:11):
You can find it on the A K Press website
at just googling a K Press After the Revolution. Uh,
please buy it and read it. Uh. Many people have
and they seem to enjoy it. That's it. That's the
only thing I've ever done that in award winning pods,
I've never I have not won an award. No, nobody,

(57:33):
nobody's given me an award. I mean either, Um, you
deserve an award. I'll give you an award. Yeah, I'll
give you. I mean I've won an award. Yes, you
have whatever. Yeah, Sophie has won an award. Prop and I,
You and I are going to have to do some
asymmetric warfare. Now get that fucking trophy, you and Loft.

(57:57):
It's a running away with it. Man. It's definitely changed us.
We're definitely people with you and they one. You know
what I'm saying, I have I'm gonna be honest with you.
Never been this angry um, not so high and above us.
That's your new name now, Jamie, You and you and
me proper. We gotta do some some Bill Casey, some McFarland,

(58:20):
some fucking Ali North Ship. We gotta roll on this. Yes, yeah,
get those goddamn trophies anyway. She all right, all right,
I don't know which, I don't know which. The music
is rolling in right now, but that's don't the Batman.
Let's do the Batman theme music. Okay, leader, all right,

(58:43):
all right, that's part one by