New reports raise growing concerns that the next US elections may be endangered -- along with a ton of other rights. After 54 years of fire, Turkmenistan's "Door to Hell" may be closing. Radioactive rhinos and wasps. Sex toys thrown during WNBA games. Israel conducts expansive surveillance of Palestinians, prompting a larger conversation about Big Brother. All this and more in this week's strange news segment.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is Noel.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
They call me Ben. We're joined as always with our
super producer Dylan the Tennessee pal Fagan. Most importantly, you
are you. You are here. That makes this the stuff
they don't want you to know. Uh, guys, I gotta
tell you. For everybody tuning in the evening, this strange
news program publishes. It is August eleventh, a date of
(00:53):
weirdly personal importance to us.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
So we're recording it on the sixth.
Speaker 3 (00:59):
We're recording on the sixth, it's publishing on the eleventh,
by which point several of us will be on the road.
Just real quick, some important things that happened on August eleventh.
This is so dumb. I never know if this is
gonna work. Of course, everybody remembers this is the beginning
(01:19):
of the Mesoamerican Long count calendar. Never forget, Never forget.
That led to the belief that what was it that
the world was going to end in twenty twelve.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Twelve, twenty one, twenty twelve.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, spoiler, it either did not happen or
the world dead end and we're all just sort of
circling around.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Joe Rogan performed that night in Atlanta, and that is
when the world changed.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
It was that night that was the inciting event. That's
what did it.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Yeah, Joey Diaz Brogan, they all got up on stage
and the world was never the same Joey d all right.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
Also, it's a ton of people's birthdays we're talking specifically about,
you know, the big hits like Alfredo Bina, the Italian cyclist.
I'm literally just picking names out of the list.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
And as of today, all three of us on this
show have just become older. So we're now older gentlemen. Now, hey,
look at.
Speaker 4 (02:18):
Us, gentlemen of a certain age, of a certain interest
in vintage.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Perhaps I like when people say vintage for age. Also,
our pal Dylan Tennessee is on the wave for a
birthday as well, Dylan, And won't get too specific on
that one before we dive in. Okay, we've got a
lot of disturbing stuff that's happening and off air Actually,
we pushed our recording time a bit to chat about
(02:44):
all these fluid developments in place. So we're gonna have
a little bit of a roller coaster. We're gonna have
some positive, funny stuff, some up and down kind of experiences,
because there are some very disturbing things that we all
need to learn more about if we start on a
positive note or maybe like a weird note. You guys
(03:07):
like pizza, Yes, it's pretty good.
Speaker 4 (03:10):
Yeah, I've been known to have a pizza party from
time to time.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
I love a pizza party. Shout up, book it. And
I'm also really happy that you didn't say no, Ben,
pizza is terrible.
Speaker 4 (03:21):
Yeah, who would say such a thing. I mean, I
guess there are Do you know about the pizza the
way they do it? And I want to say it
is pen No, I'm sorry, is it Pittsburgh? I'm sorry
to jump in, but is it when they do the
cheese and it's not the cold toppings? Yes? What's that about?
Speaker 3 (03:38):
Wait?
Speaker 2 (03:38):
Wait? Wait, wait what it's a style.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
Of pizza in Pittsburgh, Thank you, Dylan where the cheese
is served cold and the toppings are served cold on
top of the cooked base on purpose.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Yeah, I don't get consensually ordered. The people of Pittsburgh.
Speaker 4 (03:57):
Doesn't seem don't it don't seem right?
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Man? I got super into hierarchies a pizza. You know,
I read too much about food. I think we all
are mystified by it. What's your favorite style, Ben, my
favorite style of pizza? All right, come at me, Chicago.
I don't like deep dish.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
You don't like a deep dish. I respect it. It's
a lot.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
I respect it.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
It's a lot of food. It's heavy. It's like a
if lasagna and pizza had a weird pizza baby.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Shout out local pizza joint Parma Tavern got their pizza
last night as we're recording. It's called some like it Hot.
It's got a chili pepper bass. So instead of pizzas
like pasta, yeah, so, instead of marinera or pizza sauce,
it's got chili straight up chili's seeker.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
That guy right there, what was that really good spot
we all went to together in Brooklyn that we liked.
It had some really hot sausage with hot honey or
something like that.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
I like a hot honey.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Who was that spot?
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Though we always can't remember?
Speaker 4 (04:56):
We had Atari games and stuff.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Geez yeah, I love it. Well, look, we're all polyg
polyg something like that.
Speaker 4 (05:03):
I think.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Okay, a pizza place that has the person's name in it,
that's always a good indicator.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, John's Pizza in NYC is also a
solid choice.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
Sure, we got Geno's here. We've got a bunch of
people listening based in New York. Feel free to email
us about the New York pizza thing again. For now,
what we'll see is that, look, we're all fans of pizza.
We don't have to get into the history of it
unless we do something on it for Ridiculous History or
(05:35):
our pals Saver, one of the best food shows out there,
does something on it. But recently, guys, on just July
twenty eight, few days ago, there was an outbreak, a
pizza related outbreak in Wisconsin. More than eighty people found
themselves non consensually high AF and I do not mean
(06:00):
as foretold, but the fortuitously high. They did not agree
to this. So this is arguably old beans because the
incident took place in October of last year, of twenty
twenty four, but the news about it is just coming out.
(06:21):
Apparently the authorities have concluded that famous Yeti's Pizza in Stoughton,
Wisconsin had accidentally, by which we mean without knowledge management,
accidentally dosed at least eighty five people with THCHC. I
believe through probably through the cooking, you know, like how
(06:43):
you cook edibles with TC oil or with with us
kind of butter.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Well, it was in the dough, right, They used oil
to create the dough that had TC in it, so.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
It also got into the garlic bread. Additionally, it got
into the sandwiches. It reminds me of our earlier story
about Turkey. It reminds me again of the idea that
some of these eighty five people might have just visited
this yetti pizza place for the first time and thought, wow,
(07:14):
this is amazing. Why do I want to eat three
more pizzas and maybe listen to some SKA.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
I mean, you could argue that it's a marketing ploy. No,
that wouldn't really work. Where is it again, It's in Wisconsin, Wisconsin, Okay, No,
not the same at all. It also reminds me of
the story we talked about out of Germany, out of
deutsch Land, where there was a very popular pizza joint
that was using pizza delivery as a way of delivering cocaine.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Oh boy, guys Russeldorf really quickly. I just looked at
the story you shared Ben on Live Science that it
was one of those companies we've talked about. I guess
not a ghost kitchen, but they share their in their
kitchen with other people, and one of the groups that
works in that same kitchen makes thc. Somebody making the
(08:01):
dough just grab the wrong bottle and just starting making dough.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yes, that's what we're saying. It's your honor for legal purposes,
we're pleading. Whoops.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Oh and it was a state licensed vendor who prepares edibles.
Speaker 4 (08:15):
Oh, we haven't even done.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
We haven't even paused for a second for a word
from our sponsors. We would have a little logger. We
think it's okay because you know, hopefully you like us,
enjoy pizza and Dylan. I hope we can repair our
relationship now that I've confessed that I'm not the biggest
fan of Deep Dish, but agreed Chicago forever for anything
(08:38):
but malort. We're gonna pause for a word from our sponsors,
and then we're going to get into some more strange
news that may hopefully ruffle some feathers, and we have returned. Okay,
do you guys want the good news first, like continue
(09:00):
the pizza level or genre of conversation or do you
want to get straight to the well?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Do we make it a good news sandwich, a good
news HOGI and give us some bad news and then
we'll finish it out with some more good news.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Great, Okay, here we go. So, guys, remember turk Ministan.
Speaker 4 (09:19):
How could I forget heard of it?
Speaker 3 (09:21):
How could I forget? We'll always have turk Ministan, we
say together at the turk Ministan. No, I won't so
turk Ministan. For over over half a century, out in
the Karakum Desert has been home to a continually burning
(09:41):
creator of underground gas. It was formed in nineteen seventy one.
Soviet geologists accidentally collapsed a natural gas chamber while they
were drilling, and they were terrified that this gas they
had released would spread to the population and poison everything.
So they shrugged their shoulders and they set that chamber
(10:03):
on fire. They did not understand how much gas was there.
They thought it would burn out quickly, so instead, similar
to Centralia, Pennsylvania, this thing often called the Door to Hell,
has been burning and burning and burning. The good news
(10:23):
here is that, finally, as a reported just recently, the
fires are quelling down. The door to Hell may be closing.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Nice.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
Okay, can you not a moment too soon? Those cenobytes
are about to start pouring out.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Can you guys imagine how large of a chamber there
must be in there somewhere, Yeah, like deep within the
earth and.
Speaker 4 (10:47):
Keeping for all that gas to accumulate and just consistently
burn off like that.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Yeah, for all of it to just exist in that pocket,
something decomposed at some point to create that stuff that gas.
I'm just imagining if you could somehow excavate whatever that
chamber is and go down.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
There and once the fires, well, you know, it'd be
also very interesting to see whether there was some sort
of extremophile life form that it.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Is now crispy.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
Or has survived. Oh that would also I think that
would be more interesting as well. Right. Anyway, this comes
to us from Daniel Graham, writing for Discover Wildlife. The
fires aren't completely out yet for any absolute sith lords
in the crowd who are going, oh no, my door
to Hell? Right, how am I going to get back home.
(11:35):
The reduction of fires, however, per Arena L'eva, the director
of Turkmenistan's energy company Turkmen Gays get it Turkmen Gas
whatever they say, the reduction in fires is nearly threefold.
So this is good news overall for the world. And
(11:56):
we hope that anybody who has had the chance to
is it Turkmenistan, which is an episode all its own.
We hope that you take the time to reach out
and tell us about your experiences. We would like to
go to some of the stands, I imagine, but as
you can likewise imagine, folks, it's kind of tricky for
Americans to get over.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
There and then you got to get back.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Yeah, yep, that's a great point, Matt. So getting in
is way easier than getting out. And I don't know
the specific people you're thinking of, but I know some
folks who had a little bit of a tough time.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Well, yeah, I think we're in a weird We're in
a weird climate right now. When it comes to somebody
leaving for a country and then deciding they want to
come back, and then maybe some folks who would say, nah.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
All right, man, don't do this right now you know what,
you know, what's about to go down? Oh it's true though,
it is very true, and please travel safely, folks. Here
is our dark news that may be may irritate some people,
may terrify some others. There are new reports emerging from
(13:11):
the Brennan Center for Justice over at NYU School of
Law that indicate the current US administration may be working
ardently and specifically to undermine free elections. What do we
mean by free elections? Free elections? We mean in the
(13:33):
United States, with certain caveats, usually felony status right or
legal residency status, anyone over a certain age is allowed
to vote in local elections, in state elections, and federal elections.
That's what makes a representative democracy work in theory, right
(13:54):
if it's natural democracy. So right now, if you go
to i mean some admittedly biased sources like People's World,
you'll see there are serious concerns, not from far left
activist groups, but from legal beagles. Serious concerns that there
may be a conspiracy to screw over the vote, which
(14:19):
is the bedrock of the American experiment. Have you guys
heard about this, I'm sure you haven't. So the idea
is found from the legal boffins in a combination of
a Trump executive order, an EO issued on March twenty fifth,
and the Save Act and a proposed voter repression law
(14:41):
that would disenfranchise something to the tune of twenty one
million people, most of them identifying as women. How is this? Like,
how is this happening? You guys? Well, you know we're
talking off air. Went to the went to Congress dot
gov and re learned that the Constitution of the United
(15:02):
States website has removed sections from the language like the
one piece of paper we're all supposed to read.
Speaker 4 (15:12):
It's not quitely.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Well, yeah, sorry, Ben, I have not looked into this
at all, and I think it's just mostly because the
politics stuff is so overwhelming right now purposefully, and this
just seems like an actual power move if you can
undermine the elections for the group of people who are
gonna help you make decisions right or help you get
(15:33):
things passed.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
Yeah, it's ugly, Yeah, it's it's missing from the Library
of Congress on Congress dot gov. You can call it
a goof. But then if you go to other related
websites and links under the same auspice, then you will
see that sections article one, section nine to ten have
(15:59):
been removed from both things from multiple sources.
Speaker 4 (16:03):
I'll tell you what this reminds me of, and that
it isn't a goof and I don't think we've talked
about it. It was I believe, an exhibit at the
Smithsonian on impeachment, right, and the Trump administration gently requested
that that event in the history of Trump's political career
(16:24):
be removed.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
Yeah, it was temporarily removed and then the Smithsonian reinstated they did.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
I didn't see that. Thanks for the update then, But
that just that kind of information control and gives us
all the squigs. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
Absolutely, you know, regardless of what your level of political
interest is or your you know, ideological identification, we can
agree that the Constitution is the thing you're only supposed
to fus with through amendments, not through just removing stuff
(16:58):
off a website, you know. So I think it's also
likewise just to walk through an exercise empathy. I think
it's likewise easy to say, well, hey, this is just
a website, you know what I mean. It's not like
someone ran up to DC and started taking a black
highlighter and marking out, marking out passages of the printed Constitution.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
The Library of Congress is the official like repository for
that kind of information. That's very different than the censoring
or futzing a.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Website exactly exactly, and well said, this also cuts out
the end of section eight. The question then becomes is
this intentional or is this just maybe something as simple
as a result of the massive cuts to government employees. Also,
(17:51):
I'm going to miss in PR guys.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
Well we haven't talked about that, but in PR isn't
necessarily going anywhere. It's will affect for sure, is a
lot of the more rural agencies or branches rather that
to get a lot of their funding from the Corporation
for Public Broadcasting. So that's definitely gonna have an impact.
But in PR as an organization is you know, listener
supported as they always say, and how much we love
(18:15):
those fund drives, which are going to be more important
than literally ever.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
That's a good correction.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Local areas that only have news because there's federal funding
to bring them local news, they don't have local news
outlets and things like that. So there go and.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
Not a correction at all, just clarification just in terms
of like the bigger picture because it's easy to absolutely
say and not inaccurate rip and pr because it doesn't
mean that that's not what's coming down the pike necessarily.
If people don't step up.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
It's just going to be ninety percent pledge drive, ten
percent news.
Speaker 4 (18:52):
Well, it's a great tagline, man.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
Perhaps this is a bit of a ball in gilly here.
The Library of Congress's official Twitter account earlier, I think
today or yesterday, said quote, it has been brought to
our attention that some sections of Article one are missing
from the Constitution Annotated website. We've learned this is due
(19:16):
to get this everyone, due to a coding error. We've
been working to correct it and expect it to be
resolved soon. So perhaps simply another whoopsie, right, grabbing the
wrong oil for the pizza and the ghost kitchen.
Speaker 4 (19:32):
And that's what happens when you move fast and break
stuff right, It's roses along the way.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
One law professor Anthony Michael Kreese said, I didn't believe
this at first, but then I thought, do I have
to teach Article one Section nine to ten anymore now
that they're removed from the Congressional website.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
I don't know if that's how it works.
Speaker 3 (19:52):
I mean, but that's god level s tier level hotshot
lawyer plus professor snark. Yeah, you know what I mean.
That guy has got I kind of want to hang
out with him. So that's it. Folks, tell us what
you're thinking about the ideas of habeas corpus. The recent
signals that we haven't even talked about about removing birthright
(20:16):
citizenship in some cases. I know we've spoken in the
past about the rough concept of what citizenship means in
different countries. So birthright citizenship means that, regardless of your past,
if you are bored on US soil, you are a
citizen by virtue of that experience of that act. Other
(20:40):
countries have stuff like citizenship via blood or lineage. If
you are descended from what we consider, you know, Irish
or Japanese or whatever, then you can become a citizen
because we think of you as one of us. Birthright
citizenship as a concept is even imperfectly applied. It's honestly
(21:03):
one of the reasons that the United States became such
a world leader, such a melting pot, such an exporter
of culture and success and ideas. So I think that
I haven't spoken with everybody in Congress about this. I
think we should keep it.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
That's a good call.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Okay, is that a hot take?
Speaker 2 (21:21):
Disappointment?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
I think maybe we should keep it. I don't know,
jeez anyway, all right, so we'll move on. And the
last thing that I think is going to be a
nice throw to a story that we're going to talk
about right after. Poaching is terrible in South Africa, and
the anti poaching folks have reached a new kind of
(21:43):
out of the box approach toward poaching of rhino horns.
Right now, as we record, about one rhino per day
is getting legally killed, and their horns are being trafficked
to various parts of the world as collectibles to be
used in some types of pseudo medicinal applications. Someone looked
(22:05):
around and said, why don't we just, uh make the
rhino horns radioactive?
Speaker 4 (22:13):
It's the question that's on everybody's mind.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
Ben right, keeps us up at night.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Yeah, how did the rhinos feel about this?
Speaker 3 (22:20):
The rhinos weren't in the meeting, so they were they
were very corporate about it. This is the University of
Vit Watterson or with watersund Uh. They made something called
the reisotope project, and it's they put six years of
testing research into this. Uh they say, look, we can
(22:42):
prove that the radioactive material we're putting into these rhino
horns is fully safe for the rhinos. That's what they say.
So the idea is that it's not that poachers will
get within, you know, x meters of a rhino and
then a ropped in cancer tumors or vaporize as though
(23:05):
they had run up to Chernobyl on its most famous day. Instead,
the idea is that when rhinos are murdered, you can
use the radioactive signal to track the providence of the horn,
the material that is.
Speaker 4 (23:22):
A ride the signature.
Speaker 3 (23:23):
Yeah, that's a perfect word for it. And these are
stories that are happening so often that it's hard to
keep track of all of them. Similar sadly enough to
the fact we acknowledged recently where we said, hey, we
don't even report on all the mass shootings all that
(23:44):
often now because they happen so often. There was one
here in Atlanta, by the way, not too long ago.
But with this in mind, there is another radioactive animal
story that we can't wait to chop up together. We'll
pause for word from our sponsors, and we'll be back
with more strange news.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
And we've returned before we continue on our journey of radioactivity,
We're gonna pause here to just say, guys, have you
noticed how crappy it is to just try and find
news articles on anything anywhere, to search for them, to
find them. Once you're there, all you hear about is
Jason Momoa's Chief of War as a giant pop up,
(24:30):
and then you get a bunch of other crap about
how they want to send you messages or just it's awful.
It's an awful experience.
Speaker 4 (24:38):
And that's why we enjoy ground news. Yeah it's kidding,
but they do a good job. But yeah, it's yes,
it's not the best.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
I'm just my whole point here is you have to
find a workaround like that. You have to find a
work around the way we've described before on the show
or else like if you're just using any of these
websites that offer actual news nowadays, it is it's terrible.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
It is terrible.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
You'll also find that there are so many typos in
everything and weirdly phrased sentences that don't make actual English sense.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Shat gpd up.
Speaker 4 (25:11):
Yeah, I don't love it.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
You'll also find a lot of echoing of a primary
source which has clear signals, like tracking a rhydo horn,
you see the same turn of phrase, you see that
maybe a typo has occurred, right, and that typo has
just been uncritically like like ripples in a lake when
you throw a stone, that typo is uncritically propagated throughout.
(25:36):
And it's crazy, because Matt, what you're talking about. These
are not just and we say this without aspersion. These
are not just you know, someone's private labor of love blog.
These are supposed to be the high end journalistic minds
of the day.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Yeah, looking at you, AP News and your typo's good lord,
oh no, aphid and terrible CNN because they are.
Speaker 4 (25:59):
Typically the primary source that gets passed around, right, if
we're talking about a big one, it's them.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
Writers, all the hits, all the things that we used
to even if we disagreed in the course of our research.
We prize media literacy, so we would never we still
never read a single source before we make a conclusion.
Speaker 4 (26:19):
But it's it's that erosion of that journalistic integrity that's
a direct result of the throwaway kind of culture of
Internet content. I mean not to put too fine a
point on it, but I think that's a big part
of it.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
And no one is immune, that's correct, even The Guardian,
one of my personal favorite outlets that exists on the planet.
And you know, speaking of not looking at one source,
when you've got a great group like the folks at
the Guardian, they will work with multiple other outlets when
they're doing a big investigation, which is what we're about
to explore, one of those multi agency investigations.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
And before we get to that, we got to tell you, folks,
pro Publica is awesome. A lot of people don't like
it because it speaks truth to power, but pro Publica,
I would argue, is somewhat an exception to some of
these other sources that we're.
Speaker 4 (27:09):
Talking Axios two maybe they do good work.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
Yeah, and for quite a while the Intercept, I think
they're still at it. Every once in a while you
will find something incredible coming out of there.
Speaker 4 (27:19):
And four oh four Media we dig a lot too.
In terms of like internety news items. I think they've
been doing a fine job.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
There's lots of good ones.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
If you have any leftover money, If folks don't VEMMO
uncle Sam to pay the national debt? Donate sorry or propublican?
How come you know that gets me? This is a derailment.
But how come just once? I want a cold call
message that's not asking me to donate. I want to
be donated too, you know what I mean? Like, Hi,
(27:50):
I'm the World Wildlife Federation. Good hustle, You're in danger,
You're an endangered entity. Here's I don't care how much
money is. It's the principle. Yeah, here's two bits.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Yeah about about sorry. That goes back to South Park.
By the way, South Park season twenty seven, episode two
is out right now. Episode three is on its way.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
And did you see that the White House posted us
still from it as a way of recruiting ice. Oh
it's not Yeah, they did that, to which the South
Park fellows responded, Oh, so I guess we are relevant
hashtag eat a bag of.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Oh they did?
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Wow?
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Okay, well all right, so okay, reported we've gone through that.
We've yeah, yeap.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
So to breach the subject we're going to today, we
have to go back in time time time time. We
were jumping to the Electronic Frontier Foundation's NSA timeline that
you can find at www. Dot eff dot org slash
NSA dash spying slash timeline.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
Check it out.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
It's got an entire timeline of the warrantless wiretapping and
crazy mass surveillance that the United States has been going
through since two thousand and one. And it goes way
back the NSA timeline here, guys to seventeen ninety one.
Whoa cool stuff. Wait in there, you're gonna remember a
guy named John wu Uh. I think his real name
(29:14):
is you tune Uh though, John You not wu John
You was a He was an attorney. He was a
Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel
way back in the day, only for a couple of
years two thousand and one and two thousand and three.
He's he's one of the guys that came up with
the legal framework for things like, you know, going around
(29:36):
the Geneva Conventions, when it came to torturer and when
it came to how do we surveil everybody in a
country enhanced interrogation, yes, well yeah, yeah, yeah, the torture members.
Speaker 4 (29:48):
But also he had a torture schmortcher. He all comes
enhanced in there.
Speaker 3 (29:52):
He had a phenomenal interview with John Stewart by the
way back.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
In the day.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
I'm sure he did.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
But he's also the guy, no matter how great he is,
he's the guy that found a way to make this
terrible stuff happen, which is.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
All we go. I'm not saying he's a good guy.
I'm saying the interview was good.
Speaker 2 (30:06):
Okay, Well yeah, just again, everyone is complicated, right, But
it's just a weird individual that you will find there
in the timeline. And if you look at that timeline,
you will see that on October fourth, two thousand and one,
twenty three days after the Twin Towers fell, the president
at that time signed off on this secret eavesdropping operation
(30:27):
that was so secretive that the people who generally know
about this kind of stuff, people in the national security
sector there, the senior folks, they had no idea it
was happening. They had no idea it was taking off.
John used one of the people who came through and
came up with a legal framework for that program. Then
you move on to around late two thousand and two,
(30:47):
and that is when telecommunications companies in the United States
began doing this kind of voluntary handover of information about
their customers. So this is when everybody from AT and
T to Verizon to everyone who's operating would say, Okay,
us government, you've got this program, and for the good
(31:09):
of the country, for the good of everybody, at least
that's the way it's framed. You can have all the
metadata on our folks, the people who pay us to
use communications services, and by the way, that is through
requests from the FISA courts, the Foreign Intelligence surveillance courts.
And it's interesting that that's occurring. And then you just
(31:31):
keep on going down the line here because those voluntary
systems stopped. And then there came some really weird stuff
that Edward Snowden hipped everybody too that a lot of
other whistleblowers, including I think his name is Mark Klein,
some people who came forward who were inside AT and T,
who were inside telecommunications and said, hey, there's some weird
(31:54):
stuff going on. The NSA is operating in our San
Francisco AT and T building, and they're building a secret
room and that secret room has this weird thing in it.
It's very strange. It's called a NARIS surveillance system. They
called it NARIS Surveillance equipment. It's the kind of stuff
that siphons off all data that's coming through that giant
communications hub in San Francisco for AT and T and
(32:15):
it copies it essentially.
Speaker 3 (32:17):
Right, Yeah, don't worry about the massive storage infrastructure there.
But do ask yourself, what is prism?
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Yes, oh, yes, so something like this. And this is
January two thousand and three when we hear about that
AT and T stuff.
Speaker 4 (32:31):
This is.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
This is all happening right way back in the day.
We're talking about over twenty years ago. This is happening
just in the US. Then in twenty thirteen we learn
about Verizon getting in with the NSA and how all
of the calls that were made by all Verizon customers
for just a couple months back in twenty thirteen, we're
(32:54):
copying all the information was handed over to the NSA.
And that was just a special little thing. And again
because there was some whistleblower that found a document, began
talking about and reported on. In this case, it was
Glenn Greenwald that we know from at the time at
least it was through the Guardian, and then we know
about his reporting through the Intercept a couple other places.
(33:15):
But that's one of the people. One of the journalists
individuals that are willing to talk about this stuff. And
then we jump all the way down, guys to today
today published in The Guardian, written by Harry Davies in
Yvelle Abraham. There's a new story coming out and here's
the title, A Million Calls an hour. Israel relying on
(33:36):
Microsoft Cloud for expansive surveillance of Palestinians and this is
a new kind of mass surveillance program. All the ones
that we've talked about in this episode before this were
metadata systems. At least according to every piece of documentation
that I've seen, they are recording information about calls, stuff
(33:57):
like who the people are that are calling the numbers,
who they're associated with, right, how long the.
Speaker 3 (34:02):
Call was, the time the call was made, the location.
That's a fig leaf, though it is. It is the
idea then, I think, just to put it plainly, is
that those previous systems. Check out our twenty thirteen snowed
In episode, even Snowden was arguing, they're not checking for
content of the call, no men.
Speaker 4 (34:21):
No data.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
They're trying to see who's communicating with whom. At least again,
we're talking about the early two thousands, though do you
want to know why, Guys, I think this is my opinion,
why I think they weren't just screening all of the
phone calls at that time in two thousand and one,
two thousand and three, do tell because there was not
the computing power or the storage to keep all of
(34:45):
that information or to be able to even analyze any
of that information. Because the systems, at least the one
that was being talked about in two thousand and three
that was installed at and T, it is analyzing thousands
of pieces of communication every set, which is a lot,
but it's not nearly enough, it's not nearly fast enough,
and you couldn't store it somewhere. There were no If
(35:08):
you think about what cloud storage has become nowadays, that
didn't exist back then, Well it does now through things
like Microsoft Azure Azure I guess is what you would
call it. Things you know out there like Adobe's servers
that they have their cloud servers that are just massive
installations that can hold you know, untold amounts of information,
(35:32):
essentially infinite information. It continues to expand right at least now,
because of this new investigation from The Guardian plus nine
to seventy two magazine and local call. This new program
in Israel records every single phone call made in the
West Bank and in Gaza. And we're talking, you know,
(35:53):
there are three million human beings in the West Bank
and they this is that whole thing. A million calls
an hour, that is rough what it is recording and storing.
Imagine that, guys, A million calls an hour are stored
through this mass surveillance program that Israel is running.
Speaker 3 (36:09):
Not the information about the calls, the content of the
calls themselves. And Matt, from what we understand here, the
nation of Israel has pretty much run all Palestinian telecoms
for some time. Oh yeah, so it's not a huge
stretch for this to be deployed.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Yes, correct. It's the kind of thing where if you're
living there in Gaza, you may imagine, gosh, I wonder
if I wonder if anybody's just listening to all these calls.
Now that's all run you know, by people that are
bombing us currently. Yeah, it is. And it also helps
when you take out most of the telecommunications systems with bombs.
Right now, now this entire area is reliant on your systems.
(36:54):
It's it's really, it's really creepy. You can look up
Unit eighty two hundred. This is kind of it's equivalent to,
but not the same as, the NSA for Israel, and
you can just you could read this entire thing. I
would recommend it highly. It is crazy, you guys. These
(37:14):
calls are kept for a long time, you know, thirty
days or more. They are analyzed using AI systems. There
is a threat level assessment that occurs. That is not
a human It is a system. It is an algorithm
that is figuring out who's threatening and who's not. They
are also looking at all text messages and they have
(37:36):
been doing that since around twenty twenty one, and again
using AI systems to assess those things. Is this person
a threat? Are they communicating threatening things? It's really creepy,
really scary. According to Microsoft, they had no idea this
is what was happening. We thought we were just storing
a bunch of things. The CEO allegedly met with the
(37:58):
chief just give these names. Setaya Nadella, who is the
CEO of Microsoft, met with the commander of that unit
eighty two hundred back in twenty twenty one. The unit
commander of eighty two hundred said, hey, we've got a
lot of data we want to go to the cloud.
We think you're the right people for it. But a secret,
super secret, And you know, Nadella said that sounds like
(38:21):
a lot of money. Now I'm just showing you we
have official statements for Microsoft that you know, say we
had no idea. We have official statements from a lot
of people saying basically, hey, we're just doing business here.
But it is the equivalent of millions and millions and
millions of dollars. So, guys, it's just a really messed
up thing to think that there that you could even
(38:42):
possibly record all of those calls and then use them.
According to a couple of people within eighty two hundred
who came forward for this investigation, again, you got to
trust the Guardian and these other outfits that they're telling
the truth, because these are unnamed witnesses. These are unnamed
people who are a part of the Israeli intelligence group.
But they are saying that these calls were used to
(39:03):
maybe target an individual that they thought was maybe a threat,
and then they would listen to the calls of everybody
in the surrounding area.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Not even direct communicators, right, Not the Kevin bacon game
that we talk about with PRISM or other surveillance systems.
This is geographically based. So this is for instance, if
we hear someone on one two three Main Street and
they become a person of interest to us, then everybody
on one two three Main Street is now of interest.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
Yeah, basically a neighborhood level. You just listen to everybody
in there again, listening to the full phone call too,
everything that's said, calls between everybody.
Speaker 4 (39:44):
No longer just metadata stuff. This is like a cut above.
Speaker 3 (39:48):
Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting because analysts, I'm sorry I have
to be vague here, but analysts have long been This
has been around for a minute, some version this across
various countries and regions of conflict. Analysts are already figuring
out or speculating on how this will run a foul
(40:13):
of some EU stuff because those servers that are being
used for this gargantuan infrastructure, they're not based in the
Middle East. They're more like in what I believe Netherlands
Ireland properly.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
Yes, at least those are the two known ones where
the information is primarily stored. It's weird too, because this
is the kind of thing where back in the day. Again,
before September eleventh, two thousand and one, before a lot
of these legal precedents were said, before a lot of
you know, the world decided this kind of thing was
a necessary evil To protect everyone, you would have to
(40:48):
target somebody for surveillance. You'd have to say, Okay, this
person is suspected of some bad stuff, We're going to
target them for surveillance. In this case, you record all
the phone calls. Then somebody gets put on a list
for one reason or another. One text goes through that's
a little iffy, and the system says, hey, we think
you should look at this person. Now, Unit eighty two
hundred can go back for a month or more and
(41:10):
listen to every single phone call that person has made
or received and can decide if that person is actually
a threat or not. That to me is just super creepy.
Speaker 3 (41:21):
Yeah, absolutely, because it's it's restructuring the typical order of operations, right.
Even Look, it's no secret that in the wake of
September eleventh, and they're in the subsequent war on Terror
or however was packaged to the global public. It's no
(41:42):
secret that there was a lot of beat me here,
Dylan cowboys going on the wallet was open, the rationale
was there. You could finally do all the government overreach
stuff you wanted, and you could do it while you
had a flag draped around your shoulders. That is the reality,
and you can't. It's very difficult to walk that stuff back,
(42:02):
you know where I would say at this point, almost
regardless of where you live, you should assume that your
communications are going to be heavily monitored.
Speaker 4 (42:14):
Yeah, yeah, it does feel that way. Did y'all see
the John Oliver piece about gang lists, about lists of Yeah,
I mean it's it's not the same, but it's it's
a similar level of willy nilly, uh, you know, putting
people's names on lists that maybe don't deserve to be there,
and then the lack of transparency with how the hell
to get yourself off of it?
Speaker 3 (42:34):
Right where they like where they put the anti gang
activist who sang the hook for these.
Speaker 4 (42:41):
With the most anti gang song from the most anti
gang movie of the nineties starring Michelle Pfeiffer.
Speaker 3 (42:48):
Yeah, but I don't want to derail us here, guys,
But I think there's there's a parable and there's lesson
in this, and there's a hell of a horizon ahead
because these folks. We didn't say this explicitly, Matt, but
I think it's obvious. None of these folks got a
chance to consent to being surveilled in this way, and
(43:10):
none of the folks that we're talking about had a
chance to contest any arbitrary or AI driven decision made
about them. They also were not informed about this, So
a lot of violations there.
Speaker 2 (43:28):
Yeah, and according to several people from Unit eighty two
hundred who came forward are saying that these calls were
specifically used to identify bombing targets during the ongoing campaign
in Gaza, where thousands of civilians have died. Anyway, I
think that's all I got. Guys, definitely read this entire thing.
There's so much more to be said about this. Look
(43:49):
it up on your own and assess on your own,
and you know, maybe let us know what you think.
We'll be right back with more Strange News.
Speaker 4 (44:03):
And we have returned with today's final segment of Strange News,
and Ben teese that at the top he had a
very kindred story about radioactive animals on the loose, So
I'll just go ahead and lead with that one. It
also hits kind of close to home for me, I think.
I know. I've mentioned multiple times that I used to
(44:25):
do a little bit of coverage for public radio around
the nuclear industry in Augusta, Georgia, and one of the
sites that was involved in that reporting was the Savannah
River site in South Carolina. I lived in Augusta, Georgia,
right across the river, the Savannah River. From Augusta, Georgia,
you're in South Carolina, North Augusta, South Carolina, and a
(44:47):
little further than that you're gonna find SRS as it's
referred to. And it is a one of those super
fun sites as we talked about, that is involved in
the disposal of legacy nuclear waste left over from the
manufacturing of nuclear weapons. It is overseen by the US
Department of Energy, and you know, they've got ongoing activities
(45:11):
there designed to monitor various pits and areas that were
used to dispose of rake radioactive waste before they knew
that was maybe a bad idea. And there are also
these these tanks, these underground waste tanks, so liquid nuclear
waste is actually stored in some of these underground tanks.
(45:34):
And on July third, this is near Aiken, South Carolina.
Officials at the srs or Savannah River Site found a
radioactive wasps nest with radiation levels ten times that which
is allowed by federal regulations. The immediate reaction, after probably
a bit of an ocean because a wasp nest, whether
(45:55):
radioactive or no, is nothing to fool with it, was
to spray it with the sect killer, remove it, and
dispose of it as radioactive waste. They say that no
mega radioactive wasp creatures were found. The report said that
there is no leak from the waste tanks and the
nest was likely irradiated through what they referred to as
(46:18):
quote on site legacy radioactive contamination oh TY, residual radiation
leftover from when the site was fully operational. This is
what you would consider a decommissioned site. So all activities
there are clean up activities. There are watchdog groups that also,
you know, keep an eye on this kind of stuff,
(46:40):
and Savannah River Site Watch said that the report was
incomplete at best, as it doesn't detail where the contamination
came from. This vague sort of ambient contamination radioactivity is
a little bit on the creepy end of vague. Let
us just say, so, it does indicate that there may
(47:00):
be another radioactive nest elsewhere. There may also be a
leak somewhere. The Associated Press reports that knowing the type
of wasp nest could also be critical. Some wasps make
nests out of dirt and others use different material, which
could pinpoint where the contamination came from. Said Tom Clements,
(47:20):
the executive director of that watch group. I'm as mad
as a hornet. He says that SRS didn't explain where
the radioactive waste came from, or if there is some
kind of leak from the waste tanks that the public
should be aware of. The tank farm, as it's referred to,
is inside the boundaries of the site, and wasps generally
(47:41):
fly just a few hundred yards from their nests, so
there's no danger that they are migrating outside of the
facility if there are, in fact any radioactive wasps to
be concerned about. And the last time SRS came up,
I can't remember the exact story that made me bring
this up, but I talked about how when I actually
went out there once, I talked to a lot of
(48:03):
scientists researchers who are on site. I think these efforts
are still ongoing. Who actually use native wildlife to track
the progress of radioactive decontamination over time. The specific ones
that I remember were turtles that were actually tagged with
these little micro kind of tags that they could use
to differentiate between them. They're not in any way like trackers.
(48:27):
I don't think they may be, but the whole point
was they would know that we have tested this turtle before,
they'd pick it up, bring it back to the lab,
run at Geiger counter or whatever over it, and then
use them as kind of benchmarks as to how successful
the efforts to decontaminate this site have been, and it
is ongoing because as we know, you know, radiation that
don't just go away overnight. So what do you guys
(48:48):
think radioactive wasp worried, not worried, indifferent.
Speaker 2 (48:51):
I'm for it cool dealing with some wasp stuff over
here in home base.
Speaker 4 (48:57):
And what I have.
Speaker 2 (48:58):
Learned about wasp sky is that they generally don't go
very far from where their nest is, so hopefully not
going to be a problem for the human population.
Speaker 3 (49:08):
Again, yeah, depending on the type of wasp. Radioactive animals
are so interesting to me. I also want to shout
out the New York Times for calling them hot wasp
You I like the idea that someone's got some hot wasp.
Speaker 4 (49:22):
What's your hot take on the hot wasp spell?
Speaker 3 (49:24):
While the idea here first is this could have you know,
not comic book level altering effects on the wasp, but
it's definitely not going to be good for their population
as well, right, Like we know, we've had great discussions
about how disasters at Chernobyl, for instance, were actually over
(49:46):
the long term kind of good for biodiversity in the
area because they removed humans. But now I think one
thing I really appreciate about you bringing the story is
that it shows us how much more is out there,
Like for any students of nuclear shenanigans, Silvada is a
(50:07):
fascinating place right the Savada River site, and they still
haven't found that bomb, have they. You're more familiar with
it than I am.
Speaker 4 (50:15):
I don't remember that story right off the top. I'm
sure I knew about it in the past, the coast
of Savada, that's right. I do remember talking about that. That
wasn't something that I was super super familiar with, But
I'll have to do a little digging into that myself.
I do want to just backtrack one second. The site
was decommissioned as a site for manufacturing the plutonium cores
(50:35):
to make nuclear weapons during the Cold War, of course
with the Soviet Union. But now it actually is still
used to make product, and that product would be fuel
rods for nuclear plants, nuclear power plants. And again, of
course these activities involving cleaning up that legacy waste from
manufacturing of those nuclear weapon cores, nuclear bomb cores. According
(50:58):
to the AP and the Savannah River site stats, the
site generated more than one hundred and sixty five million
gallons of liquid nuclear waste, which has through evaporation been
reduced to about thirty four million gallons. And that is
according to Savannah River Mission completion. So an ongoing process there.
Speaker 3 (51:21):
And no, do we have any do we have any
specific stats on like the level of contamination on these wasp.
Speaker 4 (51:31):
Ten times what is allowed by federal regulations. That's all
I've got. So I don't know if that's specific WASP
specific or just like you know, wildlife specific, I think,
but ten times the allowable federal limits.
Speaker 3 (51:44):
Okay, so it sounds like ten types the allowable federal
limits for contamination of wildlife in general.
Speaker 4 (51:52):
Yeah, I think that's right.
Speaker 3 (51:53):
This is one of those weird, weirdly specific questions. We
always run into it our research, So we were everybody, luck,
how much is too much? How much is too much
for a wasp? Specifically, where's the study on that? Well,
we know the study will be on the way now.
Speaker 4 (52:09):
And remember the murder hornets? Yes, yes, yeah, I actually
came up in the movie Eddington, which I quite enjoyed.
But yeah, what if we had nuclear radioactive murder hornets? O?
Speaker 2 (52:20):
Hey, fast, guys. There are also European hornets that look
a lot like the murder hornets, just smaller in size.
If you see them in the backyard, do be aware
they could be nesting somewhere in your home.
Speaker 4 (52:35):
Do run for the hills.
Speaker 2 (52:36):
And they are giant and scary, but not as giant
as the giant murder hornets.
Speaker 4 (52:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (52:40):
Also you have to run. If you do run, remember
to come back. If you're human, you need to hold
the lie. I'm sorry, I don't know what talking you
can cover.
Speaker 4 (52:51):
Oh.
Speaker 3 (52:52):
Also, there's a totally unrelated other than the kinds of
animals we're speaking about. We'll maybe follow this up in
a future listener mail. But people who think they can
smell ants or people who can smell ants, or probably
smelling formic acid. Just get to get any emails on
that one. That's just one of the many out of
context facts.
Speaker 4 (53:11):
What is this substance and how is it excreted? It's
that ant stank, bro, That's what I thought. It's that
ant musk. Yeah, okay, got it. Do check out our
episode on pheromones and you know animal musk and human musk. Well,
we'll move on from that one real quick to it
seems to be an epidemic just absolutely overtaking the WNBA.
(53:35):
It appears that some practical or impractical jokers slash sports
fans keep throwing adult implements onto the courts of w
NBA games. For the third time in a week, it
would seem a sex toy was thrown onto a court
(53:55):
at a w NBA game Tuesday, August the fifth. As
we record this that yesterday, a game between the Indiana
Fever and the Los Angeles Sparks was disrupted when an
object described as being a sex toy was thrown onto
the court. An announcer exclaimed, oh, look out, something just
came onto the floor. An object just flew in as
the free throw is being made. The free throw rather,
(54:17):
it looked like that hit a player too. Oh dear,
it does appear to have hit fever player Sophie Cunningham.
Sparks did come out on top, no pun intended of
that game, one hundred to ninety one. The first incident
hits a little closer to home here in Georgia. On
July twenty ninth, still again, same week, in about between
(54:38):
the Golden State Valkyries and the Atlanta Dreams took place
in College Park, which is not too far from where
we are here in Atlanta. Morgan Reagan, who is a
sports announcer, said, during a replay, something flies on the court,
actually from the crowd, and you can see the object,
the green thing bounces and it goes the sideline. We're
(55:01):
not exactly sure where it came from. Uh, she continued,
as a timeout was called according to people, and the
game was paused. No room for any of that type
of activity. And no one's picked the object up yet,
you guys, then we uh we move on to a
further realization from Reagan saying, oh my gosh, okay, okay, inappropriate,
get him out of here. Whoever it was that through that,
(55:23):
And guys, what do you think for the plural for
dildo is I'm thinking dildy. We've got a spate of
as a pitch. I think it's fine till day if
till till till don't. Actually, this is a bad move.
This does seem to Yeah, it doesn't. This seem to
be an act of misogyny, like.
Speaker 3 (55:40):
It does seem targeted, because it's not as though when
you were first telling me about this off air, I
was unaware. It does seem that it is not like
a gorilla marketing campaign by a sex toy company because
they're not targeting correct me if I'm off base here.
They're not targeting anything but wns.
Speaker 4 (56:01):
That's sure what it seems like. I don't like it. Oh,
it seems pretty gross. And the other one was in
Chicago during the Valkyrie August first game against the Chicago
Sky seven minutes into the third quarter, a person threw
a similar object onto the court of wind Trust Arena
in Chicago. The broadcast footage saw again a green sex
(56:25):
toy being thrown onto the sidelines, just shy of the court.
Speaker 2 (56:30):
Guys, it sounds like the whitest kids, you know, sketch
to me, like, that's all the whole thing sounds like
a setup.
Speaker 4 (56:35):
Well, you know what occurred to me, especially with the
idea of it being bouncy. What if a fun sketch
would be a basketball game played with entirely bouncy sex
toys instead of basketballs.
Speaker 2 (56:46):
Here we go.
Speaker 3 (56:48):
You have my attention, now, you have my interest.
Speaker 4 (56:50):
Yes, yeah, it's it would be you know, fun and
sketch for him in any case.
Speaker 5 (56:54):
But yeah, if it was consensual and that that player
that got beamed by the the object in question tweeted,
stop throwing dildos on the court.
Speaker 4 (57:04):
You guys, Yeah, you're gonna hurt one of us. It's funny,
but it's also I think it's pretty gross. It does
appear to be like a kind of dismissal of women's sports.
Speaker 3 (57:17):
It feels in selly, to be quite honest, And it
feels like, look, you know, any professional athlete has been
in a situation where people at the at the game
are throwing stuff, you know, whether that's bottles of beer,
whether that's underwear, would be another thing. But this one
seems like they're inherent pointed implicitly right, they're choosing this
(57:41):
now I did find, Nola Matt. I did find something
interesting from eight years ago on a forum trying to
figure out the collective noun for a group of dildos.
And I'm going to go with a waggle, A waggle.
Speaker 4 (57:56):
Yeah, we got a murder of crows and a waggle
of doze dild does that is? We do have from
this people article that I mentioned a little snippet from
the fan code of Conduct for the w NBA, which
comes from its website, which says guests who engage in fighting,
throwing objects, or attempting to enter the court will be
immediately ejected from the arena, and no suspects have yet
(58:20):
to be identified, which is funny considering the intense TV
coverage of these things. But I guess, you know, they
saw the object onto the court, but they didn't. They
weren't able to pull you know, the identity of the assailor.
Speaker 3 (58:33):
The camera probably follows the object moving onto the court, right,
But I think that makes sense cameras. Another question is security,
How do you get through security?
Speaker 4 (58:44):
Well, it's not metal, so you could have it on
your person. I suppose perhaps even in your person.
Speaker 3 (58:49):
Oh yeah, no, that makes sense if it's just a
metal detector that might not clock it.
Speaker 4 (58:55):
You know what I mean when I say in your person, Yeah,
I know what you mean. It makes it extra cross
touch it. Don't touch it all. If you see dildo's flying,
do not touch it.
Speaker 3 (59:03):
Yeah, you know what. That is a great takeaway if
asops fable, this must be if you're walking by anywhere.
It doesn't have to be a game. If we're walked
by anywhere and you see a dildo on the ground,
let it be where it's at.
Speaker 4 (59:17):
It's not a lucky penny, and even those are pretty Yeah. Well,
I will close out the episode today in this segment
with a story that Matt was super interested in about
a comedian named Matt Rife who is now the legal
guardian of the haunted house that contains the original Annabelle
(59:38):
Doll of Warren fame. You know of the Amityville Horror
and the Conjuring films and all of that. There is
a museum, the Warren Museum, which includes the Annabelle Doll,
which I believe had to close due to some issues
with the lease. We definitely reported on that this comedian
(59:58):
does not own the these objects now, but rather is
now the Steward, I guess, or the caretaker, and he
did this along with a fellow YouTuber that I think
just goes by Castille not familiar. Raife had this to say,
if you know me, you know I'm obsessed with the
paranormal and all things haunted. You also may know the
(01:00:20):
Conjuring films are my favorite scary movies of all time.
So I'm incredibly honored to have taken over one of
the most prominent properties in paranormal history. A lot of
peace there. Edda Lorraine Warren arguably put demonology and paranormal
into the mainstream and are the very heart of some
of the most famous haunted stories of all time. So
it does seem like this is a bit of a
fan move. Bet Matt, you asked what the deal was,
(01:00:42):
why this person had done this, It just it does
appear there. Maybe you're coming from an honest place. Real
litter dot Com reported that the Warrant Occult Museum shut
down in twenty nineteen because of zoning issues. Now Rife
and Castille are planning to open it back up and
welcome visitors. And this property is located where I want
(01:01:04):
to say, it's Massachusetts, the most haunted place in America. Connecticut. Yes, Connecticut,
that's awesome. It's yeah, another much to it other than
it's kind of good news because if you're into this stuff,
it maybe it's sort of like the what is it
the South Park guys buying Casa Bonita, you know and
opening that back up.
Speaker 2 (01:01:24):
Oh yeah, it looks like they're moving everything because of
those zoning issues. So they're basically taking everything that's in
that house and putting it on Main Street somewhere around
the area where.
Speaker 4 (01:01:33):
Tons of other haunted cursed objects in this facilitat right,
thank you cursed in quotes, Yes, we.
Speaker 3 (01:01:42):
Do check out. By the way, folks, if you're interested
in this. We went through a heavy Warren phase. I
definitely did. I think it was back in twenty sixteen
we had an episode, an actual episode on the Warrens
and the deep controversy surrounding at LRAE. We tried to
be really fair with that one, but it is. I
(01:02:03):
it is, if nothing else, even if you consider yourself
a massive skeptic, it is a fascinating story.
Speaker 4 (01:02:09):
So do check it out for sure. And in that
I think we mentioned the late couple's son in law,
Tony Spara, who maintains the organization started by Ed and
Lorraine or in New England Society for Psychic Research or NESPER,
and he actually and that organization still officially owned the collection,
(01:02:32):
which includes Annabel and over seven hundred and fifty additional
bits of you know, ephemera.
Speaker 2 (01:02:39):
Dude, guys, they're turning the house into an airbnb, so
that'll be popular. You can go stay there, let's skill,
let's do an episode inside the house.
Speaker 4 (01:02:48):
That's a note for me. Dog, I've seen the movies.
Speaker 3 (01:02:51):
Oh, I'm fine with it.
Speaker 4 (01:02:54):
Freaking bunk up.
Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
It'll be fun.
Speaker 4 (01:02:57):
Yeah, all right, I'm down.
Speaker 3 (01:02:59):
I owe some of those some of those folks that
reach out anyway.
Speaker 4 (01:03:02):
So yeah, but some of those demonic spirits just to
check in.
Speaker 3 (01:03:06):
You know how it is.
Speaker 4 (01:03:08):
You gotta do. You gotta do a little checking out
with your infernal forces.
Speaker 3 (01:03:11):
Of course. Of course, folks, this has been a wild ride,
as we promise, a roller coaster of ups and downs.
We have so much more to get to. Please check
out our upcoming episodes. The Conspiracy of Cool is one
that we're excited about. We've got an Epstein update on
(01:03:32):
the way, and we always have strange news and listener
mail segments every week. So we want your help with this.
Please join up with us, give us your take on
everything we've discussed, and give us leads for new things
you think will interest your fellow conspiracy realist. You can
always send us an email, you can call us on
(01:03:53):
the phone, and you can contact us on the lines.
Speaker 4 (01:03:57):
You sure can. You can find this in the handle
conspiracy Stuff whre. We exist on Facebook with our Facebook
group Here's where it gets crazy, on x FKA, nay, Twitter,
and on YouTube video content glory for your perusing, enjoyment
on Instagram and TikTok. However, we're Conspiracy Stuff Show and Matt,
I think you got more for us.
Speaker 2 (01:04:15):
Hey, before I tell you about the phone number, If
you've made it this far into the episode, you're either
asleep or you really get us.
Speaker 4 (01:04:23):
Man.
Speaker 2 (01:04:24):
If you do get us, why not share the show
in general with a friend, maybe an acquaintance. How about
your dad? Share the show? Let other people know about it.
You can send them to Apple Podcasts or I hire
Radio app or Spotify anywhere, maybe even YouTube. Just share
the love because you get us. If you want to
call us, call one eight three three STDWYTK it's a
(01:04:47):
phone number. When you call in, give yourself a cool
nickname and let us know if we can use your
name and message on the air. If you want to
send us words and email, we are.
Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
The entities that read each piece of correspondence. Folks, Thank
you for tuning in. This is where we'll sneak in
some information. Yes, help us with a strange news or
listener mail segment. We do those every week. Help us
with episodes as well. They inform the exploration here. Please
always remember you can write to us for a random,
(01:05:18):
out of context fact like the smell of ants or
whatever you wish. We'd also love to hear. If you're
interested in reading a stuff they don't want you to know,
choose your own adventure book. Tell us your thoughts conspiracy
at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 2 (01:05:50):
Stuff they Don't want you to Know is a production
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From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
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production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is Noel.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
They call me Ben. We're joined as always with our
super producer Dylan the Tennessee pal Fagan. Most importantly, you
are you. You are here. That makes this the stuff
they don't want you to know. Uh, guys, I gotta
tell you. For everybody tuning in the evening, this strange
news program publishes. It is August eleventh, a date of
(00:53):
weirdly personal importance to us.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
So we're recording it on the sixth.
Speaker 3 (00:59):
We're recording on the sixth, it's publishing on the eleventh,
by which point several of us will be on the road.
Just real quick, some important things that happened on August eleventh.
This is so dumb. I never know if this is
gonna work. Of course, everybody remembers this is the beginning
(01:19):
of the Mesoamerican Long count calendar. Never forget, Never forget.
That led to the belief that what was it that
the world was going to end in twenty twelve.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Twelve, twenty one, twenty twelve.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, spoiler, it either did not happen or
the world dead end and we're all just sort of
circling around.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Joe Rogan performed that night in Atlanta, and that is
when the world changed.
Speaker 4 (01:46):
It was that night that was the inciting event. That's
what did it.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
Yeah, Joey Diaz Brogan, they all got up on stage
and the world was never the same Joey d all right.
Speaker 3 (01:55):
Also, it's a ton of people's birthdays we're talking specifically about,
you know, the big hits like Alfredo Bina, the Italian cyclist.
I'm literally just picking names out of the list.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
And as of today, all three of us on this
show have just become older. So we're now older gentlemen. Now, hey,
look at.
Speaker 4 (02:18):
Us, gentlemen of a certain age, of a certain interest
in vintage.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Perhaps I like when people say vintage for age. Also,
our pal Dylan Tennessee is on the wave for a
birthday as well, Dylan, And won't get too specific on
that one before we dive in. Okay, we've got a
lot of disturbing stuff that's happening and off air Actually,
we pushed our recording time a bit to chat about
(02:44):
all these fluid developments in place. So we're gonna have
a little bit of a roller coaster. We're gonna have
some positive, funny stuff, some up and down kind of experiences,
because there are some very disturbing things that we all
need to learn more about if we start on a
positive note or maybe like a weird note. You guys
(03:07):
like pizza, Yes, it's pretty good.
Speaker 4 (03:10):
Yeah, I've been known to have a pizza party from
time to time.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
I love a pizza party. Shout up, book it. And
I'm also really happy that you didn't say no, Ben,
pizza is terrible.
Speaker 4 (03:21):
Yeah, who would say such a thing. I mean, I
guess there are Do you know about the pizza the
way they do it? And I want to say it
is pen No, I'm sorry, is it Pittsburgh? I'm sorry
to jump in, but is it when they do the
cheese and it's not the cold toppings? Yes? What's that about?
Speaker 3 (03:38):
Wait?
Speaker 2 (03:38):
Wait? Wait, wait what it's a style.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
Of pizza in Pittsburgh, Thank you, Dylan where the cheese
is served cold and the toppings are served cold on
top of the cooked base on purpose.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Yeah, I don't get consensually ordered. The people of Pittsburgh.
Speaker 4 (03:57):
Doesn't seem don't it don't seem right?
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Man? I got super into hierarchies a pizza. You know,
I read too much about food. I think we all
are mystified by it. What's your favorite style, Ben, my
favorite style of pizza? All right, come at me, Chicago.
I don't like deep dish.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
You don't like a deep dish. I respect it. It's
a lot.
Speaker 3 (04:20):
I respect it.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
It's a lot of food. It's heavy. It's like a
if lasagna and pizza had a weird pizza baby.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
Shout out local pizza joint Parma Tavern got their pizza
last night as we're recording. It's called some like it Hot.
It's got a chili pepper bass. So instead of pizzas
like pasta, yeah, so, instead of marinera or pizza sauce,
it's got chili straight up chili's seeker.
Speaker 4 (04:45):
That guy right there, what was that really good spot
we all went to together in Brooklyn that we liked.
It had some really hot sausage with hot honey or
something like that.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
I like a hot honey.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Who was that spot?
Speaker 3 (04:55):
Though we always can't remember?
Speaker 4 (04:56):
We had Atari games and stuff.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Geez yeah, I love it. Well, look, we're all polyg
polyg something like that.
Speaker 4 (05:03):
I think.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Okay, a pizza place that has the person's name in it,
that's always a good indicator.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, John's Pizza in NYC is also a
solid choice.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
Sure, we got Geno's here. We've got a bunch of
people listening based in New York. Feel free to email
us about the New York pizza thing again. For now,
what we'll see is that, look, we're all fans of pizza.
We don't have to get into the history of it
unless we do something on it for Ridiculous History or
(05:35):
our pals Saver, one of the best food shows out there,
does something on it. But recently, guys, on just July
twenty eight, few days ago, there was an outbreak, a
pizza related outbreak in Wisconsin. More than eighty people found
themselves non consensually high AF and I do not mean
(06:00):
as foretold, but the fortuitously high. They did not agree
to this. So this is arguably old beans because the
incident took place in October of last year, of twenty
twenty four, but the news about it is just coming out.
(06:21):
Apparently the authorities have concluded that famous Yeti's Pizza in Stoughton,
Wisconsin had accidentally, by which we mean without knowledge management,
accidentally dosed at least eighty five people with THCHC. I
believe through probably through the cooking, you know, like how
(06:43):
you cook edibles with TC oil or with with us
kind of butter.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
Well, it was in the dough, right, They used oil
to create the dough that had TC in it, so.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
It also got into the garlic bread. Additionally, it got
into the sandwiches. It reminds me of our earlier story
about Turkey. It reminds me again of the idea that
some of these eighty five people might have just visited
this yetti pizza place for the first time and thought, wow,
(07:14):
this is amazing. Why do I want to eat three
more pizzas and maybe listen to some SKA.
Speaker 4 (07:20):
I mean, you could argue that it's a marketing ploy. No,
that wouldn't really work. Where is it again, It's in Wisconsin, Wisconsin, Okay, No,
not the same at all. It also reminds me of
the story we talked about out of Germany, out of
deutsch Land, where there was a very popular pizza joint
that was using pizza delivery as a way of delivering cocaine.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Oh boy, guys Russeldorf really quickly. I just looked at
the story you shared Ben on Live Science that it
was one of those companies we've talked about. I guess
not a ghost kitchen, but they share their in their
kitchen with other people, and one of the groups that
works in that same kitchen makes thc. Somebody making the
(08:01):
dough just grab the wrong bottle and just starting making dough.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yes, that's what we're saying. It's your honor for legal purposes,
we're pleading. Whoops.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Oh and it was a state licensed vendor who prepares edibles.
Speaker 4 (08:15):
Oh, we haven't even done.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
We haven't even paused for a second for a word
from our sponsors. We would have a little logger. We
think it's okay because you know, hopefully you like us,
enjoy pizza and Dylan. I hope we can repair our
relationship now that I've confessed that I'm not the biggest
fan of Deep Dish, but agreed Chicago forever for anything
(08:38):
but malort. We're gonna pause for a word from our sponsors,
and then we're going to get into some more strange
news that may hopefully ruffle some feathers, and we have returned. Okay,
do you guys want the good news first, like continue
(09:00):
the pizza level or genre of conversation or do you
want to get straight to the well?
Speaker 4 (09:06):
Do we make it a good news sandwich, a good
news HOGI and give us some bad news and then
we'll finish it out with some more good news.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Great, Okay, here we go. So, guys, remember turk Ministan.
Speaker 4 (09:19):
How could I forget heard of it?
Speaker 3 (09:21):
How could I forget? We'll always have turk Ministan, we
say together at the turk Ministan. No, I won't so
turk Ministan. For over over half a century, out in
the Karakum Desert has been home to a continually burning
(09:41):
creator of underground gas. It was formed in nineteen seventy one.
Soviet geologists accidentally collapsed a natural gas chamber while they
were drilling, and they were terrified that this gas they
had released would spread to the population and poison everything.
So they shrugged their shoulders and they set that chamber
(10:03):
on fire. They did not understand how much gas was there.
They thought it would burn out quickly, so instead, similar
to Centralia, Pennsylvania, this thing often called the Door to Hell,
has been burning and burning and burning. The good news
(10:23):
here is that, finally, as a reported just recently, the
fires are quelling down. The door to Hell may be closing.
Speaker 2 (10:34):
Nice.
Speaker 4 (10:35):
Okay, can you not a moment too soon? Those cenobytes
are about to start pouring out.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Can you guys imagine how large of a chamber there
must be in there somewhere, Yeah, like deep within the
earth and.
Speaker 4 (10:47):
Keeping for all that gas to accumulate and just consistently
burn off like that.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
Yeah, for all of it to just exist in that pocket,
something decomposed at some point to create that stuff that gas.
I'm just imagining if you could somehow excavate whatever that
chamber is and go down.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
There and once the fires, well, you know, it'd be
also very interesting to see whether there was some sort
of extremophile life form that it.
Speaker 2 (11:12):
Is now crispy.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
Or has survived. Oh that would also I think that
would be more interesting as well. Right. Anyway, this comes
to us from Daniel Graham, writing for Discover Wildlife. The
fires aren't completely out yet for any absolute sith lords
in the crowd who are going, oh no, my door
to Hell? Right, how am I going to get back home.
(11:35):
The reduction of fires, however, per Arena L'eva, the director
of Turkmenistan's energy company Turkmen Gays get it Turkmen Gas
whatever they say, the reduction in fires is nearly threefold.
So this is good news overall for the world. And
(11:56):
we hope that anybody who has had the chance to
is it Turkmenistan, which is an episode all its own.
We hope that you take the time to reach out
and tell us about your experiences. We would like to
go to some of the stands, I imagine, but as
you can likewise imagine, folks, it's kind of tricky for
Americans to get over.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
There and then you got to get back.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Yeah, yep, that's a great point, Matt. So getting in
is way easier than getting out. And I don't know
the specific people you're thinking of, but I know some
folks who had a little bit of a tough time.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Well, yeah, I think we're in a weird We're in
a weird climate right now. When it comes to somebody
leaving for a country and then deciding they want to
come back, and then maybe some folks who would say, nah.
Speaker 3 (12:46):
All right, man, don't do this right now you know what,
you know, what's about to go down? Oh it's true though,
it is very true, and please travel safely, folks. Here
is our dark news that may be may irritate some people,
may terrify some others. There are new reports emerging from
(13:11):
the Brennan Center for Justice over at NYU School of
Law that indicate the current US administration may be working
ardently and specifically to undermine free elections. What do we
mean by free elections? Free elections? We mean in the
(13:33):
United States, with certain caveats, usually felony status right or
legal residency status, anyone over a certain age is allowed
to vote in local elections, in state elections, and federal elections.
That's what makes a representative democracy work in theory, right
(13:54):
if it's natural democracy. So right now, if you go
to i mean some admittedly biased sources like People's World,
you'll see there are serious concerns, not from far left
activist groups, but from legal beagles. Serious concerns that there
may be a conspiracy to screw over the vote, which
(14:19):
is the bedrock of the American experiment. Have you guys
heard about this, I'm sure you haven't. So the idea
is found from the legal boffins in a combination of
a Trump executive order, an EO issued on March twenty fifth,
and the Save Act and a proposed voter repression law
(14:41):
that would disenfranchise something to the tune of twenty one
million people, most of them identifying as women. How is this? Like,
how is this happening? You guys? Well, you know we're
talking off air. Went to the went to Congress dot
gov and re learned that the Constitution of the United
(15:02):
States website has removed sections from the language like the
one piece of paper we're all supposed to read.
Speaker 4 (15:12):
It's not quitely.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Well, yeah, sorry, Ben, I have not looked into this
at all, and I think it's just mostly because the
politics stuff is so overwhelming right now purposefully, and this
just seems like an actual power move if you can
undermine the elections for the group of people who are
gonna help you make decisions right or help you get
(15:33):
things passed.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
Yeah, it's ugly, Yeah, it's it's missing from the Library
of Congress on Congress dot gov. You can call it
a goof. But then if you go to other related
websites and links under the same auspice, then you will
see that sections article one, section nine to ten have
(15:59):
been removed from both things from multiple sources.
Speaker 4 (16:03):
I'll tell you what this reminds me of, and that
it isn't a goof and I don't think we've talked
about it. It was I believe, an exhibit at the
Smithsonian on impeachment, right, and the Trump administration gently requested
that that event in the history of Trump's political career
(16:24):
be removed.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
Yeah, it was temporarily removed and then the Smithsonian reinstated they did.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
I didn't see that. Thanks for the update then, But
that just that kind of information control and gives us
all the squigs. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
Absolutely, you know, regardless of what your level of political
interest is or your you know, ideological identification, we can
agree that the Constitution is the thing you're only supposed
to fus with through amendments, not through just removing stuff
(16:58):
off a website, you know. So I think it's also
likewise just to walk through an exercise empathy. I think
it's likewise easy to say, well, hey, this is just
a website, you know what I mean. It's not like
someone ran up to DC and started taking a black
highlighter and marking out, marking out passages of the printed Constitution.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
The Library of Congress is the official like repository for
that kind of information. That's very different than the censoring
or futzing a.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Website exactly exactly, and well said, this also cuts out
the end of section eight. The question then becomes is
this intentional or is this just maybe something as simple
as a result of the massive cuts to government employees. Also,
(17:51):
I'm going to miss in PR guys.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
Well we haven't talked about that, but in PR isn't
necessarily going anywhere. It's will affect for sure, is a
lot of the more rural agencies or branches rather that
to get a lot of their funding from the Corporation
for Public Broadcasting. So that's definitely gonna have an impact.
But in PR as an organization is you know, listener
supported as they always say, and how much we love
(18:15):
those fund drives, which are going to be more important
than literally ever.
Speaker 3 (18:19):
That's a good correction.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Local areas that only have news because there's federal funding
to bring them local news, they don't have local news
outlets and things like that. So there go and.
Speaker 4 (18:32):
Not a correction at all, just clarification just in terms
of like the bigger picture because it's easy to absolutely
say and not inaccurate rip and pr because it doesn't
mean that that's not what's coming down the pike necessarily.
If people don't step up.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
It's just going to be ninety percent pledge drive, ten
percent news.
Speaker 4 (18:52):
Well, it's a great tagline, man.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
Perhaps this is a bit of a ball in gilly here.
The Library of Congress's official Twitter account earlier, I think
today or yesterday, said quote, it has been brought to
our attention that some sections of Article one are missing
from the Constitution Annotated website. We've learned this is due
(19:16):
to get this everyone, due to a coding error. We've
been working to correct it and expect it to be
resolved soon. So perhaps simply another whoopsie, right, grabbing the
wrong oil for the pizza and the ghost kitchen.
Speaker 4 (19:32):
And that's what happens when you move fast and break
stuff right, It's roses along the way.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
One law professor Anthony Michael Kreese said, I didn't believe
this at first, but then I thought, do I have
to teach Article one Section nine to ten anymore now
that they're removed from the Congressional website.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
I don't know if that's how it works.
Speaker 3 (19:52):
I mean, but that's god level s tier level hotshot
lawyer plus professor snark. Yeah, you know what I mean.
That guy has got I kind of want to hang
out with him. So that's it. Folks, tell us what
you're thinking about the ideas of habeas corpus. The recent
signals that we haven't even talked about about removing birthright
(20:16):
citizenship in some cases. I know we've spoken in the
past about the rough concept of what citizenship means in
different countries. So birthright citizenship means that, regardless of your past,
if you are bored on US soil, you are a
citizen by virtue of that experience of that act. Other
(20:40):
countries have stuff like citizenship via blood or lineage. If
you are descended from what we consider, you know, Irish
or Japanese or whatever, then you can become a citizen
because we think of you as one of us. Birthright
citizenship as a concept is even imperfectly applied. It's honestly
(21:03):
one of the reasons that the United States became such
a world leader, such a melting pot, such an exporter
of culture and success and ideas. So I think that
I haven't spoken with everybody in Congress about this. I
think we should keep it.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
That's a good call.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Okay, is that a hot take?
Speaker 2 (21:21):
Disappointment?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
I think maybe we should keep it. I don't know,
jeez anyway, all right, so we'll move on. And the
last thing that I think is going to be a
nice throw to a story that we're going to talk
about right after. Poaching is terrible in South Africa, and
the anti poaching folks have reached a new kind of
(21:43):
out of the box approach toward poaching of rhino horns.
Right now, as we record, about one rhino per day
is getting legally killed, and their horns are being trafficked
to various parts of the world as collectibles to be
used in some types of pseudo medicinal applications. Someone looked
(22:05):
around and said, why don't we just, uh make the
rhino horns radioactive?
Speaker 4 (22:13):
It's the question that's on everybody's mind.
Speaker 3 (22:15):
Ben right, keeps us up at night.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Yeah, how did the rhinos feel about this?
Speaker 3 (22:20):
The rhinos weren't in the meeting, so they were they
were very corporate about it. This is the University of
Vit Watterson or with watersund Uh. They made something called
the reisotope project, and it's they put six years of
testing research into this. Uh they say, look, we can
(22:42):
prove that the radioactive material we're putting into these rhino
horns is fully safe for the rhinos. That's what they say.
So the idea is that it's not that poachers will
get within, you know, x meters of a rhino and
then a ropped in cancer tumors or vaporize as though
(23:05):
they had run up to Chernobyl on its most famous day. Instead,
the idea is that when rhinos are murdered, you can
use the radioactive signal to track the providence of the horn,
the material that is.
Speaker 4 (23:22):
A ride the signature.
Speaker 3 (23:23):
Yeah, that's a perfect word for it. And these are
stories that are happening so often that it's hard to
keep track of all of them. Similar sadly enough to
the fact we acknowledged recently where we said, hey, we
don't even report on all the mass shootings all that
(23:44):
often now because they happen so often. There was one
here in Atlanta, by the way, not too long ago.
But with this in mind, there is another radioactive animal
story that we can't wait to chop up together. We'll
pause for word from our sponsors, and we'll be back
with more strange news.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
And we've returned before we continue on our journey of radioactivity,
We're gonna pause here to just say, guys, have you
noticed how crappy it is to just try and find
news articles on anything anywhere, to search for them, to
find them. Once you're there, all you hear about is
Jason Momoa's Chief of War as a giant pop up,
(24:30):
and then you get a bunch of other crap about
how they want to send you messages or just it's awful.
It's an awful experience.
Speaker 4 (24:38):
And that's why we enjoy ground news. Yeah it's kidding,
but they do a good job. But yeah, it's yes,
it's not the best.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
I'm just my whole point here is you have to
find a workaround like that. You have to find a
work around the way we've described before on the show
or else like if you're just using any of these
websites that offer actual news nowadays, it is it's terrible.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
It is terrible.
Speaker 2 (25:02):
You'll also find that there are so many typos in
everything and weirdly phrased sentences that don't make actual English sense.
Speaker 3 (25:10):
Shat gpd up.
Speaker 4 (25:11):
Yeah, I don't love it.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
You'll also find a lot of echoing of a primary
source which has clear signals, like tracking a rhydo horn,
you see the same turn of phrase, you see that
maybe a typo has occurred, right, and that typo has
just been uncritically like like ripples in a lake when
you throw a stone, that typo is uncritically propagated throughout.
(25:36):
And it's crazy, because Matt, what you're talking about. These
are not just and we say this without aspersion. These
are not just you know, someone's private labor of love blog.
These are supposed to be the high end journalistic minds
of the day.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Yeah, looking at you, AP News and your typo's good lord,
oh no, aphid and terrible CNN because they are.
Speaker 4 (25:59):
Typically the primary source that gets passed around, right, if
we're talking about a big one, it's them.
Speaker 3 (26:03):
Writers, all the hits, all the things that we used
to even if we disagreed in the course of our research.
We prize media literacy, so we would never we still
never read a single source before we make a conclusion.
Speaker 4 (26:19):
But it's it's that erosion of that journalistic integrity that's
a direct result of the throwaway kind of culture of
Internet content. I mean not to put too fine a
point on it, but I think that's a big part
of it.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
And no one is immune, that's correct, even The Guardian,
one of my personal favorite outlets that exists on the planet.
And you know, speaking of not looking at one source,
when you've got a great group like the folks at
the Guardian, they will work with multiple other outlets when
they're doing a big investigation, which is what we're about
to explore, one of those multi agency investigations.
Speaker 3 (26:54):
And before we get to that, we got to tell you, folks,
pro Publica is awesome. A lot of people don't like
it because it speaks truth to power, but pro Publica,
I would argue, is somewhat an exception to some of
these other sources that we're.
Speaker 4 (27:09):
Talking Axios two maybe they do good work.
Speaker 2 (27:12):
Yeah, and for quite a while the Intercept, I think
they're still at it. Every once in a while you
will find something incredible coming out of there.
Speaker 4 (27:19):
And four oh four Media we dig a lot too.
In terms of like internety news items. I think they've
been doing a fine job.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
There's lots of good ones.
Speaker 3 (27:27):
If you have any leftover money, If folks don't VEMMO
uncle Sam to pay the national debt? Donate sorry or propublican?
How come you know that gets me? This is a derailment.
But how come just once? I want a cold call
message that's not asking me to donate. I want to
be donated too, you know what I mean? Like, Hi,
(27:50):
I'm the World Wildlife Federation. Good hustle, You're in danger,
You're an endangered entity. Here's I don't care how much
money is. It's the principle. Yeah, here's two bits.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Yeah about about sorry. That goes back to South Park.
By the way, South Park season twenty seven, episode two
is out right now. Episode three is on its way.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
And did you see that the White House posted us
still from it as a way of recruiting ice. Oh
it's not Yeah, they did that, to which the South
Park fellows responded, Oh, so I guess we are relevant
hashtag eat a bag of.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
Oh they did?
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Wow?
Speaker 3 (28:27):
Okay, well all right, so okay, reported we've gone through that.
We've yeah, yeap.
Speaker 2 (28:33):
So to breach the subject we're going to today, we
have to go back in time time time time. We
were jumping to the Electronic Frontier Foundation's NSA timeline that
you can find at www. Dot eff dot org slash
NSA dash spying slash timeline.
Speaker 4 (28:49):
Check it out.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
It's got an entire timeline of the warrantless wiretapping and
crazy mass surveillance that the United States has been going
through since two thousand and one. And it goes way
back the NSA timeline here, guys to seventeen ninety one.
Whoa cool stuff. Wait in there, you're gonna remember a
guy named John wu Uh. I think his real name
(29:14):
is you tune Uh though, John You not wu John
You was a He was an attorney. He was a
Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel
way back in the day, only for a couple of
years two thousand and one and two thousand and three.
He's he's one of the guys that came up with
the legal framework for things like, you know, going around
(29:36):
the Geneva Conventions, when it came to torturer and when
it came to how do we surveil everybody in a
country enhanced interrogation, yes, well yeah, yeah, yeah, the torture members.
Speaker 4 (29:48):
But also he had a torture schmortcher. He all comes
enhanced in there.
Speaker 3 (29:52):
He had a phenomenal interview with John Stewart by the
way back.
Speaker 2 (29:55):
In the day.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
I'm sure he did.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
But he's also the guy, no matter how great he is,
he's the guy that found a way to make this
terrible stuff happen, which is.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
All we go. I'm not saying he's a good guy.
I'm saying the interview was good.
Speaker 2 (30:06):
Okay, Well yeah, just again, everyone is complicated, right, But
it's just a weird individual that you will find there
in the timeline. And if you look at that timeline,
you will see that on October fourth, two thousand and one,
twenty three days after the Twin Towers fell, the president
at that time signed off on this secret eavesdropping operation
(30:27):
that was so secretive that the people who generally know
about this kind of stuff, people in the national security
sector there, the senior folks, they had no idea it
was happening. They had no idea it was taking off.
John used one of the people who came through and
came up with a legal framework for that program. Then
you move on to around late two thousand and two,
(30:47):
and that is when telecommunications companies in the United States
began doing this kind of voluntary handover of information about
their customers. So this is when everybody from AT and
T to Verizon to everyone who's operating would say, Okay,
us government, you've got this program, and for the good
(31:09):
of the country, for the good of everybody, at least
that's the way it's framed. You can have all the
metadata on our folks, the people who pay us to
use communications services, and by the way, that is through
requests from the FISA courts, the Foreign Intelligence surveillance courts.
And it's interesting that that's occurring. And then you just
(31:31):
keep on going down the line here because those voluntary
systems stopped. And then there came some really weird stuff
that Edward Snowden hipped everybody too that a lot of
other whistleblowers, including I think his name is Mark Klein,
some people who came forward who were inside AT and T,
who were inside telecommunications and said, hey, there's some weird
(31:54):
stuff going on. The NSA is operating in our San
Francisco AT and T building, and they're building a secret
room and that secret room has this weird thing in it.
It's very strange. It's called a NARIS surveillance system. They
called it NARIS Surveillance equipment. It's the kind of stuff
that siphons off all data that's coming through that giant
communications hub in San Francisco for AT and T and
(32:15):
it copies it essentially.
Speaker 3 (32:17):
Right, Yeah, don't worry about the massive storage infrastructure there.
But do ask yourself, what is prism?
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Yes, oh, yes, so something like this. And this is
January two thousand and three when we hear about that
AT and T stuff.
Speaker 4 (32:31):
This is.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
This is all happening right way back in the day.
We're talking about over twenty years ago. This is happening
just in the US. Then in twenty thirteen we learn
about Verizon getting in with the NSA and how all
of the calls that were made by all Verizon customers
for just a couple months back in twenty thirteen, we're
(32:54):
copying all the information was handed over to the NSA.
And that was just a special little thing. And again
because there was some whistleblower that found a document, began
talking about and reported on. In this case, it was
Glenn Greenwald that we know from at the time at
least it was through the Guardian, and then we know
about his reporting through the Intercept a couple other places.
(33:15):
But that's one of the people. One of the journalists
individuals that are willing to talk about this stuff. And
then we jump all the way down, guys to today
today published in The Guardian, written by Harry Davies in
Yvelle Abraham. There's a new story coming out and here's
the title, A Million Calls an hour. Israel relying on
(33:36):
Microsoft Cloud for expansive surveillance of Palestinians and this is
a new kind of mass surveillance program. All the ones
that we've talked about in this episode before this were
metadata systems. At least according to every piece of documentation
that I've seen, they are recording information about calls, stuff
(33:57):
like who the people are that are calling the numbers,
who they're associated with, right, how long the.
Speaker 3 (34:02):
Call was, the time the call was made, the location.
That's a fig leaf, though it is. It is the
idea then, I think, just to put it plainly, is
that those previous systems. Check out our twenty thirteen snowed
In episode, even Snowden was arguing, they're not checking for
content of the call, no men.
Speaker 4 (34:21):
No data.
Speaker 2 (34:22):
They're trying to see who's communicating with whom. At least again,
we're talking about the early two thousands, though do you
want to know why, Guys, I think this is my opinion,
why I think they weren't just screening all of the
phone calls at that time in two thousand and one,
two thousand and three, do tell because there was not
the computing power or the storage to keep all of
(34:45):
that information or to be able to even analyze any
of that information. Because the systems, at least the one
that was being talked about in two thousand and three
that was installed at and T, it is analyzing thousands
of pieces of communication every set, which is a lot,
but it's not nearly enough, it's not nearly fast enough,
and you couldn't store it somewhere. There were no If
(35:08):
you think about what cloud storage has become nowadays, that
didn't exist back then, Well it does now through things
like Microsoft Azure Azure I guess is what you would
call it. Things you know out there like Adobe's servers
that they have their cloud servers that are just massive
installations that can hold you know, untold amounts of information,
(35:32):
essentially infinite information. It continues to expand right at least now,
because of this new investigation from The Guardian plus nine
to seventy two magazine and local call. This new program
in Israel records every single phone call made in the
West Bank and in Gaza. And we're talking, you know,
(35:53):
there are three million human beings in the West Bank
and they this is that whole thing. A million calls
an hour, that is rough what it is recording and storing.
Imagine that, guys, A million calls an hour are stored
through this mass surveillance program that Israel is running.
Speaker 3 (36:09):
Not the information about the calls, the content of the
calls themselves. And Matt, from what we understand here, the
nation of Israel has pretty much run all Palestinian telecoms
for some time. Oh yeah, so it's not a huge
stretch for this to be deployed.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Yes, correct. It's the kind of thing where if you're
living there in Gaza, you may imagine, gosh, I wonder
if I wonder if anybody's just listening to all these calls.
Now that's all run you know, by people that are
bombing us currently. Yeah, it is. And it also helps
when you take out most of the telecommunications systems with bombs.
Right now, now this entire area is reliant on your systems.
(36:54):
It's it's really, it's really creepy. You can look up
Unit eighty two hundred. This is kind of it's equivalent to,
but not the same as, the NSA for Israel, and
you can just you could read this entire thing. I
would recommend it highly. It is crazy, you guys. These
(37:14):
calls are kept for a long time, you know, thirty
days or more. They are analyzed using AI systems. There
is a threat level assessment that occurs. That is not
a human It is a system. It is an algorithm
that is figuring out who's threatening and who's not. They
are also looking at all text messages and they have
(37:36):
been doing that since around twenty twenty one, and again
using AI systems to assess those things. Is this person
a threat? Are they communicating threatening things? It's really creepy,
really scary. According to Microsoft, they had no idea this
is what was happening. We thought we were just storing
a bunch of things. The CEO allegedly met with the
(37:58):
chief just give these names. Setaya Nadella, who is the
CEO of Microsoft, met with the commander of that unit
eighty two hundred back in twenty twenty one. The unit
commander of eighty two hundred said, hey, we've got a
lot of data we want to go to the cloud.
We think you're the right people for it. But a secret,
super secret, And you know, Nadella said that sounds like
(38:21):
a lot of money. Now I'm just showing you we
have official statements for Microsoft that you know, say we
had no idea. We have official statements from a lot
of people saying basically, hey, we're just doing business here.
But it is the equivalent of millions and millions and
millions of dollars. So, guys, it's just a really messed
up thing to think that there that you could even
(38:42):
possibly record all of those calls and then use them.
According to a couple of people within eighty two hundred
who came forward for this investigation, again, you got to
trust the Guardian and these other outfits that they're telling
the truth, because these are unnamed witnesses. These are unnamed
people who are a part of the Israeli intelligence group.
But they are saying that these calls were used to
(39:03):
maybe target an individual that they thought was maybe a threat,
and then they would listen to the calls of everybody
in the surrounding area.
Speaker 3 (39:11):
Not even direct communicators, right, Not the Kevin bacon game
that we talk about with PRISM or other surveillance systems.
This is geographically based. So this is for instance, if
we hear someone on one two three Main Street and
they become a person of interest to us, then everybody
on one two three Main Street is now of interest.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
Yeah, basically a neighborhood level. You just listen to everybody
in there again, listening to the full phone call too,
everything that's said, calls between everybody.
Speaker 4 (39:44):
No longer just metadata stuff. This is like a cut above.
Speaker 3 (39:48):
Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting because analysts, I'm sorry I have
to be vague here, but analysts have long been This
has been around for a minute, some version this across
various countries and regions of conflict. Analysts are already figuring
out or speculating on how this will run a foul
(40:13):
of some EU stuff because those servers that are being
used for this gargantuan infrastructure, they're not based in the
Middle East. They're more like in what I believe Netherlands
Ireland properly.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
Yes, at least those are the two known ones where
the information is primarily stored. It's weird too, because this
is the kind of thing where back in the day. Again,
before September eleventh, two thousand and one, before a lot
of these legal precedents were said, before a lot of
you know, the world decided this kind of thing was
a necessary evil To protect everyone, you would have to
(40:48):
target somebody for surveillance. You'd have to say, Okay, this
person is suspected of some bad stuff, We're going to
target them for surveillance. In this case, you record all
the phone calls. Then somebody gets put on a list
for one reason or another. One text goes through that's
a little iffy, and the system says, hey, we think
you should look at this person. Now, Unit eighty two
hundred can go back for a month or more and
(41:10):
listen to every single phone call that person has made
or received and can decide if that person is actually
a threat or not. That to me is just super creepy.
Speaker 3 (41:21):
Yeah, absolutely, because it's it's restructuring the typical order of operations, right.
Even Look, it's no secret that in the wake of
September eleventh, and they're in the subsequent war on Terror
or however was packaged to the global public. It's no
(41:42):
secret that there was a lot of beat me here,
Dylan cowboys going on the wallet was open, the rationale
was there. You could finally do all the government overreach
stuff you wanted, and you could do it while you
had a flag draped around your shoulders. That is the reality,
and you can't. It's very difficult to walk that stuff back,
(42:02):
you know where I would say at this point, almost
regardless of where you live, you should assume that your
communications are going to be heavily monitored.
Speaker 4 (42:14):
Yeah, yeah, it does feel that way. Did y'all see
the John Oliver piece about gang lists, about lists of Yeah,
I mean it's it's not the same, but it's it's
a similar level of willy nilly, uh, you know, putting
people's names on lists that maybe don't deserve to be there,
and then the lack of transparency with how the hell
to get yourself off of it?
Speaker 3 (42:34):
Right where they like where they put the anti gang
activist who sang the hook for these.
Speaker 4 (42:41):
With the most anti gang song from the most anti
gang movie of the nineties starring Michelle Pfeiffer.
Speaker 3 (42:48):
Yeah, but I don't want to derail us here, guys,
But I think there's there's a parable and there's lesson
in this, and there's a hell of a horizon ahead
because these folks. We didn't say this explicitly, Matt, but
I think it's obvious. None of these folks got a
chance to consent to being surveilled in this way, and
(43:10):
none of the folks that we're talking about had a
chance to contest any arbitrary or AI driven decision made
about them. They also were not informed about this, So
a lot of violations there.
Speaker 2 (43:28):
Yeah, and according to several people from Unit eighty two
hundred who came forward are saying that these calls were
specifically used to identify bombing targets during the ongoing campaign
in Gaza, where thousands of civilians have died. Anyway, I
think that's all I got. Guys, definitely read this entire thing.
There's so much more to be said about this. Look
(43:49):
it up on your own and assess on your own,
and you know, maybe let us know what you think.
We'll be right back with more Strange News.
Speaker 4 (44:03):
And we have returned with today's final segment of Strange News,
and Ben teese that at the top he had a
very kindred story about radioactive animals on the loose, So
I'll just go ahead and lead with that one. It
also hits kind of close to home for me, I think.
I know. I've mentioned multiple times that I used to
(44:25):
do a little bit of coverage for public radio around
the nuclear industry in Augusta, Georgia, and one of the
sites that was involved in that reporting was the Savannah
River site in South Carolina. I lived in Augusta, Georgia,
right across the river, the Savannah River. From Augusta, Georgia,
you're in South Carolina, North Augusta, South Carolina, and a
(44:47):
little further than that you're gonna find SRS as it's
referred to. And it is a one of those super
fun sites as we talked about, that is involved in
the disposal of legacy nuclear waste left over from the
manufacturing of nuclear weapons. It is overseen by the US
Department of Energy, and you know, they've got ongoing activities
(45:11):
there designed to monitor various pits and areas that were
used to dispose of rake radioactive waste before they knew
that was maybe a bad idea. And there are also
these these tanks, these underground waste tanks, so liquid nuclear
waste is actually stored in some of these underground tanks.
(45:34):
And on July third, this is near Aiken, South Carolina.
Officials at the srs or Savannah River Site found a
radioactive wasps nest with radiation levels ten times that which
is allowed by federal regulations. The immediate reaction, after probably
a bit of an ocean because a wasp nest, whether
(45:55):
radioactive or no, is nothing to fool with it, was
to spray it with the sect killer, remove it, and
dispose of it as radioactive waste. They say that no
mega radioactive wasp creatures were found. The report said that
there is no leak from the waste tanks and the
nest was likely irradiated through what they referred to as
(46:18):
quote on site legacy radioactive contamination oh TY, residual radiation
leftover from when the site was fully operational. This is
what you would consider a decommissioned site. So all activities
there are clean up activities. There are watchdog groups that also,
you know, keep an eye on this kind of stuff,
(46:40):
and Savannah River Site Watch said that the report was
incomplete at best, as it doesn't detail where the contamination
came from. This vague sort of ambient contamination radioactivity is
a little bit on the creepy end of vague. Let
us just say, so, it does indicate that there may
(47:00):
be another radioactive nest elsewhere. There may also be a
leak somewhere. The Associated Press reports that knowing the type
of wasp nest could also be critical. Some wasps make
nests out of dirt and others use different material, which
could pinpoint where the contamination came from. Said Tom Clements,
(47:20):
the executive director of that watch group. I'm as mad
as a hornet. He says that SRS didn't explain where
the radioactive waste came from, or if there is some
kind of leak from the waste tanks that the public
should be aware of. The tank farm, as it's referred to,
is inside the boundaries of the site, and wasps generally
(47:41):
fly just a few hundred yards from their nests, so
there's no danger that they are migrating outside of the
facility if there are, in fact any radioactive wasps to
be concerned about. And the last time SRS came up,
I can't remember the exact story that made me bring
this up, but I talked about how when I actually
went out there once, I talked to a lot of
(48:03):
scientists researchers who are on site. I think these efforts
are still ongoing. Who actually use native wildlife to track
the progress of radioactive decontamination over time. The specific ones
that I remember were turtles that were actually tagged with
these little micro kind of tags that they could use
to differentiate between them. They're not in any way like trackers.
(48:27):
I don't think they may be, but the whole point
was they would know that we have tested this turtle before,
they'd pick it up, bring it back to the lab,
run at Geiger counter or whatever over it, and then
use them as kind of benchmarks as to how successful
the efforts to decontaminate this site have been, and it
is ongoing because as we know, you know, radiation that
don't just go away overnight. So what do you guys
(48:48):
think radioactive wasp worried, not worried, indifferent.
Speaker 2 (48:51):
I'm for it cool dealing with some wasp stuff over
here in home base.
Speaker 4 (48:57):
And what I have.
Speaker 2 (48:58):
Learned about wasp sky is that they generally don't go
very far from where their nest is, so hopefully not
going to be a problem for the human population.
Speaker 3 (49:08):
Again, yeah, depending on the type of wasp. Radioactive animals
are so interesting to me. I also want to shout
out the New York Times for calling them hot wasp
You I like the idea that someone's got some hot wasp.
Speaker 4 (49:22):
What's your hot take on the hot wasp spell?
Speaker 3 (49:24):
While the idea here first is this could have you know,
not comic book level altering effects on the wasp, but
it's definitely not going to be good for their population
as well, right, Like we know, we've had great discussions
about how disasters at Chernobyl, for instance, were actually over
(49:46):
the long term kind of good for biodiversity in the
area because they removed humans. But now I think one
thing I really appreciate about you bringing the story is
that it shows us how much more is out there,
Like for any students of nuclear shenanigans, Silvada is a
(50:07):
fascinating place right the Savada River site, and they still
haven't found that bomb, have they. You're more familiar with
it than I am.
Speaker 4 (50:15):
I don't remember that story right off the top. I'm
sure I knew about it in the past, the coast
of Savada, that's right. I do remember talking about that. That
wasn't something that I was super super familiar with, But
I'll have to do a little digging into that myself.
I do want to just backtrack one second. The site
was decommissioned as a site for manufacturing the plutonium cores
(50:35):
to make nuclear weapons during the Cold War, of course
with the Soviet Union. But now it actually is still
used to make product, and that product would be fuel
rods for nuclear plants, nuclear power plants. And again, of
course these activities involving cleaning up that legacy waste from
manufacturing of those nuclear weapon cores, nuclear bomb cores. According
(50:58):
to the AP and the Savannah River site stats, the
site generated more than one hundred and sixty five million
gallons of liquid nuclear waste, which has through evaporation been
reduced to about thirty four million gallons. And that is
according to Savannah River Mission completion. So an ongoing process there.
Speaker 3 (51:21):
And no, do we have any do we have any
specific stats on like the level of contamination on these wasp.
Speaker 4 (51:31):
Ten times what is allowed by federal regulations. That's all
I've got. So I don't know if that's specific WASP
specific or just like you know, wildlife specific, I think,
but ten times the allowable federal limits.
Speaker 3 (51:44):
Okay, so it sounds like ten types the allowable federal
limits for contamination of wildlife in general.
Speaker 4 (51:52):
Yeah, I think that's right.
Speaker 3 (51:53):
This is one of those weird, weirdly specific questions. We
always run into it our research, So we were everybody, luck,
how much is too much? How much is too much
for a wasp? Specifically, where's the study on that? Well,
we know the study will be on the way now.
Speaker 4 (52:09):
And remember the murder hornets? Yes, yes, yeah, I actually
came up in the movie Eddington, which I quite enjoyed.
But yeah, what if we had nuclear radioactive murder hornets? O?
Speaker 2 (52:20):
Hey, fast, guys. There are also European hornets that look
a lot like the murder hornets, just smaller in size.
If you see them in the backyard, do be aware
they could be nesting somewhere in your home.
Speaker 4 (52:35):
Do run for the hills.
Speaker 2 (52:36):
And they are giant and scary, but not as giant
as the giant murder hornets.
Speaker 4 (52:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (52:40):
Also you have to run. If you do run, remember
to come back. If you're human, you need to hold
the lie. I'm sorry, I don't know what talking you
can cover.
Speaker 4 (52:51):
Oh.
Speaker 3 (52:52):
Also, there's a totally unrelated other than the kinds of
animals we're speaking about. We'll maybe follow this up in
a future listener mail. But people who think they can
smell ants or people who can smell ants, or probably
smelling formic acid. Just get to get any emails on
that one. That's just one of the many out of
context facts.
Speaker 4 (53:11):
What is this substance and how is it excreted? It's
that ant stank, bro, That's what I thought. It's that
ant musk. Yeah, okay, got it. Do check out our
episode on pheromones and you know animal musk and human musk. Well,
we'll move on from that one real quick to it
seems to be an epidemic just absolutely overtaking the WNBA.
(53:35):
It appears that some practical or impractical jokers slash sports
fans keep throwing adult implements onto the courts of w
NBA games. For the third time in a week, it
would seem a sex toy was thrown onto a court
(53:55):
at a w NBA game Tuesday, August the fifth. As
we record this that yesterday, a game between the Indiana
Fever and the Los Angeles Sparks was disrupted when an
object described as being a sex toy was thrown onto
the court. An announcer exclaimed, oh, look out, something just
came onto the floor. An object just flew in as
the free throw is being made. The free throw rather,
(54:17):
it looked like that hit a player too. Oh dear,
it does appear to have hit fever player Sophie Cunningham.
Sparks did come out on top, no pun intended of
that game, one hundred to ninety one. The first incident
hits a little closer to home here in Georgia. On
July twenty ninth, still again, same week, in about between
(54:38):
the Golden State Valkyries and the Atlanta Dreams took place
in College Park, which is not too far from where
we are here in Atlanta. Morgan Reagan, who is a
sports announcer, said, during a replay, something flies on the court,
actually from the crowd, and you can see the object,
the green thing bounces and it goes the sideline. We're
(55:01):
not exactly sure where it came from. Uh, she continued,
as a timeout was called according to people, and the
game was paused. No room for any of that type
of activity. And no one's picked the object up yet,
you guys, then we uh we move on to a
further realization from Reagan saying, oh my gosh, okay, okay, inappropriate,
get him out of here. Whoever it was that through that,
(55:23):
And guys, what do you think for the plural for
dildo is I'm thinking dildy. We've got a spate of
as a pitch. I think it's fine till day if
till till till don't. Actually, this is a bad move.
This does seem to Yeah, it doesn't. This seem to
be an act of misogyny, like.
Speaker 3 (55:40):
It does seem targeted, because it's not as though when
you were first telling me about this off air, I
was unaware. It does seem that it is not like
a gorilla marketing campaign by a sex toy company because
they're not targeting correct me if I'm off base here.
They're not targeting anything but wns.
Speaker 4 (56:01):
That's sure what it seems like. I don't like it. Oh,
it seems pretty gross. And the other one was in
Chicago during the Valkyrie August first game against the Chicago
Sky seven minutes into the third quarter, a person threw
a similar object onto the court of wind Trust Arena
in Chicago. The broadcast footage saw again a green sex
(56:25):
toy being thrown onto the sidelines, just shy of the court.
Speaker 2 (56:30):
Guys, it sounds like the whitest kids, you know, sketch
to me, like, that's all the whole thing sounds like
a setup.
Speaker 4 (56:35):
Well, you know what occurred to me, especially with the
idea of it being bouncy. What if a fun sketch
would be a basketball game played with entirely bouncy sex
toys instead of basketballs.
Speaker 2 (56:46):
Here we go.
Speaker 3 (56:48):
You have my attention, now, you have my interest.
Speaker 4 (56:50):
Yes, yeah, it's it would be you know, fun and
sketch for him in any case.
Speaker 5 (56:54):
But yeah, if it was consensual and that that player
that got beamed by the the object in question tweeted,
stop throwing dildos on the court.
Speaker 4 (57:04):
You guys, Yeah, you're gonna hurt one of us. It's funny,
but it's also I think it's pretty gross. It does
appear to be like a kind of dismissal of women's sports.
Speaker 3 (57:17):
It feels in selly, to be quite honest, And it
feels like, look, you know, any professional athlete has been
in a situation where people at the at the game
are throwing stuff, you know, whether that's bottles of beer,
whether that's underwear, would be another thing. But this one
seems like they're inherent pointed implicitly right, they're choosing this
(57:41):
now I did find, Nola Matt. I did find something
interesting from eight years ago on a forum trying to
figure out the collective noun for a group of dildos.
And I'm going to go with a waggle, A waggle.
Speaker 4 (57:56):
Yeah, we got a murder of crows and a waggle
of doze dild does that is? We do have from
this people article that I mentioned a little snippet from
the fan code of Conduct for the w NBA, which
comes from its website, which says guests who engage in fighting,
throwing objects, or attempting to enter the court will be
immediately ejected from the arena, and no suspects have yet
(58:20):
to be identified, which is funny considering the intense TV
coverage of these things. But I guess, you know, they
saw the object onto the court, but they didn't. They
weren't able to pull you know, the identity of the assailor.
Speaker 3 (58:33):
The camera probably follows the object moving onto the court, right,
But I think that makes sense cameras. Another question is security,
How do you get through security?
Speaker 4 (58:44):
Well, it's not metal, so you could have it on
your person. I suppose perhaps even in your person.
Speaker 3 (58:49):
Oh yeah, no, that makes sense if it's just a
metal detector that might not clock it.
Speaker 4 (58:55):
You know what I mean when I say in your person, Yeah,
I know what you mean. It makes it extra cross
touch it. Don't touch it all. If you see dildo's flying,
do not touch it.
Speaker 3 (59:03):
Yeah, you know what. That is a great takeaway if
asops fable, this must be if you're walking by anywhere.
It doesn't have to be a game. If we're walked
by anywhere and you see a dildo on the ground,
let it be where it's at.
Speaker 4 (59:17):
It's not a lucky penny, and even those are pretty Yeah. Well,
I will close out the episode today in this segment
with a story that Matt was super interested in about
a comedian named Matt Rife who is now the legal
guardian of the haunted house that contains the original Annabelle
(59:38):
Doll of Warren fame. You know of the Amityville Horror
and the Conjuring films and all of that. There is
a museum, the Warren Museum, which includes the Annabelle Doll,
which I believe had to close due to some issues
with the lease. We definitely reported on that this comedian
(59:58):
does not own the these objects now, but rather is
now the Steward, I guess, or the caretaker, and he
did this along with a fellow YouTuber that I think
just goes by Castille not familiar. Raife had this to say,
if you know me, you know I'm obsessed with the
paranormal and all things haunted. You also may know the
(01:00:20):
Conjuring films are my favorite scary movies of all time.
So I'm incredibly honored to have taken over one of
the most prominent properties in paranormal history. A lot of
peace there. Edda Lorraine Warren arguably put demonology and paranormal
into the mainstream and are the very heart of some
of the most famous haunted stories of all time. So
it does seem like this is a bit of a
fan move. Bet Matt, you asked what the deal was,
(01:00:42):
why this person had done this, It just it does
appear there. Maybe you're coming from an honest place. Real
litter dot Com reported that the Warrant Occult Museum shut
down in twenty nineteen because of zoning issues. Now Rife
and Castille are planning to open it back up and
welcome visitors. And this property is located where I want
(01:01:04):
to say, it's Massachusetts, the most haunted place in America. Connecticut. Yes, Connecticut,
that's awesome. It's yeah, another much to it other than
it's kind of good news because if you're into this stuff,
it maybe it's sort of like the what is it
the South Park guys buying Casa Bonita, you know and
opening that back up.
Speaker 2 (01:01:24):
Oh yeah, it looks like they're moving everything because of
those zoning issues. So they're basically taking everything that's in
that house and putting it on Main Street somewhere around
the area where.
Speaker 4 (01:01:33):
Tons of other haunted cursed objects in this facilitat right,
thank you cursed in quotes, Yes, we.
Speaker 3 (01:01:42):
Do check out. By the way, folks, if you're interested
in this. We went through a heavy Warren phase. I
definitely did. I think it was back in twenty sixteen
we had an episode, an actual episode on the Warrens
and the deep controversy surrounding at LRAE. We tried to
be really fair with that one, but it is. I
(01:02:03):
it is, if nothing else, even if you consider yourself
a massive skeptic, it is a fascinating story.
Speaker 4 (01:02:09):
So do check it out for sure. And in that
I think we mentioned the late couple's son in law,
Tony Spara, who maintains the organization started by Ed and
Lorraine or in New England Society for Psychic Research or NESPER,
and he actually and that organization still officially owned the collection,
(01:02:32):
which includes Annabel and over seven hundred and fifty additional
bits of you know, ephemera.
Speaker 2 (01:02:39):
Dude, guys, they're turning the house into an airbnb, so
that'll be popular. You can go stay there, let's skill,
let's do an episode inside the house.
Speaker 4 (01:02:48):
That's a note for me. Dog, I've seen the movies.
Speaker 3 (01:02:51):
Oh, I'm fine with it.
Speaker 4 (01:02:54):
Freaking bunk up.
Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
It'll be fun.
Speaker 4 (01:02:57):
Yeah, all right, I'm down.
Speaker 3 (01:02:59):
I owe some of those some of those folks that
reach out anyway.
Speaker 4 (01:03:02):
So yeah, but some of those demonic spirits just to
check in.
Speaker 3 (01:03:06):
You know how it is.
Speaker 4 (01:03:08):
You gotta do. You gotta do a little checking out
with your infernal forces.
Speaker 3 (01:03:11):
Of course. Of course, folks, this has been a wild ride,
as we promise, a roller coaster of ups and downs.
We have so much more to get to. Please check
out our upcoming episodes. The Conspiracy of Cool is one
that we're excited about. We've got an Epstein update on
(01:03:32):
the way, and we always have strange news and listener
mail segments every week. So we want your help with this.
Please join up with us, give us your take on
everything we've discussed, and give us leads for new things
you think will interest your fellow conspiracy realist. You can
always send us an email, you can call us on
(01:03:53):
the phone, and you can contact us on the lines.
Speaker 4 (01:03:57):
You sure can. You can find this in the handle
conspiracy Stuff whre. We exist on Facebook with our Facebook
group Here's where it gets crazy, on x FKA, nay, Twitter,
and on YouTube video content glory for your perusing, enjoyment
on Instagram and TikTok. However, we're Conspiracy Stuff Show and Matt,
I think you got more for us.
Speaker 2 (01:04:15):
Hey, before I tell you about the phone number, If
you've made it this far into the episode, you're either
asleep or you really get us.
Speaker 4 (01:04:23):
Man.
Speaker 2 (01:04:24):
If you do get us, why not share the show
in general with a friend, maybe an acquaintance. How about
your dad? Share the show? Let other people know about it.
You can send them to Apple Podcasts or I hire
Radio app or Spotify anywhere, maybe even YouTube. Just share
the love because you get us. If you want to
call us, call one eight three three STDWYTK it's a
(01:04:47):
phone number. When you call in, give yourself a cool
nickname and let us know if we can use your
name and message on the air. If you want to
send us words and email, we are.
Speaker 3 (01:04:57):
The entities that read each piece of correspondence. Folks, Thank
you for tuning in. This is where we'll sneak in
some information. Yes, help us with a strange news or
listener mail segment. We do those every week. Help us
with episodes as well. They inform the exploration here. Please
always remember you can write to us for a random,
(01:05:18):
out of context fact like the smell of ants or
whatever you wish. We'd also love to hear. If you're
interested in reading a stuff they don't want you to know,
choose your own adventure book. Tell us your thoughts conspiracy
at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 2 (01:05:50):
Stuff they Don't want you to Know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Stuff They Don't Want You To Know News
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Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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