March 31, 2025 • 53 mins
Birds are fighting. A pilot loses a passport. Boeing scores a big win with a contract that will surely work out great. Let's hang out on Signal. All this and more in this week's strange news segment.
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Episode Transcript
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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 the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of iHeart Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is known.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
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. Strange days, indeed, you guys,
strange days. Indeed, as we are hurtling headfirst into April,
(00:52):
we we do have to tell you there may or
may not be in April Fool's Day episode of ridiculous history.
On the way, we want to be the first to
welcome you to Monday, March thirty.
Speaker 4 (01:04):
First, How does April come in and come go out?
Is it in like a lion, out like a lamb?
Speaker 5 (01:09):
Is that a thing? People say? I think I didn't
make that up. I'm not clever enough for that.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
I like it.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
If you made it up, YEH would have been cool,
But no, I cannot clame.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
I think it's just referring to, like you know, end
of winter, versus beginning of spring, which where I think
the Atlanta weather has finally picked a color and it's
it's spring.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
It does remind me of the fantastic line from T. S.
Eliot's The Wasteland where he says April is the cruelest month.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
I would definitely argue that April is the cruelest month
because everybody goes around trying to trick you on the
first exactly.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Yeah, I always found it a mean spirited holiday in
the modern West. But do tune in. We're going to
get into the surprisingly murky origins of April Fool's Day.
The line we're talking about here from ts Eliot is
the following April is the cruelest month, breeding lilacs out
(02:05):
of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull
roots with spring brain.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Somebody needs, I don't know, a little happy juice.
Speaker 5 (02:15):
Yeah, a little bit. It's a bit of a bummer.
Speaker 4 (02:18):
And actually it's March that comes in like a lion
and goes out like a label.
Speaker 5 (02:22):
We know what we're in it right now. Currently, as
we sit and records the twenty sixth.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
In media rests, we are going to explore some bird updates.
We're going to talk about passports and why you should
remember them, a little bit of UFO news. We have
so much to get to. Of course, we're going to
talk about twenty three and me we'll have a follow
up on our Slavery at Sea episode from the past. Everybody,
(02:49):
hold on to your ATM cards and be very careful
where you put them before we do any of that. Guys,
remember a while back on our group chat, I asked
whether we were all on signal.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, we've been talking about signal for a minute.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
I used telegram, which is kind of similar and it's
and encryption. But people really have been screaming about signal
lately in terms of you know, privacy, and it seems
like the government's been screaming about it too.
Speaker 5 (03:24):
To like that out of school.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
That's what we call a segue. We're going to be
right back after a word from our sponsors, and we
have returned. All right. Unless you are living off the
grid and somehow hearing podcasts but not the news, you
(03:47):
have probably heard of the recent hullabaloo regarding an editor
in chief of the Atlantic, a guy named Jeffrey Goldberg, who,
per his own reports, found himself accidentally in the wrong
digital room. Have you guys ever walked into a room
and realized you weren't supposed to be there?
Speaker 5 (04:08):
Yeah, and then I just kind of hung out and
eaves dropped.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
You know.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Yeah, you just pretend like you are supposed to be there.
If you find yourself in that situation, act like.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
You belong here. Yeah, that's that's one of the big
that's one of the big keys, right, one of the
jewels will drop here?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Can I answer really quickly? Just that thing? So one
time with our company, I got an email giving me
full press credentials, so like like the actual facts, full
press credentials that I could take with a number and
everything and walk into a place and just be like
I'm a member of the press, yes, getting and elaminated. Well,
(04:46):
I just said, hey, cool, thanks so much, this is amazing.
I can't I'm so happy to have this. And then
a couple of days went by and then I got
another follow up email that said you were not meant
to receive that.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Yeah, you can't really do take backsies outside of children's games.
That reminds me Matt Nolan, Tennessee and all of us home.
That reminds me of the time I interviewed Howard Dean
when he was still like an up and coming viable
presidential candid, wasn't he the He was, Yeah, that's how
(05:23):
I don't have the I don't have a high enough
range for it.
Speaker 5 (05:26):
But it was yeah, yes, it was a bit of
a yea.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, Billy could find the exact one, right, play that.
Speaker 6 (05:39):
The one that's it.
Speaker 5 (05:43):
Yeah, he sounds like a pokemon.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
That's what we're going with, Okay, And when we talked
when when we talked behind the curtain, right when it's
just us guys hanging out. Uh, then we'll tell each
other the truth in our super secure signal chat. And hey,
while we're there, why not why not collaborate on that
thing we always wanted to do, which is bomb a
(06:08):
couple of countries.
Speaker 5 (06:09):
Let's do it. You know what's taken so long. Let's
just you only live once, right.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Let's let's detail specific weapon caches.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
By minute accounts of the entire operation and logistics there.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, while that one guy is standing in
the corner holding a little red solo cup just like
the meme from Reddit, that's.
Speaker 4 (06:35):
Right, the one where he's walking into the party, you're
talking about and everyone's like thinking, he's wondering what everyone's
thinking about him.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
That.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
Yeah, I think that's how I pickedure our buddy jeff
So uh we have not met. Uh, we have not
met the journalist Jeffrey Goldberg. He is the current editor
in chief of the Atlantic. And what Jeffrey found is
that government officials have been using signal to communicate in
(07:04):
the aftermath of the you know, the Chinese telecom breach
we talked about with the US Treasury, but also maybe
as a way of skirting FOYA compliance.
Speaker 5 (07:18):
Disappearing messages not cool, not trained.
Speaker 6 (07:22):
Can we also just.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
Say that I'm stoked to be just back to a
place where we can just talk smack about the government.
Isn't that what this show is all about? And just
what this kind of thing is all about. Whoever is
in power America is a political trash talk about those
in power. That is what the conspiracy world should be
thriving on. I just want to put that out there,
because this stuff is wild.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I think it's thoroughly American to constantly, constantly complain about
your government because of in theory, this is not one
of the governments that will black bag you for bats yeah,
I said, in theory, I said, in.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Theory, they'll just take away our security clearances once we're gone.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Out of office, like the like the current admin did
with specifically with members of the Biden family.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
We're going to talk about it.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
So let's uh, let's go with this to give you
the straight poop or the hot cheese.
Speaker 6 (08:24):
Here, straight poop and hot cheese.
Speaker 3 (08:29):
Okay, it's evocative. Is really a weird way, So cast
our memories back to March eleventh, five. There's a group
chat created on signal. It's created by a national security
advisor named Michael Waltz. This chat, it is like a
group thread with the gang. You know, the current Vice
(08:52):
president is there, the Secretary of State is there. That
would be Vance and Ruby ospectively, and you there. Yeah,
a guy named Pete who heads the Secretary of Defense
position was there because the CIA director, the Director of
National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, the Secretary of the Treasury, the
(09:16):
guy who is probably the chief of staff for the
White House, a couple of other folks including special envoys
to the Middle East, and Jeffrey Goldberg. In this group chat.
Goldberg is just like that meme standing there in the
corner of the digital room right slowly sipping his coffee
(09:37):
or his juice, and he is watching this thing called
Hoothy PC Small Group PC, ostensibly meaning Principals Committee. They
go into depth. Some of us were talking. Some folks
messaged me on various social media platforms about this. It
(10:00):
is a true story. It is worrisome, and I really
appreciate that point about a politically holding anyone who is
in charge accountable. Because signal is fine if you're I
don't want.
Speaker 7 (10:19):
To sell like the app store, just saying right, yeah,
it's fine if you are trying to avoid hackers in
your day to day activities.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
It's fine if you're doing you know, small small time
drug deals or something like that. But if the if
the alphabet boys want to get into your signal chat,
they will, and if it's just it's an important point.
I feel like a lot of people with the best
of intentions get a little bit Pollyanna or a little
(10:53):
bit over sold on that purported security.
Speaker 4 (10:56):
Maybe you saw this ben and I don't recall who
it was, it was person it was on that thread,
so then you mentioned their name, but being grilled by
I believe a senator or a congressman on the Democratic
side about using this app, and this person said that
it was considered an approved CIA communication tool and had
(11:18):
been for some time further back even into the previous administration.
So I don't know about that, and that is sort
of neither here nor there, But that was sort of
the like defense that popped up first.
Speaker 5 (11:29):
Thing was like, no, no, no, it's totally cool.
Speaker 4 (11:31):
But I do just want to call back to mention
taking away Hillary clinton security clearances. What a to do
was made about her using emails and using private servers
and all that, and I just think this seems to me,
again a politically, to be so much worse.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Yeah, it's it's pretty egregious, especially because we know that
Russian forces can easily, just like our alphabet boys can
easily compromise the encryption of signal. Now officially they can't,
but there's a world of difference between official and in practice, right.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
And in this case, we're not even talking about any
kind of hacking that occurred. We're talking about user error, right.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
We must be And this is sort of the Matroshka
doll aspect of this. And I'm really glad you brought
that up for the timeline here what do we say
was March eleventh. The group chat was created on March eighteenth.
The Pentagon warned everyone in their staff against using signal
(12:37):
before the White House Chat League went through. The Pentagon said, hey, guys,
I'm cool. You know, we're all cool, but let's be
a little bit safe. Let's have some opsec here less
a blunder occurs. In a blunder, definitely did so. Picture
(12:58):
ourselves as the editor in chief of the Atlantic and
you're getting these crazy notifications. You're even reading stuff like this.
I am not sure the President is aware how inconsistent
this is with his message on Europe. Right now, there's
a further risk that we see moderate to severe spike
(13:18):
in oil prices. I'm willing to support the consensus of
the team and keep these concerns to myself, but there
is a strong argument for delaying this. They're talking about
a bombing against toothy forces, as it will affect oil prices,
right there's a strong yeah argument for delaying this a month,
doing the messaging work on why this matter, seeing where
(13:41):
the economy is. To your point, Noel, et cetera. That
is a post from the current Vice president talking smack
about the current president.
Speaker 5 (13:51):
Oh, that is true.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
So can you unpack that a little bit? How is
that kind of a subtle subtweet as they might call it.
He's blaming him for the bad economy and basically saying
we should time this better so it doesn't make it worse.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
He's saying that he doesn't believe the commander in chief
is being consistent in's economic pause in US activity. Yeah,
especially pertaining to Europe, which you know, critics of the
current president would kind of say the same thing. And
(14:24):
this is the gosh. You can go to sources like,
of course, Jeffrey Goldberg at The Atlantic. You can also
go to surprisingly enough, Yahoo News, which has a full
list of the texts that were leaked, that were sent.
I maybe this is an episode in the future, but
(14:45):
for now we're establishing just the timeline of events because
I have a question, and Matt, you inspired this earlier,
and I'm so glad you asked it. We always talk
about pretend leaks, right, A source familiar with the situation, right,
an unnamed employee of the Pentagon. So one of the
(15:09):
questions we have to ask is was this leak simple,
as simple as human error or user error or is
it somehow a complex power play? Is it on purpose?
Speaker 5 (15:24):
This is what you call Larry David speak, the accidental
text on purpose?
Speaker 4 (15:30):
Yeah right, It's where you like, text the wrong person
on purpose and say it was an accident, but you're
giving them information that actually could potentially cause them to
do something that would be beneficial to you.
Speaker 5 (15:44):
Maybe I don't think so in this case. I think
it's a total f up. I really truly do.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
I think they fuffle the bat? I really do?
Speaker 2 (15:51):
You do?
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Read also that this was not as simple as the
accidental text on purpose or accidentally texting a group thread
when you meant to text one member of it. This
guy was invited to this right group, this private group
of not that many members. He was he received an
invitation from I believe that the person that you mentioned,
and these folks are all newly installed and I'm forgetting
(16:13):
some names, but the National security advisor, I believe yes,
And he was like, is it this guy?
Speaker 5 (16:18):
I want to see?
Speaker 4 (16:19):
Maybe it's really him, And literally he just clicked Okay,
let's just see what we see where this goes. Maybe
he thought the guy was legitimately trying to reach out
to him to do an interview, to do something right.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
Sure, because you're you're a big deal journalist. And make
no mistake, this is a big the editor in chief
of The Atlantic, yew, how is he mistakenly added to
a group chat? And if that is possible, how can
we mistakenly invite you know, some of our favorite celebrities
(16:50):
like Fran Dresher and Keanu Reeves to our group chat.
Speaker 4 (16:53):
We might be having one of our favorite celebrities on
the show before not too long.
Speaker 3 (16:59):
I really like his work, really could work. Lovely guys,
hope it's not a staff and we do it. We
we carry through with a plom So this this, there's
another deeper issue here, which is that at least one
of these guys, the US Envoy to the Middle East,
(17:19):
Steve Whitcoff, at least one of them was in Moscow
quite recently meeting with Vladimir Putin from earlier and just
after it was March thirteenth, so just after midnight local time,
the chat started naming active CIA officers at least one
(17:42):
at least one at least one, which is a big note.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Well, and and that person was named at five twenty
four pm Eastern time, just after midnight in Russia, and
according to CBS News the Sky Witcoff was in Moscow
until about two am, and right up until about one
thirty am, he was at the Kremlin meeting with President.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
Putin right right exactly, which goes to our recent episode
that should be out by this time. Why are so
many spies getting busted? And I can't wait for us
do the QA on that one.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
There's just unseen signal chats where people are just like, oh, yeah,
that one badass spy who's currently at the Kremlin right now.
Speaker 6 (18:33):
You know that dude, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
And someone else is like, Gene is a fucking legend.
And then you know someone hits it with a like
or an emoji react.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Oh he's having a party at his house next week.
Are you guys going, here's this deep?
Speaker 4 (18:48):
Do we mention the emoji react from this chain? That's
fantastic in and of itself. I think it's like a
power fist, an American flag and a fire emoji.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Yeah, it's a it's a it's a fist bump and
then the flag and the fire emoji. And that comes
to us courtesy of Michael Waltz, one of the Oh
my god, what are the top decision makers. Look again,
we did take pains to keep this, to keep this
within the remit of the show. It seems right now,
(19:22):
the most likely possibilities are the following two and we'll
wrap and we'll go to an ad break after this
because we want to hear from you guys. The first
possibility is human error in an attempt to skirt skirt
around Freedom of Information Act compliance. The second possibility is
(19:47):
a purposeful leak, which doesn't make a ton of sense.
It's simply the like, what is the endgame, quibono. Who benefits?
We don't know, but we can we can say right
now it appears to be something that is going to
haunt the administration and probably the American public as well
(20:12):
as American interests abroad.
Speaker 4 (20:14):
Well, any one thing that disturbs me too just about
this administration is the old, you know, kind of fascist
playbook move of discrediting journalism journalists, and like the moment
Trump was asked about this, he responded, oh, you mean
discredited loser journalists of the failed, you know, substandard magazine
(20:36):
The Atlantic.
Speaker 5 (20:37):
Like just that move right off the rip, when he
didn't even know.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
What it was about. It's just so fascinating to me
and really scary.
Speaker 5 (20:47):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
And this this paints not just a picture of the present,
but it gives us a sense of the horizon or
the possibilities here. So we'd love to hear from anybody
who has security clearance, anybody who has worked in info
security or this kind of opsec. What do you think
(21:10):
is going on?
Speaker 5 (21:11):
How?
Speaker 3 (21:11):
How did this happen? Is there a conspiracy afoot? Speaking
of conspiracy, you can email those thoughts to us conspiracy
at iHeartRadio dot com. For now, we're going to pause
for a word from our sponsors. We'll return with more
strange news and tune in at the very end. Uh,
there's an update on the Moonies.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
And we've returned, guys, exciting news in the world of
government contracts. Tail Oh, I've been learning about government contracts.
Speaker 5 (21:45):
Guys.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Trying to dip my toes into the game. It looks
like that's one of the best ways to make some
serious moolah these days.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Yeah, dip your dip your fingers, you know what I mean,
Get a little vigorous. It's all to help the mission.
Dip your ways, you know, like like our pal Fingi's
O'Brien from Daily's.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Actually been doing some chocolate fond do action over here
with some semi sweet chocolate dipping, some pretzels, some strawberries,
all kinds of deliciousness in there.
Speaker 4 (22:13):
Wet to make a little pattern, you know, do a
little little half and half, like getting to spoke with it.
Speaker 5 (22:18):
That's interesting.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
No, no, no, just full on semi sweet. It's like
almost not sweet.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Oh yeah, yeah, it's gotten asked to it.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Yeah yeah, but we didn't dip our fingies into the
fondue itself or tozies. But uh got on the fingies
and tozies.
Speaker 5 (22:36):
How about that?
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Not tozi so much? That would be weird.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
It's okay, I'm already picturing the shot a soundtrack for this.
Speaker 5 (22:43):
Oh yeah, check a wow.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
Uh so yeah, guys, Yeah, Boeing got a win. We
got a win for Boeing. Everybody out there underdogs, to
be fair, they have had a bad Can.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
I can I be the first to say it on
the show. You're welcome, guys, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
You're welcome. You've got the big contract. Boeing has won
an Air Force contract to develop the first ever sixth
generation war fighter, dubbed the F forty seven.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
That sounds scary fish America fire.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Okay, I don't want to sound like a jerk, so
sell us on the forty seven.
Speaker 5 (23:35):
Well, guys, you don't have to sell me.
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Please go, heart and soul. It's the Air Force's next
generation Air Dominance or ENDGAD program. Guys. It's a game
changer for Boeing. Before this, they've been developing and developed
and maintaining the F eighteen program. This is a huge
different type of fighter jet that has been in use
(24:00):
with the United States Military and the Air Force for
quite a time, but that contract is ending for Boeing,
so they needed something to juice up the old coffers
and make sure Boeing stock stays you know, wherever it's
going to go after the next plane falls out of
the sky.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Sorry, sorry, it's just okay, we're really proud of.
Speaker 6 (24:24):
Really trying to maintain here.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
Yeah, but really you're welcome.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
But really, there's a massive Boeing facility in Saint Louis
that produces these F eighteens and maintains them. And getting
this new contract means, you know, those individuals who are
probably awesome human beings, it means they still have a
job and they're going to make new things, new, really
kick ass things. In my opinion, these planes, no doubt,
they're terrifying, at least if they do what Boeing says
(24:53):
they will do on paper.
Speaker 5 (24:54):
What do they call it again, terror birds F forty.
They don't have some cool like nickname.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
Or I don't know. It's the it's the GAD program. Okay,
that's the generation AIRDM.
Speaker 5 (25:06):
We can work. We can workshop that.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
But yeah we can. Yeah, we'll just we'll we'll hit
them up on signal about that. The goat suckers. But
but okay, Matt, this is, as you said, a huge win.
It's also important to put this in perspective because the
contract award is after a successful pitch, and that's very
(25:31):
different from building the actual plane. And we know, for
a lot of our fellow aviators in the crowd, we
know that there's always a bumpy road right, a bumpy runway.
There there are always uh hiccups and warts and blemishes
and sometimes dangerous things with deploying a new kind of
(25:55):
complex agglomeration of technology like this. So there there are
probably plenty of pilots who are already thinking, thank god,
this thing is not in service before I retire.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Well, so there's some complexity to this. I agree with you, Ben,
but there's complexity because it is a part of, as
you said, a pitch, but as part of that pitch,
actual vehicles are produced not just by Boeing, also by
Lockheed Martin, also by Northrop Grumman. Those are the three
big contract fighters in the ring.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
And Rocked Lockheed made the sort of ancestor or older
brother to this. They may be F twenty two, right.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
And the F thirty five. So right now, Lockheed or
right before now, Lockheed was the king of the stealth
fighter in the United States for the for the Air Force, right.
There are other versions of these planes for the Navy,
different types of planes, sometimes by the same manufacturer, just
different specifics, right for the other branches of the military.
(27:04):
But Lockheed was Lockheed Martin was standing on top of
that hill. But there have been a lot of problems
with the these next generation fighters that have been kind
of put out in the news. Just how many issues
there are, specifically with the systems, like the integrated computer
(27:24):
based systems issues happen there.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
They're ballooning budget issues as well, I mean, as ever everybody.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Particular, Yes, right, there's corruption happening a little bit on
the side there, but like, we gotta we need some
more money for this project.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
R and D cost can be a black hole because
they don't have you know, you can have clearly defined
objectives to arrive at, but you will also have agency
to figure out how you get to that objective. Yeah,
it's that there's riddle be this is there a recent
military project that has come in under budget.
Speaker 5 (28:08):
Doesn't really seem to be the priority.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
I want to say, has something to do with with
space force probably, no kidding, I do.
Speaker 3 (28:18):
Have to we do have to point this out again
just being we're we're being curmudgeonly, but we're doing it
in in a political way. It doesn't matter what administration
is at the wheel. Uh. The real reason that the
military industrial complex rarely goes under budget in projects like
this is that on the military side, if you go
(28:42):
under budget, the being counters in your department are going
to come back to you and say, oh, I guess
you don't need so much money next year.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Well, and and as part of winning this contract, one
of the main things that's looked at by the government
is how cost effective are these planes, Like per unit
when we them to actually deploy them in places like Yeman. Well,
in this case, Boeing was on the lower end of
how much it's going to cost. But something to keep
in mind is, once you win one of these contracts
(29:11):
and your budget does go a little over, it's a
lot easier for the government to modify a contract than
it is to go through a whole other system of Well,
I guess we're gonna need to make a new contract
and get new people in here and test new you know,
prototypes and figure out all of that stuff. You just
it's way easier to follow that sunk cost and just
(29:32):
you know, eventually get those F thirty five's mostly working.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
In cost fallacy.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
Yeah, exactly. But this is the thing that blew my mind.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
Guys.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
There's two things. Okay, I didn't know. There's an actual
US government Uncle Sam, and I think we may have
talked about it before, yea, like once or twice. There's
a real actual government SAM. It's called the System for
Award Management or SAM dot gov. This is the place
(30:02):
where all of these companies and individuals sometimes go to
create a basically a user account or an entity is
what they refer to it. On the website an entity
that can be eligible for certain contracts government contracts, big
ass contracts like this one. And if you go to that,
(30:25):
you can go to the website and check it out
and learn all about it. There's a great website GSA
dot gov, which is the General Services Administration, and it
will tell you how to do the process, how to
make it work.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
It's just it.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
It's weird to look at it on your computer screen
and think, oh wow. People from these major weapons manufacturers
do this exact thing and then sign up make an
entity as let's say Northrop Grumming or in this case Boeing,
and then.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
They don't want you to know.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
Yeah whatever, it's Americadwick. It could mean anything. But they
do all that and it just happens. That's weird. The
other thing is these next generation warplanes like the If
you imagine a prototyped vehicle that gets shown off by
Tesla as he says.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
It, Tesla, No, he says Tesla, Tesla, Okay.
Speaker 6 (31:20):
Well Tesla.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Well, let's say the next generation prototype of a Volkswagen
gets shown off at a car show. These prototypes for
these major weapons manufacturers have been flying since at least
twenty twenty. Yes, which makes you think about some of
the things human beings have seen in the air every
once in a while, or a little blip that goes by,
or weird sound. It could very well be one of
(31:46):
these prototypes that's being tested and has been tested for
the last four or five years.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
Yeah, we're talking something that has advanced stealth capabilities the
fifth generation vehicles simply don't possess, and significantly longer range.
It's still it's still classified, so we can't we can't
say too too much about it lest we get kicked
off the group chat. But we do we do know
(32:16):
to your point there, that there's a phenomenal and significant,
provable precedent of secret aviation innovations and breakthroughs and reports
of UAP or UFO. One of, indeed one of the
most plausible answers to mysterious objects in the sky is
(32:38):
going to be secret, very expensive testing of next gen
stealth aircraft.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Yeah, and thank goodness they're testing them. They didn't test them,
and they you know, won a nineteen billion dollar contract
that has you know, a couple sections in there. It
will likely cost hundreds of billions of dollars.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Yeah, I think it's up to twenty already.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, thank goodness they're testing them
rather than just saying, guys, look at this cool picture
of a fighter jet I designed.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
How cool would I make test pilot? Would you guys
ever be test pilots for this kind of stuff?
Speaker 5 (33:14):
Don't think?
Speaker 3 (33:14):
Well?
Speaker 2 (33:14):
No, interestingly enough, both. I think it was both astronauts,
or at least one of the astronauts that was recently,
you know, finally brought down from the International Space Station.
I think there were both test pilots for craft that
you know, hopefully work the way they say they.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
Do, mind reader, That's kind of why I'm asking, yeah,
because it just seems like such rarefied air. That's true
on two levels. But you know, when we when we
look at these programs, we know there's a lot of largess.
We know there's a lot of graft or a lot of
what people used to call port in earlier evenings. But
(33:55):
it is important to do this. Ye kind of have
to do this, especially now given that the US is,
and I hate to say it, the US is losing
the technological arm race against foreign powers. Particularly are our
friends over at Uncle Gee's side of the world.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Well, not with the f forty seven's with the when
they roll through, Oh, it's they're going to be beautiful.
Speaker 5 (34:22):
It is inspired.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
You won't even notice them all right, our our enemies
won't know what hit them. That's I think it'll be
a miss from the announcement. Yeah, but okay, guys, there's
there was a lot of stuff I wanted to cover
and we ended up talking about this a lot. A
couple of things you need to know. Do yourself a
favor and look up Just do a quick search for
Pirates Booty Long Island. You mean, like, just do that
(34:48):
the snack. Yes, just do yourself a favor. At some
point google that and just give yourself a little read.
Have some fun has to do with the founder of
Pirates Booty attempting to basically pull a full mutiny on
a town in Long Island, declaring himself mayor and all
kinds of con.
Speaker 6 (35:06):
Pirate king I have.
Speaker 5 (35:08):
I have a bunch of pirates Booty in me pantry.
Speaker 3 (35:12):
And also also pirates are the reason are probably one
of the reasons the US does not currently have the
metric system.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
Hey, hey, I agree, And speaking of pirates, let's stay
on the high seas. Do yourself a favor and do
a little search for Bumblebee Tuna. Bumble Bee Tuna and
fishing boat slavery. Something we talked about on a previous episode.
I can't remember the name of it, something about canned
fish or it's the.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
One where we I think I called it the one
where we ruined seafood.
Speaker 6 (35:44):
I think that's it.
Speaker 2 (35:45):
I think that's it.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
Now that being said, there are some bespoke ten fish
companies that do a really fine Jeff, that's a good yeah,
very good for sure.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
In this case, Bumblebe Tuna has found itself in a
landmark lawsuit where they're for Indonesian fishermen who are suing
Bumblebee Foods because they said these four fishermen alleged that
Bumblebee Tuna knowingly benefited. That's a quote from forced labor, debt,
bondage and other forms of abuse that we described in
(36:17):
that previous episode.
Speaker 3 (36:19):
And that episode is from twenty twenty three. I'm having
a hard time believing that, but it's true. That episode
is from July of twenty twenty three. It's called the
one where we ruin canned seafood bones. It's an important
issue to us and you know, it's perfect if you
are having too good of a day.
Speaker 2 (36:40):
Exactly, exactly, Okay, just last few things that rattle off,
and these really are rattling off, guys, because it's time
for this section. But Google search rescinding security clearances and
access to classified information from specified individuals. That is where
you will find a list of people that have lost
(37:02):
their access to classified information who are formerly government officials,
who are not currently in office anymore, or at least
are not in favor with the current administration. It is
a very interesting thing to see one administration come through
and say, hey, people that I don't agree with or
don't like, or who were my enemies, my perceived enemies,
(37:25):
you no longer have access to the thing that generally,
you know, helped you with your job, you know, as
being an official in some capacity. It's very strange to
see that. It's not something that happens with every administration.
It's just a little weird. And then I pose to you, guys,
(37:46):
or at least I propose that we should do a
full episode on the twenty three and meters stuff as
we were going through it for this, you know, to
talk about it today. There's just a lot of complexity there.
Speaker 3 (37:59):
I called it in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
You remember we've talked about this. It's it's a dangerous
thing when all of that information is just hanging out
with a private company and they're trying to figure out,
Oh do we do an IPO, do we go public?
Oh do we sell to one other private investor? Who
is that investor? Like?
Speaker 4 (38:17):
Are we a DNA analysis company or are we a
data gathering company?
Speaker 3 (38:23):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 5 (38:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Yeah, And you know every single person that's spit into
a thing is the product. So congrats.
Speaker 5 (38:31):
We talk about how that question. I think they knew
the answer from the start.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, all right. We'll be right back afterward
from our sponsors with more strange.
Speaker 4 (38:39):
News and we return, y'all. Pilots are just like us.
They can be absent minded, little little.
Speaker 5 (38:50):
Silly goofballs too, just like us, Just like us. Thank you.
Speaker 4 (38:55):
A United Airlines flight from Los Angeles heading to shang
I had to make an emergency diversion to San Francisco
after the pilot realized that he did not have his passport.
Speaker 3 (39:12):
Dylan, can we get the whoopsie sound c from Mortal Kombat?
Speaker 6 (39:16):
Whoopsie made it?
Speaker 5 (39:18):
See yeah, you know the one.
Speaker 4 (39:22):
Yep, he apparently grumpily announced this over the P eight.
Speaker 3 (39:29):
Well there's a stupid and then of course still followed
up with the weather right, oh yeah, a positive note,
the looking great levels sailing.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
Yeah, should be a smooth ride all the way to
San Francisco where we were not going. Yeah, it was
a six hour, all told delay to the passengers going
where they were going, and to whoever was unlucky enough
to be scheduled to be on that plane next.
Speaker 5 (40:05):
Because we all know.
Speaker 6 (40:05):
How airline delays work.
Speaker 4 (40:06):
It is a rolling domino effect situation. And they I've
always been irritated about this, Ben and Matt, I'm sure
you guys have noticed this too. They don't give you
information in a timely manner. They want to keep you
hanging on. They want to keep you hanging on with
these rolling delays when they probably know what the full
(40:27):
delay extent is going to be. But instead they just
keep moving it ten minutes, fifteen minutes. And I don't
know what do you guys, how do you cope with this?
Like where you really decide to cut your losses if
you haven't left yet for the airport and don't and
don't want to be stuck there because you don't trust
the damn airlines.
Speaker 3 (40:44):
To be honest with you. So you haven't left yet.
Speaker 6 (40:46):
I have, I haven't yet. It has happened to me recently.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
It was rolling delays and I was trying to decide, yeah,
because it was actually on our way to our big trip,
our big show in Brooklyn. Because I was traveling, I
was having to check a bag with some very not
only expensive, but important equipment for our show, and I
was worried that if I went to the airport and
(41:09):
then the flight was canceled after I already checked the bag,
it might end up in some kind of airport limbo,
you know what I mean. I actually asked you about this,
Ben at the time, So maybe share your perspective with
the listeners too, because I know you're a season traveler
and probably run into this more times than I have.
Speaker 3 (41:27):
Oh shucks. I love hanging at airports, you guys. Remember
when we were stranded at the Atlanta Aircraft Yes, yeah,
with war Yeah who says Hi. By the way, we
we were hanging there, and we were in the same
sort of domino effect situation. We were still there. Yeah,
(41:48):
beautifully described. Yeah, so one of the questions was how
long do we stay at this airport in the city
that we all live it. You know, we're not stranded
out in Sammarcan's or something. We're we're in our hometown.
And we ended up staying there because of the information
drip that you were talking about. The plane, if I
(42:11):
recall correctly, the plane, our flight kept getting pushed just
a little at a time, a little at a time,
and we kept saying, well, it's not really worth it
for us to drive back home and then go through security. Uh,
so we better befriend everybody else who was stranded. And
we had an epic night. But I know there's a question, Noel,
(42:35):
that all of us listening are are gonna expect. Uh
And so I asked on behalf of our conspiracy realist,
what airline was it?
Speaker 1 (42:44):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (42:44):
Yeah, sorry, I was United?
Speaker 6 (42:46):
Which is what type of plane was it?
Speaker 5 (42:48):
Unclear?
Speaker 4 (42:49):
Probably a Boeing, but it was, Yeah, the Boeing.
Speaker 5 (42:54):
Didn't make dude forget his passport.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
I know, I know Boeing gets such a hard time.
Speaker 4 (42:59):
Of the dude.
Speaker 5 (42:59):
Why not let's just throw it at them.
Speaker 3 (43:01):
Somebody Congress will be like, now is it? Is it correct?
That the Boeing aircraft does not provide on board passports
all the pilots, Like, no, Senator, that would be illegal.
That's not how passports.
Speaker 5 (43:18):
Yeah, yes, exactly, I guess it.
Speaker 4 (43:20):
Never you know, this is interesting to me, I think too,
because because it never really occurred to me that pilots
are like subject to all the same crap that the
rest of us are. They might get waved through certain security,
there might be like a expedited line for them and stuff.
And also depending on maybe where this person was going
to end up, perhaps this was a resident of China
(43:42):
and definitely needed the passport to get home.
Speaker 3 (43:45):
Even Yeah, that's a that's a great question because this
you're absolutely right about the cool line at the airport.
That's for flight crew, that's for the pilots, and and
you're also absolutely correct, I would say regarding you know,
the question of nationale. We can assume this was a
(44:08):
US passport holder, but do we know that for sure?
Speaker 5 (44:11):
I don't think so. We didn't. They didn't name names.
Speaker 4 (44:13):
And it's actually pretty funny. The reporting on this is
a little bit light. Honestly. Maybe it's just an information
air gap kind of situation with the airline. But the
one they just got the most. CNN just got the
most absolutely lackluster quote from one of the passengers.
Speaker 5 (44:32):
I'm feeling pretty frustrated.
Speaker 4 (44:33):
A business traveler who requested anonym and he told CNN,
I have to reschedule all my plans for Monday, which
is really inconvenient.
Speaker 3 (44:44):
It steaks though, because you know, we have to exercise.
We would probably have said the same thing. You know,
if CNN showed up at that that cursed what what
was it? Like a blue moon or Gordon Biersch power
is it? You see? It showed up and asked us,
we would have been we would have been like, uh,
(45:06):
we we have said some of the same things.
Speaker 5 (45:08):
We probably would have bought CNN a drink at that point, man,
I mean we were we were.
Speaker 4 (45:13):
Just owned it at that you know, we were just
posted up like like what's that movie where Tom Hanks
lives in the airport?
Speaker 5 (45:21):
We were like the terminal. We were terminal boys.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Can you guys, like, really, can you imagine that panic
that would set in if you were flight Yeah, and
you can visualize your passports sitting there on the table
like you put it there to remember it, but you.
Speaker 3 (45:39):
Your stomach drops and it's even I would argue it's
even worse on some level because not just not only
is there a ton of people trusting you right depending
on you and they all have their together beat me there,
but also perhaps on an even more damaging social aspect
(46:00):
of it, you have a co pilot, Yeah, and your
co pilot, like you know, in a different country, they
might just tell you to get the parachute and pop
off the plate because we got somebody else who can
fly it.
Speaker 4 (46:14):
Well, it's my understanding that they diverted to San Francisco
so they could get a whole new flight crew, Like
so they like do it was donezo? And I gotta
ask you, guys, do you think And I'm sorry, I
sick keep saying, dude, we don't have no indication of
this individual's gender, but you.
Speaker 5 (46:31):
Think they got to let go? It's pretty bad, dude,
It's a pretty bad look for the airline.
Speaker 4 (46:37):
I mean, maybe, how do you what what is the
middle ground between being let go and being severely wrist slapped?
Speaker 3 (46:45):
You get? You get a passport on a on like
a lanyard.
Speaker 4 (46:50):
Yeah, yeah, a lamin it like Matt's a girl gotten
press pass.
Speaker 3 (46:55):
Right right right? You you get. I mean, really, it's
a case of human error, absent mindedness. Without more context,
you know, it'd be very Look, pilots have such a
high threshold of learning, and they have such expertise, and
there's such an investment of time that I don't think
(47:16):
this person will get fired. I'm sure they will get punished,
but it's not like some of those other pilots who
get you know, not canned, but faced at the airport
bar and they're like a hop on, I'm playing.
Speaker 4 (47:32):
Well, we have no indication there is any intoxication involved,
no intoxication indication, and there was nobody harm's way at
any point. This is literally just an example of a
really foolish thing to have done and an embarrassment to
the airline and this individual, who to my knowledge thus
far has not been named. Gosh, guys, I had no
(47:54):
idea that was going to be such a robust conversation.
Speaker 5 (47:56):
That was meant to be my little throwaway story.
Speaker 4 (47:58):
I got a story here about burn in the Galopa
ghosts getting pissed off because of traffic noise.
Speaker 5 (48:06):
A fantastic study.
Speaker 4 (48:08):
From some very very smart folks who simulated different types
of traffic noise and different concentrations and basically animal behavior.
Is The is the journal that published the study about
how Galopagos yellow warblers respond when traffic noise disrupts their
communication systems. It essentially shows that there are environmental things
(48:31):
that lead to evolution much quicker than maybe one might think.
Speaker 5 (48:35):
And I know, you know, look, this is the way
to put this is.
Speaker 4 (48:38):
Thus, Charles Darwin, this is from a study finds fantastic
type by the way Great Resource dot org sort of
crystallization of this. Charles Darwin may have studied finches during
his famous Galapagos visit in eighty thirty five, but today's
yellow warblers are offering modern lessons about adaptation to human
altered environments. Rather than evolutionary changes occurring over generations, these
(48:59):
birds are showing behavioral changes within their own lifetimes. So
these human made knock on consequences that are invading, you know,
natural habitats for these creatures are causing much more accelerated
evolutionary traits, which I think is super super interesting. Again,
to wrap this up, research teams from the University of
(49:20):
Vienna set up experiments across two Galapagos islands that differ
dramatically in their human footprint. Santa Cruz hosts over fifteen
thousand people in more than a thousand vehicles, while Florinia
Island has about one hundred residents and only ten vehicles.
This contrast created a natural laboratory for studying how different
levels of exposure to traffic noise affect bird behavior. And
(49:40):
it just goes into this whole concept of sound as
a survival tool for these creatures. You know, they use
it to communicate, they use it to signal danger, to
attract mates so that they can reproduce. And this is
potentially causing problems in those departments, which is causing the
birds to have to sing louder and be a lot
more aggressive and they're mating you know, rituals and habits.
Speaker 3 (50:05):
And no one still, no one's going to talk about
the effects of submarines and sonar on whales, which is
a very similar situation. Yeah, I got I gotta point
out one we're talking about this briefly off air. One
related story that stood out to me. I just have
to say, at least I'm like emotionally four years old.
(50:26):
There's another issue with light pollution for a specific type
of bird over in Switzerland. Great tits are having fewer
young in the city because of the light pollution. They're
the kind you know, they're great. Tits are the great
tits are the types who really get down when the
(50:47):
lights are off.
Speaker 4 (50:48):
You know it seems yeah, yeah, t he indeed. And
I just want to read this last quote from the
study Finds piece, which I think is so well done.
They said, think of trying to have an important conversation
while standing next to a busy highway. You'd likely change
how you speak or isort to gestures to get your
point across. Birds face similar challenges with the potentially life
(51:11):
altering consequences.
Speaker 5 (51:13):
And then whole section on the power of noise.
Speaker 3 (51:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (51:16):
Man, it's a great, great resource. So this is a
road rage how busy streets yield angry birds on studyfines
dot org.
Speaker 3 (51:24):
Oh gosh, you can tell the energy is great. This evening, folks,
fellow conspiracy realists, because we have a lot of stuff
we didn't get to yet, and we will get to
that in future segments or in a future episode. In
the meantime, we need your help. We pass the torch
to you. Be it yours to hold it high, So
(51:46):
join us. You're the most important part of the show.
We'd love to hear from you. We'd love to hang
out with you, whether that is on a telephonic device,
whether that's on our notorious email, or whether it's on
the lines, on the lines on the Internet.
Speaker 4 (52:02):
Oh boy, indeed, you got options galore to reach us.
You can find us at the handle Conspiracy Stuff where
we exist on Facebook with the Facebook group that is ours.
Here's where it gets crazy. It can be yours too.
It's a community that you can join be a part
of some great folks on there. We're also Conspiracy Stuff
Show on x FKA, Twitter and on YouTube where we
(52:22):
have video content for your perusing, enjoyment. On Instagram and TikTok, however,
we're Conspiracy Stuff Show.
Speaker 2 (52:30):
We have a phone number. It is one eight three
three STDWYTK. When you call in, you've got three minutes.
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 other stuff, maybe links
or I don't know, pictures, one not, instead send us
an email.
Speaker 3 (52:48):
We are the entities that read every piece of correspondence
we receive. Be well aware, yet unafraid. Sometimes the Void,
writes back. The most successful assassin in recent news is
at u Ya Yamagami, whose murder of Shinzo Abbe in
twenty twenty two may have led to Japan disbanding the Moonies.
(53:10):
What do we mean? What are we talking about? Just
shoot us a lie, I'll tell you all about it.
Conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
Stuff they don't want you to know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
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From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
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production of iHeart Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt,
my name is known.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
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. Strange days, indeed, you guys,
strange days. Indeed, as we are hurtling headfirst into April,
(00:52):
we we do have to tell you there may or
may not be in April Fool's Day episode of ridiculous history.
On the way, we want to be the first to
welcome you to Monday, March thirty.
Speaker 4 (01:04):
First, How does April come in and come go out?
Is it in like a lion, out like a lamb?
Speaker 5 (01:09):
Is that a thing? People say? I think I didn't
make that up. I'm not clever enough for that.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
I like it.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
If you made it up, YEH would have been cool,
But no, I cannot clame.
Speaker 4 (01:16):
I think it's just referring to, like you know, end
of winter, versus beginning of spring, which where I think
the Atlanta weather has finally picked a color and it's
it's spring.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
It does remind me of the fantastic line from T. S.
Eliot's The Wasteland where he says April is the cruelest month.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
I would definitely argue that April is the cruelest month
because everybody goes around trying to trick you on the
first exactly.
Speaker 3 (01:45):
Yeah, I always found it a mean spirited holiday in
the modern West. But do tune in. We're going to
get into the surprisingly murky origins of April Fool's Day.
The line we're talking about here from ts Eliot is
the following April is the cruelest month, breeding lilacs out
(02:05):
of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull
roots with spring brain.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Somebody needs, I don't know, a little happy juice.
Speaker 5 (02:15):
Yeah, a little bit. It's a bit of a bummer.
Speaker 4 (02:18):
And actually it's March that comes in like a lion
and goes out like a label.
Speaker 5 (02:22):
We know what we're in it right now. Currently, as
we sit and records the twenty sixth.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
In media rests, we are going to explore some bird updates.
We're going to talk about passports and why you should
remember them, a little bit of UFO news. We have
so much to get to. Of course, we're going to
talk about twenty three and me we'll have a follow
up on our Slavery at Sea episode from the past. Everybody,
(02:49):
hold on to your ATM cards and be very careful
where you put them before we do any of that. Guys,
remember a while back on our group chat, I asked
whether we were all on signal.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, we've been talking about signal for a minute.
Speaker 4 (03:12):
I used telegram, which is kind of similar and it's
and encryption. But people really have been screaming about signal
lately in terms of you know, privacy, and it seems
like the government's been screaming about it too.
Speaker 5 (03:24):
To like that out of school.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
That's what we call a segue. We're going to be
right back after a word from our sponsors, and we
have returned. All right. Unless you are living off the
grid and somehow hearing podcasts but not the news, you
(03:47):
have probably heard of the recent hullabaloo regarding an editor
in chief of the Atlantic, a guy named Jeffrey Goldberg, who,
per his own reports, found himself accidentally in the wrong
digital room. Have you guys ever walked into a room
and realized you weren't supposed to be there?
Speaker 5 (04:08):
Yeah, and then I just kind of hung out and
eaves dropped.
Speaker 3 (04:12):
You know.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Yeah, you just pretend like you are supposed to be there.
If you find yourself in that situation, act like.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
You belong here. Yeah, that's that's one of the big
that's one of the big keys, right, one of the
jewels will drop here?
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Can I answer really quickly? Just that thing? So one
time with our company, I got an email giving me
full press credentials, so like like the actual facts, full
press credentials that I could take with a number and
everything and walk into a place and just be like
I'm a member of the press, yes, getting and elaminated. Well,
(04:46):
I just said, hey, cool, thanks so much, this is amazing.
I can't I'm so happy to have this. And then
a couple of days went by and then I got
another follow up email that said you were not meant
to receive that.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Yeah, you can't really do take backsies outside of children's games.
That reminds me Matt Nolan, Tennessee and all of us home.
That reminds me of the time I interviewed Howard Dean
when he was still like an up and coming viable
presidential candid, wasn't he the He was, Yeah, that's how
(05:23):
I don't have the I don't have a high enough
range for it.
Speaker 5 (05:26):
But it was yeah, yes, it was a bit of
a yea.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, Billy could find the exact one, right, play that.
Speaker 6 (05:39):
The one that's it.
Speaker 5 (05:43):
Yeah, he sounds like a pokemon.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
That's what we're going with, Okay, And when we talked
when when we talked behind the curtain, right when it's
just us guys hanging out. Uh, then we'll tell each
other the truth in our super secure signal chat. And hey,
while we're there, why not why not collaborate on that
thing we always wanted to do, which is bomb a
(06:08):
couple of countries.
Speaker 5 (06:09):
Let's do it. You know what's taken so long. Let's
just you only live once, right.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
Let's let's detail specific weapon caches.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
By minute accounts of the entire operation and logistics there.
Speaker 3 (06:25):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, while that one guy is standing in
the corner holding a little red solo cup just like
the meme from Reddit, that's.
Speaker 4 (06:35):
Right, the one where he's walking into the party, you're
talking about and everyone's like thinking, he's wondering what everyone's
thinking about him.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
That.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
Yeah, I think that's how I pickedure our buddy jeff
So uh we have not met. Uh, we have not
met the journalist Jeffrey Goldberg. He is the current editor
in chief of the Atlantic. And what Jeffrey found is
that government officials have been using signal to communicate in
(07:04):
the aftermath of the you know, the Chinese telecom breach
we talked about with the US Treasury, but also maybe
as a way of skirting FOYA compliance.
Speaker 5 (07:18):
Disappearing messages not cool, not trained.
Speaker 6 (07:22):
Can we also just.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
Say that I'm stoked to be just back to a
place where we can just talk smack about the government.
Isn't that what this show is all about? And just
what this kind of thing is all about. Whoever is
in power America is a political trash talk about those
in power. That is what the conspiracy world should be
thriving on. I just want to put that out there,
because this stuff is wild.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I think it's thoroughly American to constantly, constantly complain about
your government because of in theory, this is not one
of the governments that will black bag you for bats yeah,
I said, in theory, I said, in.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Theory, they'll just take away our security clearances once we're gone.
Speaker 3 (08:08):
Out of office, like the like the current admin did
with specifically with members of the Biden family.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
We're going to talk about it.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
So let's uh, let's go with this to give you
the straight poop or the hot cheese.
Speaker 6 (08:24):
Here, straight poop and hot cheese.
Speaker 3 (08:29):
Okay, it's evocative. Is really a weird way, So cast
our memories back to March eleventh, five. There's a group
chat created on signal. It's created by a national security
advisor named Michael Waltz. This chat, it is like a
group thread with the gang. You know, the current Vice
(08:52):
president is there, the Secretary of State is there. That
would be Vance and Ruby ospectively, and you there. Yeah,
a guy named Pete who heads the Secretary of Defense
position was there because the CIA director, the Director of
National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, the Secretary of the Treasury, the
(09:16):
guy who is probably the chief of staff for the
White House, a couple of other folks including special envoys
to the Middle East, and Jeffrey Goldberg. In this group chat.
Goldberg is just like that meme standing there in the
corner of the digital room right slowly sipping his coffee
(09:37):
or his juice, and he is watching this thing called
Hoothy PC Small Group PC, ostensibly meaning Principals Committee. They
go into depth. Some of us were talking. Some folks
messaged me on various social media platforms about this. It
(10:00):
is a true story. It is worrisome, and I really
appreciate that point about a politically holding anyone who is
in charge accountable. Because signal is fine if you're I
don't want.
Speaker 7 (10:19):
To sell like the app store, just saying right, yeah,
it's fine if you are trying to avoid hackers in
your day to day activities.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
It's fine if you're doing you know, small small time
drug deals or something like that. But if the if
the alphabet boys want to get into your signal chat,
they will, and if it's just it's an important point.
I feel like a lot of people with the best
of intentions get a little bit Pollyanna or a little
(10:53):
bit over sold on that purported security.
Speaker 4 (10:56):
Maybe you saw this ben and I don't recall who
it was, it was person it was on that thread,
so then you mentioned their name, but being grilled by
I believe a senator or a congressman on the Democratic
side about using this app, and this person said that
it was considered an approved CIA communication tool and had
(11:18):
been for some time further back even into the previous administration.
So I don't know about that, and that is sort
of neither here nor there, But that was sort of
the like defense that popped up first.
Speaker 5 (11:29):
Thing was like, no, no, no, it's totally cool.
Speaker 4 (11:31):
But I do just want to call back to mention
taking away Hillary clinton security clearances. What a to do
was made about her using emails and using private servers
and all that, and I just think this seems to me,
again a politically, to be so much worse.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
Yeah, it's it's pretty egregious, especially because we know that
Russian forces can easily, just like our alphabet boys can
easily compromise the encryption of signal. Now officially they can't,
but there's a world of difference between official and in practice, right.
Speaker 2 (12:07):
And in this case, we're not even talking about any
kind of hacking that occurred. We're talking about user error, right.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
We must be And this is sort of the Matroshka
doll aspect of this. And I'm really glad you brought
that up for the timeline here what do we say
was March eleventh. The group chat was created on March eighteenth.
The Pentagon warned everyone in their staff against using signal
(12:37):
before the White House Chat League went through. The Pentagon said, hey, guys,
I'm cool. You know, we're all cool, but let's be
a little bit safe. Let's have some opsec here less
a blunder occurs. In a blunder, definitely did so. Picture
(12:58):
ourselves as the editor in chief of the Atlantic and
you're getting these crazy notifications. You're even reading stuff like this.
I am not sure the President is aware how inconsistent
this is with his message on Europe. Right now, there's
a further risk that we see moderate to severe spike
(13:18):
in oil prices. I'm willing to support the consensus of
the team and keep these concerns to myself, but there
is a strong argument for delaying this. They're talking about
a bombing against toothy forces, as it will affect oil prices,
right there's a strong yeah argument for delaying this a month,
doing the messaging work on why this matter, seeing where
(13:41):
the economy is. To your point, Noel, et cetera. That
is a post from the current Vice president talking smack
about the current president.
Speaker 5 (13:51):
Oh, that is true.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
So can you unpack that a little bit? How is
that kind of a subtle subtweet as they might call it.
He's blaming him for the bad economy and basically saying
we should time this better so it doesn't make it worse.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
He's saying that he doesn't believe the commander in chief
is being consistent in's economic pause in US activity. Yeah,
especially pertaining to Europe, which you know, critics of the
current president would kind of say the same thing. And
(14:24):
this is the gosh. You can go to sources like,
of course, Jeffrey Goldberg at The Atlantic. You can also
go to surprisingly enough, Yahoo News, which has a full
list of the texts that were leaked, that were sent.
I maybe this is an episode in the future, but
(14:45):
for now we're establishing just the timeline of events because
I have a question, and Matt, you inspired this earlier,
and I'm so glad you asked it. We always talk
about pretend leaks, right, A source familiar with the situation, right,
an unnamed employee of the Pentagon. So one of the
(15:09):
questions we have to ask is was this leak simple,
as simple as human error or user error or is
it somehow a complex power play? Is it on purpose?
Speaker 5 (15:24):
This is what you call Larry David speak, the accidental
text on purpose?
Speaker 4 (15:30):
Yeah right, It's where you like, text the wrong person
on purpose and say it was an accident, but you're
giving them information that actually could potentially cause them to
do something that would be beneficial to you.
Speaker 5 (15:44):
Maybe I don't think so in this case. I think
it's a total f up. I really truly do.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
I think they fuffle the bat? I really do?
Speaker 2 (15:51):
You do?
Speaker 4 (15:51):
Read also that this was not as simple as the
accidental text on purpose or accidentally texting a group thread
when you meant to text one member of it. This
guy was invited to this right group, this private group
of not that many members. He was he received an
invitation from I believe that the person that you mentioned,
and these folks are all newly installed and I'm forgetting
(16:13):
some names, but the National security advisor, I believe yes,
And he was like, is it this guy?
Speaker 5 (16:18):
I want to see?
Speaker 4 (16:19):
Maybe it's really him, And literally he just clicked Okay,
let's just see what we see where this goes. Maybe
he thought the guy was legitimately trying to reach out
to him to do an interview, to do something right.
Speaker 3 (16:29):
Sure, because you're you're a big deal journalist. And make
no mistake, this is a big the editor in chief
of The Atlantic, yew, how is he mistakenly added to
a group chat? And if that is possible, how can
we mistakenly invite you know, some of our favorite celebrities
(16:50):
like Fran Dresher and Keanu Reeves to our group chat.
Speaker 4 (16:53):
We might be having one of our favorite celebrities on
the show before not too long.
Speaker 3 (16:59):
I really like his work, really could work. Lovely guys,
hope it's not a staff and we do it. We
we carry through with a plom So this this, there's
another deeper issue here, which is that at least one
of these guys, the US Envoy to the Middle East,
(17:19):
Steve Whitcoff, at least one of them was in Moscow
quite recently meeting with Vladimir Putin from earlier and just
after it was March thirteenth, so just after midnight local time,
the chat started naming active CIA officers at least one
(17:42):
at least one at least one, which is a big note.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Well, and and that person was named at five twenty
four pm Eastern time, just after midnight in Russia, and
according to CBS News the Sky Witcoff was in Moscow
until about two am, and right up until about one
thirty am, he was at the Kremlin meeting with President.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
Putin right right exactly, which goes to our recent episode
that should be out by this time. Why are so
many spies getting busted? And I can't wait for us
do the QA on that one.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
There's just unseen signal chats where people are just like, oh, yeah,
that one badass spy who's currently at the Kremlin right now.
Speaker 6 (18:33):
You know that dude, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:35):
And someone else is like, Gene is a fucking legend.
And then you know someone hits it with a like
or an emoji react.
Speaker 2 (18:44):
Oh he's having a party at his house next week.
Are you guys going, here's this deep?
Speaker 4 (18:48):
Do we mention the emoji react from this chain? That's
fantastic in and of itself. I think it's like a
power fist, an American flag and a fire emoji.
Speaker 3 (18:59):
Yeah, it's a it's a it's a fist bump and
then the flag and the fire emoji. And that comes
to us courtesy of Michael Waltz, one of the Oh
my god, what are the top decision makers. Look again,
we did take pains to keep this, to keep this
within the remit of the show. It seems right now,
(19:22):
the most likely possibilities are the following two and we'll
wrap and we'll go to an ad break after this
because we want to hear from you guys. The first
possibility is human error in an attempt to skirt skirt
around Freedom of Information Act compliance. The second possibility is
(19:47):
a purposeful leak, which doesn't make a ton of sense.
It's simply the like, what is the endgame, quibono. Who benefits?
We don't know, but we can we can say right
now it appears to be something that is going to
haunt the administration and probably the American public as well
(20:12):
as American interests abroad.
Speaker 4 (20:14):
Well, any one thing that disturbs me too just about
this administration is the old, you know, kind of fascist
playbook move of discrediting journalism journalists, and like the moment
Trump was asked about this, he responded, oh, you mean
discredited loser journalists of the failed, you know, substandard magazine
(20:36):
The Atlantic.
Speaker 5 (20:37):
Like just that move right off the rip, when he
didn't even know.
Speaker 4 (20:42):
What it was about. It's just so fascinating to me
and really scary.
Speaker 5 (20:47):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (20:49):
And this this paints not just a picture of the present,
but it gives us a sense of the horizon or
the possibilities here. So we'd love to hear from anybody
who has security clearance, anybody who has worked in info
security or this kind of opsec. What do you think
(21:10):
is going on?
Speaker 5 (21:11):
How?
Speaker 3 (21:11):
How did this happen? Is there a conspiracy afoot? Speaking
of conspiracy, you can email those thoughts to us conspiracy
at iHeartRadio dot com. For now, we're going to pause
for a word from our sponsors. We'll return with more
strange news and tune in at the very end. Uh,
there's an update on the Moonies.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
And we've returned, guys, exciting news in the world of
government contracts. Tail Oh, I've been learning about government contracts.
Speaker 5 (21:45):
Guys.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Trying to dip my toes into the game. It looks
like that's one of the best ways to make some
serious moolah these days.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Yeah, dip your dip your fingers, you know what I mean,
Get a little vigorous. It's all to help the mission.
Dip your ways, you know, like like our pal Fingi's
O'Brien from Daily's.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Actually been doing some chocolate fond do action over here
with some semi sweet chocolate dipping, some pretzels, some strawberries,
all kinds of deliciousness in there.
Speaker 4 (22:13):
Wet to make a little pattern, you know, do a
little little half and half, like getting to spoke with it.
Speaker 5 (22:18):
That's interesting.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
No, no, no, just full on semi sweet. It's like
almost not sweet.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Oh yeah, yeah, it's gotten asked to it.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Yeah yeah, but we didn't dip our fingies into the
fondue itself or tozies. But uh got on the fingies
and tozies.
Speaker 5 (22:36):
How about that?
Speaker 2 (22:37):
Not tozi so much? That would be weird.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
It's okay, I'm already picturing the shot a soundtrack for this.
Speaker 5 (22:43):
Oh yeah, check a wow.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
Uh so yeah, guys, Yeah, Boeing got a win. We
got a win for Boeing. Everybody out there underdogs, to
be fair, they have had a bad Can.
Speaker 3 (23:00):
I can I be the first to say it on
the show. You're welcome, guys, Yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
You're welcome. You've got the big contract. Boeing has won
an Air Force contract to develop the first ever sixth
generation war fighter, dubbed the F forty seven.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
That sounds scary fish America fire.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Okay, I don't want to sound like a jerk, so
sell us on the forty seven.
Speaker 5 (23:35):
Well, guys, you don't have to sell me.
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Please go, heart and soul. It's the Air Force's next
generation Air Dominance or ENDGAD program. Guys. It's a game
changer for Boeing. Before this, they've been developing and developed
and maintaining the F eighteen program. This is a huge
different type of fighter jet that has been in use
(24:00):
with the United States Military and the Air Force for
quite a time, but that contract is ending for Boeing,
so they needed something to juice up the old coffers
and make sure Boeing stock stays you know, wherever it's
going to go after the next plane falls out of
the sky.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Sorry, sorry, it's just okay, we're really proud of.
Speaker 6 (24:24):
Really trying to maintain here.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
Yeah, but really you're welcome.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
But really, there's a massive Boeing facility in Saint Louis
that produces these F eighteens and maintains them. And getting
this new contract means, you know, those individuals who are
probably awesome human beings, it means they still have a
job and they're going to make new things, new, really
kick ass things. In my opinion, these planes, no doubt,
they're terrifying, at least if they do what Boeing says
(24:53):
they will do on paper.
Speaker 5 (24:54):
What do they call it again, terror birds F forty.
They don't have some cool like nickname.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
Or I don't know. It's the it's the GAD program. Okay,
that's the generation AIRDM.
Speaker 5 (25:06):
We can work. We can workshop that.
Speaker 3 (25:08):
But yeah we can. Yeah, we'll just we'll we'll hit
them up on signal about that. The goat suckers. But
but okay, Matt, this is, as you said, a huge win.
It's also important to put this in perspective because the
contract award is after a successful pitch, and that's very
(25:31):
different from building the actual plane. And we know, for
a lot of our fellow aviators in the crowd, we
know that there's always a bumpy road right, a bumpy runway.
There there are always uh hiccups and warts and blemishes
and sometimes dangerous things with deploying a new kind of
(25:55):
complex agglomeration of technology like this. So there there are
probably plenty of pilots who are already thinking, thank god,
this thing is not in service before I retire.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Well, so there's some complexity to this. I agree with you, Ben,
but there's complexity because it is a part of, as
you said, a pitch, but as part of that pitch,
actual vehicles are produced not just by Boeing, also by
Lockheed Martin, also by Northrop Grumman. Those are the three
big contract fighters in the ring.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
And Rocked Lockheed made the sort of ancestor or older
brother to this. They may be F twenty two, right.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
And the F thirty five. So right now, Lockheed or
right before now, Lockheed was the king of the stealth
fighter in the United States for the for the Air Force, right.
There are other versions of these planes for the Navy,
different types of planes, sometimes by the same manufacturer, just
different specifics, right for the other branches of the military.
(27:04):
But Lockheed was Lockheed Martin was standing on top of
that hill. But there have been a lot of problems
with the these next generation fighters that have been kind
of put out in the news. Just how many issues
there are, specifically with the systems, like the integrated computer
(27:24):
based systems issues happen there.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
They're ballooning budget issues as well, I mean, as ever everybody.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Particular, Yes, right, there's corruption happening a little bit on
the side there, but like, we gotta we need some
more money for this project.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
R and D cost can be a black hole because
they don't have you know, you can have clearly defined
objectives to arrive at, but you will also have agency
to figure out how you get to that objective. Yeah,
it's that there's riddle be this is there a recent
military project that has come in under budget.
Speaker 5 (28:08):
Doesn't really seem to be the priority.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
I want to say, has something to do with with
space force probably, no kidding, I do.
Speaker 3 (28:18):
Have to we do have to point this out again
just being we're we're being curmudgeonly, but we're doing it
in in a political way. It doesn't matter what administration
is at the wheel. Uh. The real reason that the
military industrial complex rarely goes under budget in projects like
this is that on the military side, if you go
(28:42):
under budget, the being counters in your department are going
to come back to you and say, oh, I guess
you don't need so much money next year.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Well, and and as part of winning this contract, one
of the main things that's looked at by the government
is how cost effective are these planes, Like per unit
when we them to actually deploy them in places like Yeman. Well,
in this case, Boeing was on the lower end of
how much it's going to cost. But something to keep
in mind is, once you win one of these contracts
(29:11):
and your budget does go a little over, it's a
lot easier for the government to modify a contract than
it is to go through a whole other system of Well,
I guess we're gonna need to make a new contract
and get new people in here and test new you know,
prototypes and figure out all of that stuff. You just
it's way easier to follow that sunk cost and just
(29:32):
you know, eventually get those F thirty five's mostly working.
Speaker 3 (29:36):
In cost fallacy.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
Yeah, exactly. But this is the thing that blew my mind.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
Guys.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
There's two things. Okay, I didn't know. There's an actual
US government Uncle Sam, and I think we may have
talked about it before, yea, like once or twice. There's
a real actual government SAM. It's called the System for
Award Management or SAM dot gov. This is the place
(30:02):
where all of these companies and individuals sometimes go to
create a basically a user account or an entity is
what they refer to it. On the website an entity
that can be eligible for certain contracts government contracts, big
ass contracts like this one. And if you go to that,
(30:25):
you can go to the website and check it out
and learn all about it. There's a great website GSA
dot gov, which is the General Services Administration, and it
will tell you how to do the process, how to
make it work.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
It's just it.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
It's weird to look at it on your computer screen
and think, oh wow. People from these major weapons manufacturers
do this exact thing and then sign up make an
entity as let's say Northrop Grumming or in this case Boeing,
and then.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
They don't want you to know.
Speaker 2 (30:58):
Yeah whatever, it's Americadwick. It could mean anything. But they
do all that and it just happens. That's weird. The
other thing is these next generation warplanes like the If
you imagine a prototyped vehicle that gets shown off by
Tesla as he says.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
It, Tesla, No, he says Tesla, Tesla, Okay.
Speaker 6 (31:20):
Well Tesla.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Well, let's say the next generation prototype of a Volkswagen
gets shown off at a car show. These prototypes for
these major weapons manufacturers have been flying since at least
twenty twenty. Yes, which makes you think about some of
the things human beings have seen in the air every
once in a while, or a little blip that goes by,
or weird sound. It could very well be one of
(31:46):
these prototypes that's being tested and has been tested for
the last four or five years.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
Yeah, we're talking something that has advanced stealth capabilities the
fifth generation vehicles simply don't possess, and significantly longer range.
It's still it's still classified, so we can't we can't
say too too much about it lest we get kicked
off the group chat. But we do we do know
(32:16):
to your point there, that there's a phenomenal and significant,
provable precedent of secret aviation innovations and breakthroughs and reports
of UAP or UFO. One of, indeed one of the
most plausible answers to mysterious objects in the sky is
(32:38):
going to be secret, very expensive testing of next gen
stealth aircraft.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
Yeah, and thank goodness they're testing them. They didn't test them,
and they you know, won a nineteen billion dollar contract
that has you know, a couple sections in there. It
will likely cost hundreds of billions of dollars.
Speaker 3 (32:56):
Yeah, I think it's up to twenty already.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, thank goodness they're testing them
rather than just saying, guys, look at this cool picture
of a fighter jet I designed.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
How cool would I make test pilot? Would you guys
ever be test pilots for this kind of stuff?
Speaker 5 (33:14):
Don't think?
Speaker 3 (33:14):
Well?
Speaker 2 (33:14):
No, interestingly enough, both. I think it was both astronauts,
or at least one of the astronauts that was recently,
you know, finally brought down from the International Space Station.
I think there were both test pilots for craft that
you know, hopefully work the way they say they.
Speaker 3 (33:31):
Do, mind reader, That's kind of why I'm asking, yeah,
because it just seems like such rarefied air. That's true
on two levels. But you know, when we when we
look at these programs, we know there's a lot of largess.
We know there's a lot of graft or a lot of
what people used to call port in earlier evenings. But
(33:55):
it is important to do this. Ye kind of have
to do this, especially now given that the US is,
and I hate to say it, the US is losing
the technological arm race against foreign powers. Particularly are our
friends over at Uncle Gee's side of the world.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Well, not with the f forty seven's with the when
they roll through, Oh, it's they're going to be beautiful.
Speaker 5 (34:22):
It is inspired.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
You won't even notice them all right, our our enemies
won't know what hit them. That's I think it'll be
a miss from the announcement. Yeah, but okay, guys, there's
there was a lot of stuff I wanted to cover
and we ended up talking about this a lot. A
couple of things you need to know. Do yourself a
favor and look up Just do a quick search for
Pirates Booty Long Island. You mean, like, just do that
(34:48):
the snack. Yes, just do yourself a favor. At some
point google that and just give yourself a little read.
Have some fun has to do with the founder of
Pirates Booty attempting to basically pull a full mutiny on
a town in Long Island, declaring himself mayor and all
kinds of con.
Speaker 6 (35:06):
Pirate king I have.
Speaker 5 (35:08):
I have a bunch of pirates Booty in me pantry.
Speaker 3 (35:12):
And also also pirates are the reason are probably one
of the reasons the US does not currently have the
metric system.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
Hey, hey, I agree, And speaking of pirates, let's stay
on the high seas. Do yourself a favor and do
a little search for Bumblebee Tuna. Bumble Bee Tuna and
fishing boat slavery. Something we talked about on a previous episode.
I can't remember the name of it, something about canned
fish or it's the.
Speaker 3 (35:40):
One where we I think I called it the one
where we ruined seafood.
Speaker 6 (35:44):
I think that's it.
Speaker 2 (35:45):
I think that's it.
Speaker 4 (35:46):
Now that being said, there are some bespoke ten fish
companies that do a really fine Jeff, that's a good yeah,
very good for sure.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
In this case, Bumblebe Tuna has found itself in a
landmark lawsuit where they're for Indonesian fishermen who are suing
Bumblebee Foods because they said these four fishermen alleged that
Bumblebee Tuna knowingly benefited. That's a quote from forced labor, debt,
bondage and other forms of abuse that we described in
(36:17):
that previous episode.
Speaker 3 (36:19):
And that episode is from twenty twenty three. I'm having
a hard time believing that, but it's true. That episode
is from July of twenty twenty three. It's called the
one where we ruin canned seafood bones. It's an important
issue to us and you know, it's perfect if you
are having too good of a day.
Speaker 2 (36:40):
Exactly, exactly, Okay, just last few things that rattle off,
and these really are rattling off, guys, because it's time
for this section. But Google search rescinding security clearances and
access to classified information from specified individuals. That is where
you will find a list of people that have lost
(37:02):
their access to classified information who are formerly government officials,
who are not currently in office anymore, or at least
are not in favor with the current administration. It is
a very interesting thing to see one administration come through
and say, hey, people that I don't agree with or
don't like, or who were my enemies, my perceived enemies,
(37:25):
you no longer have access to the thing that generally,
you know, helped you with your job, you know, as
being an official in some capacity. It's very strange to
see that. It's not something that happens with every administration.
It's just a little weird. And then I pose to you, guys,
(37:46):
or at least I propose that we should do a
full episode on the twenty three and meters stuff as
we were going through it for this, you know, to
talk about it today. There's just a lot of complexity there.
Speaker 3 (37:59):
I called it in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
You remember we've talked about this. It's it's a dangerous
thing when all of that information is just hanging out
with a private company and they're trying to figure out,
Oh do we do an IPO, do we go public?
Oh do we sell to one other private investor? Who
is that investor? Like?
Speaker 4 (38:17):
Are we a DNA analysis company or are we a
data gathering company?
Speaker 3 (38:23):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 5 (38:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (38:24):
Yeah, And you know every single person that's spit into
a thing is the product. So congrats.
Speaker 5 (38:31):
We talk about how that question. I think they knew
the answer from the start.
Speaker 2 (38:34):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, all right. We'll be right back afterward
from our sponsors with more strange.
Speaker 4 (38:39):
News and we return, y'all. Pilots are just like us.
They can be absent minded, little little.
Speaker 5 (38:50):
Silly goofballs too, just like us, Just like us. Thank you.
Speaker 4 (38:55):
A United Airlines flight from Los Angeles heading to shang
I had to make an emergency diversion to San Francisco
after the pilot realized that he did not have his passport.
Speaker 3 (39:12):
Dylan, can we get the whoopsie sound c from Mortal Kombat?
Speaker 6 (39:16):
Whoopsie made it?
Speaker 5 (39:18):
See yeah, you know the one.
Speaker 4 (39:22):
Yep, he apparently grumpily announced this over the P eight.
Speaker 3 (39:29):
Well there's a stupid and then of course still followed
up with the weather right, oh yeah, a positive note,
the looking great levels sailing.
Speaker 4 (39:45):
Yeah, should be a smooth ride all the way to
San Francisco where we were not going. Yeah, it was
a six hour, all told delay to the passengers going
where they were going, and to whoever was unlucky enough
to be scheduled to be on that plane next.
Speaker 5 (40:05):
Because we all know.
Speaker 6 (40:05):
How airline delays work.
Speaker 4 (40:06):
It is a rolling domino effect situation. And they I've
always been irritated about this, Ben and Matt, I'm sure
you guys have noticed this too. They don't give you
information in a timely manner. They want to keep you
hanging on. They want to keep you hanging on with
these rolling delays when they probably know what the full
(40:27):
delay extent is going to be. But instead they just
keep moving it ten minutes, fifteen minutes. And I don't
know what do you guys, how do you cope with this?
Like where you really decide to cut your losses if
you haven't left yet for the airport and don't and
don't want to be stuck there because you don't trust
the damn airlines.
Speaker 3 (40:44):
To be honest with you. So you haven't left yet.
Speaker 6 (40:46):
I have, I haven't yet. It has happened to me recently.
Speaker 4 (40:49):
It was rolling delays and I was trying to decide, yeah,
because it was actually on our way to our big trip,
our big show in Brooklyn. Because I was traveling, I
was having to check a bag with some very not
only expensive, but important equipment for our show, and I
was worried that if I went to the airport and
(41:09):
then the flight was canceled after I already checked the bag,
it might end up in some kind of airport limbo,
you know what I mean. I actually asked you about this,
Ben at the time, So maybe share your perspective with
the listeners too, because I know you're a season traveler
and probably run into this more times than I have.
Speaker 3 (41:27):
Oh shucks. I love hanging at airports, you guys. Remember
when we were stranded at the Atlanta Aircraft Yes, yeah,
with war Yeah who says Hi. By the way, we
we were hanging there, and we were in the same
sort of domino effect situation. We were still there. Yeah,
(41:48):
beautifully described. Yeah, so one of the questions was how
long do we stay at this airport in the city
that we all live it. You know, we're not stranded
out in Sammarcan's or something. We're we're in our hometown.
And we ended up staying there because of the information
drip that you were talking about. The plane, if I
(42:11):
recall correctly, the plane, our flight kept getting pushed just
a little at a time, a little at a time,
and we kept saying, well, it's not really worth it
for us to drive back home and then go through security. Uh,
so we better befriend everybody else who was stranded. And
we had an epic night. But I know there's a question, Noel,
(42:35):
that all of us listening are are gonna expect. Uh
And so I asked on behalf of our conspiracy realist,
what airline was it?
Speaker 1 (42:44):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (42:44):
Yeah, sorry, I was United?
Speaker 6 (42:46):
Which is what type of plane was it?
Speaker 5 (42:48):
Unclear?
Speaker 4 (42:49):
Probably a Boeing, but it was, Yeah, the Boeing.
Speaker 5 (42:54):
Didn't make dude forget his passport.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
I know, I know Boeing gets such a hard time.
Speaker 4 (42:59):
Of the dude.
Speaker 5 (42:59):
Why not let's just throw it at them.
Speaker 3 (43:01):
Somebody Congress will be like, now is it? Is it correct?
That the Boeing aircraft does not provide on board passports
all the pilots, Like, no, Senator, that would be illegal.
That's not how passports.
Speaker 5 (43:18):
Yeah, yes, exactly, I guess it.
Speaker 4 (43:20):
Never you know, this is interesting to me, I think too,
because because it never really occurred to me that pilots
are like subject to all the same crap that the
rest of us are. They might get waved through certain security,
there might be like a expedited line for them and stuff.
And also depending on maybe where this person was going
to end up, perhaps this was a resident of China
(43:42):
and definitely needed the passport to get home.
Speaker 3 (43:45):
Even Yeah, that's a that's a great question because this
you're absolutely right about the cool line at the airport.
That's for flight crew, that's for the pilots, and and
you're also absolutely correct, I would say regarding you know,
the question of nationale. We can assume this was a
(44:08):
US passport holder, but do we know that for sure?
Speaker 5 (44:11):
I don't think so. We didn't. They didn't name names.
Speaker 4 (44:13):
And it's actually pretty funny. The reporting on this is
a little bit light. Honestly. Maybe it's just an information
air gap kind of situation with the airline. But the
one they just got the most. CNN just got the
most absolutely lackluster quote from one of the passengers.
Speaker 5 (44:32):
I'm feeling pretty frustrated.
Speaker 4 (44:33):
A business traveler who requested anonym and he told CNN,
I have to reschedule all my plans for Monday, which
is really inconvenient.
Speaker 3 (44:44):
It steaks though, because you know, we have to exercise.
We would probably have said the same thing. You know,
if CNN showed up at that that cursed what what
was it? Like a blue moon or Gordon Biersch power
is it? You see? It showed up and asked us,
we would have been we would have been like, uh,
(45:06):
we we have said some of the same things.
Speaker 5 (45:08):
We probably would have bought CNN a drink at that point, man,
I mean we were we were.
Speaker 4 (45:13):
Just owned it at that you know, we were just
posted up like like what's that movie where Tom Hanks
lives in the airport?
Speaker 5 (45:21):
We were like the terminal. We were terminal boys.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Can you guys, like, really, can you imagine that panic
that would set in if you were flight Yeah, and
you can visualize your passports sitting there on the table
like you put it there to remember it, but you.
Speaker 3 (45:39):
Your stomach drops and it's even I would argue it's
even worse on some level because not just not only
is there a ton of people trusting you right depending
on you and they all have their together beat me there,
but also perhaps on an even more damaging social aspect
(46:00):
of it, you have a co pilot, Yeah, and your
co pilot, like you know, in a different country, they
might just tell you to get the parachute and pop
off the plate because we got somebody else who can
fly it.
Speaker 4 (46:14):
Well, it's my understanding that they diverted to San Francisco
so they could get a whole new flight crew, Like
so they like do it was donezo? And I gotta
ask you, guys, do you think And I'm sorry, I
sick keep saying, dude, we don't have no indication of
this individual's gender, but you.
Speaker 5 (46:31):
Think they got to let go? It's pretty bad, dude,
It's a pretty bad look for the airline.
Speaker 4 (46:37):
I mean, maybe, how do you what what is the
middle ground between being let go and being severely wrist slapped?
Speaker 3 (46:45):
You get? You get a passport on a on like
a lanyard.
Speaker 4 (46:50):
Yeah, yeah, a lamin it like Matt's a girl gotten
press pass.
Speaker 3 (46:55):
Right right right? You you get. I mean, really, it's
a case of human error, absent mindedness. Without more context,
you know, it'd be very Look, pilots have such a
high threshold of learning, and they have such expertise, and
there's such an investment of time that I don't think
(47:16):
this person will get fired. I'm sure they will get punished,
but it's not like some of those other pilots who
get you know, not canned, but faced at the airport
bar and they're like a hop on, I'm playing.
Speaker 4 (47:32):
Well, we have no indication there is any intoxication involved,
no intoxication indication, and there was nobody harm's way at
any point. This is literally just an example of a
really foolish thing to have done and an embarrassment to
the airline and this individual, who to my knowledge thus
far has not been named. Gosh, guys, I had no
(47:54):
idea that was going to be such a robust conversation.
Speaker 5 (47:56):
That was meant to be my little throwaway story.
Speaker 4 (47:58):
I got a story here about burn in the Galopa
ghosts getting pissed off because of traffic noise.
Speaker 5 (48:06):
A fantastic study.
Speaker 4 (48:08):
From some very very smart folks who simulated different types
of traffic noise and different concentrations and basically animal behavior.
Is The is the journal that published the study about
how Galopagos yellow warblers respond when traffic noise disrupts their
communication systems. It essentially shows that there are environmental things
(48:31):
that lead to evolution much quicker than maybe one might think.
Speaker 5 (48:35):
And I know, you know, look, this is the way
to put this is.
Speaker 4 (48:38):
Thus, Charles Darwin, this is from a study finds fantastic
type by the way Great Resource dot org sort of
crystallization of this. Charles Darwin may have studied finches during
his famous Galapagos visit in eighty thirty five, but today's
yellow warblers are offering modern lessons about adaptation to human
altered environments. Rather than evolutionary changes occurring over generations, these
(48:59):
birds are showing behavioral changes within their own lifetimes. So
these human made knock on consequences that are invading, you know,
natural habitats for these creatures are causing much more accelerated
evolutionary traits, which I think is super super interesting. Again,
to wrap this up, research teams from the University of
(49:20):
Vienna set up experiments across two Galapagos islands that differ
dramatically in their human footprint. Santa Cruz hosts over fifteen
thousand people in more than a thousand vehicles, while Florinia
Island has about one hundred residents and only ten vehicles.
This contrast created a natural laboratory for studying how different
levels of exposure to traffic noise affect bird behavior. And
(49:40):
it just goes into this whole concept of sound as
a survival tool for these creatures. You know, they use
it to communicate, they use it to signal danger, to
attract mates so that they can reproduce. And this is
potentially causing problems in those departments, which is causing the
birds to have to sing louder and be a lot
more aggressive and they're mating you know, rituals and habits.
Speaker 3 (50:05):
And no one still, no one's going to talk about
the effects of submarines and sonar on whales, which is
a very similar situation. Yeah, I got I gotta point
out one we're talking about this briefly off air. One
related story that stood out to me. I just have
to say, at least I'm like emotionally four years old.
(50:26):
There's another issue with light pollution for a specific type
of bird over in Switzerland. Great tits are having fewer
young in the city because of the light pollution. They're
the kind you know, they're great. Tits are the great
tits are the types who really get down when the
(50:47):
lights are off.
Speaker 4 (50:48):
You know it seems yeah, yeah, t he indeed. And
I just want to read this last quote from the
study Finds piece, which I think is so well done.
They said, think of trying to have an important conversation
while standing next to a busy highway. You'd likely change
how you speak or isort to gestures to get your
point across. Birds face similar challenges with the potentially life
(51:11):
altering consequences.
Speaker 5 (51:13):
And then whole section on the power of noise.
Speaker 3 (51:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (51:16):
Man, it's a great, great resource. So this is a
road rage how busy streets yield angry birds on studyfines
dot org.
Speaker 3 (51:24):
Oh gosh, you can tell the energy is great. This evening, folks,
fellow conspiracy realists, because we have a lot of stuff
we didn't get to yet, and we will get to
that in future segments or in a future episode. In
the meantime, we need your help. We pass the torch
to you. Be it yours to hold it high, So
(51:46):
join us. You're the most important part of the show.
We'd love to hear from you. We'd love to hang
out with you, whether that is on a telephonic device,
whether that's on our notorious email, or whether it's on
the lines, on the lines on the Internet.
Speaker 4 (52:02):
Oh boy, indeed, you got options galore to reach us.
You can find us at the handle Conspiracy Stuff where
we exist on Facebook with the Facebook group that is ours.
Here's where it gets crazy. It can be yours too.
It's a community that you can join be a part
of some great folks on there. We're also Conspiracy Stuff
Show on x FKA, Twitter and on YouTube where we
(52:22):
have video content for your perusing, enjoyment. On Instagram and TikTok, however,
we're Conspiracy Stuff Show.
Speaker 2 (52:30):
We have a phone number. It is one eight three
three STDWYTK. When you call in, you've got three minutes.
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 other stuff, maybe links
or I don't know, pictures, one not, instead send us
an email.
Speaker 3 (52:48):
We are the entities that read every piece of correspondence
we receive. Be well aware, yet unafraid. Sometimes the Void,
writes back. The most successful assassin in recent news is
at u Ya Yamagami, whose murder of Shinzo Abbe in
twenty twenty two may have led to Japan disbanding the Moonies.
(53:10):
What do we mean? What are we talking about? Just
shoot us a lie, I'll tell you all about it.
Conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
Stuff they don't want you to know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
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Stuff They Don't Want You To Know News
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Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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