Havana Syndrome Update, with Jack O'Brien

The story began, officially, in 2017 -- multiple US government employees stationed abroad began reporting eerily similar symptoms, ranging from mild discomfort to intense headaches and debilitating ringing in the ears. Soon this became known as "Havana Syndrome." So what, exactly, is it? This question has fascinated Ben, Matt and Noel almost as much as today's special guest, Jack O'Brien. In today's episode, the guys team up to separate fact from fiction in this strange, ongoing saga. (Bonus: We quiz Jack on conspiracies at the end). They don’t want you to read our book. They don’t want you to see us on tour.

They don't want you to read our book.: https://static.macmillan.com/static/fib/stuff-you-should-read/

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Before we dive in, folks, we want to have a
quick disclaimer. This conversation as some strong language, none of
which has been edited, So do be aware. From UFOs
to psychic powers and government conspiracies, history is riddled with
unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the

(00:21):
stuff they don't want you to know. A production of
My Heart Radio. Hello, welcome back to the show. My
name is Matt, my name is Noel. They called me Ben.
We're joined as always with our super producer Paul mission

(00:44):
controlled decands. Most importantly, you are you. You are here.
That makes this the stuff they don't want you to know.
And we have a an episode that I have been
looking forward to. I think we all have for quite sometime.
You have heard about Havannah syndrome. In fact, we did

(01:05):
an episode on this very concept, uh not too too
long ago, but time has flown during these our days
of pandemic. So we wanted to go on air with
a conversation that has been continuing for a weird amount

(01:27):
of time, and you have asked us for it, conspiracy realists,
and we wanted to deliver. We are not diving into
the concept of the Havana syndrome alone. Today we are
joined by the one and only the man, the myth legend,
Mr Jack O'Brien live and direct hit me. Hi, guys,

(01:49):
how are you? Thank you for having me? Very excited
to be here. This is uh, this is one of
my pet subjects. This is one of the things that
Um Miles would play the Curb your Enthusiasm music when
I started talking about it. Because here we go again,

(02:10):
Uh to start down music. Yeah, I think that's no. No. Uh.
First off, as we're recording it is Mr Miles of
Grace birthday. So had it this year to you? Miles? Yeah?
And uh and this uh, this conversation is a long
time in coming because Jack, you and Matt Nolan I

(02:32):
have been in a weird situation with Havana syndrome. We
are the guys who keep bringing it up to the
point of like exhausting the attention of our friends and
our loved ones. And we're probably doing that. Actually move
to them where they say something and we go, actually

(02:54):
I've given up, by the way, I'm just like I
I have come on here to do my last talking
about Havana syndrome. So this is it, I promise I promise.
My wife she made me promising a couples therapy. So yeah, okay,
all right, well we're gonna we're gonna help you keep

(03:16):
that promise. Man. But before we get into Havannahs syndrome,
let's talk a little bit about your background. For anyone
who somehow isn't aware you are the creator of cracked
dot com. Uh, you have also uh been for quite

(03:37):
a while now one of the few people more busy
than us in the world of podcasting, with a little
thing called the Daily Zeiegeist. What's what's the Daily Zeiegeist. Yeah,
so it's a twice daily podcast. I don't know why
we get that, but it's not even in the name.

(03:57):
She called the twice daily. We so we do an
hour long episode that drops in the morning and is
more like outlined and thoughts composed, and then we just
check in in the afternoon and tell you what's trending.
But yeah, it's been Miles Gray and I and a
guest along with superproducer on a hose ni a and

(04:20):
just kind of combing through what is happening in the
zeitgeist and um, yeah, it's fun. It's um. I think
we started it during the Trump administration, thinking like, well,
this will last as long as the Trump administration lasts,
and like we feel like we're we have so much
to say that our heads are gonna burst. And then

(04:43):
it's actually gotten more fun to do like a lot
of parts of life outside of that administration, and uh,
it's freed me to talk and think about things like
Havana syndrome. Well before we even get into that. Just
regarding covering now national events and the news and the zeitgeist,
have you guys been covering the real strike that's like

(05:05):
about to either kick off or be Okay, yeah, we
we we actually were covering that on today's episode, and
we we kind of got head faked by the mainstream
media being like it's over, they gotta we gotta deal
and the unions are happy, and then the unions being like,
we didn't. We haven't agreed to anything just yet. Um,
but yeah, we we have been talking about that and

(05:26):
kind of the rise in uh labor in the in
the US, uh, and it's been cool. You gotta love
pre written press releases like that where they actually don't
wait for the real news to drop. That's fine. Yeah,
we're good. We're just gonna do an onion style. They'll
read the headline. Let's spend the time writing that, Well,
the headline is that President Joe Biden, what is it

(05:50):
secured a tentative deal? That was the headline, right, Okay.
And the demands, the request, I don't like calling them demands.
The request of the rail workers are super not crazy.
There things like can I have a little vacation if

(06:12):
my mom is sick? And can I go to the
doctor cantor without getting like uh, you know, in Trouble
with Work essentially, we actually just did an episode on
the Luddites, the history of the Luddites, ridiculous history. And
back in the early days of textiles, there were these
individuals with a job called croppers, and their job was

(06:34):
to like kind of smooth out the pieces of fabric.
And they were these high demand, very specialized workers who
were able to demand all of this like paid vacation
and like they had mondays off just to get drunk
and all of this stuff that they were able to
command because of the fact that they were very good
at their jobs and they had this like legacy kind
of knowledge around this. And then the Industrial Revolution comes

(06:55):
along and everything scales and it's no longer about quality,
it's about quantic d and it's this interesting trajectory and
seeing where we are now with all this labor movement stuff,
how slay it for somebody? People? What if you could
do this one thing that's special to you, but do
it like a hundred times. Also, we want to pay

(07:17):
you less and you can't take days off. But but
so this is um. This is a brief snapshot of
some of the things that are discussed on daily Zeitgeist.
They're also fresh baked, uh, which I hate using the term,

(07:37):
but it is true. And what what this means to
me is that when the concept of Havanas syndrome first
hit the national consciousness, all right, I'll say it, when
it first hit the zeitgeist was he So let's start here,

(08:04):
jack Um. As far as we can tell, the the
name is kind of bullshit. But the the first public
reports of what would later be called Havana's syndrome kind
of came around seventeen. That's when the public started finding out.
When when did you find out and what did you hear? Initially, Well,

(08:27):
my inside report, my inside contacts at the CIA had
actually tuned me into this a little earlier. Now, yeah,
I found out the same same time as everyone else
with the with the news reports, and it's, um, they're
these stories that pop up where I'm like, well, this
should be the only thing we talked about ever again,

(08:48):
because they're saying that somebody has weaponry that no science,
like known scientists like or known science can't explain. End
they're attacking the US and like these really strange ways,
and um, it just seemed very fascinating to me. But
I also did kind of immediately that there were some

(09:10):
flags that kind of initially popped up. Specifically, Yeah, the
scientists being like that there's nothing we know of that
could do the thing that they're talking about, which doesn't
necessarily mean that it's completely false, right, doesn't necessarily mean
that because we we talked about this on the show,
weapons testing all the time, in advanced Weaponry, DARPA, RUP

(09:32):
all those things. And you know how how the public
is only gonna know what an iPhone the equivalent of
what an iPhone eight is or seven or whatever, you know,
does that make sense? But yeah, yeah, total scientists, you know,
whether they're involved with the government or not, science is science,
and they can't point to a thing that's an analog

(09:54):
for this. Chances are it might be a little far
fetched or a little overblowed. You think some scientists with
knowledge of this area would come out and be like, well,
there's a it could be done if you you know,
did this or you know, added a little you know,
widgeon or something, then maybe I could see that happening.
The vague scientistic like some vague scientific reports being like, well,
you know, their voices would get high pitched as I

(10:15):
read them in the well, you know, if you liked.
But then there would be the other scientists who were like,
not only does nothing like this exist, but theoretically like
sound doesn't do that. And microwave, like, if you're going
to create a microwave weapon like this, it would be
so loud and so huge that you wouldn't be Yeah,

(10:36):
it requires so much energy, like all the lights in
Havana would dim at the same time. Like, um, it
just it seemed like the symptoms wouldn't even be the same.
I don't think, right, isn't that part of it too?
This the symptoms don't really align with the microwave infiltration,
and the symptoms aren't the same from person to person.
In a lot of the cases, So that was another thing.

(10:58):
And you know, at Cracked we did a lot of
nonfiction and then just reading the news every day for
like since we started the daily zised back in twenty
I believe, Um, the thing that I've kind of always
thought was an underrated mover was the the ability for

(11:19):
the unconscious mind to physically affect people, both their health
and you know, it's just a very very powerful thing. Um.
So I think the thing that helped me get my
mind around it was just thinking of it not as
anybody is making it up. You know, No, nobody's making
it up. These are people to whom this is happening.

(11:41):
Um that they're not doing this. They're not intentionally creating
a lie to get out of work. Uh, it's just
it's not a it's not weaponry. What was kind of
where I landed on them. Yeah, you're you're thinking, Uh,
I think we're on the same page there. It's not
a conspiracy because there aren't people trying I'm sorry, but

(12:04):
there aren't people trying to con people right there. They're
not bad actors. These people are encountering things and Jack,
maybe this is where we introduce sort of our word
of the day. Uh, the way that it even the
definition of what you're talking about about, the how the

(12:26):
New York Times put it, the interest between yeah, between
the brain and the mind. It was called, uh, we
don't say hysteria. Now there's a different word, the p word. Yeah, psychogenic. Pa,
I was gonna say, it's a fun spiracy, a conspiracy

(12:47):
of fun spiracy. Um. Yeah, psychogenic is sort of the
term that most sides use, I think the people. So
the place that I was reading everything that I could
get my eyes on about Havana syndrome, and the first
article that fully I was like, okay, this all kind
of coheres like, and I'd read, you know, the New

(13:09):
Yorker was reporting on this. I love to read a
New Yorker article and then like tell people I read
a New Yorker article and yeah exactly. But like even
the New Yorker articles weren't really cohering like in terms
of like the just the kind of total truths of

(13:29):
what was being talked about. Um. And this New York
Times magazine article that was in the Health issue was
the first thing that kind of made it make sense
to me, and they focused on it, like the person
who wrote the article is not somebody who like reports
on you know, diplomacy or weapons. They they focus there

(13:52):
in the process of writing a book on something called
functional disorders UM, which is sort of this newer understanding
of psychogenic like what used to be called mass hysteria
or just you know hysteria in the cases of like
individuals suffering from things that were caused by the mind.

(14:12):
But for a long time, starting the twentieth century, people
thought it was I think Freud called it UM. I
forget what his term for it was, but it was
it was always the idea that like some problem in
their psyche was then causing this to physically manifest and conversion. Yeah,

(14:36):
you convert like some you know, desire to fight your
dead and uh, you know, have sex with your mom
into like this thing you know it like And so
this new understanding is that it's a neurological thing. So
it's not a thing that necessarily you can untangle to

(14:59):
something it happened to you as a child, or you know,
something that you're even psychologically aware of. UM. It's it
can be It's really like they don't have an explanation.
It's more about something that is unconscious to you that
is causing this to happen to you that you were

(15:21):
not aware of. But it's not it's not you causing it. Really,
it is something in your neurological makeup that is causing it.
It's like sort of getting locked into how your synapses
like fire and work together and they're like pathways in
your mind. It almost reminds me of like addiction. It

(15:41):
wouldn't like show up on a brain scan though, either, right,
they wouldn't show up as some sort of like you know,
anomalous thing in an m r I or a you
know CT scan. Well that's a sticky thing. Yeah. I
feel like reading about brain skins on in in the
context of Havana syndrome, I went down a road of
people's sort of debunking brain scans as a very useful

(16:03):
tool and just saying like you can look at brain
scans and like see a lot of different things depending
on the eye of the beholder and kind of what
you want to see. Because that was like a lot
of a lot of the pro this was an attack
UM articles. We're focusing on this. These studies done by

(16:23):
UM done it. I think you pen like hospitals that
basically said like their brain scans indicate something happened, and um,
it was just it seemed a little foggy. Um. But yeah,
I mean, I mean, brain scans show things that can
be helpful as diagnostic tools, so I'm not I'm not
completely discounting them. It just seems like it was a

(16:45):
little bit kind of more up in the air than
some of some of the neurological stuff. It's like pornography.
I know when I see it, says uh, scientists who
may have may have an extra grind because scientists are
people too. But I like the point about reading perhaps
some electric tea leaves there right in the signals. Well, guys,

(17:08):
what we're talking about. For me, if I was just
an objective listener encountering this for the first time, I
would think, okay, well that kind of makes sense on
an individual level. But how do we explain that occurring,
you know, so many times, with so many individuals in
countries across the world. Right, that's a good question, Matt.
But we also have to consider then that these are

(17:31):
not separate entities. They are people who are in the
same field, in the same sphere of communication. And one
thing that's important is, uh, the ability to put a
name or a category upon any series of things like, Uh,

(17:51):
we were talking about this. I can't remember whether it
was off air or on a previous episode of some
sort of show. There was this. Uh, there's the very
valid argument that says, someone wakes up and they just
don't feel great. They have some sort of malaise, right,
some sort of ill defined malaise, and they are having

(18:13):
a moment, water cooler moment if you will, with someone else,
a colleague, a trusted colleague, that's important. That's key. Who
says to them, you know, I'm feeling a little low two,
you know. And this is pre COVID, when anytime someone
got a sniffle, they were like, let's covid. I'm gonna

(18:34):
I'm gonna die. But as weird as it sounds, it
is very common for people to um, you want to
be part of something bigger than yourself. You also, if
you're a human, you want to classify patterns. Right, that's
the reason why humans are the most successful of the
primates currently. Uh, it's the it's the idea, you know,

(18:57):
Like Matt goes to Jack and say, is man, I'm sorry,
I got a real real pill of a headache, and
Jack says, you know what, I had a headache earlier.
And and are these connected? Because that's what people do.
We all sort of connect these dots for better information

(19:17):
bias if we have someone that confirms what we already
kind of believe. It's like a web MD syndrome is like,
you know, you go from having like a little body
ache to definitely I'm dying. It's like anything. It doesn't
even have to be an expert. It can just be
like you said, Ben, a trusted colleague and you're saying, whoa,
I feel exactly the same way. We were both in
the same space at the same time. It must be,

(19:40):
you know, something in our building, you know, at work.
We're gonna take a quick break, but then we'll be
back with more Jack. And we're back with Jack O'Brien
talking about the Havana syndrome. There's a article a personal history,

(20:01):
like a short story written by John lacarre or John Lakar.
I forget, I don't know Lakara. Is that how we
pronounced his name? The like spin We're covered, okay, And
so he was a former spy during World War Two.
And by the way, this did appear in The New Yorker,

(20:22):
which I read. I don't know if I meant that,
but and it's so he was a spy novelist and
he taught this was his honest account of what it
was like to be a spy during the Cold Warriors,
and it is it's really illuminating, like he's being sent
on these missions by people who, it turns out, are
like kind of creating all the intrigue to kind of

(20:43):
build up this story. Like there's a big like what
he his first mission. He goes to this like little
back alley like pool hall, and there's a briefcase drop
and it's all very cloak and dagger, and then he's
like and it turned out like there was nothing in
that briefcase. That guy was just doing this because he
wanted to live in the movie. And you know that

(21:05):
there was like everybody was paranoid, everybody thought everyone else
was a spy, but there also was like no there there,
And so that was another thing that I kept popping
up in my mind as I was reading about this.
And you know, there there was a um good piece
in Pro Publica early on in the Havana Syndrome reporting
where they just kind of tracked how the news was

(21:27):
first told to Like a few people had an experience
where they heard a high pitch noise and like started
feeling dizzy, and then that was reported at like a
staff meeting, but it was reported as like this is secret,
don't tell anyone, and it I can totally see how
it would have created a feeling of not being safe
and putting myself in that position and knowing how susceptible

(21:51):
I am to suggestion and you know body over mind,
mind over body stuff. Um, I I totally and sympathize
with like that that really helped me get my mind
around like this is not something that they are making up.
This is something that is happening to them because of
a unique combination of us as Westerners not understanding sort

(22:13):
of the mind body relationship and how powerful the mind
is in terms of illness, and then also how powerfully
weird it is to be in the CIA or be
a diplomat and stationed in another you know, in a
place and you know, rumors come up about like well,

(22:34):
they're they're attacking us or you know this, this person
had this weird experience, like don't tell anybody. It just
it felt like it was kind of ripe for the
sort of mass hysteria that that you sometimes Yeah, it's uh,
it's also uh, it's got it's leveraging the US versus them, right,
the in versus the out mentality. Uh. And then you know,

(22:58):
social pressure can be a real It is a real thing,
and it's not always purposeful, nor is it always malevolent.
It's it's sometimes just fitting in. Oh, I guess my
head does hurt. And and to me, man, that was
one of the main questionable indicators. The cases are all

(23:20):
at this point self reported. When we did uh, the
initial show on it, there were an estimated two hundred
reported cases around the world, all of similar demographics, all
people who are working closely together or live in this
rarefied air you describe. And as of now I checked

(23:42):
this going in. That's right. I did a little homework. Uh.
The tally is eleven hundred people again, all self reported.
There was no one like. This is not the same
situation as prostate cancer or something where a doctor says
this is what you have. These are people coming forward

(24:02):
and saying I think I have this thing right, and
this is again uh. One one point that you did
so beautifully uh and that I have immense respect for
is you're never dunking on these people. You're very clear
and everything you said on air about this and and
to me off air that you like, just because it

(24:26):
might not be some magical microwave weapon does not mean
these people are not experiencing real pain. Where did the
weapon theory come from? Initially, like it seems like such
a such a leap, so it had to have come
from somewhere. Yeah, I'll let well even let Jack talk
about it. But there was there was some weird stuff

(24:46):
happening in the past, and we kept seeing reports from
former UH spies or former you know, agents who were
talking about other microwave technologies that the USSR had used
in the past. Correct. Yeah, I think I think there's
some of that. You guys know more about that than
I do, But yeah, I know that there was UH

(25:07):
some like first it was sound weapons because the people
heard a strange sound and when they had the you know,
physical attack symptoms um And then once people kind of
disproved that that was possible, they moved on to microwaves.
And I think that's when they started looking through history

(25:29):
to see, oh there was an UH an example of Russia,
who I think people immediately liked for this because both
sides wanted. So I think my overall feeling on like
where it comes from is like in in paying attention
to the news, Like we overall the mainstream media in

(25:51):
the US has a pro making money bias and an
underrated thing that makes money. Uh, And it's not making
money for the most people. It's just making money, you
know there and so if there's one person who lives
in the suburbs suburbs of Virginia stands to make a
billion dollars, they're going to find a way to you know,

(26:12):
get that story seated and and make that billion dollars.
And um, you know, an underrated the way that people
make money is through the military industrial complex. And so
like creating a creating a super weapon that is generations
ahead of what we have access to. That's how Uh
we funded the twentieth century in the United States by

(26:36):
being like Russia has way more nuclear nuclear weapons than
we do, so we need to we need to keep
ramping up, revving up. And it wasn't true, but it
was good for business in the military industrial complex. We
have a defense gap. Yeah, oh exactly, And uh, the
USSR also had psychic soldiers, right, and we had to

(26:58):
had to dip our toes in there. Yeah yeah, and uh,
thank you for your service goats. That was you know,
that was that was solid your real heroes. Uh yeah,
you know this is this is true. This is one
of the largest, most consistently profitable industries in the West

(27:21):
in general, but in the United States in specific. And
you can like, that's not a conspiracy theory. That is objective,
that has proven. Uh you could call it a conspiracy,
but you can't call it a theory. Uh. We see this,
I think, uh we see this ad high octane fire

(27:43):
to the to the existing blaze. Right when folks like
Christopher Miller, former Secretary of Defense and the Trump administration
immediately here's about this directed energy thing and says, hey,
not only is that like he gets all made for
TV commercial with it. Basically he's saying, not only is

(28:06):
it an energy weapon, but it's an act of war.
And we're left behind on this. You know. If you
don't Yeah, if we don't beam the headaches in, someone's
gonna beam them at us, you know what I mean. Also, also,
we need more money. Almost every government statement ends with
also we need more money. This is fascinating because the

(28:31):
politicians at play, who were championing a lot of this stuff,
and we're indeed holding the purse of funding, they were
not so worried about the psychogenic aspects, right they were.
They were not so worried about this, and they were
likewise not particularly concerned with even theoretically proving the application

(28:54):
of what they called uh a directed energy weapon, which
is such a bullshit phrase, right, directed energy weapon. There's
just three words that sound great together. You know, that's
completely logical to me. I'm going to direct this energy beam.
It's a style attack. Come on, that's real. I think

(29:15):
if you see that it acronyms out to do you
understand that this is a Mountain Dew based op. This
is all part of some viral marketing. We got it.
That is my Mountain Dew, the Caribbean Blast. Also, I
don't know that coma Cabeo song Havana is about Thevana syndrome.

(29:38):
It's all super like subtly masked. But Havana new Nana. Yeah, yeah, seriously,
like guys, I mean we we shouldn't have to tell
you guys this, Come on, yeah, go to genius dot com.
You know what I mean, don't take our word for it,
see for yourself. But is them experiencing That's like when

(29:58):
they're like havanah, oh that hurts. No no no no
no no, no no no. And the whole thing is
really a series of acronyms. So uh, so take your time,
write the acronyms out and send them to us. Uh
and do the whole song. You know what I mean,
don't be a coward. So the uh, the thing that

(30:19):
I think stays with us is like most people we
were we were delving into this story. I think all
of us were very careful not to draw our own conclusions.
Were comparing information sources. We're looking at uh statements again

(30:40):
by multiple scientists who in the early days right in
they didn't all agree, and because it was science reporting,
they were misquoted often or you know, there was a
little hyperbole with their stuff. But one, uh, one thing
that is clear to me is that the story had

(31:02):
continued um. There was something that happened just in just
in this past August, as we record. On August, the
New York Times reported the c I, a everybody's favorite company,
had started compensating again. Self reported victims of havana syndrome.

(31:27):
And what's interesting about that is, at the same time,
almost just quite recently this month, as we record September,
uh more and more other members of government are publicly

(31:47):
going skeptical because they're saying, all right, hang on, these
symptoms are ill defined. Pardon the pun, but the like
there there's not a specific thing we and find, which
means there's not a specific thing we can test for. Right,
so we are we not correct to be skeptical. And

(32:10):
unfortunately Uncle sam uh kind of made an unpleasant bed
generations before by different pleasant bed. Sorry, yeah, but I
mean but generations before. You know, it's it's almost like
how anti vaccination movements arise out of human experimentation, like
the horrors of Tuskegee. What's happening is I would pose

(32:32):
it that there are people who remember, well, the dangers
of what was called agent orange or the dangers of
long term lead poisoning, and they're saying, well, it wouldn't
be the first time people lied to us. No. I
have a question that does the payout does that um?
Does that create the sense of culpability or like, if

(32:53):
they're paying out, then I think that maybe like caused
the perspective of the media to be, oh, well, they're
paying people out, they must have done something wrong like
workers camp, right right, yeah, but different right, Like, I mean,
maybe maybe it is exactly that, But I wonder what
your perspective is on that, Jack, I do think you know,
at the same time that they are paying out there,

(33:15):
there has been I think things in opinions in the
media are shaking out in the direction of it being psychogenic, um,
which I think I think the main thing now is that,
like so so in this article about functional disorders, they
talk about one of the kind of the smoking gun

(33:36):
that really convinced me was that the people who had
these attacks years ago, we're still experiencing symptoms and in
a lot of cases the symptoms were getting worse still,
and the that is actually a telltale sign of a
functional disorder and something that is psychogenic, because that they
were saying, even had somebody walked up and like hit

(33:58):
them on the head with something or you know what, whatever,
uh physical attack you want to talk about, the body
heals those in and it gets progressively better, and that
they would have been healed within like six months, whereas
with psychogenic and these functional disorders that are sort of

(34:19):
locked into the circuitry of the brain um that that
gets worse until you actually identify it as such and
go and like treated as such. And so my concern
is that for the people who are still suffering from this. Uh,
first of all, I'm like, like, of all the money
that the u u. S. Government is paying out, like fine,

(34:41):
but uh a bucket, But I mean and they are
going through hell. Now when you say psychogenic, is that
the same as PTSD or is that different? Like I
mean I'm a little clear. Yeah, well I think people
I actually haven't looked to PTSD enough to even like

(35:02):
kind of comment on it. I'm just saying more that
it is something that started in the is like locked
into the neurology more so than it is a physical
um wound they are kind of healing from. But the like,
you can cure these sorts of functional disorders if you

(35:25):
address them as such. But the more that this becomes
a you know, they say this and we're saying they're fake,
which it seems to be like the direction that a
lot of the media coverage takes, the less likely the
people are going to be to be willing to admit
to that. So just like this truth that's in between,
that's like, this is something that is happening to you know,

(35:45):
it was not the Cuban government and it wasn't a
Russian secret weapon that caused it, but it is something
that's happening to you Like that would be the best
outcome for everybody involved, But it feels like we've now,
you know, put it into this like well then you
were lying type thing. And I under I understand that
being the response because they were used to try to

(36:08):
like you know, fund World War three or whatever would
have happened if the people who claimed it was an
attack got their way. But um, hey, but then that
started anyway, right, yeah, yeah, exactly. Um. So that that's
I think just generally the thing that I've taken from

(36:29):
this beyond you know, a better understanding of how fullish
at the US government is and is like just a
greater appreciation for how everybody's vulnerability to um, to this
sort of psychogenic and functional disorders and um, you know,

(36:50):
if you've taken night Will, like so I always assumed
Nike Will was bluish green because like that's relaxing color,
and day Quill was you know more a more vigorous
orange because that's like a color, and like that was
just like good marketing, but they've actually done studies and
when when I take a Nike Will, like I I

(37:13):
actually sleep better physically, my body reacts to that suggest
that power of suggestion that color in a way that
is like physical and scientific like that that is what
their studies have found. So it's just like the bit
of placebo effects like to the ac I think the
effect is so much more powerful the effects and blue

(37:37):
gatorade is more refreshing. Yeah, all relaxing pills are blue,
and all like vigorous pills are red or orange or yeah,
and there is both there and that's why that's why, um,

(38:00):
did you say that's why it's a morning here an evening?
So no, it's it's it's a huge point. Yeah yeah.
And then just the like it's also the power of
the mind when it comes to medicine is also not
something you can monetize. Right, So that's again like falls

(38:21):
into what I was talking about before with like the
big bias in American media and the big bias and
like how the the US just works in general is
like if you can make money off of it. Then
that is going to be the truth we go with.
And like you can't put the you know, uh meditation
in a pill necessarily balistic medicine and meditation and mindfulness

(38:45):
are not money makers. They might sell books kind of apps, right, No,
for sure, but that's its own thing. But if you're
big pharma, you have no way of commodifying that. There's
there's nothing you can't inject that into a pill because
it is something thing that is uh sub medical, that
is something that requires discipline and reading and thoughtfulness. Hold

(39:06):
the phone. I mean, if you're listening to this on
a phone, you might already be holding the phone. What
I mean is we're going to pause for a second
and then we're gonna return to dive further into the
conversation about Havana's syndrome with Jack O'Brien, and we're back.

(39:30):
I want to get back just Ben, you mentioned people
around people who have reported this correct, So just were
they all water cooler conversations like how are all of
them communicating with each other? They are all they are
all self reported and it becomes a news story, so
they hear about how do they know? Okay, So yeah,
I got it. Yeah, it becomes a massive news story
the and they you know, a news story about your

(39:53):
profession and about people in your specific environment who are
in other countries that you perceive where that or your
higher ups perceived to be hostile territory. And um, suddenly
it because because there is a lot a lot of
the functional functional disorders that they talk about come with
some sort of like fear based like something that is

(40:15):
destabilizing or something like that is not not always, but
a lot of the time that can be where the
sort of injury occurs out. Yeah, so we uh, this
is this is a great question that this also gives
us an opportunity to talk about how the media did
Cuba dirty, just like the Spanish flu which we mentioned

(40:36):
in a previous episode, or the Kung Fu the kung flu,
you know the way like yeah, all of that crap. Yeah,
so it's um So. Havana syndrome is called Havana syndrome
popularly in the West because those were where the first
again self reported cases came from, which means that the

(40:59):
government of q was judged in the court of public
opinion to be guilty based on the name. And what
I love about adding a place name to a thing
is that it already makes it sound shady, you know
what I mean, like like pick a like pick a
verb you could say, you know, you could say mouse

(41:19):
click and then you add, uh, you add Florida to
the front, gave it the old Florida mouse click, you
know what I mean. That sounds weird, I know. And
this this happens with anything. You could call it the
you know, like tulsa elbow and people would be like gross, No,
that sounds like from the from prohibition era. I feel

(41:44):
like the inverted speaking easy. Yes. So with this what
we see is that this reporting right or people saying
that they have experienced this. Uh. I love the point
about it coming out in hostile countries. There are reports
in China, right. Uh. There are reports in of course Cuba,

(42:09):
who vehemently denied any sort of association. Uh. There were
some reports in Russia pre pre the newest iteration of
the war against Ukraine, which I think went a long
way towards dismissing the idea of secret Russian technology. To
be honest, and uh, Matt, to your point, there are

(42:30):
no reports of someone in Poughkeepsie or someone in you know,
a more friendly country. I think there were some reports
on Mexico and in Australia, Australia, Australia, Uzbekistan, Colombia, Austria.
Remember we talked about Austria um in Vienna specifically, where

(42:51):
you know, one of the spy capitals of the world,
where it was being reported. And it totally makes sense, Jack,
what you're saying when it's it's not these country ease all.
You can't think of all of these incidents as this
is happening in all of these different countries. It's happening
in the same organization essentially. Mostly isn't the government referring
to these things as anomalous health incidents so they don't

(43:14):
even assign some sort of continuity to these symptoms, right.
I think the Biden administration came out and called them
that and then that that really angered a lot of people.
And there's been some back and forth on on whether
that's an accurate way to describe it, because you know
that that makes it sound or at least shades in
the direction of them feeling like someone saying that what

(43:36):
they're experiencing is not Yeah, and I mean, like when
you look at the history of mass psychogenic like illnesses
and like you know, they are you know, people getting
like throwing up and then like suddenly hundreds of people
are like throwing up or you know, because of like
some bug that I think there was like a factory

(43:57):
where like a june bug is like supposedly biting people,
and everybody was throwing up, and it's like to them,
like they weren't making themselves throw up, like they got
very sick all of a sudden, every everyone Like when
that's happening to you, that feels absolutely real. Um. It's
not a testament to how like full of it these

(44:19):
people are. It's a testament to how real, um, a
psychogenetic functional disorder feels to a human being, you know,
in the grips of it. Yeah, well said, you know.
And there are other examples of the things like this
throughout history, right laughing epidemics for instance, uh, the screaming

(44:40):
uh screaming kids in Malaysia. That's another episode that I think,
uh clearly checks the boxes for a psychogenic phenomenon, or
like Chuck McGill's condition on better call Soul, like the
whole I have allergic to you know, electromagnetic sensitivity or
electromagnetic sensitivity. Gosh, saying e M S sensitivity is like

(45:02):
saying a T M machine or VIN number. That's my bad, everyone.
Our credibility has gone. This from the abyss I'm leaving
this show. I can't. I can't believe you just said that.
I'm out. So what we see here, if a conspiracy exists,

(45:24):
if we think in terms of objective plausibility, it is
less plausible that there is a secret sci Fi level
weapon that has only been used in these instances than
it is plausible that there are there. There is a

(45:47):
psychogenic phenomenon at play, and when we when we realize that,
when we have this benefit of retrospect, Uh. The important
thing to know is something that you have said from
maybe not day one, Jack, but from like let's call
it figurative day seven about this. People aren't trying to
get over, they're not trying to fool anyone. They're in pain,

(46:11):
they're concerned, they want to feel well. And the conspiracy
I think that is plausible is that opportunistic political forces
saw this as an avenue for funding. No question, have
there been any intimations toward a class action lawsuit type
situation with that many folks feeling connected, not not I

(46:36):
mean intimations. Uh, I appreciate that we're not super really
because uh if because working for a government is not
at that level, is not quite the same as like,
you know, working for I heard or something I did
see an interesting thing that a CIA task force found

(46:59):
where they said that a lot of these cases could
be attributed to It was described as random and completely
pedestrian factors, things like, um like being close to faulty
wiring or even exposure to like you know, bug zapper
type things like ultrasonic pest repellents that are designed to like,
you know, get rid of possums and rodents. Dang, that's

(47:19):
how they're getting rid of possums and rodents and other countries.
That's that's they don't extreme them what happened going on?
Um No, it could have happened here. It could have
happened while they were home, you know, like like the
actual thing that led to the symptoms may not have
had anything to do with their their travels abroad totally.
And I do think that that is that that is

(47:40):
also one of those explanations you need because people don't.
People think it's either it's something physically happened to you
or you're making it up right, and so we need
to say, oh, there must be like a bug zapper
that is close too close to your head when you
sleep at night, and therefore like that's what's causing this. Um.

(48:02):
We we also don't know though, I mean we there
cell phones cause that we have yet to fully wrap
our heads around, you know, I mean totally. Yeah, this
podcast is brought to you by Orkin. Are you tired
of your loved ones not having headaches and havana syndrome?

(48:23):
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in your pocket and keep it just like You'll be
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are ad ideas that we're just giving them to you guys.

(48:44):
But I think this is such a um. This is
a compassionate and objective understanding of what people mean when
they say they are having havana syndrome. Also, another thing
that argues against it being a directed energy weapon of

(49:06):
some sort is that there has not been any sort
of experiment to replicate the effects. Somehow, there has not
been a successful experiment to do so therefore there's not
a comparable metric, and of course there's no agreement. Well,
there's also the recording they got of the sound that

(49:27):
they heard in Havana that was determined to be crickets,
I believe. Um, so people spread that around a lot,
and that is like very embarrassing for the people who
were making the claim. And but that that is that's
another piece of evidence where I was like, oh wow,

(49:49):
this definitely is not um. You know, I've been in
foreign countries where like the birds sound different and I'm like,
what is that? That is so strange? And then it
just turns out as the birth that I've never one
of these things where it was for a time kind
of taken on as like pet kind of talking points
for a lot of high level government officials and like politicians,

(50:11):
and now they're kind of walking it back a little bit. Yeah. Again,
that's um part of it. If we if we are
to put on our cynic hats, then we could say
part of the cause for that step back is that
maybe maybe it's like n f T S, you know,
maybe the grift is run its course, but maybe we

(50:32):
got the funding already and so now it's onto the next, uh,
the next impossible expensive problem. Well, also Obama had opened
up Cuba. That was very promising and like a big
considered a big accomplishment, and so it tied in with
Trump's plan to undo everything that Obama had done to
make relations worse with Cuba. So like that that that

(50:56):
also felt very convenient for the that administration's priorities at
the time, such a narrow window. My kid and her
mom went to Cuba for that little brief moment when
it was there, when it was open, and then it
was like, nope, just kidding, We're cool. You guys are
thinking about this way too small. Look, this is not

(51:17):
some political thing. Okay, okay, okay. We got two major
things that happened around this time. First of all, people
especially spies across the world, are coming down with this
weird mysterious illness. The other thing, UFOs are real. According
to the Navy, come on touching on the tiptouch, most things,

(51:42):
most things in the sky and human experience are UFOs,
and that they are unidentified, like you know what, you
know what, matt Um, The next Dave and Buster's trip
is on me. If you nailed it, if the last
one was on you was it? Yeah? I think, jeez,
this is my other story that when I start talking

(52:05):
about it, everyone's like, oh boy, hearing again because I'm
just like, how are we how do we talk about
anything else? There's UFOs? But it does I am sad
to say it does fit some of the things, like
it does seem like at least the military being on
board with the spreading of those videos could be uh

(52:26):
them preparing to use that as a reason to start
really investing in in weapons that can keep up with
the space whatever this thing is man. Yeah, you mentioned
if you identify it as a psychogenic syndrome, then perhaps
it could be treated. Is this something that would require psychotherapy?
Is there a medical route? What? What is the treatment

(52:49):
when it is recognized for what it is? Yeah? It
was really interesting. They talked about this case of this
of this young man who had like uh slipped disc
things and then had some some experience and it started
devolving and evolving to the point where he couldn't walk
after two years. And he was having these arguments where

(53:10):
people would say, we think it's conversion disorder, we think
it's they would use the term psychogenic and he fought
them and he dug in and he was like, I'm
not making this up. You guys don't experience. You don't
understand I'm experiencing this. And then this expert who's like
the foremost expert on functional disorders, he saw a YouTube
video from them. His mom sent it to him and

(53:30):
he had the open mindedness to watch it, went to
their clinic and by so it sounds like it's uh,
it's a variety of things, but it's not really like
psychotherapy because that was one of the things that he
was trying during the two years when it was getting worse.
It's a lot of um cognitive behavioral therapy. It's like

(53:50):
trying to move his leg well like under hypnosis or
well like meditating and well doing these feedback things. And
it was a week of hard work, but he walked
out of the clinic. Because they it is a neural
they treat it as a neurological disorder. Your conscious mind
doesn't have access to your Your conscious mind is like

(54:14):
a spotlight that has is pointed at you know, one
small portion of this vast universe that is the totality
of your mind and who you are as a being.
And so there by like doing just focusing on the
neurology and doing exercises and taking it out of the
realm of this is something we just need to convince

(54:35):
you to stop doing and more in the realm of
this is something that is happening to you. Um because
of neurological things we don't fully understand. But here's how
we get to it. Like that helped him. So yeah,
that go going with and they actually reached out to
this person who's the foremost expert on functional disorders and
he was prevented from uh like participating in the study

(54:58):
into Havana syndrome because is I think of the dug
in nature for their purposes. Yeah, right, what we're seeing then,
I would argue, are some feedback loops, not all of
which are cynical, not all of which are profit driven.
But we're seeing that people add force to their stories
because civilization is sort of a story everybody tells each other,

(55:21):
right and life is all about relationships. But now that
we have you, uh no, we have you Jack again,
one of the busiest guys and podcasting, I suggest we
uh we quiz you a little bit or get your opinion,
get your opinion on on on on other things considered

(55:44):
conspiracy theories. I believe that we have. I think we
without conclusively proving the case we have, we have laid
out some really strong arguments for the psychogenetic perspective of
Havannah syndrome. But start here. Um, maybe we joked about
decision tree and you sorry, maybe maybe we play maybe

(56:07):
we play true false? How about that? Uh? And maybe
Matt Nolan I can ask you some true false questions
up to you. I feel like I'm about to get
podcast jumped, like you guys are gonna like, so here
we go, Jack, and it promised is not? Uh, this
is not gotcha podcasting. There's not podcast jumping. Uh. We

(56:31):
also can confirm that we haven't discussed these things off air.
So what we're getting here are organic reactions off the cuff,
I hope. Uh. First things first, you believe the the
we're true false NG the official story about the jfk assassination. Uh. False.
I don't. I don't think it's full correct now that

(56:54):
it was just Oswald. Yeah, yeah, No, I don't. I
don't think it was just Oswald now just doesn't make
sense logistically, It doesn't Honestly a little surprise Jack honestly
just because wow, that's I mean, that's cool. It's actually
the thing the thing I believe is also like kind
of boring. It's the Secret Service agent in the trailing

(57:16):
car accidentally um shooting him, which because that's yeah, it's
it's interesting. So it's this guy who is used by
CBS News, uh to test the possibility of Oswald getting
off that many shots. And this guy is a gun expert,

(57:39):
he owns his own gun shop. Um, he does the
demonstration and is able to like hit the target moving
in a car on CBS News. Like this is right
after the assassination because right away conspiracy theories pop up.
That guy like gets it in his head. He's like,
but there's something about the whole thing, Like as he's
doing this demonstration and he's like, there's something about it

(57:59):
that doesn't make sense, and so he just like really
digs into the ballistics and he's like, that third bullet
doesn't act the way that the like full metal jackets
coming from. Yeah, yeah, it doesn't act the way right
like the the um third the shot that you know,

(58:21):
blew off the side of his head, to put it bluntly,
acted more like a assault rifle bullet that you know
dissolves upon impact. And he realized that's what the Secret
Service agents behind him we're carrying. And he had also
like traced it back to where uh he was like,
it wasn't coming from where Oswald was. It was actually

(58:43):
coming from directly behind him if you just look at
the physics of it. And um, so he and then
he found a picture and there's a Secret Service agent
holding the exact gun that he said it looked like
the based on that would have been fired ing. And
you know, this guy Bonner manager has this book called

(59:04):
More Mortal Error and their theory is that they it's
not really a theory. The guys were out drinking all
night the night before, very hungover. Um. When the first
shot is fired, the car stop because they're like, what's happening? Uh,
And that causes the rear car to slow down, he
falls over and lets the shot off. Um. And you

(59:27):
you would expect that to be a thing that like
everybody would have seen that. But the first of all
people E witnesses dents, Yeah, and I witnesses did report
smelling uh, gun smoke at street level, which shouldn't have
been happening if Yeah, and seeing gun smoke and also,

(59:47):
like you, it was the middle of day, so it's
not like you would have seen like a tracer or
you know, the flash of the muzzle necessarily. Um. But
so that that I think there was a cover up
because of that. Uh, this guy Bonner manager has a
whole book about it that's really interesting that people should
check out. But also that's uh Bill James, the moneyball guy. Uh,

(01:00:10):
you know, he had that book Popular Crime or I
think that's what he called it. But he went he
read every one of the books on the JFK assassination theory,
and he he's like, this is the only one that
makes sense, Like of all stories that people put together. Yeah,
a lot of the other stuff demands um a pretty

(01:00:32):
impressive level of subterfusion cooperation, which, while not impossible, is
increasingly less plausible. I love that you bring up the
secret service aspect because, as we found on this show, man, honestly,
a lot of the real conspiracies are someone messing up
in a position of power and then attempting to look

(01:00:55):
like they did not mess upright, right, That's like the
cover up is let us continue to appear competent, but sorry.
There's also really interesting stuff. I believed that for a
long time. And then there's some really interesting stuff about
George H. W. Bush, who uh didn't really have a
connection with the CIA before they made him the head

(01:01:16):
of the CIA, And the only real connection you can
find on paper is that on the day of JFK's assassination,
he's in Dallas, but they like changed the records so
that it didn't seem like he was in Dallas. And
then there's like a call to CIA headquarters and it's
like George Bush, Why George Bush is in Dallas? And um,
it's also like Mr Dallas. I mean that's yeah, that's true.

(01:01:39):
If oh, you guys know his street name Texas Texas, Texas.
That made me very suspicious of the CIA. But I
still think it's probably more likely what you're talking about,
which is people messing up and trying to cover it up.
I remember that old movie Bush Does Dallas. Um, so
you guys, I've got I've got one more question for you. Um,

(01:02:00):
I've got one. If that's okay, really quickly, because I
know we're running up. Solved. We solved Havannah syndrome, we
solved the JFK assassination. So like, let's let's get to
the next Well, this is my this is my Havanna
syndrome topic that you're mentioning where I bring it up
way too often, jack up. Do you think it is

(01:02:23):
possible that we are living in a simulation? Yes, I
think it's possible. How possible? Check? I have no evidence
that we're not to And when I've gotten too high
in the past, I don't do any of that anymore.
But when I had gotten too high in the past,

(01:02:44):
I was absolutely convinced that we were living in a simulation.
That mind synct right there exactly. It depends on your
definition of a simulation. I mean, we are in an
environment that was created, you know, without our our involvement
or knowledge, and everything we do is just to kind
of like deteriorate it. So like is is life just

(01:03:07):
by its very definition, not a simulation? Like you know,
a lot of philosophers talk about the theory of the cave,
the idea that we're just looking at like projections on
a wall. You know, I just don't think it was
I don't know. I just think it's a very just
I think it's very interesting and it's it's but bro, like,
what's our definition of us? Man? Sorry, as much as

(01:03:30):
the thing that made me the most uh uninterested in
that because I do think like there's really interesting conversations
about the simulation stuff. But then uh now I feel
like everybody heard about it through Elon Musk, and I'm
like dah because because didn't he say that on like somewhere, No, man,
we were talking about telegraphic universe theory and what has

(01:03:52):
that been like two thousand eleven. Oh yeah, there's no
way to make something uncool than for Elon Musk a
twe know that. That bummed me out so much. I
was like, I love this theory, though, um so is
yours based on the idea that like mathematically, like you know,
things are simulations are gonna be getting more and more realistic,

(01:04:15):
and there will be more and more people making more
and more simulations and more and more opportunities to create them.
So what it's actually more likely that it's a simulation
than actual physical like reality. I don't know. All I
know is that that feels correct to me more so

(01:04:37):
than some of the other act probably actual explanations of
what we are right now, Like what all this experiences
that we're all sharing. Um, yeah, I don't know, and
I'm not high and I haven't been high in a
long time. Reality is a psychogenic illness. Oh man, here
we go. We're done done. So yeah, you just nailed it.

(01:04:59):
It's like a Soundguard lyric. It surely is, actually, and
if they play the guitar in a weird enough time signature,
no one's gonna question it. Once again, go to genius
dot com if you want to learn the truth behind
all of your favorite song lyrics. I think we have
you know, we're getting we're getting to the end. I
think we have time for just uh one more true

(01:05:21):
false conspiracy from Jack O'Brien mattuh Matt Frederick did one?
I did one? Uh, Noel, the honor goes to you. Well,
I didn't really prepare for this, Holy cow, just pick
your favorite. Man, we've done some favorite Um okay true
false Uh. There are species of sentient life that have

(01:05:45):
not yet been discovered. Species of sentient life that have
not yet been discovered, So that is that could be
extra whether they bet or or aliens. You know, I
definitely have an anti cryptid bias, like I'm think I
think we would have found them we would have found it,

(01:06:05):
would have found something this planet. So let's let's let
us throw that part out. Let's just go with the uh.
You know, however, many trillions of other planets there are,
you know, that we can't possibly reach. Is a little
self serving to believe that we are the only one,
the only forms of life, you know. And I have
nothing to back this up with, but I do, from
a philosophical and spiritual kind of standpoint, think there has

(01:06:28):
to be But that's just been It's time, It's time,
right now, let's go ver, let's do this. Someone on
Twitter was asking us if we're going to do a
k but now we're like fair maid paradox. So no.
Your original question was is there other undiscovered sentient or

(01:06:53):
intelligent life somewhere or there? Was stated in the first Yeah,
I think I think true there is. Um. I don't
know that they've visited us. UM. I do have a
theory that involves military industrial complex that like, they have
visited us and there and the fact that they're not

(01:07:16):
declaring war on us is the reason it's being kept
away from us as a conspiracy because they the military
wants us to think that Well, yeah, sure, every advanced
species is going to immediately attack you. That's why we
need to like build up all this arsenal and so
like that that was there. There's a really interesting one
of the like more credible alien sightings was at a

(01:07:38):
school and like the military came in and like shut
it down, And I spent a lot of time thinking
about that. I was like, why does what does the
military have tied up in this? Wouldn't they just be
like tell us the truth, like tell us what what
you know? But instead they just shut it down. It's controlled.
But I wonder, like what they're so afraid of, Why
they're so afraid of that message getting out that gets

(01:08:00):
that it invalidates their whole killer be kill worldview. If
there are aliens who are just coming down and like
basically engaging in tourism, and there's just like they're they're
advanced enough to destroy us, but they're just like, hey man,
we're just like we we think the oceans cool, so
God forbid their benevolent and then all of a sudden

(01:08:21):
don't need the government's protection anymore. Right, Well, that's yeah,
that that is I think if there is a conspiracy
to cover up aliens, I think that is the thing
that they're covering up is that they're benevolent and like that.
There was also a lot of alien sighting activity around
nuclear weapons, and I think it was just them being like,

(01:08:42):
we don't want you guys to shoot your eye out,
Like yeah, yeah, you're not you're not qualified because yeah, yeah,
the secret is that UFOs or so, the secret is
that extraterrestrial or interdimensional. Uh of these exist, but they're
just uncharacteristically chill, they're inconveniently chill, inconveniently for the military chill.

(01:09:08):
Yeah yeah, yeah, Okay, Now I accept that I could.
It's it's a reality in which I would aspire to
live and exist. Uh not you were you were referencing Prometheus.
I just watched Prometheus again, and every time I see
that movie, like, it's not my favorite in the cool

(01:09:32):
ideas well, Prometheus was flawed, Like think about the title, Yes,
but that that opening sequence where it's an extra terrestrial
intelligent species that I believe that's on Earth and not
on that planet that they end up on. But the
but they got seed the planets, like the pan Spermia thing, right,

(01:09:53):
They see the planet and then all life evolves out
of that that one whatever your cup that uh, I
don't know. That always just makes my mind real When
I think about evolution and could evolution have been a
process that was just kick started right instead of just
something that naturally occurs, My mind just goes everywhere And

(01:10:14):
I think, you, man, I think about I think this
is I think this is a beautiful moment for us
to hold it a day for now. Uh Jack, you
have gone three for three on true false. Also, the
three of the three of us didn't work on this.

(01:10:36):
We didn't secret to fight good questions. You happen to
hit all like three things I love talking about on
the show as any Daily like guys, I'll tell you so.
I don't think any listener is gonna believe we weren't
stoned for the last half hour this conversation, but I
promise we're not. That's right, man, Hey, if you don't

(01:10:59):
listen to the Daily See guys, seriously do that, like
at least check it out, give it a try. It's
it's worth your time. It is. Uh And where we
might be making Jack uncomfortable by saying that in front
of you, but but so so the beers hitting Matt

(01:11:21):
uh so right, So UM, so maybe maybe we will
have that cryptic rapattle or let's make it a cipher
uh and not quite a hostile in the future. Right,
we don't need to take all our cues from the
military industrial complex. But in the meantime, Jack, Uh, where
can people learn more about you? Uh? Your work and

(01:11:44):
your other shows. Jack doesn't just do Daily Zeitgeist. Uh,
you also have mad Boosties. Yeah. Yeah, so you can
find me on Twitter at Jack Underscore O'Brien and no
other social media's uh. And then yeah, twice to day
at the Daily Zeitgeist. And we also have, um, the

(01:12:05):
dumbest NBA podcast in America, I think is what I I.
I can't imagine a dumber one. Um. And it's Miles
and I just talking about the NBA. Uh. And somehow
you sold the actual NBA on this partnered with us.
So it's the third thing we record that day, and
we're just punchy at that point. We're just like, I

(01:12:28):
don't know, but we we love the NBA, but we
I the only thing I route against is like the
NBA media and all like the hot take a sphere
Like I I just love the players and the beauty
of the game. So it's really just an NBA appreciation podcast. Um,
and it is in partnership with the NBA. So that

(01:12:52):
was a pretty cool conversation. I gotta ask you guys.
You know how when you spend a lot of time
thinking about something, it kind of gives you a craving
like you might we might record an episode about food
conspiracies and then at the end we're thinking, um, hungry.
Do you guys feel like we have havana syndrome? How's

(01:13:13):
every you're gonna say you wanted a Cuban sandwich or something?
I am always down. I'm always down for Cuban sandwich, guys.
I've I've been thinking about this specific dish from this
Korean restaurant down the street. Hey, and I have to
go now. Thank you, Ben, You've convinced me. Get on
to it, man, you deserve it. Treat yourself. Yeah, you know,

(01:13:36):
wait what dishes it? You know what it is? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, Okay,
you gotta go, you gotta go. It's amazing. UM, And
we're very lucky to uh, we're very lucky to have
h all these cool restaurants here. But we're also very

(01:13:58):
lucky to have all these cool colleagues. Each show is
kind of like its own restaurant. Boy, I am just
trying my best with this analogy and segue, but whatever
point is. Yeah, we hope you enjoyed that conversation. It
went into a lot of places that you might not expect,
and we continue the conversation a little bit off air,

(01:14:21):
but as Jack said, you can check him out along
with his writer or diet Mr Miles Gray on the
Daily Zeitgeist. In the meantime, we need to we do.
I tried, I tried. There's some stuff he could speak
on from experience that he's still really on the fence

(01:14:42):
to about mentioning. But we'll see, we'll see. Uh. In
the meantime, we want to hear from you folks, that's right. Specifically,
you have you experienced something similar to havana syndrome? Do
you know anybody who has symptoms similar to that? If so,
were there any physical cause is found? Um? Do you
think this is all real? Do you think there is

(01:15:05):
something more to the story. We want to know and
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