Julian Dorey Podcast - 😳 #73 - Special Agent Jim DiOrio: Ex-FBI Agent / Army Ranger Talks Edward Snowden; Revisits The San Bernardino Shooter Case He Worked On; And Tells Story After Story From His Career

Episode Date: November 11, 2021

Jim DiOrio is a Former FBI Interrogation Expert, Military Veteran, Undercover Operative, and Savage. A member of West Point’s Class of 1986 (along with his roommate and former Secretary of State/Director of The CIA, Mike Pompeo), Jim served overseas as an Army Ranger in the late 80’s and early 90’s before leaving the military and joining the FBI. He went on to spend 10 years as one of the most successful undercover agents in the Bureau’s history––and another 15 as a ferocious Special Agent In-Charge and heralded FBI interrogator around the world. Basically, he was the guy who told Captain Phillips he could have his boat back.    Currently, Jim is the CEO of J3 Global, an international crisis/security firm (or as he explains it: “I’m Ray Donovan with more experience”). In his spare time, he also owns a Jersey Mike’s because why not. ***TIMESTAMPS*** 0:00 - Intro; How the Federal Prosecutor process works with new administrations 15:08 - Making cases at the FBI and politics behind it; Jim sent his former boss Jim Comey a Christmas Card (it wasn’t nice); The hilarious story behind Jim’s infamous Chris Christie Joke; 36:52 - Jim and Julian wonder if Trump is actually going to run for President again; Jim appeals to his friend and TikTok Executive, David Urban, to stop banning perfectly-harmless videos from this podcast; A Nantucket-Bound Private Jet & Container Ships; Jim loves his buddy Post Malone; Jim tells a funny story about his childhood baseball coach 58:22 - Julian questions Jim’s lifelong friend former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s stance on former NSA / CIA Whistleblower Edward Snowden; Revisiting Snowden’s background; The Yahoo Report regarding the Then-Director Pompeo and the CIA’s efforts to assassinate Wikileaks Founder, Julian Assange, while he was living in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London; Why Julian considers Snowden’s leaks about US Government Privacy Violations incredibly important; Jim talks about the importance of intent when evaluating people like Snowden; Revisiting the time the Bush White House tried to push through the illegal Stellar Wind Program while then Attorney General John Ashcroft was in the ICU 1:27:48 - Jim tells the story behind something special that happened as a result of his last podcast in here; Julian talks about the responsibility he feels with creating content from the conversations on this podcast 1:40:22 - Jim talks about a Charity he and many of his West Point Classmates Founded in honor of their fallen friend; Jim tells a story about 9/11 Firefighter’s son who left everything behind to carry on his father’s legacy 1:49:48 - Julian talks about the impact Jim had on many who heard his first podcast and reached out seeking  his life advice; Jim tells a story about an old Mafia informant of his at the FBI who actually became a friend; The one thing that Jim says he will never lose 2:03:33 - Julian talks about Charlie Jabaley’s incredible “I Am You” Theory; Jim discusses private investigations he did involving the Catholic Church and the impact that had on how he viewed religion; A story about a Korean War Chaplain whose body was just recently discovered Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

He was huge. He was huge. He was huge. I'm not saying it's a nice thing to say. No, but when he was running for governor with Kim Godano, if we saw a picture with him without Kim Godano, we wondered if he ate her. I don't mean that in a bad way.

Kim, please. I know you would never let that happen. Ultimately, so that I just saw him. I did not eat Kim. I did not eat her. I did not eat her. But I just saw him a few did not eat Kim. I did not. I did not eat her. I did not eat her, you know. But I just saw him a few weeks ago at a Rutgers football game, and he, you know, he's like, he hugged me, but he gave me the finger, you know.

So. All right. So you're somewhat cool. We're good. Yeah. He knew you were right. We're good. He knew.

And it, you know, incentivized him to lose like 13 pounds, which was great. He went from 400 to 387. It was beautiful what's cooking everybody he's back I'm joined in the bunker today by none other than my very good friend and former special agent in the FBI, Mr. Jim, special agent, Jim DiIorio. Jim was an absolute hit the first time he was here for number 48. I don't know anyone that didn't like that episode. It is, I think now it's definitely the most popular episode of all time. There are a few that are right there with it on the audio side but i think jim's is officially on the audio side the most popular and it was far and away the

most popular on youtube so for months people have asked me to bring him back and i have played it coy and said of course he's coming back but i wanted to hold it off i want to try to spread it out because it's it's pretty electric when he comes in here and i want to make sure we maximize it and take all the different things that are happening in the world and at least touch what we can of them and go through it so i actually have a little surprise for you guys i don't think i'm recording this before i put out the episode i don't think i'm going to put this in the title so this is going to be a total surprise unless I did, in which case, sorry. But Jim was actually here for almost six and a half hours.

So you're going to see we have an episode this week, but we also have an episode next week. And we weren't even done at the end. That's the amazing thing. I could talk with this guy all day because there's just so many different things to talk about in our crazy, fun, and also fucked up world that there was no way I couldn't stay in here and keep going. So I even said, maybe a little less than two hours into the podcast, I could already feel it. And I'm like, I am still deciding where I'm going to pick up the podcast. I may pick it up like 15, 20 minutes in. I might not. If I don't, you'll hear stories about like Don Pepe and some funny things like that that Jim talked about at the beginning if i don't take it off if i do you won't hear that and it'll pick up i'd forget somewhere i'll make that decision afterwards but i would say that if if you look at the time stamps i'll definitely have it clear in there started to get real maybe like 15 to 20 minutes into us talking and then we had some hilarious chris christie stories that was wild because jim used to used to work for the good old U.S. district attorney or whatever he was back then. Very interesting convo there. Love listening to

Jim's thoughts on that stuff. We later got into his buddy, Mike Pompeo, who was just the Secretary of State, as well as the head of the CIA before that, and is somebody who's being talked about as running in 2024 and seems to be preparing for doing so. I want to make a note that maybe of all of them in here that is the shining light example of why i appreciate jim so much because i know how he talks about mike i know that he goes way back with him was his roommate at west point loves the guy and you know mike is also a public figure and i tend to disagree with a lot of public figures. So there are issues I have with certain stances that Secretary Pompeo has, and unlike other people who would be in that position, Jim sat in here and had the conversation and was – I think fair would be understating it. So I I really really appreciate that We got into a lot of stuff around julian assange and snowden as it relates to pompeo That is a place where I have a major disagreement with him and some of his stances while he was in office

And so that that was a that was a really really cool part of the conversation But after that there were first of all, there's stories everywhere in this thing I think i'd lost count. I think Jim told like 100 stories in just the first part here, the first three hours. But we also talked about something really, really special that happened from the last episode we did together. There's a little bit of a second part to that. And I'm not even going to say what that was. It's like the coolest thing ever.

And it really almost had me in tears. That was pretty awesome. But Jim also walked right into a favorite topic of mine. He didn't know it, but the San Bernardino shooter. If you remember from 2015, that was – he was a terrorist who killed a bunch of people out in San Bernardino, California. And I talk about it often, not from the fact that he was a terrorist and did this, we know that part, but I talk about how Tim Cook, if you remember, refused to hand over the iPhone. The terrorist had an iPhone, it obviously had information on there, the FBI wanted it, and they got in a public disagreement where Tim said, I don't want to set that precedent. Now, if you know my position, and I'll talk all about it here and jim will talk about his my position is that that was the right decision that was protecting user privacy it sucks that he's a terrorist and you want to just give it but where does it end right

jim as it turns out was directly involved in those conversations and feels the opposite way and so i again very much appreciate it. I think we talked about that for like 25 minutes and he let me put all my points out there. He put some counterpoints out there and we find a, we found a little bit of middle ground too, which was cool, but just, just a very, very cool second act to the Jim DeOrio zone that happens here on trend to fire. There were other things. I won't mention them You guys check the timestamps enjoy the episode and I know you'll love this one. But yeah next week Also amazing shit amazing shit. I haven't even finished that edit, but there are a lot of things that We did not get to touch in the last podcast that we got into in both of these and then I also made sure

That at some point in here I won't tell you where we did go after a couple things that were left kind of unsaid, shall I say, in the last podcast that a lot of people were asking about, especially after the TikTok clips and after the YouTube episodes started to do really well. So I wanted to make sure we had a full encompassing experience. Thank you to Jim for providing it. He did not disappoint. I really, really love this guy. Go to the end of the earth for him. And I hope you guys all enjoy the special agent, our special agent, Jim DeOrio. That said, you know what it is. I'm Julian Dory, and this is Trendafire. This is one of the great questions

in our culture. Where is the news? You're giving opinions and calling them facts. You feel me? Everyone understands this but few seem to do it. If you don't like the status quo start asking questions.

And we've talked about this before and it's one thing that will bother me to my grave and that is um many times it's not it's not the processing or analysis of the information it's the decision making by those who can charge that particular violation, right? So let's think about it, right? Every four years, sometimes eight years, sometimes in the middle of those dual terms, there's a kind of a restaffing of federal prosecutors. How does this work? Can you explain this to people? So you can almost guarantee

that when a new administration comes aboard, one of two things is going to happen across the 56 districts that comprise the U.S. Attorney's offices across America, which are the federal prosecutors who move forward charges. it's truck month at gmc tackle the open road with added confidence in a 2025 sierra 1500 pro graphite at zero percent financing for up to 72 months with an available 5.3 liter v8 engine 20 inch high gloss black painted aluminum wheels off-road suspension with available two inch factory installed lift kit plus a towing capacity of up to 13 200 pounds you'll be ready for anything this truck month. Truck month is on now. Ask your GMC dealer for details. When does fast grocery delivery through Instacart matter most?

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Postal Inspectors, to, you know, every OIG, every Office of Inspector General, whether it be Health and Human Services, whether it be, you know, Housing and Human Development. It doesn't, Urban Development, doesn't really matter, but they will be responsible to make the decisions towards prosecution. If you remember my frustration with Jim Comey, you know, not taking on the fact as the FBI director what his role normally would have been as the U.S. attorney in the Ninth District of California. And you know my feelings about the Nin that each of these positions, each of these U.S. attorneys does one of two things upon a new administration. They either resign because they see the handwriting on the wall and they've got opportunities outside of public service. So they're going to go back to their law firm.

They're going to start a law firm. They're going to be gobbled up by some of the finest law firms in America. They're going to go work there because not for their legal their legal acumen most of them but for their network, right? So that's gonna either happen and you're gonna see an acting from the party in power or an acting attorney acting attorney US attorney We're an acting second one. I've had examples of guys be in acting for two three four years Before the things they have to staff and they have to get signed off like in the white house absolutely it's like a million i mean you can't even get the background checks done in a timely fashion you know i mean

can't even get the background checks done so now that's one thing that can happen the second thing that can happen is that you you now have someone that's sitting um and realizes that in fact they can't move a case even if they're gonna stay I'm gonna stay the course I'm going to be you know the US Attorney and support the District of New Jersey but shit I can't move anything up I can't be up the ladder so so what is that person really doing in order to promote justice? Nothing. And it's not that they choose to do nothing.

It's just that they have, when they go to that next level, let me talk to, you know, the attorney general or one of the deputy attorney generals in D.C. who's, you know, in charge of the terrorism division for instance he's going to say uh thanks a lot but we'll wait we'll wait until your real appointee shows up before we discuss important adult matters like that right so if you think about the frustration of a guy sitting looking at videos and saying damn that's that's got to be chargeable these cops ran this guy down or or you know uh or they didn't that was a great shoot i.ee., Columbus, Ohio, right? Greatest shoot I've ever seen in my life. I hate to say it. I hate to see people die, but great shoot, right?

So I'm looking at it and making that decision. Are you talking about the one that was in, like, April where the girl had her at knife point? What comes, the guy comes rolling at the cop. Boom. We talked about that. We did talk about that. We already covered that. Yeah, that was fucked up but my point is you know i'm i'm excited and um extremely meticulous about my viewing and my note-taking

and my understanding of the statutes with regards to what happened on that video however the frustrating part is i can bring that to a assistant United States attorney, you know, maybe late 20s, early 30s, who hasn't had as much experience as a litigator, but who is aggressive, smart, wants to move things forward, only to find that they say, Jim, I took it to, or, you know, whoever, I took it to my boss, and they just really don't see a chance to to win that case right so frustration in many ways in society right so you know the communities look at this and say what the fuck right you know what i mean like this is clear and we're you're looking at it we're looking at it i'm looking at it now as a retired guy and saying jesus so true but but that's the reality of it it's not like somebody's sitting there saying let's decline man that's nothing let's protect let's it's it's a it's a slow you know um frustratingly inherent process there's so many layers to it though too and like And like, I want to go after all the layers

today. I want to get into the agencies. I want to talk about some abuses. I want to talk about also what's, what is necessary too. I think we forget that. Like I'm going to be the first guy to sit here and talk about Edward Snowden and be very happy about, about some of the things that he put out there that we kind of wasted, by the way, america but you know i'm also then going to look at hey there's there's a necessary force that goes on here you the edge as the united states of america yeah you need to have the nsa you need to have the cia they have to be able to do some things you need to have the fbi they have to be able to do some things that's how it works it's just like i want to see more of the balance there and pull some of

the shit out of the darkness because what i'm seeing is people not that there was a fuck ton of trust just it's generally popular not trust like government officials and stuff like it's a it's always a popular thing that you're but the lack of trust now is at such an all-time high and i think like talking with someone like you who has been in the quote-unquote machine for your entire adult life you've seen it you understand what it is people are going to take what you say with some grain of salt but like one of the things they liked about you last time is you're very open about this stuff and so i'd like to be able to get there but to stay right on what you're talking about right now it's that gamification thing which i touched on a little

bit last time on something else but this is the other side of it. The other side of it is when you're talking about like the prosecutors who are their career building. It's what it is. They have to take a case that they're going to win. So who's incentivized to bring them a case that they're going to win? The FBI, whatever agency is working on it so when the fbi is making a case there is a quote-unquote incentivization for them to pick out the ones that they feel like have a higher percentage chance regardless of as the leaders of executing the law itself which the fbi is the highest police force in the country regardless of whether or not that knowledge and that principle more importantly that they have says that case a is actually a way more important case than case b they're they're supposed to pick they're supposed to pick the case based on what actually has the the the criminal element to it so i may have that was a little confusing no i understand what you're saying but like there there shouldn't be the well

we really should prosecute a but we have a better chance of prosecuting B. So we're going to take B. Without a doubt. And I had a longtime, well-respected federal prosecutor who I brought many cases to say to me one time, and it was more or less him reciting his boss's kind of credo. And it was, hey was hey look all right we we never ever ever lose 100 of the cases we don't bring and that was the philosophy right so if you are a fear of loss fear of loss and so if you are a guy that is a career prosecutor, you don't give a shit. Bring them all.

Bring them all. You know? But if you're a guy that's looking to chip away, and let's face it, many of these U.S. attorneys go on to one of two things. Hire public office or back to a pretty prestigious law firm where they attract cases from those in higher public office yes that that's the bottom line so my thought is always you know along those lines and i i would temper my presentations towards that towards okay where does this as here's the evidence one one you know two two this, here's the evidence, two separate things.

Here's the evidence, here's the case, here's the prosecutorial memo that I'm going to bring to AUSA A. Now, I would also look at what drives Assistant United States Attorney A versus what drives B, C, D, E, and F. And then I would make a decision where I was going with it. And the 9th District, that's way over here. God almighty. Yeah, I wouldn't bring anything there. I'd just bring my golf clubs. There's nothing to do out there.

So ultimately, I mean, I think that's a part of it too that you watch FBI, those shows, entertaining as hell. You watch whatever, NC hawaii or you watch you know csi las vegas they get it done quickly every they never have to deal with a prosecutor they just make their own decisions i wish and jim comey watched a lot of those shows clearly right so my thought is always that's the part that people don't understand, that we are really the professional law enforcement kind of fraternal, sorority organizations are really key on thinking about all those different things that the evidence doesn't necessarily totally support. How do I get this? If I need to make this case because it's the right thing to do. How do I get this? If I need to make this case because it's the right thing to do,

how do I get it there? How do I get it passed over the hump? Once you get it over the hump a couple times, it's like, listen, it's like the same thing I'm going through now with Jersey Mike's, right? Like once I get the first store up and running and I prove that my operations and my systems are well done, two comes quick. Three, four, and five are going to come quicker, right? It's the same thing.

Once I prove to a federal prosecutor that, listen, this is the right reason. This is the right case for the right reason, and it only benefits you. I mean, I'm a stupid career FBI agent, but you are going to be the governor, or you are going to be a presidential candidate by the way i got to tell the story can i can i tell did i tell the story about chris christie last time no i feel bold i feel in by by the way very quickly yeah to cut you off there yeah i just want to note for the record that we just compared our federal agencies in the way that prosecution in this country works to jersey mike's and i don't think that's the most reassuring thing to people out there well they make we make

a good sub but but you know what i'm saying systems are everything right so systems and thoughts and how you prove yourself to the man in this case mr cancro or mr summers or the guys that run jersey mikes as opposed you know the same guys mr you know i worked for uh you know mr christie for many years i worked for mr fishman i worked for all these u.s attorneys that were that worked right mr comey no jim comey i don't call him mr fucking but let me tell you the chris christie story because this is great so chris you love jim comey oh he's my favorite he's just a great guy he He's so upbeat and so tough. You sent him Christmas cards?

I've sent him a couple notes. I wouldn't say they're Christmas cards. Yeah, more recently than not. He'll be a character in the books you and I are going to write together, the fiction books. All right, good. Fiction only. We'll call him Shim Shmomey. There you go.

Shim Shmomey. Perfect. That's it. Perfect. The former director from the, we'll call it the 19th district out there on the West Coast circuit, whatever. So anyway, we come into my, probably my, I don't know, 20th or 25th corruption case when I was working purely corruption for a period of time in my career with the greatest partner that ever walked the face of the earth greatest greatest corruption fighter agent guy named bob cook who's now out in harrisburg pa i love him he's the best hope he's listening uh miss him whatever so cook and i get this case and it's it's a guy that was managing a utilities authority in monmouth county right so he's managing this now he can't understand even though we talked to him several times listen you understand that you are an appointed official you weren't elected but you're appointed by an elected body which means the

utilities authority is not your business you don't own it so a few times we gave him a little warning we said be careful about bartering your utilities authority you know for sewer lines in different places for builders in an area big area in monmouth county huge area and it's it's overgrown at this point you said this to the guy we said we said it to him because we we had some inkling and we were trying obviously to flip him to become a an informant because he could have really helped us out with corrupt builders which led right up to the state you think about it affordable housing is a mess in the state still right it could have straightened this all out 20 years ago right so we tell him just be careful okay he didn't he doesn't understand so he he thinks listen if i

tie in a couple more sewer lines for you you'll do a fence at my house if i give your if i give your company which paints and does stonework all the work around the utilities authority you'll do my daughter's back porch she really wants a beautiful deck well finally he gets charged so we tell him you're charged listen if you if you cooperate and you take a plea how long was it to like from conversation two months two months he was doing it two months you didn't give him too long no but but i mean he started he was doing it like the day after good right so we said actually people should be very reassured hearing that you don't waste any time no time you. You're like, here's your warning. Oh, you still want to do it?

No time. So we go to him again. Listen, you're going to get charged tomorrow. I'm going to come here with handcuffs in the morning. We're waiting. We've got a grand jury sitting waiting to indict you. However, if you decide to get it, let's get an attorney, take a plea. You're going to do no time in jail.

You're going to pay a fine, and you're going to walk on. Fuck that. I'm going to trial. Goes to jail. You're going to pay a fine, and you're going to walk on. Fuck that. I'm going to trial. Goes to trial. What happens? He gets convicted. Not only does he get convicted, he gets his son and daughter to lie on the stand. Oh, that was the guy.

Right. That was him. Oh, shit. That's Christie's 100th victory. He goes 100. No, wait. You'll love this. So Chris Christie was the guy, guy are you in that case no

no never never showed no he was eating uh that's terrible i should i mean chris i do like you i hope you don't give me the finger again the next time but so he we go anyway we're entertaining um i'm entertaining the the the young assistant u.s attorneys right after this trial they did a great job. They're great dudes. It's like seven or eight of them standing around. One woman who's fantastic, who's risen to the great level in justice. She's fantastic.

Sitting around, I'm telling them all jokes. They're laughing at every single joke. I'm like, I'm on fire, right? So Bob Cook's laughing, whatever. So I say, all right, guys, we got to go. You know, we got to get back and celebrate back in the FBI office. Listen, I got one more for you. So I'm, all right, guys, we got to go. You know, you're going to get back and celebrate back in the FBI office. Listen, I got one more for you. So I'm like, okay.

So I said, how come the New York Yankees cannot sign any more free agents? So they look at me, how come? We don't know. I said, because that fat fuck Chris Christie took all the pinstripes for his last suit. Nobody laughs. No way. I said, he's right behind me isn't he come on he was i turn around and he's there and he he he maintained his composure he said

uh head back to your office i said no problem so no cell phones right so i'm sweating it the whole way my pager is is lighting up 9-1-1 9- 9-1-1, 9-1-1, call the office, 9-1-1, 9-1-1, right? So I'm like, I'm not calling because I know who it is, right? So at the time, my boss, the position I had, but I was a young agent, you know, just cracking cases left and right, you know, cracking them, turned down a nice job with progressive insurance, which by the way, I probably should have taken because I'd be a multimillionaire because they're killing it. Stocks put like 75 times by progressive. So what happens is I get to the office and everybody's – now, we were in the Gateway Building in Newark.

So you had to walk this long place. There was Dunkin' Donuts. Everybody's looking at me like, oh, shit, like all my fellow agents. I'm like, uh-oh. All right, I know what's happening. So my boss at the time was a guy named Aaron Ford who's now in charge of PSE&G's entire security system. Great dude. Played football.

He's claimed to fame. He's played at Tennessee State with Richard Dent, who was the 1985 Super Bowl MVP. The refrigerator. No, not the fridge. No, that's Willie. He was on the other side. That was Willie. Refrigerator Perry.

William Perry or whatever. That's it. So Dent was on the opposite side of the line. He was the other defensive end. Long story short is Ford played with these guys, right? And then he played for the Packers for a couple years. So big, huge dude, great guy, great guy. So I get in and I'm walking up and my secretary says,

hey, the boss wants to see you. I said, I know. So I walk upstairs. I get the long elevator ride from 15 to 23 i get up 23 go in walk in how you doing hey louis can i see yeah yeah he's here he's waiting for you i know i walk in he's just sitting behind his desk cool as cool can be right so he looks up did you say it i said yeah of course i did boss he goes funny as shit you're suspended for two weeks so i'm like now you mean now

no no no way no i'm i'm barely making we're barely making a mortgage we have two young kids my wife's not my wife at the time is not working right so i gotta go home i gotta drive home now you don't you can't keep your gun you can't keep your credentials and you can't keep your car so i got a call from my office my ex and say can you come up and pick me up to Newark from Point Pleasant? You didn't have a car. She drives up, picks me up the whole way back. What's going to happen? I don't know.

I don't know. Now, it has always been tradition in the FBI. This was all over a Chris Christie joke. And he was just like, remember, he's got to appease the U.S. attorney or the office gets no cases prosecuted. Right. So I am a linchpin in this thing. Right. So all I'm worried about is this is a legendary story.

I'm going to be a legend. I don't care. Right. Which my ex didn't think was funny. Right. But at the same time, I am out. You know, at the time, it was probably three grand for those two weeks I was out. Right. So I get home and I'm sitting there and two days later

I get a phone call from one of my best buddies there and he's like hey You know feel really bad. Can can we grab coffee tomorrow morning? So I said yeah sure So I meet him out at local Point Pleasant, you know Dunkin Donuts and we're sitting in there and he's like I got something for you in the car, you know, so it's alright good I figured he's got like a gun with one bullet so I can end you know You know, that's the way he said it. So we walk out and he goes, here you go. And he hands me. I've been getting a bunch of messages from you guys over the past few weeks, showing me the latest athlete, celebrity, entertainer, or CEO who is now going public with the fact that they use an eight sleepleeppod pro mattress or 8sleeppod pro cover. And I love

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which is what I use. It's about half the price does all the same things comes in queen or king sizes and goes right on top of your current mattress that you have do it you'll love it code trying to fire check out hundred dollars off check it out a huge Manila envelope that we would pay public officials off with oh and he says don't don't yeah don't count it here because i don't know if what we call our soj is our our surveillance operations group and sometimes they'll put like especially those who are looking to jam people up agents up internal affairs are internal there it's called opm or opr it's called the office of professional responsibility they're looking to jam up anybody that can including the boss because if he authorizes this payment yeah right so i anyway i you know i'm like thank you

so much you know whatever he goes yeah go home and do it you know so i get my my personal car my pov i ride home and it's like christmas morning right so i open the envelope all right 17k cash best joke you ever made so i said i looked at my ex and i said i should just do this more often now if the irs is listening i did pay taxes on that right no um but long story short is that was like you know that's that's the beauty i think of the organization's appreciation for standing up for against because it brought the guy down i mean he was a totally different guy after that he was approachable he realized that we made we're the ones that made him 100 and 0 he never stepped foot in the classroom in the classroom i mean he was

he was a rather fat dude he was you he was huge it was huge he was huge at times not saying it's a nice thing to say no but when he was running for governor with uh kim godano if we saw a picture with him without kim godano we wondered if he ate her i mean i don't mean that in a bad way kim please um you know i know you would never let that happen but um you know ultimately so so that i just saw him i did not eat him i did not i did not eat her i did not eat her you know but i just saw him a few weeks ago at a ruckers football game and he get you know he's like he hugged me but he gave me the finger you know so um all right so you're so we're good yeah he knew you were right we're good he knew and it you know incentivized him to lose like like 13 pounds which was great he went from 400

to 387 it was beautiful but anyway uh i digress he's like honestly like it's a little bit sad to me though watching him because he like was trump's lackey and then jumped ship and then came back on and then jumped ship and now he's on abc and now it's like unfortunately these people who are on the right or left and just get politically opportunistic now that's just who they are and like if people are on that side it's kind of weird on the right side because like people are either like pro-trump or not trump so it's a little different but like if people are on one of the two sides they'll get with it they don't care and so it kind of pisses me off because like a guy like that to me, he's just playing the political game. And clearly he doesn't have stomach, no pun intended, for waiting around on things to play out. Like he's a quick jump ship kind of guy.

I couldn't agree more. And I had read something recently, and I kind of can't find any more information on it. But supposedly Christie and Pompeo teamed up to be like, I forget what they called it. It was like Republican Coalition for the Good or something. It was something, they were kind of teaming up together. I want to say in the last couple months, and I can't find anything else, and I'll find out a lot more about it in the next couple of weeks. I've got my 35th West Point reunion next week,

and it's kind of first time we've gone kind of off West Point's campus. So we're going actually down to Dallas, and Army is playing Air Force in a football game on Saturday the 7th at the new Arlington Texas Rangers baseball stadium. So we're excited about it. So I'll find out more. Mike's going, Ulrich's going, Brian's going, all the guys. I have it behind us too.

Do you see it? Yeah, you can look right here on the screen behind us. Right there. See it? All right. So just to give clarity on what you were talking about, the group charge, this is from the Hill, by the way. By the way, Mike's lost a ton of weight.

I saw that. He looks great. We can talk about that. The group charge with coordinating the gop's redistricting strategy which is all fucked up system so it's all mid it's all tapped they tapped former secretary of state mike pompeo right former new jersey governor chris christie as its national coach okay yeah so that's what i read yeah that could just mean that the different there's all different people are in this shit all different people on the board. So I don't know, but we'll have to find out more about that.

Yeah, I got to find out, and I should be able to find more out on that next week. So next time we can talk about it in great detail. This whole – by the way, though, I have to say, like I'm a huge fan of the electoral system because I think the electoral system planted ahead of time for groupthink and the ability for large groups of people to fall into the same type of thought right and so it has its downsides because sometimes you know you can have well it's hard to understand it is for your for your you know your average um just politically kind of with it person um it's even hard to understand you really have to be um even the delegates don't understand you know and i i've i've learned that from interviews you know talking to them but but i really would like a system that is really i guess universally easier yes for people to

understand that's all because people can't understand like oh shit he beat him in the in the popular vote but he lost the election and and that there is a very good reason for that but i would love for for a better you know maybe maybe um electoral vote for dummies i don't know dude to be clear right i am a hundred percent on your side the actual system where they put it into place is is bonkers yeah it's not good it's not great there's and people don't even know this i don't even understand it all the way there's like people who cast the actual vote that was the whole thing with like january 6th or whatever they were certifying after there was a december 4th i don't know fucking any of that no i agree that part's fucked up i'm saying the idea

itself seems good the thing that i that i have very little understanding about but that some people will raise with me and they'll ask the question that I'm like, I really should look at that more, is the whole redistricting thing. Because that's what they're talking about here. Absolutely. And I'm – the guy Dan Crenshaw down in Texas gets a lot of shit about it. Now, I think that guy is kind of cool. He's a cool dude. Yeah.

And he's a good person. He was a veteran and everything and he seems to kind of get it. He's with it a little more. He seems like a more moderate-ish Republican in some ways. I don't know. Some people might call me out for that, but he seems like a good kind of guy. That said, one of the things, and this is not his fault because he didn't do this, but his district, which I believe goes around Houston.

Have you ever seen this? No. It's like cutting a needle through a haystack. They basically drew this weird squiggly shape i want to pull it up actually dan crenshaw and i'll put it in the corner of the screen yeah it's they this has to do with like how they redistrict stuff but if you look at it it's like this weird squiggly line here it is right here look at that like how the fuck does that work he basically drew like the bottom of mexico like like around houston so that you wouldn't get like all the diaspora

that quote-unquote wouldn't vote in that direction this is the stuff that when people are saying the system is fucked up this is where i'm like they're right absolutely makes no sense but he's you know he ripped he reaped the rewards of that yeah so you know he's gonna get shit for it i don't get it so i guess that's what pompeo yeah i guess they're trying to figure it out you know and uh hopefully they do hopefully they do before he's you know makes this run i mean obviously we talked a little bit about his his weight loss and he looks fantastic and um you know i'm excited to see him next week. Yeah, I'd say he dropped 30, 40 pounds. He looks fantastic, and I would love to see him make a run.

I'll be supporting financially, and I'll hold whatever in my town to make sure that we get him as much as we can. I'm just not sure that we can raise that money. He can raise that money. That's the key. Listen, we talked about this in the past right the the separation piece is pretty easy for him right so as a west pointer we regardless of our feelings towards um authority which i am terrible at i'm not the best at but i still understand when the mission is is dictated and the objective is clear and defined and legal uh we salute and and we move forward which is what mike did you know and um and if you don't

believe that i hate to i don't want to listen i'm not even going to talk about that guy's book because it doesn't make sense but well look you know that that book we were talking about before with the transcripts with the transcripts the discussions oh the woodward book yeah yeah oh because he was in that that was the one where they got the transcripts, with the transcripts, the discussions between... Oh, the Woodward book? Yeah, yeah. Oh, because he was in that. That was the one where they got the transcripts of Trump's time in office. It's well done. You know, it's well done with regards to that. Don't listen to the narrative, but it's fantastic on the transcripts because you get access to that stuff. I kind of look at the system and I say to myself, Mike is in a position to really separate himself.

And he's doing a really good job. I was worried up front with regards to his views on religion and different things. But he's really done a fantastic job. Whoever he's got working with him are marvelous. Two things. So as a West Pointer, you could salute and say, it's my boss and I'm going to do what I'm told to do as long as it's legal. Right. Which he didn't always do. He didn't always do. The second piece is think about his international accomplishments.

It's significant. He's done a lot more than most secretaries of state have done. You know, significant travel, significant bringing people to the table and i and i was chuckling you know because i'm thinking about a quote from my old boss you know general schwartzkopf who they just published again and and it was a fantastic work for schwartz yeah years ago during the during the gulf right so during the gulf we all did you know we all did so i was on many flights with him and um you know helping out with one of his assistants you know as as an aide. But ultimately, if you think about, and his quote is pretty significant. Somebody asked him, and it kind of relates to the whole Afghanistan piece that we just kind of experienced, but somebody asked him what his feelings were

with regards to those, you know, the Republican Guard and those people and, you know, what, in fact, his judgment was against those people. And he said, quite simply, he said, listen, that is not our job. That's God's job. He goes, we are just tasked with arranging the meeting. And I thought that was terrific. And it kind of goes towards, you know, some of the things that Mike did to bring people to the table that we have not been able to bring to the table in many years. Now, keep your friends close and your enemies closer, right? We learned that at West Point. You know, truly.

You learned that at West Point or in The Godfather. The Art, well, that too. You're naming The Godfather and Sun Tzu right now. Sun Tzu. So Sun Tzu basically talks about that, right? I mean, that's kind of the first, that's the art of war. It is. You know, the known is a lot less scarier than the unknown, right?

So it's all about that. And it goes back to even my fight against, you know, both overseas and domestically with regards to terrorism, you know? And we talked about that a bunch last time, you know? My thought is always the guy, his contributions, besides being one of the smartest people I know, his contributions are being able to set an agenda and follow through on the agenda. Now, depends on who you're working for, but he wouldn't be working for anybody if he's elected and he should be elected. First thing to say here that's important or ask. I don't know if you know. Does any of it matter if Trump decides he's running? I don't think so.

I don't think so. So you think that if Trump says he's running, all these guys, including Mike, are just going to be like, okay, and they're going to let him run? No. Oh, you think they're going to challenge him? 100%. My personal thought. I don't know anything. I hope you're right about that.

You know, you got guys like DeSantis, you got guys like Pompeo, and you got women like Nikki Haley. Nikki Haley's got no shot. She says whatever she needs to do to win. She's a flip-flop flipper. But she'd be a great combatant for what is in the White House now. She's got no shot. I don't know. 0%.

I like her. I think she knows what she's doing. She says whatever the fuck she wants. Well, they all do, right? They all do to an extent. You're right. Except Trump. That's why he was hated.

And listen, I have a lot of views. I have a lot of different views on him too. I'm no fan. I'm no fan. But at the same time, I think he loves America. I'll agree. But is he crazy? Absolutely 100% fucking crazy.

And you had close friends. You had Pompeo. He's nuts. Who was – you had the defense – Mark Esper. Yeah, that's right. You know, Oleg Brekbul, Brian Bilitao, you know, guys up and down the administration. Dave Urban.

Dave Urban, who's credited with putting Trump in the White House, winning Pennsylvania. A dear friend. All serving on the Johnny Mac Soldier's Fund board together. So Urban now, we know what Urban's doing now. I was going to say, that's our boy TikTok. Mr. Urban is a big-time

C-sweeter at TikTok. Please leave this podcast alone. Thank you. That's a public service announcement from Jim DiIorio. That was a public service announcement. Dave, thank you. Dave, do it. So we've talked before. Bottom line is I think that I would be extremely excited about the next 15 years for my grandchildren should Mike have a legitimate chance. I have some views with regards to other things that I'm just really nervous.

Knowing what I know and what I've done in the past, I'm kind of nervous about where we're headed. It makes me nervous, you know, and it shows right up in our day-to-day lives. You know, it does. I'm not saying it's anybody's fault, but it's just the way it is. What kinds of things?

So figure it out. I mean, shit, like unemployment, you know, I you know i mean stuff cost of goods not being able to because that's that's third world country problems it's not america it's not american problems it's never been it is i mean you know i know we're joking around but going back to the jersey mike's thing like i had to make my son did a great job making a concerted effort to keep employees. They're high school kids right from this area, some of the best kids I've ever met. And he established a team in order to keep, there's restaurants right next to us in the same strip mall that can't keep an employee. Yeah, they can't, they don't have an incentive to hire them. No incentive, except, you know, team, culture, how you move things forward.

It's the same piece that's out there. You know, let's think about these container ships that are sitting off coasts. It's real. It's real. I had a woman, a good friend yesterday. She flies, you know, rich people problems, right? But she flies back and forth to Nantucket with her private pilot, right? But I like her.

I like her, right? I mean, I think she's funny as hell and um she said look my biggest concern you know from her in in her jet you know sipping on her champagne um with her starbucks is that in fact uh she could see you know 15 or 20 container ships outside of port you know north can you explain how this is happening and what like what that's caused by and why so the joke is the joke is the suez canal right you can go back to the suez but but it's that's just a what that's caused by and why so the joke is the joke is the suez canal right you can go back to the suez but but it's that's just a joke that's just what wait what is that joke you know remember when the suez canal was kind of blocked off and everybody's oh suez canal we

can't get this we can't get that bs right but it's at every level it's at every single level of your life there's an issue us right take it take it at the the ground the grassroots level of uh food service our produce just our lettuce tomatoes and onions have doubled in the last month the price it's called i mean it's not just the supply chain it is partially the supply chain no no doubt it's definitely part you you know, the gas prices, the unemployment, the, you know, the infrastructure bills and the unemployment bills that were put into place in order to rebuild and do whatever. Just never works. History says that stuff doesn't work. Right?

So we are now suffering in every which way. I mean, college costs are significantly different in the last three months. I only know because I'm dealing with a senior everything is everything's crazy right so no there's no i don't blame anybody but we need to do something about it we need somebody that's going to address it and i just don't know if there's if that person exists but if anybody can do it i have full faith in my body so here's here there's a lot to pick off here. And I want to make sure we get to several different things in here. Because, yeah, like this is... Post Malone.

I just saw him. Love that guy. You just saw him again? I just saw him right there. Oh, on here. Yeah. Love him. Yeah.

Post the best. Smartest. He should be president. He's the smartest guy I know. Honestly, like he's... Smart dude. I'm not going to go there. But he's like very people

don't know a lot about how he thinks about stuff he's very historically aware incredibly historically smart dude um greatest guy i worked for yet to date yeah i loved i loved when i heard big fan because i i remember that conversation where you were going to do that like that weekend and there were a few different guys there and you were like like, I got this fucking Post Malone. And I'm like, I'm thinking to myself, I'm like, all right, here's Jim, Mr. West Point, FBI, cleaned up at every level. We got Post Malone, tattoos all over his body, Bud Light and cigarette. I know what he's going to be thinking, but I'm a huge fan. I think he's really cool.

And I was like, Jim, just give him a chance. And you're like, okay. And you did. And then you're like, oh, he's fucking awesome. Greatest guy. Greatest guy. That's amazing. Greatest guy.

Like, that is the best compliment. He can, like, you and him running to each other in an airport. Smart dude. You're not saying anything to him at first. You know what I mean? I'm actually probably running him. Yeah. You're probably running his name.

Probably doing a little Irish scan for for my old agency my old agency but anyway back back to pompeo because i don't want to get off this yeah so a few different things number one on the trump thing i hope you're right about that i think that we would be much better off if if trump just called it a day i think he's being convinced that it doesn't make sense let's put it on to run he keeps on saying he's gonna run course. He keeps on saying everything. He's started truth Yeah, I mean, please I look I hope you're right I just don't I try to read the tea leaves here and his biggest downfall is his ego and his ego is he's doing all These fucking rallies. He's talking all these people

he's playing off all the points that people love him for like his base quote unquote and he's going around and branding himself which is what he does so of course people who hate him are going to continue hating him yeah but there are also a lot of people in this country and i'm sensing this wave that they're just so pissed off about how things are going now and i see it among like a lot of my liberal friends where they're gonna vote for anyone on the other side i think including him if this shit continues the way it is with society like you pointed out all these problems but just think about regular interpersonal society and what they're still trying to shove down our throats with dr anthony fuck brains over there and all this shit.

I really hate that guy. I can't fucking stand him. Listen, there's a case for treason, but we'll leave it at that. Dude, did you see what he did to those dogs? What he funded to do to those dogs? Yeah, there's a case for treason. If anyone defends him at this point, you're a fucking moron. There's a case for treason.

But anyway. We'll save that for another day. I purposely don't talk about him on this podcast because I dislike. It's not healthy. And I don't want those vibes out there. But anyway, we'll leave that there. You look at all this stuff and there are a lot of people who they're feeling desperate. And the bills are piling up and money is not worth much.

And we still have a long way to go. But I am really starting to look at this and going, holy shit, could we see a fucking 12-year run of this where it's just like we get four more and he's in office and we got to deal with that every day. I think that would be very bad for our country. Regardless of people listening, regardless of your political beliefs, I'm not saying that Biden's good. It has not been great.

It really hasn't. It wasn't, first few months, it like wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. And then it just took a dump after Afghanistan. But like, I just don't like, if you're going to run someone else, if you're a Republican, run somebody else. Right. Because, and that's wishful thinking on my part, I think, because I don't think that's going to happen. I think he's going to be the guy to do it. Well, listen, I respect your opinion on that, but I don't think so.

Hope you're right. I don't think so. And I think you're right. I mean, I think you hit a great point with regards to how people are feeling. Bills are piling up. There's distractions all over the place. It's not the America that we all have become used to. And in spite of the fact that we became used to it, we still had reasonable complaints and disagreements, and it was all good. Now we're at the point where we're almost forced to live a different life because we just can't feel good day to day about what's going on and things that are happening.

So, you know, I encourage, like, I try, and I'm not the best at it, but I try to stay, you know, active and clear-headed, and it kind of helps, you know, it kind of definitely helps with regards to being open to more things. It doesn't make you a different person. It doesn't make you, you know, disloyal to your upbringing, your culture, your society, your economic status. It doesn't make you disloyal to that. What it does is it allows you to be dragged out of bed in the morning. And I think what's happening, and look, we see, and mental illness affects all of us right we know somebody we we've dealt with somebody we've been around somebody we've we've loved somebody who

suffered maybe more than one yes but at the same time it's kind of like my dad said something to me when i was a when i was a cadet at west point i was a freshman at west point and it was hard it was just hard not and that's a different, that's a different generation. Like nowadays, I don't know how these young people do what, I'd never get into West Point now. I don't know how they do what they do, but they continue to do it. But my dad said something that really stuck with me and it works like a charm and I use it to this day. He said, when you're suffering the most and when you feel like there's really not much more you can do to get yourself out of a feeling, whether it be, man, this is disappointing,

whether it be I failed this test, whether it be I can't get a job, whether it be I'm not happy with what I'm doing. He said, get your ass up and go help somebody else. It doesn't have to be a big thing. Get up and go help somebody else. And that could just be a phone call. A perfect example is today. I haven't talked to a guy, and we were talking about this a little bit before. I haven't talked to a childhood friend in probably 40 years, probably 40 years. And I just found out through a mutual friend that his dad passed away. And his dad was my first little league baseball coach, a really impactful guy in my life, larger than life guy. And I just picked up the phone and I called this guy and he said to me, you know what?

I was not going to pick up the call because I don't recognize if I don't recognize the number, don't pick it up. He's a wealth management wealth management guy right and we started talking about his dad and we were laughing and he said Jimmy I'm gonna use that story that you just told me about my dad in in the eulogy tomorrow what story so this is great you'll you'll love this and this this kind of oh you told you called him and told him a story I told him a story so this kind of personifies like this guy, right? So a typical great jersey, you know, larger-than-life figure, Paisan, right? So I'm pitching. I'm terrible, right?

It's funny that I went on to play baseball at West Point, but I was terrible at the time as a pitcher. I just wanted to play third base and hit. That's it. This high school? This is 9- and 10-year-old baseball. Anyway, I get the ticket.

Mr. Papa says, you're pitching today. I'm pitching today. Mr. Papa, I don't know. Get out there and pitch. Go out and pitch. So I get out there in the first inning. I throw a couple of strikes and I get a couple kids out. I have a good first inning. Second i come back out i walk two kids and the best hitter in town is coming up to the plate so mr papa strolls i caused the time time out time out you know he comes walking as you walk like this walk around hey don't you know whatever it comes out there hey

listen kid what do you think we should throw this guy you know so i said well i've i'd throw him the fastball kid we don't throw him the fastball he said we throw him the curveball from the curveball all right so i just okay yeah i'll throw him the curveball jesus christ i throw a fastball right down middle it's at about seven miles right so we go down you know we're down three nothing right out of the box so we get out of the inning or it's the way i come back and i goes what did i tell you i said well you said to throw him the curveball he said well why didn't you do that i said because i don't know how to throw a curveball and so he said to me next time x so i said okay so i told my buddy that story

today it's great so i told my buddy that story today. The X is phenomenal. It's great. So I told my buddy that today, and it brightened his day. But for me, I was kind of having a, well, I've got to find this next location for Jersey Mime. I'm running around. And that centered me. Help out somebody.

And it was nothing more than telling this guy a story that he didn't know about his dad as his 81 year old father passed and lived a great life and passed and i just i winked up at my dad who i know is in heaven and i said it still works it still works pop thank you you know and that i think that's one thing we can however we do that whether it be encouraging somebody that needs that encouragement or being kind to somebody or holding a fucking door, you know, or giving them, listening to a story that you really don't feel like listening to. You know, like I had a vet walk into the store today, a Vietnam vet. And, you know, the kids are like, oh, this guy talks for, you know, telling me, oh, Mr. D, you got caught. You know, Big Jim, you got caught.

He's a guy's going to talk for, well, I tell you, the guy talked for an hour. It was probably, I relate to it because what he was telling me about, you know, the fact that he fired in Vietnam, fired 155 howitzers and 105 howitzers, that was all me. I remember that stuff. So he just, it was beautiful. And at the end of it, you know, he had his sub. He had his giant sub he was carrying out. And I said, you know, you and the wife are going to eat well tonight. He said, no, this is two nights of dinner.

So I knew right away. So I said, when did she pass? Tell me her name. Talk to me about her. He told some stories. And then he told a couple more stories about growing up in Jersey City and, you know, being around during the 67 riots and all those things that brought back for me something that I was in the circle of, you know. And the kids afterwards said, wow, you were laughing and he was laughing.

Because you related. I related. And I think, like, not to take any credit at all for me, but it continues to be that cycle. And the kids watch. And one of the boys, Washington Township local kid, just graduated last year. He's going to Rowan. He looked at me. I said, Mr. Day, I'm going to do that next time.

I'm going to talk to a guy. Yeah, you should. It's a good feeling. And I think that we don't have enough of that right now and what's going on. We're all worried about Biden's doing this and she's doing that and this guy's gonna run it and that's important stuff we need to talk about that because it's critical but at the same time let's not forget about the things we can do to help each other out you know i vaguely know how we got there but i don't fully know tell me i'm interested no i i like when this kind of happens because stuff like that was a great story to tell those

two to put it in perspective a bit and i understand what you're saying because at a however we got there at a high level it does tie into you know prime example somebody who was in vietnam yes you personally relate but i mean there's probably a few interesting stories in there but like the 18 year old kids 17 year old kids working for you they're not trained to think like that right now there's there's very little and i don't think it's their fault because i can't imagine being a kid while this era has happened right here but there's very little mental preparation for the world and people and how things connect and stuff like that and I don't want to go totally off down a tangent but when we're talking about politicians period it usually especially with me

it starts with just a ton of like side swiping them and and talking about how shitty they all are and everything I do understand it's an important conversation to have so we have it on here but you know talking about you're a boy pompeo look there there are going to be people who say the obvious and this is fine by the way there's nothing wrong with this like people that call this kind of shit out are stupid where they're like okay well it's your buddy your roommates with them your best friends with them of course that's who you're gonna back like fuck you you can't understand that we'll still talk about it in the open because obviously like i've been open about the fact that i don't have a political home here i have a ton of issues with with the two sides here i think right now you know we have the presidency in office what we're seeing kind of

speaks for itself i can make the case there as to why there's been a lot of issues i also don't think it was right to run him i don't think he wants to be there. I think he's old I think it's unfair Whatever when I look at the other side, I hope you're right that it's not Trump who comes up But I don't love the options there and like with Pompeo I want to be very nuanced and how I say this and this is very very important We're now at a point where people make assumptions on everyone, including military members, who may or may not get into politics but at least talk about it somewhere. But then maybe they run and stuff like that, and people are like – people who are on the left will now rip them because they're like, oh, they're in the military.

They must be conservative. And that's not a – there's not a lot of people doing that but I see some of that and it's like that that's not fair I try to separate the two things I try to respect what they what they've done and you know Giving your life to the country and everything. I'm very high regard for that provided you do it in in the right ways And then I also try to separate that from what they want to do to use that platform. And so like with mike pompeo There are a few things that i think i empathize with his position but i firmly disagree and i'd like to explain this i want to get the full context so that you can have everything to pick off the bone and it's not

just like i'm i'm around here one of the first things that comes to mind is the guy on my mug here edward snowden i think that we totally missed the boat there with what he tried to do i think that his story is so difficult to imagine yourself in that position but the very cliff notes version of it is this guy had everything to lose he had been in the agencies he had a cushy job with the NSA in Hawaii he was about to marry the love of his life living in fucking Hawaii he had everything to lose and he chose to do this and and ruin his life in a lot of ways he's fucking living I mean that there's no one who's got more free time than that guy living in his in his place in Russia and by the way like rips the russian government living in russia you want to talk about a guy puts money

where his mouth is like that's like biting the fan that the hand it feeds you but whatever you know i guess putin's like putting up with it anyway i understand where a guy like mike pompeo comes from because he's not just military he's west point and one of there's a lot of important things respect diligence all that's all that stuff but when when you look at the military if i think if there's one thing that is the most important part of it is the chain of command because it comes down to organization and keeping the objective on task. And as the military, it's a life or death kind of thing. Now, I don't know if like you may find some other things because you were in it. But from the outside, at the very least, that's one of the most important.

I agree. It's a systems piece. Okay. Yep. So with Edward Snowden, I also have a great appreciation for Slippery Slopes. And so does he. And that's why it took him a while to even go do this and that's why he did it carefully because no matter what he did it was a slippery slope

he had tried to raise the issue and people were poo-pooing him and it was at a point where now and we could talk about the whole like government forces and shit but he was gonna get you weren't gonna see him again if he kept pushing it but the contrary point was that if he wasn't going to push it internally he'd have to push it externally and so what is he doing when he does that he's breaking the chain of command he's releasing material information that he did sign a page before his career to say he wasn't going to do this and there was a risk to it and so there are things that could be charged to him now it's worth noting not a single person died as a result of his leaks because he did it

so fucking carefully however despite that slippery slope i think he made the right decision because i know he made the right that's my opinion people can disagree but he went out there and he was like all these things have now happened for 10 11 years post 9 11 and no one's raising the issue and it's getting worse this is what happens when a big group a powerful group the government in this case in the know people who are unelected often behind the scenes actually executing this stuff this is what happens when you let it go so he revealed stellar wind he revealed that the government was essentially spying on its citizens now right away there are people who are like i don't fucking care if the

government looks at what i have to do i have nothing to hide sure what about the slippery slope of that though what about when the government has so much power that they can now in a coronavirus period hold you in your home because they know you're not there and it's it that's actually easy to spot because the iphones once we got that you can spot that kind of shit but think about how much farther they can take that they can watch you in your home through a fucking camera they could do this back then when he was releasing this they've been doing it for years and so this guy comes out and tries to say it and mike pompeo whose life is about chain of command respect order you know as i haven't seen him change his opinion publicly,

I'd be open if he did, but he talked about he wanted this guy executed. And to me, I'm like, okay, I empathize with where you're coming from, high-ranking military guy, West Point. Think about this a little bit. Think about what you're saying. You are essentially saying that if the if the

government's doing it and mind you this is a republican who's all about smaller government and less power to the dark forces well you're you're promoting it when you say something like that this is a hypocritical stance to me and so i bring all this up because now there's more attention to it again because of a report that came out with yahoo i have it behind us, but you and I talked about it. I just want to give a little background so people understand. This was end of September, and the title was the CIA pitched Trump officials' plans to assassinate Julian Assange, who is the head of WikiLeaks, is the head of WikiLeaks, while he was hiding in a London embassy in 2017, according to this long report. It's like 3,000 words, 2,000 words. Go read it. It's very interesting interesting i have mixed emotions on it but it's significant because mike pompeo who

was the secretary of state this is back in the early part of the trump presidency when he was the head of the cia and so what i see here like julian assange another guy you want to talk about free speech open media something again the right side stands for right now it's like their free speech movement this is the guy doing it and he's in a london he's in a he is in an ally country in a protected embassy and the report is they were talking about going in there and assassinating him now let me be fair and say pompeo did respond and to be clear he said the wikileaks report sources for the yahoo news wikileaks report should all be prosecuted i did he deny it hold on was based on interviews before uh i can't say much about this other than

whoever those 30 people who allegedly spoke to one of those reporters, they should all be prosecuted for speaking about classified activity inside the Central Intelligence Agency. Okay, so he says – and then he goes on to say when bad guys steal those secrets, we have a responsibility to go after them to prevent that from happening. We absolutely have a responsibility to respond. We desperately wanted to hold accountable those individuals that have violated U.S. law, that have violated requirements to protect information and tried to steal it. There's a deep legal framework to that, and we took actions consistent with U.S. law to try to achieve that. To be clear, I disagree with that statement. Wikileaks was a source that people could provide them information, and then they are a media source that is free to share it. Same way that back in like the Bush days and then i'm sure in the obama days but they don't

talk about that in the media there were stories that like the new york times and stuff would have and they would call up the white house and say yo should we run this and be like no hold off on that we could have avoided fucking iraq if they had just run these fucking stories you know so like when i see this stuff i have an issue with it because I'm like, this is a small government Republican advocating for big government realization on situations that he thinks the little people shouldn't have to understand. Now, do I understand that there is classified intelligence that the general public should not have? Abso-fucking-lutely, man. I'm not one of these libertarians. National security.

Yeah, no government. Fuck that. Where I have an issue is when you start to then call someone like Julian Assange, who he should say thank you for even being in office because of that guy's leaks. When you start calling that out and start trying to say this guy is violating U.S. laws when he's just releasing things that if you want to say someone's violating it, say Chelsea Manning's violating, you know, say the people who are giving it to him are violating it. And I see that track record. I see what he said about Snowden. And it's like,

I don't like that. I get it. I understand his background, but my job is not to be like, Hey, because I understand your background, I'm going to totally agree with what you do because you have the credibility to do that.

I still want to be able to say, Hey, you're really locked in the military mindset. I get it. There's a part of that that there's a balance, needs to be there. But like there's nuance to this. And now even federal courts have gone on to say that what Edward Snowden did was righteous. He's been proven in court, which sometimes you can take that as you want. But still. Anyway, I wanted to get that all out there because that is where a big root of my issues would is is to think about the separation of of the, you know, the free speech piece, which everyone's entitled to. But also and I think that's maybe where it should have gone. I think the difference between the right to free speech versus that government

employee who signs off and who has that top secret or even that compartmentalized security clearance that says quite clearly, because I lived with it, you know, so it says quite clearly, like, you will not X, Y, and Z. Should you do that, will you be prosecuted yes maybe maybe you know right actually let me speak in defense of that yeah that's what it says well what will yes it does say you will be prosecuted however will you lose your pension definitely no no no you know who has his pension robert hansen come on no he doesn't his wife collects his pension no he doesn't same pension i get no he doesn't yes tell people who robert yes He's probably the most... Did you know him, by the way?

I did not. I did not know him. I probably ran across him. I had to have run across him, but I did not know him until it became the issue it was. I think he was a New York agent, hated it there. The whole story is he didn't want to be transferred to New York because he felt he couldn't make a living and couldn't support his family the way he wanted to. He's a Midwest guy, I believe. And ultimately, he rose in the level and through, like, our counterterrorism,

counterintelligence divisions and, you know, fought this New York thing tooth and nail. And his justification was, well, you're not going to pay me enough fucking money. I'll spy because they are paying me money. He spied for the Russians. Yep. And that was a movie. It was called Breach a movie yeah i think it was called breach yeah about the the um you know the support person who brought him down which i don't know i i don't know if that's accurate but it was pretty good you know it's pretty well done so so my my thought is yes i mean it's the same process right

so when we go through our admin function um and what i mean by that is when we go through hey an allegation is made against julian that says in fact he provided information to someone who simply wrote about it and provided factual information right um we now have to do an internal which we, and determine what your intent was. Yes. It's all about intent, right? And that goes back for me and Mike Pompeo to our honor code at West Point. A cadet will not lie, cheat, or steal.

Here's the difference between Air Forces, Naval Academy, anybody else. Nor tolerate those who do that's the difference so why is he coming out so here's here's part of it right so here's the other part of it intent spirit of the code those things that was ingrained in us through examples through living the life of it and i can tell you a story about a classmate, a bunch of classmates as freshmen at West Point sitting around after first semester and discussing GPAs. And it was very open there because you could say what you wanted to say or make believe that you did better or worse than you did. Ultimately, it was posted. They don't do that anymore because they send it to your computer it's posted in what we call our sally port area where you come out for parades that are kind of

the circular you know tunnels that the barracks sit above and it would be posted diorio calculus 101 a minus you know and all your grades for your tests and your quizzes and your class participation damn right so there was no hiding from it we'll take it we go past first semester there's probably You know, and all your grades for your tests and your quizzes and your class participation. Damn. Right? So there was no hiding from it. We'll take it. We go past first semester. There's probably 10 or 15 of us, all of my best buddies now, sitting around in a room. And we go around.

Hey, what'd you, Diorio, what'd you get, you know, this semester? Oh, I got a 2.6. Okay. What'd you get? Oh, I got a 2.8. Right? So it goes around to everybody. And everybody's between. And the funniest thing is kind of like the number 10 15 in your class is probably like a

three two right because it's so difficult yeah wow and now it's more of the entitled generation so they want to see the 4.33 so like everybody gets it because you know you get a trophy for being seventh place anyway um so not true i don. I don't disagree with you at all. So take it, it goes around the room, and it gets to the last guy, and I can remember this, and the last guy was a 4-0, right? But he says 2-9. And why does he say that?

And to this day, we know why. He's turned in. So he gets a note from the honor board and remember no computers no emails he gets a written note on his door right you got an honor board which means you go up in front of investigators basically who are cadets that determine what your intent not what you lied about or not that you lied. What was your intent? Wait. Listen, so I'm going to run it out, right?

When they asked him, cadet so-and-so, you lied about your GPA. Oh, okay. You were a 4.0, but you said you were a 2.9. Why? Because I didn't want everybody else to think I was a fucking dick. I didn't want to be a curve dick, which we used to call at West Point. I didn't want to be better than anybody else in that room, because they're my brothers, and we're going to go fight in combat together.

Right? So if you think about what Pompeo may have lost along the way, because of a couple of different reasons and mike is one of the funniest guys i know one of the kindest guys i know what can be lost and i will tell you that i had to remind myself often as the head of the fbi in you know in an office to say what was the what was that guy's intent like what did he intend to do by doing what he did and i always came to a better conclusion we might not be remembering that as much right and and i understand why because it's it is the most it is the most competitive kind of organ not organization that's a bad word

such a competitive aura and atmosphere to where these guys they are they're controlling the world they're controlling the world their words control the world so i think that's a that's my i'm defending him you know clearly i'm defending because he's my pal and And we are – we bled together. We're going to die together. But at the same time, I think we need to think about what was Snowden's intent? What was – I think that's a closed case.

I think if they were thinking about that, he wouldn't be saying that. I don't disagree. I don't disagree. What I think is where we do have the ability to go back, and if I were to do the investigation... Hey guys, real quick. I totally forgot to say this in the intro, so I got to make sure I hit it because I got to grow the podcast here after all. But if you're on YouTube, please make sure you hit that subscribe button if you haven't already. Hit the like button on the video as well.

And thank you, as always, for checking out the channel. If you are listening on Apple or Spotify, thank you for checking out the show there. If you haven't already, hit that subscribe button on Apple. Hit that follow button on Spotify. And I look forward to seeing you guys again for future episodes. Now, back to Jim. If I were to be the guy guy and I've done it before, I would want to go to those 30, 40, 50, 80, a hundred more than that. Cause if 30 are reported 500 fucking did it right. I would want

to go back and say, what the fuck were you thinking? And I'm going to guarantee a 95% of them saying, well, I thought it would make me important. Make me feel, you know, make, make me the man. Cause I've never been the man i sit in this little desk and i nobody tells me that i did a good job and and listen woe is me right and all that bullshit but that's really the case i mean i had intelligence analysts that just needed stroking they were great the reporting and the intel reports that they provided nobody ever said holy shit this is amazing. Except me. You know what?

That I know of. I'll play right in. I don't agree for this case. I don't think that's at all what it was. Let's even say it was, though. You're talking about WikiLeaks or Snowden? No, not even there. I'm on Snowden right now.

We'll get back to WikiLeaks because that report is interesting but the intent there even if there was like let's say he was like why the fuck am i only on this desk right here like the intent still was to reveal what was happening that was it's been proven was illegal by the way i have to do this i'm sorry i gotta do this your good friend jim comey is actually do you know that story come yeah okay yeah so he's one compliment i'll give him i don't know if i have to tell that real quick for people to know the story but in 2003 or 2004 john ashcroft was the attorney general yes and dick cheney yes had been pushing through all these archaic laws after the patriot act that were illegal and the way it worked was the

president had been given executive power the office of the president to instill certain initiatives after 9-11 that he could do however for the legal defense for the future which is always a bad sign if you need that like, you wanted to get the attorney general's office to sign off on it and say, we approve that the president is going to do this before he did it. So Stellar Wind, which Snowden later exposed, this is back in 03-04, Stellar Wind was coming due for its yearly signing. And so the Justice Department had been reviewing it, and they had determined that this is fucking illegal. We cannot sign off on this. So John Ashcroft, unrelated, healthy guy, got like – I remember.

He's laying in the hospital. Yeah. He got like pancreatic – like his pancreas. Yeah, pancreatitis. Something exploded. Yeah, autoimmune pancreatitis. Yeah. Like his life is actually in danger.

I remember. It's coming up on midnight. Dick Cheney – notice I'm saying Dick Cheney instead of George Bush, sends the guy who later became the AG, the Latino guy, I forget his name. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I can see his face. Oh, my God. And then Andy Card, who was the- Yeah, who was that guy?

Well, I'll pull it up in a minute. Yeah. Andy Card, who was the chief of staff at the time. He sends them to the fucking hospital, to the ICU. I remember. And they're holding this page in front of is there right in front of ashcroft jim you can't make this shit up jim comey and mueller miller whatever the guy the the report guy yeah jay miller yeah who was the head of the fbi at the time john miller

john miller abc's no no no no no i'm talking about mueller fucking um oh robert yeah yeah yeah yeah sorry i thought you meant i always say no there is a john miller who was i pronounce his name all right i'm sorry yeah it's it's i always because i would always read it and say muller right and then they'd say it the other way yeah it would never go in one ear out boring dude but anyway he shows up with comey and they look at john ashcroft who's on the. You got the White House on the other side, and they're like, John, you don't have to sign this. We know you don't agree with it, but do what you want to do.

And he's like, I'm not fucking signing it. Of course, the White House- I do remember that. They still signed off on it. But that was the one time they went to block it. So Snowden, I want to make sure I remember how we got there. But Snowden was- Well, his intent.

His intent was that that story was 2003. He was leaking – or 2004. He was leaking in 2013. His intent was the fact that those things, even after that, all those years later, have been allowed to grow to such an extent that it's like we're violating every constitutional principle. And mind you, mind you, this was a guy. He was like kind of conservative then bush came in bush blue pilled him he's like oh my god maybe obama will save this obama for whatever reason you know there's a lot of different things you can guess there he just kind of keeps

it going yeah so now he's like yo fuck all these people yeah he's got no allegiances and he's like no we're not doing this so he also goes goes to the best reporters in the world to do this. Like goes to the best people in the world. Like people who to this day – like Poitras, she didn't like the NSA. There was a little bit of bias there. I'll give that. But like why the fuck am I – Glenn Greenwald. Sorry, I almost forgot his name.

Glenn Greenwald, who's like a savage to this day. Just – I mean no allegiances whatsoever. Just reports the fucking news. Got kicked out of his own company because he wants to report the news. He goes, he protects all this stuff, and they release it correctly. No one dies, as I said earlier. And it's like, well, think about the intent there. If the guy wanted to inflict damage, you're dropping bodies.

You're putting it out. You're not meeting people in hong kong to putting this shit out you're fucking feeding it to them you're going to wiki leaks that's what you're doing like wiki leaks is just going to take it and put it out they're a media source in that way that's what a media source is going to do this guy this guy he he fucking protected everything and and there's going to be people people that point out like well he got on a plane with it or whatever look there's an element of risk but to me like i understand the scary part now is someone else can use the precedent and say well snowden did it and they can do it for something a lot less that's scary that's not good i don't want i don't want to see people from the cia coming on tv

and talking about basic intelligence right that the cia does that's a problem yeah no i couldn't agree more if they want to talk about like them and other agencies like technologically meddling with with each other and expose that oh okay i could see that but like there's still an element where it's like all right where does there have to be evil matching evil? I get that. When it goes to affect every single person for no reason other than fear-mongering and a controlled state, that's where I draw the line. And so that's why like I'm okay with it. And like for someone like Pompeo who is – he's a Midwestern conservative kind of guy.

I'm going to have a lot of disagreements with him. But like I know personally from you, you've known him your whole life, he's – I trust your opinion. Very much so. You tell me like it is with people. So I like that he seems like a nice guy. I just – I can't let something like that go because to me, I reward people for also shifting on opinions provided it's not for political bullshit. And being like okay well wait a second let's consider this and i would hope that he hears something about like

that intent board and be like okay well what was the guy's intent well that's the key man i gotta tell you you know i appreciate everything you're talking about because i think that simplifies a lot of things thinking about intent what's the what is the value to not value because that's a terrible word but what is the intent? What do I mean to be, by doing this, what's my thought? Is it about me or is it about something bigger than myself? Right? And in this case, it clearly is.

So you've got to look at it from both sides. You know, what is the politician? What is the director? You know, down the line, when I was in a position of authority in a government agency, I often thought about, well, why am I doing this? Like, all right, somebody's bringing this to me. And there were times where I'd be like, you know what, I can dig the shit out of somebody

with this information. Like I can really make somebody look like an ass. And you know my distaste for Jacoby and now fucking Andy McCabe lying again, but whatever, it is what it is, right? At the end of the day, my thought is always. You kind of liked him too. I do like Andy, but he did it again.

But anyway, you can't lie. You know, you just can't. There's no time for it. There's no place for it. But my thought, again, my thought is I would always ground myself back to why am I, why is this upsetting me? And you know what it always came back to why am I, why is this upsetting me? And you know what it always came back to? It always came back to there was some type of negative core belief in me that made me feel like I wasn't deserving or wasn't good enough to be in this position. So I'm going to show you that

I got the fucking power, but I never did that. Honestly, I never did it. I always looked and said, man, this is just me digging at myself. Let's figure out why this is important. And I think that is a critical piece, and we are missing that. And I believe as you advance into levels like directorships or secretary positions, you become more susceptible to thinking, well, man, maybe I ain't. And I'm not saying this about anybody in particular.

Maybe I am really great. Yes. No, that's an important thing for you to say. But you're not. At the end of the day, if you are a true patriot, you have plenty of the day if you are a true patriot plenty of them on both sides of the aisle plenty of them right be that be that guy you know i can remember we talked about this last time remember a mobster looking at me and saying i respect you because you do your job and you know if you're going to be a bear be be a fucking grizzly. Right. And that is the same kind of piece that I feel people in those, you know, the rest of us that are lay people that are out here doing their thing.

Yeah, you think about a lot about, you know, how does this benefit my legacy and my legacy being children or family or things that are important or safety, right? Just safety and health. But at the same time you still have the thought why am i doing you know wait a minute is this something trying to prove something more than i really need to prove like people already think i'm you know not think but people buy in you know um you know it goes back to Sheila's deceased husband, right? Jimmy Martello. This guy's credo was very simple. You know, very, very, very. If it needs to be done, do it.

If it needs to be given, give it. If it needs to be loved, love it. Period. There's no, nowhere in there is there. Because if you do it, people will say, fuck that. You know, it's that simple. So I think it's the same you know and listen we're really we're going 40 000 feet on this thing yeah no this is interesting but at

the end of the day like that's my thought and i want to i i got to tell a story because we talked about this last time you know we talked about chris morgan right and cj morgan the young cadet who was killed in an accident right and i got to tell you, we've talked about this off, but I'm going to talk about it now. What you did for that family by doing what you did and putting together the clip with regards to C.J. And we talked about this, but I get a call shortly after. Can you tell people what that was? Yeah, so C.J. Morgan's the young man who was killed in a rollover car accident at West Point. Like we talked about before, just sitting in the wrong seat, period.

So Chris and April, who have three other kids, lose their oldest son. He's killed. He was a senior, right? He was a senior at West Point. The world in front of him, great wrestler, Chicago-born, West Orange-raised, African-American male, one of the kindest people because the family is tremendous. What they do and how they do it today, still today, having lost – he buried his son, right? His dad's in the Secret Service. His dad is retired, Secret Service, right?

So anyway, I don't know any of this. When we talk about that, it's just an emotional time because you and I, you know, we relate to those sacrifices, you know, and ultimately we let it go and you release this thing. You didn't have any timeline. The short TikTok, 30 seconds, right? And we don't talk about time. We don't talk about any of that. It just releases.

I didn't tell you it was coming. You didn't. and i watch it and people are calling me like dude this thing is blowing up whatever his high school wrestling coach calls me and you know this because you talk to him and he says i want to tell you a story he said about a week ago mrs morgan april was struggling and And if she's listening, I want her to know how much I love and respect her and her family. And everybody struggles because I watch it with my wife. My wife who lost her husband in the towers. I get it. People struggle, right? But it's how they come out of it. I think Rose Kennedy once said, it's not what happens to you, it's how you handle it, right? So same kind of thing. look at me talking about democrat anyway um you're so honest i love that so ultimately what what happens is he says to me she was struggling right she

thought everybody forgot everybody's gonna forget about cj that's it everybody and then your clip pops. And she said, I can't believe it. I can't believe this happened. It's a sign. It's something from CJ. They were working on the golf tournament, right? Working on making, you know, raising some money. And hey, can you please, we're trying to do, we're trying to make this a little bigger and everything. And everybody's kind of like, ah, yeah, it's great.

You know, and time rolls on. And you know it, I know, ah, yeah, it's great. And time rolls on. And well, you know it, I know it. It doesn't matter. People go about their lives and they should go about their lives, right? But just at a time when that wonderful woman needs just a little something to say, we still got your back. You do that for her. And this has been the most successful year for them fundraising. And they're going to get to that next level and things they want to do in their son's name, who was an amazing person. Right. So I just want to say like, this is a, I get so many compliments for the way you handle yourself and hey, and that's why, that's why I choose to come back on because we're, we're friends

and we'll always be friends, but it doesn't mean that I would say, oh, yeah. And, you know, we struggled getting me on, right, for a long time. You didn't want to do it. Now you're not going to be able to get me on. I had to talk shit. You did. I'll never tell that story. I had to talk mad shit on Tim to get him on here.

And it worked, right? But you want to talk about impact. You want to talk about the importance of what you're doing and how you're doing it, you basically lifted up a family that had thought the world might have just, might have just slipped their mind for a minute about their son. And to me and to the wrestling coach and to the people that listened and are listening, you know, we just, I just want to commend you on this. And that just tells me why you're going to be beyond successful in what you're doing, but also that you've found already the formula to make an impact on people, on truly people. And that is intentional or unintentional.

And we've talked about intent, but intent but but god damn this is really good so i want to call you know i just want to make sure people understand that yeah i don't i don't know if there's like right words respond and thank you and that's an unbelievable compliment coming from you and i i appreciate that beyond measure but also with that like specific instance because obviously you you called me right after that happened and you kind of filled it in there but just to be totally clear that was a it was a regular tiktok clip i put out on a sunday and there were great highlights from our last episode so i was making some and i made that one and you know when i make this stuff

yeah there there's a self-serving aspect to it i put out all different types of content because all different types of things happen in here with all different types of people and i'm promoting the podcast to try to grow podcasts which is a crazy thing to try to start with how many there are in the world but with the tiktok clips i will say I take them so seriously, man, from every level. At this point with the style I do, I never, ever spend less than eight hours making a good clip. And most of them are towards 12. But when it's something very heavy in here, particularly something where it's not me saying it. It's the other person saying it.

It's the guest in here particularly something where it's not me saying it and it's the other person saying it it's the guest in here saying it like they're trusting me to give them the right outlet here to share some things and i'm amazed at what people share but i was going through that was a saturday night i was making that like late at night and i was going through and i was trying to find it and i saw this spot and i'm like because the way you put it was so direct and like straight to the point like it was this was not a long story you had a tangent in the middle where you gave like a little bit of color that didn't matter for a clip but like you're like this kid i didn't know him i had actually seen him at a wrestling meet when he was wrestling was so impressed by him but never talked with him and then he dies in this tragic accident here's what happened i'm talking with his father

though who's like this unbelievable guy and he just lost his kid just buried his son i can't imagine that and he's like what was the exact line he's like it was for now for now we live our lives and remember his and we'll see him again the way you said it and then there was a good one thousand to one thousand and you're like almost in tears and you're just like fuck because i see you like as a father right there trying to even try to imagine that and it's like you can't and i felt that shit and so on that one when i have a clip like that when i have a clip like ashton larold's clip where he's talking about almost committing suicide you're goddamn right i take that a little extra seriously so i actually made your clip way quicker because it was so perfect and the timing was it

came together fast maybe within like an hour i must have spent six hours just getting the right piano on that to get it right and all of it's for like hey i want people to feel this not just whether they knew him or not which is by the way that was a phenomenal benefit i never expect that but i guess it worked out that way where a lot of people he knew saw that and loved but it's like you put that out because you shared that it was an emotional thing for you and like i can't imagine being that family and i want it represented in the perfect way and so when it then goes out there and not only accomplishes that but comes back to where it fucking filled out their golf outing and got their foundation that she was worried his mother was worried that people were already forgetting about because you know

life goes on and and it's that's what happens it's it's unfair it's very unfair but it's true but it's not it it's it's a scary thing too because like as a parent you want your son's legacy to live on to see a small thing like that catalyze the community first of all you did it because it was you that said it i'm glad i could be the outlet to put it together but i i didn't know what to say to that man because it touched me so much and on a personal note you know it can be a very frustrating process building something like this i don't have a life i i used to have a great one so i guess you know that's how life works i had a great one for a long time but you know i i sit here and and i'm trying to grow

this thing and it can be tough when you have setbacks that are out of your control and you know people might not see some things that you see that people say in here that i'm like oh that was awesome and then other people they don't even notice it it's hard but when you get one to hit and you have an effect that is so far beyond some bullshit TikTok clip that does whatever views it does and it actually goes right to the point where it catalyzes not only a whole community around the country in a way because he was a West Pointer and knew so many people but also directly impacted the family to where i never expected that but they happen to be having a really in particularly tough day and week and it just came at the right time when we talk about the universe wants things to happen like i always point you ever hear that rick rubin quote the great producer no oh it's phenomenal rick rubin's like the best producer of all time he's worked with every type of musician and like he's got he looks like um who was that old writer who used to write the books like the tree the crew or

silver scene yeah he's got like the beard and all that he has a quote he's got a lot of great quotes but he had one where he said sometimes the pieces fall into place where it's almost like the universe wants it to happen and when i hear shit like that because when i see these clips come together and i kind of know when it's a special one and i see that piano drop on that first bar it's like a bar when you're talking and you're like he lost his son and the piano comes on the he and it's like then it falls in after hours of looking for a song and not having anything work running through a dell all these different people and then I get this one and it's like oh and then you see it there it's like something special about that then you put it out and all this other butterfly effect happens and you have something like that happen I it's a humbling thing but it is that's the kind of you

want to talk about like picking me up on the other side too holy shit man i mean and then i was texting with the coach great guy it's like to hear that there's nothing to say other than thank you for the compliment but also you know i'm glad we could do that wonderful i just don't i i can tell you that, um, you know, I've had a lot of what I thought were special moments in my life, but that phone call based on what we did in here will be something that I think about for a long time. And it, um, and it drives, it drives me to do more, you know, to do more for more people. And that's your impact, bro. Like, you are a smart dude. This is wonderfully done. It's going to be highly successful.

At the end of the day, this will be an impact piece that you will talk about in your 30s, 40s, and 50s. That is a story I will tell you know and it's it's kind of like we we brought that together just by having a conversation because the kind of people that we like to to talk and and praise you know it's a family that's an inspirational family and in this year you know the 20th anniversary of 9-11 which I can't believe but you think about and Sheila says it herself my wife says it herself like we get to talk about all those people at least once a year their names are and right more than that yeah right at least once a year right so but guys like chris morgan that doesn't happen as much and it's not because people don't want it to happen it just doesn't and that's what what april was worried about right like i got i got to just tell one other story and uh it's another

you can tell whatever stories you want to tell because you're one of the best storytellers i've ever heard the other thing and i want to say this early on here yeah you got a hotel for the night yes we're not going anywhere exactly yeah this is going very well so far i just want to put it out there if this ends up happening we might do two podcasts here we might no seriously like i might break this up into like two two and a half hour podcasts if we keep going like this but so whatever stories you got bring them so here's here's one you like so i'm invited or i'm actually playing in a member guest golf tournament that my beautiful wife was kind enough in my retirement to buy me a membership at a really nice golf club in the Jersey Shore.

Chris Spar International. There we go. The Spar Boys. And that's where this is going, right? So anyway, I play every year with a guy by the name of Jim McHugh, who's the older brother of my best friend who I lost in Afghanistan, John McHugh. Colonel John McHugh killed May 18, 2010. My dearest friend in the world. What's that foundation?

The Johnny Mac Soldiers Fund. And it's cranking. And you're on the board of that. I'm on the board on that. All my West Point classmates are on the board. We do some good things. We have a lot of good disagreements. It's good.

It's going great. Just very quickly, I want to give a plug for that. Yeah. I like that. Can you just tell people what exactly you guys are funding there? Yeah, absolutely. So there is a need of about $55 million to send to college or trade school or any type of educational institution for all of those surviving children on the war on terror.

So the need is significant. It's still there. And obviously, we just kind of end it with some awful, you know, sacrifices in Afghanistan on the last few days. And some of those people had kids. So we got a mission for at least another 17 or 18 years, which is great. And hopefully we're spry enough to be able to do that.

So you guys keep a running list of all of them? All of them. All of them. And we've raised almost $30 million since 2015. And so we're more than halfway there. And so ultimately, I'm playing with Jimmy McHugh. And again, one of my dearest friends, we're brothers really, and his youngest brother, my best friend in the world growing up. Went to West Point together, deployed together.

We just were around for each other. He left five kids. We started out paying for those five kids, and it's developed into this but the reason i talk about jimmy mckeough is that day we're paired up in our flight with a a guy who you know chris spar but his brother mike spar um is is it has become a dear friend and just just a genuinely incredible family and mike brings along his guest and um he's introduced as chris you know and shake chris's hand chris is a young guy and what i noticed most about him is he's an incredible golfer even though we beat them you know we knocked them off and um but as we're kind of playing um you know i said different chris right different chris not chris bar so i said

to chris hey man what uh what do you do for a living? So he says, uh, well, I'm a fireman, New York fireman. So I said, wow, that's really cool. And I said, how long have you been on the job? He said, well, you know, uh, about 10 or so years. I said, the house that you're in, was it hit pretty hard during nine 11? And so he says, nah, my house was okay. So my dad's house was hit pretty hard. As soon as he said it, you know, I knew. And he said, I said, really? And he said, yeah, my dad passed, you know, in 9-11. And he says, I was 18 years old. And I was a student at Quinnipiac University, and that's where I was roommates with Mike Spahr. Dennis McHugh?

Actually, no. Jimmy McHugh. His last name is Mascali. M-A-S-C-A-L-I. Oh, right. Different guy. So Chris says, I was a freshman at Quinnipiac. Mike Spahr was my roommate, and we've been inseparable friends.

And I said, really? And later I found out that Chris Muscali was a pretty successful trader on Wall Street, you know, who sometime in his mid twenties or late twenties, the fire department offered a legacy program. So they basically said, look, there's a list for New York firemen and it and it's pretty long, right? And it's hard to get on. But if you're a legacy and dad or mom passed in the towers, we'll take you on. Chris leaves his highly successful Wall Street job, and he is now one of the most respected New York firemen out there. And there was an article on 9-11 about the 80 or so, you know, offspring of 9-11 victim firefighters who have become, it's a great article.

It's in the New York Times. And anyway, we start talking and the connection was immediate. Um, I said, Jesus, how did we were, you know, out of a couple hundred people, we're in the same flight and we're playing on the first day in this first match. And this, this young man has become an inspiration for me, not only in the fact of his sacrifice and his something bigger than yourself, but I envision him as a role model for my stepkids, you know, my step-sons who, you know, have been looking for someone of their age to kind of talk to them about. They were five and seven. He was 18, right? So no easy time to lose dad.

But 18, in my opinion, is a hell of a lot more timely than it's harder, I think, because you're just like, holy shit. I finally think this guy had some good ideas, and he's gone. But you had him. But you had them, right? So I envision this being a godsend for my family and that when it does take shape, because it will, because Chris has agreed to take these boys to dinner and just be around them, which I think is important. But we talked a little bit about the universe kind of setting things, right? And here's my best buddy's brother who is playing golf with me that day, and here's Chris Muscali. And I looked and I said to myself,

holy cow, like this is amazing, you know? And so we continue, you know, we continue to find these things in our life. And I think it goes on to talking, like we talked about helping, you know, being around, being present for others, even though we may think we're in the worst situation that's ever happened to, you know, we're the only one, man, everybody's looking out at us. Everybody's no, you know, it's out there. It's still out there, you know? And so you have, have you have like i think you've enlightened

or i hate to use i'm not using a you know woken um that's not a woke word come on now don't get them all but but you have you have allowed me to see and be present in things that do happen you know through this which I fought tooth and nail not wanting to come on here because I was like ah you know what I wanted being stupid and saying stuff that I shouldn't be saying you know do you remember if I ever become the FBI director this is going to be a congressional yeah but that's all right I'll just take the second uh Mike Pompeo I Jim McCone should be the FBI director I will take the IG spot right under him. I'll do all the damage. Oh, you'll do the IG.

Oh, yeah. You little snitch, you. I can't wait. You little fucking snitch. No, not snitchy. I'm kidding. Systems. Systems.

Systems. You know what else is funny? I remember when you were first going to come in here. Yeah. Part of the reason you didn't, and this is such a weird thing in the universe now, all things considered, was because that golf tournament the year before got rained out yeah cj morgan's golf tournament yes and then it got moved and then we never did it yep and it's like and then you talked about it yep fucking six months later seven months later and then you come on here and now that's right there's a second part to it because that content

lives isn't that crazy yeah it's the way it sets up you know and it's you know we um we argued back and forth about why the merits of not for me of not coming on and again it goes to intent what the fuck was i you know at the time i was thinking about myself well you know what i got to think about maybe that you know there's a lot to be there's a lot to be garnered for me this is powerful this is impactful for me. And I can be selfish about that point because sometimes you just got to be a taker in your life. You can't always be a giver. But my hope is that at some point, I will inspire through our discussions someone to do some more for themselves for themselves because it will it

will make a difference it will make a difference this has made a huge difference for me huge jim you have no idea how glad i am to hear you say that and there's two things here the first thing you don't have to respond to the second thing i actually want you to respond to though the first thing is you are so fucking bad at taking things for yourself you're very bad and that's kind of a compliment right you are when you got into the private sector you were used to your career where you set an objective and you accomplished it and it didn't require you to have to sell yourself or anything it was like get the job done this guy did a bad thing let's figure it out let's get it done right and even in your military career in a different format i mean that's that's what you're doing objective let's go then you come into the private sector and you got a lot of friends and you're the kind of guy you're like all right i'll

do this for 20k instead of 80 and it's like well no jim that that job costs 80 that's what you should do and i know like you and i talked about that a lot and i relate because i'm bad at that too i think i can see that like when that happens and like i think a lot of people more than you realize that doesn't go unnoticed because people are like damn he really took that man just took care of that for us holy shit what a guy you know so it does come back to you and to see you at least grabbing a bull by the horns and also not for nothing i mean this is a very transparent platform we know that you knew that coming in i mean if ever you were gonna tell the truth and put it out there and leave yourself open to whatever scrutiny there is this is the place

you're doing it you know and and I the first episode was like a wow factor in that facet for me I was stunned at some of the things you were even willing to say on there and people noticed we now have that as like an understanding there's been it's been viewed tens of thousands I think hundreds of thousands of times not on YouTube it's at like 30 grand but it's got a lot of downloads I got to check it it's it's a lot whatever it is and people that leads in the second point which is that people reached out to me they actually did it in the public comments a little bit too but like personally i had people reaching out to me saying i want this guy to come and teach me how to do life you have to bring him in again because like i don't know how it would be possible

but sometime i want to talk with him and have him tell me how to be a man. I had people say this to me and I know there's a, if people can go check the YouTube from episode 48, I know there's at least one or two public comments where people said this and they're not kidding because for whatever reason now, I think Gen Z especially, which is where these comments were coming from, you know, whether or not they have a father in the house or anything, they're growing up in a weird time. There's a lot of shit out there.

And you are a perfect blend of an old school guy who is very open-minded. Like you're this lifelong military guy, FBI guy, conservative kind of politics guy, but you call it like you see it. And you put out your – you're willing to stand by your opinions. You're willing to listen to all sides. You're willing to be friends with Post Malone. You're that guy. That's a beautiful thing. And so I think that shined through so openly in the last episode

that there was a human aspect outside of what you do and where you've been and the crazy shit you've seen. There was a human aspect where people were like, this guy gets it. This guy is a blend of strength and understanding. That's what I want. That's the man figure that I've been looking for. And so when I see people watch or listen to a podcast and take that away from just listening to a guy for three hours, to me, as the guy who hosts it, it doesn't get any better than that. Wow.

That's humbling. I mean, I can't tell you because, you know, I've learned from the best, my dad and some, you know, family, family friends. And, you know, it's just it's humbling. I can't say really. I'm kind of at a loss for words on that, you know, and it kind of I tell you, like the one thing that when you're saying this, the one thing that came to mind right away, and I'm not sure if we talked about it the last time, but there was an old school organized crime mafia source of mine that we became friends. And the funniest part about this is that we never met face to face. You did not tell this. You never met face to face. You told tell this you never met face to face told

the story about the square hips watering your shoulders no no so we never met face to face but we talked daily and wait how did that work it's it's a dynamic that can only be in the intel community you know it just can and uh and this guy was he stretched beyond just your organized crime mafia you know kind of thing he had some additional information but wait question i just have to ask like how does this work so because this isn't like 2021 in the pandemic where you're just talking on zoom and maybe that's a thing but like someone else got him as a source and then you were i had an issue that i needed help on okay and. And this guy was pointed in my direction by a longtime associate of mine. And we just, you know, we did a three-way satellite call, and I never really knew where he was.

He was a mobster. He was a mobster, and he had a lot of overseas connections. He said to me, the most powerful thing he ever said to me was, you know, he got to know my family. You get to know, and you're not supposed to do this, but I really felt like I could trust the guy, and I'm pretty good at that. He shared his open struggles you know, struggles. And I shared mine.

And one of the things that I said to him is, hey, you know, Sammy. You know, he went by Sammy. I don't know what the hell his name was. Not Sammy the Bull. No, no, definitely not. Although we know that. So he said, Sammy. I said, Sammy, I'm struggling with one thing.

He said, what's that? And I told him about being a stepdad. You know, and I just said, like, I'm struggling with one thing. He said, what's that? And I told him about being a stepdad. You know, and I just said, like, it's hard, man. You know, it's, you know, one dad is, the two older boys' dad passed, and the other boy's dad is a difficult guy. You know, and he said to me, Jimmy, have you ever backed away from anything? And I said, no, not not really probably to a fault you know and he said well god placed you in the path of this kid so and he he basically leaned in closer

to the phone and i could just see him doing it although it wasn't with him and he said so don't it up and you know kind of changed my life, man. So when you say, you know, when you talk about people who are, you know, hoping for advice or just want to be, want to hear uplifting things about life and how they can live that life, you know, whatever that life is that brings it. Like, that brings it home for me like impact so as powerful as that was you know as powerful as it was to have you know a talk from somebody at least expect it from to say hey you're placed in the path of this kid and i can make a difference and i hope that i have and i've said to sheila a bunch of times i just hope someday when he's 30 or 40 and I'm still around and he just says, see that guy over there? It's not my dad, but damn, he made a difference.

And I think that's what you just said to me now. So the power of that is, it's humbling. It's humbling to have the ability and we're fortunate. It it's a blessing and a curse technology and the ability to do this but at the same time man it is it is powerful stuff and it's and i don't take it lightly like i don't take it lightly and i think the biggest thing when you and i went back and forth about me coming on here there was there was a lot of things that passed through my mind but they were fleeting about it what do you mean like you know like shit well i what if i'm ever you know what if i ever get a chance to do this or be this or maybe i shouldn't tell that or what if i there were fleeting thoughts they didn't stay

but the one thing that stayed and it's mine and we talked about it it's my core negative belief is i'm not i'm not worthy i'm not good enough to have people listen to advice from me, but who the fuck am I that, you know, the, the son of a, of a, you know, World War II fireman who just worked his ass off two jobs, you know, and I just tried to do them, you know, failed marriage and, you know, and, um, you know, certainly made a lot of mistakes along the way. But then you start believing that that's okay. As long as you heal from those things that make you feel as if you're not good enough. And we've talked about this last time. West Pointers as a group, my opinion, we don't think we're good enough.

And that's what drives us. Blows my mind. Yeah. And it does me too. And there's classmates of mine that will say, I'll say it at the reunion next week, and I'll have half the group. And we've got 330 classmates coming. That's amazing.

Nobody ever gets that. And I'll have half of them say, well, you're fucking crazy. But then I guarantee you those guys one by one will call me back over the next year and say, shit, you're right. And I use it as a good thing. It's okay. It's okay because it drives us to do more. kind of the most humbling part about it is that I actually have the ability to through my transparency. And I appreciate you saying that too, because I really am open about everything. I want to hear it for what it is. And I want to try to make the best decisions and I'm

not, it won't take long to tell you Neutral's ingredients. Vodka, soda, natural flavors. So, what should we talk about? No sugar added. Neutral. Refreshingly simple. I am, I guess, unwavering about one thing, and that's my love of this country, you know, and I will fight that. I just said to somebody, and don't take this wrong, family, because I love you so much, but I said to somebody who and don't take this wrong family because i love you so much but i said to somebody

who insulted west point recently in the last six months they did and they said something just just something that was uncalled for and i said you're better off talking about my family than you are talking about west point and it's just been different with the person. And I'll get it together, and it'll come back. But it'll never come all the way back. You know? And I think what I mean by that is, like, be loyal to something that's bigger than yourself. And it's okay to make mistakes. Oh, they were at West Point?

No, they weren't.'t oh just talk shit about stuff you know and got it you don't fucking know you have no idea you know so i'd rather you just don't say anything you know then like talk bad about my kids talk bad about like i can i can deal with that because i can go one for one and i could talk to you about why that's not true or why it is true and we're working on it. But when you talk about something that you have no understanding of what people have gone through in order to get to the spot that they're at and everybody's suffering, you know, and it's the, the, the PTS and the, and the things that happen to people, like, don't, don't overlook that. Don't make believe like it make believe like it's and i have a chip on my

shoulder about that because i'm like you don't know so hey rumsom guy you don't fucking know shut the fuck up you know like honestly but then my wife has taught me to look at it and say well wait a minute you know they don't understand that's that's why they educate them tell them why it's important don't just don't just write them off and i think we do that so much and so if you know if i have people that i'm helping through just being honest about things and and they say shit that's me like i have a chip it's okay to have a big time chip on your shoulder because sometimes it makes you work hard but don't carry it with you because it is devastating. It will be devastating to you and to your family and to everything around you.

Just walk around like, oh, that guy. Don't rip up everybody else's life, I guess is what it's saying. And that's coming from a guy who I'm sure wrecked a lot of family Thanksgivings along the way and but no intent just doing my job right and so when you hear a mobster say gonna be a bear be a grizzly i get it like if i'm gonna do this i'm gonna go all out otherwise i'll just go work an insurance job you know and and doing i had a great job with progressive insurance you know a great back in the day i had a great job now that that developed into something more for the bureau yeah but i love the job back in the day i had a great job now did that develop into something more for the bureau yeah but i love the job i love the training maybe it wasn't who i said i was when i was working at

progressive but i learned everything i know how to write a unibody man i can tell you how many hours you need to pull on the machine and you know that's that's a skin that's not that's a shell you put the whole door on there door frame you can't just put skin on there i'm pretty good at that but it also you know all the tricks yeah it was also avoiding other adjusters from getting That's a shell. You got to put the whole door on there, door frame. You can't just put skin on there. I'm pretty good at that. But it also, you know. You know all the tricks. Yeah, it was also avoiding other adjusters from getting thrown in the trunks of cars. Rhode Island, so. Not up in Providence.

Providence. They wouldn't do that up there. Nah. Not a voice. Johnny or whatever the guy's name was at Providence Autobot. If you're still out there, bro, you were funny as shit. I can't tell that story, so we'll leave that there. I know that's one of the off-limits ones, but- That it is.

You talk about this whole concept of like, and I don't think you used this word, but you were hitting on it. You were talking about like imperfection in yourself, like what you were saying, why would people take advice from me? And there was a ton you just said in there, but I want to focus on this one thing have you ever heard of the imu theory no okay a couple of the ogs listening to this podcast will remember this from the earliest days because i did cover it and i think it only ever came up once after that but the imu theory was this thing created by this guy charlie jabali and charlie is his claim to fame was that he was the manager for two chains

and i forget the other guys there was there was another duo he had big rap duo in atlanta but he was a manager of rappers and essentially he had been a fat kid in his mom's basement who loved hip-hop and so he built a studio down there like literally like this 300 pound kid living in his mom's basement builds a studio gets talent to roll through ends up finding two chains becomes his manager two chains becomes two chains and then everything's like he's big and so he had been out of shape his whole life gets a brain tumor and so he leaves it all behind he loses all this weight and he has this whole thing where he's like he's such an interesting guy he's very very eccentric but he helps a lot of people helps a fuck ton that's his whole brand quote unquote but he's like all right i always

wanted to be an athlete despite how i was not in shape so i'm going to become a nike athlete and he does like a triathlon then gets in the commercial like with kaepernick and like literally like the whole full-blown nike thing and leaves behind the music career and then starts this whole thing and he came out with this theory was on the ed mylett podcast a couple years ago and i remember watching it for the first time it was on instagram and the clip it had the nice music behind it and everything it only had maybe like 1700 views when I looked at it to this day I haven't looked back but I guarantee it doesn't have that many and I think it might be the most overlooked thing that is a life changer that's ever come out and essentially what it was i told you it's called

the imu theory but his question one day was who's the highest grossing superhero of all time and so he went to google to look it up and it includes comics movies everything and he's thinking it's gonna be superman batman he finds out it's it's spider-man he's like that's interesting spider-man's face was completely covered. There was no chiseled chin. He was an average-looking dude who was from a lower-class household. His parents were dead. He was raised by his aunt and uncle.

Didn't have much. Had a weird talent. He wasn't flying through the air like Superman. He was normal in a lot of ways minus his superhero power he's like okay that's interesting radioactive spider so then he started you know that's a superhero so he's like all right let's think about other things that have attention in culture he goes all right what about organized religion and so he googles the most popular organized religion in the world by following and it's christianity and i forget

what the number was but it was the most popular and he goes okay who's the face of christianity he's like jesus christ all right let's let's think about jesus here dressed very humbly i don't think that's a word but he dressed in a humble way yeah he was a carpenter worked with his hands he hung out with poor people he only had 12 disciples he didn't ride around on this beautiful shining horse like in that time if you had ridden around with shining armor on it on on a white horse that was almost like a unicorn yep with a shield and a sword you had power you were you were the important big deal all this shit yeah and he's like he was just a normal guy he just happened to be able to turn water into wine and all this other shit yep

huh what about with sports heroes and he goes who's the most popular athlete ever in america at least but you know to an extent around the world guess michael jordan exactly he does michael jordan now we know a lot about michael jordan now we do but the beginnings were a cut right not just the beginnings but during his career a lot of shit that maybe isn't so great we didn't see because it wasn't to his credit he was not a major attention guy in that way yeah wasn't the social media era so you didn't you didn't know what you couldn't see yeah and we saw all the great things yep and so he thought about michael jordan and he's like okay he was cut from his high school basketball team yep he had to hit a growth spurt yeah he was from what's the word he was from normal means normal means southern southern family a lot of kids right dad was you know dad wasn't was around but not really right and then he that's true makes a career after he

gets cut from the high school basketball team where he constantly has to prove something including when he finally goes to the nba he's coming from unc which he got himself into playing for dean smith and he's still not the number one pick he he's number three he's drafted behind sam buoy and so he had he had to prove and he went to chicago which had no history as a franchise to be anything and then he wins everything and he's like it's it's not kobe's fault it's not lebron's fault they're they're from different eras different situations but like kobe kobe was the mamba he wasn't he made it like that and i and obviously kobe's a legend i love kobe and everyone should

admire how he worked and what he did absolutely it's incredible what he did but he was the mamba he was the black mamba he was his show was called after his career was called spotlight he was different than you and in a, that was a great thing. That was who he was and it's what made him great. Michael Jordan probably would have been that way. We just didn't see it because of the era. And so we saw the story and it was like, fuck, I'm just like him. And then his dad dies and he leaves everything behind because he goes into a, righteously so, a mental state where he's like holy shit what the fuck

what's it all for my father was just killed in that i mean his dad was also murdered yep so it's like people saw in him and he's like wow what about corporations if it could be true for a corporation then this might be something that i'm on to here yeah and he goes who's the most popular corporation of all time mcdonald's no the most popular biggest important corporation of all time to this point in world history it's going to start getting arguable soon but it's inarguable right now ibm apple apple and he said who was the founder of apple that guy yep steve jobs yep steve jobs who was the first ceo to lose the suit he wore the beard scraggly hair walked around like your dad was also highly imperfect yep highly imperfect yeah he was and even like he didn't follow the regular

formative path the guy was tripping acid in in the desert to come up with the ideas that would become apple when he was like 23 he was he was like the normal kid trying to find his way true so even for all his imperfections the things that he left us were far outweighed any imperfections and yet that imperfect nature of who he was and then what he was able to accomplish and the way he looked and the way he made people feel doing it holy shit steve jobs was just like us so it's like spider-man highest grossing superhero of all time jesus christ most important religious figure of all time michael jordan most followed athlete of all time steve jobs made people love a corporation people were crying at his funeral or memorial service yep

yep it's like all these people in this world where everyone wants to say i'm famous i'm not like you i'm not like you i'm on this stage i have this spotlight on me i'm important i wear all these important clothes i have these expensive watches i i i got all i got all the women around me or if you're a female i got whatever man i want whatever all the people who have meant the most important they've made the most important impact in culture over time they're you and me they're just like you yeah and they're just like you for all the reasons that they're great see it and all the reasons why they're not and where they get things wrong people can relate yes and so in a world that seems to constantly churn out perfection to us the people who overall

their resume is they do great things far more than they do things that maybe they regret the people who do that and are open about it and are willing to share those stories and are willing to put themselves out there and and give you a light that can guide you, oh, society loves that. Love it. I think that's great. That's you. I never thought about it. It makes sense.

God, it makes sense. Yeah. It's nice to just be, and they were comfortable with themselves. Yes. Comfortable in what they knew and comfortable in telling you what they didn't. You know? And you can't say that about a lot of people. No.

You know, you can't say that about a lot of people no you know you can't say it about a lot of people and they had they were vulnerable and they allowed the world to see that i.e jordan's father passing and him trying to play baseball he looked terrible you know i mean his space jam was great but um but yeah i mean that is that is some great i mean that's that's a great way to think about things you know and there's so much out there that like that you can relate to i just saw i just saw probably and i was just telling one of my buddies last night about it um he's the guy he's a great dude he runs a horse business west point thoroughbreds he won the kentucky derby and oh he won it yeah he won it a few years ago with always dreaming i was gonna say because this year that was the whole like yeah no he won it? Yeah, he won it a few years ago with Always Dreamin'. I was going to say, because this year that was the whole like...

Yeah, no, he won it a few years ago. And we were talking last night, and we always kind of trade off things that happen in our lives. And the topic here was a really dear friend who was the chaplain at West Point when we recently accused of, you know, Catholic priest and molestation. And it was devastating for us because, you know, I don't want to get too much into the church or how they handle things, but everything is just negotiated. Everything is settled, you know, and what's left behind is terrible on both sides, right? Because, you know, I don't want to believe it, but I have to believe it, right? It happens. But as we were talking about that, we were looking for inspiration within the church.

And I had just one of our dear friends and classmates, a guy by the name of Matt Polakowski, who was cruising in his military career. And he gets a calling, and he goes to seminary. I'm sorry, he winds up seminar uh seminary i'm sorry winds up going to seminary and becoming a catholic priest and he's he's been around for funerals of ours and you know always been around for us but he just had the honor of reading and there's a um a military chaplain whose remains were just discovered in the republic of korea and from the korean war from the korean war and from the Korean War from the Korean War

and the guy's name is father Emil Capone like it's KAP AUM and there's one surviving witness to his deeds while he's he's put forward for canonization and there's one surviving witness to his deeds who wrote this letter but couldn't couldn't get up just not physically capable of getting up and reading it at his memorial or i think it was his canonization ceremony and his memorial returning his remains his body's intact completely right so my buddy our class, gets up and reads it. And in it, he you could tell Matt rehearsed it, you know, and read it over hundreds of times. And so much so that he it was like it was coming from him.

It was that amazing. But many times throughout it, he gets emotional. But the one part that stuck out to me is two things and um and you talk about just a normal just a normal person who's now you know in the catholic church's eyes you know qualified certified as a saint but and there's a couple things that are in there first one is a miracle um that someone has to witness and the second one is just his um constant unwavering, unconditional giving, being available and sacrificing everything. And there's some pictures of him saying mass in different spots with a war zone going on and soldiers are kneeling. But one of the two things that struck me, one was his ability to relate and to make

humor in a situation. It was during the Bataan Death March. It was during the time when there was uh no hope you know it's a forgotten war to forgotten war if you fell behind on a march they just shot you right it was like like a stephen king like a stephen king novel gone bad um and you know and all those heroes that that passed but capon willed himself to stay alive in spite of sacrificing meals and any little bit they had for others. And during the freezing cold, not wearing the clothing that he should have been, giving it to other injured and wounded and dying.

And basically ministering to all these people, all these soldiers that had given up hope and bringing light to their time. So they talk about one instance where a man recognizes him and he says father capon like um you know how did you how did you get here like what are you doing here he says and he looked around and he said hey my bishop doesn't know don't tell him and that there like his ability to bring people forward that was one thing and then he gets the end of the letter and matt's reading and he does an amazing job and he says you know there's there's the the miracle piece and um his body was the only one that wasn't thrown in these mass graves over a hill where they discovered hundreds upon hundreds of dead GIs that had just

died in the death houses and where they would put them and anyway capone every night would go out and minister he would sneak out he would bring whatever food he could steal and from you know the the guards and he would go out and he would minister and say prayers and whatever and one night he leaves and one of the guys who was dying says where his father and he said well father's out ministering he said said, well, I need last rites and I'm not going to make it. And the guy passes. And an hour goes by. Capone comes back. And he prays and he takes the guy's head in his hands.

And the guy comes back to life. No. Come on. And then gives him the last rites and he passes. And anyway, so now this is Matt Polakowski. He's one of my dearest friends Who's who's interviewing who who took this letter from this guy? He's a West Point class of you know, I think he was a West Point class of 39 or 40 guys in 100 years old and

The guy is sitting in the fur and they film it they had it filmed the guy sitting in the first row just tears rolling down his eyes, you know, and there's no incentive but I think my point in thinking back of like who we are and how we have an effect, that story, and I'm, I've given up some hope on, on the Catholic church. You know, I, I've, I've seen too much. I've done, you know, I've done independent investigations, you know, uh, in my business, um, for the diocese of Albany and, and, and really the church doesn't want to, they don't want to really go out and interview victims.

They don't want to do, and I think that's an important piece. But you've worked for them? Yeah, I was contracted for the better part of a year when I first started. So during that time, I had a hard time dealing with the church because I was like, well, you really should talk to the victims because you shouldn't just write a check. We need to find out why this is happening. What's going on? Like, what are the – don't – nope.

We'd rather not know. We have a budget. And I think – I'll tell you, I think in my time, and I covered about a five-year period. It was maybe 13 to 18 in one diocese, the Diocese of Albany, which is huge. It's got a lot of churches. The settlements in those five years, $100 million, one diocese, five years for just that. So, you know, I think in saying this i i was like just distraught and when i saw this father capon piece that my classmate brought to the table you know it just

was enough i was like because if matt polakowski who beat the dickens of out of me and plead boxing and freshman boxing at West Point, if it's good enough for him, who the fuck am I to say anything more than let's support it. Let's be what we can for Matt. And so I think that goes to the same piece we were talking about. I can relate to that guy because he was somebody who I was at a time, you know, and now he is guiding me through, even though he doesn't know it, but he'll know it next week when I see him guiding me through difficult times, continuous difficult times in our lives. You know, it's the same thing that we all face. And it's nice to feel, um, first off, it's nice's nice to no longer have to attach myself to an outcome.

I could just kind of see it and kind of just take it for what it is and be that taker that we talked about. I don't have to give. And I felt like I was taking from off of Matt's back by this story. And I felt it helped me – it truly helped me for the first time in my life not to attach to an outcome always was attached to an outcome so when you're saying i want to make sure i understand that yeah because i'm a little confused yeah by the way my my mug just uh it's okay you were that was damaged like five minutes in happens all the time but you're you were telling the story which has its own significance is like it puts things in perspective

and it shows that there's good in things i got that then you're putting it up against also some of the reality which is not pretty nope and i agree with you like you know i have my own relationship with a higher power so to speak i'm i grew up catholic i don't identify that way i'm just you know but for people who are into organized, it's an important thing in their life. I fully support that. Yep. As long as it doesn't come into my politics. Totally agree.

Totally agree. I think it's wonderful. I understand where you're coming from and you see it unfortunately up close and I don't know how you even sleep at night thinking about that. that but was the point that you would be predisposed to just kind of roll in your eyes at this kind of situation because it's like oh this is just another catholic priest jesus christ i already know what happens with all those guys and which is unfair to say but you know what i mean versus like all right you know that's my buddy reading it who also happens to be a catholic priest and this is an interesting story from somebody who was in a combat zone as well, which I know all too well, unfortunately, and who died in a way serving his country.

Let's call it what it is, you know? So is that the point? Yeah. I mean, I think it's also kind of whatever you need in your life to help you to relate to difficult, you know, kind of times. I don't ever think before this particular story, short of the fact that my parents were both, you know, probably the most faithful people religiously that I knew, short than McHugh, you know, the McHugh parents, John McHugh's parents. But I needed something more to kind of get me back into an open mind about the Catholic Church after what I had seen. And I think what kind of struck with me, what you were talking about is,

I think that's what we don't do enough. I mean, I'm sitting here guessing McDonald's and I'm guessing IBM. In the meantime, why didn't I guess Apple? And I think the reason is because I don't view them as being something, sometimes I don't view them as being something, sometimes I don't view them as being something that has helped along the way, because of my law enforcement background. So they blocked our ability for the San Bernardino, right? Fucking. Okay, hold on a minute.

Hold on a minute. Hold on. Hold on. Back off. We got to get the dogs down on this one and actually address that. So you didn't like that? I just thought it's strange. Like, I guessed the other two right away.

Other three right away. As soon as you said superhero, I was like Spider-Man, like in my mind. Yeah, but the San Bernardino thing. Bring that up. Well, that's just, you know, that was fucking obstruction. So, okay. Good. Obstruction that was fucking obstruction. So, okay. Good. Obstruction. I like this.

I like this. I disagree. I think I can understand where you're coming from because what we can all agree on is that guy was a scumbag. He did a horrible thing. He was a fucking terrorist. Yeah, he was a terrorist. He did a horrible thing. And what happens when a horrible thing happens?

You want to get answers. You want accountability. You want to make sure you do your best to be able to disincentivize anything like that happening again somehow some shit always does but you want to minimize those situations moving forward that's the idea of law enforcement no yeah i. Agreed with some caveat. Okay. But agreed. Yeah. Theoretically, I agree. Okay.

When you address what I'm going to say, feel free to go into that caveat. Yeah, yeah, yeah. While Apple has done other quote-unquote hypocritical things in the eyes of privacy and individual rights since then and probably before i can also say at the same time that if there has been any company among big tech that has been more about individual rights and some sense of privacy in this world of no privacy it is them it's basically like saying they're a dwarf among midgets. No offense intended obviously there, but you know what I mean. With this situation, it was another slippery slope example where Tim Cook is saying to himself, and I agreed with what he did. publicly pressuring me the ceo of a company who handles people's data to hand over a phone of a guy who we know was evil we know he was bad but if i hand this over who the fuck else am i going to hand it over for and where is the public trust so i can understand being on the federal

investigation bureau of investigation side of it that's frustrating because you know this guy's phone has the answers in it. You know it does. You could use that. It did. I can also understand the private citizen version of it in a situation

where most companies don't do that, by the way. Saying, I agree with you. Fuck, I wish I could help you out, but if I do this who else am I gonna do it for all right so here's here's my thought would you rather oh we're playing would you rather I'm trying to think about how you're bringing up some good shit all right so I'm getting that shit anyway, right? I'm glad you said that.

Go ahead. So would you rather I go about it in a way that allows me. This is tough. This is tough. So would if I'm cooperate, would you rather have a that that phone includes information that could protect not only national security on a 40,000-foot view, but specific instances that are documented, not instances, threats, straight up threats that are documented on that phone that we need to expedite for the safety of individuals, right?

Would you rather that we go through that process, which we both know is lengthy, right? And we're proving it to you. We're basically winning. We're convicting at trial. That's how much we're giving you as a member of this organization that has this technology? Or would you rather I fucking jump into it in 30 seconds in the back room of a fucking overseas hotel? My answer? Yeah.

I'd rather see you go through court 100%. Okay. And I'd rather see my taxpayer money wasted on that. And I'll tell, excuse me, not wasted, put towards that. And I'll tell you why. But what do you think about the victims, the potential victims or the known victims that we know? I know people, other people perished. Here's where I'll defend you.

Based on that decision. Here's where I'll defend your side. No matter what answer you give here there's collateral damage in that case if i answer the way i did against what you did other people how you answer it potentially potentially or in my from my level of knowledge definitely okay let's go with death let's be conservative and say definitely i also let's add to that i have what was it like 25 victims or something like that right yeah i think that's right i have all their families who now they already have the guy who did it dead so there's a level of justice that will never happen but now i

open up the opportunity to drag this out even more and affect them in the process which by the way and you understand this 9-11 families know all too much with the beautiful country of saudi arabia and what's happened there finally the paperwork was released right documents i really yeah i think so i actually didn't see that i think so okay we'll get to that yeah but the precedent here is everything when you listen to this back again, you'll hear the words you used, and I'm not surprised to hear you use them because it was also your life,

and there's an extent to which they're very important, but you'll hear the words like, as a matter of national security, preventing future threats, saving lives, doing all these things, whatever. It's the same thing that I hit on people over blowing what is a bad

thing with coronavirus but using it to the extent of total control and never stopping this pandemic though that language is the language that cheney and bush and rumsfeld used to put through all these archaic fucking laws including the patriot act including the program that was illegal stellar wind it's a matter john ashcroft you're on your you're on your fucking potential deathbed here but it's a matter of national security and if you don't sign that page people are gonna die my answer is unfortunately people do die unfortunately bad people exist unfortunately some of these situations will happen what is the cost of continuing government intervention and reach and control into all private citizens lives to the point that eventually

they can just fucking get everything versus if tim cook knows i just want to say this last thing if tim cook knows that you're eventually say this last thing if tim cook knows that you're eventually going to get that because you're going to prove this shit in court at least he had the check and balance to make you do it he doesn't want those victims to have to sit out there an extra year while this goes through court he hates that collateral damage he's a human being i understand that but he understands the bigger picture of if i fucking give this up we know this guy's guilty what about the next guy well i i understand what you're saying i think i think that what is difficult for most that

haven't been in the game and the game is a wrong expression but been in the profession is the targeted you know kind of piece that's missing, right? So when I say, I can tell you that everything I'm worth, everything I've lived for and done, it is not a far-reaching scope when it comes to what we need, what we need it, what we've been able to obtain. In any way, we obtain it right because my my like i said on this podcast you know i am an american i that's non-negotiable my american status and my my fight to always be to put this flag you know on on the on the front you know when my epitaph will read you know might not even read for god but it'll read for country yeah right and you back that up and i

back in every way so you know my thought is and i understand i understand what he what his decision was i understand why he made it i understand what his intent was however that being said i appreciate yeah i i do but but i also want people to understand that and listen we have not the intelligence community i'm not talking about just the fbi i'm talking about the intelligence community has not done a great job at explaining and following through with our targeted approach. All right? So the only thing that's been public, the millions of times that we were perfect doesn't get publicized. That's fair.

I agree with that. But the times that we fucked up were really bad up right so i think that i want people to understand that we are those professionals in the intel community that do the job the way it was defined to be done because it's it's duty and it's it's you know it's duty on our country right it's the it's the right thing to do you know what do they say about character it's doing the right thing even when nobody's looking right my dad doesn't hear that right or or doing he killed that quote for me you just always say it but or also you know we we used to explain it at west point right um one of the one of the freshmen responsive there's three major responsibilities at west point right there's the head laundry carrier so laundry carriers that is a shit job because you're basically, they send out all their laundry,

the upper class and their shoes, and you're responsible to find all that shit and bring it back to the room. That's one, right? Then there's a minute caller, right? Which minute callers stand outside by the clock and they're the human alarm clocks even to this day. And what they do is, sir, there are 10 and a bit minutes to accountability formation. The uniform for accountability formation is this. The menu for lunch is this. And they go each minute and they count it down. That's okay, but you get destroyed while you're standing out there for having a bad uniform.

And then the final thing is head mail carrier. carrier's duties is to drop off a copy of the fucking new york times every every morning in front of each upper class and even your classmates door the failing new york time failing yeah fake news so if pop wants to win by the way you should start talking like this with the finger well i gotta get him off twitter failing new york times yeah so but at least a listen baldwin should do that when he shot and killed a guy anyway um so so that was fresh here's the thing right yeah too soon but the thing we used to say right there's this whole process and i know i'm going a little deeper on this but there's a whole process about squaring corners when you're at West Point. So what you're doing is picture a dormitory hallway with stairs and doors and everything else.

You would have to walk on the far side away from upper class or anybody's rooms, far side pinging at 120 steps per minute, right? And you would walk down in any corner. If there was a kind of a jutting piece of the lavatory, you would walk around it, square every corner and going. Now, when everybody's looking during lunch formation, during dinner formation, you do it, right? But in the morning at 5 a.m., when you're picking up the cold copies of the New York Times, they still do it to this day, even with a digital version. And you're snapping out those deals in your phone.

I think we're supporting, single-handedly supporting the New York Times at the Service Academies. And you would drop a copy of that paper. You would walk up, square it, walk up, drop it, turn around, do an about face, walk to the wall, go to the next one. I'm so interested in where you're going with this. Well, what is a duty concept? A duty concept says do what you're supposed to be doing even when no one's looking. So we used to say if you're a freshman who cuts corners at 5 a.m., you're going to cut corners for the rest of your life.

On the battlefield. Right? going to cut corners for the rest of your life on the battlefield right or you're going to cut corners when you probably should provide a targeted information packet or what we call a targeting package to apple in order to show them this is exactly what needs to be done here's the scope of it right now that being said okay there's guys that don't there's guys that don't square the corner at 5 a.m let's assume they did though i want you to assume they did yeah let's be conservative let's just i'm here to tell you i did all right oh you were involved well on many things i won't confirm or deny the

sam bernardino the old confirm or deny well of course i was involved in that so let's let's be honest i'm getting looser let's assume they did i would love to be a fly on the wall for you and tim cook hey tim come over here take a seat but anyway it didn't work i guess no let's assume they did that the public reads headlines. Of course. The headline is Tim Cook hands over, unlocks iPhone. They don't give a fuck. The average person, the court of public opinion, and Tim Cook knows this, doesn't give a fuck about the fourth paragraph where they explain that Special Agent Jim DiIorio laid out the exact evidence that included X, Y, and Z. Well, how about Apple turns, you know, Tim Cook turns over San Bernardino bombers, shooters, cell phone, you know, based on threats to hundreds of people in the Southern California County. Again, look at our, you have to understand previous trust in this country.

The last person to be saying that left and right, the last people were Dick Cheneyy george bush and donald rumsfeld and then it just continued with every administration after them no one stopped that i i understand but you know i i just this is where it's like i just think it's yeah i mean so would you rather would the american public feel better with no headline? And we just get the fucking information. Now I'll relate it to this. I mean, we could do that. Would the American public feel good with two weeks to stop the curve? Oh, yeah. You see what I'm saying?

And look, I understand. You're in there. You're biased. Your job, I think it's, correct me if I'm wrong, it's literally written in part of like the code with the FBI is to protect and serve and protect American lives specifically I think it's the get you know, it's funny. I Don't think I don't know that it had I think it just says to collect evidence and crimes that against the best interests of the United States honestly fucking J Edgar Hoover man. I know and to wear dresses. Yeah, I do wear skirts

All right, which there's nothing wrong with that because it doubles your chances on a Saturday night. Okay. All right. We're going to slide right past that one. But there is a – my point is there's an understanding here that you have a job to do and this is a prototypical red line in the sand check to the balance where you're not going to like the outcome if my argument as a private citizen in this case wins but i appreciate as a private citizen two things a being able to have that voice because as frustrating as it might be for you i can see the bigger picture here and i have press this

before coronavirus even i have precedent to prove that that's never a good sign. When you're getting promised like, but we're going to prevent all this stuff, unfortunately, not everyone at the government is a good guy the future. I always point to Terrence Jones, I point to Mike Speier, they're my liberal and conservative go-tos. I even tell them, I'm like, I was even telling Terrence's dad this the other day, I'm like, I hope that when that happens, he doesn't change. Because I think anyone's susceptible to it. I think you and me are both susceptible to it. I think there's all kinds of bullshit things that happen.

But you've lived your life in public service, you come on here in front of this camera to talk about this shit i think people if they can't understand that you're an open book on this kind of stuff at this point i can't help them so i'm going to use that as as an example if you're a good guy in there you're a guy that when you say that to me i believe you i think that's what you mean it by i know that there are a lot of other people exist who by the way exist at way higher positions than even you had. You know, guys who are fucking in the executive suite who are like, oh, yeah, that's a, you know what? Exactly. You know what?

Yeah, it's national security. Well, we saw it. We saw it. i would much rather them have to play it out in court for a year where they'll win and at least have tim cook even though he'll annoy you have the precedent of being able to have a beer with you after and say jim as a private citizen i appreciate what you did i appreciate the fact that you won fair and square in court here's the iphone let's go i hope you understand it was a precedent situation and i think i would okay understand it was a precedent situation and i think i would okay yeah and i think it would and i will tell you that i think that i think the

caveat that we i was mentioning is you know basically your you know your emergency situation right so so that that everybody understands right because we've got a pending you know we've got something that's happening as we speak so we're we have to be reactive there i think everybody so i understand i kind of understand what you're saying i i think in this case it was questionable as to whether or not we had an exigent circumstance what so in other words it means like it's something that's occurring or going to happen shortly and we needed some more information quickly now what i understand from your standpoint is we don't want listen like like my old you know my old um profiling you know we called it um what the hell was it behavioral science and no it was um i'm thinking of west point

behavioral um oh my god behavioral the bau um whatever the fbi's profilers um like my my buddy say there you wouldn't want me climbing around your head for a couple days so it's if you take that and i wouldn't because the fucking guy would figure out shit that i didn't even know about myself right so it's the same thing i think what he's talking about and his protection of those that that hold and and subscribe and have an apple phone in their in their life in there is can we trust the fact that we're going to scope out? We're going to stay in the scope, right? So I get that. And I can tell you that even with the best intentions,

because we've been talking a lot about intentions, even with guys and girls who are monitoring what we call, you know, Title III wiretaps, which is people just think, you know, because TV makes it look in the movies make it look like i could just i want to listen to your phone fuck it now now what you talked about earlier with the patriot act that was closer to the truth of being able to plug into your fucking phone if i could prove in fact you had anything to do with a terrorist plot or you were associated with a terrorist no you'll you'll actually appreciate that yeah appreciate this

have you heard what snowden says about that? Absolutely. Absolutely. The Save the Puppies act and everything? Absolutely. Absolutely. He's spot on about that. And I don't disagree.

But my point is, even with, all right, so we get, let's just say I spend my time, and remember, a title three, a wirettap although it looks on tv in the movies like that's the first thing we do well you know we're gonna track this guy we'll fucking get him that is that is the you have to prove that everything else has been exhausted to include interviews to including me walking up to you and saying are you a fucking cartel member are you a cop are you are you a fucking clock is practice right so i gotta i gotta so everything so surveillance you got to prove why surveillance wouldn't be fruitful right everything go through it before i can get you up on before i can get your phone wired up right then on top of

that i have to minimize i'm supposed to they have these minimization briefings weekly daily where a federal prosecutor comes and say if you are says, if you hear information with regards to the guy's latest guma, you can't listen to it. Because it's got nothing to do with the fact that he was extorting business owners in Turnersville, New Jersey. You're listening. Well, I mean, what is the... Don't lie. No, I mean, listen, you're minimizing. You're turning it off. You're minimizing. You're listening. Well, I mean, what is the... Don't lie. No, I mean, listen, you're minimizing. You're turning it off. You're minimizing.

You're minimizing. Now, you can spot check every minute, right? And if you hear something that makes sense, you can come back on. Now, I'm going to tell you. I'm going to tell you. There's guys that are just plain fucking stupid. They don't even understand

the case. Who gets to monitor? Who do you think gets to monitor monitor midnight to 5 a.m wiretaps jim colstrom yeah he hadn't worked today just an honest day in his life but no i like jim he's a good dude but i'm saying he's not a 12 to 5 guy you're gonna get the junior guy right that doesn't really understand what is this all What is this whole thing about? You know, I'm going to. So there are times when you listen to a little bit more than you should. So basically the guy.

But you're not cheating on it. And if you do hear something and you use it, it gets thrown out anyway, right? But ultimately, ultimately it could cause a situation where, you know, you are overreaching. I will give you that there could be but again remember that stuff handled by any defense attorney not even a good defense attorney it's going to get chucked yeah i could see the guy it's going to get i could see the federal prosecutor in one of his cute little minimization meetings looking at the 12 to 5 guy saying you know why did you record the quote-unquote mobster a fucking his gumar well sir she said quote choke me daddy and i thought we were gonna

we're gonna have a murder we're gonna have a murder like you see where that's fucking going right i mean well well shit you know stuff is stuff has happened along the way with different you know i mean just misunderstandings and things I think I told the story last time about the guy. I don't know if I told the story. You know, here's a simple thing that can happen, right? So we have a major case against a Monmouth County mayor who wound up getting convicted and spending six years because another guy that I told, were you fucking crazy going to trial?

Here's what we got on you. You told about the guy who went to trial, about the trial itself, where his wife said, I hope you die of fucking pain. No, that's an even different one. So this one, what happens, talking kind of what we're going to, is he winds up, we wind up having a meeting with myself, the chief of the corruption unit in in the u.s attorney's office in in new jersey and a u.s attorney's office investigator by the way another west point guy great dude right and in the meeting we decide that we are going to interview the target the mayor that's the comes out we're going to interview We're going to interview him. That's it.

I write an email to the investigator copying the federal prosecutor that just says, let's set up X, the guy, meaning we just talked about a meeting. Right. We're going to we're going to interview him. Let's set it up. Well, what is the defense attorney do? Right. So it's a perfect opportunity so he has me on the stand for three hours and all we talked about is the meaning of let's set up so-and-so oh you

fucking you're gonna set him up he didn't do anything right so finally what did i what did i do i got he the guy would just badgered badgered i couldn't get a word in i had the jury because what they do at the beginning is they announce your military service, that you're a West Point guy and everything else and everything else. So finally I said, you know, he wouldn't let me just yes, no, quote, unquote. So finally I said, you know, can I speak?

He said, no, I'm done. Fuck you. So on recross, right, so I redirect. So the prosecutor comes up and says, Agent Theorio, tell us what you meant by that. He said, well, I said, in West Point we learn about intent right right and and my intent was simply to set up a meeting and here's you know here's the here's the notes my notes and the jury just looked and basically afterwards the jury heads we get the poll the jury and talk to them jury's like man we can't

believe you wasted three hours of your life on that one thing we knew the guy we we were convicting the guy two seconds after that display so and again you have good in here's the thing though i need to point this out yeah and then i'll let you finish you have good intent there i believe absolutely listening to that 100 could you see how there are other hacks without a doubt maybe wouldn't without a doubt but but my my point there is it's always going to play out um not always yeah it's going to play it's going to play out the way it's meant to play out right so if that if you do have a corrupt or a corrupted tough for me like it's not I think we talked about this before. It's not, it's lazy.

Right. It's apathetic. It's unavailable. It's no drive. It's, fuck, I can't believe I'm doing this job when there's thousands of people that want the job, right? So I think that's what you find is, you know what? I'm, I'll just? I'll write whatever.

I'll listen. I just don't give a shit. I'll let somebody else have to deal with this. So I'll listen when I'm not supposed to. Well, what does that cause for me? It causes me to have to go back through my case and look at everything that that person found and any lead that he tried to generate based on the information that we weren't entitled to. So it kind of goes back to the same deal when you talk about Apple.

You know, I get it because they don't always know that that's going to be me. And I'm not just saying me. Listen, the majority, the majority, the strong majority of us that did this job did it with the appropriate intent. Right. Right. But. Even some of the one-thirders.

Mostly all of the one-thirders just didn't do fucking shit. Right? So I would say all. I'd give them 100%. By the way. It's those middle of the road guys. Quick note for people who didn't hear the last episode. One-thirders.

Somebody who was a desk lackey just fucking went to the next paycheck. Do the crossword puzzle. In the New York Times, by the way. Exactly. Didn't fucking make cases new york times crossword puzzle but like that but you know i was pretty good at it not fridays but go ahead sorry but but i think that's kind of it goes back to that i get it like i i can completely understand it and i can respect the decision i think my frustration, and it was always my frustration as an agent, as a street agent who did the job the way it was supposed to be done in my eyes, you know, my eyes. And I got a lot of validation based on that is, you know, the best prosecutors would say, I want the bowl full and the lid sealed. I don't want you bringing stuff that even has a question of us not following every single lead.

Every lead. You know, if I had a case, I was following, towards the end, just to prove, because a big part of it is proving, you know, it followed the money, right? So if you had a corruption case, it's one thing to have a guy or three guys or 10 guys saying, oh yeah, without any, you know, if you have a recording device on them, obviously it's good, but you know, hey, I paid the man, you know, I paid him. Okay. Well, how do we prove that? Well, you know, it's a simple source and application investigation. If you make a hundred thousand dollars and you spent five to a hundred thousand dollars and you have no inheritance and you don't use credit cards, I'm following your ass into every place you go. You go into the Wharfside patio bar in Point Pleasant at 5 o'clock on a Friday night,

guess when I'm going in? 7.30 when you leave, and I'm going to ask, how'd the guy pay? I'm with the FBI. How'd the guy pay? And I'm going to mark it down. That was my way of doing, of working cases, besides everything else that I did. And that was the sealing the lid, right?

But not everybody does that. But if I went to Apple, I felt like he should have given me the benefit of the doubt, but why should he? He doesn't know me. And that's it. It's your intent there. And we're coming back to that point

but i i need to say this in plain english so that we understand it completely how many people who have been in that type of a capacity including the good ones a lot of good ones how many people would be willing to go in front of that and go in front of this and talk about it on the record like that not a lot of them they don't do it they don't do and i'm and by the way i'm not even faulting a lot of the guys for that but you have to understand that like that makes you unique and so i can sit here and i think people can listen to this right now and be like wow this is really credible like this guy whether or not they agree with everything you're saying or not and there's going to be points where people do don't whatever depends on who you are they're going to be like this guy is putting his money where his mouth is and he's he's telling it to me the way

he sees it or saw it in that job people will appreciate that they will then remember that you are the exception not the rule so i get it. But it also makes me think of, and this is a little different, but it's the same lane. It makes me think of the Ross Ulbrich Silk Road case. Now, you're at least somewhat familiar with this, right? I know you didn't work on this personally, but okay. So Ross Ulbrich, I have, this is another one I have a very clear down the middle view on. Ross Ulbrich had to go to jail. He broke the law. Whether or not it was based on a political belief, which it was, creating the Silk Road for people that don't know, it was the website that basically allowed global free access to drugs you make your own decision it was based on the fact that he was a radical libertarian and believed in individual rights and freedom and so he wanted to create an outlet using the internet and bitcoin where people could do that fine you i understand in a society of laws even if some are a

little dated and we got to fix them you can't break every international law and be like well you were making a point no you you gotta get convicted for that you gotta go to jail if if you're caught no problem what happened to him was fucked up he went to jail for a double life sentence and was serving it now he's in another bad one but he was in florence supermax with like el chapo robert hansen who we were talking about the worst of the worst people right that was a total and the case was a total government hit job once it got to court the other place where it was a government hit job and where there were people in the fbi who i'm by the way i'm not even going to call them bad people i'm not going to do i don't know them

and i'll respect the fact that maybe you could empathize with where they were coming from there was a team in the fbi there were multiple teams along with other agencies by the way irs was involved da was yeah i'm sure the da fucked up they had like two two guys go rogue and go to jail that's a that's a shocker shocker right there but anyway there was a guy named chris tarbell who was an fbi agent i believe he was new york office and he was cyber okay like that was i don't know if he was himself cyber but he was heading up like the cyber team for this okay makes sense and the way that they got ross olbrich was through his server which was codenamed like frosty or something okay and to the

credit of i think it was the i could be remembering this wrong so people please go fact check this i think it was the irs agent who had discovered some old weird through google some old weird chat rooms where certain code names had been used and he figured out that ross used the code word frosty they figured out that this server that i believe existed out of iceland again, please check that, but it was somewhere – was tied to Ross on the other side, and it would be their proof that he was Dread Pirate Roberts, which was DPR, the codename of the quote-unquote head of the Silk Road. They had their deductive reasoning. They had their end result. They knew they had them red-handed. They knew that they could get them, and they had to stop this. They had to bring them down. Right.

I agree with them 1,000%, but they wanted the result, and they didn't have a way in. And so, very long story short, and I won't go fully into detail because I'm not the educated guy to explain it. You can talk to any hacker. You can talk to any software engineer, anyone who anyone who's like in the know with this shit the fbi got a hold of this frosty server and the explanation that they later gave under duress it was one of the few things that the public actually was able to like get out in this case the explanation that they later gave to give a long to make a long story short publicly has been refuted by anyone who has any idea what a basic hack is they're like that's not even possible essentially what what we can practically confirm is that the fbi got in there

not legally they didn't get in there via the warrant they didn't get in there via and i'm gonna get over my head here so i won't go past that but they didn't get in there via the warrant. They didn't get in there via – and I'm going to get over my head here so I won't go past that. But they didn't get in there the right way. And they were able to make this case against Ross Ulbrich. And then on top of that, it was a closed courtroom government hit job. They gave him double life for no violent crimes. They even – and this was fucked up. In the court of public opinion, when they caught him, they put out there, they put out all these hits on people.

He didn't do it. In fact, he didn't do it so much that when they went to, before trial, they dropped all those charges. And they didn't tell anyone that at that point. Because there were multiple, and this is, this is 100%. There were multiple Dread Pirate Roberts. So there were other people who ordered hits on people. Copycatting? No, no. Or just other people that they missed they they didn't identify properly he gave access to whatever

because he got in over his head and he met these other people online who believed in these libertarian beliefs and they played him and he gave him that that's what happened so he actually gave access to his yes and so they accounts they used it and and again but he was he took the hit let me be respectful here to the legal process and say this is alleged this is technically not guaranteed based on my opinion and my understanding of the case and reviewing everything i'm telling you i'm a hundred percent so i i want to put the bias out there but they were able to beat him in the court of public opinion close the trial off from public and then when he was convicted it's a five to ten year sentence

which by the way i support you got to do that it's called deterrence you can't do this they gave him double life no parole federal florence supermax quiet away. And then he's another guy Trump left hanging at the end there with the pardon. I look at this and I say – Where was it tried? Was it District of New York? It was in front of Berman, I think. No, Berman's the D.C. judge. I forget her name.

It was a different judge. I'm sorry. I'll look it up later. But I say that because I look at Chris Tarbell and he's the name we know. There's other people involved that might not have even been him with this decision or whatever. And I go, were their intentions wrong? Because they weren't the one giving the sentence, though they celebrated it afterwards catch a guy who was running an international drug ring. Let's call it what it was. This was a place where people could go buy drugs. You can't do that. Even if I agree with this. It was supporting existing drug cartels and basically giving them an opportunity to.

That actually the opposite. It was fucking over the cartels. I can't believe the Mexicans didn't get to them before the feds did. So you would just elementary, basically, I want drugs. I need a kilo. Anything. So I just basically use this program, and then I make my payment on there, and then it's delivered by a runner.

No. It's just mail. In the fucking mail it was it was so simple that's how it fell under its own weight right so and then even some of the other guys who were quote-unquote dpr who got in there they encouraged them to put like guns on there and shit work okay we're running arms and again sending hits and all that shit let me be clear had to go to jail this was not a this isn't a like when i was did they publish a guideline before he was sentenced like you know what i mean like a federal guideline and say hey this particular no so he was indicted and then went

to trial in the southern district behind closed doors no cameras in there oh one day ross albrecht double life sentence no parole well in all fairness there's no cameras in there oh one day ross ulbrich double life sentence no proof well in all fairness there's no cameras ever allowed in federal court there was a lack of media coverage on this so they they basically closed it down but it was just it was a hush hush under the table i i know you know who is do you know who is his defense attorney i'd be interested to know who that was i forget his mom his mom it's so hard to watch mitch actually interviewed her a few years ago at in in philly at a conference that he was running media for and he did check that out mitch lexamon and my buddy did that your friend too did that back in 2018 with lynn olbrich and he did a great job and it

was it was only like 15 20 minutes but it's a tough spot because and i i always make sure i say that when i was advocating towards the end of trump's presidency to to get him i was clearly saying commutation not a pardon right you cannot pardon him right i would look him in the eyes and say you know ross you had to go to jail right you broke the law but your your point is that he served it should be time served and his intentions were not horrible they were actually good unfortunately with intentions and this is important number one negligence is not an excuse we know that number two just because you have the right intentions on certain things that involve directly breaking not just federal law international

law this was around the world right because you want to make a political statement in this case as a libertarian does not give you the right to do that like you can't this you want to talk about slippery slopes if that went unpunished which technically it should have because they broke the law to get in there but that would have been disastrous like you can't let that go however when they went to get their result they did it in very clearly in a legal way and now this guy for a non for a non-violent crime is never going to get out of an eight by four cell which to me is fucking insane you know and so i i have a i have it's it's a different like when i look at snowden i go

pardon the motherfucker get him back here let's do our thing i don't look at ross like that i go well you know you lose some so much time has he served so far he's been in there for i almost a decade wow yeah 2013 he got caught and it's like i look at this and I go, maybe Chris Tarbell bad. Maybe not. Either way, the system is incentivized for him to go get it. And so when you – The sentence is beyond – like for me, so just in cutting in real quick. No, please.

There's a couple pieces to this that – first off, there's a side of – All right. That seems like a good place to leave it with a little cliffhanger for next week. If you guys enjoyed this episode, though, I would really, really appreciate it if you shared it with a friend who enjoys podcasts and particularly with a friend who enjoys podcasts

that cover the type of subject matter that we just did. The best way I can grow this thing is through good old-fashioned word-of-mouth marketing. And to all the people who have done that, especially over the past several months, thank you so much. I see that all the time. It's in my DMs where new listeners tell me they found the show through a friend. So please continue doing that to all the people who haven't yet. If you can do that, it would be an enormous, enormous help. So thank you once again to all of you. And I already can't wait for next week. I know you guys are going to enjoy that one too.

That said, you know what it is. Give it a thought. Get backed. Peace.