The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe - 327: Tony Ortega Doesn't Like Bullies Either

Episode Date: June 20, 2023

Substack journalist Tony Ortega has been covering Scientology for decades, and he weighs in on what the Danny Masterson double conviction means for the future of the "church." Subscribe to Tony's newsletter at tonyortega.substack.com Read his Rolling Stone Article about the trial  here  

Hey guys, it's the way I heard it. Episode number 327. This one's called Tony Ortega doesn't like bullies either. Explain, Chuck. Well, as people may already know since when we've had two people on associated with Scientology in the past, Spanky Taylor and Mike Rinder, the biggest boogaboo up your butt about Scientology is that they're bullies and you don't like bullies. I don't like bullies. No, I mean, to be fair, who does? I mean, who really walks around going, you know what? The bullies are getting short shrift these days. Let's hear it for the pulling. I mean, olive oil hung out with a bully.

I mean, they can't be all bad. But I don't know. Well, look, I hope those of you listening aren't put off by the fact that this is the third conversation we've had on this podcast that involves Scientology. We're having it for a couple of reasons. First of all, my guest is Tony Ortega, and there is no journalist on planet Earth who has dedicated more time, more thought, and endured more harassment for writing about this particular topic than Tony. He's been at it now for nearly three decades. You'll hear early on in our conversation the incredibly weird and totally unscriptable way that he came into my life 28 years ago.

it's such a kick to make this kind of connection. But here's the short version. Tony was in a movie called Going Clear. So was our friend Spanky Taylor. So were some other people who I admire, who made a pretty great documentary and who ruffled a lot of feathers. Ever since then,

we've kind of been following the fate of the church and the trial of Danny Masterson, who starred in that 70s show and was just very, very recently convicted of two counts of forcible rape and could be going to jail, Chuck, for 30 years? 30 to life. Yeah. Each count carries 15 to life.

So this is a big deal. It's a big deal because Scientology got pulled into the trial in ways that they didn't want to be pulled into. Right. And I want to say that what is unique to this story is, too, that Tony Ortega was on the case from the get. He first wrote an article about Jane Doe number one, I believe, in the thing. He broke the story way back when, and he was out here in Los Angeles, staying at a friend's house.

And I had dinner with the friend and Tony. And he was there every day at the courthouse all the way through the entire trial. And we'll be back, I think, for the sentencing on August 4th. So when I learned that Tony was available. to talk about this. The guilty verdict really was kind of shocking. He just wrote a huge piece for Rolling Stone that's out there right now and so many other pieces over the years. So look, it's not just a conversation about Scientology. It is a conversation about justice and bullies. The implications of this ruling are significant. Tony's work on this topic is unexampled.

Like I said, nearly three decades. He writes every day. He writes every day, and his goal is to try to say something new about Scientology. Yeah, I think you're going to like him a lot. For no other reason, never mind the cults and all the other stuff. The state of journalism in our country is unlike anything I've seen in my life. Credibility in journalism is at an all-time low. And Tony's been an editor-in-chief for years over at the Village Voice,

and now he's an independent and now like so many other people doing really important work, like Barry Weiss and Matt Taibi and Michael Schellenberger, who's been on our podcast. He's over at Substack writing some really interesting stuff. So that all comes out in the conversation. You're going to like it a lot. It's Tony Ortega, who doesn't like bullies either or either. Chuck, you say either. I like either, actually.

You say neither. I say neither neither neither neither either either let's get this podcast started my friends with Tony Ortega right after this do do do do do do do do

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It's filled with super useful information. And again, it's free at netsuite.com slash mike. That's netsuite.com. NetSuite. And off we go, Tony Ortega. You're looking very sharp. You may even be overdressed for this occasion. Well, Mike, you know, this is a big occasion for me.

I've been looking forward to something like this for a long time. You know, can I just say right off the bat? I was fortunate enough to be in going clear with Spanky Taylor. Old friend of mine, I've been talking to you for many years. Yep. And, you know, one of the things that's so interesting about Spanky is she's got all these people that she works with, very famous celebrities and everything. And out of all those very famous people, the one person,

who said something that stuck up for her when she was being attacked by Scientology was you. And I admired that so much. I really did. You know, thank you. I don't take it lightly because you've had a front row seat into this particular three ring circus. I'll tell you something that might freak you out a little bit because it freaked me out a little bit. And again, thanks for your patience. I had a crazy morning and I wanted to just reacquaint myself with a few things.

and I was reading through your curriculum, Viet, and I think that I read one of the first articles you ever wrote. Oh, really? And this is so odd, Chuck, I haven't even told you this, but you'll remember back in 1995, I was in Arizona, and I was on my way to Hawaii with the human calculator, my old buddy Scott Flansberg, who lived in Phoenix for years up there off of Lincoln. And we were going, Scott was performing at a Tony Robbins seminar. And I was like his plus one. And long story short, I spent like a week with a room full of very earnest people who were there for the express purpose of dramatically improving their lives, right? And I participated. You know, there were hot colds to walk across and exercises.

And I did all this stuff. And when I got back to Phoenix, Tony, I was like, I'm not sure what I just sat through. I actually picked up some useful things. And for the record, I think Tony is a straight shooter and he's running a hell of an organization. But I saw some behavior there among 50 or 60 attendees that struck me as a little, I hate to say the C word, but a little cultish. Right. So I went down this rabbit hole. My buddy Scott and I had this conversation.

I'm like, was this a cult we just came from? And he said, I don't think so. And I said, no, I don't think so either. But I found this guy named Rick Ross, who was running this thing called Can, the Cult Awareness Network. And I took a deep dive into this, which launched really a lifelong interest in why people believe weird things, which of course is the book that Michael Shermer wrote around the same time. into all of this, and pardon me for all the exposition, but I just wanted you to know that in the fall of 1995 at my buddy Scott Flansberg's house, the human calculator,

I picked up what I think was the Arizona knew something or other, the alternative paper. The Phoenix New Times. The Phoenix New Times, that's what it was. And it's not just that you had written an article. This was a time when a guy like you could take a deep dive. I mean, you gave him a good. four or five thousand words in this thing. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And your thing was Scientology. And of course,

you mentioned Rick. And suddenly, I was like, all right, there's a world of people here trying to get at the truth. All that is to say that how odd here, nearly 30 years later, to be talking to you, because I don't know if Scientology, tell me if I'm wrong, but is there a bigger pain in the to Scientology right now, Dentone Ortega? Well, sure. Leah Remini, Mike Rinder. I mean, I'm just a journalist

who's trying to document things, Mike. They don't like what I write, but you said it really well when you had Mike on, Mike Rinder on, that you don't like a bully. And I think that's what you and I have in common is that this is an organization that bullies people,

and one of the people they were bullying in the mid-90s was Rick Ross. I had recently started with the newspaper at that time. I was looking for a juicy story. And one of the nice things about all weeklies back then was you were looking for stories that the daily paper had either missed or done badly. And one day I was just going through the letters to the editor in the Arizona Republic. And there was a letter from Rick.

And he said, yes, you covered the story where I lost a lawsuit for $5 million, but you failed to point out that the plaintiff was recruited by the Church of Scientology. And I thought, well, that sounds pretty juicy. I looked him up and just said, please tell me that story. And that is what brought down the Cult Awareness Network that you mentioned was that Rick was, he wasn't running it, but he was one of the people that Cannes would recommend to help people get out of these organizations. And he had helped this young Christian kid get out of this controlling group. But then the kid came back and was recruited by Scientology to sue him. He was already 18.

They kept him in a hotel against his, well, you know, that kind of. thing. So anyway, the point is Scientology was behind that litigation which cost Rick and Cannes so much money. It bankrupted Cannes. The Cult Awareness Network was this organization trying to help parents get information

about these groups so that their kids don't get sucked into them. Not only did Scientology bankrupt Can through that lawsuit, they then bought the assets in an auction. These mother. Unbelievable. After that day, when you

called the Cult Awareness Network to get information about cults, you were calling Scientology. Oh, my God. Well, look, just so people can really understand why I went down this rabbit hole personally and why I still don't feel like I've gotten to the bottom of it. Rick wasn't just helping parents keep their kids out of dangerous organizations. He was going into those organizations. He was doing what a lot of people described as kidnapping, right? And then he had embarked upon one of the jobs that I always just thought would be, like one of my fantasy jobs. He was a true deprogrammer. Like this guy would sit down in a hotel room with you and walk you through why you believe what you believe and peel back the layers and over a period of days, sometimes weeks.

try and get to the truth of the thing. And Tony, I've just always been so impressed and so interested with this combination of persuasion and passion and truth seeking. And like, I guess maybe this is all just a ramp up to the first thing I really want to talk about. Like, what's going on with deprogramming today? What have you seen? How is it evolving? and oh, by the way, how weird for you 30 years later to be writing for substack at a time when big newspapers and typical media outlets are no longer giving people anything close to the

whole story? It's like, on the one hand, everything appears to have changed. On the other hand, not a damn thing has. Well, it's a very fractured media landscape right now, Mike, and a lot of people that I used to work with have given up on it. You know, you always hear about these legacy corporations laying off so many journalists. It's very difficult out there. And you're right.

I was very fortunate. I got into this in the alt-weeklies when they were making money. They could give us the space. They could give us the time. And we could do those deep dives. It's so much more difficult now. I've been very happy with Substack because it's helped me grow my own personal audience. And I have a lot of freedom there.

but just today, a couple of hours before I joined you here, my substack came under attack by the Church of Scientology. And I had to write personally to the CEO to alert him that they are trying to take down my post and trying to get my entire substack taken down. So I just wanted substack to know what's going on. And it is one of the attorneys for the Church of Scientology who was identified that's making these attacks on my site.

So it's just, things don't change that much. You know, when I was talking to Rick Ross in 1995, he was going through a lot of the same things I'm going through today. One of the things that's interesting about Scientology is it was created by this science fiction writer, Elron Hubbard, who wrote down millions of words in policies, and then he died.

And they consider those policies to be sacrosanct. They consider it scripture, and they can't change those policies. And so that's why they're still doing the same things over and over and over again, they don't change. You know, I think it needs to be said, obviously, from a truth, capital T standpoint, there is much to discuss regarding the content of Dianetics. But it ought to be said that he wasn't a very good writer.

And I know that that'll probably sound mean, but I remember as a kid, maybe not even as a kid. I was probably, they're probably still running the ads. The way the book is presented, it is like a great tome of literary, just wonderfulness, right? It's just mentioned in the same breath as other great literary works. This guy, this guy didn't do rewrites. He just wrote, puked it up, slapped a couple of covers on it, went on to the next one, wrote some more, wrote some more. Anything that came out of his head, it seemed. and now to all of a sudden have it represent some kind of dogma.

That's amazing. And, you know, I have to be careful because churches, I have great respect for the rights that churches have. But when you're talking about a church whose founder, until very recently, was still walking among us, I mean, what, it's Scientology and I guess maybe Mormonism, Joseph Smith, you know? And so it gets weird when you can actually point to an actual human and see him. Like, okay, this is the source of all of the wisdom. Well, let me just bring up something about the word church. You know, you're talking about the book Dianetics, which El Ron Hubbard put out on May 9, 1950.

And it's important to look at the subtitle of that book. The full title is Dianetics, the modern science of mental health. he sold it as a science. And one of the things that I guess characterizes me as a journalist is that I've slogged through hundreds and hundreds of the man's lectures. Okay, I'm very familiar with the things that he said in the 50s and the 60s. And in those first couple of years, he savaged religion. It was one of his whipping posts. You know, he just, he made fun of it. And it was very clear that this was a science. There was nothing about faith involved. But then it went belly up. And he actually lost the use of the word Dianetics in bankruptcy court.

And that's why he had to come up with a new name and started something called Scientology. The biggest difference between the two of them is in Dianetics, you were trying to remember what happened to you in the womb that's affecting you today as an adult. But in Scientology, you go back even farther to try to remember what happened to you in previous lives. That's the basic difference between the two. But essentially, he had to come up with a new name. that was in 1950 was the book. In 1952, he started Scientology.

In 1953, he literally wrote a letter to one of his followers and said, let's try the religion angle. He actually used that phrase, Mike, the religion angle. And suddenly overnight, in December, 1953, it was the Church of Scientology. And you can talk to longtime members that got in in the 60s and 70s, and they will tell you, to them it was always. soldiers of science. It was still this thing using a machine. These were actual memories who were digging up from other planets. There was nothing religious or belief about it and that they were told that

church trappings, the language about, you know, faith was all for the lawyers and for tax reasons. Did the IRS see this letter written? Yes. And so the IRS, so he just stopped paying taxes at that point on his own, unilaterally. In 19, In 1967, the government finally got wise, took him to court, and in very detailed rulings, said, look, this is not a religion. This is benefiting one man, which is not what a religion does. And they yanked his tax-exempt status in 1967. He still didn't pay taxes. Just because the government told him to pay, he didn't pay.

So by the 80s, they had such a huge tax bill. As Marty Rathman put it in the movie Going Clear. they had about a billion dollar tax bill, and they only had about a quarter of that in the bank. And they either had to get taxes and them status or disappear. And that's why they fought so hard in the late 80s and early 90s. They were surveilling IRS, individual IRS agents. They were breaking into the IRS offices and bugging meetings. And if you think about it, it's just incredible.

They intimidated the IRS into giving them tax exempt status in 19. 1993. There's just no question about it. The IRS just simply gave up. They couldn't take it anymore and said, here, you're a church. And, you know, it's a decision that I think has affected many, many people since then because Scientology is so protected now. They know that if they're being sued or if the government's looking at them, the first thing they do is walk into court and say, we're a 501C3 religious organization and you can't touch us. And you've got to be sitting there right now. You've got to be wondering, good God, If they can bully the IRS into backing off of a claim like that, who's running substack?

And what kind of spine do they have? Right? And just how much of that leaning are they going to be able to absorb before all of a sudden Tony Ortega's work goes up and smoke? Well, I guess I'm going to find out, Mike. And I'm hoping that they can weather the storm because I've been with some other organizations that have a, it's frightening to people. I mean, even law enforcement is cowed by these situations.

You know, there are actual figures in the federal government, state governments, who have said, I don't want to be investigated. I don't want these guys looking into my family. And so, you know, year after year, the investigations that should be done just aren't getting done. I know it sounds incredible. You think, oh, come on, the police aren't afraid of anybody. Then how has David Miscavage, the leader of Scientology, been able to banish his wife to a small mountain compound above Los Angeles for the last 18 years

without any consequences. Paging Shelley. Hello. Is Shelley in the house? Have they ever done like a wellness check on her? Because you know where she is, right? Right. In the summer of 2013, I broke the news that Leah Remini had left the Church of Scientology.

And a month later, I also broke the news that she had submitted a missing person's report. about Shelly to the Los Angeles Police Department. I talked to the lieutenant who handled that. He said that two of his detectives had gone to where Shelley is, had talked to her, and she did not want to make a public statement. And I asked the lieutenant at that point, this conversation with your detectives,

did it take place in the presence of other church officials? And he said, that's classified. Just like that. Wow. And then later, now, See, it's interesting that the APD did that because she's not in Los Angeles. She's not in the LAPD's jurisdiction. She's in a small mountain compound that's actually in the San Bernardino Mountains in San Bernardino County near Lake Arrowhead.

I later was contacted by some extended family members of her, some cousins. They wanted to check on her because they had read my reporting and they were very concerned about her. I told them, listen, don't go to the LAPD. You need to go to the San Bernardino Sheriff's office. So they did. They came back to me and said, they told us they don't have enough information. that she's there. So I then wrote a detailed letter to the San Bernardino Sheriff's Office explaining all the reasons why we know she's at this particular small, mountain Scientology

compound. And I got this form letter back, just like, you know, we can't look into it. And I know it's just because they don't want to get involved with David Miscavage. They are literally afraid of this organization. So year after year, she's up in that organization. Now, she may be resigned to her fate. I'm not saying that, you know, she's, he's trying to climb a fence at this point or anything like that. But, you know, her own sisters can't see her. Why not? There are lots of different kinds of prisons, Tony.

You know, not all prisons have bars, right? This one does. Yeah. Just so people understand, David Miscavage is essentially the heir apparent to Elrond Hubbard, the head of the church. And his wife has been the subject of all kinds of, that's who we're talking about right now, Shelly. Give me the subtitle again, just so I

I got it right in my head. The Dienetic Subtitle? Yeah. The modern science of mental health. Okay. So my question, and I want to get to the big trial, you know, there's huge news and the implications of all that and so many other things, but just a big broad question. Do you think that title, that book and this movement has done more harm to organized religion

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at Pure Talk. dot com slash row. Pure talk. Wow, that's a great question. I don't think science ever pays much attention at all to Elron Hubbard or Dianetics or Scientology. In particular, Scientology absolutely hates the psychiatry industry and they agitate at psychiatric conventions.

And the psychiatrists I've talked to just say, we don't care. It's just like, they don't matter. So I don't think science pays much attention to them. I think religion does because on the one hand, I think some mainstream religions realize that Scientology is making them all look bad. Some other small organizations that have their own issues with abuse tend to defend Scientology and they tend to stick together. So I think there's definitely been some very interesting influence that Scientology has had

on other religions in the United States? I just look at the platitudinous nature of follow the science, right? A relatively recent phrase, I think, that has been somewhat shoehorned into the lexicon. And the righteousness, the almost religious righteousness that accompanies demands, right, that we all just follow the science and go wherever it leads.

Well, you know, that's what I'm. referring to. When you start throwing science around like that, you know, in the same breath as church, well, it's interesting, right? Because where, where do you put your faith? I think I kind of understand the role of faith in religion. I'm not sure I understand the role of faith in science. And to conflate the two really opens the door to some, well, some pretty interesting navel gazing, if nothing else. No, it's interesting the way that Scientology kind of combines some of these urges in the human spirit. And let me just make it real clear.

I really don't have a problem if people want to look into their 5 billion year history in the galaxy and try to bring up memories of where they were a million years ago on another planet. In fact, I've said often in my writings that that's my favorite part of Scientology. I wish they would be more open with it. The space opera is great. But instead it's exactly. It's the secrecy, you know, like just a basic issue with them. I've always pointed to this out.

Christianity, Islam, Judaism, it takes about a minute to explain what their basic belief is. And a Bible is free, okay? And you can go through it and somebody will explain to you within a few minutes exactly what the basic tenets are. In Scientology, it takes years of time, hundreds of thousands of dollars, before they even begin to clue you in what the whole point of this whole exercise is. And I just find that really troubling. Well, and I find it troubling too, but also fascinating because as a rapacious capitalist

and as somebody who's been involved in everything from multi-level marketing to all kinds of sales jobs, I'm a big fan of, you know, caveat and mTOR, right? Buyer Beware. And I'm a big fan of, well, Willie Lohman and all the tropes that, come along with knocking on the door and asking for the sale. And don't take no for an answer. And here's the alternative. And here's the second effort. And here's the third effort. And I've been, you know, to take it back to Tony Robbins. I can't tell you how many organizations like that I've visited in the last 10 years and spoken at, right? And the rooms full of people who have paid their

money. And they're there because they want to come out a slightly more enlightened person. I'm good with all of it, right up to the point where you say you're a church and right up to the point where I feel, and I can't articulate it as well as I'd like, but you know when you're being manipulated, Tony, you know when there's a thumb in the small of your back. And when you start sprinkling money on top of that feeling and then put the impromatore of organized religion and tax-exempt status on top of everything else, that's where the wheels come off the bus for me. So I just, you know, maybe I'm selling beyond the sale. I've got no problem with all kinds of things that are involved with Scientology

right up to the water's edge where my tax dollars are supporting it. That's when I kind of feel like wait. And ultimately, that's why you're on this program, because I want to know if you think we're going to live to see the day when the IRS wakes up one day and realizes or remembers perhaps where they put their spine. Yeah, I know. It's difficult. I have thought that, you know, Scientology has been shrinking. It has less influence than it did before.

It has a lot less influence in Hollywood, for example. And it's just got fewer numbers of people. It still has a lot of money. David Miscavage has a ton of money he can call on to spend on attorneys and private investigators. But it does feel like this organization is weaker than it once was. And I have wondered if the federal government is way, for some point when it's a little bit more of a pushover.

Mike Rinder once said it to me. I thought he explained it perfectly. He said, look, there are these middle managers whose names you never know at the Department of Justice, at the IRS. They are the ones who really have to make this decision about, are we going to go after this investigation? And he said, they know they are making a decision that is going to take up the rest of their careers.

And that's why we don't see. see them acting very quickly, is they know what a fight this is going to be for so many years. So, you know, I don't think there's any question that Scientology is in violation of the agreement it has with the IRS, that it is harming people. We see that people coming forward all the time. It's really a question of when is the government going to have the will and the interest to do something. And I've talked to individual agents who are very interested, but it comes down to their

bosses and whether they're ready to make that calculation. It seems to me that those middle managers you're talking about, right? They're a lot like cops or detectives in a way who are also a lot like investigative reporters or beat reporters, right? I mean, you've only got so much time and you got an editor who's drumming his or her fingers on the desk. They're waiting for the next story and so forth. You said yourself 28 years ago, you're looking for something juicy. But did you think you were going to find something that would consider? assume you for the next 30 years, right? Like, middle manager can't do that. They got other things to do.

And so I get it. You're right. It's like, like, there probably wasn't some big meeting where a bunch of well-intended people said, ah, screw it. They probably all just came to their own decision in their own way like Sisyphus, who just one day said, you know, this freaking rock, man. I just am never, I'm never going to get it up the hill. Well, one thing that might affect that calculus is the conviction of Danny Masterson. This is something I first broke the news of the LAPD investigation in 2017. I've been reporting this story every day for the last six years. I was in the courtroom when the verdict was announced and Danny Masterson was handcuffed and led away. He's going to be sentenced on August 4th. He's looking at 30 years to life in prison. And what was really interesting

to me is not just these terrible, awful crimes that he's accused of committing against these women, who were, like him, Scientologists. He is a Scientologist now, but they were at the time. But all the things we heard about Scientology trying to keep this from getting to law enforcement and that these women felt that they were being punished for coming forward as victims. So much we heard about Scientology policy that encourages this.

It was a brutal, brutal trial for the Church of Scientology. I really believe Leah Remini and some of these other people that have much more clout than I do, feel that this is the kind of outcome that may begin to move those government officials who have been maybe thinking about it, but now they've got literally a criminal conviction of a well-known Scientology celebrity who the prosecutor said it outright. This man was protected by the Church of Scientology, even though it knew the horrible crimes he was committing. that's the kind of sea change that might encourage government officials to do something. God, I hate to even say this out loud, but my mind looks for corollaries, right?

And when did people start paying attention to the allegations of abuse in the Catholic Church? What did it take? I mean, to bring it back to journalism, I mean, I don't know how much of the movie was true, but I think it was called... Spotlight? Was it Spotlight? Yeah. Yeah. Right.

I mean, there you've got some journalists who are given enough rope, enough time, they have enough passion, right? They're curious. And they peel away, they peel away, they peel away. And eventually the Archdiocese kind of crumbles and we have a movie and then we have a thing. Is there a corollary there? Is this that sort of moment for Scientology? You know, I have always been in awe of journalists who came well before me that have exposed

Scientology. I mean, going back to people like Paulette Cooper, I wrote a book about her. She was one of the first people to expose Scientology, and Scientology targeted her for destruction for years. And that's what my book was about. But there have also been terrific exposés. If you remember, the Los Angeles Times did an incredible series in the 1990s. Time Magazine had Scientology on its cover in 1991. There have been other wonderful exposés all along. And I think the public has had some great insights into what's going on in there. But what I noticed is that, you know, one of these great takeouts would come out, Tampa Bay Times or LA Times, and then it would just sort of die away.

And I thought the niche I might insert myself in was that you mentioned it, a beat reporter, somebody that day in and day out would just keep people apprised of the various different, you know, litigation going on, scandals happening. That's the job I gave myself 12 years. ago, like you said, I started writing about them 28 years ago, but I thought that that's what was missing was that daily look at what's going on. So that's what I've been trying to do. So people won't forget what this organization is up to. Well, but it sure helps every now and then when you have a potential extinction event, right?

And I think maybe there are two things that Scientology rushes to associate themselves. with that in my mind are both cause for great suspicion. The first is science, obviously. You know, the second is celebrity. In the spirit of the subtitle of the book, what is the Scientology headquarters called in Los Angeles? Pacific Area Command? Isn't it?

Oh, the Hollywood Celebrity. Yeah. There's something under. The Hollywood Celebrity Center. It's the Celebrity Center. Exactly. I mean, that's not HQ, I don't think. Is it, Tony?

No, the headquarters in Los Angeles. is called Pacific Area Command, Pack Base, the big blue, formerly hospital building. A little bit farther north is the Hollywood Celebrity Center. But you're right. It's incredibly important. El Ron Hubbard in 1950. This is even, I'm sorry, but this is even better. Yeah.

So their headquarters is borrowing from military. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Okay. Their Bible is the hinge is science. Right. And the attractant is.

celebrity. So back to a guy like Danny who we should be clear was one of the stars of that 70 show, a celebrity by any definition and a real adherent to the cause. For him to go down would have been, and now is, an existential threat to the underlying church, which obviously is why somehow the church wound up with redacted information that was in possession of the prosecution. Weird. Weird how that would happen. So sorry, but This idea that Danny's celebrity could wind up being the proximate cause of their demise is sort of interesting. It is. And I also wanted to mention that, you know, we've been talking about sea changes or big events.

And I had mentioned some historically like the LA Times and Time magazine. But certainly the thing that has really changed, at least for public perception and the media, I think Alex Gibney's movie going clear. on HBO, but especially Leah Remini's A&E series, Scientology in the aftermath. She brought this to a whole new audience. She also brought a passion about what it was like for ex-Scientologists to recover from Scientology, a real compassion for these people. And I think between those two things, it's really raised the public awareness about this organization.

I've heard from a couple of Scientologists since Spanky was on. this and again after Mike was on this and I've run into a couple serendipitously out in the world you know without picking a fight one guy in particular pretty powerful and very very very successful and I'm amazed Tony all of them have basically just looked at me with pity or something that looks like it and they've shook their heads real slow right and they've just said look you've been lied to it's all lies every bad thing you've ever heard about Scientology is a lie. Let me tell you, and then it turns, and it's so interesting, the way that the arguments tend to play out, at least the ones that I've seen, right?

It's, they're skilled, they're facile, and it all comes back to that sort of thing. Look, this works for me. This is what I've done. Here's where I was. Look at where I am. How can you second guess these results and so forth? and so on, which is why in the end, I throw up my hands and just say, look, I got one beef. Tax exempt status, that's it.

That's it. I don't care what else you do. I don't care if Zeno, Zeus, Dino, Rhino. I don't care. So I guess I'm just, it scares me when you compliment me for being brave enough to talk about this. You were the only one. Okay. Great.

Great. So, awesome. But I mean, Joe Rogan has had the on. No, but I meant of Spanky's clients, right? I mean, Spanky. Oh, of Spanky's friends. Yeah, Spanky's friends. People, you know, she represents some really important people in Hollywood.

And you saw her on going clear. You heard about, I think, some of the things she was going up through behind the scenes. All of us who were in that movie went through hellacious harassment by Scientology. And, you know, you said something about it. thought that was so great because most people just won't do anything. And it was really, I thought it was really important. Look, I was proud of all you guys, but I was especially proud of her, because she's not Paul Haggis. She's not Larry Wright. She's not John Travolta. She's not Tom Cruz. Tell me if I'm wrong, but if I remember, Spanky was basically Travolta's assistant and was

instrumental in recruiting Lisa Marie Presley. Well, Priscilla, and then, because Lisa was only Nine at the time. Right, right, right, right. So, you know, it's just like the connections are stunning. The celebrity that runs through it is interesting. But mostly, Tony, it's the connections. I've been looking forward to talking to you, but I didn't really get super excited about it until I found this very weird connection. Your first article, Arizona. You're writing about Rick Ross as I'm wondering, man, how do you? How do you? you'd get to do what Rick Ross does, you know, this whole programming thing. It all just came back in a rush watching this Danny trial unfold. And by the way, with regard to passion and investigative journalism, I saw you doing like a 10-minute update on YouTube just the other day, right after the

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Hey-haw! I was totally stunned, Mike. I thought we were coming into another hung jury, honestly. I was completely stunned. And, you know, I had people afterwards. It's funny that you say it that way because I had people afterwards telling me, you know, you didn't smile at all during that. And I said, on purpose, there was nothing to smile about. These women have been through such hell for all these years.

I made sure I was very serious about that announcement because I did not want anybody thinking that I was spiking the ball or anything like that. Look, I'm a reporter in the front row, well, back row of the courtroom every day watching this thing unfold, trying to give people a sense of what it was like in there. and seeing him let away in handcuffs, hearing Bijou Phillips wail and sob, knowing what these victims have been through, this was a... His wife.

No, but I'm also what his victims, knowing what his victims have been through for the last six years. And yes, I'm sorry, Danny Masterson's wife, Bijou, was in the front row. Once the second guilty was announced, we heard this bizarre sound that I realized it was her wailing.

And the judge asked her to please comply. pose yourself. And then Danny was let out. And, you know, when I thought about, you know, seeing Danny let out, hearing how Bejoo reacted, seeing how the rest of the family was reacting, but then thinking about what these victims have been through for all these years, when I went outside the courthouse to make that video, to me, it was a very serious, you know, gut-wrenching occasion. And I did not want to show any mirth. So if you thought that I was somehow happy about it, I don't know. I didn't feel that. way. I was... It wasn't like celebratory glee. It was wonder. Yeah. Right. You looked really surprised.

Not in an unhappy way, just in a like, I did win the lottery. Those are my tickets. Are you sure those numbers are right? Before I celebrate, let's just, let's just check. That was interesting to watch. This is a tough case from the beginning because of the length of time that had happened, had gone by, which they explained because they were too afraid to be, you know, the retaliation from the Church of Scientology, the fact that there were no forensics involved, that it was, you know, these women and then the witnesses they had told shortly thereafter. This was not an easy case for the prosecutor. I thought they had done so much better in the retrial than in the first trial.

They told a better narrative. They put things together more quickly. And they anticipated the defenses trying to poke holes in their story. And the result was, yeah, you got two guilties. But even until the moment that clerk read those verdicts, I was still not sure that this was going to happen. So, yeah, I was very surprised. Let's talk about story for a minute. In particular, persuasion.

I think it was you I heard talk about this. But when the prosecution got their first crack at this, right out of, I mean, I think she started with, it all starts with a drink. and man, why don't more lawyers get that memo? The jury wants to hear a story. Exactly. And that's what I said after the first trial. I really felt that they had not told the jury a story. And I mean, these are people. They're sitting there day after day.

They're missing their jobs. They want to have things put together in an understandable narrative. And they did not do a good job of that in the first trial. The second trial, they made much better use of the Deputy D.A. Reinhold Mueller. had been the lead prosecutor. But Deputy DA, Ariel Anson, got much more involved in the retrial. And she was so good at leading these witnesses through their questioning. And then she had the opportunity to do that closing.

And you're right. Her opening of that statement was, it all starts with a drink. And right from that moment, she's telling you a story. She wants you to think about the way that Danny Masterson was accused of carrying out these multiple incidents. And then Mueller followed her up by pointing out, this took planning. This was not a spontaneous thing. He had to think about how he was going to spike these drinks.

He had to think about how he was going to get it into their hands. He had to think about how he was going to make sure they drank. And they didn't do that in the first trial, Mike. They learned. They understood that the jury wants to hear that kind of a coherent narrative. And I think that's a large reason of why they got these convictions. You know, our audience probably wants to hear the same thing. So what is the short version?

I mean, is it even right to say what is he accused of at this point? Right. He's been found guilty. So maybe the question is, what did he do? He's now a convicted serial rapist. Danny Masterson, yeah, had been, he was, he Hyde, Stephen Hyde on that 70s show. And it was right around the time he got that role. He was dating a woman that I refer to as Jane Doe 3.

some publications use at least part of her name. I tend not to. Jane Doe 3, he was dating her. They had been together for several years. Her allegation is that they went to a restaurant, had a glass of wine, and she doesn't remember anything until the next afternoon. When she woke up, she was injured,

she was bleeding, she went to the bathroom, she was in great pain, and it was, you know, her bottom. And she found Masterson and asked him what happened and she says he admitted, I had sex with you there. And she was so outraged that he had done this,

that's when she decided to go to the Church of Scientology to turn him in. Church of Scientology told, you know, she said my boyfriend raped me. And the first thing she said she was told was, don't use that word. You can't rape somebody in a relationship. And then they punished her. She ended up having to do an ethics program where she had to get his car washed.

in order to make amends to him. The second incident occurred in 2003. Sorry, Tony, but I think it's worth pointing out. Okay, so 2003, before hashtag Me Too. Oh, yeah. Before way back. But not the trial, right? The trial's coming.

That was, what, six years ago when that began. Let me do it a little more quickly because I know there's a lot to it. The other two women were Scientologists at the time, but they were only acquaintances. He was not dating them. They each claimed that same thing. They had a drink. They felt suspiciously intoxicated. And he attacked them.

He raped them brutally. At his Hollywood Hills home, all three of these attacks occurred in that home. The one woman that's referred to as Jane Doe One, not only went to the Church of Scientology, and they told her you can't go to the police, but she went to the police anyway. In June 2004,

Scientology swarmed that investigation. got it killed. And so then 10, 15 years passes. It's only in 2015, 2016, when Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 3, for the first time, learn about each other and then find out about Jane Doe 2. That's when they decided to go to the police again because they had no idea there were other victims. They always assumed they were the only ones that had been attacked by Madison. So it was only in 2015, 2016, then when they learned about each other that they went to the police. Now, it's too late to try Danny Masterson on a single count of rape in 2016, 2017, if it occurred in 2001, 2003. However, California has a very harsh law called the one-strike law for people who have committed multiple violent felonies. and under that law, if you have multiple, that's the key word, more than one, then a rape carries a possible sentence of 15 years to life. And once there's a potential life sentence involved, there is no statute of limitations.

That's how the DA's office was able to bring this in 2020 when they charged him, was under the one strike law as multiple forcible rapes. So they brought three counts knowing they had to have two. And that's what they got. On May 31st, the jury came back, gave them guilty on count one, guilty on count two. They hung on the third. But they had the two. So now he's facing 30 years to life in prison.

Good grief. So they hung on three, but it was eight four, right? It was eight four. Also, I want to also point out that in the first trial in October, there was a fourth woman who alleged that she had been raped by Masterson in 1996. He was not charged with that. And in the second trial, there was a fifth woman who testified that she was raped by Madison in the year 2000. Also, these women have filed a civil lawsuit. And there's another woman who claims she was raped by Masterson who's in the civil lawsuit. So that's six. He may have been convicted on two,

but there's at least six women who alleged that they were raped by Danny Masterson. God. And more might come forward now that he's been convicted. We know that there's a woman in Scientology who has allegations but will not, refuses to come forward. And I think there are others. There are six that are at least public about it. So how many went to the cops initially?

Initially it was just Jane Doe 2. I mean, I'm sorry. Initially it was just Jane Doe 1 in 2004. That case was closed. Then in 2016, Jane Doe 1, 2, and 3 came forward. And then again, there were two more women who testified in the trials. And of the three Jane Doe's one, two, and three, how many went back to the church to complain? Well, Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 3 went to the church to complain.

Jane Doe 2 said that the reason she did not go to complain to the church about Danny is that she had complained about a previous boyfriend who was a Scientologist and they had punished her for it. This was the consistent testimony of all these women that when they came forward, to report a rape to the church, they were punished as victims. And so Jane Doe's testimony was, I'm not going to try and turn in Danny Mason after what they did to me the last time. So she did not bring allegations to the church, but the other two did. So that's the damning thing. The cops didn't know necessarily that there was a pattern and practice going on.

But the church certainly knew that two people had made an identical complaint about one of their celebrities. Absolutely. This is one of the characteristics of Scientologists. They keep incredible records and they interrogate people. We know that Danny Mason was interrogated about this stuff by the church. The LAPD could never get those documents from the church. But we know that the church knew about these incidents. If that's the case, then couldn't these Jane Does collectively get together and sue Scientology for their participation in their rapes? That's a great question. They are suing Scientology over harassment. They say that since they came forward to the LAPD in 2016, they have been under constant surveillance, hacking, harassment, even the poisoning of their pets. And so they filed a lawsuit against Scientology and Masterson in 2019. That lawsuit has been on hold while the criminal case was going on. Now that the criminal case is over, the civil case is scheduled to get back underway on June 28th, I believe. Scientology has already said that the first thing it's going to do is filed what's called an anti-slap motion, which is really cynical because I don't know if you know much about anti-SLAP statutes, but they were developed to protect, you know, protesters from Monsanto and stuff, you know, that big bullies would sue small people to keep their mouths quiet.

And so this litigation, I mean, the statutes developed where you could ask the judge, look at this lawsuit, is it legitimate or is it, are they just trying to silence the little guy? And so Scientology is going to use that. They've already said they're going to to basically say Scientology is being silenced by these bullies, these women. It's just so upside down. They're the little guy.

Right, right. They bought the cult awareness network. Of course they're going to do this. Of course they are. Well, it seems, Chuck, to your point, I mean, yeah, it feels like there could be a class action, but the really damning thing is four, and six, right? So if the church knows they got a bad actor, if they know that two of their

parishioners have complained credibly about being raped, that means that four, five, and six could have been prevented had they come forward. Those are the three that ought to get together. If you know there's a pedophile in the playground, right? If you know it and you're the teacher, well, you've just entered into a different kind of world there. It seems to me, I'm not a lawyer. Jane Do Three made this point really passionately that what motivated her to finally come forward was she was so horrified to realize that if she had done more back in 2001 and 2002, then maybe these other attacks would not have happened.

She feels terrible about that and is what motivated her to come forward when she did. This does now open new doors. What's the future? Like, what's the ideal thing that could happen from your perspective at this point? I'd like a serious government investigation of what Scientology is doing with its tax-exempt status. We know that it's spending incredible amounts of money harassing people, hiring private investigators, smearing people like Leah Remini all the time. I think it's time the government took that a little more seriously. I think there may be some litigation about that coming. I've heard. heard some things. I don't know for sure. But, you know, I think maybe with the conviction of Danny

Masterson, a tide has begun to change. We know that the public is more aware of Scientology, thanks to Leah Remini and Alex Gibney, Spanky Taylor. And I think maybe it's time for the government to do something. But in the meantime, Mike, I can't rely on that. I'm just going to watch this organization day after day, first of all, because I'm fascinated by it. Second of all, because there are people who are just desperate to hear about their loved ones that are still in it that they can't talk to. And so my day-to-day work does not rely on that sort of, you know, outcome. It's just what are they up to today? And they're always up to something new.

They just can't help themselves. They're always infiltrating groups and trying new tricks and operations. I mean, that's kind of what's so fascinating about. them. They're still stuck in the 60s. They still think that they're fighting Smersh. I mean, they literally think they're fighting Smersh. What did that stand for you again?

What was Smurge? Oh, gosh, I don't know. It was just one of the army of angry acronyms. Yeah. Right. Elron Hubbard would literally tell his followers that they were fighting Smersh, which was, I don't know, out of a James Bond novel or something. So

that's what's entertaining about them, but it's also, you know, scary that they just won't stop. They keep trying to destroy people. They, you know, they tried to destroy Paulette Cooper in the 60s and 70s. And that's what I wrote a book about. And they're still trying to destroy people today. They've run elaborate operations against me. Mike, you can't believe the amounts of money they spend trying to harass and intimidate me. I mean, it's insane. Well, look, what have they done to you particularly? Yeah, I mean, I told Alex Gibney about this. I told Leah Remini about this. One of the things they did, for example, was they hired an out of, well, first of all, let me

just say, they never answer my requests for comment. They never just call me up and say, hey, we had a problem with your story. We'd like to see something changed. I'd be happy to talk to them about that. They don't have the guts to talk to me directly. So what they do, for example, they hired an out of work New York Daily News reporter to pretend that he was working on a story that my wife was a terrorist in order to freak out her employers. Now, my wife was interested also in this stuff, and she had gone on those boards, the anonymous boards 10 years ago, where people were joking around about Scientology. Well, Scientology considers anonymous a terrorist organization. So the fact that my wife went on those forums and discussed Scientology makes her a terrorist.

And fortunately, Mike Rinder helped us out. He wrote her employers a letter to explain to them that This is Scientology. They're not serious. This is a cynical attempt to hurt Tony Ortega. And her boss is understood. So I was fortunate. And I just want to say how grateful I am to Mike Rinder. He's got some new challenges now.

We're all rooting for him. I thought he did an excellent job on your podcast. He's a good friend of mine. And he came to my aid when I needed that. They've run other bizarre operations. They've flown people all around the globe trying to intimidate my family members. They even sent Mike, they even sent their dirty tricks private investigator to intimidate my mother twice. She doesn't scare so easy.

No. Yeah. Look, you know what? Please give Mike our regards for those people listening who didn't hear the prior podcast. Mike, unlike you, Tony, was an avowed Scientologist. He was way up the food chain. Number three, as I recall, right? Yeah.

And he got out, wrote a heck of a book. book called it Billion Nears. And so, yeah, between he and Lee and you and your, it's the underground bunker, right, that you've been running for some time. You just mentioned money, and I just want to not to put too fine a point on it, but however much money they're raising through the auditing process and through their parishioners, it must pale in comparison to their real estate holdings. I mean, these guys own a lot of property. This has been the new focus of David Miscavage, the leader of Scientology. He's put less focus on the money that comes in through processing and training.

He's just asking his wealthy followers for just giant donations. And they have been giving him to him. He's just raising huge amounts of money and turning it into real estate. They're replacing older orgs, they call them. That's their word for churches with newer what they call ideal orgs. And these things cost $10 or $20 million, dollars each. He's already built more than 60 of them around the world. They sit empty, but there's incredible amounts of money invested in those properties. He's begging them for even

more money. Nancy Cartwright, who is the voice of Bart Simpson, is a very dedicated Scientologist. They recently celebrated her because she has now given them $21 million, just in straight donations. There's another couple. They've actually split up, but they're still giving money separately, who acknowledged that they have given Muscovage more than $300

million for him to build these new initiatives and things. We estimate he's sitting on at least $3 or $4 billion. And remember, this is a small group. I want to try and make a point if I can and maybe some people will see it as a

distinction without too much of a difference or maybe an irrelevant line. But back to more traditional churches, whether they're evangelical, Pentecostal, Catholic, whatever it is. I think it's worth saying that if you want to contribute to your church, I've got no truck with that at all. But when you walk into a Christian church, or really many, many denominations, you can get a pretty good top-down explanation of what's for sale, right? In about 10 minutes, right? There was a virgin, she got pregnant, it was a miracle, it's divine, and if you put your trust in him, you'll have eternal life. Are there any questions? And so it's out there, right? With this basic scheme, the word audit is so interesting to me, because as we were talking earlier, Tony,

about celebrity and Hollywood. It occurred to me that audit is the root word of a thing that Chuck and I have spent most of our professional lives doing, which is auditioning, okay? So you audition. You go to the Church of Scientology and you go through the auditing process,

which is a series of auditions, but you pay for the privilege to be audited. And I just think that it's worth making that distinction. You know, however people, want to define a church and however they want to conflate Scientology with other religions organized or not cults or not sanctioned or not, it is worth saying that in most cases, you know exactly what you're getting into when you sit down in the pew and search your heart. And if you want to write a check, you write a check. But it just seems like salvation

and happiness is not a thing you ought to have to audition for. I mean, They literally have price lists. How many churches do you know? That's what I was going to say. Have priceless. It's $10. If you want the Eucharist, it's $10. If you want the wine as well, that's going to be another $50.

How much for the wafer again? And is that gluten free? I'm really interested. Oh, the gluten free is even more. And when you get to the upper levels, you're talking $700 an hour for auditing that goes on for weeks. I mean, you can easily spend millions of dollars. dollars in Scientology, and many people do. How can they be so opposed or skeptical of modern psychology?

And by the way, I am too. I've got issues with all kinds of things, but to be so uniformly opposed to it, I mean, isn't the very essence of auditing awfully rooted in a sort of a doctor-patient sort of exchange? Oh, no question. And, you know, El Ron Hubbard in 1947 begged the VA for mental health help for psychiatry. I mean, he was in very bad shape. And he didn't get the care that he needed, apparently.

And so he invented this thing, Dianetics, which from the beginning, many observers were describing it as an alternative to psychotherapy. You're sitting down and you're telling your auditor things from your childhood. You're telling them particularly about traumas in your early life. And this makes you feel better. Well, gosh, that sounds a lot like what psychiatry is, right? And Hubbard just hated when people would make that comparison. He had this bloodlust against psychiatry and psychiatrists. And that's the organization always reflects Hubbard.

He wrote all the policies. He wrote all the ideas. And because El Ron Hubbard hated psychiatry, Scientology hates psychiatry. I got to tell you something else too, man. And Chuck, you might have had more experience with this than I have, but actors typically, you know, going through workshops, going through classes, there are lots of different methods, you know, we've all heard of the method, you know, status loss and whatever,

this one, that one, that one. So much of it, though, is rooted in some version of psychiatry where you sit down and you journey back. Chuck, you remember, right? I mean, even in Essex Community College, I remember some professors taking us through exercises that, you know, left some students in tears. It gets like super emotional. You're screwing around with still waters that run deep, I think. Yeah, you're tapping into past experiences, traumas in order to use them to your benefit to convey that in the present. But I want to ask you, Tony, didn't Hubbard first try to get his findings into the psychological community? Like, I know you said that he hated psychiatrists and whatnot, but it's only because they

thwarted him, correct? Because he was rejected, absolutely. When he first came up with Dionetics, he tried to shop it around to various professionals who said it was quackery. He was very angry about that, and that started that path that, you know, all show them. Lawrence Wright put it perfectly in going clear. He said what Hubbard had invented was sort of a psychological folklore. I thought that was an absolutely perfect description of what Dianetics and Scientology are. That's terrific. Look, I want to be respectful of your time. We checked all the boxes I wanted to hit but one. And as sincere as I am for wanting to see the average people adopt a more skeptical. view of anything cultish, Scientology in particular, I do think there's another thing going on

in the country that you're uniquely suited to at least say a few words about. And that's just the state of journalism and the incredible loss of faith in our institutions. This podcast is called the way I heard it because frankly, I think I've become about as credible as any news source, tragically. I shouldn't be. But I've just never seen more people more skeptical. Fox's own fans are highly skeptical of Fox right now. Same as true of CNN. They did the town hall and there was an insurrection. Fox let Tucker go.

So many diehard viewers are just twisted up. But even before that, people are just shaken. And so when I see what's going on at Substack and when I see what's going on in the mainstream, I just wonder, because you're an actual journalist. You've paid your dues. You've done it on all sides. of it. Where are we headed?

I wish I knew. Like I said, it's very fragmented. Somebody said something very interesting to me, and that was, I know it's people of our generation tend to bag on millennials and Generation Z or whatever. But the younger people seem to understand there's more of a transactional nature to this. And if you want good journalism that's done well, you need to subscribe and you need to pay. You know, because I'm often really reluctant to ask people, please buy a subscription, please give me money for what I do. It's just, it feels so awful. But younger people get it. They know that, look, if you want media that really digs into things and takes its time, you're going to have to pay for it. So I don't know, it's a very, very muddled

picture right now as to how things are going to turn out because I remember when, you know, a few years ago, I kept hearing that, you know, newspapers were having problems. because they were either too liberal or too conservative. And I was trying to point out to them, when I was editor-in-chief of the Village Voice, we had never had more readers than any time in that paper's history. The problem was not interest from readers.

The problem was turning that interest into money. It's literally a business problem more than anything else. Now, like I said, younger folks and their way they're using YouTube and thing, I think they're figuring some of this out. It's just a very difficult transition period right now where we're all trying to find jobs that actually work so that we can do the real work of journalism and make a living. And it's just really, really a difficult period.

I just think that this is so obvious the thing, but it didn't strike me until you just said it. One old axiom that I do think is fundamentally rooted in truth is you get what you pay for. here we have Except for auditing Except for auditing But you know what

Also like I said Caviat mTOR A fool in his money Soon parted and so forth and so forth But the greatest freedom that we have The right to express ourselves Is enumerated under this notion Of free speech

A free press But if you get what you pay for And if what we value is free Then what actually are we getting Other than the hot mess we seem to be up to our necks in right now. I hadn't heard it put that way before, but really you're saying when things get this confused,

right, if you want something of quality, how can you expect it to be handed to you for free? It just violates the laws of the universe, basically. But we're very used to that. The way the Internet developed, we got used to everything being free, and it's a very difficult situation. I have found a perch at Substack that is working for me, but it's not easy.

And like I said, I know so many other people that have just given up on the business. Newspapers are struggling. I don't know the solution. I really don't. I just know that people do crave quality journalism, and I hope they understand how to recognize it. Sometimes it's a little difficult. I think people are grabbing onto stuff that's just very, you know, click baity and not very worthwhile.

Well, part of the solution could be going to Substack and subscribing to your channel. Right? I do my best to bring people something interesting to read every day. It's Tony Ortega.substack.com. Please at least sign up for free email so you get everything I write. For those people who do subscribe, there's some extras and some podcasts that they only get access to. but I really do have a very supportive community that they just want to hear something new about Scientology every day. And that's the goal I set for myself is I try to bring everybody every morning something they have not heard yet about Scientology.

And that's a big challenge. I have lots of readers that were in Scientology 20, 30 years, and they know it forwards and backwards. So trying to bring something new for them, well, it's a tough goal, but I enjoy it. Yeah, well, maybe there's no such, there are no new ideas. but it's a wheel. The wheel is spinning and things that feel old all of a sudden can feel new again.

I mean, our conversation, I think, is a perfect example. I can't believe that 28 years ago I was sitting at my buddy's house in Phoenix reading your first serious piece published in essentially

a free paper. I mean, what the hell? I picked it up at the Biltmore at a coffee shop. That's how I met. that Tony Ortega, a guy who I didn't really ever think about again until all of a sudden Spanky Taylor comes into my life. And there you are in that excellent documentary, which is worth plugging again. If you haven't seen going clear, find it, pay a $1.99 for it if they're charging

or watch it for free. It's worth it. Read everything. Tony Ortega is writing. Check out the, is it the underground bunker or just the bunker? It's the underground bunker is the name of the substit. Yeah, because who would put a bunker above ground? That'd be stupid. It just seems counterintuitive, really. It's a fluid situation, folks. The truth is out there. Tony's been searching for it a long time. I hope you guys found some listening to us here today. You're welcome back anytime. Anything else you want to plug before we say goodbye? No, just I want to say thank you again. You've been one of the few people to speak out when so many others have been afraid to. And I really respect. you for that. Well, you know what? I'm either

brave or stupid. We'll see. And let me know how it works out with Substack. If you get shit can from there, well, you know, we might have an opening at MicroWorks. Chuck. Thanks, Tony. You're right. Yeah, he's saying you'll replace me. You know what? I'll probably fire you next week.

But for now, you're still safe. Okay. All right, everybody. Adios. This episode is over now. I hope it was worthwhile. Sorry it went on so long. But if it made you smile Then share your satisfaction

In the way that people do Take some time to go on Lasserie I hate to ask, I hate to beg, I hate to be a nudge But in this world the advertisers really like to judge You don't need to write a bunch Just a line or two All you've got to do is leave a quick five-star review.

Not four. All you've got to do is leave a quick five-star review. And not three. All you've got to do is leave a quick five-star review. Definitely not too. All you've got to do is leave a quick-five-star review. We need five. All you got to do is leave a quick...

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