John Kiriakou, CIA Part 2 "From the Inside"

[00:00:00] Speaker A: I like to think I'm a nice guy, but I can be an asshole. And sometimes you have to be an asshole, especially in prison where it's a combination of seventh grade lord of the flies and a mental institution. So there was a serial killer in the unit who we called truck. And he loved prostitutes, so he'd pick them up and have sex with them in the cab of his truck, but he didn't want to pay them, so he would strangle them. And he strangled one and thought she was dead and threw her out of the truck. But she lived and she was able to identify him. So they knew that he was the serial killer, but they couldn't prove it. So the only thing they got him on was kidnapping, assault. So I'm sitting this close to cat in the hat, sitting directly next to truck and not knowing that I'm three feet behind him. Cat in the head says, do you hear kiriakou was sent to the or called to the lieutenant's office? That guy's a rat. He says, and I just sat there. And truck says, that guy just called you a rat. And I thought, here's my opportunity. And I said, an hour ago I heard him call you a chump child. He didn't say a word. He stood up, walks over to cat in the hat and beat him to within an inch of his life. At the first sign of trouble, everybody runs back to the cell because they didn't see anything, right? I just sat there watching the football game. So next thing you know, you know, you hear the horn going off. I get up, I casually walk back to my cell. Then they have lockdown. Then they have to bring medics to come and clean up cat in the hats from everywhere. And sure enough, I get called down to the lieutenant's office. The lieutenant says, so tell me about the fight. I said, there was a fight. He said, oh, you're going to play it like that, are you? I said, I don't know what you're talking about. I was watching a football game and then I heard the alarm go off, so I went back to my. My cell. And you didn't see the fight? 3. Three feet away from you? I said, I didn't see any fight. I said, maybe you were in a fight, huh? Why don't you tell me about the fight? What, you want me to do your f cking job for you now, too? He goes, get the fuck out of my office. Admit nothing. Deny everything. Make counter accusations. [00:03:02] Speaker B: Welcome to part two of the john kiriakou interview. If you missed part One, I encourage you to click the link in the description and scope it out. No need to see it necessarily in order, but it's an amazing experience listening to this man tell stories. John is an ex CIA officer, famous in particular for his work after 911 and during 911 and ultimately for his whistleblowing on the 911 interrogation program that the government permitted to happen. He went to prison for a couple of years for that. And we talk in depth in this episode about his prison experience, the CIA tactics that he leveraged in a crooked prison system and prison reform ideas, racial divides and. And how this country can improve the processes that we have. So that among many other periphery things I think you're going to truly enjoy. I consider him now a friend. So please help me in welcoming back to the teagan Broadwater podcast, Mr. John Kiriakou. Forgive me for being a little more sporadic today because the last time we got into a lot of stuff that I wanted to get into. I also want to. I not only want to feed my audience with some of the stories that we missed, but I also want to get into some things that I really care about. In terms of the experience in prison, which we didn't really get to talk about. [00:04:21] Speaker A: Yeah, we didn't touch that. [00:04:22] Speaker B: We really didn't get a good opportunity to explain how prison even occurred, which was very unfair because, you know, you get some of those comments that are either uneducated or guessing, and. And I hated that also. So I think that that's. And the book is great. Doing Time Like Us by is a great book, too, for anybody that wants to buy a book and get some good reading in. But I thought I would jump back kind of to the beginning and see if we could launch this way. So you mentioned before that both of your parents were teachers, your mother went back, got a master's degree and everything else. So obviously you grew up in a household where that was how you were weaned. With all the training that you had in the CIA and all the circumstances you had to mitigate, was there ever a time like an epiphany or something where you either had a survival skill develop or handled something under pressure or had an opportunity to read somebody where you attributed that skill back to something you learned as a kid from your mother, as opposed to something you were taught? So something more inherent a situation you were in? [00:05:30] Speaker A: Wow, that's a good question. That's a hard question. [00:05:34] Speaker B: Well, I didn't mean it to be hard necessarily, but. [00:05:38] Speaker A: Well, on the one hand, the training at the CIA is unbelievably thorough. [00:05:43] Speaker B: Right. [00:05:44] Speaker A: On the other hand, your mind has to be adaptable to it or you're going to fail. [00:05:50] Speaker B: And you also have to be in a position to be selected, which also means you have a disposition that they also want. But that's nature. [00:05:58] Speaker A: It is. [00:05:58] Speaker B: And so some of that has to be. I'm just curious about how much of that is something that was put into you, where you leveraged it. [00:06:06] Speaker A: You know, I think I would say that it was actually the opposite, where nothing from my childhood was directly applicable to what I ended up doing in the CIA. Let me rephrase. Nothing that came out of nurture was applicable. It was nature that was applicable. With one exception. I was always the good cop. That's a part of my nature. I like people. I like talking. I like exchanging stories and ideas and hanging out. I feel like I gain strength by being around other people. And when you're trying to recruit somebody, when you're trying to convince somebody to commit treason for you or espionage for you just because you're a good guy, you sort of need that, right? [00:07:06] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:07:07] Speaker A: It was never my nature to say, you know, give me the information or I'm going to break your nose. I'm going to tear off your arm and beat you to death with it. That's. I. I don't find that to be useful strategy. And I was raised in a very warm, loving, nuclear household, so I had that as a basis. But in terms of the actual spy craft, that was all taught. [00:07:34] Speaker B: Okay, well, that's interesting enough. I mean, that says a lot about the training program, too. [00:07:39] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:07:40] Speaker B: This is not a way that people think naturally. [00:07:43] Speaker A: You know, I've said before that the CIA actively seeks to hire people who have sociopathic tendencies, not sociopaths, because sociopaths have no conscience and they're impossible to control. They blow right through a polygraph because they don't feel guilt, remorse. People who have sociopathic tendencies do feel remorse, but are happy to break the law because we're the good guys and it's all about the end result. [00:08:11] Speaker B: For the cause you're willing. [00:08:12] Speaker A: It's for the cause, God and country. And in retrospect, I have or had sociopathic tendencies. For example, and stop me if I told you this already, but when I was going through the application process, I had been recommended by my grad school advisor, so I didn't physically apply. So I'm in this. This group setting with three or four other applicants, and the proctor says, you're a CIA officer overseas. You get A cable from headquarters telling you that headquarters really needs the latest Indonesian economic figures and you have to go get it. So go. What do you do? Well, you seek out the Indonesian economic secretary at the embassy. You start working him, take him to lunch, take him to dinner. He mentions he likes fishing. You charter a boat, you go deep sea fishing. You get your wives together, you have them over to your house, maybe you go away for the weekend, you become great friends. But six months into it, you realize he's just not recruitable. So then what do you do? And this guy raises his hand and he says, well, you double down. You go another six months, you spend more money on him. This woman raises her hand, she says, maybe you work it through the wives. Maybe the wives become closer. And I'm looking around, like what? I raised my hand. I said, you break into the embassy and you steal it. And the guy goes, that's exactly what you do. That's a sociopathic tendency. A normal person won't default to breaking into a foreign embassy and stealing classified documents. [00:10:03] Speaker B: It's the last thing that comes to a normal person's mind. [00:10:05] Speaker A: Right. It was the first thing that came to my mind. [00:10:09] Speaker B: Hey, if you're like me and you grow frustrated sometimes about ways that you can make a positive impact, I can tell you that one of the simplest things you can do that goes such a long way is to like and subscribe to this channel and share some of these videos that you're enjoying. It brings other people into the middle, regardless of their perspective, to start engaging into that productive conversation that we all need. Thanks in advance. [00:10:31] Speaker A: So that's a tendency. [00:10:32] Speaker B: That's great. And you look at things backwards. Often when you're assessing a target or whatever, you kind of think of worst case scenarios or how would I do it? If you find yourself doing that, If. [00:10:42] Speaker A: I do it this way, is the guy going to shoot me in the face or is he going to say, oh, let's have a beer? [00:10:49] Speaker B: It's kind of an important distinction. [00:10:51] Speaker A: It's exactly right. [00:10:53] Speaker B: So you talk about recruiting. Have you ever. Has anyone ever tried to flip you or recruit you in the past? [00:10:59] Speaker A: Yeah. And how did you. [00:11:00] Speaker B: How did you navigate that? [00:11:04] Speaker A: Well, the first time I didn't even realize it was happening. And I got to thinking about it later, there's no harm in saying who it was. It was a Hungarian intelligence officer. And so I reported it. And I said, you know, this is probably nothing, but I just wanted to be on the safe side, so I reported it. And then headquarters came back and Said, oh, no. He's an identified intelligence officer. Good for reporting it. So I just stayed away from him. Then there was one time where I had to. I was assigned to work with this French idiot from the French intelligence service. And I called him and I said, okay, so we're supposed to do this thing together. Where do you want to meet? He said, well, meet me at the corner of, you know, A and B. I thought that was odd, but okay. So I'm standing there at the corner of A and B. He comes down this alley, makes a right turn, and he's like, get in. We only have 15 seconds. And I'm like, no, no, no, no. I'm not a clandestine source of yours. I'm not going to take the 15 second window to jump in your car if you haven't done a surveillance detection route. I'm just going to meet you at the Pizza Hut and we're going to have our meeting there. But I'm not doing this clandestine game thing with you. No. And afterwards, I wrote headquarters. I was like, tell the French that they need to change their MO Because I'm not doing this with this guy. [00:12:30] Speaker B: So it was that. It was that apparent, though. [00:12:32] Speaker A: Yeah, it was ridiculous. Ridiculous. But then there were times where I expected a pitch that never came. I expected the Greeks to pitch me. Never even a hint. I expected the Russians at some point. Nothing at all. So you just never know. Sometimes you're just a target of opportunity for an odd outlying service. Let me say one other thing, too. When I was senior staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, I was there from 2009 to midway through 2011. I was the chief investigator. And I got a call from a Japanese diplomat who said, hey, let's go to lunch. I said, great. I love doing this. I love going out with foreign diplomats and just talking about whatever happens to be in the news. [00:13:22] Speaker B: And it's post CIA at this time. [00:13:23] Speaker A: Post CIA. So we go out to this steakhouse and perfectly delightful lunch. I remember what we talked about. We talked about the Middle east peace process, Israeli elections and Turkish elections. And at the end of it, I said, well, thank you for meeting me. This was a lovely lunch. And he said, no, no, no. Before you leave, he said, what's next for you? And I should add, his English was so bad that we did the lunch in Arabic. He was in Arabic? Yeah. So I said, well, I think I'm going to resign soon. I promised Senator Kerry. John Kerry was the chairman at the time. I promised Senator Kerry I'd give him two Years. It's been two and a half. I have five kids. I still have to put three through college. So I said, I need to make some money. And he goes, don't resign. If you give me information, I can give you money. I said, what is wrong with you? How dare you cold pitch me like that? Do you have any idea how many times I've made that pitch? Shame on you. I said. And I got up and I walked out and I went directly, without stopping, to the office of the Senate security officer. So I go in there and I said, I was just pitched by a foreign intelligence officer. And he said, was it that damn Russian again? And I said, no, Japanese. He goes, Japanese? I said, yeah, I know. I'm shocked, too. And he said, well, you know, the Japanese poke around every once in a while on trade issues. I said, this was a direct, cold pitch, right? [00:15:06] Speaker B: Nothing subtle about alibi. [00:15:07] Speaker A: Nothing subtle at all. No room for confusion. So he says, write it up on this standalone computer that's not connected to the Internet, and I'll send it to the FBI. So I wrote it up, he sends it to the FBI. The next day he calls me. He says, two FBI agents want to come up and interview you. I said, okay, great. I meet them in the skiff. The next. The secure skiff. Secure conference or no. Special compartmented information. Whatever. It's a secure conference room. [00:15:39] Speaker B: Got it. So. [00:15:43] Speaker A: These two young guys come up and they said, here's what we want you to do. We want you to invite him to lunch and try to get him to tell you exactly what information he wants and how much money he's willing to pay for it. And I said, okay, you want me to wear a wire or something? They said, no, no, we're going to be at the next table. We'll listen to everything. I said, okay. So I invite him to lunch. He lays it all out. These guys had called me right before the meeting, said something came up, we can't do it. Just write up another memo. I thought that was odd, but okay, I write the memo, I send it. And I always prided myself on my accounts of my meetings. They're very fulsome. So then they asked me to do it. A third meeting, fourth meeting, fifth meeting. [00:16:31] Speaker B: Are they showing up at these? [00:16:32] Speaker A: No, just write them up. So I'm writing every detail. He said this, I said that, he did this, I did that, back and forth, like you're in the room. So at the last meeting, it was at a restaurant in Georgetown. He says to me, I just got promoted, got My dream job. I'm going to be the number two at the Japanese embassy in Cairo. I said, congratulations. Never saw him again. A year later, I get arrested after blowing the whistle on the program. And we get 15,000 pages of classified discovery. And it turns out we get these memos. There was no Japanese diplomatic. He was an FBI agent pretending to be a Japanese diplomat. And they did five meetings with me because I kept reporting the contact back to the Japanese. I mean, to the FBI. And so finally he writes, he's clearly not going to take the bait, suggest we end this operation. They were trying to get me to commit actual espionage because they wanted to charge me with espionage. [00:17:42] Speaker B: But what did they. What did they think you were going to give up? This is the. You'd already. By this time, you'd gone on television and talked about the 911 program, so they thought you were just somebody that was just going to vomit a bunch of stuff. [00:17:54] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:17:56] Speaker B: And anything. They were just fishing for anything. [00:17:58] Speaker A: Anything. Anything. They could charge me with a crime. And. And I never gave them anything. And I kept reporting the contact back. [00:18:05] Speaker B: So do you think that has anything to do with how they ended up charging you? Can you go into detail a little bit more just to kind of give us a little background into what you were charged with and how that kind of unfolded? Because I know last time we talked specifically about the interview you went on and that some of that stuff you thought was public information already. It wasn't like, I'm gonna go on this show and I'm gonna out everything. [00:18:31] Speaker A: No. [00:18:32] Speaker B: You were quite upset about the 911 program. [00:18:35] Speaker A: Yeah, it was. [00:18:36] Speaker B: But it wasn't necessarily an intentional thing where you were bound to determine to let it out. [00:18:42] Speaker A: No, no. So I said three things in that interview. This was an interview with ABC News and a subsequent interview with the New York Times. I said that the CIA was torturing its prisoners, which was illegal. I said that there was official US Government policy, also illegal. And I said that the policy had been personally approved by the President himself, which he had denied and denied and denied and denied and then admitted. So they charged me with three counts of espionage for speaking to ABC News and the New York Times. They charged me with one count of violating the Intelligence Identities Protection act of 1982. And they charged me with making a false statement. We were never clear on exactly what the false statement was supposed to have been, but they knew that those espionage charges were. Were made up. There was a memo from John Brennan in discovery to Eric Holder, who was the Attorney General, and he said Charge him with espionage. And Eric Holder wrote back and said, my people don't think he committed espionage. And then Brennan wrote back and said, charge him anyway and make him defend himself. So they charged me with three counts of espionage. This is a death penalty charge. He charged me three counts, and then when I went bankrupt, they dropped the charges. See, so what they were hoping was that I would actually tell this pretend Japanese diplomat something that wasn't public so they could charge me with actual espionage. [00:20:15] Speaker B: Right. So that was tied in directly to. Because you, by that time, they were looking to charge you, in other words. [00:20:21] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:20:21] Speaker B: And so they were trying to substantiate the charges that they had out there, because otherwise, the FBI was thinking, there really isn't anything here. [00:20:29] Speaker A: Yeah, there's nothing there. Right. [00:20:32] Speaker B: That's insane. So how does it feel? I can only imagine how it would feel for you, knowing damn well that you're innocent of these charges that you've been. That have been laid upon you. But you take a plea deal, and in some states, it's not even legal to take a plea deal and say, I plead guilty to this, even though I don't think that I did it. [00:20:56] Speaker A: Well, I stood up in court. We negotiated the deal. Right. I was facing 45 years. That was their offer, was 45 years. And then I offered to take a plea to one count for 23 months. With 30 months, I would do 23 months. And so I stood up in court, and the judge said, have you agreed to this plea deal? I said, yes. Are you actually guilty of the crime? And I said, no. And then she says, Mr. Kacheris, you might want to talk to your client. And then he says, you have to say you're guilty. I said, but I'm not guilty. I just want the deal. He said, you have to say that you're guilty. And I said, sure, I'm guilty. [00:21:38] Speaker B: So how did that feel? I mean, it's got to be. [00:21:40] Speaker A: The whole system is perverted. [00:21:42] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:21:43] Speaker A: You know, there's this joke that everybody in prison's innocent. I was shocked at the number of people in prison that were innocent. [00:21:49] Speaker B: Really? [00:21:49] Speaker A: Yeah. Because they stack these charges on you, they'll charge you with 20 felonies. And then at the end, when you're beaten down, they say, all right, we'll dismiss 19 of them. If you take a guilty plea to the one do five years, what are you going to do? You're facing 300 years in prison. [00:22:08] Speaker B: Yeah, but that's different, though. That's different. If you're guilty of the one right. If you're not guilty of 20 and they're just playing that chess game and saying, we're going to charge you with 20 and come down, but you're actually, you know, a dealer, a supplier, a conspiracy or whatever. [00:22:25] Speaker A: But the feds win 98.2% of their cases according to ProPublica, 98.2. So do you really want to roll those dice knowing that you have a 1.8% chance of winning? I said to my attorneys, well, I'm getting ahead of myself. They made their best and final offer. 30 months. I do 23. And I had until noon the next day to either accept or reject. My wife and I stayed up all night long and we decided, I'm going to turn it down. I hadn't done anything wrong. As soon as I got in front of a jury, I said, they're going to see how ridiculous this is. Which was ridiculous in and of itself to even think that. [00:23:10] Speaker B: Right. [00:23:11] Speaker A: So I emailed the lawyers at 6am I said, we've been up all night, I'm turning it down. Let's go to trial. [00:23:19] Speaker B: What was your level of emotion at that point? No sleep. Talking through it, Knowing that you're looking at almost the rest of your life. [00:23:27] Speaker A: Yeah, it would have been the versus. [00:23:29] Speaker B: Versus a couple of years. And then you, I mean, sending that email has to be. [00:23:33] Speaker A: It was so incredibly stressful and nerve wracking. So at seven o', clock, one of the, one of the attorneys writes back and says, put on a pot of coffee, we're coming over. 7 o' clock in the morning. So I had 11 lawyers, four of them came over to the house, the four top ones, and the lead attorney, Plato Cocheras, he's dead now, but he was already in his mid-80s then and he was a Washington, the, the Washington Post called him a legal titan. That's really what he, what he was. He comes in first, he gets right in my face and he says, you stupid son of a bitch, take the deal. Like that. I was like, whoa, what's up with you? You're the one who told me not to take a deal. You said they had a shit case and they know it's shit and we're going to trial. He said, I only said that to make you feel better. Yeah. So the second attorney, Bob Trout, lovely, lovely southern gentleman, he said to me, if you were my own brother, I would beg you to take this deal. Take the deal. [00:24:46] Speaker B: Good way to put it. Did he say why? [00:24:50] Speaker A: No, but the third one did. Mark McDougal, I liked and respected mark the most out of all of them. He was tough. In fact, several people, friends of mine, independently of one another, described him to me as the meanest man in washington. And I said, well, I'm glad he's on my side if he's the meanest man. I found him to be absolutely wonderful and brilliant, and he got in my face, too. And he said, you know what your problem is? Your problem is you think this is about justice. And. And it's not about justice. It's about mitigating damage. Take the deal. [00:25:28] Speaker B: There you go. [00:25:29] Speaker A: And then the fourth one, john hundley, I said to him, if I don't take the deal and I'm convicted, what am I realistically looking at? And he said, 12 to 18 years. Take the deal. And so I took it. You know, mcdougall said another thing. He said, listen, this could be a blip in your life, or it can be the defining event in your life. Make it the blip. [00:25:58] Speaker B: Amen to that. But still, that's so easy for anyone else to say. [00:26:03] Speaker A: And I went into prison with an attitude like all of you people. Not afraid of you. And I'm not going to help you run your prison either. You know, I'm not going to do anything that serves the administration. You know, clean the. Clean the warden's office. Tell the warden clean his own office. I'm not going to help him run his prison. [00:26:21] Speaker B: How much pushback did you get there versus pushback from the inmates in the collective scenario there, I was very fortunate. [00:26:30] Speaker A: With the inmates first. It's easier for me to explain this by starting with the inmates. You know, we have a weird system in this country. If you're not remanded into custody at sentencing on your first day of prison, you have to just drive to the prison and knock on the door and say, I'm john kiriakou. I'm here to turn myself in. It's weird. So the morning that I left for prison, said goodbye to my kids and my wife, my attorneys, several of my attorneys came to drive me, my cousin and his son, a documentary film crew. We stopped at a diner on the way up for my last meal. And then. And then we went to the prison. So at sentencing, my attorneys asked that I be sent to a minimum security work camp. And there are no bars on the windows. The doors are unlocked. You're just on your honor not to run away. And camps are always across the street from the actual prison because if there's a riot and a lockdown, it's the guys in the camp who go do the cooking and the laundry and the maintenance and stuff like that. [00:27:40] Speaker B: Interesting. Okay. [00:27:41] Speaker A: Yeah. So I go to the camp, knock on the door, tell the guard I'm here to turn myself in. He says, yep, you gotta go across the street to the prison first, and they process you and then they'll bring you back over here. And I said, okay. So I went across the street to the prison, knocked on that door. Cop opens the door, I said, I'm here to turn myself in. He puts me through the metal detector, and then he starts taking me around to the back of the prison. And I said, no, no, I'm supposed to be at the camp across the street. And he goes, not according to my paperwork, you're not. And I said to myself, take it easy. There's nothing you can do. If you raise a ruckus, they're going to put you straight in solitary. So I didn't say anything. So they take me into R and D, receiving and discharge, and they give you a very comprehensive body check. And then they give you, you know, three pairs of underwear, three pairs of socks, three shirts, three pants and two sheets. What else? A washcloth and a towel and a roll of toilet paper. And it took about 40 minutes. And then the cop walks me to my cell, and the only thing he said to me in the whole 40 minutes was, if anybody comes into your cell uninvited, that's an act of aggression. I thought, great, I've been here 40 minutes and I'm going to get my ass kicked. I thought, well, all right, well, there's nothing I can do. So I go into the cell, I took a nap, and I realized later it's because I was in shock. [00:29:31] Speaker B: I think you'd been through a whole lot leading to this time. [00:29:35] Speaker A: In terms of stress, it was just overwhelming. [00:29:39] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:29:40] Speaker A: So I wake up, I'm just sitting in the chair. These cells were built for four guys, but they squeeze an extra bunk bed in. So there's six guys in a four man cell. You got three bunk beds and one plastic chair. So I'm sitting in the chair, and these two guys just walk right into my cell. One has a. That takes up his entire neck. The whole front of his neck up onto his face. The other one had GIU tattooed on his eyelids, so every time he blinked it said, fuck you. So they come into the. I know, right? Isn't that lovely? He's wholesome like, your parents must be so proud, right? [00:30:23] Speaker B: His mom didn't go back and get a master's degree and teach him anything? [00:30:27] Speaker A: No. So I jump up, I put up my dukes. I go, what do you want? Like that? And the guy goes, take it easy. This guy. Take it easy. You the new guy? I go, yeah. So he goes, you a. I said, no, I'm not a. You a. You a rat? I said, no, I'm not a rat. I didn't have anybody else in my case. And he goes, you a cho. I said, I don't know what that word means. And he goes, cho, Child. I said, no, I'm not a child. And he goes, okay, you can sit with the Aryans in the cafeteria. And I go, oh, okay. [00:31:06] Speaker B: I'm so delighted to hear this. [00:31:07] Speaker A: Now I'm with the Aryans. I said to myself, great. So a couple of days later, this black guy walks right into my cell, and he's holding this newspaper. And again, I jump up, and this guy is like knotted muscle, a perfect human specimen, right? And I jump up and go, what do you want? And I'm thinking, I wouldn't last five seconds against him. [00:31:32] Speaker B: He's going to break me in half. But I'm going to be swinging my arms when he does it. [00:31:35] Speaker A: That's it. Haymakers. So he very gingerly hands me this paper, and I see it's the newspaper of the Nation of Islam. And he said, are you the CIA guy? And I said, yeah. And he says, as he hands me the paper, he says, reverend Farrakhan says, you're a hero of the Muslim people, and I want you to know you won't have any problems with us. And I said, oh, okay, Thanks. I actually put my hand out, and he's like, I don't shake hands with the white devil. I was like, sorry, sorry. Okay, thank you. [00:32:10] Speaker B: I got carried away a little bit. [00:32:12] Speaker A: So. So of my cellmates in that original cell, four were members of Mexican cartels. Burachos, nortenos. Mexican. And I forget the other one now. And then one Chinese drug smuggler. And so one of the Mexicans said to me, are you educated? And I said, yeah. He said, can you write my appeal? And I said, I'm not a lawyer. Yeah, but you're educated. I said, yeah, sure, I'll write your appeal. How hard could it possibly be? The guy was guilty. I mean, the DEA had actually shot him. He had a bullet wound, like the scar from the bullet where the DEA shot him. They had, like, 20 tons of cocaine in a. In a warehouse in Houston. [00:32:58] Speaker B: Right. [00:32:59] Speaker A: So I wrote the appeal. The appeal was denied, but he told all the Mexicans that I was A good guy, because I wrote the appeal and I didn't charge him anything. I said, he offered me, the currency is either books of stamps, which were worth $7 at the time, or bags of mackerel. Smoked mackerel, those were worth a buck. So I said, no, I got people on the outside. I don't need. I don't need your Mac. So he told everybody, oh, I was a good guy. And I didn't charge him any money. So I didn't have any problem with the Mexicans either. The Italians. And this is what made my prison experience so easy. There was a front page article in the New York Times on a Sunday, sang the CIA guys going to FCI Loretto, Pennsylvania on Thursday. And one Italian, Mark Lanzilotti, God bless him, for whatever reason, took it upon himself to go to every one of the Italians. And there were at least a half a dozen made men. One was a boss of one of the five families, and one was the number three in another family. And he went to each one of these Italians to explain to them the difference between a CIA officer and an FBI agent. FBI agent is a cop. Cop and a rat is what he said. A CIA officer protected us from the Muslims. And so the Italians welcomed me with open arms. I lived directly across the hall from the number three in the Bonanno crime family. I used to give him my New York Times. He would give me his New York Post. We'd watch football on the weekends. And he said to me one day, let me ask you something. He said, why do you sit with those Nazi retards in the cafeteria? I said, I don't know. They came up to me my first day here and told me to sit with the Aryans. And he says, from today you're with the Italians. And they adopted me, and I was with the Italians the rest of the time. And I'll tell you, when word got around quickly that I was with the Italians. And so it was hands off. [00:35:10] Speaker B: Really. Yeah, because those were top level Italians. [00:35:14] Speaker A: The Italians were the very smallest one of the groups or gangs, and they were the most highly respected. [00:35:23] Speaker B: Do you think a lot of that was perception from movies and such? [00:35:27] Speaker A: Without any question? [00:35:29] Speaker B: Interesting. [00:35:30] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:35:31] Speaker B: How much of those people do you feel like wore the perception of movies with them, including the, and the Mexican mafias and all those guys? I mean, because really, when it gets down to it, you know, I've had that experience where you strip down and you're talking about a video game or something else, you're like, this is just. [00:35:51] Speaker A: A Dude, Just a dude. That's so true. [00:35:53] Speaker B: Other than it says you on his eyelids right now. [00:35:55] Speaker A: Let's think of it this way. This was a low security prison. Not a minimum, but a low. So it goes maximum, medium, low, minimum. Most of these guys started off at a maximum and because of good behavior, they work their way down to a low. They don't want to go back up to a medium or maximum. So they're not going to make any trouble. There were like three fights the whole two years I was there. And all three of the fights were about what to watch on tv. [00:36:26] Speaker B: That sounds like they were married before. [00:36:28] Speaker A: Oh my God. The Hispanics control half the TVs and the blacks control the other half. The whites don't get a choice. So you just, you can choose to watch, you know, love and Hip Hop Atlanta or the, the Costa Rica versus Venezuela soccer match. Other than that, you're shit out of luck. [00:36:48] Speaker B: Find it fascinating that you ironically in, in some way leveraged your CIA training there to help people, genuinely helping people beat the government who essentially put them there. [00:37:04] Speaker A: Oh, the best, the best experience that I had in that respect was my friend Mark Lanzilotti. Mark was my best friend in prison and remains one of my best friends post prison over the last 10 years. He's a genuinely sweet, good kind of person who never should have been in prison in the very first place. But toward the end of my sentence, Obama passed the. Was it called the First Step act or something like that? Second Chance Act, I can't remember. Anyway, I'm sitting in Mark's cell and I'm reading the New York Times. No, it wasn't the New York Times, it was USA Today that Mark used to get. And I said, buddy, did you read this article? And he said, no. I said, this article is about you. It's about people who have ridiculously long sentences that if they were tried today and convicted, they would get shorter sentences. And you have to have had no gun involved in the, in the case and no gang affiliation. So just as background, Mark had a stepfather years and years ago who made meth. And he brought Mark and like eight other guys, five other guys, whatever it was, into this meth manufacturing plan. Mark decided this wasn't for him and he quit. He was the only person to voluntarily leave the conspiracy. Sure enough, a couple of years later, they all get wrapped up by DEA and they all want to flip. So Mark's the only one not arrested. Well, to flip, they point the finger at each other. They point the finger at Mark. Mark's stepfather says, I'll pay for your lawyer if you don't take a plea because I don't pay for rats. Mark had no idea everybody else was ratting him out, right? Always the case. So they all got five and a quarter years. Mark got triple life without parole. [00:39:05] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. [00:39:06] Speaker A: For a first time nonviolent drug offense. And he was the only one to leave the conspiracy. So they sent him to the maximum security penitentiary at Springfield because it was. [00:39:20] Speaker B: Such an extraordinary sentence. They figured this guy's a mobster. [00:39:23] Speaker A: Mobster? [00:39:23] Speaker B: Ridiculous. [00:39:24] Speaker A: Yeah, he actually developed bone cancer. And because he was deemed to be such a dangerous threat to society, he had surgery to remove the cancerous bone in his wrist in the parking lot of the prison in a motorhome that they converted into a surgical unit. [00:39:47] Speaker B: And none of this, none of this had behavior manifest in prison. And they still treat it like that. They just. [00:39:53] Speaker A: For a meth dealer. They don't care. They don't care. Ridiculous. [00:39:57] Speaker B: Though. [00:39:57] Speaker A: He appealed and they reduced his sentence to 30 years. [00:40:01] Speaker B: Hey, if you're like me and you grow frustrated sometimes about ways that you can make a positive impact, I can tell you that one of the simplest things that you can do that goes such a long way is to like and subscribe to this channel and share some of these videos that you're enjoying. It brings other people into the middle, regardless of their perspective, to start engaging into that productive conversation that we all need. Thanks in advance. [00:40:23] Speaker A: So he was at the halfway point when I met him. So I'm reading the USA Today. I said, I said, buddy, they're talking about you in this article. And he said, yeah, but I don't even know how I'd go about applying for relief. I don't know what to do. I said, I'm going to write it. So I went to the law library, took an exemplar because I'm not a lawyer, but most lawyers are morons anyway. Seriously. So I was like, I can do this. So I wrote an appeal and I sent it. Then I get released. So I'm out of prison, let me think, six months. And Mark's mom calls me and I see it's her. And I answer the phone, I said, hi, Ro. She's bawling. I said, oh, my God, what happened? I thought something terrible. He got killed in prison. And she said, mark's being released. And I said, what? And she said, you appeal that you wrote, he won. He's being released. [00:41:27] Speaker B: He got commuted. Man, See, no wonder you're best friends. You'd be my best friend, too. That's unbelievable. [00:41:35] Speaker A: He took such good care of me in prison. I'm sure you saw in the book. Marc had a gift for the most wonderful Italian cooking I've ever experienced in my life. He would take a garbage can and put a plastic bag in it, fill the plastic bag with water, plug a live wire into the wall with the pieces. The wire coming out the other end. [00:42:09] Speaker B: Split. [00:42:10] Speaker A: Yeah, split. Throw it in the water. It goes. And the water starts boiling. And then he has all this other stuff in another bag, and he puts it in the boiling water. The Italians had a crooked cop on the payroll, so he'd bring in pork loin and veal and the crusty bread and mushrooms and tomatoes and white wine for the marsala sauce. I gained 35 pounds in prison. I said to him one day, I said, I would spend $50 on this in a restaurant. That's how good it was. Every single day we had dinner together. All the Italians, every single. [00:42:48] Speaker B: Is he a restaurateur now? [00:42:50] Speaker A: You know, crazy thing he got out of prison, and I said, tell me you're going to open a restaurant. And he said, I think I'm going to apply for a real estate license. And I said, yeah, but you're a felon, so you can't be licensed. He writes a letter to Chris Christie when he was a governor, and he said, look, you know, I. I did this crime. I took responsibility for it. I got commuted by President Obama because Justice Department screwed me. I want to rebuild my life. Would you please lift the ban on my ability to get a real estate license? And he did. [00:43:29] Speaker B: All you to do was ask. All he had to do was ask, who knew? [00:43:32] Speaker A: And so he passes the exam for the real estate license. And now, and I'm not exaggerating, he is the number one one selling realtor on the Jersey shore. [00:43:44] Speaker B: Well deserved. Number one, he could have written his own commutation request then perhaps he probably should have. But you're a smart guy. I mean, you're not the average smart guy. You're a very smart guy. [00:43:56] Speaker A: Thank you. [00:43:57] Speaker B: I think it's also quite genuinely noble of you to have done things like that. You don't hear as many stories like that as you do, you know that, you know, whoever can street fight the. [00:44:08] Speaker A: Best or intimidate somebody or somebody. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:44:12] Speaker B: And I do know that you had to leverage. I mean, you make it sound kind of like a cakewalk, but I read the book, so I know there's more than cakewalking yeah. And certainly the, you know, the process leading up to it, I know was. Was traumatic. So what were some of the things that you did? Leverage without going into an exhaustive list. And I know maybe even some things you. You aren't proud of now, maybe like. [00:44:37] Speaker A: Introduction to the Book. [00:44:39] Speaker B: Maybe any. Anything that you feel like. You know, I just. I've been inclined to think, what is something that you did? There is where I think there would be more things. But it could possibly be in the CIA, too, something that you've done that you weren't proud of necessarily, but was kind of a slick in the book. [00:44:58] Speaker A: I have these 20 life lessons that the CIA taught me, and some of them. I started writing that book sort of as a comedy, but I realized as I was writing it now. This is real. Yeah. [00:45:12] Speaker B: It's just the tone. [00:45:13] Speaker A: It's not at all funny. [00:45:14] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:45:15] Speaker A: So, you know, I'd say things like, oh, the CIA said, admit nothing, deny everything. Make counter accusations. Ha ha ha. I actually used that against the cops a couple of times. But there were a couple things in there that were serious, like, make others do your dirty work or. Oh, my gosh, there were so many. I talked about trickery. So in the introduction to the book, I say, people say I'm a nice guy. I like to think I'm a nice guy, but I can be an asshole. And sometimes you have to be an asshole, especially in prison, where it's a combination of seventh grade Lord of the Flies and a mental institution, which is true. [00:46:03] Speaker B: Perfect. [00:46:04] Speaker A: So in the introduction of the book, I say I talk about this guy that I call Wallace. In the book. It's not hard to figure out who it is, but this guy had gone out with an A list Hollywood star, an Academy Award winner, household name. And he was just a con man. Right. He was just a fraudster. He would steal her money and steal her friend's money. And he got caught and he went to prison. His father went to prison. They were just common con men. This guy never shut his mouth 24 hours a day the whole time. And so I said to one of the Italians one day, I said, I'm this guy up. I've had enough. And he goes, are you crazy? You're going to go straight to solitary, and you're going to be in there for six weeks, and then they're going to send you to another prison. I said, I would never be so crude as to physically him up. I said, watch and see what I do. [00:47:04] Speaker B: You underestimate me, sir. [00:47:05] Speaker A: Yes, you underestimate Me, sir? So. Oh, this guy. I won't get into the background, but, oh, my God, I hated this guy so much. So when you're being released from prison, they give you a sheet of paper called a merry go round. And all it is is it's got a list of all the offices in the prison. And you have to go get a signature on your last full day. You don't need any signatures for real. It's just to keep you out of trouble that last day so you're not out there settling scores before you leave. So one of the Mexicans in my cell was getting released and I said, jose, can I borrow your. Your merry go round? He said, sure. So I take it up to the library, I make a photocopy. I white out Jose's name and prisoner number and make a clean copy. I type in Wallace's name and number, give Jose back his original. Then one of the Italians, I asked him to steal a laundry bag, gives me the laundry bag. I wait until 5 o' clock on a Friday. I put the merry go round on Wallace's bed. And the empty laundry bag. Laundry bag. So Wallace comes in like, you know, hey, guys. Hey, Wallace. He goes over to his bed. He goes, I said, what? He goes, I'm going home. I said, what? It's a merry go round. I'm going home. He goes, I must have won my appeal. Nobody wins their appeal. I won. I go, oh, my God, Wallace, congratulations. The Italian says, wallace, let us have a party for you tomorrow night. We'll have a big party. He's like, I gotta call my lawyer. He runs to the phones, well, even fancy New York lawyers are gone by six o' clock on a Friday afternoon, right? He goes to the unit manager, he's long gone. He goes to the case manager, he's gone at 2:00'. Clock. So I said, wallace, we got to celebrate all weekend. [00:49:15] Speaker B: Terrible. [00:49:15] Speaker A: So he gives away all of his possessions. Cause he doesn't need them anymore. He's going home. So we have this big going away party, big dinner Saturday night, Sunday, he's going around shaking hands with everybody. Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye. Monday morning, we all walk him down to receiving and discharge. So long, Wallace. Good luck, buddy. And he's like, you're all going to come on my yacht when you get out. We're going to cruise the Mediterranean. We're like, thank you, Wallace. The cop in R and D later told us the rest of the story. Wallace goes into R and D. The cop says, who are you? He says, I'm Wallace. What are you doing here? I'm going home. He hands him the merry go round. The cop looks at the merry go round. He says, turn around. You're under arrest. For what? Attempted escape. And they cuff him. He bursts into tears. They take him to solitary. He's in there for six weeks, and then they send him to a prison in Ohio for the rest of his term. They did not charge him with attempted escape. They didn't charge him with anything because they actually believed him when he said that he really believed he was being released. [00:50:29] Speaker B: Right. He got punked. [00:50:30] Speaker A: He got punked and nobody knew who did it. [00:50:35] Speaker B: And ultimately you got him out of your hair. [00:50:38] Speaker A: I did. And so a very senior captain in the Bonanno family came up to me and said, I can't believe you pulled that off. I said, I told you I was going to him up, and now he's gone. Gone and done. [00:50:54] Speaker B: That's remarkable. [00:50:55] Speaker A: Well, there was a story that's not so fun. You know, when you have an empty bunk in your cell, it's a very big deal. So if you've got a good cell. Got all good guys. And my second cell was all good guys. We had planned it very well. People line up to sort of apply for the bunk, and the case manager, who's in charge of bunk assignments will ask, have you cleared this with the other guys in the cell? Otherwise you're going to get a beat down. So we interviewed people like, oh, you want to be in our cell? Okay, your child? Get the out. We don't have child in this cell. Then there was one guy, he was relatively new, from Pittsburgh. We called him the Cat in the Hat because he had this unusually elongated head, like you could project a movie on his forehead, you know? And he looked like the Cat in the Hat. So the Cat in the Hat comes and he says he wants to move into our cell. And I said, well, what's your crime? Are you a choke? He said, no, I'm not a choke. I said, what's your crime? He said, for hire. And I said, ooh, I'm not sure I like that one either. I said, well, what were the circumstances? And he said, well, I had a gambling problem and I was 100 grand in debt to the Mafia, and I couldn't pay it. So I took out a $100,000 life insurance policy on my business partner, and I hired a hitman to. To hit him. And the hitman hit him and then got arrested and ratted me out. But then the hitman had a heart attack and died in Prison. And I had already taken a plea, So I got 20 years. I said, I. That's not cool. So you're a rat. You ratted out the hitman? And he said, yeah, we ratted each other out. I said, no, no, no rats. I told him in our cell, so. [00:52:58] Speaker B: We gotta be hard to find somebody that's not a rat. [00:53:00] Speaker A: Yeah, in federal prison, because all that's left is the Aryans. You can't. I don't want to get any. Any deeper than I am. Yeah, yeah. [00:53:11] Speaker B: I'm not trying to dig you. No, that's. That's good. [00:53:13] Speaker A: So he started badmouthing me to other prisoners. And I knew he was badmouthing me, okay. But I'm thinking, gotta be patient. Figure out how I'm gonna get my revenge on this guy. But, you know, you can't make it obvious. You can't just go up and pound him. You have to do, like, with Wallace. So in the meantime, there was a serial killer in the unit who we called Truck because he was a long distance truck driver and he used to drive cross country and he loved. So he'd pick them up and have sex with them in the cab of his truck, but he didn't want to pay them, so he would them, and he strangled one and thought she was dead and threw her out of the truck. But she lived, and she was able to identify him. So they knew that he was the serial killer, but. But they couldn't prove it. So the only thing they got him on was kidnapping, assault, you know, whatever. So he got 20 years for the one girl? For the one girl. Did the whole 20. But like I say, the cops knew that he was the serial killer because as soon as he was incarcerated, the killings stopped. So they set up this plan to trap him. And they sent a parole officer to his house to do an inspection, a surprise inspection. They found a gun in the house. Truck attacked the PO. He ended up getting another 20. So he was doing the second 20 when I met him. For reasons that were never clear to me, that this guy constantly sought my approval. I don't know why. Like, he would say stuff like, oh, my God. He said, one time you were with the agency? I was with the agency. Guy had, like, two teeth, right? And they were little black nubs, you know? You were with the agency? I was with the agency. I said, yeah, good for you. He said, yeah, I ran a shrimp boat down to Angola to supply arms to the. To the rebels. I go in a shrimp boat across the Atlantic Ocean. Yeah, you stick with that story. So I would just. I was, like, openly rude to him, but I didn't realize he was a serial killer. One of the italians said, you know, be careful of him. He's nuts. He killed a lot of people. So. So I backed off with my attitude toward him. But he would say things like, hey, john, there's a new classic rock station at 1580am I know you like classic rock. I'm like, thanks, truck. Hey, john, I saved a seat for you if you want to watch the football game. Thanks, truck. And I'd sit down. So I'm sitting next to him one day, and as close as I am to you, that's how close we were to the email computers. There's a prison email system. It's not really Internet. You can't have Internet in prison. But you can send an email, right? And cat in the hat is standing there. That morning, I had been called to the lieutenant's office because I had an interview request from npr and I had to sign a release. So they just say, kiriakou, lieutenant's office. Usually people are called to the lieutenant's office because they're ratting somebody out, but I'm not a rat. So I knew why I was called lieutenant's office. It was to approve the npr interview. So I'm sitting this close to cat in the hat, sitting directly next to truck, and cat in the hat says, not knowing that I'm three feet behind him. Cat in the hat says, did you hear kiriakou was sent to the or called to the lieutenant's office. That guy's a rat, he says. And I just sat there. And truck says, that guy just called you a rat. And I thought, here's my opportunity. And I said, an hour ago, I heard him call you a chump child. He didn't say a word. He stood up, walks over to cat in the hat and beat him to within an inch of his life. Everybody runs back to their cells at the first sign of trouble. Everybody runs back to the cell because they didn't see anything, right? I just sat there watching the football game as he's beating this guy nearly to death three feet away from me. So next thing you know, you know, you hear the horn going off. I get up, I casually walk back to my myself. Then they have lockdown. Then they have to bring medics to come and clean up cat in the hats from everywhere. And sure enough, I get called down to the lieutenant's office. And they're mad because they just watched the security film. And I'm Just sitting there watching the football game while this guy's getting wailed on next to me. So the lieutenant says, so tell me about the fight. I said, there was a fight. He said, oh, you're going to play it like that, are you? I said, I don't know what you're talking about. I was watching a football game and then I heard the alarm go off. So I went back to my cell. And you didn't see the fight three feet away from you? I said, I didn't see any fight. I said, maybe you were in a fight, huh? Why don't you tell me about the fight? What, you want me to do your job for you now, too? He goes, get the fuck out of my office. Admit nothing. Deny everything. Make counter accusations. I smiled all the way back to my cell. They got nothing from me. What ended up happening was I killed two birds with one stone truck. Received an extra charge for assault. They added five years onto that 20 year sentence. And he was sent to a medium security prison. Cat in the Hat had to go to an outside hospital, he was so severely beaten. And then after he got out of the hospital, they sent him to solitary. He was there for six weeks. So he came back and people had told him what happened, and he came back like this and he's like, I'm sorry. I said you were a rat. I should never have said anything like that. And I'm just looking at him and I said, listen, I'm going to tell you something. If I ever hear my name cross your lips ever again, you're dead. You understand me? And he goes, yes. And I was done with him, too. [01:00:05] Speaker B: You owned the Italian mafia Persona and you also leveraged your Almost a sociopath too, right? [01:00:14] Speaker A: Almost a sociopath. [01:00:15] Speaker B: I mean, it's appreciable when you tell the stories because you dislike both characters. [01:00:21] Speaker A: I did. [01:00:23] Speaker B: And justifiably. And one who ends up with more time, everyone would feel like, well, he deserved more time. [01:00:29] Speaker A: Deserved it. He's a serial killer. [01:00:32] Speaker B: It is very brilliant. And it is. [01:00:34] Speaker A: Thank you. [01:00:35] Speaker B: Tying this all in. That is wonderful. I love that. Yeah. [01:00:41] Speaker A: I'm genuinely not proud of either one of those stories that I told you, but prison's not normal life and you have to protect yourself. And that that first day when I realized I was not going to the camp, I thought, you know what? You're trained for this. You've lived in far worse places than Loretto, Pennsylvania, and you are going to remain at the top of the heap. So I started with strategic alliances. That was rule number One establish strategic alliances. My strongest one was with the Italians, but I was good with the Aryans too. And the other ones had no problem with me. So I didn't need to make problems where they didn't exist. [01:01:27] Speaker B: I mean, it was brilliant. And it is very true that you have to completely become a different person. It's almost like being drafted or something and being sent to Vietnam. I mean, if that's not in your character, then you better figure out how to make it in your character. [01:01:41] Speaker A: That's right. [01:01:41] Speaker B: Because that's the life you're about to live. How much of the. Now that you're long been out and got to experience some of the racial division. And it wasn't a high security or anything, but I know guys that have been in high security prisons that are fights every day and they literally can't get to the email box to even communicate because they're locked down. They're basically in solitary. [01:02:07] Speaker A: Yes. [01:02:08] Speaker B: And a lot of it's racially motivated. [01:02:11] Speaker A: Like 90% of it is racial. [01:02:13] Speaker B: So how, how does, how are those people specifically affected when they go back out? Because I. [01:02:21] Speaker A: That's a great question. And it's an important question because we do nothing, literally nothing, nothing to prepare these people for life on the outside. So if you, if you're in a maximum security penitentiary or a medium, which is also violent and dangerous, and then they just open the door and let you go, what are you going to do? First of all, you've been hardened inside. You now tend toward violence because that's how you've been settling everything since you went in. You have no new skills. In many cases you don't know how to read and write and you go back to do the only thing that you knew how to do, which in most cases was to sell drugs. And then you go back to the old neighborhood. [01:03:09] Speaker B: And you also separate yourself from other cultures because you were made to live segregated. [01:03:15] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:03:15] Speaker B: So you live 15 years inside where you hate the blacks or you hate the Mexicans or whatever, and then you get out and are supposed to acclimate. [01:03:24] Speaker A: How do you do it? I say in the book that one of the real shocks for me in the beginning was how racially and ethnically divided it was. It was like walking into 1950s American south where everything was segregated. So take the cafeteria as an example. You have this cafeteria and imagine a dividing line right down the middle. One half of it 100% black. Every black prisoner is on the right side of the cafeteria. The left side is everybody else, but they're subdivided so the first, I'm going to say table, it's actually three tables put together. So the first row is the Aryans and it, it, it's graduated. So the actual, these Aryan brotherhood are at one end and the so called good guys, white guys who were not rats or tom, are on the other end. Okay. The second table on the one end is all the Italians and next to them are all the native Americans. Right. And then behind them all the rows are the rats and the child. So everybody's divided and the Hispanics just sit with the rats and ch. I never understood that. They don't care what you're in for. They just assume it's drugs. Sometimes it's drugs and child crimes and they don't care. [01:04:58] Speaker B: Would it be more functional if everyone were like that or do you still think that's a bad idea? And it just come to mind when you bring it up, it's almost like you either buy into the segregation or, or you don't. [01:05:14] Speaker A: Right. [01:05:14] Speaker B: And it would be difficult to separate people by crime because even on the inside it's difficult to tell who's innocent and who's not. I know you found some obviously innocent people or people that were screwed over. Yeah, but that would be difficult to do that because everybody would have been charged. Is it even possible, or would it be a better idea if everybody were just like, hey, let's make the best experience out of this? I mean, it seems impractical. [01:05:37] Speaker A: That would be the best, but not at all practical. [01:05:40] Speaker B: And there's no way to do it. [01:05:41] Speaker A: There's such hatred at play, you know, people. And then biases and hatreds are reinforced while you're there too. You know, seeing these two guys just scrap it out where one is in the end laying unconscious on the floor because he had the audacity to change the channel on the tv, it's just stunning to me. Stunning. [01:06:06] Speaker B: So what, what does prison reform look like to you? Having had that experience and knowing that at the state level, it's probably worse. I mean, it just, it doesn't get better, so. [01:06:17] Speaker A: That's right. [01:06:18] Speaker B: So what does prison reform look like? You've got people that go in and try to teach and mentor, but it's all the well behaved. But sometimes you can't be well behaved unless you've got the intellect and sophistication for trickery that you do. [01:06:32] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, just as background, the United states has roughly 5% of the world's population. Okay. And we have 25% of the world's prison population. We are so over regulated, over criminalized in this country that according to the book, Dr. Harvey Silverglate, the author of the book, three felonies a day, that the average American on the average day going about his normal business commits three felonies. I've written a couple of times about Congress over the last 20 years has created 50 new crimes every year for the last 20 years. 50 new crimes, a thousand new felonies that last year you could do, no problem. This year it's a felony this year. [01:07:25] Speaker B: And they don't purge either. [01:07:26] Speaker A: They don't purge. [01:07:27] Speaker B: I mean, just keep stuff on the book. [01:07:28] Speaker A: You spit in the wind on Saturdays, it's a felony in Vermont. [01:07:32] Speaker B: They could leverage it if they needed to. [01:07:34] Speaker A: Exactly. Almost keep it back. And that's my, that's my point, is that if they want to get you, they're going to get you. And there's nothing you can do to protect yourself. So number one is top to bottom reevaluation of the criminal code. I write about this stuff all the time. And I'll give you another example. This one still makes me angry. There was a woman in Honolulu who was an employee of the Department of Commerce, national oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, noaa. They're the weather people. They belong to the Department of Commerce. So Honolulu is very expensive. She's a GS12, mid level nobody. So she and a business partner buy a boat and on the weekends they take tourists out to go whale watching. One weekend they're out there and they see an orca, a pot of orcas, and one of the orcas is eating a seal. So everybody runs to the side of the boat and they're taking pictures and somebody goes to the orca, I don't know, to get them to stay near the top. Like the orca is going to say, oh, somebody is watching me taking a picture. [01:08:42] Speaker B: Idiot. Human response. [01:08:43] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. A couple of weeks later, FBI. She answers the door. You have a boat? Yes. You take tourists out on the boat? Yes. Were you out there two weeks ago? Yes. See the orca eating the seal? Yeah. Did you whistle at the, at the whale? She said no. Somebody did. You know what she says? I video all the trips and I sell the DVDs to the tourists. Do you want me to look? They take all the DVDs. A couple of weeks later, they come, they arrest her. They take all the DVDs they take her computers, they take her phone, they take everything. They confiscate the boat and they charge her with one felony count of interfering with the feeding of a Wild animal, which is a violation of the Endangered Species Act. She said, I didn't whistle at the whale. Somebody else did. Well, they couldn't figure out. It was unclear on the video. They arrest her. She fought this thing for five years. In the end, they bump it down to a misdemeanor. She does a year of probation. She pays a fine. But she was fired from her job. She lost her pension. She lost her boat, she lost her condo. Her business relationship broke up. She had to start back at square one. So I ask, is society safer because they went after her? Yeah. Are you and I better off in society because they protected us from this woman who may or may not have whistled at a whale. But this is what we're up against. This isn't illegal in any other country in the world. Why would it be illegal here? [01:10:31] Speaker B: It's difficult sometimes to get a legitimate case called in to that the FBI will adopt. [01:10:38] Speaker A: May I give you an example there, please. May of 2020, Covid has just started. I get a job offer to be the chief operating officer of an Athens, Greece based investment company. It's a job from heaven, right? I negotiate a package. I take the job. I start flying back and forth every two weeks. Washington, Athens. Washington, Athens. I'm loving it. Yeah, I'm there about six weeks and I call my lawyer who's one of my best friends. He's the former deputy attorney general under President Reagan. And I said. He said, hey, how's it going out there? I said, bruce, you're not going to believe this whole thing is just an elaborate bank fraud. He said, I got to resign, but I'm not sure what to do. He said, download every document you can download onto a thumb drive and quit. So I download 15, 20,000 pages of documents, prove large scale bank fraud. I quit. I come back to D.C. so I call the FBI. I just can't get through. There's an FBI agent in my neighborhood. I said, what do I do with this? And he said, you got to call 311. I said, that's what you call to fill potholes. He said, I know, but we got the system now. You call 31 1. They say, oh, refer it to the police. The police are going to realize that it's federal. Then they bump it up to us and then if we're interested. I said, forget that. I'm not going to waste my time doing that. So I call my lawyer again and I said, you remember this guy Ben? He used to be the deputy director of the FBI. He said, yeah. I said, I used to be in touch with him regularly. Are you still in touch with him? He said, sure, I'll call him. He calls Ben. Ben says, I'll get you into the FBI. So he makes us an appointment at the Washington field office. I take my thumb drive, my lawyer and I go to the Washington field office. We sit down with this agent and I said, I have documentary proof of a large scale international bank fraud scheme. And the guy puts up his hands and he goes, guys, if this doesn't have the words terrorism, China or January 6th, we're not interested. And that was the end of it. [01:13:05] Speaker B: As if they're just understaffed. But all those processes are so jacked up. You're also, these days, you're also banking on the fact that somebody that answers 311 isn't lazy, sends it to a police department detective who isn't lazy, who then calls an FBI agent who isn't lazy. I mean, all those things are never going to fall in a row anyway. I've had stuff on local levels and federal levels that I try to hand people and I'll, I'll do, I'll write the PC for you. [01:13:34] Speaker A: Same here. I'll do the work. I was so angry that I flew. My lawyer and I, on our own dime, flew to Athens and we met with the Greek police fraud unit and then we flew to Israel from there because there was an Israeli component to this. And we met with the Israeli police and they're like, yeah, we'll take it. [01:13:58] Speaker B: Yeah, that's, that's depressing, outrageous. [01:14:01] Speaker A: So that's, number one is there are just too many people in prison because we have too many crimes on the books. And sentences are draconian. You know, for example, a life sentence In Europe means 17 years. It will, will sentence people to a thousand years and they'll, they'll do it until their, you know, bones are turning to dust. Right? [01:14:32] Speaker B: That's all relative. I mean, it is. A sentence should be a sentence. And that's kind of. Is that not part of the problem too? I mean, you get sentenced to 20 years and they say, hey, in the Fed, you're going to do all 20, which is not necessarily the case either, but close enough. I mean, 20 should be 20. And if there's an extenuating circumstance that you can appeal, then great, you get out earlier. But. [01:14:54] Speaker A: Or even a mitigating circumstance. [01:14:56] Speaker B: And there's. But you also have all this discernment on each judge who's sent in from a different political party. [01:15:05] Speaker A: And a look at Texas for example, 85% of the death penalty sentences in Texas are from Harris County. Just Harris County. How's that fair? [01:15:19] Speaker B: Yeah, these poor Houstonians. [01:15:22] Speaker A: Exactly. Don't commit murder in Houston. Yeah, you're going to get executed. [01:15:28] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:15:30] Speaker A: So anyway, sentences are too long. We have too many laws. Not, not too many laws. We have too many crimes. And probably the most important part here. Well, we don't have, we don't have parole in the federal system. Right. There's a little bit 15% good behavior, but that's it. If you're, if you're sentenced to 20, you're going to do 20 or close to 20. But in 1979, in the Carter administration, we started phasing out educational programs. And then by the time we were midway through the Reagan administration, they were gone. Time was you could learn plumbing, electrical work, small engine repair, whatever, correspondence course and get a college degree. That's all gone. The only things that are available to you are a GED course and a pre GED course and that's it. Yeah. [01:16:26] Speaker B: And the, the more distinct, the more prestigious, should I say, leadership programs and stuff like that are only for people with certain sentences. If you're going to be short stays. You don't get it. If you're forever stays. You don't get it. Then you have to qualify and get all these things. They make it jump through so many hoops, it seems. But you're right. And then those people get out. It's worse for us. [01:16:48] Speaker A: It's worse for us as a society because they're going to, they're gonna, they're gonna reoffend. Recidivism is over 50% and it's even more in poorer communities. That makes us less safe. You know, you would think that it would be better for us, better for society, if we teach these guys how to unclog a drain or something. [01:17:13] Speaker B: Something. A skill that they can get a license for. That a felony being not prohibitive. [01:17:20] Speaker A: Exactly. [01:17:20] Speaker B: Which is another. [01:17:21] Speaker A: We're not asking that they be made airline pilots. [01:17:23] Speaker B: Right, Right. [01:17:24] Speaker A: Let them become plumbers. [01:17:25] Speaker B: They don't work at a bank. [01:17:27] Speaker A: Exactly. [01:17:29] Speaker B: Yeah. And there are so many problems, but you think that's at the root. You think the criminal system and laws on the books need to be reevaluated. [01:17:41] Speaker A: And I would also say another problem. Let me, Let me rephrase. Dr. Peter Moskos, 30 year Baltimore detective, is now a professor of criminal justice at John Jay College of Criminal justice in New York. He wrote a book called In Defense of Flogging, which is tongue in Cheek. He doesn't really defend flogging, but he says that the prison systems, as they are today in America, whether at the federal or the state levels, are nothing more than employment agencies for otherwise unemployable rural white men. Almost all the prisons in America are in rural areas surrounded by farmland. They are the only industry in these areas. So if you just got out of the military, you're not going to find a job in, you know, in Loretto, Pennsylvania, population 1200. The prison's there, and they're always hiring. Or if you are a flunky from the local police academy, you just couldn't cut it in the police academy. The Bureau of Prisons is happy to take you. The only qualifications to be a prison guard are you have to have a GED or be working on a GED and no felony convictions. That's it. I say in the book, too, one of the things that surprised me when I went to prison was mail call. Right. They have mail call six days a week, and oftentimes a prisoner would do the mail call. Prisoners aren't allowed to do the mail call, but they would do it regularly. Why? Because the guard who was supposed to do mail call can't read. [01:19:31] Speaker B: Oh, Lord. [01:19:32] Speaker A: He just can't read. And so he just has the, you know, whoever is standing nearest to him. Why don't you just do it? Yeah. [01:19:42] Speaker B: And part of that is circumstantial, though, too, because if you try to put it in the heart of a city and see if they'll approve that zoning, can you imagine? It's not going to happen. [01:19:54] Speaker A: It'll never happen. [01:19:55] Speaker B: No, they're always going to put you in this. [01:19:56] Speaker A: Never, always. [01:19:58] Speaker B: But that's an interesting consequence of that circumstance, is that then you're just going to get kind of the lowest common denominator to oversee this. [01:20:07] Speaker A: That's right. [01:20:08] Speaker B: And the other problem is you can't throw more money at the prisons. No, we're already. [01:20:14] Speaker A: You can't. [01:20:15] Speaker B: Throwing money at the prison. [01:20:16] Speaker A: The Bureau of Prisons is the largest bureau inside the Justice Department. It has the biggest budget, bigger than the FBI inside the Justice Department. [01:20:26] Speaker B: Practically wasted to the squandering money half the time. [01:20:30] Speaker A: Oh, my God. [01:20:30] Speaker B: Yes, please bring Elon in, I guess, and put him in a prison and see what he comes up with. [01:20:36] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:20:38] Speaker B: So I'm curious, too. So, and this may kind of bridge some of this gap, how long were. And I am tying this back to the prison thing, too, but how long were typically your undercover operations when you go out and work on a case Were there intermittent breaks and flying back home or whatever? Okay. And during. So what was an average length or what was an extraordinary length of operational time that you spent out? [01:21:08] Speaker A: It varied widely. So it could be as short as one meeting to pass a document, to collect a document, or, you know, to determine if this guy is the real McCoy or not. It could be just as short as that one day, or it could go for years. [01:21:28] Speaker B: Right. And it seems like the years, similar to the prison experience, which is what I'm trying to get at, would be an interesting thing to mentally reconcile. Because even you are stating that your personality became someone else in prison. [01:21:43] Speaker A: That's exactly right. [01:21:44] Speaker B: And your personality obviously is somebody else when you're doing the CIA ops, whether they're longer or shorter, especially the longer ones. How do you reconcile that and come back? And I'm not trying to be all movie esque, because, you know, I have some experience doing some of that too. [01:21:59] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:22:00] Speaker B: But there is some reality to it. [01:22:02] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, man. So you have to be in the right mental frame. [01:22:07] Speaker B: Right. [01:22:07] Speaker A: So to be able to do this. [01:22:09] Speaker B: Yeah. So how do you. How do you come back, though? Because there has to be some degree of struggle and re. [01:22:15] Speaker A: Acclimation, and then it's all about preparation. As a general rule, I don't talk to people on planes. That's from my agency days where I have to get in character, so to speak. Oftentimes I would be crossing borders or transiting airports in a. In a. With a false passport from a different country. So, you know, rule number one, don't draw attention to yourself. Right. So I just don't talk to people on planes. And I was flying one time from Milan to a country in Eastern Europe, and I'm sitting next to this big fat Italian guy and bah, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah, bah. He never shut his mouth the whole trip. And I'm giving him one word answers to get him to stop. He's like, well, what do you do for a living? I said, I'm involved in import, export. What do you import and export? I said, whatever. I can make money on changes all the time. Well, like what? Give me an example. Finally, I said, all right, look, I smuggle women and cigarettes from Eastern Europe. Okay, Are you happy now? And he goes, I don't think I approve. I said, I didn't ask for your approval, so shut the up. And then he just sat there like this the rest of the flight. But he kind of threw me off, and then I had to start all over Again. And then you get to the place where you're going to do the meeting. You usually get there a day in advance. And then you have to slip into whatever your cover is. Maybe you do some window shopping, maybe you go to a hunting lodge. You know, maybe you go to a rare bookseller because you're an expert in rare books that day or that week, whatever the operation calls for. And then you have to sort of settle back into your cover. Cover is very, very important. You have to live it, and it has to be backstopped. So it's not just John, you know, arrives in this country and is a dealer in rare books. John's gotta have a business card that says he's a dealer in rare books. And when somebody calls the number on it, it rings at the CIA and they say, you know, Acme Rare. Brooks, may I help you? So I can't have some Italian guy throwing me off my game on the plane. [01:24:42] Speaker B: Right. And in doing so for a long period of time. [01:24:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:24:48] Speaker B: Did you ever find yourself acting out of character when you returned in, whether it would be, you know, a post prison experience? [01:24:56] Speaker A: Yeah, once. Once I was so paranoid about surveillance. I was in Williamsburg, Virginia, and this car had been behind me for a couple of miles, and I'm stopped at a red light. And I don't know, I got it into my head that I was under surveillance and I was preparing to just crash through the cars in front of me to escape. And then I'm like, wait a minute, what are you doing? This is Williamsburg. [01:25:26] Speaker B: You can't do that here. [01:25:28] Speaker A: What are you doing? And I just told myself to relax. I got off at the first exit. There was a barbecue restaurant there. And I just stopped and had a Diet Coke and just sat there and tried to calm down. [01:25:39] Speaker B: What about your relationships? Does it affect your relationships adversely? [01:25:43] Speaker A: That's the most important question. I think the CIA has the highest divorce rate of any entity in government. The last number that I saw was 78%. And I'm divorced twice. [01:25:59] Speaker B: And you attribute it to those experiences you told us the first time. [01:26:03] Speaker A: My first marriage, definitely. [01:26:05] Speaker B: That was the Greek. Yeah. So we told that story. [01:26:09] Speaker A: In the first one, she had had enough. It's enough of this. [01:26:13] Speaker B: It was less about your character and more about what you did. And just the fact that it was such an unstable way to live, right? [01:26:18] Speaker A: Yeah, it really was. And then you have little kids. Our kids were like six and three at the time. And, you know, I'm dragging an assassination squad home with me to, you know, kill me. And when they realize they can't, then they kill the next door neighbor. And my wife is like, enough. Yeah, we're going home. [01:26:37] Speaker B: Understood. You had mentioned one time, and I'm sorry that I can't figure out where I heard this, but I know I heard it before you deny it, but you had made a comment one time about, you know, most CIA folks, and it may have even been here before we were rolling last time. But most CIA people, when you talk about being on the verge of sociopaths, but this and this and this, they're all well intended. They're good people. They're great at what they do. You know, there's all. And then you said flippantly, you know, there's always the 1% that just want to go kill people. [01:27:08] Speaker A: Yes. [01:27:10] Speaker B: I'm curious about if there's a place for those people. How does that work? They. They. They knocks. They. They assassins specifically, or how does that work? [01:27:21] Speaker A: Yeah, they're. [01:27:21] Speaker B: They're in those confines. [01:27:22] Speaker A: The CIA has two different organizations. One is called the Special Activities Division. Special activities division. Before 9 11, they were homegrown officers. Post 9 11, they are guys who have just gotten out of the SEALs, Delta Force, the Rangers. And then there is a mirror organization, Special Activities Group that's in the Counterterrorist Center. And so their job is to take delivery of the names of people identified in the Tuesday morning meetings at the White House. These people pose an imminent threat to the United States. A clear and present danger is the terminology that's used. And their job is to go out and neutralize those threats and all that stuff. [01:28:13] Speaker B: Well, I think I know the answer, but obviously you've hinted at the Tuesday morning briefings, so they're not always substantiated. [01:28:22] Speaker A: Oh, no, no, no, no. In fact, intelligence is notoriously unreliable. Listen, maybe I borrowed a thousand dollars from you. You and I live in the same village, right, in Afghanistan. I borrowed $1,000 from you, and you came back to me and you say, look, you borrowed $1,000 from me and you haven't paid anything back. I need my money back. Instead, I call the Americans and I say, he's Al Qaeda. They put you on the list, and then they kill you. And then I don't have to pay back the thousand dollars. It's as simple as that. [01:28:57] Speaker B: One of you did good in prison. So I am curious because when you mentioned Brennan, and I know we had some touch point on that where there was those, I mean, I would be interested to know how much you can expound on that. Who are involved. Is that something that is a recurring thing amongst CIA directors, or is it a. Is it a. [01:29:26] Speaker A: Well, this was a story that was broken by the Boston Globe in 2009. John Brennan, at the time, was the deputy National Security Advisor for counterterrorism. And he was reportedly hosting these meetings at the National Security Council every Tuesday morning where they would come up with a list of people to be that week, people who, for whatever reason, were deemed to be a clear and present danger. [01:29:51] Speaker B: And this is with how many people do you think? [01:29:53] Speaker A: Oh, probably fewer than half a dozen. [01:29:55] Speaker B: Okay. You would think the smaller number, the better because of the sensitivity, departmentalization. [01:30:01] Speaker A: Yeah. You don't want this out there for the whole world to see. [01:30:04] Speaker B: But it got discovered. [01:30:05] Speaker A: It was discovered, yeah. [01:30:07] Speaker B: Was it somebody from the inside that spoke? [01:30:10] Speaker A: It had to be. It must have been. Because if you know what. And let me qualify that, it was probably somebody from the White House who objected to it because they're not polygraphed over there and they are at the agency plus the Agency, you get a lot of true believers. If you're going to be involved in something like this, it's because you believe in the mission. And so my guess is it probably came from the nsc. They leaked it. And then finally the administration's like, look, these people want to blow us up. So, yeah, there's a meeting on Tuesdays. Yeah, we come up with a list, you know, to stop them from killing you. [01:30:51] Speaker B: So I thought. I found it interesting because as a kid, I'm close to your age, so, you know, the Iran Contra stuff, the hostages and. And all that kind of stuff was also fascinating, as it was with you. [01:31:06] Speaker A: Me, too. [01:31:07] Speaker B: And I always thought it was just, I guess as a kid, you think it's cool, but it's also, you know, when you gain, you know, political awareness. It seemed like, and I could be wrong, the 70s and 80s had a lot more of that. We're having this issue with this new president over here, and then all of a sudden be like, where did the SEAL team go? Oh, there they are. Oh, that guy was assassinated. It just seemed like that happened more often. I don't know if it's a communication deal where everybody has to know everything, and it's almost swung the pendulum the other way. But within the clandestine services, it seems like you're saying that that is still a practice. And that goes on. And despite the fact that we think we know so much about what's going on. [01:31:54] Speaker A: Yeah. The CIA changed dramatically on 9 11. I used to work for A deputy director named Jim Pavitt who had this mantra, he would repeat it all the time, that the job of the CIA was to recruit spies to steal secrets and to analyze those secrets to allow the policymakers to make the best informed policy, period. Recruit spies to steal secrets. Post 9, 11, it became a paramilitary organization. And so a lot of the mission changed to be to stop the threat. You know, certainly you've got longer term, more sophisticated operations going on against the Chinese, the Russians, the Iranians, whatever, the North Koreans. But in terms of day to day operations to protect Americans, it was these teams of guys from Special Forces going out and just doing things that people don't normally talk about. [01:32:54] Speaker B: It changed. I think that's what changed the FBI's focus too. When you talk about it, it's not about terrorism. I mean. [01:32:59] Speaker A: That's right. [01:32:59] Speaker B: That wasn't a primary focus leading up to that. It wasn't, it really wasn't very much internal focus. [01:33:05] Speaker A: Right, that's right. [01:33:08] Speaker B: Well, that, I mean, I guess that's good and bad, but when you're talking about some of those, if you have somebody that's crooked that's running those meetings and sharing intel as if it's been vetted. [01:33:20] Speaker A: Well, let me ask you a question. Do you remember at the very end of the Obama administration, so we're talking about 2016, Eric Holder, the Attorney General, testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Senator Rand Paul is asking him, does the president have the authority to murder an American citizen on US Soil? Well, Senator, we've never had a situation like that. That's not what I'm asking you as the Attorney General, does the president have the authority to murder an American citizen on US Soil without benefit of a trial? Yes. Yes, yes. So what happens then if there's somebody at the National Security Council who draws up a list that includes, you know, Abdullah, Mohammed, Rashid and Tegan? Because I don't like you, I don't like your politics. I put you on the list. Who's going to stop them? Who's going to even know that there is a list? [01:34:24] Speaker B: Right. [01:34:26] Speaker A: I mean, do we just trust that these guys are going to do the. [01:34:29] Speaker B: Right thing and it certainly isn't going to end up that I get offed and there's some kind of a righteous case to follow? [01:34:37] Speaker A: No, exactly. [01:34:38] Speaker B: Coming off a list like that, you get every protection. [01:34:41] Speaker A: Exactly. And then the CIA goes into court and says, national security, your honor. And the judge says, case dismissed. Which happens all the time. [01:34:49] Speaker B: Right. So obviously it's not a good idea. And I appreciate that. It's not a good idea. When I was 10 years old, I thought it was cool. [01:34:58] Speaker A: I did, too. I told my parents when I was nine I wanted to be a spy. [01:35:03] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:35:03] Speaker A: And I told them when I was 16, I wanted to be a spy in the Middle East. Yeah. [01:35:07] Speaker B: Well, part of that is lunacy, but. [01:35:09] Speaker A: Yeah. My dad is like, can't you be a dentist? [01:35:13] Speaker B: So appreciable. I. I love it. I have something interesting I'd like to do and I. We'll see how this turns out. Because who knows? I may have some names on here that turn into something. Something else, a complete left turn. But I put together. I have. I have a handful of questions that were left over from the last time that are kind of random. So I don't want to go into too many left turns. But this. This might cause some left turns anyway. But I have a word association that I'd like to play, and I have some names, and if you have a word or a phrase to describe the first thing that comes to mind, or something interesting you want to elaborate on, but I'll start with just some. These are super random and in no order, probably on purpose, but. Dick Cheney. First thing that comes to mind. [01:36:01] Speaker A: Dangerous. [01:36:04] Speaker B: Dangerous. Short explanation. [01:36:08] Speaker A: Dick Cheney pushed the bounds of the Constitution more than any other vice president in American history. And we've learned now, a generation after he left office, that he really was the president. He had primacy over foreign affairs, intelligence, defense, energy, everything that mattered. George W. Bush, who by all accounts was a perfectly lovely man, just simply was not in charge of the country. Dick Cheney was. [01:36:37] Speaker B: And is that due to his personality? Because I know George. George's personality was passive and cool and everything's okay. [01:36:45] Speaker A: The movie Vice has kind of a funny scene where Bush is trying to convince Cheney to run for vice president. And Cheney says, no, no, I don't want to do it. No, I'm not interested. No. Okay, well, I would have to be in charge of foreign policy. Bush says, done. Defense policy. Okay. Intelligence. All right. Energy. Yes. Trade. Okay. Okay, then I'll do it. I'll do it. And then he does it, and Bush just turns it all over. [01:37:18] Speaker B: Remarkable position to be everyone looking this way while this is happening over here. It's kind of a whole vice president thing. All right, how about Bill Clinton? [01:37:28] Speaker A: Disinterested. Bill Clinton famously was briefed by the CIA twice in his eight years as president. He had no interest whatsoever in intelligence. Al Gore had a great interest. And Gore was briefed six days a week for eight years. And if there was something important that Clinton needed to know, Gore would brief him. But Jim Woolsey, who was Clinton's first CIA director, said that he had never briefed Clinton and he wasn't sure Clinton would recognize him in a meeting. [01:38:06] Speaker B: He trusted Gore that much. [01:38:08] Speaker A: He did. He did. And Gore really was on top of things. [01:38:13] Speaker B: This is going to be a weird one. And tell me if you know anything about this, because I don't remember exactly when your CIA stint started, but Kiki Camarena. [01:38:22] Speaker A: Oh, well, he's kind of a famous. Kind of a famous DEA agent who was killed. In fact, I think he was the first one that was killed in Mexico by one of the cartels. And it was the death of Kiki Camarena that led the Reagan administration to pursue legislation that would allow U.S. law enforcement to kidnap people overseas and clandestinely bring them back to face trial. [01:38:47] Speaker B: So part of that whole story was about. And this, you know, there's no distinct story because all this stuff was obviously under cloud of suspicion, but that he was on to the CIA for moving arms, Nicaraguan Contra arms, and that the CIA had some role in having him taken care of. [01:39:10] Speaker A: Entirely possible. Have you seen the TV series Snowfall? [01:39:16] Speaker B: I have not seen it. [01:39:17] Speaker A: It used to be on like I know what's called or amc now it's on Hulu. It is, in my view, the definitive account of the CIA's role in the movement of cocaine from Latin America to Los angeles in the 1980s. It's incredible. [01:39:34] Speaker B: And that that was a man. There's so many questions never answered. Yeah, that get brought up too, about how that happened. We already talked about John Brennan. Yeah, that's one we won't go. Let's. Let's go. I have not a desire to go super deep here, but I may have a question for you regarding Jeffrey Epstein. I know you've been saturated with all that stuff. [01:40:00] Speaker A: Yeah, it's been busy. [01:40:01] Speaker B: Are you one of the people that. That feel like he may have been recruited. [01:40:06] Speaker A: Oh, by the Israelis. Yeah. [01:40:08] Speaker B: So strongly. [01:40:10] Speaker A: I believe it. Strongly. [01:40:11] Speaker B: So I have. I have my question to you is this because you would know more than any, barring a name on that list, which I can only imagine that there has to be a name on that list that is so significant that something would come crashing down otherwise, would it not be a good idea to. If you know that somebody has something that they're blackmailing you over and you know that it's. You're just biting your time by sitting on it, you can change the timing of Everything that happens by just exposing it yourself. Rip the band aid off. [01:40:49] Speaker A: Right. I mean, that's the logical thing to do. [01:40:52] Speaker B: It's, it's a, it's going to be terrible. [01:40:55] Speaker A: Yeah, but it's on our timing. [01:40:57] Speaker B: On our timing, yes. Not on someone else's. [01:40:59] Speaker A: That's right. Okay, I agree 100%. 100%. Just be done with it. And remember the lesson of Watergate. It's not even the crime that brings down presidents, it's the COVID up of the crime that brings down presidents. Watergate was a second rate burglary. A bunch of idiots. Former CIA officers, CIA contractors, they burgle the DNC headquarters at the Watergate Hotel and they get caught. But then when the White House denies and denies and denies and denies that they were involved, it was that cover up that led to the one and only resignation of a President in American history. [01:41:38] Speaker B: Remarkable. And a wide suspicion because then you wonder how many parts are. [01:41:43] Speaker A: How deep does this go? Yeah. [01:41:44] Speaker B: U.S. military dominance. [01:41:50] Speaker A: Yeah. I don't believe that we're so dominant. The method of warfare, the standard of warfare is changing very quickly. We're seeing it on the battlefield in Ukraine right now, for example, where it's Black Mirror, it's drones and these robot dogs that scare the hell out of me. And we're getting to the point where, where drones are going to be the future of warfare, or maybe they're the present of warfare. But we've always struggled. We, the United States have always struggled with things like urban warfare. We're not good at it. We haven't figured it out. And long term pacification and nation building, we're not good at it. And one of the things that we have consistently missed from a policy perspective is that when we go into a country to liberate it, we are never seen as liberators. We're seen as invaders and occupiers. [01:42:54] Speaker B: Right. Only in our own minds are we doing what we feel like is in the best interest of other people. [01:42:58] Speaker A: I told you in the last time we spoke that the night before the invasion of Iraq, I was the note taker in a meeting. It was a Principals Committee meeting. So it was supposed to be chaired by the President, but it wasn't. It was chaired by the Vice President. And it's all. They're all in a bank of monitors. So it's the Vice President, Condoleezza Rice, the National Security Advisor, Colin Powell, General Tommy Franks from centcom, a bunch of guys from the National Security Council, and George Tenet. So I'm sitting directly behind George, and I'm taking notes, and Cheney starts the meeting by saying, general Franks, why don't you start by giving us the order of battle? I've said before, I hate order of battle briefings. I hate them. They mean nothing to me. And he says, well, elements of the 1st Cavalry are moving here, and we're 10 clicks from this village. And the 2nd Mountain Brigade is. I don't care where these guys are. Just go fight your war the way you want to fight it. And we don't need to know where each guy is moving on the map. So then Chaney says, so everything's in place for tomorrow. And Frank says, if everything goes as planned, we can be in Tehran by August. And then George discreetly turns off his microphone and he goes, did he say Tehran or did he say Baghdad? And I said. He said Tehran. And George goes, have these people lost their minds? And then he turns the microphone back on and just sits there. So we go through the rest of the briefing, and one of these idiots from the National Security Council. I never liked this guy. He. He used to say something. He used to call Kurdistan Kurdland, which was offensive. And then I saw an unnamed White House official said, you know, Curdland, blah, blah, blah. And I said, he's the source for the Washington Post, because he's the only person in town who says, curdland, you just outed yourself. Yeah. So anyway, he says, the moment we cross that border tomorrow, they're going to throw flowers at us. So the meeting ended, and I went back to the deputy director's office, and he said, how was the meeting? And I said, did you know we were going to invade Iran? And he said, are they still talking about that? We're not going to invade Iran. I said, so? And so said, they're going to throw flowers at us when we cross the border tomorrow. I said, do these guys know nothing about history? And he said, no, they know nothing about history and they know nothing about the Middle East. [01:45:48] Speaker B: How do we get better intel? I mean, even today, we're looking at similar circumstances in the Middle East. [01:45:53] Speaker A: Nothing changes. [01:45:54] Speaker B: Where we just assume, like, well, this is what we think is a great idea, therefore everyone else thinks it's a great idea. [01:45:59] Speaker A: Yeah, the Iranian regime is a house of cards. And as soon as we drop these bunker busters, people are gonna take to the streets and overthrow the ayatollahs. No, they're not. I'll tell you, my girlfriend is. Is Iranian, and she goes to Iran two or three times a year, and she sends me like every night she'll send me videos. People are out at 1 o' clock in the morning at the cafe and there's music and people are laughing and, and enjoying each other's company. That government's not going anywhere. Their economy lacks for nothing because they have such great trade relations with Russia, China and India. We have crippling sanctions on them. Well, guess what? They can get everything they need from the other guys. And so the notion that this country is just going to fall apart as soon as we launch an airstrike, that's fantasy land. It's not going to happen. Yeah. [01:46:56] Speaker B: And I just don't know where you find somebody, because everybody's going to have their idea of someone reputable who knows from the inside. [01:47:04] Speaker A: You know, somebody asked me the other day, well, what about the Shah of Iran in exile? And I go, the guy in Maryland? I said, no, he's not going to become the new Shah of Iran. No, never going to happen. [01:47:19] Speaker B: It seems like we're missing kind of part of the premise of even this show is really finding strings of commonality between people. Could you tell me maybe a couple examples of. Because I think that would solve this problem too, if he had somebody who had actual cultural experience over there to explain how people are going to take it as opposed to a political stance put out by the government. [01:47:44] Speaker A: Absolutely. [01:47:45] Speaker B: Could you give me a couple examples of maybe somebody, a terrorist or a prisoner or somebody like that who has a lot more in common with us common folk then most people would wonder why? [01:47:59] Speaker A: Yeah, I can give you a couple. I talk about this guy in my very first book. He was the first in depth interrogation I did when I got to Pakistan as the chief of counterterrorism operations. He was a Jordanian and we captured him coming across the border from Tora Bora. So the guy is cuffed and he's chained to an eyebolt in the table. And I've never done an interrogation before. We didn't have interrogation classes at the CIA. The FBI normally did interrogations, but this was different. So I sat down and I'm thinking, should I be like a good cop? Should I be a bad cop? And I said, ah, screw it. I'm just going to have a conversation with the guy, neither good nor bad, just going to ask him. So I introduced myself. I don't think I use my real name. And I said, is your name Ahmed Shmachman? And he said, yes, it is. And I said, so what were you doing in Tora Bora? You're Jordanian. Why were you in Tora Bora. And he said, well, for a couple of reasons. Number one, I went to Afghanistan in 2000 to open an orphanage for parentless Afghan children. And the Arabs were very involved in Afghanistan. And Al Qaeda approached me, and I joined Al Qaeda. I said, you joined Al Qaeda? And he said, yes. I said, like a left turn. Why'd you do that? And he said, well, they were very generous in funding the orphanage, and they didn't ask anything of me. He said, I never had a weapon or anything, but I'm an Arab living in a non Arab country. And they came to me and asked for help, and they would bring children to the orphanage and blah, blah, blah, like, okay. And I laid out a map on the table, and I said, one of the things that we're interested in is the path that you took from Tora Bora across the mountains into Pakistan. We used to call them rat lines, right? So we wanted to plug up the rat lines. These mountains are prohibitive. They're so steep and jagged, and it's almost impossible to. You can't go over the mountains. You have to go through these valleys. So the map was very specific. So I said, show me how you got from Tora Bora to Quetta, Pakistan. And he laid it all out. And he would say, well, there's a village right here. And there was a guy in the village who had a Toyota pickup truck. And he drove me from point A to point B. His wife gave me some food, and then I spent the night in a barn here or a hovel. Whatever it was, he couldn't have been any more detailed. I knew he was telling the truth. I knew it because we already knew the rat lines. We just wanted to see if he would. [01:50:49] Speaker B: You're making up a story. You're not going to be overly detailed. You're going to be under detail. [01:50:53] Speaker A: Exactly. And I said, one last question. I said, why would you tell me all this? I know you're telling the truth. Why would you tell me all this? And he goes, I'm your prisoner. What good would it do for me to lie to you? I said, okay. And then he says, but now I have a question for you. I said, all right. And he says, I would like to invite you into the embrace of Islam, and I will be your godfather. And I said, well, thank you for that. I said, I'm a Christian, and I'm going to remain a Christian, but thank you for the offer. I appreciate it. We ended up releasing him back to Jordan. He wasn't a combatant. He just kind of got caught up in everything and came across the border with all the other Al Qaeda people. But there were lots of people like him. One of the things that I heard many, many times, and usually it was from the lower level, the younger kids, 18, 19, 20 years old, was they didn't know anything about the United States. They didn't know anything about American foreign policy. They were in these isolated villages, and they couldn't read and write. They had no job skills, and they wanted to get married. You're 18 years old. You want to get married in that culture. [01:52:22] Speaker B: That's what you're thinking about here, too. [01:52:24] Speaker A: Here, too. But what man wants his daughter to marry this kid who can't read and write, can't work, you know, doesn't have any skills, so they can't find a bride. The local imam would go up to them and say, what are you doing in this village? You don't want to stay in this village. You should go to Afghanistan, make jihad against the Americans. And if you do that, we'll give you $300 a month. And if you're martyred, we'll give your parents a $500 martyrdom bonus. And they're like, okay. And they just go. [01:52:55] Speaker B: But that's got to be an extraordinarily different culture to take that on. Because you could take a poor American all day long and say, you're going to still pay them a little bit. [01:53:05] Speaker A: Yeah, go fight the roaches or take. [01:53:07] Speaker B: Care of your family, which is seeing far outside of yourself, which I think so many of us are. [01:53:11] Speaker A: But this is the role of Islam, right? It's. They. They genuinely believe that there is something waiting for them in paradise. And so they'll. They'll make the best of what they have here. And if it doesn't work out, then they go to heaven anyway, so what's the difference? [01:53:27] Speaker B: Yeah, but Christians are going to go to heaven anyways, too, and you're not going to see a lot of them. [01:53:32] Speaker A: Well, you know the old. The old joke that Osama bin Laden went to. He was. He was killed and he went to heaven, and George Washington was waiting for him. And George Washington beat him up, punched him in the face, gave him a black eye. And then next to George Washington, here comes Thomas Jefferson. And Jefferson beats him up and punches him and gives him the second black eye. And then Alexander Hamilton kicks him in the balls and beats him up. And finally he says to God, what's going on here? And God says, you idiot, I told you 70 virginians, not 70 virgins. [01:54:11] Speaker B: I love it. Of course. And we need some more jokes, too. I think you can still screw word association. What do you think is. I mean, you have an extraordinary life. You've had ups and downs and experiences that most of us can only dream to have. What do you think is your most accomplished, your greatest accomplishment, essentially? What do you think? [01:54:38] Speaker A: Yeah. Blowing the whistle on the torture program. [01:54:41] Speaker B: Really? [01:54:42] Speaker A: Yeah. I wouldn't have said that 10 years ago. Ten years ago, I may have even said that I wished I had kept my mouth shut because I lost literally everything. I lost my job, I lost my pension, I lost my family, my marriage. I lost everything. But in retrospect, John McCain, six weeks before I got out of prison, I called my wife. I was able to call her for 15 minutes every other day, and I called her this one day in December, and I said, how was your day? She said, it was great. I said, yeah. Why was it so great? And she said, because the Senate torture report came out today and it proved that everything you said was true. And John McCain got up on the floor of the Senate and said that the country owed me a debt of gratitude because if I had not said something, they would never have known what the government was doing in their name. And then when the McCain Feinstein amendment was passed, McCain credited me with spurring it on and it outlawed torture permanently in the United States. And so that's something I can be proud of. [01:55:50] Speaker B: Well, you should be proud of that. I find it. That's remarkable, though, too, because you've also turned that tragedy into something. You turned a tragedy into another tragedy, because the program in and itself is a tragedy. [01:56:05] Speaker A: Tragedy. [01:56:06] Speaker B: Oh, but. And by doing that, that's. Well, that's a really surprising answer, but I think it's truly appreciable. I think it's fantastic. I mean, you must be in a much better headspace now. [01:56:18] Speaker A: Much better. Much, much better. You really get to know who your friends are in a situation like this, and the answers would surprise you. [01:56:29] Speaker B: The answers would surprise me. [01:56:31] Speaker A: What are, like, the people that you think are the least likely to walk away are the first ones. [01:56:40] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:56:40] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:56:41] Speaker B: Is it because they have. Is it just the. I don't know. I guess there's a discernment between what is the mission? I mean, you're talking about, hey, we're willing to do things that are unethical pretty much for the cause. [01:56:55] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:56:56] Speaker B: And so they're just on the other side of that line where you say, this is the unethical thing. I was willing to secret, even if I don't believe in it because we're part of something bigger. And you're saying this is. This crossed a line where wrong. It is sociopathic. [01:57:11] Speaker A: It is right, and it's illegal. [01:57:13] Speaker B: It's criminal. [01:57:14] Speaker A: You know, the day after I blew the. The whistle, I got an email from a retired deputy director of the CIA. Deputy director. And he said, you've chosen a difficult road. I only wish that I had had the guts to do it myself. I saved it as a souvenir to remind myself that I had done the right thing. [01:57:33] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:57:34] Speaker A: And then, you know, I had agency friends. I had one guy. He actually came to my door, to my front door. I hadn't seen him in years. And he said, I just wanted to tell you I think you did a brave thing. It was the right thing to do, but you have to understand that I can never speak to you again. And I said, I get it. We all choose our paths in life. [01:57:55] Speaker B: Yeah. There's no balls to that, though. [01:57:58] Speaker A: No, no. He's a coward. But at least he realizes, recognizes that he's a coward. [01:58:03] Speaker B: A transparent coward. But I think a lot of people would feel that way. And it was just. I also feel like. I think we touched on this last time. I also feel like people underappreciate how the emotional level that we were all on during 9 11, where when you talk about we just made this list and we went out and killed these people. I think everybody was in support of that. [01:58:27] Speaker A: Yeah, everybody was. [01:58:28] Speaker B: They've come to our turf and attacked us, and everybody died. [01:58:32] Speaker A: A thousand Americans in one day. [01:58:34] Speaker B: Yeah. So I think the people that either didn't live through that time, who were younger, or have just lived through periods of time. And people even talk about COVID like, I can't believe we did whatever, but, you know, there was a year where nobody knew what the hell we're supposed to do. [01:58:49] Speaker A: Yeah. We didn't know any better. [01:58:50] Speaker B: Yeah. So, you know, hindsight is 20 20. And when you look back on that, it's easier to dismiss the level of pure emotion that I think everybody shared here. [01:59:01] Speaker A: That's right. I agree. [01:59:02] Speaker B: So I can see where the program came into play, but it also needed to be like, we're also freaking professionals one. And we are humans with ethical standards, too. And so I appreciate, too, that you've carved that lane and reminded us it was there in the first place. [01:59:24] Speaker A: It was. It was there in the first place. The law was clear. [01:59:29] Speaker B: Sure. [01:59:29] Speaker A: Was illegal. Right. [01:59:31] Speaker B: For a reason. [01:59:31] Speaker A: For a reason. We executed Japanese soldiers in 1945 for water American POWs. That was a death penalty offense to water somebody. The law never changed. So how was it? Like magic. It was legal in 2002. We should just go ahead and do it. Actually do it 187 times to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. 83 times to. I was a beta. [01:59:55] Speaker B: And do you think that. So when you first blew the whistle, you didn't. You weren't even aware of the extent. [02:00:03] Speaker A: Oh, no, I was not aware of the extent. I'm glad you brought that up. I said in my original ABC news interview that we had watched ABS Beta one time. And the reason why I said that is that that was what was reported back from the secret site. They were even lying internally. And they said, oh, we him one time. Look, he opened up, he gave us all this great intelligence. No, he didn't. First of all, you stole that intelligence from the FBI report because they got the information from him just by having a conversation. And then you made 83 times and lied about that too. So. Well, we didn't even know that until. Well, the inspector general wrote a report about it in 2005 and the report was declassified in 2009. So we didn't even know about it until 2009. [02:00:51] Speaker B: And there was some degree of regret that you had, I think, in the beginning. [02:00:55] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, I look like a fool, but. [02:00:57] Speaker B: Because you were standing alone. But I think over time it had to have reinforced, especially when they came out with, hell, I didn't even know the barely the tip of it was even what I was reporting on. [02:01:10] Speaker A: Even internally, they were lying to each other. [02:01:15] Speaker B: And conspiracies are so hard to hold. So it's pretty incredible. I mean, this has finally come out, but it's years and years later that people are even willing to buy it. You still have people that are still angry about it. You've got the Epstein thing that's all conspiratorial. You went through the. I don't remember which prince it was. You had the Saudi prince situation where they had the numbers that would have potentially exonerated Abu Zubaydah, which was your prisoner that ended up again being imprisoned. [02:01:49] Speaker A: And going to poor Abu Zubaydah. I spoke with his attorney again last week and he lost his appeal in the ninth circuit court of appeals. But the ninth circuit pointed out that the reason they ruled against him, he had sued the two contract psychologists that tortured him. They said that the contract psychologists, yes, had broken the law by torturing him, but the torture had been authorized by the CIA. And so the psychologists can fall back on national Security defense. And so they dismissed the charges. But one of the things that the court wrote was that the CIA for the very first time confirmed that they had him. Right. They just, at first they denied and then they just ignored. Now they say, okay, okay, we him and that the. Had been approved by the President, just as I said in 2007. And he was a traitor. [02:02:56] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And they still do. Like I said, there's only so much people are, are willing to look at factually or otherwise. It's so politicized now that it just seems difficult to fathom that there's some kind of a list somewhere or there's a number of people who are aware of those circumstances that that stuff isn't going to get out in a legitimate way. I mean, having a hidden source that I can't reveal told me, blah, blah, blah. I mean, all that's going to do is stir the pot. But if somebody has something tangible and all those things were available and you had people that could have stood up for you and said, no, this is, this is correct. It would have been. Can't imagine where your life would be now. [02:03:40] Speaker A: It'd be completely different. [02:03:41] Speaker B: I would say would be better or worse though. [02:03:44] Speaker A: Better. [02:03:45] Speaker B: Do you think? [02:03:45] Speaker A: Yeah, I wouldn't have had to stand alone like that. [02:03:48] Speaker B: But don't you think that made you. I mean, we learned the most from our worst experiences. Unless we die, of course. [02:03:54] Speaker A: That's a good point. [02:03:55] Speaker B: I think that that's the things that you've, that you've persevered through now knowing what you did, I mean, this would, this would no way. That would be your greatest accomplishment, first of all. [02:04:07] Speaker A: Right. Because it would have been watered down. [02:04:09] Speaker B: Yeah, it would have, it would have been the blip. [02:04:11] Speaker A: It would have been the blip. [02:04:13] Speaker B: Oh, I think it's, I think it's extraordinary. I like said, I, I'm, I'm a big fan and I really appreciate all of your time every time. [02:04:20] Speaker A: I appreciate it. These are good conversations we have. I enjoy them very much. [02:04:23] Speaker B: And anything I can do for you, let me know. [02:04:26] Speaker A: Thank you very much. [02:04:27] Speaker B: I will actively look for opportunities. [02:04:29] Speaker A: So I appreciate it. [02:04:30] Speaker B: Let me know what you need, man. [02:04:31] Speaker A: Good to see you. [02:04:33] Speaker B: What's it take? What you going to do? Success around the sand the second grade rules A confident fake to make you do what they want when they won't. [02:04:51] Speaker A: Be the fool. [02:04:54] Speaker B: A diplomatic face is the one to see through don't let those bigots take you off your game or just let him lose Just sit here in the front seat baby ain't that sweet Take a little honey from the money be but don't pay the. [02:05:11] Speaker A: Fool. [02:05:15] Speaker B: An apolitical magical potion A missing beast at the end of the game A slow roll see the truth of soul motion I never found in 63 like five winding motion the truth lies between blurry lines if you're gonna call me back.