#176: Lose Extra Pounds of Brain & Bone the JFK Way, pt. 5
Boy, that Warren Commission was pickin' gnat shit out of pepper.
P.S. It's Jean Souètre. I forgot whether or not I'd already said the first O.
Comments (61)
There are several videos on YouTube where people use a Carcano to attempt shots at the range and within the timeframe Oswald is alleged to have made them and many of them are able to do it.
I can't help but thinking about how this event really created the iconosphere you've been collating. It sure has helped them dilute any and every discussion of their misdeeds in popular rhetoric...
Your description of the shittyness of the carcano is amazing. All I would add is that your reload ch-ch is too short. Loading the next round into a bolt gun is more like ch-ch (up and back)…ch-ch (forward and down)…take aim again. So, your point of how slow it is is even a bit faster than reality.
I didn't know Brace yet when I initially did these shows, but we've since talked about the Carcano, and he knows enough about guns for me to trust his opinion that the Carcano was so bad it probably helped the Partisans take Italy back from the fascists
I feel you are so relatable. You should be proud of your whole show, it's one of a kind. Keep fighting the good fight comrade
“Going through a divorce while your son is in ISIS” sounds like a synopsis for a Noah Baumbach film.
Absolute legend michael. I love your stuff 🙏
What's the song at the end? That was great
Empire State of Mind by Gold & Youth
Fuckin’ Skorzeny
About the cia job where people would read books for coded messages or subversive messages, the Robert Redford movie “Three days of the Condor” has the main character doing exactly that. Dick Helms even visited the set and advised on the film, funnily enough.
That's where I learned about it as a kid. And the next time you listen to "Fitter Happier" by Radiohead, listen to the voice in the background: "This is the Panic Office. Section 917 may have been hit. Activate the following procedure," also from CONDOR
A few months back I got the chance to actually shoot an M38 Carcano, and my best time at manipulating the bolt was two shots in seven seconds, and that was without really bothering to aim properly. It's not a wimpy round either, 6.5 Carcano recoils more than any of the 5.56 rifles I've handled, takes you longer to return to target. On the other hand it was surprisingly accurate, by the standards of the '60s it'd be the ideal sniper assassination weapon...if you had a clear shot at a stationary target, only needed one shot, and had a properly zeroed scope on the rifle.
Yeah, it's not that you couldn't kill something with one, it's that 2 of 3 dead-on shots in 6 seconds (and, most importantly, from 2 different angles) is nonsense
MJ, been a while since I’ve had the s ability to listen, been dealing with my own kind of imploding series of life events. But let me tell you it’s a sheer joy to hear your voice in such exultant form, and I have been walking around town today cackling out loud at some of this shit. The CIA really is sending their best. I bet they’re glad to have you on the payroll
So nice to have you back!
An Abilene shoutout! There's, like, three of us out here fighting the good fight. Thanks for a great ep.
Take the win, MSJ. Feels good.
Off topic, but I stumbled across this extremely weird story right after listening: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/dec/11/brittney-griner-political-fallout-over-prisoner-swap-continues Why is Brittney Griner, an athlete who was never a member of the military and spent less than a year in the regular Russian penal system on civil charges, being held for "debriefing" and "extensive medical evaluation"/"rehabilitation" at an Army base in Texas? For 3 days now? I never (and mostly still don't) thought there was anything nefarious about her, just wrong place wrong time. But what justifies more than 3 days of military interrogation/examination for such a mundane case? A CNN story on the same topic quotes a Venezuelan gusano saying "After he was freed, Toledo said, he was part of a program in San Antonio that involved six days with a group of psychologists. He says the program was “extremely important” for his reintegration and hopes Griner can take advantage of similar resources. ", and the linked article references her "gradually re-entering US society". What the fuck is this?
well she was in a russian prison, i think it would be weirder if they just let her go without talking
The brilliant closing song would sound nice paired with, "Sweethearts" by Camper Van Beethoven - "'Cause in the mind of Ronald Reagan /Wheels they turn and gears they grind / Buildings collapse in slow motion / And trains collide, everything is fine"
Great episode Michael. Two questions irt the skorzeny claims: 1) does anyone have a link to the declassified docs referenced at the end? Specifically the plan for Dulles to hire skorzeny. 2) can anyone find a source for skorzeny training the green berets? I see it mentioned all the time but I can’t find an original source and I’m curious as to who first discovered that and how.
first one was @marina0swald on Twitter, and I don't know who found the original source for #2, but I first heard of it via Recluse/Steven Snider
I definitely never took Kennedy conspiracy stuff remotely seriously till around 2018 or 2019. This podcast helped change my mind about that, and also the release of O'Neill's CHAOS and the Epstein thing. When I realized that the most comprehensive "Warren Commission got it right" book of my lifetime was written by a guy who O'Neill catches lying, well, that was destabilizing! (I'm now regretting the line I have in a forthcoming essay about not being "completely certain" that Dulles did it lol. Sometimes trying to be sober and careful bites you in the ass)
Mom new D/C dropped
A cathartic episode. Much appreciated, MJ
One gun nerd clarification, that in no way should modify anything contained in the series. The Carcano 38 was considered a decent bolt-action service rifle -in WWII- as in: could a reasonably skilled soldier hit a man-sized target out to 100 yards more often than not with it. By all reports I can find the scope attached to the one found was *terrible*. But if you did hit your target that cartridge it uses was designed to fuck a dude's shit up good, so that's some basic plausibility. But we don't need to revisit the *implausibility* of someone not noted as a marksman getting off 3 shots and two fatal hits on a bolt action in 6 seconds on a moving target w obstructions.. I believe it was chosen as the evidence to be found as it's a *plausible* choice for the narrative - a cheap easily obtained rifle purchased by a deranged loner who's only pulling down book depository money, and the one in the [possibly doctored] photo to tie it back to LHO. Whomever may have fired that thing [if it even was] was never expected to do much more than make some noise, and leave it to be found. Others were certainly much better equipped but those items were never recovered and those people never detained. Also considering the players is the choice of a fascist era Italian rifle an in-joke?
I think it was primarily that Oswald was known to own one – though the "killer of fascists" photo is extremely suspect, Oswald did mail-order a Carcano under the name "Alec Hidell" or "A.J. Hidell" (can't recall which version), which was his main alias. ... However: remember the story of Richard Case Nagell, the CIA asset who was also spying for the KGB? The guy who held up a bank but took no money, waited for the cops, and explained that he'd done it because JFK was about to get shot, and he wanted to be in jail when it happened? The guy who had one of those out-of-nowhere heart attacks which are apparently a comorbidity factor for being a spook, and he'd been preparing to transfer all his documents about Oswald, JFK, and the CIA to researchers, but by the time they got there, he was dead and all those files were stolen? Well, I didn't know this until recently, but Nagell also used the aliases "A.J. Hidell," "Alek Hidell," "Aleksei Hidell." So whether those names were simply reused by the CIA, or they were given to Nagell expressly so he could do shit that would incriminate Oswald, OR – if you really want to lose your mind – the CIA used the "Hidell" pseudonyms for a whole GROUP of people who had Russia ties and would make great assassination patsies, well ...
Damb MSJ, this one absolutely snatched my wig. Great work
I also like the outro song at my 1.25x speed. Probably doesn't need to be that fast. 1.15-1.2x would be enough
My favorite thing about Allen Dulles is that in the end he was a demented gibbering idiot, wandering around DC, getting lost.
"I'm not going to have a grave stone," you heard it here first folks, Michael S. Judge proclaims his immortality.
Thanks for clarifying on what happened to the episode that was formerly part 5 as I went to re-listen to it and had to wonder if I just imagined it? Also did that episode start w you doing Felix doing Rich Piana "if you think all it takes to blow the president's head off is a socially marginalized loner w a rifle.. THATS FUCKING WRONG!"
fuck, now I don't remember and have to look for the file, because I hope so
lmao best cold open of all time
for a reason I can't define, everything involving Oswald has to have a cold open
Wow. Like so many other episodes, I'll be listening to this one more than once.
Well, I for one loved the cold open parody radio bits. 😁
Wild timing, I binged episode 1-4 of this series earlier this week. Thanks for sticking with it MSJ. Wish you sold merch, even though it’s against your ethos. (Which of course i respect / admire)
I wish I was more educated on this topic, because I had a hard time following this one. I'll revisit this episode after I research more of the basics of the JFK assassination.
Épisodes 1-4 are a great start. I like true anon’s jfk series too. Essential reading is ‘the devil’s chessboard’ and ‘jfk and the unspeakable’
I think we're around the same age chomsky played such a huge role in shaping my politics at that time. It left me so confused and defeated. Finding podcasts like yours helped me put a finger on that thing that was right in front of me but I could never fully articulate. I think (hope) were doing a better job for gen z and the kids coming up now. My most charitable take is that boomers, especially the tale end, didn't really understand what happened to them in the late 60s and thought they were teaching us a winning strategy. They thought the rally in the park to raise awareness could actually stop a war.
I'll probably never know this for sure, but my understanding is that Chomsky actively questioned the Warren Commission until about 1969, at which point he suddenly reversed course and said it wasn't really worth thinking about anymore, so maybe he got fed up with the early waves of "it was Plutonians doing a Rosicrucian ritual," or maybe he got a personal phone call from J. Edgar Hoover describing the floor plan of Chomsky's house in detail
Great episode
Glad to have you and this series back, Michael, you’ve been missed! On the topic of things (perhaps a projectile) that didn’t miss, I’m currently reading “Libra” by DeLillo based on your recommendation.
If Mao did it, he would have done it right
Got to the Albarelli research. Letsss gooo
Pretty good. Everything after jfk after assination changed. Mlk,Malcom x,rfk, and walter reuther after exposing afl-cio working with the cia and then resigned his seat on afl cio committee after founding that they are working with the cia. Mysteriously his plane was sabotage after that. I suck at Grammer but walter reuther was almost nominated as jfk's vp until that pos j. Edger hoover sabotaged that.
oh my god thank you for this
Holy shit.
this channel is a scam
are you the reddit guy that doesn't know what pain sounds like?
a half hour in and there is no information yet. Am I wasting my time here?
Holy shit
Got my ass with that Don’t Stop Me Now, bravo.
Brace has to be CIA and I don't think he is actually a nasty woman with boils either. He looked reasonably tall and good looking IRL too. Very suss and I didn't get to lance any boils.
he did it. he fucking did it
Really looking forward to this one. Thank you
NO WAY!!! Another JFK episode?? I was just jamming to the song at the end of episode 4 earlier this week!
Just act naturally
es skitet!!!!!!