Speaker 1: You're listening to Comedy Central.
Speaker 2: It's been two years since Donald Trump lost the twenty
Speaker 2: twenty election, and although a stubbornly high number of Republicans
Speaker 2: still don't believe he lost, they are at least coming
Speaker 2: around to the reality that he is no longer the
Speaker 2: president who is running the government right now, President Trump,
Speaker 2: well most of them are. For some the truth is
Speaker 2: just too much to bear. I found this out firsthand
Speaker 2: when I was told that a Maaga rally that Trump
Speaker 2: is still in charge of the military.
Speaker 3: He's running the government, and he's running the military, so
Speaker 3: we should blame him for what happened in Afghanistan. No,
Speaker 3: thank you for talking to me, George and joy seeing
Speaker 3: president current President Trump. It makes me think of that
Speaker 3: famous courtroom quote from a few good men, you can't
Speaker 3: handle the truth. Although if you think about it, that's
Speaker 3: a quote from Colonel Nathan R. Jessup, who, as a
Speaker 3: member of the military of logic follows still reports to
Speaker 3: Donald Trump.
Speaker 2: Damn it made it again. This Jordan Glepper fingers the
Speaker 2: conspiracy and today we're talking about the military. The Trump
Speaker 2: is still in charge of the military. Conspiracy theory. It's
Speaker 2: just one of many military related conspiracy theories, and we
Speaker 2: have two people here with us today who know a
Speaker 2: lot about them and the people who believe them, both
Speaker 2: outside and inside military ranks. There are Paul Zoldra, a
Speaker 2: veteran who covers military issues and as the editor of
Speaker 2: the weekly newsletter of The Rock that focuses on national
Speaker 2: security and defense. I'm also joined by doctor Amy Cooter
Speaker 2: of Middlebury College, who has studied and spent time with
Speaker 2: militia groups like the Oathkeepers. Guys, Welcome aboard, Nice to
Speaker 2: be here, Thank you for having me. Good to have
Speaker 2: you guys. All right, Paul, I want to start here,
Speaker 2: help us understand the logic behind the theory that Donald
Speaker 2: Trump is still in charge of the military. I mean,
Speaker 2: even with Ivanka bailing on the campaign, I'm not even
Speaker 2: convinced he's in charge of his family anymore. Walk us
Speaker 2: through this. How is he in charge of the military?
Speaker 4: Well, Jordan, he's the commander in chief. Still, he didn't
Speaker 4: lose the election. I mean didn't you didn't you read that?
Speaker 2: That's how it works. If you believe it, you can't
Speaker 2: achieve it and or convince a bunch of other people
Speaker 2: you have achieved it. It seems wild. So why do
Speaker 2: people actually think this.
Speaker 4: It really boils down to his A lot of his
Speaker 4: supporters believe that he he did not lose the election,
Speaker 4: and you know, that's kind of coming into uh an
Speaker 4: interesting uh interesting part where he's running for re election
Speaker 4: now even though he didn't lose the last election. But
Speaker 4: even still, yeah, he's the commander in chief. And so
Speaker 4: if he's if he's still the president of the United States,
Speaker 4: then he's still the commander in chief, and he's still
Speaker 4: has poll in the military and and and oh, by
Speaker 4: the way, a whole bunch of the military is is
Speaker 4: is supportive.
Speaker 1: Of Trump, and and we'll we'll, you know, go with
Speaker 1: every his every word. I hope the sarcasm is coming through.
Speaker 2: I under I can hear some of the sarcasm in there.
Speaker 2: I guess help me walk through a little bit of
Speaker 2: it sounds it sounds ridiculous, but it's not the only
Speaker 2: time I've heard this out and about. I know people
Speaker 2: are denying the idea that Donald Trump lost the election,
Speaker 2: but there are people who still believe, Okay, he lost
Speaker 2: and Biden is in charge, but that there is something
Speaker 2: going on that we cannot see where Donald Trump is
Speaker 2: in charge. Of the military apparatus. Can you speak to
Speaker 2: that mindset? I know it's it's not true, but speak
Speaker 2: to the mindset. Where does something like that come from?
Speaker 2: Why are there people who are grasping onto this? Is
Speaker 2: there like a military idea that there is some sort
Speaker 2: of shadow general, shadow leader? Like what draws people to
Speaker 2: this other than the inability to let go of the
Speaker 2: idea that Trump is still president?
Speaker 4: Well, I think it would come. I think primarily you
Speaker 4: look back to the QAnon conspiracy of of you know,
Speaker 4: the there there's this big you know, massive underground you know,
Speaker 4: lizard galaxy of of uh you know, democrats and celebrities, uh,
Speaker 4: you know, stealing children and and doing all kinds of stuff.
Speaker 4: And that all came from uh uh a person calling
Speaker 4: himself hit himself quh. You know, many people became convinced
Speaker 4: by this, this whole idea of getting really highly classified
Speaker 4: information inside the government. And the idea was at that
Speaker 4: time was q Q was was inside you know, it
Speaker 4: was supportive of the Trump administration and fighting back against
Speaker 4: this the so called deep state, uh that is that
Speaker 4: is trying to thwart his agenda. And so you know,
Speaker 4: if you if you think that if you can belie
Speaker 4: leave that that there's some you know, person inside the
Speaker 4: government who's not only sharing all this really highly classified
Speaker 4: information with the public on a message board. I don't
Speaker 4: see much separation. I don't see how you you know,
Speaker 4: how we go from that to believing that Trump is
Speaker 4: still president.
Speaker 1: That's not that wacky when you think about it, you know.
Speaker 2: I think what always makes me laugh within it, though,
Speaker 2: is the belief in the fun parts, the wearing of
Speaker 2: the uniform and the stars and the power, but none
Speaker 2: of the accountability of what has happened. You know. We
Speaker 2: discuss the critical things that people are critical of the
Speaker 2: Afghanistan withdrawal, and the person that I talked to very
Speaker 2: clearly was like, no, no, he had nothing to do
Speaker 2: with that. It's almost as if, you know, in military parlance,
Speaker 2: you have a dress uniform. Correct. I'm not somebody who
Speaker 2: is in the military, but I've definitely watched films that
Speaker 2: are about the military, Harry, and I am to understand
Speaker 2: that you have a dress uniform and you also as
Speaker 2: an infantryman you were in the Marines, correct, correct, Yes,
Speaker 2: you also have something you might wear functionally to go
Speaker 2: do dirtier, more applicable things, right, camouflage. Yes, Camo, I
Speaker 2: knew it. Camo. I've done all the research, and it's
Speaker 2: as if believing in this theory is a belief that
Speaker 2: you only get to wear your dress whites and that
Speaker 2: there is no secondary part to it all, which is
Speaker 2: sort of emblematic of the whole American thought process.
Speaker 4: I think you you actually, you bring up a really
Speaker 4: good point, which is a lot of these conspiracy theories
Speaker 4: they hinge on people's ignorance of the military. You know,
Speaker 4: less than one percent of the of Americans serve in
Speaker 4: the military.
Speaker 1: It's a very small number.
Speaker 4: During World War Two, we had about ten percent of
Speaker 4: the of Americans in the in the military. Of course,
Speaker 4: we're fighting a gigantic war and that may sense, but
Speaker 4: that that number is is so much smaller now. And
Speaker 4: so what we what I've found from you know, just
Speaker 4: reporting on these issues for the past decade, being in
Speaker 4: the Marine Corps before that, most people have no idea
Speaker 4: how the military works.
Speaker 1: You know, I think.
Speaker 4: A lot of people think that we just you know,
Speaker 4: march around, we salute and and then you know, they
Speaker 4: like press a button, break glass, and you go to war,
Speaker 4: and like there's a black box in there nobody really
Speaker 4: understands what it's actually like. And and you know, the
Speaker 4: thing is that most of it's really boring. You know,
Speaker 4: we're just sitting around waiting to do things. We're doing
Speaker 4: maintenance or other kinds of stuff. But those are less
Speaker 4: sexy parts of the military that the military itself doesn't
Speaker 4: really share all that much with the public.
Speaker 1: And you know that ignorance.
Speaker 4: Really feeds these ideas, you know that the military is
Speaker 4: you know, doing nefarious things and you know they're up
Speaker 4: to no good. And and also also the the idea
Speaker 4: that the military can do these amazing things with ease,
Speaker 4: you know, like like like the Bengazi attack could have
Speaker 4: just been stopped just just easily by by you know,
Speaker 4: the military just swooping in there with jets from Italy
Speaker 4: and stuff like that. It takes more planning and and
Speaker 4: actually you know, diving in and figuring out how to
Speaker 4: actually do things. Uh, It's it's like it's it's almost
Speaker 4: like a comic book caricature of of the military is
Speaker 4: what what you get from from a lot of Americans
Speaker 4: who just you know, don't really know any better, you tell.
Speaker 2: I mean, even if you've played call of duty, that's
Speaker 2: not enough information to fully understand how the military works.
Speaker 4: I mean the call it call of duty is realistic
Speaker 4: for combat experience.
Speaker 2: Yea, I know it. Enough said, Enough said, enough said.
Speaker 2: I much like if you've watched Wag the Dog, you
Speaker 2: understand American politics as well. That and maybe half of
Speaker 2: American president You get it. You know how this thing works.
Speaker 2: Now you should talk about it and fear the institutions
Speaker 2: and of themselves.
Speaker 4: If call of duty was more realistic, there would be
Speaker 4: soldiers sitting around really bored, you know, smoking cigarettes, you know,
Speaker 4: really you know, bitching about their chain of command and
Speaker 4: complaining about complaining about you know, going out on patrol
Speaker 4: that day. Like that's that's the more realistic version of
Speaker 4: combat operations. The joke is, like, the joke is, like,
Speaker 4: you know, combat is is ninety or one percent sheer
Speaker 4: terror and ninety nine percent boredom, right, and that that
Speaker 4: usually is is pretty accurate.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So, like bitching and moaning is a part of
Speaker 2: the military. So play your call of duty, but then
Speaker 2: make sure you watch a good season of curb your
Speaker 2: enthusiasm to get the full understanding. Right, I knew it,
Speaker 2: I knew it. I want to actually fill out this
Speaker 2: we're talking about the military here, but sort of our
Speaker 2: conversation today is going to fold in also the worlds
Speaker 2: of malicious and citizen militias. So so I want to
Speaker 2: bring amy in amy. A lot of these conspiracy theories,
Speaker 2: they become incoherent the further you look into them. But
Speaker 2: I want to talk about what you studied citizen militias.
Speaker 2: Can you define for audience what is a militia compared
Speaker 2: to what being in the military is. And also, as
Speaker 2: somebody who studied who's talked about militias, I'm curious if
Speaker 2: you have a militia code name, because I do, and
Speaker 2: it's cold Brew and it got me a lot of
Speaker 2: cred with the Georgia State militia. Does everybody here get
Speaker 2: a cool nickname?
Speaker 5: Yes, sir?
Speaker 3: If you don't have one, will help get one for you.
Speaker 2: Could I be a cold Brew or if that's taken
Speaker 2: a French price.
Speaker 1: Colbrew works better?
Speaker 2: I think you like that, Yes, sir, feels very bold
Speaker 2: yet smooth finish.
Speaker 6: Well, to start with your first question of US domestic
Speaker 6: militias are civilian militias. They are intended to exist outside
Speaker 6: the military, outside the National Guard, and their members are
Speaker 6: people who really see it as their personal civic duty
Speaker 6: to kind of act in concert in some ways with
Speaker 6: the military, to be almost a civilian line of defense
Speaker 6: against potentially invasion, potentially natural disasters, anything in between. A
Speaker 6: lot of the members actually have military training. Among the
Speaker 6: groups I studied, about two thirds of the leaders and
Speaker 6: about one third of the other members had some service experience,
Speaker 6: and many of the others who did not kind of
Speaker 6: felt like they had missed out. They had wanted to
Speaker 6: be in the service but didn't qualify medically or for
Speaker 6: some other reason didn't get that service, and this was
Speaker 6: almost like a surrogate for them. Their experiences were really
Speaker 6: about trying to, in their view, stand up for their country,
Speaker 6: defend the Constitution and the American way of life in
Speaker 6: terms of how they specifically defined it.
Speaker 2: And as to a code name, do you have a
Speaker 2: code name?
Speaker 6: Some of them actually did call me renegade because I
Speaker 6: would study them at a time when it was not
Speaker 6: really popular for liberal academics to be dealing with more
Speaker 6: conservative topics.
Speaker 2: Well, I will say this, I was talking with Amy
Speaker 2: offline a little bit about this, but I read Amy's
Speaker 2: dissertation years ago because I am fascinated about militias. I'm
Speaker 2: from Michigan, which if you're into militias, Michigan's a great
Speaker 2: place to be. We got some og militia action happening there.
Speaker 2: And I think what is fascinating about it is there's
Speaker 2: a lot of talk about the effects of militias and
Speaker 2: extremist groups recently, but you've been doing this for quite
Speaker 2: some time right now. What a lot of people I
Speaker 2: don't think look into is what is appealing about militias,
Speaker 2: the process of militias, and the average militia go er.
Speaker 2: I think what I noticed with some of the time
Speaker 2: that I spent with a few militia members. I spent
Speaker 2: some time with some oath keepers recently, just hanging out,
Speaker 2: having fun, watching mailboxes, trying to save the election. And
Speaker 2: I hung out with some folks in Georgia wayback when.
Speaker 2: And I think the military side of it is fascinating
Speaker 2: because there are some of those people, oathkeepers in particular,
Speaker 2: who are ex military folks, ex cops, who see it
Speaker 2: as an extension of their service. They made an oath
Speaker 2: to this country and to the Constitution, and this is
Speaker 2: their extension of it. There are other folks too, who
Speaker 2: feel like just day players who wanted to be in
Speaker 2: the military, and perhaps some had very interesting stories about
Speaker 2: an inability to get into the military, like you had
Speaker 2: an astigmatism, so now you want to be in the militia.
Speaker 2: It's good enough, Okay, fine, I get it. Seeing a
Speaker 2: lot of cosplaying here, there's military here, and then there's
Speaker 2: a lot of these people who are pretending to be military.
Speaker 2: You know how, you know, because they don't have badges.
Speaker 2: They just have notes from their wife that says you
Speaker 2: can go for the weekend and hang out with your friends,
Speaker 2: but be back on time. But there's this funny balance
Speaker 2: of people wanting to serve people pretending to serve. And
Speaker 2: I guess I'm curious too of how you see that
Speaker 2: aligned with their relationships to actual military forces. Did you
Speaker 2: find do you often see it as in concert with
Speaker 2: the American military system or is oftentimes some of these
Speaker 2: militias looking to act in case the military in and
Speaker 2: of itself is something that turns on the American people.
Speaker 6: Yeah, the relationship that militias have with the military is
Speaker 6: frankly quite complicated. It's something that they tend to like
Speaker 6: in the abstract in theory at least because they believe
Speaker 6: that military and national defense are kind of the primary
Speaker 6: functions of what the federal government is supposed to do.
Speaker 6: It's one of the few legitimate functions of the federal
Speaker 6: government from their perspective, But they think that in practice
Speaker 6: the military is prone to corruption or other problems that
Speaker 6: they see as being kind of endemic to the government
Speaker 6: as a whole. So it tends to be the case,
Speaker 6: and there can be variation across units or even across
Speaker 6: sometimes individual militia members, but it tends to be the
Speaker 6: case that they really honor and revere veterans and service
Speaker 6: members themselves, but have a lot of distrust for the
Speaker 6: military as an institution, have a lot of distrust for
Speaker 6: military leadership.
Speaker 2: Paul de Zecho both ways, you know, the military world
Speaker 2: and those circles. What is the feeling for those in
Speaker 2: service when they look at the modern militia movement.
Speaker 4: There's military people in the militias, but also there are
Speaker 4: those people who are kind of you know, we kind
Speaker 4: of call it stolen valor if you're trying to kind
Speaker 4: of you know, represent yourself as as part of the military,
Speaker 4: you know, and you know, like some people will do
Speaker 4: it a whole lot, you know, throwing metals on their
Speaker 4: chest and stuff like that. Others will just kind of
Speaker 4: pretend and where the gear and you know there's like
Speaker 4: there's air soofters and stuff that where all the gear.
Speaker 4: They look very military and represent themselves as if you know,
Speaker 4: like hey, I get you your thank you for your
Speaker 4: service free meal at Denny's or something.
Speaker 1: But I I think I think, you.
Speaker 4: Know, military members probably looking at the militia, they think
Speaker 4: they're a bunch of geeks, you know, like you know,
Speaker 4: get a job, like get do do uh you know,
Speaker 4: if you want to join the military, then join the military.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 4: It just looks like this kind of pretend defense thing,
Speaker 4: and it really ignores the reality of of military operations
Speaker 4: and what the US military is capable of. You know,
Speaker 4: if you're looking at a militia, if you're in a
Speaker 4: militia and uh, you're you're they're you know, you're training
Speaker 4: to uh defend the constitution whatever that that that idea
Speaker 4: they think they are doing. But you know, bottom line
Speaker 4: is is they're also thinking about potentially going up against
Speaker 4: the US military, and that's not a winning battle. You know, like, uh,
Speaker 4: guys with guys with the small arms aren't going to
Speaker 4: really do much against an army with you know, drones
Speaker 4: and and missiles and all kinds of stuff. Uh, And
Speaker 4: so it's it it seems a little bit lopsided, but
Speaker 4: I think I think also they they tap into the
Speaker 4: military legitimacy of wearing a uniform and looking like you're
Speaker 4: organized and you know, following some sort of chain of command.
Speaker 4: These are these are military concepts, and they they make
Speaker 4: you look, you know, more professional. And that's the reason
Speaker 4: why they seek out military members and veterans, because that
Speaker 4: lends them credibility and legitimacy among among their their followers
Speaker 4: and supporters. You know, even even if you're even if
Speaker 4: you're you know, if you're a uh, you know, some
Speaker 4: nerd who could never could never get into the military,
Speaker 4: Well you can at least join the militia and be
Speaker 4: close to you know, former military members and kind of
Speaker 4: it kind of brushes off on you.
Speaker 2: You are spilling that tea, spilling that tea of that militia. Well. Also,
Speaker 2: I do think it also plays off of also the
Speaker 2: public perspective of the military. There's as as a civilian,
Speaker 2: I think there is a general misunderstanding of the ranks
Speaker 2: and the difficulties and the world of the military, and
Speaker 2: so somebody purporting to be a militia member who wears
Speaker 2: the outfit to talk to the talk in a public
Speaker 2: setting is almost treated as a person with law enforcement
Speaker 2: bona fides or has put in the time. It's like,
Speaker 2: if you buy enough t shirts with flags on them
Speaker 2: and you have good enough posture, then liberal elites like
Speaker 2: myself are going to let you get on a plane
Speaker 2: before them, and they're not gonna say anything about it.
Speaker 2: So you can you could steal enough valor to get
Speaker 2: you in certain positions. It's interesting. I'm curious, Amy. We
Speaker 2: talk about some of the perhaps with the goofy your
Speaker 2: sides of that, and the desire to be more legitimate
Speaker 2: like the military. But you look at something like January sixth,
Speaker 2: and you have militia members, oathkeepers, proud boys, people who
Speaker 2: are storming the Capitol with a legitimate fear that the
Speaker 2: military in and of itself could be utilized against them.
Speaker 2: The one thing you couldn't help but notice was just
Speaker 2: how many people look like they were preparing for battle.
Speaker 2: From the tactical vest to the pitchforks. This rally fell charged.
Speaker 2: You can tell these people really love America by the
Speaker 2: number of weapons they brought to hurt other Americans. Where
Speaker 2: where does a theory like that come from and how
Speaker 2: do they get to that point?
Speaker 6: Well, you know, I think it can come from a
Speaker 6: few different places, But among some of the specific groups
Speaker 6: that I have spent time with, it's come in part
Speaker 6: from an interesting dynamic where everything that Paul just described
Speaker 6: is true. That there are these folks who really want
Speaker 6: to attach on to the military sort of aura, if
Speaker 6: you will, and try to kind of claim some of
Speaker 6: that legitimacy. But also there are veterans who actively seek
Speaker 6: out something like a militia to join, and that can
Speaker 6: be for one of two reasons. One reason is that
Speaker 6: they kind of miss the camaraderie of the military. They've
Speaker 6: been honorably discharged, and they want to find a space
Speaker 6: where people are trying to look up to them and
Speaker 6: learn from some of their experiences. On the other hand,
Speaker 6: I've encountered some folks who really did not enjoy their
Speaker 6: military experience, to say the least. They really felt like
Speaker 6: there was no legitimate purpose to some of the conflicts
Speaker 6: they were involved in. One man in particular, for example,
Speaker 6: really believes that Desert Storm was truly all about experimentation
Speaker 6: on service members, that there was no other legitimate purpose
Speaker 6: for it. He came back incredibly angry and told me
Speaker 6: that he wanted to join something like a militia as
Speaker 6: a way to figure out how to fight back against
Speaker 6: the government, to take a proactive stand against the government.
Speaker 6: So I think some of that kind of my mentality
Speaker 6: kind of seeps in there, where even some people who
Speaker 6: have direct military experience kind of feed those narratives that
Speaker 6: the military might be the enemy. And usually that narrative
Speaker 6: is not about the rank and file, but again about
Speaker 6: the leadership or about the government, and then they're misleading
Speaker 6: the rank and file, and they're doing all this nefarious
Speaker 6: stuff that most military or service members may not even
Speaker 6: be aware is happening. So they feel like it's their
Speaker 6: job to raise awareness of that to fight back against it.
Speaker 6: In some ways, that's the logic that kind of undergirds
Speaker 6: the oathkeepers as an organization as a whole, because their
Speaker 6: whole purpose was supposedly to remind military and law enforcement
Speaker 6: about the oaths that they took to serve the people
Speaker 6: as opposed to serving the government.
Speaker 2: I want to talk a little bit about that distrust there, Paul,
Speaker 2: You've written and you've been very critical of some of
Speaker 2: the conspiracy theories that have been perpetrated by Donald Trump.
Speaker 2: You've called him America's crazy uncle because of these conspiracies
Speaker 2: that he has spread, including one that claims Joe Biden
Speaker 2: killed Seal Team six to cover up the reality that
Speaker 2: Osama bin Laden was never shot and it was a
Speaker 2: body double, which is wild, but it was something that
Speaker 2: he pushed out there. What is the story behind that one?
Speaker 4: So this one is very very strange and weird, and
Speaker 4: it's worth noting right away that Robb O'Neil, the.
Speaker 1: Seal Team six.
Speaker 4: Member, who who you claimed to have shot Ben Lauden,
Speaker 4: he's credited with killing Bin Lauden on that raid. He
Speaker 4: was and he's also a big fan of Donald Trump.
Speaker 4: But even he was like, whoa, bro, can you kind
Speaker 4: of back this off a little bit? And pushed back
Speaker 4: on this theory. It goes back to the Seal Team
Speaker 4: sixth raid on O'saoman Laden. This happened in twenty eleven.
Speaker 4: The Seals went into Pakistan, they raided Bin Laden's house,
Speaker 4: they killed him, and they took his body back. They
Speaker 4: got a ton of intelligence for it. It was a
Speaker 4: very successful operation by all kinds of measures. Soon after that,
Speaker 4: I'd say, you know, maybe within months or so, there
Speaker 4: was a helicopter crash in Afghanistan and a large number
Speaker 4: unfortunately of of of Navy seals were in that crash.
Speaker 4: And this this helicopter call sign was Extortion seventeen. And
Speaker 4: the theory of Extortion seventeen going down was that these
Speaker 4: were seals that were involved in the Bin Laden raid
Speaker 4: and in order to you know, keep them silent, to
Speaker 4: make sure that you know, and nothing nothing about the
Speaker 4: Bin Laden raid that the government didn't want getting out,
Speaker 4: Obama killed them, made the made made the helicopter crash somehow,
Speaker 4: and that it was a cover up of the of
Speaker 4: the Bin Laden raid.
Speaker 1: And now we.
Speaker 4: See that this is sort of refashioned into well, actually no,
Speaker 4: it was the vice president at the time, Joe Biden.
Speaker 1: And he was the one who.
Speaker 4: Set down this hell helicopter for some reason. And it
Speaker 4: just it just doesn't make any sense. And it also
Speaker 4: it also makes very little sense if if the government
Speaker 4: is trying to you know, suppress seals from you know,
Speaker 4: revealing the truth, and why is why is Rob O'Neil
Speaker 4: still alive? Why is Matt Bissonette, who wrote a book
Speaker 4: about the entire rade. Two seals have revealed details of this,
Speaker 4: and yet the government wanted to you know, take down,
Speaker 4: take down a helicopter and and and you know, bring
Speaker 4: down the truth. It's it's totally ludicrous and and really
Speaker 4: really unfortunate. The thing about this, these conspiracy theories that
Speaker 4: people forget is that there are these were seals that
Speaker 4: went down in a helicopter crash. There's a pilot, there
Speaker 4: are pilots in this in this crash, army pilots. They
Speaker 4: all have families, you know, they have they have friends,
Speaker 4: and they're they uh, they are now I'm sure affected
Speaker 4: by this conspiracy theory nonsense. And you know, whenever there's
Speaker 4: some kind of new article coming out about the extortion
Speaker 4: seventeen cover up, it's.
Speaker 1: You know, it's if that were if that were.
Speaker 4: My loved one, that that was lost, I'd be pretty
Speaker 4: pissed off by by this stuff. And it just continues
Speaker 4: and kind of snowballs, and and you know, one conspiracy
Speaker 4: theorist cites the other conspiracy theorists, and it kind of
Speaker 4: you know, goes on and on.
Speaker 2: Trump was challenged on this one by Savannah Guthrie during
Speaker 2: the twenty twenty election at a town hall.
Speaker 5: Just this week, you retweeted to your eighty seven million
Speaker 5: followers a conspiracy theory that Joe Biden orchestrated to have
Speaker 5: Seal Team six, the Navy Seal To six, killed to
Speaker 5: cover up the fake death of Bin Laden. Now, why
Speaker 5: would you send a followers you reach.
Speaker 1: Tweet it, retweet that was an opinion of somebody, and
Speaker 1: that was a retweet.
Speaker 2: I'll put it out there. People can decide for them.
Speaker 2: How do you think members of the military react when
Speaker 2: they see a conspiracy theory like this?
Speaker 4: Probably like what the what the hell? Like, why are
Speaker 4: people believing this crap? Like that's that? That would be
Speaker 4: my initial reaction, like can we can we teach some
Speaker 4: more critical thinking skills in school? I look at these
Speaker 4: kinds of things and I think, like we are. We
Speaker 4: are a society with a whole lot of people that
Speaker 4: are fooled by uh misinformation, disinformation, And what I fear
Speaker 4: is is nation states.
Speaker 1: Using that to their advantage.
Speaker 4: And I'm talking about China and Russia. That is not
Speaker 4: a conspiracy theory that these these nations do, that they
Speaker 4: have substantial intelligence apparatuses. They have information warfare specialists just
Speaker 4: as we do, and they have budgets that support this stuff.
Speaker 4: And so if you have a society that's already you know,
Speaker 4: not even not even able to discern fact from fiction
Speaker 4: because you have a former American president, you know, throwing
Speaker 4: fuel on that fire, that's gonna be that's going to
Speaker 4: be used to the advantage of of China and Russia.
Speaker 4: And it's not it's not propaganda. That's like, you know,
Speaker 4: like so obvious that it's you know, it's like suddenly
Speaker 4: you're you're gonna see some message that says, like, you know,
Speaker 4: Vladimir Putin is the greatest leader of all time. It's
Speaker 4: it's more about egging these things on and and sort
Speaker 4: of adding more fuel to the fire and more bs
Speaker 4: to actually expand the amount of people who are confused
Speaker 4: about what the truth is or just questioning, questioning complete
Speaker 4: you know, reality of what's going on. And you know,
Speaker 4: there's examples of this stuff in like like jade Helm.
Speaker 4: There was an operation in Texas, uh, this training exercise
Speaker 4: in which a huge number of conspiracy theorists you know,
Speaker 4: started talking about jade Helm as you know, some kind
Speaker 4: of government takeover. The military was going to take over
Speaker 4: the entire United States, and this training exercise was some
Speaker 4: kind of cover. Of course it was bogus and ludicrous,
Speaker 4: but you know that's that's like our internal conspiracy stuff.
Speaker 4: Just imagine if if you know that that expands, that
Speaker 4: goes out, and you have China sharing this stuff.
Speaker 2: That actually happened with jade Helm, right is ja jade
Speaker 2: Helm specific didn't Governor Abbott in Texas put troops activated
Speaker 2: troops because of that conspiracy, and China activated bots to
Speaker 2: gin up more chaos around it because they saw that
Speaker 2: as a weakness. Right. It was what you're describing is
Speaker 2: our susceptibility to conspiracies is a legitimate vulnerability to our
Speaker 2: own national security. I want to pausit right there. I
Speaker 2: want to talk a little bit more about jade Helm.
Speaker 2: After the break. We'll be right back, Paul. We were
Speaker 2: talking a little bit about jade Helm. Technically, what is
Speaker 2: it jade Helm fifteen.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 4: I don't know what number we're on of the times
Speaker 4: that jade Helm has led to the collapse of the government.
Speaker 2: I know sometimes they throw a number on there. It
Speaker 2: sounds so much of these conspiracies they have to sound
Speaker 2: somewhere between a born Identity movie and an exotic dancer.
Speaker 2: If you can get that right right there in the middle,
Speaker 2: then it's going to catch fire. And jade Helm was
Speaker 2: one of those. Correct.
Speaker 4: The thing is that that's that's crazy about the jade
Speaker 4: Helm conspiracy is that you had a whole lot of
Speaker 4: people who are thinking that this was some kind of
Speaker 4: government takeover. The military was you know, planning some kind
Speaker 4: of coup, and you know, the governor of Texas actually
Speaker 4: had troops from the National Guard you know, activated and
Speaker 4: and and kind of keeping an eye on jade Helm activities,
Speaker 4: which is it's just wild to think about that you
Speaker 4: have straight up b s actually affecting policy makers and
Speaker 4: moving them to action. Uh, this is this is I mean,
Speaker 4: you know, part of it is is probably you know,
Speaker 4: i'd imagine there's some kind of politics at play where
Speaker 4: the governor is you know, trying to kind of pretend
Speaker 4: like he's you know, he's he's uh, he's doing something
Speaker 4: about this this problem. But I would really hope instead
Speaker 4: that you'd say, hey, this is this is nutty, this
Speaker 4: makes no sense, and this isn't happening, and I don't
Speaker 4: actually waste National Guardsmen's time sending them out to to
Speaker 4: take care of this. But it's not like outside the
Speaker 4: realm of possibility to to think about these types of
Speaker 4: conspiracies or or just simple misinformation disinformation. The people that
Speaker 4: are making national security decisions, policy decisions, uh movements in
Speaker 4: the military, they're susceptible to this this information just like
Speaker 4: anybody else. And you know, some of them have training
Speaker 4: on these types of things. Some are are you know,
Speaker 4: understand counterintelligence and information warfare. But a lot of them,
Speaker 4: a lot of them, don't, you know. They they're just
Speaker 4: like they're just like every other American you know, and
Speaker 4: they you know, so if you know where you come
Speaker 4: from in America, that's that's your your neighbors are. Some
Speaker 4: of them are in the military, and they're still getting
Speaker 4: the same information that you're doing on Facebook. You know,
Speaker 4: they're still looking at it too.
Speaker 2: Oh no, don't say it. Don't say that. I mean, yeah,
Speaker 2: you're saying. Our susceptibility to conspiracies is a vulnerability at
Speaker 2: a national security level, especially when people in positions of
Speaker 2: power buy into this shit. Right do we are we
Speaker 2: handing out stars too easily? In the military. I look
Speaker 2: at I mean General Flynn. I don't know. General seems
Speaker 2: like a pretty big position. And General Flynn now he
Speaker 2: believes in all the QAnon nonsense. He believes the Democratic
Speaker 2: Party is all demonic Satan worshippers. This man was a general,
Speaker 2: and from all the movies I've watched, that's like tip
Speaker 2: top if I recall. So, what's what's going on there?
Speaker 2: Are we not vetting our generals enough? Or or is
Speaker 2: this just what an America general looks like right now?
Speaker 2: Batshit crazy?
Speaker 4: Well, to be fair, he is not the first batshit
Speaker 4: crazy general that the US military has ever had.
Speaker 2: If you look at well, is that a problem? I
Speaker 2: guess you know what? Is that a problem too? Because
Speaker 2: I think that brings up a larger question. Right the
Speaker 2: military in and of itself. We we put the military
Speaker 2: in a pedestal, and rightfully so they protect our country
Speaker 2: and keep us safe. And yet there's this American ideal
Speaker 2: of the wild general who goes on in there, Custer
Speaker 2: with all of his crazy dogs and what have you.
Speaker 2: From the beginning, there's stories of generals who's who let
Speaker 2: reality be damned and that makes them heroes. But is
Speaker 2: that a myth that is starting to erode and hurt
Speaker 2: us in modern day warfare.
Speaker 4: Well, I think it's it's always a it's just generally
Speaker 4: a mistake to put put people, you know, high up
Speaker 4: military leaders, military members in general.
Speaker 1: On a pedestal.
Speaker 4: You know, they the we should we should, we should
Speaker 4: respect and honor the US military and and service members
Speaker 4: who you know, swear an oath to the Constitution and
Speaker 4: raise their raise their right hand to do so. That
Speaker 4: is something that most people don't do. And they they
Speaker 4: the vast majority of of of of them do do
Speaker 4: so honorably. Then there's people like Michael Flynn who rise
Speaker 4: up in the ranks and and and and and go
Speaker 4: go places up there. And the thing about Flynn is
Speaker 4: that he was he was a very widely respected UH
Speaker 4: intel guy. He he he's credited with with really sort
Speaker 4: of transforming the intelligence world. And you know, on that
Speaker 4: sort of reputation, he moved up the ranks and he
Speaker 4: was he was eventually part of the leader of the
Speaker 4: Defense Intelligence Agency. It's like the military's version of the CIA,
Speaker 4: and they they deal with, you know, gathering intelligence on
Speaker 4: foreign militaries.
Speaker 1: And you know, at that point.
Speaker 4: There's a there's a there's a really famous Washington Post
Speaker 4: article about Flynn's time at d I A and after,
Speaker 4: and one of the quotes that I found really fascinating
Speaker 4: is is some some of the some of his subordinates
Speaker 4: started talking about his sharing of what we're called Flynn facts,
Speaker 4: which were basically ideas, crazy sounding ideas that he would
Speaker 4: put out there and try to get the intelligence to sort.
Speaker 1: Of molding to his ideas.
Speaker 4: So, for example, he would say something like like like,
Speaker 4: you know, there's definitely like an Iraq correct connection to
Speaker 4: this thing, or you know the Iranians are behind this
Speaker 4: or something. And it's like, that's not actually how you're
Speaker 4: supposed to start with intelligence. You're supposed to like, like,
Speaker 4: you don't want to find the bad guy, like.
Speaker 2: You're telling me this one of the architects of the
Speaker 2: Iraq War. Like the idea of oh, there's weapons of
Speaker 2: mess destruction over here, let's go invade this country. That's
Speaker 2: not a good starting point for good, clean intel.
Speaker 4: You actually want to have a starting point of being
Speaker 4: open to being wrong.
Speaker 2: And but the military doesn't create that, right does does
Speaker 2: the military create those types of people? It seems like
Speaker 2: that is a vulnerability in a modern modern military. Right,
Speaker 2: you were a soldier. Were there any classes on were
Speaker 2: there any improv classes about being wrong and saying yes
Speaker 2: and to any other idea?
Speaker 1: Yes?
Speaker 2: And no?
Speaker 1: I I.
Speaker 4: You know the thing about that, well, the thing about
Speaker 4: that article that, you know, it really sticks out to
Speaker 4: me is that you don't rise to this position without
Speaker 4: other people seeing warning signs along the way. And the
Speaker 4: thing about the military, you know, it's it's it's sometimes
Speaker 4: it is easier to pass the problem off to someone
Speaker 4: else than deal.
Speaker 1: With it right now, you know, it's the federal government.
Speaker 4: And so it's hard to fire somebody, especially hard to
Speaker 4: get rid of somebody out of the military. And how
Speaker 4: do you get rid of somebody from the military who's
Speaker 4: you know, a little like saying some weird stuff like
Speaker 4: what is how do you put that in the performance
Speaker 4: review and justify it?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 4: And so he he he and others have have sort
Speaker 4: of moved up into higher up ranks and and now
Speaker 4: we're kind of seeing the consequences of that where uh,
Speaker 4: you know, it's not Michael Flynn anymore, you know, it's general.
Speaker 4: It's all over his Twitter, it's you know, he introduced
Speaker 4: himself so much as General Flynn.
Speaker 1: And and yeah, I get it.
Speaker 4: You know, if you're a retired general, sure you want
Speaker 4: to you want to maintain the you know, the respect
Speaker 4: and and you know kind of the dignity of that rank.
Speaker 4: But I'm not walking around, you know, telling everybody I'm
Speaker 4: Sergeant Zoldra, you know, like it's it's a it's a
Speaker 4: way to uh, you know, get more legitimacy to your ideas.
Speaker 4: And it's it's people hear a lieutenant general, a former
Speaker 4: lieutenant general, or a former colonel there. You know, there's
Speaker 4: there's lieutenant colonels out there that are sharing conspiracies that
Speaker 4: I've found and and people hear these because and they
Speaker 4: they believe it because he's a general. Why would a
Speaker 4: general lie to me? You know, generals are very honorable
Speaker 4: and and they they they tell us the truth, and
Speaker 4: they they they've been there, he's been in for really
Speaker 4: long time. And so of course he's telling us the
Speaker 4: truth about the the you know, the Kraken being released
Speaker 4: and you know, the uh, the you know, the colonel
Speaker 4: telling us that the Green Berets have found mail in
Speaker 4: ballots at some secret facility in Europe that should have
Speaker 4: gone to Trump. You know, of course that's true because
Speaker 4: they're a colonel.
Speaker 2: I think there's there's a there's a secondary level of
Speaker 2: stolen valor that exists with folks like like Trump, who
Speaker 2: takes somebody like a General Flynn and they use his
Speaker 2: title as a way to bolster their own bs in
Speaker 2: a way that gives them credibility just because they're hiding
Speaker 2: behind the shield of somebody with the title like that.
Speaker 2: That that's but that's a whole that's a whole different.
Speaker 2: That's an editorial I'm working on. I want to talk
Speaker 2: about some of these real life examples of theories and
Speaker 2: ideas that could put into action. I want to talk
Speaker 2: about the Wolverine Watchmen. Uh. They're a splinter group of
Speaker 2: the Michigan Liberty Militia and they're the guys who wanted
Speaker 2: to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer. I want to know a little
Speaker 2: bit about the story behind them and how they plotted
Speaker 2: to do exactly that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I think the main thing to know
Speaker 6: with them is that they have been stirred up by
Speaker 6: this broader milieu that we've been talking about, where conspiracism
Speaker 6: about a variety of things, but especially about COVID nineteen
Speaker 6: was kind of at the forefront of their motivation. For them,
Speaker 6: it seems that they really believed that the lockdown efforts
Speaker 6: in Michigan and perhaps some that were being discussed nationally
Speaker 6: were really interpreted as government tyranny. They felt like it
Speaker 6: was going to slip into further tyranny, that that was
Speaker 6: just kind of the beginning of telling citizens what they
Speaker 6: could and could not do, and seemed to believe that
Speaker 6: it was their personal responsibility to do something about that.
Speaker 6: And I think, to Paul's earlier point, part of the
Speaker 6: reason this kind of conspiratorial thinking is damaging to our
Speaker 6: national security is not just what it can potentially open
Speaker 6: up internationally, but how it creates divisive content even among Americans.
Speaker 6: It's been really interesting to observe the militia movement over
Speaker 6: a long period of time, because folks that I was
Speaker 6: watching in two thousand and eight, two thousand and nine,
Speaker 6: twenty ten, who were very skeptical of some conspiracy theories,
Speaker 6: who openly laughed at some of them that people kind
Speaker 6: of assumed were part and parcel of the militia movement,
Speaker 6: got turned on to more and more of them, especially
Speaker 6: during Trump's administration, especially as q Andon theories sort of
Speaker 6: spread across the Internet and especially on places like Facebook,
Speaker 6: and so I think that the idea that some people
Speaker 6: have special knowledge or special insights into the way the
Speaker 6: world really works is a major variable creating some of
Speaker 6: this divisiveness and potentially creating the ability for some people
Speaker 6: to get so wrapped up in it that they feel
Speaker 6: like they have to commit violence to do some thing
Speaker 6: to course correct our culture here.
Speaker 2: I think that's a great point. There's something special about
Speaker 2: feeling like you have that secret information and that's something
Speaker 2: you can sort of build an identity around. It makes
Speaker 2: you feel like you have a sense of purpose. I
Speaker 2: guess the time that you've spent with militias talking to
Speaker 2: militia members, what is something that people don't understand about
Speaker 2: it the modern militia movement that you noticed.
Speaker 6: I think probably the major thing is that most militia
Speaker 6: members are average people, like they're really not social outliers.
Speaker 6: They have families, they have jobs. Militia activity is something
Speaker 6: that they care very much about, but they're not necessarily
Speaker 6: just centering their entire life around it in the way
Speaker 6: that we sort of stereotypically portray. And I think we
Speaker 6: have ignored that at our peril because something that I've
Speaker 6: been trying to get people to understand for a long
Speaker 6: time is that much of what they believe politically, ideologically
Speaker 6: in other ways too, is very similar to what a
Speaker 6: lot of Middle America believes, at least a lot of
Speaker 6: white Middle America. And I think that I kind of
Speaker 6: anticipated where we would go with the Trump election campaign
Speaker 6: and beyond in ways that took a lot of people
Speaker 6: by surprise, because we sort of just miss militia ideology
Speaker 6: as fringe when actually they've just been a little bit
Speaker 6: louder and more comfortable with it in terms of sort
Speaker 6: of owning it, really, when it's been something that's been
Speaker 6: shared among a broader swath of the population really forever.
Speaker 2: But what do you say to somebody who here's militia
Speaker 2: and they're like, oh, those are white nationalists, far right extremists.
Speaker 2: How do you respond to that? How far off are
Speaker 2: they with that assessment?
Speaker 6: You know, those elements do overlap, But I think that
Speaker 6: that's overly simplistic in a way that makes us downplay
Speaker 6: what real white nationalism is, makes us kind of miss
Speaker 6: opportunities for intervention potentially with people who aren't that extreme,
Speaker 6: people who could potentially be talked out of in some ways.
Speaker 6: At least they're conspiratory thinking in some of that divisiveness
Speaker 6: as well. If we sort of paint them all with
Speaker 6: one brush, it is more of a bleak picture than
Speaker 6: I think what we really have.
Speaker 2: We're going to take a short break. When we come back,
Speaker 2: we'll talk about what's next for military extremism here in
Speaker 2: the United States. Amy groups like the Oathkeepers have been
Speaker 2: emboldened by extremists of the Republican Party supporting them, but
Speaker 2: also hit with the realities of court sentences because of
Speaker 2: their role in January sixth. What's next for groups like
Speaker 2: the Oathkeepers?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think probably with the Oathkeepers specifically, that they
Speaker 6: are done as we know them. It's kind of interesting
Speaker 6: because the Oathkeepers have always had a bit of a
Speaker 6: mixed reputation within the broader militia world. Some people sort
Speaker 6: of appreciated what Stuart Rhodes and some of the other
Speaker 6: members were trying to do in terms of prioritizing oths
Speaker 6: to civilians basically, whereas others thought that Rhodes was too
Speaker 6: big for his breeches, speaking beyond what he was really
Speaker 6: able to do, so based off of his own experiences
Speaker 6: and based off of how he kind of excluded some
Speaker 6: other longstanding militia organizations when he was first starting. So personally,
Speaker 6: I think that the trials and everything that's going to
Speaker 6: follow from that is going to be pretty devastating to
Speaker 6: the oath Keepers as we have known them, But that
Speaker 6: doesn't mean that the underlying ideology has gone away. Many
Speaker 6: groups that have previously affiliated as Oathkeepers have just changed
Speaker 6: their name or taken down their Facebook pages or their
Speaker 6: other websites, and they still very much believe that the
Speaker 6: election was stolen, that it is their personal responsibility to
Speaker 6: do something to prevent the next presidential election from being stolen.
Speaker 6: So I think headed into twenty twenty four, we're going
Speaker 6: to have to be incredibly cautious and keep an eye
Speaker 6: on the narratives that develop that as Trump continues his
Speaker 6: next campaign, as other people sort of try to out
Speaker 6: trump him, we may see other figures even rise to
Speaker 6: the forefront in terms of their ability to appeal to
Speaker 6: these groups to make them feel like their fears are legitimate.
Speaker 2: Paul, I'm curious how we talk to people in the military,
Speaker 2: people in citizen militias. You served in the military, you
Speaker 2: served with white supremacists who had Nazi tattoos. Uh, how
Speaker 2: do you talk to someone like that about about their beliefs?
Speaker 4: I I wish I had a good answer for this,
Speaker 4: but it's it's it's terribly difficult. I can you know,
Speaker 4: you know, you brought up a point about the you know,
Speaker 4: Nazi tattoo.
Speaker 6: I was.
Speaker 4: I joined the Marine Corps and and you know, after
Speaker 4: nine to eleven, and you know, got to my first unit,
Speaker 4: and you know, one of my one of my senior
Speaker 4: senior marines, uh, you know, was a little bit higher.
Speaker 1: In rank than than me.
Speaker 4: And he, you know, they they were in charge, and
Speaker 4: I was the junior guy, and I didn't know what
Speaker 4: it was at the time, but he had some he
Speaker 4: had some kind of like Hyle Hitler kind of coated tattoo.
Speaker 1: On his arm.
Speaker 4: And and it's you know, having a person like that
Speaker 4: in your unit is incredibly dangerous. Uh. First and foremost
Speaker 4: it you know, can sew discord among a close unit.
Speaker 4: You know, the thing in the Marine.
Speaker 1: Corps that we we talk.
Speaker 4: About is is is a spree de corps. This this
Speaker 4: sense of of you know, working together and you're very
Speaker 4: very close and so and we're also we're also serving
Speaker 4: with uh, you know, black black you know, I got
Speaker 4: black grunts in my platoon. I've got you know, people
Speaker 4: from Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic and you know, Mexico.
Speaker 4: Like it's all every it's it's just everybody. It's it's
Speaker 4: a it's a mixed bag. It's all of America. And
Speaker 4: you have one one person who you know basically hates
Speaker 4: a portion of your platoon. It kind of like makes
Speaker 4: you wonder, like what are they gonna Are they gonna
Speaker 4: do the right.
Speaker 1: Thing in combat? Will they will they? Will they do?
Speaker 5: You know?
Speaker 1: Will they will they protect the people that are you
Speaker 1: know they they don't?
Speaker 4: Like, you know, it's there, there's that fear. But but
Speaker 4: also it's it's it's the fear of of stealing weapons,
Speaker 4: UH stealing ammunition, and militias have done this many times
Speaker 4: in the past. There's there's plenty of examples of of
Speaker 4: of using military members who are parts of of militias
Speaker 4: or parts of uh, you know, these kind of extremist
Speaker 4: groups and they basically use their military access to supply
Speaker 4: them with guns and ammunition. It's also really concerning from
Speaker 4: an intelligence standpoint to have have someone like that, who
Speaker 4: who's you know, loyalty is maybe not with one hundred
Speaker 4: percent with the unit and with the military. When you
Speaker 4: have this dual loyalty to a militia group or or
Speaker 4: some you know, extremist group outside of the military, it's
Speaker 4: right for the Defense Department to wonder, you know, what
Speaker 4: are what are these what are these people doing? And
Speaker 4: it's it's a it's a real it's a real problem
Speaker 4: because once you're in inside, you're largely trusted. You know,
Speaker 4: you've made it through the basic training. You maybe have
Speaker 4: gone through some kind of security clearance or you know,
Speaker 4: but you're you're trusted. People aren't you know, skeptical of
Speaker 4: you or pushing back on you as much as they
Speaker 4: would a civilian. You know, that's outside of this military sphere.
Speaker 4: And and it's you know, it's it's the it's the
Speaker 4: supposed it's it's called an insider threat, and the military
Speaker 4: takes that, takes that very seriously. When it comes to
Speaker 4: like cybersecurity, there's insider threat, uh you know, software and
Speaker 4: things like that. But there's not a lot to do
Speaker 4: for the insider threat for you know, the guy like
Speaker 4: me who's joining the platoon and like this is my
Speaker 4: senior marine. I couldn't you know if I knew what
Speaker 4: that tattoo was at the time, Like, how do I
Speaker 4: report that? What am I supposed to tell people?
Speaker 5: Like?
Speaker 4: It shouldn't be a hard or difficult decision to get
Speaker 4: rid of you know what I think is a scumbag?
Speaker 4: You know, Like, but that's it's not always that easy.
Speaker 2: Is the military ripe for conspiratorial thinking? UH? An institution
Speaker 2: that UH relies on loyalty but also blind faith can
Speaker 2: be hijacked by charisma and power to have people follow.
Speaker 2: I think the start was something like fifteen percent of
Speaker 2: the folks charged on January sixth. We're part of the military.
Speaker 2: At some point. Does that number surprise you?
Speaker 1: Not? Not really.
Speaker 4: I think it goes back to it goes back to
Speaker 4: what I said before, which is the military is a
Speaker 4: reflection of society. The people in the military, they're they're not,
Speaker 4: you know, better or worse than the rest of America.
Speaker 2: They're people just have all the guns.
Speaker 1: They have said, all the guns and tanks.
Speaker 2: They should be better, shouldn't they shouldn't that be the goal?
Speaker 2: The people with the tanks and the guns should be
Speaker 2: better than all of us. They should be smarter, they
Speaker 2: should have the research or discipline, more loyal. Dear God,
Speaker 2: I hope that people with the tanks are better than me.
Speaker 2: They must be, they have to be.
Speaker 1: Look, look, Jordan, you're a dirt bag, so I'm sure better.
Speaker 2: Thank you. That makes me feel better, thank you.
Speaker 4: But for seriously, I think it's it's they're just like
Speaker 4: you and I and they're just as susceptible to this stuff.
Speaker 1: And I still. I mean, just the other day, I
Speaker 1: had a.
Speaker 4: Friend of mine, you know, sharing something on on Instagram,
Speaker 4: like something about funding for the Ukraine War and how
Speaker 4: it's way too much, you know, the the Biden adminstration
Speaker 4: is wasting all our money and sending ninety billion dollars
Speaker 4: to this war and he could be spending it elsewhere.
Speaker 4: And you know, he was sharing it in like a
Speaker 4: positive manner, like, oh my god, this is crazy, and
Speaker 4: I it totally makes sense if you see that, like
Speaker 4: oh that's that's screwed up. And I looked at it.
Speaker 4: It's it's one of those things. And this happens a lot.
Speaker 4: It's like it's too good to check, and a lot
Speaker 4: of these things are just too good to check. And
Speaker 4: I looked and I check because I care about this
Speaker 4: this person as I served with, and I looked it up.
Speaker 4: It took me like basically five seconds to find the
Speaker 4: Congressional Research Service report, which is a non partisan outlet,
Speaker 4: and looking up Ukraine funding, and it's right around nineteen billion.
Speaker 1: It's like a.
Speaker 4: Rounding error on the Department Defense budget.
Speaker 1: It's it's like the.
Speaker 4: Bang for our buck that we're getting in in security,
Speaker 4: in US security and protecting Americans from our competitor of ours, Russia,
Speaker 4: who's that has been a competitor of ours for a
Speaker 4: very long time and will be a competitor, our competitor
Speaker 4: of ours for a very long time. That that spending
Speaker 4: is so small, and but but looking it up, you know,
Speaker 4: I'm like, I'm like, hey, here's here's the actual thing.
Speaker 1: And he's like, oh, thank you. You know, I like some.
Speaker 4: People some people have done that too, and they get
Speaker 4: pissed at me, you know, they get they're really mad
Speaker 4: that I'm not buying in to the conspiracy theory.
Speaker 1: And it's like.
Speaker 4: It's it's hard to it's really hard to to push
Speaker 4: back on on on something like.
Speaker 1: This when.
Speaker 4: It's you've bought in so much to the idea that
Speaker 4: there's some kind of nefarious thing. You're closing off your
Speaker 4: mind to alternatives and and it's it's just people. It's
Speaker 4: it almost becomes out of kind of religious.
Speaker 2: I think you should host some sort of Facebook class
Speaker 2: because that may be the only positive experience of people
Speaker 2: pushing back with an alternative point of view that was
Speaker 2: greeted with a thank you. Any kind of social media media.
Speaker 2: This was, it was very impressive.
Speaker 4: It was in the DM, so I think you nicer
Speaker 4: in the DM if it's on the comments.
Speaker 1: You know, I I gave it.
Speaker 2: This is slide into the dms and give facts. That's
Speaker 2: what people need to do. It's about time.
Speaker 4: I actually, I actually do think that that is something
Speaker 4: we need to do and more people should do that.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 4: It's it's really, it really is like it is a
Speaker 4: bit it's it's it's it's a bit of a bummer
Speaker 4: to see, you know, like just these conspiracies flourish and
Speaker 4: then there's nobody that's like saying like, here's the actual reality,
Speaker 4: you know, and I I will try my best if
Speaker 4: I think I might have a shot at at you know,
Speaker 4: correcting the record for at least one other person. And
Speaker 4: and really that's that's the that's the point for me.
Speaker 4: You know, it's like it's like, yeah, you're not going
Speaker 4: to impact the entire world.
Speaker 1: You're not going to push.
Speaker 4: Back on on this this conspiracy mindset, and you know,
Speaker 4: just this the crazy amount of misinformation.
Speaker 1: No one person is going.
Speaker 4: To be able to to stop that all but one
Speaker 4: person can have impact on one other person, you know, like,
Speaker 4: and that's that's worthwhile.
Speaker 6: I was going to say that I agree with that too.
Speaker 6: I mean, there's this academic research that that talks about
Speaker 6: this backlash effect where if we factually correct conspiracy theories,
Speaker 6: people just kind of dig further into them. And I
Speaker 6: think that can be true in some circumstances, although I
Speaker 6: think it's just a little bit too pessimistic for me
Speaker 6: to believe that must be true all ways across the board.
Speaker 6: But if nothing else, especially in sort of those more
Speaker 6: public forums, when we say no, here's factual information, here's
Speaker 6: why the logic of this is wrong, I think at
Speaker 6: the very least it can prevent other people from slipping
Speaker 6: into that kind of thinking as well.
Speaker 2: That it might be a backstop too. You might not
Speaker 2: save that person, leave that man behind. That's a military
Speaker 2: concept right, that that person too bad, But maybe you
Speaker 2: can throw something down and they won't come rushing back
Speaker 2: in amy. I want to ask, finally, what you expect
Speaker 2: to happen over the next few years with the citizen
Speaker 2: militia movement.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know, I always say I wish I had
Speaker 6: a crystal ball, because there are so many variables right
Speaker 6: now that it's difficult to know for sure what's going
Speaker 6: to happen. But I expect it's likely that we will
Speaker 6: have a resurgence once more, not just of militias, but
Speaker 6: of those groups that we tend to label right wing
Speaker 6: across the board headed into the twenty twenty four cycle,
Speaker 6: because I think that there are multiple political actors who
Speaker 6: now have learned how to play into the fears of
Speaker 6: these groups in an instrumental kind of way, and who
Speaker 6: see them as something that they can weaponize for their
Speaker 6: own benefit. So I expect that we will see pockets
Speaker 6: of resistance. I don't think we'll see another January sixth.
Speaker 6: I think this is going to continue to be more
Speaker 6: about school boards and supposedly like culture war right type issues,
Speaker 6: but it's really about sort of who has a voice
Speaker 6: in culture, who has a voice in politics? In a
Speaker 6: way that will absolutely show up in many of our
Speaker 6: campaign speeches and what that election cycle is at least
Speaker 6: framed to be about, which I believe they're going to
Speaker 6: frame it to be more about sort of like the
Speaker 6: soul of America in a way that's going to be
Speaker 6: very appealing to a lot of these groups and galvanizing
Speaker 6: them into action.
Speaker 2: You hear that America the weapon of the future. It's us.
Speaker 2: We are being weaponized, our susceptibilities, our free thinking, we
Speaker 2: are being we are being weaponized. Well, thank you guys,
Speaker 2: Thank you to Paul, Thank you to Amy for joining
Speaker 2: us here today. You're listening to Jordan Klepper Figures the Conspiracy.
Speaker 2: We'll see you next week. Listen to Jordan Klepper Fingers
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