1 00:00:16,115 --> 00:00:16,595 Speaker 1: Pushkin. 2 00:00:22,795 --> 00:00:25,875 Speaker 2: An election is meant to produce a fact. Who do 3 00:00:25,955 --> 00:00:28,955 Speaker 2: the citizens of this country want to lead them? And 4 00:00:28,995 --> 00:00:31,355 Speaker 2: the production of facts is sort of our meat and potatoes. 5 00:00:31,355 --> 00:00:34,675 Speaker 2: Here at the last archive, we made our second season 6 00:00:34,795 --> 00:00:37,595 Speaker 2: in twenty twenty one. We'd started working on it in 7 00:00:37,675 --> 00:00:40,915 Speaker 2: late twenty twenty. I don't remember how Jill was planning 8 00:00:40,955 --> 00:00:43,315 Speaker 2: on ending it back then, but I do know that 9 00:00:43,355 --> 00:00:46,675 Speaker 2: on January sixth, twenty twenty one, whatever that plan was 10 00:00:46,795 --> 00:00:50,475 Speaker 2: went out the window. On that day, rioders stormed the 11 00:00:50,555 --> 00:00:53,315 Speaker 2: United States Capitol Building in an attempt to stop the 12 00:00:53,355 --> 00:00:57,195 Speaker 2: certification of the twenty twenty election. They were denying a fact. 13 00:00:57,675 --> 00:01:00,595 Speaker 2: This was an insurrection. The FBI saw it as an 14 00:01:00,635 --> 00:01:04,195 Speaker 2: act of terrorism. Multiple deaths have been linked to that day, 15 00:01:04,555 --> 00:01:07,235 Speaker 2: some in the chaos of it, some by suicide after. 16 00:01:08,275 --> 00:01:11,875 Speaker 2: Since then, hundreds have been convicted of crimes, including the 17 00:01:11,915 --> 00:01:16,315 Speaker 2: crime of seditious conspiracy. The aftermath of that day is 18 00:01:16,355 --> 00:01:20,075 Speaker 2: still playing out, most recently in the Supreme Court. It 19 00:01:20,115 --> 00:01:22,875 Speaker 2: has a deep influence on the twenty twenty four election, 20 00:01:23,395 --> 00:01:26,755 Speaker 2: raising questions about whether Trump can even legally run for president. 21 00:01:27,635 --> 00:01:31,355 Speaker 2: But today I want to revisit the inciting incident and 22 00:01:31,395 --> 00:01:34,275 Speaker 2: play you. The finale of our second season, an episode 23 00:01:34,315 --> 00:01:37,835 Speaker 2: called Epiphany, which is all about January sixth of twenty 24 00:01:37,875 --> 00:01:40,595 Speaker 2: twenty one and the moment that an election which had 25 00:01:40,595 --> 00:01:43,915 Speaker 2: produced a single fact, the fact of Joe Biden's presidency, 26 00:01:44,475 --> 00:01:49,955 Speaker 2: instead split the country into two irreconcilable realities. Here's the episode. 27 00:01:58,635 --> 00:02:01,275 Speaker 1: There's a place in our world where the known things go. 28 00:02:03,275 --> 00:02:07,435 Speaker 1: A quarter of the mind lined with shelves cluttered with proof. 29 00:02:13,155 --> 00:02:17,515 Speaker 1: I'm hiding in here. Who's out there? What do they want? 30 00:02:18,715 --> 00:02:22,075 Speaker 1: They sounds so angry. I'm pretty sure they can get in. 31 00:02:22,955 --> 00:02:25,555 Speaker 1: I don't see how I can get out. I think 32 00:02:25,595 --> 00:02:35,475 Speaker 1: I might be trapped. Welcome to the Last Archive, the 33 00:02:35,555 --> 00:02:38,075 Speaker 1: show about how we know what we know and why 34 00:02:38,115 --> 00:02:41,235 Speaker 1: it sometimes seems lately as if we don't know anything 35 00:02:41,275 --> 00:02:47,275 Speaker 1: at all. I'm Jill Lapour. This season, I've been trying 36 00:02:47,275 --> 00:02:49,715 Speaker 1: to trace the history of doubt over the course of 37 00:02:49,755 --> 00:02:54,115 Speaker 1: the last century, building that history block by block, a 38 00:02:54,315 --> 00:02:58,395 Speaker 1: tower of doubt. Not too long ago, it all came 39 00:02:58,635 --> 00:03:02,155 Speaker 1: crashing down. It was the beginning of the year twenty 40 00:03:02,235 --> 00:03:06,235 Speaker 1: twenty one. Every archive of knowledge seemed to be under attack. 41 00:03:06,435 --> 00:03:16,235 Speaker 1: Embattled universities, courthouses, press rooms, even Congress but I found 42 00:03:16,275 --> 00:03:21,955 Speaker 1: it the last archives escape patch. Come through with me. 43 00:03:22,875 --> 00:03:25,195 Speaker 1: We'll have to go through a war and of underground tunnels, 44 00:03:25,235 --> 00:03:29,315 Speaker 1: but we'll get there. We're heading to a place called 45 00:03:29,475 --> 00:03:39,875 Speaker 1: Iron Mountain. Something I love about history, all the surprises, 46 00:03:39,955 --> 00:03:43,795 Speaker 1: the twists and turns. So I'm starting with a story 47 00:03:43,835 --> 00:03:47,675 Speaker 1: that has so many turns. In the nineteen thirties, a 48 00:03:47,715 --> 00:03:51,915 Speaker 1: German immigrant named Hermann Noust purchased an abandoned iron ore 49 00:03:51,995 --> 00:03:55,915 Speaker 1: mine in New York State near the Hudson River. Inside 50 00:03:55,955 --> 00:04:00,635 Speaker 1: its caves and old mining tunnels, Noust grew mushrooms. The 51 00:04:00,675 --> 00:04:04,955 Speaker 1: place was perfect for it. The mushrooms mushroomed. Nousk began 52 00:04:05,035 --> 00:04:07,435 Speaker 1: supplying the city with mushrooms, and he made a fortune. 53 00:04:07,675 --> 00:04:10,875 Speaker 1: People called him the mushroom King. At his house he 54 00:04:10,915 --> 00:04:13,875 Speaker 1: had the only mushroom shaped swimming pool in the world. 55 00:04:14,595 --> 00:04:17,955 Speaker 1: In nineteen fifty one, Noust adapted his caves and mines 56 00:04:17,995 --> 00:04:21,475 Speaker 1: and tunnels for a new business. He founded the Iron 57 00:04:21,555 --> 00:04:27,195 Speaker 1: Mountain Atomic Storage Corporation. Because at the time Americans were 58 00:04:27,235 --> 00:04:30,915 Speaker 1: crazy for bomb shelters. School children were ducking and covering 59 00:04:30,955 --> 00:04:35,115 Speaker 1: to prepare for a nuclear attack. Herman Noust outed them all. 60 00:04:35,835 --> 00:04:40,235 Speaker 1: An atomic bomb expert called Nousts Vault, the safest place 61 00:04:40,235 --> 00:04:40,995 Speaker 1: in the world. 62 00:04:42,395 --> 00:04:44,955 Speaker 3: A thirty ton door equipped with a time lock will 63 00:04:44,955 --> 00:04:47,395 Speaker 3: guard one of the main passages in which four hundred 64 00:04:47,435 --> 00:04:50,235 Speaker 3: vaults are located. During the initial phase of the enterprise, 65 00:04:50,875 --> 00:04:53,955 Speaker 3: already foreign banks have applied for storage space behind the 66 00:04:53,995 --> 00:04:57,875 Speaker 3: massive door. Museums also are expected to seek protection for 67 00:04:57,955 --> 00:05:02,115 Speaker 3: their priceless art treasures. In the atmosphere of international tension, 68 00:05:02,395 --> 00:05:05,035 Speaker 3: bank files and records began to find their way into 69 00:05:05,075 --> 00:05:05,795 Speaker 3: the sanctuary. 70 00:05:06,635 --> 00:05:09,755 Speaker 1: You could put your most valuable documents there, wills, photograph, 71 00:05:09,835 --> 00:05:13,275 Speaker 1: UF's legal papers. The company grew and grew a Cold 72 00:05:13,315 --> 00:05:18,475 Speaker 1: War knowledge vault, a last archive along the Hudson. These days, 73 00:05:18,595 --> 00:05:21,475 Speaker 1: Iron Mountain is still in business. It's a global records 74 00:05:21,515 --> 00:05:24,835 Speaker 1: management company, the world's biggest, with a four billion dollar 75 00:05:24,915 --> 00:05:28,915 Speaker 1: annual revenue and facilities in more than fifty countries. You 76 00:05:28,995 --> 00:05:31,595 Speaker 1: might have seen their trucks with a blue triangular logo. 77 00:05:31,995 --> 00:05:34,475 Speaker 1: I see those trucks all the time, rumbling up and 78 00:05:34,515 --> 00:05:39,155 Speaker 1: down the road. Iron Mountain stores everything, including the records 79 00:05:39,195 --> 00:05:42,915 Speaker 1: of nearly every fortune one thousand company. They've also got 80 00:05:43,075 --> 00:05:46,915 Speaker 1: Frank Sinatra's original recordings and Charles Dickens's last will and 81 00:05:46,955 --> 00:05:50,315 Speaker 1: testament back in the scariest years of the Cold War, 82 00:05:50,355 --> 00:05:54,715 Speaker 1: though Iron Mountain Atomic Storage offered something more than storage. 83 00:05:55,115 --> 00:05:56,355 Speaker 1: It offered secrecy. 84 00:05:57,595 --> 00:06:02,155 Speaker 3: Iron Mountain under a blanket of iron ore alternate underground 85 00:06:02,195 --> 00:06:04,595 Speaker 3: headquarters for corporations that. 86 00:06:04,595 --> 00:06:07,275 Speaker 1: Ad ran in nineteen sixty two, the year of the 87 00:06:07,315 --> 00:06:10,555 Speaker 1: Cuban Missile crisis. If you own a company and wanted 88 00:06:10,595 --> 00:06:13,315 Speaker 1: to hold a top secret meeting, why not hold it 89 00:06:13,315 --> 00:06:17,795 Speaker 1: in hidden conference rooms deep underground, Doctor evilstyle. Or you 90 00:06:17,875 --> 00:06:19,435 Speaker 1: might want to hold your meetings down there if you 91 00:06:19,475 --> 00:06:25,395 Speaker 1: were to say a super secret government agency. In nineteen 92 00:06:25,435 --> 00:06:28,675 Speaker 1: sixty seven, a few years after Iron Mountain advertised its 93 00:06:28,675 --> 00:06:32,435 Speaker 1: secret layer meeting service, a little book appeared in bookstores. 94 00:06:32,915 --> 00:06:36,755 Speaker 1: It was called Report from Iron Mountain on the Possibility 95 00:06:36,795 --> 00:06:41,235 Speaker 1: and Desirability of Peace. The book described itself as the 96 00:06:41,235 --> 00:06:44,555 Speaker 1: record of a fifteen man special study group that had 97 00:06:44,595 --> 00:06:48,555 Speaker 1: gathered at Iron Mountain in those top secret underground meeting rooms. 98 00:06:49,115 --> 00:06:52,235 Speaker 1: And here was the book's bombshell. It was never supposed 99 00:06:52,275 --> 00:06:57,075 Speaker 1: to be published, but someone had leaked it. A member 100 00:06:57,115 --> 00:06:59,995 Speaker 1: of the secret group identified only as a professor of 101 00:06:59,995 --> 00:07:04,875 Speaker 1: social science from a large Middlewestern university. The report itself 102 00:07:04,955 --> 00:07:08,195 Speaker 1: was totally wonky wonky, but shocking. 103 00:07:09,875 --> 00:07:13,595 Speaker 4: The permanent possibility of war is the foundation for stable government. 104 00:07:14,035 --> 00:07:19,155 Speaker 4: It supplies the basis for general acceptance of political authority. 105 00:07:20,035 --> 00:07:23,035 Speaker 1: The Special Study Group had been convened, it was said, 106 00:07:23,315 --> 00:07:27,195 Speaker 1: in response to a peace scare. Members of the group 107 00:07:27,355 --> 00:07:29,795 Speaker 1: talked about how devastating it would be if the United 108 00:07:29,795 --> 00:07:33,115 Speaker 1: States were ever for any length of time at peace, 109 00:07:33,795 --> 00:07:36,035 Speaker 1: as if the only thing that kept the American people 110 00:07:36,075 --> 00:07:39,275 Speaker 1: from shaking off the chains of their submission was war. 111 00:07:40,035 --> 00:07:44,995 Speaker 4: Endless war, it has ensured the subordination of the citizen 112 00:07:45,075 --> 00:07:48,995 Speaker 4: to the state. No modern political ruling group has successfully 113 00:07:49,035 --> 00:07:53,835 Speaker 4: controlled its constituency after failing to sustain the continuing credibility 114 00:07:53,955 --> 00:07:55,715 Speaker 4: of an external threat of war. 115 00:07:57,315 --> 00:08:00,315 Speaker 1: Report from Iron Mountain concluded that the US needed to 116 00:08:00,395 --> 00:08:04,155 Speaker 1: keep those wars coming, but if, given the growing anti 117 00:08:04,195 --> 00:08:07,275 Speaker 1: war movement, a dreaded peace did descend upon the land, 118 00:08:07,755 --> 00:08:10,275 Speaker 1: there were still ways for the US government to find 119 00:08:10,435 --> 00:08:14,115 Speaker 1: substitutes for functions of war. This is so crazy, I'm 120 00:08:14,115 --> 00:08:17,315 Speaker 1: going to explain it again. According to this report, the 121 00:08:17,435 --> 00:08:20,675 Speaker 1: US government was trying desperately to keep the nation at war, 122 00:08:21,195 --> 00:08:24,355 Speaker 1: but if their worst fears were realized and peace came, 123 00:08:24,915 --> 00:08:30,195 Speaker 1: they had other options other ways to stifle discontent. 124 00:08:30,755 --> 00:08:35,195 Speaker 4: A comprehensive social welfare program, a giant, open end space 125 00:08:35,275 --> 00:08:40,355 Speaker 4: research program aimed at unreachable targets, an established and recognized 126 00:08:40,435 --> 00:08:47,315 Speaker 4: extra terrestrial menace, massive global environmental pollution, fictitious alternate enemies. 127 00:08:49,235 --> 00:08:53,235 Speaker 1: Fully moonshot Batman. This leaked report was hot, hot, hot. 128 00:08:54,035 --> 00:08:56,475 Speaker 1: It became a best seller on the New York Times list, 129 00:08:56,835 --> 00:09:01,155 Speaker 1: was translated into fifteen languages. Esquire published an excerpt. Of course. 130 00:09:01,315 --> 00:09:04,515 Speaker 1: People tried to find that Midwestern social science professor who 131 00:09:04,595 --> 00:09:07,435 Speaker 1: leaked it, and they wanted to know which government department 132 00:09:07,475 --> 00:09:10,315 Speaker 1: had commissioned it. A reporter from the New York Times 133 00:09:10,355 --> 00:09:12,595 Speaker 1: called around to the White House and the State Department, 134 00:09:12,835 --> 00:09:16,395 Speaker 1: and then noted, no advanced reviewer has flatly labeled the 135 00:09:16,395 --> 00:09:20,315 Speaker 1: book fiction. People who read it were incensed, but report 136 00:09:20,355 --> 00:09:23,875 Speaker 1: from Iron Mountain proved very difficult to verify, even though 137 00:09:23,875 --> 00:09:25,955 Speaker 1: some people thought the whole thing was just a hoax. 138 00:09:26,715 --> 00:09:30,115 Speaker 1: If it's authentic, it's an enormous, roaring scandal, one scholar 139 00:09:30,155 --> 00:09:33,635 Speaker 1: told The New York Times. If it's caricature, it's a 140 00:09:33,635 --> 00:09:38,955 Speaker 1: brilliant job. Eventually most people forgot about it, but then 141 00:09:39,155 --> 00:09:42,995 Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy one, another government report was leaked to 142 00:09:43,035 --> 00:09:43,515 Speaker 1: the press. 143 00:09:44,275 --> 00:09:48,155 Speaker 5: This weekend, portions of a highly classified Pentagon document came 144 00:09:48,195 --> 00:09:50,395 Speaker 5: the light for all the world to see and brought 145 00:09:50,475 --> 00:09:53,795 Speaker 5: cries of outrage from Washington. The New York Times began 146 00:09:53,915 --> 00:09:57,195 Speaker 5: publishing parts of a voluminous report that the Pentagon had 147 00:09:57,275 --> 00:10:00,675 Speaker 5: drawn up on the causes and conduct of American involvement 148 00:10:00,715 --> 00:10:02,275 Speaker 5: in Vietnam. 149 00:10:02,795 --> 00:10:05,995 Speaker 1: The Pentagon Papers revealed decades of lying by the federal 150 00:10:06,035 --> 00:10:08,715 Speaker 1: government to the public about what had really been going 151 00:10:08,755 --> 00:10:10,155 Speaker 1: on in the war in Vietnam. 152 00:10:10,555 --> 00:10:13,755 Speaker 5: Senator George McGovern, a leading critic of the war, called 153 00:10:13,755 --> 00:10:17,835 Speaker 5: the report and we quote, a story of almost incredible deception. 154 00:10:19,395 --> 00:10:22,595 Speaker 1: This is where this history gets twisty, Tourney. The publication 155 00:10:22,715 --> 00:10:25,435 Speaker 1: of the Pentagon Papers brought the authors of the Report 156 00:10:25,475 --> 00:10:28,875 Speaker 1: from Iron Mountain out into the open, because unlike the 157 00:10:28,915 --> 00:10:32,955 Speaker 1: Pentagon Papers, which were entirely real, the Report from Iron 158 00:10:32,995 --> 00:10:39,075 Speaker 1: Mountain was in fact entirely made up. So just to 159 00:10:39,075 --> 00:10:42,595 Speaker 1: be extra extra clear here, there never was any special 160 00:10:42,675 --> 00:10:46,755 Speaker 1: study group, had never met at Iron Mountain, and this recording. 161 00:10:47,275 --> 00:10:51,595 Speaker 4: No modern political ruling group has successfully controlled its constituency. 162 00:10:51,635 --> 00:10:54,595 Speaker 4: After failing to sustain the continuing credit. 163 00:10:54,355 --> 00:10:56,675 Speaker 1: That's one of our actors reading a document that is 164 00:10:56,795 --> 00:11:00,715 Speaker 1: in fact a fake. In nineteen seventy two, in the 165 00:11:00,755 --> 00:11:03,715 Speaker 1: New York Times Book Review, a writer named Leonard Lewin 166 00:11:03,995 --> 00:11:07,395 Speaker 1: revealed that the report from Iron Mountain had been a hoax, 167 00:11:08,195 --> 00:11:11,875 Speaker 1: intended as a satire. He'd involved some pretty high level people. 168 00:11:12,235 --> 00:11:15,555 Speaker 1: Even the renowned economist John Kenneth Galbraith was in on it, 169 00:11:16,355 --> 00:11:19,755 Speaker 1: But Lewin confessed, I wrote the report, all of it. 170 00:11:20,355 --> 00:11:24,875 Speaker 1: The charade is over. The idea had come from Victor Navaski, 171 00:11:25,075 --> 00:11:27,635 Speaker 1: a leftist writer who later became Editor of the Nation. 172 00:11:28,235 --> 00:11:31,395 Speaker 1: It was all a lark, an angry one. As Navaski 173 00:11:31,475 --> 00:11:35,595 Speaker 1: told NPR's Fresh Air in nineteen ninety six, the. 174 00:11:35,435 --> 00:11:39,635 Speaker 6: Idea for reports Maron Mountain came to me one day 175 00:11:39,715 --> 00:11:42,755 Speaker 6: when I saw a little headline in the newspaper saying 176 00:11:42,835 --> 00:11:45,875 Speaker 6: that the stock market had fallen abruptly because of a 177 00:11:45,915 --> 00:11:49,355 Speaker 6: peace scare. And we got an idea to do a 178 00:11:49,355 --> 00:11:55,675 Speaker 6: book about the quashing of a report which was commissioned 179 00:11:55,675 --> 00:11:59,075 Speaker 6: by the White House to plan the transition from a 180 00:11:59,275 --> 00:12:02,635 Speaker 6: wartime to a peacetime economy. And we would do a 181 00:12:02,755 --> 00:12:06,875 Speaker 6: kind of hoax book about what happened when the Commission 182 00:12:06,955 --> 00:12:11,035 Speaker 6: concluded that the economy would collapse. Peace really broke out. 183 00:12:11,755 --> 00:12:15,235 Speaker 1: The Report from Iron Mountain hoax brought the storage company 184 00:12:15,275 --> 00:12:18,675 Speaker 1: Iron Mountain, the real Place a lot of grief, And 185 00:12:18,755 --> 00:12:21,755 Speaker 1: it wasn't fair because, let me be clear, the storage 186 00:12:21,795 --> 00:12:26,755 Speaker 1: company had nothing to do with this hoax. But meanwhile, 187 00:12:26,755 --> 00:12:31,275 Speaker 1: the Hoax report had acquired a huge following among conspiracy theorists. 188 00:12:31,795 --> 00:12:34,155 Speaker 1: They read it as incriminating evidence. They put it on 189 00:12:34,195 --> 00:12:38,235 Speaker 1: their bookshelves, and when the authors revealed themselves to be pranksters, 190 00:12:38,795 --> 00:12:42,395 Speaker 1: it didn't change anything. A lot of conspiracy minded fans 191 00:12:42,435 --> 00:12:45,115 Speaker 1: of the book simply refused to believe this new turn 192 00:12:45,155 --> 00:12:47,395 Speaker 1: of events. They just couldn't take that book out of 193 00:12:47,435 --> 00:12:50,235 Speaker 1: the mental box that said government report written in secret 194 00:12:50,315 --> 00:12:53,395 Speaker 1: underground bunker and put it in the box that said hoax. 195 00:12:54,475 --> 00:12:56,915 Speaker 1: They were still talking about it decades later, like in 196 00:12:56,995 --> 00:13:00,835 Speaker 1: this nineteen ninety three video cassette Blueprint for Tyranny. 197 00:13:01,835 --> 00:13:05,115 Speaker 7: Welcome to the Report from Iron Mountain. 198 00:13:06,675 --> 00:13:07,995 Speaker 3: This report. 199 00:13:09,115 --> 00:13:12,875 Speaker 7: Is some thing you would never believe unless you read it. 200 00:13:13,395 --> 00:13:17,555 Speaker 7: Peace in reality equals world socialism, as we will find 201 00:13:17,555 --> 00:13:20,635 Speaker 7: out as we journey through this report. 202 00:13:21,395 --> 00:13:25,355 Speaker 1: If anything, conspiracy theorists cherished the fake book. More as 203 00:13:25,395 --> 00:13:28,235 Speaker 1: the years passed, they read it avidly, passed it around, 204 00:13:28,435 --> 00:13:31,115 Speaker 1: kept it close to their vests, used it even as 205 00:13:31,155 --> 00:13:35,075 Speaker 1: a manual, a manifesto for opposition to the federal government. 206 00:13:35,835 --> 00:13:39,435 Speaker 1: And then in nineteen ninety five in Oklahoma City, some 207 00:13:39,515 --> 00:13:44,035 Speaker 1: of those right wing conspiracy theorists staged in insurrection. 208 00:13:44,755 --> 00:13:47,195 Speaker 8: The explosion that went off around nine am, and we 209 00:13:47,315 --> 00:13:49,235 Speaker 8: could feel the explosion in the news. 210 00:13:49,115 --> 00:13:51,035 Speaker 6: Room of Channel nine A. 211 00:13:51,515 --> 00:13:55,755 Speaker 2: Now Holy Cow, about a third of the building has 212 00:13:55,795 --> 00:13:56,835 Speaker 2: been blown away. 213 00:13:58,235 --> 00:14:01,595 Speaker 1: On April nineteenth, nineteen ninety five, a truck packed with 214 00:14:01,675 --> 00:14:05,235 Speaker 1: nearly five thousand pounds of explosives detonated outside the nine 215 00:14:05,275 --> 00:14:10,235 Speaker 1: story Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, killing one hundred sixty 216 00:14:10,275 --> 00:14:13,875 Speaker 1: eight people, including nineteen very little children at a day 217 00:14:13,875 --> 00:14:17,875 Speaker 1: care center. The explosion injured hundreds more. 218 00:14:18,675 --> 00:14:20,235 Speaker 9: And we can also give you a bit of a 219 00:14:20,315 --> 00:14:22,915 Speaker 9: hint now as to where the government appears to be 220 00:14:23,195 --> 00:14:27,195 Speaker 9: focusing its investigation on some of the what are called 221 00:14:27,355 --> 00:14:30,675 Speaker 9: right wing white supremacist groups in various parts of the country. 222 00:14:31,875 --> 00:14:36,195 Speaker 1: Eventually, two men were charged with eleven federal crimes. They 223 00:14:36,195 --> 00:14:38,915 Speaker 1: were the sort of guys who believed that the report 224 00:14:38,915 --> 00:14:40,515 Speaker 1: from Iron Mountain was real. 225 00:14:42,555 --> 00:14:46,075 Speaker 10: The indictment charges that Timothy McVay and Terry Nichols, former 226 00:14:46,195 --> 00:14:49,195 Speaker 10: Army buddies with a grudge against the government, planned the bombing, 227 00:14:49,355 --> 00:14:52,395 Speaker 10: selected the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City as their target, 228 00:14:52,715 --> 00:14:55,915 Speaker 10: bought and stole materials for the bomb, and built it. 229 00:14:59,555 --> 00:15:03,315 Speaker 1: After the Oklahoma City bombing, Americans suddenly started paying attention 230 00:15:03,475 --> 00:15:07,075 Speaker 1: to right wing insurrectionists. Who were these people? Where did 231 00:15:07,075 --> 00:15:10,915 Speaker 1: they get their ideas? Those ideas made They came from books. 232 00:15:11,195 --> 00:15:13,395 Speaker 1: I don't know if Timothy McVeigh read the report from 233 00:15:13,435 --> 00:15:17,115 Speaker 1: Iron Mountain or watched those video cassettes about it, but 234 00:15:17,235 --> 00:15:19,395 Speaker 1: he did have a book that's usually right next to 235 00:15:19,435 --> 00:15:22,315 Speaker 1: it on every right wing extremist's bookshelf. 236 00:15:23,275 --> 00:15:28,435 Speaker 10: Inside mcveigh's Yellow Mercury Sedan, investigators discovered a sealed envelope. 237 00:15:27,955 --> 00:15:32,275 Speaker 11: Containing evidence that would prove crucial to analyzing mcveag's motivations. 238 00:15:32,595 --> 00:15:36,275 Speaker 5: Highlighted passages from the anti government novel That Turner Diaries. 239 00:15:37,075 --> 00:15:39,915 Speaker 1: The Turner Diaries is a nineteen seventy eight novel by 240 00:15:39,915 --> 00:15:43,955 Speaker 1: an avowed American neo Nazi. It includes a detailed account 241 00:15:44,035 --> 00:15:47,195 Speaker 1: of somebody building an explosive device, putting it into a 242 00:15:47,235 --> 00:15:52,995 Speaker 1: truck and driving it up to a federal building. McVeigh 243 00:15:52,995 --> 00:15:56,675 Speaker 1: seemed to have treated the Turner Diaries as an instruction manual. 244 00:15:57,395 --> 00:15:59,955 Speaker 1: In a similar way, a lot of his fellow extremists 245 00:16:00,195 --> 00:16:03,555 Speaker 1: considered Report from Iron Mountain as some kind of decoder ring. 246 00:16:04,235 --> 00:16:07,835 Speaker 1: When Magazine reported it has become required reading for militias, 247 00:16:07,955 --> 00:16:11,035 Speaker 1: Nazi sympathizers, and other righting types who deny that it's 248 00:16:11,075 --> 00:16:13,955 Speaker 1: a hoax and cited as evidence of plans for a 249 00:16:13,995 --> 00:16:17,995 Speaker 1: new world order. The instigator of the hoax, Victor Navaski, 250 00:16:18,555 --> 00:16:21,755 Speaker 1: was horrified, as he explained on Fresh Air, he had 251 00:16:21,755 --> 00:16:25,195 Speaker 1: found out that Liberty Lobby, a white supremacist group, had 252 00:16:25,235 --> 00:16:29,515 Speaker 1: reprinted the report and was to them a kind of bible. 253 00:16:30,035 --> 00:16:33,035 Speaker 6: They were so persuaded that the report was the real 254 00:16:33,115 --> 00:16:37,075 Speaker 6: thing that they didn't bother to get copyright permission to 255 00:16:37,155 --> 00:16:39,555 Speaker 6: reprint it, and had reprinted it as if it were 256 00:16:39,595 --> 00:16:41,515 Speaker 6: a government document and we're selling it. 257 00:16:42,675 --> 00:16:46,835 Speaker 1: Navaski's original partner in crime, Leonard Lewin, sued Liberty Lobby 258 00:16:46,955 --> 00:16:49,515 Speaker 1: and reached a settlement. In the end, they had to 259 00:16:49,515 --> 00:16:52,355 Speaker 1: surrender to him their copies of Report from Iron Mountain. 260 00:16:52,835 --> 00:16:55,915 Speaker 1: Lewin stashed them in his basement but it was too 261 00:16:55,995 --> 00:16:59,475 Speaker 1: late to stop this left wing hoax turned right wing conspiracy. 262 00:17:00,155 --> 00:17:03,355 Speaker 1: Navaski wrote in the Nation about its acceptance by super 263 00:17:03,395 --> 00:17:06,675 Speaker 1: patriots and conspiracy theorists of the far right. He said 264 00:17:06,675 --> 00:17:10,515 Speaker 1: that they're taking it seriously was the scariest proposition of all. 265 00:17:12,955 --> 00:17:16,675 Speaker 1: It has since gotten even scarier. Since the nineteen nineties, 266 00:17:16,755 --> 00:17:19,595 Speaker 1: the Report from Iron Mountain has passed from generation to 267 00:17:19,675 --> 00:17:23,195 Speaker 1: generation like some kind of scripture. On the sixth of 268 00:17:23,275 --> 00:17:27,035 Speaker 1: January twenty twenty one, the day insurrectionists attacked the US capital, 269 00:17:27,835 --> 00:17:31,595 Speaker 1: some creep on four Chan posted in the cavalierly ugly 270 00:17:31,675 --> 00:17:35,235 Speaker 1: language in this hideous corner of the Internet, read the 271 00:17:35,235 --> 00:17:39,835 Speaker 1: Report from Iron Mountain, you brainless retard. These days you'll 272 00:17:39,875 --> 00:17:42,515 Speaker 1: still find Report from Iron Mountain on far right white 273 00:17:42,555 --> 00:17:45,955 Speaker 1: supremacist reading lists with no mention that it was a 274 00:17:46,035 --> 00:17:49,875 Speaker 1: left wing hoax. And now it has a new reading 275 00:17:49,915 --> 00:17:54,075 Speaker 1: list companion, the writings of Q, the anonymous alleged insider 276 00:17:54,075 --> 00:17:57,195 Speaker 1: who drops clues about all the evil goings on inside 277 00:17:57,195 --> 00:18:03,395 Speaker 1: the government. Just recently I called up Victor Navaski. He's 278 00:18:03,395 --> 00:18:05,835 Speaker 1: nearly ninety. It was really good of him to talk 279 00:18:05,875 --> 00:18:08,955 Speaker 1: to me. We both sound like we're under Iron Mountain, though, 280 00:18:08,995 --> 00:18:10,635 Speaker 1: because the phone is pretty bad. 281 00:18:10,995 --> 00:18:14,955 Speaker 12: It's a fantasy to believe that it's true. And I 282 00:18:14,995 --> 00:18:17,995 Speaker 12: think Q andon is guilty of its own fantasy. 283 00:18:18,755 --> 00:18:21,875 Speaker 13: Do you think if anyone presented himself to the world 284 00:18:21,915 --> 00:18:24,715 Speaker 13: tomorrow and said I am Q and I can prove 285 00:18:24,755 --> 00:18:28,075 Speaker 13: that I am Q, and I was just joking the 286 00:18:28,115 --> 00:18:30,835 Speaker 13: whole time, and it got out of hand none of 287 00:18:30,875 --> 00:18:33,755 Speaker 13: this is true. Would there be any way I'm doing 288 00:18:33,795 --> 00:18:34,555 Speaker 13: what had been done? 289 00:18:35,915 --> 00:18:39,915 Speaker 12: I don't think so myself. I think that's where we 290 00:18:39,955 --> 00:18:41,115 Speaker 12: are as a culture. 291 00:18:41,355 --> 00:18:47,395 Speaker 1: And unfortunately, the Q and On report goes something like this. 292 00:18:48,035 --> 00:18:51,075 Speaker 1: An insider decides to spill the beans about a secret 293 00:18:51,115 --> 00:18:56,075 Speaker 1: government run conspiracy, something to do with Satan and pedophiles. 294 00:18:56,915 --> 00:19:00,115 Speaker 1: He leakes some clues in a report and then report 295 00:19:00,235 --> 00:19:03,435 Speaker 1: after report, and the people who read those reports, those 296 00:19:03,475 --> 00:19:08,275 Speaker 1: postings by this anonymous que become passionately attached to the 297 00:19:08,315 --> 00:19:12,155 Speaker 1: idea of a conspiracy, and within the logic of that conspiracy, 298 00:19:12,515 --> 00:19:15,435 Speaker 1: they are being denied access to knowledge, some secret body 299 00:19:15,435 --> 00:19:17,955 Speaker 1: of knowledge hidden away that only the people in power 300 00:19:17,995 --> 00:19:21,115 Speaker 1: have access to, and that the followers of Q have 301 00:19:21,195 --> 00:19:25,235 Speaker 1: to hunt down and piece together clue by clue, Q 302 00:19:26,355 --> 00:19:39,355 Speaker 1: by Q Q isn't true. Also, I don't buy either 303 00:19:39,395 --> 00:19:42,075 Speaker 1: of the two big headlines about Q and On that 304 00:19:42,155 --> 00:19:45,635 Speaker 1: it's new or that it's uniquely powerful. That's what I've 305 00:19:45,675 --> 00:19:47,835 Speaker 1: been trying to argue by going over the story of 306 00:19:47,875 --> 00:19:51,515 Speaker 1: the report from Iron Mountain. This stuff isn't new, it's 307 00:19:51,555 --> 00:19:55,955 Speaker 1: not all powerful, and it has never ever been a secret. 308 00:19:56,395 --> 00:19:59,035 Speaker 4: This election will be the most rigged election in history. 309 00:19:59,515 --> 00:20:02,555 Speaker 1: That is a lie, an old fashioned lie, but it's 310 00:20:02,595 --> 00:20:05,755 Speaker 1: also a complex lie, the sort of lie that brings 311 00:20:05,795 --> 00:20:09,155 Speaker 1: together every kind of doubt whose rise I've been chronicling 312 00:20:09,195 --> 00:20:13,355 Speaker 1: all seasons long as little boats of doubt rowboats canoes. 313 00:20:13,835 --> 00:20:16,235 Speaker 1: They become a fleet of flotilla in Armada. 314 00:20:16,795 --> 00:20:19,435 Speaker 14: They're sending millions of ballots all over the country. 315 00:20:19,715 --> 00:20:22,915 Speaker 15: There's fraud. They found them in creeks. They found some 316 00:20:23,075 --> 00:20:23,875 Speaker 15: with the name Trump. 317 00:20:23,995 --> 00:20:25,995 Speaker 16: Just happened to have the name Trump just the other 318 00:20:26,075 --> 00:20:27,635 Speaker 16: day in a waste paper basket. 319 00:20:27,915 --> 00:20:30,475 Speaker 3: This is going to be a fraud like you've never seen. 320 00:20:31,195 --> 00:20:33,635 Speaker 1: It was awful to watch this unfold in the months 321 00:20:33,755 --> 00:20:36,395 Speaker 1: leading up to the twenty twenty election, and in the 322 00:20:36,395 --> 00:20:39,755 Speaker 1: months afterward, to watch it spread on the Internet and 323 00:20:39,875 --> 00:20:43,395 Speaker 1: hear it from the mouth of the US President. He 324 00:20:43,475 --> 00:20:48,715 Speaker 1: said it again and again and again. If enough people 325 00:20:48,755 --> 00:20:51,475 Speaker 1: in public and in positions of authority lie about something 326 00:20:51,515 --> 00:20:55,675 Speaker 1: for long enough, people will believe it. Watching it all, 327 00:20:55,795 --> 00:20:59,235 Speaker 1: I felt as if my brain was on rewind. Specifically, 328 00:20:59,555 --> 00:21:02,395 Speaker 1: my head kept rewinding back to a brilliant book published 329 00:21:02,475 --> 00:21:06,315 Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety four called A Social History of Truth 330 00:21:06,715 --> 00:21:09,795 Speaker 1: by Stephen Shapin, Emeritus Professor of the History of Science 331 00:21:09,835 --> 00:21:13,995 Speaker 1: at Harvard. Shapin was writing about gentleman philosophers in the 332 00:21:13,995 --> 00:21:17,355 Speaker 1: seventeenth century in England. But I find his book so 333 00:21:17,515 --> 00:21:20,315 Speaker 1: wholly applies to the President that I ask him to 334 00:21:20,355 --> 00:21:21,435 Speaker 1: read my favorite lines. 335 00:21:22,075 --> 00:21:26,955 Speaker 17: Knowledge is a collective good. In securing our knowledge, we 336 00:21:27,115 --> 00:21:31,675 Speaker 17: rely upon others, and we cannot dispense with that reliance. 337 00:21:32,195 --> 00:21:34,875 Speaker 17: That means that the relations in which we have and 338 00:21:34,955 --> 00:21:38,675 Speaker 17: hold our knowledge have a moral character. And the word 339 00:21:38,715 --> 00:21:42,275 Speaker 17: I use to indicate that moral relation is trust. 340 00:21:44,395 --> 00:21:47,235 Speaker 1: He argues that you can't actually know anything alone, You 341 00:21:47,235 --> 00:21:50,795 Speaker 1: can only know things with other people. He doesn't think 342 00:21:50,795 --> 00:21:53,595 Speaker 1: the United States or the world is experiencing a crisis 343 00:21:53,635 --> 00:21:56,315 Speaker 1: of truth. He thinks it would be better called a 344 00:21:56,355 --> 00:22:01,475 Speaker 1: crisis of social knowledge. For example, and in particular around 345 00:22:01,475 --> 00:22:02,395 Speaker 1: climate change. 346 00:22:02,995 --> 00:22:06,555 Speaker 17: I know something about the loss of biodiversity, species, about 347 00:22:06,555 --> 00:22:11,875 Speaker 17: melting icebergs, about sea level rise. Now someone puts pressure 348 00:22:11,875 --> 00:22:13,795 Speaker 17: in me and say, how do I know these things? 349 00:22:14,475 --> 00:22:16,675 Speaker 17: I don't think any of us know these things directly. 350 00:22:18,395 --> 00:22:22,195 Speaker 17: So the knowledge that I need to know these things 351 00:22:22,275 --> 00:22:24,835 Speaker 17: is to know who to believe, who has credibility, who 352 00:22:24,875 --> 00:22:26,915 Speaker 17: is author to who to trust? 353 00:22:29,435 --> 00:22:32,315 Speaker 1: To know anything, then you have to know who to trust. 354 00:22:32,955 --> 00:22:36,515 Speaker 1: If you doubt everything, it's because you trust no one. 355 00:22:36,755 --> 00:22:41,515 Speaker 1: I find this framework really helpful. No one is killed truth. Instead, 356 00:22:41,795 --> 00:22:44,635 Speaker 1: we have this crisis of trust. But how did people 357 00:22:44,675 --> 00:22:47,835 Speaker 1: stop knowing who to trust? One answer to that question 358 00:22:47,875 --> 00:22:52,235 Speaker 1: involves the unintended consequences of new technologies of communication. We've 359 00:22:52,275 --> 00:22:55,195 Speaker 1: been hearing about those all season. How radio, for example, 360 00:22:55,315 --> 00:23:00,155 Speaker 1: amplified all kinds of extremism, but broadcasts only reached so far. 361 00:23:00,995 --> 00:23:03,675 Speaker 1: Then came the Internet, starting with bulletin boards and chat 362 00:23:03,715 --> 00:23:06,675 Speaker 1: rooms in the nineteen nineties, but we still think of 363 00:23:06,715 --> 00:23:09,275 Speaker 1: it the way we thought about radio in the nineteen thirties. 364 00:23:09,955 --> 00:23:14,595 Speaker 1: The phrase echo chamber comes up a lot an acoustic metaphor. 365 00:23:15,355 --> 00:23:19,475 Speaker 17: So there's a million voices are screaming out there, but 366 00:23:20,155 --> 00:23:24,755 Speaker 17: any any body or any any group of like mind 367 00:23:24,755 --> 00:23:27,995 Speaker 17: that people are listening to some and not to others. 368 00:23:28,555 --> 00:23:33,275 Speaker 17: So there's another kind of question about what for us 369 00:23:33,435 --> 00:23:35,715 Speaker 17: is audible and what for them is audible. 370 00:23:36,275 --> 00:23:41,155 Speaker 1: Right, But then that metaphor of audibility and voice voice 371 00:23:41,515 --> 00:23:44,715 Speaker 1: also meaning vote, you know, has implications for democracy, which 372 00:23:44,755 --> 00:23:46,475 Speaker 1: is to say we will hear all the voices, and 373 00:23:46,715 --> 00:23:50,195 Speaker 1: that we will we will automate a system wherein we 374 00:23:50,235 --> 00:23:54,595 Speaker 1: hear everyone who's enfranchised. But then now we're in a 375 00:23:54,635 --> 00:23:58,515 Speaker 1: crisis of democracy around people not feeling heard, right, I mean, 376 00:23:58,555 --> 00:24:00,235 Speaker 1: if we just think about the siege of the Capitol 377 00:24:00,275 --> 00:24:02,595 Speaker 1: and if you listen to interviews with those people, we're 378 00:24:02,635 --> 00:24:04,035 Speaker 1: here to have our voices heard. 379 00:24:04,475 --> 00:24:09,475 Speaker 17: A democratic project, everyone has a voice. I mean, well 380 00:24:10,035 --> 00:24:10,875 Speaker 17: we've heard them now. 381 00:24:11,835 --> 00:24:14,995 Speaker 1: Still, the argument that technology allows fakers and haters to 382 00:24:15,035 --> 00:24:18,635 Speaker 1: find each other more easily, Stephen Shapin thinks that's just 383 00:24:18,755 --> 00:24:21,595 Speaker 1: too glib. It's one of the reasons I loved talking 384 00:24:21,595 --> 00:24:24,355 Speaker 1: with him. He got me thinking harder about another argument 385 00:24:24,435 --> 00:24:27,395 Speaker 1: to explain what has happened to Americans and trust over 386 00:24:27,435 --> 00:24:31,675 Speaker 1: the past century. That argument is political. It involves what 387 00:24:31,715 --> 00:24:34,395 Speaker 1: one set of political actors have done to institutions over 388 00:24:34,435 --> 00:24:37,995 Speaker 1: time in order to shift the balance of power in 389 00:24:38,035 --> 00:24:38,635 Speaker 1: their favor. 390 00:24:39,395 --> 00:24:41,515 Speaker 17: Do you mean to say the Supreme Court decision is 391 00:24:41,595 --> 00:24:42,235 Speaker 17: not void? 392 00:24:42,555 --> 00:24:45,835 Speaker 18: No, a Supreme Court decision is not necessarily the law 393 00:24:45,835 --> 00:24:47,835 Speaker 18: of the land. The Constitution still is. 394 00:24:48,875 --> 00:24:53,355 Speaker 1: That's Republican Senator Barry Goldwater making a Conservative argument that 395 00:24:53,435 --> 00:24:56,835 Speaker 1: the Supreme Court had overstepped in its decision to abolish 396 00:24:56,835 --> 00:25:00,835 Speaker 1: segregation in Brown versus Board of Education in nineteen fifty four. 397 00:25:02,195 --> 00:25:04,795 Speaker 1: Conservatives at the time were very much out of power. 398 00:25:05,235 --> 00:25:08,395 Speaker 1: Goldwater was an upstart, but his wing wanted to take 399 00:25:08,435 --> 00:25:11,355 Speaker 1: over the GOP, and then they wanted to take over 400 00:25:11,395 --> 00:25:15,555 Speaker 1: the country. And so, beginning in the nineteen fifties, Conservatives 401 00:25:15,555 --> 00:25:18,915 Speaker 1: engaged in a sustained assault on trust and institutions that 402 00:25:19,035 --> 00:25:25,795 Speaker 1: produce and diffuse knowledge. Three institutions, especially the courts, the press, 403 00:25:26,235 --> 00:25:30,915 Speaker 1: and the university. These institutions, they said, were all dominated 404 00:25:30,955 --> 00:25:36,275 Speaker 1: by liberals, first, the courts and the supposed liberal bias 405 00:25:36,315 --> 00:25:39,875 Speaker 1: of the judiciary. Whatever you do, Goldwater said, don't trust 406 00:25:39,875 --> 00:25:40,355 Speaker 1: the courts. 407 00:25:41,555 --> 00:25:45,955 Speaker 18: They interpreted by that action that it was wrong to 408 00:25:46,115 --> 00:25:49,795 Speaker 18: have segregation. Now, they didn't spell out what was to 409 00:25:49,795 --> 00:25:50,515 Speaker 18: be done. 410 00:25:50,995 --> 00:25:54,995 Speaker 1: Other Conservatives went after institutions of higher learning. William F. 411 00:25:55,035 --> 00:25:58,075 Speaker 1: Buckley led the assault against the academy, beginning with this 412 00:25:58,155 --> 00:26:01,195 Speaker 1: nineteen fifty one book God and Man at Yale. 413 00:26:02,075 --> 00:26:04,035 Speaker 18: How would all be governed by the first two thousand 414 00:26:04,115 --> 00:26:06,995 Speaker 18: people in the Boston telephone directory than by the two 415 00:26:07,035 --> 00:26:09,875 Speaker 18: thousand people on the faculty of Harvard University? 416 00:26:10,875 --> 00:26:15,715 Speaker 1: Buckley said, whatever you do, don't trust the professors. The 417 00:26:15,755 --> 00:26:18,715 Speaker 1: third front in this warren institutions of knowledge was an 418 00:26:18,755 --> 00:26:21,955 Speaker 1: attack on the press. This began with a Nixon administration, 419 00:26:22,235 --> 00:26:25,555 Speaker 1: and most famously with a speech given by his vice president, 420 00:26:25,835 --> 00:26:30,635 Speaker 1: Spiro Agnew in nineteen sixty nine. Whatever you do, Agnew said, 421 00:26:30,955 --> 00:26:32,115 Speaker 1: don't trust the press. 422 00:26:32,835 --> 00:26:37,195 Speaker 19: These men can create national issues overnight. They can elevate 423 00:26:37,235 --> 00:26:41,075 Speaker 19: men from obscurity to national prominence within a week. They 424 00:26:41,115 --> 00:26:45,715 Speaker 19: can reward some politicians with national exposure and ignore others. 425 00:26:47,315 --> 00:26:51,715 Speaker 1: The courts, the universities, the press. Conservatives believed that to 426 00:26:51,755 --> 00:26:55,595 Speaker 1: defeat liberalism they needed to conquer these institutions of knowledge 427 00:26:55,635 --> 00:26:59,315 Speaker 1: to story trust in them. The left has contributed a 428 00:26:59,315 --> 00:27:03,595 Speaker 1: whole lot to this epistemological unraveling, too, but conservatives have 429 00:27:03,675 --> 00:27:07,275 Speaker 1: been playing a long game. This, ever, took years and years, 430 00:27:07,595 --> 00:27:11,715 Speaker 1: and eventually they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, they took 431 00:27:11,755 --> 00:27:14,435 Speaker 1: over the courts, or at least the federal judiciary. 432 00:27:14,595 --> 00:27:18,115 Speaker 20: I'm honored and humbled to appear before you today as 433 00:27:18,155 --> 00:27:20,955 Speaker 20: a nominee for Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. 434 00:27:21,555 --> 00:27:25,715 Speaker 1: They built their own press, your mask is making me uncomfortable, 435 00:27:25,955 --> 00:27:31,515 Speaker 1: and they undermined the university, especially scientific inquiry. So here 436 00:27:31,555 --> 00:27:33,795 Speaker 1: we are, decades later, on the other side of this 437 00:27:33,995 --> 00:27:37,475 Speaker 1: slow rolling revolution, a world where there is very little 438 00:27:37,555 --> 00:27:41,435 Speaker 1: left of what used to be called common knowledge. This 439 00:27:41,515 --> 00:27:44,355 Speaker 1: brings us to the twenty twenty presidential election. 440 00:27:44,875 --> 00:27:46,835 Speaker 4: Those mail and ballots could have been written the day 441 00:27:46,835 --> 00:27:50,955 Speaker 4: before by the Democratic Party hacks that will roll over 442 00:27:50,995 --> 00:27:51,915 Speaker 4: the convention Center. 443 00:27:53,155 --> 00:27:55,395 Speaker 1: Sure are lots of people in positions of power and 444 00:27:55,475 --> 00:27:58,395 Speaker 1: authority said the election of Joe Biden was free and fair, 445 00:27:58,875 --> 00:28:02,555 Speaker 1: the most secure election in American history. The Court said 446 00:28:02,555 --> 00:28:09,235 Speaker 1: that every reputable news outlet said that political scientists, election observers, scholars, 447 00:28:09,955 --> 00:28:13,715 Speaker 1: they all said that, But could you trust them. For 448 00:28:13,755 --> 00:28:17,835 Speaker 1: a lot of Americans, the answer remained, no, not anymore 449 00:28:18,395 --> 00:28:20,395 Speaker 1: and maybe never again. 450 00:28:37,835 --> 00:28:40,635 Speaker 7: If we can be covered rarely by the media, and 451 00:28:40,715 --> 00:28:43,195 Speaker 7: the media is the biggest problem we have, and we haven't. 452 00:28:49,315 --> 00:28:53,995 Speaker 1: The sixth of January twenty twenty one. It was the 453 00:28:54,035 --> 00:28:57,155 Speaker 1: Christian holiday of Epiphany, marking the day the Three Kings 454 00:28:57,235 --> 00:29:01,275 Speaker 1: visited Jesus and the Manger, and Epiphany is a moment 455 00:29:01,315 --> 00:29:05,355 Speaker 1: when all is revealed. In Washington, thousands of people gathered 456 00:29:05,395 --> 00:29:09,395 Speaker 1: for a rally to save America, cheering President Trump and 457 00:29:09,515 --> 00:29:13,515 Speaker 1: damn the press. Meanwhile, down the street inside the Capitol, 458 00:29:14,035 --> 00:29:16,555 Speaker 1: a joint session of Congress was meeting to certify the 459 00:29:16,595 --> 00:29:20,115 Speaker 1: results of the presidential election, an election that would send 460 00:29:20,155 --> 00:29:21,995 Speaker 1: Trump packing in two weeks time. 461 00:29:22,475 --> 00:29:25,275 Speaker 18: And after this, we're gonna walk down and I'll be 462 00:29:25,315 --> 00:29:28,995 Speaker 18: there with you, and we're gonna walk down to the Capitol. 463 00:29:31,675 --> 00:29:32,795 Speaker 16: And we're gonna cheer on. 464 00:29:32,955 --> 00:29:34,675 Speaker 15: They have never seen us here. 465 00:29:34,715 --> 00:29:37,275 Speaker 8: We spent off with Trump saying it's been four more 466 00:29:37,315 --> 00:29:38,075 Speaker 8: years awad. 467 00:29:45,115 --> 00:29:45,555 Speaker 20: Already. 468 00:30:01,835 --> 00:30:04,915 Speaker 1: They marched to the Capitol, waving Trump flags and Confederate 469 00:30:04,955 --> 00:30:10,075 Speaker 1: battle flags, wearing Maga hats and superhero costumes and camouflage 470 00:30:10,315 --> 00:30:14,795 Speaker 1: and bulletproof veests. You probably saw all this. The crowd 471 00:30:14,835 --> 00:30:18,795 Speaker 1: started pulling down the barricades, flimsy fences, climbed the stairs, 472 00:30:18,995 --> 00:30:23,875 Speaker 1: scaled the scaffolding. They beat up Capital police, smashed windows, 473 00:30:24,315 --> 00:30:35,355 Speaker 1: crashed through doors. They broke into the capital. For people 474 00:30:35,355 --> 00:30:38,195 Speaker 1: who study right wing extremism and have read their neo 475 00:30:38,275 --> 00:30:41,915 Speaker 1: Nazi novel the Turner Diaries, everything that happened that day 476 00:30:41,995 --> 00:30:45,715 Speaker 1: was eerily familiar, because that book describes an attack on 477 00:30:45,755 --> 00:30:49,555 Speaker 1: the capitol this way. The real value of all our 478 00:30:49,555 --> 00:30:52,955 Speaker 1: attacks today lies in the psychological impact, not in the 479 00:30:52,995 --> 00:30:56,635 Speaker 1: immediate casualties. More important, though, is what we taught the 480 00:30:56,675 --> 00:31:00,795 Speaker 1: politicians and the bureaucrats. They learned this afternoon that not 481 00:31:00,915 --> 00:31:12,395 Speaker 1: one of them is beyond our reach. The decades long 482 00:31:12,435 --> 00:31:17,275 Speaker 1: conservative attack on institutions of knowledge, the press, the courts, universities, 483 00:31:17,915 --> 00:31:21,235 Speaker 1: it had come down to this day when these people 484 00:31:21,275 --> 00:31:24,875 Speaker 1: did not believe in the outcome of an election, or 485 00:31:24,955 --> 00:31:29,115 Speaker 1: believed it and wanted to overturn it. For weeks, Trump 486 00:31:29,195 --> 00:31:32,115 Speaker 1: supporters had been trying and failing to challenge the results 487 00:31:32,115 --> 00:31:34,755 Speaker 1: in counties where lots of black people voted. They were 488 00:31:34,835 --> 00:31:38,275 Speaker 1: especially matt about Georgia, where in runoff elections a Jewish 489 00:31:38,315 --> 00:31:40,835 Speaker 1: man and a black man had just won seats in 490 00:31:40,875 --> 00:31:41,675 Speaker 1: the US Senate. 491 00:31:43,035 --> 00:31:44,915 Speaker 12: Well, fucking writers. 492 00:31:46,035 --> 00:31:51,275 Speaker 3: Cried about on a fucking half, Well, the fucking writers. 493 00:31:55,595 --> 00:31:59,235 Speaker 1: It was a riot, a white race riot, and yet 494 00:31:59,275 --> 00:32:03,355 Speaker 1: horrible as it was the insurrection on the sixth of January. 495 00:32:03,995 --> 00:32:07,115 Speaker 1: Epiphany looked like it might be another kind of epiphany, 496 00:32:07,275 --> 00:32:10,555 Speaker 1: a day when people could finally see clearly revelation at 497 00:32:10,675 --> 00:32:14,755 Speaker 1: last that all the lying wasn't harmless. There seemed at 498 00:32:14,755 --> 00:32:20,075 Speaker 1: first to be real consequences. The President was banned from Twitter. Later, 499 00:32:20,235 --> 00:32:22,275 Speaker 1: the House impeached him for a second time. 500 00:32:22,875 --> 00:32:27,435 Speaker 15: President Trump gravely endangered the security of the United States 501 00:32:27,635 --> 00:32:31,395 Speaker 15: and its institutions of government. He threatened the integrity of 502 00:32:31,435 --> 00:32:35,875 Speaker 15: the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power, 503 00:32:36,155 --> 00:32:40,155 Speaker 15: and imperiled a coequal branch of government. He thereby betrayed 504 00:32:40,155 --> 00:32:44,395 Speaker 15: his trust as president to the manifest injury of the 505 00:32:44,435 --> 00:32:46,155 Speaker 15: people of the United States. 506 00:32:46,635 --> 00:32:52,675 Speaker 1: The charges went to the Senate for a trial. Last year, 507 00:32:52,795 --> 00:32:55,595 Speaker 1: the first season of The Last Archive, I started out 508 00:32:55,595 --> 00:33:00,075 Speaker 1: with a trial, Remember Lucina Broadwell strangled in Barry, Vermont. 509 00:33:01,115 --> 00:33:03,555 Speaker 1: I started this show there because I wanted to explain 510 00:33:03,595 --> 00:33:06,835 Speaker 1: a bit of crucial history. Most of our ideas about 511 00:33:06,835 --> 00:33:10,075 Speaker 1: how to decide what's true and what's not true come 512 00:33:10,075 --> 00:33:13,235 Speaker 1: from the thirteenth century, with the rise of trial by jury. 513 00:33:13,675 --> 00:33:17,675 Speaker 1: Two sides take turns presenting evidence, and a jury decides 514 00:33:17,715 --> 00:33:19,315 Speaker 1: the verdict the truth. 515 00:33:19,755 --> 00:33:21,955 Speaker 21: Here ye, here ye here ye. 516 00:33:22,875 --> 00:33:25,715 Speaker 1: Impeachment too, is a relic from the Middle Ages. 517 00:33:26,595 --> 00:33:30,195 Speaker 21: All persons are commanded to keep silence on pain of imprisonment. 518 00:33:30,715 --> 00:33:33,395 Speaker 21: While the Senate of the United States is sitting for 519 00:33:33,475 --> 00:33:36,915 Speaker 21: the trial of the article of impeachment exhibited by the 520 00:33:36,955 --> 00:33:41,395 Speaker 21: House of Representatives against Donald John Trump, former President of 521 00:33:41,475 --> 00:33:42,395 Speaker 21: the United States. 522 00:33:43,275 --> 00:33:47,835 Speaker 1: England's parliament invented impeachment in the fourteenth century. In seventeen 523 00:33:47,915 --> 00:33:52,035 Speaker 1: eighty seven, the framers of the American Constitution, meeting in Philadelphia, 524 00:33:52,355 --> 00:33:56,675 Speaker 1: decided to add an impeachment clause because impeachment and conviction 525 00:33:57,315 --> 00:33:59,555 Speaker 1: was the only way to stop a president from declaring 526 00:33:59,635 --> 00:34:04,595 Speaker 1: himself ruler for life like a king. Jamie Raskin, congressman 527 00:34:04,595 --> 00:34:07,795 Speaker 1: from Maryland, led the prosecution for the House in a 528 00:34:07,835 --> 00:34:11,995 Speaker 1: trial where members of the Senate sat acting like a jury. 529 00:34:12,075 --> 00:34:15,795 Speaker 8: You will not be hearing extended lectures for me because 530 00:34:15,835 --> 00:34:18,435 Speaker 8: our case is based. 531 00:34:18,355 --> 00:34:21,715 Speaker 15: On cold, hard facts. 532 00:34:22,755 --> 00:34:26,675 Speaker 1: Trump's lawyers argued that Trump hadn't incited an insurrection at all. 533 00:34:27,235 --> 00:34:30,395 Speaker 8: And if we buy this radical argument the president Trump's 534 00:34:30,475 --> 00:34:37,755 Speaker 8: lawyers advance, we risk allowing January sixth to become our future. 535 00:34:39,955 --> 00:34:47,195 Speaker 15: And what will that mean for America. I'll show you. 536 00:34:48,115 --> 00:34:51,155 Speaker 1: Raskin played that video. Trumps lawyers played some of their 537 00:34:51,195 --> 00:34:54,475 Speaker 1: own video, but nearly everyone in the Senate had already 538 00:34:54,475 --> 00:34:57,555 Speaker 1: decided how they'd vote, and there was little suspense. 539 00:34:58,155 --> 00:35:04,875 Speaker 20: These are fifty seven. The day's are forty three, two 540 00:35:04,995 --> 00:35:09,195 Speaker 20: thirds of the senator's president not having guilty. The state 541 00:35:09,395 --> 00:35:12,235 Speaker 20: judge is that the respond to Donald John Trump, former 542 00:35:12,315 --> 00:35:16,115 Speaker 20: President of the United States, is not guilty as charged 543 00:35:16,115 --> 00:35:17,275 Speaker 20: in the article of impeachment. 544 00:35:18,115 --> 00:35:20,795 Speaker 1: The vote fell short of the supermajority required to convict, 545 00:35:21,355 --> 00:35:24,395 Speaker 1: even though there is no more clear cut case for impeachment, 546 00:35:24,475 --> 00:35:28,755 Speaker 1: no more indisputable evidence than an armed insurrection incited by 547 00:35:28,755 --> 00:35:32,395 Speaker 1: the executive branch to stop the legislative branch from certifying 548 00:35:32,435 --> 00:35:37,115 Speaker 1: an election. In the aftermath of the insurrection and the impeachment, 549 00:35:37,315 --> 00:35:42,235 Speaker 1: a buzzphrase emerged, the big lie. Republicans kept insisting that 550 00:35:42,275 --> 00:35:45,755 Speaker 1: the election had been stolen. Democrats took to calling this 551 00:35:45,995 --> 00:35:49,115 Speaker 1: the big lie, but Republicans said the big lie was 552 00:35:49,115 --> 00:35:51,955 Speaker 1: the idea that Joe Biden was the lawful president. A 553 00:35:51,995 --> 00:35:54,635 Speaker 1: lot of progressives talked about another kind of big lie, 554 00:35:55,075 --> 00:35:58,035 Speaker 1: the lie that white people matter more than black people. 555 00:35:58,955 --> 00:36:01,835 Speaker 1: That move harkened back to something James Baldwin had said 556 00:36:02,155 --> 00:36:03,795 Speaker 1: in the nineteen sixties. 557 00:36:04,555 --> 00:36:07,875 Speaker 14: The curriculum my color is what you use to avoid 558 00:36:08,435 --> 00:36:13,155 Speaker 14: facing the fact of our common history, the facts of 559 00:36:13,195 --> 00:36:14,275 Speaker 14: American life. 560 00:36:14,635 --> 00:36:19,115 Speaker 1: In twenty twenty, Princeton historian Eddie Glaud Junior updated Baldwin's argument. 561 00:36:19,795 --> 00:36:25,275 Speaker 16: America is so wilfully ignorant, right, And it's willfully ignorant 562 00:36:25,275 --> 00:36:29,075 Speaker 16: because it wants to protect its innocence. As Baldwin says, 563 00:36:30,035 --> 00:36:35,155 Speaker 16: it doesn't want to admit that it is not the 564 00:36:35,195 --> 00:36:37,555 Speaker 16: shining city on the hill. The trouble is deeper than 565 00:36:37,595 --> 00:36:40,635 Speaker 16: we wish to think, because the trouble is in us. 566 00:36:43,115 --> 00:36:45,675 Speaker 1: The trouble is in us and the lies we tell. 567 00:36:46,395 --> 00:36:49,115 Speaker 1: He just can't pull these two lies apart. The lie 568 00:36:49,115 --> 00:36:52,915 Speaker 1: about the election is the lie about white supremacy. People 569 00:36:52,915 --> 00:36:56,195 Speaker 1: who say the election was stolen are generally arguing that 570 00:36:56,235 --> 00:36:59,635 Speaker 1: black voters stole the election, So really there's just the 571 00:36:59,675 --> 00:37:03,435 Speaker 1: one lie. But then I guess, predictably, the very expression 572 00:37:03,715 --> 00:37:07,435 Speaker 1: the big lie became meaningless, the way that earlier fake 573 00:37:07,555 --> 00:37:12,155 Speaker 1: news became meaningless, just another to disagree with someone. When 574 00:37:12,195 --> 00:37:15,435 Speaker 1: Georgia passed a law that challenged requirements for voting, and 575 00:37:15,555 --> 00:37:19,035 Speaker 1: liberals called it a voter suppression law. Conservatives said that 576 00:37:19,155 --> 00:37:22,395 Speaker 1: was a big lie. Here's how crazy this is. Some 577 00:37:22,435 --> 00:37:25,475 Speaker 1: people said that some other people lied, that they committed 578 00:37:25,555 --> 00:37:29,195 Speaker 1: voter fraud. Then some other people said this was a lie, 579 00:37:29,395 --> 00:37:31,955 Speaker 1: there was no fraud. And then the first group of 580 00:37:31,995 --> 00:37:35,115 Speaker 1: people said those people were lying about the lying. And 581 00:37:35,155 --> 00:37:37,475 Speaker 1: they all said all these lies with a big lie. 582 00:37:39,395 --> 00:37:42,355 Speaker 1: Here in this emergency bunker and iron mountain, I feel 583 00:37:42,475 --> 00:37:45,115 Speaker 1: buried beneath the weight of it all. I think a 584 00:37:45,115 --> 00:37:48,275 Speaker 1: lot of people feel that way. End of January, I 585 00:37:48,315 --> 00:37:53,835 Speaker 1: watched the newly and actually elected Joe Biden deliverer's inaugural address. 586 00:37:54,035 --> 00:37:57,875 Speaker 1: He'd started drafting his remarks in late twenty twenty, but 587 00:37:58,115 --> 00:38:01,275 Speaker 1: reportedly it's quite common for Biden to revise his speeches. 588 00:38:01,475 --> 00:38:05,315 Speaker 1: Up until the last moment after the insurrection, he'd had 589 00:38:05,355 --> 00:38:06,435 Speaker 1: some more revising to do. 590 00:38:08,395 --> 00:38:09,315 Speaker 15: There is truth. 591 00:38:09,915 --> 00:38:16,035 Speaker 11: Our lies lies told for power and for profit. And 592 00:38:16,115 --> 00:38:19,995 Speaker 11: each of us has a duty and a responsibility as citizens, 593 00:38:20,035 --> 00:38:24,195 Speaker 11: as Americans, and especially as leaders, leaders who have pledged 594 00:38:24,235 --> 00:38:28,715 Speaker 11: to honor our constitution, to protect our nation, to defend 595 00:38:28,755 --> 00:38:31,115 Speaker 11: the truth and defeat the lies. 596 00:38:32,235 --> 00:38:34,875 Speaker 1: Defeat the lies. I like that very much when I 597 00:38:34,915 --> 00:38:37,915 Speaker 1: heard it, so did Stephen Shapen, the historian of science, 598 00:38:38,675 --> 00:38:41,475 Speaker 1: and then it really worried both of us. 599 00:38:42,235 --> 00:38:45,355 Speaker 17: Yes, it was beautiful. I entirely agree because I know 600 00:38:45,395 --> 00:38:48,035 Speaker 17: what he meant. But it's as much as pounding the 601 00:38:48,075 --> 00:38:52,835 Speaker 17: table or shouting as a way of addressing the nature 602 00:38:52,875 --> 00:38:55,795 Speaker 17: of the problem. There is truth and there is lies. Yeah, 603 00:38:55,875 --> 00:38:57,075 Speaker 17: who could disagree with that? 604 00:38:58,555 --> 00:39:01,835 Speaker 1: Pounding on the table is not enough. Saying I tell 605 00:39:01,875 --> 00:39:06,835 Speaker 1: the truth, you tell lies is not enough, and it 606 00:39:06,875 --> 00:39:12,315 Speaker 1: doesn't work. This season of the Last Archive has been 607 00:39:12,355 --> 00:39:16,715 Speaker 1: a long hundred years, from the Scope's Trial to Ripley's 608 00:39:16,715 --> 00:39:19,595 Speaker 1: Believe It or Not, from the War of the Worlds 609 00:39:19,675 --> 00:39:24,355 Speaker 1: to Axis Sally in Tokyo, Rose Maury Bernstein, the mid centuries, Fengali, 610 00:39:24,795 --> 00:39:29,075 Speaker 1: the Moon Hoax, Soviet propaganda, and Rest in Peace Rush Limbaugh. 611 00:39:30,795 --> 00:39:33,515 Speaker 1: A problem of historical thinking is that when you look back, 612 00:39:34,155 --> 00:39:37,915 Speaker 1: everything seems to lead to now, but of course now 613 00:39:38,035 --> 00:39:42,595 Speaker 1: keeps changing, but the past remains the same. I've been 614 00:39:42,595 --> 00:39:45,435 Speaker 1: looking for a history of mischief, the peddling of doubt, 615 00:39:45,875 --> 00:39:51,075 Speaker 1: people who profited politically financially for making other people confused. 616 00:39:51,875 --> 00:39:54,715 Speaker 1: What I've argued is that there really is a genealogy. Here. 617 00:39:55,315 --> 00:39:59,355 Speaker 1: These people learn from one another's tricks, so it's been 618 00:39:59,395 --> 00:40:02,875 Speaker 1: worth laying them all out. Here's how this trick works. 619 00:40:03,195 --> 00:40:07,395 Speaker 1: Don't be fooled again. Report from Iron Mountain. It's one 620 00:40:07,395 --> 00:40:08,955 Speaker 1: of the sorriest of these tricks. 621 00:40:09,915 --> 00:40:14,595 Speaker 4: Impossibility war is the foundation for stable government. It supplies 622 00:40:14,635 --> 00:40:17,955 Speaker 4: the basis for general acceptance of political authority. 623 00:40:19,715 --> 00:40:22,515 Speaker 1: He was created as a prank, a joke. I look 624 00:40:22,555 --> 00:40:25,435 Speaker 1: what a mess it helped make. I don't want to 625 00:40:25,515 --> 00:40:29,475 Speaker 1: leave it just hanging near there. A hoax. So I 626 00:40:29,555 --> 00:40:37,075 Speaker 1: have one more story to tell. Remember Herman Noust, the 627 00:40:37,155 --> 00:40:41,595 Speaker 1: mushroom King with his mushroom shaped swimming pool. When I 628 00:40:41,635 --> 00:40:44,155 Speaker 1: was thinking about Iron Mountain and came across his name, 629 00:40:44,675 --> 00:40:48,835 Speaker 1: it sounded so familiar to me, Herman Noust, Herman Nous. 630 00:40:49,355 --> 00:40:53,195 Speaker 1: After a while I remembered I'd once met his granddaughter. 631 00:40:54,355 --> 00:40:56,915 Speaker 1: Here's how that happened. A bunch of years ago, I 632 00:40:56,955 --> 00:41:00,395 Speaker 1: got obsessed with a guy named Joe Gould, who, starting 633 00:41:00,395 --> 00:41:03,315 Speaker 1: more than a century ago, claimed to be writing the 634 00:41:03,435 --> 00:41:06,075 Speaker 1: longest book in the history of the world. He would 635 00:41:06,075 --> 00:41:09,035 Speaker 1: do this by making his own last archive, writing down 636 00:41:09,115 --> 00:41:12,235 Speaker 1: every word that anyone ever said to him. His book 637 00:41:12,275 --> 00:41:15,115 Speaker 1: was supposed to be called The Oral History of Our Time. 638 00:41:16,115 --> 00:41:18,955 Speaker 1: Apart from literary merit, it will have future value as 639 00:41:18,955 --> 00:41:24,115 Speaker 1: a storehouse of information, he would say. Later people said 640 00:41:24,115 --> 00:41:26,955 Speaker 1: this book never existed, that Gould had just talked about it, 641 00:41:26,955 --> 00:41:29,755 Speaker 1: had never written a word of it. Gould, it turned out, 642 00:41:29,955 --> 00:41:33,675 Speaker 1: was insane. He was in fact a psychopath. But long 643 00:41:33,715 --> 00:41:36,435 Speaker 1: after Gould's death, when I heard about The Oral History 644 00:41:36,475 --> 00:41:40,235 Speaker 1: of Our Time, I went looking for the manuscript. I 645 00:41:40,275 --> 00:41:45,115 Speaker 1: went digging, tunneling through archives, and weirdly, believe it or not, 646 00:41:45,355 --> 00:41:46,955 Speaker 1: I found it, or at least I found a part 647 00:41:46,955 --> 00:41:50,035 Speaker 1: of it in a notebook deep in the archives of 648 00:41:50,075 --> 00:41:54,395 Speaker 1: the New York Public Library. Gould had destroyed most of 649 00:41:54,435 --> 00:41:57,475 Speaker 1: the manuscript, but it had mainly been about one person, 650 00:41:57,835 --> 00:42:01,875 Speaker 1: a black artist named Augustus Savage. And she's the real story, 651 00:42:02,235 --> 00:42:08,195 Speaker 1: the true report from Iron Mountain. Augusta Savage had been 652 00:42:08,195 --> 00:42:10,715 Speaker 1: a leader of the Harlem Renaissance in the nineteen twenties 653 00:42:10,715 --> 00:42:14,035 Speaker 1: and nineteen thirties. She'd started her own studio. She'd been 654 00:42:14,035 --> 00:42:16,435 Speaker 1: commissioned to create a work about black Americans for the 655 00:42:16,515 --> 00:42:20,035 Speaker 1: nineteen thirty nine World's Fair. She'd been featured in Life magazine, 656 00:42:20,755 --> 00:42:23,515 Speaker 1: but then she met Joe Gould. He began to stalk 657 00:42:23,515 --> 00:42:26,995 Speaker 1: her everywhere she went. There's some evidence that he raped her. 658 00:42:27,635 --> 00:42:30,675 Speaker 1: In the nineteen forties, she disappeared. She went into hiding. 659 00:42:31,235 --> 00:42:33,715 Speaker 1: I found that she'd moved to upstate New York, where 660 00:42:33,755 --> 00:42:35,635 Speaker 1: she had lived at first in a tiny, run down 661 00:42:35,675 --> 00:42:39,035 Speaker 1: house without plumbing or electricity. She turned a chicken coop 662 00:42:39,155 --> 00:42:43,195 Speaker 1: into a studio. Then she got a job at Iron 663 00:42:43,235 --> 00:42:47,475 Speaker 1: Mounted Storage company. Augusta Savage is dead now and her 664 00:42:47,475 --> 00:42:50,715 Speaker 1: house is being turned into a museum run by Herman 665 00:42:50,795 --> 00:42:56,275 Speaker 1: Noust's granddaughter. Augusta Savage worked at Iron Mountain, but also 666 00:42:56,475 --> 00:43:00,395 Speaker 1: every week Herman Nelson's son brought her clay, He bought 667 00:43:00,395 --> 00:43:02,875 Speaker 1: her a car, He had a kitchen installed in her house. 668 00:43:02,915 --> 00:43:06,235 Speaker 1: Had electricity run out there. She'd come to the family's estate, 669 00:43:06,355 --> 00:43:10,595 Speaker 1: the one with the mushrooms shaped swimming pool, to recite poetry. 670 00:43:10,995 --> 00:43:14,355 Speaker 1: But meanwhile she destroyed much of her own art. She 671 00:43:14,435 --> 00:43:16,395 Speaker 1: went in the city mainly just to collect her old 672 00:43:16,435 --> 00:43:18,995 Speaker 1: work and destroy it. She apparently sent a man to 673 00:43:19,035 --> 00:43:21,275 Speaker 1: retrieve a bust that she'd made of W. B. D 674 00:43:21,355 --> 00:43:27,755 Speaker 1: Boys and then reportedly smashed it. The story of Augustus Savage, 675 00:43:28,835 --> 00:43:34,355 Speaker 1: that's my report from Iron Mountain. I wrote a book 676 00:43:34,395 --> 00:43:38,235 Speaker 1: about all that. It's called Joe Gould's Teeth. A lot 677 00:43:38,275 --> 00:43:41,795 Speaker 1: of the Last Archive is like Joe Gould's teeth. A 678 00:43:41,795 --> 00:43:45,915 Speaker 1: lot of history is like Joe Gould's teeth. Tragic and 679 00:43:45,995 --> 00:43:50,395 Speaker 1: maddening stories about loss and destruction, not leading to some 680 00:43:50,435 --> 00:43:55,315 Speaker 1: glorious or terrible present, just sad. When I went out 681 00:43:55,355 --> 00:43:58,635 Speaker 1: to that chicken coop that had become Augustus Savage's studio, 682 00:43:59,355 --> 00:44:02,235 Speaker 1: the ground was still covered with smashed bits of her sculpture. 683 00:44:03,155 --> 00:44:09,715 Speaker 1: Her voice, like her art, is lost. But I'm tired 684 00:44:10,035 --> 00:44:14,355 Speaker 1: of hidden and smashed history. I'm tired of bunkers, tunnels 685 00:44:14,355 --> 00:44:20,715 Speaker 1: and vaults, underground layers and ridiculous conspiracy. It's time to 686 00:44:20,755 --> 00:44:25,875 Speaker 1: dig out, time to climb up, time to get out, 687 00:44:27,715 --> 00:44:31,275 Speaker 1: time to figure it out. You can study history for 688 00:44:31,315 --> 00:44:34,995 Speaker 1: its own sake, curl around in attics to seek the truth, 689 00:44:35,875 --> 00:44:39,635 Speaker 1: rifle through the pages of old books, bury yourself in 690 00:44:39,715 --> 00:44:43,115 Speaker 1: every last archive. But you can also study history to 691 00:44:43,195 --> 00:44:46,035 Speaker 1: learn how to solve problems. Pry open the door of 692 00:44:46,035 --> 00:44:49,235 Speaker 1: the vault and creep out. Bring the knowledge of the 693 00:44:49,235 --> 00:44:52,635 Speaker 1: place where the known things go, and carry it outside. 694 00:44:53,475 --> 00:44:57,155 Speaker 1: Escape the corridor of the mind for the Messy, angry, 695 00:44:57,755 --> 00:45:18,555 Speaker 1: half wrecked, beautiful World. The Last Archive is written and 696 00:45:18,595 --> 00:45:21,955 Speaker 1: hosted by me Joe Lapour. It's produced by Sophie Crane 697 00:45:21,995 --> 00:45:25,515 Speaker 1: mckibbon and ben Natta Haffrey. Our editor is Julia Barton, 698 00:45:25,755 --> 00:45:29,435 Speaker 1: and our executive producer is Mia Obel. Martin Gonzalez is 699 00:45:29,475 --> 00:45:33,635 Speaker 1: our engineer. Fact checking by Amy Gaines. Original music by 700 00:45:33,635 --> 00:45:37,915 Speaker 1: Matthias Bossi and John Evans of Stellwagen Symphinette. Our research 701 00:45:37,915 --> 00:45:41,875 Speaker 1: assistants are Kamanie Pantheer and Lily Richmond are full Proof 702 00:45:41,875 --> 00:45:46,035 Speaker 1: players are Yoshia Mao, Raymond Blankenhorn, Matthias Bossi, Dan Epstein, 703 00:45:46,075 --> 00:45:50,115 Speaker 1: Ethan Hruschenfeld, Becca A. Lewis, Andrew Perella, Robert mccotta, and 704 00:45:50,235 --> 00:45:53,315 Speaker 1: Nick Saxton. The Last Archive is a production of Pushkin 705 00:45:53,315 --> 00:45:57,675 Speaker 1: Industries Head Pushkin Thanks to Jacob Weisberg, Heather Faine, John Schnarz, 706 00:45:57,795 --> 00:46:02,315 Speaker 1: Carli Migliori, Christina Sullivan, Eric Sandler, Emily Rostack, Maggie Taylor, 707 00:46:02,595 --> 00:46:06,555 Speaker 1: Maya Kainig and Daniella La Khan. Special thanks to Carla 708 00:46:06,555 --> 00:46:09,755 Speaker 1: and Noustelaiah and Simon Leak, and thanks to Shola Lynch 709 00:46:09,995 --> 00:46:12,995 Speaker 1: at the Schomberg Center. If you like the show, please 710 00:46:12,995 --> 00:46:16,475 Speaker 1: remember to rate, share, and review. To find more Pushkin podcasts, 711 00:46:16,635 --> 00:46:20,115 Speaker 1: listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you 712 00:46:20,155 --> 00:46:22,235 Speaker 1: listen to podcasts. I'm Jill Labour.