WEBVTT - Part Two: No Matter How Much You Hate Paul Manafort, You Should Hate Him More (And Here’s Why) 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:09.000 Mmm, Hello, and welcome once again to Behind the Bastards, 0:00:09.039 --> 0:00:10.840 the show where we tell you everything you don't know 0:00:10.880 --> 0:00:13.760 about the very worst people in all history. I'm Robert Evans, 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:16.440 our host, and my guest this week is Dave Ross, 0:00:17.200 --> 0:00:23.120 co host of Suicide Friends. No, damn it, that's okay, man, 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:27.080 It's Suicide Buddies, Suicide Buddy, Suicide Friends. It's funny. That 0:00:27.560 --> 0:00:32.080 sounds like a kid's show. I keep yeah, okay, Off Mike, Oh, 0:00:32.120 --> 0:00:34.400 this is not gonna go. I mean it could, this 0:00:34.479 --> 0:00:36.479 is great. You should. I don't know, man, I like 0:00:36.960 --> 0:00:40.200 my favorite thing in the world is mistakes. It's uh, 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:44.360 that's where all of my comedy comes from, my own mistakes. 0:00:44.440 --> 0:00:48.240 And it's especially going because we're recording this immediately after 0:00:48.280 --> 0:00:50.800 recording part one, so I haven't even had the excuse 0:00:50.840 --> 0:00:53.080 of a couple of days way time to get this wrong. 0:00:53.200 --> 0:00:55.880 Now we've been hanging out yeah and you got yeah, 0:00:56.040 --> 0:01:00.080 you got my name wrong and a terrible person. And 0:01:00.400 --> 0:01:02.560 at one point, Off Mike, you referred to the podcast 0:01:02.560 --> 0:01:06.480 as suicide Club, and I just love that because that 0:01:06.560 --> 0:01:10.920 really sounds like we're gonna die on the podcast. Suicide 0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:14.760 Buddies does too. It does I'm still it's my podcast, 0:01:14.760 --> 0:01:17.520 and I'm still not entirely sold on the name, uh 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:21.360 suicide Buddies. We're trying to we're trying to imply that 0:01:21.440 --> 0:01:25.319 it's a fun suicide podcast, because it is Buddies. It is. 0:01:25.360 --> 0:01:28.160 It's like we talk about a different person in history 0:01:28.720 --> 0:01:31.440 every week who killed themselves. Oh that's a great idea. Yeah, 0:01:31.480 --> 0:01:34.360 it's fun, and but we're two comics, so we get real, 0:01:34.600 --> 0:01:37.680 real ridiculous with sure. Yeah, well let's get ridiculous with 0:01:37.720 --> 0:01:41.440 Paul man Afford again. Yeah. Yeah. If you're if you're 0:01:41.640 --> 0:01:43.520 just tuning into this and you didn't hear part one, 0:01:43.560 --> 0:01:45.400 I would recommend listening to part one of our Paul 0:01:45.400 --> 0:01:48.640 man Afford episode. We talked about how he changed lobbying 0:01:48.680 --> 0:01:51.320 from a thing that people didn't really do into a 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:54.560 thing that there's tens of thousands of lobbyists now, and 0:01:54.640 --> 0:01:57.520 it's influences or democracy at every level. A lot of 0:01:57.520 --> 0:02:01.280 that's Paul Manafort's doing. He's the guy who wrought lobbying 0:02:01.320 --> 0:02:05.480 for dictatorships to the United States back into vogue. Um, 0:02:05.560 --> 0:02:09.000 and we had just yeah, you didn't even invent lobbying. 0:02:09.040 --> 0:02:11.520 He just made it bad. He just made it worse 0:02:11.960 --> 0:02:15.960 and bigger. Yeah, and he he fucked our whole democracy 0:02:16.000 --> 0:02:18.080 by doing it. Um, but at the point of our 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:21.600 story that we're at, uh, he is fucking Ukraine's democracy. 0:02:21.919 --> 0:02:24.480 He started working with a guy named Victor Yanukovich and 0:02:24.600 --> 0:02:28.200 a Russian billionaire named Oleg Deripashka, both of whom his 0:02:28.280 --> 0:02:30.760 names I pronounced correctly. I think while getting your name 0:02:30.919 --> 0:02:33.320 Dave wrong just a minute ago, because I I am 0:02:33.360 --> 0:02:37.160 the real bastard behind the show. You are truly are 0:02:37.280 --> 0:02:41.959 my Paul Manifort. Everyone someone's Paul Manifort. That's probably true. 0:02:42.120 --> 0:02:44.360 Paul Manafort thinks about that when he needs to feel 0:02:44.360 --> 0:02:48.160 better about himself. I wonder that's that is probably not 0:02:48.240 --> 0:02:51.799 that inaccurate. Look, other people are bad too, Sherry or whatever, 0:02:51.840 --> 0:02:53.560 his wife. So what if I've helped a couple of 0:02:53.600 --> 0:02:57.040 civil wars last longer? Yeah, man, it's funny to think 0:02:57.720 --> 0:02:59.519 that you're right. No matter who you are, there's someone 0:02:59.520 --> 0:03:06.200 out there who's like, a, yeah, Dan Ross, I'm Dan Ross. 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:10.400 Now he said it off Mike, it was yeah, I'm 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:12.520 the one bringing it back up. I'm Paul Manaford. No, 0:03:12.600 --> 0:03:15.480 but I want people to know how terrible I am. 0:03:15.520 --> 0:03:18.160 It's important. I want people to know how terrible I am. Well, 0:03:18.440 --> 0:03:20.280 this is a great show to be on. Then we 0:03:20.320 --> 0:03:25.440 should start a podcast called the Paul Manaforts, The Paul's Maniford. 0:03:27.000 --> 0:03:30.040 You're right, No, that was unfair of me. I don't 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:33.320 want to be unfair to Paul Manford. Um. So yeah, 0:03:33.320 --> 0:03:36.560 Paul Manaford has you know, advised Victor Yunukovich on what 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:38.920 he needs to do in order to win the presidency 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:41.200 because he lost back in two thousand five. He hasn't 0:03:41.280 --> 0:03:43.280 changed his hair, has n't getting new suits. It changes 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:46.200 the way his his party starts, you know, agitating and 0:03:46.320 --> 0:03:49.360 basically trying to get him to use US style political 0:03:49.400 --> 0:03:54.240 tactics to win election Ukraine. And this strategy works Yunukovich's 0:03:54.280 --> 0:03:56.000 party over the next couple of years, when's a bunch 0:03:56.040 --> 0:03:57.920 of seats in parliament, and in two thousand and ten 0:03:58.280 --> 0:04:01.840 Ukovich was finally elected president. His opponent was arrested a 0:04:01.920 --> 0:04:04.160 year later, and you Nukovich sort of went full dictator, 0:04:04.160 --> 0:04:06.680 buying himself an enormous palace with a floating restaurant on 0:04:06.720 --> 0:04:09.480 a private lake and turning the Federal riot police the 0:04:09.480 --> 0:04:12.720 Barkut into an instrument for enforcing his will. He did 0:04:12.720 --> 0:04:17.560 that like like a fucking finger snap fast, like just instantly, dictator. 0:04:18.080 --> 0:04:22.440 It's it's almost almost laudable how quickly he's like, all right, 0:04:22.520 --> 0:04:26.360 gonna jail my opponent and start building a palace. Instantly. 0:04:26.440 --> 0:04:30.520 Dictator sounds a lot like the phrase suddenly Susan. Yes, 0:04:31.480 --> 0:04:33.839 which that was a TV show, right it was. It 0:04:33.960 --> 0:04:36.480 was a corny I think t g I F said, 0:04:36.560 --> 0:04:39.240 come well, someone should reboot it and Susan should be 0:04:39.480 --> 0:04:43.680 a Eastern European dictator. Yea, yeah, putting people on the 0:04:43.800 --> 0:04:46.360 rack but tawning their feet. Yeah yeah, but with a 0:04:46.480 --> 0:04:49.080 laugh track. With a laugh track of course. Yes, people 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:54.520 know the torture scenes are funny as opposed to horrifying. Yeah. Uh, 0:04:54.600 --> 0:04:56.680 you know. This went great for Paul obviously, the fact 0:04:56.760 --> 0:05:00.200 that he had actually successfully gotten a dictator into our 0:05:00.560 --> 0:05:04.279 uh so he just basically started writing down blank checks 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:06.240 for the sums of money he needed to continue to 0:05:06.279 --> 0:05:09.080 help Yanukovich out. Yanukovich would send his chief of staff 0:05:09.120 --> 0:05:11.960 out to shake down oligarchs for cash, and they always 0:05:11.960 --> 0:05:15.120 paid because Manafort had given them control of the entire country. 0:05:15.160 --> 0:05:17.839 So he's getting millions of dollars these oligarchs are getting 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:20.279 to do whatever they want without human rights concerns, and 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:22.840 Victor Yanukovich is getting to move his country closer to 0:05:22.920 --> 0:05:26.080 Vladimir Putin's Russia, even though most people in the country 0:05:26.120 --> 0:05:28.920 don't want that. So it's it's working out for everybody. 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:31.480 For no one gets hurt in the process at all, 0:05:31.560 --> 0:05:33.640 for sure, No, it's wonderful and it seems like it's 0:05:33.640 --> 0:05:37.320 gonna last perfectly forever. Uh Maniford also continue to work 0:05:37.320 --> 0:05:40.600 with Oleg Deripashka during this period. Now, Oleg had amassed 0:05:40.680 --> 0:05:44.440 and a preposterous fortune in Russia's bloody aluminum Wars, which 0:05:44.640 --> 0:05:48.240 caused more death than a lot of actual wars. Um 0:05:48.279 --> 0:05:51.360 So when the Soviet Union fell right on the Soviet Union, 0:05:51.400 --> 0:05:54.120 all of these different industries and stuff are owned by 0:05:54.120 --> 0:05:56.200 the states, so they're own collectively by all the people. 0:05:57.040 --> 0:05:59.400 So when the Soviet Union stops being a thing, the 0:05:59.440 --> 0:06:01.560 thing that they land on essentially is giving all the 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:04.200 people vouchers for a tiny percentage of control of these 0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:07.719 various industries, the gas industry, these aluminum companies, whatever. Everybody 0:06:07.720 --> 0:06:11.039 gets a chunk of that. And it seemed like the 0:06:11.120 --> 0:06:13.520 right way to at the time, sort of nationalize the 0:06:13.600 --> 0:06:16.200 economy and benefit all the people. But what happens in 0:06:16.240 --> 0:06:20.600 practices that a small number of enterprising billionaires basically buy 0:06:20.720 --> 0:06:23.799 up all of the these people for like beer money, 0:06:23.880 --> 0:06:27.839 and then wind up amassing enormous fortunes and we'll run 0:06:27.839 --> 0:06:31.440 in the conflict money oleg is considered. Yeah, they would 0:06:31.480 --> 0:06:34.640 like bribe people with with yeah, like enough money to 0:06:34.680 --> 0:06:37.640 get drunk for a night, for shares and games. They're 0:06:39.120 --> 0:06:41.000 exactly and it was just a piece of paper. I 0:06:41.000 --> 0:06:42.840 don't give a ship. And then some of these guys 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:44.360 wind up being a few of the richest people in 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:49.440 the world who apparently meddled in our election. But after 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:53.240 hearing about what Manafort has been doing anyway, um so yeah, 0:06:53.279 --> 0:06:56.960 Derri Poshka was one of the bloodiest of the oligarchs 0:06:56.960 --> 0:07:00.400 of this period. Um and in two thousands, Evan he 0:07:00.480 --> 0:07:02.800 was worth well over twenty billion dollars. And that's the 0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:06.080 year that he promised Paul Manafort a hundred million dollars 0:07:06.360 --> 0:07:09.840 to help him start an investment fund called Pericles. Now, 0:07:10.000 --> 0:07:13.560 Manafort took at least nineteen million dollars of Derri Poshka's 0:07:13.600 --> 0:07:16.640 money and bought maybe nothing with it, So he was 0:07:16.640 --> 0:07:18.880 supposed to be using this money to purchase a telecom 0:07:18.960 --> 0:07:21.320 firm for this investment company, because he was hoping the 0:07:21.360 --> 0:07:24.720 firm would you know, appreciate in value. That price tag 0:07:24.760 --> 0:07:27.600 included seven point three five million and management fees for 0:07:27.640 --> 0:07:30.560 Paul um. But right after the purchase, the global economy 0:07:30.600 --> 0:07:32.640 collapsed and Derri Poshka was suddenly worth a whole lot 0:07:32.680 --> 0:07:36.160 less than he had been um So dry Poshka asks 0:07:36.200 --> 0:07:39.280 for his money back, and it turns out that Paul 0:07:39.320 --> 0:07:41.760 Manafort doesn't have the money and also didn't buy the 0:07:41.800 --> 0:07:43.600 firm that he said he bought, so they can't even 0:07:43.640 --> 0:07:45.920 sell the firm. Like it. It seems like he just 0:07:46.000 --> 0:07:51.120 stole nineteen million dollars from this blood drenched Russian billionaire um. 0:07:51.240 --> 0:07:54.239 Which what is funny about this is that like, yeah, 0:07:54.240 --> 0:07:56.840 this is all crazy and evil, but I don't care 0:07:57.080 --> 0:08:00.040 that someone stole nineteen million dollars from that guy. I 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:03.720 don't care at all. No, But but he's bad, I 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:05.840 keep saying bad. I mean, yeah, I don't know what's 0:08:05.840 --> 0:08:08.360 the word what he's amused to describe these people? I 0:08:08.440 --> 0:08:13.520 don't know. Ye, Bastard is a good starter term. This 0:08:13.560 --> 0:08:15.560 story makes it because if you remember from part one 0:08:15.600 --> 0:08:18.040 we were talking about there's a rumor that he's basically 0:08:18.040 --> 0:08:20.840 stole ten million dollars, right Ferdinand Marcos, the dictator of 0:08:20.840 --> 0:08:24.680 the Philippines, and Paul denies it, but this makes it. 0:08:24.920 --> 0:08:26.840 Of course he did that. This is what he does. 0:08:27.160 --> 0:08:31.000 He steals money from terrible people and assumes he'll be 0:08:31.040 --> 0:08:34.439 fine because they will probably need him in the future. 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:36.760 A hit out on him now or something like there's 0:08:36.760 --> 0:08:38.480 got to be There's no way to confirm it, but 0:08:38.520 --> 0:08:42.600 like yeah, right, yeah, um So things start to go 0:08:42.679 --> 0:08:46.280 off the rails for Paul Manafort at this point because 0:08:46.280 --> 0:08:48.400 in spite of all of the money coming in from Yanukovich, 0:08:48.480 --> 0:08:51.360 which was at least twelve point five million by like 0:08:51.480 --> 0:08:54.959 the mid oughts uh in the nineteen million dollars he 0:08:55.040 --> 0:08:57.920 stole from dey Poshka, Paul was deep in debt. This 0:08:58.000 --> 0:08:59.960 is because he loved debt and thought anyone who wasn't 0:09:00.000 --> 0:09:02.280 even debt was a sucker. He took out a fifteen 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:04.840 million dollar loan or fifteen million dollars in loans over 0:09:04.880 --> 0:09:07.440 a two year period, backed by his real estate, which 0:09:07.480 --> 0:09:10.839 the experts say is a classic money laundering tactic. Robert 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:13.920 Mueller's indictment alleged that Manafort actually led on several loan 0:09:13.960 --> 0:09:16.800 applications in order to get money. So he's he's committing 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:19.040 shiploads of crimes and just assuming no one will ever 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:21.560 look into it, which in this period of time no 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:23.680 one is looking into it. He's just getting loans left 0:09:23.679 --> 0:09:25.920 and right, and millions of dollars and buying houses and 0:09:25.960 --> 0:09:29.320 horse stables. He's fine, um, But he wound up being 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:31.840 in real trouble in November of two thousand and thirteen, 0:09:31.920 --> 0:09:35.480 when crowds assembled in Kiev's Independent Square, better known as 0:09:35.480 --> 0:09:39.040 the Maidan. These protesters were angry that President Yanukovich had 0:09:39.080 --> 0:09:41.560 decided to back out of signing an association agreement with 0:09:41.600 --> 0:09:44.320 the EU in favor of closer relations with Putin's Russia. 0:09:44.800 --> 0:09:48.040 So Yanukovich sent his elite bar Kut riot police in 0:09:48.080 --> 0:09:51.559 to disperse the protesters. They did this with tremendous violence. 0:09:51.880 --> 0:09:54.240 This sparked more protests and brought a wider swath of 0:09:54.240 --> 0:09:56.440 the population out into the street, including the parents of 0:09:56.440 --> 0:09:59.040 the kids who had first been beaten for protesting. Things 0:09:59.040 --> 0:10:01.080 got out of hand very quickly, like as out of 0:10:01.120 --> 0:10:03.280 hand as they could possibly get. Within a few weeks, 0:10:03.280 --> 0:10:05.800 the protests had turned from protests into people building an 0:10:05.840 --> 0:10:09.280 ice fortress in the center of Ukraine's capital Um. This 0:10:09.520 --> 0:10:11.800 fortress had like the resources of a small city, including 0:10:11.840 --> 0:10:16.280 communal kitchens, restrooms, media areas of library, medical tents, and catapults. 0:10:16.320 --> 0:10:19.400 So these protesters are like fighting against the dictator in 0:10:19.440 --> 0:10:22.319 the center of his capital city, with like police laying 0:10:22.400 --> 0:10:25.280 siege to them, and like ice walls that they're defending 0:10:25.320 --> 0:10:29.880 with catapults throwing hundreds of molotov I was This is 0:10:29.920 --> 0:10:31.760 one of the first stories I ever covered. And there 0:10:31.760 --> 0:10:35.080 are videos you can find of police tanks trying to 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:38.240 ram the walls of this fortress and then throwing so 0:10:38.280 --> 0:10:42.640 many Molotov cocktails that the tank's treads melt to the ground. 0:10:43.240 --> 0:10:48.360 It's nuts. The Ukrainian Revolution of two fourteen is one 0:10:48.400 --> 0:10:52.199 of the craziest looking protest movements you will ever see. Yeah, 0:10:52.280 --> 0:10:56.480 it's fucking nuts. Um and the berkout like these police 0:10:56.520 --> 0:10:58.960 that he's turned in essentially his gestapo, are doing things 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:02.439 like arresting people they suspect of supplying this protest camp 0:11:02.480 --> 0:11:04.800 and stripping them naked and throwing them into the snow 0:11:04.840 --> 0:11:07.160 in the middle of the Ukrainian winter, which is like 0:11:07.600 --> 0:11:12.360 there's no that's this winter gets right and some people 0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:16.120 die doing this, Like so the fortress is the protesters 0:11:16.200 --> 0:11:18.800 or the tanks, or the fortress is the protests, the 0:11:18.840 --> 0:11:21.560 tanks or the government, which would make sense, but still 0:11:22.080 --> 0:11:25.640 a fortress. And it's such a nuts protest that people 0:11:25.720 --> 0:11:29.040 hate Yanukovich so much in Ukraine that there are Nazis 0:11:29.120 --> 0:11:32.760 fighting alongside Jewish people and communists against the government, like 0:11:32.840 --> 0:11:35.840 it was. It was that kind of fucking crazy, like 0:11:35.840 --> 0:11:38.760 like everyone can agree, we gotta get this fucker out 0:11:38.800 --> 0:11:43.160 of office. Um. So it's it's like that's how much 0:11:43.320 --> 0:11:46.600 people hate him within western Ukraine. He's actually pretty popular 0:11:46.640 --> 0:11:50.800 in the east. Um. And again, Paul manifort strategy for 0:11:50.880 --> 0:11:54.040 trying to build popularity for the Yunukovich regime was to 0:11:54.240 --> 0:11:58.760 exacerbate the and emphasized sort of the differences between the 0:11:58.800 --> 0:12:00.719 East and the West, because the East part of the 0:12:00.840 --> 0:12:03.520 Ukraine liked Russia wanted to be closer with Russia, and 0:12:03.559 --> 0:12:05.600 the West like the EU more and wanted to be 0:12:05.600 --> 0:12:08.280 closer to the EU. And so his big strategy for 0:12:08.320 --> 0:12:11.520 Yanukovich was played the East and shipped on the West 0:12:11.559 --> 0:12:13.880 as much as possible and get the two sides of 0:12:13.920 --> 0:12:16.400 the country angry at each other because that will ensure 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:20.320 more popularity for you. So that's big Paul Manaforce. Whole 0:12:20.320 --> 0:12:24.200 strategy is to incite civil unrest within the country in 0:12:24.280 --> 0:12:29.440 order to make things. Yeah. So this is how Paul 0:12:29.480 --> 0:12:34.200 Manafford suggests playing Ukraine and exactly what Yanukovich does. Uh. 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:36.520 In December, when all of this is really hitting a 0:12:36.559 --> 0:12:39.360 point of crazy escalation, Paul Manafort sends a text to 0:12:39.440 --> 0:12:43.200 his daughter Andrea. He says Obama's approval ratings are lower 0:12:43.200 --> 0:12:45.520 than Yanukovich is, and you don't see him being ousted. 0:12:45.720 --> 0:12:48.040 So that's his him figuring it's going to be okay, 0:12:48.240 --> 0:12:50.760 because for him it has to be okay because he 0:12:50.880 --> 0:12:53.000 is so deep in debt that if he doesn't keep 0:12:53.040 --> 0:12:56.640 getting the millions of dollars he's getting from dictator. Yeah, 0:12:56.679 --> 0:12:59.480 exactly from this dictator. This is good whale right now. 0:12:59.720 --> 0:13:02.880 If this money train stops, he's fucked. So he just 0:13:02.960 --> 0:13:05.440 tells himself it's going to be fine. Crazy And you 0:13:05.559 --> 0:13:09.160 said that he likes debt. Couldn't he just pay this 0:13:09.240 --> 0:13:12.520 debt off? No, because he's spending his money as soon 0:13:12.559 --> 0:13:15.480 as he makes it he's buying houses without even looking 0:13:15.520 --> 0:13:17.840 at them. He did, like he said, he does stuff 0:13:17.880 --> 0:13:20.839 like when his daughter says she wants to learn horseback writing, 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:23.680 he buys her a star and he has purebred horses 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:26.080 flown in from Ireland along with a full time staff 0:13:26.160 --> 0:13:29.640 to take care of Like that's how he's spending money, 0:13:29.679 --> 0:13:31.600 and so everything is flying out of his hands as 0:13:31.640 --> 0:13:35.200 quickly as possible. Before this point, he's he urged the 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:38.600 Yanukovich to exacerbate tensions between East and West in order 0:13:38.640 --> 0:13:41.679 to really solidify his reign. And when this protest movement 0:13:41.679 --> 0:13:44.120 starts picking up steam, he advises him to start brutally 0:13:44.160 --> 0:13:48.200 suppressing the protesters, which you can debate on how much 0:13:48.520 --> 0:13:51.079 suggestion Yanukovich needed to do that, because he's a pretty 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:53.479 bad guy himself. Well, but even to make the suggestion 0:13:53.640 --> 0:13:56.120 is crazy. Yeah, And we'll get into who says that 0:13:56.160 --> 0:13:58.560 he did that a little bit later, because it's pretty damning. 0:13:59.200 --> 0:14:03.400 Um So. In January and February fourteen, the Ukrainian Revolution 0:14:03.520 --> 0:14:07.440 escalated to a point of true insanity. I conducted dozens 0:14:07.440 --> 0:14:09.960 of interviews with protesters during this period, people who reported 0:14:10.000 --> 0:14:12.400 being beaten with truncheons and shot with rubber bullets at 0:14:12.400 --> 0:14:15.079 point blank range. One of the guys that was interviewing 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:16.960 at one point, I asked him what he planned, because 0:14:16.960 --> 0:14:19.800 he was a guy like driving cars full of supplies 0:14:19.840 --> 0:14:22.000 into this place and out and like avoiding the police 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:24.200 on the streets while it happened. And I asked him, like, 0:14:24.240 --> 0:14:26.320 what he planned to do if the police came after him, 0:14:26.320 --> 0:14:28.400 and he just pulled a revolver out that he had 0:14:28.440 --> 0:14:30.800 in his jacket and said, like, this is what I 0:14:30.840 --> 0:14:33.360 planned to do if the police come me. And I 0:14:33.400 --> 0:14:35.840 never talked to that guy again. I tried to. I 0:14:35.840 --> 0:14:37.680 don't know what happened to him. A lot of people 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:40.040 disappeared during this period of time, and he's one of 0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:42.400 the people I've never gotten back in touch with. I 0:14:42.400 --> 0:14:46.960 don't know what happened. Um So, from February eighth to 0:14:47.240 --> 0:14:50.200 the twenty, President Yanukovich took the gloves off, possibly at 0:14:50.200 --> 0:14:53.840 Paul Manifort's behest. In two days, his police shot nearly 0:14:53.880 --> 0:14:57.720 a hundred protesters dead. The police advanced in huge numbers, 0:14:57.720 --> 0:14:59.840 and a giant medieval battle was raged over the my 0:15:00.080 --> 0:15:02.560 on Ice Fortress. A lot of it was streamed live, 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:04.760 and I remember watching the last few minutes before the 0:15:04.760 --> 0:15:07.960 signal cut off protesters. Their ice walls had been torn 0:15:08.040 --> 0:15:10.400 down and broken apart by the police, so they had 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:12.720 built a wall of fire and were burning all of 0:15:12.760 --> 0:15:15.040 their structures in tents and in the middle of the 0:15:15.160 --> 0:15:17.160 Ukrainian Winner. One of the last things I saw was 0:15:17.160 --> 0:15:20.400 people stripping off their jackets and clothing in the frigid 0:15:20.440 --> 0:15:22.400 cold and throwing it into the fire to try and 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:24.640 keep the fire going, to keep the fire going and 0:15:24.680 --> 0:15:28.600 the police away. So this is how fucking insane. It 0:15:28.640 --> 0:15:31.880 looked like the end of the damn world. Um, but 0:15:32.000 --> 0:15:36.320 it worked. They succeeded in raising so much unrest in 0:15:36.320 --> 0:15:39.080 the western part of Ukraine that President Yanukovich had to 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:42.720 flee the country for Russia. UM. So they ousted their 0:15:42.760 --> 0:15:46.360 president and of course a civil war immediately sparked right 0:15:46.400 --> 0:15:48.800 after that. Essentially a big chunk of the east declared 0:15:48.840 --> 0:15:52.360 itself a separate country, and Russian backed separatists is the 0:15:52.440 --> 0:15:53.800 term you'll hear for these guys. A lot of them 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:56.680 are Russian soldiers who would just take off their uniform 0:15:56.760 --> 0:15:59.800 patches and walk across. This is when Russia and X 0:15:59.920 --> 0:16:03.120 is the CRIMEA. All of this stuff happens and this 0:16:03.160 --> 0:16:05.720 whole East West divide that led to a civil war 0:16:05.760 --> 0:16:08.160 that's killed ten thousand people in counting, was again Paul 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:11.840 Manafort saying, you should exacerbate the divide between East and 0:16:11.880 --> 0:16:14.080 West in order to increase your own power. So you 0:16:14.120 --> 0:16:16.520 can credibly say Paul Manafort had a major role in 0:16:16.640 --> 0:16:20.320 sparking the Ukrainian Civil War because it it kind of 0:16:20.360 --> 0:16:24.560 happened as a result of Yanukovich following his advice again 0:16:24.600 --> 0:16:27.760 not to take credit for being a monster from Yanukovich away, 0:16:27.800 --> 0:16:30.320 because he's a piece of ship too. But Paul Manafort 0:16:30.480 --> 0:16:32.400 has a lot of blood on his hands, is on site. 0:16:33.160 --> 0:16:36.040 Um so yeah, by the end of February two, that's 0:16:36.040 --> 0:16:38.680 in fourteen, Yanukovich is out in the country. Is no 0:16:38.720 --> 0:16:41.720 longer safe for Paul Manafort, which was a problem because 0:16:41.720 --> 0:16:43.840 his office right next to the IDA was filled with 0:16:43.880 --> 0:16:46.120 papers that showed he'd been paid millions of dollars that 0:16:46.120 --> 0:16:49.240 he hadn't reported yet to anyone, including the US government, who, 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:51.480 thanks to that Fassa Act that we heard about in 0:16:51.520 --> 0:16:54.440 the first part, you have to register when you're working. 0:16:54.840 --> 0:16:58.000 Manafort hadn't, and he hadn't been reporting these payments, and 0:16:58.040 --> 0:17:00.880 he hadn't been paying taxes on these payments. We'll get 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:04.879 into more. I mean, I mean, everything is so awful 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:07.520 that I'm like, I don't even Yeah, the tax fraud thing, 0:17:07.640 --> 0:17:10.359 but yeah, that's what will bring him down because we 0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:12.639 live in a topsy tervy society where everything else he 0:17:12.680 --> 0:17:16.800 did was fine. Um anyway, Yeah, So around two fourteen 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:19.359 is when Paul Manaford's life starts to come off the 0:17:19.440 --> 0:17:22.199 fucking rails. His daughters catch him having an affair with 0:17:22.240 --> 0:17:24.760 a woman thirty years younger than him. He'd apparently paid 0:17:24.800 --> 0:17:27.640 for his mistresses nine thousand dollar a month apartment in Manhattan. 0:17:27.920 --> 0:17:29.520 He bought her a house in the Hampton's. He had 0:17:29.520 --> 0:17:31.600 also given her an American Express card and let her 0:17:31.640 --> 0:17:35.080 spend however much she wanted. During this time, his mistress 0:17:35.160 --> 0:17:37.840 went on a friend's podcast and said, quote, I only 0:17:37.880 --> 0:17:41.359 go to luxury restaurants and then talked about how fancy 0:17:41.400 --> 0:17:43.280 her life was. This is part of how his daughters 0:17:43.320 --> 0:17:47.600 found out about. Yeah. So when his daughters go to him, 0:17:47.600 --> 0:17:50.520 Manafort apologizes to them and promises to clean up his act. 0:17:50.720 --> 0:17:53.040 And then six months later they catch him cheating again 0:17:53.080 --> 0:17:55.159 with the same woman because she posted about one of 0:17:55.200 --> 0:18:02.399 their trips on Instagram. Yes, it's so crazy to be 0:18:02.680 --> 0:18:08.320 so so savvy with manipulating people and to be so 0:18:08.400 --> 0:18:11.640 stupid at the same time. Yeah, there's some people who 0:18:11.640 --> 0:18:14.359 are like George Bush is a very specific piece of ship. 0:18:14.400 --> 0:18:16.399 He was a piece of ship in a couple of 0:18:16.440 --> 0:18:17.959 specific ways, but the rest of the time, like as 0:18:17.960 --> 0:18:20.720 a parent, as a husband and stuff, nobody has any complaints. 0:18:21.359 --> 0:18:25.680 Paul Manifort is comprehensively a piece of shpe top to bottom, 0:18:25.760 --> 0:18:28.119 top to bottom, going for the gold and every single kid. 0:18:28.440 --> 0:18:31.680 How can I be the worst person I can possibly be? 0:18:32.280 --> 0:18:35.000 I think even it's funny daily question. On the last 0:18:35.600 --> 0:18:39.520 part one, we talked about how his daughter was conceived 0:18:39.520 --> 0:18:42.160 between conference calls and thinking about that a little bit 0:18:42.160 --> 0:18:45.080 more like, initially I thought that that's a crazy thing 0:18:45.119 --> 0:18:48.840 to tell your daughter, and it's crazy alone to just 0:18:48.880 --> 0:18:52.440 be like, hey, you know how we were conceived. Ever 0:18:52.640 --> 0:18:55.800 do you even say that? That's disgusting? Like, you know, 0:18:55.880 --> 0:18:58.439 your mom and I had sex at this specific place 0:18:58.520 --> 0:19:03.840 and that's where you came from. Oh man, Yeah, yeah, 0:19:04.040 --> 0:19:05.480 So this is as good a time as any to 0:19:05.480 --> 0:19:09.280 talk about Paul Manaforts lovely daughters. Now we're fortunate enough 0:19:09.320 --> 0:19:12.360 that several Ukrainian hackers managed to steal his daughter Andrea's 0:19:12.359 --> 0:19:14.800 text message records, and in fact I haven't had a 0:19:14.880 --> 0:19:16.919 chance to use them for this episode, but just today 0:19:16.920 --> 0:19:20.280 someone posted a searchable database of the Maniford texts. You 0:19:20.320 --> 0:19:24.119 can really yeah, yeah, yeah, it's it's fantastic. WikiLeaks refused 0:19:24.160 --> 0:19:26.240 to publish a lot of them for really, yeah, because 0:19:26.240 --> 0:19:30.320 they're shady. Use WikiLeaks is shady, yeah, yeah yeah, but 0:19:30.880 --> 0:19:33.440 they're out there and they're amazing. In these texts, which 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:37.639 Paul Manifort himself has said are legitimately text from his 0:19:37.720 --> 0:19:41.040 daughter and him. In these texts, Andrea tells her sister 0:19:41.160 --> 0:19:44.360 Jessica that their dad has quote no moral or legal compass. 0:19:44.960 --> 0:19:47.560 Don't fool yourself, She says. The money we have is 0:19:47.600 --> 0:19:51.840 blood money. So yeah, Andrea sounds nice when you hear 0:19:51.880 --> 0:19:54.760 that part, right, it does. And in her text to 0:19:54.800 --> 0:19:57.159 her friends and family, Andrea implicates her father in the 0:19:57.240 --> 0:20:00.800 murder of a hundred Ukrainian protesters. Quote, you know, he 0:20:00.880 --> 0:20:03.919 has killed people in Ukraine knowingly as a tactic to 0:20:03.960 --> 0:20:06.840 outrage the world and get focused on Ukraine. Remember when 0:20:06.840 --> 0:20:08.880 there were all those deaths taking place a while back. 0:20:08.920 --> 0:20:10.439 She's talking about all the people who are killed those 0:20:10.440 --> 0:20:12.440 two days in the my dawn about a year ago, 0:20:12.480 --> 0:20:14.960 revolts and whatnot. Do you know that whose strategy that 0:20:15.080 --> 0:20:16.760 was to cause that, to send those people out and 0:20:16.800 --> 0:20:19.439 get them slaughtered. He is a sick, fucking tyrant. And 0:20:19.480 --> 0:20:21.440 we keep showing up and dancing for him. We just 0:20:21.520 --> 0:20:25.560 keep showing up and eating the lobster. Nothing changes. Wow. Yeah, 0:20:26.440 --> 0:20:29.199 so you hear that, and you you kind of like 0:20:29.320 --> 0:20:32.679 Andrea and you think maybe evil skipped generation. We're going 0:20:32.720 --> 0:20:35.480 to get a little bit deeper into her personality. But 0:20:35.720 --> 0:20:48.399 first advertisements capitalism also by Doritos. All right, adds and 0:20:48.560 --> 0:20:52.440 we're back, uh, and we're talking about Andrea Maniffort, Paul 0:20:52.480 --> 0:20:55.320 Manafford's lovely daughter who has just at this point it 0:20:55.400 --> 0:20:59.119