Speaker 1: If you thought four hours a day, minutes a week
Speaker 1: was enough, I think again. He's the last remnants of
Speaker 1: the old republic, a sole fashion of fairness. He treats
Speaker 1: crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the rich
Speaker 1: pill poppers in the penthouse, to clearing house of hot takes,
Speaker 1: break free for something special. The Fifth Hour with Ben
Speaker 1: Maller starts right now in the air everywhere the weekend
Speaker 1: has begun. Welcome in. It is a fresh, piping hot
Speaker 1: edition of The Fifth Hour with Ben Mallard. Because four
Speaker 1: hours a night are not enough. On the overnight, we
Speaker 1: do this eight days a week, and you know the drill.
Speaker 1: On Fridays in the Magic Podcast Studio and a secret
Speaker 1: location somewhere in the north Woods, we like to have
Speaker 1: a conversation on the Fifth Hour and bring people in
Speaker 1: who are interesting, fascinating, rivet ng And we have one
Speaker 1: of those type figures today. We welcome in a man
Speaker 1: who is a social media foot soldier. He's a political columnist.
Speaker 1: He is an old talk show host. I first heard
Speaker 1: this particular person back in the day at KFI in
Speaker 1: l A as a talk show hosted a talk show
Speaker 1: at night, and I said this guy is good. I
Speaker 1: like this guy. I like his passion, his enthusiasm, the
Speaker 1: way he approaches talk radio. I really enjoyed that. And
Speaker 1: he moved on and he has done a bunch of
Speaker 1: documentaries and written political columns. So let's welcome in now,
Speaker 1: John Ziegler. He's noticed the Penn State guy. We are
Speaker 1: going to get to that, John, the Penn State stuff,
Speaker 1: but let's start with you and the fact that you
Speaker 1: originally got into the media business as a sports guy
Speaker 1: and then you made the quantum leap who firebrand political pundit.
Speaker 1: How did that happen? Well, Um, I've done a lot
Speaker 1: of things in a very mediocre fashion in my media career.
Speaker 1: I began as a TV sportscaster. My first on air
Speaker 1: job was in Steubenville, Ohio, Wheeling, West Virginia, back in
Speaker 1: the early nineties at w t o v TV, the
Speaker 1: NBC affiliate, where I was a sports anchor reporter. And
Speaker 1: then I went and did that at the Fox affiliate
Speaker 1: in Raleigh, North Carolina, and Um, I realized a couple
Speaker 1: of things. That one that my rather controversial, outspoken nature
Speaker 1: was not really suited for network sportscasting, so I went
Speaker 1: into talk radio and that's what eventually led me to
Speaker 1: here in Los Angeles and the KFI, which at the
Speaker 1: time was the number one talk station in the country.
Speaker 1: And then after that, UM, I started get into documentary
Speaker 1: films and more I guess you would call an investigative
Speaker 1: journe realism and commentary and column writing and and so
Speaker 1: that's where I am today. So I've done a lot
Speaker 1: of different things, um, none of which in a particularly
Speaker 1: spectacular fashion, but it's been interesting. Well, I enjoyed. John.
Speaker 1: You've been very outspoken about the zeitgeist of the times,
Speaker 1: with you know, doing sports radio. We had no sports
Speaker 1: last year, everything was shut down. Sports are back, but
Speaker 1: everything's been politicized and and all that. And you've been
Speaker 1: very outspoken about all the ridiculous UM rules and regulations
Speaker 1: and and is is there any end of this? I mean,
Speaker 1: you've you've been ranting day after day about it, John,
Speaker 1: Is there an end of the madness? Well, I have
Speaker 1: to say, and someone needs to tell this story. I've
Speaker 1: actually tried to tell this story, and I've been yet
Speaker 1: been successful in doing so in a documentary form. But
Speaker 1: I believe that sports played an intricral role, intricral in
Speaker 1: what happened with our reaction to COVID, and it was
Speaker 1: all negative, and it was all based on panic and stupidity.
Speaker 1: And we're not getting too deeply into it. This this
Speaker 1: might shock you. I don't know how much you've thought
Speaker 1: about this, but I actually think that one of the
Speaker 1: biggest decisions in the entire reaction of the pandemic, the
Speaker 1: one that set off a remarkable domino effect from which
Speaker 1: we may never recover, was when the IVY League decided
Speaker 1: to cancel their basketball tournament in March of Until that happened,
Speaker 1: we were still in the rational world. But within twenty
Speaker 1: four two, two thirty six hours after that, the entire
Speaker 1: world changed, and it changed not based on science, not
Speaker 1: based on logic, based on the idea wall. The smart
Speaker 1: guys of the IVY League decided that they couldn't even
Speaker 1: have their tournament forget about this, you know, not having fans,
Speaker 1: they couldn't even play the tournament. Uh, then we have
Speaker 1: to do the same, and including golf, which as a golfer,
Speaker 1: I will always be totally offended by how golf handled
Speaker 1: this thing. Golf should have been a leader in showing
Speaker 1: us that we can survive this, because it was perfectly
Speaker 1: designed to do so. But because golf is seen as
Speaker 1: a white male, conservative sport at the time tied to
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, it was very politicized and they were terrified
Speaker 1: that they would get destroyed if they were the only
Speaker 1: sports still standing, so they came like everybody else, even
Speaker 1: though to this day not one golfer has ever even
Speaker 1: gotten sick from COVID and UH and you know, as
Speaker 1: an outdoor sport with inherent social distancing, there was no
Speaker 1: reason why golf should not have maintain itself. And frankly,
Speaker 1: I think the most recent you know data would act
Speaker 1: what we've seen with college football this year. I think
Speaker 1: the entire notion that outdoor crowds are a threat is
Speaker 1: a complete myth, and golf, especially being as outdoors that
Speaker 1: can get I don't think could have should have even
Speaker 1: at any limitations on it self based upon COVID, and
Speaker 1: I don't think anybody would have ever been endangered by that.
Speaker 1: So sports played an incredibly important role and how we
Speaker 1: got here, and also in why it's we've been so
Speaker 1: slow to get out of this because the woke sports
Speaker 1: media and I don't understand this at all, and I
Speaker 1: the only thing that makes any sense to me is
Speaker 1: that it was all seen as in an election year,
Speaker 1: as as a way to get it Donald Trump. But
Speaker 1: the woke sports media went all in, all in on this,
Speaker 1: and you know, frankly, sports fans ought to be furious
Speaker 1: at the sports media. You know, these commercials and ESPN runs,
Speaker 1: well they say welcome back to college football, and they
Speaker 1: celebrate the fan. What a what a load of crap?
Speaker 1: That is ESPN openly campaigned for a over a year
Speaker 1: for you not to be allowed to go see us
Speaker 1: a sports event. And how they're gonna I mean so, um,
Speaker 1: I really do believe that sports played an incredibly erosive
Speaker 1: role here. And as far as how we get out
Speaker 1: of this, the reaction to Aaron Aaron Rodgers, We're never
Speaker 1: getting out of this, I mean, this thing is business
Speaker 1: forever in some realms. I mean, college football seems to
Speaker 1: be about the only place that it has mostly emerged
Speaker 1: from this. And um, and that's again it's it's largely
Speaker 1: before political reasons. It's only in the Deep South that politically,
Speaker 1: you know, these institutions are able to do this. And
Speaker 1: what's really shocking and usibly my last point before right
Speaker 1: shut up, I honestly thought that when you know, a
Speaker 1: good number of sports teams started to get back to normal,
Speaker 1: and they did so without incident that everyone else would follow.
Speaker 1: But that really hasn't been the case because, I guess
Speaker 1: because we're now living in a world where you have
Speaker 1: to signal your virtue by continuing with these restrictions, and
Speaker 1: if you don't, in certain areas, you're considered to be
Speaker 1: bad people, even though it has absolutely no science. Find
Speaker 1: it well, and John, it really is. And you brought
Speaker 1: up the South and that whole thing that the Dodgers,
Speaker 1: I was just some Dodger playoff games. They're playing the
Speaker 1: Atlanta Braves in the NLCS and and it's a totally
Speaker 1: different world in Atlanta going to a Major League Baseball
Speaker 1: game than Los Angeles. And and the Dodgers when they
Speaker 1: opened it up and they allowed people to to not
Speaker 1: wear masks, that lasted for a little while, and then
Speaker 1: you know, the politicians got involved in no, you gotta
Speaker 1: you gotta put the mass on. And of course, you know,
Speaker 1: being out there, John, it was mostly people to enter
Speaker 1: the stadium, you had to have the mask on. And
Speaker 1: then after that people pretty much did what people do
Speaker 1: and they took the mask off. And and live their
Speaker 1: life well to that point. I actually think that that
Speaker 1: college football, especially is the ultimate proof that most people
Speaker 1: don't really believe in masks, because if they did. Let's
Speaker 1: pretend people really believe that masks worked, right, you wouldn't
Speaker 1: you would see more than a handful of me that's
Speaker 1: in a back stadium with eighty thousand people. Yeah. But
Speaker 1: but but it's all about the politics. It's all about
Speaker 1: peer pressure. And when people are in a situation where
Speaker 1: the non maskers have control, they don't bother the mask
Speaker 1: because they feel no compulsion to do so, because they
Speaker 1: don't really believe in the science of it. They're just
Speaker 1: going along because they don't want to win yelling at them.
Speaker 1: That's what this is about and and the mask. But
Speaker 1: I am positive, I am positive that masks do nothing
Speaker 1: to hinder the spread of COVID. Now, now I've I've
Speaker 1: I've mentioned this and I've seen some of the data
Speaker 1: you've you've been outspoken about. Explain to the person listening now,
Speaker 1: because when I've said this in the past, I've gotten
Speaker 1: some pushback. So explain. You've actually seen the same numbers
Speaker 1: you've seen, probably more numbers than I've seen that there
Speaker 1: is no correlation, right that it is pretty much for
Speaker 1: theatrics to wear the mask for the most part, for
Speaker 1: most people. Right well, from every single angle, the mask
Speaker 1: the pro mask narrative makes no sense. First of all,
Speaker 1: before COVID, we had tons of studies on masks and
Speaker 1: the flu, which is the same type of virus as
Speaker 1: COVID is. It's not in most of the the cases, is
Speaker 1: not as bad, but it's the same. It's talking about
Speaker 1: the same animal. Here there are There were about a
Speaker 1: dozen studies Donne in the previous decade about masks and
Speaker 1: the flu. Not one of them showed any real impact
Speaker 1: of masks. And that was before this became politicized. This
Speaker 1: is why Dr Fauci said at the beginning of this
Speaker 1: whole thing, don't bother wearing a mask. Now he's completely
Speaker 1: lied about why he said that and what he said,
Speaker 1: and but that was the conventional wisdom before COVID. Let's
Speaker 1: under let's understand why that changed. It changed not because
Speaker 1: the science came in, not because because we suddenly had
Speaker 1: new data and here we have unprecedented amounts of data
Speaker 1: we've never had before over the last nineteen months. It
Speaker 1: changed because liberals in this country have changed. Now I'm
Speaker 1: not talking about Asia. Asia is completely different culturally, and
Speaker 1: Asia has been misinterpreted. But in this country, the mass
Speaker 1: became popular among the left as a virtue signal against
Speaker 1: Trump and a security blanket, that's what it was. And
Speaker 1: once they become deeply invested in that, there's no going back,
Speaker 1: deep emotional investment. And I'm a big believer, been huge believer,
Speaker 1: And I assume we're gonna get to this with regard
Speaker 1: to the Penn State case, which is a classic example
Speaker 1: of this, when when if something is true, then you
Speaker 1: must look at what you would expect to happen if
Speaker 1: that was true. And here we have this unprecedented amount
Speaker 1: of data for nineteen months. We've never done data like
Speaker 1: this ever before. So if mass actually worked, there would
Speaker 1: be O. J. Simpson level evidence of it by now
Speaker 1: O J. Simpson. Instead, there's nothing, nothing, there's and and frankly,
Speaker 1: here in southern California we have the best example of it.
Speaker 1: If you chart the rate of spread in Los Angeles
Speaker 1: County versus Orange County, which is are obviously butted against
Speaker 1: each other sat climate, you know the same basic everything.
Speaker 1: L A is a mass capital of the of the country.
Speaker 1: Orange County currently has no mash mandate. No one's wearing
Speaker 1: masks there. From the beginning, no one wore masks as
Speaker 1: much in Orange County as they did in l A County,
Speaker 1: caause Orange County is much less liberal. The chart is
Speaker 1: identical except for one thing. The case right in Orange
Speaker 1: County is always a little bit less than that of
Speaker 1: Los Angeles County, but it could not be more identical,
Speaker 1: which shows me that this whole thing, I actually believe
Speaker 1: what we do has very little impact over the spread
Speaker 1: of the virus. I think it's partially seasonal. I think
Speaker 1: it's parsonal. Actually luck or bad luck. The whole notion
Speaker 1: that we have have control over a virus is a fantasy. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's the idea that man can control nature. And and frankly,
Speaker 1: so much of this is as a result of liberal insanity.
Speaker 1: And you know, I'm I'm not a Trump guy. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm a conservative, but I'm not a Trump guy. And
Speaker 1: I just I just think so much of this was
Speaker 1: in reaction to liberals losing their minds in an election
Speaker 1: year when Donald Trump was was president well, and John
Speaker 1: the thing too about the last year and a half,
Speaker 1: the follow the science mantra which we hear so often
Speaker 1: in and I learned when I was in school that
Speaker 1: you know, there science is just people disagreeing. So it
Speaker 1: has totally become politicized. And you know, on both sides,
Speaker 1: people pick what they want and what they believe in,
Speaker 1: and they you can it's like doctor shopping, right, John.
Speaker 1: You find a scientist that will tell you what you
Speaker 1: want and then you just go with it. Science has
Speaker 1: become so politicized, and I find this to be a tragic,
Speaker 1: and it's so it's really a weapon. Follow the science
Speaker 1: is a weapon of the left. It's basically shut up. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, we we don't have the proof to back
Speaker 1: up our side, so we're just gonna rely on well
Speaker 1: all the scientists, say well, what what's the motivation of
Speaker 1: all the scientists? And again there's a relationship to this
Speaker 1: what happened at the Penn State when when all the
Speaker 1: experts are saying one thing on a controversial topic, nobody
Speaker 1: wants to go outside of that herd because if they
Speaker 1: go outside of that herd on a big topic, we're
Speaker 1: gonna get run over because there's an incentive of the
Speaker 1: herd to not have anyone embarrassed them. And you know
Speaker 1: this is a my My grandfather was a rather well
Speaker 1: known rocket scientist for the United States. Came over from
Speaker 1: Germany and Operation paper Clip, and his claim to fame
Speaker 1: was actually with regard to our first satellite in space.
Speaker 1: He told the Navy there was no gnass of the
Speaker 1: time he was working for the Army. He told the
Speaker 1: Navy that they were full the crap when it came
Speaker 1: to the way they were going to try to power
Speaker 1: our first satellite, and he fought like hell to put
Speaker 1: these things called solar panels on and they laughed at him. Well,
Speaker 1: within a few hours of our first satellite turned out
Speaker 1: the Navy was wrong, he was right. And the rest
Speaker 1: is history. I mean so unpopular positions throughout it, throughout
Speaker 1: the history of science have always turned out that are
Speaker 1: not always turned out, but often turned out to be
Speaker 1: the right way to go. And group think is always
Speaker 1: very dangerous and we have seen it here. And it's
Speaker 1: not about science. It's about politics, pure politics, not just
Speaker 1: the Democrat and Republican type of politics, but the politics
Speaker 1: of people who are within the science community. No one
Speaker 1: wants to lose their position in the cool kids table
Speaker 1: at school, that's what this is about. Be sure to
Speaker 1: catch live editions of The Ben Meller Show weekdays at
Speaker 1: two am Eastern eleven pm Pacific on Fox Sports Radio
Speaker 1: and the Radio. Well and also, John, it seems like
Speaker 1: you're on Twitter a lot, and I'm in their affair
Speaker 1: amount It's like that has so much power now, and
Speaker 1: you mentioned the group think, and you know, everyone wants
Speaker 1: to be involved with the cool kids and all that,
Speaker 1: but the the Twitter ROTI the wocaati that all get
Speaker 1: together on on Twitter, and and the media companies. You've
Speaker 1: been in the media business your your entire life. Here
Speaker 1: the amount of power that the algorithms have on what
Speaker 1: the news of the day is is insane and is
Speaker 1: here's another one of those questions, John, where I look
Speaker 1: at that and I've seen some of the studies about
Speaker 1: how how few people actually provide content the Twitter based
Speaker 1: on the amount of people you know, in America, for example,
Speaker 1: here we talked about, you know, many people actually contribute.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of people that are on there that
Speaker 1: don't actually add to the conversation. But media companies, and
Speaker 1: you know, I work for you one in particular, and
Speaker 1: and the some other big ones, they just whatever Twitter
Speaker 1: says that goal with it, like that's the gospel. Is
Speaker 1: there any getting back from that? They've given so much power.
Speaker 1: I couldn't agree with you more that Twitter has extraordinarily
Speaker 1: outsized power in driving the narrative. And you know, especially
Speaker 1: now that Trump has gone from Twitter, and I'm assuming
Speaker 1: many of his supporters are too, It's it is unbelievable.
Speaker 1: I mean, they have a stranglehold on the narrative of Twitter.
Speaker 1: And you know, media members love Twitter. Why because it's
Speaker 1: one of the few places well, frankly, all comes down
Speaker 1: to this. On Twitter, especially woke media members can get
Speaker 1: lots of affirmation and love at any moment. All they
Speaker 1: have to do is tweet out some you know, some
Speaker 1: PC bullcrap and they're gonna get thousands of bread tweets
Speaker 1: and they will get affirmation and love. And that's what
Speaker 1: they want. And on Twitter, the media because they're all
Speaker 1: got blue check marks. I mean, how even I have
Speaker 1: a blue checkmark? The the that's this is a place
Speaker 1: where they are deemed to be important people and they
Speaker 1: get respect and their opinion is deemed matter and so
Speaker 1: this is why they love it, and therefore they publicize
Speaker 1: it more and it becomes you know, the symbiotic relationship.
Speaker 1: And I think you're exactly right that the number of
Speaker 1: people that are actually driving this as a percentage of
Speaker 1: the population is minuscule, which is why we see, you know,
Speaker 1: the election results in Virginia last week be so completely
Speaker 1: different than you know what the world the Twitter would
Speaker 1: have indicated. Yeah, and I use the analogy, you know,
Speaker 1: dealing with Twitter, mostly in the sports world, but just
Speaker 1: in general, it's like the matrix. You don't know what's
Speaker 1: real and what's not, and you know, you the algorithms,
Speaker 1: the bots that are on there. It is a wild
Speaker 1: world in that space. And yet again, the major media
Speaker 1: companies love it. And as you said, the meat you
Speaker 1: people like it too. Well. It's easy also, right, Uh.
Speaker 1: As a reporter, if you needed to get feedback from
Speaker 1: somebody for a story, a quote for a story, you'd
Speaker 1: have to go out and chase people down. Now you
Speaker 1: can just go on Twitter on your phone and get
Speaker 1: comments from random people and put that in your story
Speaker 1: and boom, you're done. Right, You're you're good to go.
Speaker 1: You can wash your hands with it and move on
Speaker 1: to the next one. So uh, yeah, I wanted to
Speaker 1: move over that now I love documentaries, John, I am
Speaker 1: obsessed with documentaries. I love that you're making documentaries. You
Speaker 1: but this Penn State story, which you have been all
Speaker 1: over and you talked about your past, But why this story?
Speaker 1: You are known as the Pen Steak Guy. I was
Speaker 1: talking to a friend of mine and I I said, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna have John Zigler on the on the podcast. Oh
Speaker 1: he's the Penn Steak guy. You're the Penn Steak Guy. John.
Speaker 1: You've become that you've been all over this story for
Speaker 1: ten years. Uh. While you know most other people have
Speaker 1: moved on, you have stuck with it. You've got a
Speaker 1: podcast that you've done, You've written a number of stories.
Speaker 1: One of the reasons I wanted to have you on here,
Speaker 1: and your latest alumn you wrote about your experience ten
Speaker 1: years almost You have been all over the Penn State
Speaker 1: story and you have a very unpopular opinion for a
Speaker 1: lot of people that they don't want to hear what
Speaker 1: you have to say about this because it goes against
Speaker 1: everything that was reported ten years ago. But for those
Speaker 1: that don't know, maybe the one or two people listening
Speaker 1: that don't know the back store in this, John, explain
Speaker 1: how you fell down this rabbit hole with Penn State.
Speaker 1: It's crazy. Um, this is the most extraordinary experience of
Speaker 1: my life and career. In many ways, it has been
Speaker 1: the most interesting. It's also been the most excruciating. It's
Speaker 1: been the best work of my career. But it's also
Speaker 1: something that I wish I had never done. And I
Speaker 1: think it tells a lot about the times in which
Speaker 1: we live, which is why this story is way bigger
Speaker 1: than just the Penn State scandal. Obviously, what people know
Speaker 1: is that Jerry Zandowski was arrested on child sex abuse charges,
Speaker 1: and then a few days later, ten years ago this week,
Speaker 1: Joe Paterno was fired on a cell phone just before
Speaker 1: his last home game to Stetory. Had become the winner's
Speaker 1: coach and history of college football. The president university, Grand Spaniard,
Speaker 1: was also fired. Two Pence State administrators were effectively also fired,
Speaker 1: and they were charged. The three administrators ended up going
Speaker 1: to jail for two months. Jerry Sandusky is still in
Speaker 1: jail and almost certainly will die in jail. And I
Speaker 1: have no connection Defense State. I grew up in suburban Philadelphia,
Speaker 1: not really that close to State College, but I was
Speaker 1: a Notre Dame fan growing up I went to Georgetown University,
Speaker 1: but I know the news media better than anybody on
Speaker 1: the planet, especially now. Even back in two thousand eleven,
Speaker 1: I knew the news media very well, and I knew
Speaker 1: that this was the case, that they were extraordinarily vulnerable,
Speaker 1: especially under the perfect storm circumstances in the middle of
Speaker 1: a moral panic of blowing. I also have an extraordinary
Speaker 1: BS detector. And this story never made a damn bit
Speaker 1: of sense, not from the Sandosky perspective. I did not
Speaker 1: go into this thinking, all right, Jerry Sandusky must be innocent.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna exonerate Jerry Sandusky. That was the
Speaker 1: first thing from my mind. I was talking about the
Speaker 1: Joe paternal angle on this. It made no sense and
Speaker 1: it's a completely nonsensical story for anybody who understands sports.
Speaker 1: I mean, I had coached high school football in two
Speaker 1: different states, covered college and pro football at a very
Speaker 1: high level. I know the culture of football, I know
Speaker 1: the culture of Penn State that I frankly, just from
Speaker 1: a human perspective, none of this story made any damn sense.
Speaker 1: Now that doesn't mean it doesn't true. You know, j
Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense that though j Simpson would kill
Speaker 1: two people, but there's a ton of evidence though j
Speaker 1: Simpson killed two people, ton of it, and there was
Speaker 1: no evidence here that made any sense. And so I
Speaker 1: started getting involved, and at first it was from the
Speaker 1: perspective of Joe Paterno, and it was became very obvious,
Speaker 1: very early that that the idea of that Joe paternal
Speaker 1: participated in the cover up for Jerry Sonduski was absurd,
Speaker 1: completely absurd, and even the prosecutor in the case eventually
Speaker 1: told h e oh that he didn't believe that that happened. Uh,
Speaker 1: And the media course ignored that because they already had
Speaker 1: their narrative and Joe Paterno was dead at that point. Long,
Speaker 1: long story short. I kept digging and digging and digging
Speaker 1: because Joe Paterno on his deathbed said just find out
Speaker 1: what the truth is, and nobody seemed to be interested
Speaker 1: in what the truth of this was. And I wanted
Speaker 1: to find a narrative that actually had some evidence behind
Speaker 1: it and made some damn sense, And eventually I ended
Speaker 1: up an interviewing Jayson Dusky in prison twice for a
Speaker 1: total of six hours. I want on the Today Show
Speaker 1: to do high profile interviews with Matt Lawer not once,
Speaker 1: but twice, the second one with Doddie Sandusky back in,
Speaker 1: and eventually I became completely, totally, one hundred percent convinced,
Speaker 1: without a shred of doubt against my own self interest.
Speaker 1: But not only was Joe Paterno innocent, not only were
Speaker 1: the administrators innocent, but the only way to make this
Speaker 1: story fit at all, that make the puzzle pieces of
Speaker 1: this story fit was that Jerry Sandusky is also innocent.
Speaker 1: And it's not even close. And we created a podcast
Speaker 1: called With the Benefit of Hindsight, which is an epic
Speaker 1: journey through the real story of what really happened here.
Speaker 1: It's twenty one episode. Is It Ends? As we just
Speaker 1: posted a couple of days ago with a four hour
Speaker 1: exclusive interview with the former president of the Penn State,
Speaker 1: Graham Spaniard. We have two of the administrators who went
Speaker 1: to jail on the podcast, both of whom make it
Speaker 1: very clear that they believe that Jerry Sandusky is in
Speaker 1: fact innocent, which is shocking and should be national news.
Speaker 1: But the news media doesn't work that way anymore. And
Speaker 1: the evidence that we have accumulated both in breaking down
Speaker 1: the convention wisdom of this case and telling you what
Speaker 1: actually really did happen is extraordinary. It's it's it's I
Speaker 1: mean people who have no connection to me, who have
Speaker 1: fallen on on the podcast with the benefit of hindsight,
Speaker 1: I'd say we've had hundreds and hundreds of people, not
Speaker 1: thousands of contact me to say this is the greatest
Speaker 1: podcast they've ever heard and they don't even really have
Speaker 1: any connection to Penn State. Uh and uh and in
Speaker 1: it extraordinary achievement, But it's not gonna do any good
Speaker 1: because the news media as their narrative and once they're
Speaker 1: this invested, they're never going back. They're never going back
Speaker 1: because they put too many chips down on this one.
Speaker 1: Then and and and um and I'm telling you it's
Speaker 1: not close. I'm telling you, But Jo, what was the moment,
Speaker 1: because you know a lot of people might be listening
Speaker 1: to the same What are you doing Jerry Sanduski's you know,
Speaker 1: he molested children, He's in jail for the rest of
Speaker 1: his life. Here, what are you saying because you talked
Speaker 1: to him, and yet what was the thing that led you?
Speaker 1: Was there one thing in particular other than talking to
Speaker 1: Jerry Sandusky and his wife that we let may be clear.
Speaker 1: Let maybe it's a great question, because I'm gonna be clear.
Speaker 1: I didn't talk to Jerry. Sanduski gets snowed. I'm just checking.
Speaker 1: I'm just checking John. I just want there were there
Speaker 1: were uh two hundred data points before I even talked
Speaker 1: to Jerry, and then there and then after I talked
Speaker 1: to Jerry the first time I didn't. I went out
Speaker 1: of the prison that day saying, oh my god, please
Speaker 1: don't let him be innocent. Please don't let him be innocent,
Speaker 1: because I know this is going to ruin my life,
Speaker 1: because I know myself well enough to know I'm not
Speaker 1: going to be level able to let this go. Because
Speaker 1: I'm the only one in the position to tell this story.
Speaker 1: I don't want this. So I spent a year trying
Speaker 1: to prove him guilty, Ben and I couldn't do it
Speaker 1: because there's no damn evidence and everything he told me
Speaker 1: checked out a thousand percent. And then I got deeper
Speaker 1: and deeper and deeper, and it's not close. This this
Speaker 1: story is absurd, and we you asked, Okay, what was
Speaker 1: the moment. There's so many moments, But you know, Malcolm
Speaker 1: Gladwell wrote a book called Talking to Strangers, the best seller.
Speaker 1: He's a very famous author and Talking to Strangers best
Speaker 1: seller book. There's a chapter, chapter five in there, which
Speaker 1: basically deals with my work on this case, and glad
Speaker 1: Well goes right up to the precipice of saying Sandusky
Speaker 1: is innocent, but doesn't have the courage to do so.
Speaker 1: I think he actually changed his mind of the publisher
Speaker 1: changed there his mind at the last minute. But one
Speaker 1: of the key pieces of information in that chapter is
Speaker 1: maybe the biggest revelation that we have found, and there's
Speaker 1: been there's so many of these it's hard to know
Speaker 1: for sure. But for me, this whole story starts, and
Speaker 1: this is the first episode of our podcast with the
Speaker 1: benefit of hindsight. It all starts with the date of
Speaker 1: the Mike mcquerie episode. You know, to me, you're you're
Speaker 1: gonna make an allegation as Mike mcquery did that. I
Speaker 1: you know, I witnessed Jerryson Dusky. He's actually assaulting a
Speaker 1: young boy in a Penn State shower. The first thing
Speaker 1: you want to know is, Okay, when did this happen?
Speaker 1: The vast majority of people, even media members, ben don't
Speaker 1: know that. When he testified for the first time, and
Speaker 1: this was reported widely ten years ago. This week he
Speaker 1: said that this happened on March one of two thousand
Speaker 1: and two, and that's you know, that was the date
Speaker 1: that Joe Paterno thought this happened when he died a
Speaker 1: couple of months after the scandal. But then very qui
Speaker 1: lightly and the media was very diligent about covering this up.
Speaker 1: Just before Jerry Sinowski's trial, the prosecution had to announce, um, oops, um,
Speaker 1: Mike got the date, the month, and the year wrong,
Speaker 1: because now we have emails that prove when he went
Speaker 1: to go see Joe Paterno, and so now we are surmising,
Speaker 1: based upon those emails, does this actually happened in February
Speaker 1: February ninth of the year before two thousand one, thirteen
Speaker 1: months before what had been widely reported. When Paterno got fired,
Speaker 1: Spaniard got fired, all firestorms started. And my my reaction was, Woa, woa,
Speaker 1: woo woo woo woo, woa, We're gonna put all of
Speaker 1: this on a story that's ten years old, where we
Speaker 1: have no accuser at this point none. The media just
Speaker 1: ignored that part of this and where the witness this
Speaker 1: during incredibly dramatic event. He can't tell you the date,
Speaker 1: the month, or the year in which had happened. And
Speaker 1: then it gets better, And this is where I made
Speaker 1: my biggest screw up of the entire case. I should
Speaker 1: have been able to figure out that even that second
Speaker 1: date was wrong very early on in my investigation. But
Speaker 1: even I felt like, there's no possible way the prosecution
Speaker 1: could get this so wrong twice, but they did. The
Speaker 1: second date is a fabrication. Mike mcquerie did not witnessed
Speaker 1: this event on February ninth of two thousand one, and
Speaker 1: then go see Joe Paterno on the next morning. That's
Speaker 1: not what happened. He saw this, or witness this whatever.
Speaker 1: It was a shower with a boy, and that's a
Speaker 1: whole different story who the boy was on December twenty nine,
Speaker 1: two thousand. I've now proven that Malcolm Gladwell believes. I've
Speaker 1: proven that Gary Schultz, the administrator, believes. I've proven that
Speaker 1: Grand Span of the President believes. I've proven that Jerry
Speaker 1: Sandusky believes. I've proven that because even he couldn't remember
Speaker 1: what the date was, he just knew that the prosecution's
Speaker 1: date was wrong. And the reason why that's so critical,
Speaker 1: then is it? Now there's a six week gap, six
Speaker 1: weeks in the time that this happens, and Mike mcquery
Speaker 1: first reports it, not to the police but to Joe
Speaker 1: Paternal in the morning in February ten, two thousand one.
Speaker 1: And then here's the kicker. What happened on February uh
Speaker 1: the day before he goes to see Joe paternal Sebury nine,
Speaker 1: two thousand one. What what might have been the trigger
Speaker 1: for why Mike McQuary goes to see Joe paternal Not
Speaker 1: this six weeks old witnessing of Jerry in a shower
Speaker 1: with a boy. No, the job that Mike mcquery wanted,
Speaker 1: the wide receiver's coaching job opens up at Penn State
Speaker 1: when Kenny Jackson leaves Penn State to go to the
Speaker 1: Pittsburgh's Dealers. It's in the paper the morning of February ninth,
Speaker 1: two thousand and then, Whailah, Just by coincidence, Mike McQuary
Speaker 1: goes to see Joe Paterno on February tenth. That morning.
Speaker 1: He's not going there to tell him, oh my god, Joe,
Speaker 1: I saw Jerry Zudoski raping a boy last night. He's
Speaker 1: going there to see what or not he can get
Speaker 1: the Kenny Jackson job and the oh, by the way, coach,
Speaker 1: I saw Jerry in a in a shower with a boy.
Speaker 1: It made me uncomfortable. You might want to talk to
Speaker 1: him about it. That was the afterthought of what happened,
Speaker 1: and all the evidence supports that scenario. And when the
Speaker 1: Mike mcquery episode disintegrates into not a rape of a boy,
Speaker 1: but of Jerry Sandusky showering after a workout with a
Speaker 1: thirteen year old he thought of as a son by
Speaker 1: the name of Alan Myers, whose own testimony is very
Speaker 1: clear that nothing bad ever happened between him and Jerry Zandusky,
Speaker 1: then now all of a sudden, the pillar of the
Speaker 1: case has just been disintegrated and the case falls apart
Speaker 1: from there. And that's really the key element of this
Speaker 1: or people to understand. Once you understand the Mike mcquery
Speaker 1: episode was a fabrication, then you understand that the rest
Speaker 1: of this case and in an incredible easy fashion and
Speaker 1: a domino effect of of a perfect storm of panic
Speaker 1: and injustice. All right, So then the question would be,
Speaker 1: if that's the case, and you've been investigating this, why
Speaker 1: would there not be some kind of opening up of
Speaker 1: the case again and looking it over, because, as you said,
Speaker 1: Jerry Sanduski is likely going to to die in in jail.
Speaker 1: If if what you're saying is accurate and this is
Speaker 1: all all checks out, why couldn't they go back and
Speaker 1: open up Because that's not There's a couple of reasons. One,
Speaker 1: that's not the way this system works. That's not the
Speaker 1: way the legal system works. In order for Jerry Sandowski
Speaker 1: to get a new trial, they have to prove a
Speaker 1: constitutional issue with the due process of the first trial. Now,
Speaker 1: in a irrational world, that would be incredibly easy. I
Speaker 1: have to tell you, even if Jerry Sandowski was guilty,
Speaker 1: even if he was guilty, his trial was such an
Speaker 1: unbelievable joke that if it was not a famous case,
Speaker 1: if there was not politics involved, a new trial would
Speaker 1: have been a faded complete I mean, I've I've watched
Speaker 1: a hundred date lines where people get new trials based
Speaker 1: upon one one thousands of the due process issues that
Speaker 1: were involved in Jerry Sandowski's trial. But here's where the
Speaker 1: perfect storm comes in. In Pennsylvania, all the judges are elected,
Speaker 1: and because of the politics of this case, because of
Speaker 1: the media coverage of this case. Any judge that orders
Speaker 1: a new trial for Jerry Sandowski is effectively ending their career,
Speaker 1: and Jerry Sanowski's lawyer himself has been shocked time and
Speaker 1: time again. People don't even understand Jerry is still appealing
Speaker 1: on a regular basis that never happens in a serial
Speaker 1: child molester case. You I would I defy anyone to
Speaker 1: find me a serial child molester case with no pornography,
Speaker 1: no confession, no plea bargain, and where the person who
Speaker 1: end up getting convicted is still appealing vigorously with no money,
Speaker 1: no political capital, ten years later. That never ever, ever,
Speaker 1: ever happens. And the reason why it's happening in this
Speaker 1: case is because you have an innocent man who has
Speaker 1: no other choice. He's fighting for his life and he
Speaker 1: doesn't understand because he's very naive that he that he
Speaker 1: will never getting fair shake in Pennsylvania because of the
Speaker 1: politics involved, because everyone is so deeply invested in this
Speaker 1: fairy tale. That's why this cannot be reversed. I have
Speaker 1: urged him, and other people close to him, including his lawyer,
Speaker 1: have urged him to go to federal court. But if
Speaker 1: he goes to federal court and he loses. His life
Speaker 1: is over because now he has nothing to do, he
Speaker 1: has nothing to focus on, he has no hope I have.
Speaker 1: I've given this analogy to his family. I think it's
Speaker 1: a good one. In state court, he can keep going
Speaker 1: back and appealing basically every six months or a year.
Speaker 1: So basically, for the rest of Jerry Sanduski's life, he
Speaker 1: gets to run a fourth and seventy five play, you know,
Speaker 1: every six months or a year. He's never gonna make
Speaker 1: that fourth and seventy five, but he gets to keep trying.
Speaker 1: If he goes to federal court, he gets one shot
Speaker 1: at fourth and six, and if he misses the fourth
Speaker 1: and six, his life is over. And he cannot handle
Speaker 1: that from a psychological standpoint. So that's the answer to
Speaker 1: your question. Be sure to catch live editions of The
Speaker 1: Ben Miller Show weekdays at two a m. Eastern eleven
Speaker 1: p m. Pacific. So, John, you've done the podcast talking
Speaker 1: about this, You've covered it. What is next for you
Speaker 1: on this st are you? Are you done with the
Speaker 1: Penn State story and now has been ten years. Are
Speaker 1: you going to continue to follow this or are you
Speaker 1: just gonna move on to something else? What's the plan here, Well,
Speaker 1: I still want people to listen to our podcast with
Speaker 1: the benefit of hindsight. It's a remarkable historical document. You
Speaker 1: don't even have to care about the Penn State case
Speaker 1: to be interested in the podcast. It tells you so
Speaker 1: much about the nature of our media, the nature of
Speaker 1: our our system, the nature of humanity. By the way,
Speaker 1: I've had a lot of people tell me this organical,
Speaker 1: and I did this on purpose. I actually think you
Speaker 1: can understand a lot about our reaction to COVID, as
Speaker 1: I've already implied in this interview, by by listening to
Speaker 1: this podcast. I mean, the parallels are remarkable, you know,
Speaker 1: the the reaction to everything in a panic, the politics,
Speaker 1: the propaganda, the emotional investment, the lack of evidence supporting
Speaker 1: what we're doing. But there's no way to get out
Speaker 1: of this, and there's so many comparisons, So I really
Speaker 1: want people to check out with the benefit of hindsight.
Speaker 1: I um fully acknowledge that that the ten year marked
Speaker 1: for me psychologically. I was spen pointing as the time
Speaker 1: when I I end this for me. Um you know,
Speaker 1: there there are a couple of things that were supposed
Speaker 1: to happen on the tenth anniversary that have been delayed.
Speaker 1: ESPN is has been planning a special I have no
Speaker 1: faith in them at all, but those who have been
Speaker 1: interviewed for it say that it's far more pro paternal
Speaker 1: than anything LS ESPN has ever done before. And there's
Speaker 1: a mainstream news media, let a print outlet that's been
Speaker 1: investigating this case or two years from what seems to
Speaker 1: be a very pro Jerry Zandowski perspective. For some reason,
Speaker 1: they have not hit the tenth anniversary. So unfortunately, those
Speaker 1: are gonna still hang over my head, as you know,
Speaker 1: some semblance of hope that theoretically something might change, even
Speaker 1: though I have grave skepticism about that. But I have
Speaker 1: to tell you my experience in this case, combined with
Speaker 1: my experience with COVID, combined with having gone through the
Speaker 1: Trump era, I'm now at the point where I don't
Speaker 1: even know why I bothered to be part of the
Speaker 1: public discourse, because we're now living in a world where
Speaker 1: truth means nothing. In fact, when I ended the documentary
Speaker 1: film I did about the Penn State case back at
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve, called The Framing of Joe Paternal you
Speaker 1: can find it for free at YouTube, I end the
Speaker 1: documentary by saying, one of these we're gonna fight out
Speaker 1: in this case is whether or not the truth still matters?
Speaker 1: And uh, And here we are now nine years after that,
Speaker 1: and at least we now know the truth does not matter.
Speaker 1: The truth does not matter in today's world. And I'm
Speaker 1: a truth guy. I am not a you know, give
Speaker 1: you what you want to hear for to make me
Speaker 1: popular guy. That's what sells in the media now, the
Speaker 1: coin of the realm, and the media used to be
Speaker 1: mostly truth. Now it's all popularity. It's all tell people
Speaker 1: what they want to hear. And there's there's reasons why
Speaker 1: that happened once. I'm happy to go into if you're interested,
Speaker 1: But the reality is that's the case. And you know,
Speaker 1: I don't know what I'm gonna do, but there's a
Speaker 1: there's a reasonable chance that in the next few weeks
Speaker 1: or whatever, a month, you may never hear from me again.
Speaker 1: I may just go off the grid and just say
Speaker 1: screw it, because it's just it's just not worth it
Speaker 1: to me. I just don't have is This has never
Speaker 1: been a money making endeavor for me. It's not about
Speaker 1: making a living. And now you can't even tell the
Speaker 1: truth in any platform or forum that that makes any
Speaker 1: difference if it doesn't fit with what the corporate media wants. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: and John, I mean I just to follow that up.
Speaker 1: I mean, the thing we deal with it a lot
Speaker 1: in the sports world, but in politics it's even worse.
Speaker 1: It's tribalism, right, It's like you gotta give the give
Speaker 1: the red meat to the people that you know need
Speaker 1: the red meat, and not you know, not give them
Speaker 1: anything other than that. And you know, it's it's become
Speaker 1: even worse over the last like five ten years, it's
Speaker 1: gotten completely out of the media is now all about
Speaker 1: finding a tribe that fits you know, who you are,
Speaker 1: and then feeding that tribe what they want. That's what
Speaker 1: this is, which is the exact opposite of what journalism
Speaker 1: is supposed to be. And I don't believe journalism was
Speaker 1: ever perfect, but it was a lot better than it
Speaker 1: is now, that's for sure. Well, you mentioned you mentioned
Speaker 1: John and your in your column that you wrote h
Speaker 1: the latest column about the Penn State story, and I'm
Speaker 1: sure you mentioned this on the on the the podcast
Speaker 1: you did that the modern media, Uh, it's it's you
Speaker 1: compared it to the movie industry, right, the way that
Speaker 1: they handle things in media today. Can you expand on that?
Speaker 1: And because I I think that was a thank you,
Speaker 1: thank you for pointing that out, because I do think
Speaker 1: it's true. You know, movies, and I know here we
Speaker 1: are in Los Angeles and Pensiltown, the movies, even movies
Speaker 1: that were about true stories, they used to at least
Speaker 1: say based on a true story, right, and now the
Speaker 1: dramatic license has gotten so ridiculous that basically it's just
Speaker 1: based on theoretical stuff that might have been true, probably wasn't.
Speaker 1: But you know what makes a great story. I mean
Speaker 1: that that's that's the new standard in Hollywood for a
Speaker 1: supposed non fiction movie. Well, the news media is following
Speaker 1: that model. Is all now about narrative. What's the most
Speaker 1: compelling narrative we can find? So so we're gonna cobble
Speaker 1: together these fun means what seemed to be facts. We
Speaker 1: don't even know if they're really facts, but they're you know,
Speaker 1: fact ish, and we're gonna cobble these together, and we're
Speaker 1: gonna get cocked the narrative that is most salacious and
Speaker 1: best for us in that moment. And we've seen this
Speaker 1: constantly and you know, I think again, I'm not a
Speaker 1: trunk guy, but I think the media did that with
Speaker 1: the Trump Russia investigation. I mean, all you know, basically
Speaker 1: Trump was a Manchurian candidate, right because they cobbled together, um,
Speaker 1: you know, some of these things that seemed to be facts.
Speaker 1: And I think Trump actually did some things wrong with
Speaker 1: reguard to to Russia, but he's clearly not a Manchurian candidate.
Speaker 1: We've seen it in so many other situations. I mean,
Speaker 1: this keeps happening, you know. I've often said that the
Speaker 1: Penn State cases that commonents, Like if I was pitching
Speaker 1: in as a movie, it's basically Faraknos meets Jesse small
Speaker 1: Act meets man Ti Teo meets Duke Lacrosse. I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean that's basically me what it is. Um And
Speaker 1: it keeps happening because the media falls in love with narrative,
Speaker 1: and then once they fall in love, there's no going
Speaker 1: back because, as we've seen with COVID, nobody ever wants
Speaker 1: to admit they were wrong. It's amazing. I mean, I'm
Speaker 1: the only guy and I know that I admit I'm
Speaker 1: wrong all the time. I frankly, as a married guy,
Speaker 1: I thought that came a second nature. You admit you're
Speaker 1: wrong constantly. I mean, but it's just amazing to me
Speaker 1: that no one ever wants to admit that they were wrong.
Speaker 1: We all got it wrong about Penn State, and it
Speaker 1: created a massive injustice to destroy the lives of five
Speaker 1: really good men, and an institution's reputation was destroyed forever,
Speaker 1: and a lot of other people got hurt tangentially. But
Speaker 1: this story is much bigger than that, because if it
Speaker 1: can happen to them, it can happen to anybody. And
Speaker 1: it shows us so much about what is wrong with
Speaker 1: our culture. And frankly, I don't think it's gonna get
Speaker 1: any better. I think it's only gonna get worse. It's
Speaker 1: also it's also human nature, though, right, I mean, people,
Speaker 1: you know basic marketing. I remember taking a marketing class
Speaker 1: back in in college and they said, you gotta get
Speaker 1: kids early. That's why the happy meal is so successful,
Speaker 1: is because once somebody makes their mind up that something's
Speaker 1: good or bad or right or wrong, they don't Nobody
Speaker 1: wants to change their mind. But it is even worse
Speaker 1: now than you know, at any other point I in
Speaker 1: my life anyway, I don't know before that. But it's
Speaker 1: and and there's a lot of reasons why it happened,
Speaker 1: why it can't be fixed. But a large part of
Speaker 1: this has to do with fragmentation of the news media.
Speaker 1: Because we you know, back in the in the in
Speaker 1: the era where we had four television stations and it
Speaker 1: was a license to print money to own a newspaper
Speaker 1: or radio station. No one needed to do this. You
Speaker 1: didn't have to create the fictional movie. You could actually
Speaker 1: run the real movie and it would make movie, It
Speaker 1: would make money. You see where I'm going is you
Speaker 1: didn't have to juice it. Now you have to juice
Speaker 1: said because everyone is so desperate for every scrap of
Speaker 1: ratings they can get, because the business model is broken.
Speaker 1: That's the heart of a problem. And um, and you know,
Speaker 1: Penn State really was the first major story that made
Speaker 1: this abundantly clear. You know, I will now forever, based
Speaker 1: upon what's happened this year, I will now refer to
Speaker 1: Penn State as the first let's go Brandon story. I mean,
Speaker 1: where where the news media it didn't matter. I mean,
Speaker 1: I I truly believe, I truly believe that to this day.
Speaker 1: A couple of the major accusers in this case could
Speaker 1: come forward, They could do an interview saying we lied
Speaker 1: for money. Jerry Zudoski never abused us, and the media
Speaker 1: would report that they said, let's go Brandon. That's what
Speaker 1: they would do. That's hilarious. Hey, John, listen, I love
Speaker 1: you for doing this man, Thank you so much. You
Speaker 1: are I love your enthusiasm, your passion as uh as
Speaker 1: I told you earlier, but continued success. And how can
Speaker 1: people follow you if they want to read your column
Speaker 1: and you've obviously made a bunch of documentaries and whatnot,
Speaker 1: and you're all over Twitter. Yeah, the best place to
Speaker 1: find me is on Twitter. And my Twitter feed is
Speaker 1: is a terrible handle. It's zigmn freud z e I
Speaker 1: g m A n freud um. Or just look up
Speaker 1: for John John Sigler z I E g l e
Speaker 1: r uh and everything I do you can find there.
Speaker 1: Although our our website for the With the Benefit of
Speaker 1: Findsight podcast is www dot Framing Paterno dot com. You
Speaker 1: can find all the raw interviews. We did dozens of
Speaker 1: hours of raw interviews, but we that's how transparent we are.
Speaker 1: We put out the raw unedited interviews we did for
Speaker 1: this podcast at Framing Paterno dot com. Awesome. Thank you, John,
Speaker 1: appreciate it. Thanks Man,