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Speaker 1: Uh, Superintendent Dalmers, welcome. I hope you're prepared for an

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Speaker 1: unforgettable lungeon.

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Speaker 2: Why is there strom out coming out of your ibncmire.

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Speaker 1: Oh, I didn't smoke. It's steam steamed from the steamed clams.

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Speaker 1: We're having steam claims.

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Speaker 3: I'm John Cipher and I'm Jerry o'she.

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Speaker 4: I served in the CIA's Clandestine Service for twenty eight years,

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Speaker 4: living undercover all around the.

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Speaker 5: World, and in my thirty three years with the CIA,

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Speaker 5: I served in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East.

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Speaker 4: Although we don't usually look at it this way, we

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Speaker 4: created conspiracies.

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Speaker 5: In our operations. We got people to believe things that

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Speaker 5: weren't true.

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Speaker 4: Now we're investigating the conspiracy theories we see in the

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Speaker 4: news almost every day.

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Speaker 5: We'll break them down for you to determine whether they

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Speaker 5: could be real or whether we're being manipulated.

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Speaker 4: Welcome to Mission Implausible. Welcome back. Good to see you, guys.

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Speaker 2: Good to see you.

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Speaker 5: I'm here too, guys, I know because I can see you.

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Speaker 5: Good to see you, John and Adam. What high jinks

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Speaker 5: are we getting up to today? Adam, you must have

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Speaker 5: some cheese stories, right.

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Speaker 6: Vermont is a hotbed of Cheese Innovation and Cheddar Innovation,

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Speaker 6: and my good friends at Grafton Village Cheese have just

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Speaker 6: created the first cow sheep milk hybrid cheddar.

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Speaker 3: Grafton Village Cheeses. Use code Adam twenty two for ten

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Speaker 3: percent off your first order.

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Speaker 5: Do you know that main cheese that they were going

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Speaker 5: to be selling in Israel? But apparently it doesn't translate

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Speaker 5: into Hebrew very well, so they had to change the

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Speaker 5: name when they were going to sell it, and Adam,

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Speaker 5: do you know what the name they use for it is?

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Speaker 7: Oh?

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Speaker 5: No, no, So I'm selling it in Israel now, so

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Speaker 5: they're calling it Cheeses of Nanzrith. The only thing sillier

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Speaker 5: at this conversation is like the Simpsons.

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Speaker 3: Oh, it's funny you mentioned the Simpsons, because I think

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Speaker 3: I'm the biggest Simpsons fan of all of us. I

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Speaker 3: actually remember watching the very first episode live when it

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Speaker 3: was on. Look Dad, it's Santa's little helper.

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Speaker 7: Oh, I keep him gob true, but.

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Speaker 1: He's a loser. Heat.

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Speaker 3: But that aic Heat.

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Speaker 6: The Simpson.

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Speaker 3: And years later I had the pleasure of working comedy

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Speaker 3: and finding myself crossing paths with all the Simpsons writers

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Speaker 3: and directors.

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Speaker 4: I think much more highly of you now because I'm

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Speaker 4: a big fan of the Simpsons too.

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Speaker 6: I love the Simpsons very much, and I've tried to

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Speaker 6: interest my son.

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Speaker 2: It just doesn't what he's turned to.

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Speaker 4: You onto the Celtics, But you can't turn him onto.

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Speaker 6: I can't turn them onto the Simpsons, not yet anyway.

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Speaker 3: So I can't say this for a fact, but I

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Speaker 3: feel like the Simpsons invented the Easter Egg. And so

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Speaker 3: if you watch The Simpsons and you want to watch

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Speaker 3: the episode the second time or a third time, you're

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Speaker 3: always finding these little visual jokes in the background and

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Speaker 3: a sign. And it really became the thing where you

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Speaker 3: pause and you put in slow motion because you want

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Speaker 3: to pick up all these little jokes. But that's the

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Speaker 3: perfect situation to think that you're seeing special messages that

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Speaker 3: aren't there just for comedy. Could you explain to me

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Speaker 3: the conspiracy theory about the Simpsons we're about to discuss, as.

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Speaker 5: I understand it is that CIA has recruited Matt Groening

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Speaker 5: and these writers as a way to either a telegraph

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Speaker 5: its predictions of the future that it's making, or b

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Speaker 5: it's to use this to somehow subvert American society.

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Speaker 4: I think people when they hear intelligence, they assume that

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Speaker 4: it's a predictive agency collect the That's your job of

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Speaker 4: the CIA is to go to the president say China's

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Speaker 4: going to collapse next year and there's going to be

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Speaker 4: who when in fact, as you and I know, intelligence

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Speaker 4: isn't really about prediction, even with perfect information, it's impossible

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Speaker 4: in this complex world to predict things. It's more about

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Speaker 4: providing as much information to help policymakers make smart decisions.

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Speaker 3: And so the reason The Simpsons is the focus of

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Speaker 3: this conspiracy theory is because The Simpsons has apparently predicted

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Speaker 3: so many things, and so many important things that it

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Speaker 3: stands out. But the most famous prediction was in a

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Speaker 3: two thousand episode titled Bart to the Future. Bart thinks

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Speaker 3: about the future, he envisions Lisa Simpson as president.

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Speaker 7: As you know, we've inherited quite a budget crunch from

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Speaker 7: President Trump. How bad is it? Secretary van Houghton, We're broke.

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Speaker 7: The country has broke.

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Speaker 2: How can that be?

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Speaker 5: Well?

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Speaker 7: Remember when the last administration decided to invest in our

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Speaker 7: nation's children?

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Speaker 3: Big mistake. This aired long before Trump was president. Obviously,

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Speaker 3: see you guys ready for our guests, Bring them.

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Speaker 4: On I'm excited. I'm a big fan, so I'm excited

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Speaker 4: to do it.

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Speaker 3: These guys are legends in the world of the Simpsons

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Speaker 3: and comedy. David Silverman and Bill Oakley. Now, David Silverman

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Speaker 3: has been a director and an executive producer of The

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Speaker 3: Simpsons since the beginning.

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Speaker 8: Although we would say that the beginning those positions weren't

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Speaker 8: really there, because if you go back to the beginning,

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Speaker 8: beginning the Tracy Omens show, I was along with the

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Speaker 8: weiss Archer, the two animators those titles were a mass

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Speaker 8: a Bit by Bit later.

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Speaker 3: And Bill Oakley. He was a writer during what many

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Speaker 3: people consider the golden age of the Simpsons, when a

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Speaker 3: lot of the things were invented. His big claim to

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Speaker 3: fame is steamed hams.

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Speaker 1: Superden and I hope you're ready for mouth watering hamburgers.

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Speaker 2: I thought we were having steamed clams.

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Speaker 1: No, I said, steamed hams. That's what I call hamburgers.

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Speaker 2: You call hamburgers steamed hams.

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Speaker 1: Yes, it's a regional dialect. What region upstate New York?

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Speaker 4: Really, I'm from Utica and I've never heard anyone use

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Speaker 4: the phrase steamed hams.

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Speaker 1: Oh, not a Utica No, it's an Albany expression.

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Speaker 4: The Simpsons is famous in many ways, both for predicting

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Speaker 4: things that happened. What's the process when you're putting together

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Speaker 4: a show and how do you come up with those

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Speaker 4: kind of issues that might be considered predictive.

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Speaker 8: I think this all accidental. Are there usually things that

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Speaker 8: strike somebody funny and they write it and we have

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Speaker 8: a big laugh over it, and then sometimes they manifest

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Speaker 8: as true and we go look at that. But it's

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Speaker 8: not like we're sitting there like, Okay, let's get our

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Speaker 8: boxer predictions and see which one we're going to insert

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Speaker 8: in this episode. Now, that's not the way it works,

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Speaker 8: and oftentimes people forget that. What become quote unquote predictions

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Speaker 8: were actually, if you will, low hanging fruit at the time,

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Speaker 8: and I will point out the most famous one being

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Speaker 8: Donald Trump. The Donald Trump prediction. First of all, we

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Speaker 8: didn't actually represent Donald Trump physically on the show, as

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Speaker 8: it was purported later when people sorted making stuff up

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Speaker 8: about it. But it was around the year two thousand

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Speaker 8: and most people don't remember, but Donald Trump at the

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Speaker 8: time was running for president. He was running for president

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Speaker 8: on the extinct third party, what was it called the

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Speaker 8: Liberty Party that ross Pero started again. We weren't there

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Speaker 8: at a Ouiji board looking into the future. We were

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Speaker 8: just making a joke.

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Speaker 5: So you guys are being accused of being CIA agents, which,

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Speaker 5: by the way, is a tell that you're not right

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Speaker 5: because we're CIA officers. Agents are like the guys that

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Speaker 5: we hand although that's a possibility, And what does that

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Speaker 5: say about our society that Homer Simpson is like the

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Speaker 5: all knowing, omnipotent CIA predictor. And I'm not confirming nor

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Speaker 5: denying that you guys are CIA.

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Speaker 2: It's a very complicated issue. I personally and many of

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Speaker 2: us writers, especially from that era, have been accused of

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Speaker 2: being part of the Skull and Bones, part of the Illuminati,

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Speaker 2: or from the CIA, and only one of those is true.

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Speaker 2: So but the thing is, it's like, there's a couple

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Speaker 2: different things about why would the CIA want to have

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Speaker 2: comedy writers on the payroll. I don't think we have

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Speaker 2: a lot of a lot to offer the intelligence community.

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Speaker 2: One of the things that we've been accused of is

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Speaker 2: telegraphing secret messages. Usually that's we're accused of that by

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Speaker 2: people who are crazy, but we've also been accused and

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Speaker 2: this most recently in that very tragic incident where that

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Speaker 2: guy set himself on fire in front of the Trump trial.

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Speaker 2: I don't know if anybody read his manifesto, but there

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Speaker 2: were several pages about the Simpsons in there, and the

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Speaker 2: insidious nature of the Simpsons, which I believe he was

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Speaker 2: accusing of demoralizing Americans giving up, and I guess that's

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Speaker 2: more of a would be a long term operation to

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Speaker 2: demoralize Americans into not revolting against big corporations and the

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Speaker 2: status quo, which is that's a legitimate concern. And if

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Speaker 2: we did that, it's probably just because we were We

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Speaker 2: want to be funny.

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Speaker 4: I think the intelligent critity would be glad to have

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Speaker 4: creative comedy writers just because you guys are interesting, creative

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Speaker 4: and clever and funny.

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Speaker 2: Call me up then, Jesus, if you guys, if there's

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Speaker 2: anybody at the intelligent community listening to this, you can

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Speaker 2: send me a the DM on Instagram and you can

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Speaker 2: sign me up.

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Speaker 3: I'll do it.

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Speaker 4: The one thing interesting is, as we see in politics,

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Speaker 4: Americans don't even understand their system, and conspiracy theories often

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Speaker 4: come from people who don't understand how things work, so

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Speaker 4: they create some weird view of how they think it works.

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Speaker 4: In fact, the CIA, it's an intelligence organization, but it's

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Speaker 4: not an organization but prediction. Like, the point is not

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Speaker 4: to predict what's going to happen in the future, because

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Speaker 4: essentially the world's too complex and nobody can predict what's

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Speaker 4: going to happen in the future. Our job is to

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Speaker 4: collect foreign information secrets that foreign governments are trying to

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Speaker 4: keep hidden from us, that can help our policymakers make decisions.

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Speaker 2: But I do think there's one thing that you could

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Speaker 2: predict that's very likely to happen, which is that everyone

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Speaker 2: is going to get stupider. That's one of the things

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Speaker 2: that has happened over the course of the past thirty years.

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Speaker 2: For example, in an episode that my partner, when I

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Speaker 2: say we throughout this, I mean my partner Josh Weinstein

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Speaker 2: and I. By the way, we're high school friends. We

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Speaker 2: were in this episode called Margin Chains, and at the

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Speaker 2: very end of the episode, the people of Springfield are

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Speaker 2: given a statue of Jimmy Carter, which causes them to

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Speaker 2: riot because he's the worst president ever and they hate him.

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Speaker 2: And that doesn't sound so unbelievable, now, you know, I

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Speaker 2: think there's a lot of towns in America where the

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Speaker 2: populist would riot if they were a statue of Jimmy

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Speaker 2: Carter were forced upon them. And at the time, it

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Speaker 2: was like, that's so stupid. I give you thirty ninth President,

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Speaker 2: Jimmy Catta, Come on, bait History's greatest monster. We're making

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Speaker 2: fun of people who are stupid and gullible, and unfortunately,

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Speaker 2: I think a lot of the American populace is now

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Speaker 2: as dumb as as the people of Springfield were thirty

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Speaker 2: years ago. So that's part of what we were projecting.

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Speaker 8: And it's interesting because Bill, when I was even in

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Speaker 8: high school, I was concerned with my fellow students because

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Speaker 8: I thought a lot of them are you guys aren't

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Speaker 8: too bright, and you guys aren't really paying attention. So

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Speaker 8: I've been worried for ever since I was in high

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Speaker 8: school of like, where are we heading intellectually in this

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Speaker 8: country in terms of like people's education, and that we

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Speaker 8: have at least one party who seems to be championing

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Speaker 8: that because that sort of helps them.

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Speaker 2: Now, that could be a CIA operation, but the CIA

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Speaker 2: is non harnessing, or isn't it now?

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Speaker 5: We actually are when we were on the inside. We

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Speaker 5: never knew what people's political predilections were, and we stayed

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Speaker 5: away from them. And it really didn't matter to us

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Speaker 5: as long as it was legal and authorized and moral.

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Speaker 4: It was about protecting the American people, and we were

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Speaker 4: focused overseas. Our job was to understand the countries and

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Speaker 4: the politics of the countries we're in to try to

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Speaker 4: help American policy makers be smarter about what they do.

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Speaker 4: You guys, for whether you've met to or not. We're

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Speaker 4: always focused on societal and cultural issues and things. And

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Speaker 4: I think you can get a good sense of what

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Speaker 4: America is like by watching.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, The Simpsons, David, and you'll probably know more

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Speaker 2: about this than I with your travels. But The Simpsons

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Speaker 2: is very popular in many other countries, and specifically, in

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Speaker 2: my mind, Latin America and South America, where it's every

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Speaker 2: fifth bar is a mose Bar ripoff and stuff like that.

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Speaker 2: It's shown in Africa and some places. It's definitely in

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Speaker 2: a lot of places in Europe.

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Speaker 8: It's immensely popular in England, France, Italy, Germany, Australia. So

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Speaker 8: you have all my travels, you draw barred and like

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Speaker 8: people are like very happy to meet you. Most people

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Speaker 8: do see it as not only a parody of what

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Speaker 8: a life is like in America, but that sort of

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Speaker 8: modern existence, particularly in Europe, is pretty universal. It's very

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Speaker 8: well understood what we're doing. And they don't think of

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Speaker 8: it as so much as they're looking at a window

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Speaker 8: in America, but they look at it as a sort

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Speaker 8: of reflection of themselves, even though they're not in America, because,

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Speaker 8: as I say, Simpsons is mostly a parody or look

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Speaker 8: at modern culture.

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Speaker 2: The Simpsons family structure and their lifestyle. He's really taken

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Speaker 2: out of like sitcoms from nineteen fifty nine. It's Homer.

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Speaker 2: As people repeatedly pointed out, Homer is a man with

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Speaker 2: a high school education who has a five bedroom house

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Speaker 2: and two cars and makes a fairly small amount of money,

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Speaker 2: and so his financial situation is really more out of

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Speaker 2: nineteen fifty nine than it is modern day. So if

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Speaker 2: people are seeing America through that lens, what they're seeing

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Speaker 2: is in America of sixty or seventy years ago.

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Speaker 4: Let's take a break, we'll be right back, and we're back.

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Speaker 4: You guys did grow up around Washing DC. Bill, I

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Speaker 4: know you went to Harvard and a part of the

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Speaker 4: Lampoon and have been the people to often talk about

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Speaker 4: that is having connections somehow of the Illuminati or to

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Speaker 4: the National security State.

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Speaker 2: It's entirely possible that I am a sleeper agent and

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Speaker 2: don't know it yet. It's been a long wait. But

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Speaker 2: I did grow up in that whole world. As I

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Speaker 2: told you guys before the show, my dad worked in

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Speaker 2: the House and the Senate, and then he worked at

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Speaker 2: the Department Energy for twenty years in the Atomic Energy

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Speaker 2: Commission and did have a Q security clearance. I don't

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Speaker 2: think I was used as part of some sort of experiment,

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Speaker 2: but I guess I don't. I'll never really know. And

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Speaker 2: the other part is the Lampoon is definitely given way

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Speaker 2: too much credit for being like a skull and bones

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Speaker 2: type of skull and bones. But there's a conspiracy is

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Speaker 2: that people keep hiring their friends from the Lampoon to

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Speaker 2: write for TV shows, and that's really the conspiracy.

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Speaker 8: Also, by the way, this is touching on something else,

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Speaker 8: because people talk about the predictions. I like to think

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Speaker 8: that sometimes they're not predictions, but they're suggestions, and people

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Speaker 8: take us up on them famously. I think maybe at

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Speaker 8: one time Bob Igo was watching a Simpson episode, the

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Speaker 8: one that posited the idea that Disney owned Fox and thought, well,

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Speaker 8: it's not a bad idea, how much money we got.

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Speaker 3: The episode was titled When You Dish Upon a Star,

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Speaker 3: and Ron Howard pitches a movie idea at to Homer

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Speaker 3: and the studio that he's pitching to is twentieth Century Fox,

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Speaker 3: a division of the Walt Disney Company. And it wasn't

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Speaker 3: until almost twenty years later that actually happened, but it.

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Speaker 4: Was the beginning of the mergers, so it's not surprising.

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Speaker 4: Someday they're all going to be It's gonna be one

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Speaker 4: big giant company.

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Speaker 3: About the other ones that also are possibly people followed

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Speaker 3: your suggestion Lady Gaga's halftime show Cypress Hill performing with

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Speaker 3: the London Symphonia.

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Speaker 2: That now, that's an example of a suggestion, because that

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Speaker 2: was just a joke about how preposterous it was that

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Speaker 2: something like that would ever happen, and now it has

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Speaker 2: really happened, and I'm it certainly wouldn't have happened without

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Speaker 2: that joke.

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Speaker 8: Other bands have worked with orchestras. It's not like this

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Speaker 8: is the first time's ever happened, but that certainly was

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Speaker 8: a suggestion. But also yet, Lady Gaga was on our show. Okay,

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Speaker 8: she was on our show. She saw the show. See

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Speaker 8: Putney's thought, that's a good idea. I may they should

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Speaker 8: fly in.

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Speaker 3: Could I ask about a few specific ones here before

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Speaker 3: Biden and Kamala Harris were a team. There is a

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Speaker 3: shot of them standing next to each other at the

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Speaker 3: White House. Are you familiar with this one?

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Speaker 8: On the West Side story one. How I can tell

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Speaker 8: you is because I directed that thing. All I can

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Speaker 8: tell you is that I had about I don't know,

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Speaker 8: forty seven people to put into a line, and I

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Speaker 8: just put them into line randomly and just TikTok, and

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Speaker 8: we have a lot of work to do and we

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Speaker 8: have a deadline, and out the door it went. And

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Speaker 8: as far as the order was, I mean, we probably

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Speaker 8: put some Democrats together and Republicans together and something like that,

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Speaker 8: but that's as far as it went. Now, the idea

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Speaker 8: that to say, hey see there, no, I'm sorry, that's

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Speaker 8: a colossal coincidence. Sorry is, ladies and gentlemen, No conspiracies here.

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Speaker 3: I guess you could argue that after six thousand episodes,

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Speaker 3: just the law of statistics, certain things would take place.

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Speaker 8: I would think so too. The thing that's really interesting

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Speaker 8: are the sports prediction. Those are the ones that really

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Speaker 8: do have is baffled. The other ones we can explain

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Speaker 8: a little bit. But the sports predictions are pretty amazing.

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Speaker 2: I think most of them, almost all of the ones

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Speaker 2: you're talking about came from George Meyer.

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Speaker 8: Who was That was the next thing I was going

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Speaker 8: to say, who George.

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Speaker 2: Meyer has talked about it obviously, Now if anybody could

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Speaker 2: get I don't know this for sure, but I'm fairly

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Speaker 2: sure he's incredibly rich because of his ability to predict things,

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Speaker 2: including gold, which I was told he invested silver. Okay,

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Speaker 2: so yes it was silver, right, so he I believe

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Speaker 2: silver investor. I don't want anybody to burglarize George's house

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Speaker 2: after hearing this, so guys, they are be careful.

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Speaker 1: See.

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Speaker 2: But I think what happened was that he had he

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Speaker 2: was he was a very savvy investor because he did

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Speaker 2: have the ability. I don't know if he had the

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Speaker 2: ability to predict, but he could certainly he got lucky

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Speaker 2: a lot, especially in sports gambling as well in sports betting.

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Speaker 8: He was a very savvy sports handicapper. He told me

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Speaker 8: something very interesting. He was factoring people's psychology of how

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Speaker 8: much they wanted their team to win as a factor

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Speaker 8: in setting the odds, and he worked that into his

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Speaker 8: mathematical calculation on out event. Very deep, savvy thinker and

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Speaker 8: again not a prognosticator, didn't have a flex capacitor, I think,

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Speaker 8: just had a brain capacity.

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Speaker 2: I think also Sam was like that too, from what

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Speaker 2: I heard. Sam Simon was one of the other creators

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Speaker 2: of the show also was similar in that way. Is

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Speaker 2: it a big sports fan better and so forth.

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Speaker 8: Both those guys were not only good big sports betters,

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Speaker 8: but smart and successful sports betters because they understood what

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Speaker 8: was going on when the games they were beating. Yeah,

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Speaker 8: and George I think, was the one who was responsible

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Speaker 8: for all those Super Bowl sharing predictions. And then of

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Speaker 8: course it's just the accidental ones that we just for

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Speaker 8: a joke decided to pair two teams together in a

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Speaker 8: soccer match and oh my god, look they're in the

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Speaker 8: World Cup.

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Speaker 2: If that episode aired twenty five years ago, you got

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Speaker 2: twenty five chances for that particular pairing to show up,

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Speaker 2: and you're going to get lucky one eventually.

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Speaker 8: Oh how brilliant are they are? They're right, one set

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Speaker 8: of twenty five times.

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Speaker 4: Well, and you can also see things that clearly are

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Speaker 4: just funny, but then it happens and it's not really

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Speaker 4: a surprise, like the whole Siegfried and Roy being attacked

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Speaker 4: by their tigers.

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Speaker 2: Like, yes, I can imagine that that was in my

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Speaker 2: script just because it seems, yeah, that's the joke. That's

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Speaker 2: the joke, and it eventually came true. What joke would

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Speaker 2: you make to as a layman, there's a tiger trainer,

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Speaker 2: What joke would you make when tiger trainer the tiger

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Speaker 2: attacks him. That's the number one thing that occurs to

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Speaker 2: you to make a joke about a tiger tracker.

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Speaker 8: It's any joke to make again, the low hanging.

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Speaker 4: Fruit nsay, listening to everybody's phone calls or whatever.

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Speaker 5: That was my point as a CIA guy, by and large,

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Speaker 5: we try to keep things secret when we have secrets, right,

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Speaker 5: it's the whole point of a secret. If we knew

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Speaker 5: who was going to win the gold medal and curling,

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Speaker 5: why we would investigate that, I don't know, but we

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Speaker 5: wouldn't put it on a TV show with a huge audience,

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Speaker 5: and not when we think we know a secret, Hey,

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Speaker 5: we know that there is WMD in I Rock.

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Speaker 3: We generally tell people that.

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Speaker 9: And go prove it.

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Speaker 2: It's actually the other way around.

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Speaker 9: Just say it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I think a far more legitimate conspiracy theory is

401
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Speaker 2: that we're having some sort of demoralizing effect on the

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Speaker 2: nation as a whole. That would be more of a

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Speaker 2: thing that it's true. Why would we Okay, I guess

404
00:18:43,680 --> 00:18:46,320
Speaker 2: there're two more legitimate. One is that we're telegraphing information

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Speaker 2: to agents like those stations, those encoded number stations that

406
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Speaker 2: you guys use, right, We're somehow broadcasting information to agents

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Speaker 2: through encrypted material on our show or even non encrypted

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Speaker 2: stuff like that nine to eleven poster, which has been

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Speaker 2: subject of so many theories. And the other thing is

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Speaker 2: that more it's a more broad based thing, is that

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Speaker 2: we're having some sort of cultural effect on the nation

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Speaker 2: that some insidious large entity wants to take place.

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Speaker 4: Damn you guys for ruining our nation because you succeeded

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Speaker 4: very well.

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Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, I know, it's not terrible just to put

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Speaker 8: some funny shows on the air.

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Speaker 4: There you go. Let me ask, so, Bill, you mentioned

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Speaker 4: a couple of about the nine to eleven poster. Can

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Speaker 4: you give us a little background on that?

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Speaker 2: Yes, David, did you direct that episode? David went to

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Speaker 2: those photos.

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Speaker 8: Though I took those photos. This is of course, before

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Speaker 8: you had the resource of the Internet. I happened to

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Speaker 8: be recording for the road El Dorado in New York.

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Speaker 8: I was dispatched down to the World Trade Center to

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Speaker 8: take as many photos as I could have got only

427
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Speaker 8: the center and the locations, but the street across but no.

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Speaker 8: Jim Rearden directed that episode very hilariously.

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Speaker 2: So this was an episode of The Simpsons that was

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Speaker 2: the premiere of the ninth season. It was one of

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Speaker 2: the last episodes of Josh and I produced and head wrote.

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Speaker 2: And it's an episode where Barney drives Homer's car to

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Speaker 2: New York and use it in the plaza of the

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Speaker 2: World Trade Center, and Homer asked to go to New York.

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Speaker 2: And the entire literally an entire act, if not two acts,

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Speaker 2: if it take place at the World Trade Center. And

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Speaker 2: so people obviously took note of that. But most importantly,

438
00:20:14,040 --> 00:20:17,480
Speaker 2: the conspiracy theory revolves around this poster. Is a newspaper ad,

439
00:20:17,480 --> 00:20:19,560
Speaker 2: a full paid newspaper add that Bart shows off in

440
00:20:19,640 --> 00:20:20,760
Speaker 2: Act one. It's like, how are going to get to

441
00:20:20,760 --> 00:20:22,200
Speaker 2: New York? We can't afford to get to New York.

442
00:20:22,240 --> 00:20:24,120
Speaker 2: He holds up a newspaper ad that says New York

443
00:20:24,240 --> 00:20:27,159
Speaker 2: nine dollars on the bus line, and there's the nine

444
00:20:27,560 --> 00:20:30,399
Speaker 2: and then there's a silhouette of the skyline of Manhattan

445
00:20:30,440 --> 00:20:33,560
Speaker 2: including the two World Trade Centers, which does look when

446
00:20:33,600 --> 00:20:36,040
Speaker 2: you see it like nine eleven, the nine dollars and

447
00:20:36,080 --> 00:20:36,680
Speaker 2: the eleven.

448
00:20:36,960 --> 00:20:39,600
Speaker 7: I'd love to see New York. We could all go

449
00:20:39,680 --> 00:20:43,480
Speaker 7: at the bus company's special supersitter fair nine books.

450
00:20:43,600 --> 00:20:44,320
Speaker 3: This one's on me.

451
00:20:44,800 --> 00:20:47,760
Speaker 2: And so the conspiracy theory goes that us, as members

452
00:20:47,800 --> 00:20:50,360
Speaker 2: of the Skull and Bones Illuminati, et cetera, et cetera,

453
00:20:50,680 --> 00:20:54,320
Speaker 2: we're broadcasting to our sleeper agents. Here's the target. Here

454
00:20:54,359 --> 00:20:55,800
Speaker 2: is the date. They took it off the air for

455
00:20:55,840 --> 00:20:58,439
Speaker 2: ten years, although now it's back, so it was an

456
00:20:58,440 --> 00:20:59,200
Speaker 2: interesting thing.

457
00:20:59,359 --> 00:21:02,920
Speaker 8: I would mention that poster though, was not designed by

458
00:21:02,960 --> 00:21:05,600
Speaker 8: the writers. We just did a drawing of it, and

459
00:21:05,640 --> 00:21:07,320
Speaker 8: I don't know who designed it, but just had the

460
00:21:07,400 --> 00:21:09,960
Speaker 8: nine dollars and just had a silhouette of the New

461
00:21:10,040 --> 00:21:12,480
Speaker 8: York skyline as it was back in that day, and

462
00:21:12,720 --> 00:21:15,480
Speaker 8: it was not like discussed back and forth. Probably we

463
00:21:15,520 --> 00:21:18,000
Speaker 8: just probably just did it really quickly and it makes

464
00:21:18,000 --> 00:21:18,520
Speaker 8: perfect sense.

465
00:21:18,560 --> 00:21:20,639
Speaker 2: It's exactly what you would do. That's one of the

466
00:21:20,640 --> 00:21:24,040
Speaker 2: most prominent conspiracy theories there is that one, as well

467
00:21:24,040 --> 00:21:25,600
Speaker 2: as the Trump one, and the other things like that

468
00:21:25,640 --> 00:21:28,640
Speaker 2: and the Disney one are among the most most prominent.

469
00:21:28,720 --> 00:21:30,639
Speaker 8: But by the way, the other thing that really amused

470
00:21:30,640 --> 00:21:32,920
Speaker 8: me about the Trump one is they took this thing

471
00:21:32,960 --> 00:21:35,320
Speaker 8: that we did. We got it out very quickly. To

472
00:21:35,400 --> 00:21:37,200
Speaker 8: our credit, we must have got that out in two

473
00:21:37,280 --> 00:21:39,680
Speaker 8: weeks from the time that he went down, as John

474
00:21:39,680 --> 00:21:43,120
Speaker 8: Stewart jokingly put it as stair Force one going down

475
00:21:43,160 --> 00:21:46,160
Speaker 8: the escalator of the Trump Tower. We got the parody

476
00:21:46,200 --> 00:21:49,600
Speaker 8: out within two about two weeks later onto YouTube. But

477
00:21:49,640 --> 00:21:54,280
Speaker 8: what happened was is some conspiracy theorist types took what

478
00:21:54,320 --> 00:21:57,560
Speaker 8: we had done for that and posited the idea that

479
00:21:57,600 --> 00:22:01,040
Speaker 8: we actually predicted not only him being that, but represented

480
00:22:01,119 --> 00:22:05,960
Speaker 8: him going down the escalator at Trump Tower as that

481
00:22:06,119 --> 00:22:08,520
Speaker 8: was in that episode. As if you look at that episode,

482
00:22:08,520 --> 00:22:10,439
Speaker 8: you can clearly see that's not the case. But I

483
00:22:10,440 --> 00:22:13,399
Speaker 8: would have to talk to people saying and they say, oh, no,

484
00:22:13,520 --> 00:22:15,879
Speaker 8: that was in the episode. He said, no, it's not.

485
00:22:16,480 --> 00:22:19,679
Speaker 8: Well that episode was made or we're still in the

486
00:22:19,720 --> 00:22:22,760
Speaker 8: four x three format and it's not done digitally. It

487
00:22:22,840 --> 00:22:26,240
Speaker 8: was done still on cells and you can see texture

488
00:22:26,520 --> 00:22:28,760
Speaker 8: now with AI. People ask me, is this true, because

489
00:22:28,800 --> 00:22:31,080
Speaker 8: something else happened. I think it was like the disaster

490
00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:33,520
Speaker 8: with the Francis Scott Keybridge. Yeah, somebody sent me this

491
00:22:33,560 --> 00:22:35,840
Speaker 8: image and I said, this is a fake image that

492
00:22:36,080 --> 00:22:37,600
Speaker 8: do anything even remotely.

493
00:22:37,680 --> 00:22:41,400
Speaker 2: But now using AI, you can generate almost any Simpsons

494
00:22:41,480 --> 00:22:45,000
Speaker 2: scene in like about five minutes or less of any

495
00:22:45,040 --> 00:22:47,080
Speaker 2: event that happened. And that was the Key Bridge one,

496
00:22:47,480 --> 00:22:50,760
Speaker 2: David was the most recent and most egregious one because

497
00:22:51,080 --> 00:22:53,399
Speaker 2: to the casual observer it really did look like a

498
00:22:53,440 --> 00:22:56,800
Speaker 2: frame from The Simpsons of that bridge being hit by

499
00:22:56,840 --> 00:22:59,800
Speaker 2: a giant boat. Many of them are funny, like one

500
00:22:59,800 --> 00:23:02,639
Speaker 2: of it was about March vacuuming the law. March that

501
00:23:02,720 --> 00:23:04,479
Speaker 2: she's going to vacuum the lawns dirty. She's going to

502
00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:06,919
Speaker 2: vacuum the lawn and so there's just all these frames

503
00:23:06,960 --> 00:23:10,000
Speaker 2: of March using different models of vacuum cleaners to vacuum

504
00:23:10,040 --> 00:23:12,359
Speaker 2: the lawn. It looks completely unbelievable and it made me

505
00:23:12,400 --> 00:23:14,680
Speaker 2: really crack up. Anyway, So some people are using this

506
00:23:14,760 --> 00:23:17,760
Speaker 2: technology for good for entertainment. Other people are using it

507
00:23:17,800 --> 00:23:20,560
Speaker 2: to get clicks and drive advertising. To The Guardian, there

508
00:23:20,600 --> 00:23:23,240
Speaker 2: was a January sixth to one too with granz keeper

509
00:23:23,240 --> 00:23:26,520
Speaker 2: Willie wearing that guy's buffalo hat or whatever that somebody made.

510
00:23:26,520 --> 00:23:28,000
Speaker 2: That one was pretty obviously a fake.

511
00:23:28,160 --> 00:23:30,919
Speaker 3: There is an episode where there is an image of

512
00:23:31,160 --> 00:23:34,080
Speaker 3: people storming the Capitol from a while back. The episode

513
00:23:34,119 --> 00:23:37,480
Speaker 3: was called The Day the Violence Died nineteen ninety six.

514
00:23:37,720 --> 00:23:40,000
Speaker 2: What you're seeing in that episode is a parody of

515
00:23:40,080 --> 00:23:42,879
Speaker 2: Schoolhouse Rock. If you remember school House Rock from the seventies,

516
00:23:43,160 --> 00:23:45,359
Speaker 2: the episode the school House Rock, I'm just a bill,

517
00:23:46,280 --> 00:23:49,720
Speaker 2: And there was true that at the end. First of all,

518
00:23:49,760 --> 00:23:51,680
Speaker 2: it wasn't drawn in the Simpsons style. It was drawn

519
00:23:51,720 --> 00:23:54,680
Speaker 2: in the sky style of Schoolhouse Rock. And at the end,

520
00:23:54,680 --> 00:23:58,680
Speaker 2: it's true that other bills, other constitutional amendments were running

521
00:23:58,720 --> 00:24:01,000
Speaker 2: up the stairs of the Capitol. But it didn't look

522
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:03,280
Speaker 2: anything like the Simpsons. It looked like Schoolhouse Rock. And

523
00:24:04,000 --> 00:24:07,480
Speaker 2: it wasn't people. It was amendments. Hey, who left all

524
00:24:07,520 --> 00:24:09,800
Speaker 2: this garbage on the steps of Congress.

525
00:24:10,160 --> 00:24:15,320
Speaker 3: I'm not garbage, Amanamma to be yes, and I'm Emma Toby,

526
00:24:16,040 --> 00:24:18,439
Speaker 3: and I'm hoping that the runna Berby.

527
00:24:19,240 --> 00:24:22,480
Speaker 2: Why can't we just make a law against flag.

528
00:24:22,119 --> 00:24:25,520
Speaker 5: Burning, because that law would be unconstitutional.

529
00:24:25,760 --> 00:24:28,120
Speaker 3: But if we changed the constitution, then we.

530
00:24:28,040 --> 00:24:30,440
Speaker 7: Could make all sorts of crazy laws.

531
00:24:30,680 --> 00:24:31,800
Speaker 2: Now you're catching on.

532
00:24:32,240 --> 00:24:34,439
Speaker 3: There's a couple of others you might know about Homer

533
00:24:34,480 --> 00:24:37,280
Speaker 3: at the bat Season three not maddening one.

534
00:24:37,840 --> 00:24:40,240
Speaker 2: It's the sideburns, isn't it. I didn't really has embraced

535
00:24:40,280 --> 00:24:42,399
Speaker 2: that joke to become part of his personalit. It's like

536
00:24:42,400 --> 00:24:44,480
Speaker 2: the most famous thing about Don Mattically now.

537
00:24:44,359 --> 00:24:46,960
Speaker 3: The episode follows home in a softball team as they

538
00:24:47,000 --> 00:24:49,760
Speaker 3: start to believe that they're lucky because of articular bat.

539
00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:53,840
Speaker 3: This enrages of jealous mister Burns, who hires major league players.

540
00:24:54,000 --> 00:24:57,000
Speaker 3: One of these players is Don Mattingly, who's benched for

541
00:24:57,080 --> 00:25:00,920
Speaker 3: what mister Burns insists are unruly sideburns. A year later,

542
00:25:01,000 --> 00:25:04,160
Speaker 3: during an actual game in nineteen ninety three, Yankees manager

543
00:25:04,200 --> 00:25:06,800
Speaker 3: Stump Merrill points out that matting Lee did not cut

544
00:25:06,800 --> 00:25:09,280
Speaker 3: his hair for the game, which leads to the player

545
00:25:09,320 --> 00:25:10,040
Speaker 3: getting benched.

546
00:25:10,160 --> 00:25:13,760
Speaker 8: Originally, the joke was he had been benched prior. This

547
00:25:13,800 --> 00:25:15,960
Speaker 8: was not a prediction. This is an event that happened

548
00:25:15,960 --> 00:25:19,360
Speaker 8: by Steinbrenner that I think had benched him for his sideburns,

549
00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:21,280
Speaker 8: somebody I didn't know, somebody.

550
00:25:21,320 --> 00:25:23,399
Speaker 4: I forget what Steinbrenner did that a number because you're

551
00:25:23,400 --> 00:25:25,240
Speaker 4: not allowed to have facial hair.

552
00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:28,000
Speaker 8: Right, I'm not a sportsman, but I do know that

553
00:25:28,160 --> 00:25:30,760
Speaker 8: was happened before hid. I believe that Jim Brierden explained

554
00:25:30,760 --> 00:25:33,000
Speaker 8: it to me, and he thought it was a hilarious joke.

555
00:25:33,080 --> 00:25:35,880
Speaker 8: He just thought it was the best joke. So the

556
00:25:35,960 --> 00:25:39,520
Speaker 8: idea of that being predictioned is no, it's obviously a

557
00:25:39,600 --> 00:25:42,360
Speaker 8: reference to something that happened prior to the episode.

558
00:25:42,359 --> 00:25:44,680
Speaker 2: There's a number of those, by the way, David, that

559
00:25:45,560 --> 00:25:47,879
Speaker 2: that happened. The most recent one that occurred to me

560
00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:50,760
Speaker 2: was that pandemic one where a lot of people thought

561
00:25:50,760 --> 00:25:53,800
Speaker 2: we had predicted COVID in that episode, that Saint margin

562
00:25:53,880 --> 00:25:56,479
Speaker 2: Change's episode, because when the fact, what we were referring

563
00:25:56,520 --> 00:25:58,919
Speaker 2: to was the Hong Kong flu of nineteen sixty nine

564
00:25:59,000 --> 00:26:01,000
Speaker 2: nineteen seventy when we did that, so it was the

565
00:26:01,000 --> 00:26:03,000
Speaker 2: first time many people had heard of a pandemic, and

566
00:26:03,040 --> 00:26:05,160
Speaker 2: they thought we had invented the idea of a pandemic,

567
00:26:05,200 --> 00:26:07,600
Speaker 2: which clearly we didn't. But that was another one.

568
00:26:08,760 --> 00:26:11,880
Speaker 8: Yeah, a referenced to a past event and then, Oh,

569
00:26:11,960 --> 00:26:14,680
Speaker 8: but so this is a prediction. It's not laziness writing.

570
00:26:15,080 --> 00:26:17,920
Speaker 2: History repeats itself, and the show's been on so long

571
00:26:18,080 --> 00:26:20,080
Speaker 2: that we're getting to the point where history is repeating

572
00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:22,639
Speaker 2: itself over and over again, and we things that we

573
00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:25,159
Speaker 2: referred to that we're old are now new again.

574
00:26:26,040 --> 00:26:28,439
Speaker 5: Okay, let's take a break from the craziness just for

575
00:26:28,520 --> 00:26:37,200
Speaker 5: a minute or two, and we're back season nine.

576
00:26:37,480 --> 00:26:42,000
Speaker 3: Lisa Sachs ninety seven. Marge holds up a children's book

577
00:26:42,240 --> 00:26:46,199
Speaker 3: called Curious George and the Ebola Virus, three years before

578
00:26:46,400 --> 00:26:48,120
Speaker 3: the two thousand Bola outbreak.

579
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:50,239
Speaker 2: I wasn't involved in that episode, but I think that

580
00:26:50,280 --> 00:26:53,520
Speaker 2: Abola was already a thing that people knew about, as

581
00:26:53,600 --> 00:26:55,560
Speaker 2: with the flu. It's probably the first time a lot

582
00:26:55,600 --> 00:26:57,399
Speaker 2: of people heard of that, and that thus they think

583
00:26:57,440 --> 00:27:00,199
Speaker 2: the Simpsons predicted it rather than the Simpsons informed of

584
00:27:00,240 --> 00:27:00,920
Speaker 2: its existence.

585
00:27:01,200 --> 00:27:03,119
Speaker 8: That's a thing you can think of. Also from the

586
00:27:03,160 --> 00:27:06,760
Speaker 8: comedy point of view, the comedy writer he or she

587
00:27:06,880 --> 00:27:09,120
Speaker 8: might just say, well, if you're going to have Curious George,

588
00:27:09,240 --> 00:27:12,400
Speaker 8: n blank. It was probably one of those lists, right, Bill,

589
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:13,520
Speaker 8: because this is what we.

590
00:27:13,560 --> 00:27:14,920
Speaker 2: I think it was a book in al I think

591
00:27:14,920 --> 00:27:18,080
Speaker 2: this was an al Gene's script for Lisa sex it

592
00:27:18,119 --> 00:27:20,480
Speaker 2: was I think it was it was coming up as

593
00:27:20,480 --> 00:27:23,399
Speaker 2: something that people knew that was scary and weird.

594
00:27:23,760 --> 00:27:24,200
Speaker 9: I was in.

595
00:27:24,160 --> 00:27:26,800
Speaker 5: Sudan in nineteen seventy nine and they had something called

596
00:27:26,840 --> 00:27:30,320
Speaker 5: greed monkey Fever, which was renamed as a bowl, so

597
00:27:30,359 --> 00:27:32,200
Speaker 5: it was like way back then as well.

598
00:27:32,320 --> 00:27:34,639
Speaker 4: Reruns are so important for the Simpsons, right, so you

599
00:27:34,640 --> 00:27:36,640
Speaker 4: can see an old one and say, oh my god,

600
00:27:36,840 --> 00:27:38,960
Speaker 4: they're talking about what we're doing today, and so it

601
00:27:39,000 --> 00:27:40,520
Speaker 4: is in people's faces when it comes up.

602
00:27:40,600 --> 00:27:44,399
Speaker 8: We're getting closer to eight hundred episodes now, and after

603
00:27:44,520 --> 00:27:46,800
Speaker 8: eight hundred episodes, there's going to be something that we

604
00:27:47,000 --> 00:27:51,000
Speaker 8: just hit. I suspect has not as many episodes. The

605
00:27:51,119 --> 00:27:53,640
Speaker 8: gun Smoke had a lot of episodes. Maybe that would

606
00:27:53,680 --> 00:27:55,879
Speaker 8: have hit, but unfortunately took place in the Old West.

607
00:27:55,880 --> 00:27:57,240
Speaker 9: So that's what I think.

608
00:27:57,400 --> 00:27:59,520
Speaker 2: Also, this is the nature of the to be to

609
00:27:59,520 --> 00:28:02,080
Speaker 2: talk about the show more broadly. So Simpsons is one

610
00:28:02,080 --> 00:28:04,760
Speaker 2: of the few things that America shares as a cultural reference.

611
00:28:05,240 --> 00:28:08,639
Speaker 2: The media landscape has been so fragmented into two gazillion

612
00:28:08,720 --> 00:28:12,600
Speaker 2: different media inputs for everybody all day long, and everybody.

613
00:28:12,640 --> 00:28:15,800
Speaker 2: Most people remember certain Simpsons episodes because they have seen

614
00:28:15,840 --> 00:28:18,320
Speaker 2: them so many times. So it is one of the

615
00:28:18,359 --> 00:28:22,000
Speaker 2: few things that binds American society together is a knowledge

616
00:28:22,040 --> 00:28:23,040
Speaker 2: of certain moments.

617
00:28:23,080 --> 00:28:25,800
Speaker 8: In The Simpsons, Matt have the idea that here's a

618
00:28:25,840 --> 00:28:28,520
Speaker 8: TV family that watches TV, and that was a great

619
00:28:28,560 --> 00:28:32,640
Speaker 8: staring starting point because that allowed us to do a

620
00:28:32,760 --> 00:28:36,040
Speaker 8: infinite number of parodies of TV. Because we're animated, we

621
00:28:36,080 --> 00:28:37,600
Speaker 8: don't have to build a lot of sets. We just

622
00:28:37,720 --> 00:28:42,080
Speaker 8: dross stuff, So that's an advantage. What I'm getting at, though,

623
00:28:42,200 --> 00:28:44,880
Speaker 8: is that after with this idea, and with this idea

624
00:28:44,880 --> 00:28:49,120
Speaker 8: of this family observing current life and so forth, and

625
00:28:49,240 --> 00:28:52,800
Speaker 8: talking about things and talking about futuristic things, yeah, we're

626
00:28:52,800 --> 00:28:55,560
Speaker 8: going to stumble across things that kind of come true

627
00:28:55,640 --> 00:28:59,160
Speaker 8: or make some sort of technological quote unquote prediction. Because

628
00:28:59,160 --> 00:29:01,200
Speaker 8: that's the nature of the show, the nature of the writing.

629
00:29:01,560 --> 00:29:03,680
Speaker 8: You can look at like other people in entertainment who've

630
00:29:03,680 --> 00:29:06,640
Speaker 8: written science fiction. Star Trek kind of predicted these things,

631
00:29:06,680 --> 00:29:10,000
Speaker 8: these cell phone things. That's what happens when people dabble

632
00:29:10,040 --> 00:29:13,800
Speaker 8: in being futurists. And after eight hundred episodes, as I said,

633
00:29:14,200 --> 00:29:15,840
Speaker 8: we're gonna hit it a few times.

634
00:29:15,880 --> 00:29:17,920
Speaker 2: I recall being told I think by Mike and out

635
00:29:17,960 --> 00:29:21,120
Speaker 2: we got there. We don't put in contemporary references unless

636
00:29:21,160 --> 00:29:22,800
Speaker 2: there's this really good reason for it, because we want

637
00:29:22,800 --> 00:29:24,640
Speaker 2: people to be watching the show twenty years from now

638
00:29:25,040 --> 00:29:26,000
Speaker 2: and be able to get it.

639
00:29:26,120 --> 00:29:29,480
Speaker 8: Briefly, we had a in the Simpsons movie. We had

640
00:29:29,520 --> 00:29:33,080
Speaker 8: a reference to Nixon as a joke, and.

641
00:29:33,160 --> 00:29:35,719
Speaker 2: Nixon's an evergreen topic. I'm going to say, gonna, I'm

642
00:29:35,720 --> 00:29:38,640
Speaker 2: gonna double down on that. He's not dated, not quite

643
00:29:38,720 --> 00:29:40,720
Speaker 2: because he took it out because it got no laugh.

644
00:29:40,760 --> 00:29:43,000
Speaker 8: It just got to a look from the audience. They're like, what,

645
00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:44,120
Speaker 8: it's something they.

646
00:29:44,000 --> 00:29:46,280
Speaker 2: Didn't wrong audience, But they didn't have a different audience.

647
00:29:46,280 --> 00:29:46,600
Speaker 9: I hadn't.

648
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:48,720
Speaker 8: It wasn't that I would say, Bill, it's nothing. They

649
00:29:48,760 --> 00:29:51,640
Speaker 8: didn't get the joke that there was no passion behind it. Okay,

650
00:29:51,680 --> 00:29:53,160
Speaker 8: well you know what I'm saying. I can see that

651
00:29:53,480 --> 00:29:56,600
Speaker 8: you have to make the right joke about him that works,

652
00:29:56,840 --> 00:30:00,240
Speaker 8: But there's nothing the emotional passion of like love eight

653
00:30:00,320 --> 00:30:02,920
Speaker 8: of Nixon is gone, yes, right, any more than people

654
00:30:03,000 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 8: have love hate for like I don't know Warrant.

655
00:30:06,160 --> 00:30:08,560
Speaker 2: People know him now, people who know from Futurama. That's

656
00:30:08,600 --> 00:30:11,040
Speaker 2: where his that's where his legacy lives is in Futurama

657
00:30:11,160 --> 00:30:13,160
Speaker 2: and other and the projects that I'm doing, my projects

658
00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:14,920
Speaker 2: for Audible, I have a lot of Nixon in them

659
00:30:14,920 --> 00:30:16,800
Speaker 2: because they're nineteen eighth their period pieces.

660
00:30:16,880 --> 00:30:20,080
Speaker 3: Bill also has a podcast, Space nineteen sixty nine, which

661
00:30:20,120 --> 00:30:20,720
Speaker 3: is brilliant.

662
00:30:20,840 --> 00:30:22,880
Speaker 2: Thank you. I'll just plug this here. It's not so

663
00:30:22,920 --> 00:30:26,040
Speaker 2: much a podcast as it is an audio book, and

664
00:30:26,080 --> 00:30:29,120
Speaker 2: that's why it's but it's ten episodes available on audible

665
00:30:29,160 --> 00:30:32,520
Speaker 2: dot com, starring the Tasha Leone. It takes place in

666
00:30:32,560 --> 00:30:35,240
Speaker 2: a universe where Kennedy did not die from his wounds,

667
00:30:35,280 --> 00:30:37,680
Speaker 2: but instead had a revelation that America had to expand

668
00:30:37,720 --> 00:30:39,719
Speaker 2: into space as quickly as possible. And now I am

669
00:30:39,760 --> 00:30:43,120
Speaker 2: writing the sequel, Space nineteen seventy two. Look for that

670
00:30:43,160 --> 00:30:45,680
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty five or twenty twenty six. Hopefully you will.

671
00:30:45,720 --> 00:30:47,600
Speaker 2: You can help us promote the living crap out of

672
00:30:47,960 --> 00:30:49,680
Speaker 2: Space nineteen seventy two when it comes out.

673
00:30:49,960 --> 00:30:52,040
Speaker 4: You guys have tried really hard to pretend you're not

674
00:30:52,040 --> 00:30:54,680
Speaker 4: connected in some way to the intelligence community, and this

675
00:30:55,080 --> 00:30:57,080
Speaker 4: of Kennedy now is just just sealed it.

676
00:30:57,360 --> 00:31:00,120
Speaker 5: So you guys get to ask one question each to

677
00:31:00,240 --> 00:31:01,800
Speaker 5: CIA officers, truth.

678
00:31:01,640 --> 00:31:03,080
Speaker 4: Or dares you can ask more than one.

679
00:31:03,200 --> 00:31:05,840
Speaker 2: Wow, okay, just not the age go first.

680
00:31:06,160 --> 00:31:09,160
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, oh, where do you get those cool spy cars.

681
00:31:10,280 --> 00:31:13,960
Speaker 4: We didn't get cool spi cars. We were trained before

682
00:31:13,960 --> 00:31:16,360
Speaker 4: you go over season, depending on where you do get

683
00:31:16,640 --> 00:31:19,440
Speaker 4: at the training to learn how to like spin cars

684
00:31:19,480 --> 00:31:22,880
Speaker 4: and smash them and break through ros backs and crash

685
00:31:22,920 --> 00:31:24,960
Speaker 4: and burn and how to do reverse one eighties and

686
00:31:25,000 --> 00:31:26,800
Speaker 4: all that kind of stuff. That was like everybody loved

687
00:31:26,800 --> 00:31:28,280
Speaker 4: doing that because of course you never got to do

688
00:31:28,320 --> 00:31:30,360
Speaker 4: it after that in the field, and when you live

689
00:31:30,400 --> 00:31:32,720
Speaker 4: overseas in a place where it's dangerous and you can't

690
00:31:32,760 --> 00:31:35,640
Speaker 4: really bring a car, they oftentimes you'll get a car,

691
00:31:35,720 --> 00:31:38,040
Speaker 4: but they're not fancy. They're meant We're meant to be boring.

692
00:31:38,440 --> 00:31:40,960
Speaker 8: And then in the background, that was the thing that

693
00:31:41,000 --> 00:31:43,000
Speaker 8: always amused me up with these spy films, is I

694
00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:44,640
Speaker 8: thought you guys were trying to blend in.

695
00:31:45,880 --> 00:31:47,719
Speaker 2: I have a question, and this may I want to

696
00:31:47,720 --> 00:31:50,600
Speaker 2: make sure that nobody takes offense at this question, because

697
00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:53,680
Speaker 2: it has been on my mind for years, and I

698
00:31:53,760 --> 00:31:56,320
Speaker 2: know that this is a very sensitive topic and in fact,

699
00:31:56,760 --> 00:31:58,080
Speaker 2: my partner are going to write a movie about it

700
00:31:58,120 --> 00:32:01,800
Speaker 2: at one point, and everybody and it's more realistic than that.

701
00:32:01,840 --> 00:32:05,000
Speaker 2: I'm sorry to say. We all know that the KGB,

702
00:32:05,480 --> 00:32:08,160
Speaker 2: at least in fiction, had a lot of sexy female

703
00:32:08,200 --> 00:32:11,760
Speaker 2: agents that would seduce men to get information out of them.

704
00:32:12,200 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 2: Does the CIA also have that or do they just

705
00:32:14,440 --> 00:32:18,080
Speaker 2: have to hire local prostitutes or do they have men?

706
00:32:18,160 --> 00:32:20,080
Speaker 2: Do they will tell me what you know?

707
00:32:20,240 --> 00:32:24,280
Speaker 4: So yeah, they call it swallows is the program that

708
00:32:24,360 --> 00:32:27,239
Speaker 4: the KGB us and many of us who've been I

709
00:32:27,280 --> 00:32:29,640
Speaker 4: served in Moscow and there's a number of people who

710
00:32:29,680 --> 00:32:32,080
Speaker 4: traveled there and at night on your hotel door, you

711
00:32:32,120 --> 00:32:33,800
Speaker 4: get knock on the door and they'll be a pretty

712
00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:37,640
Speaker 4: girl or what have you. But in general not in general, no,

713
00:32:37,760 --> 00:32:41,480
Speaker 4: we don't use sex because the goal for us is

714
00:32:41,520 --> 00:32:45,760
Speaker 4: to recruit a spy, a source who knows what they're doing.

715
00:32:45,840 --> 00:32:48,040
Speaker 4: They're motivated, they want to work for us, they want

716
00:32:48,080 --> 00:32:50,000
Speaker 4: to keep it secret for a long time. So what

717
00:32:50,040 --> 00:32:52,000
Speaker 4: you want to do is recruit some guy in the

718
00:32:52,040 --> 00:32:56,160
Speaker 4: Iranian Ministry of Defense who hates his boss or hates

719
00:32:56,200 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 4: the system, and we continue to meet and they provide

720
00:32:58,520 --> 00:33:00,880
Speaker 4: us insight, and they continue to move up over time,

721
00:33:00,920 --> 00:33:03,160
Speaker 4: and they meet another CI officer and over time they

722
00:33:03,160 --> 00:33:06,120
Speaker 4: become you know, the deputy head of the Iranian missile

723
00:33:06,120 --> 00:33:09,400
Speaker 4: program or whatever, and we have sources inside. And to

724
00:33:09,400 --> 00:33:11,600
Speaker 4: do that you have to have people who trust you

725
00:33:11,720 --> 00:33:14,920
Speaker 4: and have and developed trust between the US government and

726
00:33:14,960 --> 00:33:17,880
Speaker 4: the CIA and the person. And so the problem with

727
00:33:18,480 --> 00:33:20,840
Speaker 4: using any kind of blackmail, whether it be sex or

728
00:33:20,880 --> 00:33:22,840
Speaker 4: any other kind of black mail, is the people want

729
00:33:22,840 --> 00:33:26,240
Speaker 4: to get out of it or there law enforcement. Oftentimes

730
00:33:26,640 --> 00:33:28,840
Speaker 4: they call them instead of calling them their sources or

731
00:33:28,840 --> 00:33:32,520
Speaker 4: their agents, it's it's a snitch or an informer. And

732
00:33:32,800 --> 00:33:35,400
Speaker 4: oftentimes they will pressure people to provide information for a

733
00:33:35,440 --> 00:33:37,880
Speaker 4: short period of time. Our job is to get for

734
00:33:37,920 --> 00:33:40,400
Speaker 4: a long period of time to motivate to people. And

735
00:33:40,440 --> 00:33:42,360
Speaker 4: so we found that using any kind of black mail

736
00:33:42,400 --> 00:33:48,120
Speaker 4: is essentially doesn't work. There are times when someone who

737
00:33:48,200 --> 00:33:50,200
Speaker 4: is working for US or helping us and the terrorism

738
00:33:50,240 --> 00:33:53,320
Speaker 4: side comes to the States and they want something like this.

739
00:33:53,840 --> 00:33:56,280
Speaker 4: There's times when we can help them do that, but

740
00:33:56,320 --> 00:33:58,240
Speaker 4: we're not doing that for We're not doing it for ourselves.

741
00:33:58,240 --> 00:33:59,560
Speaker 4: We're not doing it to them.

742
00:34:00,120 --> 00:34:03,640
Speaker 5: Interesting the agency, we're paid to break the laws of

743
00:34:03,720 --> 00:34:07,080
Speaker 5: other countries. Right every espionage organization its job is to

744
00:34:07,080 --> 00:34:09,840
Speaker 5: break the laws of other countries, but not its own. Laws,

745
00:34:09,920 --> 00:34:12,160
Speaker 5: so in CI, we can't break our own laws. True

746
00:34:12,200 --> 00:34:14,279
Speaker 5: story on sex. There was a one agent. He was

747
00:34:14,360 --> 00:34:17,360
Speaker 5: really important. So the agent comes to the US and

748
00:34:17,400 --> 00:34:20,480
Speaker 5: he says, I want to get laid. I want to

749
00:34:20,480 --> 00:34:22,720
Speaker 5: go to a prostitute. And the case Opster is handling

750
00:34:22,760 --> 00:34:24,600
Speaker 5: him is, first of all, I don't know where to go.

751
00:34:25,280 --> 00:34:27,120
Speaker 5: Second of all, I don't want you to get sick

752
00:34:27,200 --> 00:34:30,640
Speaker 5: or arrested. So he went to the FBI and said,

753
00:34:30,840 --> 00:34:32,880
Speaker 5: is there a place he can go where he's not

754
00:34:32,960 --> 00:34:35,719
Speaker 5: going to get arrested or beaten up? And I guess

755
00:34:35,760 --> 00:34:38,200
Speaker 5: the FBI said that these are places that you'll probably

756
00:34:38,239 --> 00:34:40,560
Speaker 5: be okay. But then he went to our lawyers, and

757
00:34:40,560 --> 00:34:44,280
Speaker 5: our lawyers said, you can't give him money to engage

758
00:34:44,280 --> 00:34:45,280
Speaker 5: in the legal activity.

759
00:34:45,320 --> 00:34:46,120
Speaker 9: It is illegal.

760
00:34:46,480 --> 00:34:49,560
Speaker 5: So what they finally worked out is basically says you

761
00:34:49,560 --> 00:34:52,800
Speaker 5: can give him a bonus. So here's two hundred dollars

762
00:34:52,840 --> 00:34:57,279
Speaker 5: and a pack of condoms. Right, here's a bonus for helping. Unofficially,

763
00:34:57,320 --> 00:34:59,000
Speaker 5: this is where the FBI said you might go. But

764
00:34:59,080 --> 00:35:01,480
Speaker 5: that's as far as we can go. We do have

765
00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:05,880
Speaker 5: some weird, weird rules around, like sexual activity for CIA officers,

766
00:35:06,000 --> 00:35:08,759
Speaker 5: so that we're not blackmailed, but by Larnche No, not

767
00:35:08,800 --> 00:35:11,040
Speaker 5: by lunch. We don't do it, doesn't wort.

768
00:35:11,080 --> 00:35:13,239
Speaker 8: I just wanted to point out that how well Rocking

769
00:35:13,320 --> 00:35:15,120
Speaker 8: and Bowwinkle presented.

770
00:35:17,160 --> 00:35:19,880
Speaker 9: I've seen not They're great. By the way, this is

771
00:35:19,880 --> 00:35:22,759
Speaker 9: off the kill squad. Bill Scott told me this, Bill

772
00:35:22,800 --> 00:35:25,360
Speaker 9: Scott Bowinkle. Bill Scott, who was the head writer and

773
00:35:25,400 --> 00:35:28,319
Speaker 9: the voice of Bowinkle and several other voices, wonderful guys,

774
00:35:28,360 --> 00:35:29,920
Speaker 9: something of a mentor to me. He told me the

775
00:35:29,960 --> 00:35:32,560
Speaker 9: story of I don't know what he was doing in

776
00:35:32,680 --> 00:35:35,600
Speaker 9: Russia or visiting Russia for, but the guy who was

777
00:35:35,640 --> 00:35:38,920
Speaker 9: doing his passport saying wait you look on the cartoon

778
00:35:38,960 --> 00:35:43,319
Speaker 9: show with Moosson's squirrel. Bill said.

779
00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:45,200
Speaker 8: All I could remember is that he had a long

780
00:35:45,280 --> 00:35:49,240
Speaker 8: time getting his passport cleared for some reason. So apparently

781
00:35:49,280 --> 00:35:52,480
Speaker 8: somebody did not like Boris Natasha Moosen squirrel.

782
00:35:52,719 --> 00:35:53,840
Speaker 3: So funny story.

783
00:35:54,040 --> 00:35:56,719
Speaker 5: So I was one of the guys who was on

784
00:35:56,800 --> 00:35:59,480
Speaker 5: a horse chasing bin Laden in the early days, right

785
00:35:59,520 --> 00:36:01,560
Speaker 5: growing up in the mountains, and we were looking for

786
00:36:01,880 --> 00:36:04,640
Speaker 5: bin Laden and Zawahiri, right, the two guys running. So

787
00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:07,240
Speaker 5: when I first went in to see the chief of station,

788
00:36:07,600 --> 00:36:09,919
Speaker 5: and I was about to go up country to chase

789
00:36:09,960 --> 00:36:12,400
Speaker 5: these guys. I said, so, chief, what are my orders?

790
00:36:12,680 --> 00:36:15,359
Speaker 5: And he looked at me deadpan and said kill moose

791
00:36:15,400 --> 00:36:15,840
Speaker 5: and squirrel.

792
00:36:16,480 --> 00:36:16,760
Speaker 3: Wow.

793
00:36:20,200 --> 00:36:22,840
Speaker 9: Official, we didn't kill moose or squirrel.

794
00:36:23,000 --> 00:36:25,160
Speaker 10: It was like we were unsuccessful, but we tried.

795
00:36:25,200 --> 00:36:27,319
Speaker 2: It was like, those are the orders. I just want

796
00:36:27,320 --> 00:36:29,759
Speaker 2: to ask one more question too, because I'm still I'm

797
00:36:29,880 --> 00:36:32,480
Speaker 2: very interested in the whole number station phenomenon. Do you

798
00:36:32,480 --> 00:36:34,960
Speaker 2: have any knowledge of what the number stations are? Have

799
00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:38,040
Speaker 2: you used them? Shortwave stations that have recordings of people

800
00:36:38,160 --> 00:36:41,879
Speaker 2: just going like four five all day long.

801
00:36:42,040 --> 00:36:45,000
Speaker 4: It's it's still a very secure way to communicate, and

802
00:36:45,040 --> 00:36:48,000
Speaker 4: so the Cubans still do that. That's using a one

803
00:36:48,040 --> 00:36:50,000
Speaker 4: time pad. Spies have been able to use that for

804
00:36:50,080 --> 00:36:52,360
Speaker 4: years and years. And the idea is you give people

805
00:36:52,400 --> 00:36:55,560
Speaker 4: a pad of random sort of numbers. It's just a

806
00:36:55,560 --> 00:36:58,319
Speaker 4: code system. And so what happens is you send via

807
00:36:58,400 --> 00:37:01,759
Speaker 4: shortwave radio some speaking goes on, I think goes on

808
00:37:01,800 --> 00:37:03,640
Speaker 4: twenty four hours a day, someone just speaking, and then

809
00:37:03,680 --> 00:37:06,160
Speaker 4: you give your source saying at certain times you go

810
00:37:06,200 --> 00:37:20,440
Speaker 4: in and you listen to these numbers, say burno, and

811
00:37:20,480 --> 00:37:22,920
Speaker 4: if you have the pad with numbers, when you go

812
00:37:22,920 --> 00:37:24,920
Speaker 4: on and listen. You then put the numbers that the

813
00:37:24,960 --> 00:37:27,319
Speaker 4: person is saying underneath and there's a thing called some

814
00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:31,200
Speaker 4: subtraction the numbers on your pad. You subtract the numbers

815
00:37:31,280 --> 00:37:33,840
Speaker 4: that they gave you under them, and then that's the

816
00:37:33,960 --> 00:37:36,200
Speaker 4: number of the letter that you need, and then that's

817
00:37:36,200 --> 00:37:38,799
Speaker 4: how you put together a code. So the FBI they

818
00:37:38,800 --> 00:37:41,000
Speaker 4: could know that there's Russian in Cuba and other spies

819
00:37:41,040 --> 00:37:43,200
Speaker 4: here that are being communicated with, and they can hear

820
00:37:43,239 --> 00:37:46,120
Speaker 4: the numbers on a radio, but they can't stop the radio.

821
00:37:46,280 --> 00:37:48,239
Speaker 4: They don't know what the numbers mean. So it's an

822
00:37:48,239 --> 00:37:49,600
Speaker 4: effective way to communicate.

823
00:37:50,440 --> 00:37:50,879
Speaker 2: There was a.

824
00:37:50,840 --> 00:37:54,479
Speaker 5: Conspiracy about that. It was like two thousand and three

825
00:37:54,640 --> 00:37:58,239
Speaker 5: or something like that, that l Jazeera that it's Chiron's

826
00:37:58,360 --> 00:38:02,239
Speaker 5: underneath that if if you read them correctly, that they

827
00:38:02,239 --> 00:38:03,279
Speaker 5: were the same thing.

828
00:38:03,360 --> 00:38:04,400
Speaker 3: And it turned out.

829
00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:05,520
Speaker 9: That it was completely untrue.

830
00:38:05,640 --> 00:38:08,640
Speaker 5: Wow, conspiracy that was in all the newspapers. See how

831
00:38:08,680 --> 00:38:10,600
Speaker 5: you looked at it, and it was debunked.

832
00:38:11,840 --> 00:38:13,920
Speaker 8: I'm going to take all this information and work it

833
00:38:13,920 --> 00:38:14,840
Speaker 8: into my next meeting.

834
00:38:15,960 --> 00:38:19,880
Speaker 4: Please do really great to meet you, guys, great.

835
00:38:19,719 --> 00:38:20,040
Speaker 9: To meet you.

836
00:38:20,440 --> 00:38:22,040
Speaker 8: We'll see if we predict either of the future of

837
00:38:22,040 --> 00:38:22,799
Speaker 8: the past or.

838
00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:27,240
Speaker 10: As we'd like to say in CIA five seven four

839
00:38:28,120 --> 00:38:34,680
Speaker 10: three too much information.

840
00:38:39,760 --> 00:38:39,880
Speaker 4: Now.

841
00:38:39,920 --> 00:38:42,799
Speaker 3: There were a number of other predictions. In nineteen ninety nine,

842
00:38:42,840 --> 00:38:45,960
Speaker 3: they predicted that the Rolling Stones would still be on tour.

843
00:38:46,000 --> 00:38:46,239
Speaker 8: And.

844
00:38:48,640 --> 00:38:49,439
Speaker 2: They're still live.

845
00:38:49,600 --> 00:38:50,600
Speaker 5: Is still amazing.

846
00:38:50,800 --> 00:38:54,239
Speaker 3: That librarians would be replaced by robots.

847
00:38:54,080 --> 00:38:59,360
Speaker 4: Legal pot in Canada, smartphones, smart watches, NSA listening to everybody.

848
00:38:59,480 --> 00:39:03,880
Speaker 3: The Greek financial crisis that was predicting in two thousand one. Yeah,

849
00:39:04,200 --> 00:39:07,400
Speaker 3: faulty voter machines two thousand and eight, that was a

850
00:39:07,600 --> 00:39:10,960
Speaker 3: Halloween Treehouse of Horror episode. I'll add that there are

851
00:39:10,960 --> 00:39:13,880
Speaker 3: some predictions that haven't happened yet, that the Fox Network

852
00:39:13,920 --> 00:39:17,239
Speaker 3: would become a hardcore sex channel, that Delta Burke and

853
00:39:17,280 --> 00:39:19,879
Speaker 3: the actor who plays Major Dad would get divorced. That

854
00:39:19,960 --> 00:39:23,040
Speaker 3: hasn't happened. They did predict Rocky seven. There was a

855
00:39:23,120 --> 00:39:24,920
Speaker 3: Rocky seven, but they got the title wrong.

856
00:39:25,239 --> 00:39:26,360
Speaker 4: There was a Rocky seven.

857
00:39:26,440 --> 00:39:28,920
Speaker 3: There was a seventh movie in the Rocky franchise.

858
00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:29,919
Speaker 4: He who do you Fight?

859
00:39:30,200 --> 00:39:32,800
Speaker 3: It wasn't Rocky, it was the Creed.

860
00:39:33,120 --> 00:39:36,279
Speaker 4: I guess there's Creed, then there's Creed's kid. I guess

861
00:39:36,280 --> 00:39:37,400
Speaker 4: we can call those connected.

862
00:39:37,680 --> 00:39:39,480
Speaker 5: If they could predict the future, they'd all be like

863
00:39:39,520 --> 00:39:40,680
Speaker 5: freaking richer than they are.

864
00:39:40,800 --> 00:39:42,520
Speaker 4: It's like they'd know tou.

865
00:39:43,000 --> 00:39:43,200
Speaker 8: Yeah.

866
00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:45,480
Speaker 3: I got a feeling it worked out pretty well for

867
00:39:45,520 --> 00:39:46,080
Speaker 3: them many.

868
00:39:46,080 --> 00:39:47,560
Speaker 5: I think they're doing okay well.

869
00:39:47,600 --> 00:39:49,680
Speaker 4: The Simpton's episode was fun, and I hope we can

870
00:39:50,040 --> 00:39:52,239
Speaker 4: do that again. I'd hope Stern can find more cool

871
00:39:52,280 --> 00:39:53,960
Speaker 4: Hollywood people for us to talk to you, because I'm

872
00:39:53,960 --> 00:40:00,080
Speaker 4: getting sick of talking to you guys.

873
00:40:00,239 --> 00:40:04,920
Speaker 3: Implausible is produced by Adam Davidson, Jerry O'shay, John Seipher,

874
00:40:05,200 --> 00:40:09,600
Speaker 3: and Jonathan Sterner. The associate producer is Rachel Harner. Mission

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Speaker 3: Implausible is a production of Honorable Mention and Abominable Pictures

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Speaker 3: for iHeart Podcasts