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Speaker 1: It's America's only sorce for news.
Speaker 3: This it's the Daily.
Speaker 2: Show with your host Michael Costa's Well, welcome to the
Speaker 2: Mail Show.
Speaker 1: I'm Michael Costa. We have so much to talk about tonight.
Speaker 1: It's happy hour at the Pentagon. Joe Biden is making
Speaker 1: a list and checking it twice, and Mangioni drops a manifesto.
Speaker 1: So let's get into the headlines. Let's begin with the story.
Speaker 1: Everyone is still talking about the arrest of Luigi, alleged
Speaker 1: CEO killer and the reason conjugal visit is trending on Google.
Speaker 1: Everyone's been wondering what his motivation was, and now they
Speaker 1: have his manifesto. Although for a manifesto, it's surprisingly modest.
Speaker 4: The US has the number one most expensive healthcare system
Speaker 4: in the world, yet we rank roughly number forty two
Speaker 4: in life expectancy. Obviously, the problem is more complex, but
Speaker 4: I do not have space, and frankly, I do not
Speaker 4: pretend to be the most qualified person to lay out
Speaker 4: the full argument.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, I don't really know what I'm talking about.
Speaker 1: Is a surprising thing to put in a manifesto. This
Speaker 1: is the first murder manifesto I've read that could have
Speaker 1: ended with but no worries. If not, you know, either
Speaker 1: way you never see the Taliban like death to America.
Speaker 1: Although we're not experts, so grain of salt. Now. Whether
Speaker 1: he's guilty or not will be decided by a trial.
Speaker 1: But one thing we know for certain, MANGIONI is making
Speaker 1: everyone Menja horny.
Speaker 4: Emily, I know you were inside that courtroom today with
Speaker 4: the suspect.
Speaker 1: How was he behaving, Norah? It was remarkable. He walked
Speaker 1: in confidence at times that he seemed defiant.
Speaker 4: He was looking around, he kept looking back at a
Speaker 4: couple of times I felt like he was.
Speaker 1: Making eye contact. Oh, he looked at me, he saw me.
Speaker 1: We had a moment, and Nora, I'm getting new reports
Speaker 1: just now that I can change him. Okay, Can I
Speaker 1: just say this is confusing as a straight man to me,
Speaker 1: I don't know what I was supposed to do to
Speaker 1: attract women. One day, Let's do more work around the house,
Speaker 1: the next, it's be a better listener. And now apparently
Speaker 1: it's execute the leader of a fortune five hundred company.
Speaker 1: Which one is it? Ladies, Let's move on to someone
Speaker 1: who never has to go to court again. In another
Speaker 1: edition of Trump two point zero Coming for the White House.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna come.
Speaker 1: Look. Look, there are over twenty countries in the world,
Speaker 1: and the president has to appoint an ambassador to every
Speaker 1: one of them. And being an ambassador, it's a pretty
Speaker 1: sweet gig, all right. You get paid six figures to
Speaker 1: move to some mansion in another country, and you can't
Speaker 1: even get arrested when you plow into a group of
Speaker 1: tourists with your motorcycle. It's basically a dream. And Trump
Speaker 1: just announced the latest lucky person to get one of
Speaker 1: these coveted positions.
Speaker 5: President ELEC. Donald Trump tapping another loyalists with close family
Speaker 5: ties to fill out his administration, naming Kimberly Guilfoyle to
Speaker 5: be ambassador to Greece.
Speaker 1: Kimberly Guilfoil, Kimberly guilfo Why does why does that ring about?
Speaker 1: Why does that hurt my ears?
Speaker 5: She has no diplomatic experience, but she's a long time
Speaker 5: Trump loyalist. Firing up the Republican National Convention during his
Speaker 5: twenty twenty reelection campaign, The best is.
Speaker 1: Yet to come. That's it. I remember the screaming lady.
Speaker 1: That's the screaming lady, although I guess in Greece that's
Speaker 1: considered normal volume. Maybe now you might be wondering why
Speaker 1: is Trump appointing Kimberly Guilfoyle if she has no diplomatic
Speaker 1: experience and seemingly no ties to Grease. Well, it turns
Speaker 1: out it might be a consolation prize.
Speaker 6: In a statement, the President elect calling her a close
Speaker 6: friend and praising her sharp intellect, but he made no
Speaker 6: mention of her four year long engagement to his eldest son,
Speaker 6: amid tabloid rumors that Donald Trump Junior is now dating
Speaker 6: someone new.
Speaker 1: Wow, Wow, what a great way to end a relationship
Speaker 1: forget about Listen, it's not you, it's me. Now we've
Speaker 1: got listen. How would you like to be the ambassador
Speaker 1: to Grease? Good for Kimberly to score this position after
Speaker 1: a breakup. Last time one of my relationships ended, I
Speaker 1: couldn't even get my Valtrex back. Now it's okay, she
Speaker 1: needs it now too, So boh, by gosh, kimber lady,
Speaker 1: your relationship is over. But now you get to move
Speaker 1: to Greece, or, as you might say.
Speaker 7: The best.
Speaker 1: Oh my godness hurts still. Meanwhile, things are a little
Speaker 1: rockier for a different Trump appointee, Pete Hegseth, nominee for
Speaker 1: Secretary of Defense and veteran of multiple tours with Captain
Speaker 1: Morgan last week. Last week, his nomination looked like it
Speaker 1: was in big trouble, probably because people were worried he'd
Speaker 1: have to blow into a breathalyzer before entering the situation room.
Speaker 1: Let's check in on how it's going now.
Speaker 8: After a rocky start, Pete hegg Seth, president Elect Trump's
Speaker 8: intended choice to lead the Pentagon.
Speaker 1: He's on the rebaand.
Speaker 4: He's much better off this week than it was last week.
Speaker 9: Some Republicans, including ones like Senator Tommy Tubberville out of Ballabama,
Speaker 9: someone who's very close to Donald Trump, have brushed off
Speaker 9: these reports of excessive drinking.
Speaker 3: Is he a drunk? I mean, does he hang out
Speaker 3: in arge? Does he drink for lunch and dinner and recklessly?
Speaker 1: Does he piss Martiniz and shit olives? Now? Well, then
Speaker 1: give this man to care, Declarence. I'm sorry, but he's
Speaker 1: not drunk every second of his life. It's a pretty
Speaker 1: low bar, which, by the way, is the only bar
Speaker 1: that peak Hegseth hasn't been thrown out of Look, you
Speaker 1: can argue what the exact definition of a drinking problem is,
Speaker 1: but I think a good barometer is is everyone in
Speaker 1: the country talking about how much you drink, then you
Speaker 1: probably have a drinking problem. So that's one excuse for
Speaker 1: putting heg Seth in charge of the Defense Department. Well,
Speaker 1: let's hear another one from Oklahoma Senator Mark Wayne Mullen. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's his name.
Speaker 8: What I'm saying is, when you're talking about drinking at
Speaker 8: ten in the morning, that's a drinking problem.
Speaker 1: Now, it doesn't mean that there's well, there's a lot.
Speaker 3: Of politicians that have a drinking problem, Jake, Yes, of course.
Speaker 1: But I guess my question is.
Speaker 8: Yeah, and then there's probably a lot of media that
Speaker 8: has a drinking problem too.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, a lot of people have drinking problems, but
Speaker 1: they're not trying to run the Pentagon. So yeah, it's different.
Speaker 1: It's different when you agree that's why you're crapping. It's
Speaker 1: like he's saying, Oh, nobody cared about my drinking before
Speaker 1: I got behind the wheel, and now all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: it's a problem. Yeah, it's a problem. Yeah. Ultimately, it's
Speaker 1: worse if you're an alcoholic in certain jobs, Like you
Speaker 1: don't want to have an alcoholic pilot, but a drunk
Speaker 1: daily show host. What's the worst that happens? I pee
Speaker 1: myself behind the desk, and I need LaToya to bring
Speaker 1: me new pants right now. LaToya new pants. LaToya new pants.
Speaker 1: But even if he's confirmed, Pete seems to understand that
Speaker 1: being blackout drunk twenty three hours a day might be
Speaker 1: a problem, which is why he's offering to change.
Speaker 9: He's been telling members of the Center Republican Conference that
Speaker 9: if you were confirmed as Secretary of Defense, he would
Speaker 9: not drink alcohol at all.
Speaker 1: You'd abstain from drinking.
Speaker 9: This is the biggest deployment of my life, and there
Speaker 9: won't be a drop of alcohol on my lips while
Speaker 9: I'm doing it.
Speaker 1: It's good enough for me when has an alcohol I
Speaker 1: ever promised to do better and not followed through. What
Speaker 1: a deal. Just put me in charge of the largest
Speaker 1: military in history, and I'll stop drinking. By the way,
Speaker 1: jello shots don't count as drinking. That's eating. That's a
Speaker 1: solid And it seems like it's good enough for Donald
Speaker 1: Trump too.
Speaker 4: The fact that there are these allegations against him, the
Speaker 4: fact that he said to some senators reportedly, he'll stop
Speaker 4: drinking if he gets this job. Does that worry you?
Speaker 10: No, I think that everybody has something that they can stop.
Speaker 3: Some people can stop eating.
Speaker 11: I'm lucky.
Speaker 3: I'm not a drinker, but he could stop eating.
Speaker 1: I think I speak for everyone when I say, sir, no,
Speaker 1: you couldn't. All right, I guess he means eating junk food.
Speaker 1: But still, there's a big difference between alcoholism and eating.
Speaker 1: No one's ever said, dad, you came home full again.
Speaker 1: You know what's weird. It's almost like the revelations about
Speaker 1: Hagset's drinking have helped him, because now it feels like
Speaker 1: if he can just steamroll the centators on this one issue,
Speaker 1: he wins, like the whole completely unqualified part about his
Speaker 1: resume is totally forgotten. But don't forget. If this guy
Speaker 1: quits drinking to become Secretary of Defense, his only qualification
Speaker 1: is that he quit drinking to become Secretary of Defense.
Speaker 1: But hey, maybe this nomination isn't the worst way to
Speaker 1: get someone off the sauce. In fact, some rehab centers
Speaker 1: are already adopting this strategy.
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Speaker 12: five Star Recovery. Our program gets you back on your
Speaker 12: feet by giving you full control of the higher US militant.
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Speaker 7: When I went to five Star, I was a drunk.
Speaker 7: They gave me peace of mind and the nuclear codes,
Speaker 7: and it got me clean for light six and a
Speaker 7: half weeks.
Speaker 12: Become your best self with our patented two step program.
Speaker 12: Step one, admit you have a problem. Step two determine
Speaker 12: how to redeploy our special forces in Syria without destabilizing
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Speaker 13: Do not our treaty with.
Speaker 12: Five Star. The journey to recovery starts with one confirmation
Speaker 12: boats and by the way.
Speaker 7: If advice see those those cults guys the help.
Speaker 1: When we come back, Well, who's Joe Biden? We're pardon next,
Speaker 1: don't blow up. Welcome back, to the Della shop. Last month,
Speaker 1: Joe Biden pardoned his son Hunter, causing people to ask,
Speaker 1: Joe Biden is still president, But he is, and he
Speaker 1: still has pardon power for another month. Our own Grace, Coole,
Speaker 1: and Schmidt hit the streets to ask New Yorkers who
Speaker 1: they think he should use it on. Next.
Speaker 13: President Biden pardon two turkeys.
Speaker 14: Named Peach and Blossom on Thanksgiving and a human man
Speaker 14: named Hunter. Biden a few days later to find out
Speaker 14: who else he might pardon before leaving office, I decided
Speaker 14: to ask my fellow friendly New Yorkers. Oh sorry, pardon me,
Speaker 14: Pardon me, pardon me.
Speaker 13: That's my first. That's my first, that's my first. I
Speaker 13: love this city.
Speaker 14: So they're saying that Biden might pardon enemies of Trump.
Speaker 14: Can you think of anyone else who might be on
Speaker 14: Trump's enemy list?
Speaker 13: Yes, me and all of my friends. Okay, gotcha. So
Speaker 13: doctor bout to be pardoned for the crime of doing science.
Speaker 13: We have to pardon Baucie. He got us through a
Speaker 13: hard time.
Speaker 14: Yeah, he got me through actually a really really bad breakup.
Speaker 13: Do you think he should pardon Eric Adams, Eric Adams.
Speaker 11: Eric Adams, Eric Adams, who's Eric Adams The.
Speaker 14: New York saying, now, do you think that he should
Speaker 14: pardon Giuliani for going goblin mode?
Speaker 13: Twenty four to seven?
Speaker 1: What's goblin mode?
Speaker 13: Well, it just kind of looks like a goblin.
Speaker 1: I think he's really disgusting.
Speaker 13: He shouldn't be pardoned for anything.
Speaker 14: Okay, So if he committed a crime, you're president, are
Speaker 14: you pardoning him? The crime is actually disgusting, it's anus murder?
Speaker 13: One hundred people we've.
Speaker 15: Asked the conversation about our love is actually conditional and
Speaker 15: really one of the things.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, all.
Speaker 13: Right, let's play Mary pardon you ready? Okay, Yeah, let's
Speaker 13: do it. The QAnon Trauman O Trump, Eric.
Speaker 14: Adams Okay, and you can't lock them all, Okay, I
Speaker 14: probably Eric Adams.
Speaker 13: You could watch this so you might have a chance, just.
Speaker 14: Because he's weak, and you know, you can like put
Speaker 14: your kingerhooks balls and like make him square.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 13: You know what, I'll marry I'll marry Donald Trump, you
Speaker 13: know what.
Speaker 1: Okay, I think i'd live a good life.
Speaker 12: I'm gonna marry Eric Adams interesting, just so that I
Speaker 12: can play mind games with him.
Speaker 3: Love it thinks gaslight hate.
Speaker 16: Keith boss being in the city of New York. I
Speaker 16: guess I'll pardon sure Adams.
Speaker 13: Congratulations, you're Cuana Truman. I forgot about that.
Speaker 1: You didn't.
Speaker 13: If you could get pardoned for one crime, what would
Speaker 13: it be?
Speaker 1: Arson?
Speaker 13: That was a really quick answer. I like you like fire.
Speaker 13: Let's get the matches away from this guy. Have you
Speaker 13: ever done anything that you would need a pardon for? Uh,
Speaker 13: marrying my first husband.
Speaker 17: I did pirate a lot of you know, LimeWire back
Speaker 17: in the day.
Speaker 13: All LimeWire users should be pardoned.
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
Speaker 16: Do you ever like you're at or something and you're
Speaker 16: holding a bunch of things and you forget to ring something.
Speaker 13: When you're doing self check out?
Speaker 14: To me, part of self checkout is maybe I am
Speaker 14: gonna shop. Do you want to look into the pardoning
Speaker 14: cam right here and ask Joe Biden to be partnered
Speaker 14: for your linewier usage?
Speaker 1: Joe Biden, I'm sorry, I just really wanted that Lincoln Park.
Speaker 16: Single President Biden. I would like to be pardoned for
Speaker 16: the occasional mistake of missing an item on self checkout?
Speaker 14: Right, she does it every single day, but she doesn't
Speaker 14: mean to. Is there anything that you've done that you
Speaker 14: think that you should get a pardon.
Speaker 15: For I guess telling people I love them when I don't.
Speaker 14: If you wouldn't mind looking into our pardon cam here
Speaker 14: and asking Joe Biden for a pardon for that.
Speaker 15: Yes, Joe Biden, please pardon me for lying to men
Speaker 15: all over the while. That's why Dave went, I'm black
Speaker 15: to you too. This is the first time I'm mat
Speaker 15: it on camera. I guess I am growing up, Biden.
Speaker 13: I need a pardon.
Speaker 14: I outed someone not buy television.
Speaker 13: To be fair, she said it herself.
Speaker 14: That's right, but I feel as though I was a
Speaker 14: lesbian accomplice in this situation.
Speaker 13: I would date you by Did I need another pardon?
Speaker 13: I picked someone up on camera. I'm an absolute player.
Speaker 1: Thank you Rich when you come back. DJ's English are
Speaker 1: the joining me on the show?
Speaker 11: Don't go away?
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Girl Show. My guest Tonight is a
Speaker 1: journalist and best selling author whose new book is called
Speaker 1: The Last Kilo. Please welcome TJ English. It's got it all,
Speaker 1: It's got it all. This book is so fun to read.
Speaker 3: Thanks.
Speaker 1: When I was the first half of this book, I said,
Speaker 1: you know what, I want to quit my job and
Speaker 1: become a cocaine smuggler. It changed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, But with that by the end of the book,
Speaker 3: you had a whole different view on that. I'm sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean should I do that?
Speaker 3: Should I?
Speaker 1: Should I?
Speaker 3: If you do it as well as they did it, yeah,
Speaker 3: you could possibly create a whole era of cocaine. It
Speaker 3: would last for ten years. Yeah, and you'd be very popular,
Speaker 3: and you'd be the king of the hill, and then
Speaker 3: it would all come crumbling down.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And who's they? Who do you write about so well?
Speaker 3: In here? I write about a group that was called
Speaker 3: Los Muchachos. They were led by a man named Willie Falcone,
Speaker 3: who was a Cuban exile whose family had been chased
Speaker 3: out of Cuba at the time of the King Cuban Revolution,
Speaker 3: and he came to the United States in the seventies.
Speaker 3: He kind of was working construction, and then some members
Speaker 3: of the anti Castro movement came to him and said,
Speaker 3: we need some young guys who will partner with us
Speaker 3: on a plan. We have to bring cocaine into the
Speaker 3: United States and to sell it in the United States
Speaker 3: and use the proceeds to buy guns and explosives for
Speaker 3: the contras in Central America.
Speaker 1: And Willie said drugs are not my thing, goodbye. End
Speaker 1: of the story.
Speaker 3: He probably maybe wishes he had said that. No, he
Speaker 3: said I can do that. I mean, his main motivation
Speaker 3: was to get rid of Castro. I mean that was
Speaker 3: that generation of Cubans woke up in the morning dreaming
Speaker 3: of a dead Fidel cast So, in fact, they woke
Speaker 3: up in the morning dreaming of strangling Fidel cast to
Speaker 3: death with their own hands.
Speaker 1: But in a way, doesn't that romanticize this a little bit?
Speaker 1: I mean it's like, it's easy for Willie Falcon to say,
Speaker 1: it's okay that I'm doing all this because it has
Speaker 1: a good I have fedibility, because I'm overthrowing this regime. Yeah,
Speaker 1: But I mean it grew bigger than that.
Speaker 3: For Yeah, I think we refer to that as a
Speaker 3: false value system. I mean, he believed in it. He
Speaker 3: believed in it, believed in the cause, and he was
Speaker 3: willing to do anything for the cause. And so when
Speaker 3: they they asked him to do this, he was all
Speaker 3: for it. Now, you got to remember, in the late
Speaker 3: seventies when this started, cocaine was only used by the
Speaker 3: very rich in Hollywood, rock stars and some professional athletes.
Speaker 3: Nobody else could afford it. So the first thing they
Speaker 3: did was they made it affordable. They brought in so
Speaker 3: much quantity that they could lower the price and sell,
Speaker 3: and they started to sell it, and it was available
Speaker 3: at the working class level. Everyone was using.
Speaker 1: How much cocaine did you do to research this book?
Speaker 3: Well, if you look at to cover the book they
Speaker 3: showed me to cover the book, I say, could we
Speaker 3: make the cocaine embossed so it looks like a real
Speaker 3: looks like a real line of cocaine. I think we'd
Speaker 3: sell more books.
Speaker 1: That way, And they probably said, sell more books, and
Speaker 1: then Alabasa. This book has forty pages of reference notes.
Speaker 1: So you know this is an entertaining read about cocaine
Speaker 1: smugglers and speedboat racing and and sex and women and
Speaker 1: buying sheriffs to create airfields so they can fly in
Speaker 1: cocaine from Columbia. But you tell me you actually research
Speaker 1: this shit, hey man.
Speaker 3: When I started this book, I thought I knew this
Speaker 3: era like a lot of people. I saw the movies Scarface,
Speaker 3: Miami Vice. You know, this era existed in our culture,
Speaker 3: and I came to believe that a lot of that
Speaker 3: is not untrue. But sensationalized. Sure, there's a lot of
Speaker 3: stereotypes in the presentation of the cocaine era. For instance,
Speaker 3: this group did not use violence is part of their operation.
Speaker 3: That was startling to me. I was even concerned. I
Speaker 3: was like, how do we tell a cocaine story without
Speaker 3: uzi submachine guns and chainsaws.
Speaker 1: It seems like their philosophy was he catched more flies
Speaker 1: with honey than vinegar. I mean, there's examples of people
Speaker 1: people lying to them and they actually don't use violence.
Speaker 1: If anything, they would call them in for a meeting
Speaker 1: and give them some money and say we should be friends.
Speaker 3: Right, Well, you know what they would do, They would
Speaker 3: cut them out of the business. And Willie and his
Speaker 3: partner Samagluda, William sal and Loso Muchacho's that was the
Speaker 3: name of the organization, were so predominant in the cocaine business.
Speaker 3: If you got cut out of their operation, you were
Speaker 3: cut out of the business. They had the best product
Speaker 3: at the best price. And we're talking about Miami as
Speaker 3: a base, but what they were known for was their
Speaker 3: distribution system. So bringing cocaine to La to San Francisco,
Speaker 3: to Chicago to New York. They really created a system
Speaker 3: that touched off that entire era.
Speaker 1: And you sat with Falcon, I sure did, yeah, once twice.
Speaker 3: Seven or eight times. Wow. And then we communicate a
Speaker 3: lot through.
Speaker 1: Is he still doing blow a lot of times or what? No,
Speaker 1: you know, I gotta wonder that. It's like he's doing blow,
Speaker 1: he's on speedboats, they're doing this. And then I'm like,
Speaker 1: then he goes to prison. I'm like, well, he's got
Speaker 1: to be addicted to cocaine at this point.
Speaker 3: He was doing blow in prison. I'm sure, Oh wow,
Speaker 3: that's that's one of the easiest places to get both.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you don't have to tell me TJ. Yeah, I've
Speaker 1: never been to prison. So you sat with William bunch?
Speaker 3: I sat with him a bunch, Yes, And I traveled
Speaker 3: to where he to the country that shall remain nameless,
Speaker 3: where he is.
Speaker 1: Sure.
Speaker 3: And it wasn't easy because with the middle of the
Speaker 3: COVID crisis, so flying in and out in the country
Speaker 3: was really difficult at the time, but it was really important.
Speaker 3: I knew I couldn't do the book unless we I
Speaker 3: could take stock of him face to face as a person.
Speaker 1: There's kind of a funny party vibe with cocaine. It's
Speaker 1: done at the club. That's what I hear, right, and
Speaker 1: then but then you say crack and it changes quickly.
Speaker 3: Oh man.
Speaker 1: And I wonder if Willie Falcon feels any remorse or
Speaker 1: does he feel I mean, the crack epidemic. You know,
Speaker 1: it's not a laughing matter, it's not a cocaine isn't either,
Speaker 1: But does he feel any of this or.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the crack, the emergence of crack, which they had
Speaker 3: nothing to do with, was a phenomenon that was created
Speaker 3: kind of at the street level. Changed everything. Yeah, up
Speaker 3: until then you could say that the cocaine era was
Speaker 3: all parties and good times. Crack was ugly, it was violent.
Speaker 3: It brought it down to a street level and took
Speaker 3: all the fun out of it. Yes, all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: if you were a cocaine dealer, damn it crack. Yeah,
Speaker 3: all of a sudden you had blood on your hands
Speaker 3: if you were a cocaine dealer.
Speaker 1: I remember in nineteen eighty nine watching George H. W.
Speaker 1: Bush Do Blow, Do Blow, And that's when I said,
Speaker 1: I will no. It was in the White House he
Speaker 1: did this press conference.
Speaker 3: Ever tell anybody about that him doing the White House?
Speaker 1: You know what it would it would help. Yeah, if
Speaker 1: there's a party that does blow, it's probably Republicans, to
Speaker 1: be honest with you. But he showed everybody this bag
Speaker 1: of crack. I was watching it with my father. I
Speaker 1: remember thinking, holy shit, drugs are bad. He says in
Speaker 1: this press conference that they've they bought this crack outside
Speaker 1: at the White House. I dare, don't do drugs, Nancy Reagan.
Speaker 1: Holy shit. Then I read your book. I find out
Speaker 1: that that whole bought crack at the White House thing
Speaker 1: was fake. It was fake. In fact, the Dea said
Speaker 1: to a drug dealer, you got to sell us crack
Speaker 1: outside of the White House, and the drug dealer says,
Speaker 1: where the is the White House? I mean, this is
Speaker 1: all made up?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 5: What?
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the American government's role in all this,
Speaker 1: the war on drugs, the war on drugs, and also
Speaker 1: helping fund oh, the rebellion that started this.
Speaker 3: This opened my eyes and again I thought I knew
Speaker 3: a lot about this era going into it, the ways
Speaker 3: in which cocaine was used as a political tool. Here's
Speaker 3: something that's interesting. William Sal's main money launderer was a
Speaker 3: banker in Panama City known as Kiermo and Dara. He
Speaker 3: was burying their billions and billions of dollars in bank
Speaker 3: accounts in Panama when they.
Speaker 1: Would ship in drywall palace down to Panama. I mean,
Speaker 1: I read this stuff and I'm like, discuss should be
Speaker 1: the head of wal Mart or.
Speaker 3: Something, you know what I mean. They're inventive, right, I mean,
Speaker 3: they basically were making it up as they went along.
Speaker 3: These are guys who are high school dropouts. I mean,
Speaker 3: it's ingenious. I find this in the criminal world quite often.
Speaker 3: Criminal organization people with very little formal education that construct
Speaker 3: these phenomenal criminal operations. If they had chosen legit form
Speaker 3: of business, they probably would have been really success for sure.
Speaker 3: Willi's Ghermo and Dara. So they deposed Manuel Norega in Panama.
Speaker 3: The United States is done with him. He's no longer
Speaker 3: their buddy. They force him out, they bring him the
Speaker 3: United States put him away in prison. As a successor,
Speaker 3: you know who, President Bush chooses to be president of Panela.
Speaker 3: Guermo and Dara, William Sal's money launderer, becomes the president
Speaker 3: of Panama.
Speaker 1: And there's an interesting partner here where they get worried
Speaker 1: that they're not going to get their money from him,
Speaker 1: and he says, don't worry, I'm going to become president.
Speaker 3: Yeah. And they thought they were going to get their
Speaker 3: money and they lost four hundred million dollars in those accounts. Wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the money. And then he ends up being in
Speaker 1: a cell next to Noriega and they're kind of chatting
Speaker 1: to each other, and he was kind of like, Noriega
Speaker 1: is annoying. I don't want to talk to.
Speaker 3: A strange bedfellows.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you write so much about the criminal underworld. You
Speaker 1: know some of your other books, The Westies, Havana, Nocturne,
Speaker 1: Dangerous Rhythms, Born to Kill. It's about the bloodiest Asian gang,
Speaker 1: the Cuba of Mafia, the Irish mob. Just admit it.
Speaker 1: You want to be a criminal.
Speaker 3: This is what keeps me from being a criminal. It
Speaker 3: is yes, absolutely, what is it that?
Speaker 1: I mean, it's very entertaining to read this stuff, But
Speaker 1: you are diving in.
Speaker 3: I've always thought of organized crime not as some fringe
Speaker 3: aspect of American culture, but as the main vein of
Speaker 3: American culture. And if you research it that way and
Speaker 3: you look at it that way, you learn a lot
Speaker 3: about America, politics, sociology. It really is an interesting prism
Speaker 3: or angle to look at I call it from the gutter.
Speaker 3: It's looking at America from the point of view of
Speaker 3: the gutter. And you learn so much about it. It's
Speaker 3: an inexhaustible topic to me. I can go back in
Speaker 3: history and tell stories. I can do contemporary versions of it.
Speaker 1: I can't walk around Manhattan anymore because when Willie Falcone
Speaker 1: was hiding, yes he had to hide from the federal government,
Speaker 1: he did it here in New York on the Lamb.
Speaker 1: He didn't want to stay home where I think his
Speaker 1: wife was there where the living Upper east Side or.
Speaker 3: Something, the West Soupper west side along the park.
Speaker 1: So his his work partner would pick him up in
Speaker 1: a van and he would had the Cebee radio and
Speaker 1: they would drive him around Manhattan. He would talk to
Speaker 1: Escobar on the Cebe radio, organizing every time I see
Speaker 1: a van out there, I'm going, that's cocaine smuggling happened
Speaker 1: right now.
Speaker 3: You might be onto something there, right, Yeah, a mobile
Speaker 3: headquarters where he was consummating cocaine, international cocaine deals from
Speaker 3: the back of the van.
Speaker 1: They were doing encrypted messaging.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, well yeah, they really. I mean, I'm telling
Speaker 3: you if you if you bend your mind around what
Speaker 3: it is they had to do to create this operation,
Speaker 3: it's pretty extraordinary.
Speaker 1: I love there's a speedboat on the cover here because
Speaker 1: they also.
Speaker 17: Were powerboat racing champions, Champion power I mean it's like,
Speaker 17: but also, if you're doing coke, you want to go fast,
Speaker 17: So that if they became power.
Speaker 1: Boat champions and they were high on marijuana, that'd be different.
Speaker 1: Now you're only going three miles an hour, really felt rope.
Speaker 3: If they I am marijuana, they'd be doing their power
Speaker 3: bow racing in the bathtub.
Speaker 1: I hate to say this because it romanticizes them, but
Speaker 1: it does seem like they were. They were winners, or
Speaker 1: at least they went big. Now it should everyone should know.
Speaker 1: It ends poorly. It ends very very poorly. And there's
Speaker 1: also a part of me that gets so mad at
Speaker 1: all the rules they broke. Yeah, that's not fair. You
Speaker 1: can't buy a sheriff fixing the jury they fixed, I
Speaker 1: mean that blew me away, and tell me a little
Speaker 1: bit about that.
Speaker 3: Well, they finally go to trial, a big federal racketeering trial,
Speaker 3: and they're so popular in South Florida that they not
Speaker 3: only fix the jury, they fix one two three four,
Speaker 3: five jurors out of twelve they buy off to give
Speaker 3: them a not guilty verdict, and they're found not guilty.
Speaker 3: It was a shock to everybody. They own the system.
Speaker 3: They were like Robin Hood's in South Florida. They were
Speaker 3: revered by many Cuban Americans because they funneled money back
Speaker 3: into the community. They've built baseball parks and they spread
Speaker 3: they spread the money around. They were very popular.
Speaker 1: Some of the more powerful moments in the book are
Speaker 1: when they're faced with those decisions through their families. Yes,
Speaker 1: where parents who came over dangerous situations and almost act
Speaker 1: now embarrassed of their children.
Speaker 3: That's very poignant. It was very poignant to me because
Speaker 3: you know, their parents were kicked out of Cubea. Some
Speaker 3: of them had been professionals, and they lost everything and
Speaker 3: they wound up in South Florida with nothing. And here's
Speaker 3: the kids eleven, twelve, thirteen are looking at their parents.
Speaker 3: They grow up watching their parents suffer. I think what
Speaker 3: was driving a lot of this cocaine generation was to
Speaker 3: succeed and to make their parents proud. Ironically, that was
Speaker 3: their goal to show that they could make it in
Speaker 3: America in a way that would make their parents proud.
Speaker 3: And it was the parents that came to them, knew
Speaker 3: they were in the cocaine business and came to them
Speaker 3: and said, son, you got to get out. You got
Speaker 3: to get out of this business. It's not going to
Speaker 3: end well.
Speaker 1: And that's easy. It's easy to cheat. It's hard to
Speaker 1: do it the right way.
Speaker 3: It's hard to cheat too.
Speaker 1: It's hard to cheat. And that's the lesson I want
Speaker 1: to ask you this. This is your tenth book. Yes,
Speaker 1: for any young writer author out there. Advice for anyone
Speaker 1: who wants to write. I don't even know if his
Speaker 1: kids read books anymore, but there is a kid out
Speaker 1: there that wants to write books. What would you say,
Speaker 1: it's a him or her at this.
Speaker 3: Point, Write every day, write something every day, and get
Speaker 3: out into the world, because writing is basically transforming your
Speaker 3: experiences into the written word down on the page. And
Speaker 3: so get out. If you're a kid who's in school,
Speaker 3: get away from school. And I don't mean drop out.
Speaker 3: I don't mean drop out, but I mean there's a
Speaker 3: reality other than school, and that's the reality you got
Speaker 3: to learn. Let go with the side of the pool
Speaker 3: and push yourself out into the deep end. That's how
Speaker 3: you become a writer.
Speaker 1: Well, you write wonderfully. My family was happy when I
Speaker 1: finished this book because they were talking to me and
Speaker 1: I'm going, like sex in prison, what the hell it's coin?
Speaker 1: But it's a great book. Thank you for coming and
Speaker 1: talking with us today. The last kilo is available out
Speaker 1: TJ English and there's a quick break and right back
Speaker 1: after that. How can I show up for time? But
Speaker 1: before we go, please consider donating to One Simple Wish,
Speaker 1: a charity that grants wishes to children in foster care.
Speaker 1: If you can grant a wish or donate towards their
Speaker 1: holiday Wish fund, please do so at the link below.
Speaker 1: Now Here it is your moment of zep.
Speaker 10: Isn't that enough to figure out what the drone is
Speaker 10: and who's behind it? I don't understand why we have
Speaker 10: no information on this. It feels I don't believe it.
Speaker 10: I think they do have information on if they're not
Speaker 10: telling us. I mean my guess is that it's China
Speaker 10: and they just aren't doing anything about it.
Speaker 3: Am I right?
Speaker 1: If the drone is large enough, we are going to
Speaker 1: be able to find out who made it and who
Speaker 1: brought it into effect.
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