WEBVTT - The Business Plot: When Rich Fascists Almost Took Over America 0:00:00.280 --> 0:00:04.000 You always had the feeling that there's something strange about reality. 0:00:04.200 --> 0:00:07.240 According to the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast, there is. 0:00:07.520 --> 0:00:10.920 On the show, post Robert Lamb and Joe McCormick examine 0:00:10.960 --> 0:00:16.599 neurological quandaries, cosmic mysteries, evolutionary marvels, and much more. Prosthetics 0:00:16.600 --> 0:00:19.960 are true testaments to not only human craftsmanship and ingenuity, 0:00:20.000 --> 0:00:22.720 but also to the plasticity of the human brain. Listen it' 0:00:22.720 --> 0:00:24.560 Stuff to Blow Your Mind on the I Heart Radio 0:00:24.600 --> 0:00:26.759 apper wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:29.159 dot dot go. Protect your privacy online for free with 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:33.559 dot dot go. Hello, Hello, Hey, I don't know if 0:00:33.600 --> 0:00:37.200 you heard, but my podcast Checking It has been nominated 0:00:37.240 --> 0:00:39.559 for the End of a CP Image Award in the 0:00:39.600 --> 0:00:44.800 category of Outstanding Lifestyle and Self Help Podcast. I'm grateful 0:00:44.840 --> 0:00:47.440 for the nomination. I I almost didn't even do a 0:00:47.479 --> 0:00:50.000 podcast because I was just wandering there are thousands of 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:53.640 podcasts out there and why is my voice needed. But 0:00:53.720 --> 0:00:56.560 a nomination from the End of a CP lets me 0:00:56.680 --> 0:00:59.680 know that I made the right choice, and I encourage 0:00:59.720 --> 0:01:02.520 you to don't worry if there are thousands of something 0:01:02.520 --> 0:01:06.080 else that you want to do. No nobody has your sauce, 0:01:06.360 --> 0:01:08.400 so listen. You can still vote. Go to vote dot 0:01:08.880 --> 0:01:11.960 a CP Image Awards dot net. You have until February five, 0:01:12.560 --> 0:01:15.800 um nine pm Eastern Standard time, and please listen to 0:01:15.880 --> 0:01:18.760 my podcast. We're part of the Black Effect podcast Network 0:01:18.800 --> 0:01:21.080 on the I Heart Radio app or wherever you get 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:33.800 your podcast. Thank you for checking in. Look for your 0:01:33.880 --> 0:01:37.399 children's eyes and you will discover the two magic of 0:01:37.440 --> 0:01:41.400 a forest. Find a forest near you and start exploring it. 0:01:41.560 --> 0:01:44.160 Discover the Forest dot org, brought to you by the 0:01:44.240 --> 0:01:49.920 United States Forest Service and the AD Council. What's overthrowing 0:01:49.960 --> 0:01:58.640 the government? My consortium of shady financial interests? Yeah, I 0:01:58.680 --> 0:02:03.080 don't know, I got no h. This is behind the 0:02:03.160 --> 0:02:07.360 insurrections of the Find Behind the Bastards mini series about 0:02:07.360 --> 0:02:10.720 fascist attempts to seize power. Uh. And this is our 0:02:11.120 --> 0:02:13.960 last episode of this beautiful mini series. We did have 0:02:14.000 --> 0:02:18.320 a seventh episode planned, but um I had some personal news. 0:02:18.720 --> 0:02:21.960 That's that's gonna alter our work schedule a little bit. 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:23.800 But we will get to that episode at some point, 0:02:23.840 --> 0:02:28.720 but not next week. Um My guest with this one, 0:02:28.800 --> 0:02:32.239 as as with always on our mini series, Jason Petty 0:02:32.280 --> 0:02:35.880 a k A. Prop What's always Alwa's property is in 0:02:35.880 --> 0:02:39.080 a building. Now, prop, I'm gonna come right to the chase. 0:02:39.240 --> 0:02:45.240 Have you heard of the business plot? No? Oh good? 0:02:45.600 --> 0:02:48.320 Oh well. One of the things that's fun about this 0:02:48.560 --> 0:02:51.639 is that, um, one of our characters from behind the 0:02:51.720 --> 0:02:55.120 police is the main character of this story. Um, our 0:02:55.160 --> 0:02:58.200 old friends Smedley Butler. Yeah, the guy who ran the 0:02:58.240 --> 0:03:03.040 police in Philadelphia, the marine. That's that's going to be exciting. Yeah, 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:07.959 I know that guy. So the business plot is there's 0:03:08.000 --> 0:03:10.239 a reason why you haven't heard of it. Uh. A 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:11.959 lot of people have put in a lot of effort 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:15.200 to make sure that people don't talk about this anymore. UM. 0:03:15.840 --> 0:03:20.440 Imagine a cadre of plutocratic bankers, financiers, and media moguls 0:03:20.480 --> 0:03:24.280 all conspired to take over US democracy and institute of 0:03:24.320 --> 0:03:28.480 fascist state hidden as a fake democracy. Um, shouldn't take 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:33.679 a whole lot of imagination. Yeah. Um, that's what people 0:03:33.720 --> 0:03:36.440 say to record industry is yeah, the record industry or 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:38.760 the way a lot of our government works right now, 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:42.840 Like the fact that Janet Yellen uh had financial ties 0:03:42.920 --> 0:03:45.560 to one of the giant hedge funds that shut down 0:03:45.640 --> 0:03:47.560 the game stock trading and stuff like, yeah, you know 0:03:48.000 --> 0:03:51.000 it may sound that sounds familiar to people. Um, but 0:03:51.160 --> 0:03:54.040 usually we're talking about it. Most people were talking about 0:03:54.200 --> 0:03:55.600 you know when we talk about like, well, there's a 0:03:55.640 --> 0:03:58.920 cadre of elites who control you know, the government. Um, 0:03:59.360 --> 0:04:01.880 they meet it in sort of a deep state. Since 0:04:02.280 --> 0:04:05.440 but there was a time where the wealthiest men in 0:04:05.480 --> 0:04:08.800 America engaged in a very real conspiracy to have a 0:04:08.880 --> 0:04:12.520 paramilitary army sees the levers of power overthrow the president 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:16.159 and institute of fascist state. Um. And there's people alive 0:04:16.279 --> 0:04:18.520 today who lived through it. It happened in the thirties. 0:04:20.600 --> 0:04:23.719 So yeah, yeah, yeah, this is this is a story 0:04:23.839 --> 0:04:27.479 people should know. Um. I think you'll find this one interesting. Props. So, okay, 0:04:27.640 --> 0:04:28.920 is gonna this is gonna be one of those ones 0:04:28.960 --> 0:04:32.800 where I'm like, I'm actually going in. Yeah, this is 0:04:32.839 --> 0:04:36.920 a fun one. Yes. So, our our story starts with 0:04:37.040 --> 0:04:39.000 one of my favorite historical figures. As I told you, 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:42.840 Major General Smedley Butler. We're talking about old Smedley again. Um, 0:04:43.760 --> 0:04:45.880 So we're gonna start by talking about him because he's 0:04:45.880 --> 0:04:48.880 at the center of all this. So okay, Smedley Butler 0:04:48.960 --> 0:04:51.080 was born in eighteen eighty one, who is the eldest 0:04:51.120 --> 0:04:55.080 son of a Quaker family from Westchester, Pennsylvania. His father, Thomas, 0:04:55.200 --> 0:04:58.320 was a congressman and his maternal grandfather was in Congress 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:00.520 as well, So this is a guy who comes from 0:05:00.560 --> 0:05:04.040 a lot of privilege in power. UM. He attended the 0:05:04.120 --> 0:05:06.839 Haverford School, which is a secondary school for rich kids 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:10.640 from Philadelphia, and he thrived in this upper crust, elite institution. 0:05:10.960 --> 0:05:13.640 He became captain of the school baseball team and quarterback 0:05:13.680 --> 0:05:15.960 of the football team, and he seemed to be on 0:05:16.120 --> 0:05:18.920 the road to a career in politics or business. But 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:22.360 then thirty eight days before his seventeenth birthday, he left 0:05:22.440 --> 0:05:25.560 school to enlist in the United States Marine Corps UM. 0:05:25.800 --> 0:05:28.120 So he's on like a path to follow you into 0:05:28.160 --> 0:05:31.280 business or into politics. And then when he's sixteen, he 0:05:31.560 --> 0:05:34.040 leaves home to join the Marines. Now this pisses off 0:05:34.120 --> 0:05:36.440 his dad, who didn't want his kid joining the Marines. 0:05:36.880 --> 0:05:39.920 But the reason Smedley had joined is that the Spanish 0:05:39.960 --> 0:05:42.240 American War had just started, which we chatted about of 0:05:42.279 --> 0:05:45.560 it last week, and Smedley wanted to fight UM. So 0:05:45.680 --> 0:05:47.680 he lied about his age to the Marines and was 0:05:47.720 --> 0:05:50.920 commissioned as a second lieutenant. He landed in Guantanamo Bay, 0:05:51.000 --> 0:05:53.000 Cuba shortly after it was captured, and he didn't see 0:05:53.000 --> 0:05:55.720 any action there. His unit was sent back to the 0:05:55.800 --> 0:05:57.960 mainland and he could have been cashiered out, you know, 0:05:58.200 --> 0:06:01.000 gone back into go you know, doing a business thing. 0:06:01.400 --> 0:06:03.280 But he decided to stay in the Marines and take 0:06:03.279 --> 0:06:05.320 a commission as a first lieutenant and go fight in 0:06:05.360 --> 0:06:08.599 the Philippines. Um. He was not immediately good at war. 0:06:08.839 --> 0:06:11.920 He was initially tasked with garrison duty, which bored him 0:06:11.960 --> 0:06:14.039 so much that he just spent all of his time drunk. 0:06:14.400 --> 0:06:17.160 He was at one point relieved of command temporarily due 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:19.160 to something he did in his bedroom, which is all 0:06:19.240 --> 0:06:22.640 that we know about the incident he did. He did 0:06:22.800 --> 0:06:25.839 something with alcohol in his bedroom that made his superiors 0:06:25.880 --> 0:06:27.720 be like, this guy can't be in charge of people 0:06:27.760 --> 0:06:34.000 for a while. Yeah, yeah, phil phill in the blanks, 0:06:34.120 --> 0:06:40.680 you know. Um So, in October of eighteen nine nine, 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:43.120 he saw his first combat action when he led three 0:06:43.520 --> 0:06:45.480 Marines to conquer a town from the people who you 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:48.480 know lived there, right, Like, this is a colonial, brutal 0:06:48.560 --> 0:06:51.520 colonial war. Were still colonial, got it, Like, he's he's 0:06:51.520 --> 0:06:53.400 a he's the bad guy right there, We're we're the 0:06:53.480 --> 0:06:56.680 bad guys in that war. Um. Yeah, and Butler fell 0:06:56.760 --> 0:06:59.360 in love with battle and with the Marine Corps. He 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:02.440 just was very it was very good at fighting. Like 0:07:02.640 --> 0:07:07.040 he this is a really difficult, desperate situation, and he 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:12.000 comports himself well, he's good at leading men in combat. Um. 0:07:12.480 --> 0:07:16.119 And he becomes after fighting so enthralled with the Marine 0:07:16.160 --> 0:07:18.720 Corps that he hires a tattoo artist to give him 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:21.480 a full from his neck to his belly tattoo of 0:07:21.520 --> 0:07:26.960 the Marine Corps emblem like this. He's very into the Marines. Okay, 0:07:28.600 --> 0:07:31.840 loves him some being a marine. Yeah, you're getting a 0:07:31.880 --> 0:07:34.960 full day. That's that's that's some being affleck, you know. 0:07:35.640 --> 0:07:39.120 But I think, yeah, there's I know, people, including some 0:07:39.240 --> 0:07:41.480 Marine bets, who will argue that the Marine Corps kind 0:07:41.520 --> 0:07:44.640 of the cultist of the of the military branches. Um. Yeah. 0:07:45.360 --> 0:07:47.400 And some might argue that's because they're the best at 0:07:47.440 --> 0:07:50.440 what they do. Um. But Butler is definitely drinking the 0:07:50.520 --> 0:07:55.200 fucking kool aid. Right. So he gets sent to China 0:07:55.320 --> 0:07:57.440 next as part of the U. S. Dettachment sent over 0:07:57.560 --> 0:08:00.280 during the Boxer Rebellion. He's wounded in calm At and 0:08:00.360 --> 0:08:02.560 despite having a bullet like one of his men gets 0:08:02.640 --> 0:08:04.680 hurt and he runs out to get him and get 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:06.680 shot in the leg. And despite having a bullet in 0:08:06.760 --> 0:08:10.160 his leg, he drags multiple men to safety while actively 0:08:10.280 --> 0:08:13.880 under fire and bleeding. Um and again the box reveillion 0:08:13.880 --> 0:08:18.720 another brutal colonial action. Um. But he's he comports himself 0:08:18.840 --> 0:08:22.000 very well. Now, at that time, commissioned officers were unable 0:08:22.040 --> 0:08:24.280 to receive the Medal of Honor, otherwise he probably would 0:08:24.280 --> 0:08:26.360 have earned one. But he received some decorations for his 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:31.200 gallantry under fire. Smedley Butler would spend the next couple 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:34.600 of decades as he would grow into what was probably 0:08:34.679 --> 0:08:37.920 the best soldier in the American Empire. Like he is 0:08:38.000 --> 0:08:42.680 an exceptional imperial soldier. Um. He fights in the Banana Wars, 0:08:42.720 --> 0:08:45.040 which were a series of police actions and intervention in 0:08:45.080 --> 0:08:47.400 the Caribbean and in Central America made on behalf of 0:08:47.520 --> 0:08:51.920 US business interests, killing people for He's he's killing people 0:08:52.000 --> 0:08:55.200 for banana companies. He's killing people for United you know. Uh. 0:08:55.280 --> 0:08:57.960 He fights in Honduras, where he was constantly near death 0:08:58.000 --> 0:09:01.760 with fever and received the knickname Old Gimlet Eye because 0:09:02.080 --> 0:09:05.480 his eye his every like he was, he looked terrifying. 0:09:05.559 --> 0:09:09.400 He was this gaunt, scar filled monster with bloodshot eyes. 0:09:10.000 --> 0:09:13.280 Um and like just feverish. Yeah, that's his old gimlet 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:15.600 eye is. Like he looks like a fucking a wraith. 0:09:15.880 --> 0:09:20.079 You know. I love this guy. He's except for his 0:09:21.280 --> 0:09:25.880 except for his colonial colonial stuff. Yeah. Yeah, he's fighting 0:09:26.080 --> 0:09:29.559 on the wrong side, but he's objectively a badass. Um. So, 0:09:29.679 --> 0:09:33.080 Butler racks up promotion after promotion. He enforces US foreign 0:09:33.120 --> 0:09:35.719 policy in Nicaragua. He sent us a spy during the 0:09:35.800 --> 0:09:38.760 Mexican American War. He sent us a spy to Mexico City, 0:09:39.200 --> 0:09:40.959 or one of the wars that we fall with Mexico. 0:09:41.000 --> 0:09:43.160 He sent us a spy to Mexico City to help 0:09:43.200 --> 0:09:46.440 the United States gather information for the siege of Vera Cruz, 0:09:46.640 --> 0:09:48.400 which a lot of people don't know we were doing 0:09:48.440 --> 0:09:52.720 in the early nineteen hundreds. We like bombed Vera Cruz. Yeah, yeah, 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:56.199 there's a good warren Zevon song about it. Butler was 0:09:56.280 --> 0:09:59.360 one of nearly sixty American servicemen who received Medals of 0:09:59.440 --> 0:10:01.599 Honor for their service in Mexico because he fights in 0:10:01.800 --> 0:10:04.280 in Vera Cruz as well. Uh, and virtually all of 0:10:04.320 --> 0:10:06.720 those medals were complete bullshit, like they hand out sixty 0:10:06.760 --> 0:10:09.520 medals of Honor for the Siege of Vera Cruz. And 0:10:09.600 --> 0:10:13.160 they're doing it because Woodrow Wilson, the President, knows that, like, 0:10:13.360 --> 0:10:15.439 this is an ugly colonial war, and he wants to 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:18.080 dress it up by making it look like by putting 0:10:18.120 --> 0:10:20.360 out a bunch of stories of heroism and stuff. So 0:10:20.520 --> 0:10:22.800 he hands out the military's highest honor like candy, and 0:10:22.800 --> 0:10:25.280 there's actually a bunch of It's a big controversy at 0:10:25.280 --> 0:10:26.880 the time because a lot of veterans are like, you're 0:10:26.920 --> 0:10:30.160 devaluing the medal of honor by using it this way. Um. 0:10:30.440 --> 0:10:33.199 And Smedley Butler receives one of these show medals of 0:10:33.280 --> 0:10:35.719 honor and he tries to return it, arguing that he'd 0:10:35.720 --> 0:10:37.719 done nothing to deserve it and he shouldn't get it, 0:10:38.120 --> 0:10:40.440 but he's ordered by his superiors to keep the medal 0:10:40.559 --> 0:10:43.520 and wear it on his uniform. Um. So you're seeing 0:10:43.559 --> 0:10:46.040 he's starting he's starting to like realize, like that's kind 0:10:46.080 --> 0:10:48.559 of messed up. Why why I I don't deserve this? 0:10:48.640 --> 0:10:51.800 Don't give this to me? Um? Like that, Yeah, he's 0:10:51.880 --> 0:10:55.559 he keeps me, He keeps me like imbalanced. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:10:55.600 --> 0:10:59.320 you're gonna he's he's he's a growth story. Smedley. Smedley's 0:10:59.320 --> 0:11:02.760 always Jane Jake, especially knowing because of the behind the 0:11:02.800 --> 0:11:05.040 police stuff, like I know where this guy lands where 0:11:05.040 --> 0:11:08.520 I'm just like, why am I feeling any stupidly about you? Yeah, 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:11.040 it's it's that's that's not even quite Yeah, well we'll 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:13.880 talk about it. So in Haiti. In Haiti, Butler wins 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:16.760 his second Medal of honor Um, and this was one 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:19.160 for actual fighting. His unit was sent into the country 0:11:19.200 --> 0:11:21.920 when the president was murdered by a mob. Butler and 0:11:21.960 --> 0:11:24.760 his troops repeatedly outnumbered by insurgents, and over a long 0:11:24.840 --> 0:11:28.679 campaign succeeded in breaking the insurgency and establishing order for 0:11:28.760 --> 0:11:32.199 the U S back dictatorship. Butler himself helped organize the 0:11:32.240 --> 0:11:35.000 Haitian police, and in his own recollection, he and his 0:11:35.080 --> 0:11:39.520 men hunted enemy rebels quote like pigs. Um. So again 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:42.400 this he is a brutal soldier of empire, like building 0:11:42.440 --> 0:11:46.599 the police force for a dictator. Um. You have to 0:11:47.400 --> 0:11:51.079 kind of look at but yeah, it's not great. Um, 0:11:51.679 --> 0:11:54.679 it's not great now. Smedley was promoted to brigadier general 0:11:54.720 --> 0:11:57.640 at age thirty seven. He was in Remains one of 0:11:57.679 --> 0:12:00.160 the most highly decorated soldiers in the entire history of 0:12:00.160 --> 0:12:03.120 the United States military. He's got two medals of honor. Um, 0:12:03.400 --> 0:12:05.480 and he's he's like, you know, as a general rule, 0:12:05.720 --> 0:12:09.560 generals don't get medals of honor, certainly not two of them. Um, 0:12:09.720 --> 0:12:11.839 they don't tend to be fighting guys. But Smedley is 0:12:11.880 --> 0:12:14.200 a fighting guy. He's not a stand back and give orders. 0:12:14.200 --> 0:12:17.120 He'sould get stuck in kind of dude. Um. He desperately 0:12:17.160 --> 0:12:18.959 wanted to fight in France during World War One, but 0:12:19.000 --> 0:12:21.920 he was not assigned combat duty. This is probably because 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:23.880 by the later stage of his career he was seen 0:12:23.920 --> 0:12:27.440 as politically unreliable due to the tendency he developed over 0:12:27.480 --> 0:12:29.959 the years to say exactly what he felt. But the 0:12:30.120 --> 0:12:33.000 retired in late nineteen thirty one. He ran for Senate 0:12:33.040 --> 0:12:36.000 in nineteen thirty two, supporting prohibition, but he was defeated, 0:12:36.440 --> 0:12:38.520 and in the late stage of his career while he's 0:12:38.520 --> 0:12:40.680 still in the Marines. Is when he's running the police 0:12:40.679 --> 0:12:44.959 in Philadelphia during that brief tenure. Um. So this is 0:12:45.120 --> 0:12:47.839 you know, our story starts after he's he you know, 0:12:47.960 --> 0:12:49.760 he took what he learned in Haiti and tried to 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:52.200 apply it to the Philadelphia Police. It didn't work out great, 0:12:52.280 --> 0:12:54.439 but he's kind of the father in a lot of ways, 0:12:54.480 --> 0:12:57.839 one of the fathers of militarizing the US police. UM. 0:12:58.200 --> 0:13:00.880 And now he's he's retired. He tried to get into politics. 0:13:00.960 --> 0:13:03.480 He's not good at it. UM And by the early 0:13:03.640 --> 0:13:07.440 nineteen thirties, Smedley Butler, who is probably the greatest soldier 0:13:07.520 --> 0:13:10.920 in any empire ever had um had started to change 0:13:10.960 --> 0:13:13.240 his mind on some things. A lot of this had 0:13:13.280 --> 0:13:15.480 to do with the Great Depression and a social movement 0:13:15.520 --> 0:13:18.360 that it spawned called the Bonus Army. The gist of 0:13:18.440 --> 0:13:20.719 it is that when the economy crashed, a bunch of 0:13:20.760 --> 0:13:23.240 World War One veterans found themselves unemployed, in a lot 0:13:23.280 --> 0:13:26.360 of cases homeless and starving. These guys had been given 0:13:26.440 --> 0:13:29.760 what we're called service certificates in nineteen twenty four, which 0:13:29.840 --> 0:13:32.320 was the government saying we will pay you a bunch 0:13:32.400 --> 0:13:34.719 of money for what you did in the war, but 0:13:34.920 --> 0:13:37.480 not yet because these were bonds, so they couldn't redeem 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:40.800 them until nineteen forty five. Right. It was like imaginary money, 0:13:41.080 --> 0:13:43.839 imaginary money that like, in thirty years, this will be 0:13:43.960 --> 0:13:46.160 enough money to maybe retire on but like not now, 0:13:46.480 --> 0:13:48.800 but there's we're starving now, you know, like I can't 0:13:48.840 --> 0:13:53.200 wait another fifty years. Um. So obviously in nineteen doesn't 0:13:53.200 --> 0:13:55.160 seemed like a good deal. But after two years of 0:13:55.240 --> 0:13:58.120 economic collapse, a lot of people just couldn't wait anymore. Uh. 0:13:58.160 --> 0:14:00.319 And in June of nineteen thirty two, more than forty 0:14:00.880 --> 0:14:04.760 veterans protested in Washington, d c UH. They called themselves 0:14:04.840 --> 0:14:08.720 the Bonus Expeditionary Force or the Bonus Army, and they 0:14:08.760 --> 0:14:11.640 advocated for Congress to pass an immediate soldiers bonus for 0:14:11.720 --> 0:14:14.560 serving in World War One. Now again, we're all living 0:14:14.640 --> 0:14:16.880 through our own version of of something similar. So you 0:14:16.920 --> 0:14:19.880 know what comes next. Congress adjourned without actually doing anything. 0:14:21.800 --> 0:14:24.480 Here we go. This pisses the Bonus Army off, and 0:14:24.520 --> 0:14:27.080 they started getting loud and unruly, so the shot two 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:30.320 of them, which eventually provoked a riot. The whole massive 0:14:30.360 --> 0:14:32.560 men set up this enormous camp in order to hold 0:14:32.640 --> 0:14:35.080 up and wait for Congress to do something. Right, they like, 0:14:35.240 --> 0:14:37.720 build a camp and they're like, we're not leaving until 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:40.680 you give us some fucking money. Um. The bill makes 0:14:40.720 --> 0:14:43.800 its way into Congress, but it gets defeated Congress based 0:14:43.880 --> 0:14:46.600 on some powerful financial interests decides it's too expensive to 0:14:46.600 --> 0:14:49.600 pay these veterans UM, so they lose. They don't get 0:14:49.600 --> 0:14:52.360 their bonus. But the camp doesn't disperse. Um. And when 0:14:52.400 --> 0:14:55.280 the camp doesn't disperse, the Hoover administration announces that it's 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:58.520 sending in the army to evict the soldiers. Now, it 0:14:58.680 --> 0:15:01.880 was at this point that General Smedley Butler visited the camp. Um. 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:03.760 He told the soldiers that he thought they were well 0:15:03.800 --> 0:15:06.760 within their rights to lobby Congress corporations can why can't 0:15:06.880 --> 0:15:10.040 Why can't people like us? You know? Um. He spent 0:15:10.120 --> 0:15:12.560 the night there with the men, He had breakfast with them. 0:15:12.560 --> 0:15:14.200 He told them they were good soldiers, and he was 0:15:14.240 --> 0:15:16.680 proud of them. Um. And a week or so later 0:15:16.800 --> 0:15:19.000 he leaves. In a week or so later, America's most 0:15:19.040 --> 0:15:22.200 overrated General Douglas MacArthur disperses the crowd with a mix 0:15:22.320 --> 0:15:26.200 of men on horseback and poison gas um. And this 0:15:26.800 --> 0:15:31.320 radicalizes Butler. Um. Initially he just becomes very anti Herbert 0:15:31.360 --> 0:15:34.440 Hoover and and you know, advocates for Hoover to get 0:15:34.520 --> 0:15:36.680 his ass kicked in the election that year. And Hoover 0:15:36.800 --> 0:15:39.360 does lose reelection that year. It turned out to maybe 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:43.320 be a bad idea. I can't turn on the people. 0:15:43.320 --> 0:15:45.520 Broom no, no. And he's a ship president in general. 0:15:46.120 --> 0:15:50.680 Um So, obviously Fdr Franklin Delano Rose about wins wins 0:15:50.880 --> 0:15:53.400 the election. That year he becomes the president, he promises 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:56.880 Americans a new Deal, which wealthy capitalists saw as a 0:15:56.960 --> 0:15:59.000 clear sign that Roosevelt was about to open the door 0:15:59.080 --> 0:16:01.200 to Soviet commune is him and take all of their money. 0:16:03.680 --> 0:16:08.000 Why are you also scared all the time? Man? We're 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:10.920 gonna talk about that. There's an interesting story there. Um. So. 0:16:11.080 --> 0:16:13.160 One of the men who get scared by the New 0:16:13.240 --> 0:16:15.960 Deal is a guy named Robert Sterling Clark, and he's 0:16:16.000 --> 0:16:19.400 the heir to the singer sewing machine for fortune. Um. 0:16:19.560 --> 0:16:22.000 Everybody's seen a singer sewing machine. That's the kind of 0:16:22.040 --> 0:16:24.840 money this guy has, you know. That's interesting. Yeah, yeah, 0:16:25.200 --> 0:16:27.840 And we're talking singer sewing machines in the thirties when 0:16:27.880 --> 0:16:30.880 everybody uses them all the time. Actually, every house had it. 0:16:31.000 --> 0:16:33.000 It's yeah, it's not a hobby. It's the only way 0:16:33.080 --> 0:16:39.040 you have pants. Um. Another guy who got scared was 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:42.360 a Wall Street financier named Grayson M. P. Murphy, and 0:16:42.440 --> 0:16:47.200 another was Prescott Bush, the father of President George H. W. Bush. 0:16:47.600 --> 0:16:49.520 And who is it that? Yeah, yeah, he he really 0:16:49.600 --> 0:16:53.320 doesn't like the New Deal. Um. And Prescott Bush is 0:16:53.360 --> 0:16:57.680 an investment banker on Wall Street at the time. Um. Okay, yeah, 0:16:58.280 --> 0:17:00.760 So these three are the best own members of what 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:03.440 came to be called the Business plot. And we'll talk 0:17:03.480 --> 0:17:05.679 about them all a bit more. But before we get 0:17:05.760 --> 0:17:08.600 into their plan to overthrow the United States government and 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:11.400 institute a fascist state, I should probably make it clear 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:14.159 that a lot of rich Americans in the nineteen thirties 0:17:14.280 --> 0:17:16.520 wanted to at least see FDR thrown out on his 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:19.240 ask for suggesting that rich people be taxed to stop 0:17:19.320 --> 0:17:22.600 poor people from dying in the street. Again, not surprising 0:17:22.640 --> 0:17:29.240 to anyone that it's not It wasn't new then. Yes, Um, 0:17:29.440 --> 0:17:31.600 I'm gonna read of I found a very good summary 0:17:31.720 --> 0:17:34.439 of of kind of this situation and the American culture 0:17:34.480 --> 0:17:37.080 at the time from a college thesis by Bradley Galka 0:17:37.160 --> 0:17:39.320 of the University of Albany that I really recommend reading. 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:42.200 He does a great job of putting this all together. Quote. 0:17:43.600 --> 0:17:46.000 William Manchester, in his book The Glory in the Dream 0:17:46.119 --> 0:17:48.680 describes the fear which upper class Americans had of a 0:17:48.720 --> 0:17:52.320 lower class revolt in the months before Roosevelt's inauguration. Among 0:17:52.400 --> 0:17:55.400 the propertied classes, he writes, the distinction between the poor 0:17:55.560 --> 0:17:59.080 wanting bread and a full on communist revolutionary was often 0:17:59.160 --> 0:18:01.960 non existent. The rich would have to take their security 0:18:02.000 --> 0:18:04.600 into their own hands. If the government could not keep order, 0:18:04.840 --> 0:18:07.200 each man must look to his own Businessmen in a 0:18:07.280 --> 0:18:10.240 number of cities formed committees to cope with nameless terrors, 0:18:10.320 --> 0:18:14.280 should railroad and telephone lines be cut and surrounding highways blocked, 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:18.200 Candles and canned goods were stockpiled. A Hollywood director carried 0:18:18.240 --> 0:18:20.159 with him a wardrobe of old clothes so that he 0:18:20.240 --> 0:18:23.280 could disappear into the crowd on a moment's notice. In 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:26.760 New York, hotels discovered that wealthy guests, who usually least 0:18:26.800 --> 0:18:29.160 suits for the winter, were holding up in their country homes. 0:18:29.400 --> 0:18:32.960 Some had mounted machine guns on their roofs. Manchester goes 0:18:33.000 --> 0:18:34.960 on to say that the paranoid elites were not really 0:18:35.040 --> 0:18:38.520 so paranoid. The evidence strongly suggests. He writes that had 0:18:38.600 --> 0:18:41.520 Roosevelt in fact been another Hoover, the United States would 0:18:41.520 --> 0:18:44.280 have followed seven Latin American countries whose governments had been 0:18:44.359 --> 0:18:48.200 overthrown by depression victims. So there is revolution in the air, 0:18:48.359 --> 0:18:50.600 and it scares the funk out of these people their 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:53.840 Bolton machine guns to their country houses, you know. Um. 0:18:55.160 --> 0:18:57.720 So the fears of this particular group of rich white 0:18:57.800 --> 0:19:00.600 dudes were further confirmed by the fact that twing writers 0:19:00.640 --> 0:19:03.359 in intellectuals were louder than ever in their anticipation of 0:19:03.440 --> 0:19:07.080 a coming communist revolution. Things were, from the outside, at least, 0:19:07.160 --> 0:19:09.840 looking pretty good in Soviet Russia compared to at least 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:12.479 the reality that a lot of Americans knew. In nineteen 0:19:12.560 --> 0:19:15.520 thirty two, the socialist presidential candidate we used to have 0:19:15.680 --> 0:19:22.040 socialist presidential candidates tripled his share of the vote from 0:19:22.080 --> 0:19:26.560 the nine election. Um. And uh yes, so socialism is 0:19:26.560 --> 0:19:29.280 actually doing starting to do pretty well in American politics. 0:19:29.359 --> 0:19:32.640 Socialism was mainstream in a way that seems impossible now. 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:37.199 One example of how mainstream it was, Governor Floyd Olson 0:19:37.280 --> 0:19:40.439 of Minnesota announced that he would not take any recruit 0:19:40.520 --> 0:19:43.639 for the National Guard who quote doesn't carry a red card, 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:47.200 because he said, Minnesota is a left wing state, like 0:19:48.359 --> 0:19:56.520 communists in the army. I'm the governor of Minnesota. What 0:19:56.760 --> 0:20:01.080 world is this? Okay, yeah, so yeah, obviously, if you've 0:20:01.080 --> 0:20:03.280 got a left wing governor of an entire state saying 0:20:03.320 --> 0:20:06.199 Minnesota is socialist and we're raising an army, a lot 0:20:06.240 --> 0:20:12.440 of capitalists are going to get freaked out. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Yeah. 0:20:13.880 --> 0:20:17.240 The right wing governor of Kansas, Alf Landon declared that quote, 0:20:17.320 --> 0:20:20.560 the iron hand of a national dictator is in preference 0:20:20.600 --> 0:20:23.760 to a paralytic stroke. So the right is saying we 0:20:23.880 --> 0:20:26.040 need a dictator, and the left is saying we need 0:20:26.119 --> 0:20:29.920 an army. Um. You might recognize this as kind of 0:20:30.000 --> 0:20:32.160 identical in rhetoric to both what we were see hearing 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:34.879 in Portugal and Spain before those countries had Couz Right 0:20:34.920 --> 0:20:38.600 Portugal saying like an iron chancellor. Yeah, he's saying maybe 0:20:38.640 --> 0:20:41.800 the iron hand of a dictator, you know, yeah, same rhetoric. 0:20:42.520 --> 0:20:45.920 Republicans were surprisingly, or perhaps not so surprisingly, willing to 0:20:46.080 --> 0:20:51.080 endorse outright fascism over socialism. Senator David Reid of Pennsylvania, 0:20:51.160 --> 0:20:54.680 a Republican, stated, if this country ever needed a Mussolini, 0:20:54.800 --> 0:20:58.920 it needs one. Now wait wait, wait you let yeah 0:21:00.200 --> 0:21:02.200 he let that come out of his mouth. Okay, okay, 0:21:03.280 --> 0:21:05.440 you are not you are not thinking, you're not thinking 0:21:05.480 --> 0:21:09.040 a long game, big homie. Okay, long game. Things turn 0:21:09.080 --> 0:21:11.800 out kind of upside down for Mussolini. But that's a 0:21:11.920 --> 0:21:16.280 story for another day. So in saying this, Senator Reid 0:21:16.400 --> 0:21:18.720 was tapping into what was at that point more or 0:21:18.800 --> 0:21:23.240 less an American meme, a surprising love of Mussolini. Benito 0:21:23.320 --> 0:21:27.000 Mussolini was huge in America in this period. This is 0:21:27.040 --> 0:21:29.840 like the twenties and thirties. People did not know that. 0:21:30.560 --> 0:21:32.680 So I did not know because I spent so you know, 0:21:32.800 --> 0:21:36.840 obviously during this time, I'm I'm in Harlem. Yeah, my 0:21:37.000 --> 0:21:39.639 whole history is what's happening with black people right now? 0:21:39.720 --> 0:21:41.280