On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we hit the land down under and talk about the joint US/Australia secret base known as Pine Gap. It is considered the Area 51 of Australia. It is involved in everything from Cold War spying to modern big data mining and UFO sightings. Edward Snowden said it was the backbone of American information gathering for most of the planet, and it seems he was right about that one. From Europe to Asia and Russia to Africa and all of the Pacific, this base listens and snoops on everything from satellites to cell phones.

Pine Gap started as a way for the US to track Soviet ballistic tests in the 1960s. Construction started on this innocuous base in 1966 and completed in the early 70s. It lies about 11 miles outside of the city of Alice Springs, a large population center. The staff is comprised of half Americans (many are CIA) and half Australians. As technology and the global threats changed, so too did the charge and charter for Pine Gap. Eventually, it went from Soviet missiles to spy satellites, and now it is a major global drone hub for the US as well a monitoring station for project Echelon.

Many Australians opposed this base because it has been the spearhead of many drone strikes that have killed civilians. Others worry that it is allowing the Aussie and Yankee government to spy on the population of Australia. There were even famous “Peace Pilgrims” who snuck past perimeter fences to protest with song. Like you do.

But the strangest things is, as always, the UFOS. Reports of strange sightings in the 70s and 80s gave Pine Gap a strange mystique. What went down? Well, on two separate occasions, some hunters and then some police officers reported a massive camouflaged hanger  door opening near Pine Gap and strange disks and “bathtub” like craft silently floating out and hovering above Pine Gap before streaking off at unthinkable speeds.

Multiple witnesses (including some who may have worked at the facility) reported strange craft that were shining beams of light onto the grounds and then getting beams of light reflected off of their hulls, until they started to spin at rapid speeds and zipped off into the night sky. There is even a tale that involves witnesses in an aircraft being approached by kind of lame Australian Men in Black. So, whether you are interested in more terrestrial spying or ET flying, this episode is for you.

On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we travel back in time and look at the Spanish Flu of 1918. This 15 month pandemic was the worst in history. It killed more people than the Black Plague and AIDS. It killed more people than every war in the 20th century combined—in just over a year! Estimates say that a third of the world’s population caught this bug, and it killed upwards of 100 Million people worldwide, all in the back drop of World War One.

The Spanish Flu earned its name not because it started in Spain (it simply affected the King of Spain who was neutral during WWI). In fact, most experts today think it started in a pig farm in Kansas and jumped from pig to bird to human and spread to the nearby Army base and out from there. The Flu was not the typical influenza we think of today. Indeed, within two hours, it would give someone pneumonia. A few hours later, it would make them turn blue due to lack of oxygen. A few hours after that, they’d drown in their own fluids and die. It affected healthy males ages 20-40 the most, which is the opposite of how a typical flu operates.

So, how did the flu get so deadly? Mutation. It’s what happens when it jumps through various species. How did it spread in the perfect storm, globally? First, WWI. Trench warfare, ships full of soldiers locked in with each other, and the stresses of being a soldier exacerbated it. But that wasn’t all. The biggest problem came from President Woodrow Wilson. He created the Committee on Public Information and Sedition Act, which combined to make it a crime with a 20 year sentence to say anything that would undermine the morale and effectiveness of the US during war time.

This made newspapers lie and say the flu was safe. Public health directors, newspaper editors, and even doctors were forced to tell people everything was fine, and their city had a typical flu. Of course these lies led to a radical spread of the Spanish Flu through America and then the rest of the world.

It got so bad that railroads shut down. Families wouldn’t even visit or help each other because they were so afraid of dying just a few hours after symptoms started. Children through the nation starved to death because their parents were dead, and everyone was scared to come help and risk infection. San Francisco created a shoot on sight policy for anyone not wearing a mask in public.

The Spanish Flu was about as bad as a pandemic could get. The final take away from all of our research is that every health official in the world thinks this can and will happen again, and it might even be worse next time. Give this one a listen if you want to sleep uneasily at night!

Smithsonian’s Excellent Article: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/journal-plague-year-180965222/

On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we take a look at some true crime by delving not into a serial killer but a serial kidnapper. Her name was Georgia Tann. She ran an adoption racket in the 1920s through 1940s. She kidnapped, stole, abducted, and faked the death of over 5000 children while she ran the Tennessee Children’s Home Society. She took from the poor and gave to the rich, for a hefty price tag. She sold kids for $5000 a pop, to people like the governor of New York and the actress Joan Crawford. She even sold the baby Rick Flair of professional wresting fame to his adoptive parents. So how did Georgia Tan pull all of this off?

First, she insulated herself with powerful, evil people who were in it for a buck. She used the political powerhouse E.H. “Boss” Crump who ran Memphis. She also used the juvenile court judge Camille Kelley. Between the two of them, cops were made to look the other way, suing parents were silenced by a corrupt version of the law, and Georgia Tann was never put on any investigator’s radar.

Her methods were pretty sick. Sometimes, she’d take the newborn of a single mother to a hospital under the guise of being a social worker who can get free medical attention. The baby would be reported dead days later and be sold to some other family. She had doctors and nurses who would claim the baby died in the night to new mothers and fathers, and off the baby went. She’d even straight up kidnap older kids from the street and tell them their parents died and move them to her orphanage until they could be sold.

She molested some of the girls under her care. Hundreds of children died from lack of health care and even malnutrition. Others were sold as slave labor to large farms, and some were little girls sold to suspected pedophiles. Eventually, Georgia Tann died of cancer (that I hope was very painful) before anyone could bring her to justice. Her legacy is one of misery, death, and destroyed families.

But how did the classic TV show Unsolved Mysteries help some families? How did she meet her lesbian lover? Even though she passed the bar exam, what kept her from becoming a lawyer? What did her newspaper ads say that she used to sell the babies? What was the one positive social change that this monster accidentally brought about? Listen, laugh, learn.

On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we look at the ongoing water crisis of what is perhaps the most troubled city in America, Flint, Michigan. Flint has a productive history as the headquarters of GM. It was once called Vehicle City and was part of the boom in automobiles that made Detroit and the surrounding area known as The Motor City. Quite simply, Flint was part of Henry Ford's legacy. It was a city of high wages and sound living…until GM moved its plant. The once prosperous city fell on hard times and roughly half of the 200,000 people living there ended up bailing in order to find work.

The years that followed were filled with decay, unemployment, and crime, and just when things were at their worst, they got, well, even worse! The Governor of Michigan gave a special group powers that superseded the government of Flint, and they ended up trying to do everything they could to save money and make the city solvent again. One thing they did was switch where they got the city’s water from. Instead of a plant in Detroit, they used an old and inadequate water treatment facility inside of Flint and used water from the notoriously toxic Flint River.

Citizens were upset at this decision, but then when the water started flowing, things were worse than they thought. The water through the city was brown and filled with everything from lead to E.coli to Legionnaire’s Disease! The problem is, the water facility didn’t anti  corrosion chemicals. This means the PH level of the water was pulling lead and rust from the pipes of the 100 year old city, and poisoning the water. Lead levels in children doubled, all sorts of novel diseases and ailments showed up.

This is all bad enough, but the way it was treated by the Flint managing government was horrible. They lied to the populace and told them the water was fine (all the while paying for bottled water for city employees). The water was so bad that GM even had to lay new pipe to get back to the Detroit water because their machinery was getting ruined by the Flint River water.

So, is the water clean all these years later? How much would it have cost the city to add anti corrosive chemicals and avert this problem? Where does Nestle come in to play? What’s up with the Army’s live ammo tests in the abandoned parts of the city? Listen, laugh, learn.

On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we talk about the largest maritime oil spill in human history, the tragedy and incompetence of the Deepwater Horizon. The Deepwater Horizon was a deep-sea oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, about forty miles from the coast of Louisiana. On April 20, 2010, an explosion rocked the platform, killing 11 and forcing an evacuation. Two days later, the rig sank. This was a bad enough tragedy, but the real horror started when nobody was able to seal the oil well, and every failsafe failed. It was the perfect storm.

The normal procedures to shear off the pipe in case of dangerous pressure failed. The robots they sent down to seal it manually failed. The 250 ton concrete dome failed. Back filling it with heavy mud failed. Wishful thinking and corporate lies failed. All that was left was a well that spewed thousands of barrels of oil into the gulf every day. BP claimed it was a 1000 barrels, but some government estimates are between 60,000 to over 100,000.

This spill destroyed wildlife by the thousands, grounded dolphins and whales, shut down beaches in several states, and almost killed already endangered species. What was perhaps worse than the oil itself were the chemicals they spread on the oil to make it sink to the bottom of the sea. Did this help the environment? Not at all. Did it help the companies pay less because they were able to hide the true amount of spilled oil? Absolutely!

So, who was to blame? That is where it gets tricky. The rig was divided up to different companies which all did different jobs on this particular well. Transocean, British Petroleum (BP), Anadarko, Halliburton, and M-I SWACO all had their hands in the pot. They also all lied about the amount of oil being spilled and pointed fingers at each other. But in spite of all of that, who was really at fault?

BP, really. Their smug CEO got fired, they lost a quarter of their earnings for the year, and they got spanked by different government agencies. But at the end of the day, they still killed people, animals, and ecosystems and lied about it with only a slap on the wrist. If you want corporate conspiracy and malfeasance in a podcast, this is the episode for you! This one even has Russia and nukes!

Various Lawsuits: https://www.epa.gov/enforcement/deepwater-horizon-bp-gulf-mexico-oil-spill

Good Site: https://ocean.si.edu/conservation/pollution/gulf-oil-spill

 

This is a special bonus episode of the World Famous Sofa King Podcast. It is not our normal episode, so don't be sad when you see that it's shorter than usual and doesn't focus on some sick serial killer or government conspiracy. What do we talk about on this episode? I honestly don't feel like discussing it, and even more honestly we recorded it several days ago, so I don't remember. So instead, I'll just post a joke from Norm McDonald.

A moth goes into a podiatrist’s office, and the podiatrist’s office says, “What seems to be the problem, moth?”

The moth says “What’s the problem? Where do I begin, man? I go to work for Gregory Illinivich, and all day long I work. Honestly doc, I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore. I don’t even know if Gregory Illinivich knows. He only knows that he has power over me, and that seems to bring him happiness. But I don’t know, I wake up in a malaise, and I walk here and there… at night I…I sometimes wake up and I turn to some old lady in my bed that’s on my arm. A lady that I once loved, doc. I don’t know where to turn to. My youngest, Alexendria, she fell in the…in the cold of last year. The cold took her down, as it did many of us. And my other boy, and this is the hardest pill to swallow, doc. My other boy, Gregarro Ivinalititavitch… I no longer love him. As much as it pains me to say, when I look in his eyes, all I see is the same cowardice that I… that I catch when I take a glimpse of my own face in the mirror. If only I wasn’t such a coward, then perhaps…perhaps I could bring myself to reach over to that cocked and loaded gun that lays on the bedside behind me and end this hellish facade once and for all…Doc, sometimes I feel like a spider, even though I’m a moth, just barely hanging on to my web with an everlasting fire underneath me. I’m not feeling good. And so the doctor says, “Moth, man, you’re troubled. But you should be seeing a psychiatrist. Why on earth did you come here?”

And the moth says, “‘Cause the light was on.”

 

On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we dive into some True Crime, and we talk about the Golden State Killer. He was responsible for well over 100 burglaries, 50 rapes, and at least 13 murders. This guy went by a whole lotta names: The Original Night Stalker, The Visalia Ransacker, and the East Area Rapist. Until 2018 when they finally caught the guy, law enforcement wasn’t even sure these were all different people. Eventually, though, a DNA genealogy website linked them all together and pointed at one man-- Joseph DeAngelo.

He started his sicko career as the Visalia Ransacker, where he stalked people, broke into their houses, took small trinkets of no value, and often made a mess and even ate their food. This escalated as he became the East Area Rapist. Here, he would do the same things, but it would culminate in raping the woman of the house. He often did the crime when the husband or boyfriend was home, and he had them bound in the other room with dishes on their chest. Like you do.

But, DeAngelo eventually grew bored with just the rapes and break ins, and he shifted to murder. He started to bludgeon and knife his victims, only using a gun when it was going south, and someone got out of their bindings. Eventually, there were enough cases that they put together some pretty horrible composite drawings and a disturbing profile of the killer. They said he needed to dominate in the bedroom, even with his wife, and that he had an abnormally small penis.

From the 70s through the 80s, The Golden State Killer ran through different cities in California, killing and raping. The truth about the man eventually came out once he was busted. The horrible fact is that he was a cop for several years, and he even was in charge of a burglary taskforce at one point!

So, what exactly got him busted thirty years after his crime spree? How did a DNA match used in a common DNA website help to bust him? What did the community of true crime civilians do to get this perv busted? Why did he eventually get fired as a cop, and what did he do afterward? What was up with the special knot the Golden State Killer used with his victims? What did he say when he called his rape victims years later, and what’s up with his horrible poem? Listen, laugh, learn…

 

On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we do some corporate snooping and explore the history, pitfalls, and popularity of the most iconic brand in the world: Coca-Cola. From cocaine to Nazis, this one has it all. Coke is one of the biggest corporations on the planet, and it all started with one man who suffered one saber wound in the Civil War. That man was Colonel John Pemberton. He was slashed across his vitals and expected to die, so his doctors loaded him up on morphine. Lots and lots of morphine. They knew it was addictive, but nobody gave him a prognosis of survival.

But survive he did, and he went home to Atlanta where he became a pharmacist just to feed his crazy morphine habit. After a number of years, he decided to kick the junk, and he developed some elixirs to help. The first was a wine/cocaine mix which did well until local prohibition made the wine illegal. Eventually, he settled on a syrup made from cocaine and kola, and the coke and caffeine and sugar did him good.

He sold the drink as Coca-Cola, and is was off to (slow start). Eventually, one of his alleged original investors Asa Candler wanted to buy the brand from him. Pemberton said no, died, his son said no, died, and Candler eventually took over.

Candler turned out to be a business genius. He had the iconic Coke logo developed, invented the American billboard, created coupons for the first time ever, and even did a massive make over on Santa Clause that really defines what the fat man looks and acts like, even to this day. Coke spread and eventually ditched the cocaine (we think? The recipe is so secret even congress can’t see it…).

So, what has Coke been up since it ditched the cocaine? Well, they helped launch the German Fanta as a drink for Nazis to enjoy, but the story is a bit crazier than you might think. It involves beets. So, what was the deal with New Coke, and why did it fail? What the hell was the Magican, and why did it leave Coke fans smelling like farts? Why did a Russian general insist on drinking clear Coke? How much cocaine was in a serving of Coke, and what corporate ills has the company done? Oh, and what about their immoral marketing toward children? Listen, laugh, and learn…

Some of the nasty things Coke has done :https://www.corp-research.org/coca-cola-company

On this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we go back in time to World War Two and explore the time when the US Navy got in bed with the Italian Mob through a crazy program officially called Project Underworld. It all started when about 650,000 tons of war goods per month were being sunk off the American coast by German U-boats. These were critical supplies for our European allies, and Europe was on the verge of collapsing because they couldn’t get these imperative materials. Then, a ship called the Normandie was burned on the docks in Long Island, and the Navy smelled a Nazi saboteur.

However, the docks were owned by the Mob, and snitches get stitches, so nobody would give any Intel to the Navy. At this point, they decided to contact Joseph “Socks” Lanza, a made man who controlled the fisher union. They told him then needed to find out what happened to the ship and needed to learn how the Nazi U-boats were getting fuel and supplies this far from home. Lanza was on board instantly, and he and the Navy’s Commander Haffenden hatched  an incredible plot.

They used the entire fishing fleet from Maine to Miami as eyes and ears, and they were able to sniff out the sympathizers who were supplying the U-boats and spot the U-boats before they could do damage. The results were far more effective than they ever dreamed. But their use of the mob spread. The team developed a group of half mob and half navy breaking and entering teams who snuck into places throughout Manhattan and found German spy rings.

There were many twists and turns, and the mob was very much the mob through the whole affair. Surprisingly, the Navy was on board with racketeering, roughing people up, breaking limbs, burning down buildings, and even whacking people to keep the Nazis at bay. Eventually, they needed Project Underworld to spread, so they needed the help of Lucky Luciano, the father of the modern day mob. He was in prison, cut off from the four families, but his partner, the Jewish mobster Meyer “The Little Man” Lansky, came in to help (he hated the Nazis after all). Lansky got the government in touch with Luciano, and the Navy and the New York DA fully reinstated Luciano to be the head of the five families in exchange for his help. What did he do? Well, he wacked key Nazi spies for them. They got all of New York to be an intelligence gathering apparatus within days. He got the Jewish and Irish Mobs on board. He even helped plan the ultimate US invasion of Sicily where the beginning of the end of the war all started.

Quite simply, the Mob turned the tides of the war, and people like Socks, Luciano, and Lansky were to be hailed as heroes for a moment instead of lauded as murderers and criminals. So, how effective was Project Underworld at turning the tide of U-boat attacks? What did they do to help the invasion of Sicily through Operation Husky? What did Luciano get out of his deal to help the Navy? What did the Navy higher ups think of the Mob being…well…the mob? Listen, laugh, learn.

Very Thorough Discussion: https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/wwii/project-underworld-the-u-s-navys-secret-pact-with-the-mafia/

In this episode of the world famous Sofa King Podcast, we go back in time all the way to February of 1997, and we talk about the infamous Hollywood Bank Robbery Shootout. It was a day that showed the world the damage a couple of well-equipped active shooters could be. It showed how easy and dangerous it was to outclass the cops. It was an event that changed how cops use tactics, what weapons they carry, and how to treat bank robbers.

The two robbers, Larry Eugene Phillips Jr. the Romania Decebal Stefan Emilian "Emil" Matasareanu (say that five times fast) met at Gold’s Gym in Venice beach. They shared a love of body building and stealing things while shooting at people, so they hit it off, like, right away. Within no time, they decided to rob an armored truck and got away with it. While planning another heist, they got pulled over for speeding, and their arsenal got them each 100 days in jail plus probation.

But this didn’t stop them. They robbed a few more cars and a few banks and earned the nick name of High Incident Bandits by law enforcement. They got about one and a half million dollars in short order, but they wanted more, so they planned on robbing a Bank of America in North Hollywood. This is where the Hollywood Shootout famously took place.

They stormed the bank, shot the joint up, and took the money from the vault. It was supposed to be $750,000, but it was closer to $300,000, and this made the robbers lose their cool. They shot the place up some more and stormed out toward their getaway car. Unfortunately, they had been surrounded by cops who saw them enter the building.

What unfolded here captured the eyes of the nation for 44 crazy minutes. The two walked around the streets shooting cops and civilians, unharmed by the weak sauce the cops were shooting at them. They injured 20 people in their shootout and only sustained minor injuries for the longest time. Eventually, the SWAT team showed up (wearing shorts…it happens), and the game changed.

Finally, some firepower and training was on the ground, and soon the Hollywood Shootout changed up. SWAT shot the robbers’ guns and aimed for soft unarmored targets like their buttocks and calves, and eventually, the two shooters were down. One put a pistol under his chin and ended his own life, and the other slowly bled out on national TV from his 20 gunshot wounds.

So, how did the two get their weapons? What impact did their actions have on gun legislation? Why were the SWAT team in shorts? What happened when Brad and Dave argue about gun control at the end of the episode? Listen, laugh, learn.