At the very least, Walter doesn't seem to be fond of applying Occam's razor. The fact that the CIA and the "deep state" are known to have engaged in various secret, nefarious programs does not imply that they're responsible for every notable story we see in the news.
The suspect, Luigi Mangione, was angry about insurance companies' greed and heartlessness, and a sense of despair due to his serious back problems and his consequent involuntary celibacy could well have driven him to take the drastic action he did. Unless some actual evidence appears indicating otherwise, I'll go with that explanation.
I couldn’t agree more. There’s a less crazy explanation for that young man’s actions: maybe, just maybe, he is a harbinger of the implosion of this rotten, country. And maybe, just maybe, he’s pissed off. This story is not a distraction— it should have us all riveted and worried about this country.
I think the first part threw everyone off. It did for me and I initially agreed with you, having the same WTF Walter Kirn is off his rockers/forgot his meds reaction, after such a smashing year of remarkably accurate insights.
Then afterwards was the real message of the episode (I think), which was (as I understood it) when something happens, a narrative forms around it and which can be manipulated. And by the same entities who have shown themselves capable of also
outright inventing narratives themselves (the entities behind inventing Russiagate and controlling / distorting the messaging around COVID origins in 2020 are likely closely aligned players). So (I think) Walter was saying how do we really know Luigi Mangione shooting the UHC CEO wasn't a manipulated psych op by the "deep state" to distract people from other topics (such as the upcoming blanket pardons) or to create a narrative fostering a movement towards a certain outcome? After all, we know the "deep state" has done this before. Or even if Mangione wasn't a psych op, the attempt at fostering and controlling a certain narrative around the incident is. Such is his message (I think).
However I may disagree or want to disagree with Walter on certain points, I do think we can all agree the media (their dominant focus of this episode) is guilty of not just blindly reporting on a narrative arc but actively promoting it, even if they know it's not true or aspects of it is not true or needs to be ignored. We saw this with the censorship around Joe Biden's health conditions alongside talking heads loudly proclaiming he was sharp as nails as they'd just had lunch with him or whatever. We saw this with the reporting on Russiagate and so on.
As for me, personally, I do think Luigi Mangione was a young man with serious back pain he tried to self-medicate with drugs, including psychedelics, and he went off the deep end and created a narrative arc for himself as a just warrior (with all those details Walter referred to). That he is also sharply handsome only rounds it off. Such behavior isn't unknown both in history and the thousands of delightful mysteries and novels. At the same time the core of his obsession tapped into a clear nerve in American society, our collective frustration with the massive, byzantine, contradictory and opaque health care sector, which is the real reason why it's exploded as a story narrative. Looking at the entire episode from the perspective of a writer, you can really see the story unfolding and all the pieces coming into place, just like a book, and you can actually see how an experienced writer or creator of stories can reasonably predict how people will react to and follow such a story. It does tap into a human need for storytelling as an outlet for our frustrations and dreams and desires and hopes.
The bad people in this situation are those who fully understand the human emotional need for a narrative arc in our world and for any situation that happens, and manipulates it. Just like how certainly people absolutely drove the Russiagate narrative to manipulate the beliefs and desires of the anti-Trump people in America who fully embraced every detail because they deeply wanted it to be true (aka the TDS), resulting in lasting damage to society and people in general.
This is what I am taking away from this episode. Mind you, I'm also keeping a close eye on Walter in future episodes.
“people need a narrative arc” can be applied to anything. If I say I did my laundry then went to the store a paranoid husband could respond “oh that accounts a little too neatly for your afternoon my dear, I have heard the old laundry store routine a thousand times you can’t fool me with that hoary chestnut”.
Thinking you have SPECIAL insight into events others don’t understand is sometimes accurate ….and sometimes a sign of getting wrapped too tightly.
He sounded crazy. Does not mean he is crazy but if I were his friend or relation I would be asking if he is sleeping normally, if he has been more twitchy and fidgety than usual etc.
Just got around to listening. Walter mentioned recently that he's been writing a script. Maybe he's been burning the candle at both ends with creativity-enhansing additives in that remote cabin. Hopefully a more rested and playfully conspiratorial Walter will return. I think the UFO event could've been a laugh-riot, but the discussion got bogged down in mushy meta-narrative. Everyone lays an egg once in a while.🐣
I agree that Walter had a bad night. At times it was painful to listen to he and Matt, as it was clear that Matt was having a hard time agreeing with Walter, and attempting to understand him. Walter has very good reason for his skepticism, his cynicism, all of his prior predictions being accurate, his explanations of motives and actions being accurate in so many cases. Yet in this case he seems to have allowed himself to go too far with his beliefs on motives, intrigue, conspiracy. He is correct in pointing out how often we have been lied to and manipulated by powerful interests, but in this case he was too quick to assume that the assassin was part of a deeper plot. I hope this episode did not harm in any way the close relationship that Matt and Walter have.
Manic states are temporary and treatable, happily. But motormouthing and odd grandiose narratives about everything connecting to everything else are symptoms not insights.
Walter went absolutely batshit crazy this time, with Matt just nodding along. Astonishing.
When in America isn't there some loopy crank pulling off some violent stunt. The whole world isn't following the murder.
We are meant to follow the breadcrumbs? I found this naive in the extreme. Gulf of Tonkin? Nobody in America is remotely interested in another four yours of at each other's throats. What is going to be remarkable about the next four years is how ordinary life will be.
Yes, Walter you are advancing a paranoid conspiracy theory - with the mastermind, whack job acting in concert with very powerful allies?
The story is the story. The reality is simple and straightforward.
The media will do their best to undermine the Trump presidency. That's news? Bad actors twist facts to advance their own agenda? Okay, I thought I learned that when I was maybe 16?
I expect, frankly, a more adult discussion. Matt and Walter now sound as nutty as the most tortured and convoluted Obama is a secret Muslim Manchurian candidate narrative. Really. Unwatchable.
Walter's "conspiracy of narrative" discussion makes more sense when put through the lens of (mostly) confirmed conspiracies like O'Neill's CHAOS (which Walter eventually mentioned but should have led with), in which major events and crimes are ultimately revealed to be psyops conducted on the American people, in a manner and for reasons which defy imagination when they're happening.
The claim that the CIA/deep state are behind all major events in our country suffer the defect of being non-falsifiable. In that respect, it's like Robin DiAngelo's "White Fragility" - a white person accused of being a racist cannot disprove the claim since denying it is taken as proof that they are in fact racist.
I agree with that-- its their non-falsibility which makes them so successful in shaping opinion and creating distraction. I certainly don't think every (or even a large number) of major events are the work of the deep state. But looking at events from that angle can be revealing, if only to cause us to re-evaluate our own reactions to the information we're being provided.
Walter, for the first time, you’ve lost me. Who is the ‘they’ here? Who with power wants to arouse us all against the health insurance industry? I think this is like the school shootings. Young men getting driven mad by our system + medications given to kids.
Update II - 12 hours later Walter still "cooking" on X. Seems he's going to run with Luigi as long as X trends keep "proving" Walter right. Missing White Woman resurfaces as Luigi. Walter sees the murder as an existential event planned and executed by the state as a mind virus. Really.
Three guesses what Walter's reaction will be when/if the Menendez brothers are released - "See!!! - It's aaalll connected!"
Update. I had to think about this. Bottom line, I rarely spend more than 2 minutes a day on social media. Walter clearly needs a serious Twitter/X Detox. He's a bright guy, but Walter evidently now buys Elon's pr: as in Twitter/X is reality.
X isn't. And Walter should uncouple himself from Elon's hive mind until he can root himself firmly once more in reality.
Both need a vacation - from the news. This was too much to endure from two folks I held/hold in high regard. Walter totally lost it. Matt seemed almost sober by comparison.
Tell me drugs don't play a part in unhinging people from reality. And I don't just mean Walter and Matt. At risk high IQ over-achiever self-medicates with drugs that induce hallucinations - suffers psychotic break and kills someone.
Conclusion - the killer MUST have been working with very powerful deep-state actors to somehow take over X and control our minds. Online shopping, porn, and online gaming do that job already perfectly well, Walter.
Pro-tip: keep all devices on airplane mode. Only let the intrusive monster out its cage when the beast is muzzled tightly on a choke chain. Mercilessly ignore AI and software prompts. Spend more time outdoors without f-phone listening to birds, smelling flowers, thinking good things, and engaging with those we love. That's reality.
Looking at the Picture of Putin, can you guys go back to that NYT article this past spring where "according to sources in the know" they confirmed that NATO/USA has been doing all the crap in Ukraine that Putin had been accusing them of but lied about it?
“Let this be known, I am going to smash the CIA into a million little pieces and scatter it to the wind!” He then got Dulles on the phone and told him, “Write your resignation letter, you’re done here.”
We know what happened to JFK. Everybody with a free brain knows.
Now the American people, half anyway, want regime change at home. And we want the medical dictators taken out. There's a big problem around the corner.
The medical experts who want to take down the WHO, the CDC etc contradict and don't trust one another. Dr Mike Yaedon does not like or trust Dr Peter Kory. So where does that leave us?
Acres of digital data allows behavioral science to predict the reactions of a populace to a story, and the CIA playbook on How to Destabilize a Nation is useful for comparison to what’s being done now to madden the U.S. populace. These tactics were ignored so long as they were done to others. So when an assassin becomes invisible, then turns up with a manifesto, or drones are overhead and those same officials who went ballistic over an off-course Chinese weather balloon say nothing, it’s the new normal. Rugs pulled, shifting sands, monstrous consequential things appear and disappear suddenly; it’s definitely unnerving.
One cannot help but muse over motives that may not be obvious, so watch the reaction of the NPCs settling on a story line and look elsewhere. The answer is never where they point.
And many thanks to Matt and Walter for looking over and under.
Walter’s story line is imaginative, but not believable. These sort of conspiracies require too much cooperation among its perpetrators to be true. In fact, part of Walter’s invention was tapping into other bizarre happenings, like the Manson cult, the Kennedy assassination, the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, all which have relatively simple explanations that don’t require impossible cooperation between many participants.
Not sure about the Gulf of Tonkin, but the Manson cult and Kennedy assassination have anything but simple explanations - they are complex, nefarious, and are only (sometimes) revealed for what they actually are after decades of truth-seeking. Which was his whole point (though it could have been argued a little better). Check out CHAOS by O'Neill-- it's a great read and a real eye-opener.
I am unsure of the specifics of the UHC CEO case, but Walter's take that there is no difference between fact and fiction is profound. The real world (facts, happenings, personal observation) bends itself to fit inside a narrative. The fiction leads the facts, the narrative controls the events, the characters are controlled by an ethos.
Absolutely brilliant analysis as usual Walter. I think there is a novel in there. This to me also speaks to the truth of literature and the Bible. The truth of both is the eternal human truth of narrative that speaks to the human soul irrespective of facts. Narrative is written inside of us so we scurry in furor to manifest the narrative outside as well.
I have a book about the legendary Cold War terrorist Carlos the Jackal. Syria was one of only two Soviet bloc countries in which Carlos was always able to find refuge (the other one was East Germany). I was led to believe Libya was quite friendly to Carlos, but it turns out Gaddafi and Carlos had a falling out early on over a botched operation. I need to look up in that book if the senior Assad ever met with Carlos face to face.
Carlos was in Syria when the Berlin Wall was being torn down. In a French mini series about Carlos, there's a great scene in which the Syrians tell Carlos that he is now out of a job.
The Carlos Complex, perhaps? A mass paperback by Christopher Dobson and Ronald Payne, published in the UK by Coronet in 1978 in a revised and extended edition. I read it (or much of it) back in the day. My conclusion was that he was a jerk. No surprise there.
Yeah, he was an asshole, and he wasn't even all that well versed in Marxism, nor did he really care all that much about the Palestinian cause. He just liked the action and the notoriety it brought him.
Carlos' father was a Marxist, and Carlos said in an interview that Marxism had always been his religion. However, people who knew him said that whenever they got in political discussions with him, he didn't know shit about Marxism. Now, if you're going to call yourself a Marxist, don't you think you should know a thing or two about Marxist theory and philosophy? That's what I'm getting at.
I listened to the show twice now, and still don’t really understand Walter’s point, if he had one. Listened to as an open stream of conscious about a lot of weird things, it sort of makes sense….but the guy getting caught in McDonald’s…is linked to trump at McDonald’s? Get some sleep Walter, we are forgiving fans, and still respect you very much. You just need to get some sleep I think. We still love you. 🥰 I think Matt tried to reel him in a little, but he was going like a freight train, and his mind could not be derailed.😀
Also—excellent county highway this issue—the best one yet in my opinion!
I had to bail last night. When I learned from Walter that my thinking processes were not sufficient to understand what he was saying, I thought, "Well, what's the use then?" Ironically, I do write fiction and have written a screenplay, but I still could not connect with what to my mind was a humongous stretch. I almost felt embarrassed for him. I think that's why I had to bail.
PS: my latest postings come from Amandus's Substack.
Is Matt seriously surprised a lawyer would lie on the air and play right to half the country’s affiliation? He knows they won’t check this guy. How can Matt be surprised?
Agreed! I’m surprised Matt is surprised. Is it just because he has a podcast and believes he must appeal to shock factor of his audience? I am the opposite of shocked precisely BECAUSE I’ve tuned into these guys for the past 4 years.
What a fantastic job tonight by you both! You play off each other brilliantly! Walter’s insights were particularly compelling, perhaps because I share many of his opinions but I can’t explain their derivation nearly as well.
Walter is in the grips of a manic episode and needs help. I should not have been so snarky he is obviously genuinely unwell.
At the very least, Walter doesn't seem to be fond of applying Occam's razor. The fact that the CIA and the "deep state" are known to have engaged in various secret, nefarious programs does not imply that they're responsible for every notable story we see in the news.
The suspect, Luigi Mangione, was angry about insurance companies' greed and heartlessness, and a sense of despair due to his serious back problems and his consequent involuntary celibacy could well have driven him to take the drastic action he did. Unless some actual evidence appears indicating otherwise, I'll go with that explanation.
I couldn’t agree more. There’s a less crazy explanation for that young man’s actions: maybe, just maybe, he is a harbinger of the implosion of this rotten, country. And maybe, just maybe, he’s pissed off. This story is not a distraction— it should have us all riveted and worried about this country.
I think the first part threw everyone off. It did for me and I initially agreed with you, having the same WTF Walter Kirn is off his rockers/forgot his meds reaction, after such a smashing year of remarkably accurate insights.
Then afterwards was the real message of the episode (I think), which was (as I understood it) when something happens, a narrative forms around it and which can be manipulated. And by the same entities who have shown themselves capable of also
outright inventing narratives themselves (the entities behind inventing Russiagate and controlling / distorting the messaging around COVID origins in 2020 are likely closely aligned players). So (I think) Walter was saying how do we really know Luigi Mangione shooting the UHC CEO wasn't a manipulated psych op by the "deep state" to distract people from other topics (such as the upcoming blanket pardons) or to create a narrative fostering a movement towards a certain outcome? After all, we know the "deep state" has done this before. Or even if Mangione wasn't a psych op, the attempt at fostering and controlling a certain narrative around the incident is. Such is his message (I think).
However I may disagree or want to disagree with Walter on certain points, I do think we can all agree the media (their dominant focus of this episode) is guilty of not just blindly reporting on a narrative arc but actively promoting it, even if they know it's not true or aspects of it is not true or needs to be ignored. We saw this with the censorship around Joe Biden's health conditions alongside talking heads loudly proclaiming he was sharp as nails as they'd just had lunch with him or whatever. We saw this with the reporting on Russiagate and so on.
As for me, personally, I do think Luigi Mangione was a young man with serious back pain he tried to self-medicate with drugs, including psychedelics, and he went off the deep end and created a narrative arc for himself as a just warrior (with all those details Walter referred to). That he is also sharply handsome only rounds it off. Such behavior isn't unknown both in history and the thousands of delightful mysteries and novels. At the same time the core of his obsession tapped into a clear nerve in American society, our collective frustration with the massive, byzantine, contradictory and opaque health care sector, which is the real reason why it's exploded as a story narrative. Looking at the entire episode from the perspective of a writer, you can really see the story unfolding and all the pieces coming into place, just like a book, and you can actually see how an experienced writer or creator of stories can reasonably predict how people will react to and follow such a story. It does tap into a human need for storytelling as an outlet for our frustrations and dreams and desires and hopes.
The bad people in this situation are those who fully understand the human emotional need for a narrative arc in our world and for any situation that happens, and manipulates it. Just like how certainly people absolutely drove the Russiagate narrative to manipulate the beliefs and desires of the anti-Trump people in America who fully embraced every detail because they deeply wanted it to be true (aka the TDS), resulting in lasting damage to society and people in general.
This is what I am taking away from this episode. Mind you, I'm also keeping a close eye on Walter in future episodes.
“people need a narrative arc” can be applied to anything. If I say I did my laundry then went to the store a paranoid husband could respond “oh that accounts a little too neatly for your afternoon my dear, I have heard the old laundry store routine a thousand times you can’t fool me with that hoary chestnut”.
Thinking you have SPECIAL insight into events others don’t understand is sometimes accurate ….and sometimes a sign of getting wrapped too tightly.
He sounded crazy. Does not mean he is crazy but if I were his friend or relation I would be asking if he is sleeping normally, if he has been more twitchy and fidgety than usual etc.
I think you’re watching for the Racheal Maddie segments.
Just got around to listening. Walter mentioned recently that he's been writing a script. Maybe he's been burning the candle at both ends with creativity-enhansing additives in that remote cabin. Hopefully a more rested and playfully conspiratorial Walter will return. I think the UFO event could've been a laugh-riot, but the discussion got bogged down in mushy meta-narrative. Everyone lays an egg once in a while.🐣
I agree that Walter had a bad night. At times it was painful to listen to he and Matt, as it was clear that Matt was having a hard time agreeing with Walter, and attempting to understand him. Walter has very good reason for his skepticism, his cynicism, all of his prior predictions being accurate, his explanations of motives and actions being accurate in so many cases. Yet in this case he seems to have allowed himself to go too far with his beliefs on motives, intrigue, conspiracy. He is correct in pointing out how often we have been lied to and manipulated by powerful interests, but in this case he was too quick to assume that the assassin was part of a deeper plot. I hope this episode did not harm in any way the close relationship that Matt and Walter have.
I fear you're correct. I'm still trying to convince myself you're not.
Reminds me of Nietzsche; after he wrote the brilliant “Ecce Homo” and the disavowal of Richard Wagner, his mind disintegrated.
Manic states are temporary and treatable, happily. But motormouthing and odd grandiose narratives about everything connecting to everything else are symptoms not insights.
Walter went absolutely batshit crazy this time, with Matt just nodding along. Astonishing.
When in America isn't there some loopy crank pulling off some violent stunt. The whole world isn't following the murder.
We are meant to follow the breadcrumbs? I found this naive in the extreme. Gulf of Tonkin? Nobody in America is remotely interested in another four yours of at each other's throats. What is going to be remarkable about the next four years is how ordinary life will be.
Yes, Walter you are advancing a paranoid conspiracy theory - with the mastermind, whack job acting in concert with very powerful allies?
The story is the story. The reality is simple and straightforward.
The media will do their best to undermine the Trump presidency. That's news? Bad actors twist facts to advance their own agenda? Okay, I thought I learned that when I was maybe 16?
I expect, frankly, a more adult discussion. Matt and Walter now sound as nutty as the most tortured and convoluted Obama is a secret Muslim Manchurian candidate narrative. Really. Unwatchable.
Have to agree. Walter must’ve changed what he was vaping…
Walter's "conspiracy of narrative" discussion makes more sense when put through the lens of (mostly) confirmed conspiracies like O'Neill's CHAOS (which Walter eventually mentioned but should have led with), in which major events and crimes are ultimately revealed to be psyops conducted on the American people, in a manner and for reasons which defy imagination when they're happening.
The claim that the CIA/deep state are behind all major events in our country suffer the defect of being non-falsifiable. In that respect, it's like Robin DiAngelo's "White Fragility" - a white person accused of being a racist cannot disprove the claim since denying it is taken as proof that they are in fact racist.
I agree with that-- its their non-falsibility which makes them so successful in shaping opinion and creating distraction. I certainly don't think every (or even a large number) of major events are the work of the deep state. But looking at events from that angle can be revealing, if only to cause us to re-evaluate our own reactions to the information we're being provided.
https://mileswmathis.com/brian.pdf
Always a fun time !
Walter, for the first time, you’ve lost me. Who is the ‘they’ here? Who with power wants to arouse us all against the health insurance industry? I think this is like the school shootings. Young men getting driven mad by our system + medications given to kids.
Agreed, too convoluted to be true.
Update II - 12 hours later Walter still "cooking" on X. Seems he's going to run with Luigi as long as X trends keep "proving" Walter right. Missing White Woman resurfaces as Luigi. Walter sees the murder as an existential event planned and executed by the state as a mind virus. Really.
Three guesses what Walter's reaction will be when/if the Menendez brothers are released - "See!!! - It's aaalll connected!"
Update. I had to think about this. Bottom line, I rarely spend more than 2 minutes a day on social media. Walter clearly needs a serious Twitter/X Detox. He's a bright guy, but Walter evidently now buys Elon's pr: as in Twitter/X is reality.
X isn't. And Walter should uncouple himself from Elon's hive mind until he can root himself firmly once more in reality.
Both need a vacation - from the news. This was too much to endure from two folks I held/hold in high regard. Walter totally lost it. Matt seemed almost sober by comparison.
Tell me drugs don't play a part in unhinging people from reality. And I don't just mean Walter and Matt. At risk high IQ over-achiever self-medicates with drugs that induce hallucinations - suffers psychotic break and kills someone.
Conclusion - the killer MUST have been working with very powerful deep-state actors to somehow take over X and control our minds. Online shopping, porn, and online gaming do that job already perfectly well, Walter.
Pro-tip: keep all devices on airplane mode. Only let the intrusive monster out its cage when the beast is muzzled tightly on a choke chain. Mercilessly ignore AI and software prompts. Spend more time outdoors without f-phone listening to birds, smelling flowers, thinking good things, and engaging with those we love. That's reality.
Looking at the Picture of Putin, can you guys go back to that NYT article this past spring where "according to sources in the know" they confirmed that NATO/USA has been doing all the crap in Ukraine that Putin had been accusing them of but lied about it?
American assessment of our errors in manipulating Ukrainian revolution of 2014:
https://search.app?link=https%3A%2F%2Ftruthout.org%2Farticles%2Fthe-ukraine-mess-that-nuland-made%2F&utm_campaign=aga&utm_source=agsadl1%2Csh%2Fx%2Fgs%2Fm2%2F4
Eduard Popov,PhD, History & Philosophy, Russian Federation
https://search.app?link=https%3A%2F%2Fen.interaffairs.ru%2Farticle%2Fnation-building-in-post-maidan-ukraine-historical-and-balkan-parallels%2F&utm_campaign=aga&utm_source=agsadl1%2Csh%2Fx%2Fgs%2Fm2%2F4
Anatomy of Regime Change https://open.substack.com/pub/jordanlee2liberty/p/interference-the-anatomy-of-regime?r=iuq6q&utm_medium=ios
“Let this be known, I am going to smash the CIA into a million little pieces and scatter it to the wind!” He then got Dulles on the phone and told him, “Write your resignation letter, you’re done here.”
We know what happened to JFK. Everybody with a free brain knows.
Now the American people, half anyway, want regime change at home. And we want the medical dictators taken out. There's a big problem around the corner.
The medical experts who want to take down the WHO, the CDC etc contradict and don't trust one another. Dr Mike Yaedon does not like or trust Dr Peter Kory. So where does that leave us?
That was such a good line, scatter it to the wind! It leaves us lost and confused.
Ah, if only we could trust the science. Actually if only "science" and its bastard child Technology weren't so profitable.
Acres of digital data allows behavioral science to predict the reactions of a populace to a story, and the CIA playbook on How to Destabilize a Nation is useful for comparison to what’s being done now to madden the U.S. populace. These tactics were ignored so long as they were done to others. So when an assassin becomes invisible, then turns up with a manifesto, or drones are overhead and those same officials who went ballistic over an off-course Chinese weather balloon say nothing, it’s the new normal. Rugs pulled, shifting sands, monstrous consequential things appear and disappear suddenly; it’s definitely unnerving.
One cannot help but muse over motives that may not be obvious, so watch the reaction of the NPCs settling on a story line and look elsewhere. The answer is never where they point.
And many thanks to Matt and Walter for looking over and under.
Will Walter be reporting from a Hyatt shoebox in Altoona?
Altoona. Prescient. That’s where they caught Luigi the CEO shooting “hero”
Yay!
I just finished watching your weekend show this morning.
Loved hearing Walter's impression of Edgar Allan Poe as a comic book nerd working at Blockbuster.
Walter’s story line is imaginative, but not believable. These sort of conspiracies require too much cooperation among its perpetrators to be true. In fact, part of Walter’s invention was tapping into other bizarre happenings, like the Manson cult, the Kennedy assassination, the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, all which have relatively simple explanations that don’t require impossible cooperation between many participants.
Not sure about the Gulf of Tonkin, but the Manson cult and Kennedy assassination have anything but simple explanations - they are complex, nefarious, and are only (sometimes) revealed for what they actually are after decades of truth-seeking. Which was his whole point (though it could have been argued a little better). Check out CHAOS by O'Neill-- it's a great read and a real eye-opener.
I am unsure of the specifics of the UHC CEO case, but Walter's take that there is no difference between fact and fiction is profound. The real world (facts, happenings, personal observation) bends itself to fit inside a narrative. The fiction leads the facts, the narrative controls the events, the characters are controlled by an ethos.
Absolutely brilliant analysis as usual Walter. I think there is a novel in there. This to me also speaks to the truth of literature and the Bible. The truth of both is the eternal human truth of narrative that speaks to the human soul irrespective of facts. Narrative is written inside of us so we scurry in furor to manifest the narrative outside as well.
I have a book about the legendary Cold War terrorist Carlos the Jackal. Syria was one of only two Soviet bloc countries in which Carlos was always able to find refuge (the other one was East Germany). I was led to believe Libya was quite friendly to Carlos, but it turns out Gaddafi and Carlos had a falling out early on over a botched operation. I need to look up in that book if the senior Assad ever met with Carlos face to face.
Carlos was in Syria when the Berlin Wall was being torn down. In a French mini series about Carlos, there's a great scene in which the Syrians tell Carlos that he is now out of a job.
what is the title of the book?
The Carlos Complex, perhaps? A mass paperback by Christopher Dobson and Ronald Payne, published in the UK by Coronet in 1978 in a revised and extended edition. I read it (or much of it) back in the day. My conclusion was that he was a jerk. No surprise there.
I bought a used copy of that book on Amazon, and it arrived yesterday. I'll tell you what I think of it.
BTW, thanks for the heads up on that other title.
Yeah, he was an asshole, and he wasn't even all that well versed in Marxism, nor did he really care all that much about the Palestinian cause. He just liked the action and the notoriety it brought him.
Don’t know anything about the Jackal, but being “well-versed” in Marxism sounds like some sort of pathology.
Carlos' father was a Marxist, and Carlos said in an interview that Marxism had always been his religion. However, people who knew him said that whenever they got in political discussions with him, he didn't know shit about Marxism. Now, if you're going to call yourself a Marxist, don't you think you should know a thing or two about Marxist theory and philosophy? That's what I'm getting at.
Jackal by John Follain. It was published in 1998, so it is a more comprehensive look at Carlos.
I listened to the show twice now, and still don’t really understand Walter’s point, if he had one. Listened to as an open stream of conscious about a lot of weird things, it sort of makes sense….but the guy getting caught in McDonald’s…is linked to trump at McDonald’s? Get some sleep Walter, we are forgiving fans, and still respect you very much. You just need to get some sleep I think. We still love you. 🥰 I think Matt tried to reel him in a little, but he was going like a freight train, and his mind could not be derailed.😀
Also—excellent county highway this issue—the best one yet in my opinion!
First of all, love the tracksuit, Matt. Gonna play Run DMC's "My Adidas" in your honor today. Hit it, Run!
I had to bail last night. When I learned from Walter that my thinking processes were not sufficient to understand what he was saying, I thought, "Well, what's the use then?" Ironically, I do write fiction and have written a screenplay, but I still could not connect with what to my mind was a humongous stretch. I almost felt embarrassed for him. I think that's why I had to bail.
PS: my latest postings come from Amandus's Substack.
Is Matt seriously surprised a lawyer would lie on the air and play right to half the country’s affiliation? He knows they won’t check this guy. How can Matt be surprised?
Agreed! I’m surprised Matt is surprised. Is it just because he has a podcast and believes he must appeal to shock factor of his audience? I am the opposite of shocked precisely BECAUSE I’ve tuned into these guys for the past 4 years.
Good reminder that half the country still thinks that way.
What a fantastic job tonight by you both! You play off each other brilliantly! Walter’s insights were particularly compelling, perhaps because I share many of his opinions but I can’t explain their derivation nearly as well.