Fourth Reich Archaeology

Join us this week in the first installment of what will be a periodic series focused on current events within our Reich, and the historical precedents in Reichs past.  We’re calling it “Fourth Reich Geopolitik.” After a little catch-up on some of the latest expressions of fascism in American politics, we go back to basics and wipe off our patented Fourth Reich lenses.  Recall that when we say “Fourth Reich,” what we refer to is a regime with the same capacity for cruelty and destruction as the high watermark of those qualities: the Third Reich.  To put a finer point on it, our modern US-led global capitalist world order–with the Trump administration at the helm–represents a continuation of the Nazi quest for world domination and the consolidation of capital that dates back to well before the industrial revolution.  We illustrate this continuity by a quick recounting of the “science” of Geopolitics, from the British Lord Halford Mackinder to the Nazi Karl Haushofer, to Haushofer’s American Jesuit acolyte, Edmund A. Walsh, the namesake of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.With our lenses polished, we turn to the real focus of this episode: making sense of the latest developments in the Trump administration’s foreign and domestic policy. As to foreign policy, we look at the war in Ukraine and see the imperial maneuvering of US foreign police reduced to tabloid-level spectacle.  While some might see Trump “sidling up to dictators” or “abandoning our allies,” we see him pulling a reverse-Nixon: Rather than opening up to China to push back on Russia’s global influence, the Trump team is teaming up with Russia to help it knock down the dominoes on the way to Beijing.We then turn inward, looking at domestic policy, and dissect how it is exactly that the Republican party went from the country club party of rich old white men to counting among its ranks the young tech crowd.  For this, we need not look further than Elon Musk.  With Musk, Trump gets not only a jester with a devout silicon valley following but also a vehicle to the growing concern his voter base has with fraud and corruption.  But while Trump and Musk claim they have a mandate from the people to hack away at the federal government to eliminate fraud and waste, their cuts reveal that they are focused largely on agencies–like the Dept. of Education and the CFPB–that have been on Donald Trump’s shit list since the early days of his campaign. We also look at the rhetorical ruse of the Populist Front of the Republican Party led by the likes of Steve Bannon, dissecting their ability to speak several truths only to lull people into a false sense of security and bait-and-switch into fascist eugenics.We try to maintain a positive attitude throughout it all, though admittedly, it is getting harder with every day. The time is nigh to make moves and organize strategically to build power, and if we are to make any progress in the right direction, we need to unfetter ourselves from the corrupt genocidal Democrat Party. Dig in and enjoy! And if you like what you are hearing please drop us a line, give us some support on Patreon, and spread the word! Fourth Reich Archaeology email: fourthreichpod@gmail.comFourth Reich Archaeology Patreon: patreon.com/fourthreicharchaeology

This week we bring you another current events episode because, frankly, there is just too much insanity going on right now to stay silent.  As with the last episode on current events, we take a good hard look at the sad state of affairs at home and abroad under the Trump administration, while reserving plenty of ire and disgust for the Democrats as well. You’ll recall that we primarily focused on the European Theater in our previous episode. This time, we look at the developments happening in the Americas.And while the developments are new, the story's contours are familiar.  First, you have the goons at ICE targeting individuals based on their political views. Over the last few days and weeks, we’ve witnessed activists like Mahmoud Khalil, Ranjani Srinivasan, and Radha Alawieh being targeted by the Fourth Reich Gestapo simply because they decided to exercise their constitutional right to free speech and speak up against genocide. As our listeners know full well, silencing dissent literally by disappearing dissenters is a tried and true tactic of fascism. We then turn to the Trump administration’s plan to deport hundreds, if not thousands, of Venezuelan nationals (for now) to El Salvador, where they will languish in concentration camps, out of reach from lawyers, journalists, and human rights defenders, as they await removal proceedings by Trump’s Department of Homeland Security. And, as far as we can tell, the strategy of deporting the undesirables is not going to end with the Venezuelans.  Trump’s lap dog “lil” Marco Rubio has even been in talks with El Salvador’s President Bukele to work out a plan to send undesirable U.S. citizens to serve their criminal sentences in Salvadoran black site jails. The rotten cherry on top of this putrid cake is that, in the past few weeks, the Trump administration has also targeted several prominent law firms in retaliation for their political involvement in the 2016 election and beyond.  Through executive orders, Trump has barred federal agencies from working with these law firms, revoked any security clearances that the firms' lawyers might have had, and even restricted their access to certain federal buildings.  If that sounds familiar, it should, as it is precisely the kind of thing that Adolf Hitler did back in the day. It’s the purge and intimidation of the nonconforming elements of the bourgeois elite to unify the ruling class behind the criminal state, in preparation to crush into submission the working classes when crisis inevitably hits.We give a brief preview of the economy and the ingredients for a crash stewing on the boiler, and draw just a couple of the seemingly innumerable parallels to previous fascist apex moments before bringing it all back home to what this podcast is all about: calling out both parties in the sorry spectacle that passes for a democracy, exposing the historical roots of their mutual fecklessness and self-interested cruelty, and urging our listeners to join us in building - albeit from a whisper - the foundations for a new political formation built on truth, justice, and love. In sum, the Fourth Reich alarm bells are ringing. These are scary times. So sit back, try to relax (we know that is a tall order these days), and be sure to put on that PPE—this dig is another one that qualifies for hazard pay.

This week, we're taking a break from the Warren Commission, but don't worry; JFK stuff still comes up as relevant context at the present moment. But mostly, we're back into current events to cover the inauguration of the new regime. Trump 2.0. On the one hand, as we've consistently argued, the U.S. is not a democracy but a corporate state investing the bare minimum to maintain a mere image of democracy. So in that sense, Trump is no different from Biden: both are just actors filling roles in the spectacle of politics.We begin the episode saying farewell and f-off to Joe Biden and his entire rotten, genocidal administration. We discuss Biden's and Blinken's farewell addresses, Kamala's uncertain future, and the bravery of journalists standing up for the victims of genocide in the face of violent arrest and slander. We live in a time when "freedom of speech" is being redefined to mean "freedom to espouse and inculcate hardcore racist and genocidal beliefs," while free-speech activity like protesting genocide is being redefined to mean "crime and terrorism." Biden certainly has a role in that, and Trump seems like more of the same.Then we cover the inauguration and first day of President Donald John Trump, "the king of crime." After a banger of a musical number underneath "pig man" Trump's imperial inaugural address, we cover the MANY parallels between Trump and Reagan, including but not limited to their near-identical initiatives to privatize the government under the direction of literal Nazis. We discuss some of the day-one executive orders and issue predictions about what we might see next (including initial thoughts on JFK disclosure!!). Disclaimer: any predictions may very well change; this damn world is crazy as hell! Nevertheless, the Fourth Reich Archaeology thesis - albeit dire - is vindicated daily. Enjoy!

Are you heading into Thanksgiving weekend wondering WTF you will talk about with family and friends? Fear not, dear listener; Fourth Reich Archaeology has got you covered. We dropped this exclusively pre-Thanksgiving for our Patreon subscribers (sign up to get more such treats!), but you know we won't hold out on our listeners, so here it is for free. We offer some fodder to break the ice on a subject that we’re sure you’ll agree is dinner conversation appropriate–the sad true fact that we are currently living in the Fourth Reich, and the latest election results are a painful reminder that that's true.In the third installment of our 2024 election coverage, we do a post-mortem of the spectacle and add our patented Fourth Reich Archaeology view to the discourse. We offer a verbal carving-knife to help you cut through the liberal doomerism weighing down so many of our friends and families in the wake of Trump’s win and share some thoughts on why we’re hopeful about the next four years. It’s not that we’re excited about Trump’s Killer Krony Krew; it’s that the mask of American fascism is slipping more and more, making the Fourth Reich Archaeology message resonate more than ever. You’ll want to listen to the very end of this one to catch the instructions for Fourth Reich Archaeology’s very first parlor game, which will be the perfect way to have some fun with your normie loved ones this holiday season. Music:​The Doors - “Five to One”​John Lennon - “Working Class Hero”​Blaze Foley - “Oval Room”​Mick Gordon - “Nazi Punks, gtfo”​Tom Waits - “Everything Goes to Hell”

Join us as we take a final dusting to the artifact-in-the-making that is the 2024 presidential election. Will we make an endorsement? Not likely. Will we have a few laughs? Definitely.We’ve subjected ourselves to hours upon hours of presidential slop. We went ears deep in the trough for you, listener. We’ll give a few highlights from Kamala’s performance on the Breakfast Club, Trump on Rogan, JD Vance on Tim Dillon. Seriously, we had to bathe with a steel loofah after listening to all this shit. Not unexpectedly, we conclude - while not begrudging anyone’s right to fear-vote democrat - that the two candidates for Hitler are pretty much a wash. Both pledge to continue committing genocide. Both pledge to criminalize immigration and build a wall. Both pledge to protect crypto assets (lol). It’s a race to the bottom and we ask aloud whether these parties are really trying to lose.In an election where the party of Dick Cheney is calling the OTHER guy fascist, you know you’re in the Fourth Reich. Hope this helps you keep your distance from the madness as the barbarians approach both sides of the gates.

This week on Fourth Reich Archaeology, we take a brief hiatus from Jerryworld and travel back to the present day for a special episode on the 2024 election cycle.  A true American spectacle, the sights and sounds of the 2024 campaign trail appear to have been inspired by the pomp and circumstance of modern professional wrestling. In fact, with a steady bombardment of character arcs, secret alliances, double-crosses, over-the-top walkout songs, cheesy catchphrases, and interludes from rappers and comedians to boot, you’ve been so busy being entertained this election cycle that you don’t even realize your favorite politician hasn’t said a lick about policy. While we otherwise may not know exactly what kind of terrible shit is going to come out of the mouths of our political leaders, you can always count on it being unhinged.  But lest you think we are departing from our favorite object of study... to the contrary, we apply the artifacts we've unearthed in the first three episodes of Jerryworld to help make sense of the senselessness of the 2024 presidential election. Indeed, the life and times of Jerry Ford are as relevant as ever. Whereas Gerald Ford's eventual identity as a mere brand ambassador for the entrenched powers that be had a ring of tragedy to it, Kamala and Donald inhabit a world of hyper-farce, playing the role of carnival-barker for feuding (but ultimately compatible) factions of the ruling class. Moreover, while there are issues each nominee has championed for their respective financial backers, or to pacify or incite their faithful followers, the substance of their actual policy positions on the things that really matter don’t meaningfully differ.  Like every election before it, 2024 will likely once again break the record for most expensive election ever. But in our view, money in politics nowadays isn't so much about swaying elections as inflating the spectacle of "democracy," generating viewership through the corporate media machine, and imposing hard limits on what is considered acceptable political discourse. Thus, to paraphrase our favorite Thomas Pynchon quote once again, the true election cycle is not the culmination of a democratic process but a celebration of markets. And to all our Jerry heads out there, don't fret—we will return to our regularly scheduled program next week with Jerryworld Episode 4. Meanwhile, check out our Patreon, which we're finally rolling out. We won't paywall any content just yet, but we do invite and encourage you all to get in on the ground floor. The sooner we can quit our day-jobs, the more time we can pour into the pod, and the deeper we can dig into the hellscape of the Fourth Reich.* * * * * * * Song List: Talking Heads – Once in a LifetimeBob Dylan – Masters of WarMetallica – For Whom the Bell Tolls Neutral Milk Hotel – Oh ComelyTrey Parker and Matt Stone - I’m a Little Bit Country David Bowie – Five Years Opening Clip is from Dr. Oblivion’s monologue in David Cronenberg’s Videodrome 

We are thrilled to be back with our friend from across the pond, researcher Max Arvo, for another installment of our excavation into the man who killed Lee Oswald, Jack Ruby. It's another split episode that you can find in all its 2+ hour glory on Patreon, or wait until Side B comes up here in the future.We start off by recapping and taking stock of our speculative findings thus far, from the motivating force behind Jack's desperate spate of phone calls to old mob pals, to whether and how he was brought into a larger conspiracy, to what was going through his mind as he took the fatal shot and surrendered his body to his friends on the Dallas Police Department.Then we pick up with our factual narrative where we left off in Part 3, including a deep rumination on the spectacular implications of this being the first-ever murder caught on live TV. To really drive the point home, we have condensed some of the best tidbits of ABC News's live coverage of the events of November 24, 1963 in one of our best Fourth Reich Archaeology mashups yet. Remember, that Sunday, Americans were glued to their TV sets to watch the president's casket carted from the White House to the Capitol, and Ruby's killing of Oswald interrupted the broadcast. Side B will cover the formation of Jack's legal and psychiatric team. Again, you can access the full episode today at patreon.com/fourthreicharchaeology. Otherwise you will have to wait.As a reminder, Max's series of articles on Ruby can be found here: https://www.kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-articles/jack-ruby-a-review-and-reassessment-part-1

As promised, this is the second half of our play-by-play of Jack Ruby's manic wild ride leading up to his murder of Lee Harvey Oswald on live TV on November 24, 1963. We pick up right where we left off, deep into the night of November 22, with Ruby taking his roommate ("boyfriend"?), George Senator, and his employee-cum-tenant, Curtis Laverne "Larry" Cravard, on a quest to collect evidence of what he perceived to be an antisemitic false flag attempt to blame the Jews for Kennedy's assassination.We trace Jack's bizarre activities over the subsequent 32 hours leading up to the fatal moment at 11:21 AM on Sunday morning in the basement of the Dallas Police building. We get into some light speculation over what really happened, and what was going on in Jack's drug-addled, sleep-deprived, and desperate mind in the most decisive day and a half of his short life.Remember, if you want to hear the full 2+ hour Part 3 in its entirety, head on over to Patron.com/fourthreicharchaeology and sign up. We will be back soon with Max Arvo to cover the somehow-even-stranger events of the final years in Ruby's life, including his "treatment" by a team of spooked-up psychiatrists helmed by none other than Louis Jolyon "Jolly" West himself.

We are back with Part 3 of our deep dive into the life and times of Jack Ruby. Recall that in Part 1, we focused on Ruby’s early years in Chicago’s southwest side during America’s  Prohibition era. Ruby’s rough and tumble upbringing put him in the mix with kids who grew up to be well-connected guys in some of the most powerful and notorious mob families of the 20th Century.  We discussed how Ruby’s ties to the mob influenced his eventual move to Dallas and his decision to set up clubs in the city. In Part 2, we put Chicago in the broader context of postwar America and traced the mob’s westward and southerly expansion from hubs in Chicago and New York to towns like Las Vegas and Dallas. We further fleshed out the connections between Ruby and the mafia and set the scene for the tragic events of November 1963. In this episode, we jump into the action and focus on the timeline of events immediately leading up to the killing of Lee Harvey Oswald. At the time Ruby was, to say the least, a little stressed.  He had a massive debt with the IRS and faced serious problems with local unions and competitors in Dallas. But in the days leading up to JFK’s assassination, Ruby made a flurry of calls to his mob pals, some of whom he hadn’t spoken to in years. On November 17, he traveled to Las Vegas to see Lewis McWillie–a man with ties to Meyer Lansky and Santos Trafficante. When he returned from that trip, Ruby told his tax attorney that a “friend” (whom Ruby never identified) would cover his tax debts. Perhaps a sign of relief, Ruby spent the night of November 21st out on the town, dining at the famed Dallas restaurant, Campisi’s.  That brings us to November 22, 1963. When news of the assassination broke, Ruby closed his clubs and spent the day roving around town.  He famously visited both Parkland Hospital (where Kennedy’s body was taken) and the Dallas police station (where Oswald was being held).  In proper Jack Ruby form, he made a splash wherever he went. He cried on journalist Seth Kantor’s shoulder while at Parkland. He corrected another journalist during a presser at the Dallas police station. For two days and nights, Ruby roamed the streets of Dallas and wound himself up. And on the morning of November 24, he let himself loose on Lee Harvey Oswald.This one is another two-parter, with Side A available for free this week and Side B coming to you next week. But if you can't wait for next week, you can hear the entire episode (Sides A & B) right now by subscribing to our Patreon. So head on over to patreon.com/fourthreicharchaeology and make a donation to listen to the whole thing today!

Welcome back for Part 2 of our excavation into Jack Ruby with Max Arvo! In Part 1, we dug up the surface layer of Ruby’s biography and followed his life trajectory from Chicago’s Southwest side (b. 1911) to Dallas’s club scene in the early 60s. In this episode, rather than going broader, we go deeper. This episode is really about adding some much-needed nuance to the often simplistic picture of American Organized Crime, and how it fits into the nexus between the business and intelligence networks that fueled the rise of the postwar American Empire.We put the City of Chicago in the broader context of postwar America and trace the mob’s westward and southerly expansion from hubs in Chicago and New York. We also examine some of Ruby’s oldest and closest friends from the school of hard knocks - guys like Lenny Patrick, Dave and Sam Yaras, and the hulking Barney Baker. These were street toughs who grew up alongside the Rubenstein kids in the ghetto gauntlet of Capone’s town, and they’d serendipitously pop back up in Jack Ruby’s life in Fall 1963. We also take roll call on Jack’s other bosom pals he met along the way from Chicago to Dallas and beyond - brainier guys like Paul Roland Jones and Lewis McWillie.All of these characters have direct lines to mob royalty: whether it’s Patrick & Yaras’s wet work for Sam Giancana, Baker’s muscle work for Jimmy Hoffa, or McWillie’s work running casinos for Meyer Lansky. They constituted a layer between the higher-ups in the Cosa Nostra and disposable dummies like Ruby.We do our best to really flesh out these connections and go beyond the corkboard, so that we (and you, listener!) can really understand just how “the men who put [Jack Ruby] in the position [he was] in” did so. With this episode the stage is set to pick back up next time in 1963 and go deep on the factual narrative of the Oswald hit. Enjoy!Sign up for our Patreon here: Patreon.com/fourthreicharchaeology.Read Max’s investigative series on Ruby here: https://www.kennedysandking.com/content/author/415-maxarvo.And find Max’s other work here: https://maxarvo.com.

The Warren Commission Decided Series is back with another installment of our ongoing series within a series within a series on Jack Ruby. The great Max Arvo joins us in the excavation once again. Max is a writer, researcher, musician, poet, and more, and you can find all of his work at his website here: https://maxarvo.com. We all have Max to thank for one of the most substantial original contributions to JFK research in a generation - namely, the degree to which CIA psychiatrist and MKULTRA heavyweight Louis Jolyon West became involved in the “treatment” and handling of Jack Ruby. Max has been in the Jolly West archives, he has stared into the abyss, and he has agreed to guide us like Dante’s Virgil through the hellscape of Jack Ruby’s life. His series of articles is brilliant; they’re all available for free, and you really should read them here: https://www.kennedysandking.com/content/author/415-maxarvo.In Side B of Part 1, we pick up where we left off, laying the foundation for this epic excavation into the Ruby mines. We begin with another excerpt from Jack’s Warren Commission testimony as it keeps getting weirder and weirder. Then, we follow Jack from his unremarkable service as a mechanic stateside in WWII, to his riding a southerly wave of mafia migration to Dallas, to his neurotic struggle to stay afloat in Dallas’s club scene. Most people don't know that Ruby played host to music legends like The Band, Hank Williams, and more, besides just strippers. And we end off with his “Cuban exploits" of the late 50s bringing him smack-dab in the middle of the CIA-Mafia war on Castro. You will not want to miss it.Hear the whole Part 1 by signing up for our Patreon here: Patreon.com/fourthreicharchaeology.

The Warren Commission Decided Series is back from an extended hiatus with our newest series within a series within a series. This time our object of study is Jack Ruby. We’ve teased it a few times over the past several months, and it’s finally here. And not only that, but we are joined on this journey by a very special guest, Max Arvo. Max is a writer, researcher, musician, poet, and more, and you can find all of his work at his website here: https://maxarvo.com. We all have Max to thank for one of the most substantial original contributions to JFK research in a generation - namely, the degree to which CIA psychiatrist and MKULTRA heavyweight Louis Jolyon West became involved in the “treatment” and handling of Jack Ruby. Max has been in the Jolly West archives, he has stared into the abyss, and he has agreed to guide us like Dante’s Virgil through the hellscape of Jack Ruby’s life. His series of articles is brilliant; they’re all available for free, and you really should read them here: https://www.kennedysandking.com/content/author/415-maxarvo.In this first part - the entirety of which is up on Patreon and side A of which is up for free - we lay the foundation for our excavation into the Ruby mines. We start with our first-ever Fourth Reich Archaeology cold open, reading straight from Jack’s Warren Commission testimony where he gives good reason to question any simplistic narrative about his choice to kill Lee Harvey Oswald on November 24, 1963, in the basement of the Dallas Police building amidst dozens of cops. Then, we cover Jack’s biography through the 1950s, and begin to introduce some of the recurring cast of characters in Ruby’s mobbed up world. From his immigrant upbringing in Chicago’s ethnic ghetto in the shadow of the Chicago outfit, to his trip out West. From his unremarkable service as a mechanic stateside in WWII, to his riding a southerly wave of mafia migration to Dallas, to his neurotic struggle to stay afloat in Dallas’s club scene. And we end off with his “Cuban exploits” (free listeners will need to wait for this bit!). You will not want to miss it.Hear the whole thing on Patreon here: Patreon.com/fourthreicharchaeology.

Finally, we land on the original Warren Commission Defender, junior staff member Wesley J. (“Jim”) Liebeler. Liebeler, 24 years younger than his senior partner, Albert Jenner, came to the Commission from U. Chicago law school, specifically recommended by his lawschool classmate, one Kenneth Dam. Both Dam and Liebeler were acolytes of the “law and economics” school - a legal theory fusing libertarian jurisprudence with the neoliberal, neoclassical economics of the “Chicago school” of shock-doctrine disaster capitalism.We discuss how Liebeler embodied the “gunner” lawyer prototype and how he brought that attitude to his work. He was a guy who knew how to play the middle to please everybody and advance his own star. For example, even though he went on record, writing a memo to Lee Rankin raising some serious questions about the Warren Report’s evidentiary weaknesses, he also took it upon himself to tie up some of the very loose ends he was concerned with in a way that tamped down evidence tending to show a conspiracy.In this regard, we take a deep dive into the “Odio incident,” wherein Dallas Cuban Silvia Odio was visited by a man she identified as Lee Harvey Oswald in September 1963, among a group of anti-Castro Cubans talking about wanting to assassinate the President. Liebeler’s conduct in that affair paints a disturbing picture of the man and his ethics, which casts further suspicion over his long and illustrious post-Commission career defending the Warren Report in the court of public opinion all over the country. This episode ties off our excavation into the Warren Commission staff attorneys for now, so we conclude it by zooming out to revisit the question we started with way back in Episode 7: How is it possible that all of these independent-minded professional men with no ulterior motives but to find the Truth about the President’s assassination could countenance a coverup of a conspiracy?

We return this week with another installment of our deep dive into the impact of Bert Jenner, the Warren Commission lawyer responsible for preparing the Report’s profile on Lee Harvey Oswald.  And boy has this one taken us places.   Recall that we started out this journey in The Warren Commission Decided Episode 10, by illustrating the deep connection between Jenner and General Dynamics, the company that was awarded a record-breaking $7 billion dollar contract to build a state of the art fighter jet out of its facility in North Texas.  When General Dynamics made this deal, Jenner was lead counsel to the company and its controlling shareholder, Henry Crown, and he also sat on its Board of Directors. This matters because a key focus of Jenner’s investigation was the White Russian colony that formed the Oswalds’ social circle in Dallas in the months leading up to JFK’s assassination, and his key witness from that milieu was Lee Oswald’s good friend, George de Mohrenschildt. We spent much of the last two episodes establishing de Mohrenschildt’s ties to the intelligence community, which had a heavy footprint in Dallas and in the Texas oil industry, and which unsurprisingly overlapped with Jenner’s corporate sugar daddy – General Dynamics.  Having taken a brief contextual detour to explore the de Mohrenschildts, their connection to the underbelly of the corrupt Texas military-industrial-oil-intelligence complex, and Lee Harvey Oswald, we return to Jenner this week and cover the nitty gritty of the work he did interrogating the de Mohrenschildts. In some ways, this episode provides a master class on how to interrogate a witness either to elicit – or avoid – certain testimony.  Whether through intimidation, exhaustion, or even weaponized incompetence, Jenner was learned in all the ways.  And in this episode, we show how Jenner deployed all these tricks to divert investigation away from the North Texas intelligence community and get George de Mohrenschildt to provide exactly the testimony he needed to prop up LHO as the deranged love scorned maniac who shot Kennedy. Remember, we are doing all of this to challenge one of the most persuasive anti-conspiracy lines deployed against Warren Commission critics, which is “how could all of those staff lawyers on the Commission really be in on a coverup? They’re independent-minded guys, and respectable attorneys, with no political bag to carry!” We tie it all back together to show that contrary to the popular argument against the Warren Commission cover up, there is ample evidence to show that all it took was a few key individuals like Jenner or Arlen Specter in the right places.  Even without imputing treasonous or criminal intentions to these cover-uppers, we illustrate how they played a crucial role in controlling the narrative of the Commission’s investigation and the ultimate conclusion that Oswald was the lone nut who capped Jack. Only our most loyal fans would have read this far, and if we’ve got that right, please consider giving us a donation on Patreon so that we can keep this project going: www.Patreon.com/fourthreicharchaeologyWe think you’ll agree when we say that now more than ever the world ought to know how and why it came to be that we are, most unfortunately, living in the Fourth Reich.

Last week, we talked about how President Lyndon Johnson came to put together a top-flight blue ribbon commission to cover up the Kennedy assassination. For the next two episodes, we go around the table and introduce the listener to each of the seven members of that  commission. As we do, we also receive a masterclass on how to lie, manipulate, coerce, and outright strongarm to get your way. At the head of the class is LBJ. Along with its chairman, Earl Warren, the Warren Commission consisted of two members from each chamber of Congress: one Democrat and one Republican. The Commission also had “two members of the public.” This week we cover the Warren Commission’s chairman, its members who served in the House of Representatives, and its Democrat Senator. First, we introduce Chief Justice Earl Warren, who was the ringleader of the ragtag team of spooks, drunks, racists, and rats. Warren was the perfect man to lend his name to the cover-up. He had spent the last 10 years building the public’s trust by overseeing the most progressive shift in the history of Supreme Court jurisprudence, including classics like Brown v. Board of Education and Gideon v. Wainwright. For his Democratic Senator pick, LBJ chose Senator Richard “Dick” Russell of Georgia. Russell mentored LBJ in the Senate and was a logical pick to serve as LBJ’s “inside man.” There was just one problem. Russell was a Dixiecrat and staunch segregationist, which made him Earl Warren’s arch-nemesis. LBJ bullies him like a boy. We play the tapes. It’s incredible.For the Democratic Congressman, LBJ picked Hale Boggs of Louisiana. Where Russell was an offensive pick, Boggs was a defensive one. In the days leading up to the announcement of the Warren Commission, Boggs - who had been a great admirer of the slain JFK - was vocal about the need to initiate an independent, unbiased investigation. To nip that in the bud, LBJ neutralized Boggs by bringing him in the fold. And you know we had to save the best for last. Our day one homie, Jerry Ford. Jerry was the Republican Congressman pick, and LBJ chose him for all the reasons we’ve discussed in Jerryworld. At this point Jerry was a national brand, with a reputation for being a team player, a hard worker, and a straight shooter. In fact, in LBJ’s eyes, Jerry looked like the perfect mark to be his bagman–after all Jerry was still a young up and comer. Little did LBJ know that Jerry was playing him for a fool and serving as mole to none other than J Edgar Hoover.