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Selects: John Lennon and the FBI · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hi, everybody. Christmas is in the air because December 3rd, 2020.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: And you know what's also in the air? COVID. SARS. 19.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Is that what it was called? I can't even remember.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: I think I got that wrong. And I'm glad that
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: I got that wrong because it's not something that I
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: care to remember in that kind of detail. I'm just
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: going to call it the Cove. So we are in
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: December with the Cove at this point. And we did
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: a very fun episode for me, at least, because I'm
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: a big Beatles fan. I know Josh is not, but
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: he indulges me occasionally. With episodes like this, and this
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: one is not just on the Beatles. In fact, it
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: is on John Lennon and the FBI because he was
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: under surveillance by the FBI for a lot of reasons
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: and had a pretty dodgy relationship here in the United
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: States at times. So check out this episode right now.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: I think you'll enjoy it. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know,
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: a production of iHeartRadio.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: Charles W. Chuck Bryan out there. Jerry's here. Special guest Jerry.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: This is Stuff You Should Know, the super subversive edition.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: Which is, I mean, it's subversive, but not coming from
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: who you'd expect. In this case, the subversive people, Chuck,
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: are two of the crookedest, Worst Americans to ever take
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: a breath of life in the United States.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: Yes. Hoover and Nixon, right?
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: Yes. Herbert Hoover and Charles J. Nixon. No. Oh, no.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: Not those two. Was it J. Edgar Hoover and Richard Nixon?
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: Richard Milhouse, I think is his name.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: Milhouse. That's right. So you picked this one, right?
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: I think we got help from our buddy. Oh, it
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: was a Grabster article, right?
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: This is a Grabster.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: So why did you choose this.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: One, Chuck? I'm just a Beatles nut. I'm reading a
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: massive Beatles book, and I'm always thinking about the Beatles,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: so this isn't something I knew a ton about. So
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: now I know more.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: What are you thinking about the Beatles right now?
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: They could write a song.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: Like they could, like they're really good at writing songs,
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: you mean?
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: I think so. I know you're not a Beatles guy,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: but they're regarded as good songwriters.
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: Sure. I'm willing to concede that at least. I'm a
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: grown person. I can concede when I'm wrong or when
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: I've been bested.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: I think we differ on Yoko Ono though. So that'll be,
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: you know, that's where the tables are turned.
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: Because you like her singing, isn't that right?
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: I appreciate it. I don't know. Like is a pretty
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: strong word, but I definitely appreciate it. There's some songs, like,
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: have you ever heard I Love You, Earth?
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: Sure.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: That's a pretty sweet song. I like her singing on that.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: All right. Have you ever heard her cover of Katy
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: Perry's Fireworks? No.
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: I bet that's something.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: She did it at... maybe MoMA or The Met or
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: something like that. And she's just standing there wailing. She's
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: not singing words or anything like that, just wailing. And
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: it was her cover of Katy Perry's Firework. And it's
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: pretty great to see. I'm sure if you look it
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: up on YouTube. But I appreciate a lot of her stuff.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: How about that?
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: I appreciate her as a human. And it's always fun
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: to look back at performances, live performances with Lynn Enwin.
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: she would do a full like four or five songs
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: in the row in the middle of like Madison square
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: garden concert. And you could kind of see his, his
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: backing band just kind of like, Oh boy, I can't
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: believe we're doing this. I can't believe she's really doing this.
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: Right. Right. Um, and she's actually pretty strongly implicated in
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: this whole thing. We're talking about John Lennon, um, being
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: pursued and, and surveilled and basically harassed by the FBI. Um,
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: in the 1972, actually 1971, 72, I believe, um, for
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: a very specific reason. And it was at a time
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: when John Lennon and Yoko Ono had just gotten married.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: They got married like two, two, three years before. And, um,
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: we're a very famous couple. The Grabster argues that they
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: may have been like the first genuine celebrity activist couple
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: who actually used their celebrity as a way to, um, help,
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: help influence or help causes that kind of thing. Um,
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: And by the time 1971-72 rolled around, Richard Milhouse Nixon
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: was actually running for re-election again. And he decided that
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: he didn't like people like John Lennon running around conceivably
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: swaying the vote, particularly among newly minted voters in the
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: 18 to 21-year-old block.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, he and Yoko had been contributors to causes,
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: working class causes. It's sort of the notion that Lennon
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: was always known as the working class hero, but of
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: all the Beatles, he grew up more solidly middle class
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: than any of the rest of them. And not to
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: say that that was a false persona, but he definitely
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: sort of jumped and sort of leaned into that, as
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: Noel Brown would say, as far as his persona. And
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: I think a lot of people that don't dig deep
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: kind of think that John Lennon grew up with a
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: very hard scrap of life, They're in Liverpool, which is
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: not the case. But as a result of that, he
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: championed the working man. He and Yoko contributed to causes.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: He became, along with Yoko, very much pacifist activists. And
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: if you're a pacifist activist in the early 70s, you're
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: not going to be a big fan of Richard Nixon
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: and he's not going to be a big fan of
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: you because he was not shy about war.
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: No, he really wasn't. He'd even campaigned, I think, in
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: 68 on ending the Vietnam War and then actually went
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: the exact opposite direction with that. There was a lot,
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: if you were a pacifist, there was a lot to
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: be upset about in the 60s and early 70s because
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: of Vietnam alone, you know?
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. One of the ways I think that
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: got the most press that when people think about John
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: and Yolka's activism is the bed-ins that they had, that
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: is B-E-D-I-N-S, and that is If you don't know what
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: those are, that's when you lay around in bed and
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: you invite the press to come to your room and
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: talk to you while you lay around in bed and
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: why you're laying around in bed. And it looked kind
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: of ridiculous to a lot of people, especially people on
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: the right. But John Lennon's whole kind of point, and
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: he was very tongue in cheek, kind of had a
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: great sense of humor. But I think it all sort
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: of stemmed from that, which is like, hey, all you
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: got to do is stay in bed and not go
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: and start wars. And this is a pretty ridiculous way
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: to drive that point home.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. Like, rather than having to, like, go out
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: and oppose violence, you could oppose violence just by laying
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: around in bed and doing nothing. Letting your hair grow,
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: I think, is what they were saying. Sure. Which is
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: pretty awesome. And... The thing is, is it's John Lennon and,
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: you know, Yoko Ono, and they're sitting around in bed
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: with the press in their hotel room. And like that
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: in and of itself is getting press. And then if
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: you say, well, what is all this about? And you
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: read a little further into the article.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: Maybe it kind of gets you in just the right way.
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: And all of a sudden you start thinking that way, too.
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  Speaker 2: And to the people who were, you know, running the
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: whole military industrial complex that I mean, that's a threat,
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: even if it's. just a threat of the threat of
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: saying like, just don't, you don't even have to oppose war,
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: just don't do anything. And that opposes war in and
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: of itself. And that was like kind of the way
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: things were at the time. Like there was a lot of,
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: a lot of people in power who were really opposed
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: to that kind of thinking, who were opposed to people
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: who were opposed to Vietnam or war in general or
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: violence of any kind. There was a big opposition to that.
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: And the people who were running the show in the
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: United States were chief among those people. Like we said,
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: Nixon as president and then running for reelection. Then J.
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: Edgar Hoover, who was not shy at all about doing
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: whatever he needed to to quiet dissent. Like he would
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: generate dossiers on elected officials, especially ones who were more liberal,
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: to basically keep them in line by threatening them with
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: blackmail or even the threat of blackmail, you know? there
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: were plenty of hippies who got their heads cracked in.
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: There were people who were surveilled. We did an episode
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: on the Black Panthers, if you remember. We talked about COINTELPRO,
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: the whole program to basically undermine and smear the Black
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: Panthers in the public's mind. Like, J. Edgar Hoover was
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: a vicious, terrible human being. And he ran the FBI
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: for decades and was still running the FBI when they
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: started to target John Lennon.
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so to set the stage here of kind of
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: how this all worked out was John Lennon had– he
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: was able to enter– the whole thing kind of boils
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: down to whether or not he would be allowed to
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: live in the U.S. or whether or not if he
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: was eventually allowed to live in the U.S., if they
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: could legally deport him. So he was able to enter
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: the U.S. on a work visa in 71. And concurrent
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: with this, Yoko Ono had a custody battle going on.
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: She had a daughter from a previous marriage in the
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: early 70s, and she wasn't going to leave at all.
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: She was legally there. They did try and deport her.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: They didn't know that she had a green card already,
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: which was sort of the first foible in this thing. Right.
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: But they knew that they had a lot of leverage
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: over Lennon because— if they deported him, he would be
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: without his wife, who was going to stay there. So
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: they had this leverage. Lennon loved living in New York City.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: That's where he wanted to make his permanent home.
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: So much so that that was also leverage that they had, too.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely. And so Nixon's up for reelection in 72.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: He would go on to win, you know, in a big,
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: big way against McGovern. But they were, you know, they
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: were an organization. They were an administration that was very paranoid.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: They would obviously with Watergate, they showed that they were
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: willing to do anything to ensure their victory. And that
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: included being really worried about people like John Lennon. I
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: don't think he was at the top of their list
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: of things to worry about. But he was on their
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: list thanks to Strom Thurmond, of all people.
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So Strom Thurmond, the horrible segregationist senator from what?
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: South Carolina, right? He he actually kicked this whole thing
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: off because I guess he noticed that John Lennon was was,
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: you know, he was a left leaning person. rock star activist.
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: He seems to have been one of the first people
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: to notice the activism that was developing among John Lennon
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: and Yoko Ono and to perceive it as a threat
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: to the establishment because all those recently enfranchised 18, 19
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: and 20 year old voters who hadn't had the right
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: to vote until the 26th Amendment had been passed I
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: don't remember exactly when it was passed, but it was
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: between 68 and 72 because 72 is the first election
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: those younger kids were going to be able to vote in.
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: And he apparently saw Lenin as among a group of
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: people who could speak to those kids and sway them
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: to the left and potentially unseat Richard Nixon, which it
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: would turn out is just a total laugh because Nixon
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: beat McGovern in a landslide. But at the time, they
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: didn't know this, and Richard Nixon wasn't going to take
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: any chances either. So the note from Strom Thurmond was
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: very well received in the Nixon administration.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think what I want to know is who
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: told Strom Thurmond.
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: That's what I want to know, too. Because that's the
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: biggest mystery here.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I doubt if Strom Thurmond was too hip to
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: any of this. But somebody probably got in his ear
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: and he sent a note that specifically said they try
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: and get him deported as a, quote, strategic countermeasure.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: And that's really kind of what got the ball rolling.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: We should also mention this other guy, John. I don't
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: know if it's Wiener or Weiner in this case.
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: It's pronounced Wienerslave.
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Oh, it is?
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: No. Do you remember there was a 30 Rock episode
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: where there's like an HR mediator and he's like this
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: very soft, rosy-cheeked, very calm, mild-mannered man. And Liz Lemon says, well, Mr. Wienerslav.
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: And he goes, no, it's pronounced Wienerslave.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: I miss that show.
• 12:58
  Speaker 2: That was a really good moment.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: They had such great fun with dumb jokes like that
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: and blah, blah, blah.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, right. No, that was Arrested Development.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's right. That was Arrested Development. They kind of
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: had the same DNA, though.
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: So Wienerslave was a writer or is a writer and
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: historian still, and he is why we know so much
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: of this. He was writing a lot about John Lennon,
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: writing a lot about the Beatles. he decided to file
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: Freedom of Information Act requests to get a lot of
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: these documents uncovered over the years and eventually was successful
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: in a big dump in 1997 and then in another
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: smaller one in 2006. And if it had not been
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: for his tenacity, I don't know if anyone else would
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: have picked up this mantle. Because, you know, in the end,
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: it's not the most interesting story in the world.
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: This is true.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: I say that in a whisper. It's not like some
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: huge like, oh, my God, revelations. It's sort of one
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: of those things. It's like just another example of the
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: small things that authoritarians do in this country under, you know,
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: in the back rooms and in the whispered rooms of
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: the White House.
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: Well, you know, I think like that's really true. And
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: that's a really good point is that like if you
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: just look at it on its face, like, you know,
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: the FBI followed around. John Lennon kept tabs on them.
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: And like if you read the files, it's really pedestrian,
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: boring stuff. You might miss like the real story here.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: And the real story here is that a sitting president
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: directed the FBI to get dirt that he could use
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: against a political rival, an activist rock star, to help
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: get him deported. or to figure out what leverage he
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: could use against him so that that sitting president could
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: get reelected. That's the real story here. And that the
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: FBI acted as, you know, this basically a Gestapo-type agency
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: on behalf of Nixon. That's the real story that I
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: think kind of gets covered up by John Lennon and
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: Yoko Ono's celebrity and, you know, the FBI kind of
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: wackily following him around.
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it is funny because if you look at some
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: of the files and Some of the reports, like they
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: would go to his concerts and undercover agents would go
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: to the concerts and report things like, you know, for
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: his encore, he's saying, give peace a chance. And we
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: all know about that song.
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: They would take notes on song lyrics and stuff like that.
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: So it's all just kind of silly. But yeah, I
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: definitely agree that it's just an example of the lengths
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: that Nixon would go to to be a dirty thief. Yes.
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: Yes. Well, Chuck, I think we should demonstrate the links
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: that we'll go to to bring everyone a message break.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: What do you think?
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: By just shutting up for two minutes?
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: Yep. Okay, so the whole thing started eventually, and it
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: wasn't clear what was going to happen, but the real
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: thing that kicked all of John Lennon's big problems off
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: was that he was arrested in 1968 in London for
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: possession of narcotics. I'm making air quotes you can't see
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: because he was busted with some pot, I think maybe
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: some hash, and like rolling paraphernalia. Some really BS beef
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: that they got him on in London. There was some
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: true believer, zealous anti-drug cop named Detective Sergeant Norman Pilcher,
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: who was later jailed, actually, for committing perjury as a
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: police officer. But he was alleged to have planted the
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: evidence that may or may not be true. But it
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: was like a rap that Lennon shouldn't have had on
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: him or Yoko shouldn't have had on her, that they
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: just wanted a high-profile bust. And that happened in 1968,
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: and it turned out that that would follow Lenin for
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: years to come and really kind of be the fulcrum
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: that the U.S. government had on him to try to
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: keep him from staying in the U.S.
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, he wasn't even doing heroin at this point,
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: I don't think.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: No.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: So they should have waited if they wanted a real case.
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: Well, it makes you wonder. I remember hearing in, I think,
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: our Black Panther episode, that the FBI was not above
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: like addicting activists and dissidents with heroin, like turning them
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: on to heroin and then getting them addicted and then just,
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: you know, taking them out of the game like that.
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think Lenin never shot heroin. That was his jam.
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: So early 71, like I said, he was able to
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: enter on a tourist visa. And then when Nixon and
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: his cronies get going on the deportation, The whole thing
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: was based on the fact that he had overstayed his visa.
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: But along with that, it was very valuable to them
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: that he had a drug conviction under his belt at
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: that point. So they were surveilling him. They were surveilling
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: other artists around the country, too, who they thought were
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: subversive and sending messages. Lennon, speaking of getting busted for pot,
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: Lennon very famously wrote a song called John Sinclair in
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: support and did a tribute, or not tribute, but a
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: a concert in, I don't know if they were raising money.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: Or just awareness. Both. Okay. For John Sinclair, who was
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: a poet, he was the manager of the MC5, great,
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: great rock band. And he offered two undercover cops a
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: couple of joints and went to, and he had already
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: had a couple of minor pot offenses, but he went
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: to prison for 10 years for this. And a big
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: refrain in that song, John Sinclair said, which is a
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: cool song and very rootsy and bluesy, not like very
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: Lennon at all, is 10 for 2, 10 for 2
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: is what they keep saying, 10 years for two joints.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that he sold to an undercover cop, right?
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but it worked. He actually was sprung from prison
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: shortly after this concert.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like two days after. And some people say, I
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: think that indicates he was already going to be sprung,
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: that the Michigan Supreme Court knew this was a trumped
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: up charge. But Other people say, no, the concert surely
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: had some impact. But Sinclair is, so the point about
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: Sinclair and John Lennon is John Lennon performed the song.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: He was the headliner at this concert in Ann Arbor.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: And he had been coordinating with other people in John
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: Sinclair's orbit that were prominent figures in the new left.
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: And at this time in the early 70s, the 60s
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: had ended, the, the, it become clear that flower power
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: hadn't worked. The evil people were still in charge. So
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: what was next? Maybe nonviolent coordination and resistance wasn't the
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: way to go. Now, Lenin and Yoko were were dedicated pacifists.
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: They didn't want anything to do with violence. They didn't
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: condone violence. They didn't like violence in any way, shape,
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: or form. But there were elements in the new left
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: who weren't necessarily convinced that that wasn't the only way
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: to change the course of the United States and get
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: rid of people like Nixon and his cronies. And so
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: if you're watching this from the outside, like you're J.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: Edgar Hoover and Richard Nixon, you're watching the people on
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: the new left and you don't know which way they're
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: going to break. Violent, nonviolent, who knows? But you're treating
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: all of them with suspicion. And all of a sudden,
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: John Lennon, one of the most recognizable and popular people
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: on the planet, is suddenly hanging out with some of
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: these new left cats that you don't know which way
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: they're going to go, violent or nonviolent. And that really
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: drew the attention of the FBI to John Lennon. It
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: wasn't necessarily he and Yoko and their pacifist stuff. Some
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: people think that it was his involvement with genuine bona
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: fide new left activists like John Sinclair or like Bobby Seale.
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: Like John Sinclair founded the White Panther Party, which they
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: had a 10 point platform like the Black Panthers platform
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: and the first platform in the White Panther platform. is
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: that it's fully in support of the Black Panther's 10-point platform.
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: So he's hanging out with a bunch of people that
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: had proven themselves as dyed-in-the-wool foes of the Nixon administration.
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: That definitely caught the FBI's attention.
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and they had big plans. They got together, and
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: I think their first meeting was at the Alamookie Township.
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: That's how I'm going to pronounce it.
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: The Scaramoochie Township. In New Jersey.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: In New Jersey. And initially called themselves the Alamookie Tribe,
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: but wisely changed their name to the Election Year Strategy
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: Information Center. And their plan was in 1972 is to
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: host this. And Lennon gave them money. He gave them
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: like 75 grand to kind of get going and said, here,
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: let's do a bunch of concerts with the help of
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: John Lennon all across the country in 1972. We can
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: have different artists performing, different speakers, you know, like pounding
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: home the anti-war message. And then as these concerts roll
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: closer and closer to the election, it'll culminate in a
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: big protest at the RNC in Miami. This is all
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: very legal stuff. It wasn't, they weren't staging riots or anything.
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: These were just concerts, awareness, trying to keep Nixon from winning.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: And Nixon got worried. And he knew that, like you said,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: the influence that someone like John Lennon could have was like,
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: he didn't have anyone on his side. There was no
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: Scott Baio at the time, wooing the youngsters.
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: Bob Blah Blah?
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: To the right. Oh, he was Bob Blah Blah, wasn't he?
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: That's funny. So this is all going on, and this
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: is kind of what ramps up the pressure to get
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: Lennon out of there. This custody battle's going on. They
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: know about that. And so their first step was to
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: instruct immigration and naturalization to try and say, hey, you've
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: overstayed your visa. You got to get out of here.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: And Lennon knew this was coming. This was no secret.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: He had gone on TV shows talking about being followed
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: by the FBI, having his phone tapped, which we still
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: aren't sure if that really happened. I think it says
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: officially that there was no legal phone tapping in the
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: FBI documents. But throwing that word legal in there just
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: kind of makes you think like, well, were there any
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: illegal ones that you're not going to tell us about?
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I read an interview online. So this is like
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: the depths of my depravity. I didn't even listen to
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: the interview. I read a Fresh Air interview with John
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: Weiner about this. And he said that the FBI responded
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: and said they found no evidence of illegal wiretapping by
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: the FBI or no legal wiretapping by the FBI. So so.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: whiners like okay does that mean they were doing illegal
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: wiretapping or does it mean that they didn't look very
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: hard for evidence it doesn't mean that they weren't tapping
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: his phone is what he's saying.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: Right uh it at least made Lennon paranoid enough yeah
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: like he wasn't just not he wasn't not sweating this
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: he was this made him very paranoid um and with
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: good reason but he took to going next door at
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: the uh Dakota building so he would let Lennon use
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: his phone in his apartment and to make phone calls,
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: and I guess assist with the calls at the same
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: time a little bit. And then the FBI said, you
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: know what could really help is if we could bust
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: them currently for narcotics in the United States. If we
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: have an active charge, drug charge against them, and Hoover
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: sent it out himself. He said, quote, for info of Bureau,
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: NYCPD Narcotics Division is aware of the subject's recent use
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: of narcotics, which is like every day, and are attempting
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: to obtain enough info to arrest both subject and wife
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: Yoko based on PD investigation.
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and by this time, I'm thinking he was using heroin.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: I think that's what they were referencing as his recent use.
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: Oh, really? I didn't think that started until later.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: I thought it was the early 70s.
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: I thought it happened during his lost weekend, but I
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: may be wrong on that. I'm not that far along
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: in the book yet.
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: I'm going to err toward you then, because I'm just
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: surmising here. I'm not the one who has a big
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: old book of Beatles history. So I don't know. They
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: never actually busted him, right? This was all just like
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: they were planning on doing this, but they never needed to?
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: I don't think he was arrested in the United States,
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: was he?
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I didn't know. I didn't get that impression. But
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: it seemed like everything was kind of barreling toward that.
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: And even like you were saying, the FBI was like,
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: we've let the NYPD know to go do this. So
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: and if you take a step back, like, This is
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: some heat. This is some pressure that they're putting on
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: John and Yoko. They're basically saying, we're going to split
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: you guys up by deporting John because we know that
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: Yoko is not going to leave the country because of
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: this custody battle. She can't afford to. So she has
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: to stay here. So if we threaten deportation to John Lennon,
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: it might actually keep him in line. And the FBI
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: used the word neutralized, that they were seeking to neutralize Lennon.
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: And I guess some people who don't dig very deeply
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: into the story are like, they were going to assassinate
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: John Lennon. And John Weiner has pointed out like that's
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: not at all what they meant. They meant like basically
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: making him ineffective, like taking him out of the game
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: basically one way or another, but not killing him, just
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: convincing him through putting this undue, unfair, undemocratic pressure on
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: him to drop his activities with the new left.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and by the way, I think he probably was
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: using heroin in the late 60s and had an on-again-off-again.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: But either way.
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: So that makes sense because I did see that guys
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: like Jerry Rubin and I think Rennie Davis, a couple
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: of like the Chicago 7, like they didn't even like
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: hang out with him because he was doing too many drugs.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: And I'm guessing that it wasn't like he was smoking
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: so much pot we can't even talk with him anymore.
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: Like I think he was shooting dope and they weren't.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, he never shot it. He always smoked it.
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: Or smoking dope.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: But I think he and Yoko were doing heroin actually
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: before the Beatles broke up at the end.
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: When they were sort of estranged. Not with the Beatles,
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: not John and Yoko. But at any rate, like I said,
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: these investigations are going on and they're going to his concerts.
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: And they're not even sending back information that really means much.
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: They're even saying some of these informants like, you know what,
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: they're not even really down with, like the new left
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: isn't even down with them. because they think they're just, quote,
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: self-aggrandizing rock stars, or there's little chance they'll accomplish anything
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: because they spend all their time doing drugs. They're kind
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: of sending the message like, you really don't need to
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: worry so much about John Lennon. He's not much of
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: a threat. Kind of one of the funny things about
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: this investigation was when, and Lennon was one of the
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: most famous people in the world, one of the most
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: recognizable faces in the world on planet Earth, along with
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: Yoko Ono. And the FBI passes around a sheet with
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: Lennon's picture on it so they can recognize him. But
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: it was the wrong photo. It was of a different
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: human being. It wasn't even John Lennon.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it was a street busker from the West Village
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: named David Peel.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: So funny.
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: Who had a record that I guess John Lennon helped
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: produce or something. He looked vaguely like John Lennon, but
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: that was the picture that the FBI passed around to
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: the cops of the wrong guy. The FBI also put
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: out an all-points bulletin searching for John Lennon and said
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: that he's at the St. Regis at 150 Bank Street. St.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: Regis Landscape Supply?
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: That's right. I guess that's what they meant because the St.
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: Regis Hotel is on Central Park. And John Lennon was
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: indeed living on Bank Street at the time, but he
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: was at 105 Bank Street. So that all-points bulletin was
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: all kinds of wrong. But this is the level of like–
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: coppery that the FBI was conducting, you know, trying to
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: get John Lennon.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: All right. Well, let's take a break and we'll come
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: back and talk a little bit about Lennon's official defense
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: right after this. So All right. So John Lennon is
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: not going to take this lying down. He was he
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: was paranoid. He was going on like the Mike Douglas
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: show and talking about the FBI coming after him. The
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: first thing he did was probably what any really, really
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: rich person would do is he hires a top rate
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: bulldog attorney to try and defend this or at least
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: delay this. And this guy's name was Leon Wilds. And
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: he really did delay this. He was sort of a
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: master at filing these motions. and getting it extended and extended,
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: and Lennon was able to stay in the country longer
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: and longer and longer. But he was also kind of
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: instrumental in kind of letting Lennon know that this was
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: a real situation that he was involved in.
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: Right. The thing is, is if you are a immigration
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: prosecutor for the federal government of the United States, you
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: know that there is not a ton of resources allocated
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: to your division, right? Or traditionally there hasn't been. And
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: so customarily, the Justice Department has or I guess INS
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: has left it up to each prosecutor to determine how
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: hard they want to prosecute the case. And so if
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: you are a upstanding person who's never posed any sort
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: of threat to the United States and maybe you own
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: a business or you're a productive member of society, There
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: is a chance that the INS is going to look
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: the other way and not actually deport you, even if
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: you are here illegally. You have overstayed your visa or
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: you came to the country illegally. Who knows? And that's
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: actually where the Dreamer program came from, DACA. It basically
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: said like these particular immigrants were brought here as children
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: and they pose no threat. Most of them are going
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: to college or college bound or they're in the military.
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: So we're going to not deport them. And what what
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: Lennon's lawyer told him was like, all of this is true.
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: And yet they're putting the heat on you like I
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: have never seen. This is this is clearly coming down
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: from on high. Like they want to get you out
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: of the United States. And it's not just this prosecutor. Yeah.
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: And the other thing that happens when it comes to
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: a case like this is they have to weigh or
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: they can be decided basically on the value of that
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: an immigrant might bring to the U.S. by being an
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: American or living in the United States.
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: Mm-hmm.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: And so there was, you know, it's kind of funny
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: to look back now and think that there had to
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: be a case made that John Lennon brings any kind
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: of value. But they did, and there was a series
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: of letters written by Bob Dylan and Joan Baez and
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: Joyce Carol Oates, Leonard Bernstein, John Updike, just a series
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: of very famous artists. Mm-hmm. kind of arguing in favor
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: of John Lennon being allowed to live here. It was
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: sort of a flood of public outcry, like what little
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: was known back then, at least. There's tremendous value to
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: letting John Lennon stay in this country.
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: Right. And don't forget, John Cage wrote a letter, too.
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: And I'm sure it was kind of like, well, you know,
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: do you want me to write a letter for you, John?
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: He's like, yeah, sure. I'm sure that would help a lot,
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: John Cage. Because I'm sure no one in the Nixon
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: administration has ever heard of you.
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, probably so.
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: So the one kind of the upshot, I'm just going
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: full on using this word now. The upshot of that
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: letter writing campaign was not even just so much to
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: demonstrate the value of John Lennon remaining in the United States.
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: It was if you kick him out, like there's going
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: to be a public outcry and you're going to be
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: held to account and asked to explain why you guys
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: kicked him out. So it did have a bit of
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: that combined with his his attorney's tenacity. It kept John
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: Lennon in the country. He was actually never deported, even
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: though they were he had a he lived for, I think,
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: two or three years with us. You have 60 days
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: to leave the country order. And his his lawyer kept
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: getting it extended and extended and extended. But for three years,
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: that was the threat that he was living under. And again,
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: if he was deported, he would leave without his wife,
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: who had to stay in the country for her own
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: custody battle. So that was a lot of strain on him, actually.
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: And the worst part about this whole thing is not
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: that the FBI did this and that the Nixon administration,
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: Singleton Mounder, that it all came down to Strom Thurmond
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: writing this memo to kick things off. It was that
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: it worked. They sought to neutralize John Lennon and his
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: political activism, and he stopped. He actually did. He gave
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: in in August of 1972 by announcing that he was
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: not going to take part in that series of concerts
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: that was going to culminate at the Republican National Convention
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: or engage in any kind of activist activities any longer.
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: He was just going to go back to being a
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: musician again.
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and by this point, Hoover was dead. L. Patrick
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: Gray died. was the acting director of the FBI. And
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: in that same month, that August, before the election in November,
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: the FBI's New York office reported to Gray that he's
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: no longer going to be involved with these concerts. He's
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: no longer with the new left. We don't really need
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: to worry about him anymore. We're going to basically settle
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: this case and close this case after Nixon wins the election.
• 35:18
  Speaker 1: And like we said earlier a couple of times by landslide,
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: so this is all sort of for naught anyway. Gerald
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: Ford ended up overturning Lennon's deportation order in 1975 that
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: was already filed. And in 76, he got his green
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: card and lived in New York very famously in the
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: Dakota for the last four years of his life before
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: he was murdered in the street, which I think we
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: should do an episode on that at some point, maybe
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: in a couple of years once this one is well
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: in the rearview mirror.
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: You bet.
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: That'd be a good one.
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: I agree. So if John Lennon, apparently before he died,
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: he gave a couple interviews and he said of this time,
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: like that it nearly ruined him as an artist. You know,
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: like you said, he wasn't just not sweating it. Like
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: he sweated it every day. It was a big, hairy
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: problem in his life all the time and a source
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: of great stress. So in addition to the stress, it
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: stole his focus. Like it made him think about that
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: and like how much he hated the Nixon administration and
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: how terrible the FBI was for how they were harassing
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: him and possibly tapping his phone. And it just took
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: his mind from his art. And he later said that
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: it almost ruined him as an artist because the work
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: he was producing at the time was journalism, not poetry,
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: as he put it, which is a very sad effect.
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: But it's a really real world effect when you've got
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: something just looming in in the front of your mind
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: that you can't get out of your mind, especially if
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: it's dealing with badness. That has a terrible effect on
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: you and your life in general. It can produce an
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: entire bad period of your life, you know?
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah. He was like, I had to let Yoko sing
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: a lot.
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: I have something I have to say. I don't want
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: to forget it. In one of the FBI notes at
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: that John Sinclair concert, Mm-hmm. The FBI informant reported that
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: the song, John Sinclair, was not up to Glennon's usual standards.
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: And you get this, Yoko can't even remain on key.
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: That was an FBI informant.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he had a good ear. But, you know, I
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: like the song. It doesn't, like, belong up there with
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: his greatest songs. But it was very clear. It was
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: sort of in the tradition of protest songs. It's got
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: this acoustic slide dobro guitar, and, you know, it's sort of,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: It fits in with the great folk songs of all time,
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: I think, but not necessarily one of the great Lennon
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: or Beatles songs.
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: Is it as good as John Henry was a steel
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: driving man?
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: I think it's better. I like it better.
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: Really? Yeah.
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: And, you know, like we mentioned earlier, the reason we
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: know all this was because of Wiener's reporting. And he
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: eventually got those documents released. And there was, you know,
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: in his circle, there was a big hubbub, like what's
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: going to be in there? what secrets will be revealed.
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: And really not much. What was revealed was embarrassment for
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: the FBI, embarrassment that they released a picture that wasn't
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: even John Lennon, embarrassment that they had a very unethical
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: and perhaps even illegal motivation behind trying to get this
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: person deported. And it was just egg on the face.
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: And that's why they tried to keep it under wraps
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: for so many years, hoping that it would not get out.
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: Not because there were some big revealing documents, but they
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: were just like, can we just sort of act like
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: this didn't happen?
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so we'll classify everything as a national security risk.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: And they did. And actually, that last trove of documents,
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: the little handful that trickled out in 2006, was a MI5,
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: a British Secret Service file on London that the U.S.
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: said if they— it was— And that that last bit of
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: document contained a file from a foreign government that had
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: trusted the U.S. to keep it and that it could
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: result in economic, diplomatic and military action if they were
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: to release it. Like the U.K. was just going to
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: bomb the U.S. for releasing their document or their file
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: on John Lennon. That's why the FBI held onto it
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: until 2006. And then they lost a court case. So
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: if there's a hero of the story, it's John Weiner
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: or John Weiner. I don't know how he says his
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: name and I'm sorry either way, because he was the
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: one that really stood up, not just for John Lennon,
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: but for The First Amendment, you know, and people's ability
• 39:46
  Speaker 2: to be politically active without, you know, the threat of
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: being intimidated. So good for him.
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: Totally.
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: You got anything else about this?
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: Got nothing else.
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: I have an article to direct everybody to is on
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: Pop Matters. John Lennon, colon, revolutionary man as political artist.
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: And it's about all this, sorry, history, but also just
• 40:12
  Speaker 2: a pretty good critical evaluation of him as an activist.
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: And it's just a really good, interesting article. So check
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: it out. And since I said check it out, everybody,
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: it's time for Listener Mail.
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: This is in reference of our haunted real estate. I
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: guess that was a short stuff, right? Had to be.
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it was.
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: Please tell me we didn't do 45 minutes on that.
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: We could have.
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: Hey, guys. Been a listener for years and finally have
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: a good reason to write you. I was listening to
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: the episode on whether you're supposed to disclose whether a
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: house is haunted or not, and it hit close to home.
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: Two years ago, we bought our first house, and I
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: made a point to run a report to see if
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: anyone died in the house. The previous owner had just
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: died within a year, but it didn't say where. I
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: wasn't really worried about someone actually dying in the house.
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: I was really just trying to get a big discount. However,
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: the agent said he didn't know, so no big discount.
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: Cut to two years later, I found out from neighbors
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: and research that the previous owner did not die. However,
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: he was a creep who actually had multiple abuse charges.
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: In fact, I found an article stating that he had
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: a woman tied up in our basement who he tortured
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: until she was luckily able to escape for weeks. That's
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: like almost worse than just a regular person dying.
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: Is somebody dying of natural causes? It's a million times worse.
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: Well, no, I was about to say worse than a murder.
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: I guess they're on par.
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, let's debate that at length.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: I don't want to rank awful crimes. Right. But I
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: think that might creep me out just as much. Let's
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: just say that. Sure. The police searched the house and
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: found oodles of weapons. The charges were eventually dropped. Apparently,
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: he had money, and he redid the entire basement, which
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: is beyond creepy. I don't know if this qualifies as
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: info that should have been provided to us at purchase,
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: but it sure seems like it, huh?
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: That is from Andy, Andy I. Oh, okay.
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: Well, thanks a lot, Andy. Is there a heart over
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: the I?
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: No, but it's typed.
• 42:14
  Speaker 2: Is it? It could be Andy McDowell. I think she
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: spells her name like that. I could see something like
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: this happening to Andy McDowell.
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: Sure. I love Andy McDowell.
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: Well, whether it's from Andy McDowell or not, we appreciate
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: the email. Thank you. And yes, I agree. I think
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: the realtor should have disclosed that if you ask me.
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: Totally.
• 42:33
  Speaker 2: If you want to let us know about some way
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: a realtor wronged you or anybody did, we want to
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: hear about it. You can send us an email to
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: stuffpodcasts at iheartradio.com. Stuff You Should Know is a production
• 42:48
  Speaker 2: of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
• 42:53
  Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.