If you're concerned about American politics really being down in the dumps
these days.
It is important to remember that as crazy,
it might sound American politics has always been pretty insane,
which means it's time for, it's always been this stupid.
[MUSIC]
So, one of the things that stands out in this nation's history is
how much the CIA tried and failed in assassinating Fidel Castro of Cuba,
who has since passed away on his own due to natural causes.
But this is incredible because while I was obviously aware
the CIA tried to assassinate him.
The ways in which they attempted to do so, I wasn't so
aware of and some of their strategies were just insane.
So let me give you those details.
So one of the plots.
Well let me give you the graphic here on one occasion,
aware that Castro was a keen scuba diver.
The CIA devised a cunning plan, documents released under the Clinton administration
confirmed that, the agency invested in a large volume of Caribbean molluscs.
With the intention of finding a shell big enough to contain a lethal
quantity of explosives.
The idea was that the molluscs would be painted in vivid
colors to attract the attention of an underwater Castro.
>> That is such a bad plan [LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] such a bad plan.
They tried to assassinate him 638 times.
>> It's unbelievable.
There's so many of these amazing stories.
So, can I tell you my favorite and then I want to tell you some of the lessons from
this, which are really interesting.
So, they tried to poison this milkshake ones and they try to poison in
1000 different ways, but one time they sent in what they call a honeypot.
>> Yes.
>> Okay, I gotta give you the details.
>> Go ahead.
>> Yes, I gotta give you.
So, they send in a honeypot to kill him, okay?
And it was actually one of his former lovers.
And so, she was supposed to assassinate him.
Castro laid down on the bed and said, did you come here to kill me?
Just like that?
I was standing at the edge of the bed and I said yes, I wanted to see you.
And he said that's good, that's good.
But it continues, Marita Lorenz is her name.
Castro pulled out his 45 and handed it to me,
I flipped the chamber out and hit it back.
He didn't even flinch and he said, you can't kill me, nobody can kill me.
And he kind of smiled and shoot on his cigar and he was so sure of me,
he just grabbed me, we made love, I wanted him to beg me to stay but
he got dressed and left, Jesus [LAUGH] >> Well look I'm not saying that's a man,
okay?
But I'm kinda saying it, okay?
>> That was hot.
>> I mean they see I thought they were cunning, it turns out they ran into
a cunning linguist [LAUGH] >> And my God, we could not confirm nor
deny that because Fidel Castro engaged in mouth love, we don't know.
>> Mouth love would that be?
Anyway, so listen guys, so that's a super badass story.
She apparently had the poison in this jar of cream that she brought.
We don't know how Castro figured out that she had bad intent.
But he was smart enough to figure it out.
But handing his gun to her and say go for it, that is badass and
then she puts it down and they have said come on,
come on man, I don't like communism, I'm against Castro, okay?
But that is one badass story, that story is so good, right?
Wingers might be like communism [LAUGH] thinking about it.
Okay, so now here's some important lessons from this and
some of the ways they tried to kill him was very serious.
Some of them were super goofy.
>> Like a toxic fountain pen they tried to use.
>> Yeah, they tried to poison cigar, they tried everything.
So, but but by the way though, sometimes they would plant bombs where he was going
in other countries, that could have could have killed a lot of people, okay?
And so, there was a Cuban plane that was brought down, it's not clear if
one of the Cuban exiles, who was trying to assassinate him was responsible for that.
Some people went to jail et cetera.
Okay, now first let's acknowledge we're terrorists.
That was the CIA on behalf of the US government,
that was actively doing terror's, okay?
So that's just a fact.
Now, they say, no no no that's just for people that are not us.
Know if you say hey killing people in an extra judicial ways terrorism,
that's exactly what the CIA plans 638 times, okay?
so secondly, now if you say no no, no, it's okay,
he's a world leader, you can do that, really?
Because then under your logic, if you're a right winger saying that,
Putin has every right to murder Zelensky and assassinate him, right?
Well just like here, we didn't like that communists were so
are what we viewed to be our opponents were so close to America and Cuba.
Putin doesn't like his opponents being so close to him in Ukraine.
So, Putin does do assassinations, right?
So assassinations are a bad idea.
You might like it when I don't like the guy, but
you're not gonna like it when it's your guy who's getting assassinated.
And then one more thing, back then there really was a deep state.
Because some of these were not authorized.
So they didn't tell the president, they didn't tell Congress,
they didn't tell anybody.
The CIA would sometimes even work with the mob and oftentimes with Cuban exiles and
they'd be like okay, let's go to the mafia?
Okay, Tony Soprano, can you go kill him or we'll go kill them together.
And did they ask the president, no, the president authorizing it,
that's the deep state it actually existed.
And in one part of the article that I read on this,
they said, they seem to carry more about killing Castro than even protecting their
own president on the day that JFK was killed, they sent yet another assassin.
>> Wow, really?
>> Yeah and so, but to me I was like,
nah I don't think you're getting that quite right.
It's not that they were too busy and that's why they didn't protect Kennedy.
There's a very good possibility that they killed Kennedy because they wouldn't do
the things that they wanted,
including not just assassinating Castro but starting a war with Cuba.
>> Yeah, that's right, that's right.
I gotta admit when you were talking about Putin and all that stuff,
I couldn't pay attention because I was still thinking about that sexy Castro
story that was super hot.
Look, I know this will probably be used against me at some point, but
I can't help myself.
I have to be honest with the audience.
>> You have to.
>> Politics aside completely, okay?
Whatever you think about Castro, the man like the person,
just talking specifically about aesthetics, okay?
Young Castro could get it.
I mean young Castro can get it.
>> And apparently he did.
>> He did it, yes, absolutely.
>> Like a lot of people wanted to play that fiddle,
>> It's like making me uncomfortable,
but that older Castro not into it?
>> Well, I mean [INAUDIBLE] >> Younger Castro into it.
>> The older Castro had to, police that beard and the eyebrows a little bit, okay?
>> But by the way, Castro famously once said,
quote if surviving assassination attempts were an Olympic event,
I would win the gold medal and I would agree with him on that.
>> No, he'd win the entire Olympics, he'd win every event.
The dude survived 638 assassination attempts.
And by the way, look, these are different times, right?
So the deep state's different.
Well pretty much doesn't exist these days back then there was a real deep state and
they did not ask questions of our elected officials, okay?
And you see them doing that dozens of times with Castro
maybe hundreds of times with Castro.
That's outrageous, right?
But at the same time like we're still up to our old stupid tricks, right?
What are we trying to do coups in Bolivia and Honduras for,
>> Venezuela.
>> Venezuela, right?
And we never learn, in the old days when they were competent,
they actually did amazing coups, terrible coups, but like the one in Iran, which
now has had blowback for decade after decade after we ruined their democracy.
They had a democratically elected leader.
But since he actually was protecting his people and
charged our oil companies a tiny bit more money.
We did a coup against him and back then the CIA was really bad but
good at their job and
the way that they orchestrated that could made it seem like it was homegrown.
We now have the documents on it and know how they did it and it was amazing.
Now we got the bumbling, what is the keystone cops?
Right? So when they go to do coups, just so
bad at it.
>> [INAUDIBLE] >> Totally.
And they'll get caught on video shooting from their own side going, my God,
I cannot believe Venezuela's shooting at us.
And I interviewed a CIA agent once and she told me about how no,
they still run honey pots and it was an amazing story.
>> No honeypot, like that's I tink the most effective and smart way of doing it.
>> I mean that's gonna work on a guy like 98% of the time, right?
But anyways, she explained though, No, the number one defining trait
of the CIA these days is bureaucracy and incompetence.
She says when I was at the CIA, she told me that sometimes she would
catch coworkers sleeping under their desks.
>> [LAUGH] My God.
>> Okay, like they just didn't want to work.
They're just like normal government bureaucrats and their.
>> And why under your desk?
Like why?
So people don't see you, you gotta do pull a Dave Koehler and
just sleep in your chair.
>> Yeah, you gotta pull a boss move like pull a Castro but like no,
I'm sleeping right here.
We're gonna do about it, okay?
Here, I'll hand you the pink slip.
No, you're not gonna use it, okay?