0:00

Call the media.

0:05

Yes, I don't know. I mean, I guess

0:07

it depends on what you consider to be

0:09

murder. Like, I don't really think it was

0:11

murder because, you know, I

0:14

was I was pretty wasted. So like, I feel

0:16

like that is a mitigating factor. Oh, my God,

0:18

we're recording. Yeah. Hey,

0:21

sorry. This was a podcast. Well, this was

0:23

not a podcast. I didn't realize we were

0:25

recording. I was just talking to Matt Lieb

0:27

about our weekend on Sesame Street. Yeah.

0:30

Mine was also good on Sesame Street.

0:32

And yes, you're right on Sesame Street.

0:35

Yes. Well, legal analysts are split on

0:37

whether or not the

0:39

Sesame Street weekend we had was

0:41

legal or not. Yeah.

0:43

Yeah. And it's I think what's most important to note

0:46

is that Big Bird is up in a farm in

0:49

the country now and he's doing great. He's

0:51

fine. He's fine. Good. Now,

0:53

he should look into like the

0:56

will that that is totally legitimate that will be

0:58

found in this house anyway. Matt,

1:01

we're still in our Burton Ernie bed

1:03

reading her bedtime story. A two hour

1:05

bedtime story. Yeah. Two hour lovely story.

1:08

What? Wait, I have an

1:10

important question. And I feel like

1:12

Matt would give a fantastic answer to this

1:15

question. Which fictional TV character would

1:17

you let defend you in court? Oh,

1:20

God. I mean, the obvious one is

1:22

Fogg Horn, like Horn, because he already

1:24

sounds like a rooster lawyer. Sure.

1:28

But if I had to go, does

1:30

it have to be a cartoon? No, no,

1:32

no, no, no. I think I think I think it's

1:34

just fictional. So just I know who I'm picking. So

1:36

it could be, you know, from from

1:39

other shows that I mean, you

1:41

could pod yourself the gun or pod yourself

1:44

the wire. Where where where? Yeah,

1:46

I think I already chose Fogg Horn, Lake

1:48

Horn. But if I had to choose someone

1:50

from, you know, a live action television show,

1:54

I don't know, I feel like fucking

1:57

I think the good doctor would be pretty good at it. Okay,

2:00

okay. See me, I'm

2:03

picking my cousin Vinny. Sure.

2:05

Largely because I would like to meet

2:08

Marissa Tomei. Oh yeah, that would be

2:10

sick. I'd be like put me in

2:12

jail, I don't give a shit. He will get me out of

2:15

this murder rap that I

2:17

shouldn't catch for whatever happened to Big Bird,

2:19

which I'm not responsible for. Doesn't matter what

2:21

happened to Big Bird. The point is, we're

2:23

going to be fine. We're going

2:26

to be fine. Big Bird is still

2:28

alive. I do kind of

2:30

want to see. This

2:32

is adjacent to Sesame Street. But I do

2:34

feel like right after my cousin Vinny, they

2:37

could have done a sequel, but where the

2:39

rest of the cast are Muppets. That

2:42

would have been a great movie. They could

2:44

have done that for a lot of things.

2:46

I feel like the original could have had

2:48

Muppets in it and it worked out pretty

2:50

well. There's not really many movies out there

2:52

that couldn't also work being a combination live

2:55

action Muppet movie. Godfather.

2:59

The pianist. Sure. Oh yeah,

3:01

definitely the pianist. Captain Corelli's Mandolin for

3:03

sure. I mean, it

3:05

just works. So

3:08

that's the cold open, everybody. We're going to talk

3:10

more about Avery Brundage when we

3:12

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we're back. So if

5:58

Pierre de Coubertin was the Jesus Christ

6:00

of the Olympics and kind of

6:02

was Henri de Ballet-Lettour was the

6:04

Apostle Paul. We mentioned him in

6:06

the last episode. This is kind

6:08

of the guy, Cubertin, when

6:10

he gets too old Henri is the dude

6:12

who kind of follows him as the king

6:15

of the Olympics, you might say. That's not

6:17

what they call it, but that's what I'm

6:20

going to call it because Henri de Ballet-Lettour

6:22

was a Belgian aristocrat. His father was a

6:24

Count and former governor of Antwerp, which of

6:26

all the parts of Belgium is certainly one

6:28

of them. He had been elected

6:31

de Cubertin's successor as president of the Olympics in 1925

6:33

and as the 1930s

6:35

dawned his primary claim to fame was that in 1928 he

6:37

had tried to ban women from

6:40

the Olympics. Hell yeah. That's Ballet-Lettour.

6:47

Things are too easy for broads in 1928. No,

6:49

this is going to be men only from

6:51

1928 onward, all dudes. I

6:55

just want to see men in tight

6:57

spandex dancing, dancing. I would like

7:00

to see a man do what Simone Biles

7:02

does. Yeah, listen. You can't. You

7:05

literally can't because she is one of one. Thank

7:07

you so much. Okay, but if I

7:10

try hard enough, I could probably

7:12

do those flips. Yes.

7:14

That is what I saw the first time I

7:16

met you is you have a real Simone Biles

7:18

energy to the microphone. Absolutely. I'm limber and I'm

7:20

fun. That's right. That's right. And

7:25

much too tall. You know

7:27

who's not limber or fun was Henri

7:29

de Ballet-Lettour. Cool. Yeah.

7:32

Now, I learned he was a piece of

7:34

shit from the book Berlin Games by Guy

7:36

Walters. But whenever I learned some very prominent

7:38

and respected guy was actually a scumbag, I

7:40

like to take a glance at their wiki

7:42

just to see if they're like any

7:45

funny examples of editors they are trying

7:47

to diplomatically describe how much a dude

7:49

sucks, presumably while battling the horde of

7:51

bots that today's International Olympic Committee commands

7:53

to whitewash their history. And sure enough,

7:56

when I went to Henri's Wiki, I

7:58

found this. As IOC

8:00

president, he focused on preserving the

8:02

traditional ideals and integrity of the

8:04

Olympics and supporting amateur sport globally

8:07

during a time of increasing political

8:09

and commercial pressures. Despite

8:11

his antipathy towards Jews, it is

8:13

designed to exclude women from participating

8:15

in the Olympics. Oh boy. Feels

8:19

like a buried lead there. Is

8:22

that not the name of

8:24

the subsection? Antipathy,

8:26

huh? Yeah.

8:30

Well, this does give me an opportunity to

8:32

use my Netanyahu sound board that I just

8:35

invented. You're good. All right.

8:37

There we go. And here's another

8:39

one. Crazy Jews. Crazy Jews. That's

8:41

going to be popular. So,

8:44

since Belay Latour was a raging anti-Semite, that's

8:46

what, I mean, I think we could all

8:48

do that in our heads. You hear someone

8:50

described as having antipathy towards Jews. That's the

8:52

most racist man you've ever heard of. Although

8:55

not in this case because Hitler is also a part

8:57

of our story. Yeah, he's around at the same time.

9:02

Because Belay Latour, he is going to

9:04

push back on some of Hitler's discrimination

9:06

against Jewish athletes. He gets more credit

9:08

than he deserves because he is at

9:10

no point is he doing it because

9:12

it's really wrong. He's doing it because,

9:14

like, well, I know I should do

9:16

this because the Olympics is supposed to

9:18

be for everyone. And I kind of

9:20

hate these people, but all like, I

9:22

have to demand they at least pretend

9:24

not to be racist, the Nazis, against

9:26

these people that I also hate. Yeah,

9:28

yes. We have to put on a good face. You know, it's like

9:30

you need to wear a mask if you're going to

9:33

hate Jews. Come on, Hitler. Right, right. And

9:35

the problem for Belay Latour, who's again,

9:37

he's president of the IOC, which is

9:39

the International Committee. Avery Brundage

9:41

is for most his period, he's president and then

9:43

like a leading official in the

9:46

AOC, which is the American Olympic

9:48

Committee, right? And so Brundage is

9:50

like a local Olympic leader and

9:52

Belay Latour is running the whole

9:54

shebang. Right. And so Belay Latour,

9:56

Brundage desperately wants to be on

9:59

the IOC. and he is eventually going

10:01

to get on it, and later will be president of the

10:03

IOC. And he's looking, he has to make

10:05

Ballet Latour happy in

10:08

order to be able to make that jump, right? So

10:10

this is like, from a career point of view, what's

10:12

going on here. And the problem

10:14

for both Ballet Latour and Brundage is

10:16

that as soon as the Nazis get

10:19

into power, they start banning Jewish athletes

10:21

from joining sporting organizations, from using the

10:23

same sporting facilities as Aryan athletes. And

10:26

this, they don't like directly say Jews can't be

10:29

in the Olympics, but because they have made it

10:31

impossible for Jewish people to be a part

10:33

of any of the things that funnel people into

10:35

the Olympics, right? So it's a de facto ban,

10:37

right? I think there is eventually like

10:40

a straight up ban, but it starts as just sort

10:42

of like, well, we have now made it impossible for this to

10:44

happen, right? Avery Brundage, again, also

10:46

sees this as a problem, but he's also

10:48

very racist. So they're both in this position

10:50

of like, well, we have this kind of

10:53

messianic belief in the Olympics and everyone should

10:55

be capable of being in the Olympics. So

10:57

we don't like that you've made this impossible,

10:59

but we also basically agree with

11:02

why you hate the Jews. We

11:06

do think they run an international conspiracy.

11:08

We're very racist. Listen, listen,

11:10

I get where you're coming from with

11:12

the whole Jews thing, but I'm just

11:15

saying, you know, I'm

11:18

trying to square that with letting everyone

11:20

compete in sport and it's a tricky

11:22

one. It's hard. It's

11:25

such an interesting, because there's a lot of

11:27

these kinds of, you even run, when you

11:29

read through like wartime memoirs of like Americans,

11:31

there's a lot of like, like patent, pretty

11:34

racist against Jewish people. And

11:37

then like the Holocaust becomes clear. And there

11:39

are a number of folks who were like,

11:41

oh, I guess I'm not that kind of

11:43

racist. I learned something about me through this

11:45

whole experience. And isn't that what war is

11:47

all about? Right. Learning that

11:49

you're not as bad as others. Yeah.

11:54

So the Nazis being Nazis spark anger

11:56

across the rest of the world with

11:58

a chaotic series of aggressive. of Olympic

12:00

related spasms pretty much

12:03

as soon as they're in charge. Now, this goes in

12:05

a number of different directions. First off, they're just kind

12:07

of like, we don't even want to host the games.

12:09

If you guys are going to be dicks about this

12:11

whole us oppressing Jewish people thing. And then they're like,

12:13

yeah. If you guys are going

12:15

to be rude about our belief system about

12:17

how Jews are vermin, then I don't even

12:19

think we want to do this shit. Yeah.

12:23

The other thing they do, so the guy

12:25

who's the president of the German Olympic committee,

12:27

so he's like the German Avery Brundage, is

12:30

a guy named Theodor Leveld, and

12:32

he's like half Jewish. Right? And

12:34

so they try to fire him and the IOC

12:37

is like, well, you can't, right? Like then we

12:39

definitely will. And so like he's going to be,

12:41

Leveld is like in such an awkward position where

12:43

he is part Jewish. He is

12:45

actively been discriminated on in this entire

12:48

pre and during the Olympics period. He

12:50

is also the head of the German

12:52

Olympic committee still. And

12:54

it's one of those, like, I definitely know

12:56

there are definitely people at the time, like

12:58

Jewish refugees and stuff who attacked

13:01

him for being a traitor. I

13:03

also like, well, I don't know, man,

13:05

what happens to your family if you are that publicly?

13:09

Like that, I'm not going to, I don't have it

13:11

in me to judge people in

13:13

that situation. Yeah. It's a

13:15

bit tricky if you're

13:18

a German Jew at this time. You're like,

13:20

maybe we can like reason

13:23

with him. Yeah. Yeah.

13:26

It's yeah. I just don't have it in me

13:28

to come down on the guy, but it's important to understand that context

13:30

and understand that there are a lot of people who consider him a

13:32

traitor. Right? Right. The

13:35

Nazis banned Jewish athletes from competing, from using public

13:37

training facilities and from holding membership in any of

13:39

the sporting organizations that funnel competitors up to the

13:41

Olympics. This sparks outrage in the

13:43

United States and the US. We're

13:45

really interested in, it's interesting in this period

13:47

because we are as racist as we

13:50

have ever been in the 1930s. But

13:53

anytime somebody comes straight out

13:55

and makes their politics at

13:57

a national level, you can get away with that at a local

13:59

level in the South. especially, but if you

14:01

come out at a national level and

14:03

you make your politics be about racial

14:05

exclusion, Americans don't generally like that, right?

14:07

But I think in large part, not

14:09

because we're any less racist than anyone

14:12

else, but because it conflicts with the

14:14

idea Americans have of themselves and that

14:16

offends them, right? Of one day not

14:18

being racist or the idea that like,

14:20

no, we're not actually racist, because on

14:23

a national level, we're really, really polite

14:25

about segregation. As we're going to

14:27

get into, one of the awkward things about this is

14:29

that a lot of some of the people who reject

14:31

the boycott campaign in the US are

14:34

black American athletes and they have a really good

14:36

point, right? Because they're like, well, but we have

14:38

like a lot of the same laws. Like I

14:40

can't play in most of the same facilities that

14:42

like the people running the Olympics play in. Right.

14:46

Like, so why am I pissed about Germany

14:48

in particular, right? Yeah. And it's like,

14:50

well, yeah, I mean, from the position of like,

14:52

yeah, you're a black boxer in like 1935 or whatever. I

14:56

understand that argument. I certainly can't, it's kind

14:58

of like you get with them black strikebreakers during

15:00

like the coal wars where it's like, well, they

15:02

wouldn't let you be part of the union. Like,

15:05

what are you supposed to do? Right. Like

15:07

you got a family to feed. Yeah.

15:09

Yeah. Yeah. I guess in this

15:12

case, you're legally not allowed to feed your family by being good at

15:14

sports. So there is that difference. So

15:17

there's a boycott campaign that starts to consolidate

15:19

around the 1936 games as Carolyn Marvin

15:22

lies out, lays out in an article for the

15:24

Journal of American Studies telegrams,

15:26

phone calls and letters demanding an official

15:28

American reaction. Besieged Brundage is the president

15:30

of the AOC and he released a

15:32

statement giving his personal but unofficial opinion

15:34

that the IOC would not permit the

15:36

games to be held wherever there might

15:38

be interference with the fundamental Olympic theory

15:41

of equality of all races to Brundage's

15:43

irritation. This was reported as an official

15:45

challenge to German Olympic committee policy. He

15:48

had only meant to reassure the American

15:50

public upon whose Goodwill Olympic activities depended.

15:53

He explained in a letter to the nervous Dr. Leewold

15:55

facing problems of his own and fearing the defection

15:57

of the large and prestigious American team. So,

16:00

he talks when he really shouldn't have,

16:03

and it causes problems for leveled over

16:05

in Germany and, you know, leveled again

16:07

in a very tough position. Now,

16:10

back in 1930, before the Nazis were in

16:12

charge, the American Olympic Committee had sent a

16:15

guy named Gustavus Kirby to observe construction efforts

16:17

for the stadium to make sure that the

16:19

plans for the 36 Olympics

16:21

were going according to like plan.

16:24

And he was the first guy that Ballet

16:26

Lettour had Brundage trot out to fight back

16:28

against fears that the Nazis might have plans

16:30

to do some like racial violence

16:33

and thus weren't fitting Olympic hosts.

16:35

They were also worried like, are they going to start another

16:37

war, right? Is there going to be a big European war?

16:40

And so his job, by way of defending

16:42

the Olympics, Kirby has to like argue that

16:44

Germany is never going to do another war.

16:48

And here's what Kirby writes, the German

16:50

psychology is not that of deception. The

16:52

world war was not only in their

16:55

hearts, but also on their lips before

16:57

it was precipitated and that if the

16:59

rest of the world were blind, it

17:01

certainly was not because Germany had for

17:03

years been boasting. And therefore, if the present

17:05

activity were being directed toward a war like

17:07

end, we would certainly hear of it and

17:09

know of it. Yeah, I think we know

17:11

of Germany as some sort of ambitions

17:14

towards a war. Yeah.

17:17

Oh God, that's funny. Talk about whippin' it.

17:19

Yeah. Ooh. Oh,

17:22

beautiful stuff. So somehow this failed

17:24

to reassure anybody. Belay Latour, president

17:26

of the Olympics, got involved and

17:28

he wrote Avery Brundage a letter

17:30

saying, I am not personally

17:32

fond of Jews and of the Jewish

17:34

influence, but I will not have them

17:36

molested in no way whatsoever. Oh God.

17:39

Cool. I love the

17:41

middle ground of this where they're just like, listen,

17:44

I'm no fan of the international

17:46

Jew. Yeah. Right?

17:49

I think we can all agree with that. Of

17:51

course, the Nazis are right about everything except their

17:53

laws. Yeah, except the whole part where they're molesting

17:55

them. All right. Let's not

17:58

molest. It's so funny. I

18:01

mean, it's not like this is one of the worst things

18:03

that ever happens in history. And it

18:05

keeps being repeated in various forms down through the

18:07

ages. But it's very funny whenever

18:09

you read how people like talked

18:11

about this, like the attempts

18:13

to like, we would know if the Germans

18:15

wanted war. It's

18:17

like that Simpsons line, no one who's German could

18:20

be a bad man. So

18:26

Belay Latour urges Brundage to find a

18:29

way to apply pressure to the Germans,

18:31

while also acknowledging that the Jews quote,

18:33

shout before there is reason to do

18:35

so. The

18:40

good part and then just like, and I

18:42

acknowledge again that the Jew cries out

18:44

in pain before he strikes you. I

18:47

acknowledge this. Yeah. Yeah.

18:50

We've got to put pressure on the Nazis, but

18:52

also I'm really bad. Like, let me be clear

18:54

about this. I suck so hard. No, I'm just

18:56

as evil as you guys. Don't get me wrong.

18:58

You know, white power. I just don't want to

19:00

do anything about it. I just want to get

19:02

angry on Reddit about it. You know, that's me.

19:06

I got like 1488, my fucking Twitter

19:08

handle and everything. So

19:11

both Brundage and Belay Latour did strongly

19:13

disagree with the fact that the Nazis

19:15

had banned Jews from qualifying to compete

19:17

in the Olympics. And again, this isn't

19:19

because of any particular respect for human

19:21

rights, but more because of their religious

19:23

faith in the Olympics as a concept.

19:25

Right. The only people you

19:28

can exclude are professional athletes because they're fundamentally

19:30

bad people for making marks. Exactly.

19:32

They're destroying sport by feeding their

19:34

families with it. It is a

19:37

fascinating set of moral lines these

19:39

people try. So

19:42

the American Olympic Committee voted to

19:44

boycott the games of Germany didn't

19:46

reverse course and Brundage supported the

19:48

resolution initially. And it passes easily

19:50

because again, Americans don't like being

19:52

seen as racist. Right. Had

19:55

the story ended there, Brundage probably would never have made

19:57

behind the bastards. He would have been yet another guy

19:59

in the 20s, we had some shitty opinions, but

20:01

ultimately did the right thing, right? Supporting the

20:03

boycott, I would argue, was the right thing

20:05

to do. Sure, yeah. But the

20:07

IOC was very unhappy with this situation because

20:10

every person in the IOC is a wealthy

20:12

aristocrat or at least rich in the case

20:14

of the Americans, and they all thought the

20:17

Nazis were actually pretty cool. They're

20:19

all like, no, I think they're onto something,

20:21

right? There's one

20:23

guy who doesn't suck in the

20:25

fancy boys Olympic club, and it's

20:27

a Commodore Ernest Yankee, like

20:30

JHNCKE, who is the

20:33

former assistant secretary of the Navy. So there's

20:35

another guy, a general, General Sherrill, who's on

20:37

the Olympic committee, who does suck and is

20:39

basically a Nazi. But Commodore Jahnke is like,

20:41

and I'm not saying he's like woke

20:44

by whatever standards people use today, but

20:46

he's like, the Nazis are bad and

20:48

we shouldn't humor Hitler with an Olympics,

20:51

right? Like he wants this and we

20:53

shouldn't give Hitler the things that he

20:55

wants, right? Love it. Yeah.

20:58

So the Nazis want him out as a result of this.

21:00

Now they will eventually force him out. They can't do it

21:02

right away. There's like, you got to have, you got

21:04

to basically have a whole vote. He's got to do like some Emperor

21:07

Palpatine, Star Wars prequels, politics shit

21:09

to make this happen, right? Right,

21:12

right. Ballet Latour is going to be a big part of that. So

21:14

while they're waiting to be able to force

21:16

him out, Ballet Latour promises Brundage, hey,

21:19

this guy, he's either going to resign or one of

21:21

these day, one way or another, he will be out

21:23

in the near future. And if

21:26

you fix this boycott situation, his

21:28

seat will go to you, right? And that's

21:30

the thing Avery Brundage is always wanted to know. That's

21:33

all he wants, advancement. That's what

21:35

he craves. Yes. And

21:38

we all crave advancement. And really the only

21:40

way to advance is

21:42

to buy the products sponsored on the show.

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21:56

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22:01

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22:03

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22:06

just think that would be kind of funny. That

22:08

would be sick. That would be dope. I do

22:10

kind of feel- North Korea marching through the streets

22:12

of Ida Bell. Let's do it guys. I

22:14

do kind of feel like they're gonna run

22:16

actual Olympic ads on our shows during the

22:18

games. I do kind of feel like NBC

22:20

or whoever the fuck owns the streaming rights.

22:23

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25:59

so we're back. So I want

26:01

to read a quote from Guy Walters

26:03

describing kind of the conundrum that Avery

26:06

Brundage is faced with. Well, Brundage knew

26:08

that if he wanted to succeed him,

26:10

Jonky, he would have to do exactly

26:12

as the president and the vice president

26:14

wished. With the two men looking benevolently

26:16

on Germany, Brundage decided that he would

26:18

change his opinion to coincide with theirs.

26:20

It was nothing more than toadying. From

26:22

this moment on, Brundage would do everything

26:24

in his power to ensure that his

26:26

masters were satisfied, and the best way

26:28

he could do that was to

26:30

ensure American participation at Berlin. Had

26:33

Brundage not been so personally ambitious, then

26:36

a boycott would have been, if not inevitable,

26:38

certainly more likely. Nevertheless, the road to Berlin

26:40

was long and it was to be heavy

26:42

going. Brundage's first task was

26:45

to go to Germany at the behest of

26:47

the American Olympic Association, a decision that had

26:49

been taken in February. So

26:52

he's going to go to Germany and he's

26:55

going to be assured that ... He's going to

26:57

take a little tour. Yeah. It's

26:59

all good. Everything in Germany is all

27:01

good. Everyone is chill and

27:04

don't worry about any future wars.

27:06

That's just Jewish propaganda. Right, right.

27:09

Our streets are filled with marching

27:11

soldiers. Don't worry about it. No,

27:13

they're just ... We just like

27:15

doing fucking heel to toe walking.

27:18

Okay? We like uniforms. Who

27:20

doesn't? We're race walking. We're

27:22

race walking just like you. Different

27:24

kind of race walking. It's

27:26

a master race walking, but it's still ...

27:29

We're into it. We're just like you, bro.

27:32

We're just like you guys. It

27:34

was obvious from the jump that Brundage would

27:36

approve entirely of the German efforts. Before he

27:38

left, he wrote this in an article for

27:40

Olympic News. The German committee is

27:42

making every effort to provide the finest facilities

27:45

and plans to reproduce the Los Angeles Olympic

27:47

Village. We should see in the youth of

27:49

Berlin the forebears of a race of free,

27:51

independent thinkers, accustomed to the democracy of

27:54

sport, a race disdainful of sharp practice,

27:56

tolerant of the rights of others, and

27:58

practicing the golden rule. because it believes

28:00

in it. Yes. That's

28:03

how it would describe 1936 Germans. Tolerance

28:06

of the rights of others. That

28:09

sounds like the Germany I know and have

28:11

read about in history books. People

28:14

can't stop talking about how much they love

28:16

an independent Poland. It's the only thing on

28:18

their lips. It's all, you

28:20

can't walk down their fucking street without someone

28:22

to be like, you know Polish independence is

28:24

great. Great, such a fan of

28:26

their being, because there was one less flag

28:29

in Europe before Polish independence and I like it.

28:31

I like it. It's good to have another one. That's

28:33

nice. If there's one thing we can all

28:35

agree on here in Germany, is that we

28:37

have enough space for everyone. Yeah. So

28:42

I'm gonna give as

28:44

much detail as I have on the trip Avery

28:46

took, but I wanna actually first read you a

28:48

summary of the whole trip by Oliver Hilmes in

28:50

his book, Berlin, 1936, which

28:53

I like less than Guy's book, but I

28:55

appreciated this passage. Brundage stayed in

28:57

the capital of the Third Reich for six

28:59

days, inspecting construction on the Olympic stadium and

29:01

other facilities, visiting a number of museums and

29:04

generally enjoying life. He had little time left

29:06

over for meeting representatives of Jewish athletics. When

29:08

they told him that Jews were no longer

29:10

allowed to join German sports clubs, he replied,

29:13

in my club in Chicago, Jews are not

29:15

permitted either. Sick. Great.

29:19

Great. Cool. I

29:22

mean, that's not a bad point

29:24

vis-a-vis the United States. Sure. I'm

29:26

not gonna say on this, but it's a bad point for you to

29:28

make. Yeah, yeah. It's like,

29:31

hey, you know, listen, we also

29:33

don't allow Jews here, so do

29:35

what you need to do. Who am I? I'm racist

29:38

as hell. So who's to say the Nazis are bad?

29:40

Yeah, who am I to try to change any of

29:42

this shit? So

29:44

now I'm gonna give you the full story of his

29:46

visit to Germany. I just really found that paragraph funny.

29:50

On his way to Germany, before he actually

29:52

gets there for the trip, Brundage stops at

29:54

Stockholm for a meeting of some international athletic

29:56

federation or another. They held a party at

29:58

a villa and he... He eats a guy

30:01

named Carl Diem there, who's a, he's tight with

30:03

a lot of major German sporting officials. He's

30:05

a big wig in German sporting. Diem

30:08

invites him to lunch the next

30:10

day while with Lewald, that half

30:12

Jewish German sporting official, and Justice

30:14

W. Meyerhoff, a Jewish member of

30:16

Berlin's sports club. Meyerhoff

30:19

had obviously faced repression at home, being a

30:21

German Jewish athlete. He had been forced out

30:23

of athletics like every other Jewish person in

30:25

Germany. But when the boycott threats cropped up,

30:27

the Nazis had said, hey, go put on

30:29

a show for this American or else. So

30:32

he goes to lunch with Lewald and he

30:34

tells Brundage, oh man, the Nazis, those guys

30:36

are great. You know, I tried

30:38

to resign from my sports club. Who didn't even

30:40

let me? Wouldn't take my resignation. I was so

30:43

proud of them. Great dudes. Yeah. All

30:46

those guys? Oh, the people in the brown

30:48

shirts? You know, they're cool. They're cool

30:51

as hell. Yeah. Yeah.

30:54

Well, we're all friends. Black guy? I

30:57

got it from, we hugged too hard.

30:59

No, you know, I'm a runner. So like, I

31:01

felt like fingernails were slowing me down. I just

31:03

took them all off myself, you know? Just

31:08

try and get more aerodynamic. That's

31:12

why I lost all this weight. Yeah. I'm

31:16

just trying to make way for the Olympic level wrestling.

31:21

DM later wrote of the meeting. Brundage

31:23

was visibly impressed. Avery

31:25

is wind and dined in Stockholm by German

31:28

officials who praise him as an athlete, a

31:30

businessman, and a potential friend to the German

31:32

people. When he arrived in East Prussia

31:34

on September 12th, one day short of a 9-11, he

31:36

was ready to believe

31:38

whatever the Nazis told him. Or

31:40

one day long of a 9-11. Sure. I

31:43

messed up my 9-11 joke, but I was got

31:45

to make one. Anyway, I'm going to quote from

31:47

Walters again. He met Jewish sports leaders who, under

31:49

the watchful eyes of Nazi handlers, assured Brundage that

31:52

conditions were not as the foreign newspapers were suggesting.

31:54

Brundage was further handicapped by his inability

31:56

to speak German. So any inferences that

31:59

the Jewish sportsmen may have, may have made,

32:01

would have been blocked out by the Nazis interpreters.

32:04

Brundage also met his old friend von Halt

32:06

who assured him that there were no obstacles

32:08

to Jews making the Olympic team, a pledge

32:10

echoed by von Schamer und Austin, with whom

32:12

the American got on well. By the end

32:14

of the week, Brundage not only felt content

32:16

that the Jews were getting a fair deal,

32:18

but he was also dazzled by the seeming

32:20

prosperity and order of the new Germany. America

32:22

could learn much from Germany, he was to

32:25

say in a speech 18 months later. She

32:27

is efficient and hardworking and has spirit. God,

32:31

it's so easy for this fool to be

32:33

like, just, well, I'm convinced. Well,

32:35

yeah, that's all I needed to say was a nice

32:37

match. They said the words

32:39

that I came here desperately wanting to hear so

32:41

that we could continue with the Olympics. They told

32:43

me what I wanted to hear and I didn't

32:46

ask another question. Yeah, God.

32:48

So like most prominent

32:50

people, after Avery died, his like, people

32:52

had papers back then, right? And

32:55

his papers get donated to a museum. And as

32:57

a result, we have the notes that he took

32:59

while writing out, because when he gets back to

33:01

the US, he gives a speech about his trip

33:03

to Germany, right? To the American Olympic committee. And

33:06

the notes that he had while writing that

33:08

speech include three bullet points that he took

33:10

during his meeting with Hitler. So while Brundage

33:12

is like sitting down meeting Hitler, these are

33:14

his notes. One,

33:17

a God. Two, given back

33:19

self-respect. Three, a man of

33:21

the people. His

33:26

first bullet point is a God.

33:29

Yes. Oh

33:31

my God. Bullet point four, hottest

33:33

fuck. Bullet point five, dreamy

33:36

eyes. That is, we're

33:38

going to like, some of, because other

33:40

Olympic officials go and meet with Hitler. Some of

33:42

them are literally like, man, but you

33:44

know what? The photographers never get across is how good

33:46

this guy looks. Hey, why

33:49

did you draw a picture

33:51

of Hitler naked in the margins of the

33:53

notes here? Avery, this speech

33:56

is just a drawing that you label

33:58

as what I assume Hitler's penis. looks

34:00

like. Are you

34:02

doing okay? Yeah. So did it

34:04

go well? Yeah. I

34:07

mean, it is. We do get like it's

34:09

funny that the pubic hair is shaved like

34:11

the mustache. We get it. We get the

34:13

bit, but it's not a speech really. It's

34:16

a lot of detail on the vein here.

34:18

Yeah. So it becomes clear at this point

34:20

that Avery Brundage was not just an Olympics

34:22

obsessive who got tricked by the Nazis or

34:25

even caved to them because he wanted a

34:27

job. He was himself a howling and fascist.

34:29

Right. And so once

34:31

he returned, he gives this big speech to

34:33

the American Olympic committee and in it, he,

34:36

he complains that before Hitler, Germany had suffered

34:38

from debt, uh, undernourished youth,

34:41

feverish, gayity and nightlife

34:43

until the hardest young

34:45

men by which he did

34:48

not mean to imply gayity, but rather the

34:50

Brown shirts rose up to fight back. That's

34:52

right. Of Hitler's things

34:54

are just too gay here. It was

34:56

too gay in Berlin. Stop it with

34:58

violence. That is what he's literally saying. I

35:00

mean, that was, that was a very popular conservative talking

35:02

point of the day. And today of the

35:05

Hitler's thugs, uh, who were then

35:07

murdering gay people, communists, activists, Jews

35:09

in the street, Avery wrote

35:12

that they were quote, apparently doing useful

35:14

work. I love that he's like, look,

35:16

maybe I'm wrong, but like, it seems

35:18

good. It seems fine. Yeah. Dirty job,

35:20

but someone literally has to do it.

35:22

Yeah. And he's like, you know, obviously the Jews

35:24

should be able to compete, but you know, they're

35:27

leaders in communism. So it's, it's understandable that the

35:29

Germans would need to get a handle on them.

35:31

Right. That's right. Avery also noted

35:33

that the Germans had promised that no

35:35

Jews would be prohibited from competing in

35:37

any way. So there really was no

35:39

need for a boycott. Quote, I

35:42

was given positive assurance in writing that there

35:44

will be no discrimination against Jews. You can't

35:46

ask for more than that. And I think

35:48

the guarantee will be fulfilled. Wait,

35:52

he wrote down, you can't ask for more

35:54

than that. Hitler said they weren't going to

35:58

do anything bad. Yeah. Could

36:00

you ask for it trusted? Yeah, he wrote

36:02

it down on a piece of paper I

36:04

mean who the fuck would go against something

36:06

they wrote on paper, bro It

36:08

is like well not in

36:10

Avery's defense But it's wild that basically every

36:12

man who is of his socioeconomic Level

36:15

anywhere in power in the West during this period

36:17

is doing the same thing as being like well

36:19

Hitler said he's not a bad guy Who are

36:22

we to argue? Oh man?

36:24

It is it really does go to show that

36:27

like people Really

36:30

are willing to believe Whatever

36:32

someone in a nice suit tells them

36:34

and is written down on some nice

36:36

glossy paper like you know I think

36:38

the key corollary to that is if

36:40

that makes their lives easier right of

36:42

his life is made hard by challenging

36:44

Hitler So he won't challenge Hitler so

36:46

he needs to believe that Hitler's dope

36:48

right yeah But it's

36:50

everyone else so does everyone else who's

36:52

believing him You know is it there's

36:54

like enough people out there who are

36:56

just there they want to

36:59

believe That everything's gonna be

37:01

okay for whatever reason whether it's because they

37:03

want to compete in the Olympics human desire

37:05

right But it's like just this general idea

37:07

of like you know the problem is that

37:11

These oppressed people complain too much is

37:13

kind of the through line with all

37:15

these yeah these people look Yeah, these

37:17

people are getting invaded or whatever But

37:19

like if we stand up to fucking

37:21

Russia to the United States to whoever's

37:23

doing the invasion in this situation That

37:25

makes my life hard, so I'm just

37:27

not gonna right yeah There's no incentive

37:30

for me to not believe this

37:32

blatant lie Yeah, George W.

37:34

Bush seems problematic, but like at the end of

37:36

the day like I got I got I got

37:38

a mortgage You know yeah like Yeah,

37:42

it's it's great anyway. That's how

37:45

humans Apparently are Crux

37:48

of his argument in favor of Germany

37:50

actually rested on a quite cunning stance

37:52

Which is that he had succeeded in

37:54

getting the Nazis to promise to let

37:56

Jews participate in the games this

37:58

he told the American Olympic Committee was

38:00

all the Olympics could do since they

38:02

were fundamentally in a political organization. Every

38:05

person deserved the chance to compete and the

38:07

Olympics had a responsibility to ensure that, but

38:10

it would not be reasonable for the event

38:12

to take any stance on Germany's internal political

38:14

system. This argument works and

38:16

you can see again how that's a

38:18

comforting argument to make, right? We

38:21

simply can't care about much beyond this, right?

38:23

Yeah. We're apolitical. We have

38:25

to be apolitical. Yeah. The

38:27

AOC has another vote and they reversed their position.

38:30

Belay Latour gives Brundage a pat on the

38:32

back and assured him that the job was

38:34

his, but their problems persisted because after the

38:36

AOC's vote came a steady drumbeat of stories

38:39

of Jews being murdered or beaten and forced

38:41

from public life. Many people wondered

38:43

if Avery might be full of shit. One

38:46

of them was his successor at the Amateur

38:48

Athletic Association, which Brundage had controlled as president

38:50

into leaving that year to run the AOC.

38:53

This guy was a judge, Jeremiah Mahoney,

38:56

and he publicly accused Brundage of having

38:58

been whined and dined by Hitler and

39:00

claimed that behind the scenes he'd sought

39:02

to intimidate anyone who didn't trust the

39:04

Nazis. And Mahoney

39:06

is a pretty cool guy in this, although he

39:08

is also going to wind up in a really

39:11

awkward situation. But for the next year, Mahoney is

39:13

going to be one of the leading figures in

39:15

the effort to force a US boycott of the

39:17

Olympics. A vote is set for December

39:19

1935 and that August, 20,000

39:22

people show up for an anti-fascist rally

39:24

at Madison Square Garden. That

39:26

same month, August of 35, the IOC

39:28

tried to deflect criticism by sending another

39:31

delegation to Berlin. So they're like,

39:33

well sending Brundage didn't work because they're just like, well,

39:35

he seems to really like Hitler. So what's in

39:37

the guy who likes Hitler? He keeps writing swastikas

39:39

on all of the official note paper here. He's

39:42

growing a mustache and I don't like where it's going.

39:44

Yeah, people aren't starting to believe

39:47

he may not be an impartial

39:49

third party observer here. So

39:51

in order to deal with the fact that

39:53

people didn't trust Brundage, they decide to send

39:55

a guy who's even more of a Nazi,

39:57

General Charles Sherrill. Chucky,

40:00

Chucky S. is one of the three

40:02

Americans on the IOC board, and he

40:04

has the distinction of maybe being the

40:06

shittiest person in an organization that hired

40:08

entirely based on how much you sucked.

40:11

In Berlin 1936, Oliver Hilmes

40:13

writes of him, quote, his main

40:15

qualification for this task was something

40:17

completely different, a conspicuous personal fascination

40:20

with Adolf Hitler. As long ago

40:22

as June 1933, in a letter

40:24

to the New York Times, Sheryl

40:26

had praised the newly elected German

40:28

Chancellor as the strongest man in

40:30

Europe. On 24th of August 1935, when

40:33

Sheryl was received by Hitler for an hour

40:35

long conversation, it was a dream come true.

40:37

The retired army general seemed to feel as

40:39

if he'd been called to something higher. Perhaps

40:42

he saw himself as the new US ambassador in

40:44

Berlin. In any case, he wrote up a report

40:46

on his meeting with Hitler and sent it to

40:48

none other than Franklin D. Roosevelt. Sheryl

40:50

raved about Hitler's personal modesty,

40:52

his impressive physical condition, and

40:55

his upstanding character. From the

40:57

fluttery of the bullet points on that one. Yeah.

41:00

God. If you're just like, some guy

41:03

just sent me Hitler smut, so I don't know.

41:05

He drew him as pregnant for some reason, not

41:07

really sure what to do with this. I think

41:09

this is just fan fiction at this point. Yeah.

41:12

And thus was created deviant art. I'm

41:15

going to continue that quote from Hilmes.

41:17

Please. In his conversation with

41:19

Sheryl, Hitler made no concessions. Jews were

41:21

not being discriminated against. He lied. They

41:23

were merely being treated as separate from the German

41:26

people and thus could not be members of the

41:28

German Olympic team. Sheryl pressed the

41:30

Fuhrer on the issue. He was Germany's friend, he

41:32

said, and wanted only the best for the country.

41:34

But if the Fuhrer insisted on this position, the

41:37

IOC would take the games away from Berlin. Hitler

41:39

snarled that in that case, the Third Reich would

41:41

stage a purely German Olympic games. Now-

41:45

Yeah. Yeah.

41:48

He was lying about this. In the early

41:50

days of the Third Reich, his hold on

41:53

power was not yet total. The army still

41:55

represented potential resistance and Germany was still pretty

41:57

weak militarily and economically compared to its neighbors.

42:00

Hitler could not afford to put on a German

42:02

games that would have had a fraction of the

42:04

grandeur of the Olympic games, and the gesture would

42:06

have made Germany look like even more of a

42:08

pariah state than it actually was. The

42:11

1936 Olympics were more than anything,

42:13

Germany's attempt to show themselves as turning

42:15

back towards the rest of the world.

42:17

For all of his talk of autarky,

42:20

of independence for Germany, this

42:22

mattered to Hitler. He wanted Germany to take,

42:24

I mean, the phrase he would use a

42:26

lot was Germany needs to take its place

42:28

in the sun, right? You can't do that

42:30

if you're like holding your own sad Loner

42:32

Olympics for people nobody likes. We're

42:34

calling it the No Jews Olympics. It's gonna be

42:37

here in Germany, and we're just mostly gonna run

42:39

next to each other and talk about how much

42:41

he fucking hates the Jews. Yeah,

42:44

that was basically the idea. But it matters

42:47

a lot to Hitler that Americans in particular

42:49

will be at his games. So he does

42:51

actually listen when Cheryl makes an offer. And

42:53

Cheryl's offer is, look man, I'm

42:56

not asking you to actually treat Jewish people better.

42:58

If you just have the Jewish Sports Federation's

43:01

nominate a couple of athletes, take

43:03

them on as the phrase Cheryl uses as token

43:05

Jews for the German team. Oh nice, yeah, yeah.

43:08

No, it's good. He's groundbreaking

43:10

racism here. Yeah,

43:12

yeah, they're just saying it out loud,

43:14

which is nice. Not

43:17

only does Hitler agree to the idea,

43:19

but he invites Cheryl to attend a

43:21

special event that year, a Braly in

43:23

Nuremberg, you know the one. But,

43:27

oh, okay so, starts by of right? Yeah,

43:30

they don't. The epicenter of resources you can use is

43:34

Title IX, Title IX, Title IX in taxi drink. I'm

43:37

brains, as you can see. The blush of

43:39

Israel is Sharkware, fourth in

43:41

September, we worked on eyes Hmm, the

43:50

stolen tickets, three used to call a Country's.

43:52

Twenty- does Hitler agree to the idea,

43:54

but he invites Sheryl to attend a

43:56

special event that year, a Brawley in

43:58

Nuremberg. You know, the one. Immediately

44:04

after that rally, the Nuremberg laws, which

44:06

officially codified the elimination of Jewish rights

44:08

in Germany were announced. Sheryl returned home

44:10

pretending this had not happened. And like

44:12

Brundage raved about the wondrous things the

44:14

Nazis were doing in Germany and promised

44:16

that they would totally let a Jew

44:19

play on their team. So everything's good.

44:21

Everything's cool. There's going to be a

44:23

couple of token Jews. We got this.

44:25

Don't worry. Please let it go forward.

44:28

And the Nazis do pick a couple of

44:30

Jewish people. One of them is Helena Meyer.

44:33

Meyer is a prodigy fencer. She's very

44:35

good at fencing. And she is currently,

44:37

because you know, she's living through this

44:39

whole period. She sees what's happening in

44:41

Germany. And so she goes to college

44:43

in California. She goes to a small

44:45

college in California. Good call, given the

44:47

time. And it's one of

44:50

those things she actually didn't consider herself Jewish.

44:52

She's raised Catholic, but her dad, I think,

44:54

is Jewish. Right. So the Nazis

44:56

do consider her that. But Helena also has

44:58

this kind of it's going to prove to

45:00

be a delusional belief that like, well, if

45:02

I can just convince them I consider myself

45:04

a Christian, they'll be fine with

45:06

me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, for

45:08

sure. That's not how it works. No,

45:11

it definitely works that way. No, no,

45:13

no, no, no, no. I'm not like

45:15

a Jew Jew. Right. Right. Don't worry

45:18

about me. She gets

45:20

publicly invited to the Olympics and there's some

45:22

back and forth. She publicly declines at a

45:24

point, but basically her line is I want

45:26

my citizenship restored and they restore her and

45:28

her family citizenship. Right. And Helena's line again

45:31

is basically that like, well, I'm half Jewish

45:33

and not observant, so I shouldn't be persecuted.

45:35

The Nazis again don't really agree to this,

45:37

but they pretend to. Another German Jewish

45:39

athlete they're going to pick out is

45:41

Gretel Bergmann. Bergmann had immigrated to the

45:43

United Kingdom for college. She was an

45:46

exceptionally talented runner and long jump competitor.

45:48

She was so good at this that

45:50

her college in the UK gives her

45:52

a handicap when she is competing at

45:54

like local events and she still wins

45:56

all of them. Damn. She's just very

45:58

good at this. Nice. Since

46:01

Jewish athletes had been banned from public competition at home,

46:03

she decides to try out for the British team. And

46:05

she's like, look, I'll play

46:07

for Britain and I'll beat my own

46:09

former country and that'll be kind of

46:12

nice as a Jewish exile. Right? Yeah.

46:16

Like, sounds satisfying, right? And she's particularly

46:18

excited because when she has her big

46:20

qualifying competition and does in fact qualify

46:22

for the UK Olympic team, her father

46:24

is there. He manages to secure approval

46:26

to visit England on business. But

46:29

after the competition, he's like, hey, I'm only actually able

46:31

to be here because the Nazis want

46:33

to get you to compete for Germany. And

46:36

his presence thus is kind of a threat from

46:38

the Germans. They're like, well, we can either send your

46:40

father to you or we can take

46:42

him away. Whose team do you want

46:44

to be on? You know? And,

46:46

you know, again, that's why I'm not going to... I've

46:48

got no judgment for Gretel here in deciding

46:51

to, you know, try out for the German

46:53

Olympic team. Because

46:55

Brundage and Beletour didn't actually care about

46:57

the welfare of German Jews, just that

46:59

they could show Jewish participation in German

47:01

Olympic teams to satisfy the boycotters, no

47:04

real effort was made to ensure that

47:06

stuff like this was like real offers.

47:09

And as a result, the primary thing

47:11

that the American Olympic Committee succeeds in

47:13

doing is in bringing more violence and

47:15

danger into the lives of German Jewish

47:17

athletes. Great. Because all they care about

47:19

is the look, right? They don't actually care that

47:21

conditions have changed, just that they can argue they

47:23

have. If Brundage

47:25

had been at all aware or concerned by

47:27

this, he showed no sign of it. In

47:30

late 1935, his only real worry was that

47:32

Jewish American sporting associations were continuing to advocate

47:34

for a boycott of the Berlin Olympics. Brundage

47:37

declared this a Jewish communist conspiracy, using language

47:39

he may well have taken back from his

47:41

1934 trip to see the Reich. Judge

47:45

Jeremiah Mahoney, president of the Amateur

47:47

Athletic Association, which organized the US

47:49

Olympic trials, continued to attack him as

47:52

a Nazi stooge. Alongside US socialist groups

47:54

and even a number of conservative politicians.

47:56

And I'll give some credit to New

47:58

York Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia. who

48:00

was like, nah man, we shouldn't do this. We

48:02

shouldn't go do an Olympics over there. See, that.

48:06

Congratulations LaGuardia, you earned your airport. Yeah,

48:08

I was gonna say, only good guy

48:10

that's ever had an airport named after

48:13

them. So I

48:15

don't know the rest of them. Dulles, definitely not

48:17

good. Definitely not a good guy, oh boy. Bad

48:20

airport guy. Yeah, Dulles and Reagan airports

48:22

are like the warring war crimes airports

48:25

up there. And

48:27

then a little north, you got LaGuardia. So there you go.

48:30

Hey. Yeah. The

48:32

anti-boycott side of things though, is also, this is

48:34

part of the complex history here, a lot more

48:36

diverse than you might initially guess because a big

48:38

part of it is a number of black athletes

48:40

who have a really good point. In

48:42

October of 1935, Mahoney tells a crowd at

48:45

Columbia University that he wished to God,

48:47

quote, the Nazis could witness an athletic

48:49

competition in this country. The

48:52

next guy up after him is

48:54

Ben Johnson, a black American Olympic

48:56

sprinter. And when Mahoney

48:58

says this, Johnson gets kind of pissed and

49:00

he comes up and he says, I think

49:03

Justice Mahoney should clean up the South where

49:05

Negroes are barred from his amateur athletic union

49:07

and discriminated against in Olympic selections. And

49:09

it's like, that's a fair point. He probably

49:11

shouldn't have said the Nazis should see how

49:14

we do sports here because here's how we

49:16

do sports here. Mahoney, maybe you should see

49:18

how we do sports here. Now,

49:23

Jesse Owens, who I think people still broadly know

49:25

of, he's

49:28

in the 36 Olympics, he's gonna

49:30

win like fucking everything. He's the fastest man

49:32

alive, right? But he goes back and forth

49:34

on whether or not to boycott the Olympics

49:36

beforehand in 35. During a

49:38

November of 1935 radio interview, he

49:40

stated his opinion that the US should withdraw

49:43

if Germany continued to discriminate against minorities, as

49:45

he put it. But his coach talked to

49:47

him out of it by using the same

49:49

logic Ben Johnson had used. Why would you

49:51

oppose Germany for doing the same shit your

49:53

fellow citizens do to you, right?

49:57

And the NAACP head Walter White.

50:00

No relation. Writes a

50:02

letter, he considers making a big

50:05

open statement, basically the NAACP supports

50:07

a boycott. He never actually does

50:09

that, but he does write a

50:11

letter to Owens, where

50:14

he's like, you should consider a boycott

50:16

basically. Even so, they

50:19

never kind of tip into doing it, and

50:21

Owens obviously does not ultimately boycott the Olympics,

50:23

but the amount of popular support for a

50:25

boycott in late 1935 terrifies Brundage, who

50:29

feels his chances of being appointed to the

50:31

IOC committee slipping away. In late

50:34

1935, he was a constant voice

50:36

for US participation, telling anyone who

50:38

would listen, revolutionaries are not bred

50:40

on the playing field. See,

50:42

this is how he just becomes

50:44

more anti-Semitic as

50:47

this goes along, I'm sure, because he's

50:50

just like these fucking Jews. They don't believe

50:52

it when they, I brought the piece of

50:54

paper, I brought the paper. Why

50:57

don't they understand that Hitler says he's not

50:59

gonna hurt him? Hitler is

51:01

cool, he dresses good, he's God-like,

51:03

and he is a strong dick

51:05

vein. I'm drawing it right here

51:07

in the margins of my notes.

51:11

These Jews don't believe a word of it. Speaking

51:14

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51:16

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back. So Brundage

54:43

was willing to acknowledge in private his

54:45

belief that quote, the Hitlerites did not

54:47

intend to live up to the pledges

54:49

given to the IOC. But his overwhelming

54:52

public sentiment was that those mean old

54:54

Jews were trying to ruin everyone else's

54:56

good time. Surprise, surprise. Surprise, surprise. As

54:59

he told the secretary of the British Olympic Association,

55:01

my own view is that we are pandering

55:03

too much to the Jews. In an

55:06

article for the Journal of American Studies,

55:08

Carolyn Marvin summarizes his growing anti-Semitic

55:10

paranoia. The Jews were

55:12

complaining too much. First, according to a peculiarly

55:15

circular IOC standard of evidence as to whether

55:17

their complaints had substance. And second, because they

55:19

were like that. Brundage regularly

55:21

observed in his correspondence with other sports

55:23

officials that the Jews have been clever

55:26

enough to realize the publicity value of

55:28

sports. He was informed by J. Siegfried

55:30

Edstrom, president of the International Amateur Athletic

55:32

Federation, that the main reason of the

55:34

Aryan movement in Germany was that the

55:37

Jews have taken too prominent a position

55:39

in certain branches of life and have,

55:41

as the Jews very often do when

55:43

they get in the majority, misused their

55:45

positions. Oh, God. The

55:48

second point of, the Jews

55:50

are like that. You

55:52

know how they be. You know how they

55:54

are. Yeah. Right. It is interesting that that

55:57

language has still been going around. Yeah. Yeah.

55:59

And also. So just like a side

56:01

note to this whole thing is

56:03

it just, this whole thing kind

56:05

of reminds me and maybe not

56:07

even that much of a circuitous

56:10

way, but like of the way

56:12

that the trans athlete debate kind

56:14

of like is coordinated through everything.

56:16

Just this like, this way of using sport

56:19

and sportsmanship and kind of

56:21

like the, you know, oh,

56:23

they're always, they're overrepresented and

56:26

they're everywhere and they complain

56:28

all the time. It's

56:30

like the exact same type of shit

56:32

and it's used to, you

56:34

know, it's, I don't know, it's the

56:36

beginning of what is an eventual,

56:40

you know, movement to try to

56:42

hurt this. To

56:44

try to force them out of public life, right?

56:46

Yes, yes. Which is a prelude to worse things.

56:48

A prelude to worse things, exactly. It's interesting too

56:50

that you bring that up. I think we're going

56:52

to have to do another episode because there's so

56:54

much, there's still more on Brundage than I've wrote,

56:56

but there's also, there's so much about the 36

56:59

Olympics and one of them is they

57:01

have a trans panic. Like

57:03

that, they have a panic over what they

57:05

think are, they don't use the term transgender

57:08

at this point. Of course. I

57:10

don't really think anyone did, but they have, they have what is a panic

57:12

over that and like every time that happens,

57:14

what actually happens is a bunch of, a bunch

57:17

of people who are assigned, were

57:20

assigned female at birth and who

57:22

identified as female were just baselessly

57:24

attacked because they didn't look

57:26

feminine enough to some rando in the audience.

57:30

Like, it's all the same shit. Like it's

57:32

the same, like going

57:34

over that like panic that those athletes went

57:36

through and like one of them at least

57:38

is a Nazi. So it is harder to

57:40

be sympathetic to what's worse than you, but

57:42

like that doesn't make that right, you

57:45

know? Yes, yes, yes. But it is

57:47

like, it's always the same thing. There's

57:49

only one playbook. It just always works

57:51

pretty well. Yeah. And I think

57:53

it's because of the way in which people kind

57:55

of idealize and almost idealize sports

57:57

and make them, you know,

58:00

fake themselves out into thinking they're an

58:02

apolitical expression of like, uh, fair competition

58:04

or whatever. And so they, you know,

58:06

the this is the exact same

58:08

thing where you just kind of go, like

58:11

you're messing with the, uh, my idealized version

58:13

of, of, uh, of what

58:15

sports is and what it's supposed to be. And,

58:18

uh, and they, you know, but really it's to

58:20

mask this. Like, I mean, they would say the

58:22

same things. Listen, I'm no fan of trans people.

58:24

I think we can all agree that. Look,

58:27

I'm bigoted as shit, but we shouldn't do that. Yeah.

58:30

It's the exact same type of shit.

58:32

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, in private

58:35

letters to other Olympic officials, Brundage went out

58:37

of his way to argue the Nazi party

58:39

line claiming that most of the German Jewish

58:41

athletes hadn't even been good enough to qualify,

58:44

right? Like they led a couple of charity

58:46

cases in, right? And you're still angry at

58:48

the Nazis, you know, these people would never

58:50

have qualified if we hadn't put on pressure

58:52

and that's bullshit. Gretel Bergman had to give

58:55

up her seat on the British Olympic team

58:58

to compete for Germany. And she didn't get to

59:00

compete. She, she's led into a

59:02

trial and in her trial performances to

59:04

qualify for the German Olympic team, she

59:06

equals the all time German woman's high

59:08

jump record. She does as well as

59:10

the best German woman has ever done

59:12

at the high jump in her qualifier.

59:14

And then after the British team departs for

59:17

Berlin and she can't go back, she sent

59:19

a letter saying, Hey, actually you weren't good

59:21

enough. LMAO, sorry we fucked you over here.

59:23

Wow. It sucks. So bad for

59:25

her. I mean, at least she's in the fucking

59:27

UK, right? So, but it's,

59:30

it's a real bummer, man. I'm going

59:32

to quote from Carolyn Marvin again. Not

59:34

only did Jews exalt their, and this

59:37

is her talking about Brundage, not only

59:39

did Jews exalt their own political interests

59:41

above the independence of amateur sport, not

59:43

only did they fail to appreciate the

59:46

contribution of the Olympic movement to whatever

59:48

restraint they're exercised, but also Brundage argued

59:50

with increasing irritation, Jewish protest would be

59:52

counterproductive in the long run. An Olympic

59:55

boycott on account of the Jews would

59:57

excite dangerous, possibly uncontrollable antisemitic sympathies in

59:59

America. Yeah, that's right. So he's like, look, we

1:00:01

might have to murder you guys if you all, if

1:00:03

you don't let us play do the high job. You

1:00:05

know? Yeah. That's

1:00:07

not our fault. That's on you. Yeah, yeah,

1:00:10

yeah. You can't blame us for what is

1:00:12

eventually going to happen. This is like, it's

1:00:14

just so fucking sickening, just like the way

1:00:17

in which people just, just

1:00:20

hearing people complain is enough to turn

1:00:22

anyone into a Nazi. Yeah.

1:00:26

Well, and the thing that enrages them so much is

1:00:28

that these

1:00:30

complaints, why they're reacting so negatively to the

1:00:32

complaints, is it's the same way like a

1:00:35

two year old screams if they like grab a toy

1:00:37

on the shelf at the store and you take it

1:00:39

away as they're afraid these mean old

1:00:42

activists are going to take away their toy.

1:00:44

Their fun thing. That's right. I

1:00:46

was going to be on the Olympic committee. I was going to do the high job. I

1:00:48

was going to be the bad guy to jump in. You know? Yeah.

1:00:51

Like that's what's going on here, right? Yeah. Yeah.

1:00:54

And that's kind of groundbreaking in how he publicly

1:00:56

justifies racism because after he goes on this, like,

1:00:59

you know, you guys better be worried if

1:01:01

you, if you protest too loud, he's

1:01:03

like, now I know a lot of

1:01:05

smart conservative Jews and they all agree

1:01:07

with me, right? They all think I'm

1:01:09

in the right. So I'm not racist,

1:01:11

right? The smart conservative Jews that I

1:01:13

won't name all say I'm right. You

1:01:15

know? Yeah. Yeah. Listen,

1:01:18

I got, I got binders full of Jews who think that,

1:01:20

yeah, Jews complain too much and are not

1:01:22

good at sports. He's also, he

1:01:24

uses the racism that's been drummed up

1:01:26

by the boycott to try and raise

1:01:29

money for the Olympics. He writes

1:01:31

a strategy letter to the AOC, to his

1:01:33

colleagues and says, the fact that the Jews

1:01:35

are against us will arouse interest among thousands

1:01:37

of people who have never subscribed before if

1:01:39

they are properly approached. I bet

1:01:41

it works. And because he's

1:01:43

that kind of sociopath, and this is,

1:01:45

this is something the Nazis wouldn't do.

1:01:48

Not because it's worse, but this is just a very

1:01:50

American way of being shitty. At the same time, it's like,

1:01:52

oh yeah, we can fundraise off of this racism. He's

1:01:54

like, you know what else we could do? We

1:01:57

got to tell a bunch of rich Jews that if they donate

1:01:59

money to like put on. Olympic ads, you know,

1:02:01

that'll help convince the Germans to be less

1:02:03

mean to the Jews. You know, you can

1:02:05

help, you can help your fellow Jews if

1:02:08

you give some money to the Olympics. That's

1:02:10

right. It'll help change.

1:02:12

It'll, it'll, it'll warm, you know,

1:02:14

Hitler's cold, cold heart. That

1:02:17

was the one thing that could have stopped

1:02:19

Hitler from his madness is if the Olympics

1:02:21

had had a bigger billboard. I've

1:02:25

been wrong this whole time. You

1:02:27

know, maybe I should rethink this whole Jews

1:02:29

should die thing. I'm

1:02:32

going to call back my friend and take some ecstasy.

1:02:35

We're going to Bonnaroo. Cut

1:02:40

to like one of those nineties end movie

1:02:42

montages. Hitler and

1:02:45

Bonnaroo. Oh,

1:02:47

beautiful. At the

1:02:50

end of 1935, as the AAU met

1:02:52

to take its final vote on whether

1:02:54

or not to boycott the games, Mahoney

1:02:56

continued to push the AAU to follow

1:02:58

their collective conscience, telling gathered members the

1:03:00

Nazi government wants more than American participation

1:03:02

in a sporting contest. It wants to

1:03:04

bring the American dollar into the very

1:03:06

weakened Nazi treasury. And it wants you

1:03:08

to picture Hitler with uncle Sam standing

1:03:10

behind him and saying, we are with

1:03:12

you Adolf. And he is right on

1:03:14

the money there. All

1:03:17

of his efforts are for not though. The

1:03:19

AAU delegates vote 58 to 55 ish in

1:03:21

favor of attending the Olympics. Similar

1:03:24

campaigns across the so-called free world

1:03:26

also collapsed under Hitler's charm offensive

1:03:29

two days before the opening of the games

1:03:31

at the 35th session of the IOC. So

1:03:33

it's the session of the committee right before

1:03:35

the game start. But Leila tour makes good

1:03:37

on his promises to Avery Brundage. He orchestrates

1:03:39

a coup against Ernst Yanki, the only member

1:03:41

who I've pronounced like three different ways. You

1:03:43

know, the guy, the only member of the

1:03:46

IOC who wasn't a piece of shit. The one good guy.

1:03:48

Yeah. Yanki

1:03:50

is expelled by a 49 to zero vote. Yeah.

1:03:54

Now, General Sherrill is dead by this

1:03:56

point. He drops dead right after coming

1:03:58

back with hell. from

1:04:01

his Hitler, so at least he got to,

1:04:03

that's nice though, he died, but at least

1:04:05

he got to see Hitler. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:04:08

He just probably died when he was doing

1:04:10

autoerotic excitiation of a picture he drew of

1:04:12

Hitler's dick. Yeah, yeah, that was the

1:04:14

style at the time. Yep. And

1:04:16

so in 1936, Brundage was present

1:04:19

for the opening ceremonies of the Berlin

1:04:21

Olympics, marching at the head of the

1:04:23

US delegation. As you'd expect,

1:04:25

the city was filled with battalions of

1:04:27

uniformed Wehrmacht soldiers, a show of force,

1:04:29

somewhat at odds with the peaceable dream

1:04:32

of Olympic competition. Some people

1:04:34

are alike, boy, it seems like there's a

1:04:36

lot of tens of thousands of

1:04:38

uniformed soldiers marching around at this peaceful

1:04:40

event. Sure, a lot of guns at

1:04:42

this peace competition. Yeah, I feel like

1:04:44

the other countries don't have tens of

1:04:47

thousands of uniformed soldiers marching around, maybe

1:04:49

an honor guard, you do a

1:04:51

little 21 gun salute, this is a lot of guys. Yeah,

1:04:53

this is a bunch of guys. Well,

1:04:55

it's okay, because they're doing

1:04:58

race walking, so that's fine.

1:05:00

Kiltow, Gustepe, whatever you want

1:05:02

to call it. Kind of at

1:05:04

the start of the events, we get

1:05:06

a chapter of one of the more

1:05:08

complicated sporting stories of the Nazi era,

1:05:10

which is the Hindenburg sails into Berlin

1:05:12

with Mack Schmeling on it. Oh,

1:05:15

yeah. Schmeling, he's a

1:05:17

German boxer, he's one

1:05:19

of the best boxers of his day, and he

1:05:21

has just gone up against a guy named Joe

1:05:23

Louis. Joe Louis is, if you

1:05:25

talk to boxing people in

1:05:27

USC, so it's the session of the committee

1:05:29

right before the game start, Belay Latour makes

1:05:31

good on his promises to Avery Brundage. He

1:05:33

orchestrates a coup against Ernst Janke, the only

1:05:36

member who I've pronounced like three different ways,

1:05:38

you know the guy, the only member of

1:05:40

the IOC who wasn't a piece of shit.

1:05:42

The one good guy, yeah. Janke

1:05:45

is expelled by a 49 to zero vote. Damn.

1:05:48

Yeah, now General Sherrill is

1:05:50

dead by this point, he drops dead right

1:05:53

after coming back with- Hell yeah. From his

1:05:55

Hitler, so at least he got to, that's

1:05:57

nice though, you know he died, but at

1:05:59

least- he got to see Hitler. Yeah,

1:06:01

yeah, yeah. He just probably died when

1:06:04

he was doing autoerotic excitiation to a

1:06:06

picture he drew of Hitler's dick. Yeah,

1:06:09

yeah. That was the style at the time. And

1:06:11

so in 1936, Brundage was present

1:06:14

for the opening ceremonies of the Berlin

1:06:16

Olympics, marching at the head of the

1:06:18

US delegation. As you'd expect,

1:06:20

the city was filled with battalions of

1:06:22

uniformed Wehrmacht soldiers, a show of force

1:06:24

somewhat at odds with the peaceable dream

1:06:27

of Olympic competition. When

1:06:29

people are alike, boy, it seems like there's

1:06:31

a lot of tens of thousands

1:06:33

of uniformed soldiers marching around at this peaceful

1:06:35

event. Sure, a lot of guns at this

1:06:37

peace competition. Yeah, I feel like the other

1:06:39

countries don't have tens of thousands of uniformed

1:06:42

soldiers marching around. Maybe an honor guard, you

1:06:44

know, you do a little 21 gun salute.

1:06:47

This is a lot of guys. Yeah, this is

1:06:49

a bunch of guys. Well, it's okay,

1:06:51

because they're doing race

1:06:53

walking, so that's fine. Kiltow,

1:06:56

Gustepp, whatever you want to call it. Kind

1:06:59

of at the start of the events,

1:07:01

we get a chapter of one of

1:07:03

the more complicated sporting stories of the

1:07:05

Nazi era, which is the Hindenburg sails

1:07:07

into Berlin with Mack Schmeling on it.

1:07:09

Oh, yeah. Schmeling, he's a

1:07:12

German boxer. He's

1:07:14

one of the best boxers of his day, and

1:07:16

he has just gone up against a guy named

1:07:18

Joe Lewis. Joe Lewis is ...

1:07:20

If you talk to boxing people and

1:07:22

you ask who is the best boxer of all time, you'll

1:07:25

get a number of different names, but the name

1:07:27

you might get most often is Joe Lewis. He's

1:07:29

got to be up there. For like 20 years,

1:07:31

he's basically very close to undefeated. I think his

1:07:34

record is like 54 wins, four losses. Like

1:07:37

42 of those wins are by knockout. One

1:07:41

of the very few men to beat Lewis

1:07:44

in a fight was Schmeling, and Schmeling does it when he's 30.

1:07:46

So he's considered over the hill. Schmeling

1:07:49

is able to win because he just

1:07:51

obsessively watches every fight Lewis has been

1:07:53

in and learns his strategy, and he wins.

1:07:56

This is seen as this huge thing for the Nazis.

1:07:58

It's proof of racial ... superiority.

1:08:01

It's a great lead-in to these

1:08:03

games. What's weird on the backside

1:08:06

of this is that for all

1:08:08

of that smelling, and Lewis and smelling will have

1:08:10

a rematch that Lewis wins and it's made in

1:08:12

this very big propaganda thing for the US. Joe

1:08:15

Lewis is treated like shit by the United

1:08:17

States his whole life because he's a black

1:08:19

man. He's put in

1:08:22

the army to have a PR role

1:08:24

basically and he's still discriminated against massively.

1:08:26

One of the only white guys in

1:08:28

the world who's not shitty to Joe

1:08:30

Lewis is Max Schmeling. And Schmeling pays

1:08:32

for his funeral when he dies. They

1:08:34

are friends for life. Yes, yes. They

1:08:36

are best friends forever. If

1:08:39

at any moment you want

1:08:41

to feel really good about the

1:08:43

United States for being against Nazism

1:08:45

and all that stuff, do

1:08:48

yourself a favor and don't. Just because

1:08:51

remember that so many

1:08:53

of the people we're talking about, whether it's the head

1:08:55

of these Olympic committees

1:08:57

or people who are generals

1:08:59

in the military, they're

1:09:02

all just like, listen, we

1:09:04

also hate Jews and yet

1:09:07

we also discriminate openly

1:09:09

against all African Americans

1:09:11

in this country. It's one of

1:09:13

those, I'm always, every time it

1:09:15

comes around

1:09:19

the Normandy anniversary, the anniversary

1:09:21

of Stalingrad, I've got

1:09:23

nothing but respect for the people who actually had

1:09:26

to fight the Nazis. 100%. Every single soldier who

1:09:28

went in there and kicked Nazi

1:09:30

ass. I love that. This

1:09:32

country wound up politically just

1:09:35

barely missing. That. Yes,

1:09:38

yes. By a fraction, by a

1:09:41

hair, we ended up not being

1:09:43

aligned with this Nazi project.

1:09:45

And a lot of guys like Brundage

1:09:47

probably went to his grave regretting that.

1:09:50

Yeah, yeah. Well, at least you would hope

1:09:52

so. Yeah. Yeah. So we

1:09:55

have our Nazi games, the Berlin games

1:09:57

start out. The theme of the day

1:09:59

is this. like, you know, the

1:10:01

opening of the Olympics is all of

1:10:03

these German like military marches. Right. And

1:10:05

everyone else kind of just with their

1:10:07

athletes walking around being like, boy, it

1:10:09

seems like there's a weird number of

1:10:12

soldiers. Yeah. Everyone else like, shit, we

1:10:14

didn't bring enough guns. Should we have

1:10:16

guns? And in fact, when he shows

1:10:18

up, when Hitler shows up, he's marching

1:10:20

with ballet littor and leveled, right? These

1:10:22

other IOC representatives. Right. And they are

1:10:25

like fucking the president of the Olympics

1:10:27

is next to Hitler and they are

1:10:29

flanked by dozens of SS men,

1:10:31

like apolitical games, nothing

1:10:33

political going on with this, this

1:10:35

SS march to the Olympic stadium.

1:10:37

This is all just about peace

1:10:40

and sportsmanship. In

1:10:42

the book, Berlin games, Guy Walters writes, by

1:10:44

the time Hitler reached his seat at four

1:10:46

Oh five PM, there was no doubt that

1:10:48

he was already the star of the Olympics.

1:10:50

These were his games now, not ballet littor's

1:10:53

and most certainly not Kubertin's as if to

1:10:55

reinforce the notification of the games. The orchestra

1:10:57

struck up with Deutschland Uber alleys and the

1:10:59

Horst Wessel song, both of which had heralded

1:11:01

the start of the winter games back in

1:11:03

February. So that's great.

1:11:05

Now, a major topic of discussion was

1:11:08

the precise nature of the salutes that

1:11:10

different Olympic teams chose to make as

1:11:12

they marched past Hitler in the reviewing stand.

1:11:15

This was complicated by the fact that the

1:11:17

Olympic salute, there's an Olympic salute. Oh, I

1:11:19

didn't know there was an Olympic salute. Well,

1:11:21

I don't think we use it anymore because

1:11:24

it's basically a reversed Nazi salute. Oh, they're

1:11:26

very similar. And this is because we've been

1:11:28

doing variants of the salutes, the Nazis, what

1:11:30

like for a long time. Yeah. But also

1:11:33

Hitler is known for, he's kind of a

1:11:35

lazy guy a lot of the time. And

1:11:37

so sometimes when Hitler prior even to this,

1:11:39

he'll give, he'll use the wrong arm to

1:11:41

do his fascist salute. When the Greeks give

1:11:44

an Olympic salute and Hitler responds with an

1:11:46

Olympic salute, no one's really sure. Well, we're

1:11:48

not sure if the Greeks meant to do

1:11:50

a fascist salute and we're not sure what Hitler

1:11:53

meant to do. Nobody actually knows.

1:11:55

Yeah. Hitler is the one guy,

1:11:57

he always does that little Heil,

1:11:59

right? He's really lazy with

1:12:01

it. Yes a lazy. Hile. He

1:12:03

really he really half-asses the highly.

1:12:06

Yeah, I guess they're hiling him

1:12:08

He's like I don't have to hile that much.

1:12:10

Yeah, I mean to be fair to

1:12:12

Hitler Which I usually don't say it is all

1:12:15

like yeah, he shouldn't hile him. That is kind

1:12:17

of weird, right? I don't know. I don't know.

1:12:19

I'm not gonna backseat. See how he fared

1:12:21

to Hitler. He said Yeah, that's

1:12:26

So the French come by next and they

1:12:29

do another Olympic salute But the crowd is

1:12:31

mostly Germans They did mostly Germans who lived

1:12:33

through World War one and like the starvation

1:12:35

and mass death And so a lot

1:12:38

of people kind of interpret what the French team is

1:12:40

doing as a fascist salute Which they see is not

1:12:42

that the they don't see that as the French saying

1:12:44

we're fascist too They see it as like the French

1:12:47

being like hey things are good now

1:12:49

We're not gonna have another war because like

1:12:51

most of this audience of Germans really don't

1:12:53

want another war with France It was a

1:12:55

bad time. Yeah, they remember Let's

1:12:59

be cool. Yeah, and so they

1:13:01

the audience cheers when they see the French

1:13:03

do this because they're like hey Maybe we

1:13:05

don't maybe I don't have to send my

1:13:07

son off to die like my brother did

1:13:09

in Flanders or whatever I don't have to

1:13:11

see my friends drown in mud. Yeah, sounds

1:13:13

great Hitler is really unhappy with this

1:13:15

because he hears a bunch of Germans cheering for the

1:13:17

French and he's like well Maybe they really don't want

1:13:19

what what is about to happen, right? Albert

1:13:27

Speer describes Hitler as quote more disturbed

1:13:29

than pleased by the Berliners Cheers The

1:13:32

British come next and this is there's some moments of

1:13:34

pride for both the Brits and the Americans here the

1:13:37

British and also India and Australia who

1:13:39

are part of the British Empire. They don't

1:13:41

salute at all And

1:13:43

neither do the Americans who are led in

1:13:45

their march by Avery Brundage and here's how

1:13:48

Guy Walters describes that moment The

1:13:50

United States was one of the last teams to

1:13:52

enter the stadium We were a total disgrace

1:13:54

recalled Joanna to Tuscan about 30 or

1:13:57

40 non members of the team fat with cigarette ashes

1:13:59

on their clothes marched at the head

1:14:01

of the team. Marty Glickman felt that the

1:14:03

word marching was inappropriate to describe how the

1:14:05

Americans proceeded. American athletes don't march very well,

1:14:08

he wrote. We kind of moved in our

1:14:10

usual loose-gated walk. At the team's head was

1:14:12

Avery Brundage, who was neither a fat nor

1:14:14

a smoker, and was one of the few

1:14:16

who really did march. And honestly, I have

1:14:19

some American pride for that. We've got

1:14:21

our fascist at the front, but everyone

1:14:24

else just looks like shit stumbled around,

1:14:26

hung over as hell, chain smoking. Yes,

1:14:28

that is, it's shit like that that

1:14:30

makes America great. That's right. The fact

1:14:32

that we're just like, listen, I learned

1:14:35

how to do one thing really well.

1:14:37

I'm not gonna get- That's also how

1:14:39

to march. Yeah, you're gonna get good

1:14:41

at this, fuck you. I'm

1:14:43

literally Jesse Owens, I don't have to impress

1:14:46

you. Yeah, I'm doing this

1:14:48

for a medal later. Yeah, yeah.

1:14:51

I'm gonna continue that quote. As the Americans

1:14:53

marched past Hitler, they removed their boaters and

1:14:55

clutched them to their hearts, whereas other flags

1:14:57

were dipped in honor of the fewer of

1:14:59

the stars and stripes remained resolutely aloft, which

1:15:01

caused a murmur of discontent around the stadium.

1:15:03

Marty Glickman recalled the moment when the team

1:15:05

passed Hitler. We looked up at the box

1:15:07

where he was flanked by Gering and Goebbels

1:15:09

and Hess and Himmler and all the rest

1:15:11

of the Nazi hierarchy. And you could hear

1:15:13

the comment run through our crowd as we

1:15:15

were walking in, hey, he looks like Charlie

1:15:18

Chaplin. I've

1:15:21

got his chance. And

1:15:23

this has been pretty American critical as we often

1:15:25

are, but by God, am I proud to hear

1:15:28

that. No, that's beautiful.

1:15:30

I've got that Lee Greenwood song running in

1:15:32

my heart now. Oh,

1:15:36

it's beautiful. Look at this silly ass. Yeah.

1:15:40

So we will continue at some later date

1:15:42

with the story of Hitler at the Olympics

1:15:44

and maybe finish up some Avery Brundage, but

1:15:46

you get the gist of why Brundage sucks

1:15:48

with all this. Oh yeah. Yeah, it seems

1:15:50

like a dickhead. Reasonably complete, yeah. I

1:15:53

don't like him and I don't support him. I'll

1:15:55

tell you that much. He's

1:15:57

a bastard. Yeah. Well.

1:16:00

I reckon that'll do it for us

1:16:03

here at Behind the Podcast, a

1:16:05

podcast about bastards. That's right.

1:16:08

Matt Lieb, Bad

1:16:11

Hizbarah Podcast. Bad Hizbarah,

1:16:13

new pod. H-A-S-B-A-R-A,

1:16:16

right? H-A-S-B-A-R-A.

1:16:20

Yeah, you can check it out wherever podcasts

1:16:22

are given away for

1:16:24

free. And,

1:16:27

you know, to

1:16:30

quote Benjamin Netanyahu... I

1:16:32

want you to come. I want you to

1:16:34

come. So,

1:16:37

check it out. Also, I just want

1:16:39

to give a quick shout out to

1:16:42

just a couple of live shows Francesca and I are doing.

1:16:45

We're going to be in gestures. We're

1:16:47

going to be in Chicago during the

1:16:49

DNC doing a couple of

1:16:51

shows. Monday, August

1:16:53

16th, and I think Tuesday, August

1:16:56

17th, we're going to be at

1:16:58

Lincoln Lodge. One

1:17:00

is going to be a live podcast, situation

1:17:02

room slash Bad Hizbarah. The other is

1:17:04

going to be a stand-up show. So, yeah,

1:17:07

check out that. If you're in

1:17:09

Chicago, August, you know,

1:17:11

fucking 19th, August 20th, come,

1:17:13

please. It'll be fun. Yes,

1:17:16

check that out. See Matt and Francesca

1:17:19

live. Yeah, and you won't see us

1:17:21

live because we don't have any plans

1:17:23

to do that in these times soon.

1:17:25

Maybe someday again. You guys should. It

1:17:27

would be sick. One

1:17:30

of these days I'll leave my house again, Matt. I

1:17:34

keep saying that and not leaving my house, but one of

1:17:36

these days I might. It's

1:17:38

great out there in the world, bro. Yeah,

1:17:40

that's what everyone says about the world. Yeah,

1:17:42

everyone loves the world and how good it

1:17:44

is. Yeah, that's the

1:17:47

overwhelming thing I get from social media. People are

1:17:49

happy about the world. If

1:17:51

you go outside, world good. Nothing bad ever

1:17:53

happened. Yeah, all right,

1:17:55

everybody. Go be like

1:17:57

an Olympian and touch grass. These

1:18:01

people run a 너를 쫓아보다 돕는 파란, the

1:18:03

people they're running from. Kill

1:18:05

their children for one shot! They're killing

1:18:08

their kids, they're killing their families, they're

1:18:10

putting bullets around their backs, they're jogging

1:18:12

hard. They're screwing the patient,