Lions Led By Donkeys Podcast - *UNLOCKED* The Death of Mussolini

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

We thought we would unlock a bonus episode to bring some laughs to people on such a shitty day. Support the show on patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/lionsledbydonkeys The story of how a very stupid dictator ended up swinging upside down in front of a cheering crowd. sources: https://www.nationalww2museum.org/death-of-benito-mussolini https://www.history.com/news/mussolinis-final-hours https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/how-did-benito-mussolini-die-the-story-behind-il-duces-last-moments/ https://allthatsinteresting.com/benito-mussolini-death Ray Mosley. The Last 600 Days of Il Duce.

Hey everybody, welcome to another bonus episode of the Lions Led by Donkeys podcast. I'm Joe, and with me, trapped in this wonderful content closet full of various posters on Francis' wall, is the Zoo Crew. I have many posters. I need to redo my interior decorating. I did hang up a big clay shield with swords, and the swords do come out. So that is my, instead of having a gun in my Podshack, I have swords on my wall that I can pull out and-

This podcast brought to you by Bud K. I'm excited for you to get like Indiana Jonesed when you try to whip out a sword on some dude who's like inevitably coming into your Podshack with like an AK-47 for some reason. It's all fun and games until he like managed to invoke castle law with a sword and a shield. I guarantee you that's happened in the state. Like 100% somebody has stabbed somebody with a sword and gone castle law with it.

Unfortunately it's a decorative shield so it's not really useful but the swords are very rare. There's only one way to find out about the shield. Can it take.45 cal per pistol ammo? Just start shooting. I need to field test everything by shooting it right now. I have to say that no matter where I've recorded from, and we're in the process of securing an actual studio space here,

very long process, may I add, I'm terrible at decorating walls specifically. If left to my own devices, I will hang nothing up. As you can tell from the wall behind me, everywhere I live looks vaguely like a prison. And I think that's because I grew up living in the barracks, so you can't hang shit from the wall. So the need in the back of my head of like, you have to hang pictures or posters

or other artistic doodads on the wall. It was just bled out of my brain. See, I live in a loft, and so if I did not hang things on the wall, it would be just a lot of fucking white wall space just surrounding me at all times. That's what I'm looking at right now, baby. Yeah, no, I can't do it.

Joe's got that Rustin Cole from the first season. Just the embodiment of our slash male living spaces. I have okay furniture, there's just nothing on the walls. All right, I have a nice desk chair, I have a comfortable couch, a good bed, I even have a coffee table and a rug, like all these things. I just have hang hung absolutely nothing. They're all really nice, but there are also made out of milk crates. I mean, it's it's I got them all on Etsy circa like 2011. You should you should get to your caucus, your caucus roots

and just start hanging rugs on the wall. And it would have soundproof it for you too. I did buy a rug recently from there's a Persian place here. And the guy, when he found out that I was Armenian, he asked if I was going to put on the floor or the wall. And I was like, fuck you. Now, fellas, once upon a time, we talked about the death of President Garfield. I still think it's one of our funniest episodes that we've ever done. Today, we are going to talk about the death of someone who people are probably more, probably

happier about hearing, and that is the death of Benito Mussolini. Hey, oh, hey. Hey. Oh, oh, ay! Ay! Oh, mama mia! Mama mia, that's a spicy sub-machine gun! Hahaha! The Australian hanging, yeah!

Yeah, I mean, real online heads will remember when his granddaughter got really fucking angry at Jim Carrey of all fucking people for joking about I fucking forgot about that Because he was posting pictures of dead Benito Mussolini upside down in their mentions. Yeah, that's fucking masterstroke Yeah, he's one of my favorite enigmas of online because people like like people hate him for various reasons and people love him for various reasons but in in deep down he's a shit poster and does not give a shit about Mussolini,

which I feel like that should be the goal of everybody. Now, there are certain pictures in World War II that stand as like touchstones of the conflict. When you close your eyes and you think of, you know, important moments of World War II, there's certain pictures that jump to your mind, like specifically the flag raising in Iwo Jima, and especially the story of what happened to those dudes afterwards, or Robert Cappa's pictures during the landings at Normandy.

The photo of the Red Army soldier holding the Soviet flag over the Nazi Reichstag, and them having to Photoshop out the fact that he had looted multiple different watches and was wearing them all at the same time. Who's among us, you know? They're Nazi watches, fuck it. You should've got to catch them all, man. Yeah. I don't condone looting, but if it's Nazi loot, fine.

I don't condone looting, but some people deserve to be looted. I think that's something we could all agree with. I like the thing that he was just collecting one from each new time zone he passed through all the way from like Moscow to Berlin. Half these are Russian. Yeah, it's me trying to coordinate us recording as I need four different watches to be wearing at all times.

In order to schedule a recording with me, you do actually have to loot Germany circa 1945. I don't know why. It's in my writer. My Google searches are constantly like, it's, you know, just time in, it's like, time in Da Hague? Time in Armenia? Time in Georgia?

What do you want to know? Where are you going to be? Roll the dice, baby! I'm going to, yeah, don't worry. My next arc is I have to move somewhere even smaller, which means like, I don't know, Lichtenstein, and I assume not be able to afford a place to live. I mean, I'm excited, Joe, for you to come to Rhode Island. Many people know Rhode Island as America's Netherlands.

It's all castles and weed there. There is one picture that sticks out in my mind mind though, and that is the picture of Benito Mussolini, the dictator of fascist Italy, an all-around incompetent dumbass, hanging upside down from a girder, dead. It's a picture that we've all seen, and we're all familiar with the picture. It's one hell of a powerful image for more than one reason. For starters, it's a dead fascist, which we all can be happy about, but the publication and the news of it terrified Adolf Hitler.

As the war turned against him, he vowed that he would never let his body fall into enemy hands, be poked and prodded and ogled at by spectators and photographers. And then after seeing the photo and hearing about what happened to him, he solidified his plans for his own suicide and the resulting attempted destruction of his body, which would come just three days after his once best bro and, you know, actually inspiration for his rise to power. So you know. So Hitler was only three days after Mussolini.

Yeah. Yeah. I didn't realize how close they were. The end came quite swiftly for some. Yeah, unfortunately, we didn't drag his body through and hanging up from a girder somewhere. I just imagine like doing that now it's like a dead fascist hanging from the girders of a Buc-ee's and in the Midwest somewhere. So we all know how this story ends, but what many people don't know is just how Mussolini ended up hanging upside down in the first place. And that is what we'll be talking about today.

And we already did a little bit of background on this. This is a topic we've talked about, we've touched on. During our Otto Scorzeni series, we talked about how Mussolini had been fired by King Emmanuel III and once the war had turned against Italy for good and allied troops are storming through the lands of marinara sauce and tight white pants. Which is honestly like a really daring combination that the nationality is, you know, I mean,

like I can't even... Live on the edge, baby. Like I can't even wear a white shirt like, you know, when eating spaghetti at all. Like, you know, I mean, it's... Otherwise it just ends up being a tie-dye shirt. It's because you have yet to Internalize Italian Bushido of how to eat spaghetti Well, also, you know if you if you're just like covered in spaghetti sauce, nobody can see the blood when you get shot So yeah, it's just like wearing a red. It's the same reason why the Brits wore red coats, you know and brown pants.

At this point, Mussolini was hidden in a hotel in the mountains under guard, only to be rescued by SS troops in the command of noted dickhead Otto Scorzani in 1943. However, that is where Mussolini in that story ended. We never talked about what happened next for, you know, Benito. The real government of Italy now under the command of Marshal Baldaglio and the King, both former allies of Mussolini who deposed them only after it became clear they're all going to get the rope if they didn't quickly switch sides and deliver Italy to the hands of the Allies, two for two in world wars in that category may I add.

And they talked their way out of the war. However, they didn't actually control the entire country. Rather than face another enemy to the south, Germany launched Operation Alaric or the invasion of northern and central Italy, which largely gave up without a fight because nobody in the new Italian government had any plans or passed any orders to resist the Germans in any functional way or otherwise known as normal Italian military planning. Just like, look, we killed the guy, come on in, you're probably not long for this world too, just whatever. Do we have to switch sides again? Just like opening up my closet like, ah, what uniform do I put on today? It was then that the Germans launched the rescue operation at the

hotel and freed Mussolini. Afterwards, Mussolini was flown to Germany to meet with Hitler. And the meeting is kind of funny. Mussolini is dumb, he's incompetent when it comes to military matters and governance as a whole, and he failed virtually every military operation he attempted without German help. but even he saw the writing on the wall when it came to the war as a whole. He was sick, he was beaten down, he was tired, and he told Hitler that he knew that the war was all but over and he wanted to retire. Like I'm cashing in my fascist pension

and I want to go to... where do retired fascists go? Switzerland. Argentina. No, that's Germans. Yeah. Or I don't know. I feel like at this point they probably go to like somewhere in like, I don't know, like Central America, like maybe like El Salvador. I feel like a retired Italian fascist is never more at home than he is in like Southern Switzerland.

I could see him going to, you know, especially now going to El Salvador and starting up Mussolini. Yeah, exactly Yeah, just get get his own get his own Scam coin going on from best bros Kelly. Hey look, I mean Trump did it fuck it He he got voted out of power and then he came up with Trump coin and weird shoes that he's so a Trump Bible Which is my favorite grift. All my Benitos are gone Bible, which is my favorite grift. All my Benitos are gone. Okay.

You know, the nice thing about a coin is there's no effective way to hang it upside down. It's a perfect circle at all times. Shit. After this, I'm going to have to make a Mussolini coin. All right. I'm going to put five euro on the fact that there is already a crypto named Mussolini or Benito coin out there somewhere. Yeah, I'm sure.

I'm not going to look it up. I'm just going to assume and someone will then prove me correct. And it's being hawked by someone with the most glowing eyes emoji anyone has ever had. The current prime minister of Italy. Yeah. Yeah. Now, he told Hitler he wanted to retire and he was over this whole fascist dictatorship thing and he didn't even really want to go after the people who had deposed him, which is kind of interesting until you realize, remember, what all dictators

do, right? They surround themselves with sycophants and, failing that, family members. So when those same people depose you, your family might get caught in the crosshairs. This is where Mussolini went from friend and kind of peer to Hitler. Not to mention, like, I cannot say enough how much Mussolini was an inspiration to Hitler during his rise to power. At this point, Mussolini has shifted to pretty much outright prisoner. He was all but told that no, fuck you, you're not retiring. You're going to become a puppet of a new fascist state in Italy that'd be made up of the bits

and the pieces that made up the German occupation zone that Hitler would give him. Now, Mussolini and his apologist, of which there is many, and also again not to rehash another joke, literally the current government of Italy, try to frame this differently. They say that he became the puppet of what would become known as the Republic of Salo in an attempt to curtail Nazi oppression of Italians. This is obviously and demonstrably untrue because the Nazis began the deportation of Italy's Jewish population weeks after he started warming that

bench. And I should point out here that Mussolini had no power whatsoever and he couldn't have stopped shit even if he wanted to. I'm not saying this to whitewash Mussolini. I power whatsoever and he couldn't have stopped shit even if he wanted to I'm not saying this to whitewash Mussolini I don't think that's what that does I'm just saying his the the the rationale that you you commonly hear even today is Bullshit Mussolini was literally like forced to be Hitler's Proxy he started from the top and now he's at the bottom proxy. He started from the top, now he's at the bottom. This is the only way that you survive, man, is by being Hitler's puppet, I guess. Pretty much. And even more than that, it wasn't like he's answering personally to

Adolf Hitler, which would be some amount of ranking in the fascist pecking order. He's literally answering to a local Nazi party boss boss in Lombardy. Like he's answering to just a guy so far on the Nazi totem pole. He's a regional political leader. Man's got a man's got a cow to a fucking captain. Pretty much. Yeah. It's like if the president of the United States had an answer to like some weird party boss in a, I don't know like Eastern, Oregon. They have to have to listen to the governor of It all goes back to the plantation of Rhode Island or sorry they finally changed that name, huh? Yeah

Yeah, that's one that snuck by a lot of people for a long time. Now unlike many puppet leaders, Mooselini and the people around him knew exactly what they were. Even the cabinet of the new republic was chosen, personally, by Hitler. According to the book, The Last 600 Days of Il Duce, they kind of joked and referred to their fake country as Pinocchio's Republic. I feel like I also just like having to show up for work at that point. What's the point to stay at home and do whatever the 1943 version of playing Steam is? Right. It just like, oh cool.

Can't wait to show up and like, because if Mussolini is already reporting to the deputy assistant undersecretary for Italian pasta affairs, then you're getting your orders from three steps down that fucking totem pole. So it's like, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know, boss. I got like 46 days left. I'm just going to burn some of those. As a PTO coming to me- That's when you quit a job and you try to burn all your second vacation days and and try to add up So you can quit like three months early, right? Exactly, but except he's doing it as a dictator which I don't feel like comes with like a set in stone pension plan

See I I would I'd be the guy who just keeps who still shows up to the office But I'm playing runescape in my office. So Mussolini is doing that do what what is it? They call the soft I mean, I guess the problem is is that if you don't show up to work you do end up paying mind sweeper on the clock But literally I guess Mussolini would probably be playing hearts of iron though. Oh It's probably true. That's probably true. That's the that's the fascist game. Sorry He sorry hearts of iron people pokes out from his weird office at his at his palazzo or whatever It's the guys have been playing 19 hours of Hearts of Iron. I have an idea for a country.

I'm going to cite some weird political theorists you've never fucking heard of. And then you're all going to hate me. I've developed an entirely new flag. Don't worry, this one will fix everything. Now, at this point in the Pinocchio Republic, he lived under what was effectively house arrest. He couldn't go anywhere without the SS going with him.

He only really existed to be a figurehead because Hitler still assumed that Mussolini was popular amongst Italians, but most specifically Italian fascists, which was only 50% true. Regular Italians fucking hated Mussolini at this point. And the only real loyalists left were blackshirts. I mean, like, cause like, if not for nothing else, as like an Italian, you're like, well, he fucked up so bad, the entire country has been divided into like, you know,

can't imagine that it's, you know, it's like being, you know, I don't know, a Detroit Tigers fan most seasons. That's fair. No, to be fair, I will say the Tigers never made the trains run on time. Either did Mussolini, it's common saying. I only know the Tigers for constantly losing every championship they've ever been in since they've been alive. Which is mostly like Mussolini attempting to fight a war yeah every time so The Detroit Tigers are the the the fascists of the MLB

Not not in any political way just in the fact that they never just in the form that they like to start a bunch of shit and then fold He he only existed to be the figurehead and then of course Sign whatever paperwork that was handed to him by his SS minders, but most importantly, the Nazi party leader from Lombardy. So he's like, hey dickhead, sign this paperwork. I can't even read it. It's in Italian, but I just know it came from Germany. The state effectively had no laws, no constitution, or even an economy. Everything and everything came from Germany.

For example, one of the reasons why Mussolini didn't really want to go on a bloody campaign of revenge against those who had deposed him is because his own family had taken part, namely his son-in-law, Siano, who he was a pretty big fan of. He liked him. However, Hitler is like, no, we have to kill all these people to you know for the implication You know you can't you can't allow people who cooed the government to survive and not to mention I should point out here Mussolini was not illegally cooed, which is really interesting It's not like he was ousted from power in some kind of uprising The government voted him out the Grand Council of Fascism Which is the thing that existed in Italy, said,

no sir, no more Mussolini. That's what happened. Like, he was, legal means were used to get rid of Mussolini. Getting, getting democratically like tossed out of office as an authoritarian leader is like, once again, like one of those things you can only do if you just like fuck up real fucking hard. And continuously. Yeah. So you gotta be real stupid for the fascists to be like, no, you're too, you can't do this anymore. You're too fascist. You're not fascist enough for the fascism club.

Right, I guess it's not that you don't hate people well enough, it's just you hate them stupidly. His shirt isn't black, it's been charcoal this entire time. I got it from Amsterdam! Now that like the Grand Council of Fascism took one look at it, it was like, you're not so good at the actual fascism part. You tried to reinstall the Roman Empire and got our teeth kicked in in every single country we walked in.

Not good for the whole PR thing of being like supermen and whatever. Now Hitler would not let this idea on we don't need to kill all these people who took me out, he wouldn't let that fly. So he demanded this bloody campaign of vengeance, all of them needed to be executed and then Mussolini publicly consented to these orders to do so, made it his own, and then had to clap and talk about how much of it is a champion of Italian fascism as it was when his own son-in-law swung from a rope. You know, you got to do things to save your own neck, I guess. I mean, like honestly, I mean, it's not like I'm trying to, like, I'm not trying to make Mussolini sound like anything like a pitiful character here No, nobody should feel sorry for but like just don't do it. Okay at this point like Hitler already put him in charge He's not gonna execute you you're you're there because he knows that you're important to rally Italian fascists, right?

So like just like nah, I'm good. I'm gonna sit here and I don't know Just like nah, I'm good. I'm gonna sit here and I don't know Finger paint with marinara sauce or complain about breaking pasta I mean as my friend rayos used to say though It's what stupid people do they fuck up like stupid people don't get smarter when they go to do something So it's you know It's like you know he made you know you don't get to this position in the first place by being like a competent and well-thought-out leader like you know you only get to this place by being like a Big ol fucking dummy who like you know, you only get to this place by being like a big old fucking dummy

who like, you know, can't get out of his own goddamn way. Say what you will about Mussolini, but he did once upon a time, decorate an entire front of a building with his own face, which is something that previously only super villains have done. And I should say not just pictures of his face, 3D sculptures of his face, like sticking out of a fucking building.

Angrily, too, not just like, hey, it's happy. Over his head, because it was for an election that wasn't real. Have you ever seen, like, where he used to give speeches from in Rome? Yes. A little like balcony pictures, of course, have never been to Italy. Like I went to Italy, like I went to Italy fucking years ago. And while I was walking past, the poor guy was like, oh, yeah. And there was where Mussolini used to give his speeches. And it's the most unimpressive fucking thing.

It's one of those things where you always see him giving speeches and it's always wicked zoomed in and there's a reason for it. Because it's just a balcony on a street where it's just small and on a normal city street in Rome. It's kind of narrow. It's just like, oh, okay. So you could only look really impressive. Meanwhile, Hitler was doing the big fucking Triumph of the Will, the big Nuremberg rallies and everything and whatever, but Mussolini was using Instagram influencer camera tricks to like... If he existed now...

Mussolini doing a TikToker face. For Mussolini first time listening to fascist speech. Oh yeah. You could do a Mussolini dance where all you do is just swing from your ankles for 15 seconds. I think there's a certain kind of like yoga that just has you swinging from a rope by your ankle. That's Mussolini yoga. Well, I mean, I'm just thinking that like if he existed now, he would definitely be one of those guys who's like constantly going to like a Ferrari dealership and getting his buddy to come over really quickly to like a picture of him leaning on the car to show that he

owns it and then getting chased off by the salesman because like, Oh God, he'd live in Dubai. Yeah. Yeah. Or he'd be like an Andrew Tate figure, but like wish.com Andrew Tate. Cool. He did do some trafficking. Peter Mussolini would be an incredible poster. So Mussolini's job amounted to a little more than a figurehead. He would be trotted out in front of a population of people who hated his fucking guts to deliver the occasional speech that announced those who had turned against him, namely the king, who was now safely behind allied lines. One function

that Mussolini's stupid little republic did have was amounted to a police force to try to stamp out the growing number of Italian partisans. This is largely lines. One function that Mussolini's stupid little republic did have was amounted to a police force to try to stamp out the growing number of italian partisans. This is largely known as the National Liberation Committee or CLN which is an umbrella group for many different rebel groups of many different political ideologies. This job fell to the special service of the Republican police, led by a guy named Tullio Tamburini, who despite his comical name, as he was a hardcore fascist loyalist, chosen for this role personally by Adolf Hitler. Tamburini put a man named Pietro Coch in place of what amounted to be a death squad. They stalked through the countryside hunting for

partisans but also, you know, doing Nazi shit like rounding up the Republic's Jewish population for deportation. Yeah, just being cartoonish villain shit. Despite Koch and the others technically working for the Republic's government, they actually took orders from the SS. working for the Republic's government, they actually took orders from the SS. Mussolini had no power over these police forces, but he did sign all of their paperwork and he was fully aware of what they were doing. And it's not like he would have disagreed with their methods or anything. But what he did disagree with was it was making him look bad. They're spilling all this blood in the countryside because like this this this paramilitary force is insanely brutal. And it all went back to him,

which again he would have been fine with normally because it's not like there was an incredibly violent oppression when he was actually dictator of Italy instead of fake dictator of Italy. He's just mad that he's not approving of the optics. Good luck guys. Cause I totally, I understand the necessity for, for optics, but you know, you should have thought about that before you were, you know, already brutally murdering all the Jews in your countryside. Like I can't imagine like, like Mussolini was like, no, no, we're cool.

We're cool with the Jewish population here. Oh, now it's now it's a problem. No, he's he's he's he's stepping in his own shit at this moment, stepping on his own dick. And really, it's his own fault. All of this, all of this kind of falls on me. And it's like easy messaging for Mussolini, right? To be like, whoa, whoa, whoa.

I'm not telling them to do that, even though I would if I could. Like it's like dictator purgatory. Like there's violence and oppression happening outside and I'm not even getting to lead it. And Moosilini did eventually lead something of a minor revolt against the SS and specifically these death squads. He took a few black shirts that were still loyal to him and arrested Coach, knowing that he would never be able to try him or execute him because of how powerful he was due to his SS ties. They dumped him across the border, across ally lines,

where they knew that he would be handled, and he was immediately arrested and executed a short time later. So, Mooselini did kind of switch to the allies there for a second. So again though, like I can't do this myself but I know a guy who can. I can sign some paperwork to make sure that you get death squatted somewhere else. And not to mention this guy wasn't some kind of like career SS functionary or something. He was a 26 year old career criminal, meaning that Mussolini had gone from unquestioned dictator of fascist Italy to being afraid of the political cloud of a 26 year old. Yeah, look, I've been on Twitter.

And I've been yelled at by a Marxist. I get it. He had to use the allies to do his dirty work so Hitler wouldn't get mad at him. Because again, it's not like if he had some of his black shirts ventilate this dude's skull, Hitler would have fired him. But he just didn't want to make Hitler yell at him again. I, yeah, you know, like I don't want to deal with the paperwork. I don't want to deal with the fallout from this. Why don't I just give you to the allies and let you get a 45 in your head instead of a

762? That makes sense to me. Also, a small side note here, Tom Barini, the guy that's in charge of all of this, was so corrupt that even the SS fired him and then sent him to Dachau. You get sent to your own fucking death camp. It actually happens a few times throughout the Nazi regime. There was a concentration camp guard, so it's often said that this guy was arrested for being too brutal, which is not the case. He's a concentration camp commandant,

and he was arrested and sent to a concentration camp himself because of embezzlement. So like this happens from time to time. Yeah. Sending Al Capone to Doc Al for death. Exactly. What do you mean I'm being sent to a concentration camp for stealing? What do you think we're here for? Don't fuck with the bag. You can fuck with this bag, but you can't fuck with that bag.

You fucked with the wrong bag. I mean, all of that said, however, if we started sending white collar criminals to the super max facilities, I feel like we would uh, I don't know probably you know SEC would finally have some teeth Yeah, it's there's sending white white-collar criminals to like was that adx Florence like yeah exactly welcome to the super max your cellmate is So cars sarnayev enjoy bitch look I've got I've got the perfect idea for Guantanamo We just turned it into a US Postal Service black-site idea for Guantanamo, we just turned it into a US Postal Service black site. You get rolled

up by a mailman and bundled up to Cuba. You have those sensory deprivation goggles and earmuffs on. Like, what am I here for? What's going on? You didn't put stamps on that fucking letter, Jeff. Supposed to be two stamps when it's over one pound, Jeff. It's like, oh, we saw you put that fucking package in the mailbox and it weighed 17 ounces, not 16, you motherfucker. Mussolini, unable to do much of anything else,

spent the majority of his time, locked in his own home under SS guard, working on his memoirs. He was also, his only constant companion was his mistress, Clara Ptetsi. I also like, I love that all these guys are like at the I mean, do you think that they were actually working their memoirs? Like is there? Yeah, they got published.

Oh really? Okay. Okay. You guys want to take a wild guess of what the name of the publisher was that published Moose Ladies? The Fascist Daily. Publisher Primavera. was that published Bruce Lee's force? The fascist daily publisher Primavera

De Capo Press and it was an American publishing company that they would eventually be bought by the Hatchet Group, the same publisher who would eventually put out convicted war criminal Clinton or Lawrence's memoir. So there you go.

That's something you know now. So yeah, a place called the De Capo Press published Mussolini's memoirs and they made a lot of money off of it. I feel like I would respect it more if he was just like, Yeah, I don't know. I'm going to work on my memoirs. And he's just like, drinking copious amounts of red wine and just hanging out waiting for the end. Because it's almost... I'm working on my memoirs. I was doing his mainlining red wine and turning his palazzo

into a goon cave. Right. I feel like that would almost be more respectable than actually... Your entire fascist regime is falling down around you. Every morning you wake up and sign a bunch of death warrants. And then you're like, ah, okay, I better go and sit for an hour in front of the 1945 version of a blinking cursor and just wait for inspiration to strike for me to talk about all the successes that... I mean, it'd be like writing a how to succeed in business book as like Enron is crashing down around you or like, how to win friends and influence people

by the Lehman Brothers. Like this is like not like a, come the fuck on guys. My whole country's on fire, but I would tend to this, but I really have to tighten up chapter two. Yeah, it's like I've just been, I've been using too many, too much passive language language I really need to fix that my editors really been on me this week. Mussolini's editor really on his ass about due dates. Mussolini's editors like when am I getting book two though? You're like

Benito we like the idea but how do you think about expanding into a trilogy? We feel like we might be able to get a Netflix deal. His writer's advance is just another row of medals. We're going to pay you in fistfuls of linguine. Now, during this time period, Mussolini had turned into a pit of depression and self-pity, which to me is just delightful. I have a string of quotes here from depressed Benito Mussolini. And it's incredible. So you're speaking to one German and said, quote, death has become a friend who no longer

frightens me. Death is a gift from God for those who have suffered too much. Oh, poor Benito. Much like DJ Khaled suffering from success. Yeah, he's posting sad song lyrics from My Chemical Romance on MySpace. Yeah, Benito Mussolini's current status sugar were going down swinging. Just putting out press releases throughout the course of the day with various different song lyrics Facebook mood is quixotic because he doesn't know what it means, but it's got an accident so it sounds cool

Boosalini doing the up angled emo camera shot He's bald, but he still has bangs over one eye forcing his PAO to overexpose all his photos forcing his PAO to overexpose all of his photos. Boost the light exposure on that. Get more light on me. I need to be blown out. Seriously, I find great joy in Mussolini's depression era. So much so, here's several more quotes from Sad Bonito. Quote, seven years ago, I was an interesting person.

Now, I'm a corpse. These are nine inch nails lyrics. And he's... As Bonito Mussolini once said I want to feel you from the inside Quote I'm finished my star has fallen I work and I try yet I know it is all but a farce I await the end of the tragedy and strangely detached from everything I do not feel any more of like that of an actor I feel like I am the last of spectators boy

Were you wrong? There's gonna be so many spectators soon Sad Mussolini sitting in like with a razor blade cutting his arms. Just like this is the only way I feel I feel like a fascist dictator anymore Honestly, sad Mussolini is sustaining to me. It's wonderful. Benito, where do you even get those American spirits? Mussolini smoking club cigarettes.

Hanging out with a bunch of weird goth kids and drinking MD 2020, yeah. We've been there. Yeah, actually, that's what, maybe a goth girlfriend would have saved us. Look, I can tell you from first- through Italy, ambushing Nazis, Italian Fascists and elements of the royalist government as Italy collapsed into dual invasions and a civil war as the war stretched on into 1945.

Mussolini and his government were rapidly being moved around from place to place as partisan attacks became more and more common. Then we get to the morning of April 27th, 1945. Mussolini was a part of a 40-car convoy made up of a few Italian loyalists and a lot of men from the SS, at least 200 people in total. Its goal was to get Mussolini across the Swiss border, because I was right, at which point he would run to Spain because he thought Franco owed him one for backing him

during the Spanish Civil War. Franco almost certainly was not going to let him chill there because remember Franco is very detached for World War II because he was like, that shit looks dumb. I want to stay in power Look you guys can have France, but don't don't come over here if you want to if you want to sunbathe here That's fine, but don't come fascist here. Yeah fast forward decades. You all can own overpriced Properties in the south of British tourists and the whole world can come together to be complete scumbags

Now this is despite the fact that Hitler rejected this plan outright demanding that Mussolini and the rest of his fascists go to Germany instead for refuge. But by this point, Mussolini fucking hated Germany for humiliating him. And if he went there, Hitler would almost certainly put him right back under whatever weird version of house arrest he was already in. I was also going to say it's like leaping out of my burning building and then running into a building that is burning only slightly less than the one I just left. Exactly.

Yeah. Don't worry. You'll be safe here. Only the third floor is on fire. We're pretty sure this first and second floor will be fine. Those ones are still good. You'll be fine. As the convoy raced down the road around Lake Como, it ran into a roadblock made up of rocks and tree branches and completely felled trees and promptly came under fire from Italian partisans. The convoy was struck and eventually the German in command of it tossed up a white flag. Now, this was pretty common for Germans being attacked by Italian partisans. It wasn't because he was surrendering, but rather he wanted to talk. That's because a lot of Italian partisans. It wasn't because he was surrendering, but rather he wanted to talk. That's because a lot of Italian partisans

and many anti-fascist partisans within that larger umbrella group knew that they were just practical. They knew the Allied advance and the Allied war effort would be the ones to sweep the Germans out of Italy. And they were more concerned with fighting other Italian fascists, for example, because that's who they're gonna be fighting over

for control of the country afterwards, right? So when the German officer walked over and talked to the partisan in command, a man who went by the absolute sick nickname of Count Pedro, they began to negotiate. Pedro would have been more than happy to wipe out the convoy if he could, but his band of partisans numbered only about a dozen, with mostly rifles.

They knew the Germans, numbering again around 200, would be able to fight them off and possibly kill them in an ongoing fight, but he also knew the Germans didn't know that. For all the German officers knew here, there could have been hundreds of partisans hidden around him in the mountains. So Pedro decided to bluff. He said that he couldn't give the Germans free passage, only his division commander could, who's stationed at the nearby town of Dongo could. Solid names Italy, well done. But he would be more than willing to take him there, because this was not a ruse. You gotta take him to Dongo. Take him to Dongo town. I watched a movie like that once on the internet. I only need I don't need to watch the whole movie. Only a 30 second clip does it.

You get the whole story, you know, you get the buildup, you get the conclusion. Everybody's satisfied. Now this wasn't a bluff. Really? Like they were fine letting the Germans go, but he wanted the Italians with him, even though, mind you, he had no idea that Benito Mussolini was in that convoy. But I mean, I feel like you have to have some idea that there's got to be someone important because it's like what? You said like a 40 car convoy. That's not just like some dipshit

local mayor or something, right? It's got to be like- It could have been an inkling, but he had no idea that he was about to walk into the ultimate Victor's like trophy here in the, in the form of a very depressed former fascist dictator. He just walks out. Yeah. Like wearing like, you know, like black stretch jeans, like, you know-

He went to the 1945 version that existed Italy of hot topic he's wearing nothing but invaders in clothing he steps out his zoom is playing his greatest emo hits of 2002 and I was a young dictator took me into the city to see a marching band now he was hoping to just get the Italians handed over and the Germans could fuck off because when the first thing the Germans did is like hey we're leaving Italy y'all can have it we're leaving which was not a lie and the German officer did know this is certain death for all the Italian blackshirts with us.

I don't really care about that. Um, fuck him. Now his only orders were to keep Mussolini safe. Not all these other assholes Mussolini had brought with him. So the officer agreed to the partisans terms. Then ran back over to the convoy and told Mussolini, you need to change into a German uniform immediately. And he did. Then the partisans forced the Germans to take the roadblocks out of the way that they had

put in place, a process that took him two hours. Which is not only getting punked by the partisans, now you have to pick up their roadblocks. Also were any of the Italian fascists, any of them armed? Because I feel like that's kind of like an, like that's an awkward process. Like, uh, hey Giuseppe, can you, uh, can you just, just hand me your service weapon real quick? Let me see that rifle, looks a little bit funny, but doing it like 40 times. Yeah, like, just say, you know, it's cool.

Like, don't worry about it. Yeah, no, it's uh. It's really easy. So the German officer walked, is like gathered all the Italians together, held up a stick of pasta and just snapped it in half. And they all just like threw their hands a bit hey yo and then as they're doing that they took the rifles damn it Luigi it happened again every time this fucking easy fuck it we're switching back to the Allies so the the Germans

took about two hours to move all the roadblocks. The Italian blackshirts were disarmed and handed over to the Italian partisans. And then the German convoy slowly pulled away towards Dongo, a name I love saying. And then the partisans then descended onto the Italian fascists in exactly the same way you thought they would. Many of them were immediately killed. Other others were drugged back towards Dongo to be killed later on. Not a lot of survivors in this situation.

I shed no tears. The officer probably we love more than dead Nazis on the show. The officer probably assumed he wouldn't go through any kind of vetting process once he got to the Italian partisan commander. Like they would just be like, are where are you going? Oh, we're going to the Swiss border. Like we're leaving Italy. And they'd assume that would work. And especially when he told them again, we are leaving Italy. Here's our orders telling us to leave Italy. I'm not lying to you. However, he was horrified to discover that once they got to Dongo, partisans began investigating every single man left

in the convoy and checking their paperwork and photos to make sure they matched. Oh, about to get fucked by biometrics. He stood in silence as the partisans eventually got to the car holding Mussolini, who was doing his best to hide his face by kind of like folding over himself with like his arms under him. And like the German officer, like, ah, he's just a soldier who got way too drunk and he's sleeping it off. But that wouldn't work. Partisan Urbano Lazaro walked over and picked his head up like, hey,

I need to check the paperwork immediately recognizes Benito Mussolini and greeted him sarcastically with good morning, your excellency. Mussolini and greeted him sarcastically with, Good morning, your excellency. Lazzaro informed Mussolini that he was being arrested and it would be perfectly safe as long as he didn't resist, which of course he didn't. And Lazzaro didn't think he would. He commented on Mussolini's demeanor and attitude as, Quote, The dictator's spirit was dead.

He was no longer of the living. His face was like wax and his stare was glassy, but somehow blind. I read utter exhaustion, but not fear. Mussolini seemed completely lacking in will, spiritually dead. I mean, that's just me on like any given Friday morning at this point.

Yeah. They brought his mistress, Clara, with him as a courtesy. This would turn out to be not so much of a courtesy in a little bit. Yeah, I feel, yeah, with him as a courtesy. This would turn out to be not so much of a courtesy in a little bit. Yeah, I feel, yeah, it didn't really, didn't really end up for, well for her and like the richness of time there. He went quietly into the town's hall as word slowly began to spread that Benito Mussolini had been arrested and soon crowds of people gathered, cheering and clapping.

And this is where things get kind of interesting. When the CLN commanders in Dongo radioed their superiors and told them that, yo, we arrested Mussolini, it started an argument. Some factions of the group wanted to hand Mussolini over to the Allies, while others said, yo, no, fuck that. He needs to face Italian justice, which I assume is being stabbed with dry spaghetti noodles repeatedly until he dies. They just turn you into gravy.

They just put you in a big pot and boil you. Boil you down into bolognese. Yeah, they pull out a giant pyrex and put you into a lasagna of some kind. The death is in layers. You'll love it. Get a little cotta cheese. The CLN was an alliance, an umbrella organization made up of several different factions. They weren't exactly geared towards quick and decisive decision-making all while There's constant fighting going on all around dongo between pro and anti-fascist

Between Nazis and fat between Nazis and the anti-fascist between allies and the Nazis There's like four different kinds of fighting happening there and the commander decided just like the four kinds of different kinds of cheese in there. And the commander decided- Just like the four kinds of cheese in my lasagna. Exactly. Yeah. The commander decided it was unsafe to keep Mussolini in town for fear of fascists rescuing him yet again, because remember that had already happened.

Or even radical factions in the CLN, namely the communists, decided to kill that fucker and call it a day. So they're like, we gotta get him out of here. So they moved him from place to place, changing his disguise multiple times, all while various different battles raged around him from no less than four different sides. Eventually they bailed out of their cars and began hiking through the woods, all while it was pissing down rain.

Their hike was slowed down significantly by Clara, because despite the partisans changing Mussolini multiple times, they had left her wearing high heels and a fur coat on a multi-mile uphill hike. Jesus. Give that poor woman some boots. Also, I love the idea like we must disguise Mussolini and completely forget that she's like traipsing through the woods, like dressed to the fucking nines. Like, that's fine. It's fine. I'm choosing to believe that this is the inspiration for that like like Woods episode of the Sopranos.

I've still never watched the Sopranos. Oh really? I'm sure somebody out there found that humorous. Finally they made it to a farmhouse and dumped him inside while the CLN continued their debate about what to do with Mussolini They decided at least in the short term that he should be brought to Milan One group that wasn't debating shit was the communists who insisted fuck a trial We know he's guilty and he should be killed right just ventilate that guy man It's not a hard decision communist party leader Palmiro Tagliatti Managed to convince the rest of the CLN leadership that, you know what,

you're right, Mussolini should be brought to Milan and my men will bring him to Milan. And the CLN's like, yep, sure, sounds fine. In Tagliatti's defense, he did bring him to Milan. We'll get there. So they sent a man named Walter Anduzio and Aldo Lamparedi to make sure Mussolini was transferred to Milan, eventually. Were these dudes a lawyer? Like, oh yeah, we'll get him there.

Like, yeah, you know, don't ask how, don't ask him what condition, don't ask, you know. Togliatti's like, you just said I had to bring him to Milan. You didn't say it, and you still need to be fucking alive. Yeah, I didn't sign any paperwork here. However, when the two men got to where Pedro was holding Mussolini, Pedro would not hand him over, correctly assuming that those two guys were going to kill Mussolini rather than

transport him alive to Milan. Just cartoonishly, like, sharpening knives, like cleaning their weapons, like waiting for, like, hey, just hand him over, yeah, no, I'm justening knives, cleaning their weapons, waiting for it. Like, hey, just hand them over. Yeah, no, I'm just going to check the action on this rifle real quick. You know Lamporetty's eating an apple with a knife? Like, nah, we're totally going to bring him to Milan. It's cool.

Just actively tying a deuce in front of him, waiting. Like, oh, yeah, it's a hobby. It's like knitting. We need your neck measurements for a shirt. We're going to make you the fight. You are going to Milan after all. Yeah. Yeah, we're making you a net tie that you're going to. How tall would you say you are?

You know, just curious, you know, just you weigh just asking questions. Shoe size unimportant. Fine. This devolves into a full on screaming match. And finally, Anduzio shouted quote, I've come to shoot them, fine! And then Pedro was reminded that Anduzio and Lamparedi both outranked him within the CLN. And this is apparently the only thing Pedro needed to know, like yeah that's true you do outrank me, take him take him fuck it yeah man go

ahead captain like who I know when you when you're the lowly specialist and he just don't you just want to go home for the rest of the day it's like here's this captain is like look you give him to me and you can knock off at three o'clock all he gotta do is pull rank and he's done well it was like then Pedro can be like who's I to say no right I can't legally I can't. Legally, I can't. This was a direct order. So, you know. Mussolini and Clara were sitting in a nearby cabin when Anduzio burst in and told him he was freeing them because he needed to get them into a car

without them panicking. And two heavily armed men pushing him into a car and any other kind of contacts would have made Mussolini freak out. So he busts in, he's like, I'm here to save you. And remember, Mussolini's already been rescued once, so he's probably like, fuck yeah, it's happening again. So him and Clara rush to this waiting car and they speed off, which must have been very hard

because if you've ever seen Italian cars, Mussolini must have been sitting on the fucking roof of that bitch. Just getting on the back of a Vespa. Also like speeding off in the terms of like a 1940s car at this point is like I feel like that's you know. A 1940s Fiat can probably only go about five miles an hour. Like ambitious. Right are they if they're on it if they're on top of a mountain maybe they can speed off just through grace of gravity. They flinstone that bitch to the shooting point. They only went a mile down the road to a place called the Via Belmonte, a just through grace of gravity. They flinstone that bitch to the shooting point. They only went a mile down the road to a place called the Via Belmonte, a large house on Lake Como, which happened to be surrounded by a large brick wall.

Anduzio convinced the two of them to wait next to the wall while they got the gates unlocked. But then, you know, perhaps you should face it. Then nerves started to, you know, come on, but fuck you, this guy. You know, so like he completely aband but fuck you, this guy, you know, so like he completely abandons any kind of pretense and loudly says, quote, by the general headquarters of the corporal, Vanatele, Della Liberta, I am here to charge and render justice for the Italian people.

Then Anduzio pulled the trigger on the submachine gun he was carrying and it jammed. Fucking Italian justice. Then he tried to fix it, pulling rapidly at the charging handle to clear the jam. He raised it again at Mussolini, who was literally not budged or said a word at this point, and it jammed again. At this point, Mussolini's like, fuck man, give it to me, I'll kill him, I'll kill myself. He screamed in anger, I assume because what a fucking letdown that had to be in awesome

moments of partisan history, right? Like you got the dictator against the wall, you have a shitty like, Beretta-made submachine gun jamming once again. Even had a quippy one-liner and everything. Finally he snatched a gun from another partisan and shot Mussolini's mistress, leaving Mussolini just standing there waiting for his turn. Mussolini's last words were, shoot me in the chest. So he did.

The next burst finally fired and cut him down. Hey! And around 420 PM. Nice. He was thoroughly blazed on the third attempt. Shot 69 times at 420pm. Then they grabbed a few of their fascist prisoners that were also taken from that convoy, gunned them down too, leaving them in a pile.

Then Anduzio and Lamparedi loaded Mussolini, Clara, and the other dead fascists into the back of a truck and drove them to Milan as promised, dumping them in the town square on April 29th. It was there that the people boiled over with their hatred of the asshole. This is from the last 600 days of Il Duce. Quote, One woman produced a revolver and fired five shots into Mussolini's head to quote, avenge my five dead sons. Another woman tore off a strip from his shirt, set it on fire, and threw it at his face.

Under repeated blows, Mussolini's skull was cracked and one of his eyes popped out of its socket. One woman squatted down, raised her skirt, and urinated on his face. Others covered his face and spit. People threw pieces of black bread at the bodies. One man tried to put a dead mouse in Mussolini's mouth, saying, quote, make a speech now, make a speech. One woman brought a whip and beat Mussolini's corpse with it. One person just came in like,

don't worry, I'm full of piss, I got this. I'm perving at the edges over here. Not just like, not just like momentary, like, you know, rage either, but like, now I'm going to go home, get a prop and I'm'm gonna come back and go eat this fucking ass That's with Mousseline's corpse. Yeah, like I'm gonna go get an oversized like, you know bowling ball pin and just like, you know pulls out a handsaw with a couple of googly's eyes on it's like I'm gonna get him with my Cut to leg I've been drinking water all day to make this piss take. I have been drinking water every day. One guy trying to spit until his mouth goes dry like, damn it, I should have known I drank

I should have drank more water than wine today. Fuck. Good thing I brought this dead mouse. Then the bodies are strung upside down from a nearby girder and displayed for everybody to see, but not before someone pinned Moosley's mistress dress around her ankles so to not show her ass. So they had, you know, some courtesy in the end, you know, other than the execution part. Just like, you know, like, you know, pissing, beating, shooting, like, you know, otherwise defacing the corpse and like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, though,

catch your ass. Just let, just let that be a reminder, even in death nobody wants to see that ass. Well that's the American FCC for you. All the violence is perfectly fine, but as soon as you see a butt crack we got to slap some ratings on that one. And that's where the story ends, kind of. Mussolini's corpse had one hell of a journey. Eventually it was cut down, mangled some more, and buried in a Milanese cemetery before it could stay there for a year and then a bunch of fascists dug it up and stole it. They found it hidden in a monastery, recovered by the government and buried in a different monastery before fascists tried to steal it

again. The body was then eventually given to Mussolini's family and then buried in his hometown. Is it still there? I assume so, yeah. So we still have a place we can go piss. It's a free open-air bathroom in the Italian countryside. In closing, Anduzio was later asked how he felt about shooting Mussolini and he had as good of an answer as one possibly could.

Quote, I did not have the impression I was shooting a man, but an inferior beast. Eventually though, let's not pretend that you weren't keeping your fucking weapon clean for this moment. Like we got old lady over here ready to piss on somebody's face at any drop of a hat, but you get a little crud inside of your Beretta and now you got to go snatch somebody else's. It's fair it's a Beretta if you look at it too hard that bitch will jam. That had to be the biggest letdown. I mean, I wonder if Mussolini got two for flinching, you know, when you hear the metallic clack of a jammed submachine gun, it goes, oh, oh, and then one of the Parsons have to walk over and punch him twice before they go back to the firing squad, you know?

So that is the event, is the death of Mussolini. I hope that is as joyful for everybody else as it was for me. That was a good one. Joe, thanks for making history fun. I try. Shout out to the woman who pissed on his face. I mean, credit where credit's due. I am but a messenger. As somebody who homeschools, I look forward to my daughter getting to a certain age where history is just, here, your history lesson is getting to a certain age where history is just here. Your history lesson is listen to an hour of lines led by donkeys.

Joe Kasabian's like magic school tank. Come on, kid. It's a it's a yeah, it shrinks down and goes inside of Hitler's like the hole inside of Hitler's skull. Hitler's like the hole inside of Hitler's skull It shrinks down into the insides of any soldier in the 1800s and is promptly pushed out by like dysentery diarrhea Come on the magic school tank and get depleted uranium poison Fellas that is a podcast but we do a thing on this show called questions from the Legion if you'd like to ask us a question from Legion we have an ongoing threat on our discord You can add something to you can send us a message on patreon or you can I don't know do something horrific have it end up in Missouri and get it to Francis and we'll answer it on air

Hey, man, we don't we've never had any dead fascist swinging from the how with that attitude I don't know why it's good. Yeah, I know we could do better I wouldn't hell of a block and tackle system to get them to the top of the arch to be honest 630 feet tall baby Today's question is what is your most boomer take? I believe in the abolition of prisons except for people who cannot follow basic traffic rules in the abolition of prisons, except for people who cannot follow basic traffic rules. If you, if you stop it, if you like are coming up to like, we're both coming up to a stop sign and it's obvious that I'm going to get there

first, but you continue to do that like creep over the line and never actually stop and freak me out because I think that you're going to take off jail jail for 10 years straight to prison. Yeah. Straight right to prison. Stop where you're supposed to stop. if you cannot figure out a roundabout I give you one off one one chance one chance to not fuck up to fuck up a roundabout if you fuck it up twice Ten years I counter your boomer opinion with an opinion of a boomer And that is my own mother who?

Like they put one whole traffic circle in her general vicinity in Michigan And she constantly complains about it. She's like, this goddamn European shit makes no sense. I don't know what my most boomer take is. I don't know. I mean, it probably would be traffic related because I feel like that just in general as an American, that's where, unless you're actually moving your ass, stay in the right lane,

that always drives me the fuck up the wall. Don't ride your bicycle or your fucking scooter. All that shit is fucking dumb. Don't ride on the fucking sidewalk. Don't ride up behind me like when I'm walking my dog, because it freaks my fucking dog out, and then he's going to try to jump at you. And that's going to be your fault when he knocks you off

the goddamn scooter. May I introduce you to a revolutionary concept of a bike lane. Yeah, no, we don't have those. Actually, that is my other boomer opinion about that is then, my subsidiary boomer opinion is that most bike lanes are fucking stupid just because of the way that we build them here in America, where it's like-

I'll agree with that. We made it harder to park. All our mass transit has fallen apart, but also we have a bike lane that no one's going to fucking use because like, I don't know, it's December in Boston and no one's riding a fucking bicycle. Or it's completely- You get one that gets a giant bicycle instead of wheels that just snow shoes. Yeah. Completely unprotected from the traffic in every way, shape and form. Because I've got bike lanes around me and fuck, I would not ride a bike in my neighborhood.

It's actually funny because I remember being in Seattle maybe two or three years ago and it was around the holidays and so it had snowed and they have a bunch of protected bike lanes. I'm sure you've seen, Joe, around downtown. Yeah. But it doesn't snow that often in the Pacific Northwest. So they had never made a provision to have any sort of device or public service to plow or dig out the bike lanes. So they just turned into one solid sheet of ice because they were all protected so they couldn't use a normal plow. And so it was just like, you just saw everyone try to ride through and then eat shit because it was just solid plate ice after a while.

Nice. I'm trying to think of what my most boomer opinion would be. My traffic opinions are falling by the wayside because I have not driven a car with any consistency in like two years. Yeah. I'm perfectly fine with getting rid of traffic completely in America and not having to deal with any of it. Like, I'm not, I, yeah, I'm, I, I'm just a, a boomer for this in that this is the way that the world works and you should, uh, at least follow the rules. But if we just mass trains that did everything and gave everybody a bike and he got rid of cars, cool. Then, then we can finally abolish prisons. But until then, if you are-

Everybody else in prison needs to be let go and only traffic violations make you go to prison. Actually, I have a follow-up one too, just because I'm flying soon. You need to be able to prove that you can lift your own carry-on bag over your head in order to bring it on a plane. Otherwise, you'd have to check that shit. That is what the check baggage is there for. Right. Exactly. If I had a bag that was so heavy, I could not lift it. The last thing I'd want to do is drag

it through a fucking airport and put it on a plane. And look, I fucking hate the airlines too, but I don't know. If you're fucking 80 years old and you are taking a vacation to Florida or whatever else, and you have packed all of your clothing for your vacation into your bag so it is 70 pounds that you cannot lift over your head, just check that shit. You probably have $20. I will pay for you. Or stop flying Spirit. Fly it Southwest. You get flying Spirit, fly it Southwest.

You know, you can, you get check bags for free on Southwest. My, my, okay, I have my boomer opinion and it's related to my current reality of public transportation. If you're so fucking loud on public transportation that someone can hear you three cars down, shut the fuck up. Oh yeah, you know what, you know what,

people in public talking on their phones, on speaker phone, where they're like holding it. That is always the connection. It's always someone, like look, everybody has a pair of headphones. Use a pair of headphones. Don't be a dick. Or use it as a phone. Or use it as a phone.

There's a, yeah. But like put it up to your head. I don't understand what the difference is between, it's in front of my face, like I'm gonna take a bite out of it, or it's up to my head. There's two realities to my boomer opinion. Is this talking on speakerphone, which does drive me insane. But what I've noticed is more common than public transit, at least

here is not people talking on speakerphone, but loudly watching YouTube or TikTok videos. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. How that happened on a plane recently too. And that was just like, you're loudly watching a TV show or like a... Not even like a quiet movie. It's not like you're loudly watching a TV show or like a, not even like a quiet movie, like it's not like you're watching like a little like Wes Anderson film, but you're like watching like fucking John Wick 4 at top volume on your phone directly behind me.

It's like, you fucking motherfucker. Like- Yeah, at least switch with me so I can watch it over your shoulder. Yeah, at least come and sit in comfortably close so I can watch your weird fucking TikToks with you as I sit on the train, trapped in this metal tube with you for the next 30 minutes.

And that is a podcast. Francis, you have a podcast, plug that podcast. Yeah, what a hell of a way to die. It's military, it's dad chat, it's a little bit of a lot of different things. I often have the two of you on recently, I don't know when this show's coming out, but we're going to be. We watch movies together and we let people on my Patreon vote for them.

So if you come over to my Patreon, not only will you get seven years of bonus content, but you get to vote on things and everybody loves to vote. And I promise as a patron of this podcast, you'll never have to vote on anything due to the glorious leadership of the central committee of the lines led by donkeys. Yeah, I run a nice tight democracy and Joe has a iron-fisted totalitarian regime. I prefer to call it a dictatorship of the proletariat, thank you. Proletariat because it's me and I'm broke. Everybody, thank you so much for listening to this episode. Thank you so much for supporting the show.

You make everything we do here possible. And until next time, don't, I was going to end this in a way that's almost certainly illegal. So until next time.