Title: Does the CIA Control American Presidents and Media?
Show: Fair Observer
Date: 2026-01-01
URL: https://youtu.be/M0dum00g0fs
Duration: 40:00

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[00:00] But there, but there really is such a thing as a deep state. [music] I say this all the time. You don't have to call it a deep state if you don't like that term. Look at Donald Trump. I I believed when Donald Trump was first elected in 2016 that he was going to really turn things around at the CIA. CIA operational leaders and and NSC attorneys come up with a list of people to kill that week, send the teams out around the world, kill their targets, and then come back for meeting the next

[00:30] Tuesday. It was normalized under Obama. And now we're in a we're at a point again where the CIA post-9/11 is really little more than a than a paramilitary organization traveling around the world to kill people. Welcome to a new edition of FO Talks. I'm Peter Isaacson, Fairer C's Chief Strategy Officer. I'm joined by former

[01:02] CIA analyst and operative John Kiriakou. There's really no need to introduce him, but he was he did achieve the highest level of fame thanks to being I think the most famous and most admirable whistleblower we've had. Um and it's just a pleasure to be with you, John. Thank you for having me, Peter. So I I have a lot of specific questions

[01:36] and I know you're a fantastic storyteller, so you have free reign to to tell us all these fascinating things that keep people interested, but I'd like to focus on an overarching theme, which is which I can formulate in the frame in the in the framework of a question. And I'll say it like this. Are intelligence services, considering the way they work today, compatible with democracy?

[02:09] In many respects, no. In many respects, they're not. And I'll give you one example that to me is an obvious example right here at home. Uh a couple of years ago, a journalist for Bloomberg, Jason Leopold, filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the CIA. Jason has a reputation. Uh in fact, the the Bush era Pentagon spokesman called him a FOIA terrorist because he's filed more

[02:41] Freedom of Information Act requests than any other person in the world. He broke this the Hillary Clinton email scandal through a FOIA request to the State Department. But in any event, a couple of years ago, he filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the CIA asking for all communication between the CIA's Office of Public Affairs and American journalists. And he only did it because he was bored and he wasn't working on anything at that moment.

[03:12] What he received uh just in my mind was explosive. He received thousands of pages of emails between journalists and the CIA's Office of Public Affairs, but there were a couple that were particularly important. Um he found that Ken Dilanian, the Chief National Security Correspondent for NBC News, formerly of the New York Times, I'm sorry, of the Los Angeles Times, was

[03:43] sending his articles to the CIA for clearance before sending them to his own editors and then allowing the CIA to take parts out, add information to the piece, not at all compatible with a functioning democracy. Another thing that he found was a young, hungry [snorts] investigative journalist was onto a story, emailed the story to the CIA to

[04:13] ask for comment, and the CIA responded that so help us if you publish this story, you will never be invited to the Christmas party again, and we will never give you any off-the-record or background information. And so he killed his own story to appease the CIA. What Whatever happened to investigative journalism? Now, people just take a CIA press release or they take a a CIA backgrounder, digest it, put their name

[04:46] on it, and publish it, and that's supposed to be news. Well, CIA propaganda in the public domain is not compatible with democracy. The situation in the UK is even worse because in the UK, there are real criminal penalties even for journalists. Not for even just revealing classified information, but but for just expressing an opinion that is at odds with the government's uh position

[05:17] on issues. Yeah, so I I think you're putting more blame on the media than say the CIA. So it's not the CIA that's seeking that interference the way you're explaining it. But it's the media that are >> Oh, no. falling into the trap. No, no. It's the nature of the CIA to seek that interference, but it's the duty of the media to stand up. And they're not standing up. They're they're just collapsing at the at the feet of

[05:49] the CIA. I I can tell you it's even worse here in France where I live. You talk about the UK. Uh in France, I don't know if it's the DGSE or I don't know who's doing it in France, but the government have managed to really have a stranglehold over the media. We can't get any news that's divergent even slightly from the official line. Uh I don't know if you've noticed

[06:20] that or if you have any experience of France, but Europe is in a pretty sad state today as far as uh freedom of information or freedom to react to well, to access real information and to and to spread it through the the media. It's just not there. But let me let me pick up on something I a quote of yours which I think it was from a conversation you were you had at one time with Andrew Bustamante.

[06:52] Uh where and I'm going to take issue with it. You said >> Okay. Um you said presidents uh I think your quote was the president has the CIA in his back pocket. And I would submit that my understanding of history in let's say the last 60 years or so, if not longer, uh is that sometimes

[07:22] this the CIA has the president in the back in their back pocket. So we we know that one CIA had one president in the backseat of a convertible. Uh so is that true? I mean, what would you defend your own statement that the CIA has the [laughter] president in the back I think you've taken it slightly out of context. So sure, there there are some presidents that

[07:53] that serve at the pleasure of the CIA. There are some presidents that command the CIA. It depends on the president. Uh but there are there certainly have been presidents who have actively led the CIA. While at the same time, there are certainly periods in history where the CIA led the president around by the nose. George H.W. Bush, having been a former CIA

[08:24] director, even if only for 11 months, uh had a an ongoing love affair with the CIA. He would come to the CIA just to walk the halls, and people would spontaneously break into break into applause. And then people would say, "Oh, President Bush is walking the halls." And everybody everybody would run out and just applaud. Lyndon Johnson had a very close relationship with the CIA as well, which I think should surprise no one. Richard Nixon did as well, and it's one of the

[08:56] things that brought down his presidency. Other presidents have not. Other presidents have been led by the CIA. Um and some presidents have been ignored by the CIA. But yeah, I think it varies from administration to administration. I I don't think I was making a blanket statement when I said that. >> Yeah, no. No, but it's just for someone like me who who tried to understand um various things that happened, dramatic things that happened, it seemed

[09:28] that it's not the president who's giving the orders or has even the capacity to give the orders. That after all after after the the Kennedy assassination, what, a month later, less than a month later, Truman, who created the CIA, uh complained in an op-ed that the CIA was not doing what? It was not at the service of the president. It was on its own. Uh implying that the CIA what did have a

[10:00] hand in in the Kennedy assassination. So, if a president uh, who if the very president who created the institution complains that it's not responding to the needs of the president, we shouldn't we take that seriously? Yeah, we should take that seriously. Uh, President Truman uh, is a is a good example. Uh, President Truman signed into law the National Security

[10:30] Act of 1947, which created the CIA. Um, and the National Security Council. Uh, the CIA almost immediately spun out of his control. After Kennedy was assassinated, just a day or two after Kennedy was assassinated, um, Truman wrote an op-ed that appeared in the morning edition of the Washington Post saying that he was a damn fool for signing that bill into law. Yeah.

[11:00] That op-ed did not appear in the afternoon edition of the Washington Post because the CIA demanded that the Washington Post remove it. Which it did. And this is Allen Dulles going to Truman's home and try to talk him out of pursuing it? Oh, yes. Dulles was a very dark figure in American history. Well, both Dulles brothers were dark figures in American history. >> know.

[11:31] And um, and both Truman and Eisenhower knew it. They saw what happened to Kennedy. They believed that the CIA was somehow involved. Uh, and I'll tell you a story that Bobby Kennedy Jr. told me that has stuck in my mind for a long time. Um, he said that he was just a young boy uh, 11 or 12 years old when his uncle was assassinated in Dallas. He said that day his mother went to his school in McLean, Virginia to pick him up early because of what had happened.

[12:02] When they pulled back into the driveway of the family home uh, in McLean, Hickory Hill it was called, his father was standing in the driveway with uh, John McCone, who was the CIA director at the time. The Kennedys and the McCones were very, very close and John McCone's wife had died 6 months earlier. The Kennedys were very worried about him. They were worried that he would harm himself. And so, John McCone had dinner with the Kennedys every single night and then he and Bobby

[12:32] Kennedy would go for a swim afterwards. So, when Bobby Jr. got out of the car, he sees his father and McCone standing in the driveway and he overhears his father say, "Tell me your people didn't do this." And McCone responded, "I don't know who did it." Which is interesting because he didn't say, "Well, of course my people didn't do it. Why would you even think such a thing?" He said, "I don't know who did it." And I think history has shown

[13:04] that while it was likely not a CIA operation to kill John Kennedy, there were CIA officers who were involved in the killing of John Kennedy. So, yeah, for a very long time the CIA was something to fear. That changed for a while with the advent of the of the Church Committee in the Senate and the Pike Committee in the House. But that change didn't last very long. And now we're in a we're at a point again where the CIA post-9/11 is really little

[13:35] more than a than a paramilitary organization traveling around the world to kill people. So, let me let me just ask you a specific question about that because I was kind of encouraged by the nomination of um, uh, of uh, Bill Burns, who had a diplomatic past, uh, who was a true diplomat, I think. Oh, I wrote a very, very positive op-ed

[14:06] when Bill Burns was named CIA director. I said, "Finally, an adult in the room." Yeah. So, what happened there? Did it did anything seriously change? No, unfortunately. The only anomaly in the in the Bill Burns uh, tenure was the fact that he was the de facto Secretary of State. Uh, Tony Blinken's a very nice guy. I actually took his desk on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He he moved to State when I moved to the Senate

[14:36] Foreign Relations Committee. Um, Tony's a great guy and and he's a smart guy, but he's not he was not equipped to be Secretary of State. Bill Burns was equipped to be Secretary of State. And so, every time there was some sensitive or difficult diplomacy that had to be carried out, Burns that flew all over the world to carry out that diplomacy. At the same time, he was sucked right into the CIA's culture of you know, drone warfare and

[15:08] international renditions and you know, spying on Americans and all the ugly, dirty things that the CIA has been doing since 9/11. So, so so it's a deep state with its own logic, whether you're president or director of the uh, CIA, you don't hold the reins. It's >> You don't hold the reins generally. No. You can be one of the guys or you can be the outsider. But the but there really is such a thing as a deep state. I say this all the

[15:40] time. You don't have to call it a deep state if you don't like that term. You can call it the federal bureaucracy if you want. You can call it the state. This is the government that we've given ourselves. And I don't think that any president really has the authority to challenge the CIA in any truly meaningful way. Look at Donald Trump. I I believed when Donald Trump was first elected in 2016 that he was going to really turn things around at the CIA. And then he named

[16:12] two swamp creatures to head the CIA, which dispelled any notion that there would be reform. Mike Pompeo, probably at the time literally the worst the worst person who could have been chosen for that position, number one. And then bloody Gina Haspel, the consummate insider who flew out to the secret site just to watch people being tortured just for the hell of it. I couldn't imagine two worst choices.

[16:43] Now, John Ratcliffe I respect, but I don't think John Ratcliffe has the the wherewithal to be able to really affect change inside the organization. Yeah, if Bill Burns couldn't do it, it's not likely that John Ratcliffe could. And and the the other problem is you need you need an activist president willing to do it and you need a Congress that's either willing or compliant enough to then do what the president wants them to do.

[17:14] And we don't have that. No. And will we ever is there any hope of having it? And if if there is that hope, what kind of organization and activity is required to make that happen? I mean, >> Yeah, I I do you have to think about these things? That's not your domain, but I I do. I do think about these things. Um, there's there's a book in here one of these days that I'll that I'll get onto paper about the history of the CIA and

[17:45] its very long, very well-documented history of failures. You know, the CIA has missed analytically anyway, and operationally I suppose, it's missed almost every major global event since it was created. Yeah. >> Everything from the the the Berlin Wall going up to the Berlin Wall coming down, everything in between, 9/11, you name it, the CIA's missed it. >> Greek war Sure, the invasion of Cyprus. Yeah.

[18:18] And um, I think that on a tactical level the CIA is very good. If you want to carry out an assassination, a rendition, some sort of international operation, they're very, very good at that. But in terms of the big, broad international trends, they're blind and dumb for the most part. Yeah. >> [clears throat] >> You mentioned you mentioned assassinations there as if that's just a normal part of activity.

[18:50] Uh, most Americans >> I was brought up with with we don't we would assassinate people because not only is that uh, denying them due process, but it's just a crime and it's a everyone's moral condemned it. It used to be a crime. So, so the CIA has always accepted it as part of its its mode of operation. But what about the American public?

[19:20] >> No, it's more complicated than that. Um, Executive Order 12333 signed by by Gerald Ford forbade assassinations. And that 12333 was amended several times, but that lasted until 9/11. And then after 9/11 there was an amendment to that executive order that allowed the assassinations of any person deemed by the president to be a clear and present danger to the United States, to American citizens or to American installations.

[19:53] And so I mean I I'm unaware of any assassinations between 1975 and September 11th. And now It was it was frankly normalized during the uh the Obama administration where John Brennan who later became Obama's CIA director when Brennan was the Deputy National Security Advisor for counterterrorism, he would host what was called the Tuesday morning kill list meeting. Where

[20:25] Brennan would convene a meeting of CIA attorneys and CIA operational leaders and uh and NSC attorneys, come up with a list of people to kill that week, send the teams out around the world, kill their targets, and then come back for a meeting the next Tuesday. It was normalized under Obama. And apparently has continued under Trump. >> [clears throat] >> And Brennan was already I know from your testimony was a Martha Kessler killer.

[20:58] And that that wasn't an assassination but it was No. It was a He assassinated a career. That was That was what he did. Uh but that So that brings me to a a more contemporary issue. Um Ramanullah Lakhanwal who was in the news what a couple of weeks ago who was assassinated uh those National Guard in in in Washington I don't know what's what that case has become. But one of

[21:29] the things that came out of it in all the reporting was that he was part of something called zero units. Did you work with zero units at any time in the Middle East? Do you know what they are? Yeah, they were specific to Afghanistan. >> Because he was an assassin. They were assassins, the zero unit. Mhm. Well, they didn't just do assassinations. They they did snatches, kidnappings, all kinds of armed operations, but they were very specific

[22:00] to Afghanistan. And even then they were specific to southern Afghanistan. But these were these were teams they were joint teams of CIA officers, military special forces, and local hires. Um that were sent around Kandahar province, Helmand province, all all around the south to carry out these in some cases lethal operations. Yes. So is that a a new tradition? What or

[22:31] was it limited to Afghanistan? And so what when Biden pulled out of Afghanistan No, this was very specific to Afghanistan. Not to say that it can't be reconstituted in a heartbeat in some other country. But when Biden pulled us out of Afghanistan, that was the end of the zero units. Okay, let me go back to what another thing that was of interest to me because >> [clears throat] >> and this takes us back to Bill Burns. Uh not to Bill Burns but to the CIA

[23:03] under Bill Burns simply because that's when it happened. The Havana syndrome. Is that a story you followed? Uh You know, at at first I did at first I dismissed it as as you know, sorcery. And and there are a lot of crazy people out there who think the CIA is beaming waves at their heads. But then a couple of friends of mine came down with it. People that I've known for decades, people whom I respect.

[23:33] And then they tell me that their MRIs show traumatic brain injuries. So yeah, Havana syndrome is real. Yeah, well this is I wrote a whole a whole series of articles about it. Not about the syndrome itself, not about the people who were affected, but about the way the New York Times reported which I thought was was atrocious and typical of of the media. Uh they did everything they could to turn

[24:04] it into the belief which was their belief but it was because if the New York Times believed it, we were all supposed to accept that it was a fact. That it was the it was the Russians or possibly the Cubans Right. without knowing what the technology was, what the medical situation was. Uh and yet article after article

[24:36] it went through this. It got to the point when And so I did these articles last making fun of the way the New York Times reports. Uh but I did notice that um uh the CIA um I guess HR service um dealt with it very seriously and tried to tried to respond to the needs of the people, the concerns that everyone had. But at the same time

[25:07] took a position of saying, "Well, look, this might be what the New York They didn't put it that way, but this may not be the way the New York Times is representing it." And that itself created a stir because the the people who were affected wanted They wanted to know whether there was a foreign agent that had uh that was responsible for this. And I mean is that a typical situation? I I thought Bill Burns handled handled

[25:39] that one actually quite well because he he he brought the the temperature down. But in the end they admitted I think it was in beginning of 2022 that um it might be well, it that it couldn't be explained that there was no foreign actor who could be deemed responsible. And that there might be a psycho what do you call it? A psychogenic

[26:09] component to it. So I thought that was an interesting story, but again from my point of view it tells tells us more about the media than it does about the CIA. You're abs- You're absolutely right. You know, I happened to be in Cuba when this story first broke. And it's named the Havana syndrome because it it started in Cuba. Yeah. In Havana. And um I I was with a group of of um authors. Our our books had been included in the collection of the uh National Library of

[26:42] Cuba and so we were invited uh for a a ceremony. And uh and this story broke. And the Cuban government to its credit immediately invited the CIA to come to Havana and investigate anything they wanted. They said, "We don't know what this is. We have nothing to do with this. We have nothing to hide. You're welcome to come and investigate." And the CIA did not take them up on it. Um

[27:12] Was was it the Russians? We don't have any evidence it was the Russians or the Chinese or the Israelis or the Cubans or We don't know. And you're right, it could it could have some some um organic component to it. We know for example that there are some people out there who are especially sensitive to microwaves. Especially sensitive. And um what they experience, the pain, the the headaches, the confusion, the nausea,

[27:45] it's real. There's a a quiet area in western uh Virginia. It's There's no cable TV, there are no cell phone towers, there's there's nothing. It's because the Pentagon has enormous Not the Pentagon but NASA has enormous um uh radio telescopes there. So they can't risk any any interference. When people go to this area in I think it's in Highland County, Virginia they feel better. Because there are no radio waves or

[28:16] microwaves. So it it could be that. And I'll tell you one other thing. When uh when In in 2015 I was hired by the American Psychological Association to help them come up with a a set of criteria for APA member psychologists to participate or not participate in custodial um intelligence interrogations. It was called the Brookline protocols. And I was the only non-psychologist

[28:48] in the group. It was 13 of us. And so we were walking to lunch one day and I said, "Guys, guys, I have a question." I said, "Literally not a single day goes by that I don't get an email from someone saying that the CIA is beaming waves at their heads or communicating with them through a filling in their tooth or planted a chip in their brain and is tracking their movements." I said, "What do I tell these people?" And several several of them started to laugh. And I said, "Why is that funny?"

[29:19] They call themselves targeted individuals. And I said, "Why is that funny?" And one of them said "We all deal with this on a daily basis." He said, "On the one hand, this is kind of an entry-level mental illness for a lot of people. Where when you feel overwhelmed psychologically, your brain defaults to a position where it blames the the easiest Yeah. the easiest person or group or

[29:50] organization for your problem. And for many people, that's the CIA because it operates in secret. For others, this is real. There's something out there. It's in the air. We can't see it. It's got to be, you know, electronic. And we just don't know what it is. And it was after that that the Havana syndrome story broke. My point then being, shame on the New York Times for leaping to this ridiculous conclusion with no

[30:20] evidence. Well, it must be the Russians. Why? Yeah. Russians suffer from Havana syndrome like everybody else does. Why would it be the Russians? Yeah. Now, it's a an interesting story. Uh fortunately, we're no longer talking about I don't know how the victims of it have managed whether their their health is returned or but at least we're not talking about it anymore. Uh but there's there's another story I

[30:50] want to ask you about. This is this is this is a personal story. Mhm. In In January 2003, I I happened to be in Barcelona working with a group on a European project. My phone rang and it was someone I had been working with in previous years who said, "You've got to come back to Paris." Well, I was coming back to Paris anyway. But uh you've got to come back. We've got to see each other quickly because I've uh

[31:22] I I want to a project I've been asked to do a project which is to build uh uh a new training center and we have $2 billion. I said, "You $2 million?" He says, "$2 billion." I said, uh "Wait a minute. Let me get back to Paris." Anyway, I got back to Paris and he later explained to me, "Oh, it's not $2 billion. It's the interest on

[31:52] the budget for this project is based on the interest from two fund of $2 billion." And he said, "Uh so it it will still be an enormous." So here's here's where I was. I I was dealing with this issue and I was told to go and buy a a a castle in in the French sub- suburbs to create a a training center and then to devise the whole logistics of it and everything else.

[32:23] I've done this kind of thing before. But but um when my friend, who who was a former director of General Electric, he worked under Jack Welch, ex- explained to me that um yeah, we didn't know exactly what the budget was, but there was a lot of money to spend. That was in January uh 2003. In March, I I had no news. I got back to him and said, "What's going on? I've

[32:54] been looking at real estate." And he said, "Oh, well, the whole thing's been canceled because of uh the invasion of Iraq." >> Because of It was just before Bush uh invaded Iraq. And but he said to me he had also said told me that it this was all going through something called the the the Asia Foundation. And I've done a little bit of research and there the Asia Foundation, I think, is some

[33:24] some a tool of the CIA. Would you know anything about that? I can only speculate, but it's very very common for the CIA to uh to pass money through these various um uh think tanks and uh and foundations for the purpose of um well, covert action programs, propaganda, So you I was getting into that was the CIA.

[33:56] That was the CIA trying to recruit me to do something which I knew nothing about. And in case it didn't happen because the money would had to be used for for Iraq. >> Yeah. Yeah, that's what it sounds like. Yeah. Well, that's that's that's another mystery like the Havana syndrome which I have to live with. Crazy, isn't it? Yeah. >> [laughter] >> Uh so um the other thing I wanted to to mention

[34:28] because we don't have much time left is uh we were talking about whether presidents actually control things or whether they are uh whether they're instruments of of the deep state. There's a president you know very well um Barack Obama who um we all voted for. I voted for him in 2008. >> too, once. >> Because Yeah, I did too. And one of the

[34:58] reasons I voted for him was that he was really explicit about defending whistleblowers. Yeah. So what happened? I mean, you you're the one who you're the victim of whatever change took place. But how did that change take place? What went on in his head? What went on in the whole business of moving into the the Oval Office? How do you explain it? In terms of politics. >> politics and democracy.

[35:28] Yeah, it's a rather easy explanation. Um Barack Obama had no experience in government at all. Two years as a senator. Sorry, that doesn't qualify you to be president of the United States. Well, it's more than Trump. See the CIA but at least Yeah, I agree. But it But at least Trump, you know, had some experience negotiating major contracts or what have you. Obama did

[35:59] nothing. He was a community organizer. Um there's nothing that the CIA loves more than a than an unprepared president. >> Yeah. Because they just suck him right into their orbit. And to make the situation even worse with Obama was the fact that he had John Brennan whispering in his ear all that time. >> Yeah. John Brennan convinced Obama that the whistleblower was the enemy of national security. And

[36:31] 6 months into his term, Obama developed this Nixonian obsession with national security leaks. All the while, Brennan is pressing him to prosecute to the maximum extent. Between the passage of the Espionage Act in 1917 and Barack Obama's inauguration, three Americans were charged with espionage for for speaking to the media. Just under Obama, eight people were charged with espionage for speaking to the

[37:04] Um Obama set the standard to the media espionage? >> [laughter] >> The law 20 1917 didn't did it refer to the media or wasn't it about passing information to a foreign government? My case was the the set the standard for um Espionage Act uh prosecutions. In my case, my judge said that she was

[37:35] defining espionage as providing national defense information to any person not entitled to receive it. Period. But that's quite a different >> Act is so old that it doesn't mention the words classified information because there was no classification system. It only mentions national defense information, which is up to the government to define. And so if the government says you've committed espionage, then by God, you're going to be charged with espionage.

[38:06] It doesn't matter if there's no foreign country involved. So it's not secret, but information itself that becomes suspect. [laughter] And haven't we hasn't that evolved our whole culture? We now accept this in the name of security, but what we're saying is that information is dangerous. So Yes. it's normal that we shouldn't allow it to circulate freely. Yes. >> That seems to me a change. You know, I I

[38:38] was born in the 19 in 1946. So um So on that note of information being itself suspect uh in a world in which um perhaps Palantir will sort out everything we need to know about what people believe and what they have the right to believe. I don't know if you have any opinions about Palantir and it's I mean, not just

[39:09] Palantir itself, but everything it represents in terms of where we are with technology. I You know, I I'm at a loss as to how the CIA's funding of Palantir through a venture capital um outfit called In-Q-Tel, which is wholly owned by the CIA, how in the world that is legal. It's a mystery to me. But that's the world the world that we live in.

[39:40] >> There's nothing more anti-democratic than that. That pretty pretty much sums it up. Yeah. >> So, on that note, I know you have to you have to go. Where this this is uh been a great conversation. Uh Pleasure's mine. And that's I don't know if we can draw any conclusion about intelligence operations and democracy, but there is a problem and I think we all recognize it. So, maybe if you do write that book you mentioned, we'll all be

[40:12] eager to get get our hands on it and find out what the truth is. >> you. Thank you. [snorts] >> So, thanks. Thank you very much, John. It's been a great great pleasure. Yeah. Pleasure's mine. Good to see you. Okay. Bye for now. Bye-bye. Join the conversation at Fair Observer and subscribe to our YouTube channel.
