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This is Later with Lee Matthews,
the Lee Matthews Podcast. More of what

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you here weekday afternoons on the drive, you might open up the newspaper or

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a news site today and get the
idea that there might be some very powerful

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forces that are allying themselves to determine
who will become the next president. Well,

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Ben Bolan, who is the host
of the Popetar, a podcast on

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iHeartRadio called ridiculous History and stuff they
didn't want you to know? And Alex

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French, senior writer and iHeart Podcasts
are here to say it's nothing new,

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isn't it. Guys, that's all
right, Yeah, that's absolutely rightly.

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Yeah, We've been working on a
show that is out now called Let's Start

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a Coup, And it's entirely about
how back in the nineteen thirties, very

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powerful business interests came in secret to
a hardcore marine war. He wrote named

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Smedley Butler and said, Hey,
this America thing is going okay, but

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what if we did it our way
and you helped us lead a private army

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to take over Washington and overthrow democracy. Well, Biggie and Alex, what

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was the main beef? Why did
they want to start this coup. Uh,

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Well, they really didn't like FDR. They didn't like the New Deal.

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They didn't you know, the New
Deal is, in its own way

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sort of was a version of socialism
and it didn't work for them. They

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were going to be you know,
they were already heavily taxed, but it

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was going to be more. They
were going to be restrictions on child labor,

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you know, unemployment insurance, stuff
like that that they just really opposed.

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Um, you know, it made
making money harder for them. Ben

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Bowland, Alex French, we're talking
about the iHeart podcasts called Let's Start a

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Coup? And Ben, how do
they decide they were going to go about

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it? Well, that's part of
that's part of the tricky questions, something

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that we spend a lot of time
on in the show. There is a

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web of alleged conspirators and from what
we understand, or at least what they

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said to Smedley Butler, they planned
to get together a private army of a

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bunch of people from veterans organizations,
from some other activist organizations who could call

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them, and they were going to
supply these folks with money and with arms

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from the Reming team company, and
they were going to have Butler, who

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was a war hero again at the
time, lead this army into Washington to,

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as Alex said, oust President Roosevelt
and institute an entirely new fascist form

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of government, entirely new for America, I should say, at least because

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they were keeping a close eye on
the events across the Atlanta at this time.

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I was going to ask what influences
those had, Alex. Things were

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brewing about this time in Italy and
Germany. Yeah, it was, you

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know, Mussolini was um, you
know, I mean, as we say

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in the podcast actually, or as
Ben says, you know, this was

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a period in time where fascism really
still had a new car smell. Um.

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You know, Mussolini and Hitler were
not viewed in the then in the

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way that we view them now that
you know, things were actually going pretty

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well in Italy. You know,
Mussolini had set up a welfare state,

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as they say that the trains were
running on time. Um. You know,

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he was providing um, you know, um infant you know, in

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infant care for for new mothers,
um and people. You know, people

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in America saw that, you know, we were in the middle of this

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like endless depression. Um. You
know, I think there was like,

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what was it, like twenty five
or thirty percent unemployment in America and that

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was not happening in Italy at all. And so people are like, hey,

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like, you know, maybe there's
something to this fascist thing, you

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know, the fascism thing, Maybe
we ought to give it a try,

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um. And so yeah, I
mean they were those those leaders, um

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were not reviled in the way that
you know, we revile them now and

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ben I I've even read that many
of Mussolini's policies were copied by Hitler,

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not the other way around, which
a lot of history tries to teach,

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Well, there's actually you know a
lot of Mussolini's policies were actually you know

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sort of uh, you know,
undercover incorporated into New Deal policies. You

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know, we talk about you know, Mussolini's form of economics was known as

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corporatism, and that was part of
like corporatism was like part of the you

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know, was like a mainline,
you know, like ingredient in some of

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you know, FDR's New Deal policies. And these these were I guess what

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we're left over from the robber Baron
era of the Teddy Roosevelt administration. Yeah,

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I mean go ahead, Oh yeah, this a lot of a lot

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of those same forces that existed,
you know, during that sort of Robert

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Baron era. They were still around, right, and they still had their

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own aims and interest And what we
have to understand is, like Alex was

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saying, people, people in the
United States at the time then as now,

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you could argue most people didn't really
care about getting into the nuts and

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bolts of foreign policy. You know, they're saying, I'm never going to

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travel to this far flung country.
I know things are bad here, so

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I want someone that looks like they're
getting things done. And the average person,

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you know, they just want stable
job, they want a good place

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to live, they want better opportunities
for their children. And if someone comes

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along and says, hey, I
have a new effective way to do that,

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especially when people are desperate, they're
more likely to say yes. Democracy

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is sort of a continual exercise in
being accountable, right, and democracy is

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also quite a fragile thing. That's
one thing I think we have to take

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away from stories like this. Ben
Boland is with us along with Alex French,

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senior staff writer. I'd Heart podcast. Their new podcast is called Let's

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Start a Coup and Alex this was
going to be a coup in the and

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every sense of the word. This
was going to be a military style takeover

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of the government, not a superfunded
political action committee going around making sure people

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are voting registered to vote, or
manipulating ballot harvesting laws in the country.

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Yeah. Correct, I mean the
idea was, you know, you take

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five hundred thousand out of work veterans, you march them to Washington, DC,

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surround the White House. Smedley Butler
walks through the door, says to

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FDR You're going to kiss babies and
dedicate bridges, but I'm going to make

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all the decisions that you know.
That's that's that's ostensively what the coup potters

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had in mind. Um, you
know, and Smedley would have taken his

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sort of his orders from you know
what, you know what has become known

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as sort of like the Morgan interests. Um, they would have been,

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you know, they would have been
in charge. And Ben bolan O.

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The name of the podcast is Let's
Start a Coup. At any point,

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did FDR no, this was brewing
beneath the service. Uh, this is

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something that we talked a little bit
about on the show. Just a teaser

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for folks to tune in here.
Lee, there is a point at which

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we believe FDR had a private conversation
with at least one person when this all

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came out to the American public and
to Congress. We don't know the substance

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of that conversation, but we do
know the rabbit hole goes much much deeper

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than it sounds even now, and
they go down the rabbit hole in their

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podcast, which is called Let's Start
a Kubin Bowlin Alex French. It's a

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fascinating story, and thanks for bringing
it to us. Thanks for listening to

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Later with Lee Matthews, the Lee
Matthews Podcast, and remember to listen to

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The Drive Live weekday afternoons from five
to seven and Ihearts Media Presentation