Please see the article on Tony Ortega's website yesterday about the crazy Twitter war FL State Congressman Chris Latvala started -- first with Tracey McManus of the Tampa Bay Times, then with Tony Ortega and subsequently with me. I tweeted about this after Tony' story was up, and the Congressman responded to me in a similar fashion: As you can see my last offer is to meet with him to help provide the education he needs. I hope he takes me up. He said he was unaware of the scientology connections to the books that were offered. Maybe that is the case, but … [Read more...]
Episode 18: Mary Kahn from The Aftermath
Leah and I were very happy to welcome Mary Kahn to the podcast this week. Hers was one of the most compelling episodes on The Aftermath - telling the story of her breaking away from scientology after completing OT VIII and the fallout with her family. The airing on Netflix has put her in the spotlight once again. We went into further detail about her story and covered some other topics I am sure everyone will find fascinating. I will include a link to the episode as soon as it is available. We mention a few items I am including here. First, the reporting about Hy … [Read more...]
The Scientology BS is Deep
Tracey McManus article reporting on a meeting David Miscavige had with the Clearwater Mayor and City Attorney last week isn't very revelatory on the surface. But I will try to read between the lines and explain the significance of this meeting based on scientology policy and my experience. The first thing to know is that short of testifying under oath (and even then, good scientologists have no fear of lying if they believe a lie is for the "greatest good"), the real story (either what happened in the past or intentions fo rthe future)is never going to be revealed in … [Read more...]
Episode 12: Mark Bunker
This week, Leah and I have a conversation with Mark Bunker on the Fair Game podcast. Download at midnight tonight. I will add a link to the show here when it becomes available. We talk to Mark about his history with scientology, him becoming the newest Clearwater City Council member and what the future of the City of Clearwater holds. We cover the land grab by scientology so ably reported by Tracey McManus in the Tampa Bay Times "How Scientology doubled its downtown Clearwater footprint in 3 years" : Tracey updated her story a few days ago "Vacancies in Scientology-tied … [Read more...]
Scientology “Tech” Backfires Again
Marlow Stern has written quite a number of stories relating to scientology. They have often questioned scientology's practices and have failed to regurgitate the scientology propaganda they try to feed the media. That makes him an "enemy." And what does Hubbard say about enemies? You threaten what they seek to protect and cost them their jobs. See this post for the exact words from Hubbard: Dealing with Critics of Scientology: The L. Ron Hubbard Playbook What never ceases to amaze me is how proudly scientology comes right out with the very worst of themselves, proving time and time again … [Read more...]
Mark Bunker’s New Scientology Hit Squad
Clearly scientology is worried that Mark Bunker is proving to be a viable candidate for the Clearwater City Council. They are now resorting to one of their tried and true tactics against those who worry them the most (see below in this blogpost for earlier examples of the same playbook). Following is a series of short videos of a recent candidates forum. Scientology sent along a gaggle of hecklers to disrupt Mark's statements -- pursuant to the policies of L. Ron Hubbard. Unfortunately, there is no video showing their faces -- perhaps next time when both Aaron Smith-Levin and I … [Read more...]
Where Clearwater Candidates Stand on Scientology
Tracey McManus published another of her uniformly excellent articles recently: Where every Clearwater City Council Candidate stands on Scientology I have excerpted most of the answers to her survey and offer my biased views on them. I believe there are just two reasons why scientology is actually being spoken about in this election. It has been a taboo subject for local politicians for decades. They have steered clear of this topic like it was the plague... Now for the first time in recent memory, it is something to be debated. The two factors are Tracey's bombshell article … [Read more...]
Miscavige Schmoozing City Officials
Tracey McManus is on the ball again. Reporting on the ongoing efforts of Miscavige and Co. to fulfill their plans to make Clearwater the “first scientology city”. Her latest story covers a recent meeting between scientology’s capo di tutti capi and three non-elected city officials. Miscavige has had a long term relationship with City Manager Bill Horne and City Attorney Pam Aiken. It seems they brought along Michael Delk so he could be introduced to the big cheese. Miscavige first began schmoozing Bill Horne and Pam Aiken when he was here trying to keep his ass out of a sling in the Lisa … [Read more...]
The Clearwater PR Offensive
Immediately following the revelations in the recent Tampa Bay Times article by Tracey McManus, scientology launched their version of a campaign to convince the citizens of Clearwater they are in fact good for the city. They distributed Freedom magazines to people's doors in the dead of night to try to persuade them the reason downtown Clearwater looks like the set for the latest installment of the Night of The Living Dead movies is not because they bought it up and leave most of the properties empty or massively underutilized, it is because the big bad meanies at the Tampa Bay … [Read more...]
CNN on Clearwater & More from the Tampa Bay Times
Earlier today I chatted briefly with Michael Smerconish on CNN. Unfortunately, there is no embed code for the video so you have to click HERE to watch it. It was a VERY short piece, not really enough time to explain such complex issues, but it is good to see national media paying some attention to this issue. Hopefully more media outlets than just the Tampa Bay Times will want to dig in to this. Tracey McManus also published a new story concerning community reaction to middle-of-the-night distribution of Freedom magazines. As usual, the glossy hype of scientology's PR effort does nothing … [Read more...]