New Realities recorded on May 21, 2013
Summary
This thought-provoking conversation between Alan Steinfeld and Peter Robbins delves into the evolving field of ufology, highlighting a shift from pragmatic research to a focus on consciousness and the potential for a new paradigm in understanding alien life. The speakers discuss the implications of government secrecy, the role of media in shaping public perception, and the potential for a “soft disclosure” that could alter our understanding of the universe.
Transcript
Alan Steinfeld
Welcome to New Realities. This is Alan Steinfeld and this program is about the investigation of our changing paradigm. How we are becoming different people, how our thoughts are changing, how our views of reality are shifting, and there’s nothing more central to this point of change than our relationship to the cosmos, to other civilizations, other planetary civilizations that are not hypothesized to be there, but actually there’s evidence that they are here. And tonight’s guest is one of the premier researchers in the field of ufology and all that goes along with it. I’ll be talking to Peter Robbins. Welcome, Peter, to the program.
Peter Robbins
Thank you, Alan. Good to be on with you tonight.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, I think the whole subject of UFOs, ETs, abductions, all the things that go along with these, this specific topic, which is a huge field, is changing. I mean, Peter was one, just let the audience know, was one of the premier witnesses that testified at the Citizens Hearing on UFO Disclosure in front of former members of Congress earlier this month, and I thought your testimony was excellent and made so many important points. So, let’s cover some of that, which really stood out for me. Well, first let’s talk about how you feel the whole field of what has been called ufology is changing in these last few years. Do you see signs of that, Peter?
Peter Robbins
I do. And some of them are very subtle, some of them are overt. When I first became involved in this field, it was dominated by middle-aged guys who wore big flying saucer lapel pins and, you know, talked about lights in the sky and theorized about their occupants, but literally all of them were nuts-and-bolts, pragmatic researchers, which is certainly the way that I would describe myself overall. But there wasn’t a lot of transcendence going on, or the abduction field really was in its infancy at that point. And, you know, in my 35-year friendship with dear Bud Hopkins, who we lost almost two years ago, for almost half that time, well, about half that time, I worked as his assistant. So abduction studies are a center for me, but there are now more and more people in the field and thank goodness more women as well as men, who are taking UFO studies, even as we speak, to a somewhat different place. A good example is a dear friend and colleague, Grant Cameron. Grant is Canadian. He was also in Washington with us, and in fact, we got to hang out again last week at Paula Harris’s conference in Sebring, Florida. Grant has always been the go-to guy on UFOs and the American presidency. He is the ranking, acknowledged scholar, ironic in a way because he’s not American, he’s Canadian, but that has been his research specialty.
Alan Steinfeld
And he does have an excellent website where he lists each president, I think from FDR on, about their interactions or their experiences or some kind of reference to their involvement with the UFO field. So, it’s an excellent website, yes.
Peter Robbins
Yes. And again, there are a lot of us who tend to specialize in one, two, or any number of subjects. I’m somewhat of a journeyman and cover quite a number of topics over the years. But last September, at a conference I spoke at and MC’d for Pennsylvania MUFON, Grant blew a lot of our minds, basically, with an entirely new talk on an entirely different topic for him and to a degree for ufology, which was UFOs and consciousness. And he gave I’ve seen the talk now three times, you know, in different variations. And my hat is off to this guy. He is emblematic of the best of us. And what he’s done has been to take the basic idea of those of us that are in the field and how the subject has begun to change some of us and essentially our take on the world we live in. And in doing so, he has kind of pointed the way, I think, to the future of UFO studies. Again, we are only limited in this field by our imagination and our knowledge. And real knowledge is somewhat elusive, as you know. There are any number of people that will tell you that they know certain things about these other intelligences, why they’re here, where they come from, how long they’ve been here, what they have for breakfast. More than 30 years in the field and I’m still a little like a Zen beginner, the definition of which would be to know that you know nothing and have it be OK. I know more than nothing, but I am in awe of how little I really, really know after all these years. I think one of the things I do best is to try to couch a whole certain group of my lectures and presentations in post-war history, to present it in a very efficacious manner, very heavily illustrated, basically to get people through that first door. I don’t want to hit them with abductions and missing, you know, hybrids and all this stuff first. It’s we’re all doing our best, I think, to inform a wider audience. I guess is what I’m trying to say.
Alan Steinfeld
No, I think you are you and a lot of people are doing excellent jobs. The testimonies among the researchers in front of Congress were, I mean, even for me who’s heard it for twenty years, I’ve read the books, I know Bud, I knew John Mack. I mean, I’ve been in the field and doing my own research. But even me and a lot of other people sitting there had their mouths open at the range of actual proof and cases, and none of this was new. But was what was new was that these former members of Congress were getting it. Did you sort of sense that moment where, you know, they started out saying, OK, we’ll do this, and then suddenly it’s like, oh my God, this stuff is real?
Peter Robbins
I think that you’ve pointed out one of the most fascinating parts of this whole five days when I was in the audience with you, when I was sitting at the press table, essentially keeping all my Facebook friends appraised of what was going on, and also when I was testifying. You know, we’re pretty good judges of human nature, and it was so interesting studying the faces and body language of these former public servants. All of whom serve with distinction in the United States Congress and in one case in the Senate, and what I found most fascinating were those points where you’d see somebody and their face would be fairly flat affect, not registering a lot of emotion, but you sense that they were like a pinball machine inside. That they were somewhat overwhelmed by the quality of the evidence, as you’ve noted, the quality of the presentations, the fact that this has been going on under their noses for their whole public and private lives. And toward the end, when they really began to open up and you saw in some cases a certain amount of, and I don’t mean this in a pejorative way at all, ignorance. You know, there was that one former congressional representative who at one moment made it very clear she was not familiar with something called Roswell at all. And then at other points, I think one of the greatest examples, well, two of them were former Senator Mike Gravel of Alaska and former Congressman Merrill Cook of Utah, who seemed to me to be great guys and who not only got it, but made it very clear at one point or another that they had always taken it seriously, but could never talk about it to their colleagues because, you know, they wanted to get re-elected and be taken seriously. It’s one of the reasons that of the two topics that I chose to address, one being the Rendlesham Forest incident, the other being the origins in the media of the ridicule factor and the impact that it’s had.
Alan Steinfeld
Yes, I wanted I want to get to both those topics, but I just also want to kind of clear up for people who may not actually know what we’re talking about, is that on April 29th to May 3rd, Stephen Bassett of the Paradigm Research Group put together a conference, a panel, a symposium of sorts, with about 40 UFO researchers, including Peter and Stanton Friedman, all the really the great all-star cast of people who’ve understood and researched this, and they testified for five days straight in front of these former members of Congress, four representatives, or five representatives and one senator. And that’s what we’ve been referring to, and out of that there’ll be a movie that will come out. And I think Stephen Bassett put together an all-star cast, and anyone listening, I mean, that is like a primer course for anyone interested in UFOs on any level, just to hear those five days, that would be a sort of orientation to the present history of the event. So, and where you were going with that, and where I think is the question that needs to be addressed, is what Grant Cameron was suddenly, who was a who is an expert researcher in the history, suddenly not quite out of nowhere, but said, you know, this is about consciousness or there’s more to do with consciousness. And I think the understanding that we have to understand what consciousness is, he talks about examples of ESP and all that. But we have to understand who we are as human beings in a sense, if we’re really going to understand the questions of UFOs and ETs. Would you say that’s fair?
Peter Robbins
I think that is a big part of it. The other part, for me, was how working in this field, we either resist a certain type of transformation or we begin to respond to it. And I’ve never kidded myself. Since I’ve been in my early 20s, I think of myself first as a citizen of the world and a human being, and not a New Yorker or a guy or an artist or a writer or a Jewish person or whatever. And one has to begin with that basic point of view of yourself in the universe. Also, to build a little on what you were saying about this event, it was called the Citizens’ Hearings on Disclosure, as in UFO disclosure. And our friend and colleague Stephen Bassett, who is extraordinarily dedicated to being, in essence, our unpaid lobbyist, representing the subject of serious UFO studies to elected officials in Washington, who has struggled, fallen on his face a number of times, got back up, dusted himself off. He was given essentially a large grant by an extraordinary man in Canada to create this event, and boy did he do a job on it. For those who are not familiar with it, it was held at the very prestigious National Press Club in Washington, D.C., just a few blocks from the White House. And I’ve spoken at the Press Club before, but you know, the feeling of being there already makes you feel a little bit special. And he spared no expense. Everybody that came, nobody was charged, we were all fed absolutely lovely breakfasts and terrific buffet lunches, you know, snacks throughout the day. We were all treated with respect. And he you know, it was a great lineup of researchers, investigators, and authors, but the real heroes, Alan, for me were the amazing number of military and government witnesses that he flew in from all over the world and covered all their expenses. And like you said, even for those of us that are knowledgeable in the field, I also had moments where my jaw was just open. I could hardly believe some of the testimony. And I don’t mean that in an “I can’t believe this” way. It was just so moving, so eloquent, and so backed up. Including, for me, some of the highest moments came from our brothers in South and Central America, distinguished military fighter pilots in one or two cases who were ordered to fire on UFOs. In fact, one of them made it very clear that what has happened in these historically documented events happened to him as well. He was ordered to fire on a UFO that he’d been scrambled to chase, and he pressed that button on the top of his stick which would have released a weapon, and it did not go. No surprise there. My esteemed friend and colleague, former Air Force Captain Robert Salas, was a perfect example. Bob, when he was, I think, a sergeant in the Air Force, had an extraordinarily responsible job. He was overseeing the boards in an underground complex at, was it Minot? No. It was one of the North Midwestern bases, Malmstrom Air Force Base in 67. And as he was hearing the chatter from above of men on the ground seeing UFOs coming in over the base, he watched as, I don’t know, it was either a dozen or 15 nuclear missiles under his command simply turned off. And we have case after case after case documented of this.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, that’s yeah. You know, I mean, that gets into the whole national security issue, but and all that. But let’s go a little bit back to that idea of consciousness and then we can get into some more of the specifics. But yes, because I think the biggest problem that we have, as people who who know for sure this is a reality, is talking to people that have no idea that this is possible. It’s outside their paradigm of thought. And it’s like as if there’s two different worlds meeting and we can’t see each other or we can see their world, but they can’t see the world and the possibilities that we’re in because people are saying, “Well, if they exist, why don’t they show up?” And you know, I mean, all the things we’ve heard, and of course, they ask for proof and videos. Well, now there’s dozens, hundreds, thousands of videos and photos everywhere, but the idea is in people’s consciousness. They can’t make the leap into incorporating this larger reality. I think this is where the struggle really lies.
Peter Robbins
Yeah. And there’s a very calculated reason for that, Alan. And it’s one of the reasons why I made one of my research specialties the so-called ridicule factor. How did it come to pass that of all of the subjects in the world, if I were to come to you and let’s say we were two regular business associates or acquaintances or casual friends and I run into you on the street and I would say something like, “Hey, Alan, last night or yesterday afternoon I looked up in the air and I saw a thing or some things that I had never seen before. And they were so interesting the way they moved or the way they looked. Okay, end of statement.” Of all of the subjects that we could have possibly talked about, your conditioning as somebody that has grown up in the United States of America and the Western world, as well as the conditioning of your parents and grandparents would be gee I wonder if Peter is like a little mentally ill, or has he gone like completely mystical on me? Maybe he’s trying to fool me. Or maybe he’s like really lonely and needs attention or wants to feel special. What could it be that would make him say that as opposed to, oh, that is interesting that you saw something in the sky that was interesting. And that did not happen by accident. There was, in fact, an extraordinarily well-organized, calculated, and brilliantly successful program to make us feel that way. And it began in the summer of 1947 and you know, the way that it happened is somewhat long story, but it did not happen by accident.
Alan Steinfeld
Wait. So, let’s go into a little elements of the story. There was the there was, what’s his name, seeing the ships over the Cascades. How yes, Ken Arnold.
Peter Robbins
You’re talking about Kenneth Arnold, who was a businessman and private pilot who was flying his plane over the Cascade Mountain Range in beautiful Washington State. And this is June 24th, 1947. He observed, by different accounts, seven, eight, or nine machines, I’ll call them that, under intelligent control that were vaguely circular, not completely, they had kind of a cut-out on the back. But he was able to calculate their speed by the amount of time it took them to fly, I believe, between Mount Rainier and another mountain peak. And he calculated that they were moving at about 1,800 miles an hour. Now this is the summer of 1947. We had nothing that did that. And they were not like, you know, a V-2 rocket or something, they were going on the horizontal, not going straight up. Now he landed at a local airport and the reason this story broke, not just all over the country, but all over the world that afternoon, was because a plane had gone down in the Cascades either the day before or earlier that day, whatever, and there were reporters at the airport. And he essentially held an impromptu news conference. And I guess a key moment was when one of the reporters asked him, what did it look like? And his response was to the effect of it looked a bit like a saucer skimming over the water. You know, like when you skim a rock and you try to make it bounce as many times as you can. Well, the news media picked up on the term “saucer” and that it was flying, and of course, a great deal of fun was had for decades with the idea of a flying piece of crockery. Now, a week and a half later, depending on the account, either one or two things went down very possibly in a thunderstorm outside, in the plains outside of a small town then, now a good sized city of 53,000, called Roswell, New Mexico. These stories broke a week and a half apart. And almost immediately the national news media began to cover the story of UFOs, which then began to be seen literally day by day, week by week, in more and more states over more and more countries, and it became a worldwide phenomenon very shortly thereafter. And most of the national newspapers covered it with condescension, sarcasm, a lot of humor, a fair amount of impatience, like how can people be so silly as to think these things are, you know, from Mars or another planet or something. Local newspapers covered it as well, but most of their coverage was very serious. The sarcasm in local coverage came up the next week. Most of the papers in local towns were weeklies. With letters to the editor. And I made it my business over the years to read hundreds and hundreds of articles and then focus in on a newspaper that I think in many respects is the greatest newspaper in America and has been, you know, for more than a hundred years and that’s the venerable New York Times. It was the paper that I grew up with on Sundays, that made me feel like a grown-up. Um, and I love the paper. But I guess I have a love-hate affair with it because they led the charge of this very dubious editorial policy of only covering this subject in a mocking way. And I’m probably the only person you’ve ever met who has read every single article that the New York Times has ever published on the subject of UFOs, even peripherally. Every article, commentary, editorial, letter to the editor, you name it. And I can tell you for a fact that probably 98% of their coverage has been extremely inaccurate and silly. And why did this happen? How did this come to pass? Was the question that started to run me. And I came back to it for years. And ultimately I basically developed a theory that I cannot possibly prove, but ultimately it’s the thing that makes the most sense to me. And that filling in the blanks around what we don’t know, um, is the only thing that answers the question. Because the Times has always been led by extremely knowledgeable, well-connected, um, sophisticated individuals. They’ve got a history of one of the greatest reporting staffs in the history of, you know, print journalism, uh, wonderful editors, you know, they’re what a good newspaper should be all about in many respects. How could they have gotten this so wrong for so many decades? And once again, I just can’t believe that it was an accident. If people like you and I, you know, could end up with archives of declassified documents on how bloody real this is and how seriously every agency appropriate to the topic within our government and foreign governments were taking this, at the same time that the coverage was at its most loopy and ludicrous, how did that happen? And it
Alan Steinfeld
Well, well let’s, let’s go back. So, so I mean first the Roswell crash happened. In the Roswell paper itself, there was an immediate headline confirming the crash of a flying saucer. That was the first headline to come out. And then that was retracted. But let’s trace those steps. And then how did the Air Force start to condition the media to take a ridiculing stance towards these stories, new stories?
Peter Robbins
Well, first of all, the Arnold sighting happened on June 24th, and we don’t know the exact date that the Roswell crash or crashes occurred. It could have been anywhere from the last days in June right up until right before the 4th of July. It happened right within that week, or that’s the best assumption we can make. Remember that the ranch foreman was the one to come upon this huge, half-mile long debris field. And he was the one that brought it to the attention of the Roswell Army Air Field. Remember the Air Force actually did not come into existence until September of 1947. There was no Air Force yet. There still was the Army Air Corps. And one thing here that I think is central to the story is at the time, this little air base outside this modest little town in New Mexico was the home of the only nuclear strike force in the world. If we were visitors from parts unknown, this would have been a location of interest for us. Uh, we certainly would have been knowledgeable about atomic detonations on Earth. We would have monitored them from wherever we were. There would have been no missing it if we were studying the Earth from the test in 1945. The bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, etc. Now, it was the base intelligence officer, Senior Intelligence Officer Jesse Marcel Sr., a major, who went out to the air field, to the debris field, with another officer. And he was the one who returned with retrieved pieces of the craft. Um, which brings to mind the fact that for me one of the most moving testimonies in Washington was given by somebody who I am so privileged to call a friend, and somebody I have not just grown to like, but to love over the years. And that is Jesse Marcel Jr., who was 11 or 12 years old at the time. And I’ve never tired of hearing his account of being woken up in the middle of the night by his father and asked to be come down to the kitchen, where his father had a cardboard box filled with pieces of metal, unlike anything we had on Earth at the time, and foil that had the extraordinary ability when it was crumpled up, to straighten right out again without a crease. Like aluminum foil that would refuse to hold, you know, a bend, and that could not be cut. Jesse asked if he could keep a piece, and he chose what looked like a small I-beam, from the way he’s described it over the years, almost slightly metallic lavender in color with some markings on it. And a few short days later, Air Force MPs showed up at the house and made it very clear to him that he had to return it. His father, of course, returned the other pieces. But Jesse Senior, who every American should know this man’s name. He was a true American hero in World War II and after, and no man went through a more public humiliation in the 20th century as far as I’m concerned. He was made to retract his original statement. And the reason that it happened the way it did, Alan, is General Blanchard. Blanchard was the base commander, and he took it seriously. And he authorized Marcel to put out a press release and let the world know that a flying saucer, for lack of a more descriptive term, had crashed in the plains outside of Roswell. Now bless his heart, Blanchard did this without clearing it with the Pentagon, who of course went absolutely ballistic when they found out. And then immediately went into, you know, defensive mode and came up with this pathetic story that it had been a downed Mogul weather balloon, which were a classified, you know, object at the time. And they forced Marcel, yeah, to pose with the remains of this weather balloon, which was nothing like the debris that he had picked up. And for anybody that has seen it, and in fact if you haven’t seen it, there have been so many films that have touched on Roswell one way or the other, from the sublime to the absolutely ridiculous. The most recent being the last Indiana Jones film, which took, to put it mildly, hysterical liberties with the topic, but I found entertaining. But probably the best film with the most heart is our friend Paul Davids’ wonderful film called Roswell, which co-stars, well, it stars Kyle MacLachlan, who ages over 30 years in the film. And in an unforgettable cameo, oh gosh, why am I blanking out and I’m so good on movies. Who is it who played the president on The West Wing? Oh, oh, yeah, what is his name? Martin Sheen, of course. Martin Sheen. Martin Sheen. The subject of the movie is Roswell and the crash. But the real subject of the movie is Jesse Marcel Sr., who after this event was shunned by his fellow officers, made to look like a fool everywhere around the world.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, what he was he was made to look like a fool because he had to come forward and say, “Oops, I thought this UFO was really a weather balloon.” So he was ridiculed because he didn’t know what a what I mean, it came out that he supposedly didn’t know what a weather balloon looked like, and he was so he was the focal point for the cover-up and the
Peter Robbins
Somebody had to go down and it was him. And there’s that well, there’s that great picture of him everywhere of him holding this tin foil with that look on his face like, are you kidding me? He was under orders. Yeah, but that look, you know, that look when where he’s looking up and saying this is ridiculous. It’s heartbreaking. Yeah, this is ridiculous. So I didn’t realize he was made the scapegoat for the whole Roswell. Absolutely. And what it did to him was it broke him. He became a depressive guy, he drank, and thank God that before he died, when he was well into his 80s, our ace senior UFO researcher Stanton Friedman found him. And got his account before he died. And in that sense, he was able to be vindicated. And his son, who is a country physician and who served his time in the Air Force, in fact, Jesse Jr. completed his service in Iraq as a field surgeon after he was 70 years old. He is one of the greatest Americans I have ever met. And I just can’t say enough superlatives about him. He is as honest as any person I have ever met. He spins nothing. He just was a witness to this moment in history and watched his father go through this. And you know, just makes me angry to even talk about it.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, we should be angry that the government has such a well-organized, systematized cover-up in place because obviously the cover-up was already in place when the Roswell event happened because supposedly there were a bunch of other crashes, there was the Battle of L.A. that some people refer to in 1942, there seemed to have been something in place perhaps on some level, it didn’t become maybe formalized until Truman got into it and said, you know, probably this can’t be revealed at any cost to the American people or something like that. I mean, what would you think the scenario was about all that?
Peter Robbins
Well, number one, um, you brought up a very important point, officially ufology, the modern age of UFO sightings kicks off the summer of 1947. But we do have anecdotal evidence, witness testimony, and documents that cannot fully be authenticated. And for me, I divide the world of UFO-related documents into two categories, those that are gilt-edged, declassified, either through the very natural process of quietly declassifying, lowering the classification and then with no fanfare, going back even before the Carter administration’s bringing this wonderful Freedom of Information Act law to America that there are other reported incidents of UFO activity in modern times. But of course then we have them going back to time immemorial, and that’s a whole ‘nother area of study. Having read a lot of the writings of Harry Truman, having read his memoirs, his letters, having a sense of this regular guy who was a tough little son of a bitch, who was a machine politician in Ohio, a failed haberdasher, an artillery captain in World War I, who by a series of political deals became President Roosevelt’s final vice president, and Roosevelt didn’t like him. He kept him in the dark about many things, including the Manhattan Project and the development of the bomb, which by the way, Truman did not find out about the Manhattan Project or this thing called the atomic bomb, which was pretty much done at that point, until the afternoon Roosevelt died. But I’m going off on a tangent here.
Alan Steinfeld
Right, right. Because here he is suddenly presented with the evidence that I think this is the story that a craft, a UFO, flying saucer crashed at Roswell or something about it. And then what do you make about that?
Peter Robbins
Yes, I again, this is not recorded in history, but we can do our best, especially those of us who are serious students of post-war history to put it together, based on everything I know and have learned about Harry Truman, he did what any smart leader would do and pulled his best specialists into a circle as an informed above top secret study group, the so-called MJ-12 group, the original group. And my gut sense, Alan, honest to God, is if Truman had had his way 100%, he would have learned everything he could from these men about what we recovered at Roswell, certainly the deduction that would be made that it was not from this planet. And then brought it to the American people. However, I think what happened was this extraordinary team of men around him, who were the leaders in terms of military science, science itself, intelligence, to a degree human psychology, diplomacy. Who were these, can you name a few names? I mean, I know Vannevar Bush. Is that who?
Alan Steinfeld
Yes, I’d be happy to name some names. Vannevar Bush is probably the least known, most important American of the 20th century, as far as I’m concerned. Why? Who is he?
Peter Robbins
Well, if you go to, like, a “Who’s Who” from the late 1940s, Vannevar Bush’s name takes up two and a half pages of tiny print. He was the head of MIT, he was the director of AT&T, he was Franklin D. Roosevelt’s science and technology advisor, he was Truman’s science and technology advisor, he had any number of patents, he had a bunch of Ph.D.s, and on and on and on. He’s also a very good writer and wrote two memoirs and a very interesting book on post-war realities as well.
Alan Steinfeld
So, so Truman gets him on this Majestic 12 exclusive committee, above top secret.
Peter Robbins
And eleven other ranking Americans, including our first Secretary of Defense, James Vincent Forrestal, Sidney Souers, who went on to become the first head of the CIA, Gordon Gray, who was a very close personal advisor to Truman and to a degree to Roosevelt, and on and on down this pantheon. And I believe, and this is simply my belief based on my best deductions. I bet on your best educated research and intelligence. I mean, I’m going along, I mean, we don’t know, but these, this sort of types of. Right. But my, my conclusion is that these men convinced the president that they needed to continue studying this because the implications, the possible implications of going forward, and I don’t think it would have happened, but certainly the world would have never been the same, and that would have been a point where humanity changed. What was invoked so many times in these early documents was the impact that a radio broadcast by the legendary Orson Welles and his team of radio players, the night before Halloween 1938, October 30th, 1938, based on, it was an Americanized, updated version of “War of the Worlds”, the great H.G. Wells story, but it was set in contemporary America. Even though it was like half an hour of radio listening with commercials, many Americans were convinced that the Earth had been invaded by Martians. And a number of people around the country panicked, and there were some very interesting studies that were done on this after the fact.
Alan Steinfeld
Well it’s interesting that that event in a way is still fresh in a lot of people’s minds, even though it was 1938. People still, it’s amazing, huh? That one, what was it, a half an hour at the most of a broadcast?
Peter Robbins
In fact, many, many years ago, Bud Hopkins told me a wonderful story about his childhood and he said never tell this to anybody because I’m concerned that some arch skeptic, you know, debunker like Phil Klass will get his hands on it and say, ‘Oh, that’s why Hopkins believes in this,’ which was that when Bud was a little boy, his bedroom was next to his parents’ bedroom, and he had been, for whatever reason, he went to bed early that night or maybe always went to bed early, I forget the specifics. I’m very glad that he did write this story in his memoir, which for anybody that’s familiar with Bud Hopkins’ work, may not be familiar with his last book. It is one of the most extraordinary unique American memoirs I’ve ever read. It’s called ‘Art, Life and UFOs’. And in it, he tells the story of hearing his parents react through the wall to the broadcast. Now, his father had been a military officer in both World War I and World War II, and was kind of a tough guy. His mom was not, and she got extremely upset. And I believe it was at one of the commercials that his father was on the phone with friends, they were grew up in Wheeling, West Virginia, about maybe they should go to the cabin that they had and, you know, bring arms and food and that kind of thing. And when it was over, and Orson Welles in so many words said, “Boo, happy Halloween,” his father was furious, his mother was in tears. And you know, young Bud filed that story in the back of his mind as just an interesting moment in his childhood. But I feel that these men surrounding Truman, not Truman himself, prevailed on him to hold off, and he held off, and that committee institutionalized itself, solidified itself, and outlived that president, and the rest is part of the unwritten history of the United States and the Western world.
Alan Steinfeld
Okay, so let me just then, then where does the ridicule factor? Then this Majestic 12 did they go to the New York Times and say, you must not take this stuff seriously? I mean, how did that come about? If you can hypothesize that.
Peter Robbins
Yeah, that’s not far from my deduction, namely that the week that this happened, key people in the Truman administration, who may or may not, I think it’s logical to deduce they would have been in that study group, which again goes by the name of MJ or Majestic 12, either with the president maybe sort of being aware, but not being involved to preserve what we call plausible deniability, if he was ever called on it, or under the president’s orders, it’s almost a moot point, went out very discreetly to well, another part of Washington, to New York City, to the Midwest, to Boston, to San Francisco, and met with the owners of the New York Times, the people who controlled the Copley news syndicate in Boston, the Hearst syndicate, people like David Sarnoff, who owned NBC radio, bearing in mind television was not really a reality yet, and radio was the other major news source, and did one of several things. They either again, this is just me doing my best to theorize, but I think it’s one of these things. They either communicated in no uncertain terms that because of the growing Cold War,
Alan Steinfeld
Well, I should digress here for one minute to say something that I find fascinating, which is most distinguished historians of post-war America, if they’re going to date the beginning of the Cold War, the standoff that lasted more than 45 years with the Soviet Union until it collapsed in 89, 90, that they date the origins of the Cold War to the summer of 1947, and to be more specific to July of 1947. And there’s a reason for that. It had to do with a very, very important article that appeared in Foreign Affairs magazine by a then completely unknown young political scientist named George Kennan. Kennan went on to become an advisor to either nine or 10 American presidents and died at 101 years old, a decade or so ago. And the article was called “On Containment”, Alan, and it described a policy by which the West could hold the Soviet Union within the borders that it now had. And remember at the end of World War II they grabbed up a certain amount of Europe and a certain amount of Europe remained free of the communists, and that is where the concept of rather than a hot war or shooting war, a cold war, a war of attrition, a war of standing off came from. Anyway, done with the digression. That these men either prevailed on these very important, and very powerful media leaders, and said, “You know, we, the president and this administration are concerned that because right now above all other times we are now seeing the emergence of our next big enemy, the Nazis are gone and it’s the Soviet Union now, and the last thing we need is people thinking we’ve been invaded by Martians. Do you remember what happened in 1938? The president has asked that you have your editors, inform your reporters to cover this in a kind of cavalier way, don’t take the stories seriously, whatever they are, we’re sure we’ll figure it out, it’s not a big deal.” Or Wait, wait, so let me just absorb that. So you think, and who knows really what went on because that’s still secret. But so these top government people go into the editorial rooms and say, look guys, cover this up so people aren’t so panicked. And the newspaper, the major newspapers said to these newspaper people, “You can’t take this seriously.” I mean, wouldn’t they as newspaper people, I’m just putting this out there, say, “Why not? Why shouldn’t…”
Peter Robbins
Well, what I’m saying is that because that summer the Cold War was formalizing itself and the country was still going through what the newspapers would refer to as “war jitters,” that “Oh my God, are we going to start fighting with Stalin now, we just finished with Hitler.” Oh, I see. I see. They used the beginning of this Cold War with the Soviet Union to say Just saying, “Play along with us fellas and help us stay focused here.” Now that’s one possibility. Another possibility in relationship to these stories that maybe they may have said, “These are really Soviet crafts and we can’t think of that they or something like that.” Or we’re testing something new, or everybody’s jumpy right now, and they they actually were talking about mass hallucinations. Or equally and possibly more, what happened was they said, “There is something to this. We don’t know what they are. We are concerned. The president would like it you to join with him as a unpaid member of his closest advisors, not advisors, but it is your patriotic duty to play this story down. We don’t know what we’re up against, we need to create a culture where people think of this and don’t worry about it, because it ain’t going away.” That may be exactly the point. That may be something like that. Um, I can see that. But the idea is once the ridicule started, it sort of gave it it became like a virus. Imagine that you are a young reporter on any newspaper, big or small in the United States, the summer of 47, and you’re seeing all the major papers are covering this stuff really silly. But you’ve seen one, or somebody in your small town has, or you’ve gotten reports that whatever they are, you know, they can move like crazy, they can zigzag, they can stop, they can change directions, they can hover. You know, you know it’s real, or that there’s a chance that it’s real. Do you want to buck the trend? Everybody is covering it in a lighthearted way. Do you want to put your reputation on the line and, you know, ridicule was already attaching to it. And I’ll tell you what, Alan, at some point I will show you some of what I’ve collected on this. And that will amaze you. The unbelievably silly, condescending, nonsensical way that this has been covered. But especially in the early years. It’s still going on! It’s still happening! But you know, I think there’s a sort of arrogance to newspaper reporters and reporters in general. I go back to 1903 when the Wright brothers said they they flew their airplane, and a Scientific American, you know that article, came out and said, “If such an amazing event would have happened, someone would have reported it, and since no one did, it could not be true.”
Alan Steinfeld
Well I’ve got a great post… that is a perfect point Alan, and I’ve got a great postscript to it. I believe it was in July of 47 in this first wave of condescending New York Times coverage, they actually quote Orville Wright’s attitude about these flying saucers, and he felt they were total nonsense. I mean, imagine trotting out Orville Wright in 1947. Wait, Orville Wright you’re saying was it says it’s total nonsense? UFOs. The the Times chased him down because he was the living Wright brother and said what do you think of this? Well, he was already hearing that it’s silly. And he just added a sentence that, of course, it’s nonsense. Who would know better than Orville Wright? Um, it it it’s amazing. Um, and it’s stuck. And this is the legacy that we have.
Peter Robbins
It is the it’s the living legacy that we have because it’s still the mindset of the predominant worldview, it’s it’s ridicule and laughter. It’s brilliant! It has worked so well, and that is why, that is why we have the challenge that we have in trying to reverse that understanding and beginning to truly educate people about this phenomena.
Alan Steinfeld
You know, it’s shocking though when I tell people and I’m laughed at, and I don’t care that I’m, I mean people will out there, but you know, how could you not look at the the evidence, just the the eyewitness accounts and I’ll tell you, you think of all of the knowledgeable, worldly, influential people that you can think of, political figures, world leaders, writers, commentators, who if you were to ask them they’d raise one eyebrow and say, “Are you serious? You seem like an intelligent guy, you mean you take UFOs seriously?” Well the fact is, they’ve never educated themselves to it. Why? They’re busy people. And they know it’s not true, because everything since they’ve grown up and become the important person that they are has led them to believe that that is the fact. So why should they take an hour out of their day to even look at a UFO book? I wouldn’t be caught with one, my friends would laugh at me. Or to, you know, try to look into articles by reliable people, even Stephen Hawking has Hawkins himself, who’s probably ah, there are more and more exceptions to the rule. Well but he himself though, says that there’s no such thing about, you know, if they’re there they’re pro– Yeah. No, he is open to the possibility now. We’re talking about Stephen Hawking, but there are a handful of scientists, a handful of politicians, a handful of people in public life who are more willing to take it seriously, there are a great deal more of them who take it seriously but don’t dare talk about it. Right, right. Yeah, no, I it’s true. I want to get to there. I just got a question from a listener that said, what about the amnesty for those who deny the existence in order to go forward with disclosure and to print lawsuits. I mean, I mean so I mean, jumping ahead a little bit, but there’s this secret government, obviously, we know and anyone who’s investigated knows that there’s a cover-up. And these people have denied the fact, and to come out now, and Richard Dolan sort of covers this, but what would you say about the the amnesty factor for those who said, “Guess what, they’re here, we’ve been we’ve been keeping it a secret, and they have a technology,” and all those things that that avenue starts to uncover. What’s your ideas about that?
Peter Robbins
Well I think your caller has a brilliant idea. If we lived in a world where we had a government that had the courage to initiate a change in policy, um, you almost wouldn’t need an amnesty. It would, you know, they could discuss what I have discussed as a background to this. But let’s face it. This has nothing to do with politics as we know it. It doesn’t matter that, you know, if you are a absolutely far-right conservative or a far-left progressive, or somebody closer to the middle who’s a Republican or a Democrat, you are not going to touch this once you’re president. You may inquire about it, you may look into it, you may, you know, turn a few knobs or wiggle a few levers or speak to advisors, but it’s going to go no further. And we have examples of this. Um, Gerald Ford, when he was a congressman from Michigan. There was a tremendous UFO flap in the later 60s over Michigan. And he he had guts. He brought to Congress the fact that there were witnesses that he knew, that this was real, this was serious, and because of Gerald Ford they rammed through a provision to set up a hearing on UFOs. It was killed almost as quickly as it came in. Um, President Carter, when he was campaigning at one point for governor of Georgia, had a sighting, I believe while he was speaking at an Elks Club picnic, and saw it with a number of other people. And in fact a very famous little bit of memorabilia and artifact from UFO studies is the MUFON report form that he filled out. Um, the fact is also that Bill Clinton, when he became president, he told his first Attorney General, uh, Webster Hubbell, that the two things he wanted to learn about, get to the bottom of, um, while he was president was who killed Kennedy and the truth about UFOs. Um, I do not respect former President Clinton on the Kennedy aspect because on the 40th anniversary of Kennedy’s assassination in 1993, he made a public statement that it was just a lone gunman and we need to ascribe meaning to the death of important people, but sometimes it’s just one crazy guy. Um…
Alan Steinfeld
Well, maybe that’s what he really thought. I mean, he’s kind of like… I… you know, Bill Clinton’s a complex guy, and I
Peter Robbins
Well, well I think the same sort of political maneuvering around the Kennedy assassination is is the same intelligence that um is in charge of covering this bigger secret, which is a bigger secret up…
Alan Steinfeld
Yes, I I think you’re right. But again, you can go on Grant Cameron’s website and see that there were others who were president. You know, uh, maybe one of the most popular, if not one that everybody can agree on, was Ronald Reagan. When he was governor of California, he had a knockout of a UFO sighting from the governor’s plane, and all the people on that plane saw it. He was interviewed when he landed. His pilot was interviewed. There’s a famous story of him being late for a dinner party that night with a number of Hollywood legends, um, and then coming in and blurting it all out. Now once he became president, it was understood that you can’t break the story. No president has got the clout to do it. But an interesting thing about Reagan, I’m convinced he wanted posterity to know that he knew. And on a number of occasions, four or five at least, he brought up the subject of UFOs, um, invasions of Earth, more as political allegories, including before the General Assembly of the United Nations in, um, I don’t, you know, I don’t have the quote here. That’s a famous, no, that’s a famous, often-used, uh, quote. But did you see this article in The Huffington Post, uh, Alexander John Alexander seeks amnesty for military who witnessed UFOs? Uh, and Alexander I’m a little suspicious of.
Peter Robbins
Oh, I am too. I I… Is it John Alexander? John Alexander, yeah. He comes out and he says that, um, “as one goal to ask Defense, uh, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, CIA agent, uh, David Petraeus, National Intelligence General, uh, James Clapper to offer amnesty to anyone in the military who has previously sworn to secrecy about UFOs.” So, but but Alexander himself is a bit of a, uh, He’s a character. I, I don’t know.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, he’s like, if anyone’s disinformation, it could be him, you know, a plant for. But so it’s, it’s, but it’s also suspicious because I just wrote an article on my website about the FBI document. The FBI comes out and says, this is our most looked-at document, the Oh yes, the Hoover document. Yes, the Hoover, uh, Hottel, the Hottel memo where they talk about finding these three bodies. Yeah, 1950. Yes, the 1950 Hottel memo, memo. FBI is saying, why is everyone looking at that, drawing more attention to it, and then saying, “And further documents, we cannot confirm or deny the truth about these statements.” But they’re, they’re coming out with this. I think we’re getting pushed and pulled all over the place in
Peter Robbins
Some people feel it’s part of a, a slow program to, you know, bring us all into this. I, I don’t know if it’s, if it’s an actual program or it’s just sort of happening on its own. But, um, a word about that document and about the nature of documents like that. Um, that document has been declassified for decades. The way it used to work is that every three years I think, classified documents, this was before we had such a mania for classifying millions of secrets a year. We’re out of our mind with secrets in this country. And every three years it might be reduced one level in terms of classification, until 12 years had passed or whatever, and then it would quietly be put in the National Archives. Now, what you said is absolutely true. The FBI will not deny the reality of this document because they can’t. It’s a truly authentic, vetted, gilt-edged document. However, they cannot and will not comment on it. Now I have hundreds of documents in my document archive that fall into that same category. They’re absolutely authentic, but, you know, if the Army Air Corps was still here or, um, old Army Intelligence, or the CIA or whomever put out that document, they will say yes, it’s authentic, but we cannot or will not comment on it. And that is the way it is in this country. But it’s real. And that document, very specifically, there’s no code in it. It discusses that a flying saucer, um, or several crashes have occurred in the state of New Mexico, and, um, from one, three bodies were recovered, three to four feet tall as I recall, each one in a very form-fitting suit of a material maybe that we would compare to spandex or something, and these beings were humanoid, but that they weren’t human. And that they were dead. And that’s a real FBI document. Um, and there are hundreds of documents, probably thousands, that fall into this category.
Alan Steinfeld
So I think though, I mean going back to that point that you were saying before, that there is a soft disclosure happening. It’s not the president coming out and saying, “Guess what?” Because this goes back again to the idea of consciousness where we have to slowly acclimate Yeah. to the idea and as children grow up, you know, they may be see it more on television programs. So by the Brilliant point, Alan. Absolutely on the money. By the time someone, some official comes out with it, we say, of course, we knew that all along. And so that whole generation from 1938 and War of the Worlds is, it’s gone, they’re forgotten. There’s no more fear. And it’s like, you know, it’s like airplanes, they’re here. It’s like cell phones. Like, you know, you could not have introduced a cell phone to someone 100 years ago. Well, it may well, you’re right. It may well be that that group of advisors around Truman and those who have inherited their positions are in the process of, you know, if you were going to, how can I say this. Um, you and I and many of our friends, many of your listeners are probably pretty ready for this transition. But how much of the general population of the United States and more to the point of the world, because you can’t just release this in one country, it is something that would have to be coordinated with every country in the world to a degree. And no one has that power, so to say. But if I were the ageless king of the world, and I was going to set a program in motion to normalize, to re-educate, to bring about a, a critical mass of, let’s say, 3 to 5% of the people in this country or in the world that really had a beat on this, that had studied the subject for years, that maybe experiencers or abductees or good scholars on the subject. Um, to be there as anchors for the rest of the general population or maybe a larger percentage, you know, on the ground and ready to be there um, and assist others in this transitional time. Um, and I include the Roman Catholic Church in this. Um, for an organization that has been built on a fair amount of repression and mysticism, the Roman Catholic Church has done a brilliant, laudatory job in taking this subject seriously, more so than any of the world’s organized religions. And have been doing so for years. I think to have a program in place to assist their flock when we go through that great historical transition, where school children will know their names, and their works will be looked back on as absolutely seminal in helping us prepare for this transition of these other intelligences, wherever they come from. And I, unlike many of my colleagues, I, I don’t know. I my best, my best take is that number one, we’re not alone, duh. Number two, there are a number of thems coming from different places or dimensions or both. That they have different relationships or a lack of relationships with the dominant species on Earth here. That they may have different intentions, plans, or takes on us. Um, who have such promise at our best and who are such pathologically dangerous creatures at our worst. And in this
Peter Robbins
To be more specific, because it’s not mankind, it’s man. Um, women are not responsible for the overall miserable state that the world is in. Uh, one wonders how different the world would be if monotheism had not become, you know, the major game in town. And the goddess or a more gentle guiding spirit or pantheon of, um, you know, uh, celestial creatures or deities had been the ones that governed the growth of Western civilization. You know, it’s obviously pure speculation. But, um, let’s face it. Our major preoccupation, those people in the highest levels of power is still where the lines are drawn in the dirt, and if you cross that without my permission, I will kill your ass. And we have more, you know, even though it’s not like when you and I were kids and, you know, the Cold War was raging and we were, you know, concerned about nuclear war as much as we are now, we have enough nuclear ordnance in this world to kill every living thing many times over. And the danger is still there.
Alan Steinfeld
But we’re about getting that, you know, primitive civilization and, you know, just getting out of, like, it’s adolescence. And, um, I think that’s also what’s bringing a lot of attention here, to us, uh, to this planet, to make sure we don’t get out of hand. Um, but I- but I just want to add, get right to the core of the, um, of the trauma in abductions. Because I am sort of writing about this, and it’s not just the fact that, um, that these beings exist, right? So you come face-to-face, you see these little greys. I think what the trauma is, is the emanation of the field that they generate. So when you meet a human being, you know who they are. You look in their eyes, you get a feeling of their sense of self, a sense of consciousness. But when you’re in the presence of these beings, there’s none of those relative factors that can ground you in any sort of psychological orientation. And I think that’s the trauma. And that’s the trauma really we’re going to have to face as a civilization, as a planet is an altered state of consciousness that’s not like anything we have known before. I mean, that’s…
Peter Robbins
Yeah. It’s time to grow up. And for many people, you know, who say our good Christian people and, you know, read the Old Testament and New Testament, basic questions are going to need to be addressed. The idea of if we are made in God’s image, as many people believe, whose image are they made in? Um, if are they, you know, spiritual creatures? Do they are they God, um, are they religious or are they agnostic? Or, or, or, or, or, do they threaten us? Do they want to help us? Both things may be true. But whatever it is, there are truths that we need to face. And so we continue to live in a somnambulist society where most of our brothers and sisters are sleepwalking their ways through their lives because they don’t know any better. And Bud once said something to me, “Oh, you know,” he was a great guy as well as a great man, he had a wonderful sense of humor and irony, and one day, I don’t remember how we got on the topic, but he was talking about the hardcore skeptics. He said, “You know, in a funny way, they’re the true believers. They know that UFOs don’t exist. They know the Earth isn’t being visited by other beings. They know we’re wrong. Because they just know it. Because it can’t be, therefore it isn’t. We are the ones who are feeling our way in the dark, trying to figure out what the heck is going on.” And the irony is that they see us as the true believers. I think it’s so interesting and in fact that is it. And you know, if you were to ask me, ’cause I know we’re kind of running on time here. Yeah. If you were to ask me, Alan, what you and I can do and our listeners can do to help effect this change that we are slowly in the process of. But people are changing. Not like, you know, say everybody who joined the anti-war movement against Vietnam by the thousands and then the hundreds of thousands that helped bring about the end of that awful war did. In this area, people are changing one, two, six, five at a time as they have an experience, as they see something they can’t explain, as they speak to somebody who they admire or care for or trust who has knowledge or is an abductee or an experiencer or a true researcher. Um, if disclosure is the thing, I mean, you have to understand there’s two factors. There’s the disclosure part, which is our part, and there’s the contact part, which is their part, whoever they are, right?
Alan Steinfeld
Steve is right. It will look different. And preparation for it, you know, many people will not want to, and will resist it to the very end, and it’ll be a rougher door to go through for them. For the rest of us, we’ll simply do the best we can. And go on, and evolve. I mean I really think, and this is the John Mack approach in a sense, is that meeting the other is part of our own evolution of consciousness.
Peter Robbins
I agree. I, I love John. He was a great man and a great friend and a great guy. Uh, I miss both him and Bud every day.
Alan Steinfeld
Well, yes, Bud was brilliant too. I think John, with his book and his credentials as a Harvard psychiatrist, a Harvard, you know, teacher, teacher of psychiatry at Harvard, lent the credibility that was need, was the grounding force. And thank you for that article about the Vanity Fair article about John Mack, um, that you sent me. Um, where there, maybe doing a movie? Is that what that article said? About the trials that John Mack had at Harvard in order to get rid of him when he came forward and said, “Hey, there’s such a thing as UFO abductions.” Um, anyway.
Peter Robbins
There was that article that you sent in Vanity Fair which I appreciate. Yes. And I should let listeners know that in the current issue of Vanity Fair, certainly a respected mainstream, long-running, uh, very popular publication. There is a very rare thing, which is a quality, respectful, in-depth, absolutely fascinating look at Dr. Mack, um, and to a degree, uh, Bud, and other individuals in the field, by a great, great writer named Ralph Blumenthal. Um, who I’ve been in touch with since. Uh, Mr. Blumenthal is a highly respected New York Times reporter. And for I’m very curious to know how he found the courage, I guess he just got very curious, as good reporters do, to do this research and write such a terrific piece. And bravo for Vanity Fair for publishing it. Um, well, you know, it’s just in the online version, because I went to the newsstands and looked at it. Oh yeah. No, it’s not, you’re absolutely right. It’s not in the print version, but if you go it’s a step. If you go to Vanity Fair online, uh, and just type in John Mack, I forget the exact title of the article, you will get to read a really well-written, um, look at this extraordinary man and some of the things that he was trying to accomplish in his life, some great background, and some of the wonderful and fascinating people that he knew and worked with.
Alan Steinfeld
Right. I think the article is called “Alienation: Have Human Beings Been Abducted by Aliens?”, May 10th online issue of Vanity Fair. I think you’re right. That’s it. Well Peter, uh, I appreciate your research, your enthusiasm, your your um, scholarship in this, I would say most important endeavor field of of human history because it really is, um, the next historical process that we need and are, I feel, are going through as we come together as a as a whole planet. With the Internet, with this whole, um, unifying of of who we are, uh, you know, just the environmental issues are bringing us together as a as a singularity. So this this juncture in our history needs scholars like you and Bud and John and all the people that have testified in front of Congress, um, in the beginning of this month. It, it, it’s, and the intelligence of the researchers in this field is what’s impressive. You know, these are not um, people just saying, “Hey, look at that in the sky.” No. This is, and the work you’ve done on the Bentwaters case. I mean, that’s another conversation that I would love to go into sometime. But yeah, that’s what this field takes, this kind of in-depth look, argument, uh, research, and intelligence. I mean… there you go.
Peter Robbins
Amen, brother. Alright. You’re going to love my book too, because I I feel I uncover a case that um, that puts all this in perspective and I think you’re really going to enjoy. I’ll let you know when I when I have a draft of that. Please do. Let’s get your feedback. Good luck on completing it, and always a pleasure, Alan, and we’ll look forward to getting something together, some kind of forum as we were talking about, um, in Manhattan, uh, when scheduling allows, and otherwise looking forward to my next visit to your program.
Alan Steinfeld
Great. Yes. We’ll do something, maybe I’ll let you know about a date in June where we can get down to the studio and have a roundtable discussion. Great. Thanks. Okay, Peter. Now, if people want to get in touch with you, your website, your um… The website right now is being worked on. Um, but they can contact me if they’re on Facebook. Uh, there are a number of Peter Robbinses on there. I live just outside of Ithaca, New York, so it’d be Peter Robbins, Ithaca. Um, or they can contact me through your show, and you can forward any messages on, and I’ll let you know when the website’s up and running again. Okay. Thanks for your time tonight. I appreciate it. And and let’s keep that torch burning, right? We will. Thanks. I’ll talk to you soon. Okay, goodnight, Alan. Okay, goodnight. That was Peter Robbins, who was one of the witness, um, testimony researchers in front of Congress at the Citizens Hearing on UFO Disclosure. You can see a lot of that footage online on YouTube. I have a bunch of things posted on my New Realities channel on YouTube. If you have any questions about anything you’ve heard here tonight, you can email me at newrealities@earthlink.net. And check my website, newrealities.com. I welcome discussions and comments about this topic because I think this is the question of our time. And it’s something that, um, I think everyone’s going to have to address at some point in the near future. So, we will see. Goodnight, and this has been New Realities. Alan is. Thank you.