Mike McClaughry.

RealMedia® Mike McClaughry interview, 2/05/2000, PART FIVE

Transcribed by Xenubat (Sue M.)
http://members.cox.net/batchild1/transcript/mike1.htm

JIM ESTERBROOK

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: I'll give you an example of using the love-hate button, okay? This is an actual operation that I did. Um, there was a guy in the Health Department in Sacramento by the name of Jim Esterbrook. Um, he was attacking Narconon. The reason he was attacking Narconon, uh, which we didn't know at the time, was that he had plans for starting his own drug rehabilitation group in Sacramento, California. Um, he was, uh, an official in the Health Department in Sacramento, State Health Department, okay? And he was using that position to attack Narconon from. He wrote a, a very criticizing report, you know, about that thick (holds his right thumb and index finger about one inch apart) on the subject of Narconon.

We found out that, uh, through the spy that Jim Esterbrook had plans on starting a new drug program which he was going to-- he was applying to the state for. He was asking for the state funding for his new drug program which he was gonna hold up in the mountains.

One day, um, me and my right-hand man, uh, took a drive up into the mountain community where this was gonna happen. (laughs) Okay? We picked up a couple of teenage girls that were hitch-hiking on the road, uh, we went swimming in the river with them that day, um, just got into communication with these two teenage girls. And while we were driving them up to-- uh, after we went swimming we were driving them up to where they lived. And I said, "By the way, what do people don't like up here?" Right? I'm working the hate button, see? (laughs) And they say, "Well, we hate hippies." Right? (laughs) So, I go, "Okay, you guys hate hippies" and in fact she tells me this story. She says, "I'll show you how bad we hate hippies. There's a guy up here who owns two houses. He lives in one, the other one's vacant. Some hippies moved into it and he came over with gas cans, poured it on his own house and burned his own house down!" (laughter) "That's how much we hate hippies!" (laughter)

So I go back down to Sacramento and recruit about six to eight Scientologists. I said-- these are all guys-- and I say, "You don't take a bath for a week, you don't shave for a week" and at the end of that week-- they did that, right? Um, (laughs) we dress 'em up like hippies, we go up there. I got a radio, um, they have a radio. I have 'em wait outside of town, they're in some hippie-looking dumb-ass van, right? (laughter) You get the picture already, don't you?

So he leaves, finally, he goes down in Sacramento, wherever he's going, he's gonna be gone for an hour or something. And I said, and I radio back to the hippies in the van, "Okay, come into town, he's gone." They come into town, they pretend like they're friends of this guy, right? The PR guy, like they know him. "Hey, where's Mike So-and-so? We're his good buds!" Right? And, and, um, by God, we ARC-broke everybody in that town badly, okay? (laughs) It's like the stuff they did, they did everything they could possibly do that was untactful, to insult people to, um, you know, they would-- they would, like, go into some shop where some little old lady's in there with her values, and they would go, "You got any stuff we could roll our weed with?" You know, kick the dog, grab the girls' asses, you know, everything you could think of, right? (laughter)

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: Oh, my God.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: Insulting people and all under the-- under the, uh, making them think that they were friends with this guy. They knew about the drug program, they were gonna be part of this new drug program, and "isn't that gonna be wonderful when we have this drug program up here because all of these people like us are gonna come, and we're gonna be smoking dope and getting your kids to smoke dope and" (laughter) it's gonna be a great time, right? Well, that went on for about 10-15 minutes and that town was terrorized when they left, you know? Um, and in a small town like that, I mean, anything that happens, you know, if a dog barks or something it hits the paper. I mean, this was a major catastrophe, (laughs) you know, for these people.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Yeah.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: So, uh, they said, "There ain't no way in hell we're having a drug program up here!" (laughter)

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: And all this guy did was go down to Sacramento for an hour.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: Well, he got back!--

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: -- gone.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: He came back in an hour and this town was up in arms, man, they were gonna lynch this sucker, right? (laughs) So anyway, uh, we got-- we let it go for a week. I recruited another agent who was a girl, I sent her up there to go sit in the bar. And they're still talking about this, all those damn hippies, you know, "No, no, they're not coming up here!", right? (laughs) A week later (laughs)

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: -- right.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: So she says to them-- which, you know, I told her to say to them-- "Why don't you guys circulate a petition up here and send it to your congressman?" Okay? "And tell 'em you don't want no drug program up here." Which they did, right there on the spot, that's a good idea! (laughs)

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: -- doing their civic duty.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: Yeah-- "here it is, let's make a petition right now!" They did it, they all signed it, they sent it to the congressman, the congressman got wind of it and, uh, in fact they phone-called and, you know, they just raised a big stink. And it killed the whole drug program. They called up Esterbrook and said, "You ain't getting no money for no drug programs!" (laughs)

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Wow.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: (laughs) That wasn't the only operation we did on him. By the time I was done with him, the guy sold his house and got the hell out of the state to get away from me.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Did he know it was you?

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: Me? Oh, yeah. He didn't know it was me; he knew Scientology did this to him but nobody listened to him.

UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Right.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: You know, he said, "Those damn Scientologists!" and they thought he was nuts! See what I mean? (laughs)

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: --right.

MIKE McCLAUGHRY: So she says to them--which, you know, I told her to say to them--"Why don't you guys circulate a petition up here and send it to your congressman?" Okay? "And tell 'em you don't want no drug program up here." Which they did, right there on the spot, that's a good idea! (laughs)