("Quid coniuratio est?")
INTERVIEW WITH SHERMAN SKOLNICK -- MARCH 15, 1995
On March 15, 1995, I interviewed Mr. Sherman Skolnick of the Citizens' Committee to Clean-up the Courts [CCCC] by telephone. The following is my transcription of that interview. Note that in this interview I neither necessarily agree nor disagree with either all or some of the statements of Mr. Skolnick.
-- Brian Francis Redman, Editor-in-chief, Conspiracy Nation
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CONSPIRACY NATION:
I've been readin' through some of this Tsar stuff, The File on
the Tsar by Anthony Summers, and, I gotta hand it to ya, it
really, to me it looks conclusive that there's been a cover-up of
some type.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
One of the biggest cover-ups of the 20th century.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
I have a few questions here. There's um... O.K. My question is
regarding the educational system in this country. Because, even
today, you go to a high school and they're gonna be teachin' you
that "Oswald did it." And...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Well, that's because of the school textbook publishers, like
Scott-Foresman(sp?), which is in a northwest suburb of Chicago.
They're part of the establishment. They're tied in with the
banking interests, and uh, they speak for the establishment.
Would you want them to tell the truth about things? They're not
gonna tell the truth about what happened to the Tsar and his
family, what brought on Pearl Harbor, what the Dallas
assassination of JFK was about, or any of that. They've even
lied about what brought on the First World War! They've lied
about the sinking of the Lusitania and so on -- there's a book on
that by a fellow named uh, Simpson I think, that tells what the
Lusitania was really about. [It] was carrying munitions and so
on. And the British navy withdrew all protection and allowed the
Lusitania to be at the mercy of German submarines.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
O.K. But my question is more...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
So in other words, the educational system, from top to bottom,
with their textbooks and everything there, lied. And the
teachers... Well some teachers depart from their textbooks, but
generally not. They're criticized if they depart from the
curriculum.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
O.K. But my view on this is that it would be more of a top-down
thing; that you've got, at the highest level you've got so-called
"experts" who do know a lot about this sort of thing, but that
they're more or less paid to lie about it. And because they're
the authorities, it goes top-down, and...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Yeah, that's true. But it goes through the financial connections
of the textbook publishers and, uh... For example, a person is
hard-put to find, in the United States, books... like British
school books on U.S. history telling their viewpoint of what
brought on the American Revolutionary War. I've been looking all
these years; you can't find it anywhere. The nearest to it was
some book that came out a few years ago, written about some of
those that fled the colonies to England, and their viewpoints.
In other words, I wanted a balanced account of things. And you don't get it from the run-of-the-mill books -- whether textbooks or whatever.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
O.K. There's a book called Universities and the Capitalist
State by Clyde Barrow [University of Wisconsin Press at Madison]
that, along these lines, it kind of traces the encroachment of
the government into the university system; where, say, in the
last century, universities were a lot more autonomous. But then
the government, through, say, the Carnegie...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Well, the best book on this subject is by James Ridgeway, called
The Closed Corporation. It came out of the '60s. It's as
accurate as if it was published yesterday. It tells about all
these universities and their tie-in to corporate interests. So
that supports what you're saying.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
So, in other words, you would say it's just kind of a scam,
basically. I mean, there may be honest researchers in the
educational establishment, but it's basically...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Well, some of the more prominent professors make twice, and three
times, and four times as much as outside consultants to major
corporations. During the Vietnam War, the University of Chicago
and other places had various professors that were consultants to
the Defense Department on how to make better bombs, how to bomb
Vietnam flat to the ground, and you know, stuff like that. Could
they, in their classes, teach something that caused people to
open their mind as to what was causing the Vietnam War? I don't
think so. Not while they're making hundreds of thousands of
dollars [in] consulting fees for the Defense Department.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Yeah it's, this is just somethin' it kinda dawned on me -- O.K.?
-- that the educational establishment was part of the system of
repression, it seemed to me. But it took me awhile to see that,
that these people, a lot of 'em had a vested interest in seein'
things a certain way.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Well, The Closed Corporation has, from time to time, been
available in paperback. It's, it may have been re-printed. I
strongly suggest that you go to some used bookstore and find a
copy. Because the information that's there is still good
information. And it'd be wonderful to have that circulate on
Internet, for people to consider what the heck some of our
universities are into.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
O.K. And you know, something I've also noticed is, I'm fortunate
that I live about 2 blocks from a library here. And they're
hooked up by computer to other libraries: so if that library
doesn't have the book, I can get it through inter-library loan.
And yet, there are books that just, they don't show up on the
computer. I'm thinkin' of...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
You want a short list of books like that?
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Yeah!
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Those that don't show up, that you have some trouble finding?
Gustavus Myers...
CONSPIRACY NATION:
O.K.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
The Great American Fortunes. You oughtta read that.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
O.K.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Almost every great American fortune is based on criminal
enterprises.
Then there's the book, by the same author, The History of the Supreme Court. Which, in some ways the title is a little, sounds limited. The book, The History of the Supreme Court, is actually a history of the legal system of the United States. And it shows that the Supreme Court has been run by liars and fakers all the years, who had vested interests in what they were doing. Including Chief Judge John Marshall, whose picture hangs with a gold frame in most law schools. He was one of the biggest fakers of all, and he made decisions favoring his own family regarding Fairfax County and their connection to the British!
So I mean that's, those are two books right there.
A third book, that is suppressed altogether in the United States is Farewell, America by James Hepburn.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Yeah.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
That book -- a bestseller in Europe, in 14 languages -- was not
allowed, over the years, to be sold when it came out, in
bookstores, in the United States.
So if someone says, "Oh, well, there's a free press in America." -- False. There are hard-hitting books that are not allowed to be circulated here. And that is one of 'em.
The book, Farewell, America, tells about the high-level plot, involving the oil companies and others, to assassinate John F. Kennedy. And the oil companies saw to it that the book was not allowed to be brought into the United States. There were only two people that circulated the books -- that were not bookstores! You're talking to one of 'em. In the '70s, I used to carry suitcases of those books, that we smuggled in from Canada. And I used to give 'em away at college speeches that I gave, in return for small donations. I was one of the only ones that was able to get the books into the United States. In fact, the Post Office so knew about it that all you had to do, in the '70s, was put on an envelope "Farewell, America -- Chicago, Illinois" and that envelope would arrive right in my mailbox. You didn't even have to spell "Farewell" correct...
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Um-hmm [understands].
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
...and it would arrive, right here.
But it just is an example of the fact that, there is no free press; the universities are not free and open markets of ideas; and the textbook publishers are fakers; and teachers, to keep their jobs and not to get into trouble, follow a curriculum that is often riddled with textbooks that are frauds! I know that's a broad, general statement...
CONSPIRACY NATION:
No. You know, in... Well I'm the one that brought it up...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
In other words, I could help prove that -- that's a broad,
general statement -- but I could fill it in with nitty-gritty --
you know what I mean? -- with nuts and bolts, to prove that
that's so.
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Yeah. Because I had asked recently, regarding the Kennedy
assassination, just out of curiosity, if they're still, in the
high schools, they're still teaching that "Oswald did it." And my
information is that, yeah, indeed, that's what they're sayin'.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Twenty-five years ago I taught, during the Vietnam War, at a
radio broadcast school in Chicago, O.K.? And my course was
popular. It was called "Civic Investigation". And I taught, "How
You Uncover Information" -- showing who the war-mongerers are,
even those that live in Chicago that are in the bomb and bullet
business -- You know what I'm sayin'?
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Yeah.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
-- that profit from the bloodshed in Vietnam.
After two semesters, my course was "X'd out". Even though it was very popular with the students.
So I mean that's, that's just a small example of what uh, the things are at. In other words, teachers that try to open the minds of students are rare. We had a rare one, a rare professor, on our TV program recently: Professor John Goldsmith...
CONSPIRACY NATION:
I saw that! He was from the University of Chicago. I've got...
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Wasn't that a wonderful program?
CONSPIRACY NATION:
I tell ya, one of my readers -- O.K.? -- has been very nice and
has been making copies of your shows and sending 'em to me. And
your program is just astounding. It... I'm gonna try and get it
aired down here on the public access.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
O.K. Did you happen to know or see the program we did -- we were
the only ones in the United States, so far as I know, that put
portions of the suppressed documentary, on the television, called
"ZR Rifle".
CONSPIRACY NATION:
Haven't seen it, no.
SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
That one, it was made in Havana and showed on Cuban television --
was not allowed to be even considered in the United States! --
and told about how Chicago gangsters were part, were directly
among the shooters that shot at Kennedy in Dealey Plaza at the
auspices of the CIA.
[...to be continued...]
I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation."
Coming to you from Illinois -- "The Land of Skolnick"