The Rat Pack / Occult Techniques & Magic
Date
Wednesday - February 24 2021
Host
George Noory
Guests
Richard Lertzman, Richard Smoley
Former editor and publisher of Screen Scene magazine, Richard A. Lertzman, talked about the Rat Pack, a group of entertainers led by the "Chairman of the Board," Frank Sinatra, and how they influenced entertainment during the Sixties. He also updated his work on Dr. Max Jacobson, nicknamed "Dr. Feelgood," whose unique "energy formula" altered the paths of some of the 20th century's most iconic figures. Jacobson's formula was an injected mix of ingredients featuring methamphetamine, and his clients included JFK, Jackie Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Gore Vidal, Andy Warhol, Cecil B. DeMille, and Charles de Gaulle. At the time of Marilyn's death, Jacobson supplied her with syringes of his formula that she could administer at home. Some have speculated she may have mixed that in with other pharmaceutical drugs creating a fatal dosage.
Lertzman revealed how in the 1960s, New York City's forensic examiner Dr. Michael Baden examined the deceased body of Mark Shaw, JFK's photographer, who had been a client of Jacobson's. Baden concluded that Shaw was murdered by Jacobson, whom he viewed as a psychopathic addict. But it wasn't until a few years after this that Baden was able to testify against Jacobson, when his medical license was pulled. The Rat Pack actually got its start in the 1950s with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall and their celebrity and musician friends (including Sinatra), Lertzman recounted. Bacall had quipped the group looked like "a pack of rats," and entertainment reporter James Bacon dubbed them the "Rat Pack." In the late 50s, Sinatra was given 9% ownership of the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas, and he gathered a group of his friends, including Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Joey Bishop, to perform there with him. They modeled themselves after a wild lounge act by Louis Prima and Keely Smith, Lertzman revealed, and brought much notoriety and money to the Sands and Vegas.
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One of today's most highly regarded writers on esoterica, Richard Smoley is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Oxford. In the latter half, he talked about such topics as magic, Tarot, psychic abilities, life after death, and witchcraft. Performing magic, making things happen through means that are not necessarily causal or physical, requires a strong sense of will, he suggested. The development of will, which is a type of focused attention or energy on a single point or area, can be a difficult skill to acquire, especially in our short attention span culture, he noted. Psychic skills, he added, have been demonstrated scientifically, though some people are much more naturally gifted.
Smoley believes astrology, particularly as administered by adept practitioners, can serve as a guidepost in our lives, somewhat akin to a weather report. For example, many astrologers were sounding the horn about how a Pluto-Saturn conjunction in January 2020 did not bode well for the planet. Shortly after, the pandemic kicked in. The Tarot, invented in the 1400s in Milan, functions as a kind of dictionary of archetypes, and potentially offers a psychic snapshot of the given moment. Results vary depending on the quality of the reader, he commented (more in his video New Discoveries in the Tarot). He also talked about theosophical beliefs on levels beyond the physical, namely, the etheric body (or life force), and the astral body (thoughts and emotions). Generally, when a person dies, so does their two non-physical forms, but in the case of ghosts, the "astral shell" may linger on, he explained.
News segment guests: Howard Bloom, Mish Shedlock
Website(s):
thelifeandtimesofhollywood.com
richardsmoley.com
Book(s):
Deconstructing the Rat Pack
Dr. Feelgood
The Dr. Feelgood Casebook
The Truth About Magic
A Theology of Love: Reimagining Christianity through A Course in Miracles
How God Became God
Bumper Music:
Bumper music from Wednesday February 24, 2021
Midnight Express (The Chase)
Giorgio Moroder
Lucky Jack
Cusco
I’ve Gotta Be Me
Sammy Davis Jr.
Peaches En Regalia
Frank Zappa
Sway
Dean Martin
Unknown Paradise
Cusco
My Way
Frank Sinatra
The Way It Is
Bruce Hornsby
Magic
Pilot
Shadows In Silence
Enigma
Blowin' in the Wind
Bob Dylan
Pickpockets
David Holmes
L.A. Woman
The Doors
Gravity Of Love
Enigma
Hush
Deep Purple
Inca Dance
Cusco
