Brian Hubbard (5:08)

West of the smoke. West of the smoke.

Andy (5:11)

Okay, copy. West of the smoke. I'm looking at danger close now.

Brian Hubbard (5:16)

Oh, wait a minute. Give it to me. I did it.

Andy (5:18)

You're cleared.

Brian Hubbard (5:19)

Hot. Copy. Clear.

Andy (5:20)

Not Brian. Welcome to Montana.

Brian Hubbard (5:25)

It's a pleasure to be here with you today, Andy.

Andy (5:27)

Basically the same as Kentucky.

Brian Hubbard (5:29)

You know, y'all got some. Y'all got some high country here that we. We could use some elevation at home to compete, but otherwise, there is comparable, comparable beauty between Montana and Kentucky.

Andy (5:40)

What is the high point in Kentucky?

Brian Hubbard (5:42)

Black Mountain is the highest peak in the state, and that is in Harlan county, which borders on the state of Virginia. And Black Mountain is just a little over 4,000ft.

Andy (5:53)

Okay, that's respectable.

Brian Hubbard (5:54)

Very respectable and very beautiful. There's a stretch of road at home called the Kingdom Come Parkway. It goes from Whitesburg, Kentucky, into Harlan. And when you drive it, you literally feel as though you are at the top of the world. And the name Kingdom Come certainly is the inspiration produced by what you see out over that horizon.

Andy (6:17)

It makes sense. I have heard that there are elk in Kentucky. Is this true?

Brian Hubbard (6:24)

There was the beginning several years ago of the reintroduction of the western elk into Kentucky. Because the elk had been indigenous there, they had been hunted to extinction. And there has been a gradual reintroduction of the species into the eastern mountains, which was part of its historic habitat. And I guess it was probably about five or six years ago. I was coming around a curve late at night down in the East Kentucky mountains, and standing in the road, look like it was a deer that had eaten about four other deer. Yeah. And it took a second to dawn on me that I was looking at a bull elk. And it was majestic standing there.

Andy (7:01)

Have they allowed hunting yet? Are they still in the rebuilding phase?

Brian Hubbard (7:04)

They allow what is essentially a lottery hunt. About once a year, you go in for a drawing, and there is a program that allows a certain number of hunters to go in and hunt them. They make sure that the population is managed so that it can thrive while allowing for the recreational hunting opportunities that come with that, like I said, it's.

Andy (7:26)

Basically the same as Montana. Kentucky. Montana. We can pretend we're in Kentucky if you want to.

Brian Hubbard (7:31)

Well, the cowboy spirit between the two places is alive and well. And I certainly feel home here when I look and feel of the energy.

Andy (7:39)

Well, that's awesome. You have had. You've had a busy week. Even though you filmed. The episode actually was with Joe last week. It just came out today. And for. We can timestamp this thing, I guess this is the 3rd of January. How was that?

Brian Hubbard (7:59)

It was surreal. And for reasons we can get into later. Over the past year, there has just been an incredible journey unfold that began with what I sure thought was the complete and total end of a project that had been developed in Kentucky to essentially foster the therapeutic development of ibogaine as a breakthrough treatment for opioid addiction. That project looked as though it had been killed. On December 15th of last year, I was asked to resign by the newly elected Kentucky Attorney General for having pursued the project.

Andy (8:36)

Are we talking three weeks ago?

Brian Hubbard (8:37)

We're talking a year. Okay, three weeks ago.

Andy (8:40)

Because we just said last year. That was technically two days ago.

Brian Hubbard (8:42)

So I'm still stuck in a time warp in 2020.

Andy (8:45)

I wanted to make sure. I'm like, okay, you might have had a wild month instead of a wild week.

Brian Hubbard (8:49)

All right, it was a. It's been a wild year between December of 23 and where we sit now. So that initial meeting, that result and the request for my resignation occurred on December 15th of 23. That resignation was effective December 31st of 23. The new attorney General was inaugurated and took office on January 2nd of 2024. And Mr. Rogan's episode around the entire endeavor around ibogaine that began in Kentucky and that we seek to continue in Texas was released on January 2nd of 2025, one year to the day of the new Attorney General's coming into office.

Andy (9:28)

That's wild.

Brian Hubbard (9:28)

And if that's not auspicious for 2025, I don't know what is.

Andy (9:34)

What role were you holding when they asked for your resignation?

Brian Hubbard (9:38)

I was the chairman, the very first chairman and executive director of what is called the Kentucky Opioid Abatement Advisory Commission. I had begun an accidental legal career back in 2001 that ended up turning into an accidental career in state government service in February of 2017.

Andy (9:58)

Does that mean you, like, tripped and fell into law school?

Brian Hubbard (10:01)

Essentially it was because I feel like.

Andy (10:04)

I would have gotten up and gone the other direction.

Brian Hubbard (10:06)

Well, by the time I was through the first semester in Law school, that was certainly what I was wishing. But by that time the debt shackles of student loans were on and there was no choice but to go through to the end. I came up in a very blue collar family. The aspirations for standards of success for my brother and myself were to become e a doctor or a lawyer, as is the case in many blue collar households. I wasn't very much good at math or science, but I could read and talk a little bit, which put me on the law school track. My brother's the physician and he got the brains in the family. And when I got to law school, I had received through elementary school a very idealized education as to what American history and civics involved. And I came to believe before I went to law school that the law was all about defending truth, justice and the American way and making progress for your fellow human. By the time I got through the first semester, all of those dewy eyed hopes and aspirations had been crushed and destroyed before my very eyes. That quickly, that quickly I came to find out that law often has absolutely nothing to do with the achievement of any of those objectives. And those hard lessons were reinforced over the course of that 16 year practice career which followed a career that was triggered by the necessity of paying student loan debt, but that nonetheless became a tremendous education about the forces at work within American society that have caused a tremendous amount of destruction over the past 28 years.

Andy (11:35)

Do you think that the law was ever as pristine as people hope it was? Has it been corrupted over time? Or do you think it was by its design? Maybe the architecture that you described, as opposed to the architecture people were hoping for?

Brian Hubbard (11:49)

Well, there's oftentimes a difference between what one wish to achieve theoretically and what plays out practically. When it comes to the issue of law. Human history tends to repeat itself. And there was a Roman historian who I believe was called Tacitus, who once said, during the late stage Roman Empire, where the laws are plentiful, the people suffer. Once you begin to write volumes and volumes and volumes of language that we call law, and you append it to additional volumes and volumes and volumes of language which we call regulation, you open up an infinite number of linguistic possibilities to infinitely manipulate legal realities to come to the predetermined outcome that the person who holds the power to apply it wishes to achieve. So I want to be very clear, in my experience, there are some great judges in American society, there are some great lawyers in American society, there are some great law firms in American society, some of the greatest champions for social progress in American history have been lawyers. At the same time, there is a very ugly reality about what it can and actually is, what it can be and what it actually is in many places across the country. And to Fast forward roughly 1700 years, I would quote former President Thomas Jefferson, who I believe once said, the law is often nothing other than the tyrants will, and always so when it infringes upon the liberty and dignity of the individual. Now, that's an approximate quote. I hope your audience looks that up. They don't hold it against me if I didn't get it verbatim. But the one part I can assure you, he said, was that the law is often nothing other than the tyrants will. And that's something that we have to be mindful of as we look at systems which develop around law and wish for them to produce progress rather than hardship. And when we can perceive that governmental systems produce more hardship than progress, then there's some accountability that needs to be brought to bear to get those systems working as they're supposed to.

Andy (14:14)

Where does the real power in the legal system sit? Is it with the judges?

Brian Hubbard (14:20)

It is with judges. And.

Andy (14:22)

And they ascend through being lawyers in most cases anyway.

Brian Hubbard (14:25)

Correct. Almost all judges begin as lawyers. I think in times past in states where there were elected judiciaries, you didn't necessarily have to have a legal degree to become a judge. Judges hold the power whenever a case is brought into court, no matter the nature or magnitude of the case, and pardon the use of this phraseology, the judge is the Lord God Almighty of that case within that courtroom for him, and they know it. And the culture of the judiciary is observably a wire of the power that they have. And if I were to pinpoint probably the most troubling theme within the modern American legal system, it is the immense amount of arbitrary discretionary authority judges have by virtue, as by virtue of how the system is designed to create fictitious legal realities which are designed to nullify, negate, and otherwise do violence to true reality. I believe if we started looking and inventory and all the fictitious legal realities which have been created by courts to bind the hands of social progress, the list would be fairly long. And having a population that is educated in first principles about why this country was founded, the principles on which it was founded, and the degree to which they have to be guarded at all times against all branches of government, whether they be executive, legislative, or judicial, is imperative.

Andy (16:19)

Do you think it's a fixable system?

Brian Hubbard (16:21)

It is absolutely a fixable system, but you have to have a return to first principles. And those first principles are the equal application of law to everyone, to every individual, for the purposes of achieving justice and conformity with objective truth. Many, many judges and many lawyers for that matter, have absolutely no commitment to the pursuit or the establishment of objective truth. They are there to pursue an agenda, whether that is the agenda to the specific client that is before that court, or whether it is the philosophical agenda of the judge who manipulates the language of the law to come to the predetermined conclusion that has the binding force of law. Fictitious, fictitious legal realities have binding consequences because everyone is legally bound to acknowledge them and mind them, regardless of whether they're rooted in genuine reality or common sense. One of my favorite quotes that I heard from an author, and I wish I could remember this one's name, was that common sense is often a stranger in the house of the law. I think if you asked regular everyday Americans on the street if they agreed with that or not, you'd probably get at least a 70, 30, yes to no ratio. And certainly in my years of practice, that was an experience that I had again and again and again.

Andy (17:57)

Do you think that the system you're describing is capable of fixing itself? Or would you need an outside entity that is detached to come in and look and then start carving away the cancer like a doctor would?

Brian Hubbard (18:11)

I don't think that a system which rests upon the perpetuation and expansion if its own power interests will ever self correct. There has to be accountability that is brought from on high. And for purposes of American society, that accountability must be administered by the sovereign. And the sovereign in this society are the American people. There must be a populace that is properly educated and enlightened as to how all aspects of its government functions. And with that awareness, be ready to hold office holders and those who office holders put into positions of power accountable for creating legally binding fictions which harm society in the countervailing face of what justice requires within the context of reality. Was that too complex?

Andy (19:16)

No, it's in concept very simple. The execution of that is where the rubber meets the road.

Brian Hubbard (19:28)

Well, and this is where we're going to get into some philosophy with each other. When you look at the past 25, 30 years of life in America, I think most people would agree that what we have seen is the ascendancy of survivalism within our population, the preoccupation with all the things that a person must do to keep their head above water in today's America. And when folks are focused on trying to survive, they have no Time to thrive. When somebody's working 1, 2, 3 jobs to be able to keep the lights on, the mortgage paid, and maybe get their child through an exorbitantly expensive public university, they don't have time to pay attention to all the machinations of an extremely expansive government that has tentacles that run into every sphere of our lives and to hold it duly accountable for all the ways in which it creates distortions within reality that harm everyone.

Andy (20:39)

Do you think that that ecosystem is accidental or intentional? I always am hesitant to underestimate my adversary or opponent, and I hate to use that term, facing towards my own government. I love ucia, nsa. I'm just kidding about everything I just say, except for the nice stuff because they're listening to us right now. I have to check them at the table. They might be under there, but a smart adversary would ensure that that environment exists so they could dig their tentacles deeper by keeping everybody else distracted. And I don't know the answer to that question. I actually think I probably am a little bit like a flag on the wind on that one. Because sometimes I see things where like, wow, that's not possible. That that's accidental. And other times, nah, that's just, you know, the country has continued to evolve since its inception and this is part of the evolution. But. And I don't know if there is an answer, but those are the things I ask myself. Because what better way to maneuver is if you have somebody distracted that should be watching.

Brian Hubbard (21:47)

That's exactly right. When people are focused on survival, they have no time to become the actively engaged and informed citizens that we need them.

Andy (21:56)

Yeah, their heads down, they're working.

Brian Hubbard (21:58)

There's another Jefferson quote that's right on point with that. And it relates in, in the case of that quote to government taxation and the degree to which it burdens the average citizens with the cost of government. And Jefferson says that if we are not cautious, what we will find is that we spend our time putting rivets into the shackles around the necks of our fellow sufferers. And I believe that that is a very prophetic quote and it very much encapsulates the danger that's looking us right in the face right now. You ask whether these realities are by design or whether they're by accident. You may be familiar with a guy by the name of Lord Acton who came up with the. With the phrase power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Andy (22:46)

100% have heard that for a million dollars. Wouldn't have been able to. Told you who came up with it, though.

Brian Hubbard (22:50)

Well, he has another quote that I came across a few years ago that to me, is equally powerful. And the quote is the greatest heresy, is that the office sanctifies the holder. Power corrupts. That is a part of the human condition. And what is necessary in contemporary American society and at all times is to never give power the benefit of the doubt, no matter who holds it. We are human beings. When human beings assert positions of control over other human beings, suffering is inevitable. We are autonomous, spiritual beings who I believe have been made from on high. Our authority is from on high. This nation was explicitly founded on the basis of that reality that we are endowed by our Creator with certainly inalienable rights that we have by virtue of being the children of that Creator. That is the foundational, concrete truth. That is the idea of America. Government has the responsibility to govern all with reverence for that reality. And I think if we look at where we are at right now, perhaps people would agree that that spiritual truth has faded a little bit in terms of its relevancy, that perhaps there is a collective. There's some. There's some fog related to collective cultural amnesia that needs to be cleared out about who is really in charge of American society. The people are in charge of this society. And it is the people who have the absolute ability to create mass structural change that will improve the lives of everyone if they can take a breath, lift their head from the weariness of the labor to which they have to engage every day and just take one good, firm push back at everybody who's ready to stand on their necks.

Andy (25:17)

Yeah, yeah. I think we would actually need to weaponize the legal system a little bit. That might be a improper phrasing of the term. We need to change, in my opinion, which counts for nothing. I think we need to change the structure of the power holders and power brokers in this country, in the government. And there's a lot of things that need to be changed, but one of them, I think, would make a huge difference, because I agree with you about power, and there's been studies done about it. I forget the exact name of the study, but they brought in two groups of people. And these were clearly people off the street. And they told one group that they were inmates and the other group that they were not the wardens, but people who worked in the jail. And the shift in how they were treating the inmates, which were clearly not inmates, was almost instantaneous. So you can have example of this, an example of this, an example of this. But yet, when you look at our political system, people can stay in there as long as humanly possible. And they become power brokers. And not only are they power brokers, the people that work for them that we don't get to elect, that we don't get to vote for, that. Almost nobody understands that sub layer. You know, people talk about the president's cabinet. Okay, cool. What about everybody else that works in Washington, D.C. that even though administrations change out, they just stay there and they're the power brokers. Yeah. You get a deck of cards of faces that are new, but the people actually throwing the levers, they stay there. I think we have to change the system, personally. I think that term limits is one of the first things that we have to do. And that would apply to those in the government services as well. So they can't become that power broker that can take the word from somebody who is actually above them and decide not to do it and nobody sees it. I don't know if the people in power are ready for that because I feel like they would have to act against their own self interest.

Brian Hubbard (27:07)

Mm. Well. And that's something that's very difficult for anyone to do, especially a politician who has built their entire aspiration set around the acquisition of power.

Andy (27:18)

Yeah. You're asking him to give it up.

Brian Hubbard (27:19)

Yes. You mentioned your recollection of the experiment that was conducted, what was essentially a prison simulation. I believe that was the Stanford prison experiment.

Andy (27:31)

I was going to say Harvard, but yeah, I think you're right.

Brian Hubbard (27:34)

It was horrendous.

Andy (27:35)

They started treating people horribly because they were told to pretend as if you are a guard at the jail.

Brian Hubbard (27:43)

When I was a freshman in college, I went into Sociology 101 and the professor there showed the footage that was taken by the researchers themselves over what was supposed to be a week long prison simulation. Well, they didn't even get it to 36 hours because of the emotional breakdown that happened on both sides of this dynamic. And I couldn't help. You know, this was a very serious topic about human power dynamics that was on display. But you know how sometimes you'll be watching something serious and there'll be something that comes across is just so darkly humorous, you just can't help but laugh all the time. Within this. Within the simulation, at some point, this dude who just continued to sass the folks who were portraying the guards was made to. He objected to eating his breakfast. So he went on like a hunger strike. Within the context, they punished him by making him hold three breakfast sausages in his hand until such time he was going to. And he Literally held onto the breakfast sausages for the whole rest of the time until the experiment broke down and they like released everybody from doing it because of the total psychological decompensation that occurred. But just thinking about 36 hours, people holding breakfast sausages for 36 hours, that's pretty rough.

Andy (28:59)

I mean, I know we're going to talk a lot about what people would consider to be alternate medications, whatever it may be. Even in Big Pharma, which there is an entire conversation around whether or not that is a system designed to make people healthier, get them addicted, make money, whatever it may be. Even your most benign with air quotes medicine call it aspirin has a maximum exposure and warning label on it. But we don't do that with things like power or positions that can wield incredible power and influence and then oftentimes corruption. It doesn't make any sense to me. Like aspirin can kill you. Too much power can turn you into a version of yourself that I don't think that you would recognize. And they can end up killing other people.

Brian Hubbard (29:52)

You asked about the question between design and accidental outcome. You know, I hate to keep going back to Thomas Jefferson, but in terms.

Andy (30:04)

Of he's a relatively strong individual in our history, I'm good with it.

Brian Hubbard (30:09)

In terms of the founding father philosopher, in my opinion, he is. He is at the top of the pyramid. And he made the observation that the nation that expects to be ignorant and free expects what never was and never will be. When President Reagan left office In January of 1989, he gave a farewell address. And if your listeners go back and find that address, they will hear from him a warning about the decline in the. The passing on of civilizational knowledge and the history which preceded the creation of the United States as a necessary prerequisite to understand and why this nation is unique, singularly unique in human history in terms of the purpose it is to serve as the last best hope of humankind on earth. And he warned against fallen off the mission of making sure that young people are continuously educated about the civilizational struggle that has culminated in the creation of the United States for all of its faults and deficiencies at the outset, that we continue to work through and evolve from into today. And I can't help but think that the greatest danger that we currently face right now is associated with what has been a failure to pass along those civilizational values to young folks who I believe are starved to death to number one, be recognized for their individual significance to be affirmed that this nation is one in which they can hope to thrive and to have a life that is defined by their own happiness and dignity, so long as it brings no harm to others. And I believe it's also one in which young folks are desperate to have their spiritual significance affirmed. And I think if we can begin to do those three things, we will certainly see. It may take a little while to show, but there will be generational change that lifts everyone over time if those objectives can be pursued.

Andy (32:38)

I agree with you. I think that there is a. A failure to educate people, specifically youth, about what our country is and was and could be. And I'm going to add an asterisk to that. There are people who want to change the history of who we were. What this country were founded, was founded on the principles. They want to modify that. And I don't know which one of those is more dangerous, but neither of them lead down a good path.

Brian Hubbard (33:08)

I don't disagree.

Andy (33:11)

Yeah, kind of law did you practice?

Brian Hubbard (33:15)

I failed a law that was chosen by necessity rather than by choice. My first job coming out of law school was just getting a job. I went to a school in Kentucky and going through it was immediately clear that there was a. There was pretty well affirmed caste system in place. If you were in the top 10% when it came to law school examination grades, the career services office couldn't work hard enough for you. But if you were outside of that 10%, you were kind of going to be going to row your own boat. And I was having to row my own boat. When I was in high school, I was an honor student. I graduated with distinction from my university. And at the time I was embarrassed because the worst grades I ever got in my life were in law school. And as I sit here with you now, I have to take that as a validation that I kept my head on straight through the process. When I came out, I owed $60,000 in student loans. I was that's had a good year.

Andy (34:13)

In current public education numbers.

Brian Hubbard (34:17)

Separately, that is another symptom.

Andy (34:21)

It's criminal.

Brian Hubbard (34:22)

It is absolutely criminal what has happened to access to public education in this country and the way in which public institutions especially have come off the rails. But that's a separate discussion for another time. I came out owing $60,000. I had never owed a dime for anything in my life. And Kentucky lawyer salary scale is much different than what the popular mind may associate with lawyer salaries based on TV shows.

Andy (34:48)

You're not making LA money. You're not driving a convertible Porsche, unless.

Brian Hubbard (34:51)

$30,000 would have bought a convertible Porsche in LA in 2001 probably used. That's where it started. So I was. I went to work for a law firm in 2001. When I was interviewed by them, I had just happened to write a BR related to workers compensation law that had been submitted to the Kentucky Supreme Court. And I brought it in as a writing sample, and I did my interview. And I got home that evening and got a call from one of the partners who had been in the interview and said, you know, Brian, we spoke with you. We liked what we've read and we liked what we heard. And I'm curious as to whether you would be willing to consider practicing workers compensation law. And I said, well, I don't know anything about that, but, you know, I'm looking to be able to relocate to Lexington, Kentucky, and if that is the opportunity that is given to me, I'll be glad to accept it. So I started work with that firm in May of 2001. My mentor was a lady by the name of Mary Kay Williams. Mary Kay had graduated from the University of Kentucky College of Law in 1994. She was just a tremendously vibrant, happy beam of sunshine who no one would ever would have believed was a lawyer when they first met her. And I've always said, if someone's first impressed is, oh, you must be a trial lawyer. I need a whipping right on the spot immediately. So Mary Kay was one of those where you wouldn't have thought right off the bat that she was an attorney. And she took me under her wing. And I can remember the first time she came to my office, she handed me a Cabot's medical dictionary and a stack of medical records and said, summarize these, and if you've got any questions, look at that dictionary. And that's how training started. And then after that, I got stacks of depositions that she had taken to summarize. And then I started learning how she organized her files. She was tremendously patient. I mean, she would bookmark. She treated me like the helpless law infant that I was and roadmaped everything and prepared me. And working with her was just. It was a joy. Despite the misery of the practice itself, which pretty much from day one, all the way through the end, the actual practice of law, I found to be just absolutely miserable and the business of law even more so.

Andy (37:11)

You'd be shocked how many friends I have that were lawyers that have said the same thing. What kept them in there was exactly what you said. They had to pay back their student debts. And if it wasn't for that, they would have Lateraled to a different occupation.

Brian Hubbard (37:23)

Almost instantly because of how it is set up. It is a glorified form of white collar indentured servitude. There is no doubt about it.

Andy (37:31)

How long? I mean, obviously this is a broad question, but how long on average do you think it takes people to pay it back? It depends on what you borrowed, right, and what you're making. But.

Brian Hubbard (37:38)

But it depends on what you borrowed, what you're making. You know, some people who get those top jobs, if they're financially disciplined, they can get that debt knocked out in three or four years, especially if they go to work in the big markets where the salaries are high. You know, if you are, if you're working in a southeastern state, in a small town and the salary scale is much lower, you know, in your top jobs. For instance, when I was made a partner at the law firm at which I achieved that distinction, my salary was 90 grand. I don't think when people think law partner, $90,000, they think significantly more than they're thinking.

Andy (38:11)

That's a monthly salary for somebody in LA or New York, which maybe it is. I don't know.

Brian Hubbard (38:16)

It may very well be there. It was not, it was not for me or many other attorneys who are in Kentucky and other states that are comparable. And in those circumstances, people labor long and hard to get those student loans paid off. If they manage to get them paid off in 10 years or less, they've done well. And I think oftentimes people are more along the lines of 15 or 20.

Andy (38:35)

Which is rough because then the sunken cost fallacy comes in. You spent so much time in the occupation, you paid off the debt. I'm already 20 years, 15, 20 years down the road. Do I really want to change and do something else? I mean, that's a recipe for being not enriched and not fulfilled in your life, professionally at least.

Brian Hubbard (38:54)

Well, and speaking of home, that reality was brought home and I'm. I've got to go back on my mind. In 2013, there was a national story about a Kentucky lawyer who had committed suicide. And the reason it became a national story was because this was the 13th suicide among a Kentucky lawyer within about five years. And I think that that tells a very ugly truth about the nature of practice, the professional culture, the business of practice, which at least at home it is dog eat dog. It is a dehumanizing business model that one must navigate and it takes a toll. And I've few of the lawyers that I have seen unless they're at the top of the heap and they're mining the other human beings within the firm for money who are genuinely and truly happy with the choices they made. I told both my daughters, you know, if y'all want to go to law school, that's your decision. If you get a law degree, make sure you put it to good use. Which usually does not mean going and practicing inside of a litigation firm. I didn't get to mean, didn't mean to get too sidetracked. So Mary Kay trained me. And In May of 2002, after I had worked with her for about one year, she hosted a Memorial Day cookout at her home. And I got a call at 11:00pm on Memorial Day, evening of 2002. And it was a colleague of mine. And I said, It's 11:30, what's going on? Calling me late and it's fine, but is there a problem? And he said, yes, there is. And there's no other way to put it to you than this. Mary Kay Williams died today. She had a fall from her attic and, and that almost immediately. She was trying to put a table up in her carport from a picnic she had had at her home. Mary Kay had been a partner at the firm for approximately six months before she died and she had given her all to that place. And when she was made a partner, she just was beaming with joy. And I remember going into the firm the next day, my office was next to hers, there was a sash across her door, there were flowers on her desk. And I mean everyone inside that firm, grown men to, to the secretaries, everybody was, was in profound grief and crying in the hallways over her. I remember going and sitting my office and just being in shock along with everyone else, just staring at the window, could not believe that she was gone. And my phone rang and it was a senior partner at the firm who I think maybe had said hello to me three times in the entire year that I had worked there. And he called me down and let me sit in a chair and he just said, there's no easy time to have this conversation, so we're going to have it now. Mary Kay Williams managed almost 300 litigation files for this law firm. She was a powerhouse. The most significant client within that caseload is Walmart stores of which there are 100 plus files that she handled for them. It is of utmost importance that that client be retained and anchored to this law firm. There were a lot of associates who worked with Mary Kay and you were the one that she spoke of the most highly, the most consistently. You need to go in There and get your hands around those files and do your very best to keep that client and firm damn out. At this point in time, you know, I had taken a handful of depositions, I'd summarize medical records, but I had not in any way practiced a case from front to back, but to honor her life and the investment that she made in me, I went in there and I gave it my all. And by the time 2005 rolled along, I had managed to secure that client as my own. From 2001 through the end of 2016, I practiced workers compensation law across the state, representing Walmart, Tyson Foods and Tennessee Valley Authority, three of the largest employers in the state. Now, I mentioned to you that I literally, I hated every day I practiced law. I mean, I just. The whole thing was miserable and the business of it was even more miserable. But I liked solving problems. I liked solving problems for the clients. When there was an employee who had been injured and needed to have medical treatment and the case was clear, I liked solving that problem and getting that employee everything that they needed to have to get. Well, workers compensation in Kentucky is a political patronage system which masquerades as a legal system. And here's how it works. It's an administrative law judge framework. So these are judges that are appointed by the Governor of Kentucky. Judges are nominated by through a judicial nomination process. And that judicial nomination process has certain lawyers on it who are workers compensation practitioners who make recommendations to the governor as to who a judge should be. The governor appoints that judicial selection committee. And in my years of practice, there was one four year term of a Republican governor by the name of Early Fletcher, followed by eight years of a term of a governor by the name of Steve Beshear, who was a Democrat. Steve Beshear was a heavy recipient of campaign contributions from plaintiff personal injury attorneys. So in most of my years of practice, when I would go to conduct a hearing, I could look and see who the lawyer was and who the judge was and know exactly what the outcome of the case was going to be, regardless of what the quality of the evidence in the case had been developed to be.

Andy (45:02)

Which sounds like the exact opposite way the system supposed to work.

Brian Hubbard (45:05)

You are exactly correct. So the number of times that I saw frivolous, spurious cases receive significant financial compensation were many. And I don't want to sit and bore your audience with law practice war stories, but I mean, some of the things that I could tell you that would illustrate that point of common sense, being a stranger in the house of the law, are Profound. And it was just. It was a really hardcore educational experience in terms of the way a legal system should function versus how it actually functioned. In any event, those practice years coincided with the onset and explosion of the opioid epidemic out of central and southern Appalachia, out across the rest of the country. I saw it play out in granular detail within my caseload. I saw the impact that it had statewide. And the degree to which it is an example of corrupted government systems producing predetermined outcomes that create tremendous injury to society is a concrete reality that everybody should be mindful of when it comes to that question of is this accidental or is this by intent? After I practiced those years, I received a call from an expert who I had utilized in my workers compensation cases, who had given a presentation to the administration of then governor Matt Bevin, who happened to be a Republican, about Social Security disability in Kentucky. And your listeners very well may be familiar with the federal program Social Security Disability. It's there for people who have conditions that keep them from being able to perform any kind of work. And that's as it should be. As a society. If somebody becomes disabled, we need to provide them with an income and medical treatment and make sure that they can have a dignified life despite their debility. That's what it's there for. For as long as anyone could remember, Kentucky was second only to West Virginia in terms of the percentage of its people receiving Social Security disability. Governor Bevin wanted to understand why. So this expert called me and said, hey, I've given a presentation to the governor's staff about Social Security disability. What do you know about it? And I said, well, workers compensation and Social Security disability claims go hand in hand. Aside from that, I really don't know much. I also know Kentucky has a lot of people that get it, but in terms of how it functions, I don't know. He said, well, Governor Bevins folks have asked if I know of anyone who could come in and assess the system as it is implemented by the state and figure out why enrollment is so high and if there's anything we can do about it. They asked me if I knew anyone who might could do it, and I gave him your name, and I hope that's okay. Well, having gotten to where I just couldn't hardly make myself look at a case file or go in the office and had to conjure up visions of home foreclosures and all catastrophes that could go with that in order to make myself go to work and do the job.

Andy (48:05)

Everybody finds Motivation in their own way. I'm not gonna judge some people. You know, the log of motivation comes from many different places.

Brian Hubbard (48:12)

Well, I was having to whip myself to go do what I had to do to keep the bills paid.

Andy (48:16)

I was generally a good sign that you need to find something else to do.

Brian Hubbard (48:21)

I had reached maximum burnout.

Andy (48:23)

Yeah.

Brian Hubbard (48:23)

So when this gentleman told me about this opportunity, I said, listen, if you ever need your yard mowed, your leaves raked, your shoes shine, your car washed, you let me know and I'll be able to do it. I'm going to reach out and see where the energy interview goes. So In February of 17, I started a job with as what was called the Deputy commissioner of the Kentucky Department for Income Support. And within that role I was given responsibility for leading the state Social Security disability system. And the primary job I was was given was figure this thing out. It's a federal program we implemented. As a state with a state workforce, what are our points of correction to where we can fix the high rate of benefit dependency in this state, if there are any. So we went about that task. I spent two months getting to understand the agency, how it worked. I'll never forget my first day on the job. I walked in and There was this 110,000 square foot building with 400 employees and then another building up the road in Louisville with another hundred. The most folks I had ever managed were two lawyers and maybe a paralegal. And I'm walking in that building thinking, man, they have no idea what kind of joker they've just let loose in here.

Andy (49:35)

It could be though, that you were managing in your two or three people more work than was getting done in that building. Well, I mean, let's be honest about the bureaucracy of federal and state government.

Brian Hubbard (49:45)

You know, the one thing that was a true surprise to me as I got to know that agency was the number of high caliber, high performing people within Kentucky state government.

Andy (49:58)

That's amazing to hear.

Brian Hubbard (50:00)

I was truly blown away by the level of acumen, competence and expertise within that workforce. Now this was the realization of a significant truth that applies in other contexts. In this country we have all kinds of fabulous human beings who go and just pour themselves into their work, work, work that is performed within terrible systems. There is a lot of effort and energy expended by high caliber human beings within the strictures of terrible systems. And that's what I found when I walked into that disability building there in Frankfurt. High caliber human beings just ground down within the demands of a terrible system. So the biggest objective in that job was to figure out how the disability program had played out in Kentucky. I was able to discover, just through interpersonal interaction and getting to know the workforce, six policy experts on the Social Security Disability program, all of whom recognized that something was out of whack, that the system's gateways of entry were too wide, that the mechanisms of accountability that should exist to separate the wheat from the chaff when it came to the legitimacy, legitimacy of a disability claim are not nearly as strong as they should be. And then on top of that, you had the suffocation of this federal bureaucracy called the Social Security Administration or the parent agency, whose dictates had to be minded regardless of whether they were effective, common sense, or in any way relevant to what was going on. We did a 35 year retrospective study on the system. And I sat down and I wrote out 19 different statistical metrics that we wanted to look at the state's population growth, various socioeconomic metrics that we could evaluate. We went and looked at demographics of enrollment within the Social Security Disability Program just to understand what's happening and why. So here are some of the key statistics that came out of that report. Between 1980 and 2015, Kentucky's population grew by 20%. Enrollment in the Social Security Disability Program grew 249%. Childhood enrollment in the program grew 449%. We pulled information from the state's Medicaid database about prescriptions issued to what was called the Title 16 Social Security Disability Medicaid population. And this is going to get a little dense, so forgive me. The Social Security Disability Program has what's called Title 2 and Title 16 beneficiaries. Title 2 beneficiaries are folks who have had an extensive work history whose benefits are paid on the basis of wages earned within the course of that work history. Title 16 beneficiaries are those who have little to no work history upon which wages can be based. So there is a baseline annual benefit all Title 16 receivers receive that may vary depending on where they live at within the country, but it is standardized. Kentucky for the longest time had more people receiving Title 16 than Title 2 because of the tremendous amount of generational poverty that has existed in the state. It's title 16 state. So the Medicaid system kept track of every prescription issued to an SSI Medicaid beneficiary. And our team asked for de identified data which basically tracked every opioid prescription issued to the title 16 adult population and every psychotropic medication that could potentially be dependency forming to SSI. Title 16 children. Between 2001 and and 2015, the issuance of prescription opioids to the SSI Title 16 adult population accelerated by 210% from 47 pills per SSI Medicaid adult up to 147 opioid pills per SSI adult. Within the childhood population, the issuance of habituating psychotropic medication grew 168%. And while that percentage point is lower than that reference for opioids, it's the dosages that are mind blowing. Every SSI Title 16 child was receiving 275 doses of psychotropic medications annually in 2001. By 2015, that number had climbed to 457 doses annually per SSI Title 16 child of habituate and psychotropic medication. There were other realities that were demonstrating the pernicious influence of the pharmaceutical industry within the state. There was one county in Kentucky that was the subject of a New York Times article somewhere back around 2011, in which one pharmacy and a county of 19,000 people had dispensed 11 million OxyContin pills. You heard that right? Yeah.

Andy (55:38)

Those numbers don't even.

Brian Hubbard (55:40)

It is ungodly.

Andy (55:42)

What was the lever for this to happen?

Brian Hubbard (55:48)

I hate to ask answer a question with a question, but. But this would require some explanation of Kentucky's specific history. Are you okay if I give that to you?

Andy (55:59)

Oh, let's go into it.

Brian Hubbard (56:00)

Okay. Kentucky is a border state. Historically, I would describe it as the only southern state which did not secede from the Union after the Civil War. It is a diverse state culturally. You have a significant Catholic German population around Louisville, and in northern Kentucky you have some of that influence out in the western areas of the state close to the Ohio River. But for the most part, the folks who live there are of Scots Irish descent. When Kentucky was settled by Dr. Thomas Walker and Daniel Boone in the 1770s, the people who followed them had historically lived in the tidewater areas of Virginia and other Southern states. These folks were the descendants of indentured servants who had come from England and Scotland and Ireland, who had worked on the plantations side by side with our enslaved black brothers and sisters, with the chief distinction being the legal privilege which came with their skin color to leave that indentured servitude after the term of years for which they had agreed to labor. And when that indentured servitude ended, they wandered off into a vast untamed forest and crossed the Cumberland Gap into what became Kentucky. Their first settlers were these folks. They were followed eventually by that Aristocracy that had set itself up in the Tidewater and then moved into other areas of the South. And that aristocracy brought with them the enslaved African Americans that they had possessed in those Tidewater areas. So Kentucky society, that was its genesis. In 1870, coal was discovered in the Appalachian mountains by Northeastern industrialists. And when they discovered that coal in the 1870s, they discovered a, for the most part, very simple subsistence farming peasantry that lived a very agrarian lifestyle. These were folks who had carved out 11 on the side of the mountain with their families. If they could read it all, they might have learned how to read a little bit out of the Bible. But for the most part, they were illiterate, very innocent, and certainly not in any way exposed to northeastern versions of capitalism and everything that involved. I'll make one other point about Kentucky relative to its history, particularly with African Americans. The Civil War ended at Appomattox In April of 1865, I believe. African Americans in Kentucky were not freed until eight months after Appomattox. And I believe even after the issuance of the Juneteenth Proclamation by General Granger down in Galveston, Kentucky folks were the last to be able to receive their emancipation. So coal was discovered in 1870. The folks who discovered it then brought down what was called the broad form deed. And this was very dense legal document. Remember when I said back then, lawyers just screwing us even back then, using the instrumentality of the legal word to effectuate mass thievery, especially to a population.

Andy (59:42)

That is not well versed in reading, writing and all of those things.

Brian Hubbard (59:46)

That's correct. So they came to what was essentially an autonomous peasantry. They weren't wealthy, but they were free. Presented them with a deed whereby, for a pittance, cents on the dollar, if there was a dollar, they signed away the rights to everything that was under the surface of their land, in addition to the conference of rights upon the company to come in and access what was underneath the surface in whatever way they needed to, and they signed it. Once that was signed, the companies would arrive, and these people were immediately dispossessed of everything they owned, and they were sent underground to labor their lives away as serfs on land that they used to own and control. As the social consequences of this brutal economic arrangement played out, there were attempts to challenge it. And the Kentucky Supreme Court essentially validated the legitimacy and legally binding effect of that broad form deed, despite the immense disparity of bargaining power and the complete and total ignorance of the individual who signed it as an illiterate person. Oftentimes those deeds were signed with an X. Why did the Kentucky Supreme Court do that? Because Kentucky's government, following the discovery of that coal, became a fully owned subsidiary of the industrial interests which then came in there, stripped that coal right out of those mountains and left nothing but devastation and poverty in its wake. The folks who were the first to matriculate that system then had children, who had children, who had children. So that by the time 1964 comes along, Lyndon Johnson comes to eastern Kentucky, of all the places in the United States and America, to kick off his war on poverty because of the way in which generational impoverishment had been in ground into the people of Kentucky with the active aid and assistance of its government, going back to the discovery, ironically, of coal, something which should have brought them at least some measure of prosperity that would have yielded a dignified life.

Andy (62:15)

Oh, it brought some people some prosperity.

Brian Hubbard (62:18)

The very aristocracy had been in control from the beginning.

Andy (62:22)

There was plenty of people enriched, just not the people who used to own the land and then the ones who were working on the land they used to own.

Brian Hubbard (62:29)

So you have a generationally repetitious pattern of very subsistence hand to mouth living among those who do work and the desperation for anything by way of a subsistence economic life for those who did not. In his book Empire of Pain, Patrick Radden Keefe explains the history of the Sackler family, the creation of Purdue pharma and how OxyContin was strategically developed and deployed within American society.

Andy (63:07)

Have you seen the Netflix? It's not a documentary, Michael. Look this up if you can. I think it's called Painkiller, but it's specifically about the Sackler family. Those are some evil people. Those are some evil people. Have you. This is jumping forward a little bit. I had heard that a court ruled bankruptcy was not going to protect their money. Have you heard anything that has come from that?

Brian Hubbard (63:32)

The U.S. supreme Court overturned a settlement agreement that had been achieved whereby the Purdue Farmers settlement within it had a provision that protected the Sackler family from any personal liability.

Andy (63:46)

Well, they were going to use the billions that they had made the interest off that to pay off the settlement and not actually lose a dime.

Brian Hubbard (63:54)

Correct. And the U.S. supreme Court said no. So now they're back to the negotiating table to figure out the way in which this settlement will now be executed. Since the Sacklers cannot protect their personal assets. That's what that's all about.

Andy (64:06)

Crack of the door of justice being served.

Brian Hubbard (64:09)

Yes. Every once in a while there'll be an accidental outcome that we can celebrate that lines up with justice and truth. And that would be one of them. And frankly, I think that if they hadn't done otherwise, the amount of mass outcry would have been one that would have been unbearable. At a certain point, even the most shameless institutions must do the burn necessary to maintain. Maintain credibility.

Andy (64:29)

Yeah. Michael, was that correct? Painkiller. Okay.

Brian Hubbard (64:32)

Yes. So in this book, Patrick Radden Keefe talks about that one of the genius things that the Sacklers did in addition to developing their pharmaceutical company was to develop a specific company that had as its so in purpose data collection, aggregation and analysis. So Back in the 1950s, the predecessor company to Purdue Pharma created a medication called Valium, a medication that became so widespread that it was popularized in the songs of artists of the time. And you might remember the Rolling Stones had a song that references Mother's Little Helper.

Andy (65:21)

I'm not a huge Rolling Stones fan, but I think I have heard that line.

Brian Hubbard (65:24)

I wish I could remember the title of the song. Sleep deprivation here with you today is keeping me from pulling that up. But the Rolling Stones make reference in a song to Mother's Little Helper. Yeah, they're referring to Valium. As Valium was prescribed in the United States, they tracked data as to those areas of the country in which prescriptions were most frequently issued to the population. And as they analyzed the data point they found was the areas of the country where poverty was at its highest, where disability was at its highest, were there was essentially shorter lifespan and higher rates of mortality. Across the board were those that had the highest rates of Valium prescription. So when it came time to deploy OxyContin, they went back and looked to see where the areas were that yielded the highest rates of Valium prescriptions. Those areas overlaid places like Kentucky and West Virginia and southwestern part of Virginia that I grew up in, in northeastern Tennessee and the rest of Appalachia. So when it came time to push out the oxy, they unveiled the map that they had created from their Valium sales and they just went back to the same places that they had gone, where the poverty was the highest, for the debility was the highest, and where frankly, the sociology of pain was the highest. And I have.

Andy (67:01)

And you could get the government to pay for it.

Brian Hubbard (67:03)

And you could get the government to pay for it. You've got it. I analogize east Kentucky in 1996 to a drought stricken forest. And being out here in Montana and in points west, we know what happens when lightning hits a drought stricken forest every August. We're reminded of that here you have a deadly inferno.

Andy (67:25)

Yep.

Brian Hubbard (67:26)

Because of the historical conditions which existed in East Kentucky going back to that discovery of coal in 1870, the degree to which that population had been subjected to generational traumatization embedded within its impoverishment. Impoverishment it had to work to maintain. East Kentucky was a drought stricken forest in 1996, and OxyContin was the lightning bolt that came in and set it on fire. As well as the rest of Appalachia where a coal economy had ever been prevalent. That was a system that came into being by virtue of the premeditated design of a pharmaceutical company that knew it had a major addictive medication on its hand. And the way in which it utilized the machinery of government not just to get approval for that medication, but to insist that it be forced onto physicians under penalty of sanction through the Joint Commission. The Joint Commission's creation of pain as the fifth vital sign which would have to be addressed as evidenced by physicians records and the implicit expectation that if pain were not met with opioid pills that there would be consequences. The pharmaceutical industry manipulated government agencies to create public policy which assured that their products would receive mass distribution for mass profitability, regardless of the mass destructive consequence. The opioid crisis is the gravest engineered humanitarian crisis that has befallen American society since the end of the 19th century. And we have yet to see light at the end of the tunnel. And I don't want to discount some great statistics that have come out within the calendar year of 24 which show that overdose deaths are beginning to decline. Now that's fabulous. But I have heard two theories about that. One is overdose deaths are declining because of the degree to which we have managed to supply every community in the country with an ample supply of Narcan. It is a lifesaver ignored, cannot be ignored. And it is fabulous that we have been able to roll that out to bring people back where there was not an option before. The second explanation that has been given is that there is a decline in opioid deaths because individuals due to the lethality of fentanyl within the street economy have migrated to meth. So we are see, saw in between a reduction in opioid related deaths, that is could possibly see the reemergence of meth addiction and the destruction it caused because it is viewed as the safer, non lethal alternative among those who are called in the street economy. It is vicious. The one thing that I have not seen statistically is while overdose deaths are down and it's fabulous and we should all rejoice are overdoses themselves down. And I've not seen that statistic, and I'm hopeful that that will be quantified and that's something that we can examine.

Andy (70:50)

Because I bet it will won't be.

Brian Hubbard (70:52)

As long as overdoses keep tracking with what they have been. That means that despite the decline in death, we're still not getting to the heart of the matter.

Andy (71:01)

Yeah, I don't think they're going to be well recorded because, I mean, every police vehicle in Kalispell has boxes in our can in it at this point. It's primary equipment for people, but people also have access to it. And who is going to report an overdeath of an overdose in their own house when they're able to recover from it with Narcan? I mean, you don't want to. You don't want to pull the curtain back on your life too much. I don't see it being tracked incredibly well.

Brian Hubbard (71:28)

It's also important, I think, to note, and I came to learn this, the degree to which I always. I'm always surprised by the way in which a new dynamic of the opioid epidemic is shocking. With as much of it as I have seen in my years of practice from a governmental systems perspective within the community in which I grew up within my own family, there are still realities which will emerge that are like buckets of cold water on my head in terms of the extent and magnitude of this problem. And I'll give you another Kentucky related.

Andy (71:59)

Example before you go into that. Did the book that you mentioned, did it talk about how the Sackler family got OxyContin approved?

Brian Hubbard (72:08)

It goes into exactly how one person.

Andy (72:11)

Who was standing in the way and they had a few days in a hotel room somewhere, and all of the sudden the one person, the gatekeeper on the wall who was in a position, who knows if he would have been replaced, whatever it may be, but in that moment, this person could have said no, but instead some language was changed. Don't worry. A few years later, that person went to work for Purdue Pharma. But that was literally. That was the Trojan horse coming through the wall. One person, a single human being.

Brian Hubbard (72:45)

Yeah, it is. It's breathtaking in terms of the mass scale of destruction caused by a very few hands. Yeah. And it speaks to the enormity of government power and the way it can create mass distortion within society when it has too much arbitrary authority to engage in reckless decision making, especially when it's in the dark.

Andy (73:14)

You're going to give me a Kentucky example.

Brian Hubbard (73:16)

There is a public health district at home that has seven counties. And I'm not going to name those counties because I would never want the precious people there to be embarrassed. Kentucky is like a lot of small states with small communities. There's a tremendous amount of pride in home. And anytime I discuss home, I always want to honor my people because they are beautiful. They have been long suffering and they have been terribly disserved by the power structure that has been in control of that state generationally for decades. The governance of Kentucky, historically, really until the past 20 years, has been well beneath what the dignity of the folks there deserve. So with that qualifier, there is one seven county public health district that encompasses three of the poorest counties in the United states. There are 92,000 people that live within these seven counties and there's a public health district that serves all of them which began a syringe exchange program, something that was highly controversial at the time that it was brought out because those who are opponents of those sorts of things say, you know, you're enabling and sanctioned drug use, etc. Yeah, correct. The counterpoint to that is, look, you have a opioid dependent population they are going to use. And one of the things that we have learned is when there is indiscriminate use, particularly with needles, you amplify the significant risks associated with the creation of things like hepatitis C epidemics as, as well as an outbreak of hiv, something that occurred in southern Indiana back in the mid to late 2000s that was devastating to a small community there. So as long as you have all this active use, you want to try to do everything you can to mitigate the collateral public health consequences that can produce terminal disease within a mass group of people. So this public health district started rolling out this syringe exchange program. They did it over the course of five years, from the beginning of 17 until the end of 2021. And it was staged out. Take a guess as to how many syringes were exchanged between January 1st of 17 and the end of 21 within this seven county health district of 91,000 people. One other thing, this is a deeply politically conservative and religiously fundamentalist area. You can't hardly go 200 yards and not walk in front of church house.

Andy (75:52)

1.5 million.

Brian Hubbard (75:53)

You are very. You are impressively close.

Andy (75:56)

That was a complete guess, so don't be impressed by that.

Brian Hubbard (75:58)

I am impressed. There were 1 million syringes exchanged.

Andy (76:03)

I was just trying to pick a number that was unreasonably high.

Brian Hubbard (76:05)

Well, you did it. Yeah, I was shocked 1 million syringes exchanged within those seven counties over seven years. And when we consider the fact that only a small percentage of folks in active use available themselves formal syringe exchange programs within a public health department, what does that say about the much broader problem of substance dependence within that area? Kentucky has one of the lowest labor force participation rates in the country. The last time I looked, it is somewhere around 54, 55%, which means almost half of folks who are working age adults are not in any way engaged in the workforce. There is a study, I believe, that come out of Ohio State that was able to quantify that at least 25% of working age males who are not engaged in the labor force are disengaged because they are opioid dependent. The most prosperous area in Kentucky is northern Kentucky, right outside of Cincinnati. There is one health system there called the St. Elizabeth Health System. And when I came into the commissioner or when I came into the chairman role for the Kentucky Opioid Commission, we conducted a series of town halls across the state because we wanted to introduce ourselves to communities, let them know what we were doing and to hear from them what it was they needed. We had a town hall in Covington, Kentucky, and there was a representative of the St. Elizabeth Health System that came there and said that within the St. Elizabeth Health System, that encompasses three northern Kentucky counties, maybe five, that they had 50,000 patients with an SUD diagnosis within that one system. So wherever you have an opioid death, there is without question a much larger universe dependency around it.

Andy (78:02)

Yeah.

Brian Hubbard (78:03)

And where you have that death, there is an exponential ripple effect of trauma that emanates from it from everyone who was close to that person. And when we think about the number of fathers and mothers with children who have been independently traumatized by the loss of one of them within their household, preceded by all the destruction that goes with someone who is struggling to overcome opioid dependency, you have a recipe for what has become a generationally compounded pattern of devastation. And we have poured an immense amount of resources into the creation of a treatment infrastructure that is not delivering the sorts of results that we need in order to turn the corner on this problem. So when I came into the job running the opioid commission, the question became, what do we do with this money? Kentucky had negotiated and has negotiated $842 million in settlements with opioid distributors and manufacturers which will come into the state. At the time I took the job, it was 16 years. We're probably down now to 14 years. And while $842 million sounds like. And it is a tremendous amount of money to the average ear when we consider the fact that Purdue Pharma made $100 million a month on sales of OxyContin. The entire state of Kentucky is getting roughly 8 1/2 months of Purdue Pharma OxyContin sales paid to it over 14 years. This money is crumbs off the table of gluttons. It is also blood money, money that is being delivered to the state because of the thousands of people who have died there because of this problem.

Andy (79:57)

And it's probably not hurting the organization paying it just like the Sackler family had it structured to pay off of their interest, but not even impact the nest egg that they had put away.

Brian Hubbard (80:07)

It's cost to do in business.

Andy (80:08)

Yeah, well, I mean, what kind of punishment is that? Okay, fine, we'll just leave this in whatever mechanism or tool we have our money. You can have the compounding interest, but we'll make like that's not a punishment. That's not something that another entity or organization is going to look at and say, well, I guess I probably shouldn't do that because the penalty is I get to keep everything I make.

Brian Hubbard (80:26)

It's almost an administration fee. Yeah, that goes for the right to be in business. When I was interviewed for this particular job, there had been a record of state service which I am proud to say demonstrated that I was a public servant who was very committed to making sure that whatever system I was going to be involved with was going to run honestly, competently and transparently. My boss at the time was former Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron. He had a deputy Attorney general by the name of Barry Dunn. And before the commission was assembled, the legislature had passed a statute that enabled the creation of the commission assigned it the responsibility of overseeing all of the dollars and directly administering half of those dollars through the way of grants. We were on a conference call one day and at the time I was leading the Attorney General's Office of Medicaid Fraud and Abuse Control, a law enforcement office that investigates and prosecutes medical providers for fraud on the Medicaid system. And within that role we had a caseload which was comprised of a number of what are called medically assisted treatment providers who were engaged in fraudulent activity around the medical Medicaid system. These folks would essentially have cattle calls every day where they are nurse would hand out prescriptions for Suboxone and they would just hand them out to folks who were lined up. They'd make the patients pay in Cash so that it wouldn't ding the Medicaid system, that they were getting these prescriptions and they'd be on their merry way. What was supposed to be a therapeutic model to titrate folks off of opioids with the use of Suboxone. In some cases, they were becoming white collar drug dealing operations where our licensed physician would go in there and just hand out their prescriptions like they were candy. So diversion cases around Suboxone were prominent within that caseload. And in a. In a conference call one morning, I can remember Barry Dunn talking about the need to stand up the opioid commission. And I laughed and I said, well, if this manages to be done in such a way as to not result in a frontline documentary in 10 years, we'll be lucky. And again, this goes back to the people of home. The people of home are fabulous. Their governance, with the exception of the past 20 years, has historically been very poor. Kentucky and Louisiana have competed for the bottom of the barrel when it comes to systematic political corruption. And that was the basis of that joke. So a couple of weeks later, Barry Dunn said, hey, we were talking about that opioid commission the other day, and you kind of joked about it. I'm wondering if you might be interested in running it. Now, I usually jump at a challenge, especially when it is a big challenge, to make a systematic difference at a large scale. But that was one that chilled me. And I told Barry, I said, that's a very treacherous opportunity, not just for the state, but for whoever who holds this justice. You know good and well that there are some actors in this state who have every concrete expectation that every single penny is going to be funneled to them and they're going to be ready to apply massive amounts of backroom political pressure to try to pick every bit of this, of these pennies that they can and stuff in their pockets. I said, if the office is willing to let me do the job the way I think it needs to be done, I'll be willing to do it. And the way it needs to be done is this. Number one, the system has got to be accessible to every person in this state. There is a sacred responsibility that comes with that money. And that means that we are answerable to the people of Kentucky for how it is used and that we solicit from them their opinions as to what they wish to see happen with this money. Given what they observe about the conditions on the ground and their communities, we're going to be accessible. The other thing that we're going to be is accountable. We are going to make sure that everyone knows what we're doing in the wide open at all times. There will be no secrets. There will be no off the record meetings. Everything that we do is going to be in the wide open. Which goes to the third point, transparency. We're going to make sure that we have a system in place that allows any person in Kentucky or elsewhere to know where every single dime time is gone. So there is no question as to the integrity of our process. When I articulated those three objectives, Barry Dunn said, you got it, we'll back you all the way. I said, all right. So I had to go through an application and interview process which I did. And within the interview I was asked what needs to happen with this money. I said, well, from everything I can tell, we've got to do three things. Number one, we have got to create create a child centered prevention infrastructure which takes children who have known nothing but chaos, whose families and communities have been devastated by all this and connect them to three foundational realities that are necessary to prevent them from using drugs. Those realities are sanctuary from chaos, this stability of loving and supportive adult relationships and an affirmation of their individual spirituality. We have got to start building a child centered prevention infrastructure which connects little human beings to those three realities. They will never make it unless we figure out how to do that. I said, the second thing we've got to do is remove as many barriers from people who are trying to attain long term durable recovery as possible. When somebody has been empowered by opioids and they have just a devastated life which requires that they engage consistently every day in the difficult process of rebuilding that life in the face of immense logistical, financial and in particular legal challenges. We're going to have to do everything we can to remove as many barriers from these folks ability to move forward in life as possible. People give up quickly because of how tremendously difficult it is to rebuild their lives, particularly in the face of complex and inflexible legal systems. We've got to help them. I said finally, and I think most importantly we need to evaluate the possibility of taking a small percentage of this money and investing in the research and development of a potential therapeutic breakthrough for opioid dependency. We have done a tremendous amount of work to build treatment infrastructure that does indeed save lives. And I want to be clear about this. I am not anti medically assisted treatment. I am not anti faith based abstinence based treatment programs. I am pro anything that will work. The journey toward drug dependency is unique and the recovery from it is also unique and what works for one is not necessarily going to work for another. There have to be at all times a diversity of high quality options for an individual to pursue recovery in order to maximize the possibility that they will actually be successful. We've recently had a lot of controversy around this concept of dei. And I think there is one concept of DEI which should receive almost universal acclaim. When it comes to American governance and how we do business. We should always be on the lookout for opportunities to diversify, expand and improve the content of our systems.

Andy (88:14)

Couldn't agree more.

Brian Hubbard (88:15)

So, so that's a DEI concept that everybody can say hallelujah to. Yep, we. I said I don't know what therapeutic breakthrough that might be, but Kentucky should look to pursue its own Manhattan Project opportunity to come up with something that can help the rest of the country beat this thing over the long term. I don't know what that is, but I'm gonna start looking for it. So they offered the job to me. My first responsibility was to get the commission up and doing business. The situation at home was and is dire and people expect action. So I was named by Attorney General Cameron to lead the commission in January of 2022. We had our first business meeting in July of 22. The very first thing that we did was go out on the road into the state. We went from one end to another and between September of 22 and May of 23 we held 20 town halls across the state. Some were held on Tuesday evenings at 6pm at community gathering places. Others in the spring were held in community centers in the middle of the day, on Tuesdays or Wednesdays around 1 or 2pm.

Andy (89:35)

Ladies and gentlemen, this episode is brought to you by David. David is a new protein bar with a simple concept. The least amount of calories for the most amount of protein. Protein. I'm gonna read this right off of the bar and by the way, these things are delicious. And I have experimented with protein bars for as long as I can remember and it's a mixed bag. And anybody who's been down this path can tell you exactly that some of them taste amazing. And then you do a little research into what goes into em and you can find out why they're amazing. It's because they're full of things that you probably wouldn't wanna be eating if you're prioritizing health and wellness. Some of em really try to prioritize health and wellness and they taste like chalk or eating whatever wood shavings, sawdust, whatever really dry tasteless material that you can think of. I've explored both sides of that boundary. Thankfully, David reached out. They sent me a bunch of bars. And these things are awesome. They are in my laptop case at all times. That's actually not a case. It would be a travel bag, shoulder bag, if you will. Could be a satchel. It's hard to say they're tasty. That's step number one. Because even if it's great for you and it doesn't taste good, it's gonna be really hard to eat them over the long term. But here's why I like them. 28 grams of protein. I'm reading this right off the bar. And this one is their salted peanut butter flavor bar. I had this one this morning. 28 grams of protein, 150 calories, zero grams of sugar. I am trying to do better with health and wellness. I'm trying to make better choices when it comes to eating. Taste matters to me. David comes in six flavors. Chocolate chip cookie dough cake batter, double fudge brownie, blueberry pie and the newest two peanut butter chocolate chunk and the peanut butter, which is the bar I just had in front of me. It's a really good way to have something tasty that is going to satiate maybe that desire for a sweet, but it's full of protein. It's going to help you consume fewer calories and probably less snacking throughout the day. If this sounds like something you want to add to your daily routine travel with, have a healthy snack. You can order your sample pack@davidprotein.com normal spelling of David. Normal spelling of protein slammed together with a.com at the end. That is David Protein. You're not going to be disappointed. They are delightful and by far the healthiest bar that I've ever encountered. Let's get back into the show.

Brian Hubbard (91:50)

We saw thousands of people over the course of these town halls attend. The least attended one was the very first, which had about 50 folks. After that, these town halls had anywhere from 100 to 200 people show up. And the way in which these would play out, I would go up and there would be other commissioners there. I would introduce them, introduce myself, talk about what the commission's job was. I would give a PowerPoint presentation that was an informational description of what the settlement money was, what it was intended to do, and what the commission's job was in terms of dispersing it by way of grants. And after that informational presentation was over, I would say, we're here for you this evening. We want to hear everything that you have seen, suffered and grieved. And we want to understand what we can do to help your community with this money that we're only going to get one time. We are duty bound to hear from you. And now we're going to sit back and be quiet. The first 10, 15 minutes of these were always tentative. You know, you have this room full of people, you'll have one or two folks come up and express what they want. And inevitably someone would come up and they would either tell their story or they would tell the story of their family. And then for two hours we would all sit back and we would watch a mass outpouring of tremendous grief from that crowd. I could not believe the depth and dimension of pain that we encountered over the course of those town halls. And the other thing that was so affecting was the degree to which that crowd had zero confidence. Every single one of those crowds had zero confidence in the ability of government to address their realities competently or honestly. I was never offended by the cynicism. And the entire point of engaging in this exercise was to try to build some confidence within the people of Kentucky that yes, every once in a while you will have public servants who recognize a dire circumstance and present themselves to hear and to be held accountable for how they address it. That is how I was taught American society worked by those beautiful teachers who raised me up in elementary school. And I wanted to show that we had an opportunity around this commission to put on a display of governments governance that was generally response, genuinely responsive to what people needed and to do so in a way that was completely open handed and above board.

Andy (94:44)

Did you happen to hear in any of those town halls or had you two questions before those town halls, before you took this position, had you ever heard about ibogaine and did it ever come up from people in the town halls? I'm just curious where you first stumbled across that concept.

Brian Hubbard (94:59)

None of the folks in the town halls had ever heard of ibogaine. And I came into knowledge of it while we were in the course of those town halls.

Andy (95:07)

Okay, do you remember how have you heard about it?

Brian Hubbard (95:10)

Yes. I had my first therapeutic encounter with psilocybin in 2018. I come from a family that itself has been generationally devastated, particularly by alcohol, as well as by a significant untreated mental health issues. And when I say devastated by alcohol, I was probably about 20 years old before I could see an adult hold a beer can and not almost have a panic attack at the sight of it in her hand. I saw where Compass Pathways had discovered that psilocybin had a profound impact on individuals who had been devastated by alcoholism. And this caught my keen interest because the number of people in my family that. That could have made a tremendous difference for. And the way it could have changed our family's history is profound. And I leapt on it as hope that perhaps something could be on the horizon to. To break people free of it.

Andy (96:17)

Was there actual system in place or did you have to do this outside of the boundaries of the law?

Brian Hubbard (96:21)

In Kentucky, I had a therapeutic encounter with the psilocybin mushroom room. And that's where I'm going to leave it.

Andy (96:30)

Fair enough. I believe they call that a heroic dose. So. And for clarity, I have no experience with psychedelics. I'm curious. I don't need you to describe. My context is movies, right, Where a giraffe would walk in here, which I have no idea if that's accurate, but what impact did it have for you? I mean, I know everybody's journey through. I have some friends who. That's where I got the term heroic dose. And what I think that means is they ate an unreasonable amount of mushrooms under the guise of being therapeutic. However, they described the journey as not enjoyable. And when they got to the other side of it, it had changed their relationship. Their words, not mine. It changed their relationship with the substance that had seemed to have had its hooks into them. They weren't able to describe the mechanism when they were describing the feeling and what they were experiencing. It made no sense to me whatsoever. But again, with somebody with no exposure or context. I'm just curious for you. I mean, is it. You ingest, drink, whatever it is, you come on the other side of it, and is it an instantaneous change? Is it slow over time? What was your experience?

Brian Hubbard (97:41)

I'm trying to think about how to encapsulate this in a way that does it justice. The very first thing I would say is that it awakens your awareness that there is a power higher than ourselves which holds us in its hands. There is a realization of the spiritual significance of life. And that recognition of the spiritual significance of life is tied to a recognition that the individual who is having the experience is a spiritual being. Let's begin there. Every individual is unique. Most people, unless they have had a tremendously blessed life, have some form of trauma history just by virtue of being alive and experiencing the human condition on this side of eternity. I can say that I certainly have my own. And the way in which the experiences with Son of Simon helped bring peace to me were profound. And even if the experience was terrifying at the time, and there are a few that were, they were always helpful.

Andy (99:11)

Is the change permanent or temporary?

Brian Hubbard (99:13)

I think that is dependent upon the individual, and that goes to intent. If a person approaches these medicines with cavalier, reckless attitude, they are not going to yield the beneficial result that I believe that they have been created to yield. Intention. The intention of the human hand is always determinative. A pure hand will produce a pure result. The hands of an unclean heart are going to produce an unclean result. You can take the most sacred texts written within all faith traditions, generated through human history, and with the hands of the unclean heart, they can be weaponized and made the most cruel objects of abuse that can be imagined. The hands of the pure heart will use those same things to produce tremendous hope and redemption for folks who think that there is none. The intention of the hands that hold it always determine the outcome.

Andy (100:24)

Time.

Brian Hubbard (100:24)

That is no less so with so Simon. It's no less so with the Bible is no less so than this water. And what one may decide that they aim to do with it with another human being. Are you going to saturate? You're going to satisfy their thirst? Are you going to drown them? One gives life. What's them hands going to do? And that's the question. So I believe that plant medicine are engineered to meet the unique spiritual needs of the human being. But they are only going to be effective if they are properly delivered within the correct setting and with the correct intention. If an individual seeks to be healed, and if their goal is to pull themselves out of whatever hole that they're living in and to build a life that they can celebrate when it comes to its end, then they will be very responsive to the opportunities the medicine gives them to evolve into who they wish to be. On the other hand, if they are approached as they were in the late 60s, which, you know, I'm sure that there were plenty of folks in that era who came to them with the right attitude. But the reality is contemporary American society recalls from the concept of psychedelics because of the way in which they were tremendously misused for all the wrong purposes by the generation of that day. And psychedelics weren't the only thing that were misused and abused by the generation of that day.

Andy (102:09)

There's still plenty being misused and abused.

Brian Hubbard (102:11)

Sure, sure, sure, sure, sure.

Andy (102:13)

We're just in a different era in.

Brian Hubbard (102:14)

Different time, different area in time.

Andy (102:16)

Hippie generation is. Now they're just grandparents is the only difference.

Brian Hubbard (102:19)

Yes, yes, yes. So I say all that to say if, if the right intention is honored, there is going to be a beneficial result. If you don't have the correct intention, you're not going to get the correct result.

Andy (102:34)

That falls in line with what I've heard a lot of people say.

Brian Hubbard (102:36)

So because of what I experienced by way of the benefits of those therapeutic exposures, I just followed continuously developments around psychedelics and the discoveries of their breakthrough therapeutic potentials for a variety of conditions, not just alcohol.

Andy (102:54)

I'm sorry, I was going to ask you what year was the.

Brian Hubbard (102:57)

This is 2018.

Andy (102:58)

Okay. And I asked that because that watermarks a little bit. The use of psychedelics, specifically in veterans for post traumatic stress, tbi. It was on the rise at that point. So that would align with.

Brian Hubbard (103:10)

I came into it just, just the right beginning time. So I read an author through a substack publication called the Journey and I think the first time I encountered this person was in the summer of 21. They have a pen name and it's called Juliana Christina. The individual's real name, who I think she'd be okay with me sharing it, is Julie. Julie Rabbit is her name and her substack publication. She wrote autobiographically about her own experiences with plant medicines. And she described herself as very much a typical young woman growing up in contemporary American society connected into social media, the consumption of social media inevitably producing problems related to anxiety and depression and whether she measured up up to these images that are curated and put out for young females in particular to beat themselves up over.

Andy (104:08)

So real.

Brian Hubbard (104:09)

She developed a near fatal eating disorder and she also acknowledged that she was a hardcore atheist. She at some point in time came into contact with psilocybin and she set about with the proper intention of trying to overcome those things that were destroy in her life and her ability to derive any enjoyment from it. And the way in which she wrote about her experiences were just beautiful. And at the end of her evolution process she had resolved her issues with anxiety, she had resolved her issues with depression, she had overcome her eating disorder disorder, and she had resolved her atheism. Now I want to be very clear. I have no problems. Animosities objections to non believers the greatest gift given to us by our Creator is free will. Free will is the ultimate gift of love. Because a creator who wishes to experience love will never compel it, but will simply offer it and see if it will be returned in exchange based on the volitional choice of the person. This requires every person who has faith in a creator to at all times revere the free choice given to their human brothers and sisters in this life to make that decision or not, free of compulsion, free of condemnation, free of anything that would stigmatize or pillory someone who is exercising their divine gift of free choice to make a decision for themselves. I think that's very important to say. But insofar as individuals have plant medicine experiences where they come to recognize their human divinity and their connection to a higher power who has nothing but love for them and who has blessed them with a special purpose to achieve with the gift of life they have been given. In my opinion, that is to be celebrated. That is the outcome that we want for every human being to carry with them through this life. That they are loved, that they are loved at all times from on high, and that their life has meaning that is to be achieved and fulfilled on this side of eternity. What a beautiful reality as a human being to be able to take into your heart and with the way in which plant medicine works, again, with the proper intention, the proper setting and safe people around you, that is the reality that can be affirmed. And I cannot think of any more beautiful truth to be able to. To gift to my fellow person than that.

Andy (107:11)

Even though I feel like your exposure to that and acceptance of that somehow led to their request for your resignation.

Brian Hubbard (107:19)

I'm going to leave that to you and folks listening to this to make.

Andy (107:23)

That feel like what they probably wanted you to do was some type of pharma logical approach to the pharmalogical problem, which would of course never be connected to monetary gain gain in any way, shape or form. But instead you found something that's outside of their system. I feel like hypothetically that wasn't appreciated.

Brian Hubbard (107:44)

Well, as we move into the other part of this, I might be able to give you some evidence to confirm your instinct. Yeah, because of what I read about from. From Juliana. I reached out to her and I said, hey, I've read your writing. It's beautiful. This is the job I've been given to do. Can I talk to you sometime on the phone about whether there's anything within the world of plant medicine that has special relevance to opioid dependence? She responded and gave me a time to give her a call on January 29th of 2022, and I had a phone conversation. I said, all right. Is there anything within the world of psychedelics that can have an impact on opioid dependency? She said, have you ever heard of ibogaine? And I said, no, never have. She said, I'm going to put you in touch with a lady by the Name of Juliana Mulligan. You tell her I sent you, and you tell her that you want to know about ibogaine. And that's what I did.

Andy (108:39)

Before you go into that, is there any. Has therapeutic doses of mushrooms, has that shown any impact with opioid addiction, or. They don't seem to be connected. Maybe the least effective out of the things that are available. Perhaps.

Brian Hubbard (108:54)

From what I have read about the application of psilocybin to opioids dependent individuals, it can produce some temporal relief of the despair syndrome that an individual carries with them when they are opioid dependent. But it is temporal and it does not produce. The difference between psilocybin and ibogaine as it relates to opioid dependency is the difference between a hang glider and a B52 bomber.

Andy (109:27)

Okay.

Brian Hubbard (109:28)

Okay. And that can be objectively demonstrated based on what we now know ibogaine does with the brain. So I contacted Juliana Mulligan and I said, hey, I've been sent to you. This is my job. What can you tell me about ibogaine? Giuliana proceeded to tell me one of the most heroin addiction stories that I had ever heard about her life of dependency that began with heroin. Migrated into fentanyl, repeated trips through rehabs, every model that was imaginable, abstinence, medically assisted treatment, methadone, Suboxone. She had done it all. She tried it all. She had been homeless, she'd been in and out of jail. And she said, you know, the one thing about Suboxone they don't tell you is the withdrawal from it is far harsher than any opioid that I ever had to withdraw from that I obtain on the street. She said my withdrawal from Suboxone made heroin withdrawal seemed like a cakewalk. She said, it was horrific. And I felt as though I had been lied to because that was not a side effect. That was explained to me when I was brought into treatment. She said, I got tired of living the life that I had to live in order to secure my supply in the United States. I went to Colombia to teach English as a second language. And in Colombia, they have open pharmacy. You just walk in and get what you want. And she said, for a year and a half, I had my feel of whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted it. And she said, one morning, I got up and looked in her mirror and I. It. I recognized I was going to die. I was going to die, and I was desperate for anything that that could get me out of it. And nothing had worked. And she said, I started looking Online, just researching to see what other alternatives might be out there. And I came across this thing called I became gain. And she said it sounded too good to be true. It sounded absurdly too good to be true. But I wanted to see if there was a chance that it might work. She said, but I didn't understand at the time was that it does come with cardiac risk. If you take too much of it, it'll stop your heart. I didn't know that at the time. And she said that she selected a clinic in Guatemala to administer ibogaine. She went there, they gave her twice the amount that she should have had. Oh, boy. She went into cardiac arrest six times and nearly died. And she said that she remembered waking up in the intensive care unit of a Guatemalan hospital. And she said, when I opened my eyes, I felt better than I ever had in my life. She said I was clear headed. I had absolutely no withdrawal. I. I had no desire for it. And she said I felt as though I had been reborn and I have never looked back. When you talk to Juliana, she will talk about the way in which the disease model of addiction is a philosophy that justifies the pharmaceutical industry's insistence that the only system that we make available for treatment of this is through the administration of opioid maintenance medications such as methadone, such as buprenorphine, which is the generic name for suboxone, sublocade, and other opioids that are used to treat opioid dependency. This is a crude analogy, but I think it's one that's appropriate for those who might not be familiar with this system. It's analogous taking somebody who's drank a bottle of Wild Turkey every day, and you say, here, don't drink that bottle of Wild Turkey, drink this six pack of beer every day, you still going to be drinking, but it's not going to kill you nearly as quick and it'll be less unpleasant for you. Here you go.

Andy (113:18)

Problem solved.

Brian Hubbard (113:19)

Problem solved. Juliana said that the psychological impact upon her of having essentially been browbeat with this disease model had been profound, but that after her ibogaine experience, she recognized that she had control over herself. She had volitional choice and a sense of ownership of self that she had never had before. And she said for someone who had struggled for so many years trying to attain long term recovery, who had been told over and over again that they had a disease, the sense that I actually was in charge of my life and was not doomed to carry a condition that I could not escape and had to have A medication to deal with with was immensely liberating.

Andy (114:01)

How could it not be?

Brian Hubbard (114:02)

She said that was that. That was part of the experience for her and for me. The most significant thing, she said, was that I recognized my spiritual significance as an individual human being. I recognize that there is a Creator who loves me and has a special and unique purpose for my life. And now I'm out here doing it, and I'm giving myself to whatever I can to. To make sure that insofar as people have to go outside of the United States to access ibogaine treatment, that they're able to do so through a network of clinics that I deem to be appropriate and safe based on my experience and knowledge.

Andy (114:43)

Did she combine it with dmt? Because I've often heard those two combined in those treatments.

Brian Hubbard (114:48)

I have never asked her about whether she used DMT in combination with ibogaine.

Andy (114:53)

Not at the same time. For people listening, I've heard that you do one and then other. Very separate settings, yes.

Brian Hubbard (114:59)

Those are administered, you know, usually 24 to 48, sometimes up to 72 hours after the ibogaine treatment has been given to a person. So after I heard Juliana's story, I thought, all right, I want to understand how much legitimacy there is to this and whether there is enough empirical evidence that I can draw upon to make a judgment as to whether this might be Kentucky's opportunity to pursue that Manhattan Project breakthrough. Juliana put me in touch with a lady by the name of Adriana Kurtzer. At the time, Adriana was the principal of what was called the Plant Medicine Law Firm in New York City. And she essentially helped individuals and businesses that were looking to build out psychedelic assisted treatment infrastructure within the United States to do just that. That was her specialized expertise.

Andy (115:51)

Was it legal in any of the 50 states?

Brian Hubbard (115:53)

There were states access programs that were in place in both Washington State, Oregon and Colorado that coexisted with the her practice.

Andy (116:03)

Very limited, but available.

Brian Hubbard (116:05)

And she has now gone to work in the aftermath of October 7th of 2023 for the anti Defamation League. But at the time, she had that law firm, and Juliana put me in touch with her and said, you know, call up Adriana. Tell her what you're looking to do. So I called her up. We were supposed to have a 15 minute call, and it went for about an hour and a half. And she said, what can I do for you? Who are the people that you want to meet? I've got a tremendous Rolodex and I think I can get you connected. I said, adriana, I don't know anything about this. This is all brand new to my ears. I can't begin to tell you who I need to meet, but I can give you categories of folks that I must meet. First of all, I need to be put in contact with whoever would be recognized as the foremost academic and medical researchers around Iowa. I also need to be connected to any philanthropists who have had contact with this knowledge and who would be willing to commit themselves to partner with the state of Kentucky if this looks like it's legitimate opportunity to pursue. I said, and then lastly, I would like to know whether there are any activist organizations that would be culturally relevant to a state like Kentucky that is tremendously conservative who can speak to the legitimacy of this. She said, okay, let me get to work on that and I'll get back to you. So she put together a list of individuals and she contacted me and she said if I were to host a dinner for you here in New York City with these people that I have found, would you be willing and able to travel to come and be there? And she said it would be a salon like discussion. I would introduce you, tell what your job is and then see what they had to offer. Offer. I said first of all, thank you, thank you for drawing upon your knowledge to produce this by way of an offer. We will absolutely come. I'll bring my wife, Joe, Alice, dear friend of mine by the name of Scott Hornbuckle who I had hired on the commission. And I knew Scott was someone like me who was a believer in plant medicine and what he could do. And I needed to be able to have somebody who could help me develop this knowledge and information as we moved down this track. So I said now we'll come up there, but it's on one condition. Whoever attends this meeting must keep its occurrence completely and totally confidential. I work inside of a very, very conservative Republican AG's office. And while there are some people here who would be open to this, there are some others who would object mightily and call for my head. So we're going to come up there, but I'm going to come up in my non official capacity necessity. We're going to pay for our own expenses out of our personal pocket. I do not want any state resources in any way associated with this. I'm going to take vacation time and we're going to come up clean just as regular Brian and Joannas and everybody needs to be asked to not acknowledge that the event occurred. She got that agreement and we made our clandestine trip up there on the week of December 15, very. It felt like it. Oh, man, I felt like I was major super sleuth going up there. So it means a fabulous adventure. So we go up there and Adriana hosts her dinner. I believe that happened on December the ninth. And I mean to tell you, the generosity of mind and heart that were in that room was just. It was. It was unbelievable how ready folks were to offer whatever they could to supply me with the knowledge and information that I thought was necessary to make a determination first as to whether this was a legitimate opportunity to then present to the Kentucky Attorney General. So when I got home on December 11, these people pulled out their own Rolodexes, and, I mean, they networked me in to just an unbelievable network of folks who, at great personal risk and cost, have devoted their lives to creating treatment access opportunities with ibogaine for folks within the United States who have specific conditions not just related to addiction to opioids. But I came to learn just fabulously about an organization called Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions that had been founded by Amber and Marcus Capone. Another organization called the Mission within, who had as one of its founders, I believe, a gentleman by the name of Martin Polanco, Joseph Barsoulia, and others who had been around the issue of ibogaine, trying to work to promote its power and acceptance within American society. Amber and Marcus Capone, in particular, were very supportive from the outset in terms of connecting me with information that demonstrated that, yes, indeed, this was a profound opportunity to be developed for Kentucky. Their personal history was one that, to me, was just spectacularly relevant for the people of Kentucky to hear. Marcus Capone was a Special Forces veteran. He had done 12 tours of duty in Afghanistan, and I've had one. All right, so you know who they are, what they have done through Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions to provide access for free to ibogaine treatment for war heroes who have brought that trauma back, who have found it unbearable and have been met with no answers of. Of. Of any value within the American medical system, has been beautiful in terms of how they have provided them with treatment, access in Mexico to a safe clinic down there called Ambio, and the way in which they have restored what is now almost most their 1000th veteran who has received that treatment. In speaking with Amber not too long ago, she mentioned that the average number of prescriptions that one of their veterans will take with them down to Mexico to get treatment is about 7. And the overwhelming majority, when they are done, need none. One veteran had 20 different prescriptions and was taking 60 pills a day. He is the subject, he is, he is in a movie with them called In Waves and More. I don't want to give his name away.

Andy (122:17)

Yeah.

Brian Hubbard (122:17)

But this gentleman currently takes zero prescribed medications after he had been pilled up by the agencies of the United States government who failed to deliver him any relief.

Andy (122:27)

60 pills is a full time job.

Brian Hubbard (122:30)

Yes, it is. Yes, it is.

Andy (122:31)

I mean, that's fistfuls of pills.

Brian Hubbard (122:35)

It was, it was breathtaking to hear the results that they were endorsing that their veterans were experiencing on the other side. Now, this is somewhere in February of 2023. And I was then connected to Dr. Nolan Williams, who, as I came to understand, is a neuropsychiatrist at Stanford University who had decided and who had been sponsored by a philanthropist to essentially study the scientific significance of these subjective reports of dramatic improvement from these veterans who were coming back, essentially saying that they felt as though they did before they ever went to war. Profound improvements in symptomatology related to treatment resistant anxiety and depression. Profound alleviation of symptomatology tied to objectively identifiable traumatic brain injury, and a dramatic restoration in executive functioning and just the ability to live a normal life. The results were so profound, Dr. Williams was retained through Stanford to understand what was happening within the brain that could objectively quantify and explain these dramatic subjective reports of improvement. So 30 veterans had their brain scans, their brain scanned before and after a single ibogaine treatment. These brain scans were measured against an algorithmic database of hundreds of thousands of images of healthy adult brains covering the human lifespan. When the MRIs were obtained and the results were produced, Dr. Williams said that he told his team to delete everything they had done because he thought the results were in error. They were so profound that he could not believe they could be true. So he had his team rerun everything they had done from scratch. And the results were reproduced. And those results, the most dramatic of which are these, the white matter that covers the entire surface of our brains, which is the highway across which all of our thoughts and impulses travel grew and thickened in size across the entire surface of all of these gentlemen's brains, the centers of the brain responsible for emotional regulation and executive function, and grew in size. And the average reversal of brain age was one and a half years. For the top five veterans in that cohort, their brains reversed in age, almost four and a half years. And I came to subsequently learn that there are people who live offshore from the United States who are American citizens who are using ibogaine treatment to effectively mitigate their symptoms of multiple sclerosis, Lyme disease and Parkinson's disease. Dr. Williams has said, and I absolutely believe that ibogaine is the most sophisticated medication that has ever been discovered in the history of modern science. Once this aggregation of information was in front of me, I was then ready to put together a slide deck which demonstrated what ibogaine is, what it does and the opportunity that the state of Kentucky had before it to take 5% or 42 million out of 842 million to create a public private partnership whereby a drug developer on the front end would match the state's money to develop ibogaine as an FDA approved breakthrough therapeutic treatment for opioid use disorder, co occurring substance use disorder and any other mental health conditions for which it demonstrated efficacy. I gave the presentation to Attorney General Cameron. I explained what the Stanford study was going to show. I explained that those findings would be published in a premier medical research journal months down the road. I couldn't say when, but that if he recognized the same opportunity that I did, he would ultimately be validated by the results of that Stanford study when it came to the discovery of ibogaine's profound neuro regenerative abilities on the human brain. Something that nothing else does within scientific knowledge. So I made the presentation, I told him what the opportunity was and I said, look, if we do this, we're not just going to be developing a breakthrough therapeutic for opioid addiction which will change the future of, of this state and the country. We are going to help pioneer a revolution in modern neuropharmacology that's going to have profound positive impact on millions of people for conditions for which there are no current effective treatments. And this state that has been at the back end of America for 150 years, little old, tiny, poor, looked down upon Kentucky. We're going to lead it it. And how fabulous to be able to do that for our people. And he blessed it. So on May 31st we went out to the grounds of the state capitol. One week before that, this is an important detail. One week before that I wanted to make sure that the individual who had secured the Republican nomination for Attorney General, who was absolutely going to be the next Kentucky Attorney General, was appropriately briefed. Daniel Cameron in 2023 decided to run for governor, which mean meant that he could not succeed himself as Attorney General. If he lost the governor's race, he was out of office. Another individual came along, secured the Republican nomination in January of 23 and what was an uncontested primary. This person had come up in and had matriculated through the Mitch McConnell machine that has been in place in Kentucky since the mid-80s. Someone who has been tied to the hip of Mitch McConnell since their political infancy. And I briefed the candidate one week before we had our public announcement. I didn't want this person to be taken by, surprised or blindsided, recognizing that they were going to come into office in November without question. When I briefed the candidate, he was very engaged in the discussion. He asked a lot of questions, but the one thing he didn't say was that he supported it. So when the meeting ended, I recognized that there was going to have to be a job to do to persuade him once he took office to allow this project to proceed. I didn't take anything for granted in terms of the ability to continue it once there was a change in office holders. We had a public announcement on the state capitol grounds on May 31st of 2023. And we declared our intention as a commission to explore the creation of that public private partnership with $42 million of the state settlement money to get ibogaine through the FDA's approval process. That public announcement included an introduction to the people of Kentucky of what ibogaine is, what it can do, and the reasons why Kentucky was the perfect place place to pioneer this development. In keeping with that commitment to be accessible, accountable and transparent, we then set about creating a framework to make sure that we were very public and visible with our consideration of this opportunity before we ever took a vote. So the way in which we did that was to conduct three high profile public hearings hearings between the months of July and October of 2023, the first public hearing. And these were all the subject of press releases that went out to statewide press. We had a YouTube channel dedicated to the commission which these hearings are all still accessible. Anybody who wants to go and look at them can see them in perpetuity. They are a matter of formal public record taken by way of testimony of that commission when I was leading it. The hearing in July was all about the sciences of ibogaine. And we brought in the foremost medical and academic researchers on the topic to speak to it. And they included Dr. Williams, a gentleman by the name of Dr. Kenneth Alper, a physician by the name of Dr. Deborah Mash, who has been one of the prime researchers around this area. And we also had a gentleman who was with the FDA at the time the original ibogaine trials had been approved in the mid-90s. His name is escaping me at the Dr. Don, Dr. Dr. Douglas, see the Dr. Donald or Dr. Douglas Kramer is his name. He was with the FDA and was part of the review process when I began. Trials were approved in the mid-90s and they all testified. Oh, there was also Dr. Sarah Nevis Rao, who is head of a tie which at the time owned a company called Dimmerx which had a patented product called Nord Ibogaine to get it through the fda. And they had a stage one trial that was underway in the United Kingdom at the time of that testimony. So these folks testified all about the science. In September we had a second public hearing about lived experiences with ibogaine. And we had 24 individuals come in who had either received, provided or had sent loved ones for ibogaine treatment and they came in to tell their story. That particular hearing was unique insofar as the very first person to testify was former Kentucky Attorney General by the name of Ben Chandler. Ben Chandler is part of a legacy Kentucky Democrat family. His grandfather was a gentleman by the name of Happy Chandler, who was a former commissioner of Major League Baseball. And he served as Kentucky governor first in the late third and then again in the late 50s, 20 years apart, two different terms. Ben had been the public auditor, he had been Attorney general, he had been a five time congressman, Democrat all the way. And he was our first witness to testify in full throated support of this endeavor as the head of what was then the foundation for a Healthy Kentucky, the state's largest in state philanthropy that was geared toward the improvement of health, health outcomes for the people in the state. And if you go back and look at that hearing, Democrat Ben Chandler and demonstration of the bipartisan support that gathered around this spoken full throated support of this endeavor. And then after him, what unfolded was four and a half hours of the most profoundly impactful public proceeding I have ever been a part of. And if someone goes and watches that now, they need to ask themselves in light of what they hear in those testimonies, how could anyone who has an a humanitarian impulse within them stand in the way of creating access to the healing that these individuals experience who were on their way to the graveyard before they came into contact with ibogaine money. There were two little bonuses with that here. One was the video appearance of then former governor of Texas Rick Perry, who I came to know and understand to be a champion of ibogaine and has continued to be so as time has unfolded. He made a video appearance to adult endorse the effort. And then we had the gentleman who is essentially the chieftain of the Bowedi tribe in Gabon, which for those who are not familiar. Ibogaine is derived from a plant. Three botanical sources in West Africa, one of which is called the iboga root. It takes 10 years to come into maturation. It has been used in sacred African rituals for centuries. The custodians of those rituals are the boite. And the chieftain of the Bowedi tribe recorded a statement that a person can look at in full, endorsing and expressing praise for the Kentucky endeavor and their willingness to support it because of what they recognized they could do to restore our people at home. It was beautiful. Our third and final hearing was in October. It was requested by the University of Kentucky. And throughout this process, to everyone's great surprise, in this deeply politically conservative and religiously fundamentalist state, the only two vocal opponents that emerged to this campaign were the University of Kentucky and its center for Drug and Alcohol Research.

Andy (135:16)

Well, who's that funded by?

Brian Hubbard (135:18)

We'll get into that in just about five minutes. And current Kentucky governor Andy Beshear. Both of them were very publicly vocal about their opposition to every bit of this. Andy Beshear has his health services cabinet secretary, a guy by the name of Eric Friedlander, as a assigned statutorily designated representative on that commission. And without giving anybody a hard time, I would refer your folks to the September public hearing. And you will see Mr. Friedlander on the end of the dial. And the body language speaks volumes as these people pour their hearts out onto that floor asking the commission to please create this breakthrough for the future of this country. The third hearing pertained to whether the FDA would even consider a proven ibogaine, given its cardiac risk. And that cardiac risk, as we previously discussed, is its potential to stop the heart if a person receives too much. Within that hearing, we had a gentleman by the name of Brett Waters who has an organization called Reason for Hope. And it's all about the advancement of plant medicines to be integrated into the US Medical system to treat treatment resistant conditions that impact mental health. Brett is a savant of legal knowledge and an exquisite networker of expertise. And with the assistance of Reason for Hope, which is a nonprofit organization, he was able to reach out to the scientist general of Controlled Substances research at the FDA, which at the time his name was Dr. Javier Muniz, and his colleague, Dr. Walter Dunn, who still serves on the FDA's Board of Neuropharmacology. Dr. Dunn and Dr. Muniz appeared jointly at our Kentucky health hearing in October. And at the very beginning of their testimony, they essentially stay. We've listened to a lot of assertions that the FDA will not approve ibogaine because it carries cardiac risk. We want to make clear the question for the FDA when it comes to drug approval is not whether risk exists. All medications come with risks. Some medications come with tremendous risk. The question is whether risk can be mitigated. And if a drug developer can demonstrate to the FDA that the cardiac risks associated with ibogaine can be safely mitigated, there is no reason why we would not approve a clinical trial. The entire thrust of the University of Kentucky's argument against this was that number one, ibogaine was not and is not considered to be what's called an evidence based best practice for treatment of opioid addiction. It's the first thing. Second thing is because of that cardiac risk, their argument was there is no way that the FDA would ever approve a clinical trial. And thus we are wasting time and potential monumental resources on something that is complete and total folly. So with Those statements by Dr. Munis and Dr. Dunn, the entire rationale of their ability. Objection. Collapsed right in front of their face. And I remember texting a friend of mine, those of a certain age might remember the Smurfs and they will remember Jokey Smurf and his package. And somebody would open the package, oftentimes it was jokey and it would blow up in her face. Well, I found a meme of Joki Smurtha than his exploding box. And I sent that to a friend at the end of that year because that's exactly what had happened. So by this time I had a sense that a majority of the commission was going to vote for this. And I knew that once we completed one last piece of due diligence that success would be assured. And that last piece of due diligence was to procure the testimony of Dr. Williams about the results of his Stanford study. In October of 23, his research had been submitted to what we now know to be the Journal of Nature Medicine, one of the top three medical research journals in the world. It was under peer review at the time. And Dr. Williams advised me that he could not give me a specific time as to when the research will be published. He knew it would be within the coming months, but couldn't tell me when. And I said, and I had said publicly in the commission meetings into the press. We've done a tremendous amount of due diligence research around this. We have have had three very high profile public hearings. Each have been congressional level quality in terms of content and expertise brought to bear to illuminate all aspects of this opportunity. We cannot take a vote on this until such time as we hear from Dr. Williams, what he has to say is going to be determinative in my opinion, as to whether we move forward and we will not take a vote until we have heard from him. So the election happens in Kentucky in November. Much to my great regret. Daniel Cameron lost, Andy Beshear was reelected and a new Kentucky Journal Kentucky Attorney General came onto the scene. I reached out to him individually and personally with an email in the middle of November and I said, hey, when might there be an opportunity for you and I to talk? I briefed you on this project before it was announced. I think that there is a tremendous amount of developmental energy which is gathered around it. I don't want to ever be presumptive. You are the new Attorney General and it's up to you as to whether this project proceeds. But I want you to have all the facts as to what is at hand here so that you can make a good informed opinion. And here's what was at hand. By the time October had come along, we had secured the philanthropic commitments of the Melissa Etheridge foundation to support this project. The Jurvetson foundation whose founders are Steve and Genevieve Jurvetson, Steve Jurvetson of SpaceX Affiliation and the foundation of Stephen and Alexandra Cohen Cohen Foundation. Mr. Cohen is the owner of the New York Mets. All of these families and their found and the foundations that they have been created have been personally impacted by the treatment failures associated with the US system of addressing opioid addiction. They have come to understand to know what I began can do and they were willing to commit substantial resources to partner with the state of Kentucky to make this come to pass. I had received the commitments of two drug development developers to establish state presence in Kentucky to anchor all of their research and development activities in Kentucky, not just as it pertained to opioid addiction, but as it pertained to all of the advanced neuro restorative capacities that ibogaine seems to have and then to anchor manufacturing there which would essentially allow the state to become the leader in an entirely new field of advanced biomedical research. This was the conversation that I wished to have with the new Attorney General to explain what was on the line with the hope of persuading him to let this go forward. After I sent the email, I got a text message a couple of days later that said I'm not blowing you off. I want to let the transition team take the process and let it play out. So I got a meeting request on December 14 sent to me for a meeting in Frankfurt on Friday, December 15th at 3pm and it come to find out this is a meeting with the transition team. And I thought, all right, always fire somebody on Friday. Well, my, my excitement at the potential opportunity to go in and explain overcame my perceptive abilities to see the freight train that was coming. I was just so happy that I was going to get to talk about it. Well, I got to talk about it all right. But it wasn't in the way in which I anticipated. Long story short, basically I was asked to leave for doing this project.

Andy (143:27)

Hold on, I'll put a pin in you there. I'm going to the bathroom, take a pee. Where did I stop you? We stopped before I almost peed my pants.

Brian Hubbard (143:33)

So on December 15th I was told I needed to leave because Friday, classic Friday move Friday, 3:00 on the 15th. So there is a. I was taken to little old country hillbilly churches by my grandparents growing up. And those were some of the most formative memories I had, was sitting in church with them. So there's some memories that I have of stories that were told and I was one story told out of the Old Testament about a widow whose husband died in significant debt and she faced the possibility of having to sell her son in order to pay off these debts. And the story goes that she prayed that God would deliver her son from servitude and supply her with what she needed to pay off the debts. And she had these vases in which she would place olive oil and the oil had run out. So she said this prayer. She woke up the next day in the vases were filled with oil and she sold them. She went to sleep and the bases continued to be filled with oil until such time time as she was able to pay off the debt. On October 15, I found oil in the vase in the form of a gentleman by the name of Rex Elsass. Rex Elsass in his prior life was a high level Republican political campaign ad producer for candidates state, federal and local local folks in the House of Representatives, Senate presidential campaigns. High level. Somebody looks up Rex lsis, they might get some Google results that make them blanch. However, the Rex lsis that I met was an individual who had been profoundly impacted by the decade long struggle his son Reed had with opioid addiction. Addiction, an addiction that began in high school. Rex had learned about ayahuasca. And roughly five years into Reed's addiction, he took him to South America for an ayahuasca ceremony. And Rex told me and in fact was introduced to me by Melissa Etheridge someone on the completely opposite end of the spectrum from Rex. But they had bonded because Ms. Ethereum also lost a son to opioid addiction who had had a sports injury that resulted in a broken ankle. He was given the pills and that was it. Rex and Melissa had the death of their children in common, as well as their belief that plant medicine could make a difference for families so that they wouldn't have to experience as the losses that they had. Rex was convinced that the ayahuasca ceremony that, that, that Reid had undergone extended his life for five years because he was basically clean for a five year stretch of time. And Reed died when he was at a party and came into contact with fentanyl tainted pills. He took one and it killed him. And that was in 2019. Rex has established a foundation in his son's honor called the Reed foundation, which stands for reaching everyone in distress. Rex had come to Kentucky for the public announcement on May 31. He came to all of our public hearings and he consistently reached out to me and said, whatever you need, whenever you need it, I will do everything I can. I believe if Read had had an opportunity, if I had known about ibogaine and Read and had an opportunity to get it, there is a possibility that he would still be alive today. And if I can do something to help other families gain access to this, that they don't have to experience what I and hundreds of thousands of others have, I'll do whatever I can. I said, thank you. So the first person I called after that meeting was Rex. And Rex had been very helpful in terms of securing the attendance of Lamar Odom at a documentary that was going to be screened on the evening of December 15th at the Muhammad Ali center in Louisville, Kentucky, Kentucky, to introduce the concept of ibogaine to individuals who live on the West End. Now, people in Kentucky, when I reference the West End, they're going to know what that means. Louisville, as many Southern cities were, was a tremendously segregated place for a long time. The west end of Louisville is predominantly African American. And having lived in Kentucky now for 26 years since that. Right. This will be. No, I've been there since 1997. So that means 18 years.

Andy (148:19)

97. That's more than 18 years because it's 2025.

Brian Hubbard (148:22)

See, that's why I'm a lawyer. I can't do math. Thank you very much.

Andy (148:25)

It's 18 plus a couple. I'm not going to do it in my head.

Brian Hubbard (148:29)

So you have Eastern Kentucky, which is very working class folks of Scots, Irish descent, Big time trip country out there. You have folks on the west end of Louisville and the West End for the longest time was a great place to live and to raise a family. There was a lot of industry there and you had a very healthy and vibrant middle and working class community of African Americans living there. De industrialization, which has affected the United States broadly after NAFTA removed a lot of that across economy and the west end has struggled ever since. The way in which mass media manufactures and perpetuates cultural division within this country cannot go unnoticed. I believe it is deliberate because the dividend of division is control. If you can have people taught to hate one another other who share common afflictions and circumstances, they are never going to unify across those differences with which they're beat over the head in order to really those afflictions. The one opportunity that came along with this ibogaine project was the opportunity to create a significant racial opportunity for folks out in East Kentucky who had been devastated by the prescription opioid epidemic and folks on the west end of Louisville who were and are being devastated by the injection of fentanyl into Kentucky. The opioid epidemic had had a white hillbilly face until 2021. And for the first time, the face of the opioid epidemic in Kentucky became black, with black men and women seeing a higher rate of death proportionally directly related to fentanyl for the first time as compared to white folks who were dying from opioid death. And I recognized that whatever differences that had been fabricated and cultivated, if we could elevate the opportunity of ibogaine, a West African plant, to bring healing to hillbillies in East Kentucky and African Americans in the west end of Louisville from whose heritage that plant comes, there was just poetry there that could be developed to get people to recognize their kinship. So to further that mission, we got Lamar Odom to come in and screen a documentary at the Muhammad Ali Center. We were very deliberate about bringing in community organizations that had a focus on the delivery of treatment and recovery services to African Americans to come in. And this was to be screened at 6pm on December 15th. And Rex was there for that screening. So after I had just been told I had to leave, I called Rex and I said, I got some terrible news. News this is over. It has been. I have been told that I must resign for doing this project and that's how this is going to be killed. I said, I am sick to my. We're coming there to do this screening, to hold this up. And instead I Said, I don't think I can make myself tell the crowd, let's just let this play out. He said, come see me before we walk in. I've got to think about this. Do not despair. Do not despair. Okay? Now, the job wasn't the issue. I didn't take the chairmanship of that commission in order to have a position. I took it to accomplish a mission. It was a means to an end. The job was not what I grieved. It was the lost opportunity that I have just sat here and described for you for Backseat America to take a lead, and they had been robbed of it. I went to the Muhammad Ali center, and I kept a step up her lip and a happy face. Lamar Odom played his documentary, and I watched that room just beam with hope and optimism. There was a question and answer session after the documentary, and to listen to the people in that audience express enthusiasm about what this could do to help change their lives, knowing that it was dead in the water was excruciating, heartbreaking. That was a biblical experience, to sit in there for that. When it was over, Rex pulled me to the side and said, if. If I were able to open some doors for you in other states where I've got connections, would you be willing to take the work you've done here in Kentucky and try to transplant it to a state where perhaps they would welcome what this is? And I said, rex, when I started down this road, I did so with a commitment to bet everything I am, my reputation and everything that I have to offer on it. It's now the mission of my life. I will go anywhere, I will speak to anyone in an effort to keep this alive. And it has been through the Reed foundation and Rex Elsass and his son Reed, who have been all in my bases, who have helped keep this alive and get it to the point to where now we are ready to see the introduction of legislation in the state of Texas to allocate $50 million out of their general fund to finish the job that was begun in Kentucky with the leadership of former Texas governor Rick Perry at the helm. And it has been a Dalton difficult and exhilarating journey to be able to get here. And this is one where every hardship has presented an opportunity to develop the tenacity that is necessary to get this close to the finish line.

Andy (154:24)

I feel like Kentucky, and I don't mean that Kentucky writ large, I mean the people in Kentucky who shut this down are going to have a polite way to say it would be a little bit of egg on their face. I can think of some other substances that would be better to coat them in. But and again, not to hypothesize about the impact that this is going to have, but I know enough personal, close friends that have had these transformational experiences that I think I have a good idea of where it will land. How can anybody in a leadership position in the state of Kentucky say, yeah, we had this first, but we passed.

Brian Hubbard (155:05)

Well, I hope that those within your. I hope those within your audience will aggressively interrogate the architects of the end of this endeavor in Kentucky and demand they give them answers.

Andy (155:18)

Why do you think they made the decision they did?

Brian Hubbard (155:21)

Well, I had a theory when I left, and that theory essentially was that.

Andy (155:27)

A water coated piece of paper.

Brian Hubbard (155:31)

The first thing I recognized was we had an economic reality within the treatment system in Kentucky that had to be acknowledged. Right now, if a person is on Medicaid and they go through the standard opioid addiction treatment and recovery process, they start in a 30 day inpatient program and that costs $36,000. They then go through a 90 day intensive outpatient treatment. That is another. See, $102,000.

Andy (156:09)

So we're at 138,000 right now.

Brian Hubbard (156:11)

Let's see the total for 12 months. You have 30 day inpatient, which is 36,000. You have 90 day intensive outpatient, which is 72,000. And then you have 12 months of weekly supportive recovery services at $31,200.

Andy (156:28)

Okay.

Brian Hubbard (156:28)

The entire trip through that system is $139,000 per person, per attempt. The median number of attempts is 2. The average number of attempts is 5. So you are talking about a treatment system that at its median cost is almost a quarter million dollars. At its average cost is about $695,000. And it depends on repeat customers.

Andy (156:54)

At the end of that, are they supposed to be free and clear or are they still being bolstered by the Jack Daniels beer model?

Brian Hubbard (157:04)

Well, statistically speaking, the only way we can answer that question is to assert when it comes to methadone, 25% of patients have successful treatment with methadone, which means they abstain from the other opioids and only stick with methadone, which is itself an opioid. 25% success rate. Suboxone has about a 20% success rate.

Andy (157:30)

So from 1 in 4 to 1 in 5.

Brian Hubbard (157:32)

And that 20% success rate accounts for half of patients who drop out of treatment within the first three months. So you're talking about 20% of 50%. Nonetheless, because I had access to the state's Medicaid database. As special Counsel to the Office of Medicaid Fraud and Abuse Control, which I retained to access this information, I was able to discover the economy of scale around what I call opioid maintenance treatment. Because that's what it is. It saves lives. It's necessary to save lives. It's better than nothing. It is not optimal. And we should always look to diversify, expand and improve upon systems that are mediocre. Between 1-1-17 and October 31st of 2023, Kentucky, which has a Medicaid population of 1.6 million people, Kentucky is 4.8 million. 30% of folks that are on Medicaid are 1.6 million. Kentucky Medicaid had paid for 110 million individual doses of Suboxone for a Medicaid population of 1.6 million and had been billed over $1 billion by the manufacturer of that product for its delivery. Now Medicaid is fee scheduled, which means that the bill that comes through the door gets written down substantially. So what was actually paid was less than that $1 billion. But nonetheless, that was the price tag that came through the door. Your listeners can start doing the math. Kentucky, 4.6 million people, one Medicaid system with 1.6 million, and then you start building that out across the country while we're sitting here talking about my home. This is a system that exists in 49 other states and it is an economy of scale that is immense. Before these multi state opioid settlements, which funded the Kentucky Commission as well as other states, which, by the way, I'm going to brag a little bit, I told you about how the commission had its first business meeting in July of 22. We had our first grants out the door and announced and out the door, ready for delivery by the end of April of 23. From the first business meeting to the first announcement of grants, we did it in nine months. And Kentucky was one of the first three states in the country to announce their grants in that fashion. And when you go there now, now you can see a fully interactive county by county map that shows where every single dollar has gone from the Kentucky Commission, which was something I insisted be created as part of that process, accessible, accountable and transparent. So in February, I received a contact from a guy by the name of Wes Anderson and his partner Rob, with a company called Reveley Advisors, which is a private investigation agency that specializes in corporate intelligence. They just reached out to me spontaneously, I'd never heard of them before, got an email from him and said, hey, we followed your work in Kentucky Would you be willing to have a video conference with us? We'd like to know perhaps what we can do to help you. So In February of 24 I had a zoom call with Wes and his partner and I said I'll tell you, y'all can help me. I said I believe that there is a common nexus of financial interest which drove the end of this program. And I think that that financial interest is rooted in the opioid maintenance industry which has reached its hands to puppetize the key actors who were opposed. And I would like to know if y'all can track down some dollars that can verify that and that's exactly what they proceeded to spend months doing. Your viewers right now can go to a website called reveley advisors.com how do you spell Reveley? R E V E I l l e advisors.com yes ibogaine and they will see and immaculately developed database of financial realities which verify my theory was correct. There is a nexus of financial interests which unifies the opponents of this project and the sponsorship that they have received from the industry which stands to lose the most from a fully competitive and operational ibogaine based treatment and recovery system if it can be created and integrated within the US medical system. Prior to these multi state settlement agreements the largest opioid settlement that had ever been achieved was with a company called Indivior and its parent company Reckitt Benkaiser. I think I'm saying that name correct. Reckitt Ben Kaiser aka in devior had to pay the federal government in 2019 a $2 billion fine. They paid a separate 600 million dollar fine as part of a civil settlement to the Massachusetts Department of Medicaid. The federal fine was negotiated as part of a criminal indictment and guilty pledge tendered by End of your that criminal indictment and guilty plea was tied to endeavors role as the patent owner and holder of name brand Suboxone for engaging in an illicit scheme to increase the issuance of Suboxone prescriptions nationwide. They paid a separate $600 million to the Massachusetts Department of Medicaid for making material misrepresentations which understated the risk of Suboxone exposure to children. Children. The patent holder of the evidence based practices treatment that was advocated with firm fisted conviction by representatives associated with the University of Kentucky center for Drug and Alcohol Research is a convicted federal felon. In 2021 there were a hundred and ten thousand maybe one hundred thirty thousand licensed prescribers of buprenorphine which is the generic name for Suboxone supplicate and its name brand derivatives. And by the way, the baseline formulation for Suboxone was created by virtue of the financial resources of the US taxpayer who spent 62 and a half million dollars making the formulation that was then gifted to the pharmaceutical industry. Each company putting its own chemical twist on it, which enabled it to individually patent every single thing that is now deployed around this by way of opioid maintenance.

Andy (164:12)

Their treatment, do you happen to know. So they paid 2.6 billion essentially in fines.

Brian Hubbard (164:16)

What they make, not enough for it to deter them from what I'm about to describe in terms of their rapacious ambition. So In December of 21, there were 130,000 prescribers of subaltern. Some in DVR and its allied corporate entities lobbied the Band administration for the passage of what is called the Mainstream Addiction Treatment Act. And within that act there. Sounds good, sounds good. Within that act there was a waiver provision which essentially relaxed the prescribing standards for Suboxone, meaning you didn't necessarily have to be a physician, you could be a nurse practitioner or non MD classifications to issue these prescriptions. The rationale is we continue to exceed accelerated rates of death. If we are able to put medically assisted treatment or medication for opioid use disorder in more communities, we'll reduce the death rates because wherever you have a lot of Suboxone, the death rates come down. There may be that argument, may be true to that, and that's great. But again, again, we're not talking about merely the prevention of death that's immensely important. But if we can go beyond to a restoration of quality life where a person can be freed of substance dependency total, that's something that we would want to keep on the table as a possibility. Unless of course, you're tied to this system. After the passage of the Mainstream Addiction Treatment act today, through the implementation of of perfectly legal processes and regulatory content, there are now 2 million prescribers of Suboxone within the United States. Within that same book, Empire of Pain by Patrick Ratten Keefe, he quotes an author by the name of Martin Booth who wrote a book called Opium A History. And in that book, Mr. Booth says, when it comes to products derived from the opium poppy, history repeats itself. So when you go to that revenue advisor's website, you will see a wealth of information about the financial relationships that the University of Kentucky and its researchers around drug and alcohol and substance use issues have with the opioid maintenance industry. There is a chief investigator for what's called the Healing Community Study by The name of Sharon Walsh. She is the head of the University of Kentucky center for Drug and Alcohol Research. Sharon Walsh is a zealous, and I mean zealous with a capital Z, advocate for what she calls medication for opioid use disorder, a very sanitized linguistic term for, forged within the halls of academia for opioid maintenance treatment. Again, I don't have anything against that. It should be an option. But in Ms. Walsh's case, she was one of the first focal opponents to the Ibogaine project. She expressed her belief that there were no additional therapies needed, that the existing market of options was more than adequate to address withdrawal issues related to opioids. And this was all a waste of time because everything we have is perfectly fine. Interestingly, that's a position that is not shared by the National Institute of Drug Addiction or the Institute of Health, but it's a position that was asserted by Sharon Walsh, and a person can go and hear her remarks to that effect in a Kentucky Commission meeting that was held in June of 23, just days after our public announcement related to ibogaine. The Healing Community Study, which was funded by the NIH to the tune of about $87 million, is led by Dr. Dr. Walsh. And nobody can really tell what it's doing, aside from really focusing on improving retention rates, rates for patients who are entering into suboxone programs. Dr. Walsh has been a consultant for AstraZeneca and Braeburn and Cameras, Canoxys and Lactate Therapeutics, Opiate Pfizer. She's been a consultant for the company that makes Pocket Naloxone. And she has been a consultant for Wreck It Ben Kaiser, which owns Endeavor and is the patent holder of Sabacci.

Andy (168:33)

Shouldn't all of those immediately be disqualifying?

Brian Hubbard (168:37)

Well, in the common sense world, one would think so. But remember, we live in a world that is substantially impacted by fictitious legal realities. So in this world, the University of Kentucky, and I don't want to make it seem like I'm picking on Sharon Walsh or her colleague, a lady by the name of Michelle Loftwell, who has received over $100,000 over three years in consultant fees from some opioid maintenance treatment manufacturers, as well as other known consultant clients that include Titan, Braeburn and also Endeavor Kentucky is an example of the system that exists nationwide. The pharmaceutical industry helps sponsor researchers. Those researchers generate academic papers that are attached to the development of the drugs made by those manufacturers to help them matriculate through the FDA's approval process. So in the case of a place like the University of Kentucky, you have a taxpayer subsidized land grant institution that's essentially providing and being paid to provide academic research to the pharmaceutical industry, which then takes that to support their FDA applications to secure approval for the therapeutics. And then because it has been generated from an academic research institution, that very same research is then presented to public health systems and other governmental agencies and they're translated into government policies. The center for Medicaid Services issued a regulation back, I think in 2016, 2017. Anyone, anyone who offers addiction treatment services must provide access to opioid maintenance treatment as a condition of participation in the Medicaid program. If you're going to be even an abstinence provider, you have to provide access to opioid maintenance treatment. Now again, having it is better than not having it. But insofar as we are maintaining people, people in chemical logical dependency, we want to give them a pathway out of it if that's what they wish to do. Ibogaine is that opportunity. And with that opportunity comes the possibility that there will be significant adverse bottom line impact to the companies that these researchers generate academic papers to support with the financial sponsorship of that industry. That is how it works in context and it is how it works in the other 49 states.

Andy (171:18)

I am shockingly okay with them making less money.

Brian Hubbard (171:22)

Well, you know, I don't think that anybody had in mind when the land grant institutions were created back at the end of 19th century that they would come to mimic the robber barons of that same era. But that seems to be where we're at.

Andy (171:35)

It falls back to an age old conversation of how much is enough? I mean, I don't understand what a billion dollars is. I can look at it, yes, it's a thousand million. I don't know what. I guess you could do whatever you want to in your life, but does $2 billion substantially change your life? And if you have two, do you want to have 10? And I mean, I'm not going to discount at all the pharmaceutical industry pharmacology, what they've been able to do, the impact that they have had, had. That's, that's great and I think they should be rewarded for that. But how much is enough? I mean, you're telling me they couldn't lose 5% of their product, you know, or their, their product or their market share. And even though it's probably not fair to say that, because if the ibogaine treatment goes the way that it, I believe it would go, they would lose probably far more than that. But even if they lost for more than that, we're still talking in the matters of billions and trillions of dollars. And at what cost? The cost is the health of the people that live in this country. I just, I don't know, it's. That's lost on me. But I've also never been exposed to that level of money. Maybe if you were to offer me a billion dollars, like, you know, pharmaceutical treatment is the way. I don't think I would be like that. But I've never been exposed to that environment. So I have a hard time understanding why enough is not enough to some people.

Brian Hubbard (173:04)

Well, that is a symptom, I believe, of the fundamental dynamic that is driving this conflict. And it is a conflict. On the one side, there is a preference for the continued deployment of pharmacology that essentially anesthetizes the soul and slowly euthanizes the body. Far above and beyond entertaining any notion that you bring a therapeutic to bear that has the exact opposite effect. Heaven forbid someone receive ibogaine and when they close their eyes, have an internal experience where they feel touched by the love of God, then be given appeal that essentially completely numbs their ability to feel any emotion whatsoever. There is absolutely embedded within government system a strong preference for the latter before the former will even be entertained.

Andy (174:03)

I still feel like it's driven by money.

Brian Hubbard (174:05)

At the end of the day, I'm going to. If I may just cut right to the quick of it.

Andy (174:11)

You may, of course, at any time.

Brian Hubbard (174:14)

And then I'll end it with what will appear to be a sidetrack, but nonetheless is what I think is a profound description of additional opportunity around. I have a game. I am convinced that every bit of this is a spiritual struggle. On the one side you have human powers and principalities who think they are God, and on the other, everyone else who knows better. And insofar as this country sees symptoms across society which are consistent with profound spiritual affliction, the most pronounced of which is the dynamic of deaths of despair. Those deaths caused by drug overdose, alcoholism and suicide. Deaths that have clicked at a rate of 200,000 a year for the past four to five years. Consecutively, we have lost more people in this country to deaths of despair over the past four years than we lost soldiers in the combined warfare conflicts of World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam and post 911 conflicts. Conflicts played out over spans of time that far exceedingly the past four years. There has got to be a different way of addressing the affliction of our fellow person. And if There is anything that even shows the potential it needs to be developed and made readily available as quickly as possible. I have had the privilege of being introduced to a gentleman by the name of Robert Gallery. Robert Gallery is a former lineman with the Oakland Raiders who played that position for nine years. Governor Perry has introduced me to Mr. Gallery. And when he retired from his NFL career, he went home and began to experience profound maladaptive behavior within his home. Tremendously volatile mood swings paired with the need to obtain the pharmacology to deal with those mood swings paired with the consumption of alcohol to self medicate. And his symptoms kept getting worse and worse and worse. He had experienced significant concussions over the course of his NFL career. And while autopsy is scientifically required, supposedly to verify the existence of of CTE, the symptomatology is obvious once it becomes present. Mr. Gallery had that symptomatology after struggling for years and being ready to off himself like Juliana Mulligan, he had come to the end of his rope. And in 2021 he received ibogaine. Having spoken to Mr. Galler, he has fully and completely been able to mitigate the symptomatology which led him to take it. And at present he is alcohol and conventional pharmacology free.

Andy (177:46)

How could anybody hear a story like that and not at least to use a rudimentary term, term, give ibogaine the college try as far as a treatment option for people in this country, how can I mean, unless he was off doing other things that he didn't want to talk about and he's going to say IB game was the mechanism for me to achieve this growth. And again, this goes back to the conversations I have had with people in their exposure and experience to IB Game, which they don't describe as being a comfortable journey or ride. It is internal, introspective, objective, difficult. But the vast majority of descriptions afterwards are exactly like that with symptom relief. How could anybody hear that and at least not be willing or open minded to that potential? At least make it an option. You don't have to take that option, but can we at least put that on the buffet line? It can be way down at the end with the carrot cake and the mousse. You know, like it could be part of the dessert, but at least you can pick it if you want.

Brian Hubbard (178:49)

Diversify, expand and improve options government systems provide to citizens to live better lives. It's very fundamental.

Andy (178:57)

Yeah. And it's not forcing it down their throat. It becomes an available option.

Brian Hubbard (179:00)

Unlike the purveyors of the supposed Evidence based best practices. And that was one of the most self reinforcing absurdities that I encountered through the Kentucky campaign. And it essentially was we must spend this money on the evidence based best practices because they are the evidence based based best practices and it must not be spent on that which is not evidence based best practice. Well, that makes the question tell me.

Andy (179:22)

You work for the government without telling me you work for the government.

Brian Hubbard (179:25)

You know, it begs the question, how did it become the evidence based best practice?

Andy (179:30)

Because they gathered the evidence through exposure.

Brian Hubbard (179:33)

It had to be applied and developed and the data aggregated. You can't have evidence based best practice unless you have research. So the people who insist that their preferred methodologies not be stigmatized, not be attacked, be fully and completely integrated into the US medical system, not be judged, just cause someone's taken some opioids to deal with opioids, that doesn't mean that they're addicted. And we need to not ever even suggest that they are are the same people who were just as vigorous about stigmatizing pillory and and being uncompromisingly opposed to the development of ibogaine. The people who came to Kentucky in September of 23 and poured their hearts out out for anyone with a camera and a video screen to be able to watch had all components of their stories completely and totally disregarded. When that project was ended, you asked the question of why. That is a question that needs to be vigorously interrogated by everyone who is duly outraged by what I am sitting here describing to you today. Mr. Gallery story is paired with another that I will tell. And I know that people are going to think I'm just here being a propagandist for ibogaine. And I think that that skepticism is natural. We are living in an era in which institutional America, through its corruptions and incompetencies has completely forfeited its credibility.

Andy (181:00)

People are catching on though, thank goodness. They're seeking other places for information.

Brian Hubbard (181:06)

Well, if somebody wishes to entertain the notion that I'm just here being a shield, I understand, given the context within.

Andy (181:14)

Which we live, you obviously work for big ibogaine.

Brian Hubbard (181:18)

But I want to affirm for them that the science is going to validate. I had the privilege three weeks ago of being on a video conference with a researcher who is attached to the University of Zurich and one of his patients who does not wish to be identified, as well as this patient's mother. This patient, we'll call him patient one, was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease at age 41. 41. By age 51 patient one was completely bedfast. Patient one underwent what is called deep brain stimulation. Holes are drilled through the skull and electrodes are planted in strategic places for the purposes of stimulating those areas that are associated with dopamine production. This person had been on long term l dopa treatment to produce dopamine that would enable some restoration of function. I saw a video of this gentleman 30 days after his deep brain stimulation. He was not bed fat, but he had little volitional control over his movements. He could stand out of his wheelchair but could not volitionally move forward for the tremulousness. While he had improved, he was still completely incapacitated and he had signed up for euthanasia services because in the country in which he lives, they are available as a last resort. This patient once was given a non flood dose, meaning it was not a dose that the veterans who go to Tijuana receive. It was a much lower dose given over the course of four weeks in a methodology in which the milligrams were titrated up from 20 to 60, almost a microdose of sorts, correct for a month. The second part of the video shows this channel at the completion of those four weeks and he has full and complete restoration of normal motor function and walks like a fully restored healthy human being. While his disease continues to progress in terms of its impact on his energy and cognition, he is able to get up and to walk and to ride his bike and to be in control of his person. When stories like that are combined with stories of Robert Gallery and you think about what we have in American society consume and glorify, we are a warrior society, whether it's football players, whether it's hockey players, whether it is mma, we have a glorification of full contact sports that come with a heavy price for those who participate for our entertainment. If ibogaine shows that it can effectively mitigate the symptoms of CTE, as they have for Mr. Gallery, a person who has his own foundation that is now dedicated to bringing knowledge about ibogaine's applications to CTE as well as other neurodegenerative conditions to the brain into mass knowledge for the American public, then the opposition that exists within the officialdom will inevitably be overwhelmed by the mass demand that government get out of the way and allow people to have some autonomy over how they choose to be healed. And that's where we're heading. The one thing that I can assert, based on what I perceive to be the preferences of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Who's made his feelings about ibogaine to abundantly clear is that the purveyors of supposed evidence based best treatments to the exclusion of everything else to those systems that operate as they do in Kentucky and the 49 other states, they're about to see some significant disruption because we are not going to sit back and live with the mediocrity that we got in perpetuity. Change is coming and it can't come quick enough.

Andy (185:31)

I mean, damn, what do you add to that?

Brian Hubbard (185:36)

If somebody had told me in 2017 that I would be sitting here having this kind of conversation with you, I would have to ask what had happened to me to drive me to the insanity and to be so completely reckless. But haven't.

Andy (185:54)

Don't worry, insane people don't know they're insane.

Brian Hubbard (185:58)

Well, I'm going to end it with this. People in public life need to be willing to practice what they preach. We got a whole lot of public piety and artificial sanctimony strutting around hallways with leather loafers and marble, you know what I'm saying?

Andy (186:19)

I think I do. It's making me want to go shoe shopping later tonight for some leather loafers.

Brian Hubbard (186:25)

In order to be credible an advocate needs to be willing to practice what they preach.

Andy (186:32)

It's not about what you say, it's.

Brian Hubbard (186:33)

About what you do what you do. Given the arguments that were made against ibogaine within the context of the Kentucky hearings, though the attacks that were lobbied against it as ridiculous snake oil by those whose skepticism could not be resolved, almost all of whom were attached indelibly to our existing evidence based best practices treatment system, I felt it necessary to be willing to live on the conviction that I articulated. So in November of 23, the week after Thanksgiving, my wife Joannes and I traveled to the Ambio clinic in Tijuana and we both received ibogaine and we both received receive. I received 2 days later 5 Meo DMT because I wanted to say in the event we came to a commission vote that guess what? I've practiced what I've preached and I can attest to what this has done for me and I can attest to what it has done for my wife and she's here with me today. And I will end on this story because to me it's one that will should justifiably produce hope within the minds and hearts of millions of people whose conditions will mirror what I'm going to describe. My wife and I. This is our second marriage for both of us. Her son was born in 2001. After he was born, she experienced a profound postpartum depression and whatever chemical logical change that produced in her mind, she had to go on selective an SSRI, which is medication used to address anxiety and depression disorders. I've known her since 2001 and unfortunately Celexa was necessary on a daily basis because in its absence she would experience genuinely psychotic mood swings. I would know if she missed her solexa a day based on what I experienced by way of that mood volatility. Before we were about to travel to Mexico, the clinic that we went to said, look, she's going to have to be celexa free for five days before you get her down here. If it's in her system, it will blunt the effect of the of ibogaine. She's got to be free of it for five days. And I literally broke out in a cold sweat and I said, gentlemen, we cannot come down there. I can't be in this house with her for one day without it. I can't imagine trying to get her through five without it. We cannot come down there. They said, I hear you. We're going to give you a supplementation regimen to give her. She's going to get edgy, but we promise you we'll get her, you'll get her down here. We got her down there. And let's see, November 23rd was her last Solexa. We received Ibogaine on November 28th. We're sitting here on January 3rd of 25. And my wife has been solexa free since. And the change that has unfolded within her over the past year has been profound and every bit of it is tied to and fundamentally anchored to the ibogaine experience that she had physiologically, emotionally and spiritually. There is another clinic in Mexico that operates on the other side of the country called Beyond. Ambio and beyond are the most prominent clinics that are known to provide ibogaine treatment in ways that are consistent with best safety standard practices which require the co administration of magnesium to mitigate cards cardiac risk. We went to beyond and received ibogaine on December the week of December 16, received five Meo DMT on December 20 and were home on December 23.

Andy (190:33)

You're talking like two weeks ago.

Brian Hubbard (190:34)

Yes, sir.

Andy (190:35)

Okay.

Brian Hubbard (190:36)

I did that because I wanted to be able to, through personal experience, validate the legitimacy of both operations which otherwise may be attacked for being in Mexico, ironically by the high minded and also be able to demonstrate again that this is something that is very serious. It is not a party medication. There is no recreational purpose associated with an avagain experience. It is very physically difficult and unpleasant. And the one to two days that follows are tremendously, physically taxing on the individual. If I never do it again, I will be just fine. Because you are challenged, you're challenged physically, you're challenged psychologically, and dependent on your circumstances, you're going to be challenged spiritually. But on the other side, you are going to know this. There is far more to this life than what is observable to the physical eyes. We are without question spiritual beings whose existence has been breathed into us by power from on high, which is sacred. This is a sacred mission and it has got to be pursued for all of the intents and purposes that come with delivering spiritual emancipation and restoration to people who have never had any. Any. And for as long as there's breath in me, I will do everything that I can to deliver opportunities for those who would choose to take them to be affirmed by the love of their eternal Creator in whose image they are made.

Andy (192:27)

How can people support what you're doing? Let's leave them with that. Let's leave people with the direction that they can go of what they've been listening to speaks to them.

Brian Hubbard (192:35)

Right now we are pursuing what is called the Texas Ibogaine initiative. And if you put that into your web browser, you will see that it leads to a webpage in which you can engage in all kinds of support around Ibogaine. In Texas, the objective is to persuade the legislature to set aside $50 million to complete the job that was started in Kentucky. It's important to know that the state's $50 million will only pay for the execution of clinical trials within the state of Texas. A process that can be accomplished by any number of sites within that state where there are top notch research universities including Baylor University, the University of Texas and Dell Medical Center, Texas Tech and the Texas Medical center that is in Houston, among others. They have a first class medical system that is ideal for the creation and pursuit of clinical trials with ibogaine. There the drug developer would assume all necessary legal, logistical and financial risks associated with everything up to and including securing the FDA's approval. The state's money only pays for the trials. At the same time, the state would preserve its own ownership interest on behalf of its people and whatever patentable intellectual property is generated as a result of this endeavor. There cannot be a unilateral subsidy of pharmaceutical development to benefit a for profit company at taxpayer expenses along the model of what happened with buprenorphine ever again. Certainly not at the state level. The other thing they can do is spread the word, whether it is this podcast. I understand that you're friends with Mr. Joe Rogan and have appeared on there a couple of times. Grab a hold of these and send these to as many people who have never heard of ibogaine before so that they can understand the opportunity that is at hand to bring hope to millions of people who currently have none.

Andy (194:23)

Yeah, we got to slam it through the door in one of these states. You got to crack the door open before any of the light can come through. And so I think that's one of the biggest hurdles. So there you go, people. That's how you can support guys. I mean, two of you can't be seen because you're off camera. But thank you, all of you, for making the trip up here. That was awesome.

Brian Hubbard (194:42)

This has been an honor and a pleasure and I can't tell you how thankful I am to have an opportunity to serve this cause. You have a very special audience and I want to thank everybody who has been willing to volunteer to die for this country. And I never want you to have to beg one more time to have your own government to be responsive to what you need.

Andy (195:04)

For clarity. I don't remember volunteering to die for this country. You win wars by making other people die for for theirs.

Brian Hubbard (195:12)

Thank you for that correction.

Andy (195:13)

Good to know and that's a good edit.

Brian Hubbard (195:21)

If you have a locked AT&T phone, we're here with bolt cutters.

Andy (195:25)

T Mobile will help pay off your.

Brian Hubbard (195:26)

Locked phone and give you a new 5G phone for free.

Andy (195:29)

All on America's largest 5G network.

Brian Hubbard (195:31)

Visit t mobile.com carrierfreedom via virtual prepaid MasterCard in 15 days. Free phone up to $830 via 24.

Andy (195:39)

Monthly bill credits plus tax and a.

Brian Hubbard (195:40)

$10 device connection charge.

Andy (195:41)

Qualifying port and trade and service on.

Brian Hubbard (195:43)

Go5G next and credit required. Contact us before canceling entire account to.

Andy (195:46)

Continue bill credits or credit stop and.

Brian Hubbard (195:47)

Balance on required finance agreements. Do you have bill credits and if you pay off devices early.