The RTC building — “COB’s Wing” is half the second floor facing the camera
A Special Correspondent alerted me to this website that has photos of the work they did on the RTC Building at the Int Base, otherwise known as “Building 50”.
To give you a little more detail on what you see, and what you don’t see in these photos, I pulled together some information from a number of sources who worked on this building and this a compilation of that information. There are many more details and stories about this building that I may get to at a later date.
The shots included on the website do not include Miscavige’s actual office, but only the “Communicator/Secretary” office that adjoins his, the hallway outside his office and his “library”. These are part of the “COB wing” which is on the south/west side of the second floor.
“His” wing also includes a “COB Assistant Office” (with a secret wall so Miscavige could hide in the event of a raid by the FBI or Martians landing), a Conference Room, a bathroom and shower, a “Listening Room” (with the highest end audiophile equipment he uses to “review audio submissions”), a Kitchen, a “COB Lounge/Dining Room”, a “COB Project Room”, Typists Office, Files Room, Computer room, “Visitors” space and an Auditing Room with built in grounding wires. This entire wing is off limits to anyone other than “COB Office Staff” and those who have been summoned.
This is the “Secretaries Office” – the outer sanctum before the inner sanctum (“COB’s” Office) which is through the door on the left. The one on the right goes to what used to be Shelly’s (“COB Asst”) office.
The far left desk is Lou’s (COB Comm). Near desk just to the right is Maria Starkey’s (wife of Norman Starkey, her primary duty is taking care of COB’s dogs.
Those carpets are specially woven and are extremely expensive. Of course, this is a stupid color for carpet in an office. All desk tops are black leather. All wood is custom designed and is African anigre.
This room is a good example of why the building needed 4 locomotive size air handler units in the attic (more on that later). This room alone had some 450 incandescent light bulbs hidden in the soffit all around the room as well as the big square ceiling panels you see in the center. This is close to half a million Watts of incandescent heat producing lights – roughly equivalent to plugging in and turning on about 300 toasters or hair dryers in one room. Ridiculously overspecified lighting, done with a cost-is-no-object zeal, characterizes the entire mindset with which this building was constructed.
The cost of electricity for this great empty building (mostly for lighting and air conditioning) is about $2,000.00 per day.
All external windows in the “COB wing” (that is the entire side of the building on the 2nd floor) are 1” thick bullet proof glass. Dear Leader is extremely paranoid that there are assassins hiding in every bush.
The furniture and design for the rest of the building was not as lavish as “His spaces”, but compared to a normal office building they are Taj Mahal level. Limestone floors everywhere. All desks are made from steel and translucent corian. Many of those desks have seen little use in the decade since they were installed at great expense.
This is the hallway of the “COB Wing” – the chairs face the COB office which is the corner office of the building. They are made of “cold rolled steel” – this is what Miscavige constantly specified, but they are in fact stainless steel to create the look of “cold chrome steel” that LRH stated was to be the motif of International Management. Miscavige liked it so he took it for RTC. Cold rolled steel is common structural grade dull black steel.
The chairs were specifically designed to feel hard and cold so you knew you were in trouble before you were ushered into the bowels of Dear Leader’s inner sanctum.
The hall floor is limestone with inlaid stainless steel. No other floors in the building are like this. It was extremely expensive and difficult to create and required water jet cutting of the stone and steel to create the detailed patterns.
The walls in the hallway are made of African anigre like the offices. Originally the hallway had been narrower but Miscavige didn’t like it so it was ripped out and widened. The cherry wood that had lined the walls was also a no-go (more on that later). But then when it was redone it was constructed of SOLID anigre (which is a big no-no because the stuff turns green). It was fixed with staining etc., but at the last minute (the rest of the wing was done) Miscavige complained that he “really didn’t like the fact we left the hallway like it was” and ordered it redone again.
The original “design” for the hallways had large, almost life-size pictures of Hubbard that were to go on each panel, lit perfectly with overhead custom lighting. When the hall was completed, Dave was leaning more toward putting pictures of himself from different events up and even talking about putting pictures he took when scuba diving.
Everything you see in the hallway picture – as is true with the other pictures – is custom-made. Including the mirror, which Miscavige specified be facing his door so that he could check his image as he walked out of his office.
The table in the middle of the Library was modified to accommodate a CD player, tape deck and Stax headhpones that fits just under the middle section, and at the push of a button the whole center rises up for access to the equipment.
This is where COB is supposed to spend his 2-1/2 hrs a day studying. All shelving is custom stainless steel. The ceiling soffit is entirely coated with Luminore material (a type of paint that contains metal that ends up creating a deep metallic look).
In this room alone there are about $70,000.00 in light fixtures. The amount of different bulbs required for this building resulted in computer software being written to keep track of all the light fixtures and replacement bulbs.
This room is a total prop. Miscavige never used it or even walked into it other than to show Tom Cruise how cool his junk was so that Tom could say “Wow, Dave you are so awesome I wish I could have junk like you have”
THE “COB” OFFICE
Everything in this office is custom made. Carpets. Drapes. Woodwork. Shelving. Knick knacks.
His desk is custom made and the current one is the THIRD one that was built. The final approved design and plan (rendering) was for a stainless steel desk. It wasn’t to be machine made. It was hand made by a famous guy who designed and built many cathedral doors to very large churches. The desk cost more than a car, was ugly as sin and heavy as hell.
His office is of the same design you see in the pictures here but more over-the-top, though it hardly seems possible. His office has its own lounge area, fireplace, expensive audio system, private bathroom with shower, turret conference area, outside patio, and 2 layers of motorized window shades (one for sun screening and one for blackout). He has a panic button in the desk to lock all the doors to his office.
THE BACK STORY
This building was ongoing for years. In the late 90’s Bitty Miscavige had been put in charge of it after others had “failed” and then she too became persona non grata so Miscavige brought Tom DeVocht to Int in 2001. Tom had essentially COMPLETED the construction of the SP building way back then (it was held up while Dave decided/changed his mind repeatedly over how the interior “design” was to be done).
Miscavige told Tom at the time that “His building” was almost complete and there was about $2.7 million left to wrap it up. All the planning had been done and it would be a simple task to complete it.
This, of course, turned out to be nowhere near the truth.
The previous design of his wing was a Frank Lloyd Wright style with massively intricate woodwork. There were dozens of custom furniture pieces. Most of it was built in PAC by the “PAC mill” and RPF. The COB desk was built by Monteverdi Young (a prestigious fine furniture maker). Custom hand tufted plush wool carpets were made for the wing in the Frank Lloyd Wright style at a cost of more than $100,000. After the wood work was installed, COB decided that the Frank Lloyd Wright image was not “wright” for him. The rest of the building also had been finished out with cherry woodwork trim and the carpet had arrived.
But this was all what Bitty Miscavige had gotten done back when it was her turn du jour to be the hero and fix the place up. But of course she was now that “goose stepping Nazi bitch” and anything that reminded Miscavige of her tenure was gotten rid of.
It was all torn out. The Monteverdi Young desk, all the Frank Lloyd Wright furniture pieces, stained glass windows, lamps and custom wool carpets were sent to the HGB Annex for storage, to be sold off some day. The stuff never was sold, and finally last year it was all dumped or sent to Gold sets & props. Easily a couple hundred thousand in church funds that got wasted, just so Dave’s image could be right.
When Tom arrived at Int in 2001 and inspected the building, he found:
a) The entire exterior skin (stucco) of the building – every foot to foot and a half both horizontally and vertically – was cracked.
b) The exterior windows were all different colors with different grades of “UV” and looked like a checker board.
c) The roofing was curling up, literally.
d) After a more thorough inspection by an outside engineer it was determined the entire structure was off by an inch to an inch and a half from bottom to top, that is, it was NOT straight up and vertical.
e) From room to room every ceiling was a different height.
f) It was apparent that every office had at one point been completed – furniture and everything. The original cherry wood panels, cabinetry etc., had ALL been removed and where cabinetry had been removed the walls were floated so much that there were 1 to 1.5 inch gaps in the plaster around where the cabinet had once been.
g) In the attic 4 very large Trane air-conditioning units had been installed. The ducting was completely screwed up and like a maze. Two of the AC units had been put in backwards – blowing the wrong direction. Further the building had been “completed” before the A/C was installed. These A/C units are each the size of a shipping container. So, they cut holes in the ceiling and roof… but still the units were too large. So, they took these four AC units and broke them in two, negating the warranty and then put two of them in backwards.
The insanities could go on almost endlessly. This was the project that Miscavige had been personally overseeing and signing off on every tiniest detail.
Tom brought in a team of non-Scientologist professionals and did a top to bottom inspection which took about a month. At the end of the full inspection the conclusion of the General Contractor, architect, sub-contractors, and engineers simply that it would be more cost and time effective to tear the entire building down and start over, doing it right the first time.
Of course, when he told Dear Leader this, with all the specifics, Mr. Know Best responded that it was to be “fixed” no matter the cost.
This is relevant to something else that has been said by Miscavige often in his attempt to black PR Tom DeVocht. He has come up with a story that Tom “overspent” and that he (COB) had “no idea how much money he was spending” and was “shocked” when he found out how much the final total was. Yet, Miscavige received a DETAILED report with photographs EVERY SINGLE DAY on the work done on “his building” and inspected it routinely and issued a non-stop screed of orders about things that were to be done or changed. He knew every slightest detail of everything that was done. These reports had to be sent to him, with photos no matter where he was in the world. It was a major international incident if he did not get his daily “building report.”
Another interesting point Miscavige always wants to know “WHY.” He prides himself as an expert administrator and investigator. As an example, when Tom reported about the cracked stucco, Miscavige demanded to know why “so he would know who to shoot. “
A thorough investigation was done. It took 3 days of asking people and trying to find out who decided what and who was actually responsible for it. Finally when it came down to it – the person responsible was Miscavige himself.
The first installation of stucco on the building was done correctly – the right thickness and it did not crack. It was beautifully painted too. Tom cut a two by two foot section out to see what was going on. The second layer had been put on at the express order of Miscavige because he did not like the band of stone on the building protruding an inch from the stucco so he ordered another layer of stucco to make it all level.
His management of the building construction is a perfect example of how he manages the church. Complete insanity. He spends money to do whatever he “knows best” and then kills the person that he had do it for him.
The entire leadership including Tom Cruise should be locked away for life for their assholery! Unfortunately assholery is not a crime but they are certainly frauds of a dangerous, manipulative, evil, abusive pseudo-church (Cult) who should forever be stripped of it’s tax exempt status and in all reality should be completely disbanded for eternity.
+1
this is a good link 🙂
In addition to being the very incarnation of an overpriced, ostentatious, white elephant it’s ugly too. What a bargain!
David Miscavige should live in a miniature house, or maybe a jail cell. They will need the big house for the “millions of success stories” Narconon has had.
Ah, so THIS is what DM considered important, rather than my children, or retirement for old SO members, or healthcare for the staff or other things that a sane, life-giving organization would care about. Good to know, thanks.
As I was looking at the photo of the building,
I noticed some windows look blue and others
a blackish gray. Is that something in the photo
or is that the way it is?
If it is that way how in the world did the supreme
construction magnate ever let that slip by?
Espiritu, “more money than brains” sums
it up pretty well. Didn’t you just love it when
someone like that hit the job?
Desperate Dave making slaves
He knows he can’t abide us
All that gold won’t change his soul
His fate is sealed like Midas
Hi Valerie,
So true what you say.
A leather desk top?
I wonder if it is a special
leather that soaks up coffee
spills so as to never leave a
stain. Or just sucks up pen
marks and makes them disappear.
I’m with you, I’d look at that
desk top and wonder….what in
the world do I do with this?
Mike, your last two posts have been so very meaty. I am thinking of sending you an email on the Auditor magazine one, but there is so much to say, more like a novella.
As for this one. All I can think when I see this is Star Trek. The man is so full of his grandiose schemes that he really has no idea how sterile and uninviting his fantasies look to the real world. I can’t imagine anyone in Sea Org even finding them remotely inviting (not that they would be allowed in there except for punishment).
I have never been to fond of the MOMA look of the office where I work, but at least it has whimsy and color and it is set up to get the job done. I would be afraid to do any work on a leather topped desk for fear I would destroy the finish. I do hope the workers in the office have specially made “Tom Cruise Slippers” that they don when they enter the building so as not to destroy the expensive carpet. I would also feel more comfortable wearing archive quality white gloves while working there.
Or better still, how about I keep with the status quo and never go near there.
I’m sure many on this blog are or have
worked construction. I’m an electrician
by trade and worked on many large buildings
and factories. The A/C fiasco is pure
incompetence. (nothing personal Dan).
Something like that would really hardly
ever happen if at all. True competent
architects would have specifics in their
blueprints and plans that general contractors
would go over in detail long before the units
arrive on the job. Most times if there is a problem
at installation, the architects, general contractors
and other trades connected to the installation would
work it out together. Cut them in two?…..what an
incredibly backward solution that is.
If some little prick came on a job and starting telling
old seasoned tradesmen and laborers how to do things
he more than likely would have had shit knocked out
of him and sent on down the road. If no shit kicking
occurred he surely would have been forcibly removed
from the job.
And this is what is running the tech side of Scientology?
God help us!
Uh-oh. In image 33 of 49 on the Montbleau website the photo of LRon’s on the wonk.
It looks like a storeroom for spare office furniture.
Reminds me of a biography I read about Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker.
I bet the secret room has its own secret kitchen, secret shower, secret movie theater, secret tanning bed, etc etc etc. so COB won’t be inconvenienced while hiding from the FBI.
Every surface shouts $$$$. There is no spot where the eye can rest without recoiling from the ostentation. It’s pushed to 11 on a scale of 10. Every vista inspires thoughts of, “Why couldn’t they just paper the walls with $100 bills in order to tone it down a little and save some money?”
It is completely disgusting that parishioner contributions are spent for things like this.
This, like most of DM’s “perks” constitutes inurement and is illegal as well as immoral:
http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/what-is-private-inurement.html
What a friggin’ joke. Frankly, I’ve seen this sort of thing on other COS projects but not to this extent. Miscavige is an arrogant moron. He is a type of client referred to in the construction trades as “more money than brains”.
Reminds me of a guy in Malibu who insisted on having a full sized pizza oven installed in his beachfront house so he could have pizza at his parties and then complained that the house got too hot.
Mike, you said of the library that “Miscavige never used it or even walked into it other than to show Tom Cruise how cool his junk was so that Tom could say ‘Wow, Dave you are so awesome I wish I could have junk like you have.’ ”
I’m wondering, Mike, did DM really show TC his junk in there? And did TC really say that when DM showed him his junk? And does this mean that TC is even more “challenged” in that area than DM?
So where do we go from here, Dave? –Marty’s ? To plead it was all a BIG MISTAKE, and the fault of some
deadly, undetected underling, that has wrought havoc and 3rd pty’d and scuppered all the great plans he had made for him (Marty) ? And to please come back, whereupon all shall be forgiven, and he (Dave) will make it all worthwhile if he (Marty) drops that silly lawsuit? Will meet him in secret, at the NEW HOLE (NH).
There is so much here on which to comment but here are 2 things which resound in my brain: However exensive the materials and labor was, the secretaries’ office looks really ugly, and why would the Dwarf need or even want a woodburning fireplace in Hemet? Oh, and just thought of something else: when LRH stated or wrote that “cold chrome steel” comment or directive, he wasn’t referring to furniture! The Dwarf is indefatigably literal, isn’t he?
David,
you got it wrong; you said one day that Power was just to be assumed…what you didn’t understand is that you are just what you have always been and always will be…… a mere Mini Me….nothing else….
How can you say that? Tom digs me. I know all the cool people. No one talks to me unless I let them. I’m in fucking power! – DM
Laurie Dim – This is what I have to say to that:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjgUdrEzpuY
WOW!! Thanks for a great WICOBW(“What is COB’s Wing?”) tour. Very informative. Looking forward to WICOBW II or any other tours that are not being known.
Remember he also has a lavish office in the Hollywood Guaranty Building, another at ASI, another in the servant quarters in the Saint Hill Manor, several at the Flag Land Base (including the new one in the Stupid Powers Building), a suite of several office rooms on the Prom deck and several sumptuous cabins on the A deck of the Freewinds that get used for maybe three weeks a year, several other offices at Gold that are reserved for his use, probably others that have been created in the 10 years I have been away.
He loves high end audio (think in the many $10,000s per installation, not your Bose Home Stereo). Besides the incredible system with air flotation for the record player that lives right next to his rooms at Gold, he has access to “Ron’s” system in his house (actually another building in the back of “Ron’s House”, next to the “Guest Room” that TC uses.) He goes to see first run films with TC on TC’s nickel at the fully equipped 35mm cinema next door to that. He has stereo systems at the HGB and ASI as well. The one in his office at the Saint Hill Manor is not so nice but still probably over $20,000.
Though Building 50 is by far the most elaborate it is just one of his many extravagances.
Think of that, o denizens of the Big Blue Building in LA, when you fight over the last few squares from a roll of toilet paper that some poor Estates staff member provided out of his $15 pay stub, under the flickering light of a dead fluorescent bulb, in a bathroom that should have been condemned in 1935. Think of that when you have to get your cancer treatment money through Financial Planning and the chances it will get approved are vanishingly close to zero because there is not even enough money for food. Think of Dave smoking a fancy cigar in a fancy suit while being driven in a fancy car to somebody else’s private jet for a jaunt to scuba dive in the Caribbean while your best hope for luxury is that there is enough money this week to have hot sauce on your rice and beans.
Tick Tock Dave, enjoy it while you can, your time is coming.
Maybe they could raffle his stool specimens for fund raising bingo parties.
I’m dying to know what he listens to. “Thank you for listening”? Vanilla Ice?
The Greatest Love of All sung by Whitney Houston.
Old pop and jazz mostly, they love to put on things like “Flight of the Cosmic Hippo” by Bela Fleck just to show off their “low end”. Movie sound tracks, especially “Star Wars”. I heard the Weavers “Live at Carnegie Hall” there and that was a very emotional experience. Steve Marlowe put that on for me just to recruit me to fiddle with the system more (I am an old school folkie music wise). Anything by Michael Jackson because his mixer was Bruce Swedien. They love to hear that glass breaking sound as though it was happening right in front of you.
In other words, Dave doesn’t really care about the music, just likes to show off the system. And to imply his “ear” is better than anybody’s. He shares that conceit with Ron. In truth I think he suffers hearing loss because the levels were always set somewhere around the threshold of pain when I walked into the room and put the system in play to try to hear something wrong with it.
Jon H., if your last name rhymes with sandwich you probably know more than I do about it. I’d love to know if you and your former wife made it out OK, I hear your daughter did, but we have no real details on it. When you’re ready… (if my guess is right, if not ignore this paragraph).
Thanks Bruce. This is not Jon Horwich, it is someone else…
BP,
Forget about a Hot sauce on your rice & beans, I tried. That’s a no no. It makes that meal
palatable…
Greta
Add mayo if you’re upstat.
The locals in petrolia told me this happened at the construction site there too. For instance, all the tiles had to be ripped out because Scientology changed their mind about what tiles to have.
The room would run closer to 10-30,000 watts with 450 bulbs, rather than a half-million, but still, that’s just nuts.
“…Including the mirror, which Miscavige specified be facing his door so that he could check his image as he walked out of his office.”
Bwwaaaaaa ha ha ha ha ha! I swear, if I ever met the guy, I wouldn’t slap him (although who wouldn’t mind slapping ol’ Slappy Himself). No, I’d just start laughing. I’d laugh at him, right at His face. That would probably hurt him more than slapping Him, anyway. Good Lord, what a douchebag.
This is such an important and thoroughly written article Mike. It is vital information to illustrate the sheer madness and degradation that is the leader of the rcs. The capricious and flagrant waste of parishioner’s money is astounding and disgusting. I’m actually a designer and have worked with some brilliant architects. This building’s work is grossly unprofessional and I don’t really know anyone who’d be willing to work under these horrible circumstances. What’s next for Dave, brain surgery? He obviously thinks he can do anything whether he has any education or not. The project is a clusterfuck like his brain.
You make me laugh, Hallie Jane. Out Loud.
Brain surgery. For gawd’s sake, don’t give him any ideas. He thinks he can do anything. Somebody should tell him that he’s got a brain tumor. He won’t trust anyone else to do the operation so he’ll do it himself. And it will turn out like that metal and limestone floor. Wait…maybe he’ll UNtwist his brain by mistake. Make him docile and nice while he walks around that muddy lake, wondering where the ducks are.
Statpush, that’s bloody brilliant! Now that the Ron mags have been milked for all the money they can get outta them, it’s time for DAVE Magazines! Dave the Master Mariner! Dave the Interior Designer! (oh, actually no – interior designer sounds a bit, yoooou knoooooww, ahem, gay. And we couldn’t have that!) Dave the Dwarfenfuhrer! Crap, I might even buy that one…
“…and an Auditing Room with built in grounding wires.” If this is good, why don’t all ‘Ideal’ auditing rooms have this as part of the specs?
What’s the matter davie, expecting charge to be thrown back at you because of your abuse of black knots?
He’s no leader.
This exposure, while unbelievable is a historical portrayal of earlier similar “cathedrals”. I have been to the Vatican, the duomo in Florence, Catherine the Great’s Summer Palace near St. Petersburg, and the Versailles near Paris. Dave has learned from prior’s to show off his shit.
“Let them eat rice and beans!”
It is bad enough to be a *Religious* Leader living like a Saudi King.
But it is even more heinous, that the Sea Org slaves that keep it all going live in $1 a day food allocation, sometimes rice and beans, no day off, no annual leave, Pig’s berthing punishments for not making quotas,
escalating punishments and abuse for non-performance…
While
Miscavige lives the Life of the Rich and Famous.
Damned good essay Mike Rinder.
Jefferson Hawkins gave some glimpses as well
http://leavingscientology.wordpress.com/2009/09/21/david-miscavige-lifestyles-of-the-rich-and-famous/
Dave’s favorite line is from his BFF`s movie Jerry Maguire when his client yells to him SHOW ME THE MONEY!
+1,000 Karen.
Good one Karen & Jeff H.
I simply can’t believe that there are no laws governing a religion’s accountability of funds received from
parishioners.
Al Capone was gotten by mail fraud. What sets the church of Scientology apart from any Christian church
where there is a much higher accountability of funds received?
I am throwing that out even if aware that at the Vatican level the scene is likely worse but not as obvious as
what DM is doing.
Greta
Mike,
This cannot be the dwarf’s dwelling mate.
We all know he lives in a converted dolls house.
Didn’t LRH write somewhere about not speding money on buildings?
The dwarf is in what he perceives (incorrectly) to be LRH’s valence.
The only difference is that LRH developed things.
The dwarf couldn’t even devolope a good case of piles, er well maybe he could.
As long as the shitbags he orders about put up with this nonsense and the IAS registrars keep getting 10% from the idiots who think the dwarf is source it will go on and on and on.
Can’t say I would like to live like he does.
That’s the price you pay for being the most suppressive person who ever walked into Scientology
Every Scientologist should read this. You know all of that hard-earned cash you’ve turned over to the Church? This is how it is spent and wasted – on the aggrandizement of one little sociopathic dictator.
I spent a lot of time in Building 50 – all of it a horrific nightmare. By the time I left, in 2005, it was a big, empty mausoleum. No one worked there, except for a handful of Miscavige’s personal staff. The ornate offices were empty. The only sound in the building was the echoing of David Miscavige’s screams, as he berated some poor underling, sounding like the roar of some tortured monster trapped in the bowels of a labyrinth of his own design.
There should be a mandatory event for all Scientologists, its subject to remain secret. Once everyone is gathered, miscavige will be led out on the stage in sackcloth with a rope around his neck being asked by a church official if he has any last words, after which he will be hung from the scaffold until pronounced dead.
comment of the month.
What can I say? all this is appalling. I just cannot understand how the IRS stills grants Tax exempt status to this group. Thanks for all the info Mike, the cult is shrinking at an exponential pace!
David Miscavige and his “COB Fortress of White Trash” shows what happens when some guy from Philly wins the Super-Lotto and can spend endless money to create what basically looks like any other overdone Corporate HQ or Boardroom from the 1920’s to the 1950’s.
I was doing energy-efficient lighting retrofits on highrises in Downtown Los Angeles, the Wilshire District, and West Los Angeles in the 1980’s. I had to survey many old buildings with the Building Manager or Owner’s rep to do an energy analysis and set up logistics for the phased relamp/reballast/repairs and very often new electrical systems and new lighting fixtures to bring old buildings up to code.
I saw all of the heavy dark wood, fluorescent ceilings, too many recessed downlights, heavy Berber carpets, and marble floors. The executive floors in these facilities were design-influenced (micromanaged) by CEO’s or COB’s who had tons of money and wanted to convey a sense that one was in the Corporate Sanctum Sanctorum and the office of the “Big Boss” was the Holy of Holies where God himself sat each day behind a five ton desk made from the finest hardwoods from Africa, Australia, Peru — it really didn’t matter where the wood came from as long as it came from faraway at great expense and that 1) You had never heard of it, 2) You could never afford it. Same with the marble. Back then it had to be hand-quarried in Italy from a quarry the Big Boss had personally visited with his wife and his entourage.
But then you would see that the Big Boss had a private bathroom, that he chain-smoked, and that his private wet bar was what he used the most in his office. Back in that era the Big Boss would usually have a well-used comfy sofa in a corner of his office where he passed out to sleep for a few hours after lunch and a few martinis. It was understood that no one was to ever dare set there because it was actually a bed.
Miscavige really is nothing more than a dramatizing interior decorator with an unlimited budget and a weird overwrought Wagnerian aesthetic that just screams of his rampant narcissism.
Jswift – “David Miscavige and his “COB Fortress of White Trash” shows what happens when some guy from Philly wins the Super-Lotto and can spend endless money to create what basically looks like any other overdone Corporate HQ or Boardroom from the 1920′s to the 1950′s.”
Make me laugh!! Absolutely – esp. “some guy from Philly wins the Super-Lotto and can spend endless money…”
Where the hell is Ron Miscavige, Sr. while all this is happening? Where is he now? He needs to come out and talk some sense into his little Hitler seed. But we all know that he can’t do anything about him either because he’s chiiiiicken. Yep, that’s right, I said it, Ron. Chicken. Go back to making your little exercise machines and writing your inane little books. Be as “un-dangerous” and feeble as you can be so your little man won’t hurt you.
No responsibility. Sheesh. Ron, you could make a difference in all this but you’re not saying a word. I thought that you were tougher than that. Tsk tsk.
Mike, excellent article! With all DM’s change orders the cost probably exceeded $50m. Not to mention the garages just outside the building, to stash DM’s cars. I seem to recall that when they were first built, they were a foot too close to the main building, and too small to take all his cars. While LRH’s Bluebird bus and other LRH vehicles were left out in the open. So it was demolished and a new one built instead.
More nail$ ($olid GOLD plea$e) fur der ca$ket uf der $upreme Kapitein, Herr KNOW BE$$T!!! Ve Vill Only accept ze ferry Be$$T kwaliteit for Hi$$$ finalll journey into ze HOLE uf HI$$ choice. Ze elefator ride down to ze ferry lowe$$t level po$$ible – level ” H.E.L.L.” — commmplete mitt furna$$e grade heatinnk! (uf cour$e!)
You are ferry funny, Rrrrrracer! You makame Lawwwwffff!
Less messy zen pukinnnk! Jawol! 🙂
In history kings killed relatives on a regular basis and it was seen as legitimate.
Eg. Suleiman’s wife knew that only one child could survive. These were the rules. Assassination was accepted. And even worse, it was encouraged by law.
So, what is DM doing differently? Not much indeed! Get rid of anyone, who could become dangerous. Only the most evil person will become/stay king.
Hitler died in fear, Stalin died in fear, Nero died in fear … paranoia and megalomania seem to be the long term result. Overestimation of one’s own capabilities also belongs into this group.
1.1 is not far away from 1.0 … this time I can agree with LRH. Not because he wrote it, but because I observed it myself several times in my life.
Stay away from people with fear!!!
They are time bombs. Their fear is bigger than any loyalty. The command is to avoid fear, not to be pro-survival. And fear includes lying like mad. Nobody wants to show any fear. They got laughed at quite often and learned to hide their real thoughts. You will always hear reasonable excuses. And if you corner them on the real “why”, then they explode and you’d better not be anywhere near them.
Sometimes (not always) fear comes from too many overts. And fear causes more overts. And overts cause more fear. And fear causes ….
Similar to Saddam’s palaces. Admittedly, Saddam had better taste but the same over the top, gaudy, incoherent design, with everything expensive yet looking cheap and uninviting.
These….should read my text before sending….
you can tell a lot looking at somebody’s surroudings.
This is cold and pretentious, devoid of life.
But God, this floors are beautiful, outside his office.
I’m confused. Aren’t ecclesiastical leader supposed to be humble, and take a vow of poverty?
I wonder how much longer the 위대한 령도자님 (Dear Leader) will live. Isn’t he a heavy smoker and a rather severe asthmatic? That’s not really a prescription for longetivity.
Ex_aedibus,
Certainly smoking with asthma is a no-no. He will have emphysema or COPD very soon, if not in the early stages right now.
But let’s not forget the hard liquor consumption either. Not good for you at all, especially with smoking and chronic lung issues. That’s why he looks so bad at only 54 years old without his stage make-up on. He looked like he crawled out of a crypt in Sydney.
When mistakes are made there are SP’s in the area.
Words to that effect as I recall from PTSP course as staff.
Air conditioners as big as shipping containers, hole in roof too small ?
Cut the air conditioners in half that get installed backwards?
I’ve seen some bad installations but this is monumental.
I would not touch this mess because it will always be a mess( never ending trouble)
Everything under D.M. is caved in, in some form or another.
The office space where I work has more life than that secretaries’ office. It looks sterile.
I guess now we know why ASHO and AOLA, which were both renovated unnecessarily (and expensively) not many years ago, were recently renovated yet again. Both buildings were actually more comfortable and friendly before the earlier renovations were done.
I remember getting the VIP tour around 1997 of the Auditor services facilities. They were proudly shown off. The Sea Org guide was so excited about this lavishly extravagant facilities and I just thought, ‘holy fuck they are screwing people over. The parishioners mortgage their houses and bring untold sacrifices to do their services or defend Scientology and they waste it on this shit.’ I was appalled.
I realized what I was looking at, was all the corruption and lies materialized in shiny MEST, and the member of the “most ethical group” that was enthused by it did not even have enough sense to see what this is.
They were never able to get a single dime donation out of me after that.
How many solid wood desks, mansions, custom cars and fancy a/v equipment will it take for you, Mr.Miscavige, to convince yourself that you are not in fact a slave? Your cage may be very gilded but unlike your sea org underlings there is no hope for freedom for you EVER. You have shown yourself to be a pariah and a freak, unfit for the company of decent men. May your hair be well-coiffed and your garments of the finest silk as you die alone and hunted at the top of the smoldering ant-hill.
+1
See the guy at the beginning – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xmckWVPRaI
Apropos mansions… any details on that Mr. Brousseau?
Hollywood Hills are really nice to live in…
PS: …and from the nearby Hollywood-sign one has also a magnificant view over L.A. 😉
E’ un cialtrone. Un criminale totalmente fuori scambio.. Un pazzo.
ENGLISH TRANSLATION FOR LIBERO’S POST — He’s a scoundrel. A criminal, totally out exchange…a crazy.
Ahhh, memories. I was on the decks in 1999 after originating wanting to leave the Int Base Cuckoo’s Nest and was part of the work detail that installed those air handling units in the attic. I recall that DM used to do a make wrong on Management and say that Building 50 was going to become the space for Management, because he was so disgusted with it and them.
There actually is an historical precedent for Building 50. Around 1620 Sweden was the major power in the Baltic region. They were currently at war with Poland and the King had ordered the 17 Century equivalent of the Death Star, a massive battleship called the Vasa. Named after the King, I think. Anyway, when the King saw the plans he wanted it to carry more firepower so he ordered the architect to add more cannons. The architect basically abandoned his better judgment and added the cannons under severe pressure.
The christening and launch was HUGE event. Not quite international in scope but the entire city of Stockholm turned out, which would have made it several times the size of any Int event that DM ever presided over. The Vasa floated out of its berth as Swedish pride swelled in every breast. A slight breeze arose and the Vasa set sail to kick some Polish ass. The breeze stiffened and the Vasa, now top-heavy due to the Swedish COB’s incessant meddling and know-best, promptly began to list heavily, keeled over and sank to the bottom of Stockholm’s harbor. There it lay for more than 300 years until it was discovered in the 1950s and ingeniously raised and salvaged. Because it was lying in fresh water not salt water, the ship was extremely well preserved and today it is the number 1 attraction in Stockholm and a truly incredible experience to visit.
Not sure if a similar fate will befall Building 50, though the parallels are certainly eerily similar.
Hitler had s/t similar… it was called “Maus” and the even larger version of this tank was called “Ratte”.
He had the correct names for his visions at least… 😉
Great story and parallel Dan.
Here in Pittsburgh region, in the 1850ishs an earlier communal maybe not full blown cult, but religious group, the Rapp society or Harmony Society set up a village that is preserved here. That communal tiny religious utopian waiting for the end of the world group died off, no offspring, their “cult” community survived, they had more going for themselves than frankly Scientology.
But they left behind their compound city in full, today a tourist site.
Something likely might become of the Int Base, and thus all you still alive Int Base vets ought put your stories together for collection, for the future school kids who someday might be toured through the great Golden Era Productions/Int Base!
Sheesh! (More stories Dan, please!)
BEST!
POST!
EVAH!
And the comments aren’t bad, either. 🙂
These pix and the details of Miscavige’s obsessive need for self-aggrandizement and control are just what the I.R.S. ordered.
Hey, John Koskinen! Over here!
This update was fascinating and creepy at the same time.
If I recall correctly, Marc Headley’s excellent book, “Blown for Good,” details a lot of Miscavige’s insane and repeated “re-dos” on projects.
If Miscavige truly is a sociopath — which seems very likely — he would have no concern whatsoever about the dollars spent, the stress on people, the aggravation, what people think, or any of that. Those considerations would no more meaningful to him than ignoring a buzzing mosquito — after swatting it.
Great post. This blog delivers.
Does this remind anyone else of Winchester Mansion? All that crazy duct work.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winchester_Mansion
I’m pretty sure Miscavige has a stash of weapons for his safety also! Or a bodyguard office, with gun collection safe, etc, etc.
At ASI, even in 1992, when I first went t work at ASI, we had a corner office for Miscavige and Shelly had an adjoining small room.
4 desks in Miscavige’s office, he used the one closest the inner hallway, and he was furthest from the windows, drapes always closed.
One of the desks, in his office, but not his, in one of the top drawers had a large knife, and I asked my cleaning station cohort Mari Buffington, she was the estates manager then for ASI, and Mari said the knife was for protection! (I had then the nightly or weekly cleaning duty of cleaning the office.)
Oh gosh!
When you are “on COB’s lines” even as tiny office cleaner of one of his potential office spaces, you then get draped with the whole paranoia of how important COB and his top entourage and the other top execs must all be!
Just an unbelievable out of touchess and paranoia.
That wall to hide in just gets me, it needs wise exposing!
I hope Devocht told the FBI which wall Miscavige will be hiding in!
That’s interesting, what you say about the secrecy, etc. about ASI.
One night, after an event there, I was still there, talking away with someone. We were told that we had to go into an office and wait there until we were told to come out. I asked what was going on and eventually, they said, “Someone is coming through and we can’t really have anyone here.”
I said, “Ok, no problem.”
While I was waiting in the office, I realized that it must have been COB coming through.
Do you remember when Security was drilling in the basement of the Hollywood Inn – basically across the street between ASI and HGB?
But there is also a nice side to all those memories…
The beautiful sunset over the Pacific from the roof tops of the Hollywood Inn, the balconies of CCInt or the top of the HGB (bytheway, has the helicopter landing plattform ever been approved) Ohh well… Sorry for distracting – but this were nice moments nevertheless.
Where were DM’s designers?
Functionality and simplicity along with integration
of the whole are the watchwords for down-to-
earth designers who caters to billionaires and
the stars (who has “class”).
Quite right Lars. When creating an office space, designers don’t have “sinister cult leader” generally come to mind.
I bet DM scratched many of their ideas and whoever came up with the final plan probably doesn’t want any credit for it and would never use it for their résumé, even if they weren’t bound by confidentiality agreements.
Miscavige is a freakazoid. Thanks for sharing these pics.
Every time I hear this shit it just disgusts me. This guy is truly a sick individual.
Well, don’t we know better?
Shouldn’t a possible auditing question be:
“To what problem is that a solution for?”
Just my 2 cents
+1
Aesop’s fables come to mind when I hear these stories of Scientology’s leader’s mistakes.
You cannot make a purse out of a sow’s ear!
Nothing good comes of this whole building investment and renovation strategy.
This extravagant rich person behavior by the current Scientology leader is pitiful and so wrong and irreligious.
Thanks for the details of the architectural building details for a cult leader!
Secret wall to hide in! The details of the secret wall I hope we get a lot of details on that! That ought to get media for sure!
“Scientology Leader’s Hidden Wall to Hide In When the FBI Raid Scientology’s Dessert Compound Exposed!”
Thanks so much!
Secret walls and secret doors… well who doesn’t like that kind of stuff? 😉
Like the hidden door that used to exist between the Presidential suite on the top of the Fort Harrison and the Crystall Ball room or the sooo secret VIP entrance etc. at CC Int.
Just my 2 cents
In spite of no expense spared on materials and expert construction, those spaces are not attractive nor do they compel you to want to be in them.
The Secretaries office is the worst. No windows, were a person is boxed in and the desks are ugly. I would feel dead inside if I had to be in a space like that for most of my waking existence.
The hallway is foreboding and the Library does not make me think of a mature man occupying it. There is no elegance to any of these areas whatsoever. It’s way too heavy on the design and finish, too much everywhere you look and even reads a little boyish and “guy.”
Overall, those spaces really have no “space” to them. They are hard and stuffy and there is no connection to the outside or nature. The windows in the Library have what appears to be thick metal bars on them and probably can’t even be opened for fresh air. The view faces another exterior wall.
What a horrible place esthetically to have to work in. There is nothing California about them.
Feng shui = harmonizing the human existence with the surrounding environment.
My thoughts too, Pepper. What Dave built here says something about his spirit, theta, soul or lack thereof. It is so ugly (secretaries’ office) or downright garish and lifeless. The Feng Shui, if it’s harmonizing with his human existence, speaks volumes all by itself.
I agree. Though AOSH EU&AF also didn’t have that Feng Shui feeling… IT WAS AT LEAST CROWDED AND PEOPLE SMILED AND LAUGHED AND AUDITING GOT DONE! 🙂
Yes McCarren, you get a concept of who a person is and what they’re about when you enter their living and work space.
There’s no soul in those spaces. No theta, no personality or individuality to be seen. There’s no artwork, plants, windows to the outside and no connection to nature or air. There’s no soft furnishings or color outside the black and cherry with neutral floors either.
It’s an airless, lifeless, joyless, dreadful feeling space to me.
I like the part about the cold, uncomfortable steel chairs outside his office. But I think he should add some unobtrusive steel spikes and nubs at various places on them.
In fact, I’m surprised he hasn’t done this sort of thing with ALL the chairs in meeting rooms and such. that he himself doesn’t sit in. Let me send him a suggestion about this. I’m sure he would appreciate it
Maybe even wire up the other chairs in meeting rooms so he can send a jolt of electricity to any one of them at will. The possibilities are endless for a person of his creative genius..
Being a devil’s advocate, knowing the well known data about The Hole and applying some basic Tech (like the PC is just dramatizing the incident he is stuck in), has it ever occurred to anyone, what happend to the young DM when he was put on his post in the “container like building” at Clearwater between Fort Harrisson and the Sandcastle? Out-Int? Pushed in? Forced in? ARC-X of magnitude? What sort of incident could have gone into restimulation? Any ideas? 😉 I’m not trying to C/S or evaluate (would be against the Auditor’s Code) – but I am giving my best to understand this Being in despair. As per the reference “The Nature Of A Being” there is nothing that doesn’t eventually respond to the basic Scientology principles. At least I know one thing – “he” tries to solve something.
Just my 2 cents
PS: Isn’t there a Sec-Check question that goes like: “Have you stolen a religion?” (or similar – sorry I have no access to S.I.R at the moment…)
Not trying to be a smart ass here, but, if you’re gonna try and figure out what’s wrong with Miscavige, maybe you should do so without the use of Scientology, since this is one of the primary contributors in the creation of this monster.
I think it can be summed up fairly simply: A sociopath with the worst Napoleonic Complex in the history of mankind, found himself in an organization that rewards thuggery, deceit, and oppression. Whereas most people with personalities this sick have to temper their natural impulses to better fit in with society, Dave (with no fear of repercussions) was allowed to bully and con his way to the ridiculous opulence we see in this article.
Like taking a tour of the friggin’ Reich Chancellery.
Pepper
My thoughts exactly. It mirrors DM’s inside amazingly. Heavy, the MOST expensive, too much of it (like the library floor), managing to exclude anything spiritual.
Apart from the incredible financial expenses…the mental anguish, stress. sleeplessness, bypassed charge of all persons involved in this project looms like a cloud over ‘DMs castle’.
Greta
Yes, Greta it’s painful to look at and even more painful to think of the horrible, stressful conditions that are imposed on the people who work at Gold with the Cult Leader Himself.
All paid for by the public who think that they are helping humanity and are creating a new civilization/ a better world.
Friends, look at what your dollars are buying you.
I don’t think anyone would rent this building with energy costs of over $600,000 a year. Especially because it is not in a major metro area. It might be rentable if it was in Miami. It could be rented as a hollywood movie set for a film like divergent. This is so insane it hurts.
DM, “they will know us by our MEST”.
Dave, my disgust for you grows exponentially. You don’t deserve death but a public trial where your crimes and financial waste are fully exposed and broadcast to the world. Your sentence will be cleaning latrines (Chairman of the bowels) for the remaining years of your sorry existence. Your only terminal is yourself.
MJ, last line, best one.
He would be housed in a cell with wall to wall mirrors and a video monitor playing back his motions hourly with the song we stand tall on an endless loop.
MJ – Too late. For decades, Dave’s only terminal has been himself.
His is the picture you see next to the definition of “Only One.”
Keep looking Dave.
The building should be turned into a museum, ala Hearsts Castle or the Huntington Library with tour guides that point out the changes and the expense. This could be a monument to the cult mentality that allows a little megalomaniac to run wild with an unlimited budget. Photos of the Sea Org bunk rooms and starving staff members in the hole could be in a special gallery.
Pity that lil Davey isn’t cultured enough to import works of classical art like the old billionaires did.
Wow! What your donations buy.
The Writers of the Future office at ASI was on the second floor, near the parking lot entrance. There were no windows in the long, narrow, office. Lighting was overhead with fluorescent bulbs and a couple of desk lamps. One day I discovered “daylight” bulbs were made to take the place of fluorescent bulbs and requested these be put in the office. That was so that I could see better. It didn’t take long before “daylight” blubs were put in and production carried on at a dull roar.
One day I was told by an ASI staffer (sorry, cannot remember who) that the “daylight” bulbs would need to be returned to the fluorescent type because it looked “weird” from the doorway. I, of course, responded “Absolutely not! Just close the door so the lighting doesn’t offend a passerby.” If I recall correctly, the “daylight” bulbs remained until I left in 2005.
I should note I grew beautiful plants in the office and the “daylight” bulbs helped tremendously, as there was zero natural lighting. When I was escorted off post after Dr Denk’s passing, my plants also were all sent home. That office lost quite a bit of life form, spirit, theta that fateful day. In fact, cut flowers in arrangements were brought in to brighten up the place and make it more “presentable,” but I always thought they were probably the reject flowers from other ASI spaces. They never lasted long and certainly didn’t replace my thriving plants.
Rachel, you have referred a number of times to being escorted off post after Dr. Denk’s passing. Have you told that whole story somewhere, or could you?
Well, I’m not good at this “linking” business. Let’s try this: http://markrathbun.wordpress.com/category/author-services-inc-asi/. In case that doesn’t work, My posting is on Marty’s blog, April 7, 2011 and is called, “Let’s Say …”.
Rachel, you’re right that they lost a lot of theta the day they sent you away. But why? Just because Gene was gone, why did that translate that you had to be gotten rid of? If your coming out story somewhere that I can read it? I know you as we met at Flag and I”m interested to know your story.
Hi Cindy,
You can find my story on Marty’s blog, April 7, 2011. It’s called “Let’s Say …”. Rachel
But you must admit that the office w/ all those original Science-Fiction magazines was well designed and properly lit.
I believe the office was designed as well as it could be for the space and no windows. Writers of the Future volume covers were framed and lined the walls. There was also an LRH quote but I’d have to think a bit before I could come up with it. The “daylight” lighting helped; so did the plants.
Dear TheWidowDenk,
they sort of “had” to change back to the fluorescent type bulbs and forbid real living plants (also at the HGB) because the “lost” data in the “RON-SERIES HORTICULTURE: FOR A GREENER WORLD” has not been rediscovered yet… 😉
The rosegarden and the old old tree at St. Hill were reasons enough by themselves to key out when taking a walk or enjoying one’s win…
But at least one can see now, when the 5th dynamic started to drop out. What followed was the suppression of the other lowernumbered dynamics… and then the downward spiral inverted – exactly as described in the original AXIOMS-booklet.
This is a perfect example where one can draw the line where Hubbard and Miscavige are quite different.
Yes, very well put Mike. BTW, I knew your mother very well and met you more than once.
Morris, please email me at mreppen1@gmail.com
Correct Mike. Charismatic Dictators DO tend to have more class that their successors who take power by force and guile. History shows that in many examples. Hubbard quietly socked away his ill gotten millions in foreign banks. He didn’t rub it in his slaving, S.O. members faces like that.
Someone who is in a position to know the actual facts, please chime in. But I don’t recall some great Hubbard fortune of cash that he socked away being outstanding. In the will, didn’t he leave everything to the church? He wasn’t spending excessively on himself. Isn’t it arguable that what he socked away was as an under-the-radar war chest? If he wanted it for himself, why wasn’t he spending it lavishly?
Bob, you SAW the accounting from Hubbard’s foreign (undeclared to the IRS) bank accounts after he died?
PLEASE, do show us those docs…
Anyway, ex-S.O. members who were part of that cash smuggling scheme of Hubbard’s have told their story online. East to look up. Time to live in Realityland Bob.
The library is missing any other books than lrh’s.
You would think that the book “Blown For Good” would
be prominently displayed in its own glass cage.
DM’s just leaving enough room for the autobiography that he has written! Currently it is about the thickness of the preface to TWTH. But never fear it is being ghost edited and Shermanised by his speechwriter who will fluff it up to fill the shelf space.once it is printed on goatskin, gilded and enclosed in RPF slave leather bindings.
Jokes aside…every time I read something like this the waste and arrogance just p’s me off all over again. So easy to waste other people’s money while staff and SO members go without medical and dental treatment and eat slop and sleep and live in dehumanizing conditions. This guy has stored up so much bad karma, I would hate to be him. He is a horrible, miserable little shit who only gets enjoyment out of creating misery for someone else.
This is the activity of a complete lunatic. It encapsulates Miscavige’s personality (if it can even be graced with the term “personality”). These are the activities of a person who has his head so far up his asshole it has come out his mouth and gone fully around again (if that were conceivable, but Miscavige is proving that it is).
Great post, Mike.
“Wow, Dave you are so awesome I wish I could have junk like you have” – heh heh 😀
I was just going to comment about the same thing:
Great article, thanks to your special correspond. I’m sure others like myself enjoyed the following part:
“This room is a total prop. Miscavige never used it or even walked into it other than to show Tom Cruise how cool his junk was so that Tom could say “Wow, Dave you are so awesome I wish I could have junk like you have”
I’m sure Miscavige has admired Tom’s junk just as much or more than Tom has.
Did you mean “junk” here as in the movie “The Identity Thief”? (If you don’t know what I mean, look up “slang word junk” in Google.)
It is very appropriate. I’m sure they both admire each other’s “junk” quite a bit.
Are you implying Tom plays with Dave’s junk?
😉 There are plenty of private rooms for them to enjoy each other’s junk.
Maybe that’s why the lighting is so intense…so Tom can find it.
(If you don’t like the jokes, Tom, come out of Davie’s closet and give him up for what he is…a little pr*ck).
Stucco? Why should his holiness have to live in a stucco building? The exterior should be marble. The building itself should be carved stone, possibly large blocks of stone like the Egyptian monuments.
He should just move in to the Getty museum in LA.
I don’t understand why he doesn’t have a moat. Some of the extravagant interior stuff is cool, and the bullet proof glass is a step in the right direction. But why is the building itself not stone or solid steel or something befitting such a big thetan. And why no moat?
“Because those fucking incompetent morons who are privileged to be in my presence will mess it up just like they did Building 50. I’ve got more important things to do as I’m working on the new IDEAL PUBLIC PROGRAM and GOLDEN AGE OF THEFT. And tell Mike Rinder his blog ain’t shit.” – DM
This is the complete opposite of how LRH lived. In 1978 LRH lived in Palm Springs. I helped on the renovations of his living and office spaces. It was a moderate one story house that was clean and neat.
Nothing lavish about it. In the office LRH had a drafting table and stool where he handled the flow of office traffic. Off to the side was a tiny desk with a typewriter where he could type communications. LRH would flip
to see how Miscavige wastes the resources of the “church”. I believe that if you took all the waste and financial irregularities of all Sea Org members over the last 40 years, it would not equal what Miscavige does in an average month.
To this day, the Rifle property in La Quinta, is pretty much as it was then. It is now surrounded by the flourishing and prospering La Quinta Resort and the surrounding golf course resorts. Hubbard had a strong sense of workability, functionality and practicality. To a large extent, he was still operating in the economics of the real world. Miscavige’s budding sociopathy resonated with Hubbard’s aura of importance and things only went down hill from there. Surely, straight shooter that he is known to be, Tom DeVocht would say that the RTC building was just another COB clusterfuck, typical of everything Dave touches. As Dave’s tech of extracting money though intimidation dwindles, his feet will eventually be cemented the realities of economics. Hey Eric Holder, with the plethora of evidence, why don’t you prosecute this criminal? Or, does he not qualify as a criminal under the Chicago Code of Thuggery?
You’re right, Mat. I saw the house that LRH lived in on the base, before it was torn down to make this monstrosity. Again, it was modest, low ceilings, regular kitchen, roomy but not huge bedroom, as you say, tidy and neat. He had a TV and the base crew justified the TV by saying Ron would only watch movies to study the lighting, etc. He was probably laughing his ass off at Good Times and Archie Bunker, just like the rest of us. 🙂
I’m furious that they tore it down. It should have been preserved as a museum but, as I believe Mike said in an earlier post, DM couldn’t have left it standing or people would have asked, “Hey, if LRH lived THAT way, what are you doing living THIS way?”
And bullet-proof glass on top of it. That proves to me that he knows he deserves what he gets. I’m not gonna do it and I’m not encouraging anyone to because that’s illegal. But HE knows what he deserves. That speaks volumes.
(Funny that he didn’t bullet proof anyone else’s offices. He doesn’t care if a stray bullet, meant for him, hits an innocent staff member.)
Or not so funny.
You are so right Matt and Indie8.
The whole house was lifted up to put in a moisture barrier underneath and later we put in marble tiles in ’85 and lots more on the GCT, pardon… RPF.
One of the worst time periods re sleep deprivation.
DM HAD TO get rid of LRH’s house or people would have been able to COMPARE the lifestyles of LRH and DM and this would not have looked good for DM as the Church leader.
It is so much harder to spot an outness when there is nothing to compare it with.
Greta
This is a great article, showing with specifics the excesses of Miscavige and his spending habits. This kind of factual breakdown is what we need to show his waste and innurement and get rid of this “Church’s” tax-exempt status once and for all. When RCS’s tax-exemption is gone, it will be a very short runway to its total demise.
…pleeeease do not forget the CC Int renovations in the early ’90!!! :-O
I won’t!!!
Especially the damn rats perching on the pipes and grinning mockingly down at you, just out of reach to slap ’em down…
Greta
Right on Chris. I can’t see why scientology should ever have been called a religion except by LRH in his quest to shelter and divert the cash from the taxman. And I really approve of any religion, including the big guys, being tax exempt. They are all businesses, some more disreputable than others, and some doing more common-good than others. Scientology is so low on the religious tone scale than more others that it should be the first to be delisted. But the rest should follow.. .
meant “I really DISapprove of any religion……”
What a mess. Unbelievable that all those highly trained execs allowed that to happen. All afraid of an insane dwarf.
Talking to one exec once about one of DM’s offices
this person cringed when I asked about how this
office looked like and what type of materials was
used for the furnitures. That person finally did not
want to answer my questions. The underlying tone
was disgust at the over the top expense and gaudiness.
DM has assumed the wrong beingness of a church-
leader and taken on an uneducated, newly rich and
without taste persona.
Extravagant, a veiled support for his ego, a pretended mest to boost what he lacks: a simple, honest personality and all purposeless mest.
What did he get out of it? Nothing, just an empty space with no real friends.
Wait a sec! Nothing? How about his forte?– Hatred! –Tons of the toxic stuff! Flowed BACK to him!
That’s some reward, eh?
In fact, this bird has set new bench-marks on so many levels, it would probably make the Guinness Book of World Records! In fact, I would take bets, that he would be unique in going down as THE most successful scam artist in the entire history of religion.
Way Beyond the Pale.
Greatest article yet Mike !
The question is,has David Miscavige become
the Gold Standard of out of control despots ?
Ohmygod, simply “Wow!”
Mike, your article and pics were amazing and should be used as evidence in a court case or in an IRS or Federal Investigation. Can you send it to Tony O and other media to get the word out? Using church donations to pay for this over the top opulence and re-do’s cuz it isn’t to his whim, this stuff smacks of misappropriation of church funds and is what Jim and Tammy Faye Baker went to jail for. It is not enough that we can just shake our heads or laugh or cry over it. The world at large needs to see this so that he can be prosecuted for financial irregularities, for using church funds for personal gain, for any number of things. How can this get more massive circulation than just this insular crowd?
Thank you Mike for unveiling this information. Absolutely chilling and sickening.
I agree with Cindy. This could be used as evidence.
Mike, this lavishness can only be compared to Donald Trumpet!. or any number (who cares,anyway) of oil rich Sheikhs, dotted across the Arab world…..
Only one appropriate response to this: Fellow Rinder blogsters, r-e-a-d-y? ……. BARRRFFFFF!
+1
Racing – I agree. There is one difference though. Trump or Sheikhs or Branson or whomever would have the brains to know what they DON’T know and hire professionals and let them get on with it and do it right.
In the case of Trump and Branson, they worked very hard for that money and didn’t use slave labor to make it. They know what that money is worth and so honor it.
What inflames me is that Dave has NO F’ing idea how hard a car mechanic had to work to make the $50,000 that bought his desk, how a secretary has to live with 5 other Scientologists to be able to pay her rent AND the credit card payments for the $100,000 IAS ‘donation’ nor would he give a sh*t if he did have a clue.
F me, Dave? F you, man.
From 0:00 to 0:15.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjyxFhlRDbE
You get me Indie8million. So we are equally nauseated, then! Finger ready? BAAARFF!
I agree Indie8, good points!
Thanks, Hallie (nice to hear from you again) and yes, Racing. I don’t even need to use my finger, it makes me so sick. hahaha!
Wow! I had no idea to the extent of Dear Leader’s greatness. Surely a man of his stature deserves his own line of magazines…
Dave the Master Architect
Dave the Interior Designer
Dave the Finder of Lost Tech
Dave the Case Supervisor
Dave the Scuba Diver
Only then can the public fully appreciate his supreme awesomeness!
StatPush
And let’s not leave him short of labels here…… there is always,
Dave the Dildo
A song could be made
No need to beat around the bush, he is a PRICK, through and through.
He isn’t even useful as that.
I was referring that he isn’t even useful as a dildo.
LOL+
He’s just emulating Hubbard, who, in his own mind, was an expert at everything. DM’s actually so in Hubbard’s valence that it is eerie: hiding, paranoia, sitting on stacks of assets, abusing or abandoning women, etc. Though he doesn’t claim to be Source, he repeatedly claims to fix Source in his reissues. He learned well from his master.
Bullshit.
I was thinking the same thing FOTF. Very weird indeed.
I disagree 100%. I studied and applied most of the auditing tech to 100’s of people over decades. LRH had deep compassion for the traps and predicaments people found themselves in. I believe his #1 driving purpose was to free beings. I arrived at this conclusion through much study and empirical evidence. This was a huge part of him and his life. DM is the antithesis of this, having adulterated, cheapened and debased Scn at every opportunity. He is an amoral degenerate and has no real accomplishments. LRH would abhor this grandiose waste that is DM’s world. He is the squashed cockroach under LRH’s shoe.
Hear, hear Hallie Jane!
@ MJ “Bullshit.” Not a very articulate argument. Can you say more?
@ Brian — I don’t understand if you are agreeing with me or MJ. Can you elaborate.
@ Hallie Jane — you are welcome to your view, of course, just as I am welcome to mine. What I have written about similarities between Hubbard and Miscavige can be seen by anyone willing to confront both of their histories. What specific points to you disagree with?
— Do you disagree that Hubbard went into hiding and that Miscavige is in near hiding, rarely appearing in public and only in controlled situations?
— Do you disagree that Hubbard sat on large amounts of cash and that Miscavige is doing the same thing?
— Do you disagree that Hubbard had a very screwed up 2nd Dynamic and so does Miscavige? Hubbard denied one wife having been a wife, had a travesty of a relationship with a daughter, treated Quentin like crap, and let Mary Sue go to prison for him. And Miscavige has essentially imprisoned his own wife. Disagree?
— Do you disagree that Hubbard claimed to be Source, and that Miscavige adopted the power to “correct” what we had believed to be Source? If DM can correct Source, what does that make DM if not superior to Source in some way (there are web pages that show a long list of alterations made by DM).
@ MJ “Hear, hear Hallie Jane.” I agree with that comment literally as you have put it — as an inducement to listen. But I suspect you meant “Here, here Hallie Jane.”
In terms of listening, I’ll be happy to listen to your arguments. I too had success both being audited and auditing. It took me many years to even begin to face the truth about the dark side of LRH. That side is there. If you truly believe some of the principles of Scientology, you will have to confront that eventually, if you have not already (I’m not assuming one way or the other).
DM, the squashed cockroach under Ron’s purified heel, or successful protege emulating the master well? Scientology blissful under Ron but hell under Miscavige? Nothing illegal by Ron but DM is a crim? I know where I stand at this point in time based on remembering, listening and studying for quite some time.
Having said that, I won’t dispute your right to have your own opinion. I won’t even respond to you in kind by saying “bullshit” or “weird” re your beliefs — no need.
Hallie,
With all due respect, your empirical evidence gathering needs some work. What is documented over and over again (all easily available) is LRH’s clear decision to manufacture a religion intent on bilking consumers of their money. Numerous documents – penned directly by LRH – show this to be true.
The entire hatred of the psychiatric community belies his documented request for psychiatric help during his time in service. Apparently he thought highly of the profession at that time.
He lied about his ‘wartime’ injuries. He lied about the facts of his hospitalization. He was an avid drug user. He was incredibly inconsistent with his decrees and ‘tech’.
I’ll agree that DM is a squashed cockroach, but it wasn’t an admirable man squashing him, it was a con artist, absentee father and failed husband.
Add a line about David Miscavige’s wall hiding.
Maybe soon all the Ideal Orgs will have some additional renos to put in secret walls for Miscavige to hide in when he visits them!
They could just put a shoe box in a bottom desk drawer for him. Renovation complete. 🙂
Fully tricked out with comfortable furniture, ice cubes and McCallan, of course.
NOLAgirl — that’s a great image. Reminds me of how they pulled Manson out from a cupboard he was hiding in, and Saddam Hussein out of a hole in the ground. Payback is a bitch, and quite humiliating!
Hmm, any chance DM will break down crying as he is led off in cuffs? Like Jim Bakker?
I can imagine some of the “Ideal Orgs” being repurposed, say as spas, or health clubs, when the house of cards collapses, but I can’t see anyone having any use for this Titanic white elephant.
Maybe Eckankar would buy it. Or the Moonies. Or SGI.
It sounds like the Winchester House here in California. http://www.winchestermysteryhouse.com/thehouse.cfm
160 rooms with lots of stairways leading to nowhere. Crazy crazy.
Or a really posh militia group.
Or some crazed loony plotting the overthrow of the humans. He had it all worked out but they delivered the wrong furniture.
Is this building as empty as the Ideal Orgs?
You and the special correspondants are more than worth your weight in gold, Mike (no pun intended).
+1
+1, too.