Bob Mannino is a student of history and a retired Army Lieutenant Colonel who, among other duties, worked for a little more than ten years as a covert agent against the Soviet KGB and GRU, oftentimes meeting with them in East Berlin and undergoing Soviet-administered lie detector tests. After his retirement, Bob worked a number of years for defense contractors in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Upon returning home, he volunteered to work at the ground level for political parties to understand how politics are conducted at the street level.