How did Doobie Brothers guitarist Skunk Baxter end up advising the US on missile defence?

Dan Schreiber says Jeffrey "Skunk" Baxter, who played with Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers, taught himself engineering and wrote a five-page paper on repurposing existing technology for missile defence. It reached senior officials, and his ideas, drawn from music technology, carried him up to chairing the Congressional Advisory Board on Missile Defense for many years.

At one hearing a committee chair asked whether he was the man from Raytheon or Boeing.
Baxter's first band was Ultimate Spinach, which he joined on its third album.
Baxter has never explained the nickname Skunk, though the panel shares one unconfirmed theory.
Baxter's walrus-style moustache is said to have helped inspire Floyd from The Muppet Show.

▸In their words

“No sir, this is the guy from the Doobie Brothers.” Dan Schreiber · at 17:19 — open in the transcript →

Source: our own transcription of the episode. The full conversation is on No Such Thing As A Fish (2026-11-05). Read the whole episode summary →

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