March 12, 2024 • 44 mins
SERIES 2 EPISODE 138: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: I would've expected Trump to mispronounce "Melania" as "Melanoma" before he garbled Putin's name. Whether Putin is his blackmailer, his benefactor or just his idol, if he called him "Poten," Donald Trump is a desperately sick man. I mean, Jesus H. Christ in a Hatbox. The evidence continues to mount for either the thesis that he has Fluent Aphasia or what veteran Trump health analyst Dr. John Gartner has identified as Phonemic Paraphasias (an Alzheimer's symptom in what regular words are replaced by nonsense that rhymes with them).
This could also explain Trump, a day after posting his latest bond for the latest money he owes E. Jean Carroll after her latest lawsuit, insisting again that he never met her, and two days after that going live on national television and insisting - as if he has never mentioned before - that he never met her. If his brain is dissolving, he might really have no idea that he met her or raped her or anything else.
The bond in the Carroll case (one of them, I forget the number) brings us back to the other question. It was a bond posted by Chubb insurance (irony unbound) and neither Trump nor Chubb will confirm or deny the 91 million was co-signed by anybody else. Chubb has outlets in Russia, Turkey, UAE, Brasil. Trump met with right-winger Jeff Yass (who owns part of TikTok and now Trump DOESN'T want to ban TikTok) and Elon Musk. Did either of them buy Trump?
And: today's House Judiciary Committee comedy show with Special Counsel Robert Hur hits differently now that Biden put a dagger in the heart of the MAGA Biden Age Plot during The State of the Union, and that Hur has "left" the Justice Department and is testifying as just a corrupt citizen Trump Stooge (which he was all along). If the Democrats begin to set him on fire, the GOP will turn on him on a dime.
B-BLOCK (23:13) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: England's Kate is bad at photoshop and worse at apologizing. Pope Francis just echoed the wartime popes who appeased Hitler, and Marjorie Taylor Greene appears to have given away her plot to sabotage Biden into calling the murder victim "Laken Riley." (28:06) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Funny that Politico, The Washington Post, CNN, the broadcast networks, the AP, New York Times and everybody rushed to the Katie Britt disaster story but almost none of them gave any credit to the independent reporter Jonathan Katz who beat them to it by two days. WaPo actually pretended their guy broke it, and Politico amplified that. It's shameful, and another symptom of broken media. Speaking of broken, there's Mitt Romney, and Bill Maher. We have an explanation for why he turned into an idiot: he reads only the most idiotic political columnists (George Will? Really? I mean other than for baseball?)
C-BLOCK (36:35) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: After the audience for our SOTU special was exceeded by only eight television news operations (each of which has, you know, a news operation) a prominent non-news TV executive asked me why I wasn't back on MSNBC. So I had to tell the Maddow story again. Including the part about the $437 with which I hired her for the network out of my own pocket.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. Who
Owns Trump? And how bad is his latest illness? Since
(00:28):
we last spoke, Trump has redefamed Egene Carroll and then
re redefamed her yesterday live on national television. He has
made some kind of financial deal to get the cash
or the money he already owed her. He has vowed
to cut Social Security and Medicare. He turned out to
have praise Hitler more than we knew, and other dictators.
(00:48):
He has been endorsed by the dictator of Hungary, the
one he once claimed was the dictator of Turkey, And
maybe most importantly, his illness, his brain and or speech
related disease, has gotten so bad that among his now
steady output of dozens and dozens of mispronunciations and nonsense words,
he has even mispronounced the name of Vladimir Putin.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Ukraine and Russia wouldn't be fighting. I knew pot and
I'd know him very well.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
I mean Jesus Christ in a hat box. Whether you
think Putin has video of Trump watching hmm toots hm
hmmming on each other, or you just think Putin is
blackmailing him conventionally, or you just think Trump admires Putin
the way anybody who has admired Hitler for at least
a half a century would How does Trump mispronounce Putin's name?
(01:39):
The answer is inescapable. Trump is ill. He's sick, He's
getting sicker, and his illness is getting worse. And the
only thing we know for certain about his illness is
that it seems to get more profound later in the
day and when he's tired. And that not only can
a convincing argument be made, as I've outlined here before,
(01:59):
for it being fluent aphasia, in which the victim can
create the sounds and the flow of a sentence, but
the words are increasingly wrong, but that it might instead
or also be phonemic paraphaseus. That is a disease usually
associated with moderate or severe Alzheimer's in which the victim
substitutes non words for words that sound kind of like words.
(02:23):
The psychologist and former Johns Hopkins Medical School professor, doctor
John Gartner made that armchair informal diagnosis for the website Salon.
We'll get to the Social Security cuts and the hourly
defamation of e. Gene Carroll and the money story in
a moment. But here are the low lights of Trump's
malaprops just since Saturday. In your mind, feel free to
(02:45):
vote for which you think it is fluentophasia or phonemic
paraphaseas that's why.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
They're weaponizing law enforcement for high level election interference against
Joe Biden's top and only political appointment, A guy named me,
see guy named me. We have become a nation like
nobody thought possible.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
By far the most disgraceful part of Joe Biden's service
as a divisive all compliments of an incompetent Biden administration.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Megan Kelly, May she rest in peace. They say that
it's violent, the attacks say Biden said it.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
I knew potent.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I'd know him very well.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Again, I can't get over this. He mispronounced the name putin.
I would have sooner expected him to call Malania melanoma
than to say potent as impotent potables. The sound alike
Alzheimer's symptom advocate. Doctor Gartner was one of the twenty
seven psychiatrists and mental health experts who contributed to the
(03:49):
twenty seventeen best selling book The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump.
He now cites other sound alike things Trump has said recently.
Quote some examples of Trump's non words Beneficiaries become beneficies,
Renovations become renoverse, pivotal became pivot ball, Christmas became crisis,
(04:12):
bipartisan became bipars unquote. And we can now add to that,
potent became potent. Doctor Gartner adds, quote, this is a
fundamental breakdown in the ability to use language. If you
were talking to your father on the phone and he
did this, you would think he is having a stroke.
(04:34):
There is no healthy, older person who speaks that way.
Doctor Gartner also notes the word salads and the free
association meanderings in his speeches and calls it quote a
sign of real prain damage. Not being old, not being slow,
not losing a step, but of severe cognitive deterioration. What
I don't understand is why those clips he asks aren't
(04:55):
replayed over and over in the mainstream media. Isn't Trump
babbling incoherently the most newsworthy part of his rally Unquote Well,
doctor Gartner, I'm doing my damnest I.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Knew quote di, I'd know him very well.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Potent as in potentate, the which disease. Has he got stuff?
Is not just idle reverse both sides ism either. It
probably has extraordinary relevance to the seemingly unconnected news developments
always swirling around Trump. I mean, what would better explain this?
Egene Carroll timeline. Friday, after a stay was denied, his
(05:33):
lawyer's posted bond of ninety one million, six hundred thousand
dollars for his first defamation of his sexual victim for
claiming she had made up the story, after a court
found she had not made up the story, and after
another found he had defamed her again by saying she
had made up the story. Saturday, at his fascist rally
in Rome, Georgia, he then said quote, I just posted
(05:54):
a ninety one million dollar bond, ninety one million on
a fake story, totally made up story based on false
accusations made about me by a woman that I knew
nothing of, didn't know, never heard of, I know nothing
about her. Monday, as e Gen Carroll was arranging to
discuss a new defamation suit against him for those quote Saturday,
(06:15):
and as another deadline loomed for paying her another eighty
three million in damages for defamatory statements he made while president.
He went on CNBC and called Carol quote miss Bergdorf
Goodman a person I never met. I have no idea
who she is, and nobody had even asked him about
her or that case. On CNBC, he just started talking
(06:38):
about it. Needless to say, after that, e Gen Carroll's lawyer,
Robbie Kaplan answered, quote, the statute of limitations for defamation
and most jurisdictions is between one and three years. You
can understand, and miss Carroll and mister Caplan are buried
in paperwork over potential lawsuits against the bastard. How much
(07:00):
of this could be explained by could be exacerbated by
fluent aphasia or phoenie paraphasas or something else, or a
cocktail of brain related illnesses. And I haven't even mentioned
Trump's continued insistence, continued belief that because he's been prosecuted
in New York, companies are refusing to stay there and
(07:20):
people are moving out of the city in droves, when
the only thing related to Trump that's happening here is
they're taking his name off of all the buildings he
doesn't own, and the number of buildings he still owns
may be dropping considerably in the immediate future, which circles
back to my first question, who owns him now? And
that circles back to the eighty three mil he had
(07:41):
to pay Egen Carrolly yesterday. The Trump bond for that
amount was actually issued by federal insurance company, part of
the ever good for a laugh Chub group. Trump won't
give any details about his Chub bond. Chubb won't give
any details. On the other hand, nobody gives anybody else
(08:03):
eighty three million for now? Is there a co signer
on this bond? Is Chubb in effect just washing money
from somebody else to Trump? There is a Chub insurance
company in the United Arab Emirates, There is a Chub Turkey,
and a Chub Brasil, and oh, by the way, a
Chub insurance of Russia. Doesn't he even have to be
(08:28):
international to mean somebody now owns Trump? Last week he
met with the conservative hedge fund boss jeff Yass and
suddenly Trump did a full one to eighty on banning
TikTok and now wants it continued. But Facebook banned because
he just said Facebook is the enemy of the people.
And oh, by the way, who owns thirty three billion
dollars worth of TikTok Oh. Yeah, a guy just met
(08:48):
with jeff Yass. Trump also just confirmed yesterday that report
that he had met with Elon Musk last week. Do
Russians own Trump? Do Turks do Chubbs? Does? Jeff Yass
does Musk? I mean, why would Musk try to own Trump?
Other than you know they're both racist fascists? Who owns Trump?
(09:13):
All we know for sure is Trump lies about how
much money he has, lies by a lot, maybe ninety percent.
All we know is he needs money and he can't
control himself money. He needs money, a lot of money.
That's what he wants. That's what he Wait a minute,
that's what he.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Oh, Nancy, my name is Trump, and I'm sick in
the bean.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
I can't stop lunder in that eg nick in mind.
That's what I want.
Speaker 4 (09:55):
That's what I want.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Want. Thank you, Nancy, First bladed heavy Bird day. Maybe
that's what the love fast visit with Victor Orbon was about.
What we know about that that's new is victor Orbon says.
Trump's peace plan in Ukraine is to not give that
nation another penny to fight potent putin Putin potentially potent
(10:26):
What we know about Trump's continuing infatuation with dictators like
Orbon and mass murdering dictators of the past is reinforced
by a new CNN piece in which John Kelly and
John Bolton go on the record with stuff they have
previously been quoted about third hand or anonymously. The Hitler
did good things stuff and the Hitler's generals were loyal
to him, and you're not that, he said to General Kelly,
(10:48):
we knew. Kelly followed that by explaining to Trump, no, no,
the generals kept trying to assassinate Hitler. Now we know
what Trump replied, According to Kelly, I didn't know that.
The other new things John Kelly added, all the Hitler
praise he alleges is now on the record. Trump spokespeople
have repeatedly denied Trump ever praised Hitler, even though we
(11:11):
learned as long ago as nineteen ninety that in a
lawsuit Ivana mentioned Hubby kept a book of Hitler's speeches
in a bedside table, and Trump later told a reporter
he got it from a fellow named Davis. General Kelly
also has added a telling quote underscoring how little Trump
knew about American democracy and how little he cares about
(11:31):
it or for it. Quote. He was shocked that he
didn't have dictatorial type powers to send US forces places
or to move money around within the budget. And he
looked at Putin and she and that nutcase in North
Korea as people who were like him in terms of
being a tough guy. Only with Trump could a threat
(11:53):
to cut social Security and Medicare, echoing the one made
by Rand Paul last week get lost in the daily
fire hose of the crazy asked about how we had
to cut entire because of all that government debt, most
of which Trump caused, asked by Joe Kernin at CNBC
the guy with the bad rug, and Trump's answer was
(12:14):
not only evidence of one of those diagnoses, but also
it was stupid. There is a lot you can do
in terms of entitlements, in terms of cutting he said,
he just said he wants to cut Medicare, social Security
quote and in terms of also the theft and the
bad management of entitlements, there's tremendous amounts of things and
(12:35):
numbers of things you can do unquote. And that circles
back to the beginning, because amounts of things and numbers
of things are the same goddamn thing. There is a
new January sixth nugget, by the way, and a new
(12:56):
Trump Stolen Documents nugget the ladder first Trump employee number five,
come on down, you are the next. He has identified himself.
His name is Brian Butler, and he worked for Trump
for twenty years. And he says Walt Naude had him
Butler load big white banker's boxes from marri Lago onto
(13:16):
a private jet headed for Trump's golf course in New
Jersey in June twenty twenty two. He said he recognized
the boxes from the pictures in the indictment. He told
the Special Prosecutor's Office, which had kept his identity a
secret until he revealed it on CNN. He also says,
guess what his boss is wrong? His ex boss, It
is not a witch hunt. The last remaining question, though,
(13:39):
is why the Bedminster golf course was not sealed off
the day mister Butler testified that there were boxes sent
for mary A Lago to New Jersey, and why they
didn't dig up that unseemly burial plot next to the
first t All the doctorment are down here. The January
(14:00):
sixth nugget The Secret Service agent driving Trump's car after
his go do a coup for Me speech that day,
was interviewed by the January sixth Committee. The agent's name
was given but was not released. He confirmed, so it's
not anonymous, but he confirmed Trump demanded to be taken
(14:20):
to the Capitol where his thugs were going to try
to take the place over. The driver contradicts the assertion
that Trump tried to take the wheel, which is all
the Republicans are talking about, and it's why they released
this stuff yesterday. He says Trump's voice was raised, but
he didn't see my rate. He just wanted to go
to the Capitol and way more importantly, and all credit
(14:42):
to Kyle Cheney of Politico for seeing this. The driver's
testimony including something far more damaging to Trump than the
Republicans who released the transcript think it's damaging to Cassidy.
Hutchinson included this, as Cheney noted. Congresswoman Jamie Herrera. Butler
of Washington confirmed that the then House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy,
Remember Kevin McCarthy, finally re reached Trump by phone to
(15:06):
urge him to call his gangs off at around two
thirty on January sixth, Trump, quoting her, quoting McCarthy quoting
Trump initially repeated the falsehood that it was Antifa that
had breached the Capitol, but in the committee's interview with
the driver, the driver insists that an hour or an
hour and a quarter earlier, Trump insisted to him that
(15:30):
he faced no danger no matter what happened at the Capitol.
Quoting the driver, the thing that sticks out most was
he kept asking why we couldn't go, why we couldn't go,
and that there wasn't any reason to be concerned about
the people that were there, or referenced them being Trump
people or Trump's supporters. Wasn't concerned about the people that
(15:52):
were there. Trump ended his speech at one ten on
January sixth. Trump's motorcade left the ellipse at one seventeen,
got back to the White House at one nineteen. McCarthy
was already on TV recounting that phone call with the
Antifa reference at three zero five pm. In short, at
one fifteen or one sixteen or one seventeen, Trump admitted
(16:14):
to two Secret Service agents that those storming the Capitol
posed no danger to him because they were Trump people.
The Capitol police would retreat at one thirty. At two
thirty or so, Trump tried to convince McCarthy that his
terrorists were actually Antifa. A good prosecutor could make that
(16:34):
into guilty fore knowledge and obstruction of justice. A bad
prosecutor could be named Robert K. Her, the Trump stooge
whose testimony to date of the House Judiciary Committee run
by the Trump stooge Jim Jordan, has taken on an
entirely different vibe than it had as late as nine
(16:57):
PM last Thursday. Then Her expected to be hailed by
Republicans congratulating him on valiantly noting that why now he
would not file any charges, not one, not even some
benign technical violation of the law. Nothing. While he didn't
do any of that, he had been able to warn
the American people that, as he wrote, President Biden could
(17:19):
present himself as a quote sympathetic, well meaning elderly man
with a boo rememory still remembers what Putin's name is.
Then came Biden's extraordinary State of the Union performance Thursday night,
and the death Except within the Republican bubble, and even
in part of the Republican bubble of the entire maga,
(17:41):
Biden Age plot. Now, don't be surprised if the following happens.
Republicans will still try to reignite the age plot if
it does not catch fire immediately. If Swallwell or Shift
or Ted Lew or No Goose or Steve Cohen instead
light Robert Hurr on fire. Watched the Republicans spent the
(18:02):
rest of this hearing excory aiding Robert Herr for refusing
to bring charges against the president and asking him to
reveal whether Merrick Garland rail roaded him or her has
simply sold out to the Democrats. By the way, if
you want a tiny lull related to bad special counsels,
(18:24):
remember the Biden impeachment, Remember the Hunter Biden special counsel
David Weiss. The previous two fascist conspiracy theories that turned
out to be doa. The Republican's key witness in both,
Alexander smern Off, the one who is in jail until
his trial starts because he lied to the FBI about
(18:44):
Hunter Biden and Joe Biden. Well, it turns out then,
in a court case eight years ago, Smirnoff gave the
street address in San Francisco for what he claimed was
his home in fact that address turns out to be
the address in the official records for a median on
a Sam Francisco roadway. Holy, don't call my address. I
(19:08):
qualcify my renewal Tenna sixty West, anison to the sixty
usas Shreeley Field or an a mission from gap. Also
of interest here, did Marjorie Tanlor Green set up President
(19:29):
Biden to get Lake and Riley's name wrong in the
State of the Union, or did she simply try to
question his functionality after making the same mistakes she did
when she called the woman by the wrong name. And
did you know that Saturday was Kim Gilfoyle's birthday. They
had a giant cake with red roses on it made
(19:53):
out of icing. To paraphrase the Great Allen's Y Bell's
joke on Saturday Night Live. The cake was free, but
if you I wanted to lick it, it was twenty bucks.
That's next, This discountdown. This is countdown with Keith Olberman.
(20:21):
Postscripts to the news, some headlines, some updates, some snark,
some predictions. Dateline Kensington Palace in London. Hello, Kate, Princess
of Wales has apologized for that photo. That photo of
her and her kids for uk Mother's Day, that all
(20:42):
the news agencies around the world issued a mandatory kill
about because it turned out somebody had doctored the photo
and there were disappearing cuffs and blurry hands. And she
now says, quote, like many amateur photographers, I do occasionally
experiment with editing. I wanted to express my apologies for
any confusion the family photograph we shared Sunday caused. Sure,
(21:07):
Actually she was photographed herself yesterday in a car with
Prince Prince what's his name, the one they didn't fire,
Only she was facing away from the camera, so we
still don't know if she's recovered from her not revealed
illness or what. And by the way, I'm hearing that
the real problem with the photo, the real reason she
photoshopped in the first place, was there was a fifth
(21:30):
figure in the back besides her and the three kids,
who's not supposed to be photographed. John F. Kennedy Junior.
Uh huh. Dateline the Vatican for crying out loud. Now
they're going to have to get an entirely new pope again.
Pope Francis telling interviewers that Ukraine should have quote the
(21:52):
courage of the white flag and negotiate a settlement with Ukraine.
Is his real name, Pope Elon. At least he's holding
up the tradition of the Catholic Church, which before and
during the Second World War did nothing to help Spain
than the Jews in Germany, than Europe, and basically sided
with Hitler straight through under Pope Pious the sixth then
(22:14):
Pope Pious the seventh, though they said many mean things
about the Nazis, Maybe Pope Francis he should have the
quote courage of the go f yourself and dateline a
cave in Georgia. You may have heard that after slamming
President Biden for mistakenly calling the murdered woman lencn Riley
(22:36):
Lincoln Riley during the State of the Union, Marjorie Taylor cave.
Woman Green made exactly the same mistake from a Trump rally.
No less on television. But it's way worse than that. Actually,
it sure looks and sounds as if Green had deliberately
set the President up to call the poor woman Lincoln
Riley and confessed it inadvertently. Perhaps her exact comment to
(23:01):
the interviewer, she told the guy that she had told
President Biden Thursday night as she harangued him at the
State of the Union. Quote, say her name Lincoln Riley, And.
Speaker 5 (23:12):
He had this pin in his hand. I had given
it to him as he walked down the aisle, and
when I yelled out at him and I said, say
her name, Lincoln Riley, he picked up the pin and
he had it right there. It's easy to read Lincoln.
But he said Lincoln Riley.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Two words from Marjorie Taylor Green scum bag still ahead
(23:56):
of us on this editiontive Countdown. So somebody big in
TV who's not in news asked me after that State
of the Union show Thursday night why I was not
back on MSNBC. And I had to explain matdow sank
the deal, and I had to explain the whole story,
including the four hundred and thirty seven dollars out of
my own pocket with which I hired her in the
first place. And I told him, and if I can
tell him, I can tell you next in things I
(24:19):
promise not to tell. I lied. First, a good time
to thank you for joining us on that State of
the Union postgame show live on YouTube and Twitch, and
then on there on video and then up as the
Friday Podcast. The latest audience total for all the venues
is like one hundred and sixty five thousand, which is
more viewers and listeners, a larger audience than all but
(24:42):
eight television news operations after the State of the Union.
I mean, this was consumed by more people after the
State of the Union than we're watching PBS, CNBC, UNE Vision, Telemundo, CNNE,
and frankly, I've never heard of CNNE before, so this
makes sense. News Nation, Newsmax and Flomax. Thank you now,
(25:05):
still more idiots to talk about the daily roundup of
the miss Grants, morons and Dunning Krueger effects specimens who
constitute two days worse persons in the world, the Bronze
Politico worse. It's not just them, obviously, but they took
it to a new level. What's it screwing up? The
really screwed up Katie Britt's story. Politico first missed the
(25:29):
fact that she was trying to blame President Biden for
a sexual abuse case that not only took place in Mexico,
but took place during the administration of George W. Bush.
It wasn't just Politico, as I said, so did The
New York times they missed this Washington Post, CNNNBC News, ABCCBS,
Associated Press, Axios, flomax. I mean, they all really screwed up.
(25:50):
The story was broken by the independent journalist Jonathan Katz,
formerly of the AP, who produced a video showing how
he broke the story by simply thinking about it for
a minute and then googling it. But Politico has now
credited the story to let me just read what they wrote.
Under heavy scrutiny from the press, the story in BRIT's
(26:14):
speech that tied a girl's sex trafficking to border failures
under Biden earned a whopping four pinocchios from the Washington Posts.
Glenn Kessler, the fact checker found that her account unquote
et cetera. Not only did Glenn Kessler not find a
damn thing that hadn't been first found by mister Katz
in a TikTok video, but in Kessler's account, he never
(26:37):
even mentions that Katz beat him to the story by
two whole days. And Politico implies the Post, or at
least the Press, dug out the lies of the unfortunate
bad actress Katie Britt. This is a good moment to
note as well. That while The New York Times did
an excellent job revealing that George Santos was not who
he seemed to be, that revelation happened months after he
(26:59):
had already been elected in the area that is supposedly
where the Time is based. That's why they call it
the New York Times. It's not a nickname. It's actually
theoretically produced for people in New York. The Times, the
national news organizations, the New York newspapers all failed to
vet George Santos before that election, not even the cursory
(27:22):
kind of googling that would lead to something like what
Jonathan Katz discovered. It takes about thirty seconds. I do
it on at least a quarter of everything I put
into this podcast, just on the simple theory that, who knows,
maybe there's something else about this guy. I mean, my god,
at least look at Wikipedia. But nobody looked anywhere at
George Santos. Nobody looked anywhere at Katie Britt and god
(27:44):
knows what else. The major news organizations only seem interested
in what is already being covered by the other major
news organizations. Yes, their business formula has been getting less
and less plausible every year. But left out of that
equation is the terrifying reality that their effort level and
originality and willingness to take them in and google the
(28:05):
effing thing sucks our runner up, Mitt Romney, who was
going out with a whimper, not a bang. Mitt has
an extraordinary capacity for doing and writing and saying dumb things.
He once harangued me for calling Trump a terrorist. Three
months later, he found himself under attack in the Capitol
on January sixth by terrorists sent by Trump. Surprise. But
(28:30):
on the subject of Katie Britt, Mitt has topped himself
quote in a good way. The delivery was over the top,
out of character Biden's, of course, Katie Britt's too. The
media overreaction to hers, not his, tells us who liberals
most fear is VP nominee Mitt. Firstly, the just this
right side of anger. The President showed in the State
(28:52):
of the Union that used to be what he was
known for. He yelled, he raged, he spoke really loudly,
you know, during his first thirty years in the Senate,
while you, Mitt, you were working for hedge fund companies.
But as to who liberals most fear as VP nominee,
I'm not much on hunch political forecasting, but my godmit,
(29:12):
if you let liberals vote as to who we'd most
like to see the Republican vice presidential candidate, be the
option that would most help Biden get reelected, I'm thinking
Katie Britt would get ninety percent of our votes. Now, yes,
anybody and Britt, anybody and Britt, but our winner, topping
even the entirety of the mainstream media and Mitt Romney,
(29:35):
Bill Maher. I'm not going to rehash the forty six
years since I met him and the two times I
missed the chance to sock him and get away with it,
but I will say that I was kind of flummixed
as to what had happened to him. How Marr had
gradually turned from a generally consistent liberal with occasional complete
blackouts like his ongoing relationship with Ann Koltergeist, How he
(29:59):
had turned from that to a lazy, uninformed libertarian who
will both sides anything for a laugh. Now for a
possible laugh. He really hasn't been funny in seven or
eight years. He continued to insist that Biden should drop
out until the state of the Union sudden one eighty
Just like that, Putts. Ezraclined, well, now we know why
what has happened to Bill Maher. Billmer did a podcast
(30:23):
with Mediaite. That's a bad sign to begin with. Mediaite
is crap, and it continues also to be the dumbest
name in news or news adjacent Mediaite. But he explained
his news diet Mar did in this podcast. He says
his staff sends him a digest of stuff from the
big news organizations. But quote, I also love my independent writers.
(30:46):
Just read Andrew Sullivan. How good Andrew Sullivan, who was
last write about something in two thousand and two? Quoting
again my friends Mary Weiss and Nelly Bowls, Barry Weiss
because Jonathan Turley doesn't write enough about politics. Quote Andrew Sullivan.
(31:07):
George Will A bunch of people like that George Will.
George Will is who you read about when nobody else
is writing that day, And I mean only read about
baseball from George Will. Quote I still love my Maureen Dowd,
I love my Tom Friedman and Brett Stevens, Pamela Paul,
I've come to like a lot. Oh sweet Jesus in
(31:27):
the hat box. Bill Maher is this close to voting
for Jill Stein Maureen Dowd, Brett Stevens, Andrew Sullivan, Pamela Paul.
It's not just that Bill Maher has forfeited whatever liberal
credentials he once had. He's turned into Howard Kurtz. Bill,
(31:51):
next thing you'll be telling me your go to TV
liberal is Joe Scarborough, mar two days worse, Parson and
(32:14):
Late in November two thousand and seven, after several months
of pressuring my MSNBC bosses to hire Rachel Maddow to
try out as My guest host, with a goal of
then showcasing her and spinning her off into her own show,
the vice president in charge of the network, Phil Griffin,
agreed to give matdow a deal for forty or fifty
(32:36):
grand as an MSNBC contributor. It would do nothing more
than lock her in place so that CNN would not
steal her from us. I mean, I knew that that
conversation and that concession still would not get her her
own show. But what I did not know was the
concession I was told about the contributors contract. It was
a lie. And by January two thousand and eight, as
(32:59):
the Clinton Obama primary race turned into a tong war,
we were imposing upon Rachel Meadow to join the desk
each Tuesday for Primary Night. She was not anchoring, She's
not even the lead analyst. And my uncontrollable fire hose
co host Matthews, who was consistently pretending that she did
not actually exist, but she existed. She was there, and
(33:20):
I quizzed her about every topic every chance I got.
Soon I began to include her appearances in the pre
recorded open that I would write two minutes of hyperbole
that was really designed merely to give everybody enough time
to get my fat ass into the anchor chair and
everybody else's mics on with Tim Russard in the NBC
(33:40):
News Washington Bureau, David Gregory at Clinton Headquarters, Howard Feynman
and Eugene Robinson in New York, Chuck Todd at the
exit poll desk, Tom Broke off the perspective desk, MC
Esher at the Lack of Perspective Desk. Then came Super Tuesday,
February fifth, two thousand and eight. I was writing this
(34:01):
orgasmic dribble as I always did on Tuesday, crossing the
names of who was where off the list as I went.
The list handed to me by the executive producer, I
is Hepovich. When I noticed the list did not include
either Rachel or the Rachel desk, I knocked on the
wall that separated our little offices at thirty Rock, and
she shuffled in, complete with a sincere smile, friendship, but
(34:24):
always also with what seemed to be a little space
kept in reserve where she could wonder if I was
mad enough to try to take somebody hostage. Yes, my
third child. Where's Rachel tonight? I asked, as I waved
the paper at her, assuming oversight, but leaving my own
little space in reserve where my earlier nightmare had come true.
(34:46):
Not on paper. Please to put name Rachel on paper?
I Isypovich said it, matter of factly. Oh yeah, well,
oh I was in trouble. That elongated consonant always meant trouble.
She's on Larry King tonight. Momentarily, I went very stupid,
(35:08):
How in the hell does that work when she has
a contract with us? I'll tell you, but you have
to promise not to hate me. The Iipovich fake cringe
and crouch ensued. Phil made me promise not to tell you.
Rachel doesn't have a contract with us. He told me
he told you he'd get her one, then his boss
refused to give him the money. I'm sorry, you promised
not to hate me momentarily. I was calm momentarily, But
(35:34):
why didn't you tell me that before? Approximately Oh right now,
why didn't you tell me this before she agreed to
go on Larry King's show, while she only decided this morning.
Apparently she really needs the cash. I told Phil, and
he said, those are the breaks, buddy. The last thing
I actually remember doing, the last part that I did
(35:55):
not need to recreate from the memories of others and
an occasional flashback in therapy, was asking how much my
old friend Larry King was going to get Rachel. Is
he pursed her lips two hundred and fifty dollars. I
remember screaming that figure several times, along with all the
swear words I knew. I remember vocalizing, we are going
(36:19):
to lose Rachel Meadow, the next great talent of cable news,
to effing CNN, for two hundred and fifty efing dollars.
Everything else after that statement is darkness. I know. I
phoned Phil Griffin and threatened him. Is He recently confirmed
(36:39):
for me that I asked her to leave before I
called him and threatened him. I believe I warned him
that if he did not sign her to a contributor's
contract within twenty four hours, I would walk off the
set during that night's primary coverage, or maybe the next week's,
or maybe during countdown tomorrow night. It would be a surprise.
I'm also confident that I warned him that of all
(37:00):
of the talent on television, Larry King had the best
knowledge of what and who else would succeed, more than
the rest of us combined. He was a savant, and
when he saw her in real time on his primary
night panel, we would never see her again, and she
(37:20):
would have a CNN contract before midnight. I told Phil
that when that happened, I would then kill him with
my bare hands, or Jeff Zucker would kill him when
she wound up beating the hell out of us in
the ratings. This statement all took longer than this paragraph
would imply, because I know, without fear of contradiction, every
(37:41):
other word out of my mouth was either what we
used to call an oath or the phrase Jesus h
ka Christ, mind you these people. The president of NBC,
Jeff Zucker and it's a year since they got rid
of him at CNN. The president of NBC News Steve Cappus,
and the soon to be president of MSNBC, Phil Griffin.
(38:03):
These had been the same people who about a year earlier,
had decided that their ten PM host, Tucker Carlson yep,
Tucker Carlson was on MSNBC, that Tucker Carlson did not
need two people to play the role of liberal foil
on his show at like fifty grand a year, So
they kept one of them, his name was Max Kellerman,
(38:26):
and they fired the other one. Her name was Rachel Maddow.
They fired Rachel Matdow at MSNBC to save fifty thousand dollars.
She was back now at MSNBC only because my producer
is He had suggested making her a regular guest, and
within a couple of months I realized she would be
(38:47):
the next great host in cable news. And after months
of pleading, including pleading with her because she didn't want
to do it, I had just convinced them to put
her back under contract, except they had lied to me
and they had not put her back under contract. I
may have mentioned this to Phil Griffin during our phone
call one hundred and eleven different times. I may have
(39:08):
mentioned it to him. I also telephoned Rachel. I did
not swear at her here. Every other word out of
my mouth was not an oath but an apology. I said,
I had genuinely believed she was already being paid, and
I was not only humiliated on behalf of my network,
but that I was far more humiliated that I had
not double checked with her that they'd actually given her
(39:30):
the contract they told me they had given her. I
begged her to please, please, please, don't go and see
an end tonight. I did not ask her to skip
out on them and return to us unless she thought
she could pull that off gracefully and with a clean conscience,
but just not to go on with Larry. And that's
where I added the little four hundred and thirty seven
(39:51):
dollars stunt. I'm sorry about the money situation, I said,
I didn't know. Now I know I can only do this.
I think they will give you forty or fifty thousand
for a contributors deal just to start, but I will
do is. And while making as many sound effects of
exertion as I could dream up, I stretched around it
pulled my wallet out of my back pocket and I
(40:12):
emptied it onto my desk. I need to keep five
bucks to tip my driver tonight. You can have the
rest of whatever cash I have on me. I'm counting
it now. There's one hundred twenty twenty twenty my play
by play skipped, no bills, four hundred and forty two
(40:33):
bucks American five for the driver, the rest for you
four hundred and thirty seven dollars. Rachel deal, She laughed,
I'll see you tonight. I'll just tell Larry I couldn't
be disloyaled to you. Oh, and I will take the money.
And she took the money. In point of fact, when
I like to say anything that Rachel Mattow did with
(40:54):
her career after we got her show on the air
in August of two thousand and eight, that's all her doing.
I have nothing to do with that except being the
lead in for the first two years. That's true, true,
But I also like to say that I got that
show on the air, And I also like to say
I hired Rachel Mattow at MSNBC. And this is my point,
it was not figuratively, it was not metaphorically. I hired
(41:18):
her out of my own pocket. I literally hired Madow
at MSNBC for four hundred and thirty seven dollars, and
I will point this out again, I never even got
the four hundred and thirty seven dollars back. I've done
(41:49):
all the damage I can do here, including to my voice.
I think when I was singing, Thanks for listening. Countdown.
Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillips Chanel Arrange produced
and performed most of our music, but they would like
to remind you they had nothing to do with my singing.
Deray was on guitars, bass and drums. Mister Chanelle handled
orchestration and keyboards, produced by Tko Brothers except for the song.
(42:12):
Other music, including some of the Beethoven compositions, arranged and
performed by the group No Horns Allowed. The sports music
is the Olberman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch
Warren Davis Here to see a ESPN inc Our satirical
and pithy musical comments are by Nancy Fauss. The best
baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer today was my friend
Larry David. Everything else was pretty much my fault, especially
(42:36):
the singing. That's countdown for this two hundred and thirty
ninth day before the twenty twenty four presidential election and
the one sixty second day since dementia. J Trump's first
attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Use the Fourteenth Amendment and the not regularly given elector
objection option, the Insurrection Act, the justice system, the mental
(43:00):
health system, and my singing to stop him from doing
it again while we still can. The next scheduled countdown
is tomorrow. Bulletin says the news warrants still then on
Keith Olrimman, Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck.
Take two little louder please. My name is Chump and
(43:33):
I'm sicking the bean. I can't stop flundering by GENA
came in my That's what I won't That's.
Speaker 5 (43:45):
What I want.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Countdown with Keith Olremman is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. Who
Owns Trump? And how bad is his latest illness? Since
(00:28):
we last spoke, Trump has redefamed Egene Carroll and then
re redefamed her yesterday live on national television. He has
made some kind of financial deal to get the cash
or the money he already owed her. He has vowed
to cut Social Security and Medicare. He turned out to
have praise Hitler more than we knew, and other dictators.
(00:48):
He has been endorsed by the dictator of Hungary, the
one he once claimed was the dictator of Turkey, And
maybe most importantly, his illness, his brain and or speech
related disease, has gotten so bad that among his now
steady output of dozens and dozens of mispronunciations and nonsense words,
he has even mispronounced the name of Vladimir Putin.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Ukraine and Russia wouldn't be fighting. I knew pot and
I'd know him very well.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
I mean Jesus Christ in a hat box. Whether you
think Putin has video of Trump watching hmm toots hm
hmmming on each other, or you just think Putin is
blackmailing him conventionally, or you just think Trump admires Putin
the way anybody who has admired Hitler for at least
a half a century would How does Trump mispronounce Putin's name?
(01:39):
The answer is inescapable. Trump is ill. He's sick, He's
getting sicker, and his illness is getting worse. And the
only thing we know for certain about his illness is
that it seems to get more profound later in the
day and when he's tired. And that not only can
a convincing argument be made, as I've outlined here before,
(01:59):
for it being fluent aphasia, in which the victim can
create the sounds and the flow of a sentence, but
the words are increasingly wrong, but that it might instead
or also be phonemic paraphaseus. That is a disease usually
associated with moderate or severe Alzheimer's in which the victim
substitutes non words for words that sound kind of like words.
(02:23):
The psychologist and former Johns Hopkins Medical School professor, doctor
John Gartner made that armchair informal diagnosis for the website Salon.
We'll get to the Social Security cuts and the hourly
defamation of e. Gene Carroll and the money story in
a moment. But here are the low lights of Trump's
malaprops just since Saturday. In your mind, feel free to
(02:45):
vote for which you think it is fluentophasia or phonemic
paraphaseas that's why.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
They're weaponizing law enforcement for high level election interference against
Joe Biden's top and only political appointment, A guy named me,
see guy named me. We have become a nation like
nobody thought possible.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
By far the most disgraceful part of Joe Biden's service
as a divisive all compliments of an incompetent Biden administration.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Megan Kelly, May she rest in peace. They say that
it's violent, the attacks say Biden said it.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
I knew potent.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
I'd know him very well.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Again, I can't get over this. He mispronounced the name putin.
I would have sooner expected him to call Malania melanoma
than to say potent as impotent potables. The sound alike
Alzheimer's symptom advocate. Doctor Gartner was one of the twenty
seven psychiatrists and mental health experts who contributed to the
(03:49):
twenty seventeen best selling book The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump.
He now cites other sound alike things Trump has said recently.
Quote some examples of Trump's non words Beneficiaries become beneficies,
Renovations become renoverse, pivotal became pivot ball, Christmas became crisis,
(04:12):
bipartisan became bipars unquote. And we can now add to that,
potent became potent. Doctor Gartner adds, quote, this is a
fundamental breakdown in the ability to use language. If you
were talking to your father on the phone and he
did this, you would think he is having a stroke.
(04:34):
There is no healthy, older person who speaks that way.
Doctor Gartner also notes the word salads and the free
association meanderings in his speeches and calls it quote a
sign of real prain damage. Not being old, not being slow,
not losing a step, but of severe cognitive deterioration. What
I don't understand is why those clips he asks aren't
(04:55):
replayed over and over in the mainstream media. Isn't Trump
babbling incoherently the most newsworthy part of his rally Unquote Well,
doctor Gartner, I'm doing my damnest I.
Speaker 2 (05:08):
Knew quote di, I'd know him very well.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Potent as in potentate, the which disease. Has he got stuff?
Is not just idle reverse both sides ism either. It
probably has extraordinary relevance to the seemingly unconnected news developments
always swirling around Trump. I mean, what would better explain this?
Egene Carroll timeline. Friday, after a stay was denied, his
(05:33):
lawyer's posted bond of ninety one million, six hundred thousand
dollars for his first defamation of his sexual victim for
claiming she had made up the story, after a court
found she had not made up the story, and after
another found he had defamed her again by saying she
had made up the story. Saturday, at his fascist rally
in Rome, Georgia, he then said quote, I just posted
(05:54):
a ninety one million dollar bond, ninety one million on
a fake story, totally made up story based on false
accusations made about me by a woman that I knew
nothing of, didn't know, never heard of, I know nothing
about her. Monday, as e Gen Carroll was arranging to
discuss a new defamation suit against him for those quote Saturday,
(06:15):
and as another deadline loomed for paying her another eighty
three million in damages for defamatory statements he made while president.
He went on CNBC and called Carol quote miss Bergdorf
Goodman a person I never met. I have no idea
who she is, and nobody had even asked him about
her or that case. On CNBC, he just started talking
(06:38):
about it. Needless to say, after that, e Gen Carroll's lawyer,
Robbie Kaplan answered, quote, the statute of limitations for defamation
and most jurisdictions is between one and three years. You
can understand, and miss Carroll and mister Caplan are buried
in paperwork over potential lawsuits against the bastard. How much
(07:00):
of this could be explained by could be exacerbated by
fluent aphasia or phoenie paraphasas or something else, or a
cocktail of brain related illnesses. And I haven't even mentioned
Trump's continued insistence, continued belief that because he's been prosecuted
in New York, companies are refusing to stay there and
(07:20):
people are moving out of the city in droves, when
the only thing related to Trump that's happening here is
they're taking his name off of all the buildings he
doesn't own, and the number of buildings he still owns
may be dropping considerably in the immediate future, which circles
back to my first question, who owns him now? And
that circles back to the eighty three mil he had
(07:41):
to pay Egen Carrolly yesterday. The Trump bond for that
amount was actually issued by federal insurance company, part of
the ever good for a laugh Chub group. Trump won't
give any details about his Chub bond. Chubb won't give
any details. On the other hand, nobody gives anybody else
(08:03):
eighty three million for now? Is there a co signer
on this bond? Is Chubb in effect just washing money
from somebody else to Trump? There is a Chub insurance
company in the United Arab Emirates, There is a Chub Turkey,
and a Chub Brasil, and oh, by the way, a
Chub insurance of Russia. Doesn't he even have to be
(08:28):
international to mean somebody now owns Trump? Last week he
met with the conservative hedge fund boss jeff Yass and
suddenly Trump did a full one to eighty on banning
TikTok and now wants it continued. But Facebook banned because
he just said Facebook is the enemy of the people.
And oh, by the way, who owns thirty three billion
dollars worth of TikTok Oh. Yeah, a guy just met
(08:48):
with jeff Yass. Trump also just confirmed yesterday that report
that he had met with Elon Musk last week. Do
Russians own Trump? Do Turks do Chubbs? Does? Jeff Yass
does Musk? I mean, why would Musk try to own Trump?
Other than you know they're both racist fascists? Who owns Trump?
(09:13):
All we know for sure is Trump lies about how
much money he has, lies by a lot, maybe ninety percent.
All we know is he needs money and he can't
control himself money. He needs money, a lot of money.
That's what he wants. That's what he Wait a minute,
that's what he.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
Oh, Nancy, my name is Trump, and I'm sick in
the bean.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
I can't stop lunder in that eg nick in mind.
That's what I want.
Speaker 4 (09:55):
That's what I want.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Want. Thank you, Nancy, First bladed heavy Bird day. Maybe
that's what the love fast visit with Victor Orbon was about.
What we know about that that's new is victor Orbon says.
Trump's peace plan in Ukraine is to not give that
nation another penny to fight potent putin Putin potentially potent
(10:26):
What we know about Trump's continuing infatuation with dictators like
Orbon and mass murdering dictators of the past is reinforced
by a new CNN piece in which John Kelly and
John Bolton go on the record with stuff they have
previously been quoted about third hand or anonymously. The Hitler
did good things stuff and the Hitler's generals were loyal
to him, and you're not that, he said to General Kelly,
(10:48):
we knew. Kelly followed that by explaining to Trump, no, no,
the generals kept trying to assassinate Hitler. Now we know
what Trump replied, According to Kelly, I didn't know that.
The other new things John Kelly added, all the Hitler
praise he alleges is now on the record. Trump spokespeople
have repeatedly denied Trump ever praised Hitler, even though we
(11:11):
learned as long ago as nineteen ninety that in a
lawsuit Ivana mentioned Hubby kept a book of Hitler's speeches
in a bedside table, and Trump later told a reporter
he got it from a fellow named Davis. General Kelly
also has added a telling quote underscoring how little Trump
knew about American democracy and how little he cares about
(11:31):
it or for it. Quote. He was shocked that he
didn't have dictatorial type powers to send US forces places
or to move money around within the budget. And he
looked at Putin and she and that nutcase in North
Korea as people who were like him in terms of
being a tough guy. Only with Trump could a threat
(11:53):
to cut social Security and Medicare, echoing the one made
by Rand Paul last week get lost in the daily
fire hose of the crazy asked about how we had
to cut entire because of all that government debt, most
of which Trump caused, asked by Joe Kernin at CNBC
the guy with the bad rug, and Trump's answer was
(12:14):
not only evidence of one of those diagnoses, but also
it was stupid. There is a lot you can do
in terms of entitlements, in terms of cutting he said,
he just said he wants to cut Medicare, social Security
quote and in terms of also the theft and the
bad management of entitlements, there's tremendous amounts of things and
(12:35):
numbers of things you can do unquote. And that circles
back to the beginning, because amounts of things and numbers
of things are the same goddamn thing. There is a
new January sixth nugget, by the way, and a new
(12:56):
Trump Stolen Documents nugget the ladder first Trump employee number five,
come on down, you are the next. He has identified himself.
His name is Brian Butler, and he worked for Trump
for twenty years. And he says Walt Naude had him
Butler load big white banker's boxes from marri Lago onto
(13:16):
a private jet headed for Trump's golf course in New
Jersey in June twenty twenty two. He said he recognized
the boxes from the pictures in the indictment. He told
the Special Prosecutor's Office, which had kept his identity a
secret until he revealed it on CNN. He also says,
guess what his boss is wrong? His ex boss, It
is not a witch hunt. The last remaining question, though,
(13:39):
is why the Bedminster golf course was not sealed off
the day mister Butler testified that there were boxes sent
for mary A Lago to New Jersey, and why they
didn't dig up that unseemly burial plot next to the
first t All the doctorment are down here. The January
(14:00):
sixth nugget The Secret Service agent driving Trump's car after
his go do a coup for Me speech that day,
was interviewed by the January sixth Committee. The agent's name
was given but was not released. He confirmed, so it's
not anonymous, but he confirmed Trump demanded to be taken
(14:20):
to the Capitol where his thugs were going to try
to take the place over. The driver contradicts the assertion
that Trump tried to take the wheel, which is all
the Republicans are talking about, and it's why they released
this stuff yesterday. He says Trump's voice was raised, but
he didn't see my rate. He just wanted to go
to the Capitol and way more importantly, and all credit
(14:42):
to Kyle Cheney of Politico for seeing this. The driver's
testimony including something far more damaging to Trump than the
Republicans who released the transcript think it's damaging to Cassidy.
Hutchinson included this, as Cheney noted. Congresswoman Jamie Herrera. Butler
of Washington confirmed that the then House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy,
Remember Kevin McCarthy, finally re reached Trump by phone to
(15:06):
urge him to call his gangs off at around two
thirty on January sixth, Trump, quoting her, quoting McCarthy quoting
Trump initially repeated the falsehood that it was Antifa that
had breached the Capitol, but in the committee's interview with
the driver, the driver insists that an hour or an
hour and a quarter earlier, Trump insisted to him that
(15:30):
he faced no danger no matter what happened at the Capitol.
Quoting the driver, the thing that sticks out most was
he kept asking why we couldn't go, why we couldn't go,
and that there wasn't any reason to be concerned about
the people that were there, or referenced them being Trump
people or Trump's supporters. Wasn't concerned about the people that
(15:52):
were there. Trump ended his speech at one ten on
January sixth. Trump's motorcade left the ellipse at one seventeen,
got back to the White House at one nineteen. McCarthy
was already on TV recounting that phone call with the
Antifa reference at three zero five pm. In short, at
one fifteen or one sixteen or one seventeen, Trump admitted
(16:14):
to two Secret Service agents that those storming the Capitol
posed no danger to him because they were Trump people.
The Capitol police would retreat at one thirty. At two
thirty or so, Trump tried to convince McCarthy that his
terrorists were actually Antifa. A good prosecutor could make that
(16:34):
into guilty fore knowledge and obstruction of justice. A bad
prosecutor could be named Robert K. Her, the Trump stooge
whose testimony to date of the House Judiciary Committee run
by the Trump stooge Jim Jordan, has taken on an
entirely different vibe than it had as late as nine
(16:57):
PM last Thursday. Then Her expected to be hailed by
Republicans congratulating him on valiantly noting that why now he
would not file any charges, not one, not even some
benign technical violation of the law. Nothing. While he didn't
do any of that, he had been able to warn
the American people that, as he wrote, President Biden could
(17:19):
present himself as a quote sympathetic, well meaning elderly man
with a boo rememory still remembers what Putin's name is.
Then came Biden's extraordinary State of the Union performance Thursday night,
and the death Except within the Republican bubble, and even
in part of the Republican bubble of the entire maga,
(17:41):
Biden Age plot. Now, don't be surprised if the following happens.
Republicans will still try to reignite the age plot if
it does not catch fire immediately. If Swallwell or Shift
or Ted Lew or No Goose or Steve Cohen instead
light Robert Hurr on fire. Watched the Republicans spent the
(18:02):
rest of this hearing excory aiding Robert Herr for refusing
to bring charges against the president and asking him to
reveal whether Merrick Garland rail roaded him or her has
simply sold out to the Democrats. By the way, if
you want a tiny lull related to bad special counsels,
(18:24):
remember the Biden impeachment, Remember the Hunter Biden special counsel
David Weiss. The previous two fascist conspiracy theories that turned
out to be doa. The Republican's key witness in both,
Alexander smern Off, the one who is in jail until
his trial starts because he lied to the FBI about
(18:44):
Hunter Biden and Joe Biden. Well, it turns out then,
in a court case eight years ago, Smirnoff gave the
street address in San Francisco for what he claimed was
his home in fact that address turns out to be
the address in the official records for a median on
a Sam Francisco roadway. Holy, don't call my address. I
(19:08):
qualcify my renewal Tenna sixty West, anison to the sixty
usas Shreeley Field or an a mission from gap. Also
of interest here, did Marjorie Tanlor Green set up President
(19:29):
Biden to get Lake and Riley's name wrong in the
State of the Union, or did she simply try to
question his functionality after making the same mistakes she did
when she called the woman by the wrong name. And
did you know that Saturday was Kim Gilfoyle's birthday. They
had a giant cake with red roses on it made
(19:53):
out of icing. To paraphrase the Great Allen's Y Bell's
joke on Saturday Night Live. The cake was free, but
if you I wanted to lick it, it was twenty bucks.
That's next, This discountdown. This is countdown with Keith Olberman.
(20:21):
Postscripts to the news, some headlines, some updates, some snark,
some predictions. Dateline Kensington Palace in London. Hello, Kate, Princess
of Wales has apologized for that photo. That photo of
her and her kids for uk Mother's Day, that all
(20:42):
the news agencies around the world issued a mandatory kill
about because it turned out somebody had doctored the photo
and there were disappearing cuffs and blurry hands. And she
now says, quote, like many amateur photographers, I do occasionally
experiment with editing. I wanted to express my apologies for
any confusion the family photograph we shared Sunday caused. Sure,
(21:07):
Actually she was photographed herself yesterday in a car with
Prince Prince what's his name, the one they didn't fire,
Only she was facing away from the camera, so we
still don't know if she's recovered from her not revealed
illness or what. And by the way, I'm hearing that
the real problem with the photo, the real reason she
photoshopped in the first place, was there was a fifth
(21:30):
figure in the back besides her and the three kids,
who's not supposed to be photographed. John F. Kennedy Junior.
Uh huh. Dateline the Vatican for crying out loud. Now
they're going to have to get an entirely new pope again.
Pope Francis telling interviewers that Ukraine should have quote the
(21:52):
courage of the white flag and negotiate a settlement with Ukraine.
Is his real name, Pope Elon. At least he's holding
up the tradition of the Catholic Church, which before and
during the Second World War did nothing to help Spain
than the Jews in Germany, than Europe, and basically sided
with Hitler straight through under Pope Pious the sixth then
(22:14):
Pope Pious the seventh, though they said many mean things
about the Nazis, Maybe Pope Francis he should have the
quote courage of the go f yourself and dateline a
cave in Georgia. You may have heard that after slamming
President Biden for mistakenly calling the murdered woman lencn Riley
(22:36):
Lincoln Riley during the State of the Union, Marjorie Taylor cave.
Woman Green made exactly the same mistake from a Trump rally.
No less on television. But it's way worse than that. Actually,
it sure looks and sounds as if Green had deliberately
set the President up to call the poor woman Lincoln
Riley and confessed it inadvertently. Perhaps her exact comment to
(23:01):
the interviewer, she told the guy that she had told
President Biden Thursday night as she harangued him at the
State of the Union. Quote, say her name Lincoln Riley, And.
Speaker 5 (23:12):
He had this pin in his hand. I had given
it to him as he walked down the aisle, and
when I yelled out at him and I said, say
her name, Lincoln Riley, he picked up the pin and
he had it right there. It's easy to read Lincoln.
But he said Lincoln Riley.
Speaker 1 (23:29):
Two words from Marjorie Taylor Green scum bag still ahead
(23:56):
of us on this editiontive Countdown. So somebody big in
TV who's not in news asked me after that State
of the Union show Thursday night why I was not
back on MSNBC. And I had to explain matdow sank
the deal, and I had to explain the whole story,
including the four hundred and thirty seven dollars out of
my own pocket with which I hired her in the
first place. And I told him, and if I can
tell him, I can tell you next in things I
(24:19):
promise not to tell. I lied. First, a good time
to thank you for joining us on that State of
the Union postgame show live on YouTube and Twitch, and
then on there on video and then up as the
Friday Podcast. The latest audience total for all the venues
is like one hundred and sixty five thousand, which is
more viewers and listeners, a larger audience than all but
(24:42):
eight television news operations after the State of the Union.
I mean, this was consumed by more people after the
State of the Union than we're watching PBS, CNBC, UNE Vision, Telemundo, CNNE,
and frankly, I've never heard of CNNE before, so this
makes sense. News Nation, Newsmax and Flomax. Thank you now,
(25:05):
still more idiots to talk about the daily roundup of
the miss Grants, morons and Dunning Krueger effects specimens who
constitute two days worse persons in the world, the Bronze
Politico worse. It's not just them, obviously, but they took
it to a new level. What's it screwing up? The
really screwed up Katie Britt's story. Politico first missed the
(25:29):
fact that she was trying to blame President Biden for
a sexual abuse case that not only took place in Mexico,
but took place during the administration of George W. Bush.
It wasn't just Politico, as I said, so did The
New York times they missed this Washington Post, CNNNBC News, ABCCBS,
Associated Press, Axios, flomax. I mean, they all really screwed up.
(25:50):
The story was broken by the independent journalist Jonathan Katz,
formerly of the AP, who produced a video showing how
he broke the story by simply thinking about it for
a minute and then googling it. But Politico has now
credited the story to let me just read what they wrote.
Under heavy scrutiny from the press, the story in BRIT's
(26:14):
speech that tied a girl's sex trafficking to border failures
under Biden earned a whopping four pinocchios from the Washington Posts.
Glenn Kessler, the fact checker found that her account unquote
et cetera. Not only did Glenn Kessler not find a
damn thing that hadn't been first found by mister Katz
in a TikTok video, but in Kessler's account, he never
(26:37):
even mentions that Katz beat him to the story by
two whole days. And Politico implies the Post, or at
least the Press, dug out the lies of the unfortunate
bad actress Katie Britt. This is a good moment to
note as well. That while The New York Times did
an excellent job revealing that George Santos was not who
he seemed to be, that revelation happened months after he
(26:59):
had already been elected in the area that is supposedly
where the Time is based. That's why they call it
the New York Times. It's not a nickname. It's actually
theoretically produced for people in New York. The Times, the
national news organizations, the New York newspapers all failed to
vet George Santos before that election, not even the cursory
(27:22):
kind of googling that would lead to something like what
Jonathan Katz discovered. It takes about thirty seconds. I do
it on at least a quarter of everything I put
into this podcast, just on the simple theory that, who knows,
maybe there's something else about this guy. I mean, my god,
at least look at Wikipedia. But nobody looked anywhere at
George Santos. Nobody looked anywhere at Katie Britt and god
(27:44):
knows what else. The major news organizations only seem interested
in what is already being covered by the other major
news organizations. Yes, their business formula has been getting less
and less plausible every year. But left out of that
equation is the terrifying reality that their effort level and
originality and willingness to take them in and google the
(28:05):
effing thing sucks our runner up, Mitt Romney, who was
going out with a whimper, not a bang. Mitt has
an extraordinary capacity for doing and writing and saying dumb things.
He once harangued me for calling Trump a terrorist. Three
months later, he found himself under attack in the Capitol
on January sixth by terrorists sent by Trump. Surprise. But
(28:30):
on the subject of Katie Britt, Mitt has topped himself
quote in a good way. The delivery was over the top,
out of character Biden's, of course, Katie Britt's too. The
media overreaction to hers, not his, tells us who liberals
most fear is VP nominee Mitt. Firstly, the just this
right side of anger. The President showed in the State
(28:52):
of the Union that used to be what he was
known for. He yelled, he raged, he spoke really loudly,
you know, during his first thirty years in the Senate,
while you, Mitt, you were working for hedge fund companies.
But as to who liberals most fear as VP nominee,
I'm not much on hunch political forecasting, but my godmit,
(29:12):
if you let liberals vote as to who we'd most
like to see the Republican vice presidential candidate, be the
option that would most help Biden get reelected, I'm thinking
Katie Britt would get ninety percent of our votes. Now, yes,
anybody and Britt, anybody and Britt, but our winner, topping
even the entirety of the mainstream media and Mitt Romney,
(29:35):
Bill Maher. I'm not going to rehash the forty six
years since I met him and the two times I
missed the chance to sock him and get away with it,
but I will say that I was kind of flummixed
as to what had happened to him. How Marr had
gradually turned from a generally consistent liberal with occasional complete
blackouts like his ongoing relationship with Ann Koltergeist, How he
(29:59):
had turned from that to a lazy, uninformed libertarian who
will both sides anything for a laugh. Now for a
possible laugh. He really hasn't been funny in seven or
eight years. He continued to insist that Biden should drop
out until the state of the Union sudden one eighty
Just like that, Putts. Ezraclined, well, now we know why
what has happened to Bill Maher. Billmer did a podcast
(30:23):
with Mediaite. That's a bad sign to begin with. Mediaite
is crap, and it continues also to be the dumbest
name in news or news adjacent Mediaite. But he explained
his news diet Mar did in this podcast. He says
his staff sends him a digest of stuff from the
big news organizations. But quote, I also love my independent writers.
(30:46):
Just read Andrew Sullivan. How good Andrew Sullivan, who was
last write about something in two thousand and two? Quoting
again my friends Mary Weiss and Nelly Bowls, Barry Weiss
because Jonathan Turley doesn't write enough about politics. Quote Andrew Sullivan.
(31:07):
George Will A bunch of people like that George Will.
George Will is who you read about when nobody else
is writing that day, And I mean only read about
baseball from George Will. Quote I still love my Maureen Dowd,
I love my Tom Friedman and Brett Stevens, Pamela Paul,
I've come to like a lot. Oh sweet Jesus in
(31:27):
the hat box. Bill Maher is this close to voting
for Jill Stein Maureen Dowd, Brett Stevens, Andrew Sullivan, Pamela Paul.
It's not just that Bill Maher has forfeited whatever liberal
credentials he once had. He's turned into Howard Kurtz. Bill,
(31:51):
next thing you'll be telling me your go to TV
liberal is Joe Scarborough, mar two days worse, Parson and
(32:14):
Late in November two thousand and seven, after several months
of pressuring my MSNBC bosses to hire Rachel Maddow to
try out as My guest host, with a goal of
then showcasing her and spinning her off into her own show,
the vice president in charge of the network, Phil Griffin,
agreed to give matdow a deal for forty or fifty
(32:36):
grand as an MSNBC contributor. It would do nothing more
than lock her in place so that CNN would not
steal her from us. I mean, I knew that that
conversation and that concession still would not get her her
own show. But what I did not know was the
concession I was told about the contributors contract. It was
a lie. And by January two thousand and eight, as
(32:59):
the Clinton Obama primary race turned into a tong war,
we were imposing upon Rachel Meadow to join the desk
each Tuesday for Primary Night. She was not anchoring, She's
not even the lead analyst. And my uncontrollable fire hose
co host Matthews, who was consistently pretending that she did
not actually exist, but she existed. She was there, and
(33:20):
I quizzed her about every topic every chance I got.
Soon I began to include her appearances in the pre
recorded open that I would write two minutes of hyperbole
that was really designed merely to give everybody enough time
to get my fat ass into the anchor chair and
everybody else's mics on with Tim Russard in the NBC
(33:40):
News Washington Bureau, David Gregory at Clinton Headquarters, Howard Feynman
and Eugene Robinson in New York, Chuck Todd at the
exit poll desk, Tom Broke off the perspective desk, MC
Esher at the Lack of Perspective Desk. Then came Super Tuesday,
February fifth, two thousand and eight. I was writing this
(34:01):
orgasmic dribble as I always did on Tuesday, crossing the
names of who was where off the list as I went.
The list handed to me by the executive producer, I
is Hepovich. When I noticed the list did not include
either Rachel or the Rachel desk, I knocked on the
wall that separated our little offices at thirty Rock, and
she shuffled in, complete with a sincere smile, friendship, but
(34:24):
always also with what seemed to be a little space
kept in reserve where she could wonder if I was
mad enough to try to take somebody hostage. Yes, my
third child. Where's Rachel tonight? I asked, as I waved
the paper at her, assuming oversight, but leaving my own
little space in reserve where my earlier nightmare had come true.
(34:46):
Not on paper. Please to put name Rachel on paper?
I Isypovich said it, matter of factly. Oh yeah, well,
oh I was in trouble. That elongated consonant always meant trouble.
She's on Larry King tonight. Momentarily, I went very stupid,
(35:08):
How in the hell does that work when she has
a contract with us? I'll tell you, but you have
to promise not to hate me. The Iipovich fake cringe
and crouch ensued. Phil made me promise not to tell you.
Rachel doesn't have a contract with us. He told me
he told you he'd get her one, then his boss
refused to give him the money. I'm sorry, you promised
not to hate me momentarily. I was calm momentarily, But
(35:34):
why didn't you tell me that before? Approximately Oh right now,
why didn't you tell me this before she agreed to
go on Larry King's show, while she only decided this morning.
Apparently she really needs the cash. I told Phil, and
he said, those are the breaks, buddy. The last thing
I actually remember doing, the last part that I did
(35:55):
not need to recreate from the memories of others and
an occasional flashback in therapy, was asking how much my
old friend Larry King was going to get Rachel. Is
he pursed her lips two hundred and fifty dollars. I
remember screaming that figure several times, along with all the
swear words I knew. I remember vocalizing, we are going
(36:19):
to lose Rachel Meadow, the next great talent of cable news,
to effing CNN, for two hundred and fifty efing dollars.
Everything else after that statement is darkness. I know. I
phoned Phil Griffin and threatened him. Is He recently confirmed
(36:39):
for me that I asked her to leave before I
called him and threatened him. I believe I warned him
that if he did not sign her to a contributor's
contract within twenty four hours, I would walk off the
set during that night's primary coverage, or maybe the next week's,
or maybe during countdown tomorrow night. It would be a surprise.
I'm also confident that I warned him that of all
(37:00):
of the talent on television, Larry King had the best
knowledge of what and who else would succeed, more than
the rest of us combined. He was a savant, and
when he saw her in real time on his primary
night panel, we would never see her again, and she
(37:20):
would have a CNN contract before midnight. I told Phil
that when that happened, I would then kill him with
my bare hands, or Jeff Zucker would kill him when
she wound up beating the hell out of us in
the ratings. This statement all took longer than this paragraph
would imply, because I know, without fear of contradiction, every
(37:41):
other word out of my mouth was either what we
used to call an oath or the phrase Jesus h
ka Christ, mind you these people. The president of NBC,
Jeff Zucker and it's a year since they got rid
of him at CNN. The president of NBC News Steve Cappus,
and the soon to be president of MSNBC, Phil Griffin.
(38:03):
These had been the same people who about a year earlier,
had decided that their ten PM host, Tucker Carlson yep,
Tucker Carlson was on MSNBC, that Tucker Carlson did not
need two people to play the role of liberal foil
on his show at like fifty grand a year, So
they kept one of them, his name was Max Kellerman,
(38:26):
and they fired the other one. Her name was Rachel Maddow.
They fired Rachel Matdow at MSNBC to save fifty thousand dollars.
She was back now at MSNBC only because my producer
is He had suggested making her a regular guest, and
within a couple of months I realized she would be
(38:47):
the next great host in cable news. And after months
of pleading, including pleading with her because she didn't want
to do it, I had just convinced them to put
her back under contract, except they had lied to me
and they had not put her back under contract. I
may have mentioned this to Phil Griffin during our phone
call one hundred and eleven different times. I may have
(39:08):
mentioned it to him. I also telephoned Rachel. I did
not swear at her here. Every other word out of
my mouth was not an oath but an apology. I said,
I had genuinely believed she was already being paid, and
I was not only humiliated on behalf of my network,
but that I was far more humiliated that I had
not double checked with her that they'd actually given her
(39:30):
the contract they told me they had given her. I
begged her to please, please, please, don't go and see
an end tonight. I did not ask her to skip
out on them and return to us unless she thought
she could pull that off gracefully and with a clean conscience,
but just not to go on with Larry. And that's
where I added the little four hundred and thirty seven
(39:51):
dollars stunt. I'm sorry about the money situation, I said,
I didn't know. Now I know I can only do this.
I think they will give you forty or fifty thousand
for a contributors deal just to start, but I will
do is. And while making as many sound effects of
exertion as I could dream up, I stretched around it
pulled my wallet out of my back pocket and I
(40:12):
emptied it onto my desk. I need to keep five
bucks to tip my driver tonight. You can have the
rest of whatever cash I have on me. I'm counting
it now. There's one hundred twenty twenty twenty my play
by play skipped, no bills, four hundred and forty two
(40:33):
bucks American five for the driver, the rest for you
four hundred and thirty seven dollars. Rachel deal, She laughed,
I'll see you tonight. I'll just tell Larry I couldn't
be disloyaled to you. Oh, and I will take the money.
And she took the money. In point of fact, when
I like to say anything that Rachel Mattow did with
(40:54):
her career after we got her show on the air
in August of two thousand and eight, that's all her doing.
I have nothing to do with that except being the
lead in for the first two years. That's true, true,
But I also like to say that I got that
show on the air, And I also like to say
I hired Rachel Mattow at MSNBC. And this is my point,
it was not figuratively, it was not metaphorically. I hired
(41:18):
her out of my own pocket. I literally hired Madow
at MSNBC for four hundred and thirty seven dollars, and
I will point this out again, I never even got
the four hundred and thirty seven dollars back. I've done
(41:49):
all the damage I can do here, including to my voice.
I think when I was singing, Thanks for listening. Countdown.
Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillips Chanel Arrange produced
and performed most of our music, but they would like
to remind you they had nothing to do with my singing.
Deray was on guitars, bass and drums. Mister Chanelle handled
orchestration and keyboards, produced by Tko Brothers except for the song.
(42:12):
Other music, including some of the Beethoven compositions, arranged and
performed by the group No Horns Allowed. The sports music
is the Olberman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch
Warren Davis Here to see a ESPN inc Our satirical
and pithy musical comments are by Nancy Fauss. The best
baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer today was my friend
Larry David. Everything else was pretty much my fault, especially
(42:36):
the singing. That's countdown for this two hundred and thirty
ninth day before the twenty twenty four presidential election and
the one sixty second day since dementia. J Trump's first
attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Use the Fourteenth Amendment and the not regularly given elector
objection option, the Insurrection Act, the justice system, the mental
(43:00):
health system, and my singing to stop him from doing
it again while we still can. The next scheduled countdown
is tomorrow. Bulletin says the news warrants still then on
Keith Olrimman, Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck.
Take two little louder please. My name is Chump and
(43:33):
I'm sicking the bean. I can't stop flundering by GENA
came in my That's what I won't That's.
Speaker 5 (43:45):
What I want.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Countdown with Keith Olremman is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Host
Keith Olbermann
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