February 8, 2023 • 31 mins
EPISODE 129: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:41) SPECIAL COMMENT: The State of the Union Address has long since become an anachronism; devolving into a series of insiders talking to insiders and pointing to ordinary citizens as if they were creatures on display at a zoo; e a ritual with the meaning sucked out of it; an ever-louder arguing for resuming what President Thomas Jefferson first thought to do: to just write the damn speech and have somebody else drop it off at the House Chamber door
And against that backdrop of near-obsolescence, President Joe Biden absolutely KILLED The State of the Union last night.
At his finest, at his most robust, at his most combative, in his element, in the arena, throwing punches, blocking the hecklers, and unashamedly exploiting the undeniable advantage of having the only microphone in the room, he delivered a masterpiece. I don’t know how many of these I have heard and how many of the claims and promises and attitudes and catchphrases and applause lines I have heard at 9:30 and forgotten by 11, but this one I’ll remember: roads and infrastructure and education and insulin caps and unfair taxes and hidden service fees and cable costs and raising teachers’ pay and quadrupling the stock buyback tax, and non-compete clauses for fast food cashiers and “The Talk” and “Something Good Must Come From This” and “Do Something” and “Ban Assault Weapons Now”
And without one of them ever seeing it coming, he provided the coup-de-grace: baiting the Republicans into loudly and embarrassingly shouting and bleating and denying what they’ve all been murmuring about all week: baiting the Republicans into insisting no, they don’t want to gut social security and medicare.
And thank you to Marjorie Tailor Greene as Cruella deVil and Kyrsten Sinema as Tweety after the car airbags had inflated and especially Trump for choosing, of all days, the afternoon of the SOTU to accuse Ron DeSantis of "grooming high school girls."
Few political speeches are great. Fewer still are masterpieces. THAT was an actual masterpiece.
B-Block (13:29) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: Flaco the escaped Central Park Zoo Eagle-Owl RETURNS to the zoo...and then leaves again for Wollman Rink but is scared away by the unbelievably loud P.A. system? (14:56) IN SPORTS: Aaron Rodgers doesn't know people close their blinds when they go to sleep and LeBron James once tried to get an ESPN sportscaster fired because he thought she was mean to him? (17:00) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: American opinion weaponizes against The New McCarthyism and Kevin McCarthy's "Weaponization" subcommittee while George Santos may bring Lee Zeldin down with him, and a London tabloid anoints a dark horse GOP presidential candidate for 2024. Or maybe it's 2022. Or maybe it's 2020. They refer to all three!
C-Block (22:30) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Nigel, in New York (23:30) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: Joe Biden's State of the Union last night may have been an epic all-timer. The 1998 one came at the very start of the Clinton-Lewinsky Scandal and MSNBC didn't choose an anchor for its coverage until almost the last minute. Imagine my surprise when that anchor turned out to be... ME.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
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 I Heart Radio.
I Am actually startled. The State of the Union Address
(00:27):
has long since become an anachronism. Over the last twenty
five years, it has become a series of insiders talking
to other insiders and occasionally pointing to ordinary citizens in
the gallery as if they were creatures on display at
a zoo. It has become a ritual with the meaning
sucked out of it, and with increasing regularity, it has
(00:48):
become a stage for Republican simpleton's to disrespect the office
and the officer with stunts and shouts and heckling, and
winter after winter, it has doubled the argument for resuming
what President Thomas Jefferson first thought to do, to just
write the damned speech and have somebody else drop it
off at the House chamber door. And under those cynical
(01:13):
circumstances and with those diminishing caveats, Joe Biden absolutely killed
it last night, at his finest, at his most robust,
at his most combative, in his element in the proverbial arena,
throwing punches, blocking hecklers, and unashamedly exploiting the undeniable advantage
(01:40):
of having the only microphone in the room. Biden absolutely
killed it. And I am an utter cynic on political speeches.
I do not know how many of these I have heard,
and how many of the claims and promises and attitudes
and platitudes and catchphrases and applause lines I have heard
(02:03):
at nine thirty and forgotten by eleven. But this speech
I will remember. I will remember roads and infrastructure, and
education and insulin caps and unfair taxes and hidden service
fees and cable costs and raising teachers pay and quadrupling
the stock buy back tax and non compete clauses for
(02:26):
fast food cashiers and the talk and something good must
come from this, and do something and ban assault weapons now.
And I will remember Biden throwing away the ritualistic talk
down to them speechifying in order to cut through and
(02:46):
talk to the audience not in front of him but
the one at home, and to be conversational, and to
throw around that silly word, folks, and make it sound
sincere and serious, and then, best of all, baiting the
Republicans into loudly and embarrassingly denying what they have been
(03:07):
murmuring about all week, all year, all decade, all century,
baiting the Republicans into insisting loudly that no, they don't
want to gut Social Security and Medicare, and then inspiring
a chant of Usa Usa from Democrats for Democrats masterful.
(03:34):
And thank you George Santos for standing there beforehand, trying
to bull your way through, as Mitt Romney repeatedly said,
embarrassing or embarrassed to you. And thank you Lauren Bobert
for tweeting mid speech that when schools were closed in
it was Biden who closed them somehow while Trump was president.
(03:54):
And thank you Marjorie Taylor Green for wearing your bath
mat around your shoulders like it was suddenly Halloween and
you'd forgotten and you tried to build her own Coruella
Deville costume. And thank you Kirsten Cinema for dressing up
like Tweetie Bird after its car airbags had deployed, or
maybe the banana phone. And thank you to speaker McCarthy
(04:18):
for sitting there like a dyspeptic escaped owl. And thank
you Sarah Huckabee Sanders for sounding like a broken p
a system speaker in a nineteen fifty three bus station
with a mouth provided by Senor Wentzes and proving that
the rule of NEPO babies has now extended to the
(04:38):
State of the Union minority response. To be fair, President
Biden also had the help of somebody outside the room.
I want to thank Donald Trump for deflating all Republican
arguments hours before that speech, for completely overshadowing every criticism
(05:03):
of the State of the Union address, of silencing in advance,
every Republican who would try to insult Joe Biden, of
shadow banning every tweet by Jim Jordan about how much
the country Mrs Trump, of pomping every play of the
video of Marjorie Taylor Green holding a kid's balloon, And
what did I tell you yesterday? What did I tell
you about the need for props as the only mean
(05:25):
to communicate with the stupid demographic. So yes, thank you
Donald Trump for choosing yesterday to accuse Governor Ron De
Santis of quote grooming high school girls with alcohol as
a teacher by recirculating a blurry photo on social media
with his own caption that's not Ron, is it? He
(05:47):
would never do such a thing. And when that did
not get enough play, thank you Trump for recirculating it
a second time, adding no way and before you knew it.
Thank you de santis Is supporters, who then accused Trump
of traveling quote aboard Jeffrey Epstein's lead to express thank
you all for reminding us in real time that the
(06:11):
essence of Trump, and the essence of the Republican Party,
and the essence of American fascism in the twenty one
century is ask not what your country can do for you,
ask what your country can do for Trump. The State
of the Union address has in this last quarter century
(06:33):
devolved into not just a ritual, but into a string
of interlocking rituals. The President says a dozen or two
dozen or three dozen meaningless, vague things. The opposition party
grimaces or eye rolls or yells. A thousand pundits miss
the point in a thousand different ways, now nearly all
(06:54):
of them on CNN. It is partisan when it should
be nonpartisan, it is nonpartisan when it should be partisan.
And most importantly, words are chosen and they are spoken
in a specific way, a sublime meaninglessness. Then, after twenty
five years of having to listen to these addresses, it
(07:16):
finally struck me last night what I have been reminded
of since night, or maybe earlier, half a century ago,
there was an episode of the old TV series Star
Trek called The Omega Glory. And they land on some
planet like every other episode, and there are these rival
(07:38):
groups like every other episodes, and they're called the Yangs
and the Calms, and they're at each other's throats and
their codes for living are these meaningless, ritualistic holy words,
speeches of nonsense, syllables, the meaning of which none of
them know. They just notice say the words. And finally,
Captain Kirk, and yes, I understand, I'm invoking William Shatner
(08:01):
to explain American presidential politics and government nonsense. Finally, Captain
Kirk recognizes these ritualistic holy words for what they once
were centuries earlier before the meaning had been lost and
only some of the sounds remained and became distorted, and
the Yanks became the Yangs, and the Commies became the Calms.
(08:24):
They were speaking the Pledge of Allegiance and the U
S Constitution and your average State of the Union address
sounded like the Yangs and the Calms. That is what
American politics in general and the State of the Union
specifically have been moving towards since the nineties, and that
they have not yet gotten there, and we can hang
(08:46):
on to some small sliver of hope that they never
actually will get there. Is because of that once in
a decade or once in forever speech like the one
last night in which President Joe Biden sang and shouted
and whispered and bellowed and demanded and pleaded and most
(09:10):
of all believed stunning startling a masterpiece. Still had another
(09:33):
State of the Union quite a long time ago, the
day they handed the keys to covering that epic addressed
just as the Clinton Lewinsky scandal started to some guy
who had no idea he was going to have to
do it until the day before, and who had been
giving the baseball scores just eight months earlier. Things I
promised not to tell. Coming up. There is a Republican
(09:56):
dark horse presidential candidate, but he has a major problem.
He does not know if he is running for the
nomination in the year or I've seen this and I
still don't believe it. Worst persons ahead and Flacco. The
missing Central Park Zoo Eagle owl goes back to the
(10:18):
Central Park Zoo and then leaves again. Owl Watch twenty
three continues, that's next. This is countdown. This is countdown
with Keith Olberman. Postscripts to the news, some headlines, some updates,
(10:40):
some snarks, some predictions. Date line, Central Park, New York City,
Breaking owl watch twenty three news. Flacco, the eagle owl
is home. He is inside the Central Park. Wait wait,
there's more Flacco breaking news. Oh no, he's not at
(11:01):
large since last Thursday, when somebody broke into his inn closure.
Flacco began Tuesday right outside the Central Park Zoo grounds.
Then he flew eastwards to a pine tree actually inside
the grounds, and then to a birch and appeared to
be headed home to his enclosure. But then at sunset
he who did a couple of times and flew to
(11:22):
the women ice skating rink, evidently astonished by the price
gouging costs of renting skates there. Flacco flew north of
the rink, and at last word he might be resuming
a tour of the neighborhood. This is Sports Center. Wait,
(11:53):
check that not anymore. This is countdown with Keith. You know,
I might not be taking my news responsibilities as seriously
as I should. In sports Aaron Rodgers is just out there. Huh.
Last year, the once popular quarterback of the Green Bay
Packers revealed he kind of lied when he intimated in
(12:16):
public that he had been vaccinated against COVID, but then
said he'd actually only been immunized, which meant he'd eating
ants or bugs or I don't know, a horse or something.
And then he revealed that he'd taken a t containing hallucinogens. Now,
Rogers says he is going to go on a four
day fournight darkness retreat right after the Super Bowl, which
(12:37):
sounds great, we could all use that, but listen to
this quote. We rarely even turn our phones off or
put the blinds down to sleep in darkness. Rogers said, well,
who in the hell doesn't took the blinds down? I mean, seriously,
did you not think of that that they come down?
That's why, so it could be dark in there. I mean,
(12:58):
this guy went from being the spokesman for a multimillion
dollar insurance ad campaign to a weird I think he's
already been in a darkness retreat for a while now,
and this one is almost as weird as Lebron James
approached the all time NBA scoring record. My old ESPN
colleague Michelle Beatle revealed on a basketball podcast that lebron
(13:19):
quote tried to actually have me fired from ESPN's basketball
coverage and replaced by another one of my old ESPN
and Turner colleagues, Rachel Nichols. Beatles said he even direct
messaged her once on Twitter asking why are you so
mean to me on television? And Michelle is as mystified
as the rest of us as to why he would
(13:40):
bother and I'm jealous. The only people ever tried to
get me fired on television were Dick Cheney and George W.
Bush and Chris Matthews and Lawrence Donald and Joe Morgan
and the Undergone and Rupert Murdoch. Now the daily round
(14:09):
up of the miscreants, morons and Dunning Krueger effect specimens
who constitute today's worst persons in the world. The Bronze,
the House Weaponization Subcommittee, Washington Post ABC News poll indicating
the country has a little bit of a problem with
the new McCarthy ism. Is the new committee just an
(14:29):
attempt to score political points? Respondence to the Post ABC poll,
No percent, It's not just there to score political points.
Yes it is. Fifty second question, our government agencies actually
biased against conservatives? Yes, no, wrap it up, boys, You
(14:51):
lost before the ball game even started. The runner up,
former Congressman Lee Zelden, you knew that eventually, with the
lives of George Santos now being measured by the number
of freight trains it would take to carry them all,
that there would be collateral damage. And it looks like
it may be Zelden, as GOP bosses acknowledge, whatever is
left of the House Ethics Committee is going to investigate
(15:12):
Santos for what looks like that rare, one corrupt campaign
fundraising process. One little detail jumps out dozens and dozens
of Santos campaign expenses, all identified as costing one cents
because you only have to keep receipts and present them
for campaign expenses of two hundred dollars or more. Guests
(15:36):
whose campaign expenses turn out to also be filled with
deductions that all cost a hundred and nine cents each.
Ex Congressman Lee Zelden twenty one of them on one
day punchline. The Zelden and Santos campaign has had the
same treasurer by Felicia, but the winners Steve Laughy, Emily Gooden,
(16:02):
and as she has identified as the senior US political
reporter for the British sleazy tabloid The Daily Mail and
Gooden's publication The Daily Mail. The Daily Mail made a
big deal yesterday about some sort of exclusive interview with
this small town ex mayor Laughy, who is trying to
position himself as the next quote Republican breakout presidential candidate.
(16:24):
His name is Steve Laughy, and Ms Gooden writes, quote
his plan to charge onto the New Hampshire debate stage
and demand Republicans talk about ways to reform social security. Fine,
I guess, except Ms Gooden and The Daily Mail and
Mr Laffey apparently cannot decide on which year he is
(16:45):
running for president. In the first version of this story
posted online, read in order, quote is this the breakout
Republican candidate? Then quote in four Steve Laffey hopes person
that will be him, then quote he could be the
candidate to catch fire during primary Emily Gooden The Daily
(17:08):
Mail and Steve maybe he's a time traveler, Laughy, Today's
worst persons and the word still ahead on countdown. It
(17:35):
is twenty five years now since they basically pulled somebody
off the street and had him host national coverage of
the State of the Union address on cable news, and
that somebody was me Things I Promised not to tell
coming up first. In each addition of Countdown, we feature
a dog in need you can help. Every dog has
its day. Back to New York and Nigel. The last
(17:57):
weeks of a dog killed in a pound are almost
always the story of a self fulfilling prophecy. Nigel arrived
last week of January, friendly, soft bodied, sociable, and then
when playing he nipped at one of the hand wish
not at their skin, he nipped at the waistband of
their pants. So thereafter they refused to let him out
(18:17):
of his cage. So now he's claustrophobic and panicking. So
now they'll kill him because he's claustrophobic and panicking, and
they'll do it as early as tomorrow. He needs our
pledges to defray the cost of a rescue to save
his life. You can find Nigel on my Twitter feeds.
I thank you and Nigel thanks you. Now to the
(18:56):
number one story on the Countdown and Things I Promised
Not to Tell and the State of the Union nine.
When I left ESPN and signed with MSNBC the first
time in was not to become a political commentator nor
even anchor. I went there to do with the president
of NBC News America needed most a live, hour long
(19:19):
news magazine show from Cecaucus, New Jersey. So unfocused that
on consecutive nights we led with the threat of a
terrorist group called al Qaeda, and then the next night
we lad with the publication of the Farmers Almanac. I mean,
this was the news at eight p m. The lead
story that published the Farmers Almanac. Again, here's our live guest,
(19:44):
the publisher. Here's a going to rain next year. I
had regrets. Anyway, the good part of the job was sports.
I hosted baseball in the World Series and even did
some Super Bowl stuff for NBC, and in mid January
I flew to the West Coast to work on that
(20:04):
and do this magazine show, the Big Show on MSNBC
from entertainment venues in l A, most of them associated
with NBC. On the afternoon of Tuesday, January, were on
the set of Third Rock from the Sun preparing to
interview it's star John Liscow when my producer Phil Griffins citled,
over you, my little friend, are about to become a
(20:27):
political host, the President got caught with some chippy in
the White House. Chippy, oh not sex. Sex looks like
just you know, and then he lied about it in
the deposition Saturday. I asked him how in the hell
anybody knew about what the deposition said when it was
just four days after he gave the deposition, and those
(20:47):
things are supposed to be you know, secret preach me.
Drudge put it out yesterday, and I asked him if
credible news organizations like NBC were actually quoting an internet
guy best known for his hat about what was a
potentially impeachable offense. A lot of people were close on
this story. Griffin said, we were close. Lisa Myers almost
(21:08):
had at Sunday night. Newsweek finally put out a more
detailed version about ninety minutes ago. It was their scoop.
Judge just stole it from them. I think it was
Isakov who wrote it. You'll have to interview Tim Russer
to lead the show. The president may resign. We'll do
it from right here. Back that up. What was that
you said, we'll do it from right here? None part
about the president resigning. The president might resign. Thus, half
(21:33):
an hour later, I was hooked up by satellite with
Tim Russer from the Washington Bureau, listening to him outline
the possibilities that the president might resign before sunrise. I
nodded with as much gravitas as I could fake, despite
the elements of farces that were apparently obvious only to
me in the story and in where I was seated.
(21:54):
In the background of my close up stood the refrigerator
from the kitchen set of Lithgos show Third Rock from
the Sun, and on the refrigerator, complete with its decorative magnets,
speaking there silent and suddenly completely hip gag. The magnets
were a banana surrounded on either side by a strawberry.
Phil I said to Phil as we tried to plan
(22:16):
a smooth transition from that taped Russer interview about the
possibil impeachment of resignation of the president to a taped
interview with John Lithgow, and then back to the live
speculations of a couple of political writers for the rest
of the hour. We're not gonna have to do this
every day, are we, Griffin laugh, of course not. What
do you think this is the end of the world?
(22:36):
He was right, We did not do it every day.
We did it for two and eighteen consecutive shows, starting
that night with the Banana and the strawberry magnets over
my shoulder. Our ratings kept doubling. Following Tuesday, my thirty
eight birthday, I was back in New York hoasting a
round table of political heavyweights in the hour leading up
(22:58):
to Bill Clinton's State of the Union address. That night,
Andy Lack of NBC News and Phil Griffin had decided
that I should host a second live report once the
NBC Network guys Russer, Tom Brokaw a couple of others
had wrapped up their analysis, which we were also carrying
on MSNBC, so I would come on at eleven o'clock
after Brokaw and Russert two hours. My little friend, this
(23:20):
is our nightline. I was doing my best to keep
a straight face when during a commercial break it maybe
maybe midnight, halfway through my wrap up show, Griffin materialized
next to my anchor desk. He had this stunned but
not unhappy look, like when he used to smoke a
lot of dope when we worked together in the eighties.
(23:41):
We have the preliminary ratings, My little friend, I hope
you're sitting down. I pointed at myself, seated in the chair.
The pregame show that did a one point one. Our
average rating at MSNBC before this presidential stuff came up
had been an O point three. This was now four
times the previous ratings. In the past week, it had
(24:02):
searched to an O point six, and Griffin had insisted
to me that Andy Lack was so happy he had
wet his pants. But this is the kicker here, buddy.
We have the immediate Since the president finally stopped talking speech,
did an oh eight, Broke on Russer, they wrap up,
did an O six. Since eleven o'clock you've been doing
a one point seven. You have had three times the
(24:24):
audience of Tom Broke, three times the audience of the
old man himself. This isn't just people crossing over from
NBC to watch more. This is people watching the speech,
turning off the old man, then turning back at eleven
to watch you. I tried to assimilate what he was
telling me. For the first time in my life, my
ego refused to cooperate. The stage manager barked his queue
(24:48):
of thirty seconds until the end of the commercial break,
Phil Griffin shook my hand. Oh, and by the way, um,
that thing you said at the start of the hour
about it was as if the Intern had opened the
door to the chamber and said, Mr Speaker, the President
of the United States. Um, that's already included in the
Associated Press store one point seven, My little friend, don't
f it up. Actually you can't f it up. We're
(25:10):
in for the long haul now. Revel in it me
quoted about the Clinton Lewinsky story in the main coverage
of the State of the Union address on the Associated
Press wire. Eight months after I stopped giving the scores
of the Greater Stuttgart Invitational tennis tournament on ESPN, I
(25:31):
had this sudden, horrible feeling that the usually slow to
decide American viewing public had instantly concluded that, for some
reason elusive even to me, they really like to hear
me talk about the whereabouts of the president's penis. If
I could have figured out how to f up the
(25:52):
rest of the hour, I would have done it right then.
I didn't. The next day it got worse. The ratings
were so great last night, buddy, they want us to
go live every night at eight and eleven only about
the president. The eleven is gonna be called crisis in Washington.
Finally we get what we want. Phil Griffin was dancing around,
it'll be our nightline. Since joining MSNBC, I had not
(26:15):
taken any time off, and I actually had a vacation
booked in Hawaii the next week with a young lady.
Uh yeah about that. Phil finally announced, well, that's what
we have to talk about, Keith. They want you to
commit to this release six weeks, so it's this or Hawaii.
I explained Hawaii to fill. Black said he'd probably pay
(26:37):
for you to go do that whenever this is over.
I said, in my opinion, that probably would not be
good enough, and Griffin said neither did he, but that
it was just for openers, and Lack told him that
I could have three wishes and I could anchor NBC
nightly News at least on the weekends and a couple
of times during the week just personally, I'd recommend you
(26:59):
do it. I got the impression that the show is
gonna happen whether we agree to it or not. Griffin said.
He mentioned something Brian Williams or maybe John Gibson being
poor second choices but viable ones, he said, viable ones.
I told Phil I had some calls to make. Griffin
suggested Lack needed a decision within the hour, that he
wanted white House and Crisis on the air that night. Wait,
(27:22):
that didn't sound like what he'd called it before, Phil,
Is it white House in crisis or crisis in Washington?
Phil Griffin seemed introspective for a moment, then got in
touch with the news executive within what's the difference, It's
going to be our nightline? I almost suggested to him
that that should be the title MSNBC presents, It's going
(27:45):
to be our nightline. On and on. This went for weeks,
for months. I mocked the story. The ratings went up.
I tried to quit the show. The ratings went up.
I gave a speech insulting the network for covering the story.
The ratings went up. Fox Sports approached me and offered
(28:06):
me five times when NBC was paying me to go
out to l A to do their sportscasts l A,
which was kind of near Hawaii, nowhere near the Clinton
Lewinsky story. And the ratings went up, and I was
debating all this and the fact that I had a
contract and I had agreed to do it, and then
one night in early spring, I got home after another
night of this crap, I put my feet up. I
(28:27):
was half watching something on NBC while really just staring
off into the distance, wondering what I had done to
deserve this, mulling my own future, when the snare drum
and the violent string section of an NBC news promo
interrupted me Wednesday, on a very special edition of Nightline,
Jane Polly and the former Miss America. There she was,
(28:48):
for a second, head tilted, her look grave, journalistic, even scholarly,
Jane Paully, the ten year host of NBC's landmark Today Show,
the one who had then switched to prime time because
the journalism had slowly ebbed out of morning television and
she couldn't do it anymore. She was sitting there in
a two shot with a Miss America from too many
Miss America's ago, the former brunette, former redhead, now former
(29:12):
blonde whose jet black hair made her look a little frightening.
Why the hell was Jane Paul interviewing her on the signature,
albeit superficial NBC thrice weekly magazine show Nightline No less well,
in a split second, the promo gave me my answer, Jane,
did you have sex with the President of the United
States X Miss America? Yes, Yes, I did, announcer that's
(29:35):
Wednesday on a very special edition to Nightline only on
NBC America's news source. With genuine terror, I screamed, I
shouted aloud to no one check please, and I called
my agent to talk about Fox. The state of the
(30:05):
Union is Alderman wants quit his job. Countdown has come
to you from the studios of Alderman Broadcast the Empire
World Headquarters in the Sports Capsule Building in New York.
Thank you for listening. Here the credits. Most of the music,
including our theme from Beethoven's Ninth, was arranged, produced and
performed by Brian Ray and John Philip Shanelle, who are
the Countdown musical directors. Guitars, bass and drums by Brian Ray,
(30:29):
all orchestration and keyboards by John Philip s Chanelle, produced
by t k O Brothers. Other Beethoven selections have been
arranged and performed by the group No Horns Allowed. The
sports music is the Alderman theme from ESPN two, and
it was written by Mitch Warren Davis. Courtesy of ESPN inc.
Musical comments by Nancy Faust. The best baseball stadium organist ever.
Our announcer today was Kenny Maine, and everything else is
(30:52):
pretty much my fault. So let's countdown for this the
seven undred and sixty fourth day since Donald Trump's first
attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Arrest him now while we still and the next scheduled
countdown is tomorrow. Until then, I'm Keith Alverman. Good morning,
good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck. Countdown with Keith Alverman
(31:19):
is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts
from I heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of I Heart Radio.
I Am actually startled. The State of the Union Address
(00:27):
has long since become an anachronism. Over the last twenty
five years, it has become a series of insiders talking
to other insiders and occasionally pointing to ordinary citizens in
the gallery as if they were creatures on display at
a zoo. It has become a ritual with the meaning
sucked out of it, and with increasing regularity, it has
(00:48):
become a stage for Republican simpleton's to disrespect the office
and the officer with stunts and shouts and heckling, and
winter after winter, it has doubled the argument for resuming
what President Thomas Jefferson first thought to do, to just
write the damned speech and have somebody else drop it
off at the House chamber door. And under those cynical
(01:13):
circumstances and with those diminishing caveats, Joe Biden absolutely killed
it last night, at his finest, at his most robust,
at his most combative, in his element in the proverbial arena,
throwing punches, blocking hecklers, and unashamedly exploiting the undeniable advantage
(01:40):
of having the only microphone in the room. Biden absolutely
killed it. And I am an utter cynic on political speeches.
I do not know how many of these I have heard,
and how many of the claims and promises and attitudes
and platitudes and catchphrases and applause lines I have heard
(02:03):
at nine thirty and forgotten by eleven. But this speech
I will remember. I will remember roads and infrastructure, and
education and insulin caps and unfair taxes and hidden service
fees and cable costs and raising teachers pay and quadrupling
the stock buy back tax and non compete clauses for
(02:26):
fast food cashiers and the talk and something good must
come from this, and do something and ban assault weapons now.
And I will remember Biden throwing away the ritualistic talk
down to them speechifying in order to cut through and
(02:46):
talk to the audience not in front of him but
the one at home, and to be conversational, and to
throw around that silly word, folks, and make it sound
sincere and serious, and then, best of all, baiting the
Republicans into loudly and embarrassingly denying what they have been
(03:07):
murmuring about all week, all year, all decade, all century,
baiting the Republicans into insisting loudly that no, they don't
want to gut Social Security and Medicare, and then inspiring
a chant of Usa Usa from Democrats for Democrats masterful.
(03:34):
And thank you George Santos for standing there beforehand, trying
to bull your way through, as Mitt Romney repeatedly said,
embarrassing or embarrassed to you. And thank you Lauren Bobert
for tweeting mid speech that when schools were closed in
it was Biden who closed them somehow while Trump was president.
(03:54):
And thank you Marjorie Taylor Green for wearing your bath
mat around your shoulders like it was suddenly Halloween and
you'd forgotten and you tried to build her own Coruella
Deville costume. And thank you Kirsten Cinema for dressing up
like Tweetie Bird after its car airbags had deployed, or
maybe the banana phone. And thank you to speaker McCarthy
(04:18):
for sitting there like a dyspeptic escaped owl. And thank
you Sarah Huckabee Sanders for sounding like a broken p
a system speaker in a nineteen fifty three bus station
with a mouth provided by Senor Wentzes and proving that
the rule of NEPO babies has now extended to the
(04:38):
State of the Union minority response. To be fair, President
Biden also had the help of somebody outside the room.
I want to thank Donald Trump for deflating all Republican
arguments hours before that speech, for completely overshadowing every criticism
(05:03):
of the State of the Union address, of silencing in advance,
every Republican who would try to insult Joe Biden, of
shadow banning every tweet by Jim Jordan about how much
the country Mrs Trump, of pomping every play of the
video of Marjorie Taylor Green holding a kid's balloon, And
what did I tell you yesterday? What did I tell
you about the need for props as the only mean
(05:25):
to communicate with the stupid demographic. So yes, thank you
Donald Trump for choosing yesterday to accuse Governor Ron De
Santis of quote grooming high school girls with alcohol as
a teacher by recirculating a blurry photo on social media
with his own caption that's not Ron, is it? He
(05:47):
would never do such a thing. And when that did
not get enough play, thank you Trump for recirculating it
a second time, adding no way and before you knew it.
Thank you de santis Is supporters, who then accused Trump
of traveling quote aboard Jeffrey Epstein's lead to express thank
you all for reminding us in real time that the
(06:11):
essence of Trump, and the essence of the Republican Party,
and the essence of American fascism in the twenty one
century is ask not what your country can do for you,
ask what your country can do for Trump. The State
of the Union address has in this last quarter century
(06:33):
devolved into not just a ritual, but into a string
of interlocking rituals. The President says a dozen or two
dozen or three dozen meaningless, vague things. The opposition party
grimaces or eye rolls or yells. A thousand pundits miss
the point in a thousand different ways, now nearly all
(06:54):
of them on CNN. It is partisan when it should
be nonpartisan, it is nonpartisan when it should be partisan.
And most importantly, words are chosen and they are spoken
in a specific way, a sublime meaninglessness. Then, after twenty
five years of having to listen to these addresses, it
(07:16):
finally struck me last night what I have been reminded
of since night, or maybe earlier, half a century ago,
there was an episode of the old TV series Star
Trek called The Omega Glory. And they land on some
planet like every other episode, and there are these rival
(07:38):
groups like every other episodes, and they're called the Yangs
and the Calms, and they're at each other's throats and
their codes for living are these meaningless, ritualistic holy words,
speeches of nonsense, syllables, the meaning of which none of
them know. They just notice say the words. And finally,
Captain Kirk, and yes, I understand, I'm invoking William Shatner
(08:01):
to explain American presidential politics and government nonsense. Finally, Captain
Kirk recognizes these ritualistic holy words for what they once
were centuries earlier before the meaning had been lost and
only some of the sounds remained and became distorted, and
the Yanks became the Yangs, and the Commies became the Calms.
(08:24):
They were speaking the Pledge of Allegiance and the U
S Constitution and your average State of the Union address
sounded like the Yangs and the Calms. That is what
American politics in general and the State of the Union
specifically have been moving towards since the nineties, and that
they have not yet gotten there, and we can hang
(08:46):
on to some small sliver of hope that they never
actually will get there. Is because of that once in
a decade or once in forever speech like the one
last night in which President Joe Biden sang and shouted
and whispered and bellowed and demanded and pleaded and most
(09:10):
of all believed stunning startling a masterpiece. Still had another
(09:33):
State of the Union quite a long time ago, the
day they handed the keys to covering that epic addressed
just as the Clinton Lewinsky scandal started to some guy
who had no idea he was going to have to
do it until the day before, and who had been
giving the baseball scores just eight months earlier. Things I
promised not to tell. Coming up. There is a Republican
(09:56):
dark horse presidential candidate, but he has a major problem.
He does not know if he is running for the
nomination in the year or I've seen this and I
still don't believe it. Worst persons ahead and Flacco. The
missing Central Park Zoo Eagle owl goes back to the
(10:18):
Central Park Zoo and then leaves again. Owl Watch twenty
three continues, that's next. This is countdown. This is countdown
with Keith Olberman. Postscripts to the news, some headlines, some updates,
(10:40):
some snarks, some predictions. Date line, Central Park, New York City,
Breaking owl watch twenty three news. Flacco, the eagle owl
is home. He is inside the Central Park. Wait wait,
there's more Flacco breaking news. Oh no, he's not at
(11:01):
large since last Thursday, when somebody broke into his inn closure.
Flacco began Tuesday right outside the Central Park Zoo grounds.
Then he flew eastwards to a pine tree actually inside
the grounds, and then to a birch and appeared to
be headed home to his enclosure. But then at sunset
he who did a couple of times and flew to
(11:22):
the women ice skating rink, evidently astonished by the price
gouging costs of renting skates there. Flacco flew north of
the rink, and at last word he might be resuming
a tour of the neighborhood. This is Sports Center. Wait,
(11:53):
check that not anymore. This is countdown with Keith. You know,
I might not be taking my news responsibilities as seriously
as I should. In sports Aaron Rodgers is just out there. Huh.
Last year, the once popular quarterback of the Green Bay
Packers revealed he kind of lied when he intimated in
(12:16):
public that he had been vaccinated against COVID, but then
said he'd actually only been immunized, which meant he'd eating
ants or bugs or I don't know, a horse or something.
And then he revealed that he'd taken a t containing hallucinogens. Now,
Rogers says he is going to go on a four
day fournight darkness retreat right after the Super Bowl, which
(12:37):
sounds great, we could all use that, but listen to
this quote. We rarely even turn our phones off or
put the blinds down to sleep in darkness. Rogers said, well,
who in the hell doesn't took the blinds down? I mean, seriously,
did you not think of that that they come down?
That's why, so it could be dark in there. I mean,
(12:58):
this guy went from being the spokesman for a multimillion
dollar insurance ad campaign to a weird I think he's
already been in a darkness retreat for a while now,
and this one is almost as weird as Lebron James
approached the all time NBA scoring record. My old ESPN
colleague Michelle Beatle revealed on a basketball podcast that lebron
(13:19):
quote tried to actually have me fired from ESPN's basketball
coverage and replaced by another one of my old ESPN
and Turner colleagues, Rachel Nichols. Beatles said he even direct
messaged her once on Twitter asking why are you so
mean to me on television? And Michelle is as mystified
as the rest of us as to why he would
(13:40):
bother and I'm jealous. The only people ever tried to
get me fired on television were Dick Cheney and George W.
Bush and Chris Matthews and Lawrence Donald and Joe Morgan
and the Undergone and Rupert Murdoch. Now the daily round
(14:09):
up of the miscreants, morons and Dunning Krueger effect specimens
who constitute today's worst persons in the world. The Bronze,
the House Weaponization Subcommittee, Washington Post ABC News poll indicating
the country has a little bit of a problem with
the new McCarthy ism. Is the new committee just an
(14:29):
attempt to score political points? Respondence to the Post ABC poll,
No percent, It's not just there to score political points.
Yes it is. Fifty second question, our government agencies actually
biased against conservatives? Yes, no, wrap it up, boys, You
(14:51):
lost before the ball game even started. The runner up,
former Congressman Lee Zelden, you knew that eventually, with the
lives of George Santos now being measured by the number
of freight trains it would take to carry them all,
that there would be collateral damage. And it looks like
it may be Zelden, as GOP bosses acknowledge, whatever is
left of the House Ethics Committee is going to investigate
(15:12):
Santos for what looks like that rare, one corrupt campaign
fundraising process. One little detail jumps out dozens and dozens
of Santos campaign expenses, all identified as costing one cents
because you only have to keep receipts and present them
for campaign expenses of two hundred dollars or more. Guests
(15:36):
whose campaign expenses turn out to also be filled with
deductions that all cost a hundred and nine cents each.
Ex Congressman Lee Zelden twenty one of them on one
day punchline. The Zelden and Santos campaign has had the
same treasurer by Felicia, but the winners Steve Laughy, Emily Gooden,
(16:02):
and as she has identified as the senior US political
reporter for the British sleazy tabloid The Daily Mail and
Gooden's publication The Daily Mail. The Daily Mail made a
big deal yesterday about some sort of exclusive interview with
this small town ex mayor Laughy, who is trying to
position himself as the next quote Republican breakout presidential candidate.
(16:24):
His name is Steve Laughy, and Ms Gooden writes, quote
his plan to charge onto the New Hampshire debate stage
and demand Republicans talk about ways to reform social security. Fine,
I guess, except Ms Gooden and The Daily Mail and
Mr Laffey apparently cannot decide on which year he is
(16:45):
running for president. In the first version of this story
posted online, read in order, quote is this the breakout
Republican candidate? Then quote in four Steve Laffey hopes person
that will be him, then quote he could be the
candidate to catch fire during primary Emily Gooden The Daily
(17:08):
Mail and Steve maybe he's a time traveler, Laughy, Today's
worst persons and the word still ahead on countdown. It
(17:35):
is twenty five years now since they basically pulled somebody
off the street and had him host national coverage of
the State of the Union address on cable news, and
that somebody was me Things I Promised not to tell
coming up first. In each addition of Countdown, we feature
a dog in need you can help. Every dog has
its day. Back to New York and Nigel. The last
(17:57):
weeks of a dog killed in a pound are almost
always the story of a self fulfilling prophecy. Nigel arrived
last week of January, friendly, soft bodied, sociable, and then
when playing he nipped at one of the hand wish
not at their skin, he nipped at the waistband of
their pants. So thereafter they refused to let him out
(18:17):
of his cage. So now he's claustrophobic and panicking. So
now they'll kill him because he's claustrophobic and panicking, and
they'll do it as early as tomorrow. He needs our
pledges to defray the cost of a rescue to save
his life. You can find Nigel on my Twitter feeds.
I thank you and Nigel thanks you. Now to the
(18:56):
number one story on the Countdown and Things I Promised
Not to Tell and the State of the Union nine.
When I left ESPN and signed with MSNBC the first
time in was not to become a political commentator nor
even anchor. I went there to do with the president
of NBC News America needed most a live, hour long
(19:19):
news magazine show from Cecaucus, New Jersey. So unfocused that
on consecutive nights we led with the threat of a
terrorist group called al Qaeda, and then the next night
we lad with the publication of the Farmers Almanac. I mean,
this was the news at eight p m. The lead
story that published the Farmers Almanac. Again, here's our live guest,
(19:44):
the publisher. Here's a going to rain next year. I
had regrets. Anyway, the good part of the job was sports.
I hosted baseball in the World Series and even did
some Super Bowl stuff for NBC, and in mid January
I flew to the West Coast to work on that
(20:04):
and do this magazine show, the Big Show on MSNBC
from entertainment venues in l A, most of them associated
with NBC. On the afternoon of Tuesday, January, were on
the set of Third Rock from the Sun preparing to
interview it's star John Liscow when my producer Phil Griffins citled,
over you, my little friend, are about to become a
(20:27):
political host, the President got caught with some chippy in
the White House. Chippy, oh not sex. Sex looks like
just you know, and then he lied about it in
the deposition Saturday. I asked him how in the hell
anybody knew about what the deposition said when it was
just four days after he gave the deposition, and those
(20:47):
things are supposed to be you know, secret preach me.
Drudge put it out yesterday, and I asked him if
credible news organizations like NBC were actually quoting an internet
guy best known for his hat about what was a
potentially impeachable offense. A lot of people were close on
this story. Griffin said, we were close. Lisa Myers almost
(21:08):
had at Sunday night. Newsweek finally put out a more
detailed version about ninety minutes ago. It was their scoop.
Judge just stole it from them. I think it was
Isakov who wrote it. You'll have to interview Tim Russer
to lead the show. The president may resign. We'll do
it from right here. Back that up. What was that
you said, we'll do it from right here? None part
about the president resigning. The president might resign. Thus, half
(21:33):
an hour later, I was hooked up by satellite with
Tim Russer from the Washington Bureau, listening to him outline
the possibilities that the president might resign before sunrise. I
nodded with as much gravitas as I could fake, despite
the elements of farces that were apparently obvious only to
me in the story and in where I was seated.
(21:54):
In the background of my close up stood the refrigerator
from the kitchen set of Lithgos show Third Rock from
the Sun, and on the refrigerator, complete with its decorative magnets,
speaking there silent and suddenly completely hip gag. The magnets
were a banana surrounded on either side by a strawberry.
Phil I said to Phil as we tried to plan
(22:16):
a smooth transition from that taped Russer interview about the
possibil impeachment of resignation of the president to a taped
interview with John Lithgow, and then back to the live
speculations of a couple of political writers for the rest
of the hour. We're not gonna have to do this
every day, are we, Griffin laugh, of course not. What
do you think this is the end of the world?
(22:36):
He was right, We did not do it every day.
We did it for two and eighteen consecutive shows, starting
that night with the Banana and the strawberry magnets over
my shoulder. Our ratings kept doubling. Following Tuesday, my thirty
eight birthday, I was back in New York hoasting a
round table of political heavyweights in the hour leading up
(22:58):
to Bill Clinton's State of the Union address. That night,
Andy Lack of NBC News and Phil Griffin had decided
that I should host a second live report once the
NBC Network guys Russer, Tom Brokaw a couple of others
had wrapped up their analysis, which we were also carrying
on MSNBC, so I would come on at eleven o'clock
after Brokaw and Russert two hours. My little friend, this
(23:20):
is our nightline. I was doing my best to keep
a straight face when during a commercial break it maybe
maybe midnight, halfway through my wrap up show, Griffin materialized
next to my anchor desk. He had this stunned but
not unhappy look, like when he used to smoke a
lot of dope when we worked together in the eighties.
(23:41):
We have the preliminary ratings, My little friend, I hope
you're sitting down. I pointed at myself, seated in the chair.
The pregame show that did a one point one. Our
average rating at MSNBC before this presidential stuff came up
had been an O point three. This was now four
times the previous ratings. In the past week, it had
(24:02):
searched to an O point six, and Griffin had insisted
to me that Andy Lack was so happy he had
wet his pants. But this is the kicker here, buddy.
We have the immediate Since the president finally stopped talking speech,
did an oh eight, Broke on Russer, they wrap up,
did an O six. Since eleven o'clock you've been doing
a one point seven. You have had three times the
(24:24):
audience of Tom Broke, three times the audience of the
old man himself. This isn't just people crossing over from
NBC to watch more. This is people watching the speech,
turning off the old man, then turning back at eleven
to watch you. I tried to assimilate what he was
telling me. For the first time in my life, my
ego refused to cooperate. The stage manager barked his queue
(24:48):
of thirty seconds until the end of the commercial break,
Phil Griffin shook my hand. Oh, and by the way, um,
that thing you said at the start of the hour
about it was as if the Intern had opened the
door to the chamber and said, Mr Speaker, the President
of the United States. Um, that's already included in the
Associated Press store one point seven, My little friend, don't
f it up. Actually you can't f it up. We're
(25:10):
in for the long haul now. Revel in it me
quoted about the Clinton Lewinsky story in the main coverage
of the State of the Union address on the Associated
Press wire. Eight months after I stopped giving the scores
of the Greater Stuttgart Invitational tennis tournament on ESPN, I
(25:31):
had this sudden, horrible feeling that the usually slow to
decide American viewing public had instantly concluded that, for some
reason elusive even to me, they really like to hear
me talk about the whereabouts of the president's penis. If
I could have figured out how to f up the
(25:52):
rest of the hour, I would have done it right then.
I didn't. The next day it got worse. The ratings
were so great last night, buddy, they want us to
go live every night at eight and eleven only about
the president. The eleven is gonna be called crisis in Washington.
Finally we get what we want. Phil Griffin was dancing around,
it'll be our nightline. Since joining MSNBC, I had not
(26:15):
taken any time off, and I actually had a vacation
booked in Hawaii the next week with a young lady.
Uh yeah about that. Phil finally announced, well, that's what
we have to talk about, Keith. They want you to
commit to this release six weeks, so it's this or Hawaii.
I explained Hawaii to fill. Black said he'd probably pay
(26:37):
for you to go do that whenever this is over.
I said, in my opinion, that probably would not be
good enough, and Griffin said neither did he, but that
it was just for openers, and Lack told him that
I could have three wishes and I could anchor NBC
nightly News at least on the weekends and a couple
of times during the week just personally, I'd recommend you
(26:59):
do it. I got the impression that the show is
gonna happen whether we agree to it or not. Griffin said.
He mentioned something Brian Williams or maybe John Gibson being
poor second choices but viable ones, he said, viable ones.
I told Phil I had some calls to make. Griffin
suggested Lack needed a decision within the hour, that he
wanted white House and Crisis on the air that night. Wait,
(27:22):
that didn't sound like what he'd called it before, Phil,
Is it white House in crisis or crisis in Washington?
Phil Griffin seemed introspective for a moment, then got in
touch with the news executive within what's the difference, It's
going to be our nightline? I almost suggested to him
that that should be the title MSNBC presents, It's going
(27:45):
to be our nightline. On and on. This went for weeks,
for months. I mocked the story. The ratings went up.
I tried to quit the show. The ratings went up.
I gave a speech insulting the network for covering the story.
The ratings went up. Fox Sports approached me and offered
(28:06):
me five times when NBC was paying me to go
out to l A to do their sportscasts l A,
which was kind of near Hawaii, nowhere near the Clinton
Lewinsky story. And the ratings went up, and I was
debating all this and the fact that I had a
contract and I had agreed to do it, and then
one night in early spring, I got home after another
night of this crap, I put my feet up. I
(28:27):
was half watching something on NBC while really just staring
off into the distance, wondering what I had done to
deserve this, mulling my own future, when the snare drum
and the violent string section of an NBC news promo
interrupted me Wednesday, on a very special edition of Nightline,
Jane Polly and the former Miss America. There she was,
(28:48):
for a second, head tilted, her look grave, journalistic, even scholarly,
Jane Paully, the ten year host of NBC's landmark Today Show,
the one who had then switched to prime time because
the journalism had slowly ebbed out of morning television and
she couldn't do it anymore. She was sitting there in
a two shot with a Miss America from too many
Miss America's ago, the former brunette, former redhead, now former
(29:12):
blonde whose jet black hair made her look a little frightening.
Why the hell was Jane Paul interviewing her on the signature,
albeit superficial NBC thrice weekly magazine show Nightline No less well,
in a split second, the promo gave me my answer, Jane,
did you have sex with the President of the United
States X Miss America? Yes, Yes, I did, announcer that's
(29:35):
Wednesday on a very special edition to Nightline only on
NBC America's news source. With genuine terror, I screamed, I
shouted aloud to no one check please, and I called
my agent to talk about Fox. The state of the
(30:05):
Union is Alderman wants quit his job. Countdown has come
to you from the studios of Alderman Broadcast the Empire
World Headquarters in the Sports Capsule Building in New York.
Thank you for listening. Here the credits. Most of the music,
including our theme from Beethoven's Ninth, was arranged, produced and
performed by Brian Ray and John Philip Shanelle, who are
the Countdown musical directors. Guitars, bass and drums by Brian Ray,
(30:29):
all orchestration and keyboards by John Philip s Chanelle, produced
by t k O Brothers. Other Beethoven selections have been
arranged and performed by the group No Horns Allowed. The
sports music is the Alderman theme from ESPN two, and
it was written by Mitch Warren Davis. Courtesy of ESPN inc.
Musical comments by Nancy Faust. The best baseball stadium organist ever.
Our announcer today was Kenny Maine, and everything else is
(30:52):
pretty much my fault. So let's countdown for this the
seven undred and sixty fourth day since Donald Trump's first
attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Arrest him now while we still and the next scheduled
countdown is tomorrow. Until then, I'm Keith Alverman. Good morning,
good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck. Countdown with Keith Alverman
(31:19):
is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts
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