May 2, 2023 • 37 mins
EPISODE 191: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:43) SPECIAL COMMENT: Chris Licht's transformation of CNN into Trump's journalistic whorehouse is now complete. He and other CNN executives have NEGOTIATED the terms by which Trump will PERMIT them to cover him. Licht gives Trump a free live hour+ of a "Town Hall" next week in New Hampshire. The ONLY questions will be from those voting in the GOP Primary and CNN will exercise no editorial control. It's a program-length advertisement for a seditious madman.And it's worse than that. The Guardian reports that Trump has been told his reward for deigning to go on CNN is that later, CNN may put on more Trump Campaign Surrogates.
The journalistic prostitution extends to NBC News. In March Trump abused, threatened, and expelled an NBC reporter, then threw his two phones recording their conversation. NBC reported none of this. Why not? Is it coincidence that Politico reports that NBC is among the other networks are "negotiating" for sit-downs with Trump - NBC included.
This is everything American media agreed it could not do again for the insurrectionist scumbag Trump. And no one at CNN or NBC has uttered a word of protest, and thus everyone at CNN and NBC shares the shame - and the disqualification from journalism.
B-Block ((17:25) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: Marjorie Taylor Greene's support is not exactly based in her district. The number of campaign contributions from her district? Six. (21:49) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Greg Abbott not only insults the dead but lies about them.
C-Block (27:50) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Cannella in Tennessee (28:49) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: I like to joke that when we were at MSNBC together, we all used to think Chris Licht used to eat paste. Here's the back story of how Licht spent his days there nominally as Joe Scarborough's producer but actually tasked by Scarborough with trying to destroy liberal shows and suppress liberal voices there - just as he's doing now at CNN.
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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. Chris
Lickt's transformation of CNN into a journalistic whorehouse is now complete.
(00:30):
CNN is now bribing Donald Trump to accept its offer
of a live town hall in Goffstown, New Hampshire, next
Wednesday night, during which CNN says the questions will be
asked by New Hampshire Republicans and undeclared voters, and implies
its only involvement will be to have the former Tucker
Carlson website employee Caitlyn Collins moderate. CNN says nothing about
(00:54):
real time fact checking, nor pushback, nor anything else that
suggests it might exercise even the slightest editorial control over
the program length advertisement It is given to this seditious madman.
But I use that word bribing deliberately, because this is
worse than just sacrificing the charred remains of CNN's credibility
(01:16):
to Trump. There is a quid pro quo here. Hugo
Lowell of The Guardian quotes people close to Trump who
say he has agreed to appear on CNN on the
understanding that CNN could now put more of his campaign
surrogates on its programs. Lowell reports, CNN denies there is
(01:39):
such a deal that it has surrendered even more editorial control.
And it would be nice to believe that, after what
Lickt has deliberately done to destroy that news organization, that
his denial or CNN's institutional denial could be taken seriously.
But neither his nor theirs can be taken seriously any longer. Unfortunately,
(01:59):
it must now be assumed that everything said by someone
from CNN or on CNN, by Chris Lickt, by Wolf Blitzer,
by Jake Tapper, by Jim Shudo, by Jim Acosta, by
the dozens of hard working reporters in the field, by
the producers, by everybody else who works there, not one
of whom quit in protest of this prostituting of their
(02:21):
news brand and their personal reputations, not one of whom
even let out an anonymous squeak of regret to a
real journalist covering this story. It must now be assumed
that everybody who works on or for CNN are all
lying because they work for a liar, and they appear
on a channel dedicated to line which has just sold
(02:44):
the few remaining shards of its soul to the greatest
liar of our time in Trump, CNN is now Fox News.
If there was one consensus among virtually every American news organization,
it was that there was no way any of them
could rationalize treating Trump now the way they treated him
(03:06):
in twenty fifteen, that he was now a proven would
be dictator who repeatedly tried to orchestrate the overthrow of
the duly elected government of this country. Not even Fox
has been repeating its filating of this creature Trump, but
CNN now is now. If Chris Lick and CNN people
there did any thinking about this disqualifying act of reportorial malfeasance,
(03:31):
it was not about learning anything about the catastrophic enabling
of American media of Trump in twenty sixteen, because Chris
Lick is fantastically stupid and reprehensible and amorl and irresponsible,
and he cannot learn a thing now. If he and
CNN did any thinking about this at all, it began
(03:52):
and ended with this sentence, Ooh, Fox's viewers are really
pissed off at them for firing Tucker Carlson. I bet
we can win them over by putting Trump on that
entire fire Fox audience is out there for the taking.
It then took Trump barely two and a half hours
(04:12):
after the CNN announcement to shit all over CNN and
American journalism and the First Amendment and this country, all
of which licked and CNN have betrayed. That two and
a half hours later is when Vanity Fair reported that
it had obtained a recording of Trump abusing, threatening, and
(04:32):
then grabbing the phones of an NBC reporter named Vaughan
Hilliard because he did not like what Hilliard had asked him.
Don't ask me any more questions, Trump snapped at Hilliard
on board a flight to a rally in Texas. The
date was March twenty sixth. Hilliard had asked about Trump's
seeming frustration about the Alvin Bragg investigation here in New York.
That latest attack on the free press by Trump we
(04:55):
already knew about, but new to our knowledge of just
how sick and dangerous and violent Trump is is Vanity
Fair's further report that ten minutes later, this NBC reporter
Hilliard tried to ask Trump more questions about brag. Trump
then grabbed Hilliard's phones, grabbed them out of the reporter's
(05:17):
pile and toss those phones aside. I don't want to
talk to you. Trump is heard saying on the recording
of the event, do you hear me? You're not a
nice guy. When Hilliard persisted, Trump lost it, quoting again,
all right, let's go get him out of here, out
of here, out of here. Has Hilliard again tried to
(05:38):
ask a question? Now, a Trump minion is heard on
the tape saying, Vaughn, We're done. Trump then turned his
attention to the phones that were still recording him. Whose
is this, he asked? Hilliard said it was his. Trump
picked up his another phone. Whose is this? He asked?
Hilliard said the second one was also his. Trump then
threw both phones and quoting Vanity Fair again, out of
(06:01):
his sight, onto the seat next to him. The thud
of one one of the phones hitting a surface can
be heard in the recording. Vanity Fair reports that another
reporter tried to continue the interview. It identifies four other
media members who had been in the airborne gaggle with
Hilliard before Trump had Hilliard expelled. There was an Associated
Press photographer, there were writers from Axios and the Daily Mail,
(06:24):
and there was Brian Glenn of the RSBN streaming propaganda channel.
Brian Glenn is the one dating Marjorie Taylor Green. This
is the kind of conduct towards the media, towards the
First Amendment, towards people, towards America, which Chris Licked just
(06:47):
rewarded by handing over editorial control of CNN to Trump
for at least an hour next week and for untold
guest appearances later. But it must also be noted here
that clearly NBC News also rewarded this scumbag Trump's delusion
of omnipotence. NBC News did not report his aggressive behavior
(07:09):
towards its own reporter, even though it was witnessed and recorded,
and the Vanity Fair article clearly identifies that the recording
it heard was made on one of the phones of
NBC's Vaughn Hilliard. NBC did not defend von Hilliard. NBC
has not offered any explanation of its misconduct in attempting
to appease Trump, but a throwaway line in the Politico
(07:31):
coverage of the Trump CNN News seems to explain what
the hell. NBC News chairman Saysar Conde and NBC News
President Noah Oppenheim are doing. Quote, the former president and
his staff have re engaged the mainstream press corps after
largely shunning them. They have been in talks for sit
downs with several other notable outlets, including NBC. In short,
(08:00):
Conde and Oppenheim and NBC have been doing with Trump
what CNN has been doing with Trump, hoaring themselves out,
except NBC hasn't been quite as successful at it as
CNN has. Yet it will not happen. People don't do
(08:20):
this anymore. You are not rewarded for courage or ethics.
You are suspected. But CNN's irredeemable failure here and NBCs
should be responded to not just by a viewer boycott,
but by mass resignations by its hosts and reporters, and
more practically, by its contributors and its regular guests, for
whom there is bluntly less money on the table. This
(08:44):
is CNN turning over its network to Hitler only after
the world had learned what Hitler really was, and after
the world had been saved from him, and if he
had been scheming and plotting to regain power. But if
you go on CNN after this, you are part of
CNN's collaboration with Trump and the genuine evil he represents.
(09:06):
You are part of that collaboration. Anderson Cooper, you are
part of that collaboration. Christiana I'm on poor, You are
part of that collaboration. Manu Raju, and let us not
delude ourselves as to what kind of collaboration CNN and
Chris Lickt are committing here. Even though veteran Republican political
(09:27):
operative David Frumb quickly observed quote Trump using CNN to
punish Fox for its big tilt to DeSantis, there should
be no diminishing of our contempt of or reaction to
CNN for this journalistic crime. CNN is not responding to
a desperate play by Trump's latest handlers to mainstream him
(09:49):
or to try to sand down the rough inconvenient edges
of insurrection, or otherwise gas light the nation. CNN and
Lickt started this again, quoting Politico. A person familiar with
the discussion said CNN approached the the Trump campaign several
months ago, and talks between the two sides continued on
(10:10):
until Monday, when the plans were locked down on quote,
Chris licked solicited Trump the way a street walker solicits
a client and not the other way around. But there
is a second red flag in that part of the
background to this deal between two devils are the plans
(10:34):
locked down. The phrasing of CNN's announcement about its perfidy
in print and on camera has been consistent, specific, and strange. Quote.
Caitlin Collins will moderate the event, which will feature the
former president taking questions from New Hampshire Republicans and undeclared
(10:55):
voters who planned to vote in the twenty twenty four
GOP presidential primary. Unquote, will Caitlyn Collins ask any questions?
Will she fact check? The verb used to describe what
the hell she's doing there is moderate. While the questioners
are painstakingly identified as Republicans and others voting in the
(11:17):
New Hampshire presidential primary, only voters will ask questions of Trump.
Sixty three percent of Republican voters still believe President Biden
did not win the twenty twenty election. It isn't just
that CNN is turning over its cameras, its facilities, its
wasted reputation to Donald Trump. It is turning over questioning
(11:40):
Trump to people who are also lying, or deluded or
both people who, if we have any chance of saving
representative government in this country, must be shunned and scorned
and isolated and defeated, as Trump must be shunned and
scorned and isolated and defeated, and not as Chris Lickt
(12:02):
has just done, given their her own national TV show
on what is allegedly a news network and left to
control its editorial content themselves live because clearly there are
to be no journalists present. Caitlin Collins will be there,
(12:26):
but she works for CNN, so after this nightmare, at
best she is as all who work at CNN now,
are ex journalists still ahead? On this edition of Countdown?
(12:55):
I find that Yes, in the first episode of this podcast,
I began to warn you about and criticize to you
what Chris Lickt would do to CNN in the first episode.
This one now, the one you're listening to right now,
This is episode number one hundred and ninety one. Let
me tell you the backstory of when Lickt and I
worked at MSNBC at the same time, and he was
(13:17):
just the henchman for Joe Scarborough's attempt to silence all
liberal voices there. Out of a total of six hundred
thousand dollars raised so far this year. How much of
those campaign contributions would you guess Marjorie Taylor Green has
gotten from inside the district she represents. Now the figure
is lower than that. Nah, it's figures lower than that too.
(13:41):
And what a week Dan Bongino is having. And he
gets fired as a weekend host by Fox. And though
his podcast appears to show up among the six most
popular in this country, it seems that all his listeners
think his name is actually John ben Gino. That's next.
This is his countdown or is it catamount down? This
(14:11):
is countdown with Keith Olberman coming up. It was the
great mystery of MSNBC. How did Joe Scarborough and his
producer ever get their own show on the air when
they seem to spend all their time trying to sabotage
all the other shows on the air. Scarborough's producer's name
(14:32):
was Chris licked First postscripts to the news, some headlines,
some updates, some snarks, some predictions. Dateline Rome, Georgia. First
quarter fundraising is in from the Georgia fourteenth Congressional district.
Marjorie Barney Rubbell Green has raised six hundred and one thousand,
five hundred and eighteen dollars this year the locations of
(14:52):
her top donors seventeen thousand dollars came from Arizona, fourteen
thousand came from Texas. What about inside her own congressional district.
Out of that six hundred and one thousand dollars raised,
she got twenty three hundred bucks twenty three hundred dollars
donated to her campaign inside her own district from six voters,
(15:15):
six people that she actually represents. Only six of them
donated any money to her campaign, which should tell you
something about how they feel there about Barney Rubbell Green.
(15:47):
Thank you, Nancy Faust, Dateline New York nothing worse than
having to give the book advance back. The Daily Beast
reports that's the apparent fate of columnist Miranda Divine, who
thought she had finessed the famous publishing hat trick. Divine
works for The New York Post, owned by Rupert mur
Her book was to be published by HarperCollins, owned by
(16:08):
Rupert Murdoch, and the subject of her book was to
be one of the stars of Fox quote news unquote,
owned by Rupert Murdoch. Unfortunately, that star was Tucker Carlson,
who has been owned by Rupert Murdoch. In an entirely
different meaning of that phrase, the book is on hold.
Dateline Here in the Nation of podcasts, you good news
(16:30):
and bad news for Dan Bongino, the right winger himself
offed from his weekend show by Fox, except nobody remembers
because it was like the day before Carlson got fired.
A report on the fragmentation of the podcasting business by
the website Semaphore identifies Bonginos as one of the top
six most popular podcasts. Sixty one percent of podcast listeners
(16:52):
say they have one podcast they listen to most. Five
percent of those said Joe Rogan, two percent said The
New York Times Daily, one percent said Crime Junkie, one
percent said Ben Shapiro, one percent Dateline but litterally did
they know? And one percent quote the John Banginosh. No,
(17:17):
you know there is a John Bongino or Bongino, but
he's listed as the building supervisor for Smithtown on Long Island.
And if there's a popular podcast about the Department of
Buildings in Smithtown, Long Island, New York, I'm doing this wrong. Therefore,
one must assume that either semaphore has no idea who
(17:37):
Dan Bongino is or his listeners don't and dateline. Johns
Hopkins University. Researchers there say that their research has found
that from two thousand and one through twenty twenty, more
than four hundred and twenty two thousand American adults were
injured and needed treatment in emergency rooms for finger fractures,
(17:58):
shoulder injuries, hit problems, knee problems, traumatic brain injuries, other trauma.
Four hundred twenty two thousand er visits over twenty years,
and each one of them stemmed from accidents occurring while
they walked their dogs on a leash. Still absolutely worth it,
(18:26):
Still Ahead on Countdown. CNN's own media reporter last night
quoted a Trump source who says CNN executives made a
compelling pitch to Trump to get him to, you know,
destroy their own network. The last part of that is
my words, but executives which executives. On the other hand,
if you're chairman and CEO of CNN, it doesn't really
(18:48):
matter who else besides you, You're the one who will
be symbolically defenestrated sooner or later. The backstory of me
and mister Lick coming up first time for the daily
round up with the miss Grants, morons and Dunning KRUGERFFC
specimens who constitute today's worst persons in the world. The
Bronze Greg Abbott won yesterday for being so detached from
(19:09):
reality and humanity that, when offering a reward for information
on the murderer who executed five people in Abbot's state,
he couldn't not dog whistle and refer to the victims
as quote illegal immigrants unquote. That was bad enough. It
turns out at least one was not. Abbot lied. Diana
(19:30):
velaskez Alvarado had permanent resident status here and the government
ID card to prove it. I am surprised Abbot has
not yet reversed himself and now announced how furious he
is that Miss velaskz Alvarado was the victim of an
illegal immigrant murderer. Governor Greg Abbott is a genuinely sick man.
(19:52):
Runner up Donald J. Chump. Politics always makes strange bedfellows,
but the worst Person segment has always made strange bedfellows,
strange bedding, strange mattress covers, you name it. Thus, I
today defending Kayley Mcananey. Uh, I'm surprised the paper is
not burning in my hands. Apparently mcananey had been saying
(20:16):
positive things about Ron DeSantis recently. Then she complimented Trump
on a foreign policy speech, and so day before yesterday
he posted her compliment on social media, but added, I
guess Kaylee is no longer speaking so favorably about Rond
sanctimonious now that his polls are shot. Yes Trump attacked
(20:36):
Kaylee mcinaney. I have no use for Kayley mcananey. I
really don't have any sympathy for Kaylee mcananey. But she
carried her share of water for this turd, and she
risked her share of indictments for this turd. And this
just reminds you dealing with Trump guarantees that sooner or
later he will stab you in the back. Chris licked
(20:58):
but our winner Nikki Haley. It was sure a surprise
to devote yesterday's commentary to why Senator Diane Feinstein had
to resign, only to find out that Ambassador Haley had
tweeted that Senator Feinstein has to resign. My argument, of course,
was and is, we need that decisive vote for judges
and subpoenas on the Senate Judiciary Committee to look into
(21:20):
these six concurrent scandals on the Supreme Court. Surprisingly, that
is not Haley's argument. Hers is an attempt to attack
Trump and Biden kind of sideways by demanding competency tests
for any politician over the age of seventy five. I
don't know how many politicians you've met, or how many
(21:42):
people on TV, or how many people act, but it's
always been my argument that needing to be on stage
or on camera as a performer was a small scale
emotional illness. I mean, if you recognized it, you were
probably going to be okay. Man, that needing to be
on camera and have people listen to your opinions was
a worse form of that same illness, and recognizing it
(22:04):
would help but not exactly cure it. But that believing
your opinion should rule a nation as president was the
most dangerous version of that same illness. So yes, sure,
let's have competency tests for politicians, but not just ones
over the age of seventy five. I think we need
them for any politician of the age of eighteen. Nikki
(22:27):
no I said, competency test, not IQ test. Hayley two
Day's worst person in the world. Oh, ragers still ahead
(22:56):
on Countdown. I already told you this is Chris licked
mission accomplished day for the destruction of CNN. But if
you don't know my backstory with him, why I say
back at MSNBC, we used to think he ate paste
and how we all saw this day coming when he
would destroy a network. I will tell you my backstory
with him next. First in each edition of Countdown to
(23:17):
feature a dog in need you can help. Every dog
has its day to Tennessee and Canella. Canella was a
pop a sweet tempered tan hound, not too big, not
too small, but she was showing early signs of illness,
so her quote humans unquote abandoned her on the streets
For two years. She lived there, suffering all the time
(23:38):
with a parasitic infection called leishmaniasis, also with anemia and
a blood infection, and then House of Strays found her
and saved her. And the good news is, despite two
years of ever worsening illnesses, a series of medications and
antibiotics is getting her passed all three diseases. House of
Strays is collecting donations for Canela at Cudley dot com
(24:00):
and you can find her there or on my Twitter
feeds Canela with two ends, I thank you and Canella
thanks you. Perhaps the most amazing thing about my ten
(24:20):
years at MSNBC was the fact that Joe Scarborough and
his producers, especially his chief henchmen, ever got their own
show on the air. Because nobody I have ever worked
with in radio or television, in sports or news in
the twentieth century or the twenty first ever spent more
(24:41):
time trying to screw with other programs on the same
network than did Joe Scarborough. And until just about the
time I left in twenty eleven, the guy he sent
in to do most of the sabotage for him was
this henchman guy. The reason this should matter to you
now is Scarborough's henchman was Chris Lickt, the new president
(25:04):
of CNN. And if they scoured the nation to find
the worst person to run CNN in a time when
democracy is threatened by one political party and tepidly defended
by another, it's Chris licked I know, I know. You
turn on the TV and you see Joe Scarborough and
you see exactly what I see. A blank, dazed, darting, paranoid,
(25:27):
no soul, stupid check engine light. Look, but if you
don't trust me, trust my scars. My Joey Scars behind
that vapid face is a master saboteur. Early in two
thousand and eight, the late Tim Russert called me and
warned me that the GOP had upped its pressure on me.
(25:49):
He said he had heard from somebody in New York
that somebody in New York was going into the office
of the president of NBC News saying that Joe Scarborough
couldn't get his friend John McCain to come on to
his new Morning show because I was so critical of
McCain on countdown. Tim was not sure it was Scarborough,
but if it wasn't, who else could have gotten in
(26:10):
to see the president of NBC News other than Scarborough
or his executive producer. The evidence for the new CNN president,
mister Licht, being directly involved in interfering with programming to
benefit somebody else's friends or political cronies, was vague in
two thousand and eight, but not at all vague two
years later. Early in January twenty ten, the Republican candidate
(26:34):
to fill the Senate seat of the late Ted Kennedy,
Scott Brown, the former semi nude model was at a
rally when one of his supporters talked about quote shoving
a curling iron up the backside of the Democratic Senate
candidate Martha Cokeley. Scott Brown clearly heard the remark from
the crowd and responded, quote, we could do that. On
(26:57):
January eighteenth, on Countdown, I did a brief commentary about
how unsuitable Brown was for public office. I said he
was quote and irresponsible, homophobic, racist, reactionary, ex nude model,
t bagging, supporter of violence against women and against politicians
with whom he disagrees unquote. I had quotes from Brown.
I had videotape of him disparaging his minority opponent in
(27:20):
a local election to her face at a debate. To
back up what I said. An hour later, Joe Scarborough
commenced a tweet storm against me. Quote Olberman calls Brown
a homophobic, racist reactionary who supports violence against women. How
reckless and how sad it's no longer enough to simply
(27:40):
disagree with someone. I'm sorry, I just fell into my
Scarborough impression. Just as when Beck called a president racist,
this sort of rhetorical extremism must be discouraged it chapened
the debate, end quote and impression. Now there was a
standing rule at MSNBC. You want to criticize another MSNBC personality,
(28:01):
go ahead, have a blast, but it must be on
the air on MSNBC, and the other person must have
an opportunity to reply in real time, in the same
show or in some kind of face to face way.
No hit and run, no Joe Scarborough tweetstorms. If you
(28:22):
criticize them by name or by inference in any other
medium newspaper, interview, radio, social media, you were to receive
an automatic suspension. The next day, January nineteenth, I called
the president of MSNBC, Phil Griffin, and I asked how
long Joe Scarborough's automatic suspension was going to be. Griffin
asked me to come into the office a little earlier
(28:43):
than usual and to go see him. He said he
had already had a meeting about the tweets that morning
with Scarborough's executive producer, Chris Lickt. Griffin explained that Scarborough,
according to Lickt, considered Scott Brown a friend. More importantly,
Chris Lickt warned Griffin that if Griffin followed through and
(29:03):
enforced the suspension rule, Scarborough would have no other option
than to go to the press and tell reporters, especially
reporters at right wing websites like Tucker Carlson's The Daily Caller,
that he Scarborough had been suspended because he Scarborough was
a conservative, but I was a liberal, and that I
(29:24):
and not Phil Griffin ran MSNBC. What can I do?
Griffin was scared. I told him he could fire Scarborough
and Licked because they had just tried to blackmail him,
and eventually he was going to have to fire them
both anyway, but that I knew he would not do this,
and that I knew now that he would not suspend
Scarborough either, And Griffin did not suspend him. Partial score
(29:49):
Scarborough's friends two MSNBC's rules of behavior nothing, but Phil
Griffin did send out a memo to the entire company
insisting that anybody who criticized another MSNBC show or host
in another media would be suspended, except Scarborough, who had
just done exactly that and then threatened his own employers.
(30:12):
On January twenty fifth, Brian Stelter's old blog TV newser
got a copy of Griffin's memo. They wondered why Scarborough
had not been suspended, so they called the MSNBC president
and they printed quote Griffin responds to TV News or quote
an important rule was broken. I spoke to Keith and
he said, in the spirit of teamwork and the free
(30:34):
flow of ideas, he didn't think it warranted punishment or suspension.
I also talked to Joe and he apologized to me.
That's why I made the decision that this didn't rise
to the level of punishment. But I felt it was
necessary to reiterate my long standing policy one hundred percent
bull crap. Reiterate my long standing policy which I just
(30:54):
did not enforce against Joe Scarborough. The whole thing was
totally fabricated. Lickt and Scarborough had threatened to smear their
own bosses in the right wing echo chamber. Should have
been both fired on the spot. In May twenty ten,
Scarborough said something on the air about a Democrat getting
away with not being investigated for something. I forget the details.
(31:15):
I didn't bother to look it up. You can if
you want. Then. Marcos Mulitsus, the editor of the Daily
Coast website and not just a regular contributor to Countdown,
but somebody who had been promoting the show and the
MSNBC brand on that website every day for five years.
Marcos sent a snarky but legitimate tweet questioning Scarborough's credentials
(31:36):
to criticize others who had not been investigated for stuff,
Marcos invoked the staffer who died in an accident in
Joe Scarborough's congressional office. Scarborough then attacked Melitsus on Twitter,
inaccurately claiming Malitzus had accused Scarborough of murder. A few
days after that, I got a phone call from the
(31:57):
MSNBC president, Phil Griffin. And if he got a phone
call rather than a call to come into his office,
you know he was really scared. Griffin told me. Chris
lickt has been in to see me. Joe won't put
up with having Marcus Malitzus on his network anymore. Not
only that, but Lick says many of Joe's friends who
also appear in Dayside and Primetime won't come on if
(32:18):
Marcos Malitsus is permitted to continue here. Chris is insisting
that Marcos be banned from MSNBC immediately. Chris says he's
afraid that if we don't do that, Joe won't come
into work tomorrow. Upon hearing that, I laughed and I
congratulated Phil Griffin on the clear win win he'd just
been given. But Phil was very bad at enforcing MSNBC's rules,
(32:43):
but very good at creating new ones on the spot
to protect Joe Scarborough and Chris Licht and their friends.
I'm banning Malitzus for many further appearances on MSNBC, I said, Phil,
he's a contributor to my show. You are suspending my
contributor who has driven hundreds of thousands of viewers to
count Down at msn NBC, and I don't have any
(33:06):
say in it. You are owned by Joe Scarborough and
Chris lickt. What you now have to worry about is
whether I tell this story on the air tonight or
I just wait and tell it later. Phil now got
conciliatory because he was scared again and said it could
be just a suspension if I cooperated, so I called Marcos.
(33:27):
He said he enjoyed his contributions to Countdown. He also
did occasional appearances on the old Ed Schultz MSNBC show,
and he said if there were chants at resuming them,
he'd preferred to at least try that, so Marcus and
I went along with Griffin suspending Marcus Malitzus, and to
my knowledge, Marcus Malitzus has not been seen on MSNBC since.
(33:50):
I wish I had better notes on some of my
conversations from the two thousand and eight, nine, ten eleven
era about those conversations with the hosts and the producers
of the other shows like Schultz and Rachel Maddows Show,
and even Chris Matthews and Hardball. I must have heard
a variation of this statement a dozen times from these people.
Guess who was in Griffin's office explaining that such and
(34:10):
such as Joe's friend and Phil really needs to make
sure we lay off him. Chris licked It was usually
an expletive in the middle between Chris and Lickt. I
remember one of my producers at the MSNBC version of
Countdown telling me that one of the other producers told
him that Lickt had gone to NBC News President Steve
Cappus with an actual list of Republicans that Mattow and
(34:32):
Olberman needed to stop criticizing because they were Joe's here's
the word again friends, and we were hurting Morning Joe.
What's amazing is that, setting aside the issues of unrevealed
torrid love affairs, when CNN fired its nine PM host
Chris Cuomo, president Jeff Zooker, and senior vice president Alison Gollist,
(34:56):
they fired them in essence because they interfered with CNN
content and practices in order to do favors for people
who were their friend or, in Cuomo's case, they're relatives
at MSNBC. Interfering with MSNBC content and practices to do
favors for friends was seemingly the only reason Chris licked
(35:18):
had a job. So CNN got rid of left wingers
for a terrible violation of journalistic ethics, and then hired
as president a right wing henchman who had committed exactly
the same journalistic ethical problems and who, for his act,
the first one of his career at CNN, killed off
the only national television show that regularly held up Fox News,
(35:42):
Newsmax and all the rest to the world to show
that they were the threats to democracy that they are.
This is CNN. I've done all the damage I can
(36:09):
do here. Here are the credits. Most of the music
arranged produced and performed by Brian Ray and John Phillip Shaneale,
who are the countdown musical directors. All orchestration and keyboards
by John Phillip Shanelle, guitars, bass and drums by Brian Ray,
produced by Tko Brothers. Other Beethoven selections have been arranged
and performed by No Horns Allowed. The sports music is
the Olderman theme from ESPN two, which was written by
(36:31):
Mitch Warren Davis Curtisy BESPN Inc. Musical comments from Nancy Faust,
the best baseball stadium organist ever, and our announcer today
was my friend John Dean. Everything else is pretty much
my fault. So that's countdown for this, the eight hundred
and forty seventh day since Donald Trump's first attempted coup
against the democratically elected government of the United States. Don't
forget to keep arresting him while we still can. The
(36:54):
next scheduled countdown is tomorrow, So till then, I'm Keith Oulderman.
Good Morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck. Countdown
with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
(37:15):
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or
wherever you get your podcasts
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. Chris
Lickt's transformation of CNN into a journalistic whorehouse is now complete.
(00:30):
CNN is now bribing Donald Trump to accept its offer
of a live town hall in Goffstown, New Hampshire, next
Wednesday night, during which CNN says the questions will be
asked by New Hampshire Republicans and undeclared voters, and implies
its only involvement will be to have the former Tucker
Carlson website employee Caitlyn Collins moderate. CNN says nothing about
(00:54):
real time fact checking, nor pushback, nor anything else that
suggests it might exercise even the slightest editorial control over
the program length advertisement It is given to this seditious madman.
But I use that word bribing deliberately, because this is
worse than just sacrificing the charred remains of CNN's credibility
(01:16):
to Trump. There is a quid pro quo here. Hugo
Lowell of The Guardian quotes people close to Trump who
say he has agreed to appear on CNN on the
understanding that CNN could now put more of his campaign
surrogates on its programs. Lowell reports, CNN denies there is
(01:39):
such a deal that it has surrendered even more editorial control.
And it would be nice to believe that, after what
Lickt has deliberately done to destroy that news organization, that
his denial or CNN's institutional denial could be taken seriously.
But neither his nor theirs can be taken seriously any longer. Unfortunately,
(01:59):
it must now be assumed that everything said by someone
from CNN or on CNN, by Chris Lickt, by Wolf Blitzer,
by Jake Tapper, by Jim Shudo, by Jim Acosta, by
the dozens of hard working reporters in the field, by
the producers, by everybody else who works there, not one
of whom quit in protest of this prostituting of their
(02:21):
news brand and their personal reputations, not one of whom
even let out an anonymous squeak of regret to a
real journalist covering this story. It must now be assumed
that everybody who works on or for CNN are all
lying because they work for a liar, and they appear
on a channel dedicated to line which has just sold
(02:44):
the few remaining shards of its soul to the greatest
liar of our time in Trump, CNN is now Fox News.
If there was one consensus among virtually every American news organization,
it was that there was no way any of them
could rationalize treating Trump now the way they treated him
(03:06):
in twenty fifteen, that he was now a proven would
be dictator who repeatedly tried to orchestrate the overthrow of
the duly elected government of this country. Not even Fox
has been repeating its filating of this creature Trump, but
CNN now is now. If Chris Lick and CNN people
there did any thinking about this disqualifying act of reportorial malfeasance,
(03:31):
it was not about learning anything about the catastrophic enabling
of American media of Trump in twenty sixteen, because Chris
Lick is fantastically stupid and reprehensible and amorl and irresponsible,
and he cannot learn a thing now. If he and
CNN did any thinking about this at all, it began
(03:52):
and ended with this sentence, Ooh, Fox's viewers are really
pissed off at them for firing Tucker Carlson. I bet
we can win them over by putting Trump on that
entire fire Fox audience is out there for the taking.
It then took Trump barely two and a half hours
(04:12):
after the CNN announcement to shit all over CNN and
American journalism and the First Amendment and this country, all
of which licked and CNN have betrayed. That two and
a half hours later is when Vanity Fair reported that
it had obtained a recording of Trump abusing, threatening, and
(04:32):
then grabbing the phones of an NBC reporter named Vaughan
Hilliard because he did not like what Hilliard had asked him.
Don't ask me any more questions, Trump snapped at Hilliard
on board a flight to a rally in Texas. The
date was March twenty sixth. Hilliard had asked about Trump's
seeming frustration about the Alvin Bragg investigation here in New York.
That latest attack on the free press by Trump we
(04:55):
already knew about, but new to our knowledge of just
how sick and dangerous and violent Trump is is Vanity
Fair's further report that ten minutes later, this NBC reporter
Hilliard tried to ask Trump more questions about brag. Trump
then grabbed Hilliard's phones, grabbed them out of the reporter's
(05:17):
pile and toss those phones aside. I don't want to
talk to you. Trump is heard saying on the recording
of the event, do you hear me? You're not a
nice guy. When Hilliard persisted, Trump lost it, quoting again,
all right, let's go get him out of here, out
of here, out of here. Has Hilliard again tried to
(05:38):
ask a question? Now, a Trump minion is heard on
the tape saying, Vaughn, We're done. Trump then turned his
attention to the phones that were still recording him. Whose
is this, he asked? Hilliard said it was his. Trump
picked up his another phone. Whose is this? He asked?
Hilliard said the second one was also his. Trump then
threw both phones and quoting Vanity Fair again, out of
(06:01):
his sight, onto the seat next to him. The thud
of one one of the phones hitting a surface can
be heard in the recording. Vanity Fair reports that another
reporter tried to continue the interview. It identifies four other
media members who had been in the airborne gaggle with
Hilliard before Trump had Hilliard expelled. There was an Associated
Press photographer, there were writers from Axios and the Daily Mail,
(06:24):
and there was Brian Glenn of the RSBN streaming propaganda channel.
Brian Glenn is the one dating Marjorie Taylor Green. This
is the kind of conduct towards the media, towards the
First Amendment, towards people, towards America, which Chris Licked just
(06:47):
rewarded by handing over editorial control of CNN to Trump
for at least an hour next week and for untold
guest appearances later. But it must also be noted here
that clearly NBC News also rewarded this scumbag Trump's delusion
of omnipotence. NBC News did not report his aggressive behavior
(07:09):
towards its own reporter, even though it was witnessed and recorded,
and the Vanity Fair article clearly identifies that the recording
it heard was made on one of the phones of
NBC's Vaughn Hilliard. NBC did not defend von Hilliard. NBC
has not offered any explanation of its misconduct in attempting
to appease Trump, but a throwaway line in the Politico
(07:31):
coverage of the Trump CNN News seems to explain what
the hell. NBC News chairman Saysar Conde and NBC News
President Noah Oppenheim are doing. Quote, the former president and
his staff have re engaged the mainstream press corps after
largely shunning them. They have been in talks for sit
downs with several other notable outlets, including NBC. In short,
(08:00):
Conde and Oppenheim and NBC have been doing with Trump
what CNN has been doing with Trump, hoaring themselves out,
except NBC hasn't been quite as successful at it as
CNN has. Yet it will not happen. People don't do
(08:20):
this anymore. You are not rewarded for courage or ethics.
You are suspected. But CNN's irredeemable failure here and NBCs
should be responded to not just by a viewer boycott,
but by mass resignations by its hosts and reporters, and
more practically, by its contributors and its regular guests, for
whom there is bluntly less money on the table. This
(08:44):
is CNN turning over its network to Hitler only after
the world had learned what Hitler really was, and after
the world had been saved from him, and if he
had been scheming and plotting to regain power. But if
you go on CNN after this, you are part of
CNN's collaboration with Trump and the genuine evil he represents.
(09:06):
You are part of that collaboration. Anderson Cooper, you are
part of that collaboration. Christiana I'm on poor, You are
part of that collaboration. Manu Raju, and let us not
delude ourselves as to what kind of collaboration CNN and
Chris Lickt are committing here. Even though veteran Republican political
(09:27):
operative David Frumb quickly observed quote Trump using CNN to
punish Fox for its big tilt to DeSantis, there should
be no diminishing of our contempt of or reaction to
CNN for this journalistic crime. CNN is not responding to
a desperate play by Trump's latest handlers to mainstream him
(09:49):
or to try to sand down the rough inconvenient edges
of insurrection, or otherwise gas light the nation. CNN and
Lickt started this again, quoting Politico. A person familiar with
the discussion said CNN approached the the Trump campaign several
months ago, and talks between the two sides continued on
(10:10):
until Monday, when the plans were locked down on quote,
Chris licked solicited Trump the way a street walker solicits
a client and not the other way around. But there
is a second red flag in that part of the
background to this deal between two devils are the plans
(10:34):
locked down. The phrasing of CNN's announcement about its perfidy
in print and on camera has been consistent, specific, and strange. Quote.
Caitlin Collins will moderate the event, which will feature the
former president taking questions from New Hampshire Republicans and undeclared
(10:55):
voters who planned to vote in the twenty twenty four
GOP presidential primary. Unquote, will Caitlyn Collins ask any questions?
Will she fact check? The verb used to describe what
the hell she's doing there is moderate. While the questioners
are painstakingly identified as Republicans and others voting in the
(11:17):
New Hampshire presidential primary, only voters will ask questions of Trump.
Sixty three percent of Republican voters still believe President Biden
did not win the twenty twenty election. It isn't just
that CNN is turning over its cameras, its facilities, its
wasted reputation to Donald Trump. It is turning over questioning
(11:40):
Trump to people who are also lying, or deluded or
both people who, if we have any chance of saving
representative government in this country, must be shunned and scorned
and isolated and defeated, as Trump must be shunned and
scorned and isolated and defeated, and not as Chris Lickt
(12:02):
has just done, given their her own national TV show
on what is allegedly a news network and left to
control its editorial content themselves live because clearly there are
to be no journalists present. Caitlin Collins will be there,
(12:26):
but she works for CNN, so after this nightmare, at
best she is as all who work at CNN now,
are ex journalists still ahead? On this edition of Countdown?
(12:55):
I find that Yes, in the first episode of this podcast,
I began to warn you about and criticize to you
what Chris Lickt would do to CNN in the first episode.
This one now, the one you're listening to right now,
This is episode number one hundred and ninety one. Let
me tell you the backstory of when Lickt and I
worked at MSNBC at the same time, and he was
(13:17):
just the henchman for Joe Scarborough's attempt to silence all
liberal voices there. Out of a total of six hundred
thousand dollars raised so far this year. How much of
those campaign contributions would you guess Marjorie Taylor Green has
gotten from inside the district she represents. Now the figure
is lower than that. Nah, it's figures lower than that too.
(13:41):
And what a week Dan Bongino is having. And he
gets fired as a weekend host by Fox. And though
his podcast appears to show up among the six most
popular in this country, it seems that all his listeners
think his name is actually John ben Gino. That's next.
This is his countdown or is it catamount down? This
(14:11):
is countdown with Keith Olberman coming up. It was the
great mystery of MSNBC. How did Joe Scarborough and his
producer ever get their own show on the air when
they seem to spend all their time trying to sabotage
all the other shows on the air. Scarborough's producer's name
(14:32):
was Chris licked First postscripts to the news, some headlines,
some updates, some snarks, some predictions. Dateline Rome, Georgia. First
quarter fundraising is in from the Georgia fourteenth Congressional district.
Marjorie Barney Rubbell Green has raised six hundred and one thousand,
five hundred and eighteen dollars this year the locations of
(14:52):
her top donors seventeen thousand dollars came from Arizona, fourteen
thousand came from Texas. What about inside her own congressional district.
Out of that six hundred and one thousand dollars raised,
she got twenty three hundred bucks twenty three hundred dollars
donated to her campaign inside her own district from six voters,
(15:15):
six people that she actually represents. Only six of them
donated any money to her campaign, which should tell you
something about how they feel there about Barney Rubbell Green.
(15:47):
Thank you, Nancy Faust, Dateline New York nothing worse than
having to give the book advance back. The Daily Beast
reports that's the apparent fate of columnist Miranda Divine, who
thought she had finessed the famous publishing hat trick. Divine
works for The New York Post, owned by Rupert mur
Her book was to be published by HarperCollins, owned by
(16:08):
Rupert Murdoch, and the subject of her book was to
be one of the stars of Fox quote news unquote,
owned by Rupert Murdoch. Unfortunately, that star was Tucker Carlson,
who has been owned by Rupert Murdoch. In an entirely
different meaning of that phrase, the book is on hold.
Dateline Here in the Nation of podcasts, you good news
(16:30):
and bad news for Dan Bongino, the right winger himself
offed from his weekend show by Fox, except nobody remembers
because it was like the day before Carlson got fired.
A report on the fragmentation of the podcasting business by
the website Semaphore identifies Bonginos as one of the top
six most popular podcasts. Sixty one percent of podcast listeners
(16:52):
say they have one podcast they listen to most. Five
percent of those said Joe Rogan, two percent said The
New York Times Daily, one percent said Crime Junkie, one
percent said Ben Shapiro, one percent Dateline but litterally did
they know? And one percent quote the John Banginosh. No,
(17:17):
you know there is a John Bongino or Bongino, but
he's listed as the building supervisor for Smithtown on Long Island.
And if there's a popular podcast about the Department of
Buildings in Smithtown, Long Island, New York, I'm doing this wrong. Therefore,
one must assume that either semaphore has no idea who
(17:37):
Dan Bongino is or his listeners don't and dateline. Johns
Hopkins University. Researchers there say that their research has found
that from two thousand and one through twenty twenty, more
than four hundred and twenty two thousand American adults were
injured and needed treatment in emergency rooms for finger fractures,
(17:58):
shoulder injuries, hit problems, knee problems, traumatic brain injuries, other trauma.
Four hundred twenty two thousand er visits over twenty years,
and each one of them stemmed from accidents occurring while
they walked their dogs on a leash. Still absolutely worth it,
(18:26):
Still Ahead on Countdown. CNN's own media reporter last night
quoted a Trump source who says CNN executives made a
compelling pitch to Trump to get him to, you know,
destroy their own network. The last part of that is
my words, but executives which executives. On the other hand,
if you're chairman and CEO of CNN, it doesn't really
(18:48):
matter who else besides you, You're the one who will
be symbolically defenestrated sooner or later. The backstory of me
and mister Lick coming up first time for the daily
round up with the miss Grants, morons and Dunning KRUGERFFC
specimens who constitute today's worst persons in the world. The
Bronze Greg Abbott won yesterday for being so detached from
(19:09):
reality and humanity that, when offering a reward for information
on the murderer who executed five people in Abbot's state,
he couldn't not dog whistle and refer to the victims
as quote illegal immigrants unquote. That was bad enough. It
turns out at least one was not. Abbot lied. Diana
(19:30):
velaskez Alvarado had permanent resident status here and the government
ID card to prove it. I am surprised Abbot has
not yet reversed himself and now announced how furious he
is that Miss velaskz Alvarado was the victim of an
illegal immigrant murderer. Governor Greg Abbott is a genuinely sick man.
(19:52):
Runner up Donald J. Chump. Politics always makes strange bedfellows,
but the worst Person segment has always made strange bedfellows,
strange bedding, strange mattress covers, you name it. Thus, I
today defending Kayley Mcananey. Uh, I'm surprised the paper is
not burning in my hands. Apparently mcananey had been saying
(20:16):
positive things about Ron DeSantis recently. Then she complimented Trump
on a foreign policy speech, and so day before yesterday
he posted her compliment on social media, but added, I
guess Kaylee is no longer speaking so favorably about Rond
sanctimonious now that his polls are shot. Yes Trump attacked
(20:36):
Kaylee mcinaney. I have no use for Kayley mcananey. I
really don't have any sympathy for Kaylee mcananey. But she
carried her share of water for this turd, and she
risked her share of indictments for this turd. And this
just reminds you dealing with Trump guarantees that sooner or
later he will stab you in the back. Chris licked
(20:58):
but our winner Nikki Haley. It was sure a surprise
to devote yesterday's commentary to why Senator Diane Feinstein had
to resign, only to find out that Ambassador Haley had
tweeted that Senator Feinstein has to resign. My argument, of course,
was and is, we need that decisive vote for judges
and subpoenas on the Senate Judiciary Committee to look into
(21:20):
these six concurrent scandals on the Supreme Court. Surprisingly, that
is not Haley's argument. Hers is an attempt to attack
Trump and Biden kind of sideways by demanding competency tests
for any politician over the age of seventy five. I
don't know how many politicians you've met, or how many
(21:42):
people on TV, or how many people act, but it's
always been my argument that needing to be on stage
or on camera as a performer was a small scale
emotional illness. I mean, if you recognized it, you were
probably going to be okay. Man, that needing to be
on camera and have people listen to your opinions was
a worse form of that same illness, and recognizing it
(22:04):
would help but not exactly cure it. But that believing
your opinion should rule a nation as president was the
most dangerous version of that same illness. So yes, sure,
let's have competency tests for politicians, but not just ones
over the age of seventy five. I think we need
them for any politician of the age of eighteen. Nikki
(22:27):
no I said, competency test, not IQ test. Hayley two
Day's worst person in the world. Oh, ragers still ahead
(22:56):
on Countdown. I already told you this is Chris licked
mission accomplished day for the destruction of CNN. But if
you don't know my backstory with him, why I say
back at MSNBC, we used to think he ate paste
and how we all saw this day coming when he
would destroy a network. I will tell you my backstory
with him next. First in each edition of Countdown to
(23:17):
feature a dog in need you can help. Every dog
has its day to Tennessee and Canella. Canella was a
pop a sweet tempered tan hound, not too big, not
too small, but she was showing early signs of illness,
so her quote humans unquote abandoned her on the streets
For two years. She lived there, suffering all the time
(23:38):
with a parasitic infection called leishmaniasis, also with anemia and
a blood infection, and then House of Strays found her
and saved her. And the good news is, despite two
years of ever worsening illnesses, a series of medications and
antibiotics is getting her passed all three diseases. House of
Strays is collecting donations for Canela at Cudley dot com
(24:00):
and you can find her there or on my Twitter
feeds Canela with two ends, I thank you and Canella
thanks you. Perhaps the most amazing thing about my ten
(24:20):
years at MSNBC was the fact that Joe Scarborough and
his producers, especially his chief henchmen, ever got their own
show on the air. Because nobody I have ever worked
with in radio or television, in sports or news in
the twentieth century or the twenty first ever spent more
(24:41):
time trying to screw with other programs on the same
network than did Joe Scarborough. And until just about the
time I left in twenty eleven, the guy he sent
in to do most of the sabotage for him was
this henchman guy. The reason this should matter to you
now is Scarborough's henchman was Chris Lickt, the new president
(25:04):
of CNN. And if they scoured the nation to find
the worst person to run CNN in a time when
democracy is threatened by one political party and tepidly defended
by another, it's Chris licked I know, I know. You
turn on the TV and you see Joe Scarborough and
you see exactly what I see. A blank, dazed, darting, paranoid,
(25:27):
no soul, stupid check engine light. Look, but if you
don't trust me, trust my scars. My Joey Scars behind
that vapid face is a master saboteur. Early in two
thousand and eight, the late Tim Russert called me and
warned me that the GOP had upped its pressure on me.
(25:49):
He said he had heard from somebody in New York
that somebody in New York was going into the office
of the president of NBC News saying that Joe Scarborough
couldn't get his friend John McCain to come on to
his new Morning show because I was so critical of
McCain on countdown. Tim was not sure it was Scarborough,
but if it wasn't, who else could have gotten in
(26:10):
to see the president of NBC News other than Scarborough
or his executive producer. The evidence for the new CNN president,
mister Licht, being directly involved in interfering with programming to
benefit somebody else's friends or political cronies, was vague in
two thousand and eight, but not at all vague two
years later. Early in January twenty ten, the Republican candidate
(26:34):
to fill the Senate seat of the late Ted Kennedy,
Scott Brown, the former semi nude model was at a
rally when one of his supporters talked about quote shoving
a curling iron up the backside of the Democratic Senate
candidate Martha Cokeley. Scott Brown clearly heard the remark from
the crowd and responded, quote, we could do that. On
(26:57):
January eighteenth, on Countdown, I did a brief commentary about
how unsuitable Brown was for public office. I said he
was quote and irresponsible, homophobic, racist, reactionary, ex nude model,
t bagging, supporter of violence against women and against politicians
with whom he disagrees unquote. I had quotes from Brown.
I had videotape of him disparaging his minority opponent in
(27:20):
a local election to her face at a debate. To
back up what I said. An hour later, Joe Scarborough
commenced a tweet storm against me. Quote Olberman calls Brown
a homophobic, racist reactionary who supports violence against women. How
reckless and how sad it's no longer enough to simply
(27:40):
disagree with someone. I'm sorry, I just fell into my
Scarborough impression. Just as when Beck called a president racist,
this sort of rhetorical extremism must be discouraged it chapened
the debate, end quote and impression. Now there was a
standing rule at MSNBC. You want to criticize another MSNBC personality,
(28:01):
go ahead, have a blast, but it must be on
the air on MSNBC, and the other person must have
an opportunity to reply in real time, in the same
show or in some kind of face to face way.
No hit and run, no Joe Scarborough tweetstorms. If you
(28:22):
criticize them by name or by inference in any other
medium newspaper, interview, radio, social media, you were to receive
an automatic suspension. The next day, January nineteenth, I called
the president of MSNBC, Phil Griffin, and I asked how
long Joe Scarborough's automatic suspension was going to be. Griffin
asked me to come into the office a little earlier
(28:43):
than usual and to go see him. He said he
had already had a meeting about the tweets that morning
with Scarborough's executive producer, Chris Lickt. Griffin explained that Scarborough,
according to Lickt, considered Scott Brown a friend. More importantly,
Chris Lickt warned Griffin that if Griffin followed through and
(29:03):
enforced the suspension rule, Scarborough would have no other option
than to go to the press and tell reporters, especially
reporters at right wing websites like Tucker Carlson's The Daily Caller,
that he Scarborough had been suspended because he Scarborough was
a conservative, but I was a liberal, and that I
(29:24):
and not Phil Griffin ran MSNBC. What can I do?
Griffin was scared. I told him he could fire Scarborough
and Licked because they had just tried to blackmail him,
and eventually he was going to have to fire them
both anyway, but that I knew he would not do this,
and that I knew now that he would not suspend
Scarborough either, And Griffin did not suspend him. Partial score
(29:49):
Scarborough's friends two MSNBC's rules of behavior nothing, but Phil
Griffin did send out a memo to the entire company
insisting that anybody who criticized another MSNBC show or host
in another media would be suspended, except Scarborough, who had
just done exactly that and then threatened his own employers.
(30:12):
On January twenty fifth, Brian Stelter's old blog TV newser
got a copy of Griffin's memo. They wondered why Scarborough
had not been suspended, so they called the MSNBC president
and they printed quote Griffin responds to TV News or quote
an important rule was broken. I spoke to Keith and
he said, in the spirit of teamwork and the free
(30:34):
flow of ideas, he didn't think it warranted punishment or suspension.
I also talked to Joe and he apologized to me.
That's why I made the decision that this didn't rise
to the level of punishment. But I felt it was
necessary to reiterate my long standing policy one hundred percent
bull crap. Reiterate my long standing policy which I just
(30:54):
did not enforce against Joe Scarborough. The whole thing was
totally fabricated. Lickt and Scarborough had threatened to smear their
own bosses in the right wing echo chamber. Should have
been both fired on the spot. In May twenty ten,
Scarborough said something on the air about a Democrat getting
away with not being investigated for something. I forget the details.
(31:15):
I didn't bother to look it up. You can if
you want. Then. Marcos Mulitsus, the editor of the Daily
Coast website and not just a regular contributor to Countdown,
but somebody who had been promoting the show and the
MSNBC brand on that website every day for five years.
Marcos sent a snarky but legitimate tweet questioning Scarborough's credentials
(31:36):
to criticize others who had not been investigated for stuff,
Marcos invoked the staffer who died in an accident in
Joe Scarborough's congressional office. Scarborough then attacked Melitsus on Twitter,
inaccurately claiming Malitzus had accused Scarborough of murder. A few
days after that, I got a phone call from the
(31:57):
MSNBC president, Phil Griffin. And if he got a phone
call rather than a call to come into his office,
you know he was really scared. Griffin told me. Chris
lickt has been in to see me. Joe won't put
up with having Marcus Malitzus on his network anymore. Not
only that, but Lick says many of Joe's friends who
also appear in Dayside and Primetime won't come on if
(32:18):
Marcos Malitsus is permitted to continue here. Chris is insisting
that Marcos be banned from MSNBC immediately. Chris says he's
afraid that if we don't do that, Joe won't come
into work tomorrow. Upon hearing that, I laughed and I
congratulated Phil Griffin on the clear win win he'd just
been given. But Phil was very bad at enforcing MSNBC's rules,
(32:43):
but very good at creating new ones on the spot
to protect Joe Scarborough and Chris Licht and their friends.
I'm banning Malitzus for many further appearances on MSNBC, I said, Phil,
he's a contributor to my show. You are suspending my
contributor who has driven hundreds of thousands of viewers to
count Down at msn NBC, and I don't have any
(33:06):
say in it. You are owned by Joe Scarborough and
Chris lickt. What you now have to worry about is
whether I tell this story on the air tonight or
I just wait and tell it later. Phil now got
conciliatory because he was scared again and said it could
be just a suspension if I cooperated, so I called Marcos.
(33:27):
He said he enjoyed his contributions to Countdown. He also
did occasional appearances on the old Ed Schultz MSNBC show,
and he said if there were chants at resuming them,
he'd preferred to at least try that, so Marcus and
I went along with Griffin suspending Marcus Malitzus, and to
my knowledge, Marcus Malitzus has not been seen on MSNBC since.
(33:50):
I wish I had better notes on some of my
conversations from the two thousand and eight, nine, ten eleven
era about those conversations with the hosts and the producers
of the other shows like Schultz and Rachel Maddows Show,
and even Chris Matthews and Hardball. I must have heard
a variation of this statement a dozen times from these people.
Guess who was in Griffin's office explaining that such and
(34:10):
such as Joe's friend and Phil really needs to make
sure we lay off him. Chris licked It was usually
an expletive in the middle between Chris and Lickt. I
remember one of my producers at the MSNBC version of
Countdown telling me that one of the other producers told
him that Lickt had gone to NBC News President Steve
Cappus with an actual list of Republicans that Mattow and
(34:32):
Olberman needed to stop criticizing because they were Joe's here's
the word again friends, and we were hurting Morning Joe.
What's amazing is that, setting aside the issues of unrevealed
torrid love affairs, when CNN fired its nine PM host
Chris Cuomo, president Jeff Zooker, and senior vice president Alison Gollist,
(34:56):
they fired them in essence because they interfered with CNN
content and practices in order to do favors for people
who were their friend or, in Cuomo's case, they're relatives
at MSNBC. Interfering with MSNBC content and practices to do
favors for friends was seemingly the only reason Chris licked
(35:18):
had a job. So CNN got rid of left wingers
for a terrible violation of journalistic ethics, and then hired
as president a right wing henchman who had committed exactly
the same journalistic ethical problems and who, for his act,
the first one of his career at CNN, killed off
the only national television show that regularly held up Fox News,
(35:42):
Newsmax and all the rest to the world to show
that they were the threats to democracy that they are.
This is CNN. I've done all the damage I can
(36:09):
do here. Here are the credits. Most of the music
arranged produced and performed by Brian Ray and John Phillip Shaneale,
who are the countdown musical directors. All orchestration and keyboards
by John Phillip Shanelle, guitars, bass and drums by Brian Ray,
produced by Tko Brothers. Other Beethoven selections have been arranged
and performed by No Horns Allowed. The sports music is
the Olderman theme from ESPN two, which was written by
(36:31):
Mitch Warren Davis Curtisy BESPN Inc. Musical comments from Nancy Faust,
the best baseball stadium organist ever, and our announcer today
was my friend John Dean. Everything else is pretty much
my fault. So that's countdown for this, the eight hundred
and forty seventh day since Donald Trump's first attempted coup
against the democratically elected government of the United States. Don't
forget to keep arresting him while we still can. The
(36:54):
next scheduled countdown is tomorrow, So till then, I'm Keith Oulderman.
Good Morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck. Countdown
with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
(37:15):
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or
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