July 4, 2024 • 44 mins
SERIES 2 EPISODE 207: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: “No one’s pushing me out. I’m not leaving.” The President yesterday on a conference call with his campaign staff, and notably ALSO with Vice President Harris. “Let me say this as clearly and simply as I can: I’m running. I’m the Democratic Party’s nominee. No one is pushing me out. I’m not leaving. I’m in this race to the end…” the President’s fundraising email last night. “I had a bad night… I screwed up,” he told a radio interviewer.
I understand why the president said what he said, and I understand why the email reads as it does, and I understand he may fully or almost fully believe all that and I do NOT understand WHAT they are doing at The White House. The New York Times led a succession of reports that President Biden had told an ally “that he is weighing whether to continue in the race” although, perhaps crucially, after the White House issued a flat denial the Times ALTERED the hook and the story to focus on the idea that “he may not be able to salvage his candidacy if he cannot convince voters that he is up to the job."
I do NOT understand the litmus test the President and his advisers have apparently convinced themselves will be the magic wand. I’ll quote The Times: “Mr. Biden’s allies said that the president had privately acknowledged that his next few appearances heading into the July 4 holiday weekend must go well, particularly an interview scheduled for Friday with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News and campaign stops in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.”
The interview with Stephanopoulos is not live. It is taped. The campaign stops in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are presumably going to follow all the other campaign stops with teleprompters. If someone is telling the President that doing well in more totally controlled, utterly contained, hothouse environments, is going to quell in the slightest the impact that continues to resonate from a week ago in Atlanta, THEY are crazy. And if the PRESIDENT thinks doing what amount to canned events will quell the impact, he is DOOMED.
And between them, if he gets through a pre-recorded sitdown interview, and he gets through two speeches and there AREN’T questions from reporters or at minimum questions from THE CROWD, and he and the campaign boast about these events as some kind of TRIUMPH, then the outcome will be this: he will have forced HIMSELF off the ticket, NOT because of the debate, but because of the week AFTER the debate.
The way to steer out of the skid, the way to find the magic wand, the way to “salvage his candidacy” as the Times put it and “save his reelection bid” as CNN put it and “stay in the race” as ABC put it, was – maybe still IS – to hold a news conference, and I mean call a news conference on 20 minutes’ notice – not one next week at the NATO summit in DC, but NOW, and take whatever they’ve got for you; and it’s to do a town hall somewhere (or as Jim Clyburn says, a series of them), and if you want some comparatively comfortable exercise, that Stephanopoulos interview has got to be LIVE. And it would be best to do these things on consecutive days.
B-Block (19:49) JULY 4TH AND THE BAD PRESS LOU GEHRIG GOT FOR DYING: It's a remarkable reflection on media then and now. We think of the tragedy of the New York Yankees star as having moved 85 years of fans and writers and just humans. Not so. One columnist insisted Gehrig was faking it. Another insisted he had infected his teammates. Funny you don't hear those articles read often. I'm going to do it for you.
C-Block (47:00) GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. No
One's pushing me out. I'm not leaving. The president yesterday
(00:26):
on a conference call with his campaign staff and notably
also with Vice President Harris. Let me say this as
clearly and simply as I can. I'm running. I'm the
Democratic Party's nominee. No one is pushing me out. I'm
not leaving. I'm in this race to the end. The
President's fundraising email last night, I had a bad night.
I screwed up. The president to a radio interviewer last night,
(00:49):
all of us said, we pledged our support to him,
said Kathy Hokel. After twenty governors met with mister Biden
last night. Is he fit for office? Somebody asked him
Wallas on the way out. Yes, we would stand with him.
Wes Moore says he told the President Joe Biden's had
our back. Now it is our turn to have his,
said Gavin Newsom. And I understand what the governor said
(01:13):
and why, And I understand why the President said what
he said, and I understand why the email reads as
it does, and I understand he may fully or nearly
fully believe all of that. And I do not understand
what they are doing at the White House. I don't
understand it. The New York Times led a succession of
(01:36):
reports yesterday. The gist of all of them was President
Biden had told an ally quoting The Times, that he
is weighing whether to continue in the race, Although, perhaps crucially,
after the White House issued a flat denial, the Times
altered the hook in that story and the story itself,
to focus on the idea that, instead, quote, he may
(01:57):
not be able to salvage his candidacy if he cannot
convince voters that he is up to the job, which
sounds like what you do for you wigh whether or
not to continue in the race, all of which I understand.
I do not understand the litmus test the President and
his advisors have apparently convinced themselves will be the magic
(02:19):
wand I'll quote the Times again. Mister Biden's allies said
that the President had privately acknowledged that his next few
appearances heading into the duly fourth holiday weekend must go well,
particularly an interview scheduled for Friday with George Stephanopoulos of
ABC News and campaign stops in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The
(02:44):
interview with George is not live, it is taped. The
campaign stops in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin seem to be the
standard ones, presumably going to follow all the other campaign
stops with teleprompters. If someone is telling the president the
doing well in totally controlled, utterly contented hothouse environments is
(03:07):
going to quell in the slightest the impact that continues
to resonate from a week ago in Atlanta. They are crazy.
And if the President thinks doing what amounts to canned
events will quaill the impact, he is doomed. And between them.
If he gets through a pre recorded sit down interview
(03:28):
that gets cut up into parts for the various ABC
News shows, which is what ABC says it is doing
with mister Biden, and he gets through two speeches and
there are not questions from reporters or at minimum questions
from the crowd, and he and the campaign boast about
all these events as some kind of triumph, then the
(03:49):
outcome will be this President Biden will have forced himself
off the ticket, not because of the debate, but because
of the week after the debate. The way to steer
out of the skid, the way to find the magic
wand the way to salvage his candidacy, as The Times
(04:10):
put it, save his reelection bid, as CNN put it,
stay in the race, as ABC put it, was and
perhaps still is to hold a news conference, and I
mean call a news conference for twenty minutes for now.
I'll be there in twenty minutes. You get there if
(04:31):
you can not a news conference next week at the
NATO summit in DC, but now, and take whatever they
got for you. And then to do a town hall somewhere,
or as Jim Clyburn says, a series of town halls,
and if you want some comparatively comfortable exercise in the
(04:53):
middle of that, that's Stephanopoulos interview has got to be live,
and it would be best to do these things on
consecutive days. I do not understand what they are doing
at the White House. And let me say for the
one thousandth time, I love Joe Biden. When it hit
(05:18):
me Tuesday afternoon, that between the Pelosi remarks about the test,
about the legitimacy of the questions, and the harrowing leaked
Swing state internals, the God Helped Me vibe had just changed,
and the tipping point had been reached. When I realized
that my heart broke. I want Joe Biden to find
(05:40):
the magic wand I want him to be the nominee.
I want him to get up at his second inauguration
and give all of us the finger and become the
first American president to highlight his swearing in by swearing
at everybody. And he can swear at me personally. And
I don't think it's going to happen, because I don't
(06:02):
understand what the hell they are doing at the White House.
In response to a request for comment, White House spokesman
Andrew Bates said that quote it is false to suggest
there is any openness to ending the campaign. End quote
that to CNN, and it's finesse, just enough to give
(06:24):
a little wiggle room, because if the president retires from
the ticket, I am sure the word openness will not
have applied to the process. The polls are awful the
New York Times poll. They were asked, do you agree
with this statement quote Joe Biden is just too old
to be an effective president? Eighty four percent of registered
(06:47):
voters under the age of forty five said they agreed
with that statement. Eighty three percent of Hispanic voters, sixty
four percent of voters sixty five and over in the
horse race. Three other new polls, and the time and
the previous six taken since the debate have shown an
(07:08):
average shift away from Biden of about one and a
half points in a week. But the polls are not
fatal because almost none of that Democratic loss went to Trump,
Despite his opponent having as calamitous a one night event
(07:29):
as any presidential campaign has had since Bob Dole fell
off the stage into the crowd at a campaign rally
in nineteen ninety six, Trump has still only picked up
three tenths of one point since the debate, So the
Democrats could regain that. They could regain the whole point
(07:54):
and a half if Joe Biden proves the debate was
an anomaly. And it's not as if proving that is impossible.
If it is impossible for him, another Democrat could regain that.
On that subject, I have to say, I think we
can rule out the idea that if he leaves the ticket,
(08:15):
he should also leave the White House. Though I watched
the confirmation hearings for Nelson Rockefeller that went on through
half of my senior year in high school, I had
bluntly forgotten and I apologize to you. And new vice
president has to be approved separately by the Senate and
the House. And why would I think the House Republican
(08:37):
majority might stonewall any vice presidential nominee sent in by
a new president Kamala Harris, just because if the post
were to remain open, this weasel speaker Mike Johnson would
then be first in line for the presidency. Anyway, I
have two other things to mention on this fourth of
(08:59):
July that are either relevant or true. The first is
the incident at the White House press room. My friend
Kelly O'Donnell Tim Rosser used to call us well. She
used to call her KO, and he used to call
me KO number two. Kelly o'donald, now president of the
Correspondence Association and still with NBC News, was asking for
(09:22):
the President to himself come to the press room and
tell reporters himself that he was still running, rather than
have the press secretary do it. She was saying this
and doing it very politely and professionally, when she was
interrupted by somebody neither polite nor professional.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
She's absolutely running. Yeah, Well he's saying that, and I'm
I'm sharing with you his view and we would invite
the president to come here and tell noted directly noted
kill one, as you heard on your colleague, the president
of the WHA. That's an appropriate thank you, Kelly.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
A note about that idiot who said if he's a
link that was identified as James Rosen. He used to
be a big deal at Fox and then there was
a sexual harassment saga and they fired him and he's
at Newsmax now. And not to diminish the harassment, but
this may even be more telling about how disconnected from
(10:19):
reality this idiot is. I put him on the Worst
Person's list years ago, something idiotic he said at Fox,
and as I recall, we had two really good nominees
on the list and we needed a third one, and
I kind of stretched to put him in there, because
who the hell is James Rosen? I swear to God.
(10:40):
A couple of days later, I get at my office
an angry, multi page letter from James Rosen explaining what
a brilliant reporter he is and how many awards he
has won and how dare I and Fox has better
ratings than I do? And attached to this multi page, virulent,
(11:01):
venomous letter is his resume Lastly, back to the current
issue and a disease I have discussed here before called
anosagnosia as the legend. David Dunning of the Dunning Krueger
(11:25):
syndrome wrote once, an anosagnosic patient who is paralyzed simply
does not know that he is paralyzed. If you put
a pencil in front of them and ask them to
pick up the pencil in front of their left hand,
they won't do it. And you ask them why, and
they'll say, well, I'm tired or I don't need a pencil.
(11:52):
I don't think David Dunning made that pencil reference randomly.
It mainlines back to the president who in his lifetime
was actually credited with saving the pencil industry in this country,
President Woodrow Wilson. Now, the experts, more than a century later,
are still studying the stroke that Woodrow Wilson suffered while
(12:13):
on his cross country tour to try to sell the
League of Nations to America over the heads of a
disapproving Senate. The deduction has been widespread in the ensuing
decades that whether or not he had the disease earlier,
because evidently he had had strokes earlier. After the stroke
in nineteen nineteen, Woodrow Wilson showed all the signs of anosagnosia.
(12:39):
In the nineteen seventies, the neuropsychiatrist Edwin Weinstein was granted
access to the Woodrow Wilson papers, and he wrote, after
reviewing them carefully quote following his stroke, the outstanding feature
of the president's behavior was his denial of his incapacity.
Denial of illness or anosagnosia literally lack of knowledge of
(13:02):
disease is a Umman sequel of the type of brain
injury received by Wilson. In this condition, the patient denies
or appears unaware of such deficits as paralysis or blindness.
To casual observers, anosegnosiac patients may appear quite normal and
(13:23):
even bright and witty when not on the subject of
their disability. They are quite rational, and tests of their
intelligence may show no deficit unquote, Unfortunately, when you turn
to the subject of his disability, President Wilson was anything
but rational. His secretary of State was a man named
(13:43):
Robert Lansing, and Lancing dutifully summoned the entire cabinet to
a meeting to discuss the illness of Woodrow Wilson. After
the stroke, President Wilson or his wife promptly forced the
resignation of Secretary of State Lancing. Doctors who challenged Woodrow
Wilson about his were dismissed. People who knew him before
(14:08):
his stroke and knew there was a problem and knew
there was a difference were eased out or denied access.
Woodrow Wilson insisted until his death that while yes, he'd
had a stroke, it affected only his walking, and it
affected his walking only a little bit. It's terrifying disease.
(14:32):
One of the supposed allies, and it looks like there
were two of them, and they became sources between them
for the Times and ABC and CNN stories on Joe Biden.
One of the supposed allies insisted the President was not
oblivious to his situation. So I am not saying that
(14:53):
anosagnosia is part of this equation. Also, you do not
have to have anosagnosia or anything else impairing your judgment
to be unrealistic or to underplay your own health troubles
or your own age troubles. I turned sixty five this year,
and the last thing I want to deal with is
(15:14):
the reality that I'm sixty five. I will see myself
in the mirror and go, that can't be right. I'm
twenty two. But as you consider what is happening, as
this unfolds to whatever conclusion it unfolds, two, keep this
or something else like it in the back of your mind.
(15:37):
It may also be in play. Denial is a colloquial term.
Annosugnosia is a medical term. Reality as usual probably lies
somewhere in between. Me as a rapidly aging sixty five
(16:01):
year old, I just wanted a day off. Well, maybe
next year in the Trump re education camp. In the interim, hey,
did you know it's July fourth? I have wanted to
tell the story on a July fourth for a lot
of July fourths. Now. The story is about how the
(16:23):
media in real time mistreated someone famous associated with the
holiday in a way that is now literally unbelievable to
people who still respect the person in question. How newspaper
columnists in nineteen thirty nine and nineteen forty insisted that
the great and tragic Lou Garrick, the baseball player, was
(16:45):
a faking his illness and b had infected all of
his teammates with it. That's next. This discountdown now to
(17:12):
July fourth, and some unexpected lessons, It's still topical. This
is about what happens when you make the mistake of
thinking that the media is not self serving, when you
wrongly believe that it does not look for the negative,
when you foolishly expect it to own up to its
own disasters rather than try to bury them, and particularly
relevant to this last week with President Biden and the media,
(17:35):
whatever the outcome, whatever the truth here, there is a subtext.
If Joe Biden retires from the ticket because he's old,
or he has an illness, or for whatever reason, that
would validate what the writers wrote, especially the writers in
the New York Times and the seemi underbelly to dogged
reporting is reporters like nothing better than to first catch
(18:00):
crap for their story and then have their story proved
true after all, even if it weren't true when they
wrote it. So sometimes they write really really bad stories,
unbelievable stories, stories that should be chiseled into their gravestones.
(18:26):
This is not per se about Joe Biden, nor about politics,
nor about twenty twenty four for that matter. It may, however,
be a metaphor for all of the above. The further
we have gotten from Tuesday, July fourth, nineteen thirty nine,
the further it has been evident that this was probably
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the most poignant day in the history of American sports,
and one of the most poignant days in the history
of America. That day was when sixty one, eight hundred
and eight people crowded into Yankee Stadium in New York
to hear lou Gerrigg say goodbye. He had been stricken
by als, and as much as everybody tried to pretend
(19:09):
it was not a death sentence, or at least not
likely to be a death sentence, it is in retrospect
clear that nearly all the fans knew. It was in
fact so clear at the time that the Yankees and
even officials of the city of New York were insistent
that during the ceremonies between games of that day's doubleheader,
(19:32):
that lou Geig should not make a speech. They literally
believed that the amount of grief in the ballpark among
the fans and the employees and the players would somehow
be too much for at minimum, the mental health of
everybody there. They did not know how that much sadness
(19:58):
could be handled in public. Of course, lou Gereg spoke anyway.
All he did was give one of the bravest and
most moving speeches in human history, one that is repeated
word for word in ballparks and elsewhere every year on
its anniversary, July fourth. So we view that July fourth,
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nineteen thirty nine as a day of grief and sorrow
and love and of that rarest of emotions, of our
shared awareness of the implacability of death, and that our
victory is over death must be temporary and symbolic. We
see through hindsight lou Garrig Day Yankee Stadium, the Bronx,
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New York, Tuesday, July fourth, nineteen thirty nine, as a
unanimous gathering bathed in sympathy and empathy, representing the sympathy
and empathy of a nation. And we do that because
the baseball world and the media have spent the intervening
decades burying the work of those in its ranks in
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nineteen thirty nine who approached lou Garegg's illness as either
prepare yourself as either a fraud or a conspiracy. I
am going to read you in full two articles about
lou Gereg that must be tied for the all time
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worst pieces written in American media history, and on the
list of the worst things ever written for publication in
the English language. The second article is actually not from
nineteen thirty nine. It's from August nineteen forty, and in it,
the sports editor of the New York Daily News all
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but accuses lou Gereg of being what we would now
call a super spreader and speculates that Gereg has infected
all the other Yankee players with his disease. The first
article actually ran in hundreds of American newspapers on the
night of Monday, July third, nineteen thirty nine, but mostly
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the morning of July fourth. It was in a column
distributed by United Press, the precursors to United Press International,
where I made my full time professional debut forty years later,
almost to the day, in July of nineteen seventy nine.
When I worked there, I had never heard about this article.
Throughout the bulk of my career, I had never heard
(22:30):
about this article. I did not know of this article
until the microfilm files of newspapers migrated onto the Internet
in the late nineties, and to this day, I have
never found any indication that the writer ever apologized or
ever admitted his stupidity and coarseness and insensitivity and awfully
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timed glibness. The writer's name was Jack Cuddy Jack Cutty
c Uddy. He began as a news reporter for the
Milwaukee Journal. After World War One, he worked for newspapers
in Chicago, Miami, New Orleans, and then joined United Press
in nineteen twenty six. He was a news reporter. He
(23:12):
helped cover Lindbergh's solo flight over the Atlantic in nineteen
twenty seven, and then in nineteen thirty two they made
him their primary boxing reporter, and they also assigned him
to write columns about all sports that would sent out
on the up wire to all of the newspapers that subscribed.
We don't know how many of them ran this. Their
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sports editors probably found out just how many of their
readers actually read it, because by the time Jack Cutty
wrote this, he had been a national sports reporter for
seven years and a journalist a hard news reporter for
about fifteen before that. This still is what untold readers
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of papers that carried the work of United Press read.
Just hours four lou Geig gave his luckiest man on
the face of the Earth speech in this corner Jack
Cutty Rights on the retirement of lou Gereg by Jack Cutdy,
(24:24):
New York. There's only one thing I see wrong about
the celebration of the fourth of July, and that's the
national shedding of tears about a husky named lou Gereg,
which will be climaxed with a low Garreg Appreciation Day
during the doubleheader between the Yanks and Washington at Yankee Stadium.
(24:44):
The play rights for this gareg business at the stadium
are making the affair so touching. I understand that even
the little boys and gals of our vast land will
be unable to set off firecrackers and things because of
the tears that trickle down upon their matches and punks.
The whole businesiness seems goofy and uncalled for. To me,
(25:08):
I see no reason for pulling a pall over a
holiday when everyone should be having lots of fun and peanuts, popcorn,
cracker Jackson hot dogs. Particularly, I see no reason for
pulling this Yankee publicity stunt about Gerreg, who was the
last man in the world who would go for it.
Unless the Yankee brass Hats and New York baseball riders
(25:30):
snaffled him and forced him into it. Gerrek knows, and
so should everyone else connected with baseball, that the thirty
six year old first Basement of the Yanks was through
with top flight play just as soon as he showed
up at the Yanks training camp at Saint Pete. But
because lou was the iron Horse, the man who had
written into the records that all time mark of two
(25:52):
one hundred and thirty consecutive championship games, his fade out
had to be different from that of the ordinary player. Accordingly,
Greg was sent to a nationally known center of health
investigation to see what was wrong with him. I'll guarantee
that if ninety percent of the men, women, and children
in America were sent to that particular spot, we would
(26:15):
learn that each and all had something wrong with them,
even if it were only halatosis, athletes, foot warts, or
bo I've forgotten exactly what they said was wrong with Greg. Oh, yes,
I do recall that the first hospital report indicated infantile
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paralysis of a very vague breed, But later the experts
explained it wasn't infantile paralysis at all, it was something else.
The ailment had one of those high falutin names that
only people with plenty of dough or prestige can have. Personally,
I don't care what Garrek has got, but I'd like
(26:58):
to exchange my body for his during the next forty
or fifty years, let us say, And I'm pretty sure
i'd do all right. Regardless of the expert's argument over
the Latin or Greek declensions of what lariping Loo may
or may not have, it seems to me that Greg
was merely getting too old to play hell for leather baseball,
(27:20):
and that the scientists of ailments or advertising gave him
a graceful exit. But what really brings water to my
eyes on this particular fourth of July is the plight
of Monty Stratton, a lad who was right in his prime,
only twenty five years old, a lad who never had
the chance to amass the fortune that must be Garrick's
(27:42):
gerreg too old for Championship Baseball will be out there
tomorrow with his mysterious ailment, able to get about as
actively as any one of his piano leg build should
at thirty six. But poor Monty Stratton is hobbling about
the coaches box of the Chicago White Sox with an
artificial leg clinking about where his own right leg should be.
(28:08):
There is no question about what happened to Stratton. He
shot himself in the leg accidentally while hunting down Texas
Way last November, and the right leg had to be
amputated at the knee. At the time this accident happened,
Stratton stood out as one of the best right handed
flingers in the American League. They gave him a Stratton
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Day in Chicago this season and he got about twenty
grand out of it, about the same as his salary
for a year. Gerrig has been named non playing captain
for the All Star Interleague Game at Yankee Stadium a
week from Tuesday, along with tomorrow's Garreg Day. But it
seems to me that poor Monty Stratton could have been
(28:50):
appointed batting practice pitcher at least for the All Star Game.
And if we've got to shed tears tomorrow for some
afflicted ballplayer, let's give them off for poor Monty instead
of for lucky lou Jack Cutty everybody. Twenty three months later,
(29:15):
lou Gereg was dead. Monty Stratton the innocent bystander in
this hindenburg of a sports column who had been on
a possible Hall of Fame trajectory, actually made a comeback
on one leg, and seven years later in the low
minor leagues, he won eighteen games pitching for the Sherman
Twins of the East Texas League. He pitched sporadically thereafter
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until the age of forty one. By then a film
version based on his life had been made. It starred
Jimmy Stewart. Monty Stratton died in nineteen eighty two, seven
years and one week after the writer, Jack Cutty died.
Jack Cutty had himself died thirty four years after Lou
Garrig died, and thirty six years after he had offered
(29:59):
to trade bodies with Lou gereg Not only did mister
Cutty never apparently correct the Garret article, but United Press
apparently did not punish him in any way for having
written it. He continued to cover boxing for UP and
UPI for another twenty five years, and his obituary appeared
in The New York Times. It did not mention his
(30:21):
column about Lou Garrick, but a man named Jimmy Powers
died in February of nineteen ninety five. He too got
an oh bit in The Times, and it too did
not mention his lou garret article, which is, believe it
or not, probably much worse than Jack Cutties. Jimmy Powers
(30:41):
article appeared on Sunday, August eighteenth, nineteen forty. It covered
much of two pages in the New York Daily News.
Powers was sports editor there from nineteen thirty six until
his retirement in nineteen fifty nine. He would eventually grudgingly,
sparingly apologize for this uneducated drek that he wrote. But
I worked with people at the start of my career
(31:04):
who had worked with him. It was only about twenty
years between us. They said. It was clear that he
continued to believe that it was likely that he was right,
and that Greg had somehow infected his Yankee teammates with
some kind of milder version of ALS that cost them
(31:25):
the nineteen forty American League pennant No, I am not
kidding The New York Daily News, August eighteenth, nineteen forty.
The headline read, has Polio hit the Yankees? The Yankees, who,
for the past four years have been one of the
(31:47):
greatest baseball machines in history and almost universally selected to
win the Pennet again have collapsed. Why has the mysterious
polio germ which felled lou Geig also struck his former teammates,
turning a once great team into a floundering non contender.
(32:09):
According to overwhelming opinion of the medical profession, poliomylitis, similar
to infantile paralysis, is communicable. The Yanks were exposed to
it at its most acute stage. They played ball with
the afflicted Garrig, dressed and undressed in the locker room
(32:30):
with him, traveled, played cards and ate with him. Isn't
it possible some of them also became infected. It's hard
to believe mere coincidence can explain away the wholesale failure
of the individuals. In Gerreg's case, one of the most
(32:51):
prominent symptoms was loss of muscular power. The same symptom
can be found in many of the Yanks today. So far,
no one has been able to advance a satisfactory reas
it not without precedent. The possibility of wholesale team infection
(33:12):
is not entirely without precedent. Last fall, the Loyola University
football team was faced with the same menace from infantile paralysis,
A greatly similar disease communicated in the same manner. A
player collapsed in the dressing room was rushed to a hospital,
where it was determined he had developed paralysis. The entire
squad was quarantined and examined. Two other players were discovered
(33:36):
bearing the germ, caught from their unfortunate teammate. Luckily, the
infection was detected at the earliest stage. Injections killed the
germ and brought complete recovery. In the Textbook of Nervous
Disorders by Robert Bing, professor of neurology at the University
of Basel in Switzerland, are found the following pertinent facts. One,
(34:00):
the disease appears in a majority of cases between the
ages of thirty and fifty five. Most of the players
with the Yanks are in their thirties, with the exception
of Gordon, the others are close to them. Two. Among
causes found for the disease are over exposure to cold
and exhausting disease or capital letters over exertion. Ballplayers certainly
(34:28):
are called upon for more than normal exertion, as were
the Yanks at a time when they were exposed to
the germ. Three, Regarding the effect on the legs, where
it probably would be most noticeable in ballplayers for a
comparatively long period of time, the lower extremities remain normal,
except for marked exaggeration of their reflexes. Atrophy of the
(34:52):
leg muscles may not occur until the late stages of
the disease. Thus a player might be able to run
and move as well as ever while the germ was
sapping his strength less noticeable parts such as hands, arms,
and shoulders. Club players worried. Club officials and players have
(35:15):
been worried that such a general infection existed. They took
special precautionary measures to prevent it. Individual drinking cups were provided.
Each player took care to use only his own towel.
Special provisions were made for laundering uniforms and underclothing among
(35:37):
the players. Bill Dickey last winter made a special trip
to the Mayo Brothers Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota for a
thorough physical checkup. This coming winter Atlee, Donald rad Ralph
and several others are considering similar checkups. The fear of
the disease had a psychological effect. It preyed on the
(35:57):
minds of the athletes. Exaggerated minor aches, pains, and ailments,
which ordinarily they would have ignored. Practically, the entire club
had noticed Gareg's symptoms, became aware of and worried about
nervous and muscular reactions they had never been conscious of previously.
Club officials believe they have finally defeated this psychological sword
(36:18):
of damocles. These nervous and muscular reactions could always be
traced to an injury, a slight bump or bruise. This
apparently was the savior for in Greg's case, no injury
could be traced down to explain his early symptoms. However,
the shadow of doubt must still linger, for in the
(36:41):
same volume by Professor Byng is this quote, I have
described a case of traumatic median neuritis which later developed
into a typical lateral ammiothrophic sclerosis. The note the latter
is the medical term for Garrig's ailment, and indicates that
(37:02):
the particular form of paralysis which afflicted Gerrig might develop
from neritis Alderman note no, not quite. Doctor Robert F. Walsh,
Yank physician and surgeon, and Earl V. Painter, Yank trainer,
(37:23):
each nationally famous in his profession, are the men closest
to the physical well being of the players. They answer
emphatically that no such condition exists on the club. Here
is doctor Walsh's opinion. Quote. Though at first there was
a very definite possibility of the entire team becoming afflicted,
there is now no indication of it. Had the disease stricken,
(37:44):
there would have been a noticeable change in the physical
appearance of those to whom the disease had been communicated.
There would not be the slightest doubt remaining that the
stricken individual or individuals were infected. Unquote. Medics support Walsh.
Doctor Walsh's statement is supported by the current medical belief
(38:04):
that the infection will reveal itself within six weeks of
the time of contact. However, with the medical profession admitting
a meager knowledge of the disease, there is the possibility
a lingering means of infection exists, that the disease may
be communicated in a different form, and that it may
be chronic as well as acute, as in Garrig's case. Thus,
(38:28):
the possibility that the Yanks are so infected still exists.
Doc Painter, in an equally definite denial, takes a different slant.
He says quote In view of the circumstances, I can
understand how one might be led to a plausible hypothesis
that the team has been stricken with this disease. However,
(38:49):
I have absolutely no belief in it. There is no
similarity between the symptoms of these individual cases and Garrigs
Lou suffered from deterioration of the nervous system. The trouble
with these other boys is something entirely different. To point
out one example, Ralph suffers from a blood rather than
a nervous disorder. Are Yanks infected? Nevertheless, there is another
(39:16):
point to be remembered. Gerg slipped perceptibly as a ballplayer
about mid season in nineteen thirty eight. Almost a year later,
when he reported for spring training, there was still no
suspicion he was afflicted by this disease. In fact, not
until June, when he visited the Mayo clinic was his
ailment definitely determined. All of which apparently leaves a complete
(39:42):
and final answer still to be made. Something has happened
to the Yanks If Greg passed through a stage in
which the cause of his ineffectiveness was undetermined, isn't it possible?
Such is also the case with many of the Yanks today.
(40:02):
Jimmy Powers article nineteen forty, accompanying that, by the way,
which I have spared you, was a sidebar, a two
or three line analysis of the underperformances of ten specific
Yankee players, ending in bold faced print with this final
(40:25):
word from Jimmy Powers. Can coincidence explain these simultaneous ailments?
Couldn't the polio germ be the common cause? No, it couldn't,
you idiot, that morning that that was published, lou Gegg
(40:49):
who did not have polio, who did not have the
other disease described by doctor Bing. Lou Gereg had amiotropic
lateral sclerosis, and he had two hundred and eighty nine
more days to live. Jimmy Powers was not suspended by
the New York Daily News, not demoted, not fired, not
(41:11):
branded with a scarlet letter a for asshole or anything else.
In fact, he became one of the first sports writers
to move into television as a commentator on NBC's Friday
Night Fights in the fifties. I did not read you
these to spoil your July fourth, nor any other of
your days, nor to darken the commemorations and remembrances of
(41:36):
lou Garrick. I read them just to provide a little
perspective on media and opinion and the strongest, most unstoppable
force in the world, a journalist who thinks he's right
even though everybody else around him begs him to realize
that he's wrong. Occasionally, that motivation gives us things like
(41:56):
Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein and Watergate reporting. Occasionally it
gives us Bob Woodward sitting on tapes of Trump admitting
as it began that COVID would be airborne and a disaster,
sitting on those tapes until Woodward could get himself a
book deal. And occasionally it gives us Jack Cutty implying
lou Gegg has a cold, and Jimmy Powers insisting lou
(42:20):
Gegg had irresponsibly infected his teammates with the disease he
didn't have, but Powers thought he did because part of
the original diagnosis included a reference to another disease with
the word polio in it. I've done all the damage
(42:52):
I can do here, but not as much as Jack
Cutty and Jimmy Powers. And how many Jack Cutties and
Jimmy Powers do we read every day? On power? Politics?
In this country and enjoy July fourth. I've done all
the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening. Countdown.
Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillip Schaneil arranged, produced,
(43:15):
and performed most of our music. Mister Ray was on guitars,
bass and drums, and mister Shaneil handled the orchestration and
the keyboards, and it was produced by Tko Brothers. Other music,
including some of the Beethoven compositions, were arranged and performed
by the group No Horns Allowed. The sports music is
the Olberman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch Warren
Davis Curtisy vespn inc our satirical and pithy musical comments
(43:38):
are band Nancy Faust, the best baseball stadium organist ever.
That's countdown for this the one hundred and twenty fifth
day until the twenty twenty four presidential election. The two
hundred and seventy seventh day since convicted fellon Donald J.
Trump's first attempted coup against the democratically elected government of
the United States. Use the July eleventh sentencing hearing, use
(44:01):
the mental health system, use all of it to stop
him from doing it again. While we still can. The
next scheduled countdown is Tuesday bulletins as the news warrants
until the next one. I'm Keith Olderman. Happy July fourth,
good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck. Countdown
(44:45):
with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you get your podcasts.
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. No
One's pushing me out. I'm not leaving. The president yesterday
(00:26):
on a conference call with his campaign staff and notably
also with Vice President Harris. Let me say this as
clearly and simply as I can. I'm running. I'm the
Democratic Party's nominee. No one is pushing me out. I'm
not leaving. I'm in this race to the end. The
President's fundraising email last night, I had a bad night.
I screwed up. The president to a radio interviewer last night,
(00:49):
all of us said, we pledged our support to him,
said Kathy Hokel. After twenty governors met with mister Biden
last night. Is he fit for office? Somebody asked him
Wallas on the way out. Yes, we would stand with him.
Wes Moore says he told the President Joe Biden's had
our back. Now it is our turn to have his,
said Gavin Newsom. And I understand what the governor said
(01:13):
and why, And I understand why the President said what
he said, and I understand why the email reads as
it does, and I understand he may fully or nearly
fully believe all of that. And I do not understand
what they are doing at the White House. I don't
understand it. The New York Times led a succession of
(01:36):
reports yesterday. The gist of all of them was President
Biden had told an ally quoting The Times, that he
is weighing whether to continue in the race, Although, perhaps crucially,
after the White House issued a flat denial, the Times
altered the hook in that story and the story itself,
to focus on the idea that, instead, quote, he may
(01:57):
not be able to salvage his candidacy if he cannot
convince voters that he is up to the job, which
sounds like what you do for you wigh whether or
not to continue in the race, all of which I understand.
I do not understand the litmus test the President and
his advisors have apparently convinced themselves will be the magic
(02:19):
wand I'll quote the Times again. Mister Biden's allies said
that the President had privately acknowledged that his next few
appearances heading into the duly fourth holiday weekend must go well,
particularly an interview scheduled for Friday with George Stephanopoulos of
ABC News and campaign stops in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The
(02:44):
interview with George is not live, it is taped. The
campaign stops in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin seem to be the
standard ones, presumably going to follow all the other campaign
stops with teleprompters. If someone is telling the president the
doing well in totally controlled, utterly contented hothouse environments is
(03:07):
going to quell in the slightest the impact that continues
to resonate from a week ago in Atlanta. They are crazy.
And if the President thinks doing what amounts to canned
events will quaill the impact, he is doomed. And between them.
If he gets through a pre recorded sit down interview
(03:28):
that gets cut up into parts for the various ABC
News shows, which is what ABC says it is doing
with mister Biden, and he gets through two speeches and
there are not questions from reporters or at minimum questions
from the crowd, and he and the campaign boast about
all these events as some kind of triumph, then the
(03:49):
outcome will be this President Biden will have forced himself
off the ticket, not because of the debate, but because
of the week after the debate. The way to steer
out of the skid, the way to find the magic
wand the way to salvage his candidacy, as The Times
(04:10):
put it, save his reelection bid, as CNN put it,
stay in the race, as ABC put it, was and
perhaps still is to hold a news conference, and I
mean call a news conference for twenty minutes for now.
I'll be there in twenty minutes. You get there if
(04:31):
you can not a news conference next week at the
NATO summit in DC, but now, and take whatever they
got for you. And then to do a town hall somewhere,
or as Jim Clyburn says, a series of town halls,
and if you want some comparatively comfortable exercise in the
(04:53):
middle of that, that's Stephanopoulos interview has got to be live,
and it would be best to do these things on
consecutive days. I do not understand what they are doing
at the White House. And let me say for the
one thousandth time, I love Joe Biden. When it hit
(05:18):
me Tuesday afternoon, that between the Pelosi remarks about the test,
about the legitimacy of the questions, and the harrowing leaked
Swing state internals, the God Helped Me vibe had just changed,
and the tipping point had been reached. When I realized
that my heart broke. I want Joe Biden to find
(05:40):
the magic wand I want him to be the nominee.
I want him to get up at his second inauguration
and give all of us the finger and become the
first American president to highlight his swearing in by swearing
at everybody. And he can swear at me personally. And
I don't think it's going to happen, because I don't
(06:02):
understand what the hell they are doing at the White House.
In response to a request for comment, White House spokesman
Andrew Bates said that quote it is false to suggest
there is any openness to ending the campaign. End quote
that to CNN, and it's finesse, just enough to give
(06:24):
a little wiggle room, because if the president retires from
the ticket, I am sure the word openness will not
have applied to the process. The polls are awful the
New York Times poll. They were asked, do you agree
with this statement quote Joe Biden is just too old
to be an effective president? Eighty four percent of registered
(06:47):
voters under the age of forty five said they agreed
with that statement. Eighty three percent of Hispanic voters, sixty
four percent of voters sixty five and over in the
horse race. Three other new polls, and the time and
the previous six taken since the debate have shown an
(07:08):
average shift away from Biden of about one and a
half points in a week. But the polls are not
fatal because almost none of that Democratic loss went to Trump,
Despite his opponent having as calamitous a one night event
(07:29):
as any presidential campaign has had since Bob Dole fell
off the stage into the crowd at a campaign rally
in nineteen ninety six, Trump has still only picked up
three tenths of one point since the debate, So the
Democrats could regain that. They could regain the whole point
(07:54):
and a half if Joe Biden proves the debate was
an anomaly. And it's not as if proving that is impossible.
If it is impossible for him, another Democrat could regain that.
On that subject, I have to say, I think we
can rule out the idea that if he leaves the ticket,
(08:15):
he should also leave the White House. Though I watched
the confirmation hearings for Nelson Rockefeller that went on through
half of my senior year in high school, I had
bluntly forgotten and I apologize to you. And new vice
president has to be approved separately by the Senate and
the House. And why would I think the House Republican
(08:37):
majority might stonewall any vice presidential nominee sent in by
a new president Kamala Harris, just because if the post
were to remain open, this weasel speaker Mike Johnson would
then be first in line for the presidency. Anyway, I
have two other things to mention on this fourth of
(08:59):
July that are either relevant or true. The first is
the incident at the White House press room. My friend
Kelly O'Donnell Tim Rosser used to call us well. She
used to call her KO, and he used to call
me KO number two. Kelly o'donald, now president of the
Correspondence Association and still with NBC News, was asking for
(09:22):
the President to himself come to the press room and
tell reporters himself that he was still running, rather than
have the press secretary do it. She was saying this
and doing it very politely and professionally, when she was
interrupted by somebody neither polite nor professional.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
She's absolutely running. Yeah, Well he's saying that, and I'm
I'm sharing with you his view and we would invite
the president to come here and tell noted directly noted
kill one, as you heard on your colleague, the president
of the WHA. That's an appropriate thank you, Kelly.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
A note about that idiot who said if he's a
link that was identified as James Rosen. He used to
be a big deal at Fox and then there was
a sexual harassment saga and they fired him and he's
at Newsmax now. And not to diminish the harassment, but
this may even be more telling about how disconnected from
(10:19):
reality this idiot is. I put him on the Worst
Person's list years ago, something idiotic he said at Fox,
and as I recall, we had two really good nominees
on the list and we needed a third one, and
I kind of stretched to put him in there, because
who the hell is James Rosen? I swear to God.
(10:40):
A couple of days later, I get at my office
an angry, multi page letter from James Rosen explaining what
a brilliant reporter he is and how many awards he
has won and how dare I and Fox has better
ratings than I do? And attached to this multi page, virulent,
(11:01):
venomous letter is his resume Lastly, back to the current
issue and a disease I have discussed here before called
anosagnosia as the legend. David Dunning of the Dunning Krueger
(11:25):
syndrome wrote once, an anosagnosic patient who is paralyzed simply
does not know that he is paralyzed. If you put
a pencil in front of them and ask them to
pick up the pencil in front of their left hand,
they won't do it. And you ask them why, and
they'll say, well, I'm tired or I don't need a pencil.
(11:52):
I don't think David Dunning made that pencil reference randomly.
It mainlines back to the president who in his lifetime
was actually credited with saving the pencil industry in this country,
President Woodrow Wilson. Now, the experts, more than a century later,
are still studying the stroke that Woodrow Wilson suffered while
(12:13):
on his cross country tour to try to sell the
League of Nations to America over the heads of a
disapproving Senate. The deduction has been widespread in the ensuing
decades that whether or not he had the disease earlier,
because evidently he had had strokes earlier. After the stroke
in nineteen nineteen, Woodrow Wilson showed all the signs of anosagnosia.
(12:39):
In the nineteen seventies, the neuropsychiatrist Edwin Weinstein was granted
access to the Woodrow Wilson papers, and he wrote, after
reviewing them carefully quote following his stroke, the outstanding feature
of the president's behavior was his denial of his incapacity.
Denial of illness or anosagnosia literally lack of knowledge of
(13:02):
disease is a Umman sequel of the type of brain
injury received by Wilson. In this condition, the patient denies
or appears unaware of such deficits as paralysis or blindness.
To casual observers, anosegnosiac patients may appear quite normal and
(13:23):
even bright and witty when not on the subject of
their disability. They are quite rational, and tests of their
intelligence may show no deficit unquote, Unfortunately, when you turn
to the subject of his disability, President Wilson was anything
but rational. His secretary of State was a man named
(13:43):
Robert Lansing, and Lancing dutifully summoned the entire cabinet to
a meeting to discuss the illness of Woodrow Wilson. After
the stroke, President Wilson or his wife promptly forced the
resignation of Secretary of State Lancing. Doctors who challenged Woodrow
Wilson about his were dismissed. People who knew him before
(14:08):
his stroke and knew there was a problem and knew
there was a difference were eased out or denied access.
Woodrow Wilson insisted until his death that while yes, he'd
had a stroke, it affected only his walking, and it
affected his walking only a little bit. It's terrifying disease.
(14:32):
One of the supposed allies, and it looks like there
were two of them, and they became sources between them
for the Times and ABC and CNN stories on Joe Biden.
One of the supposed allies insisted the President was not
oblivious to his situation. So I am not saying that
(14:53):
anosagnosia is part of this equation. Also, you do not
have to have anosagnosia or anything else impairing your judgment
to be unrealistic or to underplay your own health troubles
or your own age troubles. I turned sixty five this year,
and the last thing I want to deal with is
(15:14):
the reality that I'm sixty five. I will see myself
in the mirror and go, that can't be right. I'm
twenty two. But as you consider what is happening, as
this unfolds to whatever conclusion it unfolds, two, keep this
or something else like it in the back of your mind.
(15:37):
It may also be in play. Denial is a colloquial term.
Annosugnosia is a medical term. Reality as usual probably lies
somewhere in between. Me as a rapidly aging sixty five
(16:01):
year old, I just wanted a day off. Well, maybe
next year in the Trump re education camp. In the interim, hey,
did you know it's July fourth? I have wanted to
tell the story on a July fourth for a lot
of July fourths. Now. The story is about how the
(16:23):
media in real time mistreated someone famous associated with the
holiday in a way that is now literally unbelievable to
people who still respect the person in question. How newspaper
columnists in nineteen thirty nine and nineteen forty insisted that
the great and tragic Lou Garrick, the baseball player, was
(16:45):
a faking his illness and b had infected all of
his teammates with it. That's next. This discountdown now to
(17:12):
July fourth, and some unexpected lessons, It's still topical. This
is about what happens when you make the mistake of
thinking that the media is not self serving, when you
wrongly believe that it does not look for the negative,
when you foolishly expect it to own up to its
own disasters rather than try to bury them, and particularly
relevant to this last week with President Biden and the media,
(17:35):
whatever the outcome, whatever the truth here, there is a subtext.
If Joe Biden retires from the ticket because he's old,
or he has an illness, or for whatever reason, that
would validate what the writers wrote, especially the writers in
the New York Times and the seemi underbelly to dogged
reporting is reporters like nothing better than to first catch
(18:00):
crap for their story and then have their story proved
true after all, even if it weren't true when they
wrote it. So sometimes they write really really bad stories,
unbelievable stories, stories that should be chiseled into their gravestones.
(18:26):
This is not per se about Joe Biden, nor about politics,
nor about twenty twenty four for that matter. It may, however,
be a metaphor for all of the above. The further
we have gotten from Tuesday, July fourth, nineteen thirty nine,
the further it has been evident that this was probably
(18:47):
the most poignant day in the history of American sports,
and one of the most poignant days in the history
of America. That day was when sixty one, eight hundred
and eight people crowded into Yankee Stadium in New York
to hear lou Gerrigg say goodbye. He had been stricken
by als, and as much as everybody tried to pretend
(19:09):
it was not a death sentence, or at least not
likely to be a death sentence, it is in retrospect
clear that nearly all the fans knew. It was in
fact so clear at the time that the Yankees and
even officials of the city of New York were insistent
that during the ceremonies between games of that day's doubleheader,
(19:32):
that lou Geig should not make a speech. They literally
believed that the amount of grief in the ballpark among
the fans and the employees and the players would somehow
be too much for at minimum, the mental health of
everybody there. They did not know how that much sadness
(19:58):
could be handled in public. Of course, lou Gereg spoke anyway.
All he did was give one of the bravest and
most moving speeches in human history, one that is repeated
word for word in ballparks and elsewhere every year on
its anniversary, July fourth. So we view that July fourth,
(20:20):
nineteen thirty nine as a day of grief and sorrow
and love and of that rarest of emotions, of our
shared awareness of the implacability of death, and that our
victory is over death must be temporary and symbolic. We
see through hindsight lou Garrig Day Yankee Stadium, the Bronx,
(20:42):
New York, Tuesday, July fourth, nineteen thirty nine, as a
unanimous gathering bathed in sympathy and empathy, representing the sympathy
and empathy of a nation. And we do that because
the baseball world and the media have spent the intervening
decades burying the work of those in its ranks in
(21:06):
nineteen thirty nine who approached lou Garegg's illness as either
prepare yourself as either a fraud or a conspiracy. I
am going to read you in full two articles about
lou Gereg that must be tied for the all time
(21:26):
worst pieces written in American media history, and on the
list of the worst things ever written for publication in
the English language. The second article is actually not from
nineteen thirty nine. It's from August nineteen forty, and in it,
the sports editor of the New York Daily News all
(21:46):
but accuses lou Gereg of being what we would now
call a super spreader and speculates that Gereg has infected
all the other Yankee players with his disease. The first
article actually ran in hundreds of American newspapers on the
night of Monday, July third, nineteen thirty nine, but mostly
(22:08):
the morning of July fourth. It was in a column
distributed by United Press, the precursors to United Press International,
where I made my full time professional debut forty years later,
almost to the day, in July of nineteen seventy nine.
When I worked there, I had never heard about this article.
Throughout the bulk of my career, I had never heard
(22:30):
about this article. I did not know of this article
until the microfilm files of newspapers migrated onto the Internet
in the late nineties, and to this day, I have
never found any indication that the writer ever apologized or
ever admitted his stupidity and coarseness and insensitivity and awfully
(22:52):
timed glibness. The writer's name was Jack Cuddy Jack Cutty
c Uddy. He began as a news reporter for the
Milwaukee Journal. After World War One, he worked for newspapers
in Chicago, Miami, New Orleans, and then joined United Press
in nineteen twenty six. He was a news reporter. He
(23:12):
helped cover Lindbergh's solo flight over the Atlantic in nineteen
twenty seven, and then in nineteen thirty two they made
him their primary boxing reporter, and they also assigned him
to write columns about all sports that would sent out
on the up wire to all of the newspapers that subscribed.
We don't know how many of them ran this. Their
(23:36):
sports editors probably found out just how many of their
readers actually read it, because by the time Jack Cutty
wrote this, he had been a national sports reporter for
seven years and a journalist a hard news reporter for
about fifteen before that. This still is what untold readers
(23:59):
of papers that carried the work of United Press read.
Just hours four lou Geig gave his luckiest man on
the face of the Earth speech in this corner Jack
Cutty Rights on the retirement of lou Gereg by Jack Cutdy,
(24:24):
New York. There's only one thing I see wrong about
the celebration of the fourth of July, and that's the
national shedding of tears about a husky named lou Gereg,
which will be climaxed with a low Garreg Appreciation Day
during the doubleheader between the Yanks and Washington at Yankee Stadium.
(24:44):
The play rights for this gareg business at the stadium
are making the affair so touching. I understand that even
the little boys and gals of our vast land will
be unable to set off firecrackers and things because of
the tears that trickle down upon their matches and punks.
The whole businesiness seems goofy and uncalled for. To me,
(25:08):
I see no reason for pulling a pall over a
holiday when everyone should be having lots of fun and peanuts, popcorn,
cracker Jackson hot dogs. Particularly, I see no reason for
pulling this Yankee publicity stunt about Gerreg, who was the
last man in the world who would go for it.
Unless the Yankee brass Hats and New York baseball riders
(25:30):
snaffled him and forced him into it. Gerrek knows, and
so should everyone else connected with baseball, that the thirty
six year old first Basement of the Yanks was through
with top flight play just as soon as he showed
up at the Yanks training camp at Saint Pete. But
because lou was the iron Horse, the man who had
written into the records that all time mark of two
(25:52):
one hundred and thirty consecutive championship games, his fade out
had to be different from that of the ordinary player. Accordingly,
Greg was sent to a nationally known center of health
investigation to see what was wrong with him. I'll guarantee
that if ninety percent of the men, women, and children
in America were sent to that particular spot, we would
(26:15):
learn that each and all had something wrong with them,
even if it were only halatosis, athletes, foot warts, or
bo I've forgotten exactly what they said was wrong with Greg. Oh, yes,
I do recall that the first hospital report indicated infantile
(26:35):
paralysis of a very vague breed, But later the experts
explained it wasn't infantile paralysis at all, it was something else.
The ailment had one of those high falutin names that
only people with plenty of dough or prestige can have. Personally,
I don't care what Garrek has got, but I'd like
(26:58):
to exchange my body for his during the next forty
or fifty years, let us say, And I'm pretty sure
i'd do all right. Regardless of the expert's argument over
the Latin or Greek declensions of what lariping Loo may
or may not have, it seems to me that Greg
was merely getting too old to play hell for leather baseball,
(27:20):
and that the scientists of ailments or advertising gave him
a graceful exit. But what really brings water to my
eyes on this particular fourth of July is the plight
of Monty Stratton, a lad who was right in his prime,
only twenty five years old, a lad who never had
the chance to amass the fortune that must be Garrick's
(27:42):
gerreg too old for Championship Baseball will be out there
tomorrow with his mysterious ailment, able to get about as
actively as any one of his piano leg build should
at thirty six. But poor Monty Stratton is hobbling about
the coaches box of the Chicago White Sox with an
artificial leg clinking about where his own right leg should be.
(28:08):
There is no question about what happened to Stratton. He
shot himself in the leg accidentally while hunting down Texas
Way last November, and the right leg had to be
amputated at the knee. At the time this accident happened,
Stratton stood out as one of the best right handed
flingers in the American League. They gave him a Stratton
(28:28):
Day in Chicago this season and he got about twenty
grand out of it, about the same as his salary
for a year. Gerrig has been named non playing captain
for the All Star Interleague Game at Yankee Stadium a
week from Tuesday, along with tomorrow's Garreg Day. But it
seems to me that poor Monty Stratton could have been
(28:50):
appointed batting practice pitcher at least for the All Star Game.
And if we've got to shed tears tomorrow for some
afflicted ballplayer, let's give them off for poor Monty instead
of for lucky lou Jack Cutty everybody. Twenty three months later,
(29:15):
lou Gereg was dead. Monty Stratton the innocent bystander in
this hindenburg of a sports column who had been on
a possible Hall of Fame trajectory, actually made a comeback
on one leg, and seven years later in the low
minor leagues, he won eighteen games pitching for the Sherman
Twins of the East Texas League. He pitched sporadically thereafter
(29:37):
until the age of forty one. By then a film
version based on his life had been made. It starred
Jimmy Stewart. Monty Stratton died in nineteen eighty two, seven
years and one week after the writer, Jack Cutty died.
Jack Cutty had himself died thirty four years after Lou
Garrig died, and thirty six years after he had offered
(29:59):
to trade bodies with Lou gereg Not only did mister
Cutty never apparently correct the Garret article, but United Press
apparently did not punish him in any way for having
written it. He continued to cover boxing for UP and
UPI for another twenty five years, and his obituary appeared
in The New York Times. It did not mention his
(30:21):
column about Lou Garrick, but a man named Jimmy Powers
died in February of nineteen ninety five. He too got
an oh bit in The Times, and it too did
not mention his lou garret article, which is, believe it
or not, probably much worse than Jack Cutties. Jimmy Powers
(30:41):
article appeared on Sunday, August eighteenth, nineteen forty. It covered
much of two pages in the New York Daily News.
Powers was sports editor there from nineteen thirty six until
his retirement in nineteen fifty nine. He would eventually grudgingly,
sparingly apologize for this uneducated drek that he wrote. But
I worked with people at the start of my career
(31:04):
who had worked with him. It was only about twenty
years between us. They said. It was clear that he
continued to believe that it was likely that he was right,
and that Greg had somehow infected his Yankee teammates with
some kind of milder version of ALS that cost them
(31:25):
the nineteen forty American League pennant No, I am not
kidding The New York Daily News, August eighteenth, nineteen forty.
The headline read, has Polio hit the Yankees? The Yankees, who,
for the past four years have been one of the
(31:47):
greatest baseball machines in history and almost universally selected to
win the Pennet again have collapsed. Why has the mysterious
polio germ which felled lou Geig also struck his former teammates,
turning a once great team into a floundering non contender.
(32:09):
According to overwhelming opinion of the medical profession, poliomylitis, similar
to infantile paralysis, is communicable. The Yanks were exposed to
it at its most acute stage. They played ball with
the afflicted Garrig, dressed and undressed in the locker room
(32:30):
with him, traveled, played cards and ate with him. Isn't
it possible some of them also became infected. It's hard
to believe mere coincidence can explain away the wholesale failure
of the individuals. In Gerreg's case, one of the most
(32:51):
prominent symptoms was loss of muscular power. The same symptom
can be found in many of the Yanks today. So far,
no one has been able to advance a satisfactory reas
it not without precedent. The possibility of wholesale team infection
(33:12):
is not entirely without precedent. Last fall, the Loyola University
football team was faced with the same menace from infantile paralysis,
A greatly similar disease communicated in the same manner. A
player collapsed in the dressing room was rushed to a hospital,
where it was determined he had developed paralysis. The entire
squad was quarantined and examined. Two other players were discovered
(33:36):
bearing the germ, caught from their unfortunate teammate. Luckily, the
infection was detected at the earliest stage. Injections killed the
germ and brought complete recovery. In the Textbook of Nervous
Disorders by Robert Bing, professor of neurology at the University
of Basel in Switzerland, are found the following pertinent facts. One,
(34:00):
the disease appears in a majority of cases between the
ages of thirty and fifty five. Most of the players
with the Yanks are in their thirties, with the exception
of Gordon, the others are close to them. Two. Among
causes found for the disease are over exposure to cold
and exhausting disease or capital letters over exertion. Ballplayers certainly
(34:28):
are called upon for more than normal exertion, as were
the Yanks at a time when they were exposed to
the germ. Three, Regarding the effect on the legs, where
it probably would be most noticeable in ballplayers for a
comparatively long period of time, the lower extremities remain normal,
except for marked exaggeration of their reflexes. Atrophy of the
(34:52):
leg muscles may not occur until the late stages of
the disease. Thus a player might be able to run
and move as well as ever while the germ was
sapping his strength less noticeable parts such as hands, arms,
and shoulders. Club players worried. Club officials and players have
(35:15):
been worried that such a general infection existed. They took
special precautionary measures to prevent it. Individual drinking cups were provided.
Each player took care to use only his own towel.
Special provisions were made for laundering uniforms and underclothing among
(35:37):
the players. Bill Dickey last winter made a special trip
to the Mayo Brothers Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota for a
thorough physical checkup. This coming winter Atlee, Donald rad Ralph
and several others are considering similar checkups. The fear of
the disease had a psychological effect. It preyed on the
(35:57):
minds of the athletes. Exaggerated minor aches, pains, and ailments,
which ordinarily they would have ignored. Practically, the entire club
had noticed Gareg's symptoms, became aware of and worried about
nervous and muscular reactions they had never been conscious of previously.
Club officials believe they have finally defeated this psychological sword
(36:18):
of damocles. These nervous and muscular reactions could always be
traced to an injury, a slight bump or bruise. This
apparently was the savior for in Greg's case, no injury
could be traced down to explain his early symptoms. However,
the shadow of doubt must still linger, for in the
(36:41):
same volume by Professor Byng is this quote, I have
described a case of traumatic median neuritis which later developed
into a typical lateral ammiothrophic sclerosis. The note the latter
is the medical term for Garrig's ailment, and indicates that
(37:02):
the particular form of paralysis which afflicted Gerrig might develop
from neritis Alderman note no, not quite. Doctor Robert F. Walsh,
Yank physician and surgeon, and Earl V. Painter, Yank trainer,
(37:23):
each nationally famous in his profession, are the men closest
to the physical well being of the players. They answer
emphatically that no such condition exists on the club. Here
is doctor Walsh's opinion. Quote. Though at first there was
a very definite possibility of the entire team becoming afflicted,
there is now no indication of it. Had the disease stricken,
(37:44):
there would have been a noticeable change in the physical
appearance of those to whom the disease had been communicated.
There would not be the slightest doubt remaining that the
stricken individual or individuals were infected. Unquote. Medics support Walsh.
Doctor Walsh's statement is supported by the current medical belief
(38:04):
that the infection will reveal itself within six weeks of
the time of contact. However, with the medical profession admitting
a meager knowledge of the disease, there is the possibility
a lingering means of infection exists, that the disease may
be communicated in a different form, and that it may
be chronic as well as acute, as in Garrig's case. Thus,
(38:28):
the possibility that the Yanks are so infected still exists.
Doc Painter, in an equally definite denial, takes a different slant.
He says quote In view of the circumstances, I can
understand how one might be led to a plausible hypothesis
that the team has been stricken with this disease. However,
(38:49):
I have absolutely no belief in it. There is no
similarity between the symptoms of these individual cases and Garrigs
Lou suffered from deterioration of the nervous system. The trouble
with these other boys is something entirely different. To point
out one example, Ralph suffers from a blood rather than
a nervous disorder. Are Yanks infected? Nevertheless, there is another
(39:16):
point to be remembered. Gerg slipped perceptibly as a ballplayer
about mid season in nineteen thirty eight. Almost a year later,
when he reported for spring training, there was still no
suspicion he was afflicted by this disease. In fact, not
until June, when he visited the Mayo clinic was his
ailment definitely determined. All of which apparently leaves a complete
(39:42):
and final answer still to be made. Something has happened
to the Yanks If Greg passed through a stage in
which the cause of his ineffectiveness was undetermined, isn't it possible?
Such is also the case with many of the Yanks today.
(40:02):
Jimmy Powers article nineteen forty, accompanying that, by the way,
which I have spared you, was a sidebar, a two
or three line analysis of the underperformances of ten specific
Yankee players, ending in bold faced print with this final
(40:25):
word from Jimmy Powers. Can coincidence explain these simultaneous ailments?
Couldn't the polio germ be the common cause? No, it couldn't,
you idiot, that morning that that was published, lou Gegg
(40:49):
who did not have polio, who did not have the
other disease described by doctor Bing. Lou Gereg had amiotropic
lateral sclerosis, and he had two hundred and eighty nine
more days to live. Jimmy Powers was not suspended by
the New York Daily News, not demoted, not fired, not
(41:11):
branded with a scarlet letter a for asshole or anything else.
In fact, he became one of the first sports writers
to move into television as a commentator on NBC's Friday
Night Fights in the fifties. I did not read you
these to spoil your July fourth, nor any other of
your days, nor to darken the commemorations and remembrances of
(41:36):
lou Garrick. I read them just to provide a little
perspective on media and opinion and the strongest, most unstoppable
force in the world, a journalist who thinks he's right
even though everybody else around him begs him to realize
that he's wrong. Occasionally, that motivation gives us things like
(41:56):
Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein and Watergate reporting. Occasionally it
gives us Bob Woodward sitting on tapes of Trump admitting
as it began that COVID would be airborne and a disaster,
sitting on those tapes until Woodward could get himself a
book deal. And occasionally it gives us Jack Cutty implying
lou Gegg has a cold, and Jimmy Powers insisting lou
(42:20):
Gegg had irresponsibly infected his teammates with the disease he
didn't have, but Powers thought he did because part of
the original diagnosis included a reference to another disease with
the word polio in it. I've done all the damage
(42:52):
I can do here, but not as much as Jack
Cutty and Jimmy Powers. And how many Jack Cutties and
Jimmy Powers do we read every day? On power? Politics?
In this country and enjoy July fourth. I've done all
the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening. Countdown.
Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillip Schaneil arranged, produced,
(43:15):
and performed most of our music. Mister Ray was on guitars,
bass and drums, and mister Shaneil handled the orchestration and
the keyboards, and it was produced by Tko Brothers. Other music,
including some of the Beethoven compositions, were arranged and performed
by the group No Horns Allowed. The sports music is
the Olberman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch Warren
Davis Curtisy vespn inc our satirical and pithy musical comments
(43:38):
are band Nancy Faust, the best baseball stadium organist ever.
That's countdown for this the one hundred and twenty fifth
day until the twenty twenty four presidential election. The two
hundred and seventy seventh day since convicted fellon Donald J.
Trump's first attempted coup against the democratically elected government of
the United States. Use the July eleventh sentencing hearing, use
(44:01):
the mental health system, use all of it to stop
him from doing it again. While we still can. The
next scheduled countdown is Tuesday bulletins as the news warrants
until the next one. I'm Keith Olderman. Happy July fourth,
good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck. Countdown
(44:45):
with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you get your podcasts.
Host
Keith Olbermann
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