January 18, 2024 • 47 mins
SERIES 2 EPISODE 108: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: ONE of these days ONE of these judges will have to take the bullshit by the horns and jail Trump overnight for contempt of court. He made a mockery of all the laws of the nation again yesterday in New York and must be punished. Clearly somebody or something has punished him for something. Three or four red marks have suddenly sprouted on his right hand. James Carville thinks they're evidence of the secondary stage of syphilis. I think they're more consistent with an old man slipping on ice and grabbing something to try to stop himself from face-planting. But I'm sure Trump will claim they're stigmata.
America's constipated political pundits have finally figured out that the interior numbers from Iowa confirm he didn't crush ANYTHING there; in fact only 8% of Iowa's Republicans voted for him! Oh and Nikki Haley is up to 38% in New Hampshire. Trump might not be the only one disqualified under the 14th Amendment. Representative Dan Goldman has moved to censure Representative Elise "Hostages" Stefanik
B-Block (21:15) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: The fascists are going to get another win out of the Supreme Court. Marjorie Taylor Greene sets herself up for another dick-pic joke. (25:23) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Argentina's New President - the guy in the Wolverine costume - blames the world's ills on feminism. The Babylon Bee's best bit of satire is its belief that it's funny. Ben Carson says why not concentration camps? The migrants have to have a place to stay!
C-Block (30:35) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Beaten puppy Sweet Cheeks needs our help in North Carolina. (32:05) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: Trump's rage against MSNBC for not worshiping him enough is actually not something new. The Republicans think they can get away with bullying MSNBC because they succeeded at it as long ago as 2008 - with me - and with the help of Tom Brokaw.
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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. One
of these judges is going to have to jail Trump
(00:25):
for contempt of court. I don't care about the consequences.
I don't care if it energizes his base. I don't
care if there's a conflict with his secret service. I
don't care if his cult riots in the street. At
some point, somebody in the legal system has to reassert
the simple fact that the law applies to this bastard too,
(00:47):
and that if you did what he does, not the
twentieth time he does it, not the twenty first time,
not the twenty second time, but the first time. If
you did what he did the first time he did it,
you would spend at least the night in jail. Trump
has come to the courtroom in the day damages phase
of his trial for defaming E. Jene Carroll a second time,
(01:10):
and during testimony muttered and mumbled like a jerk talking
over the dialogue at a play or a movie, his
senile dementia, dribbling out of all four corners of his
square head. Judge Kaplan responds to Trump, saying con job
and witch hunt loudly enough for jurors to hear during
(01:31):
the testimony quote, mister Trump, I hope I don't have
to consider excluding you from the trial. Trump throws his
hands up in the air, possibly because the judge addressed
him just as mister, and God bless this judge for
doing that, and he answers, I would love it the
judge quote, I understand you're probably very eager for me
(01:51):
to do that because you just can't control yourself in
these circumstances. Find him in contempt, detain him, or at
least threaten him with detention. There have to be consequences
for this man's increasing and increasingly dangerous abuses of our
legal system. I have spent the entirety of my life
(02:15):
doubting our legal system, but I have ten billion times
more confidence in it than I have in this fat
psychopath Trump. He has already been found guilty of sexually
abusing this woman. He has already been found guilty of
then defaming this woman. And while his idiot parking lot
lawyer disproves her own assertion that she can fake being
(02:38):
smart and he should hold her in contempt to and
she brings up the irrelevancy of whether or not Egen
Carroll inherited a gun from her own late father, and
the judge shuts that down, and she fails in Trump's
favorite gambit that some kind of mysterious evidence exonerating him
has been destroyed. Trump's social media spews out attack after
(03:00):
attack on Judge Kaplan, on the system, on his victim,
Egene Carol, and on the guy he now says is
the mastermind of all this, George Conway. George Conway, there
were twenty two posts about this case, defaming everybody involved
in it, just on Tuesday, and just as it was
(03:22):
in progress. There is a legal system in this country,
and it is desperately flawed, and yet at some point
it has to assert itself and kick this Trump in
the balls, because otherwise Trump gets to hold news conferences
afterwards and take the things that failed, that the judge
ruled out of order, that the judge warned him about,
(03:43):
and warned that bubblehead a Lena Haba about, and act
as if they are, to use the favorite phrase of
a putrid old man buried under bronzer and suffering a
prolonged mental health crisis that threatens the future of this
nation what he calls a Perry Mason moment.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Well, they found out today that she got rid of
a lot of evidence, as you probably noticed, that rid
of massive amounts of evidence. And in addition to that,
she had a rifle or a gun, because she said
she bought gun bullets or rifle bullets, and it was
the opposite I guess of her gun.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
And was it licensed?
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Now it wasn't license, So I guess she's got a
difficult problem. That's going to be her problem. But she
has a gun or a rifle. She didn't really explain
which she might have both.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
What the f are rifle bullets?
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Old man?
Speaker 1 (04:34):
There is considerable speculation among those following this case that
the likeliest result of all this will be that the
damages awarded to E. Gene Carroll will be astronomically high,
like rivaling or even eclipsing the one hundred and forty
eight million dollar award against Juliani in the case of
Sea Moss and Ruby Freeman. I mean, just there in
(04:56):
that clip, he defamed Ejene Carroll again. She can sue
him again. So say the jury is as ticked off
as the judge is and literally awards her half a
billion dollars of Trump's money and then, so what Trump
(05:17):
has wasted his one time on this earth perfecting loopholes
and appeals and legal escape patches. He will stall and delay,
and manipulate and pervert, and if he regains power, he
will find some manufactured way out of paying her a dime.
(05:39):
The action that is required now is jail time, twelve hours,
twenty four hours, two hundred and fifty years, whatever you
can get away with. This creature no longer responds as
a human being would to anything that might restrain him.
There exists no simple nor measured solution to the threat
(06:02):
he poses to thee forgive the cornball here the threat
he poses to the American way of life. He is
not lashing out merely at Judge Caplan or Judge Engern
or Judge Chutkin, or Egene Carroll or Jack Smith or
Letitia James, or any individual. He is lashing out at
the United States of America and the laws under which
(06:23):
the rest of us must live. And it is time
that those who are charged with enforcing those laws and
punishing the breaking of those laws to teach this asshole
one mighty lesson that will shut him up. Shut him
up in both senses of the phrase Judge Camplin, he's
(06:43):
in your courtroom. He is in contempt of you, and
the law and the country and reality. Show him at
his cult, and most importantly, those of us who still
believe in this country and believe in the rules, show
us that the law and the country and reality are
not at the mercy of one fat, deranged old man.
(07:06):
He is in contempt. Now put him in jail. Meanwhile,
in Maine, a symbolically but not practically important ruling on
Trump's ineligibility Under the Fourteenth Amendment, state law there requires
(07:26):
the main Secretary of State to rule on ballot eligibility
before the court's due. But now a state superior court
has overthrown that law. The Justice has ruled that Secretary
of State Shannonbellows cannot take Trump off the ballot in
Maine until the Supreme Court of the United States rules
(07:47):
on the disqualification clause. The Secretary confronted an uncertain legal landscape,
writes Justice Murphy incorrectly, she quotes, should be afforded the
opportunity to assess the effects and application of her ruling
based on how the Supreme Court rules on the colo
fourteenth case. It's nonsense, it's weak, need meddlesome both sizest
(08:10):
diletantish nonsense. On the other hand, we have what might
be the first murmurs about the elephant in the fourteenth
Amendment room, or more correctly, the elephants. The fourteenth Amendment
has not been acknowledged in any previous case of ineligibility
for the presidency, but it has been used without hesitation
(08:32):
or confusion against candidates for the House and Senate and
those already elected to those offices. The fourteenth Amendment disqualifies
Barry louder Milk of Georgia, your genial tour guide to
the Capitol. The fourteenth disqualifies Clay Higgins and his insistence
on the record in the House about ghost buses, whatever
(08:54):
the hell he thinks ghost buses are. It disqualifies the
Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, and the amicus brief
to hold up the certification and all those who sign it.
Disqualifies Congressman Scott Perry and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green and
Andy Biggs and Lauren Bobert and Josh Hawley and Ron
Johnson and Paul Gosar and countless others, and most immediately
(09:17):
the fourteenth amendment disqualifies Elise Stephanic, who just joined Trump
in calling the convicted violent perpetrators of the insurrection quote
hostages unquote. And while we have not yet seen anybody
act to defend the Constitution in this specific regard, somebody
(09:39):
finally spoke up and did something about the larger issue
of Elise Stephanic on the House floor yesterday, Congressman Dan Goldman,
tenth District, State of New York, thank you, mister speaker.
Speaker 4 (09:52):
I rise today to introduce a resolution to censure Congresswoman
at Lease Stefanic for providing aid, comfort, and support to
the rioters and insurrectionists who violently attacked this capital on
January sixth, twenty twenty one, in an effort to undermine
our democracy and illegally stop the peaceful transfer of power.
Since that attempted coup, Miss Stephonic has repeatedly and persistently
(10:16):
expressed support for the duly convicted insurrectionists.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Last week, echoing the.
Speaker 4 (10:21):
Inflammatory language of criminal defendant Donald Trump, Misstephonic disgracefully referred
to the January sixth insurrectionists in prison as quote hostages unquote.
Mstaephonic support of convicted criminals charged with offenses against the
United States government, including attempted violence against members of this body,
(10:41):
is simply unacceptable from a member of Congress. Nor is
it acceptable for a member of Congress who purports to
oppose anti Semitism to equate convicted insurrectionists with the more
than one hundred and thirty Israeli hostages who remain subject
to her expeditions in Gaza. She therefore must be censured.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
I yield back. That, of course, should be the starting point.
The fourteenth Amendment has no expiration date on it. It
has no statute of limitations. Quote. No person shall be
a Senator or representative in Congress who shall have engaged
in insurrection or rebellion against the Constitution of the United States,
or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof, and
(11:25):
going on national television and calling those convicted of trying
to break into the Capitol and stop the certification of
the presidential election hostages. That would be the definition of
giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States.
And a least Stephanic is therefore not eligible to serve
in Congress. Remove her from the twenty twenty four ballot
(11:48):
in New York State, and let's get this started, begin
the process of expelling her and the others who have
been disloyal to this country and given aid and comfort
to the enemies thereof Back briefly to yesterday's topic and
the inability of our inflexible, unthinking coterie of dilettants who
(12:11):
call themselves our political reporters to realize that if forty
nine percent of the participants in a presidential primary vote
against the winner, he may still be the winner. But
he sure as hell didn't crush his opponents or anything
else except maybe he crushed some adderall. Finally, finally, some
(12:34):
of the major news organizations did some of the reporting
they should have done in the immediate wake of Monday's
vote in Iowa. The key numbers fifty one to forty
nine is not a landslide, and Trump Yes beating Trump
No by just two hundred and twenty two votes. That
should have been the headline. Having failed to make that
(12:56):
the headline, there is a series of interior numbers and
places like Politico finally noticed, but these vote look at
all like a Trump crush. Hey, what happened from Politico yesterday?
He showed striking weakness in suburban and urban areas. In
(13:16):
more than three dozen precincts. In the suburbs, Trump received
less than a quarter of the vote, even while achieving
blowout wins of ninety plus percent of votes cast in
a similar number of rural precincts. It also reveals his
relative vulnerability among suburban and highly educated voters, raising questions
about how he will win over a voting block that
(13:38):
has long viewed him with skepticism and helped fuel his
twenty twenty loss.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
Well, look at that.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
It's not what he asked for, but the tin man
has gotten a brain. Charlie Sykes from the Bulwark dot com,
who I never mean to include among the dilettante pundits,
did the kind of work your average TV commentator or
writer at Politico would never think to try. Work that
involved a lot and a calculator. The low turnout Monday
(14:08):
in Iowa had many reasons, mostly the real field tempts
as low as thirty below fine valid, but whatever their cause,
Sikes notes, it means that Trump's vote total Monday comprised
only eight percent of all the Republicans just in Iowa.
(14:32):
It's not a landslide if you've gotten eight percent of
your own parties voters to vote for you. Sikes also
hit the entrance. In exit polling in Iowa, a quarter
of those Iowa Republicans who did go to the caucuses
said they will not vote for Trump in November. That's
not if he's convicted or if he's dead. That's right now.
(14:54):
They won't vote for this Trump in November. If he's convicted.
The no way number jumps from twenty five percent to
thirty one percent. And by the way, if thirty one
percent of Republicans across the country will not vote for
a convicted Trump, he's going to lose in a landslide.
And nearly half of Haley's backers in Iowa say they
(15:17):
would vote not for Trump but for Joe Biden. There
are no indications from Iowa that Trump will be denied
the nomination in a center guilty, dead or alive. But
there are also no indications that Iowa proved that Trump
is even as strong as he was in twenty twenty
or twenty sixteen, let alone somehow stronger, which seems to
(15:40):
be the headline everybody had printed. Oh, by the way,
New Hampshire Tuesday, where Nicki Haley is now up to
thirty eight percent in new polling. Ron DeSantis is headed
to South Carolina this weekend. Ron DeSantis just punted New Hampshire.
(16:05):
Also of interest here, Yes I saw Trump has three
or four bright red marks on his right hand, one
on the thumb, one on the forefinger, one or two
on the upper palm. And yes I saw. James Carville
has speculated they are not cuts or bruises, but sores,
(16:27):
sores consistent with the secondary stage of syphilis. No, I
don't think they are syphilis, although I'll respect mister Carville's
knowledge of the subject. I don't think there's syphilis, in
large part because the photos of Trump from Tuesday show
no red marks on his right hand, and I don't
(16:48):
think they would burst into full vivid color overnight. I'm
not a doctor, I just play one on podcasts. But
the marks are consistent with an old guy slipping on
the ice in Iowa, in Hampshire, in New York for
that matter, during his news conference for that matter, and
(17:09):
grabbing something to support himself or stop himself from face planting.
The campaign should explain what the marks are actually. I
will be very disappointed if Trump and his campaign do
not claim the marks are stigmata. Stigmata, perhaps from Trump's
holy anger that MSNBC and CNN did not worship him
(17:32):
sufficiently after Iowa. He wants to have their licenses revoked
even though they don't have licenses. And for once, I'm
going to defend Trump sorta. His belief that he can
bully MSNBC and NBC News into better coverage is based
(17:53):
on the fact that the Republican Party has already bullied
MSNBC and NBC News into better coverage thanks to the
interventions of Tom Brokaw that I was there when they
did that story. Next, this is an all new edition
of Countdown.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
This is Countdown with Keith Olberman.
Speaker 1 (18:24):
Oh scripts to the news, some headlines, some updates, some snarks,
some predictions. Dateline. The Supreme Court, Uh, here we go.
The Fourteenth Amendment in presidential immunity cases are the obvious
ones where the Supreme Court can turn this nation into
Weimar Republic two point zero. But there's another subtler one
(18:47):
that could basically bar all environmental protection regulations and business
regulations and you know, anything that keeps the rapacious among
us frompaciou singing. The Court heard arguments yesterday about a
repeal of the now forty year old Chevron decision, which
says that if regulatory statutes are ambiguous, judges have to
(19:09):
defer to the regulatory agency's interpretations of those statutes. Supreme
Court watchers said the six members of the Republican Supreme
Religious Court seemed skeptical of Chevron and seemed willing to
kill it and with it, the legal basis for most
government regulations, when the Solicitor General arguing to keep it
(19:29):
said it would be an unwarranted shock to the legal
system to remove it. Justice Fratboy M. Kavanaugh belched that
there were quote shocks to the system every four or
eight years when a new administration comes in, whether it's
communications law or securities law, or competition law or environmental law.
(19:49):
He doesn't like laws. Once again, we approach the point
at which we will have to decide whether to continue
to let this illegally packed court push us back towards
the year eighteen eighty five, or to draw a line
in the sand and say, hey, nice ruling, boys, and
how are you going to enforce it? Are you sending
(20:10):
Clarence over in his RV with brass knuckles? Dateline, Capitol
Hill Marjorie Taylor Green providing the comic relief yet again.
Barney rubbles stunt double at a committee hearing, setting herself
up one more time. I just traveled in airports across
(20:32):
the country just the past few days. You know what
I saw on our airports based on Marge's role pursuing
Hunter Biden, I'm going to say the answer is dick picks. Migrants,
illegal aliens all over in the airports. Damn it, Well,
we're the migrants carrying dick picks. Did you ask? Did
(20:54):
you ask to see their papers? You didn't, since you'd
have no legal right to do that, Then how do
you know they were undocumented?
Speaker 3 (21:02):
Marge?
Speaker 1 (21:21):
Thank you? Nancy Faust stell ahead on this all new
(21:45):
edition of Countdown, the Republican presidential candidate threatening MSNBC, the
right wing reacting hysterically as usual to what the network
showed or did not show. I mean that Trump story
from this week, No, Sir, September two thousand and eight,
when Goon's working for or on behalf of John McCain
(22:06):
blackmailed Tom Brokaw into going into his bosses and demanding
that Chris Matthews and I be fired from presidential debate
coverage or their guy would not show up to the
debate fifteen years plus later, and it still shocks me,
and it still cost them twenty two million dollars, which
(22:27):
I still have things I promised not to tell. Coming
up first time for the daily round up of the
miss Grits, morons and Dunn Kruger effects specimens who constitute
two days worse persons in the Lebron's Worse. The new
president of Argentina Wolverine. I'm sorry his name is Hobbier Milay.
(22:48):
He just looks like Wolverine because of that haircut. They
let this nutball talk at the World Economic Forum in Davos,
and he blamed basically all of the world's problems on
equality for women. Quoting wolver All, that this radical feminism
agenda has led to is greater state intervention to hinder
(23:10):
the economic process, giving a job to bureaucrats who have
not contributed anything to society. Examples ministries of work of
women or international organizations devoted to promoting this agenda. Another
conflict presented by socialists is that of humans against nature,
claiming that we human beings damage the planet, which should
be protected at all costs, even going as far as
(23:32):
advocating for population control mechanisms or the bloody abortion agenda. Unquote, congratulations, Argentina,
your new president is actually dumber than he looks. The
runner up worser the Babylon B, which is a right
wing humor website, and there is the ultimate oxymoron. Sure
(23:53):
is right wing, and it sure has absolutely no humor
in it, nor any sense of propriety or timing. The
same day, Vivic Ramaswami drops out of the Gace and
reiterates that there's no racism and endorses Trump. The Babylon B,
which thinks it's the Onion, except you know, the Onion
without any jokes in it, posts a piece headlined Trump
(24:17):
promises VIVAQ and administration position running the White House seven
to eleven. The saddest part of that is not that
it's racist or that it's not funny, but that some
percentage of Trump's cult will think that's an actual news story.
But our winner the worst Ben Carson. You remember Ben Carson,
(24:40):
the brain surgeon who ran for president and the only
thing he got out of it was a job. And
the Trump had men running housing and urban development and
proving to the world that to be a brain surgeon,
you do not have to have your own brain. For
some reason, CNN has interviewed Ben Carson about Trump's promise
(25:01):
to round up migrants and keep them in concentratation camps.
Although the CNN host was nice enough to defer to
Trump and the Republicans and called them internment camps, Carson
emphasized in response that the goal is to keep migrants
from coming here in the first place, and again that
by itself is laugh out loud funny. There is political
cap collapse driven by climate change underway already right now,
(25:25):
and that ain't stopping anytime soon. So good luck getting
them to stay there and fry rather than coming here
and take their chances. But then Ben Carson said something,
So Ben Carson, in that sedated man, I hope he's
brighter than that when he operates way of his Carson
was asked if he would support Trump's decision to open
(25:47):
the camps, and he actually replied, quote, well, they have
to have some place to stay. Unquote Ben, is that
also your answer when they ask you about slaves on
the plantations in this country in the eighteenth and nineteenth cents, Carson,
they have to have some place to stay. Two days.
(26:10):
Worst person in the world just ahead Trump demanding MSNBC
should lose its license, even though it doesn't have a
license for not televising his latest victory speech. It's actually
(26:33):
not something he invented. The Republicans have been doing stuff
like this to MSNBC since two thousand and eight and
sadly getting away with it. Things I promise not to
tell next first time for another dog in need, you
can help. Every dog has its day and we go
to Anson County, North Carolina and a puppy they have
called Sweet Cheeks seventeen weeks old, a beautiful white and
(26:55):
tan dog found abandoned and paralyzed on the side of
a road there, literally left to die, probably after being
beaten by a human. Only by accident was he found
before another animal or exposure killed him. This is a
lot of money that might not get the result we want,
but we have to try. They want to try to
get him the definition of innocence betrayed by humans, To
(27:17):
get him back the use of his legs. This means
treating his injuries and then seeing if surgery might get
him back the use of his legs. My friends at
Hounds in Pounds are fundraising for him. They're going for
four thousand dollars. You can find Sweet Cheeks at givinggrid
dot com and I'll tweet him out too. Your donations
can help, and so also can your reposts. Sweet Cheeks,
(27:39):
thanks you, and I thank you to the number one
story on the countdown and things I promised not to tell.
And the right wing went nuts over MSNBC and CNN
not showing all of Trump's self congratulatory speech from Iowa
(28:00):
Monday night, and Hannity attacking Matdow and Trump insisting that
they're licenses should be taken away, confirming he's either crazy
or stupid because of course they don't have licenses, although
this does portend what he will try to do if
he seeses power, is intent to punish news outlets not
just for criticizing him, but for not praising him enough.
(28:23):
And boy did this flash me back because this happened
to me at MSNBC in two thousand and eight courtesy
the supposed sane Republicans who preceded these insane Republicans, and
it underscores that there never really have been sane Republicans
and they have always longed to dictate to the media
(28:43):
what it can and cannot say about them, and thanks
to people like Tom Brokaw, they often get away with it.
Chris Matthews and I were co anchoring the Republican Convention
on MSNBC in two thousand and eight. He was there
at the convention in Minnesota. I was in the studios
at thirty Rock in New York, ostensibly so I could
also anchor hurricane covering, though it was pretty clear that
(29:06):
at least half the reason I was not in Minneapolis
was because the Republicans had threatened NBC or said they
could not guarantee my safety there or something like that.
So I was the one on September two, two thousand
and eight, who had to throw it to a video
that we had been told by the Republicans was a
tribute to the dead of nine to eleven that they
were playing in the theater in their convention in Minnesota.
(29:31):
It was not a tribute. It was a snuff film.
All of the images that the networks had stopped showing
of nine to eleven within weeks or even days of
the attacks, all of them were in this snuff film.
People jumping, falling to their deaths from the World Trade Center,
endless replays of the planes hitting the towers, dismembered bodies
in the plaza, the building collapses, the equally terrifying scenes
(29:54):
at the Pentagon, and all with the grotesque voiceover from
that Fink Robert Dovey emphasizing that this was all the
Democrats fault. The message was they might as well pray
this way, elect Obama and you will die, and you
will die like this. I was angry just on that
base level. For that five and a half years I
(30:15):
had been back at MSNBC, we had been rigorous about
not showing any of that video that the Republicans had
just forced upon us by lying to us about it.
There were rules that if we had to for some
reason sneed some snippet, we would show only skill images,
and even then only with extensive warnings to the viewers.
(30:36):
But I knew from my conversations with the president of MSNBC,
Phil Griffin, who I had known for twenty eight years
at that point, that he would insist that on the
scene in Minneapolis, Matthews and Tom Brokaw, whose career at
NBC I had resuscitated after Brian Williams had buried him
alive two years earlier. I knew from what Griffin told
me that one or both of them would rebuke the
(30:58):
GOP for showing not a nine to eleven tribute, but,
as I just said, a nine to eleven snuff film.
The snuff film ended, we came out to Brokaw and Matthews,
and Brokaw kind of coughed, and Matthews said wow. And
he turned to Brokaw and said, in that loose fire
hose delivery he had tom that kind of scores terrorism.
(31:18):
Big thing for Republicans. They try stop Obama. Brokaw droned
on approvingly, the Republican sneaking a snuff film, a banned
video onto MSNBC and by the way, also onto CNN,
onto NBC, proper, onto CBS, onto ABC without any warning.
That was not mentioned. Back to New York Ton Keith,
(31:41):
I was supposed to add liberates about what we were
expecting from the Republican convention for the rest of the
night and then throw to a commercial. Instead, I said,
and this is a paraphrase, the original tape disappeared that
night that before we moved on, I felt I needed
to apologize that we at MSNBC and for that matter,
at NBC News at extremely strict rules about not showing
(32:03):
the video the publicans had just shown you via our network,
without any warning, without any context, and by lying to us,
And we certainly would not have shown the horror and
death and blamed it on the Democrats, or for that matter,
on the Republicans. I said, if we had done such
a thing ourselves, there would have been people fired. The
(32:25):
public program the GOP provided said that was going to
be a nine to eleven tribute film, I said, And
so did the private conversations with the network, which included
the reminder from NBC and MSNBC that we had rules
against showing the scenes of horrible death and mutilation and destruction.
So I apologized on behalf of whoever trusted the Republicans
(32:45):
to live up to their word, that MSNBC viewers were
forced to see the video our network had promised never
to show them. So three nights later, without as much
as an email to me, this Griffin had called my
agent and told her I was fired and Matthews two
from our coverage of the upcoming McCain Obama debates. I
(33:07):
happened to be off that night in the press box
watching a Mets Phillies game at Shay Stadium, so she
had to relate these details to me by phone as
I walked down the many ramps in the stadium's bowels
and headed towards the subway. I told her to call
Griffin back and tell him I was quitting on the
spot right then, and he could work his way out
(33:29):
of the ensuing disaster by himself. Liberal network MSNBC fires
liberal host Alderman for criticizing conservatives for sneaking nine to
eleven snuff film onto MSNBC. He could work his way
out of that disaster any way he chose, and then
he could wait for my response on Good Morning America, CBS,
This Morning, the PBS News Hour, any other news program
(33:50):
that bothered to ask and in court. I made a
few phone calls to friendly voices within the NBC management structure,
got from them a clearer picture of what had happened.
And despite the spotty cell service along the elevated train
line heading back into Manhattan, I got a message from
a newspaper reporter friend who neatly tied together all that
(34:11):
I was hearing elsewhere. Tom Brokaw is going around NBC
saying he got you fired from the debates because the
Republicans told him to. Nine maybe ten months earlier, the
same Phil Griffin had come to me and asked me
if I would be okay with Brokaw appearing during our
weekly coverage of the Democratic and Republican primaries. Just a
(34:32):
couple of minutes, buddy, like from a perspective desk, that's
all he wants to do. He's so unhappy Brian Williams
has frozen him out of everything. I was appalled, but
not surprised. The power had gone to Brian's head, and
of course there it had not met very much resistance. Plus,
as I said to Griffin, you're asking me if i'd
(34:53):
like to add Tom Brokaw's experience and Tom Brocaw's gravitas
to stuff I'm anchoring when I'm not sure I know
as much as I really know to do this the
right way. Tom to be fair fit in beautifully, and
twice after those long Tuesday evenings during the primaries, he
sent me brief emails awarding me what he called the
(35:15):
game ball because he was so impressed by my ability
to balance the roles of political anchor and political commentator.
Having tried this myself, he wrote, I know of a
perilous tight roupe. This is game ball to koh. I
mocked them now, but they meant so much to me
then that I printed them out and carried them in
(35:37):
my wallet until September. And now Brokaw had gotten me
fired because, as my newspaper friend said, the Republicans told
him to well, that wasn't hard to unpack either. Tim
Russard had died on the third of June that year.
I anchored that night until two in the morning. It
(35:57):
was still an open wound. There were still tears. We
didn't know it then, but the structure of NBC News
and the perilous tightroup balancing NBC and MSNBC had died
with Tim Russard. So did the role of moderator of
the second debate between John McCain and Barack Obama, scheduled
for about a month. From my subway ride on October seventh,
(36:20):
two thousand and eight in Nashville, Tim had not even
been buried yet when Brokaw began to angle to get
that assignment that was now vacant. Along with brushing away
the dirt of his penny anti role on the MSNBC
Perspective Desk, leaving us in the lurch in order to
take over Tim's spot as Brian's sage sidekick on Big NBC.
(36:43):
The month of four August, there had been a story
coming out of the east end of the third floor
at thirty Rock, where NBC News managers sat around not
doing much of anything, that a Republican goon named Ed
Gillespie had been in there with Griffin and the idiot
NBC News president Steve CAPPIs trying to get me silenced
or fired or off the convention coverage or something, and
(37:06):
that somebody prominent from NBC News was in there with
Gillespie or was invoked by Gillespie. The rumor mill was
not confident in who it was or what exactly they
were doing. That Friday night in September two thousand and eight,
as I switched from the elevated seven train to the
underground f the whole thing came together before my comments
(37:30):
about the GOP Convention nine to eleven snuff film. Gillespie
had come in and had somehow vaguely threatened Campus and
Griffin about me using as leverage the debate, which Tom
Brokaw was now supposed to moderate the one that had
been Russert's, and when I apologized for their snuff video
on our air, Gillespie must have turned it into an
(37:51):
either or get rid of me, or McCain would refuse
to participate in any debate moderated by Brokaw. Tom Brokaw
had already come back from the dead once in two
thousand and eight. I had made that happen, and he
would be damned if he would be forced to do
it a second time. But as the train took me
(38:11):
home to an apartment, I was now going to have
to sell since I had quit MSNBC on the spot
for folding to such obvious blackmail, something else now occurred
to me. Why would MSNBC or NBC or our parent
corporation GE actually think that they could remove me from
the debate coverage on MSNBC where the Rachel Meadow Show
(38:34):
had not yet been born and was only going to
premiere the next week, and the three times a night
my show ran accounted for something like sixty percent of
the entire day's network audience and all of its profits.
How did they think they were going to get away
with that without a really bad reaction from our audience. Plus,
if a newspaper man already knew the Brokaw part, how
(38:54):
could this story be avoided something like this. MSNBC has
announced it had removed its liberal star Keith Alumman from
coverage of the McCain Obama presidential debates. Sources firmed former
NBC News anchorman Tom Brokaw, now an MSNBC commentator, had
helped the Republican Party to blackmail NBC into the decision.
(39:15):
Olderman immediately resigned, saying, quote in succumbing to this coercion
on behalf of John McCain, NBC has now forfeited any
further right to be called a news organization, and I'm
sad to say MSNBC, which I built, is now dead.
At that point, it dawned on me that the only
thing that could save the credibility of the whole NBC
(39:35):
News division and the careers of Griffin and Cappus and
NBC Network President Jeff Zooker, and especially Tom Brokaw, was
for me to publicly state, to lie that I had
asked to be removed from anchoring the debates because the
whatever was just too much blah blah, blah for me,
and I felt I should just stick to the post
(39:57):
debate analysis and commentary and blah blah blah blah blah.
In short, they would have a choice. They could fire
me from the debates and destroy everything, including the one
hundred million dollars a year or so in profits NBC
was suddenly making off MSNBC after years of losing about
that much. Or I could lie and claim it was
(40:18):
my idea and I could save everybody's ass and their money,
including my own. I got out of the subway and
raced home. I called my agent. I explained it to her.
I'm not quitting. In fact, I'm going to get a
huge raise. Listen carefully, you call Griffin back and explain
to him I will now personally save his job even
(40:39):
though he doesn't deserve it, and campuses and Zooker's and
bro Cause and everybody else's. I'll take the fall instead
of letting them get fired by the MSNBC audience. I'll
say this was my idea and it will cost him
only twelve million dollars. Oh, and he has to leak
the fact that it cost him twelve million dollars. That's
(41:01):
the deal. And she paused for a second, and she said, Hey,
that's genius. It might not quite be twelve, but I
bet I get at least nine million. On Sunday, several
news organizations reported I had asked to be taken off
the anchor desk for the debates. Two months and one
(41:21):
week later, The New York Times wrote, quote, Keith Olberman,
the anchor of Countdown on MSNBC, has extended his contract
through the next presidential election season. The networking outs mister
Olderman and MSNBC essentially tore up the four year, four
million dollar a year contract they signed last year and
replaced it with one worth about seven and a half
million a year. So that was a three and a
(41:43):
half million dollar raise for four years to a total
of fourteen million dollars. Except the new contract added two
years to my old deal, so the rays was actually
twenty two million dollars. All stories have punchlines. This punchline
is about Brocaw. We would have gotten away with this,
(42:03):
NBC would have gotten its money, and he's worth for
the twenty two million in hush money it had to
pay me because it had rolled over for Republican Party blackmail.
Except Brokaw couldn't keep his mouth shut. So proud was
he of preserving his role as moderator of the October
seventh debate that he had to explain in explicit detail
(42:23):
how he went to his bosses at NBC News and
threatened them on behalf of the GOP. I mean on
the record, he said this September twenty ninth, a lengthy
and glowing Brocaw profile in The New York Times. Quote
mister Brocaw said that over the summer he'd quote advocated
within the executive suite of NBC News to modify the
(42:45):
anchor duties of the MSNBC hosts Keith Olderman and Chris
Matthews on election Night and on knights where there were
presidential debates. Mister Brokaw said he had also conducted some
shuttle diplomacy in recent weeks between NBC and the McCain campaign.
His mission, he said, was to assure the candidate's aids
that despite some negative on air commentary by mister Olberman
(43:06):
in particular, mister McCain could still get a fair shake
from NBC News. Unquote. That was his mission, the hell,
that was his mission. Happily, brocaonc just could not resist
boasting even further. The next sentence reads quote, Mister Brocaw
said he had been told by a senior McCain aide
(43:28):
whom he did not name, that the campaign had been
reluctant to accept an NBC representative as one of the
moderators of the three presidential debates until his name was invoked.
One of the things I was told by this person
was that they were so irritated. They said, if it's
an NBC moalorator for any of these debates, we won't go.
(43:49):
Mister Brocaw said, my name came up, and they said,
oh hell, we have to do it, because it's going
to be Brokaw. No insufferable person in all of broadcasting
history has a better rep and a better and more
undeserved rep than Tom Brokeall So, when a Trump leans
(44:11):
on NBC management because the coverage that he got was
not the coverage he wanted, don't think it won't have
an effect. Because in two thousand and eight, they loved
me then as they love Meadow now. But what they
loved about each of us was not the truth we provided,
but the money. There is a second punchline after all this,
(44:34):
when the new format came out. MSNBC had David Gregory
quote anchor unquote the debate coverage. Practically, all this meant
was that I was on the air until ninety seconds
before the debates began, which is when I said, now
here's David Gregory. And he was on the air for
four or five minutes after the debate ended, which is
when he would then say, now here's Keith Ollerin. And
(44:55):
on Election Night, with David officially the anchor of MSNBC's coverage,
at ten fifty nine pm, he said, and bless him
for this. With the last voting bo closing at eleven PM,
NBC News can now project the winner of the two
thousand and eight presidential election, Keith plus that twenty two
(45:16):
million dollars. I still have it. I've done all the
damage I can do here. Thank you for listening. Countdown.
Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillip Chanel arranged, produced,
(45:38):
and performed most of our music. Mister Ray was on guitars,
bass and drums. Mister Shanelle handled orchestration and keyboards. Was
produced by Tko Brothers. Other music, including some of the
Beethoven compositions, arranged and performed by No Horns Aloud. The
sports music is the Oberman theme from ESPN two, written
by Mitch Warren Davis courtesy of ESPN Inc. Our satirical
(45:59):
and fifthy musical comments are by Nancy Fauss. The best
baseball stadium organist ever announcer today was my friend John Dean,
and everything else was pretty much my fault. So that's
countdown for this the two hundred and ninety fifth day
until the twenty twenty four US presidential election. See how
the Republicans blackmail NBC between now and then and the
one and eighth day since dementia J. Trump's first attempted
(46:23):
coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Use the Fourteenth Amendment, the Insurrection Act, and the justice
system to stop him from doing it again while we
still can. The next scheduled countdown is tomorrow. Boltins as
the news warrants till then. I'm Keith Olberman. Good morning,
good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck. Countdown with Keith Olderman
(46:58):
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. One
of these judges is going to have to jail Trump
(00:25):
for contempt of court. I don't care about the consequences.
I don't care if it energizes his base. I don't
care if there's a conflict with his secret service. I
don't care if his cult riots in the street. At
some point, somebody in the legal system has to reassert
the simple fact that the law applies to this bastard too,
(00:47):
and that if you did what he does, not the
twentieth time he does it, not the twenty first time,
not the twenty second time, but the first time. If
you did what he did the first time he did it,
you would spend at least the night in jail. Trump
has come to the courtroom in the day damages phase
of his trial for defaming E. Jene Carroll a second time,
(01:10):
and during testimony muttered and mumbled like a jerk talking
over the dialogue at a play or a movie, his
senile dementia, dribbling out of all four corners of his
square head. Judge Kaplan responds to Trump, saying con job
and witch hunt loudly enough for jurors to hear during
(01:31):
the testimony quote, mister Trump, I hope I don't have
to consider excluding you from the trial. Trump throws his
hands up in the air, possibly because the judge addressed
him just as mister, and God bless this judge for
doing that, and he answers, I would love it the
judge quote, I understand you're probably very eager for me
(01:51):
to do that because you just can't control yourself in
these circumstances. Find him in contempt, detain him, or at
least threaten him with detention. There have to be consequences
for this man's increasing and increasingly dangerous abuses of our
legal system. I have spent the entirety of my life
(02:15):
doubting our legal system, but I have ten billion times
more confidence in it than I have in this fat
psychopath Trump. He has already been found guilty of sexually
abusing this woman. He has already been found guilty of
then defaming this woman. And while his idiot parking lot
lawyer disproves her own assertion that she can fake being
(02:38):
smart and he should hold her in contempt to and
she brings up the irrelevancy of whether or not Egen
Carroll inherited a gun from her own late father, and
the judge shuts that down, and she fails in Trump's
favorite gambit that some kind of mysterious evidence exonerating him
has been destroyed. Trump's social media spews out attack after
(03:00):
attack on Judge Kaplan, on the system, on his victim,
Egene Carol, and on the guy he now says is
the mastermind of all this, George Conway. George Conway, there
were twenty two posts about this case, defaming everybody involved
in it, just on Tuesday, and just as it was
(03:22):
in progress. There is a legal system in this country,
and it is desperately flawed, and yet at some point
it has to assert itself and kick this Trump in
the balls, because otherwise Trump gets to hold news conferences
afterwards and take the things that failed, that the judge
ruled out of order, that the judge warned him about,
(03:43):
and warned that bubblehead a Lena Haba about, and act
as if they are, to use the favorite phrase of
a putrid old man buried under bronzer and suffering a
prolonged mental health crisis that threatens the future of this
nation what he calls a Perry Mason moment.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Well, they found out today that she got rid of
a lot of evidence, as you probably noticed, that rid
of massive amounts of evidence. And in addition to that,
she had a rifle or a gun, because she said
she bought gun bullets or rifle bullets, and it was
the opposite I guess of her gun.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
And was it licensed?
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Now it wasn't license, So I guess she's got a
difficult problem. That's going to be her problem. But she
has a gun or a rifle. She didn't really explain
which she might have both.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
What the f are rifle bullets?
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Old man?
Speaker 1 (04:34):
There is considerable speculation among those following this case that
the likeliest result of all this will be that the
damages awarded to E. Gene Carroll will be astronomically high,
like rivaling or even eclipsing the one hundred and forty
eight million dollar award against Juliani in the case of
Sea Moss and Ruby Freeman. I mean, just there in
(04:56):
that clip, he defamed Ejene Carroll again. She can sue
him again. So say the jury is as ticked off
as the judge is and literally awards her half a
billion dollars of Trump's money and then, so what Trump
(05:17):
has wasted his one time on this earth perfecting loopholes
and appeals and legal escape patches. He will stall and delay,
and manipulate and pervert, and if he regains power, he
will find some manufactured way out of paying her a dime.
(05:39):
The action that is required now is jail time, twelve hours,
twenty four hours, two hundred and fifty years, whatever you
can get away with. This creature no longer responds as
a human being would to anything that might restrain him.
There exists no simple nor measured solution to the threat
(06:02):
he poses to thee forgive the cornball here the threat
he poses to the American way of life. He is
not lashing out merely at Judge Caplan or Judge Engern
or Judge Chutkin, or Egene Carroll or Jack Smith or
Letitia James, or any individual. He is lashing out at
the United States of America and the laws under which
(06:23):
the rest of us must live. And it is time
that those who are charged with enforcing those laws and
punishing the breaking of those laws to teach this asshole
one mighty lesson that will shut him up. Shut him
up in both senses of the phrase Judge Camplin, he's
(06:43):
in your courtroom. He is in contempt of you, and
the law and the country and reality. Show him at
his cult, and most importantly, those of us who still
believe in this country and believe in the rules, show
us that the law and the country and reality are
not at the mercy of one fat, deranged old man.
(07:06):
He is in contempt. Now put him in jail. Meanwhile,
in Maine, a symbolically but not practically important ruling on
Trump's ineligibility Under the Fourteenth Amendment, state law there requires
(07:26):
the main Secretary of State to rule on ballot eligibility
before the court's due. But now a state superior court
has overthrown that law. The Justice has ruled that Secretary
of State Shannonbellows cannot take Trump off the ballot in
Maine until the Supreme Court of the United States rules
(07:47):
on the disqualification clause. The Secretary confronted an uncertain legal landscape,
writes Justice Murphy incorrectly, she quotes, should be afforded the
opportunity to assess the effects and application of her ruling
based on how the Supreme Court rules on the colo
fourteenth case. It's nonsense, it's weak, need meddlesome both sizest
(08:10):
diletantish nonsense. On the other hand, we have what might
be the first murmurs about the elephant in the fourteenth
Amendment room, or more correctly, the elephants. The fourteenth Amendment
has not been acknowledged in any previous case of ineligibility
for the presidency, but it has been used without hesitation
(08:32):
or confusion against candidates for the House and Senate and
those already elected to those offices. The fourteenth Amendment disqualifies
Barry louder Milk of Georgia, your genial tour guide to
the Capitol. The fourteenth disqualifies Clay Higgins and his insistence
on the record in the House about ghost buses, whatever
(08:54):
the hell he thinks ghost buses are. It disqualifies the
Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, and the amicus brief
to hold up the certification and all those who sign it.
Disqualifies Congressman Scott Perry and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green and
Andy Biggs and Lauren Bobert and Josh Hawley and Ron
Johnson and Paul Gosar and countless others, and most immediately
(09:17):
the fourteenth amendment disqualifies Elise Stephanic, who just joined Trump
in calling the convicted violent perpetrators of the insurrection quote
hostages unquote. And while we have not yet seen anybody
act to defend the Constitution in this specific regard, somebody
(09:39):
finally spoke up and did something about the larger issue
of Elise Stephanic on the House floor yesterday, Congressman Dan Goldman,
tenth District, State of New York, thank you, mister speaker.
Speaker 4 (09:52):
I rise today to introduce a resolution to censure Congresswoman
at Lease Stefanic for providing aid, comfort, and support to
the rioters and insurrectionists who violently attacked this capital on
January sixth, twenty twenty one, in an effort to undermine
our democracy and illegally stop the peaceful transfer of power.
Since that attempted coup, Miss Stephonic has repeatedly and persistently
(10:16):
expressed support for the duly convicted insurrectionists.
Speaker 1 (10:19):
Last week, echoing the.
Speaker 4 (10:21):
Inflammatory language of criminal defendant Donald Trump, Misstephonic disgracefully referred
to the January sixth insurrectionists in prison as quote hostages unquote.
Mstaephonic support of convicted criminals charged with offenses against the
United States government, including attempted violence against members of this body,
(10:41):
is simply unacceptable from a member of Congress. Nor is
it acceptable for a member of Congress who purports to
oppose anti Semitism to equate convicted insurrectionists with the more
than one hundred and thirty Israeli hostages who remain subject
to her expeditions in Gaza. She therefore must be censured.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
I yield back. That, of course, should be the starting point.
The fourteenth Amendment has no expiration date on it. It
has no statute of limitations. Quote. No person shall be
a Senator or representative in Congress who shall have engaged
in insurrection or rebellion against the Constitution of the United States,
or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof, and
(11:25):
going on national television and calling those convicted of trying
to break into the Capitol and stop the certification of
the presidential election hostages. That would be the definition of
giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States.
And a least Stephanic is therefore not eligible to serve
in Congress. Remove her from the twenty twenty four ballot
(11:48):
in New York State, and let's get this started, begin
the process of expelling her and the others who have
been disloyal to this country and given aid and comfort
to the enemies thereof Back briefly to yesterday's topic and
the inability of our inflexible, unthinking coterie of dilettants who
(12:11):
call themselves our political reporters to realize that if forty
nine percent of the participants in a presidential primary vote
against the winner, he may still be the winner. But
he sure as hell didn't crush his opponents or anything
else except maybe he crushed some adderall. Finally, finally, some
(12:34):
of the major news organizations did some of the reporting
they should have done in the immediate wake of Monday's
vote in Iowa. The key numbers fifty one to forty
nine is not a landslide, and Trump Yes beating Trump
No by just two hundred and twenty two votes. That
should have been the headline. Having failed to make that
(12:56):
the headline, there is a series of interior numbers and
places like Politico finally noticed, but these vote look at
all like a Trump crush. Hey, what happened from Politico yesterday?
He showed striking weakness in suburban and urban areas. In
(13:16):
more than three dozen precincts. In the suburbs, Trump received
less than a quarter of the vote, even while achieving
blowout wins of ninety plus percent of votes cast in
a similar number of rural precincts. It also reveals his
relative vulnerability among suburban and highly educated voters, raising questions
about how he will win over a voting block that
(13:38):
has long viewed him with skepticism and helped fuel his
twenty twenty loss.
Speaker 3 (13:44):
Well, look at that.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
It's not what he asked for, but the tin man
has gotten a brain. Charlie Sykes from the Bulwark dot com,
who I never mean to include among the dilettante pundits,
did the kind of work your average TV commentator or
writer at Politico would never think to try. Work that
involved a lot and a calculator. The low turnout Monday
(14:08):
in Iowa had many reasons, mostly the real field tempts
as low as thirty below fine valid, but whatever their cause,
Sikes notes, it means that Trump's vote total Monday comprised
only eight percent of all the Republicans just in Iowa.
(14:32):
It's not a landslide if you've gotten eight percent of
your own parties voters to vote for you. Sikes also
hit the entrance. In exit polling in Iowa, a quarter
of those Iowa Republicans who did go to the caucuses
said they will not vote for Trump in November. That's
not if he's convicted or if he's dead. That's right now.
(14:54):
They won't vote for this Trump in November. If he's convicted.
The no way number jumps from twenty five percent to
thirty one percent. And by the way, if thirty one
percent of Republicans across the country will not vote for
a convicted Trump, he's going to lose in a landslide.
And nearly half of Haley's backers in Iowa say they
(15:17):
would vote not for Trump but for Joe Biden. There
are no indications from Iowa that Trump will be denied
the nomination in a center guilty, dead or alive. But
there are also no indications that Iowa proved that Trump
is even as strong as he was in twenty twenty
or twenty sixteen, let alone somehow stronger, which seems to
(15:40):
be the headline everybody had printed. Oh, by the way,
New Hampshire Tuesday, where Nicki Haley is now up to
thirty eight percent in new polling. Ron DeSantis is headed
to South Carolina this weekend. Ron DeSantis just punted New Hampshire.
(16:05):
Also of interest here, Yes I saw Trump has three
or four bright red marks on his right hand, one
on the thumb, one on the forefinger, one or two
on the upper palm. And yes I saw. James Carville
has speculated they are not cuts or bruises, but sores,
(16:27):
sores consistent with the secondary stage of syphilis. No, I
don't think they are syphilis, although I'll respect mister Carville's
knowledge of the subject. I don't think there's syphilis, in
large part because the photos of Trump from Tuesday show
no red marks on his right hand, and I don't
(16:48):
think they would burst into full vivid color overnight. I'm
not a doctor, I just play one on podcasts. But
the marks are consistent with an old guy slipping on
the ice in Iowa, in Hampshire, in New York for
that matter, during his news conference for that matter, and
(17:09):
grabbing something to support himself or stop himself from face planting.
The campaign should explain what the marks are actually. I
will be very disappointed if Trump and his campaign do
not claim the marks are stigmata. Stigmata, perhaps from Trump's
holy anger that MSNBC and CNN did not worship him
(17:32):
sufficiently after Iowa. He wants to have their licenses revoked
even though they don't have licenses. And for once, I'm
going to defend Trump sorta. His belief that he can
bully MSNBC and NBC News into better coverage is based
(17:53):
on the fact that the Republican Party has already bullied
MSNBC and NBC News into better coverage thanks to the
interventions of Tom Brokaw that I was there when they
did that story. Next, this is an all new edition
of Countdown.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
This is Countdown with Keith Olberman.
Speaker 1 (18:24):
Oh scripts to the news, some headlines, some updates, some snarks,
some predictions. Dateline. The Supreme Court, Uh, here we go.
The Fourteenth Amendment in presidential immunity cases are the obvious
ones where the Supreme Court can turn this nation into
Weimar Republic two point zero. But there's another subtler one
(18:47):
that could basically bar all environmental protection regulations and business
regulations and you know, anything that keeps the rapacious among
us frompaciou singing. The Court heard arguments yesterday about a
repeal of the now forty year old Chevron decision, which
says that if regulatory statutes are ambiguous, judges have to
(19:09):
defer to the regulatory agency's interpretations of those statutes. Supreme
Court watchers said the six members of the Republican Supreme
Religious Court seemed skeptical of Chevron and seemed willing to
kill it and with it, the legal basis for most
government regulations, when the Solicitor General arguing to keep it
(19:29):
said it would be an unwarranted shock to the legal
system to remove it. Justice Fratboy M. Kavanaugh belched that
there were quote shocks to the system every four or
eight years when a new administration comes in, whether it's
communications law or securities law, or competition law or environmental law.
(19:49):
He doesn't like laws. Once again, we approach the point
at which we will have to decide whether to continue
to let this illegally packed court push us back towards
the year eighteen eighty five, or to draw a line
in the sand and say, hey, nice ruling, boys, and
how are you going to enforce it? Are you sending
(20:10):
Clarence over in his RV with brass knuckles? Dateline, Capitol
Hill Marjorie Taylor Green providing the comic relief yet again.
Barney rubbles stunt double at a committee hearing, setting herself
up one more time. I just traveled in airports across
(20:32):
the country just the past few days. You know what
I saw on our airports based on Marge's role pursuing
Hunter Biden, I'm going to say the answer is dick picks. Migrants,
illegal aliens all over in the airports. Damn it, Well,
we're the migrants carrying dick picks. Did you ask? Did
(20:54):
you ask to see their papers? You didn't, since you'd
have no legal right to do that, Then how do
you know they were undocumented?
Speaker 3 (21:02):
Marge?
Speaker 1 (21:21):
Thank you? Nancy Faust stell ahead on this all new
(21:45):
edition of Countdown, the Republican presidential candidate threatening MSNBC, the
right wing reacting hysterically as usual to what the network
showed or did not show. I mean that Trump story
from this week, No, Sir, September two thousand and eight,
when Goon's working for or on behalf of John McCain
(22:06):
blackmailed Tom Brokaw into going into his bosses and demanding
that Chris Matthews and I be fired from presidential debate
coverage or their guy would not show up to the
debate fifteen years plus later, and it still shocks me,
and it still cost them twenty two million dollars, which
(22:27):
I still have things I promised not to tell. Coming
up first time for the daily round up of the
miss Grits, morons and Dunn Kruger effects specimens who constitute
two days worse persons in the Lebron's Worse. The new
president of Argentina Wolverine. I'm sorry his name is Hobbier Milay.
(22:48):
He just looks like Wolverine because of that haircut. They
let this nutball talk at the World Economic Forum in Davos,
and he blamed basically all of the world's problems on
equality for women. Quoting wolver All, that this radical feminism
agenda has led to is greater state intervention to hinder
(23:10):
the economic process, giving a job to bureaucrats who have
not contributed anything to society. Examples ministries of work of
women or international organizations devoted to promoting this agenda. Another
conflict presented by socialists is that of humans against nature,
claiming that we human beings damage the planet, which should
be protected at all costs, even going as far as
(23:32):
advocating for population control mechanisms or the bloody abortion agenda. Unquote, congratulations, Argentina,
your new president is actually dumber than he looks. The
runner up worser the Babylon B, which is a right
wing humor website, and there is the ultimate oxymoron. Sure
(23:53):
is right wing, and it sure has absolutely no humor
in it, nor any sense of propriety or timing. The
same day, Vivic Ramaswami drops out of the Gace and
reiterates that there's no racism and endorses Trump. The Babylon B,
which thinks it's the Onion, except you know, the Onion
without any jokes in it, posts a piece headlined Trump
(24:17):
promises VIVAQ and administration position running the White House seven
to eleven. The saddest part of that is not that
it's racist or that it's not funny, but that some
percentage of Trump's cult will think that's an actual news story.
But our winner the worst Ben Carson. You remember Ben Carson,
(24:40):
the brain surgeon who ran for president and the only
thing he got out of it was a job. And
the Trump had men running housing and urban development and
proving to the world that to be a brain surgeon,
you do not have to have your own brain. For
some reason, CNN has interviewed Ben Carson about Trump's promise
(25:01):
to round up migrants and keep them in concentratation camps.
Although the CNN host was nice enough to defer to
Trump and the Republicans and called them internment camps, Carson
emphasized in response that the goal is to keep migrants
from coming here in the first place, and again that
by itself is laugh out loud funny. There is political
cap collapse driven by climate change underway already right now,
(25:25):
and that ain't stopping anytime soon. So good luck getting
them to stay there and fry rather than coming here
and take their chances. But then Ben Carson said something,
So Ben Carson, in that sedated man, I hope he's
brighter than that when he operates way of his Carson
was asked if he would support Trump's decision to open
(25:47):
the camps, and he actually replied, quote, well, they have
to have some place to stay. Unquote Ben, is that
also your answer when they ask you about slaves on
the plantations in this country in the eighteenth and nineteenth cents, Carson,
they have to have some place to stay. Two days.
(26:10):
Worst person in the world just ahead Trump demanding MSNBC
should lose its license, even though it doesn't have a
license for not televising his latest victory speech. It's actually
(26:33):
not something he invented. The Republicans have been doing stuff
like this to MSNBC since two thousand and eight and
sadly getting away with it. Things I promise not to
tell next first time for another dog in need, you
can help. Every dog has its day and we go
to Anson County, North Carolina and a puppy they have
called Sweet Cheeks seventeen weeks old, a beautiful white and
(26:55):
tan dog found abandoned and paralyzed on the side of
a road there, literally left to die, probably after being
beaten by a human. Only by accident was he found
before another animal or exposure killed him. This is a
lot of money that might not get the result we want,
but we have to try. They want to try to
get him the definition of innocence betrayed by humans, To
(27:17):
get him back the use of his legs. This means
treating his injuries and then seeing if surgery might get
him back the use of his legs. My friends at
Hounds in Pounds are fundraising for him. They're going for
four thousand dollars. You can find Sweet Cheeks at givinggrid
dot com and I'll tweet him out too. Your donations
can help, and so also can your reposts. Sweet Cheeks,
(27:39):
thanks you, and I thank you to the number one
story on the countdown and things I promised not to tell.
And the right wing went nuts over MSNBC and CNN
not showing all of Trump's self congratulatory speech from Iowa
(28:00):
Monday night, and Hannity attacking Matdow and Trump insisting that
they're licenses should be taken away, confirming he's either crazy
or stupid because of course they don't have licenses, although
this does portend what he will try to do if
he seeses power, is intent to punish news outlets not
just for criticizing him, but for not praising him enough.
(28:23):
And boy did this flash me back because this happened
to me at MSNBC in two thousand and eight courtesy
the supposed sane Republicans who preceded these insane Republicans, and
it underscores that there never really have been sane Republicans
and they have always longed to dictate to the media
(28:43):
what it can and cannot say about them, and thanks
to people like Tom Brokaw, they often get away with it.
Chris Matthews and I were co anchoring the Republican Convention
on MSNBC in two thousand and eight. He was there
at the convention in Minnesota. I was in the studios
at thirty Rock in New York, ostensibly so I could
also anchor hurricane covering, though it was pretty clear that
(29:06):
at least half the reason I was not in Minneapolis
was because the Republicans had threatened NBC or said they
could not guarantee my safety there or something like that.
So I was the one on September two, two thousand
and eight, who had to throw it to a video
that we had been told by the Republicans was a
tribute to the dead of nine to eleven that they
were playing in the theater in their convention in Minnesota.
(29:31):
It was not a tribute. It was a snuff film.
All of the images that the networks had stopped showing
of nine to eleven within weeks or even days of
the attacks, all of them were in this snuff film.
People jumping, falling to their deaths from the World Trade Center,
endless replays of the planes hitting the towers, dismembered bodies
in the plaza, the building collapses, the equally terrifying scenes
(29:54):
at the Pentagon, and all with the grotesque voiceover from
that Fink Robert Dovey emphasizing that this was all the
Democrats fault. The message was they might as well pray
this way, elect Obama and you will die, and you
will die like this. I was angry just on that
base level. For that five and a half years I
(30:15):
had been back at MSNBC, we had been rigorous about
not showing any of that video that the Republicans had
just forced upon us by lying to us about it.
There were rules that if we had to for some
reason sneed some snippet, we would show only skill images,
and even then only with extensive warnings to the viewers.
(30:36):
But I knew from my conversations with the president of MSNBC,
Phil Griffin, who I had known for twenty eight years
at that point, that he would insist that on the
scene in Minneapolis, Matthews and Tom Brokaw, whose career at
NBC I had resuscitated after Brian Williams had buried him
alive two years earlier. I knew from what Griffin told
me that one or both of them would rebuke the
(30:58):
GOP for showing not a nine to eleven tribute, but,
as I just said, a nine to eleven snuff film.
The snuff film ended, we came out to Brokaw and Matthews,
and Brokaw kind of coughed, and Matthews said wow. And
he turned to Brokaw and said, in that loose fire
hose delivery he had tom that kind of scores terrorism.
(31:18):
Big thing for Republicans. They try stop Obama. Brokaw droned
on approvingly, the Republican sneaking a snuff film, a banned
video onto MSNBC and by the way, also onto CNN,
onto NBC, proper, onto CBS, onto ABC without any warning.
That was not mentioned. Back to New York Ton Keith,
(31:41):
I was supposed to add liberates about what we were
expecting from the Republican convention for the rest of the
night and then throw to a commercial. Instead, I said,
and this is a paraphrase, the original tape disappeared that
night that before we moved on, I felt I needed
to apologize that we at MSNBC and for that matter,
at NBC News at extremely strict rules about not showing
(32:03):
the video the publicans had just shown you via our network,
without any warning, without any context, and by lying to us,
And we certainly would not have shown the horror and
death and blamed it on the Democrats, or for that matter,
on the Republicans. I said, if we had done such
a thing ourselves, there would have been people fired. The
(32:25):
public program the GOP provided said that was going to
be a nine to eleven tribute film, I said, And
so did the private conversations with the network, which included
the reminder from NBC and MSNBC that we had rules
against showing the scenes of horrible death and mutilation and destruction.
So I apologized on behalf of whoever trusted the Republicans
(32:45):
to live up to their word, that MSNBC viewers were
forced to see the video our network had promised never
to show them. So three nights later, without as much
as an email to me, this Griffin had called my
agent and told her I was fired and Matthews two
from our coverage of the upcoming McCain Obama debates. I
(33:07):
happened to be off that night in the press box
watching a Mets Phillies game at Shay Stadium, so she
had to relate these details to me by phone as
I walked down the many ramps in the stadium's bowels
and headed towards the subway. I told her to call
Griffin back and tell him I was quitting on the
spot right then, and he could work his way out
(33:29):
of the ensuing disaster by himself. Liberal network MSNBC fires
liberal host Alderman for criticizing conservatives for sneaking nine to
eleven snuff film onto MSNBC. He could work his way
out of that disaster any way he chose, and then
he could wait for my response on Good Morning America, CBS,
This Morning, the PBS News Hour, any other news program
(33:50):
that bothered to ask and in court. I made a
few phone calls to friendly voices within the NBC management structure,
got from them a clearer picture of what had happened.
And despite the spotty cell service along the elevated train
line heading back into Manhattan, I got a message from
a newspaper reporter friend who neatly tied together all that
(34:11):
I was hearing elsewhere. Tom Brokaw is going around NBC
saying he got you fired from the debates because the
Republicans told him to. Nine maybe ten months earlier, the
same Phil Griffin had come to me and asked me
if I would be okay with Brokaw appearing during our
weekly coverage of the Democratic and Republican primaries. Just a
(34:32):
couple of minutes, buddy, like from a perspective desk, that's
all he wants to do. He's so unhappy Brian Williams
has frozen him out of everything. I was appalled, but
not surprised. The power had gone to Brian's head, and
of course there it had not met very much resistance. Plus,
as I said to Griffin, you're asking me if i'd
(34:53):
like to add Tom Brokaw's experience and Tom Brocaw's gravitas
to stuff I'm anchoring when I'm not sure I know
as much as I really know to do this the
right way. Tom to be fair fit in beautifully, and
twice after those long Tuesday evenings during the primaries, he
sent me brief emails awarding me what he called the
(35:15):
game ball because he was so impressed by my ability
to balance the roles of political anchor and political commentator.
Having tried this myself, he wrote, I know of a
perilous tight roupe. This is game ball to koh. I
mocked them now, but they meant so much to me
then that I printed them out and carried them in
(35:37):
my wallet until September. And now Brokaw had gotten me
fired because, as my newspaper friend said, the Republicans told
him to well, that wasn't hard to unpack either. Tim
Russard had died on the third of June that year.
I anchored that night until two in the morning. It
(35:57):
was still an open wound. There were still tears. We
didn't know it then, but the structure of NBC News
and the perilous tightroup balancing NBC and MSNBC had died
with Tim Russard. So did the role of moderator of
the second debate between John McCain and Barack Obama, scheduled
for about a month. From my subway ride on October seventh,
(36:20):
two thousand and eight in Nashville, Tim had not even
been buried yet when Brokaw began to angle to get
that assignment that was now vacant. Along with brushing away
the dirt of his penny anti role on the MSNBC
Perspective Desk, leaving us in the lurch in order to
take over Tim's spot as Brian's sage sidekick on Big NBC.
(36:43):
The month of four August, there had been a story
coming out of the east end of the third floor
at thirty Rock, where NBC News managers sat around not
doing much of anything, that a Republican goon named Ed
Gillespie had been in there with Griffin and the idiot
NBC News president Steve CAPPIs trying to get me silenced
or fired or off the convention coverage or something, and
(37:06):
that somebody prominent from NBC News was in there with
Gillespie or was invoked by Gillespie. The rumor mill was
not confident in who it was or what exactly they
were doing. That Friday night in September two thousand and eight,
as I switched from the elevated seven train to the
underground f the whole thing came together before my comments
(37:30):
about the GOP Convention nine to eleven snuff film. Gillespie
had come in and had somehow vaguely threatened Campus and
Griffin about me using as leverage the debate, which Tom
Brokaw was now supposed to moderate the one that had
been Russert's, and when I apologized for their snuff video
on our air, Gillespie must have turned it into an
(37:51):
either or get rid of me, or McCain would refuse
to participate in any debate moderated by Brokaw. Tom Brokaw
had already come back from the dead once in two
thousand and eight. I had made that happen, and he
would be damned if he would be forced to do
it a second time. But as the train took me
(38:11):
home to an apartment, I was now going to have
to sell since I had quit MSNBC on the spot
for folding to such obvious blackmail, something else now occurred
to me. Why would MSNBC or NBC or our parent
corporation GE actually think that they could remove me from
the debate coverage on MSNBC where the Rachel Meadow Show
(38:34):
had not yet been born and was only going to
premiere the next week, and the three times a night
my show ran accounted for something like sixty percent of
the entire day's network audience and all of its profits.
How did they think they were going to get away
with that without a really bad reaction from our audience. Plus,
if a newspaper man already knew the Brokaw part, how
(38:54):
could this story be avoided something like this. MSNBC has
announced it had removed its liberal star Keith Alumman from
coverage of the McCain Obama presidential debates. Sources firmed former
NBC News anchorman Tom Brokaw, now an MSNBC commentator, had
helped the Republican Party to blackmail NBC into the decision.
(39:15):
Olderman immediately resigned, saying, quote in succumbing to this coercion
on behalf of John McCain, NBC has now forfeited any
further right to be called a news organization, and I'm
sad to say MSNBC, which I built, is now dead.
At that point, it dawned on me that the only
thing that could save the credibility of the whole NBC
(39:35):
News division and the careers of Griffin and Cappus and
NBC Network President Jeff Zooker, and especially Tom Brokaw, was
for me to publicly state, to lie that I had
asked to be removed from anchoring the debates because the
whatever was just too much blah blah, blah for me,
and I felt I should just stick to the post
(39:57):
debate analysis and commentary and blah blah blah blah blah.
In short, they would have a choice. They could fire
me from the debates and destroy everything, including the one
hundred million dollars a year or so in profits NBC
was suddenly making off MSNBC after years of losing about
that much. Or I could lie and claim it was
(40:18):
my idea and I could save everybody's ass and their money,
including my own. I got out of the subway and
raced home. I called my agent. I explained it to her.
I'm not quitting. In fact, I'm going to get a
huge raise. Listen carefully, you call Griffin back and explain
to him I will now personally save his job even
(40:39):
though he doesn't deserve it, and campuses and Zooker's and
bro Cause and everybody else's. I'll take the fall instead
of letting them get fired by the MSNBC audience. I'll
say this was my idea and it will cost him
only twelve million dollars. Oh, and he has to leak
the fact that it cost him twelve million dollars. That's
(41:01):
the deal. And she paused for a second, and she said, Hey,
that's genius. It might not quite be twelve, but I
bet I get at least nine million. On Sunday, several
news organizations reported I had asked to be taken off
the anchor desk for the debates. Two months and one
(41:21):
week later, The New York Times wrote, quote, Keith Olberman,
the anchor of Countdown on MSNBC, has extended his contract
through the next presidential election season. The networking outs mister
Olderman and MSNBC essentially tore up the four year, four
million dollar a year contract they signed last year and
replaced it with one worth about seven and a half
million a year. So that was a three and a
(41:43):
half million dollar raise for four years to a total
of fourteen million dollars. Except the new contract added two
years to my old deal, so the rays was actually
twenty two million dollars. All stories have punchlines. This punchline
is about Brocaw. We would have gotten away with this,
(42:03):
NBC would have gotten its money, and he's worth for
the twenty two million in hush money it had to
pay me because it had rolled over for Republican Party blackmail.
Except Brokaw couldn't keep his mouth shut. So proud was
he of preserving his role as moderator of the October
seventh debate that he had to explain in explicit detail
(42:23):
how he went to his bosses at NBC News and
threatened them on behalf of the GOP. I mean on
the record, he said this September twenty ninth, a lengthy
and glowing Brocaw profile in The New York Times. Quote
mister Brocaw said that over the summer he'd quote advocated
within the executive suite of NBC News to modify the
(42:45):
anchor duties of the MSNBC hosts Keith Olderman and Chris
Matthews on election Night and on knights where there were
presidential debates. Mister Brokaw said he had also conducted some
shuttle diplomacy in recent weeks between NBC and the McCain campaign.
His mission, he said, was to assure the candidate's aids
that despite some negative on air commentary by mister Olberman
(43:06):
in particular, mister McCain could still get a fair shake
from NBC News. Unquote. That was his mission, the hell,
that was his mission. Happily, brocaonc just could not resist
boasting even further. The next sentence reads quote, Mister Brocaw
said he had been told by a senior McCain aide
(43:28):
whom he did not name, that the campaign had been
reluctant to accept an NBC representative as one of the
moderators of the three presidential debates until his name was invoked.
One of the things I was told by this person
was that they were so irritated. They said, if it's
an NBC moalorator for any of these debates, we won't go.
(43:49):
Mister Brocaw said, my name came up, and they said,
oh hell, we have to do it, because it's going
to be Brokaw. No insufferable person in all of broadcasting
history has a better rep and a better and more
undeserved rep than Tom Brokeall So, when a Trump leans
(44:11):
on NBC management because the coverage that he got was
not the coverage he wanted, don't think it won't have
an effect. Because in two thousand and eight, they loved
me then as they love Meadow now. But what they
loved about each of us was not the truth we provided,
but the money. There is a second punchline after all this,
(44:34):
when the new format came out. MSNBC had David Gregory
quote anchor unquote the debate coverage. Practically, all this meant
was that I was on the air until ninety seconds
before the debates began, which is when I said, now
here's David Gregory. And he was on the air for
four or five minutes after the debate ended, which is
when he would then say, now here's Keith Ollerin. And
(44:55):
on Election Night, with David officially the anchor of MSNBC's coverage,
at ten fifty nine pm, he said, and bless him
for this. With the last voting bo closing at eleven PM,
NBC News can now project the winner of the two
thousand and eight presidential election, Keith plus that twenty two
(45:16):
million dollars. I still have it. I've done all the
damage I can do here. Thank you for listening. Countdown.
Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillip Chanel arranged, produced,
(45:38):
and performed most of our music. Mister Ray was on guitars,
bass and drums. Mister Shanelle handled orchestration and keyboards. Was
produced by Tko Brothers. Other music, including some of the
Beethoven compositions, arranged and performed by No Horns Aloud. The
sports music is the Oberman theme from ESPN two, written
by Mitch Warren Davis courtesy of ESPN Inc. Our satirical
(45:59):
and fifthy musical comments are by Nancy Fauss. The best
baseball stadium organist ever announcer today was my friend John Dean,
and everything else was pretty much my fault. So that's
countdown for this the two hundred and ninety fifth day
until the twenty twenty four US presidential election. See how
the Republicans blackmail NBC between now and then and the
one and eighth day since dementia J. Trump's first attempted
(46:23):
coup against the democratically elected government of the United States.
Use the Fourteenth Amendment, the Insurrection Act, and the justice
system to stop him from doing it again while we
still can. The next scheduled countdown is tomorrow. Boltins as
the news warrants till then. I'm Keith Olberman. Good morning,
good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck. Countdown with Keith Olderman
(46:58):
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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