February 14, 2024 • 39 mins
SERIES 2 EPISODE 122: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44) BREAKING: The Democrats have flipped the Kitara Ravache Memorial Special Congressional Election in the New York 3rd. It's not a bellwether. It won't even be the same district a year from now. But Tom Suozzi not only took back the seat lost to "George Santos," he completely overshadowed the WhoreHouse Republicans' performance art impeachment last night of Secretary Mayorkas.
(3:47) SPECIAL COMMENT: For once Politico aptly describes it: "The Biden Age Plot." Disgraced Special Counsel Robert Hur and House Republicans aren't just looking to have Hur testify on a topic about which he has no expertise, but they intend to have "Biden's Age" be the 2024 version of Benghazi: hearings, controversy, press conferences, witnesses, transcripts, subpoenas for weeks or even months.
It's enraging but it reveals the GOP's terror: it is willing to risk bringing up Trump's age, Trump's bad mental health, and especially Trump's stolen documents - the actually stolen ones for which he will stand trial eventually. There are two possible Democratic responses. The first is for Attorney General Garland to squelch testimony and leave the Republicans with only one note rather than a hatful of phony storylines. The second is for the Democrats to hoist the GOP on its own petard, and to conduct a Senate investigation to whether Hur and the House Republicans conspired for him to write his editorialization about Biden before he submitted his report.
There is a sidebar to the entire "Biden's Age" crap. When you hear 77-year old Chris Wallace or 72-year old Maureen Dowd or even 61-year old Jon Stewart say "he's too old" there is a second half to that sentence that they never say aloud. "HE'S too old, and that proves I'M not." The personal fear and memento mori are a huge component.
And there IS a response and, happily, the Biden Campaign seems to have just figured it out this week.
B-BLOCK (22:11) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Sean Hannity averaged 1.25 Hunter Biden stories per show last year and now the House has dropped the Hunter Biden performance art. A New York Times reporter explains the internal rationalization for bothsidesism: Biden Hasn't Done A Q&A With Us Recently. And gone but not forgotten: Chris Cillizza and the RFK Jr Super Bowl Commercial.
C-BLOCK (29:20) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: My friend Andrew Blauner needs your help to get his 2-1/2 year old Bernese Mountain Dog Smiles treatment for lymphoma. (31:00) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: It's 44 years ago TODAY when my nascent broadcasting career nearly ended atop a mountain at the 1980 Winter Olympics, all because my bosses had decided to teach me the night before how to drink.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. The
Democrats have won the special election in the George Santos
Katara Ravahe Memorial third District of New York former Congressman
Tom Swazi, fending off a politically amorphous opponent who may
(00:28):
or may not have been an ex Democrat. The count
was supposed to take at least all night on Long
Island and in Queen's at the website decision desk called
the race for Swazi fifty eight minutes after the polls closed,
then the Associated Press rang it up seven minutes after that,
by which point Swazi had about fifty nine percent of
(00:49):
the vote. And even if that margin does not hold up,
it's not only flipped the seat back to the Democrats,
but it completely deflated the whoreor House Republicans performance art
impeachment last night of Homeland Security Secretary Majorcus by one
vote because a Democrat stayed home due to COVID. There
is not expected to be a trial in the Senate.
(01:10):
My Orcus was of course charged with with charged with
charged with not being a Republican. But back to Long
Island and yes, it snowed on election day and no,
it wasn't a blizzard, and yes it was sunny by
three pm yesterday, And no, it's not actually much of
a predictor for November because it is in a conservative
(01:33):
swath of Long Island. And while the Democrat Tom Swazi
was trying to deny it ever heard the name Joe Biden,
the Republican Mazi Pillop was trying even harder to deny
she knew the name Donald Trump. And the whole election
was about immigration. And Pillop, of course, was born in
Ethiopia and emigrated from Israel, and her husband is from Ukraine.
And not only isn't it a predictor for November, it's
(01:55):
not even a predictor for this district in November because
it's going to be redrawn by then. And as somebody
called it, this is going to be the most expensive
rental in congressional history. And yeah, I did it this
way so I could update the results as they came in.
Now here's the real podcast. So now the full breadth
(02:24):
and the full stink of Robert Hurr's perversion of the
Special Council Statutes is becoming fully clear. Robert Herr has
not just turned his report clearing President Biden on any
willful retention. We're sharing of classified documents into a Trump
super pack, and he's not just arranged or attempted to
(02:45):
arrange follow up testimony to one or maybe two House
committees which are themselves Trump super packs. Robert Hurr took
it one step further, as Politico aptly for once puts it,
Robert Herr is at the center of the Biden age
plug the news sites. Sources on Capitol Hill report that quote,
(03:09):
House Republicans are activating a weeks long, perhaps months long,
plan to keep questions about President Biden's mental state in
the spotlight. Three House committees have asked the Attorney General
Merrick Garland, whose stupidity left the president open to this
scheme redolent of a previous Republican Congress hunting Hillary Clinton
(03:31):
and one before that hunting Bill Clinton. It is asked
Garland for transcripts, tape recordings, witnesses. They want to drag
this out with hearings, follow ups, press conferences, allegations about
national security, and even just umbrage if Democrats thwart their
plans to Benghazi the her I'm not a doctor, but
I play one with the nation's life. Report infuriating as
(03:55):
that is, there isn't a way, but there should be
a way to put Robert Hurr in prison for this,
and Garland and James Comer and whoever plotted this, I mean,
Politico would not have called it the Biden age plot
without evidence that it was a plot, which means planned
in advance. Infuriating as it is, there's still one important
(04:18):
overarching message. The Republicans are terrified enough to play this
very dangerous game, because if you managed to put Robert
her on the stand and you put Biden's age on trial,
you run the risk of her revealing whatever the Biden
age plot really is. And you also put Trump's age
(04:41):
on trial, and you also put Trump's documents kleptomania and
espionage on trial. And by the way, Trump is actually
on trial for stealing those documents and would go to
prison for espionage. It seems to me the Democrats have
two choices here. Garland has previously testified that most special
(05:03):
councils have them testified to Congress after their investigations were complete.
Doesn't mean this one should. Robert Hurr broke departmental rules. Moreover,
he broke faith with the legal system, even as the
Republicans view it, Robert Hurt as a crooked operator. He
is the equivalent of a snitch. He is the equivalent
(05:24):
of a three card Monte dealer. The Attorney General could
deny him permission to testify and prosecute him if he
tries to testify anyway, or Senate Democrats could notice that
smell of rat again. Politico the voice of the mainstream,
the home of a moral both sidesism. The promulgators of
(05:48):
a morning newsletter that was sponsored yesterday for around three
hundred thousand dollars by the fossil fuel industry trying to
protect gas guzzling cars. They were sponsored by, you know,
planetary suicide Incorporated. Politico called it the Biden age plot.
The Homeland and Government Affairs Committee in the Senate has
(06:11):
a permanent subcommittee on investigations, and that subcommittee could take
Robert her and whoever the middlemen were in whatever his
deal was with the House, gop to the effing cleaners,
your call, lady or the tiger again. I still like
the Attorney General shutting this down and Biden telling him
(06:34):
you take the heat, you're taking the fall. You hold
the press conferences, you fix this, and if you do
it right, I'll let you resign. Better to give the
Republicans just one note to pound Biden won't let us
talk about his age every day until the election. But
(06:54):
he's not really very smart. Except he won't let us
talk about his age every day until the election. He's
really super genius. Remember this is the invite we are
in right now. The New York Times has an opinion
piece this week, the body of which actually quietly marvels
that anybody could possibly think Joe Biden's age is as
(07:17):
important as Trump's past treasons or future treasons, and they
still managed to stick atop it this headline quote, which
is worse Biden's age or Trump handing NATO to Putin?
While we are here in this environment, there is also
(07:38):
a subtext to the Biden's too old to infirm to
let's see what else have we got on him? He's
too Bidenish story, a subtext that probably has not hit
you yet. I only got it the other week when
I turned sixty five years old, When sixty eight year
old Bill Maher says Biden is too old and feeble,
(08:00):
or when sixty nine year old in eight days, David
Axelrod says Biden is too old and infirm, Or when
seventy two year old Maureen Dowd says Biden is too
old and troubled, Or when seventy seven year old Chris
Wallace says Biden is too old and risky, or when
sixty one year old but he looks seventy five, John
Stuart says Biden is too old and just as bad
as Trump. They're actually not finishing their thoughts. The whole
(08:26):
sentence actually is Biden is eighty one and too old
and feeble and affirmed and troubled and risky. And I
am not. I'm only seventy seven or seventy two or
seventy nine or sixty five, and I'm sharp as attack,
especially compared to that guy. Look at him, he's old.
(08:47):
I'm not old. I'm Chris Wallace. I'm eternally young because
I dye my hair daily. And I'm Maureen Dowd, and
I'm eternally young because I constantly make hip cultural references
about Truman, Capoti and Charles in Charge. And I'm John
Stuart and I'm eternally young because I am It's too
cool to let the fact that one of these men
might crash into his words once in a while, and
(09:10):
the other one would encourage Russia to attack Poland. But
I would never let that interfere with my saucy nineteen
ninety eight comedy. I'm young, I'm young, he's not. I'm
not dead. I'm getting better. I don't want to go
(09:30):
on the court. I feel fine. I think I'll go
for a walk. I feel happy. I feel happy. You
don't think that's part of it. You have no idea kid.
Concurrent with the big Medicare birthday. The other day, my
(09:53):
extraordinarily well prepared friends from grammar school, you know, the
ones I met in nineteen sixty two, they started the
process of setting up the fifth high school reunion eighteen
months early. Ominous birthdays are one thing. But if you
have not yet heard the singularly terrifying sound that is
(10:16):
the bell tolling for your fiftieth high school reunion, you
have not been through all that existential trauma and night
terrors have to offer you. So what did I do?
Reading fiftieth high school reunion? I instinctively, reflexively desperately seized
(10:40):
on the fact that now as then when I graduated
high school, at the age of sixteen. I am about
a year and a half younger than all the rest
of them. I'm only sixty five, and I'm sharpest attack,
especially compared to that guy. Look at him, he's old.
He's sixty seven. If you want to look thin. And
(11:05):
Rodney Dangerfield told us, as Thornton Mellon, you hang out
with fat people if you want to feel young. John
Stuart tells us, you mock and insult old people. If
you don't think John Stuart, who was never smart but
during the Bush era was pretty clever and could read well,
(11:27):
if you don't think he's lost the plot. It will
never dawn on him that he will be in the
first bus with the rest of us to go into
those anti Trump holding cells. It will never dawn on
him that when right wing influencers take his clip and
repackage it as The Daily Show rips Biden on his
(11:48):
mental health, that means he just increased the chance Trump
gets elected. It will never dawn on him that if
his show's account tweets out the video and it gets
a response reading balance and humor return, and that's from
Elon Musk. John Stewart, you failed, Where's Craig Kilbourne when
(12:16):
we actually need him. As a side note, John Stuart's
cable audience for his much anticipated return after nine years
in the wilderness nine hundred and thirty thousand viewers, so
(12:36):
less than Alex Wagner. By the way, yesterday I was
asked by a friend why so much of the American
commentariat is willing to go after Biden's age and or
memory when in real time it did nothing, nothing about
Ronald Reagan's early stage Alzheimer's of nineteen eighty seven and
(12:57):
nineteen eighty eight nineteen eighty nine. There are two explanations. One,
we were still in the immediate post fair in his
doctrine era then, and there were still residual standards and
residual fear. Two, we have lost the ability, and I
mean everybody from Charlie Kirk to the New York Times
(13:19):
has lost the ability to differentiate between facts and truth.
Is it a fact that Robert Hurr wrote what he
wrote in his report? Informed or irresponsible? Insightful or politicking?
That should cost him his law license? Yeah, it's a
fact he wrote it. We used to then ask, well,
(13:42):
it's a fact that he wrote it, But is it
the truth. If somebody says, on the record, Donald Trump
has slept with a family member, it's a fact that
somebody said it. Is that enough to go with it?
Is it the truth? Nobody asks that second question anymore.
(14:02):
Nobody asks if rober Her knows what the hell he's
talking about. Nobody asks which ulterior motive drove him. Nobody
asks if it's irresponsible to report it. They just report it.
We report, You decide if it's the truth or not.
(14:25):
So what is the solution? What is the solution to
the rotting carcass of what used to be journalism? Now
additionally scared because every day they lay some more people off.
Yesterday twenty people at CBS News. What do we do
about the effect on the writers and broadcasters and the
(14:49):
maybe this will save all our jobs and make us
seem younger part of it. What do we do about
all of this? Happily, the light bulb over the Biden
campaign is finally buzzing and sputtering to full illumination, as
you may have seen Sunday after the Chiefs won the
Super Bowl and a million Qanons felt their Taylor's Swift
(15:10):
conspiracy theory had just come Drue Biden's social media posted
the dark Brandon laser eyes meme with the message just
like we drew it up yesterday. The campaign account posted
a new meme, twenty twenty four voting guide next to
a picture of Biden didn't encourage Russia to invade Europe
(15:32):
next to a picture of Trump encouraged Russia to invade Europe.
Sharp enough, dagger as it was, but then came the
coupdi gras. This one's for the New York Times. Yes,
please more of it every day, every hour. Carpet bomb Trump.
You got a TikTok account now, Joe Biden, use it,
(15:54):
Use Twitter x, use other social media memes. Videos, Trump's insanity,
Trump's gas, Trump's dictatorship quote, his adoration of dictators like
she the man is a content factory. Take all of
his videos and put them out every day. To one
of those voting guide ones about how he killed the
border deal, Donald Trump said killers are coming across the border.
(16:16):
Why is he helping them come across the border? The
media both sides something, call them out. This one's for
the New York Times. Excellent. The next one should be
for Chris Wallace or Dowd or John Stewart by name,
and the millions you are going to spend on advertising
on television in the Swing States. Do a TV spot
(16:39):
that starts, we all know Donald Trump is insane. To
another one that starts we all know something is wrong
with Donald Trump's brain and it's getting worse. To another
one with him explaining when he'll be a dictator, to
another one with the video of his deposition where he
says the photo of e Gen Carroll is actually his
(17:00):
second wife, Marila Maples. And then do some game show
effect and play the game show loser wompwomp sound, and
all of these spots should end the same way. I'm
Joe Biden, and I approved this message because I'm the
Democratic candidate for president and that's not a brand name.
We're Democrats. We're the party that wants to keep democracy.
(17:31):
Also of interest, here a New York Times writer has slipped.
He has given away one of the real reason The
Times thought not just liberal but the most liberal by
everybody except anybody who reads it. Why the Times glories
in hitting Joe Biden over the head every day, and
(17:51):
Whyatt gloried in hitting Hillary and Obama and John Kerry
and Al Gore and Bill Clinton and William Jennings Bryan probably,
And that real reason is it as petty and as
unbelievable and as infuriating as you could imagine. That's next.
(18:13):
This is countdown. This is countdown, with Keith Olberman still
(18:40):
a head on countdown. It snowed here yesterday. Snow makes
me think of the Winter Olympics and the most snow
I've ever seen in a fairly snowy life. And then
I check my notes and it's the anniversary. It's today.
It's forty four years ago today, when my career almost
(19:02):
came to an end top a mountain in Lake Placid,
New York, because my bosses had gotten me drunk the
night before and the wind chill that morning was fifty
blows zero. I'll explain next in Things I promised not
to tell first time, to honor those from the wonderful
(19:24):
world of the Dunning Krueger Effect, Today's worst persons in
the world of the Bronze Worst, Sean Hannity boys. Life
tough when you're merely a well paid carnival barker for
the Republican Scam show. Media Matters reports that Hannity got
a little deep in the weeds on the Hunter Biden
non story. Last year, remember Hunter Biden? The number of
(19:49):
different segments Hannity aired on Hunter Biden was three hundred
and twenty five. That is an average of one and
one quarter Hunter Biden segments per show. Media Matter also
reports that out of three hundred and twenty five segments,
two hundred and twenty of them contained at least one
false or misleading claim. So, now what's happened? The Republicans
(20:12):
have bailed out on the Hunter Biden's story because as
hard as they tried, it didn't go anywhere, and the
yokl they put in charge of it got caught lying,
and their mob is upset that he got nothing out
of it, and they all want to now go and
switch to the Robert her story instead. Three hundred and
twenty five handy segments on a dead scandal? What did
Hannity get for his trouble? Well, Scotch, they're runner up,
(20:38):
running up? Who am I? Tom Brokaw? They're runner up?
Worser Talman Smith The New York Times. Talman Smith. I
dealt with him once on a cover piece I did
for the Week in Review. I think nice enough guy,
a little frantic if I remember, If you'd like a neatly,
succinctly summarized microcosm of where and when The Times jumped
(21:00):
the shark, here it is. Mister Smith got into a
social media discussion of how The Times went nuts over
the Robert Herr story. You'll remember that the stat was
thirty three Times stories in four days. Quoting mister Smith
to liberals parentheses only slash, primarily blaming the media. When
(21:22):
was the last time Biden did an open presser or
did an on record Q and A with us, right,
thank you, we're not his pr people unquote Now, well, no,
you're not. What you are is you are the first
targets when a Trump back in power decides to jail reporters,
(21:44):
even in front of John Stuart. But life is like
a box of chocolates. You never know which one contains
your ticket to a Trump concentration camp. The point is
mister Smith is expressing a reality that reporters don't usually reveal.
Often they judge their response to the news and the
(22:05):
key people in the news based largely on how easy
those people make their jobs. Trump is a psychopathic would
be dictator. On the other hand, he's just a fire
hose of stories. But Joe Biden, Joe Biden hasn't given
the Times to sit down interview lately, so we have
the right to burn him to the ground and the
(22:26):
democracy with him. In other words, democracy may die in darkness,
but retaliation from The New York Times thrives in darkness. Oh,
by the way, Talman Smith in that media post there,
he misspelled the word weir. But our winner the worst.
And I know this is out of date, but I
can't let this go by unappreciated Chris Sliza of The
(22:50):
Washington Now that they fired him, Chris still is a
contributor to MSN. No they got rid of him. Chris
Stial is a writer for CNN dot No gone. Chris
sal is a he has, he's a newsletter any who,
Poor Chris. As you probably have heard by now, Robert F.
(23:10):
Kennedy Junior stole verbatim his uncle's JFK's nineteen sixties campaign ad.
A Trump donor bought time during the Super Bowl to
run the nineteen sixty commercial, complete with the voices of
President Kennedy and others, and over the furious howls of
indignation from other members of the Kennedy family who rightly
(23:31):
feel that my former friend Bob is nuts and whether
he knows it or not, my friend, former friend Bob
is just another Trump stooge stalking horse. The blowback from
the other Kennedy was so bad that RFK Junior actually apologized.
Of course, he also at the same time pinned the
commercial at the top of his Twitter feed that got
(23:52):
the attention of the Federal Election Commission because the candidate
is not allowed to have any coordination with the pack
that spent what fifteen million to run that ad that
everybody hated. I mean, there may have been a crime
committe here and not just a crime against good taste.
So where does Chris Solissa the tuning fork for political reality?
(24:12):
Whatever he says? The opposite is a certainty? Where does
Chris Solisza fit into this? Right after the purloined Kennedy
ad ran during the Super Bowl somebody who turns out
to have been a professional Trump and RFK Junior Shill
promptly tweeted the Robert F. Kennedy Junior ad was brilliant.
Chris Salizis saw that about an ad that the world
(24:35):
was poised to immediately condemn and Chris retweeted it and
added quote, totally agree, Chris, Wait, don't let the Titanic
leave Port. I have to get on board. Solissa two days.
Worst person in the world. Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle, just ahead.
(25:15):
For years, for decades, occasionally in my dreams, I would
hear in the background the public address announcement there is
a bus leaving for Whiteface Mountain. Il ya unbus, keep
part for white Face Mountain. It's skipteinen bus. They're not
a white face mountain. Fought the Lake Placid Olympics of
(25:36):
nineteen eighty still haunt me and for one dreadful moment,
which today is the exact anniversary of next in things,
I promise not to tell first time for another dog
in need, you can help. Every dog has its day,
and today it's personal. My friend Andrew Blouner has a big,
lovely Bernese Mountain dog called Smiles because she does a
(25:58):
little While back, Smile suddenly became sick. It proved to
be cancer lymphoma. The good news is no evidence it
has spread. There have been two chemotherapy sessions now and
Smiles has tolerated it well and perked up. In fact,
those are great signs, but there are twenty three more
chemo days to come for her, and they will cost money,
(26:18):
and Smiles could use your help. Andrew has set up
a gofund me for her at GoFundMe dot com. Just
search Smiles Mountain quickest way to her. The bad news
here is Smiles is just two and a half years old.
But anything you can give will be gratefully welcomed. Just
publicizing Smiles will help. I'll put the link out on
(26:38):
Twitter again our teeing it can make all the difference
in the world. Smiles thanks you, and I thank you.
No arm goes off. It is pitch black in my
room at the Swiss Acres Motel. It is Valentine's Day
(27:02):
and I am still ill drunk. Keith knew he was
in trouble, but I was also twenty one years old,
and in fact, my twenty first birthday had only been
eighteen days earlier. So somehow I survived, showered, dressed, packed,
and I mean I packed two cassette tape recorders, four
(27:23):
sets of batteries, an audio processing machine that weighed like
fourteen pounds the nine volt batteries it took. I think
it was a dozen of them, a telephone, a backup telephone,
twelve assorted patch cords, two loose leaf notebooks, about eight pens,
two microphones, two extra pair of socks, and I got dressed,
two full sets of thermal underwear, shirts, sweaters, snow pants,
(27:47):
snow shoes. Because it was eleven degrees below zero that morning.
I got something quick to eat at the commissary, and
I made it out somehow to the line for the
bus from the Lake Placid Olympics Center to the Lake
Placid Transportation Center to Lake Placid white Face Mountain, then
onto the snow track the open penned mountain tractor that
(28:10):
went up the side of Whiteface Mountain and took me
to the finish line of the nineteen eighty Olympic Men's
downhill ski final still drunk. That is how a reporter
covered the Olympics nearly forty three years ago. You drank,
you woke up, you went, You stood near the finish line,
and when the skiers completed their runs, you hiked or
(28:33):
wobbled over to them, and you took out your microphone
or your pen, and you interviewed them, like two minutes
after they had finished hurtling towards you down the hill,
you could see almost nothing of the race from there.
There were no TV monitors. Basically your only clue was
the sound of the crowd that would give you about
thirty seconds worth of warning that the skier was coming
(28:54):
over the near horizon and you should be prepared to
flee just in case he or she wiped out. Also,
you were on top of a mountain at the dead
point of winter, and whereas it might have been a
balney eleven degrees below zero in the comfort of the
Swiss Acres motel with the wind chill at the base
(29:16):
of the mountain, it was forty eight below zero and
there had already been four inches of new snow since
the sun came up, which is where the still drunk
part came in Handy, my boss is at my first job,
the thousand station radio network called United pres International Audio,
had decided the night before to teach me how to
(29:38):
drink while on assignment. My bosses were the bureau manager
for that part of you PI, the late Stan Sebik,
who had hired me, and Sam Rosen, the sports director
of the network, who not only somehow survived being my
first boss, but today just forty three years later, is
still working as the television voice of the New York
(29:58):
Rangers hockey team and is in the Hockey Hall of Fame.
So I guess my reputation is a tough employee, as
WHI overrated, or at least Sam thinks. So Sam and
Stan kept me drinking at the motel until two am,
knowing full well that I had to get on the
six am bus to go cover the men's downhill, because
it was the two of them who had assigned me
(30:19):
to go cover the men's downhill, and bluntly, I was
surprisingly pleased with myself that freezing morning because I had
indeed learned how to drink while on assignment. I had
somehow found the phone jack for the UPI phone buried
under all the new snow, which of course was buried
under all the old snow, attached the phone to it,
(30:41):
got in a dial tone, called the office, checked the
alligator clips with which I would feed the tape, and
all was well until I went to put a cassette
tape into the cassette recorder. I didn't have one fat
lot of good two cassette tape machines gonna do you
(31:04):
without a set to stick in one of them. I
looked forlornly around the base of Whiteface Mountain, twelve hundred
feet above sea level. As we were. There was a
surprisingly nice chalet and a decent restaurant, but there were
no radio shacks or other electronics stores. There was, however,
one other radio guy, Jack Briggs, from the Associated Press
(31:28):
Radio Network, the nominal arch rival to our own UPI Audio.
I knew Jack a little. He was a nice guy.
I went and explained my plight, making sure to blame
my bosses for my predicament. Oh man, he said, his
breath turning into first steam and then ice cubes. I'm
so sorry, but I can't give you a cassette. I'm
(31:52):
sorry you were UPI, and I'm ap Oh how I laughed.
That was a great line to say to a rookie reporter,
still drunk thanks to the initiation rituals of his own bosses,
the possessor of one great buzz but zero audio cassettes.
Jack Briggs could tell I thought he was kidding. That's
(32:14):
when he said, I'm not kidding. Look, if my boss,
Shelby Whitfield ever found out, he'd fire me. I suddenly
wasn't drunk anymore, not at all. My boss will will
fire me. Briggs was adamant. I can't run the risk
of shellby finding out. I have to confess. I shouted,
(32:37):
how the hell is he gonna find out? Jack? I
think subconsciously I was hoping to create an avalanche, which
would have been a better solution than the one I
was faced with. I said to him, there's you and
there's me, and we're on top of a goddamn mountain
and Shelby Whitfield, your boss is in Washington, DC, and
he's a drunk, and he's probably more drunk than I am,
(33:01):
and he'd probably thank you for helping me to drink more.
Briggs would not budge. I told him I would pay him.
I told him I would give him the cassette back
after I fed my boss the interviews over the phone,
so there'd be no evidence and he wouldn't even have
to do any interviews. No good, I'm sorry, and I
know you're going to tell this story about me for
a while. As he walked away from me, I shouted
(33:23):
after him. Forever. Turned out there was no radio shack
and no camaraderie, but there was a West Coast newspaper
reporter atop the mountain who heard some of this conversation.
I guess I yelled a little loudly at mister Briggs.
Some guy standing next to a Saint Bernard told me
to quiet down and mentioned something else about the avalanches.
(33:46):
Or maybe I dreamed that part. I don't know. Anyway,
the West Coast newspaper guy said he had a micro
cassette machine and he would loan it to me and
I could give it back to him at the media
center that day or the next one. But I had
to do him a favor because there was this really
cute reporter in our UPI bureau and he really wanted
to be introduced to her. And I said, I can
promise you nothing but handshake, and he understood, and that's
(34:06):
how I did not get fired. But of course, a
story like this has punchlines, and this one has two
of them. The first is two years and a couple
of months later, Shelby Whitfield asked me to lunch. He
had left the Associated Press to run the sports department
at the ABC Radio network, back when that was not
only a thing, but a big thing. We went to
(34:29):
a terrific New York City Chinese restaurant near ABC called
shun Lee, and Shelby Whitfield interviewed me for a job
when that kind of job paid eighty thousand a year
in my very nice studio apartment and a very nice
part of town costs less than five hundred dollars A
month later, in an interesting twist, I found out the
jobs didn't exist. I was mentioning the interview in a
(34:52):
press box somewhere I think Madison Square Garden, and there
was another kid reporter named Howie Rose, and how he
is still working, he does the New York Mets games
on the radio, and how he said, wait, the viewed
me for that job last year, just an excuse for
that damn Whitfield to go drink his lunch on ABC's tab. Anyway,
(35:13):
before we started the interview for the job I did
not know did not exist at ABC, I told Shelby
Whitfield the White Face Mountain, can I borrow a cassette
Jack Briggs story? And Shelby's exact reply was, I don't know.
Was I going to find out? There was you and
there was him, and you were on top of a
goddamn mountain and I was in Washington. Only he didn't
say goddamn that Briggs. He added, always trying to suck
(35:37):
up to me. I got to tell you something I
actually once promised I wouldn't tell you if we ever met. This.
When the Olympics were over and came back to the office,
he told me what happened. He expected me to be
happy or give him a bonus or something. And I
called him a little snitch. Only Shelby didn't say snitch,
just a word that rhymed with it. The other punch
line is from nineteen ninety two, and remember this happened
(35:59):
at the nineteen eighty Olympics. I go to work at
ESPN and come in a little early to launch their
radio network, a story I've told here before. And there
I find a friend of mine since my radio days,
who I have not seen in a year or so,
and he says, hey, last month, I was at an
NBA game in Washington. I ran in at Jack Briggs.
He heard you were going to ESPN. He asked me
(36:20):
if you were still telling that story about the time
you got stuck on Whiteface Mountain without a cassette. And
he was the only other reporter there, and he wouldn't
give you a spare, and I told him you were
and I smiled, and I replied, I hope you remembered
to use the word forever. I've done all the damage
(36:49):
I can do here. Thank you for listening. Have I
mentioned We've been nominated for Best Political Podcast in the
iHeart Podcast Awards. It'll be given out next month. Did
I mention that only one of the five nominees that's independent,
no network, no backing, just me and the dogs. I
was wrong on one key point. However, you cannot vote
(37:11):
in this category. I knew I wasn't doing as well
as I should have been. It's all rigged. It's fixed.
I could still win if Mike Pence has the courage.
Not gonna win, but what the hell? Countdown? Musical directors
Brian Ray and John Phillip Shanelle arranged, produced, and performed
most of our music. Mister Ray was on the guitars,
bass and drums. Mister Shanelle handled orchestration in keyboards. It
(37:32):
was produced by Tko Brothers. I mean pod Say of America,
which is on an exhausting two day a week schedule,
is also nominated for Best Overall Podcast. So you can
guess if it's best overall podcast, maybe and it's in
this category of best political Podcast, that they're gonna win
(37:53):
best Political Podcast. That's the way this stuff works. I'm
not bitter. How can I be bitter? This is my
first podcast nomination for anything. It's an honor just to
be nominated. Other music, including some of the Beethoven compositions,
were arranged and performed by the group. No, it's not
just an honor to be nominated. I'm sorry. The name
(38:15):
of the group is No Horns Allowed. The sports music
is the Old Woman theme from ESPN two, written by
Mitch Warren Davis courtesy ESPN Inc. Our satirical and pithy
musical comments are by Nancy Fauss, the best baseball stadium
organist ever. Our announcer today was my friend Tony Kornheiser,
who probably regrets recording that. Everything else was pretty much
by fault. That's countdown for this The two hundred and
(38:37):
sixty six day until the twenty twenty four US presidential election,
the one and thirty third day since dementia Jay Trump's
first attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the
United States use the fourteenth Amendment, use the insurrection at
use the justice system, use the mental health system, use
memes to stop him from doing it again while we
(39:01):
still can. Jon Stewart. The next scheduled countdown is tomorrow.
Bulletins is the news warrants till then. I'm Keith Olremman.
Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck. Countdown
(39:30):
with Keith Olreman 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. The
Democrats have won the special election in the George Santos
Katara Ravahe Memorial third District of New York former Congressman
Tom Swazi, fending off a politically amorphous opponent who may
(00:28):
or may not have been an ex Democrat. The count
was supposed to take at least all night on Long
Island and in Queen's at the website decision desk called
the race for Swazi fifty eight minutes after the polls closed,
then the Associated Press rang it up seven minutes after that,
by which point Swazi had about fifty nine percent of
(00:49):
the vote. And even if that margin does not hold up,
it's not only flipped the seat back to the Democrats,
but it completely deflated the whoreor House Republicans performance art
impeachment last night of Homeland Security Secretary Majorcus by one
vote because a Democrat stayed home due to COVID. There
is not expected to be a trial in the Senate.
(01:10):
My Orcus was of course charged with with charged with
charged with not being a Republican. But back to Long
Island and yes, it snowed on election day and no,
it wasn't a blizzard, and yes it was sunny by
three pm yesterday, And no, it's not actually much of
a predictor for November because it is in a conservative
(01:33):
swath of Long Island. And while the Democrat Tom Swazi
was trying to deny it ever heard the name Joe Biden,
the Republican Mazi Pillop was trying even harder to deny
she knew the name Donald Trump. And the whole election
was about immigration. And Pillop, of course, was born in
Ethiopia and emigrated from Israel, and her husband is from Ukraine.
And not only isn't it a predictor for November, it's
(01:55):
not even a predictor for this district in November because
it's going to be redrawn by then. And as somebody
called it, this is going to be the most expensive
rental in congressional history. And yeah, I did it this
way so I could update the results as they came in.
Now here's the real podcast. So now the full breadth
(02:24):
and the full stink of Robert Hurr's perversion of the
Special Council Statutes is becoming fully clear. Robert Herr has
not just turned his report clearing President Biden on any
willful retention. We're sharing of classified documents into a Trump
super pack, and he's not just arranged or attempted to
(02:45):
arrange follow up testimony to one or maybe two House
committees which are themselves Trump super packs. Robert Hurr took
it one step further, as Politico aptly for once puts it,
Robert Herr is at the center of the Biden age
plug the news sites. Sources on Capitol Hill report that quote,
(03:09):
House Republicans are activating a weeks long, perhaps months long,
plan to keep questions about President Biden's mental state in
the spotlight. Three House committees have asked the Attorney General
Merrick Garland, whose stupidity left the president open to this
scheme redolent of a previous Republican Congress hunting Hillary Clinton
(03:31):
and one before that hunting Bill Clinton. It is asked
Garland for transcripts, tape recordings, witnesses. They want to drag
this out with hearings, follow ups, press conferences, allegations about
national security, and even just umbrage if Democrats thwart their
plans to Benghazi the her I'm not a doctor, but
I play one with the nation's life. Report infuriating as
(03:55):
that is, there isn't a way, but there should be
a way to put Robert Hurr in prison for this,
and Garland and James Comer and whoever plotted this, I mean,
Politico would not have called it the Biden age plot
without evidence that it was a plot, which means planned
in advance. Infuriating as it is, there's still one important
(04:18):
overarching message. The Republicans are terrified enough to play this
very dangerous game, because if you managed to put Robert
her on the stand and you put Biden's age on trial,
you run the risk of her revealing whatever the Biden
age plot really is. And you also put Trump's age
(04:41):
on trial, and you also put Trump's documents kleptomania and
espionage on trial. And by the way, Trump is actually
on trial for stealing those documents and would go to
prison for espionage. It seems to me the Democrats have
two choices here. Garland has previously testified that most special
(05:03):
councils have them testified to Congress after their investigations were complete.
Doesn't mean this one should. Robert Hurr broke departmental rules. Moreover,
he broke faith with the legal system, even as the
Republicans view it, Robert Hurt as a crooked operator. He
is the equivalent of a snitch. He is the equivalent
(05:24):
of a three card Monte dealer. The Attorney General could
deny him permission to testify and prosecute him if he
tries to testify anyway, or Senate Democrats could notice that
smell of rat again. Politico the voice of the mainstream,
the home of a moral both sidesism. The promulgators of
(05:48):
a morning newsletter that was sponsored yesterday for around three
hundred thousand dollars by the fossil fuel industry trying to
protect gas guzzling cars. They were sponsored by, you know,
planetary suicide Incorporated. Politico called it the Biden age plot.
The Homeland and Government Affairs Committee in the Senate has
(06:11):
a permanent subcommittee on investigations, and that subcommittee could take
Robert her and whoever the middlemen were in whatever his
deal was with the House, gop to the effing cleaners,
your call, lady or the tiger again. I still like
the Attorney General shutting this down and Biden telling him
(06:34):
you take the heat, you're taking the fall. You hold
the press conferences, you fix this, and if you do
it right, I'll let you resign. Better to give the
Republicans just one note to pound Biden won't let us
talk about his age every day until the election. But
(06:54):
he's not really very smart. Except he won't let us
talk about his age every day until the election. He's
really super genius. Remember this is the invite we are
in right now. The New York Times has an opinion
piece this week, the body of which actually quietly marvels
that anybody could possibly think Joe Biden's age is as
(07:17):
important as Trump's past treasons or future treasons, and they
still managed to stick atop it this headline quote, which
is worse Biden's age or Trump handing NATO to Putin?
While we are here in this environment, there is also
(07:38):
a subtext to the Biden's too old to infirm to
let's see what else have we got on him? He's
too Bidenish story, a subtext that probably has not hit
you yet. I only got it the other week when
I turned sixty five years old, When sixty eight year
old Bill Maher says Biden is too old and feeble,
(08:00):
or when sixty nine year old in eight days, David
Axelrod says Biden is too old and infirm, Or when
seventy two year old Maureen Dowd says Biden is too
old and troubled, Or when seventy seven year old Chris
Wallace says Biden is too old and risky, or when
sixty one year old but he looks seventy five, John
Stuart says Biden is too old and just as bad
as Trump. They're actually not finishing their thoughts. The whole
(08:26):
sentence actually is Biden is eighty one and too old
and feeble and affirmed and troubled and risky. And I
am not. I'm only seventy seven or seventy two or
seventy nine or sixty five, and I'm sharp as attack,
especially compared to that guy. Look at him, he's old.
(08:47):
I'm not old. I'm Chris Wallace. I'm eternally young because
I dye my hair daily. And I'm Maureen Dowd, and
I'm eternally young because I constantly make hip cultural references
about Truman, Capoti and Charles in Charge. And I'm John
Stuart and I'm eternally young because I am It's too
cool to let the fact that one of these men
might crash into his words once in a while, and
(09:10):
the other one would encourage Russia to attack Poland. But
I would never let that interfere with my saucy nineteen
ninety eight comedy. I'm young, I'm young, he's not. I'm
not dead. I'm getting better. I don't want to go
(09:30):
on the court. I feel fine. I think I'll go
for a walk. I feel happy. I feel happy. You
don't think that's part of it. You have no idea kid.
Concurrent with the big Medicare birthday. The other day, my
(09:53):
extraordinarily well prepared friends from grammar school, you know, the
ones I met in nineteen sixty two, they started the
process of setting up the fifth high school reunion eighteen
months early. Ominous birthdays are one thing. But if you
have not yet heard the singularly terrifying sound that is
(10:16):
the bell tolling for your fiftieth high school reunion, you
have not been through all that existential trauma and night
terrors have to offer you. So what did I do?
Reading fiftieth high school reunion? I instinctively, reflexively desperately seized
(10:40):
on the fact that now as then when I graduated
high school, at the age of sixteen. I am about
a year and a half younger than all the rest
of them. I'm only sixty five, and I'm sharpest attack,
especially compared to that guy. Look at him, he's old.
He's sixty seven. If you want to look thin. And
(11:05):
Rodney Dangerfield told us, as Thornton Mellon, you hang out
with fat people if you want to feel young. John
Stuart tells us, you mock and insult old people. If
you don't think John Stuart, who was never smart but
during the Bush era was pretty clever and could read well,
(11:27):
if you don't think he's lost the plot. It will
never dawn on him that he will be in the
first bus with the rest of us to go into
those anti Trump holding cells. It will never dawn on
him that when right wing influencers take his clip and
repackage it as The Daily Show rips Biden on his
(11:48):
mental health, that means he just increased the chance Trump
gets elected. It will never dawn on him that if
his show's account tweets out the video and it gets
a response reading balance and humor return, and that's from
Elon Musk. John Stewart, you failed, Where's Craig Kilbourne when
(12:16):
we actually need him. As a side note, John Stuart's
cable audience for his much anticipated return after nine years
in the wilderness nine hundred and thirty thousand viewers, so
(12:36):
less than Alex Wagner. By the way, yesterday I was
asked by a friend why so much of the American
commentariat is willing to go after Biden's age and or
memory when in real time it did nothing, nothing about
Ronald Reagan's early stage Alzheimer's of nineteen eighty seven and
(12:57):
nineteen eighty eight nineteen eighty nine. There are two explanations. One,
we were still in the immediate post fair in his
doctrine era then, and there were still residual standards and
residual fear. Two, we have lost the ability, and I
mean everybody from Charlie Kirk to the New York Times
(13:19):
has lost the ability to differentiate between facts and truth.
Is it a fact that Robert Hurr wrote what he
wrote in his report? Informed or irresponsible? Insightful or politicking?
That should cost him his law license? Yeah, it's a
fact he wrote it. We used to then ask, well,
(13:42):
it's a fact that he wrote it, But is it
the truth. If somebody says, on the record, Donald Trump
has slept with a family member, it's a fact that
somebody said it. Is that enough to go with it?
Is it the truth? Nobody asks that second question anymore.
(14:02):
Nobody asks if rober Her knows what the hell he's
talking about. Nobody asks which ulterior motive drove him. Nobody
asks if it's irresponsible to report it. They just report it.
We report, You decide if it's the truth or not.
(14:25):
So what is the solution? What is the solution to
the rotting carcass of what used to be journalism? Now
additionally scared because every day they lay some more people off.
Yesterday twenty people at CBS News. What do we do
about the effect on the writers and broadcasters and the
(14:49):
maybe this will save all our jobs and make us
seem younger part of it. What do we do about
all of this? Happily, the light bulb over the Biden
campaign is finally buzzing and sputtering to full illumination, as
you may have seen Sunday after the Chiefs won the
Super Bowl and a million Qanons felt their Taylor's Swift
(15:10):
conspiracy theory had just come Drue Biden's social media posted
the dark Brandon laser eyes meme with the message just
like we drew it up yesterday. The campaign account posted
a new meme, twenty twenty four voting guide next to
a picture of Biden didn't encourage Russia to invade Europe
(15:32):
next to a picture of Trump encouraged Russia to invade Europe.
Sharp enough, dagger as it was, but then came the
coupdi gras. This one's for the New York Times. Yes,
please more of it every day, every hour. Carpet bomb Trump.
You got a TikTok account now, Joe Biden, use it,
(15:54):
Use Twitter x, use other social media memes. Videos, Trump's insanity,
Trump's gas, Trump's dictatorship quote, his adoration of dictators like
she the man is a content factory. Take all of
his videos and put them out every day. To one
of those voting guide ones about how he killed the
border deal, Donald Trump said killers are coming across the border.
(16:16):
Why is he helping them come across the border? The
media both sides something, call them out. This one's for
the New York Times. Excellent. The next one should be
for Chris Wallace or Dowd or John Stewart by name,
and the millions you are going to spend on advertising
on television in the Swing States. Do a TV spot
(16:39):
that starts, we all know Donald Trump is insane. To
another one that starts we all know something is wrong
with Donald Trump's brain and it's getting worse. To another
one with him explaining when he'll be a dictator, to
another one with the video of his deposition where he
says the photo of e Gen Carroll is actually his
(17:00):
second wife, Marila Maples. And then do some game show
effect and play the game show loser wompwomp sound, and
all of these spots should end the same way. I'm
Joe Biden, and I approved this message because I'm the
Democratic candidate for president and that's not a brand name.
We're Democrats. We're the party that wants to keep democracy.
(17:31):
Also of interest, here a New York Times writer has slipped.
He has given away one of the real reason The
Times thought not just liberal but the most liberal by
everybody except anybody who reads it. Why the Times glories
in hitting Joe Biden over the head every day, and
(17:51):
Whyatt gloried in hitting Hillary and Obama and John Kerry
and Al Gore and Bill Clinton and William Jennings Bryan probably,
And that real reason is it as petty and as
unbelievable and as infuriating as you could imagine. That's next.
(18:13):
This is countdown. This is countdown, with Keith Olberman still
(18:40):
a head on countdown. It snowed here yesterday. Snow makes
me think of the Winter Olympics and the most snow
I've ever seen in a fairly snowy life. And then
I check my notes and it's the anniversary. It's today.
It's forty four years ago today, when my career almost
(19:02):
came to an end top a mountain in Lake Placid,
New York, because my bosses had gotten me drunk the
night before and the wind chill that morning was fifty
blows zero. I'll explain next in Things I promised not
to tell first time, to honor those from the wonderful
(19:24):
world of the Dunning Krueger Effect, Today's worst persons in
the world of the Bronze Worst, Sean Hannity boys. Life
tough when you're merely a well paid carnival barker for
the Republican Scam show. Media Matters reports that Hannity got
a little deep in the weeds on the Hunter Biden
non story. Last year, remember Hunter Biden? The number of
(19:49):
different segments Hannity aired on Hunter Biden was three hundred
and twenty five. That is an average of one and
one quarter Hunter Biden segments per show. Media Matter also
reports that out of three hundred and twenty five segments,
two hundred and twenty of them contained at least one
false or misleading claim. So, now what's happened? The Republicans
(20:12):
have bailed out on the Hunter Biden's story because as
hard as they tried, it didn't go anywhere, and the
yokl they put in charge of it got caught lying,
and their mob is upset that he got nothing out
of it, and they all want to now go and
switch to the Robert her story instead. Three hundred and
twenty five handy segments on a dead scandal? What did
Hannity get for his trouble? Well, Scotch, they're runner up,
(20:38):
running up? Who am I? Tom Brokaw? They're runner up?
Worser Talman Smith The New York Times. Talman Smith. I
dealt with him once on a cover piece I did
for the Week in Review. I think nice enough guy,
a little frantic if I remember, If you'd like a neatly,
succinctly summarized microcosm of where and when The Times jumped
(21:00):
the shark, here it is. Mister Smith got into a
social media discussion of how The Times went nuts over
the Robert Herr story. You'll remember that the stat was
thirty three Times stories in four days. Quoting mister Smith
to liberals parentheses only slash, primarily blaming the media. When
(21:22):
was the last time Biden did an open presser or
did an on record Q and A with us, right,
thank you, we're not his pr people unquote Now, well, no,
you're not. What you are is you are the first
targets when a Trump back in power decides to jail reporters,
(21:44):
even in front of John Stuart. But life is like
a box of chocolates. You never know which one contains
your ticket to a Trump concentration camp. The point is
mister Smith is expressing a reality that reporters don't usually reveal.
Often they judge their response to the news and the
(22:05):
key people in the news based largely on how easy
those people make their jobs. Trump is a psychopathic would
be dictator. On the other hand, he's just a fire
hose of stories. But Joe Biden, Joe Biden hasn't given
the Times to sit down interview lately, so we have
the right to burn him to the ground and the
(22:26):
democracy with him. In other words, democracy may die in darkness,
but retaliation from The New York Times thrives in darkness. Oh,
by the way, Talman Smith in that media post there,
he misspelled the word weir. But our winner the worst.
And I know this is out of date, but I
can't let this go by unappreciated Chris Sliza of The
(22:50):
Washington Now that they fired him, Chris still is a
contributor to MSN. No they got rid of him. Chris
Stial is a writer for CNN dot No gone. Chris
sal is a he has, he's a newsletter any who,
Poor Chris. As you probably have heard by now, Robert F.
(23:10):
Kennedy Junior stole verbatim his uncle's JFK's nineteen sixties campaign ad.
A Trump donor bought time during the Super Bowl to
run the nineteen sixty commercial, complete with the voices of
President Kennedy and others, and over the furious howls of
indignation from other members of the Kennedy family who rightly
(23:31):
feel that my former friend Bob is nuts and whether
he knows it or not, my friend, former friend Bob
is just another Trump stooge stalking horse. The blowback from
the other Kennedy was so bad that RFK Junior actually apologized.
Of course, he also at the same time pinned the
commercial at the top of his Twitter feed that got
(23:52):
the attention of the Federal Election Commission because the candidate
is not allowed to have any coordination with the pack
that spent what fifteen million to run that ad that
everybody hated. I mean, there may have been a crime
committe here and not just a crime against good taste.
So where does Chris Solissa the tuning fork for political reality?
(24:12):
Whatever he says? The opposite is a certainty? Where does
Chris Solisza fit into this? Right after the purloined Kennedy
ad ran during the Super Bowl somebody who turns out
to have been a professional Trump and RFK Junior Shill
promptly tweeted the Robert F. Kennedy Junior ad was brilliant.
Chris Salizis saw that about an ad that the world
(24:35):
was poised to immediately condemn and Chris retweeted it and
added quote, totally agree, Chris, Wait, don't let the Titanic
leave Port. I have to get on board. Solissa two days.
Worst person in the world. Gurgle, gurgle, gurgle, just ahead.
(25:15):
For years, for decades, occasionally in my dreams, I would
hear in the background the public address announcement there is
a bus leaving for Whiteface Mountain. Il ya unbus, keep
part for white Face Mountain. It's skipteinen bus. They're not
a white face mountain. Fought the Lake Placid Olympics of
(25:36):
nineteen eighty still haunt me and for one dreadful moment,
which today is the exact anniversary of next in things,
I promise not to tell first time for another dog
in need, you can help. Every dog has its day,
and today it's personal. My friend Andrew Blouner has a big,
lovely Bernese Mountain dog called Smiles because she does a
(25:58):
little While back, Smile suddenly became sick. It proved to
be cancer lymphoma. The good news is no evidence it
has spread. There have been two chemotherapy sessions now and
Smiles has tolerated it well and perked up. In fact,
those are great signs, but there are twenty three more
chemo days to come for her, and they will cost money,
(26:18):
and Smiles could use your help. Andrew has set up
a gofund me for her at GoFundMe dot com. Just
search Smiles Mountain quickest way to her. The bad news
here is Smiles is just two and a half years old.
But anything you can give will be gratefully welcomed. Just
publicizing Smiles will help. I'll put the link out on
(26:38):
Twitter again our teeing it can make all the difference
in the world. Smiles thanks you, and I thank you.
No arm goes off. It is pitch black in my
room at the Swiss Acres Motel. It is Valentine's Day
(27:02):
and I am still ill drunk. Keith knew he was
in trouble, but I was also twenty one years old,
and in fact, my twenty first birthday had only been
eighteen days earlier. So somehow I survived, showered, dressed, packed,
and I mean I packed two cassette tape recorders, four
(27:23):
sets of batteries, an audio processing machine that weighed like
fourteen pounds the nine volt batteries it took. I think
it was a dozen of them, a telephone, a backup telephone,
twelve assorted patch cords, two loose leaf notebooks, about eight pens,
two microphones, two extra pair of socks, and I got dressed,
two full sets of thermal underwear, shirts, sweaters, snow pants,
(27:47):
snow shoes. Because it was eleven degrees below zero that morning.
I got something quick to eat at the commissary, and
I made it out somehow to the line for the
bus from the Lake Placid Olympics Center to the Lake
Placid Transportation Center to Lake Placid white Face Mountain, then
onto the snow track the open penned mountain tractor that
(28:10):
went up the side of Whiteface Mountain and took me
to the finish line of the nineteen eighty Olympic Men's
downhill ski final still drunk. That is how a reporter
covered the Olympics nearly forty three years ago. You drank,
you woke up, you went, You stood near the finish line,
and when the skiers completed their runs, you hiked or
(28:33):
wobbled over to them, and you took out your microphone
or your pen, and you interviewed them, like two minutes
after they had finished hurtling towards you down the hill,
you could see almost nothing of the race from there.
There were no TV monitors. Basically your only clue was
the sound of the crowd that would give you about
thirty seconds worth of warning that the skier was coming
(28:54):
over the near horizon and you should be prepared to
flee just in case he or she wiped out. Also,
you were on top of a mountain at the dead
point of winter, and whereas it might have been a
balney eleven degrees below zero in the comfort of the
Swiss Acres motel with the wind chill at the base
(29:16):
of the mountain, it was forty eight below zero and
there had already been four inches of new snow since
the sun came up, which is where the still drunk
part came in Handy, my boss is at my first job,
the thousand station radio network called United pres International Audio,
had decided the night before to teach me how to
(29:38):
drink while on assignment. My bosses were the bureau manager
for that part of you PI, the late Stan Sebik,
who had hired me, and Sam Rosen, the sports director
of the network, who not only somehow survived being my
first boss, but today just forty three years later, is
still working as the television voice of the New York
(29:58):
Rangers hockey team and is in the Hockey Hall of Fame.
So I guess my reputation is a tough employee, as
WHI overrated, or at least Sam thinks. So Sam and
Stan kept me drinking at the motel until two am,
knowing full well that I had to get on the
six am bus to go cover the men's downhill, because
it was the two of them who had assigned me
(30:19):
to go cover the men's downhill, and bluntly, I was
surprisingly pleased with myself that freezing morning because I had
indeed learned how to drink while on assignment. I had
somehow found the phone jack for the UPI phone buried
under all the new snow, which of course was buried
under all the old snow, attached the phone to it,
(30:41):
got in a dial tone, called the office, checked the
alligator clips with which I would feed the tape, and
all was well until I went to put a cassette
tape into the cassette recorder. I didn't have one fat
lot of good two cassette tape machines gonna do you
(31:04):
without a set to stick in one of them. I
looked forlornly around the base of Whiteface Mountain, twelve hundred
feet above sea level. As we were. There was a
surprisingly nice chalet and a decent restaurant, but there were
no radio shacks or other electronics stores. There was, however,
one other radio guy, Jack Briggs, from the Associated Press
(31:28):
Radio Network, the nominal arch rival to our own UPI Audio.
I knew Jack a little. He was a nice guy.
I went and explained my plight, making sure to blame
my bosses for my predicament. Oh man, he said, his
breath turning into first steam and then ice cubes. I'm
so sorry, but I can't give you a cassette. I'm
(31:52):
sorry you were UPI, and I'm ap Oh how I laughed.
That was a great line to say to a rookie reporter,
still drunk thanks to the initiation rituals of his own bosses,
the possessor of one great buzz but zero audio cassettes.
Jack Briggs could tell I thought he was kidding. That's
(32:14):
when he said, I'm not kidding. Look, if my boss,
Shelby Whitfield ever found out, he'd fire me. I suddenly
wasn't drunk anymore, not at all. My boss will will
fire me. Briggs was adamant. I can't run the risk
of shellby finding out. I have to confess. I shouted,
(32:37):
how the hell is he gonna find out? Jack? I
think subconsciously I was hoping to create an avalanche, which
would have been a better solution than the one I
was faced with. I said to him, there's you and
there's me, and we're on top of a goddamn mountain
and Shelby Whitfield, your boss is in Washington, DC, and
he's a drunk, and he's probably more drunk than I am,
(33:01):
and he'd probably thank you for helping me to drink more.
Briggs would not budge. I told him I would pay him.
I told him I would give him the cassette back
after I fed my boss the interviews over the phone,
so there'd be no evidence and he wouldn't even have
to do any interviews. No good, I'm sorry, and I
know you're going to tell this story about me for
a while. As he walked away from me, I shouted
(33:23):
after him. Forever. Turned out there was no radio shack
and no camaraderie, but there was a West Coast newspaper
reporter atop the mountain who heard some of this conversation.
I guess I yelled a little loudly at mister Briggs.
Some guy standing next to a Saint Bernard told me
to quiet down and mentioned something else about the avalanches.
(33:46):
Or maybe I dreamed that part. I don't know. Anyway,
the West Coast newspaper guy said he had a micro
cassette machine and he would loan it to me and
I could give it back to him at the media
center that day or the next one. But I had
to do him a favor because there was this really
cute reporter in our UPI bureau and he really wanted
to be introduced to her. And I said, I can
promise you nothing but handshake, and he understood, and that's
(34:06):
how I did not get fired. But of course, a
story like this has punchlines, and this one has two
of them. The first is two years and a couple
of months later, Shelby Whitfield asked me to lunch. He
had left the Associated Press to run the sports department
at the ABC Radio network, back when that was not
only a thing, but a big thing. We went to
(34:29):
a terrific New York City Chinese restaurant near ABC called
shun Lee, and Shelby Whitfield interviewed me for a job
when that kind of job paid eighty thousand a year
in my very nice studio apartment and a very nice
part of town costs less than five hundred dollars A
month later, in an interesting twist, I found out the
jobs didn't exist. I was mentioning the interview in a
(34:52):
press box somewhere I think Madison Square Garden, and there
was another kid reporter named Howie Rose, and how he
is still working, he does the New York Mets games
on the radio, and how he said, wait, the viewed
me for that job last year, just an excuse for
that damn Whitfield to go drink his lunch on ABC's tab. Anyway,
(35:13):
before we started the interview for the job I did
not know did not exist at ABC, I told Shelby
Whitfield the White Face Mountain, can I borrow a cassette
Jack Briggs story? And Shelby's exact reply was, I don't know.
Was I going to find out? There was you and
there was him, and you were on top of a
goddamn mountain and I was in Washington. Only he didn't
say goddamn that Briggs. He added, always trying to suck
(35:37):
up to me. I got to tell you something I
actually once promised I wouldn't tell you if we ever met. This.
When the Olympics were over and came back to the office,
he told me what happened. He expected me to be
happy or give him a bonus or something. And I
called him a little snitch. Only Shelby didn't say snitch,
just a word that rhymed with it. The other punch
line is from nineteen ninety two, and remember this happened
(35:59):
at the nineteen eighty Olympics. I go to work at
ESPN and come in a little early to launch their
radio network, a story I've told here before. And there
I find a friend of mine since my radio days,
who I have not seen in a year or so,
and he says, hey, last month, I was at an
NBA game in Washington. I ran in at Jack Briggs.
He heard you were going to ESPN. He asked me
(36:20):
if you were still telling that story about the time
you got stuck on Whiteface Mountain without a cassette. And
he was the only other reporter there, and he wouldn't
give you a spare, and I told him you were
and I smiled, and I replied, I hope you remembered
to use the word forever. I've done all the damage
(36:49):
I can do here. Thank you for listening. Have I
mentioned We've been nominated for Best Political Podcast in the
iHeart Podcast Awards. It'll be given out next month. Did
I mention that only one of the five nominees that's independent,
no network, no backing, just me and the dogs. I
was wrong on one key point. However, you cannot vote
(37:11):
in this category. I knew I wasn't doing as well
as I should have been. It's all rigged. It's fixed.
I could still win if Mike Pence has the courage.
Not gonna win, but what the hell? Countdown? Musical directors
Brian Ray and John Phillip Shanelle arranged, produced, and performed
most of our music. Mister Ray was on the guitars,
bass and drums. Mister Shanelle handled orchestration in keyboards. It
(37:32):
was produced by Tko Brothers. I mean pod Say of America,
which is on an exhausting two day a week schedule,
is also nominated for Best Overall Podcast. So you can
guess if it's best overall podcast, maybe and it's in
this category of best political Podcast, that they're gonna win
(37:53):
best Political Podcast. That's the way this stuff works. I'm
not bitter. How can I be bitter? This is my
first podcast nomination for anything. It's an honor just to
be nominated. Other music, including some of the Beethoven compositions,
were arranged and performed by the group. No, it's not
just an honor to be nominated. I'm sorry. The name
(38:15):
of the group is No Horns Allowed. The sports music
is the Old Woman theme from ESPN two, written by
Mitch Warren Davis courtesy ESPN Inc. Our satirical and pithy
musical comments are by Nancy Fauss, the best baseball stadium
organist ever. Our announcer today was my friend Tony Kornheiser,
who probably regrets recording that. Everything else was pretty much
by fault. That's countdown for this The two hundred and
(38:37):
sixty six day until the twenty twenty four US presidential election,
the one and thirty third day since dementia Jay Trump's
first attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the
United States use the fourteenth Amendment, use the insurrection at
use the justice system, use the mental health system, use
memes to stop him from doing it again while we
(39:01):
still can. Jon Stewart. The next scheduled countdown is tomorrow.
Bulletins is the news warrants till then. I'm Keith Olremman.
Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck. Countdown
(39:30):
with Keith Olreman 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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