December 22, 2025 • 55 mins
SEASON 4 EPISODE 43: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (2:30) SPECIAL COMMENT: TRUMP BLOWS UP THE EPSTEIN DEAD WHALE - AND WHY DID HE NAME IT TRUMP MEMORIAL?
Remember when they blew up the eight-ton beached whale carcass in Oregon in 1970? Tons of dynamite, they figured it would vaporize the poor dead creature and any pieces left over would be devoured by birds? And instead they sent chunks of hard blubber a hundred feet in the air and actually crushed a car and left debris everywhere?
That's what Trump just did to the Epstein Scandal. Trump doxed victims. Published and then deleted photos of himself. Planted photos of Bill Clinton and got caught. It’s raining chunks of Epstein dead whale blubber on the White House AND TRUMP.
And I know this is semantics. But why did Trump re-name it ““The Donald J. Trump and The John F. Kennedy MEMORIAL Center for the Performing Arts” That means it’s the Donald J. Trump Memorial Center. Why did he name it TRUMP MEMORIAL? Did I miss a bulletin or something?
AND IN MEMORY OF PETER ARNETT: A colleague of mine the day I started full time in television at CNN in 1982 and the day I started full time in news in 2003, he was a great reporter because he could tell the truth about Vietnam, sneak into Afghanistan, cheat death, and then when nothing big was happening would go cover a snowstorm in Manhattan or counsel a rookie sportscaster who needed advice.
B-Block (28:00) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Mehmet Oz has an update on the great challenge of inflation in the penis market, Riley Gaines (America's favorite 85th Place Finisher) has podcast news, and Lindsey Halligan misspells "Virginia." At least we THINK she meant Virginia.
C-Block (36:00) CHRISTMAS WITH THURBER: Haven't done any lately and there is a holiday coming so here goes. My favorite - and the first Thurber story I ever read aloud ("A Box To Hide In"). His best known ("The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty") and the one that inadvertently brought me into the 'official' Thurber fold ("The Peacelike Mongoose").
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. Remember
when they blew up that dead whale, That's what Trump
(00:25):
just did to the Epstein cover up. You've seen the
video right. Forty five foot eight ton carcass of a
dead sperm whale washes up on shore at Florence, Oregon,
November nineteen seventy. They decide the easiest way to dispose
of it is to blow it up with dynamite. That's
(00:45):
what Trump has just done to the Epstein cover up.
So the geniuses in Oregon in nineteen seventy figured some
of it will wash away and the smaller parts will
be eaten by scavenger animals. Only they had a highway
engineer plan it out, and he used half a ton
of dynamite instead of the twenty sticks that would have
(01:07):
done the job. And the next thing you knew, the
whale had become a thousand pieces of rock hard shrapnel.
That's what Trump just did to the Epstein cover up.
A piece of blubber, and whale blubber is hard. A
piece of blubber the size of a coffee table hit
a parked car and crushed it, and the driver later
(01:30):
swore he had just bought that car from a lot
that was then running a promotion called get a Whale
of a Deal. That's what Trump just did to the
Epstein cover up. I also want to know today why
Trump renamed the Kennedy Center the Donald J. Trump Memorial Center.
(01:50):
But let me plow through the trump Stein disaster first.
It starts with Image four sixty eight. Image four to
sixty eight, from the Epstein files, from which virtually all
the Trump stuff had already been scrubbed, was not scrubbed.
It was a photo of a bunch of framed photos
in a drawer, all of which showed Trump and Epstein together. So,
(02:13):
twenty four hours later, Image four to sixty eight, which
hadn't been scrubbed, was instead deleted. And even in doing that,
after they posted it and scrubbed it and deleted it,
they left Image one three hundred and forty six, a
larger shot of framed Epstein photos on a credenza, a
couple dozen of them. And sure enough, zoom in on that,
(02:36):
as the impeccable Lauren Windsor did, and there is a
framed photo of Epstein and Trump and Malania. The three
of them doesn't look like anybody's being introduced to anybody else.
At least sixteen pages that were released on Friday had
disappeared by yesterday. Some of the ones they did release
(03:00):
had one hundred percent redactions five hundred and fifty of
them five fifty pages fully redacted, just the black boxes,
per Scott McFarlane and CBS News, and they are still counting.
One Epstein victim says she was doxed that Trump released
her identifying information and just to apply the chef's kiss,
(03:20):
Todd Blanche, who believe it or not, is the Deputy
Attorney General, gets on one of the Sunday shows and
presents a self fulfilling prophecy or in this case, a
self unfulfilling prophecy. Quote. If there's photographs that we have
of President Trump or anybody else, they of course will
be released, with the exception of any victims or survivors
(03:43):
that we've identified unquote. In other words, any photos proving
Trump was with verified Epstein victims or survivors, they will
not be released because because because they would show Trump
was with verified Epstein victims or survivors, we can't show
(04:04):
you THEO that would prove it. Hey did just stuff
the dynamite into the dead whale. Yet Cole let her rip,
the penultimate flaw of this administration, has now once again
moved center stage, even ahead of his own instability. That
(04:26):
second ranked fatal flaw is these people are idiots. Dan
Bongino didn't say this as he quit as deputy FBI director,
but the suspicion is Cash Patel is too much of
an idiot, even for Dan Bongino. I mean, that's a
lot of idiot. And apart from Patel screwing up every
investigation he's put his eye on, so to speak, the
(04:49):
key Trumpest exposure on the brain drain issue is the
Epstein files. First was Pam Bondi's empty Epstein loose leaf
notebooks bought at a Staples in Georgetown or somewhere for
all we know. Then it was her claim that there
was a client list on her desk. Then it was
Trump going from running on releasing the Epstein files to
(05:09):
Trump calling the Epstein files a hoax, to Trump signing
the humiliating House measure to force him to release the
Epstein files. Then it was Susie Wiles saying Bondie quote
completely whiffed on the Epstein files. Then it was not
releasing documents that must by law be released, and it
said releasing only some of them, then unreleasing others, and
therefore blowing up the metaphorical whale while simply spreading the
(05:33):
metaphorical whale over a square mile area, and by the way,
still not complying with the law Trump signs, so people
at the DOJ could technically go to jail now or
more likely later. Twenty twenty nine comes to mind. If
you'd like to make sure the Epstein story stays alive,
you'd do any one of those things I just mentioned.
(05:56):
If you'd like to make sure America is convinced Trump
is again convicted of complicity with Epstein, I mean a
second time after the release of the Trump signed drawing
of the nude, do all of those things I just mentioned.
And if you'd like to escalate the Epstein scandal to
indelibly market as the Trumpstein scandal, do what these idiots
(06:17):
did and plant things in the files and release the
planted things, and do it so clumsily and moronically that
it gets community noted on Twitter. X Abigail Marone Jackson
a deputy Press secretary. And remember if you're a deputy
press secretary. When Caroline Levitt is the press secretary, you
(06:39):
are necessarily dumber even than Caroline Levitt is. Abigail Morone
Jackson wrote that per the Epstein Files Transparency Act, DOJ
was specifically instructed only to redact the faces of victims
and or miners. Here is a picture of Bill Clinton
with his arm around Michael Jackson and redacted individuals might
(07:02):
as well have had a picture of Abraham Lincoln. The
picture of Clinton is of course available by googling his
name and Michael Jackson and the redacted individuals in that
picture are Michael Jackson's two sons and Evan Ross, the
son of Diana Ross. And also Diana Ross is also
in the picture. And apparently Abigail Moron Jackson doesn't know
(07:23):
who she is. She's too inbubbled to know who Diana
Ross is. And the picture is from a Democratic fundraiser
from two thousand and three, and it don't have a
damn thing to do with the Epstein Files. But Abigail
Jackson decided to try to deceive the American public into
believing it has something to do with them. In other words,
they blew up the whale, and then they went back
and assembled the pieces again and blew it up a
(07:43):
second time. And that gives anybody an excuse to look
at anything in the Epstein files and just assume that
if it puts the finger on somebody else, Trump put
it there. Nice work, Abigail Moron Jackson. This is Abigail's
second job in life. The first one was as a
(08:04):
press aid to Josh Hawley, the January sixth running Man.
There are, in fact, at last check, at least eight
Twitter ex community notes on posts by Jackson, by the
deplorable Todd Blanche, by Pam Bondi herself Blondie, who simply
cannot be long for her job. She just can't. New
(08:27):
Year's Day would be a surprise if she's still in
that job. Wasn't even posting about Trumpstein, and she still
got community noted about trump Stein. She wrote about Trump
setting all time great transparency standards for a presidency, and
nobody is buying it community note quote contrary to the claim,
Instead of transparency, the administration runs defense for pedophiles and rapists.
(08:51):
And then there are links to four tweets, including two
by Congressman Tom Massey. Keep up the good work, Madam
Attorney Generic Trump. Not just covering up the Epstein files
and breaking the law by not fulfilling the law passed
by his own party. Not just doing that, but now
(09:12):
faking things and putting them in the Epstein files and
not even doing it very well, and faking something about
Bill Clinton. The day Bill Clinton left the White House,
the average American of today was fifteen years old. You
might as well have faked something about Epstein and the
y two K computer crisis, Abigail. This underscores why Trumpstein,
(09:35):
no matter what happens next, will be self perpetuating in
a way nobody dreamed of last Thursday. This is the
true danger of conspiracy theories, as no one will find
out more than Donald Trump will find out in the
days and weeks to come. Twenty percent of Americans do
not believe the reality of what happened on nine to eleven.
(09:57):
The Kennedy assassination only became more desirable as conspiracy fodder
after the Warren Commission reports. Jill McCay's eighteen forty one
book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds has
been surpassed since its publication in explaining mass stupidity, but
it is still always a wonderful reminder that while it
(10:20):
has now been weaponized by everybody from the Nazis to Trump,
people have always been this gullible. It is hard to
get away from conspiracy theories except by massive and even
shocking straightforwardness and transparency, and that is impossible if a
government consists of conspiracy theorists and stupid conspiracy theorists like
(10:43):
har Meat Dylan. If you don't know her, she is
actually an assistant Attorney General. Her previous job was Tulsey
Gabbard's lawyer. She deliberately or otherwise turned the Brown University
shooting into another fake conspiracy. Somebody tweeted that after the shooting,
Brown was removing articles from its website about one of
(11:06):
its students. She retweeted it with the musk like addition.
Concerning Anna, Paulina Luna, the member of the House from
Dipshit County, Florida, wrote she found it suspicious that things
were altered on the Brown website. Luna also probably finds
it suspicious that the amount of daylight changes every day. Well,
(11:28):
Dylan retweeted her too, adding just sus turned out the
deletions had nothing to do with the shooting, and the
student had nothing to do with the shooting. As I
recorded this, Dylan had not even deleted her misinformation sus
this clown. One can argue that it is part of
the trumpest playbook, that it is part of the authoritarian playbook,
(11:51):
that the less people who believe in official accounts about anything,
the more they will turn to one seemingly authoritative source.
And unfortunately, for many of these idiots, that's still Trump.
I confess. I think that's giving them too much credit.
It's like reading Senator Mike Lee, who is so deep
down his let's see what's the amount one million Internet
(12:13):
rabbit hole now that he would need to detox to
find his way back to reality, and thinking that Mike
Lee's borderline paranoia is some kind of re election strategy.
It's not. He's just a moron. These people are all
just morons. They blew up the Epstein whale. They have
not processed that. Conspiracy theories are like giant fire hoses.
(12:36):
They're effective and decisive unless you lose control of yours
and you drop it and the next thing you know,
the water has drowned you, or the blubber has the
Trump Stein story would have forgive me exploded. If everything
had come out Friday, just like a dead whale would
eventually explode due to natural biological forces, then there would
(13:01):
have been a significant, if probably inaccurate, sense that almost
the whole thing was out in the open now, and
however bad it might have been, there would have been
a virtual end to it. But everything didn't come out Friday.
All that did was just give you a reason to
reread the nauseating New York Times story about Epstein giving
Trump a twenty year old woman of Trump denying, denying,
(13:23):
and denying, and nobody ever bothering to reread the Epstein
evidence while playing Trump's words from the Access Hollywood tape
and remembering that when Trump said that, it was after
most of his sleaziness with Epstein had already occurred, so
it didn't come out. Instead, you maniacs, you blew it up.
(13:46):
Damn you, damn you Hotell. And now the blubber will
just sit there everywhere. It will just sit there, symbolically,
a whole, huge chunk of at the size of a
coffee table in the crushed car next to Trump, forever,
next to Trump as he dozes off for boasts about
(14:09):
acing the cognitive test and being able to tell which
one was the giraffe. Let's take another look at those
trump Steen photos. Is the draft in there too? How
about the dead blowed up whale, loaded up bloaded up,
(14:41):
real good, loaded up, real good. Okay, So why did
Trump name it the Donald J. Trump Memorial Center. This
is not the biggest problem with renaming the Kennedy Center
illegally after himself, But didn't anybody else notice this? He
changed the name of the Kennedy Center before anybody could
(15:02):
file a suit to stop him, and he put up
a new sign on it, reading the Donald J. Trump
and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
I mean, could we be Is it possible that we're
missing the real lead story here? The Donald J. Trump
and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing
(15:26):
Arts means well, it does include the idea that it's
the Donald J. Trump Memorial Center. The word memorial applies
to everybody in the new name, It's Trump Memorial. Did
I miss a bulletin or something? He's not dead yet, right,
I mean officially, officially, not in terms of brain health
(15:48):
or his own soul. The Donald J. Trump and the
John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. You
read that, and it doesn't mean that only Kennedy is
memorialized here. It's it's that's the construction you use when
you are memorializing two people in the title of a
(16:08):
building or a book or anything else. Then don't tell me, Well,
if you're going to slap your name on the Kennedy Center,
that's the only way to do it. No, you take
out the word memorial and you make it the Donald J.
Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. See,
or if you're Trump and you really think there is
something too disrespectful even for you to do, and you
(16:31):
have to keep the word memorial in there for Kennedy's sake,
you take a page from sports stadiums and you make
it the Donald J. Trump Auditorium at the John F.
Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. That way, it's
Kennedy memorial and Trump not memorial. Obviously, the whole thing
(16:52):
is sacrilege. But there's sacrilege and then there's stupid sacrilege.
And what a surprise, Trump chose the stupid sacrilege. This
needs to be undone now by court act later just
with pick axes, maybe on pay per view, or people
buy a two dollars lottery ticket and the winners get
(17:12):
to wield the pick axes. You'd raise eleven hundred and
seventy four trillion dollars. But it's just so unsettling that anybody,
even a guy as flat out crazy as Trump, would
slap his name on an American cultural institution and make
it read like it is now the Trump Memorial Center.
Sir Memorial means dead sir. On the other hand, if
(17:36):
this sticks, Trump will have the last laugh, because of course,
sooner or later it will be it will be Trump Memorial.
(17:57):
So with trump Stein, kaboom and here comes the blubber.
I'm not sure why Trump probably got scared out of
announcing an attack on Venezuela last Wednesday. Do not get
me wrong, I would be happy to see Maduro go,
no matter the how, just like I'd like to see
Putin go, no matter the how. These aren't socialist countries
(18:19):
or democracies or whatever form of government Russia has convinced
it's captive citizens they are in. These are dictatorships. But
once again, if Trump has the right to try to
force regime change in some place like Venezuela. Bunduro necessarily
also has the right to try to force regime change
in some place like oh here. Plus, Trump's relationship to
(18:42):
Venezuela is he wants it to be his. Iraq, Bush
managed to sell just enough Americans on the idea that
the Iraqis had something to do with nine to eleven.
And even if it wasn't much, sure, they didn't really
us hanging him and destroying his country would be a
lesson to somebody. In point of fact, it just amped
(19:05):
up the terrorist threat, and that secured Bush his narrow
reelection in two thousand and four. That obviously is why
they have invented this nonsensical term narco terrorism. Might as
well name it after Rubio and call it Marco terrorism.
That makes just as little sense. The point is to
repeat again and again and again and get the casual
(19:27):
American to forge a connection between Venezuela and terrorism, and
then use that to in a way repeat Bush's success.
And yes, sorry, it pains me more than anybody else
I think in media. Yes, Bush was successful in Iraq.
Not for America, not for the world, certainly not for Iraq.
(19:48):
Just for Bush. Where does that leave Venezuela. We'll find
out after somebody has to tell Trump that the planted
photo of Clinton did nothing and the deleting of photos
of him was well, somebody has to go go in
now and tell Trump about the exploding whale. Couple of headlines. No,
(20:16):
it's Trump's economy, you gov. Polling for CBS concluded Friday,
released yesterday. What's more responsible for the state of the
US economy today? Trump's policies forty seven percent, Biden's twenty
two percent, both equally twenty two percent. You put the
key numbers together there, and sixty nine percent of the
(20:37):
people think it's at least mostly or partly Trump's economy.
Note to former UN ambassador, former New York state candidate
for governor soon to be former Representative Elise Stefanic betrayed
and abandoned by Trump because ettd the note is from
the devil and it consists of two words, no refunds.
(21:00):
Gavin Newsom brought it up again. Why do we pay
federal taxes? Tweeted his press office in one of those
Kitchie Trump all caps satire posts, and then the governor
reposted it seriously again quote. If Trump cannot provide the
bare minimum to Californians, perhaps it is time California with
holds resources from the Feds. I'm telling you this is
(21:24):
the way out. It'll be messy. It is virtually a
declaration of war. It destabilizes the country. I mean it
destabilizes the country almost as fast as Trump is destabilizing it.
And lastly, Peter Arnett has died. Peter Arnett was not
(21:44):
the first reporter to tell the truth about Vietnam, but
he was the one who paved the way for all
the others too, including the ones on TV, because he
was reporting for the Associated Press when the Associated Press
had a world duopoly on news services. He won the
Pulitzer Prize in nineteen sixty six from Vietnam. He worked
(22:05):
so long and took such personal chances that he was
in Vietnam as early as nineteen sixty two and as
late as the day we withdrew in the chaos of
nineteen seventy five. And he was covering the Soviet invasion
of Afghanistan in nineteen seventy nine, And he covered the
Gulf War from Iraq for CNN, and he covered the
Bush War in Iraq in two thousand and three for NBC.
(22:27):
But what made Peter Arnett a great reporter among great
reporters is that in between when he was based at
the CNN bureau in New York in CNN year one
and year two, and that day they didn't need him
at the un or he wasn't packing to go overseas,
and instead they needed somebody to go interview commuters during
(22:49):
a snowstorm, or to get a SoundBite about the latest
I don't know, exploding whale. Peter Arnett was the first
to volunteer. He liked reporting, or when the rookie sports
reporter needed some advice on how to put together his
rookie sports story, Peter Arnett not only gave it, he
(23:09):
sat through nearly the entire editing session of the sports
piece in question. When I was next on the same
channel as him twenty one years later, he was live
from Iraq and before we went on in the commercial break,
he said over the satellite, Hey, in that New Zealand
accent of his nice career, and I got to say, well,
(23:32):
I had a lot of help from the real pros
when I was just getting started. Peter Arnett was ninety
one years old Thank you, Peter. Also of interest here,
I'll mention this again later for your planning purposes. No
podcast Thursday. It's a holiday. The holiday season, of course,
(23:54):
does not stop the worst. Of course, memet Oz wants
you to know that the price of penises is a
going up. And in an unexpectedly possibly related topic, Lindsey
Halligan misspelled Virginia. So it looks like maybe she wasn't
trying to spell virginia. Maybe she was trying to spell
(24:20):
That's next. This is Countdown. This is Countdown with Keith Oberman.
Oberman still ahead on this edition of Countdown. Hey it's Christmas.
(24:54):
I haven't done any Thurber in a long time. And
I don't know if you've noticed this, but the news Hole,
as it is colloquially known locally known Broklaw, it's kind
of small this week. So let's give you a little
something to do if you want to laugh at and
with everybody else. His most famous story, the story which
(25:15):
began my relationship with the Thurber family and the Literary Trust,
and my favorite Thurber story, A holiday three for ahead
from James Thurber. But first, believe it or not, there's
still more new idiots to talk about the roundup of
the misgrants, morons, undunning Kruger effects specimens who constitute today's
other worst persons in the world. Lebron's worst doctor Oz,
(25:42):
you heard him while millions of Americans are about to
fall off the economic cliff because he's part of the
dictatorship determined to cut healthcare to save money for billionaires.
He gave an address on how inflation is hitting transgender
care quote the creation of a penis unquote all right.
(26:05):
Pro tip if you are ever giving a speech and
you see that phrase on the page in front of you,
simply throw the script in the air, make some sort
of diversion and run from the podium. In fact, run
from the room as fast as you can. Memo and
Oz chose not to do this. He continued, the creation
(26:25):
of a penis costs on average in America one hundred
and fifty thousand dollars per child. Then he added a
scrotleplasty where you add testicles. That's extra. Wait, you can
add testicles? Has anybody told Mike Johnson The silver worser
(26:46):
Riley Gaines, America's also ran Sweetheart. Her podcast will migrate
from the Deplorable OutKick to the Home of the Devil Fox,
and interestingly, it has already reached the podcast charts, where
it's finished oh in eighty fifth place. Sources say in
(27:08):
the first episode, Gains will confess she never really learned
how to swim. But the winner the Worst Lindsey Halligan,
Miss Uncongeniality and third runner up from the Colorado Miss
USA pageant many many many years ago, and now the
unqualified attorney Trump keeps trying to install as the US
(27:30):
Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, even though she
didn't know any of the rules, like you have to
show the grand jury whatever it is you claim they
voted on, and get approved by somebody for your office
before you start indicting people as political vengeance for the
guy who used to own the Miss USA pageant. El Trumpolini,
she didn't know stuff like that, while she's done it again,
(27:52):
only this one is way simpler and way funnier than
the Star Chamber indictments in her name. She keeps having
trouble with details, details, and trouble like Lionel Hutts from
The Simpsons level trouble noted by someone I think on
Blue Sky. Her self identification on one of the legal
(28:14):
documents she filed reads Lindsay Halligan, United States Attorney, Eastern
District of Virginia, Florida, bar number one on the nine
four three of the tamis and amnue Alexandria Virginia two
two three fo Wait, Wait what United States Attorney Eastern
District of v I r gi na Virgina Virgina. She
(28:44):
misspelled Virginia v i r g i na Virgina. Well,
we're assuming she was trying to spell Virginia.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
Lindsay, what was the name of that old minstrel song
from the nineteenth century? Carry me back to old Virgina Alligan,
Today's other worst person in the world.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
As promised, Merry Christmas. Not just one Thurber story, since
we haven't done any of them in a while, not two,
but three, and all of them with special connotations. My favorite,
his most famous, and the one that first connected me
to the Thurber literary tradition. As I've mentioned many times,
I read this story first aloud in a class in
(30:15):
college in nineteen seventy nine, and a friend of mine
came up to me and said, you should forget that
sportscasting thing. You should read Thurber for a living, and
I said, yeah, that'll ever happen. This is, for some
reason salvation for me, Catharsis, and every other emotion that
is appropriate after it has been a long week. A
(30:38):
Box to Hide in by James Thurber. I waited till
the large woman with the awful hat took up her
sack of groceries and went out, peering at the tomatoes
and the lettuce on her way. The clerk asked me
(30:58):
what mine was. Have you got a box, I asked,
A large box. I want a box to hide in.
You want a box, he asked, I want a box
to hide in. I said, what do you mean? He said,
you mean a big box? I said, I meant a
(31:18):
big box big enough to hold me. I haven't got
any boxes, he said, only cottons that cans come in.
I tried several other groceries and none of them had
a box big enough for me to hide in. And
there was nothing for it but to face life out.
I didn't feel strong, and I'd had this overpowering desire
(31:40):
to hide in a box for a long time. Well,
what do you mean you want to hide in this box?
One grocer asked me. It's a form of escape, I
told him, hiding in a box, it circumscribes your worries
in the range of your anguish. You don't see people either.
(32:04):
The hell you eat when you're in this box, asked
the grocer, I don't know. Hell do you get anything
to eat? I said, I had never been in a
box and didn't know, but that that would take care
of itself. Well, he said, finally, I haven't got any boxes,
only some pasteboard curtains that cans come in. It was
the same every place. I gave up when it got
(32:27):
dark and the groceries closed, and hid in my room again.
I turned out the light and lay on the bed.
You feel better when it gets dark. I could have
hit in a closet, I suppose, but people are always
opening doors. Somebody would find you in a closet. They
would be startled, and you'd have to tell them why
(32:49):
you're in the closet. Nobody pays attention to a big
box lying on the floor. You could stay in it
for days and nobody'd think to look in it, not
even the cleaning woman. My cleaning woman came the next
morning and woke me up, and I was still feeling bad.
(33:11):
I asked her if she knew where I could get
a large box. How big a box you want, she asked,
I want a box big enough for me to get
inside of, I said. She looked at me with big,
dim eyes. There's something wrong with her glands. She's awful,
but she has a big heart, which makes it worse.
(33:33):
She's unbearable. Her husband is sick, and her children are sick,
and she is sick too. I got to thinking how
pleasant it would be if I were in a box
now and didn't have to see her. I'd be in
a box right there in the room, and she wouldn't know.
I wondered, if you had a desire to bark or
laugh when someone who doesn't know walks by the box
(33:53):
you were in, maybe she would have a spell with
her heart. If I did that would die right there.
The officers and the elevator man and mister Graham would
find us funny, dog Gune, thing happened at the building
last night. The doorman would say to his wife, I
led in this woman to clean up tenf and she
never come out. See she's never in there more in
(34:15):
an hour, but she never come out. See. So when
it got time for me to go off duty. Wissays
to Credit, who was on the elevator. I says, what
the hell you suppose happened to that woman cleans tenf?
He says he didn't know. He says he never seen
her after he took her up. So I spoke to
mister Drammage about it. I'm sorry to bother you, mister Grammage,
I says, but there's something funny about that woman cleans
(34:37):
ten f. So I told him so he said we
better have a look, and we all three goes up
and knots on the door and rings the bells sea
and nobody answers. So he said we'd have to walk in.
So Credit opened the door and we walked in, and
here was this woman cleans the apartment, dead as a
herring on the floor, and the gentleman that lives there
(34:59):
was in a box. The cleaning woman kept looking at me.
It was hard to realize she wasn't dead. It's a
form of escape, I murmured, wat say. She asked, Dully,
you don't know of any large packing boxes, do you?
(35:21):
I asked, now, I don't. She said, I haven't found
one yet, But I still have this overpowering urge to
hide in a box. Maybe it will go away, Maybe
I'll be all right, Maybe it will get worse. It's
(35:42):
hard to say. A box to hide in by James Thurber.
James Thurber's best known work, best loved work, and maybe
just best work has been made into two different films,
(36:02):
neither of which is really satisfactory, but which gives you
just a glimpse of what your imagination is doing as
you hear or read his words. It is a universal.
It is the story of everybody who's ever lived, who
has ever daydreamed. It is the secret life of Walter
(36:22):
Mitty by James Thurber. We're going through. The Commander's voice
was like thin ice breaking. He wore his full dress uniform,
with the heavily braided white cap pulled down rakishly over
one cold gray eye. We can't make it, sir. It's
spoiling for a hurricane. If you ask me, I'm not
(36:45):
asking you, Lieutenant Berg said the commander. Throw on the
power lights, rever up to eighty five hundred. We're going through.
The pounding of the cylinders increased to pocket to pocket,
to pocket, to pocket to pocket. The commander stared at
the ice forming on the pilot window. He walked over
and twisted a row of complicated dials. Sweat youah, number
eight auxiliary, He shouted, switch on Mber eight auxiliary repeated.
(37:10):
Lieutenant Berg full strength and number three turret shouted the
commander full strength and number three turret. The crew, bending
to their various tasks in the huge, hurtling eight engined
Navy hydroplane, looked at each other and grinned. The old
man will get us through, they said to one another.
The old man ain't afraid of hell, not the fast.
(37:32):
You're driving too fast, said missus Middy. What are you
driving so fast for? Hmmm, said Walter Middy. He looked
at his wife in the seat beside him with shocked astonishment.
She seemed grossly unfamiliar, like a strange woman who had
yelled at him in a crowd. You're up to fifty five,
(37:52):
she said. You know I don't like to go more
than forty. You're up to fifty five. Walter Middy drove
on toward Waterbury in silence, the roaring of the s
N two two through the worst storm in twenty years
of Navy flying, fading in the remote intimate airways of
his mind. Your ten step again, said missus midty. It's
(38:14):
one of your days. I wish you'd let doctor Renshaw
look you over. Walter Mitty stopped the car in front
of the building where his wife went to have her
hair done. Remember to get those overshoes while I'm having
the hair done, she said, I don't need overshoes, said Mitty.
She put her mirror back into her bag. We've been
all through that, she said, getting out of the car.
(38:37):
You're not a young man any longer. He raced the
engine a little. Why don't you wear your gloves? Have
you lost your gloves? Walter Mitty reached in a pocket
and brought out the gloves. He put them on, but
after she had turned and gone into the building and
he had driven onto a red light, he took them
off again. Pick it up, brother snapped the cop as
(38:59):
the light changed, and Mitty hastily pulled on his gloves
and lurched ahead. He drove around the streets aimlessly for
a time, and then he drove past the hospital on
his way to the parking lot. It's the millionaire banker
Wellington McMillan, said, the pretty nurse, Yes, said Walter Mitty,
removing his gloves slowly. Who has the case? Doctor Renshawn,
(39:22):
Doctor Renbow. But there are two specialists here, doctor Remington
from New York and mister Prichard Mitford from London. He
flew over the door, opened down a long cool carter,
and doctor Renshaw came out. He looked distraught and haggard.
Hello Mitty, he said, we're having the devil's own time
with McMillan, the millionaire banker and close personal friend of
(39:44):
Roosevelt obstriosis of the ductal tract tertiary. Wish you'd take
a look at him. Glad to said Mitty. In the
operating room, there were whispered introductions Doctor Remington, doctor Mitty,
mister Richard Mitford, doctor Mitty. And I've read you bok
(40:04):
Gunscript of thracosis, said Richard Mitford, shaking hands. A brilliant performance, sir,
thank you, said Walter Mitty. Didn't know you're in the
State's midty, grumbled Remington. Coles to Newcastle, bringing Midford to
me up here for a tertiary. You are very kind,
said Mittie. A huge complicated machine connected to the operating
(40:27):
table with many tubes and wires began at this moment
to go pocket, pocketa pocketa. The new anesthetizer is giving way,
shouted an in turn. There is no one in the
east who knows how to fix it. Quiet man, said
Mitty in a low, cool voice. He sprang to the machine,
which was now going pocket to pocket to creep, pocket
(40:48):
to pocket to creep. He began fingering delicately a roll
of glistening dials. Give me a fountain pen, he snapped.
Someone handed him a fountain pen. He pulled a faulty
piston out of the machine and inserted the pen in
its place. That will hold for ten minutes, he said,
Get on with the operation. A nurse hurried over and
(41:08):
whispered to Renshaw, and Mitty saw the man turn pale.
Coreopsis has set him, said Renshaw nervously. If you would
take over, Middy. Mitty looked at him, and at the
craven figure of Benbow, who drank, and at the grave
uncertain faces of the two great specialists. If you wish,
(41:29):
he said. They slipped a white gown on him. He
adjusted a mask and drew on thin gloves. Nurses handed
him shiny back it up. Mac look out for that
buick Walter. Mitty jammed on the brakes. Wrong lane, mack,
said the parking lot attendant, looking at Mitty closely. Gee yeah,
muttered Mitty. He began cautiously to back out of the
(41:52):
lane marked exit. Only leave us sit there, said the attendant.
I'll put her away. Mitty got out of the car.
Hey better leave the key, oh, said Mitty, handing the
man the ignition key. The attendant vaulted into the car,
backed it up with insolent skill, and put it where
(42:12):
it belonged. They're so damn cocky, thought Walter Mitty, walking
along Main Street. They think they know everything. Once he
had tried to take his chains off outside New Milford,
and he got them wound around the axles. The man
had to come out in a wrecking car and unwind them,
(42:32):
a young, grinning garage man. Since then, missus Mitty always
made him drive to a garage to have the chains
taken off. The next time, he thought, I'll wear my
right arm in a sling. They won't grin at me.
Then I have my right arm in a sling, and
they'll see I couldn't possibly take the chains off myself.
He kicked at the slush on the sidewalk. Overshoes he
(42:56):
said to himself, and he began looking for a shoe store.
When he came out into the street again with the
overshoes in a box under his arm, Walter Mitty began
to wonder what the other thing was his wife had
told him to get. She had told him twice before
they set out from their house for Waterbury. In a way,
he hated these weekly trips to town. He was always
getting something wrong. Kleenex, he thoughts, quibbs, razor blades, now, toothpaste,
(43:22):
toothbrush by carbon at carborundum initiative referendum. He gave it up,
but she would remember it. Where's the what's its name?
She would ask? Don't tell me you forgot the what's
its name? The newsboy went by, shouting something about the
Waterbury trial. Perhaps this will refresh your memory. The district
(43:42):
attorney suddenly thrust a heavy automatic at the quiet figure
on the witness stand. Have you ever seen this before?
Walter Mitty took the gun and examined it expertly. This
is my Webley Vicar's fifty point eight, oh, he said calmly.
An excited buzz ran around the courtroom. The judge rapped
for order. You are a crack shot with any sort
(44:04):
of firearms, I believe, said the district attorney, insinuatingly, objection,
shouted Mitty's attorney. We have shown that the defendant could
not have fired the shot. We have shown that he
wore his right arm in a sling. On the night
of the fourteenth of July. Walter Mitty raised his hand briefly,
and the bickering attorneys were stilled with any known make
(44:26):
of gun. He said evenly, I could have killed Gregory
Fitzhurst at three hundred feet with my left hand. Pandemonium
broke out in the courtroom. A woman's scream rose above
the bedlom, and suddenly a lovely, dark haired girl was
in Walter Mitty's arms. The district attorney struck at her savagely.
Without rising from his chair. Mitty let the man have
(44:48):
it on the point of the chin. You miserable, cur
puppy biscuit, said Walter Mitty. He stopped walking, and the
buildings of Waterbury rose up out of the misty courtroom
and surrounded him again. A woman who was passing laughed.
He said, puppy biscuit. She said to her companion that
man said, puppy biscuit to himself. Walter Mitty hurried on.
(45:12):
He went into an a and p not the first
one he came to, but a smaller one farther up
the street. I want some biscuit for small young dogs,
he said to the clerk. Any special brand, Sir, the
greatest pistol shot in the world, thought a moment. It
says puppies bark for it on the box, said Walter Mitty.
(45:38):
His wife would be through at the hairdressers in fifteen minutes.
Mitty saw in looking at his watch. Unless they had
trouble drying it. Sometimes they had trouble drying it. She
didn't like to get to the hotel first. She would
want him to be there waiting for her as usual.
He found a big leather chair in the lobby facing
a window, and he put the overshoes and the puppy
biscuit on the floor. Beside it. He picked up an
(46:00):
old copy of Liberty and sank down into the chair.
Can Germany conquer the world through the air? Walter Mitty
looked at the pictures of bombing planes and of ruined streets.
The Cannonaden has got the wind up in young Rawleigh, Sir, said,
the sergeant. Captain Mitty looked at him through touzled hair.
(46:24):
Get him to bed, he said, wearily. With the others,
I'll fly alone. But you can't, sir, said the sergeant anxiously.
It takes two men to handle that bomber, and the
Archies are pounding l out of the air. Von Rickman's
circus is between here and Solier. Somebody's got to get
that ammunition dump, said Mitty. I'm going over spot of brandy.
(46:46):
He poured a drink for the sergeant and won for himself. Wore,
thundered and whined around the dugout and battered at the door.
There was a rending of wood and splinters flew through
the room. Bit of a near thing, said Captain Mitty carelessly.
The box barrage is closing in, said the sergeant. We
only live once, sergeant, said Mitty, with his faint, fleeting smile.
(47:10):
Or do we? He poured another brandy and tossed it off.
Never seen a man could hold his brandy. Lock you, sir,
said the sergeant, begging you pardon, sir. Captain Mitty stood
up and scrapped on his huge Webbley vicars automatic. It's
forty kilometers through el, Sir, said the sergeant. Mitty finished
one last brandy after all, he said, softly, What isn't
(47:35):
The pounding of the cannon increased. There was the rat
tat tatting of the machine guns, and from somewhere came
the menacing Pucket to Pucket, to Pucket to Pucketer of
the new flame throwers. Walter Mitty walked to the door
of the dugout, humming out Prey de ma blonde. He
turned and waved to the sergeant cheerio. He said. Something
(47:58):
struck his shoulder. I've been looking all over this hotel
for you, said missus Mitty. Why do you have to
hide in this old chair? How did you expect me
to find you? Things? Close in? Said Walter Mitty, vaguely
what Missus Mitty said? Did you get the wats it's
name the poppy biscuit? What's in that box overshoes? Said Mitty?
(48:20):
Couldn't you put them on on the star? I was thinking,
said Walter Mitty. Does it ever occur to you that
I am sometimes thinking? She looked at him. I'm going
to take your temperature when I get you home, she said.
They went out through the revolving doors that made a
faintly derisive whistling sound when you push them. It was
(48:41):
two blocks to the parking lot at the drug store
on the corner. She said, wait here for me. I
forgot something. I won't be a minute. She was more
than a minute. Walter Mitty lighted a cigarette. It began
to rain, rain with sleet in it. He stood up
against the wall of the drug store smoking. He put
(49:01):
his shoulders back and his heels together. Hell with the handkerchief,
said Walter Mitty, scornfully. He took one last drag on
his cigarette and snapped it away. Then, with that faint,
fleeting smile playing about his lips, he faced the firing squad,
erect and motionless, proud and disdainful. Walter Mitty, the Undefeated,
(49:24):
inscrutable to the last. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
by James Thurber, The peace Like Mongoose is the starting
point of my relationship with James Thurber's daughter Rosemary, and
his granddaughter and his publishers. It was my dad, fatally
(49:46):
sick in the hospital, to whom I would read Thurber
every night, who suggested I should read Thurber on the
TV news show. I thought he was crazy. I told
him if I did that, I'd probably hear from his
literary trust. But I did it anyway, and so I
read the Peace like Mongoose, and I heard from his
literary trust, because at the moment I read this story,
(50:08):
Rosie Thurber was on the horns of the proverbial dilemma.
A British publisher wanted to put the piece like Mongoose
in an anthology for school kids. It is placements like
that which keep an author alive. But that publisher wanted
to remove one word from the story, and Rosie was
now torn edit her father's work or don't publish her
(50:30):
father's work. Unbeknownst to me, she and her daughter Sarah
were both Countdown viewers and were watching as I read
the piece like Mongoose. Sarah and then called her mother
and said, I think you've got your answer right there.
Not long after, the British publisher, probably a coincidence, changed
its mind about excising the word amen. The word, by
(50:54):
the way, is mongoose sexual, which is a perfect creation
of the perfect James Thurber. And the complaint from NBC
was about the moral to the story, which I will
not read first and without any other pointless ado. The
Piece Like Mongoose by James Thurber. In Cobra Country, a
(51:17):
mongoose was born one day who didn't want to fight
cobras or anything else. The word spread from mongoose to
mongoose that there was a mongoose who didn't want to
fight cobras. He didn't want to fight anything else. It
was his own business. But it was the duty of
every mongoose to kill cobras or be killed by cobras. Why,
(51:40):
asked the peace like mongoose, And the word went around
that the strange new mongoose was not only pro cobra
and anti mongoose, but intellectually curious and against the ideals
and traditions of mongoosi Ism. He's crazy, cried the young
mongoose's father. He's sick, said his mother. He's a coward,
(52:04):
shouted his brothers. He is a mongoose sexual, whispered his sisters.
Strangers who had never laid eyes on the Piece like
Mongoose remembered that they had seen him crawling on his stomach,
or trying on cobra hoods, or plotting the violent overthrow
of Mongoosia. I'm trying to use reason and intelligence, said
(52:30):
the strange new mongoose. Reason is six sevenths of treason,
said one of his neighbors. Intelligence is what the enemy uses,
said another. Finally, the rumors spread that the mongoose had
venom in his sting like a cobra, and he was tried,
convicted by a show of pause, and condemned to banishment.
(52:54):
Moral ashes to ashes, and clay to clay. If the
enemy doesn't get you your own folks, may a box
(53:18):
to hide in. My favorite Walter Mitty, his most famous
and that one that connected me to the eternal Thurber Tree,
the piece like mongoos. Okay, I've done all the damage
I can do here, Thank you for listening. Most of
our Countdown music was arranged, produced, and performed by Brian
Ray and John Phillip Schaneil, our musical directors of Countdown,
(53:39):
and was produced by Tko Brothers, mister Ray on guitars,
bass and drums, and mister Shaneil handling the orchestration and keyboards.
Our satirical and pithy musical comments by the best baseball
stadium organist ever, Nancy Faust. The Olderman theme from ESPN two,
written by Mitch Warren Davis courtesy of ESPN Inc. Is
the sports music. Other music arranged and performed by the
(54:02):
group No Horns Allowed. Today was my friend Larry David.
The program was produced by Ted and everything else was
as always my fault. That's countdown for today. Day three
hundred and thirty seven of America held hostage again, but
just one twenty six days until the scheduled end of
his lame duck and lame brained term. Unless he is
(54:25):
removed sooner by MAGA, or by Jeffrey Epstein, or by affordability,
or by Susie Wiles. There is no countdown Thursday, you know,
Merry Christmas. Bluntly, I'm still undecided about next week. Maybe
I'll do one from Monday, maybe not. I will advise
(54:45):
on social media and via the conduit that is provided
with your subscription if you have one. In any event,
Happy holidays, and until the next one, I'm Keith Olberman.
Good morning, good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck. Countdown with
Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts
(55:07):
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. Remember
when they blew up that dead whale, That's what Trump
(00:25):
just did to the Epstein cover up. You've seen the
video right. Forty five foot eight ton carcass of a
dead sperm whale washes up on shore at Florence, Oregon,
November nineteen seventy. They decide the easiest way to dispose
of it is to blow it up with dynamite. That's
(00:45):
what Trump has just done to the Epstein cover up.
So the geniuses in Oregon in nineteen seventy figured some
of it will wash away and the smaller parts will
be eaten by scavenger animals. Only they had a highway
engineer plan it out, and he used half a ton
of dynamite instead of the twenty sticks that would have
(01:07):
done the job. And the next thing you knew, the
whale had become a thousand pieces of rock hard shrapnel.
That's what Trump just did to the Epstein cover up.
A piece of blubber, and whale blubber is hard. A
piece of blubber the size of a coffee table hit
a parked car and crushed it, and the driver later
(01:30):
swore he had just bought that car from a lot
that was then running a promotion called get a Whale
of a Deal. That's what Trump just did to the
Epstein cover up. I also want to know today why
Trump renamed the Kennedy Center the Donald J. Trump Memorial Center.
(01:50):
But let me plow through the trump Stein disaster first.
It starts with Image four sixty eight. Image four to
sixty eight, from the Epstein files, from which virtually all
the Trump stuff had already been scrubbed, was not scrubbed.
It was a photo of a bunch of framed photos
in a drawer, all of which showed Trump and Epstein together. So,
(02:13):
twenty four hours later, Image four to sixty eight, which
hadn't been scrubbed, was instead deleted. And even in doing that,
after they posted it and scrubbed it and deleted it,
they left Image one three hundred and forty six, a
larger shot of framed Epstein photos on a credenza, a
couple dozen of them. And sure enough, zoom in on that,
(02:36):
as the impeccable Lauren Windsor did, and there is a
framed photo of Epstein and Trump and Malania. The three
of them doesn't look like anybody's being introduced to anybody else.
At least sixteen pages that were released on Friday had
disappeared by yesterday. Some of the ones they did release
(03:00):
had one hundred percent redactions five hundred and fifty of
them five fifty pages fully redacted, just the black boxes,
per Scott McFarlane and CBS News, and they are still counting.
One Epstein victim says she was doxed that Trump released
her identifying information and just to apply the chef's kiss,
(03:20):
Todd Blanche, who believe it or not, is the Deputy
Attorney General, gets on one of the Sunday shows and
presents a self fulfilling prophecy or in this case, a
self unfulfilling prophecy. Quote. If there's photographs that we have
of President Trump or anybody else, they of course will
be released, with the exception of any victims or survivors
(03:43):
that we've identified unquote. In other words, any photos proving
Trump was with verified Epstein victims or survivors, they will
not be released because because because they would show Trump
was with verified Epstein victims or survivors, we can't show
(04:04):
you THEO that would prove it. Hey did just stuff
the dynamite into the dead whale. Yet Cole let her rip,
the penultimate flaw of this administration, has now once again
moved center stage, even ahead of his own instability. That
(04:26):
second ranked fatal flaw is these people are idiots. Dan
Bongino didn't say this as he quit as deputy FBI director,
but the suspicion is Cash Patel is too much of
an idiot, even for Dan Bongino. I mean, that's a
lot of idiot. And apart from Patel screwing up every
investigation he's put his eye on, so to speak, the
(04:49):
key Trumpest exposure on the brain drain issue is the
Epstein files. First was Pam Bondi's empty Epstein loose leaf
notebooks bought at a Staples in Georgetown or somewhere for
all we know. Then it was her claim that there
was a client list on her desk. Then it was
Trump going from running on releasing the Epstein files to
(05:09):
Trump calling the Epstein files a hoax, to Trump signing
the humiliating House measure to force him to release the
Epstein files. Then it was Susie Wiles saying Bondie quote
completely whiffed on the Epstein files. Then it was not
releasing documents that must by law be released, and it
said releasing only some of them, then unreleasing others, and
therefore blowing up the metaphorical whale while simply spreading the
(05:33):
metaphorical whale over a square mile area, and by the way,
still not complying with the law Trump signs, so people
at the DOJ could technically go to jail now or
more likely later. Twenty twenty nine comes to mind. If
you'd like to make sure the Epstein story stays alive,
you'd do any one of those things I just mentioned.
(05:56):
If you'd like to make sure America is convinced Trump
is again convicted of complicity with Epstein, I mean a
second time after the release of the Trump signed drawing
of the nude, do all of those things I just mentioned.
And if you'd like to escalate the Epstein scandal to
indelibly market as the Trumpstein scandal, do what these idiots
(06:17):
did and plant things in the files and release the
planted things, and do it so clumsily and moronically that
it gets community noted on Twitter. X Abigail Marone Jackson
a deputy Press secretary. And remember if you're a deputy
press secretary. When Caroline Levitt is the press secretary, you
(06:39):
are necessarily dumber even than Caroline Levitt is. Abigail Morone
Jackson wrote that per the Epstein Files Transparency Act, DOJ
was specifically instructed only to redact the faces of victims
and or miners. Here is a picture of Bill Clinton
with his arm around Michael Jackson and redacted individuals might
(07:02):
as well have had a picture of Abraham Lincoln. The
picture of Clinton is of course available by googling his
name and Michael Jackson and the redacted individuals in that
picture are Michael Jackson's two sons and Evan Ross, the
son of Diana Ross. And also Diana Ross is also
in the picture. And apparently Abigail Moron Jackson doesn't know
(07:23):
who she is. She's too inbubbled to know who Diana
Ross is. And the picture is from a Democratic fundraiser
from two thousand and three, and it don't have a
damn thing to do with the Epstein Files. But Abigail
Jackson decided to try to deceive the American public into
believing it has something to do with them. In other words,
they blew up the whale, and then they went back
and assembled the pieces again and blew it up a
(07:43):
second time. And that gives anybody an excuse to look
at anything in the Epstein files and just assume that
if it puts the finger on somebody else, Trump put
it there. Nice work, Abigail Moron Jackson. This is Abigail's
second job in life. The first one was as a
(08:04):
press aid to Josh Hawley, the January sixth running Man.
There are, in fact, at last check, at least eight
Twitter ex community notes on posts by Jackson, by the
deplorable Todd Blanche, by Pam Bondi herself Blondie, who simply
cannot be long for her job. She just can't. New
(08:27):
Year's Day would be a surprise if she's still in
that job. Wasn't even posting about Trumpstein, and she still
got community noted about trump Stein. She wrote about Trump
setting all time great transparency standards for a presidency, and
nobody is buying it community note quote contrary to the claim,
Instead of transparency, the administration runs defense for pedophiles and rapists.
(08:51):
And then there are links to four tweets, including two
by Congressman Tom Massey. Keep up the good work, Madam
Attorney Generic Trump. Not just covering up the Epstein files
and breaking the law by not fulfilling the law passed
by his own party. Not just doing that, but now
(09:12):
faking things and putting them in the Epstein files and
not even doing it very well, and faking something about
Bill Clinton. The day Bill Clinton left the White House,
the average American of today was fifteen years old. You
might as well have faked something about Epstein and the
y two K computer crisis, Abigail. This underscores why Trumpstein,
(09:35):
no matter what happens next, will be self perpetuating in
a way nobody dreamed of last Thursday. This is the
true danger of conspiracy theories, as no one will find
out more than Donald Trump will find out in the
days and weeks to come. Twenty percent of Americans do
not believe the reality of what happened on nine to eleven.
(09:57):
The Kennedy assassination only became more desirable as conspiracy fodder
after the Warren Commission reports. Jill McCay's eighteen forty one
book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds has
been surpassed since its publication in explaining mass stupidity, but
it is still always a wonderful reminder that while it
(10:20):
has now been weaponized by everybody from the Nazis to Trump,
people have always been this gullible. It is hard to
get away from conspiracy theories except by massive and even
shocking straightforwardness and transparency, and that is impossible if a
government consists of conspiracy theorists and stupid conspiracy theorists like
(10:43):
har Meat Dylan. If you don't know her, she is
actually an assistant Attorney General. Her previous job was Tulsey
Gabbard's lawyer. She deliberately or otherwise turned the Brown University
shooting into another fake conspiracy. Somebody tweeted that after the shooting,
Brown was removing articles from its website about one of
(11:06):
its students. She retweeted it with the musk like addition.
Concerning Anna, Paulina Luna, the member of the House from
Dipshit County, Florida, wrote she found it suspicious that things
were altered on the Brown website. Luna also probably finds
it suspicious that the amount of daylight changes every day. Well,
(11:28):
Dylan retweeted her too, adding just sus turned out the
deletions had nothing to do with the shooting, and the
student had nothing to do with the shooting. As I
recorded this, Dylan had not even deleted her misinformation sus
this clown. One can argue that it is part of
the trumpest playbook, that it is part of the authoritarian playbook,
(11:51):
that the less people who believe in official accounts about anything,
the more they will turn to one seemingly authoritative source.
And unfortunately, for many of these idiots, that's still Trump.
I confess. I think that's giving them too much credit.
It's like reading Senator Mike Lee, who is so deep
down his let's see what's the amount one million Internet
(12:13):
rabbit hole now that he would need to detox to
find his way back to reality, and thinking that Mike
Lee's borderline paranoia is some kind of re election strategy.
It's not. He's just a moron. These people are all
just morons. They blew up the Epstein whale. They have
not processed that. Conspiracy theories are like giant fire hoses.
(12:36):
They're effective and decisive unless you lose control of yours
and you drop it and the next thing you know,
the water has drowned you, or the blubber has the
Trump Stein story would have forgive me exploded. If everything
had come out Friday, just like a dead whale would
eventually explode due to natural biological forces, then there would
(13:01):
have been a significant, if probably inaccurate, sense that almost
the whole thing was out in the open now, and
however bad it might have been, there would have been
a virtual end to it. But everything didn't come out Friday.
All that did was just give you a reason to
reread the nauseating New York Times story about Epstein giving
Trump a twenty year old woman of Trump denying, denying,
(13:23):
and denying, and nobody ever bothering to reread the Epstein
evidence while playing Trump's words from the Access Hollywood tape
and remembering that when Trump said that, it was after
most of his sleaziness with Epstein had already occurred, so
it didn't come out. Instead, you maniacs, you blew it up.
(13:46):
Damn you, damn you Hotell. And now the blubber will
just sit there everywhere. It will just sit there, symbolically,
a whole, huge chunk of at the size of a
coffee table in the crushed car next to Trump, forever,
next to Trump as he dozes off for boasts about
(14:09):
acing the cognitive test and being able to tell which
one was the giraffe. Let's take another look at those
trump Steen photos. Is the draft in there too? How
about the dead blowed up whale, loaded up bloaded up,
(14:41):
real good, loaded up, real good. Okay, So why did
Trump name it the Donald J. Trump Memorial Center. This
is not the biggest problem with renaming the Kennedy Center
illegally after himself, But didn't anybody else notice this? He
changed the name of the Kennedy Center before anybody could
(15:02):
file a suit to stop him, and he put up
a new sign on it, reading the Donald J. Trump
and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts.
I mean, could we be Is it possible that we're
missing the real lead story here? The Donald J. Trump
and the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing
(15:26):
Arts means well, it does include the idea that it's
the Donald J. Trump Memorial Center. The word memorial applies
to everybody in the new name, It's Trump Memorial. Did
I miss a bulletin or something? He's not dead yet, right,
I mean officially, officially, not in terms of brain health
(15:48):
or his own soul. The Donald J. Trump and the
John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. You
read that, and it doesn't mean that only Kennedy is
memorialized here. It's it's that's the construction you use when
you are memorializing two people in the title of a
(16:08):
building or a book or anything else. Then don't tell me, Well,
if you're going to slap your name on the Kennedy Center,
that's the only way to do it. No, you take
out the word memorial and you make it the Donald J.
Trump and John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. See,
or if you're Trump and you really think there is
something too disrespectful even for you to do, and you
(16:31):
have to keep the word memorial in there for Kennedy's sake,
you take a page from sports stadiums and you make
it the Donald J. Trump Auditorium at the John F.
Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts. That way, it's
Kennedy memorial and Trump not memorial. Obviously, the whole thing
(16:52):
is sacrilege. But there's sacrilege and then there's stupid sacrilege.
And what a surprise, Trump chose the stupid sacrilege. This
needs to be undone now by court act later just
with pick axes, maybe on pay per view, or people
buy a two dollars lottery ticket and the winners get
(17:12):
to wield the pick axes. You'd raise eleven hundred and
seventy four trillion dollars. But it's just so unsettling that anybody,
even a guy as flat out crazy as Trump, would
slap his name on an American cultural institution and make
it read like it is now the Trump Memorial Center.
Sir Memorial means dead sir. On the other hand, if
(17:36):
this sticks, Trump will have the last laugh, because of course,
sooner or later it will be it will be Trump Memorial.
(17:57):
So with trump Stein, kaboom and here comes the blubber.
I'm not sure why Trump probably got scared out of
announcing an attack on Venezuela last Wednesday. Do not get
me wrong, I would be happy to see Maduro go,
no matter the how, just like I'd like to see
Putin go, no matter the how. These aren't socialist countries
(18:19):
or democracies or whatever form of government Russia has convinced
it's captive citizens they are in. These are dictatorships. But
once again, if Trump has the right to try to
force regime change in some place like Venezuela. Bunduro necessarily
also has the right to try to force regime change
in some place like oh here. Plus, Trump's relationship to
(18:42):
Venezuela is he wants it to be his. Iraq, Bush
managed to sell just enough Americans on the idea that
the Iraqis had something to do with nine to eleven.
And even if it wasn't much, sure, they didn't really
us hanging him and destroying his country would be a
lesson to somebody. In point of fact, it just amped
(19:05):
up the terrorist threat, and that secured Bush his narrow
reelection in two thousand and four. That obviously is why
they have invented this nonsensical term narco terrorism. Might as
well name it after Rubio and call it Marco terrorism.
That makes just as little sense. The point is to
repeat again and again and again and get the casual
(19:27):
American to forge a connection between Venezuela and terrorism, and
then use that to in a way repeat Bush's success.
And yes, sorry, it pains me more than anybody else
I think in media. Yes, Bush was successful in Iraq.
Not for America, not for the world, certainly not for Iraq.
(19:48):
Just for Bush. Where does that leave Venezuela. We'll find
out after somebody has to tell Trump that the planted
photo of Clinton did nothing and the deleting of photos
of him was well, somebody has to go go in
now and tell Trump about the exploding whale. Couple of headlines. No,
(20:16):
it's Trump's economy, you gov. Polling for CBS concluded Friday,
released yesterday. What's more responsible for the state of the
US economy today? Trump's policies forty seven percent, Biden's twenty
two percent, both equally twenty two percent. You put the
key numbers together there, and sixty nine percent of the
(20:37):
people think it's at least mostly or partly Trump's economy.
Note to former UN ambassador, former New York state candidate
for governor soon to be former Representative Elise Stefanic betrayed
and abandoned by Trump because ettd the note is from
the devil and it consists of two words, no refunds.
(21:00):
Gavin Newsom brought it up again. Why do we pay
federal taxes? Tweeted his press office in one of those
Kitchie Trump all caps satire posts, and then the governor
reposted it seriously again quote. If Trump cannot provide the
bare minimum to Californians, perhaps it is time California with
holds resources from the Feds. I'm telling you this is
(21:24):
the way out. It'll be messy. It is virtually a
declaration of war. It destabilizes the country. I mean it
destabilizes the country almost as fast as Trump is destabilizing it.
And lastly, Peter Arnett has died. Peter Arnett was not
(21:44):
the first reporter to tell the truth about Vietnam, but
he was the one who paved the way for all
the others too, including the ones on TV, because he
was reporting for the Associated Press when the Associated Press
had a world duopoly on news services. He won the
Pulitzer Prize in nineteen sixty six from Vietnam. He worked
(22:05):
so long and took such personal chances that he was
in Vietnam as early as nineteen sixty two and as
late as the day we withdrew in the chaos of
nineteen seventy five. And he was covering the Soviet invasion
of Afghanistan in nineteen seventy nine, And he covered the
Gulf War from Iraq for CNN, and he covered the
Bush War in Iraq in two thousand and three for NBC.
(22:27):
But what made Peter Arnett a great reporter among great
reporters is that in between when he was based at
the CNN bureau in New York in CNN year one
and year two, and that day they didn't need him
at the un or he wasn't packing to go overseas,
and instead they needed somebody to go interview commuters during
(22:49):
a snowstorm, or to get a SoundBite about the latest
I don't know, exploding whale. Peter Arnett was the first
to volunteer. He liked reporting, or when the rookie sports
reporter needed some advice on how to put together his
rookie sports story, Peter Arnett not only gave it, he
(23:09):
sat through nearly the entire editing session of the sports
piece in question. When I was next on the same
channel as him twenty one years later, he was live
from Iraq and before we went on in the commercial break,
he said over the satellite, Hey, in that New Zealand
accent of his nice career, and I got to say, well,
(23:32):
I had a lot of help from the real pros
when I was just getting started. Peter Arnett was ninety
one years old Thank you, Peter. Also of interest here,
I'll mention this again later for your planning purposes. No
podcast Thursday. It's a holiday. The holiday season, of course,
(23:54):
does not stop the worst. Of course, memet Oz wants
you to know that the price of penises is a
going up. And in an unexpectedly possibly related topic, Lindsey
Halligan misspelled Virginia. So it looks like maybe she wasn't
trying to spell virginia. Maybe she was trying to spell
(24:20):
That's next. This is Countdown. This is Countdown with Keith Oberman.
Oberman still ahead on this edition of Countdown. Hey it's Christmas.
(24:54):
I haven't done any Thurber in a long time. And
I don't know if you've noticed this, but the news Hole,
as it is colloquially known locally known Broklaw, it's kind
of small this week. So let's give you a little
something to do if you want to laugh at and
with everybody else. His most famous story, the story which
(25:15):
began my relationship with the Thurber family and the Literary Trust,
and my favorite Thurber story, A holiday three for ahead
from James Thurber. But first, believe it or not, there's
still more new idiots to talk about the roundup of
the misgrants, morons, undunning Kruger effects specimens who constitute today's
other worst persons in the world. Lebron's worst doctor Oz,
(25:42):
you heard him while millions of Americans are about to
fall off the economic cliff because he's part of the
dictatorship determined to cut healthcare to save money for billionaires.
He gave an address on how inflation is hitting transgender
care quote the creation of a penis unquote all right.
(26:05):
Pro tip if you are ever giving a speech and
you see that phrase on the page in front of you,
simply throw the script in the air, make some sort
of diversion and run from the podium. In fact, run
from the room as fast as you can. Memo and
Oz chose not to do this. He continued, the creation
(26:25):
of a penis costs on average in America one hundred
and fifty thousand dollars per child. Then he added a
scrotleplasty where you add testicles. That's extra. Wait, you can
add testicles? Has anybody told Mike Johnson The silver worser
(26:46):
Riley Gaines, America's also ran Sweetheart. Her podcast will migrate
from the Deplorable OutKick to the Home of the Devil Fox,
and interestingly, it has already reached the podcast charts, where
it's finished oh in eighty fifth place. Sources say in
(27:08):
the first episode, Gains will confess she never really learned
how to swim. But the winner the Worst Lindsey Halligan,
Miss Uncongeniality and third runner up from the Colorado Miss
USA pageant many many many years ago, and now the
unqualified attorney Trump keeps trying to install as the US
(27:30):
Attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, even though she
didn't know any of the rules, like you have to
show the grand jury whatever it is you claim they
voted on, and get approved by somebody for your office
before you start indicting people as political vengeance for the
guy who used to own the Miss USA pageant. El Trumpolini,
she didn't know stuff like that, while she's done it again,
(27:52):
only this one is way simpler and way funnier than
the Star Chamber indictments in her name. She keeps having
trouble with details, details, and trouble like Lionel Hutts from
The Simpsons level trouble noted by someone I think on
Blue Sky. Her self identification on one of the legal
(28:14):
documents she filed reads Lindsay Halligan, United States Attorney, Eastern
District of Virginia, Florida, bar number one on the nine
four three of the tamis and amnue Alexandria Virginia two
two three fo Wait, Wait what United States Attorney Eastern
District of v I r gi na Virgina Virgina. She
(28:44):
misspelled Virginia v i r g i na Virgina. Well,
we're assuming she was trying to spell Virginia.
Speaker 2 (28:57):
Lindsay, what was the name of that old minstrel song
from the nineteenth century? Carry me back to old Virgina Alligan,
Today's other worst person in the world.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
As promised, Merry Christmas. Not just one Thurber story, since
we haven't done any of them in a while, not two,
but three, and all of them with special connotations. My favorite,
his most famous, and the one that first connected me
to the Thurber literary tradition. As I've mentioned many times,
I read this story first aloud in a class in
(30:15):
college in nineteen seventy nine, and a friend of mine
came up to me and said, you should forget that
sportscasting thing. You should read Thurber for a living, and
I said, yeah, that'll ever happen. This is, for some
reason salvation for me, Catharsis, and every other emotion that
is appropriate after it has been a long week. A
(30:38):
Box to Hide in by James Thurber. I waited till
the large woman with the awful hat took up her
sack of groceries and went out, peering at the tomatoes
and the lettuce on her way. The clerk asked me
(30:58):
what mine was. Have you got a box, I asked,
A large box. I want a box to hide in.
You want a box, he asked, I want a box
to hide in. I said, what do you mean? He said,
you mean a big box? I said, I meant a
(31:18):
big box big enough to hold me. I haven't got
any boxes, he said, only cottons that cans come in.
I tried several other groceries and none of them had
a box big enough for me to hide in. And
there was nothing for it but to face life out.
I didn't feel strong, and I'd had this overpowering desire
(31:40):
to hide in a box for a long time. Well,
what do you mean you want to hide in this box?
One grocer asked me. It's a form of escape, I
told him, hiding in a box, it circumscribes your worries
in the range of your anguish. You don't see people either.
(32:04):
The hell you eat when you're in this box, asked
the grocer, I don't know. Hell do you get anything
to eat? I said, I had never been in a
box and didn't know, but that that would take care
of itself. Well, he said, finally, I haven't got any boxes,
only some pasteboard curtains that cans come in. It was
the same every place. I gave up when it got
(32:27):
dark and the groceries closed, and hid in my room again.
I turned out the light and lay on the bed.
You feel better when it gets dark. I could have
hit in a closet, I suppose, but people are always
opening doors. Somebody would find you in a closet. They
would be startled, and you'd have to tell them why
(32:49):
you're in the closet. Nobody pays attention to a big
box lying on the floor. You could stay in it
for days and nobody'd think to look in it, not
even the cleaning woman. My cleaning woman came the next
morning and woke me up, and I was still feeling bad.
(33:11):
I asked her if she knew where I could get
a large box. How big a box you want, she asked,
I want a box big enough for me to get
inside of, I said. She looked at me with big,
dim eyes. There's something wrong with her glands. She's awful,
but she has a big heart, which makes it worse.
(33:33):
She's unbearable. Her husband is sick, and her children are sick,
and she is sick too. I got to thinking how
pleasant it would be if I were in a box
now and didn't have to see her. I'd be in
a box right there in the room, and she wouldn't know.
I wondered, if you had a desire to bark or
laugh when someone who doesn't know walks by the box
(33:53):
you were in, maybe she would have a spell with
her heart. If I did that would die right there.
The officers and the elevator man and mister Graham would
find us funny, dog Gune, thing happened at the building
last night. The doorman would say to his wife, I
led in this woman to clean up tenf and she
never come out. See she's never in there more in
(34:15):
an hour, but she never come out. See. So when
it got time for me to go off duty. Wissays
to Credit, who was on the elevator. I says, what
the hell you suppose happened to that woman cleans tenf?
He says he didn't know. He says he never seen
her after he took her up. So I spoke to
mister Drammage about it. I'm sorry to bother you, mister Grammage,
I says, but there's something funny about that woman cleans
(34:37):
ten f. So I told him so he said we
better have a look, and we all three goes up
and knots on the door and rings the bells sea
and nobody answers. So he said we'd have to walk in.
So Credit opened the door and we walked in, and
here was this woman cleans the apartment, dead as a
herring on the floor, and the gentleman that lives there
(34:59):
was in a box. The cleaning woman kept looking at me.
It was hard to realize she wasn't dead. It's a
form of escape, I murmured, wat say. She asked, Dully,
you don't know of any large packing boxes, do you?
(35:21):
I asked, now, I don't. She said, I haven't found
one yet, But I still have this overpowering urge to
hide in a box. Maybe it will go away, Maybe
I'll be all right, Maybe it will get worse. It's
(35:42):
hard to say. A box to hide in by James Thurber.
James Thurber's best known work, best loved work, and maybe
just best work has been made into two different films,
(36:02):
neither of which is really satisfactory, but which gives you
just a glimpse of what your imagination is doing as
you hear or read his words. It is a universal.
It is the story of everybody who's ever lived, who
has ever daydreamed. It is the secret life of Walter
(36:22):
Mitty by James Thurber. We're going through. The Commander's voice
was like thin ice breaking. He wore his full dress uniform,
with the heavily braided white cap pulled down rakishly over
one cold gray eye. We can't make it, sir. It's
spoiling for a hurricane. If you ask me, I'm not
(36:45):
asking you, Lieutenant Berg said the commander. Throw on the
power lights, rever up to eighty five hundred. We're going through.
The pounding of the cylinders increased to pocket to pocket,
to pocket, to pocket to pocket. The commander stared at
the ice forming on the pilot window. He walked over
and twisted a row of complicated dials. Sweat youah, number
eight auxiliary, He shouted, switch on Mber eight auxiliary repeated.
(37:10):
Lieutenant Berg full strength and number three turret shouted the
commander full strength and number three turret. The crew, bending
to their various tasks in the huge, hurtling eight engined
Navy hydroplane, looked at each other and grinned. The old
man will get us through, they said to one another.
The old man ain't afraid of hell, not the fast.
(37:32):
You're driving too fast, said missus Middy. What are you
driving so fast for? Hmmm, said Walter Middy. He looked
at his wife in the seat beside him with shocked astonishment.
She seemed grossly unfamiliar, like a strange woman who had
yelled at him in a crowd. You're up to fifty five,
(37:52):
she said. You know I don't like to go more
than forty. You're up to fifty five. Walter Middy drove
on toward Waterbury in silence, the roaring of the s
N two two through the worst storm in twenty years
of Navy flying, fading in the remote intimate airways of
his mind. Your ten step again, said missus midty. It's
(38:14):
one of your days. I wish you'd let doctor Renshaw
look you over. Walter Mitty stopped the car in front
of the building where his wife went to have her
hair done. Remember to get those overshoes while I'm having
the hair done, she said, I don't need overshoes, said Mitty.
She put her mirror back into her bag. We've been
all through that, she said, getting out of the car.
(38:37):
You're not a young man any longer. He raced the
engine a little. Why don't you wear your gloves? Have
you lost your gloves? Walter Mitty reached in a pocket
and brought out the gloves. He put them on, but
after she had turned and gone into the building and
he had driven onto a red light, he took them
off again. Pick it up, brother snapped the cop as
(38:59):
the light changed, and Mitty hastily pulled on his gloves
and lurched ahead. He drove around the streets aimlessly for
a time, and then he drove past the hospital on
his way to the parking lot. It's the millionaire banker
Wellington McMillan, said, the pretty nurse, Yes, said Walter Mitty,
removing his gloves slowly. Who has the case? Doctor Renshawn,
(39:22):
Doctor Renbow. But there are two specialists here, doctor Remington
from New York and mister Prichard Mitford from London. He
flew over the door, opened down a long cool carter,
and doctor Renshaw came out. He looked distraught and haggard.
Hello Mitty, he said, we're having the devil's own time
with McMillan, the millionaire banker and close personal friend of
(39:44):
Roosevelt obstriosis of the ductal tract tertiary. Wish you'd take
a look at him. Glad to said Mitty. In the
operating room, there were whispered introductions Doctor Remington, doctor Mitty,
mister Richard Mitford, doctor Mitty. And I've read you bok
(40:04):
Gunscript of thracosis, said Richard Mitford, shaking hands. A brilliant performance, sir,
thank you, said Walter Mitty. Didn't know you're in the
State's midty, grumbled Remington. Coles to Newcastle, bringing Midford to
me up here for a tertiary. You are very kind,
said Mittie. A huge complicated machine connected to the operating
(40:27):
table with many tubes and wires began at this moment
to go pocket, pocketa pocketa. The new anesthetizer is giving way,
shouted an in turn. There is no one in the
east who knows how to fix it. Quiet man, said
Mitty in a low, cool voice. He sprang to the machine,
which was now going pocket to pocket to creep, pocket
(40:48):
to pocket to creep. He began fingering delicately a roll
of glistening dials. Give me a fountain pen, he snapped.
Someone handed him a fountain pen. He pulled a faulty
piston out of the machine and inserted the pen in
its place. That will hold for ten minutes, he said,
Get on with the operation. A nurse hurried over and
(41:08):
whispered to Renshaw, and Mitty saw the man turn pale.
Coreopsis has set him, said Renshaw nervously. If you would
take over, Middy. Mitty looked at him, and at the
craven figure of Benbow, who drank, and at the grave
uncertain faces of the two great specialists. If you wish,
(41:29):
he said. They slipped a white gown on him. He
adjusted a mask and drew on thin gloves. Nurses handed
him shiny back it up. Mac look out for that
buick Walter. Mitty jammed on the brakes. Wrong lane, mack,
said the parking lot attendant, looking at Mitty closely. Gee yeah,
muttered Mitty. He began cautiously to back out of the
(41:52):
lane marked exit. Only leave us sit there, said the attendant.
I'll put her away. Mitty got out of the car.
Hey better leave the key, oh, said Mitty, handing the
man the ignition key. The attendant vaulted into the car,
backed it up with insolent skill, and put it where
(42:12):
it belonged. They're so damn cocky, thought Walter Mitty, walking
along Main Street. They think they know everything. Once he
had tried to take his chains off outside New Milford,
and he got them wound around the axles. The man
had to come out in a wrecking car and unwind them,
(42:32):
a young, grinning garage man. Since then, missus Mitty always
made him drive to a garage to have the chains
taken off. The next time, he thought, I'll wear my
right arm in a sling. They won't grin at me.
Then I have my right arm in a sling, and
they'll see I couldn't possibly take the chains off myself.
He kicked at the slush on the sidewalk. Overshoes he
(42:56):
said to himself, and he began looking for a shoe store.
When he came out into the street again with the
overshoes in a box under his arm, Walter Mitty began
to wonder what the other thing was his wife had
told him to get. She had told him twice before
they set out from their house for Waterbury. In a way,
he hated these weekly trips to town. He was always
getting something wrong. Kleenex, he thoughts, quibbs, razor blades, now, toothpaste,
(43:22):
toothbrush by carbon at carborundum initiative referendum. He gave it up,
but she would remember it. Where's the what's its name?
She would ask? Don't tell me you forgot the what's
its name? The newsboy went by, shouting something about the
Waterbury trial. Perhaps this will refresh your memory. The district
(43:42):
attorney suddenly thrust a heavy automatic at the quiet figure
on the witness stand. Have you ever seen this before?
Walter Mitty took the gun and examined it expertly. This
is my Webley Vicar's fifty point eight, oh, he said calmly.
An excited buzz ran around the courtroom. The judge rapped
for order. You are a crack shot with any sort
(44:04):
of firearms, I believe, said the district attorney, insinuatingly, objection,
shouted Mitty's attorney. We have shown that the defendant could
not have fired the shot. We have shown that he
wore his right arm in a sling. On the night
of the fourteenth of July. Walter Mitty raised his hand briefly,
and the bickering attorneys were stilled with any known make
(44:26):
of gun. He said evenly, I could have killed Gregory
Fitzhurst at three hundred feet with my left hand. Pandemonium
broke out in the courtroom. A woman's scream rose above
the bedlom, and suddenly a lovely, dark haired girl was
in Walter Mitty's arms. The district attorney struck at her savagely.
Without rising from his chair. Mitty let the man have
(44:48):
it on the point of the chin. You miserable, cur
puppy biscuit, said Walter Mitty. He stopped walking, and the
buildings of Waterbury rose up out of the misty courtroom
and surrounded him again. A woman who was passing laughed.
He said, puppy biscuit. She said to her companion that
man said, puppy biscuit to himself. Walter Mitty hurried on.
(45:12):
He went into an a and p not the first
one he came to, but a smaller one farther up
the street. I want some biscuit for small young dogs,
he said to the clerk. Any special brand, Sir, the
greatest pistol shot in the world, thought a moment. It
says puppies bark for it on the box, said Walter Mitty.
(45:38):
His wife would be through at the hairdressers in fifteen minutes.
Mitty saw in looking at his watch. Unless they had
trouble drying it. Sometimes they had trouble drying it. She
didn't like to get to the hotel first. She would
want him to be there waiting for her as usual.
He found a big leather chair in the lobby facing
a window, and he put the overshoes and the puppy
biscuit on the floor. Beside it. He picked up an
(46:00):
old copy of Liberty and sank down into the chair.
Can Germany conquer the world through the air? Walter Mitty
looked at the pictures of bombing planes and of ruined streets.
The Cannonaden has got the wind up in young Rawleigh, Sir, said,
the sergeant. Captain Mitty looked at him through touzled hair.
(46:24):
Get him to bed, he said, wearily. With the others,
I'll fly alone. But you can't, sir, said the sergeant anxiously.
It takes two men to handle that bomber, and the
Archies are pounding l out of the air. Von Rickman's
circus is between here and Solier. Somebody's got to get
that ammunition dump, said Mitty. I'm going over spot of brandy.
(46:46):
He poured a drink for the sergeant and won for himself. Wore,
thundered and whined around the dugout and battered at the door.
There was a rending of wood and splinters flew through
the room. Bit of a near thing, said Captain Mitty carelessly.
The box barrage is closing in, said the sergeant. We
only live once, sergeant, said Mitty, with his faint, fleeting smile.
(47:10):
Or do we? He poured another brandy and tossed it off.
Never seen a man could hold his brandy. Lock you, sir,
said the sergeant, begging you pardon, sir. Captain Mitty stood
up and scrapped on his huge Webbley vicars automatic. It's
forty kilometers through el, Sir, said the sergeant. Mitty finished
one last brandy after all, he said, softly, What isn't
(47:35):
The pounding of the cannon increased. There was the rat
tat tatting of the machine guns, and from somewhere came
the menacing Pucket to Pucket, to Pucket to Pucketer of
the new flame throwers. Walter Mitty walked to the door
of the dugout, humming out Prey de ma blonde. He
turned and waved to the sergeant cheerio. He said. Something
(47:58):
struck his shoulder. I've been looking all over this hotel
for you, said missus Mitty. Why do you have to
hide in this old chair? How did you expect me
to find you? Things? Close in? Said Walter Mitty, vaguely
what Missus Mitty said? Did you get the wats it's
name the poppy biscuit? What's in that box overshoes? Said Mitty?
(48:20):
Couldn't you put them on on the star? I was thinking,
said Walter Mitty. Does it ever occur to you that
I am sometimes thinking? She looked at him. I'm going
to take your temperature when I get you home, she said.
They went out through the revolving doors that made a
faintly derisive whistling sound when you push them. It was
(48:41):
two blocks to the parking lot at the drug store
on the corner. She said, wait here for me. I
forgot something. I won't be a minute. She was more
than a minute. Walter Mitty lighted a cigarette. It began
to rain, rain with sleet in it. He stood up
against the wall of the drug store smoking. He put
(49:01):
his shoulders back and his heels together. Hell with the handkerchief,
said Walter Mitty, scornfully. He took one last drag on
his cigarette and snapped it away. Then, with that faint,
fleeting smile playing about his lips, he faced the firing squad,
erect and motionless, proud and disdainful. Walter Mitty, the Undefeated,
(49:24):
inscrutable to the last. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
by James Thurber, The peace Like Mongoose is the starting
point of my relationship with James Thurber's daughter Rosemary, and
his granddaughter and his publishers. It was my dad, fatally
(49:46):
sick in the hospital, to whom I would read Thurber
every night, who suggested I should read Thurber on the
TV news show. I thought he was crazy. I told
him if I did that, I'd probably hear from his
literary trust. But I did it anyway, and so I
read the Peace like Mongoose, and I heard from his
literary trust, because at the moment I read this story,
(50:08):
Rosie Thurber was on the horns of the proverbial dilemma.
A British publisher wanted to put the piece like Mongoose
in an anthology for school kids. It is placements like
that which keep an author alive. But that publisher wanted
to remove one word from the story, and Rosie was
now torn edit her father's work or don't publish her
(50:30):
father's work. Unbeknownst to me, she and her daughter Sarah
were both Countdown viewers and were watching as I read
the piece like Mongoose. Sarah and then called her mother
and said, I think you've got your answer right there.
Not long after, the British publisher, probably a coincidence, changed
its mind about excising the word amen. The word, by
(50:54):
the way, is mongoose sexual, which is a perfect creation
of the perfect James Thurber. And the complaint from NBC
was about the moral to the story, which I will
not read first and without any other pointless ado. The
Piece Like Mongoose by James Thurber. In Cobra Country, a
(51:17):
mongoose was born one day who didn't want to fight
cobras or anything else. The word spread from mongoose to
mongoose that there was a mongoose who didn't want to
fight cobras. He didn't want to fight anything else. It
was his own business. But it was the duty of
every mongoose to kill cobras or be killed by cobras. Why,
(51:40):
asked the peace like mongoose, And the word went around
that the strange new mongoose was not only pro cobra
and anti mongoose, but intellectually curious and against the ideals
and traditions of mongoosi Ism. He's crazy, cried the young
mongoose's father. He's sick, said his mother. He's a coward,
(52:04):
shouted his brothers. He is a mongoose sexual, whispered his sisters.
Strangers who had never laid eyes on the Piece like
Mongoose remembered that they had seen him crawling on his stomach,
or trying on cobra hoods, or plotting the violent overthrow
of Mongoosia. I'm trying to use reason and intelligence, said
(52:30):
the strange new mongoose. Reason is six sevenths of treason,
said one of his neighbors. Intelligence is what the enemy uses,
said another. Finally, the rumors spread that the mongoose had
venom in his sting like a cobra, and he was tried,
convicted by a show of pause, and condemned to banishment.
(52:54):
Moral ashes to ashes, and clay to clay. If the
enemy doesn't get you your own folks, may a box
(53:18):
to hide in. My favorite Walter Mitty, his most famous
and that one that connected me to the eternal Thurber Tree,
the piece like mongoos. Okay, I've done all the damage
I can do here, Thank you for listening. Most of
our Countdown music was arranged, produced, and performed by Brian
Ray and John Phillip Schaneil, our musical directors of Countdown,
(53:39):
and was produced by Tko Brothers, mister Ray on guitars,
bass and drums, and mister Shaneil handling the orchestration and keyboards.
Our satirical and pithy musical comments by the best baseball
stadium organist ever, Nancy Faust. The Olderman theme from ESPN two,
written by Mitch Warren Davis courtesy of ESPN Inc. Is
the sports music. Other music arranged and performed by the
(54:02):
group No Horns Allowed. Today was my friend Larry David.
The program was produced by Ted and everything else was
as always my fault. That's countdown for today. Day three
hundred and thirty seven of America held hostage again, but
just one twenty six days until the scheduled end of
his lame duck and lame brained term. Unless he is
(54:25):
removed sooner by MAGA, or by Jeffrey Epstein, or by affordability,
or by Susie Wiles. There is no countdown Thursday, you know,
Merry Christmas. Bluntly, I'm still undecided about next week. Maybe
I'll do one from Monday, maybe not. I will advise
(54:45):
on social media and via the conduit that is provided
with your subscription if you have one. In any event,
Happy holidays, and until the next one, I'm Keith Olberman.
Good morning, good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck. Countdown with
Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts
(55:07):
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Host
Keith Olbermann
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