January 12, 2023 • 47 mins
EPISODE 111: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:42) SPECIAL COMMENT: Washington Post's huge scoop. The Justice of Department is now investigating whether Trump or his minions paid for the attorneys of witnesses in the Special Counsel's investigation and to the Grand Jury. It's the Cassidy Hutchinson question and it's critical to proving perjury, suborning of perjury and obstruction of justice. DOJ is subpoenaing witnesses' retainers with their attorneys. For the second time in three nights the breadth of Jack Smith's investigation has widened. Did you see it on CNN? Are the Post and the Times pushing it? They are not, because they have the "new" Biden story: NBC has one source saying somewhere (their source doesn't know where) somebody (their source doesn't know who) found something (their source doesn't know what). And another stampede reminiscent of the Clinton-Lewinsky "Anything Is News" mindset of 1998 is underway. The knives are out for Joe Biden, and CNN's goal is obvious: it will participate in the cover-up of the crimes as Donald Trump. It's so bad CNN actually brought Maga Maggie Haberman in to "analyze" the Biden sliver and she actually said "We don't know the details, BUT..."
Oh by the way, on the same day it broke its "story," NBC News... fired its president.
B-Block (19:44) SPECIAL COMMENT 2: I really think we have forgotten how serious the allegations are against Trump. Donald Rumsfeld's onetime speechwriter wrote "If Trump's classified document mishandling was 'irresponsible' so is Biden's." Well, no, it wasn't 'irresponsible.' Trump's classified document mishandling was 'when Ethel Rosenberg did the same damn thing in the 1950's we executed her.' Let's really play the CNN Whataboutism game. Here's what I reported on August 9, 2022.
C-Block (36:10) SPECIAL COMMENT 3: Oh and lookee here: this is from September 8, 2022, when we first realized that Trump had stolen nuclear documents outlining what nukes another nation did and didn't have. Not only did this espionage and kleptomania hit home, but three months and four days ago I actually said here that sooner or later, CNN would join the cover-up of Trump's crimes. Point to moi.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Countdown with Keith Oldman is a production of I Heart Radio.
For the second time in three days, there was a
huge development and the Special Council's investigation of Donald Trump
(00:27):
of January six, of his coup attempts, of the Trump
Recounts scam, and of his theft of classified nuclear documents
and his attempts to keep them as his personal property
in order to show them to or give them to,
or sell them to whichever foreign nationals or governments he
(00:48):
wished to at his version of a Florida Golden Corral
Mara Lago. There is another new line of investigation from
the Justice Department this morning, another new set of crimes
for which Trump maybe in legal jeopardy, another set witnesses
quizzed and grand jury testimony given. And if you heard
(01:09):
about any of this, congratulations, Because with CNN leading the way,
the country's major news websites and other organizations buried this story.
Behind this uncontrollable masturbatory mountain of both sides, is um
and what about is um? And proof to they're tough
on everybody that they have made out of a mole hill.
(01:31):
CNN did not as much as report last night's special
Council story, just as it had buried its own Monday
Special council scoop, because all that would have eaten into
time better spent softening America's brains by endlessly repeating that
Trump's personal hands on potential nuclear espionage was exactly the
(01:52):
same as whoever could have been Biden, could have been
a staffer, could have been a lawyer, whoever misfiled documents
that nobody missed but upon discovery were immediately returned to
the National Archives. The story, the important story about Jack Smith,
the Special Counsel, was broken by the Washington Post, and
(02:15):
it is this The Justice Department has subpoenaed multiple Trump
campaign officials now to answer questions about literally more than
a dozen, no two dozen categories of information. The newspaper
has seen this subpoena document and the questions, and probably
the most important of them, and quoting the Post, one
part of the four page legal document asks recipients to
(02:36):
reveal if anyone other than themselves are paying for legal representation,
and if so, to provide a copy of the retention
agreement for that legal work. Unquote. This we might call
the Cassidy Hutchinson question because it gets to the issue
not just the potential witness perjury for Trump, but of
(02:59):
subportment of perjury by a witnesses attorney paid for by
somebody else. You do not have to be a rocket
and or political scientist to discern that the somebody else
in this equation is Trump or one of his organizations
or one of his henchmen. It was January six committee
witness Hutchinson who revealed that her original Trump supplied attorney,
(03:22):
Stephan Passantino, explained to her that she could easily say
she didn't recall something even if she did, even if
she was under oath, because who's gonna know what you
can recall? If you are at all a student of
American presidential scandals. That should have sounded familiar from the
get go. On marche N seventy three, Richard Nixon, in
(03:45):
a conversation recorded by the White House taping system, he
himself activated great move. Dick told my friend John Dene
that Wen Dean talked to prosecutors. Quote, just be damn
sure you say I don't remember, I can't recall. I
can't give any honest answer to that that I can recall.
But that's it. As John Dene put it the president
(04:07):
of the United States was coaching him on how to
commit perjury and get away with it. Within a month,
Nixon would be coaching others on how to commit perjury
while testifying against Dean. The subpoena questionnaire reported by The
Post not only asks recipients, and we don't know how
many recipients there were quote to reveal if anyone other
(04:29):
than themselves are paying for legal representation, and if so,
to provide a copy of the retention agreement for that
legal work. But they are in short, asking prove Trump
didn't pay for your attorney. Now if somehow none of
this is news enough, the Special Counsel is asking witnesses
whether Trump has paid for their attorneys and is thus
(04:49):
controlling by proxy what they have testified to or might
yet testify to. There are those other twenty three or
more topics in the questionnaire. To again quote the Post,
the subpoenas seeks any communications or information about Dominion and
smart mannic to voting technology companies that were subjected to
(05:09):
a barrage of false conspiracy theories floated by advisers to Trump.
The subpoena shows the Justice Department is interested in other
Trump entities besides the Save America Pack, which The Post
and others reported earlier this year was the subject of
inquiry by investigators. It seeks all documents and communications related
to a panoply of other Trump affiliated groups, including the
(05:32):
Make America Great Again Pack, the Save America Joint Fundraising Committee,
and the Trump Make America Great Again Committee. Recipients are
asked to produce documents related to the formation, funding, and
or use of money of the groups, and to show
all employment contracts or correspondence with the groups or officials
(05:52):
affiliated with them. And yes, I'm quoting the Post directly,
since who knows. By the time you go to their
website they may have scrubbed this story. You will notice
in there that the same America Pack is not specified
in the Post story. It was specified in Monday's report
about the sweeping expansion of Special Council Smith's investigation. That
(06:15):
was when CNN revealed that Rudy Giuliani and a host
of other Trump functionaries had been subpoenaed, demanding they turned
over to the grand jury what records they had about
the scam Trump ran after the election. The whole phony
Save America Pack, the fundraising scheme that tricked thousands, maybe
millions of Americans into donating into what they thought were
(06:37):
recounts and legal challenges on behalf of Trump's campaign. This
is twice in three nights that the Special Council's investigation
into Trump and everything he did with the documents, with
the coup, with the election, with the post election fundraising,
with the smearing of companies and individuals on whom the
(06:58):
Assinine conspiracy theories of the Trump crime family could be pinned,
with so much more new Trump Perfect d was expanded
in terms of its coverage. It is so large now
that if they indicted and convicted Donald Trump on all
of it, he would need thirty three more lifetimes before
he would be eligible for parole. And did you hear
(07:21):
about it? You did not, because NBC News reported in
as thin a story as I've ever seen from them,
and I worked for them for ten years. Quote. Aids
to Biden have discovered at least one additional batch of
classified documents in a location separate from the Washington office
(07:41):
he used after leaving the Obama administration, according to a
person familiar with the matter, like classification level, number and
precise location of the additional documents was not immediately clear.
It also was not immediately clear when the additional documents
were discovered. Too long, didn't read on this. We have
one source who says more documents were found. Oh, we
don't know where, we don't know who, and we don't
(08:05):
know when, and we don't know what they were here,
Kendallanian and Carol Lee turn that into seven five words
because we want to put it in the upper left
hand corner of the website. They just fired the president
of NBC News yesterday. We don't want to follow him
out the freaking door. Also, if we put it up
there in the upper left hand corner, then the New
(08:26):
York Times can give itself an excuse to put this
one detail, one source, not their own story, into the
upper left hand corner of their website, and into two
of the three boxes in the upper left hand corner
of its website. And then so the Washington Post itself
can put it not its own Trump Special council scoop,
(08:46):
but this thing from NBC. The Post can put it
in its upper left hand corner and then actually put
at the top of its opinion list in the upper
right hand corner an appalling piece by the appalling Rumsfeld
speechwriter Mark Teason. I mean, who admits today to writing
reaches for Donald freaking Rumsfeld? Mark Teason The headline, if
(09:10):
Trump's classified document misshandling was quote irresponsible, so is Biden's. Yeah,
Trump's document misshandling was not quote irresponsible, it was quote
when Ethel Rosenberg did the same damn thing in the
nineteen fifties, we executed her unquote. It does not take
much to make the American news media stampede. It never
(09:33):
has lost to the generations who have followed me here
those who never saw the time when national network television
news was just ABC, CBS, and NBC coming on for
half an hour at seven pm each night. Lost to
all of you was the disquieting reality that if you
could do a log of each newscast, you would have
(09:54):
found not only that they had broadcast only the same
fifteen or twenty stories in their twenty two minutes of content,
with an occasional kicker usive to one of the networks,
but almost invariably, ABC, CBS, and NBC had broadcast these
fifteen to twenty stories in exactly the same order and
(10:14):
allotting almost exactly the same amount of time to each story.
In fact, if something did not match exactly, each network
used to have post mortem sessions the next morning, trying
to figure out why they gave Vietnam a minute seventeen
last night, but NBC gave it a minute forty six,
And before noon somebody would have sent a cable to
(10:35):
Saigon reaming out the bureau chief for missing something, and
it wasn't. In the dear dead days of Black and
White TV, I saw it again from the inside in
the Clinton Lewinsky story. We at MSNBC had staffers on
the key shows, including my own, whose jobs were to
(10:56):
watch not their own program while it was on, but
to watch CNN and Fox, and if they had something
we didn't, we had to scramble. That producer had to scramble.
I saw a producer promoted because he realized CNN had
a different story, and I mean a different, anonymous thread
with less to it than this other Biden stuff. Found
(11:17):
one source says, we don't know anything else about it, crap,
And before my hour was over, this producer who had
seen this CNN lead, had gotten a guest to say
more or less the same thing and gotten him into
a studio and in front of a camera and on
the show, and the next hour, MSNBC led with this
story as if it had been its own. The American
(11:39):
news organizations are repeating the exact same stampede mentality, and
they are led by a CNN thoroughly corrupted by this
hatchetman Chris Licked, if you want to know how thoroughly,
last night CNN stooped to the lowest thing imaginable. They
brought on Maggie Haberman, Trump's voice inside the New York
(12:02):
Times to comment on nbase one source no details leak,
which CNN did not even credit nor blame on NBC
but claimed as its own. We don't know the details,
she said, But as I have said here all weeks,
CNN has jumped the shark on this story, and last
night they decided they had not done it spectacularly enough,
(12:25):
so they went back, had Maga Maggie hop on board
the motorcycle, and they jumped the shark again. And in
case you are still holding out hope that there is
some other explanation for what CNN, in particular, but not exclusively,
is doing, consider this. CNN's lead story at eight pm
last night was not Biden nor the Washington Post story
(12:48):
about the widening of the Special Council's investigation, nor its
own Giuliani Special Counsel story from Monday, CNN at eight
o'clock lead with George Santos, the congress Man who never was,
and it not only reduced the story entirely to a
political horse race, leaving out the damn that is clearly
(13:09):
waiting to break here. I mean, children can see this,
the increasingly clear reality that this entire Santos campaign was
some kind of money laundering effort, and his entire candidacy
was some sort of scam, and it was organized by
or at least with GOP knowledge. Not only did CNN
(13:30):
ignore those elements, it not only had Anderson Cooper fawn
all over the head of the Republican Party in Santos,
his own county in New York and actually say to
the man, of course you didn't know. But when it
came time to note that, yes, in the history of America,
other politicians had lied about themselves, Anderson Cooper mentioned exactly
(13:50):
two of them, herschel Walker, but before herschel Walker, who
did he mention as a liar in the history of
American politics, as an embellisher about their own personal histories.
Who did he mention? You guessed Joe Biden talking about
speeches he gave while he was campaigning for president In
(14:11):
Night seven seven Biden story in which the speechwriter Pat Cadell,
who was later a paid commentator for Fox News, plagiarized
parts of many other politicians speeches. Caddell did this. He
wrote the speeches. He did not credit the sources, nor
(14:32):
did he tell Biden. He just handed him the speeches.
It is a complicated and nuanced one, and Biden is
not without some guilt in it. But it centers around
word for word duplications of the speech of a British
Labor Party politician named Neil Kinnock. In some of the speeches,
the words Biden said were quoted and Kinnock was credited
(14:56):
in others, no quotes, no credit. So CNN's first example
to compare to George sa Antos, who has lied so
far about race, religion, high school, college sports, three different employers, eleven,
the Holocaust, the Pulse shooting, his criminal record, his nationality,
(15:17):
and his residence. CNNs first camp to that was careless
crediting of quotations in speeches somebody else wrote for Biden
thirty five years ago, because this is the both sides
is um that John Malone bought CNN and hired Chris
Licked to enact, because the knives are out at CNN,
(15:42):
and they are out for the President of the United States,
in order that CNN can now participate in the cover
up for Donald Trump and the rest of the mindless
bowls in American political media can stampede as they have
for generations and will for generations more unless we punish them.
(16:19):
Still ahead, lost in all this, lost because it is
now months ago, Lost because he has not been dragged
by his heels to prison yet. Is just how extreme
and how extraordinary the document theft by Donald Trump personally
really is compared to anything else in human history. CNN
(16:39):
wants to play the what about his game? Let's play
the what about his game? That's next. This is countdown.
I had hoped, in this addition, to do a thorough
(17:01):
analysis of just how many documents were discovered at Meryl
Logo hidden there by Donald Trump deliberately, personally, maliciously, illegally,
and how when he was caught, how hard he had
fought to deny he had done anything wrong, and how
indignantly he insisted the documents where his and the real
victim here was as always him. But I find myself
(17:26):
out over my skis with the sinus now bronchial infection
that I have mentioned here all weeks. So the full
analysis is physically impossible at the moment, and that actually
may be a good thing, because how better to give
a real time sense of just how guilty Trump is
and how ludicrous the Biden camp is than to revisit
(17:47):
in real time the two biggest, almost incomprehensively dangerous days
of the raid and the investigation at Mari Lago. This
is from the morning after it happened August nine, did
(18:14):
the FBI search the toilets at Mari Lago. Facts are few,
and speculation is mountainous, But the FBI raid of the
home and office of Trump Donald John hereafter possibly known
as the Defendant, may wind up being the corrupt presidential
equivalent of the prosecution and conviction of al Capone, not
for murder or organized crime, but for tax evasion, two
(18:39):
important immediate political facts. For all the frenzied crescendos of
rage from the right, I felt a great disturbance in
the farce, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out
in terror and were suddenly silenced. For all that the
reminder that the head of the FBI, Christopher Ray, is
a Trump appointee, and a further reminder that the stuff
(19:03):
in the boxes they pulled out of Marilago is serious stuff.
These were not boxes full of thank you notes. And
whatever happens from here on in the Department of Justice,
is most feared scenario that it would be investigating a
candidate for president again has been averted. Trump has not
(19:25):
announced his candidacy. Whether charges result from this or they
do not, the investigation is already under way and as
dramatically as it could get underway without a purp walk. Anyway,
what this case looks like from the little evidence we
have would suggest that the endgame here could be a
court finding Trump guilty of violation or violations of eighteen
(19:49):
US Code two oh seven one, Section B, which includes
a very specific penalty for a federal office holder who
steals or destroys records disqualification from federal office for the
rest of your life caveat. In two thousand and fifteen,
the Republican Party thought it had found a way to
(20:10):
keep Hillary Clinton out of the White House, come hell
or high water, by prosecuting her under this exact law.
And then it concluded that the Constitution specifies that the
eligibility requirements for the president are this and that, and
you cannot add to them without a constitutional amendment. Still,
(20:30):
eighteen US Code two oh seven one, section B is
worth hearing pretty much in full, quoting whoever, having the
custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper,
or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates,
false fies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under
(20:52):
this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both,
and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding
any office under the United States disqualified from office? Would
the conviction of an ex president be different than somebody
seeking the presidency? Could you offer Trump a plea deal
(21:14):
on this, no fine, no jail time, but you accept
that last proviso disqualification from office. There's also a hatful
of other crimes specifically related to taking or destroying classified materials.
And I'll repeat my joke more seriously this time. Did
the FBI search the toilets at Mari Lago. All of
(21:35):
this is speculation, or a better phrase might be extrapolation,
in large part based on some very good reporting by
The Miami Herald, quoting the FBI raid focused only on
Trump's possession of boxes containing alleged classified materials and was
unrelated to the ongoing January six federal grand jury investigation.
(21:57):
The Herald, which has absolutely cleaned the repertorial clocks so
far of The Washington Post, New York Times and the networks,
also quoted law enforcement sources who said, quote, FBI agents
obtained a search warrant from a federal magistrate judge in
West Palm Beach to gather dozens of boxes containing alleged
classified materials that President Trump had taken with him when
(22:20):
he left the White House in January. The Miami Papers
Alex Roarty, Michael Wilner, and Jay Weaver also quoted sources
who said, quote, Federal agents were able to establish probable
cause for the warrant because Trump and his lawyers had
already turned over some classified documents that had been sought
by the National Archives and Records Administration. Agents suspected that
(22:44):
Trump was unlawfully holding other classified documents from his presidency
in his private club and residence at Mari Lago. It
was Eric Trump who first learned of the raid. His
father then announced it, ending it with the now timeless
quote they even broke into my safe, which may now
join the pantheon of similar quotes like you sunk my
(23:07):
battleship and I'm not going to pay a lot for
that muffler, and of course the newest one, John Eastman's
I've decided that I should be on the pardon list.
The other part of this story is the reaction from
Trump's defenders. It is nothing short of amazing, the more
hysterical parts of it in a moment. First, the running
(23:28):
theme of the actual criticism that this is unprecedented. You
don't investigate a president past or presence. That's all nonsense.
The rate itself might be a first, but the FBI
running an investigation of a president? What was Watergate? The
famous source Deep Throat was the Deputy director of the FBI.
(23:50):
Mark felt the material he was leaking to the Washington
Post was the result of investigations by Richard Nixon and
his administration by the FBI. The FBI and the Department
of Justice also investigated Nix's finances and property. Much earlier,
President Warren G. Harding was investigated, but he died before
(24:11):
a special prosecutor was appointed. In t pot Dome, the
Treasury Department investigated President Ulysses has Grant over the whiskey
ring scandal, and Grant wound up while still president testifying
for the defense at the trial of his own personal secretary.
Stuff like this has happened before. Sorry, gang, But then
(24:36):
there is the sheer entertainment value of the reaction on
the right. It is panicked and wonderfully apocalyptic. A sampling
third word banana Republic Trump JUNR. This does not happen
in civilized countries. According to Texas fascist Congressman Troy Nils,
who previously mocked the police injured on January six, using
(25:00):
government power to persecute political opponents is something we have
seen many times from heard world Marxist dictatorships. Marco Rubio,
who last month urged that I be arrested for tweeting
about the Supreme Court. How about the Venghazi scandals? You
want to talk about scandals that were never investigated? Eric
Trump brilliant as ever, sever all ties with d o
(25:22):
J immediately any FBI agent conducting law enforcement functions outside
the purview of our state should be arrested upon site.
Florida congressional candidate Anthony Sabbatini, the one who called the
nomination of Supreme Court Justice Catangi Brown Jackson quote anti
white racist exclusion. All I can say is the FBI
(25:43):
better have the goods. Harry Fleischer, Bushes press secretary who
sold the Iraq War w M D fraud when he
didn't have the goods. Attorney General Garland, preserve your documents
and clear your calendar. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, whom
the Trumper has planned to oust if they take back
the House. Greatest threat to art democracy since the Civil War.
(26:07):
Some guy this is madness, Former Trump adviser Jason Miller. Meanwhile,
former hopeless Trump sick offet Richard Grennell. The FBI rags
Trump's house, and the Democrats vote to add eight seven
thousand I R S agents to go after Americans. Wake up, America.
This rate is part of the worst political scandal in
(26:27):
American history. Tom Fitton, the Judicial Watch guy who wears
the shirts three times so small so you can see
his nipples, can't wait to see the dessantist reaction on
Mari Lago. He will drop the hammer on this lawlessness.
Pizza Jack Possovik, Who's expecting the governor of Florida to
what banned critical race theory in the Florida office of
(26:51):
the FBI. Defend the attack on America? From Matt Schlepp
to fund the attack on America. Frankly, I'm disappointed in you, Matt.
Defund the FBI, Eric Ericson, Eric, the FBI is law enforcement.
You just called for defunding the police. Moron. This is
the hill to die on from Monica Crowley, my former
(27:14):
MSNBC colleague, which invites the response, Okay, Merrick Garland is
a disgrace to human kind from Dan Bongino, the Fox
News talking head with the drawn on hair. Nazi Germany
meets Soviet Union KGB Wayne Root Lisa Booth. The federal
(27:35):
government needs to be dismantled entirely, which you have to
admit would be a neat trick. We see you, and
we see how slimy and disgusting you are trying to
weaponize the FBI, writes Tommy Laren. Frankly, that's also kind
of underwhelming. Isn't it. No, it's not. The FBI rights
the South Dakota Governor Christie Nome unprecedented weaponization of the
(27:58):
Justice Department. Some other guy insisted the church needs to
pay attention to this too. Pray for Trump's safe. Some
woman saying the Trump rally text number is eight eight
O two two and that just happens to be the
day Trump's home gets rated. Yeah, because there was a
(28:19):
conspiracy and Trump was in on it. This weaponizes power
to squelch descent. Governor Abbot of Texas, what descent was
involved in this? Abbey the election denier from Arizona, Mark
Fincham going a little hyperbolic with the FBI just united
the entire world behind President Trump. I don't think so.
(28:43):
Gestapo from nut job congressional candidate Laura Loomer and Gaspacho
for Marjorie Taylor Green not just made that one up,
though she did do that earlier. For the last comment
from the right, former Trump Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders quote,
when you're attacking FBI agents because you're under criminal investigating
(29:04):
and you're losing. She tweeted that on November third, two
thousand sixteen, but you know, still counts. But the overriding
reaction consisted of one word. It's a very disturbing word war,
a repeated meme the late alcoholic Andrew Breitbart's saying that
(29:25):
word war. It is an understandable reaction. The rules and
the laws do not apply to Republicans and fascists, say
Republicans and fascists, and the fact that so far Trump
has gotten away with everything for seven long years, in fact,
for the whole of his life, has led republican and
fascists to a certain sense of collective invulnerability. Granted, almost
(29:48):
all of this hyperbolic reaction is their fear and their
sudden realization in millions of heretofore numbed minds, that the
man they are totally invested in, the guy they think
they are hiding behind, is actually in trouble. Still calling
for war, whatever that means, seems to be a really
(30:11):
odd flex When the military of the United States of
America is in the hands of President Joe Biden Dark Brandon,
that would be through at least January. I mean, it's
the same lack of logic that has led countless Second
Amendment nuts to bark, to boast, come and take magoons,
or you'll only get my gun when you're prior from
(30:32):
my dead hands. And you realize it has never occurred
to them, not once, that were the government actually planning
on taking their guns, or if there actually were to
be some sort of war over Trump's safe, the government
would not walk up to them empty handed, nor bring
one gun. They would bring forty seven tanks and thirty
troops war in defense of Trump's safe. You say, now,
(30:59):
I ask this as literally as you are or aren't
saying a Trump fists you and what army? August nine,
the first thing we knew about Trump and Mari Lago
(31:20):
and literally hundreds of classified documents he stole and he
kept terrifying and horrifying and in retrospect, almost innocent. Let's
jump ahead to the first day that the real implications
here were thoroughly understood, September. The word of the day
was nuclear. That's next. This is countdown again in real time.
(31:56):
The seriousness of what Trump stole, what Trump stashed at
Mari Lago, and the ridiculousness of a comparison to the
Biden think tank documents story. We may have in fact forgotten.
Happily the audio files. Never forget this is from the
morning after it happened September. Come for the nuclear secrets,
(32:22):
Stay for the four month old prophecies about how CNN
would eventually start covering for Donald Trump. Where's the denial?
(32:51):
Late Wednesday night, The Washington Post reported that a month
ago today, an FBI search team found in Trump's residents
unsecured at his Chinsey country club, that anybody could buy
a membership to classified ultra secret US intelligence document describing
a foreign government's military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, Nuclear Cleptomania,
(33:13):
International nuclear Cleptomania, and the response Well. Thursday morning, Trump
reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft story by raging
about the FBI taking his medical records. Thursday night, Trump
reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft story by posting
on social media about caravans of migrants. Wednesday night, Trump's
(33:38):
spokesman reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft story by
accusing The Washington Post of collusion and handwringing about never
ending leaks. Thursday afternoon, Trump's attorney reacted swiftly to the
nuclear document theft story by complaining that the media keeps
changing its story as to what was found at Mari Lago.
Thursday afternoon, Trump's Renfield Lindsey Graham reacted swiftly to the
(34:01):
nuclear document theft story by demanding to know why the
FBI didn't search mary Lago sooner. Thursday morning, Trump's Flying
Monkey Marco Rubio reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft
story by demanding to know how the Washington Post was
permitted to know about a classified nuclear document, while also
saying Trump had declassified it. Thursday night, Trump's Pennywise Kelly
(34:26):
Anne Conway reacted swiftly to the nuclear documents theft story
by railing against Hunter Biden. Something missing here? Where's the denial?
Where's just one flat denial? Where's one person saying a
document describing a foreign government's military defense is including its
(34:49):
nuclear capabilities? Of course Trump didn't steal that? Where if
not that, where even is the nonsense denial? Where is
the Trump is Captain America denial? If he took anything,
he only took it to technic because security was so
laxed because democrats. I mean, I don't want to give
these idiots any ideas. I don't think that's a particularly
(35:12):
brainy one. But where is everybody? Where is anybody? I
mean when I was a kid. July, the House Judiciary
Committee adopted the first article of impeachment against Richard Nixon.
The vote was twenty seven to eleven. By July, the
(35:34):
committee had adopted to more articles, won by a wider
margin than that it impeached the president. On August five,
a week after it impeached the president, Congressman Chuck Wiggins
from the most republican part of southern California got up
and insisted none of the evidence pointed to Nixon committing
any crimes, not a doubt in his mind that Richard
(35:57):
Nixon was innocent. Then Alexander Haig called him over to
the White House to look at a transcript of the
smoking on tape and said oops. And two days later,
late on August seven, the stories began to leak that
Nixon was going to resign. He announced it on the eighth,
but three days before Nixon went down in flames in
(36:17):
what had been the previous greatest political scandal in American history.
Three days before this, Congressman Wiggins was still out there
insisting not guilty. And after Wiggins left Congress, they made
him a judge seventy two hours before guilty enough to
resign as the president, and he's defending Nixon. And now
(36:39):
Lindsey Graham comes out and says, of a story about
Trump stealing documented evidence of another nation's nuclear defense system,
that of course the FBI should have rated Trump's home sooner.
I mean, what have you got to lose at this point,
Lie tell him he's innocent. Maybe the other country is
(37:01):
Israel and they know and Trump and his culture suddenly
living an abject terror. But then if that were the case,
somebody would have turned on Trump, right just to save themselves, right, somebody, anybody,
anybody gonna say anything one way or the other about this,
Mitch McConnell anything. Do you think it's appropriate the way
(37:26):
that the former president was storing those top secret and
flassified documents at his private state at mar Lago. I
don't really have any comments on this, this whole investigation
that's been dominating the news for the last month. I
think we're slollowing it like all of you are documents.
Mr Leader. I mean that's important. You should have any
(37:47):
comment that no comment, But let me get back to
Hillary Clinton and Hunter Biden. If there is ever a
credible report that I have stolen documentary evidence of another
nation's nuclear defense capabilities and hidden it amid my vintage
baseball guards. Will somebody, just one person, say now I
(38:09):
didn't do it? Just one We also await something else.
The Danu mount to the Steve Bannon New York State
indictment for the we Build the Wall scam after his
media statement in fact I can't wait quote I am
never going to stop fighting. In fact, I have not
yet begun to fight. They will have to kill me first.
(38:32):
M seems a little draconian to me, But hey, resput
and you do you We have a new shooter today,
William S. Russell not only does the New York Times
report he has been subpoenaed for some uncertain, vague way
as part of the grand jury investigation of the events
leading up to the January six coup assault on the Capitol,
(38:56):
but the picture they have put of him in the
newspaper of this former opts an advanced man for Trump,
shows him pulling a flight bag, wearing a shoulder bag
with a copy of the Epoch Times in it, carrying
a folding portfolio, balancing a banker's box on top what
appears to be a clipboard and hanging onto a small
(39:18):
paper bag which could be lunch or could be well,
I don't know, a document describing the foreign government's military defenses,
including its nuclear capabilities. Who's to know? And the last
note about trying to follow all this, you do realize
that before this is all over, CNN will be giving
(39:40):
more than half its airtime two people apologizing for Trump,
defending Trump, and making up excuses for Trump, while CNN
staffers whistled past graveyards and say things like somebody said
to Vanity Fair yesterday about the firings of Bryan Stelter
and John Harwood. Through firings as a purge, CNN is
nevertheless changing before your eyes. First came the near identical
(40:04):
whining about Biden's Marines by Brianna Keieler and Jeff Zelni
to try to hold off the internal tiger from eating them,
I am told the Anderson Cooper newscast last night lead
with Marco Rubio not defending Trump but insisting the real
crime here isn't you know, stolen nuclear secrets about another country,
but that somebody leaked it to The Washington Post. Lead
(40:24):
with the clip of Rubio on Fox News, I'm told
had people on to say, yes, that's an important concern here, which,
as the old analogy goes, is like saying, yes, a
mouse and an elephant are the same, They're both animals.
I have to confess I have not watched Anderson Cooper
since we co anchored CNN Mornings in two thousand two.
(40:45):
The other day, CNN had a conservative reporter named Francesca
Chambers I think from USA Today on and they asked
her about that warm up act at the Trump rally
who talked about her political prisoner nephew, the poor guy
who's in jail, who actually wore a Hitler mustache and
(41:06):
a Hitler haircut and said, quote, Hitler should have finished
the job unquote, and this Francesca Chambers began optics or everything.
The former President of the United States has run into
some issues with optics coming out of his rally this week,
and at the same time you also saw President Biden
come into criticism for optics coming out of his event
(41:27):
this week. In the new CNN, things like Francesca Chambers
almost holding up a sign saying I am here for
the both sides. Is um, these are not bugs? These
are features. And lastly, on this point, there is one
more development at CNN, especially about its coverage of Trump,
(41:47):
that should set your sirens rotating and set your hair
on fire. And his name is John Miller. He is
CNN's new chief Law Enforcement and Intelligence Analyst, hired personally
by the new CNN Worldwide CEO and chairman, Chris Licked,
which to me still sounds like the punch line to
a comedy sketch at MSNBC. I thought Chris Licked used
(42:10):
to eat glue. Anyway, I have known this John Miller,
whom Chris Lick just hired as CNN's new chief Law
enforcement intelligence Analysts. I have known John Miller four forty
four years. He has had the kind of career you
probably think of if you ever think of my career.
Listen to this resume. Assignment Editor, Channel five, New York Reporter,
(42:34):
Channel five, New York Reporter, Channel four, New York Spokesman,
City of New York Police Department reporter, ABC News, Chief
of counter Terrorism and Criminal Intelligence, Los Angeles Police Department,
Assistant spokesman, FBI reporter, CBS News, Deputy Commissioners, City of
New York Police Worldwide's leader in sports or pants or
something for CNN. In short, all over the freaking place.
(42:57):
When he was starting as a reporter at Channel five
in New York, just as we were all converting to
color TV, I was an intern on the assignment desk.
I swear I know him since seventy eight. I actually
made phone calls for John Miller on a couple of
his stories in y eight when I didn't need to
(43:18):
shave more than like once a week. And his act
was the same in nineteen seventy eight as it is two.
He was a cop jock sniffer. He was the teenage
kid at home in New Jersey with the police scanner
radios who would then show up at the crime scene.
The backstory at Channel five was John Miller started doing
(43:39):
that for them, showing up at crime scenes and interviewing
people in the middle of the night and getting the
film or the video for use in the ten o'clock
news the next night, when he was fifteen or sixteen
at the latest. And the through line for all of
this is if a cop or a federal agent in
New York, in l A in Washington says anything, John Miller,
(44:01):
for the last forty five years has existed solely to
say he's damn right, you know, or worse, as it
turns out, as police spokesman or as quote reporter unquote,
John Miller has been compulsively on the cops side period
In a woman was raped in a park in Brooklyn.
(44:23):
Soon a newspaper columnist wrote that the cops felt she
had not been raped, but she had made it up
just to get publicity for a quote gay and lesbian rally.
The rape victim sued the city. It came out that
one of the sources was John Miller. He was forced
to publicly apologize it's a long time ago. Is March
(44:45):
of this year a long time ago for something like this?
As New York's Deputy Police Commissioner for Intelligence and counter Terrorism,
just before he went back on the air with CNN,
that sounds not shady, John Miller testified this March to
the New York City Council and claimed, quote, there is
no evidence on that the police here spied on Muslim
(45:07):
communities after nine eleven. If it had not been so serious,
what would have happened next would have been half the
city would have gone deaf from all the laughter. Of course,
New York City spied on Muslim communities after nine eleven,
it was like the leading industry for six months. John Miller,
Chris lifts first Higher, CNN's new chief law enforcement and
(45:29):
intelligence analyst and cop apologist, was so wrong, so offensive,
so islamophobic, that the Mayor of New York, Eric Adams
himself and ex cop contradicted John Miller publicly and apologized
to everybody and said, quote, what we did was wrong.
(45:52):
So who knows. By the time somebody, anybody actually defends
Trump and says, na, he couldn't have done that, it'll
be John Miller on CNN explaining that his vast collection
of law enforcement sources are a sure ring him that
Trump did not steal a document describing a foreign government's
military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, but that Hunter Biden did.
(46:29):
The Biden documents, the Trump documents, They're the same thing,
aren't they. They're all documents. This is CNN. I have
ignored my doctor's advice. I am going to stop doing that.
Barring a quick bath in the miracle waters at the
Grotto of Lords or something so compelling that I need
(46:51):
to talk to you tomorrow, I will instead listen to
the doctor. I will talk to you again on Monday.
Thank you, good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck.
(47:18):
Countdown with Keith Alderman is a production of I heart Radio.
For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the i
heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Countdown with Keith Oldman is a production of I Heart Radio.
For the second time in three days, there was a
huge development and the Special Council's investigation of Donald Trump
(00:27):
of January six, of his coup attempts, of the Trump
Recounts scam, and of his theft of classified nuclear documents
and his attempts to keep them as his personal property
in order to show them to or give them to,
or sell them to whichever foreign nationals or governments he
(00:48):
wished to at his version of a Florida Golden Corral
Mara Lago. There is another new line of investigation from
the Justice Department this morning, another new set of crimes
for which Trump maybe in legal jeopardy, another set witnesses
quizzed and grand jury testimony given. And if you heard
(01:09):
about any of this, congratulations, Because with CNN leading the way,
the country's major news websites and other organizations buried this story.
Behind this uncontrollable masturbatory mountain of both sides, is um
and what about is um? And proof to they're tough
on everybody that they have made out of a mole hill.
(01:31):
CNN did not as much as report last night's special
Council story, just as it had buried its own Monday
Special council scoop, because all that would have eaten into
time better spent softening America's brains by endlessly repeating that
Trump's personal hands on potential nuclear espionage was exactly the
(01:52):
same as whoever could have been Biden, could have been
a staffer, could have been a lawyer, whoever misfiled documents
that nobody missed but upon discovery were immediately returned to
the National Archives. The story, the important story about Jack Smith,
the Special Counsel, was broken by the Washington Post, and
(02:15):
it is this The Justice Department has subpoenaed multiple Trump
campaign officials now to answer questions about literally more than
a dozen, no two dozen categories of information. The newspaper
has seen this subpoena document and the questions, and probably
the most important of them, and quoting the Post, one
part of the four page legal document asks recipients to
(02:36):
reveal if anyone other than themselves are paying for legal representation,
and if so, to provide a copy of the retention
agreement for that legal work. Unquote. This we might call
the Cassidy Hutchinson question because it gets to the issue
not just the potential witness perjury for Trump, but of
(02:59):
subportment of perjury by a witnesses attorney paid for by
somebody else. You do not have to be a rocket
and or political scientist to discern that the somebody else
in this equation is Trump or one of his organizations
or one of his henchmen. It was January six committee
witness Hutchinson who revealed that her original Trump supplied attorney,
(03:22):
Stephan Passantino, explained to her that she could easily say
she didn't recall something even if she did, even if
she was under oath, because who's gonna know what you
can recall? If you are at all a student of
American presidential scandals. That should have sounded familiar from the
get go. On marche N seventy three, Richard Nixon, in
(03:45):
a conversation recorded by the White House taping system, he
himself activated great move. Dick told my friend John Dene
that Wen Dean talked to prosecutors. Quote, just be damn
sure you say I don't remember, I can't recall. I
can't give any honest answer to that that I can recall.
But that's it. As John Dene put it the president
(04:07):
of the United States was coaching him on how to
commit perjury and get away with it. Within a month,
Nixon would be coaching others on how to commit perjury
while testifying against Dean. The subpoena questionnaire reported by The
Post not only asks recipients, and we don't know how
many recipients there were quote to reveal if anyone other
(04:29):
than themselves are paying for legal representation, and if so,
to provide a copy of the retention agreement for that
legal work. But they are in short, asking prove Trump
didn't pay for your attorney. Now if somehow none of
this is news enough, the Special Counsel is asking witnesses
whether Trump has paid for their attorneys and is thus
(04:49):
controlling by proxy what they have testified to or might
yet testify to. There are those other twenty three or
more topics in the questionnaire. To again quote the Post,
the subpoenas seeks any communications or information about Dominion and
smart mannic to voting technology companies that were subjected to
(05:09):
a barrage of false conspiracy theories floated by advisers to Trump.
The subpoena shows the Justice Department is interested in other
Trump entities besides the Save America Pack, which The Post
and others reported earlier this year was the subject of
inquiry by investigators. It seeks all documents and communications related
to a panoply of other Trump affiliated groups, including the
(05:32):
Make America Great Again Pack, the Save America Joint Fundraising Committee,
and the Trump Make America Great Again Committee. Recipients are
asked to produce documents related to the formation, funding, and
or use of money of the groups, and to show
all employment contracts or correspondence with the groups or officials
(05:52):
affiliated with them. And yes, I'm quoting the Post directly,
since who knows. By the time you go to their
website they may have scrubbed this story. You will notice
in there that the same America Pack is not specified
in the Post story. It was specified in Monday's report
about the sweeping expansion of Special Council Smith's investigation. That
(06:15):
was when CNN revealed that Rudy Giuliani and a host
of other Trump functionaries had been subpoenaed, demanding they turned
over to the grand jury what records they had about
the scam Trump ran after the election. The whole phony
Save America Pack, the fundraising scheme that tricked thousands, maybe
millions of Americans into donating into what they thought were
(06:37):
recounts and legal challenges on behalf of Trump's campaign. This
is twice in three nights that the Special Council's investigation
into Trump and everything he did with the documents, with
the coup, with the election, with the post election fundraising,
with the smearing of companies and individuals on whom the
(06:58):
Assinine conspiracy theories of the Trump crime family could be pinned,
with so much more new Trump Perfect d was expanded
in terms of its coverage. It is so large now
that if they indicted and convicted Donald Trump on all
of it, he would need thirty three more lifetimes before
he would be eligible for parole. And did you hear
(07:21):
about it? You did not, because NBC News reported in
as thin a story as I've ever seen from them,
and I worked for them for ten years. Quote. Aids
to Biden have discovered at least one additional batch of
classified documents in a location separate from the Washington office
(07:41):
he used after leaving the Obama administration, according to a
person familiar with the matter, like classification level, number and
precise location of the additional documents was not immediately clear.
It also was not immediately clear when the additional documents
were discovered. Too long, didn't read on this. We have
one source who says more documents were found. Oh, we
don't know where, we don't know who, and we don't
(08:05):
know when, and we don't know what they were here,
Kendallanian and Carol Lee turn that into seven five words
because we want to put it in the upper left
hand corner of the website. They just fired the president
of NBC News yesterday. We don't want to follow him
out the freaking door. Also, if we put it up
there in the upper left hand corner, then the New
(08:26):
York Times can give itself an excuse to put this
one detail, one source, not their own story, into the
upper left hand corner of their website, and into two
of the three boxes in the upper left hand corner
of its website. And then so the Washington Post itself
can put it not its own Trump Special council scoop,
(08:46):
but this thing from NBC. The Post can put it
in its upper left hand corner and then actually put
at the top of its opinion list in the upper
right hand corner an appalling piece by the appalling Rumsfeld
speechwriter Mark Teason. I mean, who admits today to writing
reaches for Donald freaking Rumsfeld? Mark Teason The headline, if
(09:10):
Trump's classified document misshandling was quote irresponsible, so is Biden's. Yeah,
Trump's document misshandling was not quote irresponsible, it was quote
when Ethel Rosenberg did the same damn thing in the
nineteen fifties, we executed her unquote. It does not take
much to make the American news media stampede. It never
(09:33):
has lost to the generations who have followed me here
those who never saw the time when national network television
news was just ABC, CBS, and NBC coming on for
half an hour at seven pm each night. Lost to
all of you was the disquieting reality that if you
could do a log of each newscast, you would have
(09:54):
found not only that they had broadcast only the same
fifteen or twenty stories in their twenty two minutes of content,
with an occasional kicker usive to one of the networks,
but almost invariably, ABC, CBS, and NBC had broadcast these
fifteen to twenty stories in exactly the same order and
(10:14):
allotting almost exactly the same amount of time to each story.
In fact, if something did not match exactly, each network
used to have post mortem sessions the next morning, trying
to figure out why they gave Vietnam a minute seventeen
last night, but NBC gave it a minute forty six,
And before noon somebody would have sent a cable to
(10:35):
Saigon reaming out the bureau chief for missing something, and
it wasn't. In the dear dead days of Black and
White TV, I saw it again from the inside in
the Clinton Lewinsky story. We at MSNBC had staffers on
the key shows, including my own, whose jobs were to
(10:56):
watch not their own program while it was on, but
to watch CNN and Fox, and if they had something
we didn't, we had to scramble. That producer had to scramble.
I saw a producer promoted because he realized CNN had
a different story, and I mean a different, anonymous thread
with less to it than this other Biden stuff. Found
(11:17):
one source says, we don't know anything else about it, crap,
And before my hour was over, this producer who had
seen this CNN lead, had gotten a guest to say
more or less the same thing and gotten him into
a studio and in front of a camera and on
the show, and the next hour, MSNBC led with this
story as if it had been its own. The American
(11:39):
news organizations are repeating the exact same stampede mentality, and
they are led by a CNN thoroughly corrupted by this
hatchetman Chris Licked, if you want to know how thoroughly,
last night CNN stooped to the lowest thing imaginable. They
brought on Maggie Haberman, Trump's voice inside the New York
(12:02):
Times to comment on nbase one source no details leak,
which CNN did not even credit nor blame on NBC
but claimed as its own. We don't know the details,
she said, But as I have said here all weeks,
CNN has jumped the shark on this story, and last
night they decided they had not done it spectacularly enough,
(12:25):
so they went back, had Maga Maggie hop on board
the motorcycle, and they jumped the shark again. And in
case you are still holding out hope that there is
some other explanation for what CNN, in particular, but not exclusively,
is doing, consider this. CNN's lead story at eight pm
last night was not Biden nor the Washington Post story
(12:48):
about the widening of the Special Council's investigation, nor its
own Giuliani Special Counsel story from Monday, CNN at eight
o'clock lead with George Santos, the congress Man who never was,
and it not only reduced the story entirely to a
political horse race, leaving out the damn that is clearly
(13:09):
waiting to break here. I mean, children can see this,
the increasingly clear reality that this entire Santos campaign was
some kind of money laundering effort, and his entire candidacy
was some sort of scam, and it was organized by
or at least with GOP knowledge. Not only did CNN
(13:30):
ignore those elements, it not only had Anderson Cooper fawn
all over the head of the Republican Party in Santos,
his own county in New York and actually say to
the man, of course you didn't know. But when it
came time to note that, yes, in the history of America,
other politicians had lied about themselves, Anderson Cooper mentioned exactly
(13:50):
two of them, herschel Walker, but before herschel Walker, who
did he mention as a liar in the history of
American politics, as an embellisher about their own personal histories.
Who did he mention? You guessed Joe Biden talking about
speeches he gave while he was campaigning for president In
(14:11):
Night seven seven Biden story in which the speechwriter Pat Cadell,
who was later a paid commentator for Fox News, plagiarized
parts of many other politicians speeches. Caddell did this. He
wrote the speeches. He did not credit the sources, nor
(14:32):
did he tell Biden. He just handed him the speeches.
It is a complicated and nuanced one, and Biden is
not without some guilt in it. But it centers around
word for word duplications of the speech of a British
Labor Party politician named Neil Kinnock. In some of the speeches,
the words Biden said were quoted and Kinnock was credited
(14:56):
in others, no quotes, no credit. So CNN's first example
to compare to George sa Antos, who has lied so
far about race, religion, high school, college sports, three different employers, eleven,
the Holocaust, the Pulse shooting, his criminal record, his nationality,
(15:17):
and his residence. CNNs first camp to that was careless
crediting of quotations in speeches somebody else wrote for Biden
thirty five years ago, because this is the both sides
is um that John Malone bought CNN and hired Chris
Licked to enact, because the knives are out at CNN,
(15:42):
and they are out for the President of the United States,
in order that CNN can now participate in the cover
up for Donald Trump and the rest of the mindless
bowls in American political media can stampede as they have
for generations and will for generations more unless we punish them.
(16:19):
Still ahead, lost in all this, lost because it is
now months ago, Lost because he has not been dragged
by his heels to prison yet. Is just how extreme
and how extraordinary the document theft by Donald Trump personally
really is compared to anything else in human history. CNN
(16:39):
wants to play the what about his game? Let's play
the what about his game? That's next. This is countdown.
I had hoped, in this addition, to do a thorough
(17:01):
analysis of just how many documents were discovered at Meryl
Logo hidden there by Donald Trump deliberately, personally, maliciously, illegally,
and how when he was caught, how hard he had
fought to deny he had done anything wrong, and how
indignantly he insisted the documents where his and the real
victim here was as always him. But I find myself
(17:26):
out over my skis with the sinus now bronchial infection
that I have mentioned here all weeks. So the full
analysis is physically impossible at the moment, and that actually
may be a good thing, because how better to give
a real time sense of just how guilty Trump is
and how ludicrous the Biden camp is than to revisit
(17:47):
in real time the two biggest, almost incomprehensively dangerous days
of the raid and the investigation at Mari Lago. This
is from the morning after it happened August nine, did
(18:14):
the FBI search the toilets at Mari Lago. Facts are few,
and speculation is mountainous, But the FBI raid of the
home and office of Trump Donald John hereafter possibly known
as the Defendant, may wind up being the corrupt presidential
equivalent of the prosecution and conviction of al Capone, not
for murder or organized crime, but for tax evasion, two
(18:39):
important immediate political facts. For all the frenzied crescendos of
rage from the right, I felt a great disturbance in
the farce, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out
in terror and were suddenly silenced. For all that the
reminder that the head of the FBI, Christopher Ray, is
a Trump appointee, and a further reminder that the stuff
(19:03):
in the boxes they pulled out of Marilago is serious stuff.
These were not boxes full of thank you notes. And
whatever happens from here on in the Department of Justice,
is most feared scenario that it would be investigating a
candidate for president again has been averted. Trump has not
(19:25):
announced his candidacy. Whether charges result from this or they
do not, the investigation is already under way and as
dramatically as it could get underway without a purp walk. Anyway,
what this case looks like from the little evidence we
have would suggest that the endgame here could be a
court finding Trump guilty of violation or violations of eighteen
(19:49):
US Code two oh seven one, Section B, which includes
a very specific penalty for a federal office holder who
steals or destroys records disqualification from federal office for the
rest of your life caveat. In two thousand and fifteen,
the Republican Party thought it had found a way to
(20:10):
keep Hillary Clinton out of the White House, come hell
or high water, by prosecuting her under this exact law.
And then it concluded that the Constitution specifies that the
eligibility requirements for the president are this and that, and
you cannot add to them without a constitutional amendment. Still,
(20:30):
eighteen US Code two oh seven one, section B is
worth hearing pretty much in full, quoting whoever, having the
custody of any such record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper,
or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates,
false fies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under
(20:52):
this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both,
and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding
any office under the United States disqualified from office? Would
the conviction of an ex president be different than somebody
seeking the presidency? Could you offer Trump a plea deal
(21:14):
on this, no fine, no jail time, but you accept
that last proviso disqualification from office. There's also a hatful
of other crimes specifically related to taking or destroying classified materials.
And I'll repeat my joke more seriously this time. Did
the FBI search the toilets at Mari Lago. All of
(21:35):
this is speculation, or a better phrase might be extrapolation,
in large part based on some very good reporting by
The Miami Herald, quoting the FBI raid focused only on
Trump's possession of boxes containing alleged classified materials and was
unrelated to the ongoing January six federal grand jury investigation.
(21:57):
The Herald, which has absolutely cleaned the repertorial clocks so
far of The Washington Post, New York Times and the networks,
also quoted law enforcement sources who said, quote, FBI agents
obtained a search warrant from a federal magistrate judge in
West Palm Beach to gather dozens of boxes containing alleged
classified materials that President Trump had taken with him when
(22:20):
he left the White House in January. The Miami Papers
Alex Roarty, Michael Wilner, and Jay Weaver also quoted sources
who said, quote, Federal agents were able to establish probable
cause for the warrant because Trump and his lawyers had
already turned over some classified documents that had been sought
by the National Archives and Records Administration. Agents suspected that
(22:44):
Trump was unlawfully holding other classified documents from his presidency
in his private club and residence at Mari Lago. It
was Eric Trump who first learned of the raid. His
father then announced it, ending it with the now timeless
quote they even broke into my safe, which may now
join the pantheon of similar quotes like you sunk my
(23:07):
battleship and I'm not going to pay a lot for
that muffler, and of course the newest one, John Eastman's
I've decided that I should be on the pardon list.
The other part of this story is the reaction from
Trump's defenders. It is nothing short of amazing, the more
hysterical parts of it in a moment. First, the running
(23:28):
theme of the actual criticism that this is unprecedented. You
don't investigate a president past or presence. That's all nonsense.
The rate itself might be a first, but the FBI
running an investigation of a president? What was Watergate? The
famous source Deep Throat was the Deputy director of the FBI.
(23:50):
Mark felt the material he was leaking to the Washington
Post was the result of investigations by Richard Nixon and
his administration by the FBI. The FBI and the Department
of Justice also investigated Nix's finances and property. Much earlier,
President Warren G. Harding was investigated, but he died before
(24:11):
a special prosecutor was appointed. In t pot Dome, the
Treasury Department investigated President Ulysses has Grant over the whiskey
ring scandal, and Grant wound up while still president testifying
for the defense at the trial of his own personal secretary.
Stuff like this has happened before. Sorry, gang, But then
(24:36):
there is the sheer entertainment value of the reaction on
the right. It is panicked and wonderfully apocalyptic. A sampling
third word banana Republic Trump JUNR. This does not happen
in civilized countries. According to Texas fascist Congressman Troy Nils,
who previously mocked the police injured on January six, using
(25:00):
government power to persecute political opponents is something we have
seen many times from heard world Marxist dictatorships. Marco Rubio,
who last month urged that I be arrested for tweeting
about the Supreme Court. How about the Venghazi scandals? You
want to talk about scandals that were never investigated? Eric
Trump brilliant as ever, sever all ties with d o
(25:22):
J immediately any FBI agent conducting law enforcement functions outside
the purview of our state should be arrested upon site.
Florida congressional candidate Anthony Sabbatini, the one who called the
nomination of Supreme Court Justice Catangi Brown Jackson quote anti
white racist exclusion. All I can say is the FBI
(25:43):
better have the goods. Harry Fleischer, Bushes press secretary who
sold the Iraq War w M D fraud when he
didn't have the goods. Attorney General Garland, preserve your documents
and clear your calendar. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, whom
the Trumper has planned to oust if they take back
the House. Greatest threat to art democracy since the Civil War.
(26:07):
Some guy this is madness, Former Trump adviser Jason Miller. Meanwhile,
former hopeless Trump sick offet Richard Grennell. The FBI rags
Trump's house, and the Democrats vote to add eight seven
thousand I R S agents to go after Americans. Wake up, America.
This rate is part of the worst political scandal in
(26:27):
American history. Tom Fitton, the Judicial Watch guy who wears
the shirts three times so small so you can see
his nipples, can't wait to see the dessantist reaction on
Mari Lago. He will drop the hammer on this lawlessness.
Pizza Jack Possovik, Who's expecting the governor of Florida to
what banned critical race theory in the Florida office of
(26:51):
the FBI. Defend the attack on America? From Matt Schlepp
to fund the attack on America. Frankly, I'm disappointed in you, Matt.
Defund the FBI, Eric Ericson, Eric, the FBI is law enforcement.
You just called for defunding the police. Moron. This is
the hill to die on from Monica Crowley, my former
(27:14):
MSNBC colleague, which invites the response, Okay, Merrick Garland is
a disgrace to human kind from Dan Bongino, the Fox
News talking head with the drawn on hair. Nazi Germany
meets Soviet Union KGB Wayne Root Lisa Booth. The federal
(27:35):
government needs to be dismantled entirely, which you have to
admit would be a neat trick. We see you, and
we see how slimy and disgusting you are trying to
weaponize the FBI, writes Tommy Laren. Frankly, that's also kind
of underwhelming. Isn't it. No, it's not. The FBI rights
the South Dakota Governor Christie Nome unprecedented weaponization of the
(27:58):
Justice Department. Some other guy insisted the church needs to
pay attention to this too. Pray for Trump's safe. Some
woman saying the Trump rally text number is eight eight
O two two and that just happens to be the
day Trump's home gets rated. Yeah, because there was a
(28:19):
conspiracy and Trump was in on it. This weaponizes power
to squelch descent. Governor Abbot of Texas, what descent was
involved in this? Abbey the election denier from Arizona, Mark
Fincham going a little hyperbolic with the FBI just united
the entire world behind President Trump. I don't think so.
(28:43):
Gestapo from nut job congressional candidate Laura Loomer and Gaspacho
for Marjorie Taylor Green not just made that one up,
though she did do that earlier. For the last comment
from the right, former Trump Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders quote,
when you're attacking FBI agents because you're under criminal investigating
(29:04):
and you're losing. She tweeted that on November third, two
thousand sixteen, but you know, still counts. But the overriding
reaction consisted of one word. It's a very disturbing word war,
a repeated meme the late alcoholic Andrew Breitbart's saying that
(29:25):
word war. It is an understandable reaction. The rules and
the laws do not apply to Republicans and fascists, say
Republicans and fascists, and the fact that so far Trump
has gotten away with everything for seven long years, in fact,
for the whole of his life, has led republican and
fascists to a certain sense of collective invulnerability. Granted, almost
(29:48):
all of this hyperbolic reaction is their fear and their
sudden realization in millions of heretofore numbed minds, that the
man they are totally invested in, the guy they think
they are hiding behind, is actually in trouble. Still calling
for war, whatever that means, seems to be a really
(30:11):
odd flex When the military of the United States of
America is in the hands of President Joe Biden Dark Brandon,
that would be through at least January. I mean, it's
the same lack of logic that has led countless Second
Amendment nuts to bark, to boast, come and take magoons,
or you'll only get my gun when you're prior from
(30:32):
my dead hands. And you realize it has never occurred
to them, not once, that were the government actually planning
on taking their guns, or if there actually were to
be some sort of war over Trump's safe, the government
would not walk up to them empty handed, nor bring
one gun. They would bring forty seven tanks and thirty
troops war in defense of Trump's safe. You say, now,
(30:59):
I ask this as literally as you are or aren't
saying a Trump fists you and what army? August nine,
the first thing we knew about Trump and Mari Lago
(31:20):
and literally hundreds of classified documents he stole and he
kept terrifying and horrifying and in retrospect, almost innocent. Let's
jump ahead to the first day that the real implications
here were thoroughly understood, September. The word of the day
was nuclear. That's next. This is countdown again in real time.
(31:56):
The seriousness of what Trump stole, what Trump stashed at
Mari Lago, and the ridiculousness of a comparison to the
Biden think tank documents story. We may have in fact forgotten.
Happily the audio files. Never forget this is from the
morning after it happened September. Come for the nuclear secrets,
(32:22):
Stay for the four month old prophecies about how CNN
would eventually start covering for Donald Trump. Where's the denial?
(32:51):
Late Wednesday night, The Washington Post reported that a month
ago today, an FBI search team found in Trump's residents
unsecured at his Chinsey country club, that anybody could buy
a membership to classified ultra secret US intelligence document describing
a foreign government's military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, Nuclear Cleptomania,
(33:13):
International nuclear Cleptomania, and the response Well. Thursday morning, Trump
reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft story by raging
about the FBI taking his medical records. Thursday night, Trump
reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft story by posting
on social media about caravans of migrants. Wednesday night, Trump's
(33:38):
spokesman reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft story by
accusing The Washington Post of collusion and handwringing about never
ending leaks. Thursday afternoon, Trump's attorney reacted swiftly to the
nuclear document theft story by complaining that the media keeps
changing its story as to what was found at Mari Lago.
Thursday afternoon, Trump's Renfield Lindsey Graham reacted swiftly to the
(34:01):
nuclear document theft story by demanding to know why the
FBI didn't search mary Lago sooner. Thursday morning, Trump's Flying
Monkey Marco Rubio reacted swiftly to the nuclear document theft
story by demanding to know how the Washington Post was
permitted to know about a classified nuclear document, while also
saying Trump had declassified it. Thursday night, Trump's Pennywise Kelly
(34:26):
Anne Conway reacted swiftly to the nuclear documents theft story
by railing against Hunter Biden. Something missing here? Where's the denial?
Where's just one flat denial? Where's one person saying a
document describing a foreign government's military defense is including its
(34:49):
nuclear capabilities? Of course Trump didn't steal that? Where if
not that, where even is the nonsense denial? Where is
the Trump is Captain America denial? If he took anything,
he only took it to technic because security was so
laxed because democrats. I mean, I don't want to give
these idiots any ideas. I don't think that's a particularly
(35:12):
brainy one. But where is everybody? Where is anybody? I
mean when I was a kid. July, the House Judiciary
Committee adopted the first article of impeachment against Richard Nixon.
The vote was twenty seven to eleven. By July, the
(35:34):
committee had adopted to more articles, won by a wider
margin than that it impeached the president. On August five,
a week after it impeached the president, Congressman Chuck Wiggins
from the most republican part of southern California got up
and insisted none of the evidence pointed to Nixon committing
any crimes, not a doubt in his mind that Richard
(35:57):
Nixon was innocent. Then Alexander Haig called him over to
the White House to look at a transcript of the
smoking on tape and said oops. And two days later,
late on August seven, the stories began to leak that
Nixon was going to resign. He announced it on the eighth,
but three days before Nixon went down in flames in
(36:17):
what had been the previous greatest political scandal in American history.
Three days before this, Congressman Wiggins was still out there
insisting not guilty. And after Wiggins left Congress, they made
him a judge seventy two hours before guilty enough to
resign as the president, and he's defending Nixon. And now
(36:39):
Lindsey Graham comes out and says, of a story about
Trump stealing documented evidence of another nation's nuclear defense system,
that of course the FBI should have rated Trump's home sooner.
I mean, what have you got to lose at this point,
Lie tell him he's innocent. Maybe the other country is
(37:01):
Israel and they know and Trump and his culture suddenly
living an abject terror. But then if that were the case,
somebody would have turned on Trump, right just to save themselves, right, somebody, anybody,
anybody gonna say anything one way or the other about this,
Mitch McConnell anything. Do you think it's appropriate the way
(37:26):
that the former president was storing those top secret and
flassified documents at his private state at mar Lago. I
don't really have any comments on this, this whole investigation
that's been dominating the news for the last month. I
think we're slollowing it like all of you are documents.
Mr Leader. I mean that's important. You should have any
(37:47):
comment that no comment, But let me get back to
Hillary Clinton and Hunter Biden. If there is ever a
credible report that I have stolen documentary evidence of another
nation's nuclear defense capabilities and hidden it amid my vintage
baseball guards. Will somebody, just one person, say now I
(38:09):
didn't do it? Just one We also await something else.
The Danu mount to the Steve Bannon New York State
indictment for the we Build the Wall scam after his
media statement in fact I can't wait quote I am
never going to stop fighting. In fact, I have not
yet begun to fight. They will have to kill me first.
(38:32):
M seems a little draconian to me, But hey, resput
and you do you We have a new shooter today,
William S. Russell not only does the New York Times
report he has been subpoenaed for some uncertain, vague way
as part of the grand jury investigation of the events
leading up to the January six coup assault on the Capitol,
(38:56):
but the picture they have put of him in the
newspaper of this former opts an advanced man for Trump,
shows him pulling a flight bag, wearing a shoulder bag
with a copy of the Epoch Times in it, carrying
a folding portfolio, balancing a banker's box on top what
appears to be a clipboard and hanging onto a small
(39:18):
paper bag which could be lunch or could be well,
I don't know, a document describing the foreign government's military defenses,
including its nuclear capabilities. Who's to know? And the last
note about trying to follow all this, you do realize
that before this is all over, CNN will be giving
(39:40):
more than half its airtime two people apologizing for Trump,
defending Trump, and making up excuses for Trump, while CNN
staffers whistled past graveyards and say things like somebody said
to Vanity Fair yesterday about the firings of Bryan Stelter
and John Harwood. Through firings as a purge, CNN is
nevertheless changing before your eyes. First came the near identical
(40:04):
whining about Biden's Marines by Brianna Keieler and Jeff Zelni
to try to hold off the internal tiger from eating them,
I am told the Anderson Cooper newscast last night lead
with Marco Rubio not defending Trump but insisting the real
crime here isn't you know, stolen nuclear secrets about another country,
but that somebody leaked it to The Washington Post. Lead
(40:24):
with the clip of Rubio on Fox News, I'm told
had people on to say, yes, that's an important concern here, which,
as the old analogy goes, is like saying, yes, a
mouse and an elephant are the same, They're both animals.
I have to confess I have not watched Anderson Cooper
since we co anchored CNN Mornings in two thousand two.
(40:45):
The other day, CNN had a conservative reporter named Francesca
Chambers I think from USA Today on and they asked
her about that warm up act at the Trump rally
who talked about her political prisoner nephew, the poor guy
who's in jail, who actually wore a Hitler mustache and
(41:06):
a Hitler haircut and said, quote, Hitler should have finished
the job unquote, and this Francesca Chambers began optics or everything.
The former President of the United States has run into
some issues with optics coming out of his rally this week,
and at the same time you also saw President Biden
come into criticism for optics coming out of his event
(41:27):
this week. In the new CNN, things like Francesca Chambers
almost holding up a sign saying I am here for
the both sides. Is um, these are not bugs? These
are features. And lastly, on this point, there is one
more development at CNN, especially about its coverage of Trump,
(41:47):
that should set your sirens rotating and set your hair
on fire. And his name is John Miller. He is
CNN's new chief Law Enforcement and Intelligence Analyst, hired personally
by the new CNN Worldwide CEO and chairman, Chris Licked,
which to me still sounds like the punch line to
a comedy sketch at MSNBC. I thought Chris Licked used
(42:10):
to eat glue. Anyway, I have known this John Miller,
whom Chris Lick just hired as CNN's new chief Law
enforcement intelligence Analysts. I have known John Miller four forty
four years. He has had the kind of career you
probably think of if you ever think of my career.
Listen to this resume. Assignment Editor, Channel five, New York Reporter,
(42:34):
Channel five, New York Reporter, Channel four, New York Spokesman,
City of New York Police Department reporter, ABC News, Chief
of counter Terrorism and Criminal Intelligence, Los Angeles Police Department,
Assistant spokesman, FBI reporter, CBS News, Deputy Commissioners, City of
New York Police Worldwide's leader in sports or pants or
something for CNN. In short, all over the freaking place.
(42:57):
When he was starting as a reporter at Channel five
in New York, just as we were all converting to
color TV, I was an intern on the assignment desk.
I swear I know him since seventy eight. I actually
made phone calls for John Miller on a couple of
his stories in y eight when I didn't need to
(43:18):
shave more than like once a week. And his act
was the same in nineteen seventy eight as it is two.
He was a cop jock sniffer. He was the teenage
kid at home in New Jersey with the police scanner
radios who would then show up at the crime scene.
The backstory at Channel five was John Miller started doing
(43:39):
that for them, showing up at crime scenes and interviewing
people in the middle of the night and getting the
film or the video for use in the ten o'clock
news the next night, when he was fifteen or sixteen
at the latest. And the through line for all of
this is if a cop or a federal agent in
New York, in l A in Washington says anything, John Miller,
(44:01):
for the last forty five years has existed solely to
say he's damn right, you know, or worse, as it
turns out, as police spokesman or as quote reporter unquote,
John Miller has been compulsively on the cops side period
In a woman was raped in a park in Brooklyn.
(44:23):
Soon a newspaper columnist wrote that the cops felt she
had not been raped, but she had made it up
just to get publicity for a quote gay and lesbian rally.
The rape victim sued the city. It came out that
one of the sources was John Miller. He was forced
to publicly apologize it's a long time ago. Is March
(44:45):
of this year a long time ago for something like this?
As New York's Deputy Police Commissioner for Intelligence and counter Terrorism,
just before he went back on the air with CNN,
that sounds not shady, John Miller testified this March to
the New York City Council and claimed, quote, there is
no evidence on that the police here spied on Muslim
(45:07):
communities after nine eleven. If it had not been so serious,
what would have happened next would have been half the
city would have gone deaf from all the laughter. Of course,
New York City spied on Muslim communities after nine eleven,
it was like the leading industry for six months. John Miller,
Chris lifts first Higher, CNN's new chief law enforcement and
(45:29):
intelligence analyst and cop apologist, was so wrong, so offensive,
so islamophobic, that the Mayor of New York, Eric Adams
himself and ex cop contradicted John Miller publicly and apologized
to everybody and said, quote, what we did was wrong.
(45:52):
So who knows. By the time somebody, anybody actually defends
Trump and says, na, he couldn't have done that, it'll
be John Miller on CNN explaining that his vast collection
of law enforcement sources are a sure ring him that
Trump did not steal a document describing a foreign government's
military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities, but that Hunter Biden did.
(46:29):
The Biden documents, the Trump documents, They're the same thing,
aren't they. They're all documents. This is CNN. I have
ignored my doctor's advice. I am going to stop doing that.
Barring a quick bath in the miracle waters at the
Grotto of Lords or something so compelling that I need
(46:51):
to talk to you tomorrow, I will instead listen to
the doctor. I will talk to you again on Monday.
Thank you, good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck.
(47:18):
Countdown with Keith Alderman is a production of I heart Radio.
For more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the i
heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Host
Keith Olbermann
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