August 30, 2023 • 40 mins
SEASON 2 EPISODE 25: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: The Trial of Donald Trump and the Trump 19 could begin in Atlanta on October 23rd. In such a low-key manner that it barely got noticed, Fonni Willis has now formally petitioned Judge Scott McAfee to MOVE UP the trial date for everybody – and reverse his previous ruling to sever the trial of Ken Chesebro from the entire roster of 19 defendants. It would mean everybody - not just Chesebro - goes on trial just 55 days from now, instead of on March 4.
And thus we are presented with the reality that the Chesebro, the man who may do the most to put Trump in prison BEFORE the 2024 election may be the man he turned to, to engineer this half-baked plan to overturn the 2020 election. Way to go Cheese-Bro!
Now we need to know when the State of Georgia and maybe the Department of Justice will put this Georgia State Legislator Colton Moore behind bars. This is the State Senator with eyes on opposite sides of his head and he is the one who tried to get a special session of the Georgia senate called so he could defund the Fulton County D-A’s office, and he is the one who previously revealed he believes that the Trump 19, if convicted, face death by lethal injection and he is now the one serving up on the propaganda channel “Real America’s Voice” a threat to send troopers to arrest Fonni Willis and make a Trumpian stochastic promise of Civil War.
In Washington, Congressman Andy Clyde is on the House Appropriations Committee and he says he has TWO amendments ready to tag on to the Fiscal 2024 budget for Commerce Justice and Science which his committee will take up next month after the recess and guess who they defund and no it’s not Aileen Cannon. Clyde thinks he can take out Willis AND Alvin Bragg in New York AND Jack Smith (and he’s wrong about that, which I'll explain in detail).
B-Block (19:59) IN SPORTS: The complete failure of the Colorado Rockies' security staff as two fans charge and hold an Atlanta Braves star underscores that since 9/11 sports has adopted only "security theater" - not real security. It was the worst breach in baseball in nearly a week! The White Sox finally have an explanation as to how two fans got shot in the bleachers last Friday and it involves hiding a gun in "folds of belly fat." (25:35) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Shouldn't have praised the urban Trump Mugshot Mural until you saw what the thought bubble said, Charlie Kirk and Jesse Watters; Matt and the sound of one hand Schlapping; and the Katy, Texas, School Board Moronic Fascist who banned a book because it used "they" instead of "he" or "she" except that's not why they used they; THEY used THEY because it was grammatically correct and Morgan Calhoun is too stupid to know it.
C-Block (31:49) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: Running that clip of O.J. Simpson endorsing Vivek Ramaswamy provided a good laugh but ever since I've been haunted of memories of what he did in 1994, how nobody believed it was possible, and how in LA media in the '80s and '90s we knew he was a phony and an evil man, but we weren't able to probe harder to learn what a monster he truly was.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. The
trial of Donald Trump and the Trump nineteen could begin
(00:25):
in Atlanta on October twenty third, in such a low
key manner that it barely got noticed or reported anywhere.
Fannie Willis has now formally petitioned Judge Scott McAfee to
move up the trial date for everybody, to reverse his
previous ruling and not sever any of the defendants from
(00:45):
the entire roster of nineteen, to schedule them all to
be heard from March fourth to just fifty five days
from now. And though this really is not a surprise,
sometimes even when the other shoe falling is expected, the
other shoe makes a really loud noise, and even bound
is back up and the other shoe falls a second time.
(01:08):
In this case, the bouncing shoe is none other than
that unlikeliest of potential American heroes, Ken Cheesebro. Okay, I
got a little carried away on the imagery there, but
you will recall that almost immediately after his part of
this mass indictment, Cheesebro, the impossibly named lawyer from Wisconsin
(01:30):
who helped devise the plan to use fake electors to
delay or muddy the Biden certification and enable the Supreme
Court to ultimately choose the President invoked the Georgia law
requiring that every defendant get a speedy trial that meant
trial starting by November fifth. Willis responded by saying okay.
October twenty third, Cheesebrow assented. That led Judge McAfee to
(01:52):
sever Cheesebrow's case from that of the other eighteen, including Trump,
and then Sidney Powell invoked the speedy trial clause too,
and John Eastman is going to While it was widely
assumed and even reported that this meant everybody would go
on trial on October twenty third and not March fourth,
this was actually not the case. The judge had separated Cheesebro,
(02:14):
but all the other trials are still on the books
for March, so late yesterday Willis petitioned the judge to
not sever Cheesebro's trial and in fact use the speedy
trial provision to expedite trial for quote all nineteen defendants
and keep them intact, since, after all, this is a
(02:34):
racketeering indictment, a sprawling conspiracy that is to be presented
to a jury or jury's as one gigantic crime led
by Trump, in which each of the other defendants is
guilty to some degree small or large. And thus we
are presented with the reality that the man who may
do the most to put Trump in prison before the
(02:55):
twenty twenty four election maybe the man he turned to
to engineer this half baked plan to overturn the twenty
two money election Way to go. Cheesebro District Attorney Willis,
through her deputy, John will Wooton, who actually wrote the
brief to the judge yesterday, also has a fallback position. Quote.
(03:16):
The state maintains its position that severance is improper at
this juncture, and that all defendants should be tried together.
But at an absolute minimum, the court should set defendant
Powell's trial and that of any other defendant who may
file a speedy trial demand, on the same date as
defendant Cheesebros unquote. So Judge Chutkin in Washington ready to
(03:40):
start jury selection on March fourth. In the case of
the United States of America versus Donald J. Trump and
Donald J. Trump's lawyers conceivably having accelerated the start of
the trial date in Atlanta to less than two months
from now. It is still enraging that our prosecutors waited
so long to act in the first place that we
(04:00):
are in this position today. But at least you cannot
argue that Fannie Willis and Jack Smith are not literally
trying to make up for lost time. Now we need
to know when the State of Georgia and maybe the
Department of Justice will put this Georgia State Legislator, Colton
Moore behind bars. This is that state senator, the one
(04:20):
with the eyes on the opposite sides of his head.
And he is the one who tried to get a
special session of the Georgia Senate called so he could
defund the Fulton County DA's office because it was prosecuting Trump.
And he is the one who previously revealed he believes
that the Trump nineteen, if convicted, faced death by lethal injection.
And he is now the one serving up on the
(04:41):
propaganda channel Real America's Voice, a threat to send troopers
to arrest Fannie Willis on behalf of the State Senate
and making a Trumpian stochastic promise of good old civil war.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Now that we've got nineteen people who are facing the
rest of their life in prison because they spoke out
against an election. I mean, you know, I told one senator,
I said, listen, I said, We've got to put our
heads together and figure this out. We need to be
taking action right now, because if we don't, our constituencies
are going to be fighting it in the streets. Do
you want a civil war? I don't want a civil war.
(05:19):
I don't want to have to draw my rifle. I
want to make this problem go away with my legislative
means of doing so. And the first step to getting
that done is defunding Fannie Willis of any Georgia tax dollars.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
State Senator Moore two questions. A. Who has all the tanks? B?
Who won the last civil war? Colton Moore is crazier
than he sounds, and he has not even gotten his
special Session of the State Senate started, let alone his
civil war. But at some point one of these Republicans
dangling the prospect of civil war, which is after all,
(05:55):
defined as the attempt to overthrow the lawfully elected government
of the United States of America by violence, one of
them is going to have to be made an example
of by that government. No matter how much Colton Moore
or carry Lake or Trump himself tries to inoculate themselves
legally by bubble wrapping their sirens call. It is still
(06:15):
the sirens call Culton. Moore didn't say protests, he didn't
say argue, he didn't say petition, He said civil war.
When the black lives matters, protesters called for reducing funding
for the police after a rash of murders of citizens
by the police. Far right legislators and prosecutors look for
(06:36):
anything up to and including the Insurrection Act to use
against them. And I am not suggesting President Biden go
anywhere near that, but at some point we will have
to stop assuming that these bloodlusting fascists are just going
to go away if we ignore their calls for insurrection,
because guess what, they are not always being hyperbolic bullies
(06:57):
on the political playground. Remember January sixth, and remember who
has all the tanks. More immediate concern is the nuisance
that state legislator is like Moore, or national ones like
Congressman Andy Clyde, who represents the Georgia District just north
(07:18):
of Fulton County, can produce by these constant threats of
defunding Fannie Willis's office or defunding Jack Smith's office. Clyde
is on the House Appropriations Committee, and he now says
he has two amendments ready to tag onto the fiscal
twenty twenty four budget for Commerce, Justice, and Science. Amendments
his committee will take up next month after the recess.
(07:39):
And guess who they defund and note it's not Eileen Cannon.
Clyde thinks he can take out Willis and Alvin Bragg
here in New York and Jack Smith, and he's wrong
about all of it. Bragg has already submitted records to
the House Select Committee on the Obstruction of Justice, whatever
they're calling their committee these days, records that show he
has spent exactly five thousand dollars in federal Asset forfeiture
(08:02):
funding on his prosecution of Trump, and not another dime
of federal taxpayer money, so they have no claim on him.
But Representative Clyde can continue to inflame this thing and
get State Senator Colton Moore to start stroking his gun
in anticipation. As a very relevant aside, if you have
(08:24):
been wondering the funding for the Special Council, and Andy
Clyde has now merely joined his fellow redneck Marjorie Taylor
Green in this hunt. The funding for Jack Smith's office is,
for all intents and purposes untouchable. Smith's office is funded
through a permanent, indefinite appropriation, cleverly nestled inside the Independent
(08:46):
Council Reauthorization Act of nineteen eighty seven. You're going to
have an independent council. You're going to have funding for
the independent Council. The government can be shut down completely,
and some Republicans are dreaming of doing that just because
they think it would shut down the prosecutions of their
Lord and master. The whole government could actually shut down indefinitely,
(09:10):
and Jack Smith's office would still be paying its bills
and its payrolls, and it would be at all those
hearings before that nice Judge Chuckkin and that Judge Cannon.
Two postscripts to the Willis prosecution. There was a late
twist to the Mark Meadows attempt to move his part
of the trial to federal court. His lawyer's argument was
(09:32):
that everything he did that they have charged him with,
he did under color of his office, and he very
cleverly trying to prove this by basically confessing to everything
they've charged him with and implicating Trump wherever possible to
prove he was working for Trump taps Wooden head. Judge Jones,
(09:54):
hearing that bid yesterday, turned around and asked both the
prosecutors and the Meadows team to say what they thought
about this theoretical. If only one of those things that
Meadows did, not all of them, just one, was under
color of office, would that be enough to justify moving
it to federal court.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Now?
Speaker 1 (10:13):
I'm not a fancy, big city attorney, but it seems
to me Judge Jones just told us that he thinks
one and only one of those things Meadows did was
under color of office. I know I'm going way out
on a limb on that one second PostScript in Atlanta,
I did not know this until just now. Maybe you did.
(10:35):
Either way, it has made me giggle, maybe it will
make you giggle. Fannie Willis has a spokesman. Fannie Willis's
spokesman is named Jeff Jeff DeSantis spelled differently d I Santus.
(10:59):
But still, while meanwhile, it is a remark reality that
the Republican Party is in desperate suicide packed thrall to Trump,
and yet there are twelve other Republicans challenging Trump for
the presidential nomination. Nearly all of whom have made no
serious criticism of him, would support him if he is
(11:21):
the nominee. In many cases, would pardon him and would
probably have asked give him their livers. On the other hand,
until yesterday, that number was thirteen. The Miami Mayor Francis
Suarez dropped out yesterday and to his credit, Suarez, who
seemed like the least reality based of the challengers, and
(11:41):
boy is that saying something. Suarez said that any candidate
who could not meet the threshold for the first debate
should drop out. He didn't meet the threshold. Then he
went radio silent for a few days, apparently sitting in
a room by himself, mumbling I'm not going to be president.
And then he did what he said people like him
(12:03):
should do. He dropped out. And as his reward as
the initial departee, Mayor Suarez finally gets to say he
finished first in something. Nothing blossoms and wilts faster than
a dark horse candidate for president, whom the pundits decide
(12:24):
is hut and it looks like the pedals sure are
fallen off. VV Ramaswami already his fifteen minutes of fame
owed largely to his insistence that he was the only
one on the debate stage last week who was not
bought and paid for, So I can say this, the
climate change agenda is a hoax. Now, Emily Atkin of
(12:47):
the Energy newsletter Heated reveals Ramaswami is in fact bought
and paid for. Turns out, he launched an anti clean
energy investment fund called Strive, which has a sub fund
literally called Drill. And guess who has fifty million dollars
holdings in Strive? Fifty million dollars invested in making sure
(13:10):
we burn more fossil fuels and kill everybody on the
planet faster. Who has that investment? Oh it's be bake Ramswamy.
Not bought and paid for it by those climate change freaks,
bought and paid for by those fossil fuel freaks. Yeah.
Ramaswami also got caught flip flopping from a previous flip flop,
(13:33):
which is pretty impressive. It's just three weeks since he
demanded this nation abandoned Ukraine and focus instead on the
real enemy, China, and then he backed off on that
and insisted we had to change our policy on Taiwan.
We should protect it, but only until we become self
sufficient at producing the semiconductors we now buy from Taiwan,
(13:54):
and then protecting Taiwan is no longer in our self interest,
so tough luck Taiwan. Now he has gone on Sean
Hannity and said, no, neither of those is his position. Now,
we should protect Taiwan until we bleed it out of
all of its semiconductors, and then simply return to the
(14:15):
current Biden administration policy of strategic ambiguity. The guy is
making it up as he goes along. Speaking of which,
if that were not bad enough for the flavor of
the month, and note Vivek, the new month starts Friday.
I'm sure you've heard this after Ramaswami performed Lose Yourself
(14:37):
at the Iowa State Fair this month. Lose Yourself an
odd topic or title to perform while you're running for president,
Lose yourself, lose kamma yourself anyway. After he performed it
at the Iowa State Fair and boid did it go
over big there? Eminem has sent Ramaswami a cease and
(15:00):
desist letter saying, hey, copyrights, we enforce them. Stop rapping
Eminem's music. His campaign has now said it will bide
by the letter and the copy writs, and I can
only think Ramaswami missed a golden opportunity by simply sending
a copy of the video of him doing Lose Yourself
at the Iowa State Fair to Eminem and Writing Boy.
(15:21):
People have called this a lot of things, but one
thing everybody agrees on is that this this could never
be considered actual rapping. Also of interest here speaking of Ramaswami,
that clip I played for you Monday when he got
the coveted OJ Simpson endorsement. I laughed. I suspect you laughed.
(15:47):
But I have to tell you, ever since, I have
been having flashbacks to those horrible weeks of nineteen ninety
four and to the before OJ Simpson I knew while
I was a sportscaster in Los Angeles in the late
eighties and early nineties. And I need to again to
convey to anybody who was not here for all that
(16:08):
or can't remember it, we have seen nothing like OJ
Simpson in the nearly thirty years since, nobody, not even Trump,
who has gone from possibly the most well liked cultural
figure in the country, or at least one of them,
to the nation's number one villain overnight. The transformation is
(16:30):
still startling and disturbing, and the transformation from that to
what oj Simpson has become now may be more disturbing.
That's next. This is countdown.
Speaker 4 (16:42):
This is countdown with Keith Alberman. This is Sports Center. Wait,
check that not anymore. This is le Countdown with Keith Ulberman.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
In sports authorities in Denver say the two fans who
ran onto the field Monday night, apparently to get selfies
with Atlanta Braves outfielder Ronald Acunya and then got belligerent
have been charged with trespassing and disturbing the peace. If
you have not seen the amateur video taken from the
stands during the Rockies Braves game A, you should be.
(17:30):
Jefferson Gonzales Merida and Carlos Rivelo Paez approached Tocunya one
after the other. The first grabbed him and would not
let go, even as the hopelessly unready and overmatched Colorado
Rocki's Corps field stadium security arrived at the scene. The
second fan tried to escape the grasp of the guards
even as they were carrying him off the field. It
(17:53):
was an utter failure by the home team, and baseball
is not surprisingly completely ignoring it, just as baseball completely
ignored it twenty one years ago next month when two
fans at the Chicago White Sox Stadium, which was then
still called Kamiski Park, vaulted over the first base railing
and for no reason at all, blindsided and attacked Kansas
(18:15):
City Royal's first base coach Tom Gamboa with their fists.
The two shirtless men were father and son. One of
them was carrying a knife that fortunately was not used.
Gamboa was okay, but it was thirty years ago last
April when that was not the case. A deranged Steppie
Graff tennis fan ran out of the stands and stabbed
(18:37):
Groff's rival Monica Cellis in hopes of improving Groft's position
in the international tennis rankings. Celis was never the same
after nine to eleven. Sports was the second part of
our culture to fully adopt security. Theater transportation obviously was
the first. And you have been screened and examined and
photographed and prevented from bringing water or food with you
(19:01):
into a game. And it's just coincidence that you have
to water and food from the teams, but they haven't
done a damn thing to actually increase your safety nor
the safety of the players. And that has never been
more obvious than this week, because, if you will, recall,
the Acunya thing in Denver was only the second extreme
(19:22):
security breach at a Major League Baseball game since last Friday,
that is, when two fans were injured by gunfire in
the bleachers at the same White Sox stadium at which
that coach was attacked in two thousand and two. The
team and the sport spent several days trying to convince
everybody that the bullets were actually fired from outside the
(19:42):
park and yet caused one woman's hospitalization and gave a
second a minor grazing inside the park. Yesterday, ESPN Chicago reported, no, No,
the gun was in the park all right, in the bleachers,
in the possession of the woman who was grazed by
the bullet the gun had accidentally discharged. She, according to
(20:05):
the report, had sneaked it through metal detectors by hiding
it in quote the folds of her belly fat. Now,
as hilarious as that may sound as a picture, if
that's possible, let's just contemplate the implications there for gun
security everywhere. And here's something to think about going forward
(20:30):
in sports in this country, because when Canada acts against
a problem, that usually means the problem also exists in
this country. We just have not noticed it yet, but
we doubtless will sooner or later. As of the end
of next February, the Province of Ontario, you know, Toronto, Ottawa,
Town of Renfrew, it will make it illegal for online
(20:51):
gambling outfits to use in their commercials and promotions active
or retired athletes. Now in this country there is pretty
much nothing but active or retired athletes in sports gambling ads,
and there's pretty much nothing but sports gambling ads on
all sportscasts in Canada. Hockey's biggest active stars, Connor McDavid
(21:12):
and Austin Matthews, and its biggest retired star, Wayne Gretzky,
have been featured in such spots. Gretzky and McDavid did
one together. This is probably less about the prospect of
scandals about fixed games or players betting on or against
their own teams, and more about the undue influence that
the athletes have over kids and those susceptible to gambling addictions.
(21:36):
Ten years ago, even associating with gambling on sports could
get you banned or suspended by your league. Now it
gets you a little extra money from an advertisement. If
Ontario's action is any indication, however, tomorrow it might get
you banned or suspended by your league. Still ahead on countdown.
(22:11):
Since I ran that clip of OJ Simpson Monday, I
have been haunted, I have been flashed back. I need
to testify to you about how popular he was in
nineteen ninety four, how for a week nobody believed he
could have been the monster that he was, and how
those of us who had covered him in the media
(22:32):
in Los Angeles in the eighties and nineties had a
vague idea he was a bad man, but we could
never have known how bad, and how we should have
tried harder first time. For the daily roundup of the
miss grants, morons and Dunning Kruger effect specimens who constitute
today's worse persons in the world, Thebron's Jesse waters If
Fox quote news unquote, and balloonhead Charlie Kirk each has
(22:55):
reported with apparent's sincerity that the painting of a mural
of the Trump mugshot in Atlanta is evidence that the
arrest and the photograph have given dementia Jay Street cred
and it means he's winning over African Americans and they
can get him re elected. Both Waters and Kirk have
(23:15):
shown images of the mural before it was completed, and
whether this was stupidity on their part or it was
intentional doesn't really matter. They have not updated their audiences
about the fact that the artist added one final touch
to the mugshot mural, a thought bubble in which Trump thinks, quote, Maga,
my ass got arrested unquote are a good old match Schlap,
(23:42):
proving that if you are incapable of embarrassment, you can
grope a male staffer allegedly on the herschel Walker campaign
and continue to pretend you're a good old straight family
man and justified in passing judgment on the world as
the head of the fascist organization Sea Pack, even as
Seapack executives resign left and right and accuse you of
(24:03):
more misconduct, personal and financial. The Daily Beast now reports
Schlap made an offer to settle the lawsuit by his
accuser in the low six figures. They say, a slap
spokesman says, quote, let me set the record straight. I
believe doctor Freud would like a word about that preamble.
But to resume, there has been no settlement offer from
(24:25):
the outset. Mister and Missus Schlap have been and remain
prepared to go to trial at are confident of prevailing
in court unquote, and boy, oh boy, do you get
the feeling Missus Schlap is still yet to get the
surprise of her life something about the sound of one
hand slapping. But our winner the school Board of Katie,
(24:47):
Texas and Trustee Morgan Calhoun now Roger Clemens used to
work out in Katie, Texas, which is probably all you
need to know about the place. But this will tell
you the rest. The school board in Katie, Texas has
banned a book from the school libraries because the last
thing Texas needs is smarter kids, were, happier kids are
nicer kids. The book is called Itty Bitty Kitty Corn,
(25:11):
and the crime of Itty Bitty Kitty Corn is that
the cartoon cat in the title uses the word they
instead of she or he, and this buffoon, Morgan Calhoun
evidently dropped out of school in the third grade because
the sentence in question is wow, says parakeet astonished, Woo
says Gecko impressed. Finally they see me thinks kitty. The
(25:36):
use of they they see me thinks kitty. That's not
some communist Obama, atheist, Chinese deep state plot, Morgan Calhoun fascist.
It's called proper English grammar. And this bozo Morgan Calhoun says, Oh, well,
maybe she made a mistake. She's human. Well I'll need
(25:59):
proof of that. But this isn't going to stop her
from banning books. This is the inevitable result of book banning.
It's not only wrong, but it is invariably done by
slobs who are literally too stupid to recognize correct English
grammar in a picture book with like fifty words in
total in it, designed for kids just learning to read.
(26:22):
So did Katie Texas School Board Trustee Morgan Calhoun make
a mistake? Yes she did, and she should be fired
and banned from all further association with education, private, public,
or parochial in this country. And not because she's a fascist,
although she is, And not just because she's an American,
(26:43):
though she is, but because she is a moron, and
she is Morgan Calhoun of Katie Texas two Days, worst
person and the world now to the number one story
(27:20):
on the countdown and things I promised not to tell.
And it was just two days ago that I heard
this and played it and I had the appropriate good
laugh about it.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
This morning, I got up and I found myself watching
to meet the press they at the babik Owamaswami on
Now just like the debates, the Republican debates. I said, Hey,
this guy is onto something and he'll say something.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Oh J. Simpson endorsing Vivek Ramaswami or whatever he called
him in a selfie video posted on social media. And
in the time since I played that, I have found
myself doing what I really do not like to do.
I have been thinking about O. J. Simpson and who
(28:05):
he really is and what we knew about him in
the years I worked in local news in Los Angeles
from nineteen eighty five to nineteen ninety two. And the
immutable fact that if you did not know the public
OJ Simpson, who killed his ex wife and Ronald Goldman
in nineteen ninety four, I can never explain, I can
never convey, I can never completely describe to you just
(28:29):
how popular he was. Maybe with some time I can
give you just a glimpse in the sad and in
many quarters still startled commemorations of the various anniversaries of
the White Bronco car chase, the beginning of the OJ
Simpson most people know there seems to be only passing
(28:52):
reference to one of the most amazing transformations in American history,
let alone just American sports history. On June seventeenth, nineteen
ninety four, when the Los Angeles Police Department finally admitted
Simpson was a suspect in the murder of his ex
wife and Ronald Goldman, and then said he was turning
himself in and then said no, no, he's not, he
(29:12):
hasn't shown up, and yeah, in fact, he's now a
fugitive from justice. And then his attorney implied that Simpson
had fled to go kill himself, and then the car
chase played out in front of ninety five million witnesses.
All of this in one day. One of the most
popular people in America instantly became its greatest living villain.
(29:35):
There is no hypothetical comparison in the America of today
with the Internet, with the paparazzi, with the maxed out
cynicism about sports and television, and celebrity. There is nobody
who was as teflon as the OJ Simpson of pre
June nineteen ninety four. I mean, not even Trump. Trump
(29:56):
had fans, but nobody ever liked Trump. Trump was never,
for a second one of the top one hundred thousand
most pop filer people in the country, let alone one
of the ten most popular people in the country.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:09):
Simpson was maybe maybe maybe, And I apologize to her
for even dragging her name into this. Hypothetically, maybe it
would be as if I don't know, Taylor Swift were
a murder suspect and had fled and the police chase
was being shown live on literally every television channel. But
(30:31):
that absurd hypothetical. It really isn't good enough.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Simpson was not just a star in one field. He
was not just a star athlete, virtually uncriticized, instantly recognizable nationwide.
He'd also become one of the most prominent sportscasters in
this country, and one of the most prominent actors in
this country, and one of the most prominent advertising spokesmen
in this country.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Simpson the football player was one thing.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
Simpson was also O J. Simpson the rental car pitch
man go Oj go o. J Simpson was also OJ
Simpson from NBC Sports. OJ Simpson was also OJ Simpson
as Nordberg in the Naked Gun movies. And he was
also OJ Simpson wife batterer. But he lived in an
era at the end of an era where the public
(31:20):
persona was not only all that people knew about him,
it was all that almost everybody wanted to know about him.
In nineteen ninety four, we thought we were living in
the middle of the tabloid era. In fact, we were
just nine years removed from actor Rock Hudson shocking untold
Americans when he died of AIDS because for thirty years
(31:43):
he had been the heart throb of millions of women,
a staggering percentage of whom had no earthly clue that
he was gay until he died of AIDS. I loathe
the tabloid era, and I lament what it has done
to American sports, to American entertainment, to America. But there
is one thing to be said for this America where
(32:04):
an actor can call his whiny little daughter a whiny
little daughter, and then here at broadcast nationwide within hours,
and OJ Simpson in this year, would not have been
able to hide his true self for a month. Whatever
the full stories are, whatever miscarriages of justice there may
be in either direction. You know about Johnny Depp and
(32:27):
Amber heard, and you sure know about Kanye West, and
you sure know about Trump, and you would have known
today about OJ Simpson. Early on New Year's morning, January first,
nineteen eighty nine, police went to the infamous home on
North Rockingham in Brentwood and arrested O. J. Simpson on
spousal battery charges. He had punched and kicked his wife.
(32:51):
She said he had screamed, I'll kill you. He had
slapped her so hard that his handprint was still visible
on her neck when police arrived and took him away
and took her to the hospital. And OJ Simpson's reaction
on January first, nineteen eighty nine officers on the scene
quoted him in their official report as saying, the police
have been out here eight times before, and now you're
(33:12):
going to arrest me for this. This is a family matter.
Why do you want to make a big deal out
of it when we can handle it today. That callous,
mindless statement would have been recorded by bodycam or leaked
in some other way or somehow made it around the
world fast enough that it would have been on five
(33:34):
million Twitter accounts within minutes in Los Angeles. In Los
Angeles Media, where I worked at the time for a
television station as sports director, we didn't know about the
assault until months later. Suddenly there was a story that
OJ Simpson had pleaded out an assault charge for hitting
(33:56):
his wife. That's all we heard about it. They buried
the story. We certainly did not know about the nine
police trip to what would become the murder scene on
North Rockingham, but we did know who oj Simpson was.
And here is where we let everybody down. We had
heard the stories hidden behind the big smile, that he
(34:17):
hit women, that police had been to his house, that
while married, whenever he spoke to a group of students,
he would bring his creepy friend, Al Cowowings with him
and he'd have Al Callowings approach the girls. He was
interested in having him do that would provide himself deniability,
we knew, and between the laws and customs that still
(34:37):
protected the man in domestic cases ninety percent of the way,
and the laws and customs of a one industry town
like Los Angeles that still predicted the celebrity ninety percent
of the way, we could say nothing about his character.
And so my clearest memory of covering the murder and
the investigation and the hearings and the trial on Sports
(34:59):
Center in nineteen ninety four is not the car chase.
It's not the sense of shock or revelation of the
real OJ Simpson. I never felt that. I only witnessed
it in others. My memory is of sitting at my
desk in the ESPN newsroom that day and first hearing
of the murders and being consumed by a sinking feeling.
The note in our internal computer news file said that
(35:22):
Simpson had flown to Chicago and police were asking him
to fly back to LA but just so they could
ask him a few questions. It wasn't like he was
a suspect or something. I looked into the script in
the next edition of Sports Center and I saw it written,
Simpson is not a suspect. Might as well have said it,
of course, Simpson is not a suspect. Over the nausea,
(35:46):
I made a few phone calls to ex media colleagues
in Los Angeles and a police source in LA and
I can still feel myself, hanging up the phone with
the police source and getting up from my desk to
go talk to the news editors, to go tell people,
some of whom were still saying poor OJ four days later,
that I had just been told not a suspect. He's
(36:07):
our only suspect. To tell them that all they thought
they knew about OJ Simpson, all everybody they knew thought
they knew about O. J. Simpson, all of it was
a lie. And to tell them that I was one
of hundreds, maybe thousands of people who had inadvertently helped
to protect that lie, to protect this monster Simpson. Now,
(36:32):
my police source had been emphatic, I'll answer your question,
but whatever you do, do not say he's a suspect.
We are terrified he's going to run or off himself. Maybe,
but yeah maybe. And this is the point at which
he had to stop himself from laughing. Maybe you want
to drop that part out of the script about not
(36:52):
a suspect. Jesus I convinced them. Sports Center did not
report that OJ Simpson was not a suspect. They did
not address it. But to be fair, those news ed
and some of the on air people spent that week
until he made his run for it, convinced I was
nuts and that when they found whoever had done this
(37:14):
to OJ and his wife, ESPN would look ridiculous. And
then he made his run for it. And even after that,
there were people at NBC when I first worked there
in nineteen ninety seven, three years later, who had accepted that, yeah,
he had done it, but they could never quite shake
the belief that maybe maybe there was some other explanation
(37:35):
that nobody had thought of yet, because that wasn't the
Oj they knew. So when you see OJ Simpson tweeting
selfie videos about watching meet the Press and vivek Wamawami
or whatever he called him, laugh, God knows I laughed,
(37:55):
but please remember the context for the laugh. This creature
was as popular and as well known in three or
four different fields in this country as almost anybody else
in this country in nineteen ninety four, and then he
murdered two people, including the mother of his children, brutally,
(38:18):
hands on, face to face. And now, in essence, he
has been reduced to nothing worse than an eternal running joke.
(38:46):
I've done all the damage I can do here. Thank
you for listening. Countdown has come to you from our
studios in New York. Here are the credits. Most of
the music was arranged, produced and performed by Brian Ray
and John Phillip Shaneil, who are the Countdown musical directors.
All orchestration and keyboards by John Phillip Shanel, Guitars, Bassed
and drums by Brian Ray, produced by Tko Brothers. Other
(39:06):
Beethoven selections have been arranged and performed by the group
No Horns Allowed. The sports music is the Olberman theme
from ESPN two and it was written by Mitch Warren
Davis Curtisey of ESPN, Inc. Musical comments by Nancy Fauss,
the best baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer today was
my friend Kenny Maine, and everything else is pretty much
my fault. So that's countdown for this the nine hundred
(39:27):
and sixty sixth day since Donald Trump's first attempted coup
against the democratically elected government of the United States. Convict
him now while we still can. The next scheduled countdown
is tomorrow bulletins as the news warrants till then, I'm
Keith Olberman. Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck.
(40:02):
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. The
trial of Donald Trump and the Trump nineteen could begin
(00:25):
in Atlanta on October twenty third, in such a low
key manner that it barely got noticed or reported anywhere.
Fannie Willis has now formally petitioned Judge Scott McAfee to
move up the trial date for everybody, to reverse his
previous ruling and not sever any of the defendants from
(00:45):
the entire roster of nineteen, to schedule them all to
be heard from March fourth to just fifty five days
from now. And though this really is not a surprise,
sometimes even when the other shoe falling is expected, the
other shoe makes a really loud noise, and even bound
is back up and the other shoe falls a second time.
(01:08):
In this case, the bouncing shoe is none other than
that unlikeliest of potential American heroes, Ken Cheesebro. Okay, I
got a little carried away on the imagery there, but
you will recall that almost immediately after his part of
this mass indictment, Cheesebro, the impossibly named lawyer from Wisconsin
(01:30):
who helped devise the plan to use fake electors to
delay or muddy the Biden certification and enable the Supreme
Court to ultimately choose the President invoked the Georgia law
requiring that every defendant get a speedy trial that meant
trial starting by November fifth. Willis responded by saying okay.
October twenty third, Cheesebrow assented. That led Judge McAfee to
(01:52):
sever Cheesebrow's case from that of the other eighteen, including Trump,
and then Sidney Powell invoked the speedy trial clause too,
and John Eastman is going to While it was widely
assumed and even reported that this meant everybody would go
on trial on October twenty third and not March fourth,
this was actually not the case. The judge had separated Cheesebro,
(02:14):
but all the other trials are still on the books
for March, so late yesterday Willis petitioned the judge to
not sever Cheesebro's trial and in fact use the speedy
trial provision to expedite trial for quote all nineteen defendants
and keep them intact, since, after all, this is a
(02:34):
racketeering indictment, a sprawling conspiracy that is to be presented
to a jury or jury's as one gigantic crime led
by Trump, in which each of the other defendants is
guilty to some degree small or large. And thus we
are presented with the reality that the man who may
do the most to put Trump in prison before the
(02:55):
twenty twenty four election maybe the man he turned to
to engineer this half baked plan to overturn the twenty
two money election Way to go. Cheesebro District Attorney Willis,
through her deputy, John will Wooton, who actually wrote the
brief to the judge yesterday, also has a fallback position. Quote.
(03:16):
The state maintains its position that severance is improper at
this juncture, and that all defendants should be tried together.
But at an absolute minimum, the court should set defendant
Powell's trial and that of any other defendant who may
file a speedy trial demand, on the same date as
defendant Cheesebros unquote. So Judge Chutkin in Washington ready to
(03:40):
start jury selection on March fourth. In the case of
the United States of America versus Donald J. Trump and
Donald J. Trump's lawyers conceivably having accelerated the start of
the trial date in Atlanta to less than two months
from now. It is still enraging that our prosecutors waited
so long to act in the first place that we
(04:00):
are in this position today. But at least you cannot
argue that Fannie Willis and Jack Smith are not literally
trying to make up for lost time. Now we need
to know when the State of Georgia and maybe the
Department of Justice will put this Georgia State Legislator, Colton
Moore behind bars. This is that state senator, the one
(04:20):
with the eyes on the opposite sides of his head.
And he is the one who tried to get a
special session of the Georgia Senate called so he could
defund the Fulton County DA's office because it was prosecuting Trump.
And he is the one who previously revealed he believes
that the Trump nineteen, if convicted, faced death by lethal injection.
And he is now the one serving up on the
(04:41):
propaganda channel Real America's Voice, a threat to send troopers
to arrest Fannie Willis on behalf of the State Senate
and making a Trumpian stochastic promise of good old civil war.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
Now that we've got nineteen people who are facing the
rest of their life in prison because they spoke out
against an election. I mean, you know, I told one senator,
I said, listen, I said, We've got to put our
heads together and figure this out. We need to be
taking action right now, because if we don't, our constituencies
are going to be fighting it in the streets. Do
you want a civil war? I don't want a civil war.
(05:19):
I don't want to have to draw my rifle. I
want to make this problem go away with my legislative
means of doing so. And the first step to getting
that done is defunding Fannie Willis of any Georgia tax dollars.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
State Senator Moore two questions. A. Who has all the tanks? B?
Who won the last civil war? Colton Moore is crazier
than he sounds, and he has not even gotten his
special Session of the State Senate started, let alone his
civil war. But at some point one of these Republicans
dangling the prospect of civil war, which is after all,
(05:55):
defined as the attempt to overthrow the lawfully elected government
of the United States of America by violence, one of
them is going to have to be made an example
of by that government. No matter how much Colton Moore
or carry Lake or Trump himself tries to inoculate themselves
legally by bubble wrapping their sirens call. It is still
(06:15):
the sirens call Culton. Moore didn't say protests, he didn't
say argue, he didn't say petition, He said civil war.
When the black lives matters, protesters called for reducing funding
for the police after a rash of murders of citizens
by the police. Far right legislators and prosecutors look for
(06:36):
anything up to and including the Insurrection Act to use
against them. And I am not suggesting President Biden go
anywhere near that, but at some point we will have
to stop assuming that these bloodlusting fascists are just going
to go away if we ignore their calls for insurrection,
because guess what, they are not always being hyperbolic bullies
(06:57):
on the political playground. Remember January sixth, and remember who
has all the tanks. More immediate concern is the nuisance
that state legislator is like Moore, or national ones like
Congressman Andy Clyde, who represents the Georgia District just north
(07:18):
of Fulton County, can produce by these constant threats of
defunding Fannie Willis's office or defunding Jack Smith's office. Clyde
is on the House Appropriations Committee, and he now says
he has two amendments ready to tag onto the fiscal
twenty twenty four budget for Commerce, Justice, and Science. Amendments
his committee will take up next month after the recess.
(07:39):
And guess who they defund and note it's not Eileen Cannon.
Clyde thinks he can take out Willis and Alvin Bragg
here in New York and Jack Smith, and he's wrong
about all of it. Bragg has already submitted records to
the House Select Committee on the Obstruction of Justice, whatever
they're calling their committee these days, records that show he
has spent exactly five thousand dollars in federal Asset forfeiture
(08:02):
funding on his prosecution of Trump, and not another dime
of federal taxpayer money, so they have no claim on him.
But Representative Clyde can continue to inflame this thing and
get State Senator Colton Moore to start stroking his gun
in anticipation. As a very relevant aside, if you have
(08:24):
been wondering the funding for the Special Council, and Andy
Clyde has now merely joined his fellow redneck Marjorie Taylor
Green in this hunt. The funding for Jack Smith's office is,
for all intents and purposes untouchable. Smith's office is funded
through a permanent, indefinite appropriation, cleverly nestled inside the Independent
(08:46):
Council Reauthorization Act of nineteen eighty seven. You're going to
have an independent council. You're going to have funding for
the independent Council. The government can be shut down completely,
and some Republicans are dreaming of doing that just because
they think it would shut down the prosecutions of their
Lord and master. The whole government could actually shut down indefinitely,
(09:10):
and Jack Smith's office would still be paying its bills
and its payrolls, and it would be at all those
hearings before that nice Judge Chuckkin and that Judge Cannon.
Two postscripts to the Willis prosecution. There was a late
twist to the Mark Meadows attempt to move his part
of the trial to federal court. His lawyer's argument was
(09:32):
that everything he did that they have charged him with,
he did under color of his office, and he very
cleverly trying to prove this by basically confessing to everything
they've charged him with and implicating Trump wherever possible to
prove he was working for Trump taps Wooden head. Judge Jones,
(09:54):
hearing that bid yesterday, turned around and asked both the
prosecutors and the Meadows team to say what they thought
about this theoretical. If only one of those things that
Meadows did, not all of them, just one, was under
color of office, would that be enough to justify moving
it to federal court.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
Now?
Speaker 1 (10:13):
I'm not a fancy, big city attorney, but it seems
to me Judge Jones just told us that he thinks
one and only one of those things Meadows did was
under color of office. I know I'm going way out
on a limb on that one second PostScript in Atlanta,
I did not know this until just now. Maybe you did.
(10:35):
Either way, it has made me giggle, maybe it will
make you giggle. Fannie Willis has a spokesman. Fannie Willis's
spokesman is named Jeff Jeff DeSantis spelled differently d I Santus.
(10:59):
But still, while meanwhile, it is a remark reality that
the Republican Party is in desperate suicide packed thrall to Trump,
and yet there are twelve other Republicans challenging Trump for
the presidential nomination. Nearly all of whom have made no
serious criticism of him, would support him if he is
(11:21):
the nominee. In many cases, would pardon him and would
probably have asked give him their livers. On the other hand,
until yesterday, that number was thirteen. The Miami Mayor Francis
Suarez dropped out yesterday and to his credit, Suarez, who
seemed like the least reality based of the challengers, and
(11:41):
boy is that saying something. Suarez said that any candidate
who could not meet the threshold for the first debate
should drop out. He didn't meet the threshold. Then he
went radio silent for a few days, apparently sitting in
a room by himself, mumbling I'm not going to be president.
And then he did what he said people like him
(12:03):
should do. He dropped out. And as his reward as
the initial departee, Mayor Suarez finally gets to say he
finished first in something. Nothing blossoms and wilts faster than
a dark horse candidate for president, whom the pundits decide
(12:24):
is hut and it looks like the pedals sure are
fallen off. VV Ramaswami already his fifteen minutes of fame
owed largely to his insistence that he was the only
one on the debate stage last week who was not
bought and paid for, So I can say this, the
climate change agenda is a hoax. Now, Emily Atkin of
(12:47):
the Energy newsletter Heated reveals Ramaswami is in fact bought
and paid for. Turns out, he launched an anti clean
energy investment fund called Strive, which has a sub fund
literally called Drill. And guess who has fifty million dollars
holdings in Strive? Fifty million dollars invested in making sure
(13:10):
we burn more fossil fuels and kill everybody on the
planet faster. Who has that investment? Oh it's be bake Ramswamy.
Not bought and paid for it by those climate change freaks,
bought and paid for by those fossil fuel freaks. Yeah.
Ramaswami also got caught flip flopping from a previous flip flop,
(13:33):
which is pretty impressive. It's just three weeks since he
demanded this nation abandoned Ukraine and focus instead on the
real enemy, China, and then he backed off on that
and insisted we had to change our policy on Taiwan.
We should protect it, but only until we become self
sufficient at producing the semiconductors we now buy from Taiwan,
(13:54):
and then protecting Taiwan is no longer in our self interest,
so tough luck Taiwan. Now he has gone on Sean
Hannity and said, no, neither of those is his position. Now,
we should protect Taiwan until we bleed it out of
all of its semiconductors, and then simply return to the
(14:15):
current Biden administration policy of strategic ambiguity. The guy is
making it up as he goes along. Speaking of which,
if that were not bad enough for the flavor of
the month, and note Vivek, the new month starts Friday.
I'm sure you've heard this after Ramaswami performed Lose Yourself
(14:37):
at the Iowa State Fair this month. Lose Yourself an
odd topic or title to perform while you're running for president,
Lose yourself, lose kamma yourself anyway. After he performed it
at the Iowa State Fair and boid did it go
over big there? Eminem has sent Ramaswami a cease and
(15:00):
desist letter saying, hey, copyrights, we enforce them. Stop rapping
Eminem's music. His campaign has now said it will bide
by the letter and the copy writs, and I can
only think Ramaswami missed a golden opportunity by simply sending
a copy of the video of him doing Lose Yourself
at the Iowa State Fair to Eminem and Writing Boy.
(15:21):
People have called this a lot of things, but one
thing everybody agrees on is that this this could never
be considered actual rapping. Also of interest here speaking of Ramaswami,
that clip I played for you Monday when he got
the coveted OJ Simpson endorsement. I laughed. I suspect you laughed.
(15:47):
But I have to tell you, ever since, I have
been having flashbacks to those horrible weeks of nineteen ninety
four and to the before OJ Simpson I knew while
I was a sportscaster in Los Angeles in the late
eighties and early nineties. And I need to again to
convey to anybody who was not here for all that
(16:08):
or can't remember it, we have seen nothing like OJ
Simpson in the nearly thirty years since, nobody, not even Trump,
who has gone from possibly the most well liked cultural
figure in the country, or at least one of them,
to the nation's number one villain overnight. The transformation is
(16:30):
still startling and disturbing, and the transformation from that to
what oj Simpson has become now may be more disturbing.
That's next. This is countdown.
Speaker 4 (16:42):
This is countdown with Keith Alberman. This is Sports Center. Wait,
check that not anymore. This is le Countdown with Keith Ulberman.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
In sports authorities in Denver say the two fans who
ran onto the field Monday night, apparently to get selfies
with Atlanta Braves outfielder Ronald Acunya and then got belligerent
have been charged with trespassing and disturbing the peace. If
you have not seen the amateur video taken from the
stands during the Rockies Braves game A, you should be.
(17:30):
Jefferson Gonzales Merida and Carlos Rivelo Paez approached Tocunya one
after the other. The first grabbed him and would not
let go, even as the hopelessly unready and overmatched Colorado
Rocki's Corps field stadium security arrived at the scene. The
second fan tried to escape the grasp of the guards
even as they were carrying him off the field. It
(17:53):
was an utter failure by the home team, and baseball
is not surprisingly completely ignoring it, just as baseball completely
ignored it twenty one years ago next month when two
fans at the Chicago White Sox Stadium, which was then
still called Kamiski Park, vaulted over the first base railing
and for no reason at all, blindsided and attacked Kansas
(18:15):
City Royal's first base coach Tom Gamboa with their fists.
The two shirtless men were father and son. One of
them was carrying a knife that fortunately was not used.
Gamboa was okay, but it was thirty years ago last
April when that was not the case. A deranged Steppie
Graff tennis fan ran out of the stands and stabbed
(18:37):
Groff's rival Monica Cellis in hopes of improving Groft's position
in the international tennis rankings. Celis was never the same
after nine to eleven. Sports was the second part of
our culture to fully adopt security. Theater transportation obviously was
the first. And you have been screened and examined and
photographed and prevented from bringing water or food with you
(19:01):
into a game. And it's just coincidence that you have
to water and food from the teams, but they haven't
done a damn thing to actually increase your safety nor
the safety of the players. And that has never been
more obvious than this week, because, if you will, recall,
the Acunya thing in Denver was only the second extreme
(19:22):
security breach at a Major League Baseball game since last Friday,
that is, when two fans were injured by gunfire in
the bleachers at the same White Sox stadium at which
that coach was attacked in two thousand and two. The
team and the sport spent several days trying to convince
everybody that the bullets were actually fired from outside the
(19:42):
park and yet caused one woman's hospitalization and gave a
second a minor grazing inside the park. Yesterday, ESPN Chicago reported, no, No,
the gun was in the park all right, in the bleachers,
in the possession of the woman who was grazed by
the bullet the gun had accidentally discharged. She, according to
(20:05):
the report, had sneaked it through metal detectors by hiding
it in quote the folds of her belly fat. Now,
as hilarious as that may sound as a picture, if
that's possible, let's just contemplate the implications there for gun
security everywhere. And here's something to think about going forward
(20:30):
in sports in this country, because when Canada acts against
a problem, that usually means the problem also exists in
this country. We just have not noticed it yet, but
we doubtless will sooner or later. As of the end
of next February, the Province of Ontario, you know, Toronto, Ottawa,
Town of Renfrew, it will make it illegal for online
(20:51):
gambling outfits to use in their commercials and promotions active
or retired athletes. Now in this country there is pretty
much nothing but active or retired athletes in sports gambling ads,
and there's pretty much nothing but sports gambling ads on
all sportscasts in Canada. Hockey's biggest active stars, Connor McDavid
(21:12):
and Austin Matthews, and its biggest retired star, Wayne Gretzky,
have been featured in such spots. Gretzky and McDavid did
one together. This is probably less about the prospect of
scandals about fixed games or players betting on or against
their own teams, and more about the undue influence that
the athletes have over kids and those susceptible to gambling addictions.
(21:36):
Ten years ago, even associating with gambling on sports could
get you banned or suspended by your league. Now it
gets you a little extra money from an advertisement. If
Ontario's action is any indication, however, tomorrow it might get
you banned or suspended by your league. Still ahead on countdown.
(22:11):
Since I ran that clip of OJ Simpson Monday, I
have been haunted, I have been flashed back. I need
to testify to you about how popular he was in
nineteen ninety four, how for a week nobody believed he
could have been the monster that he was, and how
those of us who had covered him in the media
(22:32):
in Los Angeles in the eighties and nineties had a
vague idea he was a bad man, but we could
never have known how bad, and how we should have
tried harder first time. For the daily roundup of the
miss grants, morons and Dunning Kruger effect specimens who constitute
today's worse persons in the world, Thebron's Jesse waters If
Fox quote news unquote, and balloonhead Charlie Kirk each has
(22:55):
reported with apparent's sincerity that the painting of a mural
of the Trump mugshot in Atlanta is evidence that the
arrest and the photograph have given dementia Jay Street cred
and it means he's winning over African Americans and they
can get him re elected. Both Waters and Kirk have
(23:15):
shown images of the mural before it was completed, and
whether this was stupidity on their part or it was
intentional doesn't really matter. They have not updated their audiences
about the fact that the artist added one final touch
to the mugshot mural, a thought bubble in which Trump thinks, quote, Maga,
my ass got arrested unquote are a good old match Schlap,
(23:42):
proving that if you are incapable of embarrassment, you can
grope a male staffer allegedly on the herschel Walker campaign
and continue to pretend you're a good old straight family
man and justified in passing judgment on the world as
the head of the fascist organization Sea Pack, even as
Seapack executives resign left and right and accuse you of
(24:03):
more misconduct, personal and financial. The Daily Beast now reports
Schlap made an offer to settle the lawsuit by his
accuser in the low six figures. They say, a slap
spokesman says, quote, let me set the record straight. I
believe doctor Freud would like a word about that preamble.
But to resume, there has been no settlement offer from
(24:25):
the outset. Mister and Missus Schlap have been and remain
prepared to go to trial at are confident of prevailing
in court unquote, and boy, oh boy, do you get
the feeling Missus Schlap is still yet to get the
surprise of her life something about the sound of one
hand slapping. But our winner the school Board of Katie,
(24:47):
Texas and Trustee Morgan Calhoun now Roger Clemens used to
work out in Katie, Texas, which is probably all you
need to know about the place. But this will tell
you the rest. The school board in Katie, Texas has
banned a book from the school libraries because the last
thing Texas needs is smarter kids, were, happier kids are
nicer kids. The book is called Itty Bitty Kitty Corn,
(25:11):
and the crime of Itty Bitty Kitty Corn is that
the cartoon cat in the title uses the word they
instead of she or he, and this buffoon, Morgan Calhoun
evidently dropped out of school in the third grade because
the sentence in question is wow, says parakeet astonished, Woo
says Gecko impressed. Finally they see me thinks kitty. The
(25:36):
use of they they see me thinks kitty. That's not
some communist Obama, atheist, Chinese deep state plot, Morgan Calhoun fascist.
It's called proper English grammar. And this bozo Morgan Calhoun says, Oh, well,
maybe she made a mistake. She's human. Well I'll need
(25:59):
proof of that. But this isn't going to stop her
from banning books. This is the inevitable result of book banning.
It's not only wrong, but it is invariably done by
slobs who are literally too stupid to recognize correct English
grammar in a picture book with like fifty words in
total in it, designed for kids just learning to read.
(26:22):
So did Katie Texas School Board Trustee Morgan Calhoun make
a mistake? Yes she did, and she should be fired
and banned from all further association with education, private, public,
or parochial in this country. And not because she's a fascist,
although she is, And not just because she's an American,
(26:43):
though she is, but because she is a moron, and
she is Morgan Calhoun of Katie Texas two Days, worst
person and the world now to the number one story
(27:20):
on the countdown and things I promised not to tell.
And it was just two days ago that I heard
this and played it and I had the appropriate good
laugh about it.
Speaker 3 (27:30):
This morning, I got up and I found myself watching
to meet the press they at the babik Owamaswami on
Now just like the debates, the Republican debates. I said, Hey,
this guy is onto something and he'll say something.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Oh J. Simpson endorsing Vivek Ramaswami or whatever he called
him in a selfie video posted on social media. And
in the time since I played that, I have found
myself doing what I really do not like to do.
I have been thinking about O. J. Simpson and who
(28:05):
he really is and what we knew about him in
the years I worked in local news in Los Angeles
from nineteen eighty five to nineteen ninety two. And the
immutable fact that if you did not know the public
OJ Simpson, who killed his ex wife and Ronald Goldman
in nineteen ninety four, I can never explain, I can
never convey, I can never completely describe to you just
(28:29):
how popular he was. Maybe with some time I can
give you just a glimpse in the sad and in
many quarters still startled commemorations of the various anniversaries of
the White Bronco car chase, the beginning of the OJ
Simpson most people know there seems to be only passing
(28:52):
reference to one of the most amazing transformations in American history,
let alone just American sports history. On June seventeenth, nineteen
ninety four, when the Los Angeles Police Department finally admitted
Simpson was a suspect in the murder of his ex
wife and Ronald Goldman, and then said he was turning
himself in and then said no, no, he's not, he
(29:12):
hasn't shown up, and yeah, in fact, he's now a
fugitive from justice. And then his attorney implied that Simpson
had fled to go kill himself, and then the car
chase played out in front of ninety five million witnesses.
All of this in one day. One of the most
popular people in America instantly became its greatest living villain.
(29:35):
There is no hypothetical comparison in the America of today
with the Internet, with the paparazzi, with the maxed out
cynicism about sports and television, and celebrity. There is nobody
who was as teflon as the OJ Simpson of pre
June nineteen ninety four. I mean, not even Trump. Trump
(29:56):
had fans, but nobody ever liked Trump. Trump was never,
for a second one of the top one hundred thousand
most pop filer people in the country, let alone one
of the ten most popular people in the country.
Speaker 3 (30:09):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:09):
Simpson was maybe maybe maybe, And I apologize to her
for even dragging her name into this. Hypothetically, maybe it
would be as if I don't know, Taylor Swift were
a murder suspect and had fled and the police chase
was being shown live on literally every television channel. But
(30:31):
that absurd hypothetical. It really isn't good enough.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Simpson was not just a star in one field. He
was not just a star athlete, virtually uncriticized, instantly recognizable nationwide.
He'd also become one of the most prominent sportscasters in
this country, and one of the most prominent actors in
this country, and one of the most prominent advertising spokesmen
in this country.
Speaker 3 (30:54):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Simpson the football player was one thing.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
O J.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
Simpson was also O J. Simpson the rental car pitch
man go Oj go o. J Simpson was also OJ
Simpson from NBC Sports. OJ Simpson was also OJ Simpson
as Nordberg in the Naked Gun movies. And he was
also OJ Simpson wife batterer. But he lived in an
era at the end of an era where the public
(31:20):
persona was not only all that people knew about him,
it was all that almost everybody wanted to know about him.
In nineteen ninety four, we thought we were living in
the middle of the tabloid era. In fact, we were
just nine years removed from actor Rock Hudson shocking untold
Americans when he died of AIDS because for thirty years
(31:43):
he had been the heart throb of millions of women,
a staggering percentage of whom had no earthly clue that
he was gay until he died of AIDS. I loathe
the tabloid era, and I lament what it has done
to American sports, to American entertainment, to America. But there
is one thing to be said for this America where
(32:04):
an actor can call his whiny little daughter a whiny
little daughter, and then here at broadcast nationwide within hours,
and OJ Simpson in this year, would not have been
able to hide his true self for a month. Whatever
the full stories are, whatever miscarriages of justice there may
be in either direction. You know about Johnny Depp and
(32:27):
Amber heard, and you sure know about Kanye West, and
you sure know about Trump, and you would have known
today about OJ Simpson. Early on New Year's morning, January first,
nineteen eighty nine, police went to the infamous home on
North Rockingham in Brentwood and arrested O. J. Simpson on
spousal battery charges. He had punched and kicked his wife.
(32:51):
She said he had screamed, I'll kill you. He had
slapped her so hard that his handprint was still visible
on her neck when police arrived and took him away
and took her to the hospital. And OJ Simpson's reaction
on January first, nineteen eighty nine officers on the scene
quoted him in their official report as saying, the police
have been out here eight times before, and now you're
(33:12):
going to arrest me for this. This is a family matter.
Why do you want to make a big deal out
of it when we can handle it today. That callous,
mindless statement would have been recorded by bodycam or leaked
in some other way or somehow made it around the
world fast enough that it would have been on five
(33:34):
million Twitter accounts within minutes in Los Angeles. In Los
Angeles Media, where I worked at the time for a
television station as sports director, we didn't know about the
assault until months later. Suddenly there was a story that
OJ Simpson had pleaded out an assault charge for hitting
(33:56):
his wife. That's all we heard about it. They buried
the story. We certainly did not know about the nine
police trip to what would become the murder scene on
North Rockingham, but we did know who oj Simpson was.
And here is where we let everybody down. We had
heard the stories hidden behind the big smile, that he
(34:17):
hit women, that police had been to his house, that
while married, whenever he spoke to a group of students,
he would bring his creepy friend, Al Cowowings with him
and he'd have Al Callowings approach the girls. He was
interested in having him do that would provide himself deniability,
we knew, and between the laws and customs that still
(34:37):
protected the man in domestic cases ninety percent of the way,
and the laws and customs of a one industry town
like Los Angeles that still predicted the celebrity ninety percent
of the way, we could say nothing about his character.
And so my clearest memory of covering the murder and
the investigation and the hearings and the trial on Sports
(34:59):
Center in nineteen ninety four is not the car chase.
It's not the sense of shock or revelation of the
real OJ Simpson. I never felt that. I only witnessed
it in others. My memory is of sitting at my
desk in the ESPN newsroom that day and first hearing
of the murders and being consumed by a sinking feeling.
The note in our internal computer news file said that
(35:22):
Simpson had flown to Chicago and police were asking him
to fly back to LA but just so they could
ask him a few questions. It wasn't like he was
a suspect or something. I looked into the script in
the next edition of Sports Center and I saw it written,
Simpson is not a suspect. Might as well have said it,
of course, Simpson is not a suspect. Over the nausea,
(35:46):
I made a few phone calls to ex media colleagues
in Los Angeles and a police source in LA and
I can still feel myself, hanging up the phone with
the police source and getting up from my desk to
go talk to the news editors, to go tell people,
some of whom were still saying poor OJ four days later,
that I had just been told not a suspect. He's
(36:07):
our only suspect. To tell them that all they thought
they knew about OJ Simpson, all everybody they knew thought
they knew about O. J. Simpson, all of it was
a lie. And to tell them that I was one
of hundreds, maybe thousands of people who had inadvertently helped
to protect that lie, to protect this monster Simpson. Now,
(36:32):
my police source had been emphatic, I'll answer your question,
but whatever you do, do not say he's a suspect.
We are terrified he's going to run or off himself. Maybe,
but yeah maybe. And this is the point at which
he had to stop himself from laughing. Maybe you want
to drop that part out of the script about not
(36:52):
a suspect. Jesus I convinced them. Sports Center did not
report that OJ Simpson was not a suspect. They did
not address it. But to be fair, those news ed
and some of the on air people spent that week
until he made his run for it, convinced I was
nuts and that when they found whoever had done this
(37:14):
to OJ and his wife, ESPN would look ridiculous. And
then he made his run for it. And even after that,
there were people at NBC when I first worked there
in nineteen ninety seven, three years later, who had accepted that, yeah,
he had done it, but they could never quite shake
the belief that maybe maybe there was some other explanation
(37:35):
that nobody had thought of yet, because that wasn't the
Oj they knew. So when you see OJ Simpson tweeting
selfie videos about watching meet the Press and vivek Wamawami
or whatever he called him, laugh, God knows I laughed,
(37:55):
but please remember the context for the laugh. This creature
was as popular and as well known in three or
four different fields in this country as almost anybody else
in this country in nineteen ninety four, and then he
murdered two people, including the mother of his children, brutally,
(38:18):
hands on, face to face. And now, in essence, he
has been reduced to nothing worse than an eternal running joke.
(38:46):
I've done all the damage I can do here. Thank
you for listening. Countdown has come to you from our
studios in New York. Here are the credits. Most of
the music was arranged, produced and performed by Brian Ray
and John Phillip Shaneil, who are the Countdown musical directors.
All orchestration and keyboards by John Phillip Shanel, Guitars, Bassed
and drums by Brian Ray, produced by Tko Brothers. Other
(39:06):
Beethoven selections have been arranged and performed by the group
No Horns Allowed. The sports music is the Olberman theme
from ESPN two and it was written by Mitch Warren
Davis Curtisey of ESPN, Inc. Musical comments by Nancy Fauss,
the best baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer today was
my friend Kenny Maine, and everything else is pretty much
my fault. So that's countdown for this the nine hundred
(39:27):
and sixty sixth day since Donald Trump's first attempted coup
against the democratically elected government of the United States. Convict
him now while we still can. The next scheduled countdown
is tomorrow bulletins as the news warrants till then, I'm
Keith Olberman. Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck.
(40:02):
Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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