0:04

Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production

0:07

of iHeartRadio. A

0:22

gag order against Donald

0:24

Trump. His lawyers

0:26

reportedly expect one a gag

0:29

order to be imposed on him

0:32

as soon as today in the Stormy

0:34

Daniels case, thirty days in

0:36

jail or a one thousand dollars fine

0:38

or both if he talks about the case in person

0:41

or on television, posts about

0:43

it on social media. We do not know if

0:45

that would be thirty days and a grand for

0:47

each violation, or if it's a flat

0:50

fee, or if it's like Twitter blue check marks,

0:52

and you have to guess. The

0:54

source for this story is

0:56

a fairly dubious one, England's Daily

0:58

Mail tabloid. But they don't get

1:01

everything wrong, and they have a source, and

1:03

it is speaking in American English, not

1:05

British English, and to quote

1:07

it. The Trump legal team now

1:09

thinks that the Manhattan judge will take the unprecedented

1:12

step of silencing the presidential

1:14

frontrunner with an unconstitutional

1:17

gag order, said a source. It's

1:19

considering adding a First Amendment

1:21

lawyer to the effort to combat this and

1:24

will fight it all the way

1:27

as inconceivably delicious

1:30

as Trump gagged would

1:32

seem. I mean, who

1:35

would have to be the one to explain the concept

1:37

to Trump of shutting

1:40

up? How could he process

1:42

such a concept? If he stops talking, he dies.

1:46

Trump has already scheduled his speech for after

1:48

the indictment Tuesday night, which

1:50

he expects will be televised from Marilago,

1:53

and a second British paper, The Guardian,

1:55

reports that after days of genuine shock

1:58

that he is to be indicted, Trump

2:00

quote vowed to people close to him that

2:02

he wants to go on the offensive. In

2:04

a private moment over the weekend at his Marilago

2:07

resort in Florida that demonstrates his gathering

2:10

resolve. Yeah, that's what

2:12

you call this resolve, remarked,

2:15

using more colorful language, that it was

2:17

time to politically quote

2:19

f them up. Even

2:22

more reason to take the Daily Mail's

2:24

gag order story seriously or

2:27

somewhat seriously. There has

2:29

been gurgling about such a gag order

2:31

since the death, end destruction and baseball

2:33

bat social media tweets now a

2:35

week and a half ago. The

2:38

previous Manhattan Da Si Vants

2:40

Junior now says the judge Juan Marshan

2:43

would be quote well within his rights

2:45

unquote to issue such a gag order,

2:48

but that Marshaan could not stop other

2:50

people talking on Trump's behalf. Yet

2:53

no less an authority on breaking the law than Roger

2:55

Stones says no, he could that

2:57

not only did his judge impose

2:59

a gag order on him Stone for

3:02

sixteen months, but it extended

3:04

to his family. Quote. Can you imagine

3:06

a situation where Trump was gagged

3:09

but then Don Junior and Eric were

3:11

also gagged? Actually

3:13

I can. It's happened, but it was when Eric

3:15

tried to say something coherent and Juniors snorted

3:18

wrong. Apart

3:20

from the gag order, which would take

3:22

effect no later than the moment the indictment hearing

3:25

ends at mid afternoon tomorrow, there is something else

3:27

breaking. When the photographers at

3:29

the courthouse at one hundred Center Street

3:31

take Trump's mugshot, they should

3:34

probably take a second set of

3:36

photos, because it sure looks like the Special

3:38

Council is at least nearing

3:40

being ready to indict Trump on conspiracy

3:42

to obstruct justice. I went to Hollywood made

3:44

two pictures on don't like this for New York and We're like this for the Fence.

3:48

Back to tomorrow's circus in a moment,

3:50

but on the subject of this next indictment,

3:53

the one by Jack Smith, Molly

3:55

Michael has entered the chat. And

3:58

Molly Michael maybe the Stormy

4:00

Daniel's equivalent of the Special Council's

4:03

Documents case. If her

4:05

name not Daniels, but Molly Michael rings

4:07

a faint and distant bell, it's

4:09

because she was Trump's last White

4:11

House executive assistant, and she

4:14

used to have to dial his calls for him,

4:16

and she used to have to try to tell him when he was supposed

4:18

to be at a meeting, and she had to jot down

4:20

notes about his constant deviations

4:22

from his schedules and his unplanned

4:24

conversations, and by what appeared

4:27

to be chance, she was off

4:29

on the morning of January sixth, twenty

4:31

twenty one, and the House January

4:34

sixth Commission put

4:36

her on the record in a deposition,

4:38

and the big news out of that was she

4:41

testified that if Trump wanted to send an

4:43

email to almost anybody, he

4:45

would dictate it to her and

4:48

tell her to send it out from

4:50

her email account. Remember

4:53

this, So when he leaves

4:55

Washington, this Molly Michael goes

4:58

with him to Marilago. And now the Washington

5:00

Post is reporting that FBI and DOJ

5:02

quote have a mask fresh

5:05

evidence pointing to a possible obstruction

5:07

by Trump in the investigation

5:10

into top secret documents found at

5:12

his Marilago home. And guess what the

5:14

evidence turns out to be down there? In paragraph

5:17

sixteen, quote

5:21

YEP emails and texts of Molly

5:23

Michael. Michael's written communications

5:25

have provided investigators with the detailed understanding

5:28

of the day to day activity at

5:30

Marilago at critical moments

5:33

unquote. All

5:36

right, to try to simplify this, and

5:38

it's two or more crimes now, not

5:40

just the one about stealing the documents. The

5:42

timeline of the classified documents

5:45

Trump stole seems to be this one.

5:48

He stole them. Two the

5:50

National Archives asked for them back.

5:53

Three he gave some of them back and

5:55

said they had all been in his storage room

5:57

at Marilago, and that was

5:59

it. Four last May, the

6:01

Archives got the DOJ to issue

6:03

a subpoena to at all of them back. Five.

6:07

Trump then had boxes of these documents

6:09

moved from the Marilago storage

6:11

space where he said they all were. And

6:14

there is security video of this happening

6:16

and the guy carrying it for him,

6:18

Walt Nauta was his name. Six

6:21

Trump went through the contents of the boxes

6:24

himself and pulled out stuff

6:26

he decided he wanted to keep. Seven

6:29

Molly Michael's emails and texts. The

6:32

Post does not explain this, but there's only

6:34

one explanation. Molly Michael's

6:36

emails and texts must document

6:38

Trump's instructions about

6:41

the illegal moving and illegal keeping

6:43

of the documents he was holding illegally,

6:45

And maybe they document eight

6:48

his instructions to his attorney, Evan Corker,

6:50

in to write up a legal document and have Christina

6:53

Bob sign it, in which they all lied

6:56

that Trump was giving back everything he had.

6:59

That's called conspiracy to obstruct justice.

7:03

And there's also a ninth item on this timeline,

7:05

courtesy the Post story, and it's this whole

7:08

separate kind of dilly. Let

7:11

me just read it. Investigators

7:14

have also asked witnesses if Trump showed a

7:16

particular interest in material relating

7:18

to General Mark

7:20

A. Millie, the chairman of the Joint

7:22

Chiefs of Staff. People familiar with those interviews

7:25

said Millie was appointed

7:27

by Trump, but drew scorn and criticism

7:29

from Trump and his supporters after a

7:31

series of revelations in books

7:33

about Millie's efforts to reign in Trump

7:35

toward the end of his term in twenty

7:38

twenty one, Trump repeatedly complained publicly

7:40

about Millie, calling him quote an idiot.

7:44

Wait what Jack

7:46

Smith's team was already clearly putting together

7:48

obstruction of justice charges against

7:50

Trump and conspiracy to obstruct

7:53

justice, let alone whatever they

7:55

have on him for the handling of the

7:57

documents, the stealing of the documents. But

7:59

he was clearly telling the lawyers how to

8:02

lie and then yet

8:04

claim he was giving all the documents back to the government.

8:07

Now they have this whole new tranch of real

8:09

time texts and emails from

8:11

this assistant, this Molly Michael via

8:13

whose email account we know

8:16

from her testimony Trump used

8:18

to communicate when they were in the White House together,

8:21

And just for spits and giggles, they're

8:23

also asking about material relating

8:26

to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs

8:28

of Staff. The conclusion

8:30

has to be not only did

8:32

Trump steel classified documents,

8:35

at least one of which detailed a foreign

8:37

nation's nuclear capabilities, and

8:39

not only did he lie about having and keeping

8:42

them, and lie about returning them

8:44

and launch a conspiracy to get his lawyers

8:46

and god knows who else to lie about having returned

8:49

them. But there is also a paper trail

8:51

of Trump trying to get his grubby little fingers

8:53

on documents that would what smear

8:57

the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, that

8:59

he could use against the Chairman of the Joint

9:01

Chiefs, that he could give to other countries,

9:04

to you against the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, with

9:06

which he could blackmail the Chairman of the

9:08

Joint Chiefs. The

9:11

mind reels at the possibilities.

9:15

So take an extra set of mugshots Tuesday

9:17

in New York, and back to Tuesday

9:19

in New York and the spit with which Trump

9:22

apologists are flooding the zone. But

9:25

this case was dropped, but George Soros,

9:27

But you can't indict a presidential candidate. This

9:30

crap has been enough to fool the likes of even

9:33

the supposedly rational Jeb Bush,

9:35

who tweeted quote Bragg's predecessor

9:37

didn't take up the case. The Justice Department

9:40

didn't take up the case. Bragg first said

9:42

he would not take up the case. This is very political,

9:44

not a matter of justice. Please clap

9:47

unquote. And all

9:49

this time we've been thinking George was the dumber Bush

9:51

brother. I added

9:53

the please clap. He didn't tweet that. If

9:56

you need truth though, with which

9:59

to respond to this Trump stuff, first,

10:02

just keep thinking gag order. We

10:05

may have gotten a little clarification on the part

10:07

about Bragg's predecessor didn't take

10:09

up the case nonsense when that former

10:12

Manhattan DA Sivance Junior, spoke

10:14

out confirming that as they investigated

10:17

Trump over the Stormy Daniel's payoff,

10:19

federal prosecutors said to his Manhattan

10:22

DA's office, we'll take this one. Vance

10:25

was polite, even respectful,

10:28

kind of affectionate as he said this quote.

10:31

We learned from the Southern District of

10:33

New York that they asked us to stand

10:35

down. They wished that we would

10:38

put our efforts on hold. At

10:41

no point in the interview did Vance

10:44

mention the guy who was the boss

10:46

of the Southern District of New York prosecutors

10:48

at that time, the then Attorney

10:51

General William cover

10:53

Up Bar. Unfortunately,

10:56

the interviewer, the inexperienced and rather stiff

10:58

TV rookie Jensaki, did not follow

11:00

up, did not ask about Barr,

11:03

did not ask about are and

11:06

if Vance heard from Bar or

11:08

if Vance new Bar was talking

11:10

to him. Soto voce. She

11:13

did push Vance on whether or not he was

11:15

ready to indict Trump on Stormy Daniels.

11:18

Vance waffled. Vance didn't

11:20

deny it. Vance said if he had been,

11:22

it would have been knowing that the final

11:24

decision would be passed along to Alvin Bragg. He

11:27

would not answer whether a prosecution memo

11:30

was promulgated under his watch at the Manhattan

11:32

Day's Office. The apparent

11:34

inference of the entire interview,

11:36

though, was that Vance was ready to

11:38

indict Trump was held off

11:40

by bar Or his New York office, and

11:44

by that little detail that the Trump cult has

11:46

refused to acknowledge that it has been

11:48

Department of Justice tradition to not indict

11:50

a sitting president. So there's only been

11:53

twenty six months and two weeks

11:55

in which Trump could have been indicted, and

11:59

Vance was only in office for a limited

12:01

period of that time. There's also

12:03

the little question of the Federal Election Commission.

12:05

In May of twenty twenty one, it's two Republican

12:08

members blocked a move to continue

12:10

its investigation of the Stormy Daniel's

12:12

payoff. Now to the

12:14

George Soros part, well, let's not kid anybody.

12:17

This is fascist shorthand. For it's

12:19

the Jews, what done it? When

12:21

Trump calls Alvin Bragg quote handpicked

12:24

and funded by George Soros, it's one

12:26

of his anti Semitic dog whistles, which reminds

12:29

me to ask if that gag order

12:31

would cover dog whistles. But as

12:33

to the facts, soros spokesman

12:35

says, the men have never met, never

12:38

spoken, never communicated. That's

12:40

a lot of nevers. Also, Soros

12:42

never directly contributed to Bragg's campaign,

12:45

in which he upset a Democrat in the primary

12:47

who had a lot more to spend, and then got

12:50

eighty three percent of the vote in the general election.

12:53

Soros's only connection to Bragg

12:55

is a little remote, and it goes like this.

12:57

In May twenty twenty one, Soros gave a

13:00

million dollars to the Van Jones

13:02

pack dedicated to criminal justice reformat

13:04

other racial justice causes. It's called

13:06

Color of Change. Among its

13:09

many donations to progressive candidates

13:11

for district attorney posts around the country,

13:13

Color of Change donated slightly more than

13:15

half a million to Bragg's campaign. It

13:18

was going to be more than that, but

13:20

there was an uncorroborated allegation

13:22

about Bragg during the campaign, so

13:24

Color of Change cut him off.

13:27

Owen Sarrows's son and daughter

13:29

in law each donated four hundred and fifty

13:31

bucks to Bragg early in twenty twenty one,

13:34

and then ten thousand each during the primary

13:36

campaign. Now,

13:38

as to the you can't indict a presidential

13:41

candidate part, that we also keep hearing time

13:43

and time again, in just the last seven years,

13:46

one man has demanded not

13:48

just the investigation of and indictment

13:50

of four different presidential candidates,

13:53

but he has also accused each of them of

13:55

treason. The candidates were

13:57

Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama,

14:00

and John Kerry. And

14:02

the guy doing the thing about presidential candidates

14:04

that Trump apologists now say as forbidden

14:07

was, of course Trump. Former

14:10

Trump US attorney Jeffrey Burman wrote

14:12

in his book that two days after Trump accused

14:14

John Kerry of shadow diplomacy,

14:17

his US attorney's office was instructed

14:20

to look for something to charge

14:22

John Kerry with. So on

14:24

this particular pearl clutching

14:26

topic, Trump should probably

14:29

well dag so

14:32

back to tomorrow. Could Trump be under

14:35

a gag order other than

14:37

canceling his live address from the elbow

14:39

of the Palm Beaches, Marilago, Would

14:41

it really impact his martyrdom in

14:44

and out of the court hearing tomorrow. Kenny, just do the silent

14:47

movie version of Norma Desmond's Descent

14:49

down the Sunset Boulevard stairs. Is

14:52

there a chance he still might not show and

14:54

do an oj? Will Marjorie

14:57

Taylor Green draw the capacity crowd of

14:59

three hundred people to her New

15:01

York protest or will all the tickets

15:03

have been reserved by other who did what

15:05

they did to Trump at his infamous no show

15:08

rally in Tulsa. So many

15:10

questions, so many clues?

15:41

What is dewey decimal system? Thank

15:44

you Nancy Faust and as

15:46

we wait, let us enjoy the comic relief. Jim

15:48

Jordan has now talked about issuing subpoenas

15:51

to get Alvin Bragg to testify to one

15:53

of the House committees on making TV clips

15:55

for Fox. Again, if

15:58

you cannot enforce contempt of Congress

16:00

citations, you cannot force

16:03

Alvin Bragg to show up or

16:05

send you anything other than a high Hello

16:07

postcard. Also,

16:10

Jim needs to be a little bit better prepared when

16:12

he is exposed to actual journalists and

16:15

not just news Max or Fox sycophants.

16:18

Listen to this on his way

16:20

into a GOP gathering in Florida.

16:22

It's not new. It's just

16:25

I hadn't heard this before. And it's so wonderfully

16:27

bad that Jordan wound up

16:29

resorting to every excuse except

16:32

denying that he speaks English. You

16:34

don't know what the charges up against. No, it

16:36

was on the way you guys have tall us. I mean, that's all a jumping

16:40

to conclusions. I mean, you might have broken the law because

16:42

that concerned you. We don't think. We don't

16:44

think broke the law at all. About.

16:46

What concerned me is what they're going to do based

16:49

on what's been reported. You have any

16:51

evidence that federal friends were used

16:53

here we're asking about. That's not something that's

16:55

what we're requiring any

16:58

local investigations. No,

17:00

this is a little different. I think help the guys

17:03

he's running for president. What

17:09

the president's calls for protests? That

17:11

is that something that you do you think is support?

17:15

And that's uh, that's a that's a that's

17:18

when Jim vanished. Vanish van vanished, no

17:20

doubt, in search of his jacket missing now

17:22

for these last sixteen years since

17:25

he succeeded the late Ohio Congressman

17:27

Mike Oxley. Wait,

17:29

what Mike, and

17:32

let's circle back to where we began. Let's say the

17:34

Daily Mail is on the money and Judge Juan Marshawn

17:37

is prepared to issue a gag order sometime

17:39

today or tomorrow against Trump. What

17:42

about his family? No,

17:44

no gag order against this family. Keep them

17:46

talking. A social media

17:48

thread of Trump supporters next

17:51

to video of Trump Junior has

17:53

realized the awful truth. Junior

17:56

has been replaced by

17:59

a body double. Quote

18:01

looked like a mask. He must be in a safe

18:03

location. Also, his teeth are wrong, then

18:07

sup with his neck? Then something

18:10

crazy up with his eyes. His pupils

18:12

don't look right, and they look very long and

18:14

not round. Yes, he's been replaced

18:17

by a body double. That's what's wrong

18:19

with his pupils. Nothing

18:21

simpler, and

18:25

he's still not the most hilarious. Trump

18:27

brother Eric Trump, Saturday

18:29

Fox and Friends quote, Guys, I

18:31

have to tell you I was on a plane. I was

18:33

on a commercial flight when this whole indictment

18:35

broke. People were coming up to me giving me hugs.

18:39

Well, of course they were, Eric, given how your

18:42

father hates you. They just assumed that you'd be as

18:44

happy that he got indicted

18:46

as they were. Same

18:48

interview, Eric Trump actually topped

18:50

that. He says, the Democrats

18:53

quote weaponized the legal system.

18:55

They've literally weaponized every institution

18:57

that we have in this country, whether it be the military,

19:00

whether it be the DOJ, whether it be the FBA.

19:03

Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait. They've

19:05

literally weaponized every institution

19:08

that we have in this country, whether

19:10

it be the military.

19:13

Eric Trump has accused Democrats

19:16

of weaponizing the

19:18

military. For God's

19:20

sake, no gag order

19:23

for Fredo, please keep

19:26

him talking. Still

19:41

ahead of us in this edition a countdown. What will

19:43

you remember from the women's college basketball

19:45

championship game? How about a

19:47

classless gesture made by the MVP

19:51

towards her star opponent, who

19:53

had herself made a classless gesture

19:55

two games previously. Yea

19:58

sportsmanship in worse persons.

20:00

Marjorie Taylor Green is given a platform

20:03

by CBS News and six minutes

20:05

to twice repeat the libel that quote

20:07

Democrats are pedophiles unquote.

20:10

What does Leslie Stall do when this big,

20:13

slow moving softball floats up

20:15

before her eyes and she has only to connect

20:17

with it to end Barney Rubble's congressional

20:19

career. She whiffs

20:23

And then what will happen if there

20:25

is no gag order and Trump gives

20:27

his speech tomorrow night, Will Fox cover it

20:29

live? How about CNN, NBC,

20:31

ABC, CBS with

20:34

Marjorie Taylor Green anchoring the

20:37

nightmares prophesigned by a movie

20:39

from nineteen seventy six continue

20:41

to unfold now for a forty

20:44

seventh year. That's next.

20:46

This discountdown. This

20:53

is Countdown with Keith Olberman.

21:09

This is Sports

21:11

Center. Wait, check that not

21:14

anymore. This is

21:17

Countdown with Keith

21:20

Alberman in Sports

21:22

Angel. Reese and Caitlin Clark

21:24

are star women's college basketball players.

21:27

In an Elite eight playoff game,

21:29

Clark of Iowa scored forty

21:31

points and had triple double and made a wrestling

21:33

gesture towards her opponents, meaning

21:36

you can't see me. Last

21:38

night, Reese and LSU beat Clark

21:40

and Iowa for the national title one hundred and two

21:42

to eighty five, and Reese made the same gesture

21:44

two Clark and added another

21:46

one indicating she was getting

21:49

the championship ring. Reese was named

21:51

MVP of the tournament. And I'm not sure

21:53

anybody will remember that, nor the fact that

21:55

LSU won the title, just the fact that

21:57

women's hoops has now achieved parody with

22:00

the Men It's Stars can also

22:02

beat classless winners who are willing to overshadow

22:04

their own team's ultimate victories.

22:08

On the morning of Wednesday, November twenty

22:10

twenty two, the Philadelphia Phillies were still celebrating

22:12

their seven nothing win over the Houston Astros to

22:14

take a two games to one lead in the World Series.

22:17

Two more wins and two more games

22:19

at home and they would have the title.

22:22

That night, they got no

22:24

hit by four Houston pitchers, series

22:27

was tied. Then they lost Game five, three to

22:29

two, then Game six four

22:31

to one to lose the World

22:33

Series they had led. The twenty

22:35

twenty three baseball season opened last Thursday,

22:38

and the Phillies scored five runs off the new

22:40

Texas ace Jacob deGrom, formerly

22:42

of the New York Mets, and lost the game

22:44

eleven to seven. Then they lost

22:47

their second game to Texas sixteen

22:49

to three. Then last night

22:51

they lost to Texas two to one. As

22:53

I suggested last November, sometimes teams

22:56

go to sleep on top of the world, but wake up

22:58

ready for Old Timer's Day. It

23:00

may have happened to the Phillies. Then

23:02

time for the monthly Nightmare story about James

23:05

Dolan, owner of the New York Knicks, New York

23:07

Rangers, Madison Square Garden, Radio City Music

23:09

Hall, and, despite stiff competition

23:12

over the course of three different centuries,

23:14

the worst owner in the history of New

23:17

York sports. Latest, as

23:19

New York investigates canceling Dolan's

23:21

annual forty two million dollar tax break

23:23

on Madison Square Garden or whatever the number

23:26

is, the New York Post is reporting Dolan

23:28

has been sued over allegations

23:31

that he short changed investors and

23:33

spied on employees. The Post

23:36

says securities filings indicate

23:38

Dolan made a settlement of eighty five million

23:40

dollars with shareholders of MSG

23:43

Entertainment when he had that company

23:45

by MSG Television Networks.

23:48

Now he's still being sued by

23:50

shareholders of the network

23:53

he allegedly short changed both sides

23:55

of the same deal. Post

23:57

also says that when employees of the arena

23:59

that Dolan is building in Las Vegas warned

24:02

that costs there were running very high

24:04

and or over budget by at least half a billion

24:06

dollars, Dolan had other employees

24:08

spy on their emails and secretly

24:11

record their conversations. A

24:13

reminder for Jim Dolan. New York's

24:16

first great sports owner was named

24:18

John B. Day, a

24:20

tobacco millionaire. He not only owned

24:22

the original New York Mets, but founded

24:25

the New York now San Francisco Giants in

24:27

eighteen eighty three and built the

24:29

famous Polo Grounds for them.

24:32

By eighteen ninety three, a decade later,

24:34

he was virtually bankrupt had to sell the Giants

24:37

at In nineteen ten, John B. Day returned

24:39

to the Polo Grounds as a ticket

24:42

taker for five dollars

24:44

a game. Hi,

24:47

I'm Jim Dolan. Welcome Madison Square Garden.

24:50

You want mustard on your hotdog? Relish

25:08

still ahead. So

25:10

the movie network came back

25:12

into my head over the weekend because

25:14

of what happens if there is no Trump dag

25:16

order and he gives that speech after being

25:18

indicted tomorrow. Coming up next

25:21

on things I promised not to tell first

25:23

time For the daily roundup of the misgrants, morons

25:25

and Dunning Kruger effect specimens who constitute

25:27

today's worst persons in the world Lebronze,

25:32

we have Fox quote News unquote.

25:34

Britain's version of it is gb News,

25:37

and it's nine PM host is named Dan Ruten

25:41

Wooten and he tweeted. Biden

25:44

planning to snub the coronation of King

25:46

Charles tells you everything you need to know about how

25:48

one of the worst presidents in modern

25:50

history feels about the United Kingdom. Shame

25:53

on him. No

25:56

American president has ever attended

25:58

a British coronation, and there have been seven

26:00

of them since we repudiated

26:04

the down that they're gonna put on Charles's

26:06

head. This was pointed

26:08

out to this routing fella,

26:10

and he doubled down, and he retweeted somebody

26:12

else saying it didn't matter, because what it is

26:15

is Biden hates England and traveling is so much

26:17

easier, which is about as dumb as if somebody on Fox

26:19

said, well, look, if King Charles is offended and

26:21

he really wants Biden to be there, he should just hold

26:23

his coronation in Wilmington, Delaware. Runners

26:27

up Jim Jordan and Maria bartar Romo. Bartar

26:30

Romo turns out has learned nothing from

26:32

the dominion defamation suit, which is not surprising

26:34

because she's an adult and Jordan

26:37

still has not found his jacket. Actual

26:39

conversation between them yesterday, We're

26:42

gonna have to look at the appropriations

26:45

process and limit funds going to the some of

26:47

the these agencies, to which

26:49

bartar Romo says, the

26:51

DOJ and the FBI,

26:54

and Jordan answers, yeah, and everybody

26:57

watching the clip says, my god, Jim

26:59

Jordan just called for a defunding law enforcement

27:02

alert the media. But

27:05

the winners, unfortunately, the great Leslie

27:07

Stall and sixty Minutes and CBS

27:10

News, not only did they give a platform

27:12

to the dangerous and demented Marjorie

27:14

Barney Rubble, but boy did

27:16

they treat her as if she were just colorful.

27:19

I mean this pains me because Leslie has

27:21

always been nice to me in sixty Minutes once did a

27:24

very nice profile on me Susan

27:26

Spencer, if I remember correctly, But this was bad.

27:29

In the studio open Stall called

27:32

Green quote famous and referred to Green's

27:34

quote celebrity some say notoriety,

27:36

and called her smart and fearless.

27:41

I don't know about the smart. In the interview,

27:43

she never once asked Green about the pipe bombs,

27:46

and she didn't ask her about giving away Pelosi's

27:48

location during the coup

27:51

attempt, and she didn't ask her about the request

27:53

for a pardon. She didn't ask her at all about January

27:56

sixth, and she let Green twice

27:58

reiterate that quote Democrats

28:00

are pedophiles unquote. Leslie

28:02

simply made an absurd fate an

28:05

iroll asking if she could really mean that,

28:07

rather than saying by definition

28:09

pedophiles or people who have sex with children,

28:11

either you say now that you believe all

28:14

Democrats have sex with children or retract

28:16

it. She didn't

28:18

do that, and because she didn't do that, the

28:20

far right is now celebrating the fact that Leslie

28:22

Stall let Marjorie Taylor Green say

28:25

that quote Democrats have sex with children on

28:27

CBS CBS

28:29

News and Leslie Stall an

28:32

I roll is not enough to stop

28:34

a lying psychopath like Marjorie

28:36

Taylor Green. Shame on all of

28:38

you today's worst persons

28:40

in the world. To

28:55

the number one story on the Countdown, and this one

28:57

is long enough that it's going to take up one and a half blocks

29:00

of the show. But it pertains to Trump and

29:02

what we may see Tuesday night if there is

29:04

no gag order against him. And

29:07

it is sobering. When I

29:09

did elections on MSNBC, and I was

29:11

the primary anchor from two thousand and six or

29:13

two ten, which between the presidential,

29:15

midterm and primaries. I must have done thirty

29:17

knights of elections. Mark lakasowich

29:21

was the executive producer, had

29:23

the right feel for it, though I could never talk him

29:25

out of the big flowery exit bumps that we ran

29:27

before the commercials. I would ask, why are you giving them more

29:29

time to change channels? Luke? Anyway,

29:31

he's now the dean of the communications school

29:34

at Hofstra University and they have a good

29:36

one and boy, could NBC use

29:38

him now? And yesterday Luke tweeted

29:41

this Tuesday's Trump post

29:43

indictment address is a test for TV

29:45

news orgs organizations.

29:47

He will lie. There is no justification

29:50

for platforming liars and their lies

29:52

on live television. There are many reasons

29:54

not to your organization's credibility.

29:57

For one, watch, analyze,

29:59

then report, unquote

30:02

exactly. Sadly,

30:05

if the speech happens, I am confident

30:07

that at least Fox and CNN will run

30:10

it, maybe the broadcast networks too. And their argument

30:12

now, their excuse will be that it's

30:14

history, that it's an ex president getting his

30:16

sorry ass indicted. As

30:19

Mark Lacasowitz points out, not

30:21

good enough. But this is where

30:23

we are in television news and this was forecast

30:26

long ago by the greatest movie

30:28

ever made, Network, the

30:30

Patty Chayevsky film about

30:32

the network anchorman who announces he has been

30:34

fired for low ratings and thus

30:37

he has decided to kill himself, whereupon

30:39

his ratings go up, and

30:41

then he begins to give voice to what are

30:44

either extra worldly prophecies

30:47

and warnings or the pure ravings

30:49

of unadulterated insanity. The

30:52

movie stars Peter Finch as the newscaster,

30:54

William Holden as his best friend, the network

30:56

news boss, Fade Dunaway as the

30:58

network programmer who sees in the newscast

31:01

a goldmine, and Robert Duval as

31:03

the ambitious new network workhead who

31:05

sees in the newscast his ticket to the corporate

31:08

boardroom. When I first

31:10

saw Network as a seventeen year

31:12

old aspiring TV broadcaster, my

31:14

jaw dropped and it stayed that

31:16

way, and in the last forty

31:18

six plus years, my

31:20

jaw has barely moved from

31:23

that position high hills

31:27

anymore. The world of TV news

31:29

that Network predicted was not unthinkable

31:31

in nineteen seventy six, but

31:34

it was a nightmare today.

31:36

Virtually everything Chayavsky saw

31:38

in the future has come true and is accepted

31:41

as conservative broadcasting.

31:43

The movie was so prophetic, but

31:46

younger viewers sometimes see the quality

31:48

of the film and its artistry and its genius, but

31:50

they can't imagine what the big deal was about

31:52

its content. It's just showing TV

31:54

news the way it's always been. So

31:57

a while ago, I sat down and watched

31:59

Network, and I took notes. I

32:02

counted twenty three major things

32:04

about TV news that we're not true

32:07

when Network came out, but are true

32:09

now, and they cover basically

32:12

everything in the business. First

32:14

of these the on air breakdown

32:16

of a newscaster, Peter Finch's Howard Beale

32:18

announces he's going to shoot himself on the

32:21

air in one week. There was

32:23

a local news anchor named Christine Chubbuck

32:25

who had already shot herself during a newscast

32:28

in Sarasota in nineteen seventy four, but

32:30

she did not give advance warning nor

32:32

show any indication of emotional distress.

32:35

Sadly, tragically, she just did

32:37

it. But after Network,

32:40

things began to come apart at the seams

32:42

in local news and network news. In nineteen

32:44

eighty eight, after reporter Bree Walker

32:46

of New York's Channel two news had

32:49

concluded a story on birth defects,

32:51

Veteran anchor Jim Jensen questioned

32:53

her at length about a hand and foot

32:55

deformity which she herself suffered

32:58

from, and whether or not her parents

33:00

would have aborted her had they known

33:02

in advance she had the condition. Shortly

33:05

afterwards, Jensen, who had been on the air in New York

33:07

forever, entered a rehab center

33:10

for treatment of alcohol, prescription drug

33:12

and cocaine abuse and depression.

33:15

Later in two thousand and four, Dan Harris

33:17

had a live panic attack on ABC's

33:20

Good Morning America, losing his breath then cutting

33:22

his newscast short. Second

33:25

of the Prophecies Network posited that such

33:27

a breakdown would lead not to treatment nor

33:29

removal from a broadcast, but to greater

33:32

success. Fifteen years

33:34

ago, Glenn Beck began to regularly

33:37

weep on the air. If

33:39

that was not an indication of emotional trouble,

33:42

it might have been the attempt to convey that

33:44

feeling legitimate or contrived.

33:46

Beck was rewarded

33:49

and the ABC newscaster I just mentioned,

33:51

Dan Harris would go on to do a World News

33:53

Tonight feature on his own

33:55

on air breakdown. Third

33:58

prophecy, when Howard Beale first tells

34:00

his boss, Max Schumacher played by William

34:02

Holden, that he will kill himself on the air. Schumacher

34:05

goes off on a drunken flight of fancy about

34:07

a new Sunday night news show he called

34:10

in his mind the Death Hour,

34:12

Suicides, assassinations, mad

34:14

bombers, mafia hitman, automobile

34:16

smashups, he says, and a

34:19

terrorist of the Week. Schumacher's

34:22

utterly dystopian forecast has not

34:24

made air yet, but the

34:26

terrorism of nine to eleven did play out

34:29

live on all networks, and parts

34:31

of that terrorism are repeated minimally

34:34

annually. Much of

34:36

a network like True TV consisted

34:38

of programs that were merely edited highlights

34:41

of disasters, centering, in fact, largely

34:43

on, as Max Schumacher phrased

34:45

it, automobile smashups. The

34:48

fourth network Prophecy Beal

34:50

swears repeatedly during his newscasts.

34:53

In the last few years, CNN in

34:55

particular, has made the decision to quote

34:57

words that would have been bleeped less

35:00

than a decade ago, and at least

35:02

one broadcast television program, The Late Late

35:04

Show with Craig Ferguson on CBS,

35:06

produced its show live to tape with an

35:08

audience and in real time

35:10

let the hosts swear copiously

35:13

and then would bleep him just as copiously

35:16

for the broadcast itself. Maybe the

35:18

scripted swear in the newscast

35:20

is not far away. Fifth

35:23

of the network prophecies. Newscasts

35:25

did not do stories about other

35:28

newscasts before network premiered.

35:31

When Beale announces his intention to kill

35:33

himself, all of New York's local ten

35:35

and eleven PM newscasts made

35:37

it their lead story at

35:40

this point, and in ensuing years,

35:42

even monumental retirements

35:44

such as Chet Huntley's retirement in NBC

35:47

in nineteen seventy or Walter Cronkite's

35:49

retirement from CBS in nineteen eighty one,

35:51

had only merited the briefest of footnotes

35:54

on rival network programs. But

35:56

by the time of Peter Jennings lung cancer

35:58

announcement in two thousand and five, a newscast

36:01

or newscaster could become

36:03

the lead story on another newscast.

36:05

Indeed, when I left MSNBC

36:08

in January twenty eleven, announcing

36:10

it mid show, CNN's

36:12

Anderson Cooper three sixty

36:15

not only led its live broadcast

36:17

at ten pm ET with it

36:19

it devoted a dumbfounding

36:22

twenty two minutes to something

36:24

that would have been ignored even a decade

36:26

before. Understand how long twenty

36:28

two minutes is on CNN. I

36:31

retired from the broadcast countdown

36:33

on MSNBC and was able to get

36:36

home before he was

36:38

done covering the story of my retiring

36:40

from the broadcast

36:42

sixth and this was the

36:45

key to everything in

36:47

network And since network, Penny

36:50

Chayevsky and his script

36:52

forecast a moment in which newscasts

36:55

would be required to make money.

36:57

It had not been that way before

36:59

news divisions were considered public service.

37:02

The price the networks paid to make billions

37:04

of entertainment shows. Robert

37:06

Duval as Frank Hackett, the

37:08

executive, attacks UBS's

37:11

quote credit news division and its annual

37:13

thirty three million dollar deficit. As

37:15

Hackett later tells UBS stockholders,

37:18

in effect, the news division would be reduced

37:20

from an independent division to a department

37:23

accountable to network. After

37:25

CBS was sold in nineteen eighty seven,

37:28

the news budget was cut in half, and the

37:30

moment arrived newscast from there on in

37:32

had to be profitable. In two

37:35

twelve, NBC took it to a new level

37:37

by appointing a programming executive with

37:39

no news experience to oversee

37:41

all news on all of its networks,

37:44

stations, and even local cable systems.

37:47

The reason Padaychavsky could

37:49

see this when others could not was

37:52

that he had worked in live television drama

37:54

in the nineteen fifties, particularly on one show

37:56

called You Are There, in which

37:59

CBS news reporters and actors

38:01

re enacted great moments from history. The

38:03

newscasters could make extra cash on the

38:05

side, and the network made huge profits.

38:08

The host of You Are There,

38:10

half news, half entertainment

38:13

was Walter Cronkite.

38:17

The seventh network prophecy criminals

38:19

videotaping their own crimes.

38:21

A series in network is created

38:23

after a terrorist group called the Ecumenical

38:26

Liberation Army shoots film

38:28

of its own members robbing a bank. This

38:31

was inconceivable in nineteen

38:33

seventy six, yet is today a facet

38:35

of every act, from the simplest self

38:38

taped vandalism uploaded to YouTube,

38:40

to actual terrorist attacks, recordings

38:43

of which are made by and then disseminated

38:45

to news organizations by the perpetrators.

38:48

The eighth prophecy of network television

38:50

news as rage quote

38:53

the American people want somebody to articulate

38:56

their rage for them, says Faye Dunaway's

38:58

character Diana Christiansen, relative

39:00

to cable news in particular, does

39:03

this even require me to elaborate

39:05

at all? Ninth Christensen,

39:08

not a news executive, is then given

39:10

control over and permission

39:12

to program Beal's newscast,

39:15

the UBS Evening News. Although

39:17

there was a history of news personnel being

39:19

involved in entertainment programming, Edward

39:21

R. Murrow also did an interview show called

39:23

Person to Person Evening newscast

39:26

were sacrosancd Today

39:28

the fiction may be maintained that they're still

39:30

sacro sancd, But since the advent of

39:32

the consultant on the local news level

39:34

in the late nineteen seventies and early eighties, more

39:37

and more decisions about not just who does

39:39

the news, but what goes on the news

39:41

have been made by non news

39:43

executives. The tenth

39:45

prophecy, Diana Christensen also

39:48

foretells the various genres of five

39:50

nights a week network programming that

39:52

didn't happen before network. She sees

39:54

a profit center in a chiefly produced,

39:56

low budget program that can run Monday

39:59

through Friday, and which happens to be about

40:02

the news. The other networks

40:04

try to find their own outlandish newscasts

40:07

and run them five nights a week. Pandachevsky

40:10

is now anticipating every genre of

40:12

craze that followed in news, from

40:14

nightline to Dateline, to Who Wants to Be

40:16

a Millionaire? To American Idol to

40:19

the NBC two thousand and nine experiment

40:21

in which they put Jay Leno on for a comedy

40:24

show every night at ten pm.

40:27

The eleventh Prophecy network

40:29

anticipates government deregulation

40:32

and what it would do to TV. When

40:35

the UVS president objects to a pornographic

40:38

network news show and warrens the FCC

40:40

had kill us Robert duval as

40:42

Hackett dismisses him and the

40:44

FCC and foretells the declawing

40:47

of the commission. The FCC can't do

40:49

anything except wrap our knuckles again,

40:52

does anything the FCC has not done

40:54

in post network television? Need

40:57

any detail from me? Twelfth

41:00

news commentary devolving into rants

41:03

and takes? Wait? What

41:05

did I write here? News commentary

41:08

devolves into rants and takes.

41:11

I've never heard any news commentator

41:13

ranting what the hell is this? The

41:16

rest of this rant about the relevance of the Movie

41:18

Network. Right after this, before

41:26

the break, I was about halfway through my look

41:28

at the remarkably prescient nineteen seventy

41:30

six Film Network, which foresaw things

41:32

we thought impossible then, ranging

41:35

from TV news covering TV news

41:37

as news, to terrorists

41:39

videotaping their own terror and giving it two

41:41

newscasts, to the twelfth

41:44

thing that network foretold, the evolution

41:47

or devolution of news commentary

41:49

into takes and rants. What

41:53

in substance are we proposing, new

41:55

network chief Hackett asks his horrified

41:57

colleagues. Then he answers his own question,

42:00

merely to add editorial comment to our

42:02

news show. Brinkley SEVERI

42:04

reasoner all have their comments now,

42:06

Howard Beale will have his. Hackett's

42:09

erasure of a line between nuanced,

42:12

thoughtful scripts of commentary agonized

42:14

over by commentators, producers, and executives

42:17

and ad libbed madness foresaw

42:20

the similar real life change. Not

42:22

merely were comments added to newscasts,

42:25

but the standards for what constituted useful

42:28

public commentary dropped from an age's

42:30

old tradition of newspaper editorials

42:32

and columnists to verbal

42:34

graffiti spontaneously letting

42:37

out his anger. The thirteenth

42:39

Network prophecy, newscasters and commentators

42:42

never used to claim that God told

42:44

them what to say. Though

42:47

Beale specifically quotes the voice who

42:49

tells him to tell the people the truth as

42:51

also saying that that voice is not God.

42:54

Beale still says he feels quote

42:56

imbued and connected

42:58

to all living things.

43:00

The leap for a commentator from

43:03

hearing your inner voice to

43:05

hearing somebody else's

43:07

inner voice was preposterous

43:10

enough as it was, but reality took

43:12

it further. While Glenn Beck

43:14

may not have claimed God was writing

43:16

his commentaries for him, in

43:18

April twenty twelve, according to the ut

43:21

San Diego News, he told

43:23

an audience in Rancho, San Diego that God

43:26

did tell him to quit

43:28

his job at Fox News Channel. On

43:30

the day he decided to leave, they wrote,

43:33

Beck said he walked up to a floor to ceiling

43:35

window in his New York apartment and asked his wife,

43:37

how could this possibly be God's plan?

43:40

As I stood there, the Lord whispered to

43:42

me. If you do not leave now,

43:45

you will lose your soul. Beck said

43:47

it was the easiest decision I've

43:49

ever made. Beck also

43:52

later announced that God not only wantedmit

43:54

Romney to be president, but had put him

43:56

behind in the polls so that when Romney

43:59

won, everyone would see a modern miracle.

44:02

Had that one turn out for you, Glenn, the

44:04

fourteenth Network prophecy, Network accurately

44:07

predicted that journalists would stop throwing themselves

44:09

in front of professional train wrecks. The

44:12

same year that network was released,

44:14

a House committee wanted correspond at Daniel

44:17

Shore of CBS News to testify

44:19

about where he got a copy of a secret

44:21

report. He refused. CBS

44:24

pressured him to testify, so he

44:27

quit. He quit his job,

44:30

but Network foretold that Shore

44:32

would be among the last to do something like that.

44:35

William Holden's Max Schumacher tries to

44:37

derail the Howard Beal Prophecy and

44:39

Rage newscast by telling Robert

44:41

Duval's Frank Hackett, you want me out of here, You're gonna

44:43

have to drag me out of here, kicking and screaming

44:46

in the whole news division, kicking and screaming with me.

44:48

Hackett dismisses him. You

44:51

think they're going to quit their jobs for you. Not in

44:53

this recession, buddy. The premise

44:56

of the integrity of news people

44:58

was as widely held as the

45:00

integrity and inviolability of a

45:02

news division, and yet in each

45:05

downsizing, redesigning, and bulbliterization

45:08

of the old standard concept of news.

45:10

Again, Patty Chayevski foresaw

45:13

correctly the number of public

45:15

protests, let alone public exits,

45:18

has been negligible in the last thirty

45:20

years. Dan rather railed

45:22

against the gutting of CBS in nineteen

45:24

eighty seven. That's been about it,

45:27

And for all the other good things Dan has done,

45:30

he didn't quit his job. Fifteenth

45:33

Network foresaw reality television

45:35

and the staging of news. When

45:37

Christiansen meets with the activist Lorraine

45:40

Hobbs and her attorneys to program their

45:42

terrorism show, The Moutsay Tongue Hour,

45:44

she's not merely reflecting the coming amorality

45:47

of reality television, nor just amplifying

45:50

the already extant if it bleeds it

45:52

leads mantra of local news.

45:54

Through her, Patty Chayevski is also foretelling

45:57

a time when television would begin

45:59

not to cover the news, but to

46:02

orchestrate it. If the networks

46:04

have yet to actually be guilty of misprision

46:06

of a penalty regarding terrorists,

46:08

we hope, surely on a lesser

46:10

scale than nineteen ninety two NBC scandal

46:13

over faked video of Chevy trucks

46:15

exploding after collisions confirms

46:17

the basic premise of adding programming

46:19

helper to the actual news. Somewhat

46:22

more remotely. Event recreations

46:24

were once absolutely impermissible

46:27

in news, they are now one

46:29

of its staples. There

46:31

are eight more prophecies, and they

46:33

all fall into one category. Howard

46:36

Beal's revised newscast, The Network News

46:38

Hour, has components in it, eight

46:40

of them that would have been thought absurd

46:43

in any newscast anywhere the

46:45

day that the Film Network premiered in nineteen

46:47

seventy six. Number one, it

46:50

has a studio audience. Countless

46:53

newscasts, particularly on cable, have

46:56

now used studio audiences.

46:58

MSNBC's Donahue did it nightly

47:00

in two thousand and two two thousand and three.

47:03

Others like Anders Cooper and

47:05

Chris Matthews and Chris Hayes have

47:07

experimented with it. Number

47:09

two, predicting the news

47:12

on the Beal Show, Sybil the Soothsayer

47:15

actually predicts the news.

47:18

Well, nobody has done that yet, not

47:20

literally. But what does every

47:22

specialty newscast, especially political

47:24

ones, do in its last broadcast

47:27

before Monday Almost invariably

47:29

there is some kind of prediction or

47:31

forecast for the week ahead what to

47:33

look for, and if it is not institutionalized

47:36

in that distinct manner, the show

47:39

still contains pundits who do nothing but

47:42

forecast tomorrow's news. As

47:44

long ago as nineteen ninety eight, we would try

47:46

on Thursday Night to guests

47:49

where the Clinton Lewinsky story

47:51

was going and what we could give them

47:54

to put in the prerecorded promos

47:57

that would run on Monday, three

47:59

days later. Number

48:02

three Trial Obsessed TV News.

48:04

There is a Howard Beal segment called Jim

48:06

Webbing and His It's the Emis

48:09

Truth Department. The script is a little

48:11

vague. We don't know. Is

48:13

the Emis Truth a series of hard to believe

48:16

news stories. Does the giant logo

48:18

behind Jim Webbing of Justice carrying

48:20

her scales suggests it's a regular

48:22

report on trials and the law. Or is

48:25

the emphasis on Emis as

48:27

in, you've been lied to. Here's

48:29

the real truth, not the cover up? Which

48:32

is it? Well? Does it matter? Which? Do

48:35

we not have all of them? Concurrently

48:38

every hour fourth

48:41

public sexual Scandal coverage.

48:43

Another Beal segment stars Miss

48:45

Matta Harry and her skeletons in the closet

48:48

and she stands in front of a giant keyhole.

48:51

This is something beyond just gossip, and

48:53

it has become the sustaining joy of

48:55

all newscasts, from the cheesiest

48:58

local station to PBS

49:00

the public sex scandal, Asked

49:03

Bill Clinton, ask Madison

49:06

Cawthorne. Fifth

49:08

opinion polls, as news Beale

49:11

has a regular segment called vox populi,

49:13

the calculation and reporting a public

49:15

opinion. This one is the hardest to explain

49:18

to younger viewers of the film network, But

49:20

the idea of running polls,

49:23

especially polls conducted by

49:25

the news organization that would then televise

49:28

the results of those polls, was laughable

49:31

when Chayavsky saw it coming. Now,

49:33

TV news organizations like MSNBC

49:36

will not only employ somewhat reliable

49:38

polling morning, noon, and night, but they'll

49:40

also employ text polls in

49:43

which viewers are asked if a particular Republican

49:45

is a evil or be just

49:48

stupid. Moreover, every

49:50

newscast believes in relies on and

49:52

most of them commission their own polling

49:55

for everything and treats the results

49:58

as breaking news. Guilty

50:00

is charged here, I did it, then

50:03

I do it In this podcast. At six

50:06

the corporate influence. Beal opens

50:09

the first edition of The Network News Hour with

50:11

the death of network president Ed

50:13

Ruddy and the ascent of Frank Hackett

50:16

and the full control of UBS by

50:18

the company. Cca

50:20

Bal asks, when the twelfth largest

50:22

company in the world controls the most awesome,

50:25

goddamn propaganda fos in the whole godless

50:27

world, who knows what blank

50:30

will be pedaled for truth on this network?

50:33

The cross promotion between GE

50:36

and NBC and its

50:38

various networks and channels, or Universal

50:41

Studios when the former owned the ladder,

50:44

or between Disney Networks and Disney

50:46

products, ABC, ESPN,

50:49

the cross quotation of one news

50:51

corp print entity by a news

50:53

corp broadcast entity or Fox News

50:56

and the like. That was only the start.

50:59

But what is Fox News? What

51:02

is oa N? What is Newsmax?

51:04

What is a serious coverage of the entire

51:06

big lie about the twenty twenty

51:09

presidential election? You

51:11

think those are the newscasters thinking

51:13

all that up? It is exactly what

51:15

Chayevsky had Beale warn of.

51:18

What if the corporations own all

51:20

the television networks and tell you

51:23

what they the corporations want you to

51:25

hear seven

51:27

direct involvement of corporate CEOs

51:30

in news content. Well,

51:32

I know of no meeting in which a real life

51:34

equivalent to the Ned Baity character, one

51:36

of the great characters in motion picture history,

51:39

Arthur Jensen, preaches fire and

51:41

brimstone to Howard Beale to get

51:43

him to do what he Jensen wants.

51:46

But I can tell

51:48

you, without fear of contradiction,

51:51

as a witness to this, that

51:53

corporate CEOs will tell

51:56

individual newscasters what they

51:58

want personally, directly and

52:00

with the threat of retribution spoken

52:02

or otherwise. Just yesterday

52:05

here I mentioned Jeff Immelt, the

52:07

head of GE in the summer of two thousand

52:09

and nine, during the well publicized GE

52:12

swoon over MSNBC's

52:14

criticism of Immelt's friends at Fox

52:16

News. Eventually it was all

52:18

resolved when Immelt had

52:21

me come up to the private GE

52:24

NBC dining room a top

52:26

thirty Rock in New York City along with

52:28

NBC President Jeff Zucker to hash

52:30

it all out. This

52:32

thing lasted two hours. When

52:35

I finally asked Immelt, is

52:37

this a question of never criticizing Fox

52:39

again? Or how much we criticize

52:41

Fox? He said how much?

52:44

And I said, well, I can do less,

52:46

and he said, well great, really, then

52:48

it's resolved. Let's eat.

52:51

And that's when Immelt confirmed that

52:54

he had met on this topic with Rupert Murdoch,

52:56

the CEO of News Corp, and that Jeff Zucker

52:59

had met with Roger Ales, who ran Fox

53:01

News, to discuss what the

53:03

Fox Corporation and the NBC

53:05

Corporation would and would not allow

53:08

their television networks to report about each

53:10

other. Eight Lastly,

53:14

assassination spoiler

53:17

alert about the movie network. I don't think

53:20

anybody has actually been killed by his

53:22

own bosses for having lousy

53:24

ratings, but the moral

53:26

equivalent character assassination

53:28

of a network's own newscasters. That

53:31

is a regular technique to

53:33

undermine them, to discipline

53:35

them, to make them more malleable, to get

53:37

away with firing them. In

53:40

Aaron Sorkin's newsroom, his employers

53:42

were themselves leaking gossip

53:44

about their newscaster, played by Jeff Daniels,

53:47

to the tabloid newspaper they also

53:49

owned. But I know

53:52

for a fact that past bosses of mine

53:54

at NBC leaked to The New York

53:56

Post in hopes of making me fear from my

53:58

job when Current TV

54:00

tried to fire me to get out of having to

54:02

pay me roughly fifteen million

54:04

dollars. It still owed me. It actually hired

54:07

a former White House spin doctor

54:09

to make up and spread stories

54:11

with his contacts about me in

54:14

hopes of getting themselves off the financial

54:16

hook. If

54:19

you have never seen the movie, Network,

54:21

all that I've been through in the last twenty minutes

54:23

probably makes it sound like some sort of drab,

54:25

almost academic treatise on declining

54:28

journalistic values and personal

54:30

moral decay. While it's

54:32

anything but that. It is exciting, hilarious,

54:35

surprising, terrifying, and it's virtually

54:37

perfect, with brilliant acting

54:40

and a subtle but perceptible sense

54:42

that everybody in the film and everybody

54:44

watching the film is detaching

54:47

slowly and slowly

54:49

and more slowly, detaching

54:52

from reality and the reliable world

54:54

they thought they knew with every

54:56

passing minute of the film. But

54:59

mostly it's just a great flick. If

55:01

you have not seen it, see it now.

55:04

To paraphries for Finch as be so,

55:07

turn off this podcast and go watch Network.

55:09

Turn it off now, turn it off right now, turn

55:12

it off and leave it off. Turn it off right in the middle

55:14

of a sentence, I'm speaking to you now all

55:29

right, mus madness, I've done all

55:31

the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening,

55:33

Thank you a lot. Friday's

55:35

Countdown set a record with fifty

55:38

nine thousand, nine hundred and twenty one downloads.

55:40

We're just under three hundred and seventeen thousand,

55:43

four hundred for the week, and relative

55:45

to the million a month benchmark,

55:47

March saw this thing downloaded one

55:50

million, two hundred forty six thousand, four hundred

55:52

and sixty times. And forgive my amazement at

55:54

the numbers. It's nice to have precise,

55:56

reliable numbers rather than the guesswork

55:58

that is TV ratings. I thank

56:00

you, and my producer me thanks

56:03

you as well. A little more navel

56:05

gazing. I suspect there will be two different

56:08

editions of this podcast tomorrow, one

56:11

before and one after the indictments. So

56:13

if you're not subscribed with notifications,

56:15

do that now so you can

56:17

hear firsthand how badly my predictions

56:19

go. And yes, I will not

56:22

update the whole thing tomorrow, only the first block,

56:24

but check your emails for the update tomorrow.

56:27

Anyway. Here the credits. Most of the music was arranged,

56:29

produced and performed by Brian Ray and John

56:31

Philip Channel, who are the countdown musical

56:34

directors. All orchestration and keyboards

56:36

by John Philip Channel, guitars,

56:38

bass and drums by Brian Ray, produced

56:41

by Tko Brothers. Another Beethoven

56:43

selections have been arranged and performed by No

56:45

Horns Allowed. The sports music

56:48

is the Olberman theme from ESPN two

56:50

and it was written by Mitch Warren Davis Curtisy,

56:53

ESPN Inc. Musical comments by

56:55

Nancy Faust. The best baseball stadium organist

56:57

ever our announcer today was Larry David

56:59

and everything else is pretty much my fault.

57:02

So let's countdown for this, the eight hundred and eighteenth

57:04

day since Donald Trump's first attempted

57:07

coup against the democratically elected government of

57:09

the United States. Arrest him now

57:11

while we still all

57:13

right. They are arrest

57:16

him again while we still can. The

57:18

next scheduled countdown is tomorrow, Trump

57:21

miss day. Till then, I'm Keith

57:24

Olverman. Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and

57:27

good luck. Countdown

57:40

with Keith Olverman is a production of

57:42

iHeartRadio. For more podcasts

57:44

from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio

57:47

app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

57:49

you get your podcasts.