0:04

Countdown with Keith Olderman is a

0:06

production of iHeartRadio.

0:22

It was a presidential kidnapping and

0:24

assassination video. It

0:27

showed a pickup truck Trump flags

0:29

flapping in the wind from it, and on

0:31

its tailgate there was a sadistic fantasy

0:33

illustration of President Biden bound

0:36

and gagged and thrown in the flatbed

0:38

of the truck. And the video was posted

0:40

by Donald Trump. And Donald Trump is

0:42

a living and mortal threat to everyone

0:45

and everything in this country and from

0:47

whom It is not an unrealistic extrapolation

0:50

to conclude that that was a stochastic

0:52

attempt to get Joe Biden president

0:55

of the United States, kidnapped or assassinated,

0:58

a stochastic attempt at assassination

1:01

by Trump, and

1:03

it was part of an orgy of stochastic

1:06

threats made by Trump over the Easter

1:09

weekend. Photos of the daughter

1:11

of the judge and his trial for criminalized use

1:13

of hush money to interfere with an election. The

1:16

prosecution had to

1:18

ask the judge himself last

1:20

night to include his own daughter in

1:23

the gag order in that case. There

1:25

were more Trump comparisons of himself

1:27

to Christ. One article

1:30

literally headlined the crucifixion

1:32

of Trump, another titled something

1:34

supernatural is happening with Trump and

1:37

by the way, Trump is competing with his own soon to

1:39

be disbarred lawyer criminals John

1:41

Eastman and Jeffrey Clark. Eastman's

1:44

own children portrayed him as Christ.

1:47

Over Easter weekend as well. There

1:50

were more than one hundred posts of vengeance

1:52

and hate from Trump on Easter Sunday.

1:55

More social media posts from an ex

1:57

New York cop now Long Island congressman

2:00

with hundreds of police shown marching

2:02

behind a cross and the war

2:04

from this fascist x cop desposito

2:08

quote don't cross us. It

2:12

all makes me again. Ask a chilling question I

2:14

first posed months ago. Had any

2:17

of Trump's various coup attempts

2:19

succeeded in twenty

2:21

twenty If any of the coup

2:23

attempts Trump is planning now

2:26

for this November or this December

2:28

or next January, should any of them succeed?

2:32

Exactly? What is Trump's plan or

2:34

what are the plans of his thugs

2:37

and gangs and cultists and psychotics

2:39

and death fetishists and militias

2:41

and god and gun lunatics? What are

2:43

their plans for

2:45

the actual president He usurps

2:49

when he usurps him, you

2:53

steal the presidency, as Trump tried

2:56

to do in twenty twenty, in a legal

2:58

fashion, in an illegal fashion, in a

3:00

nonviolent fashion, then in a violent

3:03

fashion, and success. You

3:06

have a problem. You have

3:08

the rightfully democratically

3:11

chosen president elect, and you

3:15

detain him, You

3:17

keep him in communicado, you

3:19

try him for fabricated

3:22

crimes because you have declared

3:24

his legal election illegal.

3:30

The parallel situation ensues this

3:33

upcoming election. Biden wins by four

3:35

electoral votes or four hundred

3:37

electoral votes, and Trump cries fraud,

3:40

and his mob believes

3:42

him, or pretends to

3:44

it no longer matters which, and

3:47

Trump finds sufficient muscle in the militias

3:50

or the police, or parts of the

3:52

military, or the Secret

3:54

Service, or some combination, not all

3:56

of them, but enough that he can seize

3:58

Joe Biden and do

4:01

what with Joe Biden. Well,

4:04

this weekend past has finally given us that answer.

4:08

Have the mob, the pickup truck

4:10

mob with the giant Trump flags flying

4:12

in exact reproduction and recreation

4:15

of Nazi Germany and every other

4:17

dictatorship of every ideology

4:19

of every century, in every country.

4:21

You have the mob grab Joe Biden

4:24

and tie him up and throw him in

4:26

the back of a truck. If

4:28

they figet how they're supposed to do it, there's

4:30

now a picture of it. The

4:33

hidden plan is hidden no more. This

4:36

is what Trump wants

4:39

in real life.

4:42

This is what Trump has now conveyed

4:44

to his paramilitary squads, his

4:48

he and its members hope death

4:50

squads. And if they need

4:52

to practice, there is

4:54

that picture on the back of that truck. But

4:57

if they need to practice, Trump wants them to

4:59

go after Judge and garn

5:02

not Judge Merschan, but Judge Merschan's daughter

5:04

and Jack Smith. Because

5:07

there are a lot of pickup trucks. See,

5:12

there was one pickup truck

5:15

that Trump showed, and then there was at

5:17

least one other one shared

5:19

on social media by an Idaho state legislator

5:22

named Heather Scott, who has

5:24

openly defended white supremacism on social

5:27

media, and that truck has

5:29

the same illustration, the

5:31

same picture of Joe Biden bound

5:34

and seemingly in

5:36

the back of a pickup truck. It

5:39

is yet another reminder, said Kristen

5:42

Welker on Meet the Press, somehow, capping

5:44

the week long self destruction of NBC News

5:46

over the Ronald McDaniel hiring, capping

5:49

it with something actually worse, that

5:51

we are covering this election against

5:54

the backdrop of a deeply divided

5:56

nation. Television

6:00

journalism, much of print and digital

6:02

journalism has failed. Kristin

6:05

Welker has failed. The

6:07

language itself of political

6:10

journalism has failed. It

6:13

is not factually mistaken to call us

6:16

a deeply divided nation right now, but

6:18

it wrongly paints this country in exactly

6:20

the same way the same phrase a deeply

6:22

divided nation would have done so during

6:25

the Civil War, or

6:28

in exactly the same way that the Ukraine

6:30

under siege now by Russia is a

6:32

deeply divided nation, or

6:35

in exactly the same way the Spain, attacked

6:38

by international fascism in the nineteen thirties

6:40

was a deeply divided nation.

6:44

There is right and there is wrong.

6:49

And there are Kristin Welker and NBC News

6:51

and most of TV news, and they are

6:54

so buried beneath rituals and

6:56

superstitions that they have mistaken

6:58

for ethics and rules that

7:01

they can no longer tell the difference between right

7:03

and wrong, no longer recognize

7:05

that they are supposed to take sides

7:08

in that particular, both sides

7:10

this nightmare that

7:13

in this kind of deeply divided nation, stick

7:15

with the people who are right. They

7:21

do not think for a moment that the freedom

7:24

of the press is not an end

7:26

unto itself, that it exists

7:29

to keep a nation free, that

7:32

it exists to say, we are

7:34

covering this election against the backdrop of

7:36

a deeply divided nation where the candidate

7:39

of one party can publicly broadcast

7:41

an image of the other candidate

7:44

bound and gagged, and

7:46

we in the media can let

7:48

the bastard get away with

7:51

it. But

7:54

they will not say that. They really

7:56

do think that if the bottom falls

7:58

out of democracy, or if Trump kicks

8:01

through the floor of democracy, they

8:03

can somehow hold up

8:06

their press passes and

8:08

somehow their lives will be unaffected

8:11

by the fascism to come, and they can still

8:13

get seen in spotted in

8:16

Politico Playbook instead

8:18

of seeing in the Stephen Miller detention

8:21

camp for political re education. NBC

8:25

News has, as the kids say,

8:28

lost the plot that if

8:30

NBC News disappeared tomorrow, there would

8:32

be much good journalism lost, but much

8:35

more hollow, ritualistic,

8:37

flatulent air zots journalism

8:40

ended project

8:45

this nightmare, the Republican releases

8:47

that video literally a hostage

8:49

video involving

8:51

the President of the United States, and

8:55

then a Republican politician in Idaho

8:58

publishes a still photograph of the

9:00

same image of the bound

9:02

and gagged President of the United States. And

9:04

this happens during the nineteen

9:07

seventy two presidential campaign, or

9:10

the nineteen ninety two presidential campaign,

9:12

or the twenty twelve presidential campaign,

9:15

or the Democrat in any of those campaigns,

9:17

does it.

9:20

It would have been the only story in

9:22

the nation on television,

9:24

on radio, in newspapers,

9:27

online, for days, for

9:30

weeks, four months, for

9:32

the rest of the campaign, or

9:36

until the candidate who posted

9:38

the video withdrew or

9:41

was removed by his party.

9:45

Instead, today it has become

9:47

fodder for the both sidest

9:49

mill when anybody

9:52

bothered to cover it. My

9:56

god, and it is amazing and

9:59

nauseating and terrifying

10:01

to say this. At

10:04

least NBC mentioned it in Passing

10:08

and Wait, There's worse because

10:11

there was something worse. Worse,

10:13

not because it was more violent nor dramatic,

10:16

but because it was neither worse,

10:18

even though Trump's hand was not obvious in

10:21

it, but just as Trump's Biden

10:23

bound in the pickup truck video marked

10:26

the dropping of yet another pretense that

10:28

that isn't what they have planned. So

10:31

did another story nobody

10:33

covered. It was another up

10:36

here we go moment when the

10:38

fig leaf fell off and it left

10:40

three ugly trumps hanging

10:43

there, exposed for the world to see.

10:46

Small ones at that headline

10:49

in the magazine The American Conservative New

10:52

Issue, Trump twenty

10:55

twenty eight subhead, the

10:58

twenty second Amendment is an arbitrary

11:00

restraint on presidents who serve none

11:03

consecutive terms and on

11:06

democracy itself. As

11:10

I said, oh here we go. This

11:12

has been building for a while, the

11:14

Republican Party on the verge of extinction

11:16

and instead suddenly now poised

11:19

via the proverbial perfect storm,

11:22

to corrupt all elections in this

11:24

nation and strangle the Democrats

11:26

by simply effectively strangling democracy.

11:28

The Republican Party has seemingly joked

11:31

and tweaked and triggered the left

11:34

with variations on this idea ever

11:36

since. Trump mused in twenty

11:39

eighteen that he was owed some

11:41

sort of third term because

11:43

his first one had been preoccupied with

11:46

defending his crimes,

11:49

so he didn't really get a first term, so this

11:52

second term would only barely be his first term,

11:54

and his third term would only really be his second

11:56

term. Seet then there was the

11:58

joky animation of a Trump

12:00

twenty twenty campaign banner, followed

12:03

by a Trump twenty twenty campaign banner,

12:06

followed by a Trump twenty twenty eight campaign

12:08

banner, followed by a Trump twenty thirty two campaign

12:10

banner, and on and on and on, until

12:12

it was a one hundred and two year old Trump running

12:15

in the year twenty forty eight. Nobody was wondering

12:17

if he'd be dead by then and running from

12:19

a coffin, because after all, they

12:21

were only doing this to own

12:23

the Libs,

12:26

except they weren't.

12:30

They are softening up the opposition, and

12:33

the rest of the media did not notice this story.

12:36

They are softening up the opposition in

12:40

order to elect Trump in

12:42

November, on the assumption

12:44

that he will be eligible to

12:47

run for a third term

12:49

in twenty twenty eight, and

12:51

after that, god knows what, seriously

12:55

as serious as death yours

12:59

quote. Trump's reemergence

13:02

as the Republican nominee in twenty twenty four

13:04

is a triumph of democracy. Not

13:07

only did Trump secure the nomination following

13:10

his defeat in twenty twenty a rather incredible

13:12

feat in and of itself, but did

13:14

so in spite of every obstacle the

13:16

mainstream media, the Republican

13:18

establishment, and the lawfare apparatus

13:21

have put in his way. You

13:24

see where this is going. Trump

13:27

overcame obstacles, or,

13:30

if you prefer, Trump overcame

13:32

mediocrity and weaponized

13:35

stupidity and hatred and some

13:37

kind of blackmail against many of the leading

13:39

Republicans. Therefore, the

13:41

Constitution should not apply to

13:44

him, just

13:46

him, especially those pesky

13:49

term limits in the twenty second Amendment. Republican

13:52

primary voters chose him,

13:55

writes the American Conservative quote,

13:57

because they damn well felt

14:00

like it. Wow,

14:02

how about seventy five percent of them so far,

14:04

damn well felt like it? So far a total of

14:07

thirteen million, four hundred and seventy five thousand

14:09

and six of them did, a total

14:12

which would not even win him Florida, Texas

14:14

and Ohio. But I'm

14:17

diverging here, I'm interrupting

14:19

the author's termination of the Constitution.

14:23

Twenty second Amendment two

14:25

full terms per president or one

14:27

and a half if you are serving out another

14:29

president's term quote sounds

14:32

reasonable enough, especially in light of FDR's

14:35

hold on the office. Yet those

14:37

who supported the amendment more than seventy

14:39

years ago could not have foreseen

14:42

the prospect of a one term president

14:44

who lost the office but who later

14:46

regained it in a subsequent election.

14:50

The author then immediately cites the time

14:52

it happened with Grover Cleveland all

14:54

the way back in eighteen ninety two. The author

14:56

leaves out that while he may

14:59

see the Grover Cleveland

15:01

story as something from prehistory

15:04

when din Missaurus still had the vote or

15:06

something, the twenty second Amendment

15:08

to the Constitution of the United States of America

15:10

was in fact introduced in

15:13

nineteen forty seven by a Michigan

15:15

Congressman named Earl Mitchener. And

15:18

Earl Mitchener was sixteen years old

15:21

and preparing to go to the University of Michigan

15:23

law school when Grover Cleveland

15:25

was elected, and

15:27

who just in his lifetime. Congressman

15:30

Mitchener had not only seen Cleveland re elected

15:33

after four years in the wilderness, but Mitchener

15:35

had also seen former President Theodore

15:38

Roosevelt try for a third non consecutive

15:40

term in nineteen twelve, and

15:42

Mitchener had seen the Republican bid

15:45

to draft former President Calvin Coolidge

15:47

to run for a third non consecutive term

15:49

instead of President Hoover in nineteen thirty two.

15:52

And he had seen the former

15:54

President Hoover try for nomination for a second

15:56

non consecutive term in nineteen thirty six and

15:59

then again in nineteen forty. And

16:01

he had seen Franklin Roosevelt run for a third

16:03

term and then a fourth. And he'd seen William Jennings

16:05

Bryan get the Democratic nomination in eighteen ninety

16:08

six and nineteen hundred, having not had enough,

16:10

run for it again in nineteen oh eight, and begin

16:12

to try to run for it for a fourth time

16:14

in nineteen twelve. Mitchener, the congressman

16:17

behind presidential term limits,

16:20

only saw all that unfold,

16:23

all those ex presidents and presidential

16:25

nominees who would not go away. Mitchner

16:28

alone saw that all happen in his own lifetime,

16:30

most of which spent in Congress. But

16:34

once again I'm interrupting the American

16:36

conservative narrative here that

16:38

Trump is unique, and

16:41

the laws don't apply to him,

16:43

and the Constitution doesn't apply to him, and if it does,

16:45

they'll just change it because well, to

16:47

paraphrase the author here, because they damn

16:50

well feel like it of

16:54

the audacity that the Constitution

16:57

has in prohibiting letting

16:59

Trump run again in twenty twenty eight, despite

17:01

the fact that he's so special

17:05

quote this is plainly unfair.

17:11

Even though the uniqueness the

17:13

American Conservative bestows upon

17:15

Trump he was elected, He was not

17:17

reelected. He tried to overthrow democracy.

17:19

He failed even at that, even though that uniqueness

17:22

is rather akin to we should break the rules

17:24

for him. He shot a guy on Fifth Avenue

17:26

and they applauded. The

17:28

author promptly uses for support

17:31

two two term presidents

17:34

who doubted that the twenty second

17:36

Amendment and the quote artificial

17:38

limits it places on voter choice

17:42

were correct, even though

17:45

those two presidents are Reagan,

17:47

who love him or hate him won

17:50

his two elections, first by five

17:52

hundred and twelve electoral votes.

17:55

He didn't get five hundred and twelve electoral votes

17:58

that was his margin of victory, and then the second

18:00

time he won by only three hundred and fifteen

18:02

electoral votes. The other two

18:04

term president who they say doesn't like the

18:07

twenty second Amendment it was Barack Obama,

18:09

who won his two elections first by

18:11

one hundred and ninety eight electoral votes and then

18:14

by one hundred and twenty six electoral votes. In what

18:16

to borrow in BC's phrase, when

18:18

it would have actually been true and not pitiful.

18:21

We were holding those elections against

18:23

the backdrop of a deeply divided nation. And

18:27

oh, by the way, Reagan had gone

18:29

into mental decline by the second full year

18:31

of his second term. But

18:34

here I am again having the nerve

18:36

to interrupt the launching of

18:38

the trial balloon to see if we can

18:41

make Trump elected by

18:43

a total of seventy nine thousand,

18:45

six hundred and forty six specific

18:47

voters in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

18:50

If we can make him somehow into

18:52

Reagan times Obama times FDR,

18:55

with just a smidge of Grover Cleveland

18:58

added in for false uniqueness.

19:04

This writer is busily trying to

19:06

slip a lifetime dictator who

19:10

got in despite losing the popular vote,

19:14

And I'm busily

19:16

harshing his buzz and slowing down

19:19

the snake oil spiel back

19:22

to the snake oil already in progress to

19:24

quote again. Trump, however, makes

19:26

an even more forceful ethical argument

19:29

against the twenty second Amendment and for its

19:31

repeal. If a man who

19:33

was once president returns

19:37

after a series of years to stand

19:39

again for the office and proves

19:42

so popular as

19:44

to earn a second non consecutive

19:46

term, as Trump seems bound

19:48

to. To deny him the right

19:51

to run for a second consecutive

19:53

term cuts against basic fair

19:56

play unquote.

19:59

Ah, once again the familiar

20:02

no fair argument that has

20:04

domin d the Supreme Court for literally

20:07

what couple of days.

20:12

If by twenty twenty eight voters feel Trump

20:14

has done a poor job, they can pick another candidate.

20:17

But if they feel he has delivered on

20:19

his promises, why should they be denied

20:22

the freedom to choose him? Once more?

20:24

Unquote, Well,

20:27

I'd like to note that if he really has delivered

20:30

on his promises, what makes you think

20:32

that those voters would get the chance to deny

20:34

him another term or a fourth one

20:36

after that, or that there'd ever be

20:39

another election again? There

20:42

follows in this piece some hurried sophistreet

20:44

quote. Don't let questions of Trump's age

20:47

in four years fool you, and his

20:49

ability to walk in a straight line, ha

20:52

ha, And how in twenty

20:54

thirty two he'd only be eighty six, which

20:56

would be Biden's age in twenty twenty eight eighty

20:59

six, tenned ready

21:01

and rested. Let's just cancel

21:04

the thirty two election now and give

21:06

them four terms. That's only

21:08

fair, isn't it. Isn't that freedom

21:13

to bolate the constitution. The

21:17

best part of the American Conservative piece

21:19

positing that Trump deserves a theoretical

21:21

third term even though it's illegal, is

21:24

how fluidly the author, having not come

21:26

close to proving his case, then concludes he

21:28

has proved his case and in a

21:30

slam dunk, and so

21:32

shut up and enjoy it. Quote.

21:35

Conservatives have gritted their teeth for years

21:37

as the left, in their hatred of Trump, has

21:39

attempted to pervert the meaning of

21:41

the twenty second Amendment unquote,

21:46

which Democrats haven't, because

21:48

you can't pervert the meaning of the twenty second Amendment.

21:50

It's more like a math problem. And

21:53

by the way, if Democrats had wanted

21:55

to pervert the meaning of the twenty second Amendment,

21:57

they would have found a pretext to

22:00

run Obama for a third term in twenty

22:02

sixteen, or in twenty twenty, or

22:04

now or four years from now.

22:08

Quoting again, the case for

22:10

repealing the twenty second Amendment is

22:12

far more straightforward. As

22:14

with prohibition, it is simply

22:16

a matter of finding the will

22:19

to get rid of a bad idea that needlessly

22:22

limits Americans freedom

22:25

Trump twenty twenty eight exclamation

22:28

point. So

22:32

this guy is saying it would be a triumph

22:34

of the will like the laany

22:37

Reef install Adolf Hitler film

22:39

from nineteen thirty five. Got it. You

22:42

know you can't spell triumph of

22:44

the will without Trump

22:51

On that one little point mentioned

22:53

only at the end of that thousand

22:55

word pipe bomb written

22:58

with the matter of factness of Jonathan Swift's a

23:00

modest proposal about

23:02

eating starving babies. You

23:05

may have noticed that there is nothing in there about

23:08

that tiny detail, the actual repealing

23:11

of the twenty second Amendment. Nothing

23:14

about process or the

23:16

necessary legislation or the votes in

23:18

the States. Nothing like that, because

23:21

it is an afterthought. Because

23:24

to the Trumpsts, to Maga, to

23:26

the fascists, it is an afterthought.

23:29

Repealing the amendment is an afterthought.

23:32

The author did mention how the left did

23:34

try to pervert the Fourteenth Amendment

23:37

against electing insurrectionists by

23:39

you know, reading it, and

23:41

how the Republicans responded by simply having

23:44

their theocratic Supreme Court ignore

23:46

the Fourteenth Amendment the way they ignored

23:48

the Second Amendment. For three decades the

23:52

Roberts Court disqualification

23:55

vote against the Fourteenth

23:57

and its invention of a non existent congressional

24:00

action required to implement the Fourteenth,

24:02

when in fact the Fourteenth insists that they're us

24:04

be congressional action to override the Fourteenth.

24:07

That is the green light for

24:10

the very simple Republican plan. If

24:12

they elect Trump this autumn and he isn't

24:14

dead by twenty twenty eight, and they

24:16

want to run him again, they just

24:19

do it. They just

24:21

do it like they're just doing

24:23

it this time, and they dare

24:26

you to sue, They dare

24:28

you to stop them. Hey,

24:32

who knows, maybe this

24:34

time you'll get lucky and you can find some other

24:37

Supreme Court of the United States that

24:39

would rule in favor of

24:43

the Constitution. They

24:47

run him in twenty twenty eight, they

24:50

to again use the author's phrase, because they

24:52

damn well feel like it. In

24:54

twenty twenty eight, they string out the nominating

24:56

process just long enough so that

24:59

the court cases don't really become relevant

25:01

until late spring or

25:03

summer, and when their

25:05

Supreme Court finally gets around to it in July

25:07

or August at twenty twenty eight convention

25:10

time, the court will have to tisk tisk

25:12

the political system and say that to strike

25:15

dear reelected non consecutive

25:17

Trump from the ballot at such a late

25:19

date would be an unthinkable denial

25:22

of the rights of millions of fascist

25:24

voters, some of whom were five

25:26

when he first declared for the nomination, their

25:29

right under the American Right

25:32

to vote for Trump because

25:35

of the constitutions no

25:38

fair rule. As

25:42

to the other detail not mentioned in the article

25:44

in The American Conservative, the pesky little constitutional

25:47

grandfather clause, in

25:49

which you cannot restrict nor expand

25:51

the rights of anyone already

25:53

doing whatever you just changed, just

25:56

like you can't prosecute somebody for something they did

25:58

in nineteen ninety six that you only made

26:00

a crime in twenty twenty four. That little

26:03

grandfather clause that even if you

26:05

did repeal or simply ignore

26:07

the twenty second Amendment, it would

26:09

not apply to Trump, It would not grant

26:11

him the right to run for a third term.

26:14

Well, it would just have to give way

26:16

to the overarching constitutional

26:19

premise of the no fair

26:21

rule grandfather

26:25

clause. What does that have to do with this? This is the

26:27

people's will. It's not fair,

26:31

it's democracy. And

26:34

what about Barack Obama, who would suddenly be

26:36

eligible, who in twenty twenty eight would be

26:38

just sixty seven years old and suddenly

26:40

eligible for third term. What about Bill Clinton,

26:43

who in twenty twenty eight would still be two

26:46

months younger than Trump. Oh

26:48

sorry, the new ignoring of the twenty

26:50

second Amendment only applies to presidents

26:52

who've served non consecutive

26:55

terms. Those guys are

26:57

not eligible. Only anti

27:00

democracy, treasonous, mass murdering

27:03

terrorists comeback, sexual assaulters

27:05

who lost reelection and

27:08

then tried to insurrect Only

27:10

they can run for one more term than everybody

27:13

else, because that's just fair,

27:17

am I right? This

27:20

is where we are. The former

27:23

president insane, murderous,

27:26

criminally narcissistic, the Ted Bundy

27:28

of politicians is promoting

27:30

and distributing stochastic kidnapping

27:33

and assassination threats against the

27:35

incumbent president, whom he hopes to

27:37

unseat in an upcoming election. His

27:40

minions are now laying

27:42

the groundwork for him to take and I do mean

27:45

take not one term but two.

27:48

And the news network whose executives

27:51

weren't trained in the supposedly vapid

27:53

world of television news, the ink stained

27:55

wretches of the New York Times, in the Philadelphia

27:57

Inquirer, and Politico now running

28:00

NBC News, the ones who thought Rona

28:02

McDaniel had unsuspected depth.

28:05

They have moved on, in the span of one

28:07

week, to dismissing this attempt to reduce

28:09

America to rubble on November fifth,

28:11

and then make sure Trump can stick around

28:13

to light the rubble on fire again

28:16

on November seventh, twenty twenty eight. They

28:18

have moved on to dismissing all

28:20

of this to instead

28:23

highlight the plight of

28:25

the real danger to America, the

28:27

plight of the real victims here themselves,

28:32

the folks at NBC News, Kristin

28:35

Welker especially, We

28:37

are covering this election against

28:39

the backdrop of a deeply divided nation.

28:43

My god, Kristin Welker, it must

28:46

be hell in there. Could

28:48

you use an extra week of

28:50

vacation? Can I

28:53

send in paratroopers

28:55

with pina coladas? The

29:01

guardrails of democracy have long

29:03

since failed us. The one

29:06

labeled media turned out to

29:08

not only be not a guard rail,

29:11

turned out to not only be made out

29:13

of paper mache, but it turned out

29:15

to have been made out of paper mache made out

29:17

of old porous copies of the New

29:19

York Times, and

29:22

Trump is busy setting them ablaze,

29:25

while eighty one writers and editors at NBC

29:27

decide whether the correct phrase was the

29:29

backdrop of a deeply divided nation

29:32

or the context of

29:34

a deeply divided nation. Let's

29:37

go have lunch and then we'll meet and discuss it again. In

29:42

point of fact, it is the

29:44

democracy itself that has failed us,

29:46

at least for the moment. I

29:48

don't know if there are fixes to be made

29:50

to it now, or if we have to personally,

29:53

individually act as if we are on

29:55

our own out here, and I don't even

29:58

know. I don't even begin to know what that would

30:00

mean or what that would look like. But

30:03

if we let one vi violence obsessed,

30:05

murderous guy running for president

30:08

publish a video of a

30:10

drawing of the other guy running for president

30:12

trundled up in ropes and thrown in the

30:14

back of a pickup truck on the way to being

30:17

hidden somewhere or ransomed or

30:19

kidnapped or assassinated, and the

30:21

best response democracy can come up

30:23

with is, we are covering this election

30:25

against the backdrop of a deeply divided nation.

30:28

Democracy is either going to have to as

30:30

they said, in Book of Mormon man Up

30:33

or we are going to have to do it ourselves.

30:39

And by the way, that banal milk

30:42

toast sounding piece in the American

30:44

Conservative, you know, the one

30:46

I just quoted from in Growing

30:48

Horror Trump twenty

30:50

twenty eighth. The twenty second Amendment is an arbitrary

30:53

restrained on presidents who served non consecutive

30:55

terms. I have deliberately

30:57

to this point left out the author's

31:00

name because it is the one laugh

31:03

I would like to offer for you. I

31:05

would like to leave you with the one faint,

31:07

ephemeral giggle that suggests

31:10

maybe all is not lost, just

31:12

ninety nine point nine percent of it is lost.

31:16

The author's name is Peter. His

31:19

last name is spelled t o n

31:22

g u e t

31:24

t E. He

31:27

also does Peter t o n g

31:29

u e t t E writes

31:31

with some success about films. My

31:34

not inconsiderable research in that field

31:36

suggests his name is actually pronounced

31:39

tungit. I,

31:42

however, will cling to the hope that,

31:44

given his self congratulatory anti

31:46

constitutional fascism, Peter

31:49

t O n g u e t t e

31:52

actually pronounces his name Peter

31:57

toungue it.

32:04

Two bits of bookkeeping before we resume.

32:08

Hey, NBC News has just hired Peter Tungett.

32:13

I've got a routine medical procedure or

32:15

later this week. It may lead to the canceling or

32:17

shortening of the Thursday and Friday episodes.

32:19

More likely just the shortening. I'll see. I'll keep you

32:21

posted. Just a little tip in advance

32:24

the other news. The first quarter numbers

32:26

are in between podcast downloads

32:28

and YouTube views. Your patronage has

32:31

already hit seven million,

32:33

four hundred and sixty four hundred and eighty

32:35

three. Good work

32:37

out of you. That's actual

32:40

watches and listens to like at

32:42

least half of

32:45

each program that

32:48

averages an audience of about one hundred and forty

32:50

six four hundred and twenty one per countdown.

32:54

I do not have figures for those of you who drift

32:56

in and out in

32:58

any event, drifting or not drifting.

33:01

Thank you. I will note that it looks

33:03

like something like twenty thirty percent of the

33:05

daily listeners where the

33:07

YouTube viewers do not subscribe.

33:10

Subscribe. What's it to you?

33:12

You don't have to listen every day, just

33:16

subscribe. By

33:18

the way, these numbers one hundred and forty six thousand a

33:20

day and seven and a half million so far this year.

33:22

These do not include those who just watched

33:24

the headlines I've put out on Twitter. X okay,

33:27

back to the actual content. Also

33:29

of interest here, there are so many

33:31

candidates for worse persons in

33:34

the world. I had to give out eight

33:36

awards, including one

33:38

to the Republican candidate for state superintendent

33:41

of Schools who belongs to a group

33:44

that has insisted that Barack Obama

33:47

is the grandson of Adolf

33:50

Hitler. And

33:52

then there are the real schmucks. That

33:55

Roni McDaniel scandal continues

33:57

at NBC News, the McDaniel

33:59

scandal, and the clear

34:02

Fall Guy. All the arrows are pointing

34:04

Tory him. The clear Fall Guy

34:06

is going to be the chairman of NBC

34:09

News, says our Conde, which

34:11

means, as I tell you the story,

34:13

you can call me brutus.

34:16

That's next. This is Countdown. This

34:20

is Countdown with Keith Oldwoman

34:44

still ahead of is on this all new edition of Countdown.

34:47

It's one thing if the wheels come off at

34:49

a place like NBC News, but it's quite

34:51

another when the wheels require

34:54

more than a full week to come off at

34:56

a place like NBC News, especially

34:58

if you don't like NBC News, And

35:01

I'll now reveal a secret nobody knows

35:04

don't like NBC News. What

35:09

that isn't a secret? Oops?

35:12

There is an executive there named Sezar Kande.

35:15

He is in charge of NBC News and because

35:17

of the Rana McDaniel scandal,

35:20

he has now been given a suit with a big

35:23

target on the back after

35:26

how he treated me good. He'd

35:29

be the fourth head of NBC News. I have outlasted

35:32

one of them. I outlasted then he came back,

35:34

and I outlasted him again. Things

35:38

I promised not to tell

35:40

next First, still more idiots to

35:43

talk about, the daily roundup of the misgrants,

35:45

morons and Dunning Kruger effect specimens who constitute

35:47

today's worst persons in

35:49

the world. And I want to welcome you to

35:52

something historic. Often I

35:54

have squeezed in more than just three winners,

35:56

more than just a silver, bronze and

35:58

gold. But the pile of morons

36:01

meriting, nay demanding recognition

36:04

in this is so

36:06

vast that I am, for the first and maybe last

36:09

time, expanding the award. And

36:11

the awards stand to hold

36:14

not three, not four, not six,

36:16

but eight different medal

36:18

winners. Ladies, and gentlemen.

36:20

To quote past winner Jeff Zucker the

36:23

supersized edition of the Worst

36:26

Persons in the World. In

36:29

eighth place, the ten award

36:32

winner, New York City Mayor Eric

36:34

Adams. God isn't

36:36

his term over yet? Plan

36:38

number three million to improve the subways, because

36:41

the only one that worked that have having the cops

36:43

on the subways, sometimes in the stations,

36:45

sometimes on the train. You never knew

36:47

where or when. It was the element of surprise.

36:50

They stopped that because of unions.

36:53

Plan number three million is state

36:55

of the art weapons scanners. This

36:58

is our sput Nieck moment, said

37:00

our mayor who fades in and out

37:02

of this plane of existence. When Kennedy

37:05

said we're going to put a man on the moon, let's

37:07

bring on the scanners first,

37:10

Mayor. They're scanners. If

37:13

there are anything like Apollo's spacecraft

37:15

and we're going to the Moon in them, they

37:17

aren't going to be of much use because they will not stay

37:19

in one place. Plus, each time

37:21

you switch them on, they're going to generate seven

37:24

million, six hundred thousand pounds of thrust,

37:26

which will be a bit of a shock if you're standing

37:28

next to one of them. Also,

37:32

I can never tell what Adams knows

37:34

and what he doesn't, But it sure sounds like

37:36

he thinks that the American Moon mission

37:39

is the same thing as Sputnik, the

37:41

satellite the first to orbit the

37:43

Earth, which was put up by Russia in nineteen

37:45

fifty seven, the Communists. So

37:48

when he says this is our Sputnik moment, he's

37:50

saying this is our communism. I

37:54

don't know, does he know Sputnik

37:57

was not American? Just

37:59

mention it to him. Somebody mentioned it to him, all

38:01

lay odds of five to three. The mayor then says, Nick,

38:04

who in

38:06

seventh place? Your Aluminum

38:08

Award winner? Roseanne bar used

38:10

to be funny, used to not be particularly

38:13

crazy. Then came that off key crotch

38:16

grabbing national anthem at the San Diego Padres

38:18

game, which was discovered by my producer

38:20

at Channel two in La Ron Grelnick by

38:23

the way, And so for the last thirty four years

38:25

it's been a dice roll with Roseanne

38:28

her newest submission from yesterday, and

38:30

man waiting Mari Lagow to

38:32

help support the Great Carrie Lake.

38:36

No, I'm really seeing this, the Great

38:38

Carrie Lake. We

38:41

must try to vote our way out of this Roseanne

38:43

writes for at least one last year, and then

38:45

if that doesn't work seventeen seventy

38:48

six, unquote, I'm

38:50

just going to skip the idea that Carrie Lake, a

38:53

fired weathercaster who has never held

38:56

elected office nor come close to winning one,

38:58

is great at something other

39:01

than camera filters. My concern

39:03

here is that little threat at the end of a quote

39:05

seventeen seventy six, which would be an

39:08

armed revolution against the duly elected, and

39:11

she, in fact, in her theorem here makes

39:13

it a just re elected government of the United

39:15

States, apart from that being,

39:18

you know, an illegal threat see pickup

39:20

trucks, Roseanne, Roseanne, I do

39:22

have one question about your seventeen seventy

39:24

six plan. If you lose the next election, who

39:27

has all the tanks? Roseanne by

39:30

Felicia the Palladium

39:32

Award for sixth place me for

39:35

a really mean joke. The New York

39:37

Post put out that quote Trump

39:39

ordered two hundred dollars worth of burgers from Long

39:42

Island drive in for flight home after

39:44

NYPD officers wake, and

39:46

my response was, what did everybody

39:48

else have? I

39:51

understood that not only did he eat all of those

39:53

burgers, he didn't even take off the Rappers

39:55

first fifth place,

39:58

the Zinc Medal to the New

40:00

York Yankees as part of this continuing

40:02

melding of pro sports and gambling, which is going

40:05

real well, ask show

40:07

Hey Otani. On opening

40:09

night of the baseball season, on the team Twitter

40:11

account, the New York Yankees posted a video highlight

40:14

of a picture of theirs named Nestor

40:16

Cortes and it read

40:19

quote Nestor settled in plus

40:21

one twelve to record five plus

40:23

k's odds from fd sportsbook.

40:27

I recognize those as words

40:29

and letters in the English

40:32

alphabet, but I don't know what a name of it

40:34

means. And this is happening

40:36

while the rest of baseball had suddenly realized.

40:39

Wait wait, wait, wait wait, Otani's

40:41

interpreter got access to Otani's bank

40:43

account and he was able to wire out

40:45

five hundred thousand dollars nine

40:48

different times. And

40:50

Otani didn't know, and

40:52

Otani's business agent didn't know, and Otani's

40:55

bookkeepers didn't know, and Otani's investment

40:57

team didn't know, and Otani's banker didn't

40:59

know. Maybe baseball

41:02

could lighten up on the gambling hype

41:04

until we figure out how bad the Otani

41:06

gambling scandal is because

41:09

whether or not he placed any of the bets, it's still

41:11

the Otani gambling scandal. How'd

41:13

the guy get four and a half million dollars out of Otani's

41:16

bank account? The

41:18

Copper fourth place Representative

41:21

Mike Turner of Ohio.

41:23

This sentence structure that Turner used is

41:25

now the main escape patch for Republicans

41:28

who want to deny that they are at

41:30

all responsible for Trump turning their party

41:32

into a whorehouse. I should

41:34

say, a bigger whorehouse. CBS

41:37

asked Turner about Trump scamming

41:39

the Gullible with his sixty dollars inscribed

41:42

Trump mcbibles, and Turner

41:44

answered, quote, you know, I haven't

41:46

really seen that. I think I'm

41:48

more concerned about the White House restricting

41:51

the ability of children to put religious

41:53

symbols on Easter eggs. Clever,

41:57

Mike Turner. Clever what about his nonsense?

42:01

But given that the rule you tried to hit Biden with

42:03

has been in place since nineteen seven, you'll

42:05

need to go ask the Gerald Ford White

42:08

House about this, and the Ronald Reagan

42:10

White House in the hw Bush White House about

42:12

it, and W's White House about it, oh,

42:14

and the Trump White House about it. Because

42:16

they did it too, in which case

42:18

I assume Congressman Turner has his next pivot

42:21

already, the Trump White House restricting

42:23

the ability of children to put religious symbols on Easter

42:25

eggs. You know, I haven't really seen that.

42:29

Trump could be executing labor leaders

42:31

on the White House lawn, and these Republican

42:34

monkeys would claim they had not seen it

42:36

or heard about it, or didn't know anything about

42:38

those heads rolling down Pennsylvania

42:41

Avenue from the Guillotine Center at the Place

42:43

de la Concord, the

42:46

Bronze We're almost

42:48

done worse. Well, how in the hell

42:50

do you not see this coming? Trump? Media?

42:52

This is your classic pump and dump.

42:55

Stock, the company that owns

42:57

Truth Social could

43:00

be renamed Trump's ID. The

43:02

company is worth nearly seven bills

43:04

million dollars, so it goes public and on

43:06

day one of trading it stock reports

43:09

twenty twenty three revenue of four

43:11

million dollars, but losses

43:13

of fifty eight million dollars, and

43:15

the stock drops by twenty percent before

43:18

lunch, and the company

43:20

is now worth not seven billion dollars, but

43:22

six billion dollars. Trump

43:26

in a scam,

43:28

The silver worser Michelle

43:30

Morrow Republican nominee for state

43:32

superintendent of Schools in North Carolina, possibly

43:35

the worst major candidate the Republicans

43:37

have ever pulled out of whichever sewer they

43:39

found her in. She's qan on. I've

43:42

already mentioned she believes Jim Carrey drinks

43:44

the blood of children to look younger, which raises

43:47

the obvious question, wait, you think

43:49

Jim Carrey looks younger? There

43:51

is, though a new high in Michelle

43:54

Morrow Low. Media Matters

43:56

says she has been a self

43:58

proclaimed spokesperson for

44:00

a bag of nut rocks called Liberty

44:02

First Grassroots, one

44:06

of whose Facebook postings about President

44:08

Obama in twenty twenty read

44:10

quote Hitler bloodlines Allegedly

44:12

Hitler is Obama's grandfather, show

44:15

who Barack really was and everything

44:17

he did in his presidency will be null and void

44:20

unquote. A

44:22

reminder, there's an easy fix here. What involves

44:25

superintendents of schools and changing

44:27

degree requirements and not

44:30

woke in college. Other states simply

44:32

must stop accepting North

44:35

Carolina high school and college

44:37

degrees as being sufficient for

44:40

admission to higher education in

44:42

their states. And

44:45

yes, I know I'm talking about education, and I

44:47

just said sufficient. That guy

44:49

has fum vienna sufficient.

44:53

But now to our winner the

44:56

worst Charles Johnson,

44:58

owner of baseball San Francisco Giants.

45:01

Twenty years ago, the Giants sold fans

45:04

high to be placed in the walkway

45:06

across the cove from their wonderful ballpark

45:09

in San Francisco. Most fans

45:11

put the names of loved ones on the tiles,

45:13

often deceased parents, often

45:15

parents who have died in the twenty years since.

45:18

For the last four years, purchasers have

45:20

not been able to see these often memorial

45:23

tiles because the area, which features

45:25

a statue of San Francisco Giants Great Willie

45:27

mccubby, also a former Padre star,

45:30

has been under construction reconstruction.

45:33

The good news, the McCovey statue is

45:35

in great shape and looks wonderful. The bad

45:37

news, tile owners got an email

45:40

from the Giants that informs them, Oops,

45:42

all the tiles have been destroyed. Quote

45:45

a digital version of your tile message

45:48

from the original park will be showcased

45:50

via a kiosk nearby

45:52

the McCovey statue.

45:55

Translation, so, no more tiles,

45:57

but we can show you a picture of what

46:00

your tile of your dead mother used to

46:02

look like before we destroyed it.

46:04

Over there in that booth, but

46:08

not anytime soon. More of the email.

46:11

We will provide another update with more details

46:13

once the feature is installed.

46:16

The Giants tell the San Francisco Chronicle

46:18

they think the kiosk for

46:22

viewing the destroyed memorial tiles

46:24

will be opened this season. Or

46:27

maybe not, or given the giants

46:29

recent string of public relations gaps,

46:31

maybe never. Who knows, It's

46:34

hard to say. The

46:36

owner of the San Francisco Giants, Charles,

46:40

Sorry, we destroyed your tile, your

46:42

mini headstone of your dead parent. But

46:44

here's a picture of it. Wait, no picture.

46:46

Check back with us later June.

46:49

Try September, just

46:52

to be sure. Make it next year. Johnson

46:55

two days worst

46:58

person in the world

47:01

that I nearly listened everybody in the world

47:15

to the number one story on as I keep

47:18

hyping this all new edition of Countdown. And while

47:20

it is absolutely true that my favorite topic is

47:22

me, my next favorite

47:24

topic is disasters at

47:26

NBC News. Nowhere

47:28

else have I worked and kid, I've

47:31

worked for all of them. Nowhere

47:33

else is there such a culture of ingratitude,

47:36

one that dates back generations like the one

47:38

there is at NBC News. I

47:40

have watched executives who built the place erased

47:43

by journeymen whose only skill

47:46

is claiming for themselves the work of their predecessors

47:48

and betters. I've watched inadvertently

47:51

helped on air Frankenstinian

47:54

ego monsters who will talk

47:56

to mere mortal reporters about themselves

47:59

for their own publicity only if their

48:01

origin stories are not addressed those

48:04

who got them started even mentioned. So

48:08

as NBC News continues, it's second week

48:10

falling down the proverbial Homer Simpson

48:13

cliff over the Rana McDaniel

48:15

scandal, the McDaniel hiring,

48:18

and the knives come out for the latest guy

48:21

running the place. I smile quietly

48:23

to myself. And when I say I

48:26

smile quietly, I mean I

48:29

roar with laughter so profound

48:35

I strained muscles. On

48:39

social media, someone identifying

48:41

as Rose of Texas made me roar

48:44

with such muscles straining laughter.

48:47

She wrote, Rona McDaniel

48:49

can still be an MSNBC contributor if

48:51

Mike Pence has courage.

48:56

I dealt with this. Saesar Conde,

48:58

the chairman of NBC News, who is clearly

49:01

the one who's going off the cliff when this is over,

49:03

not that they haven't all fallen off the cliff. I

49:06

dealt with Caesar Conde during the conversations

49:08

to bring me back to resume Countdown on

49:11

MSNBC either at eight pm or

49:13

as mad Ow's caddy, four nights a week at nine

49:16

Those started in twenty nineteen. They

49:18

stretched wearily across the pandemic.

49:21

They lasted into late summer twenty twenty

49:23

one, and they were highlighted by one

49:25

day towards the end, when the new CEO

49:27

of NBC Universal, Jeff Shell, an

49:30

old friend from my sports days at Fox,

49:32

finally got his new news chairman this

49:34

Conday to pay attention to

49:36

his own job for an hour and to meet

49:39

me to talk the admittedly delicate

49:41

process to try to make this happen. There

49:43

were lots of drawbacks, but getting

49:46

MSNBC viewers it had hemorrhaged, and

49:48

profits it had hemorrhaged even faster,

49:51

those were not among the problems AnyWho.

49:55

On the afternoon of October eight, twenty

49:57

twenty one, Conday's assistant emailed

49:59

me to set up breakfast. Would a

50:01

week to the day be good eight thirty am.

50:03

I said yes, it would. As

50:06

I said, there were obstacles, obvious

50:08

obstacles I was going to have to overcome.

50:11

There was going to have to be a certain amount of

50:13

tail between the legs here for old

50:15

Keith, and I was not playing hard

50:17

to get. If his assistant

50:19

had said, let's meet at three point thirty in the morning, I

50:21

would have said, damn dy, I like to get up early. Seven

50:25

minutes later, she suggested the bar at

50:27

a place called the Whitby Hotel for

50:30

October fifteenth, kind of equidistant

50:32

between me and thirty rock. At

50:35

the risk of repeating myself, I said,

50:37

dandy. One minute later

50:39

she replied with apologies,

50:42

Sezar has a tentative trip that week.

50:45

That was the next week. This was a Friday. She

50:47

just discovered that he was going to go away the

50:49

next week. Let me get back to you, she wrote.

50:52

This is email number five over

50:55

a twenty four minute span, which

50:57

Conde's office had itself initiated,

50:59

and she has just noticed, oh,

51:02

this thing we've been talking about for twenty four minutes, he's

51:04

out of town. And

51:07

by the way, they never did get back to me. Mark

51:09

Shapiro, who negotiated madows thirty

51:11

one million dollar MSNBC deal, told

51:14

me the next week that she had found out about the breakfast,

51:16

and Condey had then canceled it. Eighteen

51:20

months later, Conde's boss, my old friend, Jeff

51:22

Shell, was fired for prolonged

51:24

sexual harassment, no

51:27

severance pay, didn't get

51:29

a dime, started to sue. Drop

51:32

the suit. Now

51:34

just under a year after that, after

51:36

the Rona McDaniel scandal, Puck

51:39

News reports that the consensus within NBC

51:42

and NBC News, and more importantly, within Comcast,

51:44

which owns it, is that the McDaniel fiasco

51:47

transpired because Seesar Conde

51:49

was too busy devoting himself to his primary

51:51

professional interest, which is Seesar

51:54

Conde, to quote Puck.

51:57

In the context of the McDaniel mess,

51:59

remembrances of Conde's extracurricular

52:02

activities have caused journalists

52:04

at both ENDS News and MSNBC to

52:06

once again question their boss and whether

52:08

one of America's most storied news

52:11

organizations should

52:13

really be run by someone who seems to prioritize

52:16

his personal and professional advancement

52:18

over the concerns of the news division.

52:20

He leads, quote, it's

52:23

clear he's using the perks of the

52:25

job for himself. One NBC

52:27

News veteran told me, is it

52:29

for corporate purposes or political

52:32

purposes? I don't know what

52:35

I do know is it's never

52:37

been about us? Unquote.

52:43

I'll repeat myself from last week. Good

52:45

night, sayes Arcande, wherever you

52:48

are, by

52:50

the way, if you're trying to answer the question, wherever

52:52

is he? If it's me, I'm checking the bar at

52:54

that Whitby hotel. First,

52:58

it's been two and a half years. Do you think Olberman will

53:00

ever show up for breakfast? In

53:02

my decade at NBC, I worked for five

53:05

different MSNBC chiefs. It

53:07

was the good guy Mark Harrington who

53:09

got sick. I barely got to know him. They

53:12

hired me without telling him while he was out

53:14

sick getting chemotherapy. The next

53:17

guy who got my support for the job,

53:19

he was an old friend by promising me he would

53:21

let me leave MSNBC while he

53:23

was promising the folks at thirty Rock that were going to

53:25

hire him that he would get me to stay. Then

53:28

there was the six foot five guy who lied

53:31

to say he was six foot seven, who

53:34

did not have cable in his home. Then

53:36

they fired him, and they promoted the moron

53:39

anchor who they made general manager, who

53:41

believed that the key was his pet advertising

53:43

slogan keeping it Real, which

53:46

was ironic given his hair and

53:49

then there was my first producer in TV,

53:52

who had spent the preceding year telling

53:54

me nobody would ever watch a woman do

53:56

the news, let alone a gay woman, and

53:58

who was now president of her production company.

54:02

At the same time I worked for these five idiots,

54:05

I worked for three different NBC News

54:07

chiefs in reverse order. They

54:09

were the hysteric whose boss

54:11

said she fired him after

54:14

he told her to her face that he would never accept

54:16

direction from a woman boss.

54:19

Before him, there was the well meaning president who

54:21

wanted me to do a show called Countdown because

54:23

he liked the name, but he really

54:25

didn't have any other ideas for it. And

54:27

then the guy before him, the original guy, Andy

54:30

Lack, after Andy

54:32

Lack, who had left to go

54:35

run Sony into the ground. After

54:37

Andy Lack returned to running NBC

54:39

News in twenty fifteen, I negotiated

54:41

with him for about a year to

54:44

go back and do Countdown there as well.

54:46

This was the running theme of a decade

54:48

with me in MSNBC. But

54:51

he had a few provisos. He

54:55

was the one who wanted me to return to MSNBC.

54:57

He offered me a job on MSNBC, a

54:59

show called The Last Word. He

55:03

offered me the show, just as long as I he did not do

55:05

any commentaries or cover

55:08

any politics, and just

55:10

as long as I had a co anchor,

55:13

a conservative co anchor, and

55:15

just as long as I moved to LA even

55:18

though I could see thirty Rock out

55:21

my apartment window. Andy

55:25

Lack reminds me a lot of

55:28

Saesar Coonde. Not styles, not personalities.

55:30

They could not have been more different, except in one

55:33

vital area. Their job

55:35

was themselves.

55:39

I saw Andy Lack about a year ago, walked

55:41

right past him on the block where

55:43

I lived. As

55:46

usual, I heard Andy Lack before I saw

55:48

him. I met him first in

55:50

nineteen ninety seven and spoke to him on the phone

55:52

a couple of times, and realized he was another one of

55:54

those people you could hear without

55:57

actually using the phone.

56:00

Married to this foghorn is

56:02

his utter fascination with himself. As

56:05

I saw him approach from the east as my dog and

56:07

I walked from the west, I tried to make myself

56:09

small and invisible, but I really had

56:11

nothing to worry about. As usual,

56:14

Andy Lack was so absorbed with the

56:16

sound of his own voice and the brilliant

56:18

points he was making, that I could have blasted

56:21

hello Andy Adam

56:23

threw a bullhorn, and he would never have noticed.

56:26

On the other hand, I noticed again that

56:29

phenomenon of his career and life,

56:31

that his wife Betsy looks

56:34

a little like every woman

56:36

anchor he has ever hired. It

56:40

was Andy Lack who, in his second and

56:42

finally incarnation as the head of NBC News,

56:44

decided that Megan Kelly should be brought

56:46

over from Fox and given a reported

56:49

sixty nine million dollars over three years.

56:51

Because I forget

56:53

what he said, but the actual answer was

56:56

she looked like his wife when she was

56:58

younger. As

57:00

several of my remaining friends at NBC had

57:02

told me, he had already demoted a couple of the

57:04

minority anchors on MSNBC to

57:07

make room for women anchors he liked, who

57:10

look like his wife at various

57:12

stages of her life. He

57:15

probably never heard any of the racist,

57:17

stupid, moronic things Megan Kelly had

57:19

said on the air, nor any of the warnings he

57:21

had been given about here, because he was

57:23

always talking, talking,

57:26

talking makes

57:28

me look like a mute.

57:31

Back in nineteen ninety eight at MSNBC,

57:33

the little sputtering nightly news magazine

57:35

show, Lack had hired me to do suddenly exploded.

57:38

We went from literally seventy or eighty thousand

57:41

viewers a night in total to a

57:43

million, then to a million and a half,

57:45

then to two million a night, just as

57:47

long as we continued to mention Bill

57:50

Clinton and or Monica

57:52

S. Lewinsky. So

57:54

after a couple of months of this, I

57:56

decided to quit. I

57:59

had just left the office of my new therapist,

58:02

having spent most of the hour talking about

58:04

the crazy est person I had yet met

58:06

in broadcasting, Andy Lack,

58:08

the president of NBC News, when my phone

58:10

rang out on twenty third Street in New York, and

58:13

it was Andy Lack. The

58:17

background here is that the problem, in short, was

58:19

that we had turned my not too successful magazine

58:22

show of nineteen ninety seven into the all Bill

58:24

Clinton Monica Lewinsky showed nineteen ninety

58:26

eight that there was not enough new

58:29

news about them. Every night

58:31

did not matter. We did at least one show

58:33

a night, often too often for two

58:35

hours each. If Monica

58:37

Lewinsky's lawyer said anything more detailed

58:39

than no comment, we stayed on the air until we ran

58:41

out of guests. The

58:43

whole thing, including television's

58:46

crazed wall to wall reaction, was

58:49

a carefully planned Newt Gingrich plot

58:51

in which he thought he could actually impeach Clinton

58:54

and then somehow impeach President Al

58:56

Gore before President Gore could

58:58

get a new vice president confirmed, which

59:00

would mean the new new president

59:03

would be So

59:07

I wanted out because we were

59:09

no longer just covering this, we

59:11

were participating in it. I

59:13

said, let me leave, or let me do something

59:16

else, change the topic, because

59:18

I'm done. The problem

59:20

was every time I said something like

59:22

I'm done, or I let my cynicism

59:25

about the story escape on the air, the ratings

59:27

went up. The year before, MSNBC

59:30

was lucky to get one hundred thousand viewers for

59:32

one fifteen minute period a month. Now

59:35

we were upset if we did not get a million

59:37

viewers a minute. MSNBC was actually

59:39

making money, and

59:42

that was almost entirely because of my shows.

59:45

So when I wanted to quit, people like Andy

59:47

Lack wanted not to kill me, but

59:50

to force me to stay there and keep

59:52

talking like that woman who does the

59:54

news on North Korean television. To

59:57

make that possible, Andy Lack tried everything

59:59

promises that I and not Brian Williams,

1:00:01

would be the next anchor of NBC nightly News

1:00:04

once he got Tom Brokaw, more

1:00:06

money, time off, threats,

1:00:09

threats against my family, anything

1:00:11

except the first step towards

1:00:14

letting me change the show or leave

1:00:16

it. The first step would have been

1:00:18

just talk to me, face to face. That

1:00:22

was what he was calling to talk about on the warm afternoon

1:00:25

of the twenty seventh of May nineteen ninety eight.

1:00:27

How he couldn't talk

1:00:29

to me. It was exactly

1:00:32

as crazy as it sounds, and it underscored

1:00:34

what I saw that Friday evening on my dog

1:00:37

walk. You think I can

1:00:39

talk, Holy cow. First

1:00:43

I asked Lack if I could come into his office

1:00:45

to talk to him about it. He said no. I

1:00:47

asked him if we could talk about it on the phone. At some point

1:00:49

he said no. Then he proceeded

1:00:51

to talk about it well, he began, if you're

1:00:54

calling about this meeting of life business, if you just

1:00:56

want to stir the pot about how you're not satisfied

1:00:58

with the show at the moment, I might add, only at the moment

1:01:00

the nuance and subtleties of your career will I'd

1:01:02

have to say no, we can't meet. Of course, in say that

1:01:04

I'm always available to meet with you. I love you, but

1:01:07

to me. He

1:01:10

paused for no discernible reason, possibly

1:01:13

in the desperate attempt to remember what he had

1:01:16

just said in my mind.

1:01:18

There now appeared at the bottom of that

1:01:20

news channel ticker that always

1:01:22

goes across it that flashed

1:01:25

a message about not worrying about what I would

1:01:27

hear next, that all this was just some sort of test

1:01:29

of the Andy Lack emergency random

1:01:31

thoughts warning system. He

1:01:33

suddenly resumed, it's just not the

1:01:36

right time. It's premature, it's too early in the process.

1:01:38

And in saying it's too early in the process, I'm not saying there

1:01:40

is a process. I'm just saying that

1:01:42

there shouldn't be a process yet, because it's

1:01:45

just not right the right time for this, and I don't think we've

1:01:47

explored the options fully for improving

1:01:49

how you see what's happening. And when I say we, of

1:01:51

course I mean you and Phil

1:01:53

Griffin, You and Phil Griffin, because Phil's

1:01:55

part of this process. Not to imply there is a process,

1:01:58

but rather he's just at the beginning of this situation,

1:02:00

of the resolution of this situation, not that this is

1:02:03

a situation that requires resolution, because

1:02:05

I think you know in life you have many times,

1:02:08

many durations, many seasons, many years

1:02:10

where you might say you're unhappy or discontented

1:02:12

or in some way not pleased with what you're doing, but

1:02:15

you'll have plenty of opportunities to make changes in the

1:02:17

direction of your life. Obviously not now. You

1:02:19

made these changes last year, and you committed to it,

1:02:21

and I committed to it, and you've done such an outstanding

1:02:24

job, a thoroughly outstanding job.

1:02:26

But I can't tell you how much we value you.

1:02:28

And I was on Larry King last week and Larry

1:02:30

said to me, I love Olderman, and I said,

1:02:32

I love Olderman and he said, I wish I could be doing

1:02:34

for you what he's doing for you. And this is

1:02:36

not that you should think that I'm totally blowing smoke

1:02:39

up your backside, but the critical acclaim,

1:02:42

especially the insider's critical acclaim, the

1:02:44

people whose opinions matter consistently

1:02:46

rating you is the best at this on the cutting edge.

1:02:48

And for that matter, the ratings have been outstanding. And I'm

1:02:51

fully committed to you in all senses of the word.

1:02:53

But if you want to talk to me about in some way changing

1:02:56

what you're doing, it just doesn't enter

1:02:58

into the equation. Because things are going so well,

1:03:00

then we're just delighted with the program. And

1:03:03

you need to understand that on my screen,

1:03:05

this isn't even on the fast track, because why should

1:03:07

I say to you, Look, I want to change this completely

1:03:09

successful show when it's been such a success

1:03:12

and a complete one and a runaway hit, and

1:03:14

everybody says to me how smoothly you've made the

1:03:16

transition from sports, And I can't talk

1:03:18

to you about it because I love you. I mean, I'm fully

1:03:20

behind you one hundred percent, and you have my

1:03:22

support and my commitment and my resources

1:03:25

and they're all at your beck and call anytime

1:03:27

you need them or you need me. But there aren't problems,

1:03:29

and I love the show and the thought of tinkering

1:03:31

with it or adjusting it just is the farthest

1:03:33

thing from my mind right now. But you have to understand

1:03:35

I'm completely committed to you and Phil then

1:03:37

what you're doing, and I just can't talk to you about

1:03:40

it now, although the door is always open, and

1:03:42

you know you can call me and talk to me at any

1:03:44

time about anything. And when I say I

1:03:46

mean anything, I don't

1:03:48

mean this, and I can envision changing things because

1:03:50

I don't have to click

1:03:55

that was Andy Lack, the president of NBC

1:03:58

News talking to me about not talking

1:04:00

to me about changing the Clinton Lewinsky

1:04:02

TV marathon. Is possible

1:04:06

that after all these years, I did not quote

1:04:08

his three minute spasm of words completely

1:04:11

accurately. But if I did not, I got damned

1:04:13

close. So

1:04:16

the next time Megan Kelly says something stupid

1:04:19

or tweets something stupid, and it's got to be

1:04:21

soon, she's due, just remember,

1:04:24

don't just blame her, spread

1:04:26

it around, Blame the guy who

1:04:28

stuck her on an actual television

1:04:31

network with a reputation, Andy

1:04:35

Lack, And say your criticisms

1:04:38

of Andy Lack as loud as you want, because

1:04:41

just remember, he's going to keep talking

1:04:43

and he'll never hear a

1:04:46

word of it. I've

1:05:01

done all the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening

1:05:03

and bearing with me my uncertain

1:05:06

voice. Countdown. Musical directors

1:05:08

Brian Ray and John Phillip Schanel arranged, produced,

1:05:10

and performed most of our music. Mister

1:05:13

Ray was on guitars, bass and drums. Mister

1:05:15

Shanelle handled orchestration and keyboards. It

1:05:18

was produced by Tko Brothers and

1:05:20

not by Megan Kelly. Other

1:05:23

music, including some of the Beethoven compositions were

1:05:25

arranged and performed by the group No Horns Allowed.

1:05:28

The sports music is the Overman theme from ESPN

1:05:31

two, written by Mitch Warren Davis, courtesy

1:05:33

of ESPN, Inc. Now. Our satirical

1:05:35

and pithy musical comments are by Nancy Faust.

1:05:38

The best baseball stadium organist ever. Our

1:05:40

announcer today was my friend Jonathan Banks.

1:05:42

Everything else pretty much my

1:05:45

fault. That's countdown for this

1:05:47

the two hundred and eighteenth day until

1:05:50

the twenty twenty four presidential election,

1:05:52

but one hundred and eighty third

1:05:54

day since demented Jay Trump's

1:05:56

first attempted coup against the democratically

1:05:58

elected government of the United States. Use

1:06:01

the fourteenth Amendment and the not regularly

1:06:03

given elector of objection option, Use

1:06:06

the Insurrection Act, use the Terrorism

1:06:08

Acts, use the justice system

1:06:10

and the mental health system to stop

1:06:13

him from doing it again while

1:06:16

we still can. The

1:06:19

next scheduled countdown is tomorrow. Bulletin says

1:06:21

the news warrants till then. I'm Keith

1:06:23

Oldremman. Good Morning, good afternoon, good night,

1:06:25

and good luck. Countdown

1:06:46

with Keith Olreman is a production of iHeartRadio.

1:06:49

For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,

1:06:51

Visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

1:06:54

or wherever you get your podcasts.