SERIES 2 EPISODE 102: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN BULLETIN JANUARY 6th WEEKEND EDITION

A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: You already know that MY default position when it comes to President Biden is deep respect, deep affection, and love. And having said that, even Iwas stunned by the virtuosity of his pitch-perfect speech about Trump and the threat to democracy he represents, which the President gave near Valley Forge on the eve of the third anniversary of Trump’s Insurrection, in which he hit every note ranging from whispered warning to raging righteousness; in which his emotional ebb and flow went from the astonishment of the moment to anger on behalf of every past president and every dead soldier; in which he roared from clear and unvarnished statement of the danger of Trump and the dictatorship with which he would KILL America, and the still CLEARER and MORE unvarnished delineation of the path by which to defeat it, and Trump, and these fascists, for all time. It was breathtaking. It was honest to God JFK-FDR level oratory. Here are the highlights.

Also, here is Trump's response: to claim that migrants who don't speak "our language" should not be allowed to vote, and to post a video claiming God sent him to rule America. If the cadence of this accompaniment to Dementia J. Trump turning into Deified J. Trump sounds familiar, it should. It was stolen from a 2013 Super Bowl Ad, and itself stolen from a 1978 speech by one of my old bosses.

B-Block (25:00) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: Biden's speech was so good, so sweeping, that I think you should listen to all of it. Carve out half an hour and do so - here it is,

C-Block (59:10) UPDATE: While we're here, there's news on this sports story I mentioned during the week in which Aaron Rodgers, on the Pat McAfee Show, a program for which ESPN just paid its namesake host 85 million dollars to run on its platforms, Rodgers implied that when the Jeffrey Epstein lists were published, Jimmy Kimmel would be mentioned. Rodgers said when that happened, he’d pop open a bottle of something.Kimmel, who like McAfee, and Rodgers – who is under contract TO McAfee to appear on his shows – is employed by Disney. And within hours of the Aaron Rodgers statement, Kimmel tweeted that if Rodgers did not stop, he would sue Rodgers.

The next day McAfee pleaded ignorance. It didn’t take much effort; he’s pretty ignorant. He said he believed there was no cause for any problem because Rodgers was just quote “talking shit.” In fact that’s not really a defense many courts will accept in a defamation suit. A defamation suit by one Disney employee against two other Disney employees in McAfee and Rodgers. Rodgers has not again appeared on the show, nor did McAfee issue a retraction.

What McAfee DID do Friday, though, was to declare war ON ESPN. He accused executives of the company of leaking inaccurate ratings about the program.Actually, what it is, is – professionally – suicidal. Because McAfee named names, and he named the one ESPN executive who has outlasted everybody who has ever worked there, including me, including me the second time, including me the third time when HE personally got me rehired, including me as he supervised the unlikeliest of outcomes to my ESPN career in which of all people I wound up… RETIRING FROM ESPN. I got everything but the gold watch.

The executive’s name is Norby Williamson. And in trashing him, McAfee gave ESPN a way to fire him - for cause - and owe him none of the money in his contract. Or pay him off and silence him, just like Fox did with Tucker Carlson. Because if 32 years with Norby has taught me one thing: he survives - the other guy doesn't.