EPISODE 141: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN

A-Block (1:41) SPECIAL COMMENT: Where is the Department of Justice? Homeland Security? The House Democrats? The Senate Democrats? The Capitol Police Board? When those who are supposed to protect us make it a four-day week, WHO will step up to stop Kevin McCarthy's criminal collusion with Tucker Carlson on the 1/6 Security Video?

Mike Lindell.

No, seriously. 

Lindell alone acts as the implications of McCarthy's Quid Pro Quo become more evident. As the argument is made that the Democrats should now release all the video to all news organizations so some of them will be prepared to push back against Carlson's Conspiracy Theories and False Flag claims, the 44,000 hours of pure unadulterated high grade brainwash is clearly designed to be used to whitewash Trump. And it fits into the Gaslight Ecosystem, which last night expanded to include an organization trying to blacklist ALL former staffers on the House January 6th Committee, and blacklist their new employers, and blacklist their new employers' clients.

B-Block (15:02) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Ron DeSantis and his press secretary are losing a battle with a newscaster who fell asleep on the air the other day; Alaska's advocate for child abuse death is censured; and George Santos not only signs on to legislation honoring a gun, but lies about it as well (19:22) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: Does a publisher get to purge mildly offensive words like "fat" or "bald" from the works of a dead author? Wouldn't a warning note be enough? Upping the ante: the author is Roald Dahl, the man who created Willy Wonka. Upping the ante again: he was both an often terrible human being and an often exceptionally kind one. Upping the ante one last time: when I was seven years old, Roald Dahl and I corresponded.

C-Block (39:40) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Ben in Brooklyn (40:40) FRIDAYS WITH THURBER: His most darkly humorous story, the one that prophesied Trump: "The Greatest Man In The World."

EPISODE 141: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:41) SPECIAL COMMENT: Where is the Department of Justice? Homeland Security? The House Democrats? The Senate Democrats? The Capitol Police Board? When those who are supposed to protect us make it a four-day week, WHO will step up to stop Kevin McCarthy's criminal collusion with Tucker Carlson on the 1/6 Security Video?
Mike Lindell.
No, seriously. 
Lindell alone acts as the implications of McCarthy's Quid Pro Quo become more evident. As the argument is made that the Democrats should now release all the video to all news organizations so some of them will be prepared to push back against Carlson's Conspiracy Theories and False Flag claims, the 44,000 hours of pure unadulterated high grade brainwash is clearly designed to be used to whitewash Trump. And it fits into the Gaslight Ecosystem, which last night expanded to include an organization trying to blacklist ALL former staffers on the House January 6th Committee, and blacklist their new employers, and blacklist their new employers' clients.
B-Block (15:02) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Ron DeSantis and his press secretary are losing a battle with a newscaster who fell asleep on the air the other day; Alaska's advocate for child abuse death is censured; and George Santos not only signs on to legislation honoring a gun, but lies about it as well (19:22) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: Does a publisher get to purge mildly offensive words like "fat" or "bald" from the works of a dead author? Wouldn't a warning note be enough? Upping the ante: the author is Roald Dahl, the man who created Willy Wonka. Upping the ante again: he was both an often terrible human being and an often exceptionally kind one. Upping the ante one last time: when I was seven years old, Roald Dahl and I corresponded.
C-Block (39:40) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Ben in Brooklyn (40:40) FRIDAYS WITH THURBER: His most darkly humorous story, the one that prophesied Trump: "The Greatest Man In The World."

“Countdown With Keith Olbermann,” the landmark news and commentary program that reordered the world of cable news, returns as a daily podcast. Olbermann’s daily news-driven mix will include his trademark “Special Comment” political analysis, the tongue-in-cheek “Worst Persons In The World” segment, and his timeless readings from the works of the immortal James Thurber. The man who turned SportsCenter into a cultural phenomenon will broaden the content to include a daily sports segment, a daily call for help for a suffering dog, and a remarkable series of anecdotes covering a career that stretched from covering the 1980 Olympic Miracle on Ice a month after his 21st birthday, to anchoring the 2009 Presidential Inauguration and the 2009 Super Bowl pre-game show in a span of just twelve days, to rejoining ESPN as a “rookie” baseball play-by-play man at the age of 59.

“Countdown With Keith Olbermann,” the landmark news and commentary program that reordered the world of cable news, returns as a daily podcast. Olbermann’s daily news-driven mix will include his trademark “Special Comment” political analysis, the tongue-in-cheek “Worst Persons In The World” segment, and his timeless readings from the works of the immortal James Thurber. The man who turned SportsCenter into a cultural phenomenon will broaden the content to include a daily sports segment, a daily call for help for a suffering dog, and a remarkable series of anecdotes covering a career that stretched from covering the 1980 Olympic Miracle on Ice a month after his 21st birthday, to anchoring the 2009 Presidential Inauguration and the 2009 Super Bowl pre-game show in a span of just twelve days, to rejoining ESPN as a “rookie” baseball play-by-play man at the age of 59.

Countdown with Keith Olbermann

FIGHTING TUCKER AND MCCARTHY, IT'S MIKE LINDELL? 2.24.23

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/bb5255e6-07b3-45ae-ae40-afb3003fcafe/transcript

SERIES 2 EPISODE 175: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN

A-Block (1:44): Dumboesque Senator Tommy Tuberville has gone on the Newsmax propaganda channel and revealed the obvious: the Speaker, the Senators, Congressmen, (one) Governor and one political jock-sniffer (Ramaswamy) who've stunt-attended Trump's New York trial are there to help Trump evade Judge Merchan's Gag Order.

Merchan must bring them into court, put them under oath, and get their testimony as to what Trump demanded that Mike Johnson, Cory Mills, J.D. Vance, Tuberville, Doug Burgum, and Ramaswamy do to help him get around the Judge's order. Then find Trump in contempt because the gag order ALSO precludes him from telling others to attack witnesses or the judge's family for him.

Also, thanks for Ramaswamy for the funniest Freudian slip of the trial, in which he accidentally called Trump a "sham politician."

MEANWHILE: A day ago I asked The New York Times to give us a "Walter Cronkite" moment and instead it gave us a Judith Miller Moment. Introduced into evidence yesterday? Texts from Michael Cohen to Maggie Haberman from 2018 reading “Big boss just approved my responding to complaint and statement. Please start writing and I will call you soon." What she wrote presented Cohen's (and Trump's) lies about Stormy Daniels and the payoffs as facts. She wrote it the same day and came back and wrote it again the next day.

There is a difference between facts (Cohen texted me) and the truth (WHAT Cohen texted me isn't true and I didn't bother to try to find out or even caveat the lies - and Haberman and The Times have to go. As they fired Judith Miller for disseminating George W. Bush's "Saddam WMD" lies so they must fire Haberman - the same Haberman who two days ago dismissed Cohen's testimony as "hearsay" and who is still writing Times leads on this story TODAY.

B-BLOCK (40:47) WHY The Times needs to give us a Walter Cronkite Moment.

C-BLOCK (64:39) GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK.

SERIES 2 EPISODE 175: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44): Dumboesque Senator Tommy Tuberville has gone on the Newsmax propaganda channel and revealed the obvious: the Speaker, the Senators, Congressmen, (one) Governor and one political jock-sniffer (Ramaswamy) who've stunt-attended Trump's New York trial are there to help Trump evade Judge Merchan's Gag Order.
Merchan must bring them into court, put them under oath, and get their testimony as to what Trump demanded that Mike Johnson, Cory Mills, J.D. Vance, Tuberville, Doug Burgum, and Ramaswamy do to help him get around the Judge's order. Then find Trump in contempt because the gag order ALSO precludes him from telling others to attack witnesses or the judge's family for him.
Also, thanks for Ramaswamy for the funniest Freudian slip of the trial, in which he accidentally called Trump a "sham politician."
MEANWHILE: A day ago I asked The New York Times to give us a "Walter Cronkite" moment and instead it gave us a Judith Miller Moment. Introduced into evidence yesterday? Texts from Michael Cohen to Maggie Haberman from 2018 reading “Big boss just approved my responding to complaint and statement. Please start writing and I will call you soon." What she wrote presented Cohen's (and Trump's) lies about Stormy Daniels and the payoffs as facts. She wrote it the same day and came back and wrote it again the next day.
There is a difference between facts (Cohen texted me) and the truth (WHAT Cohen texted me isn't true and I didn't bother to try to find out or even caveat the lies - and Haberman and The Times have to go. As they fired Judith Miller for disseminating George W. Bush's "Saddam WMD" lies so they must fire Haberman - the same Haberman who two days ago dismissed Cohen's testimony as "hearsay" and who is still writing Times leads on this story TODAY.
B-BLOCK (40:47) WHY The Times needs to give us a Walter Cronkite Moment.
C-BLOCK (64:39) GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK.

TUBERVILLE CONFIRMS TRUMP'S PLOT TO EVADE GAG ORDER; TIMES MUST FIRE HABERMAN - 5.15.24

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/f4dbe11c-bc47-4100-b6de-b171000fe223/transcript

SERIES 2 EPISODE 174: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN

A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: We need a Walter Cronkite moment from The New York Times. The New York Times needs, one day – one day soon, one day now – to devote the entirety of the front page – to a headline, and an editorial, signed by the publisher Sulzberger and the editor Kahn and the key columnists and correspondents – headlined “TRUMP IMPERILS DEMOCRACY” and sub-headlined “YOUR LIFE AT STAKE.”

We need a Walter Cronkite moment from The New York Times and when Trump went to a Philadelphia area seaside resort called Wildwood, drew maybe 10,000 cultists, lied and had the Republican mayor lie and say it was 80,000, complained that immigrant students don’t speak English and immediately afterwards said something like “Borden-in-riv-iv,” said something else like “carry doubt-ite-by-rite,”claimed the president between Ford and Reagan was named Jimmy Connors, said the Chinese were preparing to invade Beijing (their own capital), insisted the entire country was grateful that he killed Roe-V-Wade, thanked – by name - the Supreme Court justices who gutted it, suddenly invoked the fictional cannibal character Hannibal Lecter, seemed to praise him, claimed the character was dead, and got the name of the movie wrong, and then insisted all immigrants are Hannibal Lecter – and all of that was after he was introduced by some immigrant who called him “President CHUMP"... the New York Times story, by a sixth-stringer named Michael Gold, mentioned… none of that. This was what Editor Joe Kahn’s writer told consumers of the most influential news organization in America, quote: “After a long and often tense week in his criminal trial in Manhattan… Trump… took part in a time-honored ritual enjoyed by countless New Yorkers in need of a break: He went to the shore.”

Oh ho ho, how clever.

The Times instead lets Maggie Haberman dismiss as “hearsay” Michael Cohen’s first-hand recounting of what Trump told him about ‘not being on the market for long’ if Melania dumped him and if Haberman doesn’t know the legal definition of “hearsay” get rid of her. And the Times made room for an op-ed bashing Joe Biden by Mark Penn, a dishonest right wing pollster who has been posing as a Democrat for at least 20 years.

In Court: “Michael Cohen calmly describes Trump’s hush money instructions,” reads the headline in The Washington Post. The SUB-headline quotes Trump: “Just do it.” That’s what the prosecution needed out of Cohen. And it needs it again out of him today. AND whenever the cross-examination begins. It needs him making more self-abnegating jokes about ‘angry, even for me.’ It needs him testifying as he did yesterday: that he was there in Trump Tower, days before Trump was sworn in as president, with Allan Weisselberg, reviewing a handwritten document plan to repay Cohen for the Stormy Daniels hush money and how they would hide it. And that Trump said “smart individuals” had told him, Trump, to pay the $130,000. And that Trump told him he knew if the Daniels story got out it would be a disaster for the CAMPAIGN. And it needs him producing one outstandingly sleazy quote from Trump per day on the stand, like when Cohen asked Trump about the impact on his wife MELANIA if the story got out and Trump said “don’t worry. How long do you think I’ll be on the market for? Not long.”

B-Block (22:54) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: California Assembly Bill 2265 and what it can do to save dogs - and save shelters the horrible cost of killing them. (24:27) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: An update on the back story to the "This Is SportsCenter" commercial I did with soccer's Alexi Lalas, in which I reprised John Belushi's moment in "Animal House" in which he smashes the guitar against the wall. The update? The DVD with the outtakes literally fell off a shelf here yesterday. Enjoy.

C-Block (40:35) GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK.

SERIES 2 EPISODE 174: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: We need a Walter Cronkite moment from The New York Times. The New York Times needs, one day – one day soon, one day now – to devote the entirety of the front page – to a headline, and an editorial, signed by the publisher Sulzberger and the editor Kahn and the key columnists and correspondents – headlined “TRUMP IMPERILS DEMOCRACY” and sub-headlined “YOUR LIFE AT STAKE.”
We need a Walter Cronkite moment from The New York Times and when Trump went to a Philadelphia area seaside resort called Wildwood, drew maybe 10,000 cultists, lied and had the Republican mayor lie and say it was 80,000, complained that immigrant students don’t speak English and immediately afterwards said something like “Borden-in-riv-iv,” said something else like “carry doubt-ite-by-rite,”claimed the president between Ford and Reagan was named Jimmy Connors, said the Chinese were preparing to invade Beijing (their own capital), insisted the entire country was grateful that he killed Roe-V-Wade, thanked – by name - the Supreme Court justices who gutted it, suddenly invoked the fictional cannibal character Hannibal Lecter, seemed to praise him, claimed the character was dead, and got the name of the movie wrong, and then insisted all immigrants are Hannibal Lecter – and all of that was after he was introduced by some immigrant who called him “President CHUMP"... the New York Times story, by a sixth-stringer named Michael Gold, mentioned… none of that. This was what Editor Joe Kahn’s writer told consumers of the most influential news organization in America, quote: “After a long and often tense week in his criminal trial in Manhattan… Trump… took part in a time-honored ritual enjoyed by countless New Yorkers in need of a break: He went to the shore.”
Oh ho ho, how clever.
The Times instead lets Maggie Haberman dismiss as “hearsay” Michael Cohen’s first-hand recounting of what Trump told him about ‘not being on the market for long’ if Melania dumped him and if Haberman doesn’t know the legal definition of “hearsay” get rid of her. And the Times made room for an op-ed bashing Joe Biden by Mark Penn, a dishonest right wing pollster who has been posing as a Democrat for at least 20 years.
In Court: “Michael Cohen calmly describes Trump’s hush money instructions,” reads the headline in The Washington Post. The SUB-headline quotes Trump: “Just do it.” That’s what the prosecution needed out of Cohen. And it needs it again out of him today. AND whenever the cross-examination begins. It needs him making more self-abnegating jokes about ‘angry, even for me.’ It needs him testifying as he did yesterday: that he was there in Trump Tower, days before Trump was sworn in as president, with Allan Weisselberg, reviewing a handwritten document plan to repay Cohen for the Stormy Daniels hush money and how they would hide it. And that Trump said “smart individuals” had told him, Trump, to pay the $130,000. And that Trump told him he knew if the Daniels story got out it would be a disaster for the CAMPAIGN. And it needs him producing one outstandingly sleazy quote from Trump per day on the stand, like when Cohen asked Trump about the impact on his wife MELANIA if the story got out and Trump said “don’t worry. How long do you think I’ll be on the market for? Not long.”
B-Block (22:54) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: California Assembly Bill 2265 and what it can do to save dogs - and save shelters the horrible cost of killing them. (24:27) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: An update on the back story to the "This Is SportsCenter" commercial I did with soccer's Alexi Lalas, in which I reprised John Belushi's moment in "Animal House" in which he smashes the guitar against the wall. The update? The DVD with the outtakes literally fell off a shelf here yesterday. Enjoy.
C-Block (40:35) GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK.

WE NEED A "WALTER CRONKITE MOMENT" FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES - 5.14.24

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/53f08ea1-3d3c-4930-ad3b-b16f0184a070/transcript

SERIES 2 EPISODE 173: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN

A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: I don’t know much about the law but I do know the Trump Trial has confirmed one of the immutable truths of the field: Never hire an attorney with a rating of 3-1/2 stars.

Susan Necheles somehow managed to lose to Stormy Daniels during the second day of cross-examination in Trump-On-Trial yesterday; lose so badly and obviously that Trump’s team was forced to file for a desperation mistrial from the very thin ice of basically claiming Necklace forgot to object to something that Daniels said on TUESDAY.

All of a sudden the Trump defense was claiming – and leaking to every news organization, by the way – that Daniels had dog-whistled a subtext of rape or assault when she gave details about Trump standing in front of her, and not using a condom, and a bodyguard being out in the hallway – and we should just ignore that when she said all that, THREE DAYS AGO, Trump’s lawyer with the three-and-a-half stars rating Susan Necheles said… nothing. Not even the only thing you or I would remember to say if we woke up in some alternate universe where we were in that courtroom as Trump’s lawyer: “OBJECTION.”

And that might have been Necheles's best work.

Ms. Necheles: “You have experience in making up fake stories about sex?”

Ms. Daniels: “The sex is real. That’s why it’s not a B movie.”

Ms. Necheles: “NOW you have a story about having sex with President Trump, right?”

Ms. Daniels: “If that story was untrue, I would’ve written it to be a lot better.”

Ooops! There goes another half a star.

Ms. Necheles: “You had sex with a cameraman?”

Ms. Daniels: “I started dating him and he became my husband.”

A reminder: None of this needed to be heard by the jury. If Trump’s defense had stipulated, yeah, they had sex, she wouldn’t have been allowed to testify. Or they could have just asked her what she knew about Trump’s involvement in the non-disclosure agreement and the payoffs and she could have said “nothing” and Ms. Necheles could have said “nothing further, your honor.” This is a case – a relatively boring case with excruciating details about how routine company checks got sent to the White House for Trump to sign even as president and he never ignored a single detail that cost him more than 99 cents – a relatively boring case about falsified business records and the attempt to interfere with an election and Trump’s team turned it into wocka-wocka-wocka, and his credibility and their credibility against the credibility of a pornographic actress and guess what: the actress won.

ALSO: Oh by the way, last month Trump assembled around 20 of the nation's top oil and fossil fuel executives and offered them a deal. He'd sell them the world to destroy as quickly as they wanted - repeal all regulations and make Doug Burgum Secretary of Energy or VP or whatever - if they'd simply give him a billion dollars with which to get elected. So when you worry that democracy is on the ballot in November, just remember, no, it's worse than that: human EXISTENCE is on the ballot.

B-Block (23:10) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Mark Levin tries to get around calling Judge Juan Merchan "a pervert" because he was listening to Stormy Daniels' testimony. Failson Andrew Giuliani is "reporting" on the trial and puts me in an impossible position by blasting Lawrence O'Donnell. And Chuck Todd ISN'T gone after all. He has just written a masterpiece of nonsense: an Epic Poem of bothsidesism in which he concludes Biden and Trump both need to admit their mistakes. He spends one paragraph on Trump's mistakes and about a dozen on how Biden failed to bring the country together (while Trump was tearing it apart). 

C-Block (34:00) FRIDAYS WITH THURBER: No gentle reminiscences here. No prophetic tales of heroes who were actually schmoes. Thurber goes for the jugular vein of the famous Avantgarde artist Salvador Dali in "The Secret Life Of James Thurber."

SERIES 2 EPISODE 173: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:44) SPECIAL COMMENT: I don’t know much about the law but I do know the Trump Trial has confirmed one of the immutable truths of the field: Never hire an attorney with a rating of 3-1/2 stars.
Susan Necheles somehow managed to lose to Stormy Daniels during the second day of cross-examination in Trump-On-Trial yesterday; lose so badly and obviously that Trump’s team was forced to file for a desperation mistrial from the very thin ice of basically claiming Necklace forgot to object to something that Daniels said on TUESDAY.
All of a sudden the Trump defense was claiming – and leaking to every news organization, by the way – that Daniels had dog-whistled a subtext of rape or assault when she gave details about Trump standing in front of her, and not using a condom, and a bodyguard being out in the hallway – and we should just ignore that when she said all that, THREE DAYS AGO, Trump’s lawyer with the three-and-a-half stars rating Susan Necheles said… nothing. Not even the only thing you or I would remember to say if we woke up in some alternate universe where we were in that courtroom as Trump’s lawyer: “OBJECTION.”
And that might have been Necheles's best work.
Ms. Necheles: “You have experience in making up fake stories about sex?”
Ms. Daniels: “The sex is real. That’s why it’s not a B movie.”
Ms. Necheles: “NOW you have a story about having sex with President Trump, right?”
Ms. Daniels: “If that story was untrue, I would’ve written it to be a lot better.”
Ooops! There goes another half a star.
Ms. Necheles: “You had sex with a cameraman?”
Ms. Daniels: “I started dating him and he became my husband.”
A reminder: None of this needed to be heard by the jury. If Trump’s defense had stipulated, yeah, they had sex, she wouldn’t have been allowed to testify. Or they could have just asked her what she knew about Trump’s involvement in the non-disclosure agreement and the payoffs and she could have said “nothing” and Ms. Necheles could have said “nothing further, your honor.” This is a case – a relatively boring case with excruciating details about how routine company checks got sent to the White House for Trump to sign even as president and he never ignored a single detail that cost him more than 99 cents – a relatively boring case about falsified business records and the attempt to interfere with an election and Trump’s team turned it into wocka-wocka-wocka, and his credibility and their credibility against the credibility of a pornographic actress and guess what: the actress won.
ALSO: Oh by the way, last month Trump assembled around 20 of the nation's top oil and fossil fuel executives and offered them a deal. He'd sell them the world to destroy as quickly as they wanted - repeal all regulations and make Doug Burgum Secretary of Energy or VP or whatever - if they'd simply give him a billion dollars with which to get elected. So when you worry that democracy is on the ballot in November, just remember, no, it's worse than that: human EXISTENCE is on the ballot.
B-Block (23:10) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Mark Levin tries to get around calling Judge Juan Merchan "a pervert" because he was listening to Stormy Daniels' testimony. Failson Andrew Giuliani is "reporting" on the trial and puts me in an impossible position by blasting Lawrence O'Donnell. And Chuck Todd ISN'T gone after all. He has just written a masterpiece of nonsense: an Epic Poem of bothsidesism in which he concludes Biden and Trump both need to admit their mistakes. He spends one paragraph on Trump's mistakes and about a dozen on how Biden failed to bring the country together (while Trump was tearing it apart). 
C-Block (34:00) FRIDAYS WITH THURBER: No gentle reminiscences here. No prophetic tales of heroes who were actually schmoes. Thurber goes for the jugular vein of the famous Avantgarde artist Salvador Dali in "The Secret Life Of James Thurber."

TRUMP PROVES: NEVER HIRE A LAWYER WITH 3-1/2 STARS - 5.10.24

https://api.omny.fm/orgs/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/clips/f19d5f42-e529-468c-aca6-b16c000fd85e/transcript

FIGHTING TUCKER AND MCCARTHY, IT'S MIKE LINDELL? 2.24.23

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