Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. More people were arrested in LA after the Lakers won the twenty twenty NBA title than were arrested in LA on Sunday during the protests during the Ice Riot during the Gestapo invasion of Southern California. This is not some sort of metaphor or analogy. October eleventh, twenty twenty, after the COVID delayed NBA Finals ended with the LA Lakers winning the championship, in LA, there were seventy six arrests Sunday, the day Trump now says that without him and his Brown Shirts, Los Angeles would have been completely obliterated. There were forty two arrests seventy six to forty two vandalism, unlawful assembly, failure to disperse, bottles thrown at cops, vehicles set on fire, flash bangs and projectiles fired at civilians, graffiti covering buildings, property damage, a crowd of at least two thousand out of control, Downtown LA streets closed. No, that was also all after the Lakers won. The Lakers victory celebration five years ago was measurably a greater risk to security and safety than were the protests against Trump's unconstitutional kidnapping of civilians, often citizens, almost always law abiding this past Sunday, And if that raw final score is not stark enough Lakers seventy six protests for due process forty two. It's a final. You knew this will true. Once Trump declared victory yesterday, at midnight, our hitler was posting, looking really bad in La, bring in the troops. At noon, our hitler was posting that the governor and the mayor who just fire five things are not insane fascist dictators quote should be saying thank you, President Trump. You are so wonderful. We would be nothing without you? Sir? Is he an insane narcissist or calculating monster? Why can't we have both? Right after congratulating himself, Trump mobilized five hundred members of the Marines to join the National Guard in La. Some say it's seven hundred members of the Marines to take care of the rapidly expanding nothing. It is not just unnecessary, it is illegal, and I will get to the California lawsuit against all of it presently, which has now been filed. The other content, though, that Sunday was nothing seventy six Laker arrests forty two Trump riot arrests. Was when Trump insisted, quote, I wouldn't call it quite an insurrection, but it could have led to an insurrection on quote, And there was disappointment in his voice because of course he wants one. As we will analyze in a moment, the powers he has awarded himself when federalizing the National Guard turned out to be enough for him to literally install his dictatorship to day. But let's first finish the clean up on the near complete obliteration of Los Angeles. Ah, what a shame. I like the place this could reignite at any point. You could know more about this than I do, because I recorded this earlier than you're listening to it. The rumor within local government was ICE would be kidnapping people off the streets of LA and southern California for the next twenty eight days to a month. They were at multiple home debas yesterday, And of course Trump wants it reignited, because that is the point of it. The deportations are not only an end in themselves raw meet to the racists and the Stephen Miller grade psychos, but they are also a means for him to control anything he wants, especially foremost the midterm elections, but that there was nothing approaching what he told his cult had happened was underscored when Rick Caruso, the lifelong Republican who lost the election for mayor to Karen Bass in November twenty twenty two and has since criticized her every move, when he wrote, quote, there is no emergency, widespread threat, or out of control violence in Los Angeles, and absolutely no danger that justifies deployment of the National Guard, military, or other federal force to the streets of this or any other Southern California city. Local law enforcement is capable of handling the situation and should arrest anyone causing violence in the streets. We must call for calm in the streets, and deployment of the National Guard may prompt just the opposite. Lifelong Republican lost the mayor's race, hates the mayor. Caruso reiterated all of that yesterday, just in case you missed it, live in drivetime on local radio news just before noon Eastern. For the record, Caruso was the Republican head of the Police Commission in LA for many years, and he has a little money behind him that race for mayor. He blew forty one million on the primary around the country as much as Trump is selling the idea that la is a cauldron and he alone can save it, even though no, no, that's right. I saved it yesterday, so everybody should call me, sir. It's not Landing. Polling by the Last King of five thirty eight Elliott Morris confirms Trump has been hurt by the deportations and especially the case of kilm Are of Rego Garcia, and people like him and the Democrats have been helped, not that they're doing anything with it, except for Newsome. New CBS polling says fifty five percent in this country supports the general idea of these deportations, but fifty six percent dislike how Trump is doing it, and no matter how they feel about the kidnappings and the renditions, sixty three percent want due process. The problem, of course, is that Trump doesn't have to convince anybody but his supporters and the news media and the Republican political wars he terrorizes into submission. He doesn't need fifty one percent of voters. He doesn't need fifty one percent of Americans. He just needs one hundred percent of his voters. They are, in short, a mob, a gang, an organized crime family, a cult, a suicide cult. Trump stumbling up those airplanes step Sunday is the perfect metaphor. You and I correctly see a deranged, delusional, elderly creature rapidly losing control not just of his mind but of his bloated carcass. They see him triumphantly getting up the stairs anyway and overcoming all the obstacles anyway, and saving Los Angeles from a crisis that he completely provoked and escalated. And matter of fact, the son of a bitch didn't even manage to create a real crisis, did he. I need a couple of moments of humorous relief. One North Carolina congressman, a Republican named Moore who does not appear to have his own neck, let alone a brain, retweeted a Homeland Security post insisting California politicians must call off their rioting mob. More added, La is being burned down by lawless mobs who support foreign criminals. The photo from DHS that he has reached tweeted shows one car on fire, one not even very on fire. There's some smoke There's about a dozen people around this car. One is standing on top of it. He is shirtless. He is wearing a Mexican flag, because of course you never see a Mexican flag in Los Angeles. It's the apocalypse again. Lakers arrests seventy six, Trump Ice riot arrests forty two a final score. Then there is the foppish conservative grifter, Scott Presler, you know, the guy with the shoulder length hair, the one Politico reported had sex in an office shared by the Republican National Committee and the Republican Party of Virginia while he was working for the latter group, and took pictures of himself having sex in the office and posted the pictures on Craigslist. Political outreach. I suppose well trump ists, mister Pressler is ready to meet you at the barricades. Quote if Ice needs more bodies on the ground, I'm willing to temporarily stop my political work to help. I studied criminal justice in college. I am physically fit and want to make sure that the mission is a success. I'm very serious, ready and willing to serve. Oh, Scott will save you. He has a degree from George Mason University. Now about the real danger behind this danger. Governor Gavin Newsom has filed the Attorney General has filed a federal lawsuit by the State of California against the Department of Defense and Warrior Ethos and hair Products devotee Pete Hegseth for violating the states' rights in the tenth amend, specifically the provisos that state control of the National Guard is in the hands of the states, or as somebody else put it in twenty twenty, quote, we have laws. We have to go buy the laws. We can't move in the National Guard. We can't call in the National Guard unless we're requested by a governor unquote and you know who said that, then President d Mensha Trump. As straightforward as this would seem, especially with Trump providing this unintentional testimony against himself, there is a darker element to this, as outlined yesterday by the impeccable Ryan Goodman, the co editor in chief of Just Security and CNN analyst. Mister Goodman notes what most of us had not had time to see because of the spectacle of Trump's terrorist attack against la The memorandum from Saturday, which federalizes the National Guard is almost unbelievably almost completely vague. I encourage you to read Ryan Goodman's thread on Blue Sky. It is harrowing and detailed. These are the eight bullet points, and unfortunately that term may never have been more appropriate than now. Points one and two. The definition of rebellion, which used to mean, you know, at least January sixth, rebellion, now means peaceful protests. The part of the combined Pentagon and Homeland Security Memo Goodman highlighted reads to the extent that protests or acts of violence directly inhibit the execution of the laws. They constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the government of the United States. So if you protest, the National Guard is in theory entitled I shoot you. The second point he makes is that one use of that word or to the extent that protests or acts of violence, so they're both covered. If you protest or you commit an active violence, they can shoot you. Goodman's third and fourth points this memo authorizes the use of preemptive force and the use of preemptive force for quote protests. I hereby call into Federal service members and units of the National Guard under ten USC one two four oh six to temporarily protect ice and other United States government personnel who are performing federal functions, including the enforcement of federal law, and to protect federal property at locations where protests against these functions are occurring or are likely to occur. Based on current threat assessments and planned operations, Your non violent protest doesn't even have to have happened, yet they can bring in the National Guard. Goodman's fifth point no geographically, this is not an authorization to use the Guard in southern California. In June of twenty twenty five, it's all purpose. It's a magic, evil wand of all people. Bill Crystal noted this first to quote him. The presidential memorandum never mentions Los Angeles or California. It's a blank check for mobilizing National Guard and active duty troops to deploy anywhere to protect federal personnel or functions wherever protests are occurring or are likely to occur. It gets worse and worse. Goodman six point authorizes regular armed forces. It does not tell you under what authority a president can use the military in an emergency that is established, but he has to invoke the Insurrection Act first, except this memo does not say that. It just says members of the regular Armed Forces, as determined appropriate in his discretion. So much for the Insurrection Act, so much for any review of what a president does. Goodman's seventh point expressly overrides the governor's authorities, changing Title ten, Section one two four oh six from orders for these purposes shall be issued through the Governors of the States to saying only that the Secretary of Defense should quote coordinate with the governors of the States. For the record, before we finish these points, this whole thing is, or at least should be, incredibly illegal, but amazingly Trump has already violated it. His own new illegal rules, according to Governor Knusimi, not only ignored the governor's rights regarding the National Guard, he didn't even bother with that lip service instruction to coordinate with the governor. Lastly, Ryan Goodman's eighth point not a last resort. The Department of Justice has a policy which is at least as old as the policy that you can indict a candidate around election time, that the military can only be deployed legally in this country. As a last resort. This whole thing, quite clearly and You don't need to be Ryan Goodman to realize this, and you don't need to read the entire memo from Homeland Security and the Pentagon to realize this. This whole thing authorizes the use of the military as a first resort. This is why Gavin Newsom in California are suing. This is why, ultimately that lawsuit may be more important than anything that happens on the streets of Los Angeles this entire month. This is why Newsom is suing. It is not just about what Trump is doing in LA, and it won't be resolved fast enough to likely impact Trump is doing in LA. It is that it provides a template for Trump to institute a police state, a military dictatorship in this country today. You can use the National Guard and the military against peaceful protests, or just the threat of peaceful protests, or your threat assessment that there may be peaceful protests, or you can use it against anything really, or as we are seeing in LA, you can use it against nothing. CNN should have mister Goodman on to cover this twenty four to seven and said it will show you an empty intersection in downtown LA and insists hell may break loose at any moment. Right after this message from yet another insurance firm specializing in mesothelioma, which leads me to one dark bit of humor. I am glad CNN televised George Clooney's good Night and good Luck over the weekend, which I mentioned I saw the first night of previews. I hope they rerun the live presentation again. It has many flaws, not the least of one is fairly hilarious. George Clooney is not as an actor as good a newscaster as his father, Nick Clooney was, largely because Nick Clooney was a newscaster in Los Angeles when I was a sportscaster there. It has flaws, but it is invaluable right now. Except I couldn't help notice that CNN ran it Saturday night just as the events in LA were beginning to snowball, and CNN kept with it, kept showing it and a postgame show for three hours anyway. In short, CNN was showing a play about news instead of showing you know news, which sadly is the CNN story in a nuts Next now to Musk and Trump, and why follow me closely here? Why I think their fight probably proves no. Musk did not rig the voting machines last November. That's next. This is countdown now. Two things that may have slipped off your plate in the last ten days of constant chaos. Okay, last ten years of constant chaos. They are beginning to talk about a military draft again. Bluntly, nothing, nothing, not even the Blue state tax strike I mentioned yesterday, could bring Trump down faster than if he imposed a draft on the families of American youth in the twenty first century. Sean Hannity, one of the oldest and most obvious distributors of Trump's trial balloons, said on his radio show last week, quote, Look, Israel's safety today depends on the brave men and women of the IDF. Well that's also bullshit, but we'll pass on that for the moment. Every citizen, by the way, is required to serve. I actually think we should adopt this in Thish country. It'd be so good for our young people. Required to serve. That means a draft, or it means compulsory registration and service, which is a draft where everybody is drafted and sent to La to rendition the brown people. We should a competition Nish country. You first, Sean, see if we can find a military suit of paratroopers outfit that would fit you. Trump hit it at this during the campaign. Last June, his former Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, told The Washington Post that a national service requirement should be quote strongly considered. He described the concept as a common right of passage, one that would create a sense of quote shared sacrifice among America's youth unquote. A little article, not much play, and it went over so badly. Trump had to publicly deny it, to say he'd never even thought about a draft, never, not once, just as I'm certain he's not thinking about it now. I'm certain Sean Hannity the Renfield to Trump's Dracula, the man who has not had an original idea since nineteen ninety six. I'm sure Sean Hannity dreamed that up all on a jan and he wasn't told to shay it by his master. And the second news story that you may have missed Musk and Trump. Remember Elon Musk, Remember when it was not just the lead story but the only story. Are you old enough to? I mean it was Czech's calendar three thousand years ago, oh no, sorry, I read that wrong. It was last Friday. And one, yes, it's a distraction, certainly by now it is a distraction. But two, I think it's a meaningful distraction. And three to understand its meaning, you really have to turn off your sanity and your filters for a moment and infer what crazy people do in such circumstances. And also four, I told you so if you miss this or have forgotten it, because after all, there's only so much space in our brains for the latest asshole thing Trump has done. Overnight Friday, Musk deleted his Trump is in the Epstein files tweets and the Trump should be immediately impeached tweets, But Musk did not delete his I won the election for Trump tweets. Now again, it's trivia. That's why it's at the back end of the segment here, and it could wait till Tuesday. But the tea leaves I think are important. When this erupted, Musk went almost immediately to Epstein and impeachment and President Vance. And I suppose it's possible Elon was hit by lightning over the weekend and suddenly his head cleared and he removed those tweets because he wanted to de escalate like a you know, human being would. But Musk and Trump aren't human beings in the sense the rest of us understand the term. They don't de escalate in an emergency. They may occasionally run away in fear, but they can't be strategic or remorseful or corrective even in self interest, and screenshots be damned. They just try to burn the evidence and hope nobody notices. And since the mottos of the Republican Party and the Association of MAGA disease Victims have long since become I haven't seen what he posted, said wrote on the sidewalk in his own blood, so I can't comment on it. Burning the evidence usually works. What I notice is that he did not delete quote. Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House, and Republicans would be fifty one to forty nine in the Senate. And adopting for a moment the crazy think that prevails in the vast empty caverns of Musk's mind, I would suggest this confirms Musk did not rig the voting for Trump, and that Trump's infamous remark about Musk knowing those vote counting computers was just more of Trump's imbecilic imprecision. Now, look, I don't diminish or demean anybody who thinks otherwise. I don't doubt that people could listen to that and think Trump just confessed that Musk rigged the election. To you and me, vote counting computers that means elections and devoled company machines switching votes in Florida in two thousand, from Gore to Bush, but to Trump, who is more like a semi sentient vegetable of some kind. Vote counting computers could mean anything, anything from that actual election rigging to computers that produce polling results to tell Trump how many votes he's going to get. It could mean that or the other thing. It could mean, Siri. Trump used the word counting, and sometimes to Trump, counting means counting out loud. It didn't say the out loud. Party just says counting. And we're supposed to assume we know what he means. We're supposed to assume he knows what he means. That's the way Trump is. His relationship to language, to human language is like that of chance the gardener from being there. Trump only uses words that could mean ten different things. In any event, The reason I think all this sturm Undran with the two worst people in this country actually confirms there was no Musk effort to fix the twenty twenty four election is that when things with Trump got so bad that Musk was willing to invoke Epstein not only accused Trump of pedophilia or knowledge of pedophilia, but of using his government to cover up evidence of pedophilia. When things with Trump got so bad so fast that Musk went to each faster than well, faster than I do, Musk did not say I rigged the election for him. His post, which is still up, is about the things we know about immoral, unforgivable but largely legal things. Two hundred and seventy five million dollars in funding putting onto the campaign trail is not inconsiderable appeal as a stupid person's idea of a smart person throwing his social media site completely behind Trump, because if you are willing to apply to idiots who believe all Liberals are part of a cannibalistic pedophilia ring that their hero, the sitting president of the United States and semi Jesus is in a report about a pedophilia ring, and that's why he hasn't released it to you the way he promised. And if you're willing to say flat out, he should be immediately impeached. What on God's green earth would stop you from saying, by the way, I rig the election for him. To Trump's supporters, the idea that you rig the election for him is like seventeenth on the list of great admissions. Oh you did tell us how, so we can do it without you next time. I mean, nuclear war is nuclear war. You don't hold anything back, And Musk didn't hold anything back. He may have rolled some of it back over the weekend, but the claim he won the election for Trump is still out there. And the only reason I can think of for why what he wrote is not stronger than it is is that what he did was not stronger than it was. Musk Thursday was reaching for things with which to kill Trump, at least metaphorically, Epstein impeachment. Then he suddenly said, oh, rigging the election. I won't throw that at him. Nonsense. Also, if Musk or anybody else actually rigged all or part of the twenty twenty four election, why didn't he rig the Wisconsin Supreme Court election two months ago. I mean he spent twenty million on it. He went there, humiliated himself, campaigned in his ketamineupopt Clip's way, and his guy, Brad, lost by ten percent. It's a lot, but ten percent in a statewide special election is less than two hundred and thirty nine thousand votes, and Musk would have literally had to flip only one hundred and twenty thousand votes and Brad wins. And if you can't do that, how can you rig several swing states in an actual presidential election? And by the way, one of them you would have had to have rigged would have been Wisconsin. The Musk vote rigging machine broke, did it between November and April. Couldn't get the Wi Fi starlink, failed gelon, you got a blue screen on your Dell. So there is the rather serpentine backwards logic that says to me, the Musk Trump fight kind of proves the election wasn't rigged, because given what Musk wanted to do to Trump last week, if he had that rock, he would have dropped it on Trump like Trump was while e Coyote, which brings me to my last point about this. I did tell you so. When the podcast promos dropped last Wednesday night, Musk attacks Trump, there was blowback from every corner. No he didn't. No, you're making too much of one retweet. No I got that one right. I am not an insider. I do not have sources. Even on TV, I really didn't have sources. They all looked at me funny in Washington, like how does this guy know stuff? But what I might lack in those and even lack in insight at times I make up for in old age Trump as the coyote and Musk as the road runner. Okay, Trump is the coyote and Musk as a different coyote might be new, but the formula ain't. These are narcissists with brains that don't work. Right. I have covered them half of my career, and I have worked for them half of my life. And oh, by the way, there will be another round to this fight, at least another round. Trump, drifting off from reality like ooh, a metallic balloon let go by a child in southern California callback to the last episode, has threatened Musk with more king Lear consequences if now he helps Democrats instead. Howell Musk respond who knows other than that he will respond. These are mad men with basses who cannot conceive that their cult leader is wrong. They will fight. As I suggested online, we can only hope that when they fight, it's a duel, which brings me to the chef's kiss here. The Washington Post buried this in its thumbsucker on the Musk Trump brawl. It got a little play on Sunday because it's such a dramatic image. They didn't deny it at the White House, but literally, The Washington Post put this in paragraph twenty two, long past the point Bezos or his whorees would fallen asleep and thus missed it. It was about a sub fight between Musk and Scott Bessant, the Treasury Secretary, who I am still not convinced actually exists, who I am still not convinced isn't just a character played by the impeccable actor Barry Bostwick, who used to portray the mayor on Spin City. The term fight here is used literally, quoting the Post quoting Steve Bannon, and yes, we will accept Steve Bannon as a source for anything this much fun quote. In mid April, Musk and Besson had gone into the Oval Office to make their respective cases about their preferences for acting IRS Commissioner. Trump decided to support Besson's choice. That disagreement was first reported by The New York Times. Actor Bessant and Musk exited the Oval office and began walking down the hallway. The two men started to exchange insults, Bannon said, adding that Bessant brought up Musk's claims that he would uncover more than one trillion dollars in wasteful and fraudulent government spending, which Musk had not succeeded at doing. Quote, Scott said, You're a fraud. You're a total fraud, Bannon said in an interview. Musk then rammed his shoulder into Besson's ribcage quote like a rugby player, Bannon said, and Bessont hit him back. Multiple people stepped in to break up the scrum who rugby term as the two men reached the National Security Advisor's office and Musk was shuffled out of the White House. So we are now at this point in this bizarre timeline. The Treasury Secretary is physically attacked by the mad scientist spacey guy outside the National Security advisor's office. Thus the movie Doctor Strangelove is real. Gentlemen, you can't fight in here. This is the war room. Finally, the number one story on the countdown, and my favorite topic me and things from my career and my life. And it is to me amazing, even after all this time, that you could meet somebody just once in your life, but years later be moved to tears upon learning of their death. Then again, the man in question was named Walter Mathow, and if he was not the most popular American comedic actor of the last half of the twentieth century, he was close to it. And maybe more importantly, he was the most skilled, minimal touch American actor of the last half of the twentieth century. In other words, he was the man who, on stage or on camera, seemed to be doing the least amount of actual acting while still keeping you utterly convinced that the guy you saw on the screen was not Walter Mathow, but was Oscar Madison, and was not Walter Mathow, but was Max Goldman, and was not Walter Mathow, but was Willie Gingrich, and was not Walter Mathow but was Mel Miller, even though mel Miller had a Southern accent, smoked a pipe, had horn rim glasses, and supposedly went to Vanderbilt. We all knew Walter Mathow. It felt like we knew him personally because he managed a miracle. Every time he performed it was all him up there, and yet at the same time it was not him at all anyway. October first was his birthday, which is what brought this extraordinary man to the front of my mind again. I will get to my meeting with him first. Walter Mathow's best friends as an adult were his partner in half a dozen films, Jack Lemon and my dear friend Norman Lloyd, the one man history of Hollywood, who he lost in twenty twenty one at the age of one hundred and six. Norman loved Walter, and Norman loved talking about Walter, and there was an amazing amount of things to talk about about Walter. Norman told me that on the last of the Grumpy Old Men movies that he and Lemon made together, I think it was called Grumpy Old Men were doing this for the money. Mathow wanted to wrap up one day of shooting quickly. He was scheduled to film a scene in a water slide made up to look like a sewer through which his character was escaping. As the lunch break was called, he said to lemon, come on, Jack, let's go rehearse the water slide thing. This way. We can do it in one take. Get the hell out of here anyway. Don't you have to wait an hour after eating before you can shoot through a sewer. They went to the sewer water slide set. Walter Mathow grabbed the raft he was supposed to ride, and he jumped in. As he went through it, he studied all the corners and where the cameras would be, so he knew where to make his faces. And seconds later he was shooting out the far end of the water slide onto the giant inflatable twelve foot square air mattress placed there to break his fall. Or he would have been doing that, except it was lunch and the teamsters had deflated the mattress then moved it away because the set was on lunch break. So Walter Mathow, then seventy three years old, came flying out of the water slide onto the pavement. He broke his collarbone, which is just about as painful a thing as you can break. No Walter Mathow screamed. Jack Lemon raced over to him. Walter, Walter, are you all right? No? Not Jack? Call nine one one? Oh how Lemon panicked? Can I help you, Walter? Can I Can I get you something? Walter? Yes, Jack, get me nine one one ow o. Lemon continued to panic but till they come. Are you okay, Walter? Are you comfortable? Walter Mathow was in sheer agony, but he realized through the fog of pain that one of the oldest jokes in show business was actually happening to him. Finally, in real life. Am I comfortable? I make a nice living? Jack ow O? My friend Norman Lloyd used to go hiking with Walter Mathow in the Hollywood Hills, and he told me that one day Walter was unusually quiet. The two had gone a mile or so, and Mathow suddenly stopped and grabbed Norman by the arm. Nomy, did you know at the end and Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting. Norman smiled, snorted, and started to say that it was the dumbest thing he'd ever heard. But halfway through norman sentence, Mathow had already turned away from him and was back walking again. Another mile passed in silence, and now Mathou slowed down and faced his friend Norman. This is important. I have something to tell you, Norman said. His heart skipped. He thought there was something wrong. What is it, Walt did you know at the end Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting? Now Norman just shook his head. As they completed their five mile hike through the hills, Mathou stopped roughly once every mile and repeated the same line, did you know at the end Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting? Norman told me it totally unnerved me. When we got back to where we parked our cars, I felt like I had to avenge myself somehow, so I blurted out to him, WALTA, did you know at the end Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting, Norman said. Mathow looked at him, screwing his great craggy face into a resentful sneer as he did, what the hell are you talking about? Thought he was painting? That's the dumbest thing I ever heard, As I said, I met Walter Mathow once when I was a local sportscaster in Los Angeles. I was invited to host a charity event at the Hollywood Park Racetrack. I ordinarily did not do these things because to do them I would have to take the day off. But when the organizer said, oh, and Walter Mathow will be there, I just asked for directions. First time I had ever imagined what it was like to be a sportswriter or to be a sports broadcaster. It was when I was nine years old and I saw Walter Mathow portray Oscar Madison in the movie The Odd Couple. It was exactly what I wanted to be and where I wanted to live and how I wanted to eat. And I wanted to get a chance to tell him that. So at the charity dinner, I screwed up my courage, I introduced myself. I told him all that, and he replied, I hate you. I was so crushed I almost passed out, and clearly Walter Mathow recognized this. No, no, no, I don't hate your work. I watch you every night on Channel two Action News, you and Jim Lampley and Bree Lampley and Jim Lampley. But I hate the fact that you don't have an accent of any kind. Where are you raised? Iowa? I did not know where this conversation was going. I said, I was from the Bronx originally, Is that right? I'm from Brooklyn? Could you tell the hell kind of speech teacher did you have? You? You sound like Iowa? I explained, my father had said that if I wanted to go into broadcasting, I could not talk quote like the rest of us. Walter looked away from me and then back, and he said, very wise words. Your father was a speech teacher. No, I said, architect. His eyes flared. How in the hell does that work? I started to explain, when it suddenly dawned on me that we were discussing this only because he said he hated the fact that I did not have an accent. I asked him, why no accent means I can't do an impression of you? Well? This caused me to pause. Impressions. This is nineteen ninety one. In nineteen ninety one, Walter Mathow was one of the top five most impersonated voices in America. Anybody who did impressions, good or bad, professional or amateur. Anybody did a Walter Mathow? You did your Sammy Davis, your Howard Cosell, your Walter Mathow. Wait, I said to him, you do impressions of sportscasters? Yes, he said, proudly. Would you like to hear them? I said, I'll pay cash. Don't normally do these, but seeing you are in the business, I will just for you. I practiced these a lot. By the way, twenty years later, Norman Lloyd confirmed for me Mathou did do sportscaster impressions. He did practice them a lot. This was not some sort of bit. Now back in nineteen ninety one, Mathow cleared his throat, he shook his shoulders. Let's start with the best, and it sounds something like this, Hello, everybody, this is Vin Scully at Dodger Stadium. What do you think? It sounded exactly like Walter Mathow. Didn't sound like Vin Scully. It didn't even sound like a bad impression of Vin Scully. It didn't even sound like a bad impression of Walter Mathow. It was just Walter Mathow talking. Thinking quickly, I said, uncanny, mister Mathow, thank you. I work on Vinnie especially hat he's my favorite. Now the big mouth. Hello again, this is Howard co Sell at ringside. How about that one? I think I got most of the inflection. Goodness, mister Mathow, It's like he's in the room with us. This went on for many minutes, Kurt Goudie, Chick, hern Al Michaels, several local LA radio announcers. I cursed myself for not having brought a tape recorder with me. Walter Mathow did impressions of sportscasters, and they were all terrible, but he said he couldn't do one of me because I had no accent. I was complimented and crushed after a very nice event, saluting his friend and neighbor in the front row seats at the Laker Games, doctor Robert Curlin. We called it an evening, and as everybody got up to leave, I asked Walter Mathow to autograph my program from the dinner my pleasure. He said, nice work tonight. But I still don't get how your father, the architect was also a speech teacher. But never mind. In the program he wrote this listen, Keith quit kidding around, No, don't. Walter mathowt it was lovely, and then he did something that took my breath away, something I have tried to do anytime circumstances permitted me to. He picked up his program, he handed it to me, and he said, no, you sign mine. Can you believe that I only met him the one time, but that gesture stayed with me to such a degree that this happened. Nine years later. I woke up at the crack of dawn to go host the baseball Game of the Week at Fox Studios in LA It was Saturday morning, July first, two thousand. It was nine years and about two weeks after I met Walter Mathow and on the all news radio station. There was one big story that morning in Los Angeles. Overnight the great actor Walter Mathow had died heart attack, aged seventy nine. To tears, I've done all the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening. Most of our Countdown music was arranged, produced, and performed by Brian Ray and John Phillip chaneil musical directors of Countdown. This is my all purpose Walter Mathow Bernie Sanders' voice. It was produced by Tko Brothers. Mister Ray was on the guitars, bass and drums. Mister Chanelle handled orchestration in keyboards. I'll stop now. Our satirical and fifthy musical comments are by the best baseball stadium organist ever, Nancy Faust. The Olberman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch Warren Davis courtesy of ESPN, Inc. Is our Sports Music. Other music arranged and performed by the group No Horns Allowed. That's countdown for today, Day one hundred and forty two of America held hostage just one and twenty two days until the scheduled end of his lame duck and lame brained term unless putin or musk remove him sooner, or the actuarial tables do, or we do the next scheduled countdown. He is Thursday until that next one. I'm Keith Olderman, good afternoon, good morning, good evening, good night, and was the last part of that all right, good luck Countdown with Keith Ouldreman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. More people were arrested in LA after the Lakers won the twenty twenty NBA title than were arrested in LA on Sunday during the protests during the Ice Riot during the Gestapo invasion of Southern California. This is not some sort of metaphor or analogy. October eleventh, twenty twenty, after the COVID delayed NBA Finals ended with the LA Lakers winning the championship, in LA, there were seventy six arrests Sunday, the day Trump now says that without him and his Brown Shirts, Los Angeles would have been completely obliterated. There were forty two arrests seventy six to forty two vandalism, unlawful assembly, failure to disperse, bottles thrown at cops, vehicles set on fire, flash bangs and projectiles fired at civilians, graffiti covering buildings, property damage, a crowd of at least two thousand out of control, Downtown LA streets closed. No, that was also all after the Lakers won. The Lakers victory celebration five years ago was measurably a greater risk to security and safety than were the protests against Trump's unconstitutional kidnapping of civilians, often citizens, almost always law abiding this past Sunday, And if that raw final score is not stark enough Lakers seventy six protests for due process forty two. It's a final. You knew this will true. Once Trump declared victory yesterday, at midnight, our hitler was posting, looking really bad in La, bring in the troops. At noon, our hitler was posting that the governor and the mayor who just fire five things are not insane fascist dictators quote should be saying thank you, President Trump. You are so wonderful. We would be nothing without you? Sir? Is he an insane narcissist or calculating monster? Why can't we have both? Right after congratulating himself, Trump mobilized five hundred members of the Marines to join the National Guard in La. Some say it's seven hundred members of the Marines to take care of the rapidly expanding nothing. It is not just unnecessary, it is illegal, and I will get to the California lawsuit against all of it presently, which has now been filed. The other content, though, that Sunday was nothing seventy six Laker arrests forty two Trump riot arrests. Was when Trump insisted, quote, I wouldn't call it quite an insurrection, but it could have led to an insurrection on quote, And there was disappointment in his voice because of course he wants one. As we will analyze in a moment, the powers he has awarded himself when federalizing the National Guard turned out to be enough for him to literally install his dictatorship to day. But let's first finish the clean up on the near complete obliteration of Los Angeles. Ah, what a shame. I like the place this could reignite at any point. You could know more about this than I do, because I recorded this earlier than you're listening to it. The rumor within local government was ICE would be kidnapping people off the streets of LA and southern California for the next twenty eight days to a month. They were at multiple home debas yesterday, And of course Trump wants it reignited, because that is the point of it. The deportations are not only an end in themselves raw meet to the racists and the Stephen Miller grade psychos, but they are also a means for him to control anything he wants, especially foremost the midterm elections, but that there was nothing approaching what he told his cult had happened was underscored when Rick Caruso, the lifelong Republican who lost the election for mayor to Karen Bass in November twenty twenty two and has since criticized her every move, when he wrote, quote, there is no emergency, widespread threat, or out of control violence in Los Angeles, and absolutely no danger that justifies deployment of the National Guard, military, or other federal force to the streets of this or any other Southern California city. Local law enforcement is capable of handling the situation and should arrest anyone causing violence in the streets. We must call for calm in the streets, and deployment of the National Guard may prompt just the opposite. Lifelong Republican lost the mayor's race, hates the mayor. Caruso reiterated all of that yesterday, just in case you missed it, live in drivetime on local radio news just before noon Eastern. For the record, Caruso was the Republican head of the Police Commission in LA for many years, and he has a little money behind him that race for mayor. He blew forty one million on the primary around the country as much as Trump is selling the idea that la is a cauldron and he alone can save it, even though no, no, that's right. I saved it yesterday, so everybody should call me, sir. It's not Landing. Polling by the Last King of five thirty eight Elliott Morris confirms Trump has been hurt by the deportations and especially the case of kilm Are of Rego Garcia, and people like him and the Democrats have been helped, not that they're doing anything with it, except for Newsome. New CBS polling says fifty five percent in this country supports the general idea of these deportations, but fifty six percent dislike how Trump is doing it, and no matter how they feel about the kidnappings and the renditions, sixty three percent want due process. The problem, of course, is that Trump doesn't have to convince anybody but his supporters and the news media and the Republican political wars he terrorizes into submission. He doesn't need fifty one percent of voters. He doesn't need fifty one percent of Americans. He just needs one hundred percent of his voters. They are, in short, a mob, a gang, an organized crime family, a cult, a suicide cult. Trump stumbling up those airplanes step Sunday is the perfect metaphor. You and I correctly see a deranged, delusional, elderly creature rapidly losing control not just of his mind but of his bloated carcass. They see him triumphantly getting up the stairs anyway and overcoming all the obstacles anyway, and saving Los Angeles from a crisis that he completely provoked and escalated. And matter of fact, the son of a bitch didn't even manage to create a real crisis, did he. I need a couple of moments of humorous relief. One North Carolina congressman, a Republican named Moore who does not appear to have his own neck, let alone a brain, retweeted a Homeland Security post insisting California politicians must call off their rioting mob. More added, La is being burned down by lawless mobs who support foreign criminals. The photo from DHS that he has reached tweeted shows one car on fire, one not even very on fire. There's some smoke There's about a dozen people around this car. One is standing on top of it. He is shirtless. He is wearing a Mexican flag, because of course you never see a Mexican flag in Los Angeles. It's the apocalypse again. Lakers arrests seventy six, Trump Ice riot arrests forty two a final score. Then there is the foppish conservative grifter, Scott Presler, you know, the guy with the shoulder length hair, the one Politico reported had sex in an office shared by the Republican National Committee and the Republican Party of Virginia while he was working for the latter group, and took pictures of himself having sex in the office and posted the pictures on Craigslist. Political outreach. I suppose well trump ists, mister Pressler is ready to meet you at the barricades. Quote if Ice needs more bodies on the ground, I'm willing to temporarily stop my political work to help. I studied criminal justice in college. I am physically fit and want to make sure that the mission is a success. I'm very serious, ready and willing to serve. Oh, Scott will save you. He has a degree from George Mason University. Now about the real danger behind this danger. Governor Gavin Newsom has filed the Attorney General has filed a federal lawsuit by the State of California against the Department of Defense and Warrior Ethos and hair Products devotee Pete Hegseth for violating the states' rights in the tenth amend, specifically the provisos that state control of the National Guard is in the hands of the states, or as somebody else put it in twenty twenty, quote, we have laws. We have to go buy the laws. We can't move in the National Guard. We can't call in the National Guard unless we're requested by a governor unquote and you know who said that, then President d Mensha Trump. As straightforward as this would seem, especially with Trump providing this unintentional testimony against himself, there is a darker element to this, as outlined yesterday by the impeccable Ryan Goodman, the co editor in chief of Just Security and CNN analyst. Mister Goodman notes what most of us had not had time to see because of the spectacle of Trump's terrorist attack against la The memorandum from Saturday, which federalizes the National Guard is almost unbelievably almost completely vague. I encourage you to read Ryan Goodman's thread on Blue Sky. It is harrowing and detailed. These are the eight bullet points, and unfortunately that term may never have been more appropriate than now. Points one and two. The definition of rebellion, which used to mean, you know, at least January sixth, rebellion, now means peaceful protests. The part of the combined Pentagon and Homeland Security Memo Goodman highlighted reads to the extent that protests or acts of violence directly inhibit the execution of the laws. They constitute a form of rebellion against the authority of the government of the United States. So if you protest, the National Guard is in theory entitled I shoot you. The second point he makes is that one use of that word or to the extent that protests or acts of violence, so they're both covered. If you protest or you commit an active violence, they can shoot you. Goodman's third and fourth points this memo authorizes the use of preemptive force and the use of preemptive force for quote protests. I hereby call into Federal service members and units of the National Guard under ten USC one two four oh six to temporarily protect ice and other United States government personnel who are performing federal functions, including the enforcement of federal law, and to protect federal property at locations where protests against these functions are occurring or are likely to occur. Based on current threat assessments and planned operations, Your non violent protest doesn't even have to have happened, yet they can bring in the National Guard. Goodman's fifth point no geographically, this is not an authorization to use the Guard in southern California. In June of twenty twenty five, it's all purpose. It's a magic, evil wand of all people. Bill Crystal noted this first to quote him. The presidential memorandum never mentions Los Angeles or California. It's a blank check for mobilizing National Guard and active duty troops to deploy anywhere to protect federal personnel or functions wherever protests are occurring or are likely to occur. It gets worse and worse. Goodman six point authorizes regular armed forces. It does not tell you under what authority a president can use the military in an emergency that is established, but he has to invoke the Insurrection Act first, except this memo does not say that. It just says members of the regular Armed Forces, as determined appropriate in his discretion. So much for the Insurrection Act, so much for any review of what a president does. Goodman's seventh point expressly overrides the governor's authorities, changing Title ten, Section one two four oh six from orders for these purposes shall be issued through the Governors of the States to saying only that the Secretary of Defense should quote coordinate with the governors of the States. For the record, before we finish these points, this whole thing is, or at least should be, incredibly illegal, but amazingly Trump has already violated it. His own new illegal rules, according to Governor Knusimi, not only ignored the governor's rights regarding the National Guard, he didn't even bother with that lip service instruction to coordinate with the governor. Lastly, Ryan Goodman's eighth point not a last resort. The Department of Justice has a policy which is at least as old as the policy that you can indict a candidate around election time, that the military can only be deployed legally in this country. As a last resort. This whole thing, quite clearly and You don't need to be Ryan Goodman to realize this, and you don't need to read the entire memo from Homeland Security and the Pentagon to realize this. This whole thing authorizes the use of the military as a first resort. This is why Gavin Newsom in California are suing. This is why, ultimately that lawsuit may be more important than anything that happens on the streets of Los Angeles this entire month. This is why Newsom is suing. It is not just about what Trump is doing in LA, and it won't be resolved fast enough to likely impact Trump is doing in LA. It is that it provides a template for Trump to institute a police state, a military dictatorship in this country today. You can use the National Guard and the military against peaceful protests, or just the threat of peaceful protests, or your threat assessment that there may be peaceful protests, or you can use it against anything really, or as we are seeing in LA, you can use it against nothing. CNN should have mister Goodman on to cover this twenty four to seven and said it will show you an empty intersection in downtown LA and insists hell may break loose at any moment. Right after this message from yet another insurance firm specializing in mesothelioma, which leads me to one dark bit of humor. I am glad CNN televised George Clooney's good Night and good Luck over the weekend, which I mentioned I saw the first night of previews. I hope they rerun the live presentation again. It has many flaws, not the least of one is fairly hilarious. George Clooney is not as an actor as good a newscaster as his father, Nick Clooney was, largely because Nick Clooney was a newscaster in Los Angeles when I was a sportscaster there. It has flaws, but it is invaluable right now. Except I couldn't help notice that CNN ran it Saturday night just as the events in LA were beginning to snowball, and CNN kept with it, kept showing it and a postgame show for three hours anyway. In short, CNN was showing a play about news instead of showing you know news, which sadly is the CNN story in a nuts Next now to Musk and Trump, and why follow me closely here? Why I think their fight probably proves no. Musk did not rig the voting machines last November. That's next. This is countdown now. Two things that may have slipped off your plate in the last ten days of constant chaos. Okay, last ten years of constant chaos. They are beginning to talk about a military draft again. Bluntly, nothing, nothing, not even the Blue state tax strike I mentioned yesterday, could bring Trump down faster than if he imposed a draft on the families of American youth in the twenty first century. Sean Hannity, one of the oldest and most obvious distributors of Trump's trial balloons, said on his radio show last week, quote, Look, Israel's safety today depends on the brave men and women of the IDF. Well that's also bullshit, but we'll pass on that for the moment. Every citizen, by the way, is required to serve. I actually think we should adopt this in Thish country. It'd be so good for our young people. Required to serve. That means a draft, or it means compulsory registration and service, which is a draft where everybody is drafted and sent to La to rendition the brown people. We should a competition Nish country. You first, Sean, see if we can find a military suit of paratroopers outfit that would fit you. Trump hit it at this during the campaign. Last June, his former Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, told The Washington Post that a national service requirement should be quote strongly considered. He described the concept as a common right of passage, one that would create a sense of quote shared sacrifice among America's youth unquote. A little article, not much play, and it went over so badly. Trump had to publicly deny it, to say he'd never even thought about a draft, never, not once, just as I'm certain he's not thinking about it now. I'm certain Sean Hannity the Renfield to Trump's Dracula, the man who has not had an original idea since nineteen ninety six. I'm sure Sean Hannity dreamed that up all on a jan and he wasn't told to shay it by his master. And the second news story that you may have missed Musk and Trump. Remember Elon Musk, Remember when it was not just the lead story but the only story. Are you old enough to? I mean it was Czech's calendar three thousand years ago, oh no, sorry, I read that wrong. It was last Friday. And one, yes, it's a distraction, certainly by now it is a distraction. But two, I think it's a meaningful distraction. And three to understand its meaning, you really have to turn off your sanity and your filters for a moment and infer what crazy people do in such circumstances. And also four, I told you so if you miss this or have forgotten it, because after all, there's only so much space in our brains for the latest asshole thing Trump has done. Overnight Friday, Musk deleted his Trump is in the Epstein files tweets and the Trump should be immediately impeached tweets, But Musk did not delete his I won the election for Trump tweets. Now again, it's trivia. That's why it's at the back end of the segment here, and it could wait till Tuesday. But the tea leaves I think are important. When this erupted, Musk went almost immediately to Epstein and impeachment and President Vance. And I suppose it's possible Elon was hit by lightning over the weekend and suddenly his head cleared and he removed those tweets because he wanted to de escalate like a you know, human being would. But Musk and Trump aren't human beings in the sense the rest of us understand the term. They don't de escalate in an emergency. They may occasionally run away in fear, but they can't be strategic or remorseful or corrective even in self interest, and screenshots be damned. They just try to burn the evidence and hope nobody notices. And since the mottos of the Republican Party and the Association of MAGA disease Victims have long since become I haven't seen what he posted, said wrote on the sidewalk in his own blood, so I can't comment on it. Burning the evidence usually works. What I notice is that he did not delete quote. Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House, and Republicans would be fifty one to forty nine in the Senate. And adopting for a moment the crazy think that prevails in the vast empty caverns of Musk's mind, I would suggest this confirms Musk did not rig the voting for Trump, and that Trump's infamous remark about Musk knowing those vote counting computers was just more of Trump's imbecilic imprecision. Now, look, I don't diminish or demean anybody who thinks otherwise. I don't doubt that people could listen to that and think Trump just confessed that Musk rigged the election. To you and me, vote counting computers that means elections and devoled company machines switching votes in Florida in two thousand, from Gore to Bush, but to Trump, who is more like a semi sentient vegetable of some kind. Vote counting computers could mean anything, anything from that actual election rigging to computers that produce polling results to tell Trump how many votes he's going to get. It could mean that or the other thing. It could mean, Siri. Trump used the word counting, and sometimes to Trump, counting means counting out loud. It didn't say the out loud. Party just says counting. And we're supposed to assume we know what he means. We're supposed to assume he knows what he means. That's the way Trump is. His relationship to language, to human language is like that of chance the gardener from being there. Trump only uses words that could mean ten different things. In any event, The reason I think all this sturm Undran with the two worst people in this country actually confirms there was no Musk effort to fix the twenty twenty four election is that when things with Trump got so bad that Musk was willing to invoke Epstein not only accused Trump of pedophilia or knowledge of pedophilia, but of using his government to cover up evidence of pedophilia. When things with Trump got so bad so fast that Musk went to each faster than well, faster than I do, Musk did not say I rigged the election for him. His post, which is still up, is about the things we know about immoral, unforgivable but largely legal things. Two hundred and seventy five million dollars in funding putting onto the campaign trail is not inconsiderable appeal as a stupid person's idea of a smart person throwing his social media site completely behind Trump, because if you are willing to apply to idiots who believe all Liberals are part of a cannibalistic pedophilia ring that their hero, the sitting president of the United States and semi Jesus is in a report about a pedophilia ring, and that's why he hasn't released it to you the way he promised. And if you're willing to say flat out, he should be immediately impeached. What on God's green earth would stop you from saying, by the way, I rig the election for him. To Trump's supporters, the idea that you rig the election for him is like seventeenth on the list of great admissions. Oh you did tell us how, so we can do it without you next time. I mean, nuclear war is nuclear war. You don't hold anything back, And Musk didn't hold anything back. He may have rolled some of it back over the weekend, but the claim he won the election for Trump is still out there. And the only reason I can think of for why what he wrote is not stronger than it is is that what he did was not stronger than it was. Musk Thursday was reaching for things with which to kill Trump, at least metaphorically, Epstein impeachment. Then he suddenly said, oh, rigging the election. I won't throw that at him. Nonsense. Also, if Musk or anybody else actually rigged all or part of the twenty twenty four election, why didn't he rig the Wisconsin Supreme Court election two months ago. I mean he spent twenty million on it. He went there, humiliated himself, campaigned in his ketamineupopt Clip's way, and his guy, Brad, lost by ten percent. It's a lot, but ten percent in a statewide special election is less than two hundred and thirty nine thousand votes, and Musk would have literally had to flip only one hundred and twenty thousand votes and Brad wins. And if you can't do that, how can you rig several swing states in an actual presidential election? And by the way, one of them you would have had to have rigged would have been Wisconsin. The Musk vote rigging machine broke, did it between November and April. Couldn't get the Wi Fi starlink, failed gelon, you got a blue screen on your Dell. So there is the rather serpentine backwards logic that says to me, the Musk Trump fight kind of proves the election wasn't rigged, because given what Musk wanted to do to Trump last week, if he had that rock, he would have dropped it on Trump like Trump was while e Coyote, which brings me to my last point about this. I did tell you so. When the podcast promos dropped last Wednesday night, Musk attacks Trump, there was blowback from every corner. No he didn't. No, you're making too much of one retweet. No I got that one right. I am not an insider. I do not have sources. Even on TV, I really didn't have sources. They all looked at me funny in Washington, like how does this guy know stuff? But what I might lack in those and even lack in insight at times I make up for in old age Trump as the coyote and Musk as the road runner. Okay, Trump is the coyote and Musk as a different coyote might be new, but the formula ain't. These are narcissists with brains that don't work. Right. I have covered them half of my career, and I have worked for them half of my life. And oh, by the way, there will be another round to this fight, at least another round. Trump, drifting off from reality like ooh, a metallic balloon let go by a child in southern California callback to the last episode, has threatened Musk with more king Lear consequences if now he helps Democrats instead. Howell Musk respond who knows other than that he will respond. These are mad men with basses who cannot conceive that their cult leader is wrong. They will fight. As I suggested online, we can only hope that when they fight, it's a duel, which brings me to the chef's kiss here. The Washington Post buried this in its thumbsucker on the Musk Trump brawl. It got a little play on Sunday because it's such a dramatic image. They didn't deny it at the White House, but literally, The Washington Post put this in paragraph twenty two, long past the point Bezos or his whorees would fallen asleep and thus missed it. It was about a sub fight between Musk and Scott Bessant, the Treasury Secretary, who I am still not convinced actually exists, who I am still not convinced isn't just a character played by the impeccable actor Barry Bostwick, who used to portray the mayor on Spin City. The term fight here is used literally, quoting the Post quoting Steve Bannon, and yes, we will accept Steve Bannon as a source for anything this much fun quote. In mid April, Musk and Besson had gone into the Oval Office to make their respective cases about their preferences for acting IRS Commissioner. Trump decided to support Besson's choice. That disagreement was first reported by The New York Times. Actor Bessant and Musk exited the Oval office and began walking down the hallway. The two men started to exchange insults, Bannon said, adding that Bessant brought up Musk's claims that he would uncover more than one trillion dollars in wasteful and fraudulent government spending, which Musk had not succeeded at doing. Quote, Scott said, You're a fraud. You're a total fraud, Bannon said in an interview. Musk then rammed his shoulder into Besson's ribcage quote like a rugby player, Bannon said, and Bessont hit him back. Multiple people stepped in to break up the scrum who rugby term as the two men reached the National Security Advisor's office and Musk was shuffled out of the White House. So we are now at this point in this bizarre timeline. The Treasury Secretary is physically attacked by the mad scientist spacey guy outside the National Security advisor's office. Thus the movie Doctor Strangelove is real. Gentlemen, you can't fight in here. This is the war room. Finally, the number one story on the countdown, and my favorite topic me and things from my career and my life. And it is to me amazing, even after all this time, that you could meet somebody just once in your life, but years later be moved to tears upon learning of their death. Then again, the man in question was named Walter Mathow, and if he was not the most popular American comedic actor of the last half of the twentieth century, he was close to it. And maybe more importantly, he was the most skilled, minimal touch American actor of the last half of the twentieth century. In other words, he was the man who, on stage or on camera, seemed to be doing the least amount of actual acting while still keeping you utterly convinced that the guy you saw on the screen was not Walter Mathow, but was Oscar Madison, and was not Walter Mathow, but was Max Goldman, and was not Walter Mathow, but was Willie Gingrich, and was not Walter Mathow but was Mel Miller, even though mel Miller had a Southern accent, smoked a pipe, had horn rim glasses, and supposedly went to Vanderbilt. We all knew Walter Mathow. It felt like we knew him personally because he managed a miracle. Every time he performed it was all him up there, and yet at the same time it was not him at all anyway. October first was his birthday, which is what brought this extraordinary man to the front of my mind again. I will get to my meeting with him first. Walter Mathow's best friends as an adult were his partner in half a dozen films, Jack Lemon and my dear friend Norman Lloyd, the one man history of Hollywood, who he lost in twenty twenty one at the age of one hundred and six. Norman loved Walter, and Norman loved talking about Walter, and there was an amazing amount of things to talk about about Walter. Norman told me that on the last of the Grumpy Old Men movies that he and Lemon made together, I think it was called Grumpy Old Men were doing this for the money. Mathow wanted to wrap up one day of shooting quickly. He was scheduled to film a scene in a water slide made up to look like a sewer through which his character was escaping. As the lunch break was called, he said to lemon, come on, Jack, let's go rehearse the water slide thing. This way. We can do it in one take. Get the hell out of here anyway. Don't you have to wait an hour after eating before you can shoot through a sewer. They went to the sewer water slide set. Walter Mathow grabbed the raft he was supposed to ride, and he jumped in. As he went through it, he studied all the corners and where the cameras would be, so he knew where to make his faces. And seconds later he was shooting out the far end of the water slide onto the giant inflatable twelve foot square air mattress placed there to break his fall. Or he would have been doing that, except it was lunch and the teamsters had deflated the mattress then moved it away because the set was on lunch break. So Walter Mathow, then seventy three years old, came flying out of the water slide onto the pavement. He broke his collarbone, which is just about as painful a thing as you can break. No Walter Mathow screamed. Jack Lemon raced over to him. Walter, Walter, are you all right? No? Not Jack? Call nine one one? Oh how Lemon panicked? Can I help you, Walter? Can I Can I get you something? Walter? Yes, Jack, get me nine one one ow o. Lemon continued to panic but till they come. Are you okay, Walter? Are you comfortable? Walter Mathow was in sheer agony, but he realized through the fog of pain that one of the oldest jokes in show business was actually happening to him. Finally, in real life. Am I comfortable? I make a nice living? Jack ow O? My friend Norman Lloyd used to go hiking with Walter Mathow in the Hollywood Hills, and he told me that one day Walter was unusually quiet. The two had gone a mile or so, and Mathow suddenly stopped and grabbed Norman by the arm. Nomy, did you know at the end and Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting. Norman smiled, snorted, and started to say that it was the dumbest thing he'd ever heard. But halfway through norman sentence, Mathow had already turned away from him and was back walking again. Another mile passed in silence, and now Mathou slowed down and faced his friend Norman. This is important. I have something to tell you, Norman said. His heart skipped. He thought there was something wrong. What is it, Walt did you know at the end Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting? Now Norman just shook his head. As they completed their five mile hike through the hills, Mathou stopped roughly once every mile and repeated the same line, did you know at the end Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting? Norman told me it totally unnerved me. When we got back to where we parked our cars, I felt like I had to avenge myself somehow, so I blurted out to him, WALTA, did you know at the end Beethoven was so deaf he thought he was painting, Norman said. Mathow looked at him, screwing his great craggy face into a resentful sneer as he did, what the hell are you talking about? Thought he was painting? That's the dumbest thing I ever heard, As I said, I met Walter Mathow once when I was a local sportscaster in Los Angeles. I was invited to host a charity event at the Hollywood Park Racetrack. I ordinarily did not do these things because to do them I would have to take the day off. But when the organizer said, oh, and Walter Mathow will be there, I just asked for directions. First time I had ever imagined what it was like to be a sportswriter or to be a sports broadcaster. It was when I was nine years old and I saw Walter Mathow portray Oscar Madison in the movie The Odd Couple. It was exactly what I wanted to be and where I wanted to live and how I wanted to eat. And I wanted to get a chance to tell him that. So at the charity dinner, I screwed up my courage, I introduced myself. I told him all that, and he replied, I hate you. I was so crushed I almost passed out, and clearly Walter Mathow recognized this. No, no, no, I don't hate your work. I watch you every night on Channel two Action News, you and Jim Lampley and Bree Lampley and Jim Lampley. But I hate the fact that you don't have an accent of any kind. Where are you raised? Iowa? I did not know where this conversation was going. I said, I was from the Bronx originally, Is that right? I'm from Brooklyn? Could you tell the hell kind of speech teacher did you have? You? You sound like Iowa? I explained, my father had said that if I wanted to go into broadcasting, I could not talk quote like the rest of us. Walter looked away from me and then back, and he said, very wise words. Your father was a speech teacher. No, I said, architect. His eyes flared. How in the hell does that work? I started to explain, when it suddenly dawned on me that we were discussing this only because he said he hated the fact that I did not have an accent. I asked him, why no accent means I can't do an impression of you? Well? This caused me to pause. Impressions. This is nineteen ninety one. In nineteen ninety one, Walter Mathow was one of the top five most impersonated voices in America. Anybody who did impressions, good or bad, professional or amateur. Anybody did a Walter Mathow? You did your Sammy Davis, your Howard Cosell, your Walter Mathow. Wait, I said to him, you do impressions of sportscasters? Yes, he said, proudly. Would you like to hear them? I said, I'll pay cash. Don't normally do these, but seeing you are in the business, I will just for you. I practiced these a lot. By the way, twenty years later, Norman Lloyd confirmed for me Mathou did do sportscaster impressions. He did practice them a lot. This was not some sort of bit. Now back in nineteen ninety one, Mathow cleared his throat, he shook his shoulders. Let's start with the best, and it sounds something like this, Hello, everybody, this is Vin Scully at Dodger Stadium. What do you think? It sounded exactly like Walter Mathow. Didn't sound like Vin Scully. It didn't even sound like a bad impression of Vin Scully. It didn't even sound like a bad impression of Walter Mathow. It was just Walter Mathow talking. Thinking quickly, I said, uncanny, mister Mathow, thank you. I work on Vinnie especially hat he's my favorite. Now the big mouth. Hello again, this is Howard co Sell at ringside. How about that one? I think I got most of the inflection. Goodness, mister Mathow, It's like he's in the room with us. This went on for many minutes, Kurt Goudie, Chick, hern Al Michaels, several local LA radio announcers. I cursed myself for not having brought a tape recorder with me. Walter Mathow did impressions of sportscasters, and they were all terrible, but he said he couldn't do one of me because I had no accent. I was complimented and crushed after a very nice event, saluting his friend and neighbor in the front row seats at the Laker Games, doctor Robert Curlin. We called it an evening, and as everybody got up to leave, I asked Walter Mathow to autograph my program from the dinner my pleasure. He said, nice work tonight. But I still don't get how your father, the architect was also a speech teacher. But never mind. In the program he wrote this listen, Keith quit kidding around, No, don't. Walter mathowt it was lovely, and then he did something that took my breath away, something I have tried to do anytime circumstances permitted me to. He picked up his program, he handed it to me, and he said, no, you sign mine. Can you believe that I only met him the one time, but that gesture stayed with me to such a degree that this happened. Nine years later. I woke up at the crack of dawn to go host the baseball Game of the Week at Fox Studios in LA It was Saturday morning, July first, two thousand. It was nine years and about two weeks after I met Walter Mathow and on the all news radio station. There was one big story that morning in Los Angeles. Overnight the great actor Walter Mathow had died heart attack, aged seventy nine. To tears, I've done all the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening. Most of our Countdown music was arranged, produced, and performed by Brian Ray and John Phillip chaneil musical directors of Countdown. This is my all purpose Walter Mathow Bernie Sanders' voice. It was produced by Tko Brothers. Mister Ray was on the guitars, bass and drums. Mister Chanelle handled orchestration in keyboards. I'll stop now. Our satirical and fifthy musical comments are by the best baseball stadium organist ever, Nancy Faust. The Olberman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch Warren Davis courtesy of ESPN, Inc. Is our Sports Music. Other music arranged and performed by the group No Horns Allowed. That's countdown for today, Day one hundred and forty two of America held hostage just one and twenty two days until the scheduled end of his lame duck and lame brained term unless putin or musk remove him sooner, or the actuarial tables do, or we do the next scheduled countdown. He is Thursday until that next one. I'm Keith Olderman, good afternoon, good morning, good evening, good night, and was the last part of that all right, good luck Countdown with Keith Ouldreman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.