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Speaker 1: Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. At

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Speaker 1: this exact hour, the United States of America does not

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Speaker 1: have a functioning government. The Trump dictatorship and the Library

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Speaker 1: of Congress Congress, which Mike Johnson runs via a porn

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Speaker 1: app deleted part of the Constitution yesterday. I'll just say

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Speaker 1: that again. Deleted part of the Constitution yesterday. Deleted that

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Speaker 1: part of the Constitution that limits the suspension of habeas

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Speaker 1: corpus and bans presidents from accepting foreign bribes. The Library

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Speaker 1: says this was a coding error and it would be

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Speaker 1: fixed soon. Is coding error, Yeah, the coding in Trump's DNA.

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Speaker 1: The White House had to deny that the White House

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Speaker 1: Chief of Staff was to meet last night with the

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Speaker 1: Vice President, the Attorney General, the Deputy Attorney General, and

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Speaker 1: the FBI Director to discuss what to do about the

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Speaker 1: trump Stein disaster, the Trump Epstein cover up scandal, and

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Speaker 1: also what to do with the recording of the Deputy

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Speaker 1: Attorney General's two days worth of bargaining with a convicted

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Speaker 1: pedophile and child sex trafficker. And nobody seemed to notice

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Speaker 1: that the real headline in that was whatever the Chief

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Speaker 1: of Staff ag deputy agn FBI director. We're meeting with

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Speaker 1: the Vice president about the president was not going to

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Speaker 1: be there. There is right now, no confident executive authority,

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Speaker 1: no congressional or Senate oversight, no reliable judiciary. The United

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Speaker 1: States of America does not now have a functioning government.

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Speaker 1: The nominal president, a lunatic, has spent the last few

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Speaker 1: days making up economic statistics and poll numbers and threatening

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Speaker 1: his predecessors with prosecution for imaginary crimes punishable by death,

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Speaker 1: while he, the nominal President, wanders around the roof of

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Speaker 1: the White House and phones into a business TV network

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Speaker 1: spewing racist moronity, the content of which is just this

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Speaker 1: side of a nineteenth century minstrel show. Or while he

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Speaker 1: continues to get more and more in bed figuratively with

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Speaker 1: a convicted pedophile and child sex trafficker in a scheme

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Speaker 1: to cover up her crimes, her late partners crimes, and

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Speaker 1: whatever the President's role was or was not in those crimes,

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Speaker 1: and the first and seventh people in the line of

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Speaker 1: presidential succession, we're going to have dinner with their Epstein

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Speaker 1: expert who just met with Gallaine Maxwell, and they were

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Speaker 1: going to dine with the head of the FBI and

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Speaker 1: the woman who actually runs the White House, but not

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Speaker 1: the president. And you know, it almost doesn't matter if

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Speaker 1: they were meeting to try to figure out what to

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Speaker 1: do about trump'steen or not. What are they meeting for

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Speaker 1: with the vice president but not the president? The United

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Speaker 1: States of America does not now have a functioning government.

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Speaker 1: By three fourteen pm Eastern daylight time, the Library of

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Speaker 1: Congress said sections eight, nine, and ten of the First

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Speaker 1: Article of the Constitution were back online. So shrug, emoji,

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Speaker 1: I guess there are limits on emoluments and on suspending

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Speaker 1: habeas corpus for now. Fifteen minutes later, however, there were

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Speaker 1: still huge swaths of all three of those sections of

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Speaker 1: the first Article that were missing from the official online

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Speaker 1: version of the Constitution, but just coding. So what, it's

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Speaker 1: just the online version not the real one. What's the difference. Well,

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Speaker 1: Trump just fired the head of the Bureau of Labor

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Speaker 1: Statistics because she would not delete the official online jobs numbers,

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Speaker 1: and he will soon find somebody to post fabricated numbers online,

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Speaker 1: which will then be accepted as real and official and

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Speaker 1: online because they're online. There is no functioning government, just

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Speaker 1: a mediocre public relations firm, an understaffed, mediocre public relations

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Speaker 1: firm which is trying to sell the governmental equivalent of

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Speaker 1: ed souls and Google glasses and new coke and fascism. Happily,

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Speaker 1: that firm, the new NGO USA pr inc Is still

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Speaker 1: insistent on keeping Trumpstein in the news. Thank goodness, they

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Speaker 1: can get that right. Release the tapes or the transcripts

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Speaker 1: of Todd Blanche talking to Maxwell for two days, in

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Speaker 1: which she says, oh, no, Trump was uninvolved, don't believe

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Speaker 1: those pictures, and after which she was then coincidentally, maybe accidentally,

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Speaker 1: moved from her jail cell in Debs behind Bars, Florida

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Speaker 1: to Club fed in Texas. You're gonna release those tapes

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Speaker 1: and then try to explain why she was moved and

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Speaker 1: create yet another Trumpstein scandal. What number seventy three? And

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Speaker 1: this decision to release or not release was made only

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Speaker 1: after they met with everybody except Trump, after Trump brought

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Speaker 1: Trumpstein up again at an event about the old Olympics.

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Speaker 1: Were you aware of and did you personally approve the

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Speaker 1: prison transfer for Gallaine Maxwell that your Justice department.

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Speaker 2: I didn't know about it at all.

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Speaker 1: No, I read about it.

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Speaker 2: Just like you did.

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Speaker 1: And do you believe that she is not.

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Speaker 2: A very uncommon thing.

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Speaker 1: Do you believe that she's credible to be listening to

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Speaker 1: your deputy Attorney General sat down with her recently.

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Speaker 2: Well, he's let me tell you, he's a very talented man.

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Speaker 2: His name is Todd Blanche. He's a very legitimate person,

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Speaker 2: very high I just have very highly thought of person,

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Speaker 2: respected by everybody. And I didn't talk to him about it,

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Speaker 2: but I will tell you that whatever he asks would

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Speaker 2: be totally appropriate, and it's not an uncommon thing to

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Speaker 2: do that. And I think he probably wants to make

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Speaker 2: sure that you know people that should not be involved

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Speaker 2: or aren't involved, or not hurt by something that would

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Speaker 2: be very very unfortunate, very unfair to a lot of people.

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Speaker 1: For her part, Maxwell does not want that interview released

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Speaker 1: or the Epstein files and lists released. And Trump has

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Speaker 1: sent Congress and somebody has to be the four hundred

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Speaker 1: and thirty first best Congressman James Comer to demand depositions

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Speaker 1: about Epstein from Democrats because somebody in a dictatorship has

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Speaker 1: to do the dumbest jobs, and that somebody is Jamie

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Speaker 1: Comer demanded depositions from everybody except Trump and accept the

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Speaker 1: ex Attorney General Bill Barr, And it was the Congressman

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Speaker 1: Steve Cohen who again asked what did Barr do with

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Speaker 1: the Epstein videos and films and images confiscated after the

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Speaker 1: FBI under Barr's administration, rated Epstein's townhouse in New York

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Speaker 1: Low these many years ago, and the political commentator Charlemagne

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Speaker 1: the God pointed out that when he criticized Trump on

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Speaker 1: Fox about trump Stein, he never mentioned race once, but

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Speaker 1: then Trump called him a racist. Charlemagne added this quote

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Speaker 1: shows how authoritarians will attempt to bully people into pushing

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Speaker 1: false narratives and added quote, I need you that is

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Speaker 1: Trump to keep the promises of a great economy and

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Speaker 1: the promises of transparency with the Epstein files. And if

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Speaker 1: your head is spinning, because once again there is so

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Speaker 1: much Trumpstein news, what do you mean there was a

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Speaker 1: Trumpstein dinner with the Vice president, the chief of staff

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Speaker 1: attorney generally FBI chief and without Trump Huh, what what

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Speaker 1: do you mean? You couldn't even make up a good

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Speaker 1: cover story for why you'd do that. If your head

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Speaker 1: is spinning because of that, remember it doesn't matter. The

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Speaker 1: point was summarized in the movie The Manchurian candidate. The

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Speaker 1: point is Trumpstein lives, Trumpstein expands, Trumpstein abides. Are they

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Speaker 1: saying are there any Communists in the Defense Department? Of

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Speaker 1: course not. They're saying how many communists are there in

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Speaker 1: the defense department? Trump Stein? Now, trump Stein? Tomah, you've

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Speaker 1: already heard me say. You know the rest quote of

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Speaker 1: the week about Trump, a clear winner, the utterly unself

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Speaker 1: aware and utterly unintentionally hilarious nutjob. Charlie Kirk Quoting Charlie Kirk,

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Speaker 1: There's a lot you can call Donald Trump. No one

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Speaker 1: has ever called him feminine. I paused there, because you

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Speaker 1: wouldn't have heard anything I said while you were laughing.

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Speaker 1: Trump is a giant middle finger to all the screeching

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Speaker 1: hall monitors that attacked young men for just existing. He's

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Speaker 1: a giant fu to the feminist establishment. I'm sorry, no

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Speaker 1: one has ever called Trump feminine. Donald Trump, for thirty years,

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Speaker 1: at least every day, slathers on enough makeup every day,

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Speaker 1: not for being on TV, but just for being out

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Speaker 1: among people. Slathers on enough makeup every day to completely

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Speaker 1: cover all of the New Year York Radio City Rockets

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Speaker 1: and their backup team and at the age of seventy nine.

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Speaker 1: He dyes his hair and eyebrows yellow. That is as

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Speaker 1: goddamned feminine as it gets. My mother never did any

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Speaker 1: of that. My grandmother, who died wearing makeup, never did

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Speaker 1: any of that, never called him feminine. Holy cow, he's

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Speaker 1: wearing bronzer. That's the quote of the week about Trump.

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Speaker 1: And as always, we have a dozen quotes of the

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Speaker 1: week by Trump. The most meaningful one if you continue

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Speaker 1: to harbor the belief that the third term, or as

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Speaker 1: we call it, the dictatorship talk, is just trolling. Trump

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Speaker 1: went on CNBC and between his other lies, said of

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Speaker 1: an illegal, unconstitutional civil war starting third term quote, I'd

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Speaker 1: like to run. I have the best poll numbers I've

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Speaker 1: ever had. You know why, because people love the tariffs.

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Speaker 1: Even the CNBC people had to correct him on all

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Speaker 1: of that, all of which is wrong. The Daily Beast

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Speaker 1: corrected him quote. Trump's comments come as the real clear

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Speaker 1: Politics polling Aggregator shows Trump's approval rating is five points underwater,

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Speaker 1: with just forty six percent of Americans approving. It should

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Speaker 1: be noted that five points underwater is the best Trump polling.

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Speaker 1: Forty six percent approval is the best Trump number because

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Speaker 1: Real Clear Politics is a bullshit fascist site that cooks

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Speaker 1: the polling books, uses discredited polls, sometimes uses brand new

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Speaker 1: ones to try to make things look better than they

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Speaker 1: are for Trump. Elliott Morris's Strength in Numbers has Trump's

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Speaker 1: approval not at forty six percent, but at thirty seven percent.

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Speaker 1: Gallup has just measured Trump among independents approval twenty nine percent.

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Speaker 1: More independents like the makeup job he does on himself

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Speaker 1: than his policies. Hell, that's Susie Wilds's dinner might have

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Speaker 1: been about how to get him out of the White House.

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Speaker 1: One thing they might explore as an alternative is seeing

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Speaker 1: if he could become a farm worker. The reports are

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Speaker 1: beginning to trickle in about crops rotting in the fields.

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Speaker 1: Now it is cherries in Oregon. Half the workers from

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Speaker 1: one of the big cherry farms gone gone. Three hundred

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Speaker 1: thousand dollars worth of cherries gone. That's just this spring

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Speaker 1: and summers cherries. Never mind all the cherries yet to

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Speaker 1: be gone. It is so bad that even Trump has

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Speaker 1: noted and responded and seem to be laying the ground

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Speaker 1: work for backing off the deportation of farm workers. He

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Speaker 1: did it in the most possibly racist way. I mean,

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Speaker 1: listen to this. What he says here, he could be

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Speaker 1: quoting from an episode of Amos and Andy.

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Speaker 3: We're taking care of our farmers. We can't let our

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Speaker 3: farmers not have anybody. You know, these are very these people.

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Speaker 3: You can't replace them very easily. You know, people that

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Speaker 3: live in the inner city are not doing that work.

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Speaker 3: They're just not doing that work. And they've tried. We've tried,

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Speaker 3: everybody tried. They don't do it. These people do it naturally, naturally.

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Speaker 3: I said, what happens if they get it to a

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Speaker 3: farmer the other day? What happens if they get a

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Speaker 3: bad back? He said, they don't get a bad back, sir,

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Speaker 3: because if they get a bad back, they die. I said,

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Speaker 3: That's interesting, isn't it. You know, these are very you know,

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Speaker 3: in many ways, very very special people.

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Speaker 1: If this sounds like something you read back in high school,

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Speaker 1: that's because it's just what every slave owner said as

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Speaker 1: a rationalization of slavery in eighteen fifty nine. They're good

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Speaker 1: at it. Oh and by the way, with all of this,

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Speaker 1: we have not even gotten yet to Trump wandering around

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Speaker 1: on the White House roof. We haven't gotten to it. Yet,

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Speaker 1: why are you on the roof, mister president?

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Speaker 3: Why are you doing up there?

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Speaker 1: Let's come down and talk to us. You know, why

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Speaker 1: do you feel? They started? On internet? Wag put it

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Speaker 1: the premiere of Fat on a Hot Tin roof. You

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Speaker 1: may have seen Trump on the roof of the White

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Speaker 1: House the other day, the video of it at least,

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Speaker 1: and wondered if you were awake, or what had happened

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Speaker 1: now to this timeline, or who had screwed up the universe,

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Speaker 1: or what could possibly be next. I saw that, and

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Speaker 1: I said, I've seen this before. I have seen Trump

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Speaker 1: do this before. I have been there in person as

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Speaker 1: Trump has done this before, not the roof part. If

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Speaker 1: it had been the roof part, I had have been

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Speaker 1: playing the patrician Neil role from the great movie A

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Speaker 1: Face in the Crowd, which I will circle back to later,

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Speaker 1: which concerns the subject of guys on roofs. But I've

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Speaker 1: seen that look of him wandering around leading a bunch

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Speaker 1: of people who are pretending that he's not doing something

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Speaker 1: really crazy, stupid or wasting time. And I have been

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Speaker 1: there within feet of him as he has done it,

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Speaker 1: the look in his eye of I know what all

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Speaker 1: of this is I'm a builder. I could have been

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Speaker 1: a architect when he's lucky, if he can successfully construct

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Speaker 1: a good lie the what's all of this over here?

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Speaker 1: Is this? Are these storm drains or vents or shrubbery?

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Speaker 1: Is that a martian or a tree? He doesn't know

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Speaker 1: what he's doing. He's not a builder, he's not an architect.

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Speaker 1: He's not a designer. He just has money and pays

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Speaker 1: other people to do it and slaps his name on it.

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Speaker 1: This is his life. It's not even his money, it's

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Speaker 1: just his name. In fact, it's not even his name,

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Speaker 1: it's his father's name. The story that what I saw

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Speaker 1: was about the elevator and the gym at two hundred

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Speaker 1: East sixty ninth Street, what was formerly until they all

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Speaker 1: got their money together and took his name off of it.

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Speaker 1: Trump Palace a somewhat exaggerated name for a halfway decent

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Speaker 1: apartment building on the Upper East Side of New York

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Speaker 1: in which I lived from the year two thousand and

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Speaker 1: seven to the year twenty sixteen, until I couldn't stand

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Speaker 1: it anymore and sold my apartment at a loss, which

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Speaker 1: was the last apartment sold in that building for several years.

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Speaker 1: Because I recognized, in the one time I've ever been

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Speaker 1: smart about real estate that whether he won or lost

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Speaker 1: the twenty sixteen election, his name as a conveyance for

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Speaker 1: real estate was dead, as it now is, certainly in

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Speaker 1: New York. So I sold and got out. But a

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Speaker 1: few years previously, he had written me a fan letter.

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Speaker 1: I've discussed this before. It was about a commentary I

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Speaker 1: did on ESPN two about Ted Turner, and he wrote

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Speaker 1: me a fan letter, and obviously I couldn't stop him.

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Speaker 1: He had my address. I had met him previously at NBC.

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Speaker 1: I had met him in the nineteen eighties. It feels

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Speaker 1: like the eighteen eighties. It was a long time ago,

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Speaker 1: and I knew him, and it was like, oh, no,

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Speaker 1: here he is again. I decided to take advantage of

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Speaker 1: the fan letter, which is how I wound up seeing

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Speaker 1: the look on his face as he wandered around the

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Speaker 1: roof aimlessly and mindlessly, while projecting, at least in his

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Speaker 1: own mind, a sense of being the great constructor. Well,

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Speaker 1: the con part is correct. What I wrote him back

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Speaker 1: to take advantage of this fandom was to try to

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Speaker 1: approach him on the subject of the deteriorating condition of

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Speaker 1: the building in which I lived. He didn't own it.

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Speaker 1: It was called Trump Palace, but it was just managed

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Speaker 1: by his company. The building had its own separate ownership,

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Speaker 1: and obviously the apartments were owned by US suckers who'd

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Speaker 1: bought there. And I thought, if I could play on this,

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Speaker 1: I could get him to do something about what was happening,

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Speaker 1: which was number one. The elevators had basically stopped working,

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Speaker 1: and a lot of members of the staff had worked

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Speaker 1: very hard to hold them together. But it was time

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Speaker 1: to do something about the elevators and various other sundry

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Speaker 1: problems in the infrastructure of this building. So I wrote

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Speaker 1: a letter, and I must say I got a call

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Speaker 1: almost immediately from one of his staffers, who later explained

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Speaker 1: that that's the way they treated people. While they were

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Speaker 1: treating people with celebrity kind of names, this way, they

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Speaker 1: didn't treat the average person who lived in a Trump building.

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Speaker 1: They just were afraid I'd go public or they could

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Speaker 1: claim credit for my success because I lived in their building.

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Speaker 1: You'll remember the story about Derek Jeter of the New

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Speaker 1: York Yankees breaking his ankle and Trump announcing that he

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Speaker 1: had broken his ankle because he'd sold his apartment in

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Speaker 1: another Trump building, because that's the way Trump thinks, or

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Speaker 1: doesn't think, as the case may be. So now let

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Speaker 1: me take you back to this time when I saw

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Speaker 1: him with the same look on his face and the

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Speaker 1: same meandering. I'm just supervising this because I have to

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Speaker 1: make the final decision. I'll make the decision about where

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Speaker 1: the giant electric Trump sign with the picture of me

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Speaker 1: goes on the roof of the White House. Where that

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Speaker 1: look comes from, and what it indicates about him, and

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Speaker 1: also how it, for a moment made me think that

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Speaker 1: we were finally approaching the only possible literary ending to

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Speaker 1: the Trump presidency. And it evoked again the movie A

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Speaker 1: Face in the Crowd and Patrician Neil and Andy Griffith.

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Speaker 1: But I'm diverging past the point of you understanding what

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Speaker 1: I'm saying anymore, So I'll get back to this. I

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Speaker 1: write him about the elevators. They call me and they

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Speaker 1: say he's going to come in and inspect the elevators

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Speaker 1: on such and such a day and see what the

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Speaker 1: problem really is. And my argument was, it's your name

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Speaker 1: on the building. When my name is on something, I

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Speaker 1: take personal responsibility for it. I'm only doing TV shows. Here,

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Speaker 1: you do a TV show and you have buildings, you

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Speaker 1: can materially do something much more easily about the buildings

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Speaker 1: than I can about my TV shows. I'm sure you've

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Speaker 1: found the same thing. And sure enough he showed up

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Speaker 1: right at the hour that was announced that I was

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Speaker 1: fairly impressed by that, and in he walked. And by

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Speaker 1: the way, for those of you scoring at home, he's about,

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Speaker 1: at least he was in twenty thirteen about my height,

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Speaker 1: and I'm about six three and a half, so that

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Speaker 1: part may not be an exaggeration, although he did look

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Speaker 1: heavier than I did it those days, and I was

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Speaker 1: pretty heavy. I was probably about two sixty five. Then anyway,

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Speaker 1: he walks in, he comes over, shakes my hand, and

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Speaker 1: in person he can be exactly the charmer that the

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Speaker 1: people who believe he's not insane think he is. And

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Speaker 1: you sit there going, wait a minute, this doesn't line

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Speaker 1: up with the other guy. And my initial thought in

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Speaker 1: twenty thirteen was there's a real problem here, because there

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Speaker 1: are at least two different Donald Trump personalities, and that's

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Speaker 1: always a bad sign. It doesn't really matter which one

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Speaker 1: is the right one, the good one, or the evil one.

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Speaker 1: That they're both there. That's a bad sign. My first

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Speaker 1: objection to him running for president was I didn't think

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Speaker 1: we should have a president with a totally split personality.

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Speaker 1: Then we found out what the split personality was a

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Speaker 1: cover for the real horrible personality. Okay, So he's in

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Speaker 1: there and he's inspecting the elevators, and he's inspecting the

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Speaker 1: other problems, and he's quizzing me about the things I

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Speaker 1: wrote in the letter, and he says, we're going to

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Speaker 1: get right on it. Thanks, but I enjoy the show.

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Speaker 1: You're doing. Great work, great work, great work. Keep up

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Speaker 1: the good work and call me anytime. My numbers on

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Speaker 1: the letter called me. And off he goes. And a

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Speaker 1: week later there's a big announcement inside Trump Palace. They

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Speaker 1: are going to remodel the gym. What about the elevators,

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Speaker 1: the other problems with the electrical elements, the failing heating

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Speaker 1: and air conditioning ducts, and the internal structure that now

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Speaker 1: creates a slamming noise on six or seven of the floors,

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Speaker 1: and the other things that were no the gym. And

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Speaker 1: it was explained to me by the manager of the

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Speaker 1: building was a very nice guy named Bill. Bill explained

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Speaker 1: to me that the problem with doing what I did

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Speaker 1: was you simply send him into your building and he

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Speaker 1: starts looking at it, and he doesn't remember what you

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Speaker 1: said was the problem. He just sees what he sees,

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Speaker 1: and he sees something that he didn't think looked gold enough.

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Speaker 1: The gym, which was on the ground floor and actually

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Speaker 1: had windows onto the street, was one of the first

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Speaker 1: things you would see if you got a tour of

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Speaker 1: Trump Palace. It was over to the left of the

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Speaker 1: main stand, the main business desk, the concierge area, the lobby,

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Speaker 1: and then the gym, and you could see the gym,

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Speaker 1: and you could see it from the street. And he

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Speaker 1: didn't like any of the equipment in the gym, so

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Speaker 1: he tore out the entire gym. Obviously, he didn't pay

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Speaker 1: for that. We the people who owned the apartments, paid

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Speaker 1: for that. And it was tens or twenties or thirties

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Speaker 1: of thousands of dollars, and we all got charged for it.

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Speaker 1: And the new equipment none of it worked, and the

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00:25:07,835 --> 00:25:10,635
Speaker 1: matting didn't fit, and all of the good machines were

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Speaker 1: taken out in bad machines. Gold machines were put in

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Speaker 1: in its place. And I learned a great lesson there,

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Speaker 1: which was, yes, he's just as crazy now as he

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Speaker 1: was when you met him in nineteen eighty three. So

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Speaker 1: that look on his face, that look on his face

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Speaker 1: is I'm in my element. I am the master of building.

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Speaker 1: I'm better than my father was at this I can

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Speaker 1: build anything. We could rebuild the entire White House. We

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Speaker 1: could make it two hundred and seventy four stories tall.

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Speaker 1: When somebody shouted, he are you're thinking of putting on

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Speaker 1: an addition, a second floor, I thought, oh God, don't

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Speaker 1: suggest that to him. The thing will be two hundred

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Speaker 1: and seventy six stories tall before the end of the month.

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Speaker 1: Whatever it is that he plans to do is not

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Speaker 1: what the White House needs, and not structurally what it

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Speaker 1: can support, and nothing that will help anybody but him.

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Speaker 1: Just count on that. However, as I said in a

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Speaker 1: more metaphorical and symbolic way, I saw two other things.

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Speaker 1: The first I saw the famous Andy Griffith film A

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Speaker 1: Face in the Crowd. If you have never seen A

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Speaker 1: Face in the Crowd, stop playing this podcast right now

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00:26:14,195 --> 00:26:17,475
Speaker 1: and go and find it, stream it, buy it, borrow

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Speaker 1: it from somebody, steal it out of a library somewhere,

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Speaker 1: and watch a Face in the Crowd in which Andy

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Speaker 1: Griffith portrays a populist, a bum, a criminal who rises

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Speaker 1: literally from the floor of a jail. I believe in Arkansas,

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Speaker 1: and through various circumstances, one of which is, he gets

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Speaker 1: his own populist television show, becomes the advisor to presidents,

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Speaker 1: and is on the verge of running for president himself.

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Speaker 1: And I won't spoil it any further except to say

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Speaker 1: that the character that Andy Griffith plays, Lonesome Roads, is

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Speaker 1: so evil that Andy Griffith, in interviews that he did

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Speaker 1: after this film was completed in nineteen fifty seven and

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Speaker 1: It's Ilia Kazan, after this film was completed, Andy Griffith

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Speaker 1: said he would never do any part like that again.

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Speaker 1: And the reason that he only played lovable sheriffs from Bumpkinville, Carolina,

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Speaker 1: or lovable elderly lawyers who are far smarter than they

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00:27:17,235 --> 00:27:22,435
Speaker 1: seem from Bumpkinville, Illinois. The reason he only played sweet, old,

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00:27:22,555 --> 00:27:25,875
Speaker 1: nice guys and good pillars of the community was that

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00:27:25,955 --> 00:27:29,355
Speaker 1: the role of Lonesome Roads the populace, brought out evil

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Speaker 1: in his own personality that he never wanted to experience again.

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Speaker 1: Andy Griffith could have been one of the great horrible

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Speaker 1: actors of all time, one of the great evil characters.

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Speaker 1: If in another world he says, no, I think this

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Speaker 1: is my calling. He could have been Darth Vader, only

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00:27:47,195 --> 00:27:49,035
Speaker 1: they wouldn't have put a helmet on it, because the

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Speaker 1: look in his eyes when he was being evil in

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Speaker 1: that film is extraordinary. I know what he saw. He

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Speaker 1: could see it on the screen, and if it was

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00:27:58,635 --> 00:28:00,795
Speaker 1: in you, you would never want it to come out again,

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Speaker 1: unless you were Donald Trump. So at the end of it,

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00:28:04,955 --> 00:28:07,115
Speaker 1: he is at the top of his tower and he

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00:28:07,195 --> 00:28:09,475
Speaker 1: has given away and I will not spoil it any

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Speaker 1: further if you've not seen the film. He's given away

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Speaker 1: his popularity with one act and they've all left him.

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00:28:16,835 --> 00:28:18,795
Speaker 1: And he's up there. And the woman who put him

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00:28:18,835 --> 00:28:22,155
Speaker 1: there was named Marcia, and she's portrayed by Patricia Neil,

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Speaker 1: the great actress, and she's standing at the bottom of

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00:28:27,275 --> 00:28:33,075
Speaker 1: this giant home of his, this duplex. I believe somewhere

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00:28:33,115 --> 00:28:37,075
Speaker 1: on the Central Park area of New York, one of

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00:28:37,115 --> 00:28:39,755
Speaker 1: the sides of Central Park's never made clear, could be

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00:28:39,835 --> 00:28:42,955
Speaker 1: Central Park South, Central Park West Fifth Avenue, and he's

428
00:28:42,955 --> 00:28:46,755
Speaker 1: standing on the balcony and he's going, I'll jump, I'll jump,

429
00:28:47,075 --> 00:28:51,515
Speaker 1: and she stops and looks at him, and Patricia Neil,

430
00:28:51,515 --> 00:28:53,595
Speaker 1: who's always been a sweetheart in this film and has

431
00:28:53,595 --> 00:28:57,995
Speaker 1: put up with everything from this man, suddenly starts screaming, jump.

432
00:28:58,355 --> 00:29:03,235
Speaker 1: Do everybody a favor? Already a jump? So that's what

433
00:29:03,315 --> 00:29:05,555
Speaker 1: I thought of as well, in addition my own experience

434
00:29:05,595 --> 00:29:08,355
Speaker 1: watching him look around, asking what is this? Is it

435
00:29:08,475 --> 00:29:11,675
Speaker 1: power station? Is it a bridge? What is it I'm at?

436
00:29:11,915 --> 00:29:14,115
Speaker 1: Is it the White House? Is it the Blue House?

437
00:29:14,355 --> 00:29:17,555
Speaker 1: Should we add seventeen stories to it? Where is this?

438
00:29:18,275 --> 00:29:22,715
Speaker 1: Where are my wings? I also thought of a face

439
00:29:22,795 --> 00:29:25,235
Speaker 1: in the crowd. But lastly I thought of the book,

440
00:29:26,275 --> 00:29:28,955
Speaker 1: not the TV series, not the British TV series, not

441
00:29:29,075 --> 00:29:32,995
Speaker 1: the American TV series with Kevin Spacey, the Book House

442
00:29:33,035 --> 00:29:38,155
Speaker 1: of Cards. Four years literally since this began in twenty fifteen,

443
00:29:38,555 --> 00:29:42,955
Speaker 1: I have thought that there was only one known, already

444
00:29:43,115 --> 00:29:48,555
Speaker 1: printed literary conclusion to this entire nightmare of Donald Trump

445
00:29:48,915 --> 00:29:54,155
Speaker 1: as candidate for office, as commentator about public events, and

446
00:29:54,195 --> 00:29:56,475
Speaker 1: finally as President of the United States, and now as

447
00:29:56,555 --> 00:29:59,915
Speaker 1: repeat president of the United States and as potential dictator

448
00:29:59,955 --> 00:30:05,635
Speaker 1: of the United States, there was only one possible literary outcome,

449
00:30:05,915 --> 00:30:08,555
Speaker 1: and I would like to read it to you now.

450
00:30:08,635 --> 00:30:12,235
Speaker 1: It's a few paragraphs because if you've seen House of Cards,

451
00:30:12,435 --> 00:30:14,755
Speaker 1: first off, if you've seen the British edition, you love it.

452
00:30:14,915 --> 00:30:18,675
Speaker 1: If you've seen the American edition, you asked, why is

453
00:30:18,715 --> 00:30:21,995
Speaker 1: it four hundred and eighty seven episodes long? Why have

454
00:30:22,115 --> 00:30:24,115
Speaker 1: they slowed it down to the point where an hour

455
00:30:24,235 --> 00:30:27,715
Speaker 1: of the TV show only covers an hour of their lives.

456
00:30:28,275 --> 00:30:32,555
Speaker 1: They kind of stretched that thing out, patting it a

457
00:30:32,635 --> 00:30:36,395
Speaker 1: little bit. The British series is, I believe, complete with

458
00:30:36,435 --> 00:30:39,555
Speaker 1: six episodes, and it is masterfully done by Ian Richardson,

459
00:30:39,675 --> 00:30:41,995
Speaker 1: and as we used to say at ESPN, it moves

460
00:30:42,115 --> 00:30:45,755
Speaker 1: like a rocket. Not so the American edition. But the

461
00:30:45,835 --> 00:30:49,955
Speaker 1: key factor is in each of the ends of both

462
00:30:49,995 --> 00:30:53,435
Speaker 1: of these shows, the British and the American versions. In

463
00:30:53,515 --> 00:30:57,635
Speaker 1: the end of the first series, the lead character Prime

464
00:30:57,675 --> 00:31:04,835
Speaker 1: Minister Erkitt and in the American version, President Underwood their

465
00:31:04,875 --> 00:31:09,955
Speaker 1: own hands, kills a woman reporter. In the British case,

466
00:31:10,435 --> 00:31:13,635
Speaker 1: he throws her off the roof of the Houses of

467
00:31:13,715 --> 00:31:17,915
Speaker 1: Parliament after he confesses to her of his other crimes.

468
00:31:18,755 --> 00:31:21,755
Speaker 1: This is not how the book ends. The book ends.

469
00:31:22,155 --> 00:31:25,635
Speaker 1: It was written by Michael Dobbs, with no idea that

470
00:31:25,675 --> 00:31:28,395
Speaker 1: there would be sequels. In Britain, they made it into

471
00:31:28,475 --> 00:31:31,075
Speaker 1: three series, and as I mentioned, in this country, they

472
00:31:31,115 --> 00:31:35,315
Speaker 1: made it into seven thousand different episodes and they don't

473
00:31:35,355 --> 00:31:40,355
Speaker 1: play it anymore because the whole Kevin Spacey thing. However,

474
00:31:41,515 --> 00:31:44,835
Speaker 1: this is not what the book says. The book offers

475
00:31:44,915 --> 00:31:48,675
Speaker 1: a different kind of ending altogether, the same scenario in

476
00:31:48,715 --> 00:31:55,635
Speaker 1: which the woman reporter Mattie Storn, actually records his confession

477
00:31:56,795 --> 00:31:59,795
Speaker 1: and in the TV series he then throws her off

478
00:31:59,875 --> 00:32:02,475
Speaker 1: the roof, and the animating part of the next two

479
00:32:02,595 --> 00:32:05,955
Speaker 1: series is what happened to the taper that she made

480
00:32:05,955 --> 00:32:09,395
Speaker 1: of him confessing after she is dead in a car

481
00:32:09,635 --> 00:32:14,675
Speaker 1: parked next to Parliament. That's not how the book ends,

482
00:32:14,715 --> 00:32:16,675
Speaker 1: and I have thought, and I was reminded of this

483
00:32:16,715 --> 00:32:19,595
Speaker 1: because he's wandering around the roof of this and I'm

484
00:32:19,635 --> 00:32:22,955
Speaker 1: going to take the liberty of probably violating their copyright

485
00:32:23,035 --> 00:32:28,275
Speaker 1: and reading about four paragraphs so you know this, So

486
00:32:28,395 --> 00:32:31,475
Speaker 1: you know that this is what I thought at first

487
00:32:31,515 --> 00:32:34,435
Speaker 1: glance when I saw Trump on the roof of the

488
00:32:34,435 --> 00:32:39,755
Speaker 1: White House. You can't prove a thing. It's your word

489
00:32:39,755 --> 00:32:44,275
Speaker 1: against mine, he whispered. Mattie said, nothing at first, but

490
00:32:44,475 --> 00:32:47,875
Speaker 1: pressed the rewind button on her recorder. As the tapes

491
00:32:47,915 --> 00:32:51,875
Speaker 1: fun round, she looked down upon Erkutt, who was shivering violently.

492
00:32:53,035 --> 00:32:56,075
Speaker 1: Your final mistake, mister Urkutt. You thought I switched it off.

493
00:32:56,675 --> 00:32:59,075
Speaker 1: She punched yet another button. As she did so, the

494
00:32:59,115 --> 00:33:02,875
Speaker 1: clearly recorded words of their conversation filled the air, damning

495
00:33:02,915 --> 00:33:07,515
Speaker 1: him in every syllable, the proof which would condemn him.

496
00:33:07,875 --> 00:33:11,395
Speaker 1: As she walked slowly away, leaving him wretched in the snow,

497
00:33:11,515 --> 00:33:13,755
Speaker 1: the silence in his head was filled with the ghostly

498
00:33:14,115 --> 00:33:18,595
Speaker 1: mocking laughter of his father. The setting sun pierced through

499
00:33:18,595 --> 00:33:21,515
Speaker 1: the frosty sky. As it did so, it glanced off

500
00:33:21,555 --> 00:33:24,715
Speaker 1: the snow covered tower of Big Ben and cascaded into

501
00:33:24,755 --> 00:33:28,915
Speaker 1: a thousand tiny streams of light, blinding the American tourist

502
00:33:29,155 --> 00:33:32,515
Speaker 1: who was trying to capture the scene on video. He

503
00:33:32,635 --> 00:33:35,595
Speaker 1: was quite clear later in his description of what had happened.

504
00:33:36,275 --> 00:33:39,835
Speaker 1: The Parliament building had suddenly become like a great torch

505
00:33:40,475 --> 00:33:44,435
Speaker 1: set alight by the sun. It was really a beautiful sight,

506
00:33:44,755 --> 00:33:48,795
Speaker 1: as if the whole building were blaze. And then from

507
00:33:48,875 --> 00:33:54,555
Speaker 1: way up under Big Ben, something seemed to fall, as

508
00:33:54,555 --> 00:33:57,235
Speaker 1: if a moth had flown into the heart of an

509
00:33:57,235 --> 00:34:02,755
Speaker 1: immense candle, and its blackened and charred body was falling

510
00:34:03,075 --> 00:34:07,315
Speaker 1: all the way to the ground. Owned it's difficult to

511
00:34:07,355 --> 00:34:12,035
Speaker 1: believe it was a man, one of your politicians. What

512
00:34:12,195 --> 00:34:19,675
Speaker 1: did you say his name was? So the original end

513
00:34:19,715 --> 00:34:22,435
Speaker 1: of House of Cards, Prime Minister Urkett confesses to his

514
00:34:22,515 --> 00:34:25,635
Speaker 1: crimes while being secretly recorded, and instead of killing the reporter,

515
00:34:26,075 --> 00:34:30,355
Speaker 1: he throws himself off the roof. And I say that

516
00:34:30,475 --> 00:34:34,675
Speaker 1: because it might have been difficult to tell that that's

517
00:34:34,715 --> 00:34:39,435
Speaker 1: what's happening from my otherwise brilliant and compelling reading of

518
00:34:39,475 --> 00:34:42,875
Speaker 1: the original Michael Hobbs' novel. Because and you will reach

519
00:34:42,955 --> 00:34:46,155
Speaker 1: this conclusion quickly. The job that Hobbs and the other

520
00:34:46,195 --> 00:34:50,595
Speaker 1: producers and especially the actors like the late Ian Richardson

521
00:34:50,995 --> 00:34:55,035
Speaker 1: did in creating the BBC version of House of Cards

522
00:34:55,115 --> 00:35:02,835
Speaker 1: is spectacular. And the novel House of Cards, anyway, that's

523
00:35:02,955 --> 00:35:07,075
Speaker 1: how all this would end, were at a novel. Also

524
00:35:07,115 --> 00:35:09,435
Speaker 1: of interest here in novel is fiction, and so apparently

525
00:35:09,515 --> 00:35:12,515
Speaker 1: is the President's Council on Physical Fitness. Here's a shock.

526
00:35:12,795 --> 00:35:15,915
Speaker 1: Trump named a member of the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia

527
00:35:15,955 --> 00:35:21,595
Speaker 1: Iggles to it after said member had declined announced he

528
00:35:21,715 --> 00:35:24,235
Speaker 1: was on it, and then the guy says no, not,

529
00:35:24,435 --> 00:35:27,075
Speaker 1: I never agreed to it, adding to the fact that

530
00:35:27,235 --> 00:35:32,315
Speaker 1: everybody else, including two star TV sportscasters and two sports

531
00:35:32,475 --> 00:35:36,075
Speaker 1: league commissioners, did not decline the appointment. So they are

532
00:35:36,115 --> 00:35:40,635
Speaker 1: now members of a commission featuring a registered sex offender

533
00:35:40,875 --> 00:35:45,475
Speaker 1: who was arrested for statutory rape the President's Council on

534
00:35:45,515 --> 00:35:50,635
Speaker 1: total lack of fitness. What do Tony Romo, Wayne Gretzky,

535
00:35:50,995 --> 00:35:56,595
Speaker 1: Gary Bettman, and Roger Goodell do? Now that's next. This

536
00:35:56,715 --> 00:36:24,395
Speaker 1: is Countdown. This is Countdown with Keith Oberman still ahead

537
00:36:24,435 --> 00:36:28,035
Speaker 1: on this edition of Countdown almost Friday. Haven't done a

538
00:36:28,035 --> 00:36:32,835
Speaker 1: lot of Thurber lately. Let's go Thursdays with Thurber. A

539
00:36:32,875 --> 00:36:36,915
Speaker 1: box to hide in is great, Walter Middie. They have

540
00:36:37,035 --> 00:36:44,595
Speaker 1: made many movies about, even the catbird seat movies, but

541
00:36:44,795 --> 00:36:49,435
Speaker 1: for my money, his best, most action filled, most easily

542
00:36:49,715 --> 00:36:54,595
Speaker 1: visualized in your head story. The best story to read

543
00:36:54,675 --> 00:37:00,195
Speaker 1: aloud is The Night the Bed Fell. Next in Thursdays

544
00:37:00,595 --> 00:37:03,595
Speaker 1: with Thurber first, Believe it or not, There's still more

545
00:37:03,595 --> 00:37:05,555
Speaker 1: new idiots to talk about out the roundup of the

546
00:37:05,595 --> 00:37:08,515
Speaker 1: mis grants, morons and done in Kruger effects specimens who

547
00:37:08,555 --> 00:37:15,395
Speaker 1: constitute two days. Other horse persons in the world, the

548
00:37:15,515 --> 00:37:25,835
Speaker 1: brons worst Sean has this pronounced Doofy, Duffy duffy. Anyway,

549
00:37:25,875 --> 00:37:32,355
Speaker 1: he's the Secretary of Transportation and NASA because everybody has

550
00:37:32,395 --> 00:37:34,675
Speaker 1: to do two jobs now, because Trump's keeping all the

551
00:37:34,715 --> 00:37:38,395
Speaker 1: money for himself. This is also what happens when you

552
00:37:38,435 --> 00:37:41,235
Speaker 1: do not hire qualified people to run a government. You

553
00:37:41,435 --> 00:37:45,515
Speaker 1: cast them because in your sinility and dotage and madness,

554
00:37:45,555 --> 00:37:48,955
Speaker 1: you think they look good on TV and that all

555
00:37:49,035 --> 00:37:51,555
Speaker 1: the shit they're supposed to do takes care of itself.

556
00:37:54,155 --> 00:37:57,395
Speaker 1: This is Duffy who can't get the air traffic control

557
00:37:57,475 --> 00:38:01,875
Speaker 1: centers fully staffed, and we put him in charge of

558
00:38:01,915 --> 00:38:10,995
Speaker 1: a new project building nuclear reactors on the Moon. I'm

559
00:38:10,995 --> 00:38:15,235
Speaker 1: going to point out that to get nuclear material with

560
00:38:15,395 --> 00:38:21,715
Speaker 1: which to operate nuclear reactors to the Moon, you're going

561
00:38:21,795 --> 00:38:24,915
Speaker 1: to have to send nuclear material up in a rocket,

562
00:38:25,795 --> 00:38:30,755
Speaker 1: presumably an Elon Musk rocket, maybe a Jeff Bezos rocket

563
00:38:31,555 --> 00:38:35,275
Speaker 1: made out of cardboard. So the odds are high that

564
00:38:35,395 --> 00:38:38,195
Speaker 1: the rocket is going to blow up on or near

565
00:38:38,275 --> 00:38:41,275
Speaker 1: the launch pad. So you have now spread all the

566
00:38:41,355 --> 00:38:48,875
Speaker 1: nuclear material all over, say Texas or the whole hemisphere.

567
00:38:49,675 --> 00:38:55,355
Speaker 1: But first you've flown the nuclear material up. Great plan,

568
00:38:56,315 --> 00:39:00,595
Speaker 1: duff Man. But let's just say you don't blow it

569
00:39:00,675 --> 00:39:03,995
Speaker 1: up somehow, and you actually build a nuclear reactor on

570
00:39:04,155 --> 00:39:08,275
Speaker 1: the moon, because that way you can build a house

571
00:39:09,115 --> 00:39:13,755
Speaker 1: in which Captain Scarlet and the Thunderbirds and the other

572
00:39:13,915 --> 00:39:18,115
Speaker 1: Jerry Anderson marionettes can live in while they run you know,

573
00:39:19,035 --> 00:39:26,515
Speaker 1: space pew pew pew pew. Nuclear reactions to help fuel

574
00:39:26,795 --> 00:39:33,835
Speaker 1: homes on the moon. Why does this sound so familiar?

575
00:39:34,355 --> 00:39:39,355
Speaker 1: Oh right, this was the plot ad in the two

576
00:39:39,395 --> 00:39:42,635
Speaker 1: thousand and two remake of the movie The Time Machine.

577
00:39:43,315 --> 00:39:48,235
Speaker 1: We're in the year two thirty seven, just eleven twelve

578
00:39:48,355 --> 00:39:52,795
Speaker 1: years from now. They try nuclear reactions on the Moon

579
00:39:53,115 --> 00:39:56,755
Speaker 1: and destroy the Moon. They literally break it into little pieces,

580
00:39:57,035 --> 00:39:59,595
Speaker 1: and the debris comes out of the sky and hits

581
00:39:59,675 --> 00:40:04,395
Speaker 1: us and makes Earth uninhabitable for like seven hundred thousand years.

582
00:40:04,835 --> 00:40:09,195
Speaker 1: And worst of all, the only human left is the

583
00:40:09,235 --> 00:40:17,675
Speaker 1: actor Guy Pierce. Was this the plan? Great job? Secretary

584
00:40:17,675 --> 00:40:21,435
Speaker 1: of Reality TV, Sean Doofey, the runner up worser The

585
00:40:21,475 --> 00:40:25,275
Speaker 1: New York Times, the great journalist James Fallows keeps pointing

586
00:40:25,355 --> 00:40:28,355
Speaker 1: this out, and the Times keeps doubling down. Anyway, The

587
00:40:28,395 --> 00:40:33,675
Speaker 1: Harvard Crimson Campus newspaper, a real news organization still operating

588
00:40:33,715 --> 00:40:38,675
Speaker 1: in Boston, keeps reporting that the reports that the school

589
00:40:38,715 --> 00:40:41,835
Speaker 1: is negotiating a five hundred million dollar bribe of Trump,

590
00:40:42,035 --> 00:40:45,035
Speaker 1: like the one Columbia is doing, like the one Brown

591
00:40:45,195 --> 00:40:49,635
Speaker 1: is doing, that these reports are false. The Crimson quotes

592
00:40:49,835 --> 00:40:53,355
Speaker 1: Harvard President Alan Garber as insisting he is doing no

593
00:40:53,435 --> 00:40:56,275
Speaker 1: such thing and would do no such thing. Yet the

594
00:40:56,355 --> 00:41:00,515
Speaker 1: reports continue in The New York Times because somebody in

595
00:41:00,555 --> 00:41:07,355
Speaker 1: the Trump administration is using Times reporters as stenographers day

596
00:41:07,915 --> 00:41:12,835
Speaker 1: after bloody day. Are they negotiating? What is the right

597
00:41:12,875 --> 00:41:16,235
Speaker 1: way to negotiate? Why would Harvard pay five hundred million

598
00:41:16,395 --> 00:41:19,875
Speaker 1: when Brown is only paying fifty million? The Times, as

599
00:41:19,955 --> 00:41:25,075
Speaker 1: James Follows, notes, keeps doubling down without even noting the

600
00:41:25,155 --> 00:41:29,155
Speaker 1: denials from the president of Harvard, or the story in

601
00:41:29,195 --> 00:41:33,075
Speaker 1: the Harvard Crimson, or the next story in the Harvard Crimson.

602
00:41:33,155 --> 00:41:36,195
Speaker 1: We're the one after that, quoting The Times. By the

603
00:41:36,195 --> 00:41:39,915
Speaker 1: start of last week, Harbard University had signaled its readiness.

604
00:41:40,355 --> 00:41:43,835
Speaker 1: And that's got an underscore on it indicating it's a

605
00:41:43,875 --> 00:41:45,795
Speaker 1: link to something, and I'll explain that in a moment.

606
00:41:45,955 --> 00:41:48,435
Speaker 1: By the start of last week, Carbard University had signaled

607
00:41:48,555 --> 00:41:51,235
Speaker 1: its readiness to meet President Trump's demand that it's been

608
00:41:51,315 --> 00:41:54,155
Speaker 1: five hundred million dollars to settle its damaging months long

609
00:41:54,235 --> 00:41:57,995
Speaker 1: battle with the administration, restore its critically bribe Trump. That's

610
00:41:58,035 --> 00:42:00,755
Speaker 1: the translation. The Times is looking for a way to

611
00:42:00,755 --> 00:42:03,715
Speaker 1: say bribe Trump, but it's afraid to because The New

612
00:42:03,795 --> 00:42:07,355
Speaker 1: York Times has now made of cowards. Also, the link

613
00:42:07,595 --> 00:42:10,955
Speaker 1: had signaled its readiness. The New York Times link is

614
00:42:10,995 --> 00:42:14,915
Speaker 1: to another New York Times story. So in this New

615
00:42:14,955 --> 00:42:18,675
Speaker 1: York Times story, which is clearly wrong, they use as

616
00:42:18,715 --> 00:42:21,995
Speaker 1: supporting evidence another New York Times story that is also

617
00:42:22,115 --> 00:42:24,955
Speaker 1: clearly wrong. You know what this is called. This is

618
00:42:25,035 --> 00:42:30,035
Speaker 1: called not being a good newspaper anymore. The Times also

619
00:42:30,115 --> 00:42:32,755
Speaker 1: is not noting what Brian Boitler wrote about last week.

620
00:42:33,075 --> 00:42:36,115
Speaker 1: If you are a Columbia student or a Brown student,

621
00:42:36,475 --> 00:42:39,395
Speaker 1: or if they are right somehow, a Harvard student, and

622
00:42:39,475 --> 00:42:43,675
Speaker 1: it is your racial data and your admissions details that

623
00:42:43,715 --> 00:42:46,755
Speaker 1: would be turned over to Trump, you have a lawsuit

624
00:42:47,075 --> 00:42:53,195
Speaker 1: against your school. You might have a class action lawsuit. Hell,

625
00:42:53,275 --> 00:42:55,675
Speaker 1: if you're an alum who just saw the value of

626
00:42:55,715 --> 00:43:00,635
Speaker 1: his degree or herd degree plummet in your workplace because

627
00:43:00,755 --> 00:43:04,875
Speaker 1: your alma mater is collaborating with Nazis you I might

628
00:43:04,995 --> 00:43:09,955
Speaker 1: have a lawsuit. What if you're a donor, Hi Columbia,

629
00:43:10,395 --> 00:43:12,915
Speaker 1: I'd like my twelve million dollars back. Oh you put

630
00:43:12,915 --> 00:43:15,755
Speaker 1: it in a building. Tough shit, I want it back.

631
00:43:17,395 --> 00:43:20,115
Speaker 1: But the Times just keeps throwing this crap against the wall.

632
00:43:20,195 --> 00:43:25,075
Speaker 1: And sadly, with all of this repeated instances of throwing

633
00:43:25,155 --> 00:43:28,595
Speaker 1: crap against the wall that benefits Trump, and all of

634
00:43:28,635 --> 00:43:33,115
Speaker 1: the both scientist stories and all of the headlines that

635
00:43:33,155 --> 00:43:37,835
Speaker 1: have been put through the defactualization machine, and all of

636
00:43:37,875 --> 00:43:40,875
Speaker 1: the refusals to call Trump crazy, and all the refusals

637
00:43:40,875 --> 00:43:43,355
Speaker 1: to say he's lying when he's lying, we now have

638
00:43:43,435 --> 00:43:47,755
Speaker 1: to ask, is the Times actively positioning itself to be

639
00:43:48,275 --> 00:43:53,155
Speaker 1: a tool of the fascists? Is the Times officially now

640
00:43:53,515 --> 00:43:57,755
Speaker 1: collaborating with Trump? And if so, why are any of

641
00:43:57,835 --> 00:44:05,155
Speaker 1: us patronizing it or believing it? But the winners the worst?

642
00:44:05,475 --> 00:44:09,315
Speaker 1: Worse than that, everybody who is on and whoever is

643
00:44:09,395 --> 00:44:13,835
Speaker 1: running the new President's Council on Physical fitness. Note that's

644
00:44:13,875 --> 00:44:17,355
Speaker 1: physical fitness, not mental fitness, since we have a president

645
00:44:17,355 --> 00:44:20,955
Speaker 1: who is opposed to mental fitness. Also, it doesn't say

646
00:44:20,955 --> 00:44:24,475
Speaker 1: anything about ethical fitness. Because it's pretty clear whoever announced

647
00:44:24,475 --> 00:44:30,475
Speaker 1: this lies a lot and without skill. Who in the

648
00:44:30,515 --> 00:44:34,795
Speaker 1: Trump administration does that description fit. The council will include

649
00:44:34,835 --> 00:44:41,315
Speaker 1: Executive Director Catherine Grenido, Chair Bryson Deschambeau, Saquon Barkley, Gary Bettman,

650
00:44:41,435 --> 00:44:45,635
Speaker 1: Nick Bosa, Harrison Butker, also known in the NFL as

651
00:44:45,635 --> 00:44:50,555
Speaker 1: Harrison butt Kiss, Cody Campbell, Roger Goodell, Wayne Gretzky, Nelly Corda,

652
00:44:50,635 --> 00:44:56,395
Speaker 1: Paul Triple h Levesque, Jack Nicholas, Gary Player, Marianna Rivera,

653
00:44:56,435 --> 00:45:04,315
Speaker 1: Tony Romo, Annika Sorenstam, Toua, Taggia Valoyo, Lawrence Taylor, Matthew

654
00:45:04,395 --> 00:45:09,675
Speaker 1: Kati Chuck, and Marianna Rivera and Marianna Rivera. That's not me.

655
00:45:09,995 --> 00:45:15,075
Speaker 1: They listed him twice, and I know it's Tagoviloa. I

656
00:45:15,115 --> 00:45:19,235
Speaker 1: was just doing a Trump pronunciation of Tago Viloa. He

657
00:45:19,275 --> 00:45:23,595
Speaker 1: listed Marianna Rivera twice. There's Gary Player, Marianna Rivera, Tony Romo,

658
00:45:23,995 --> 00:45:29,315
Speaker 1: instance and Marianna Rivera. He's on it twice. Well, Marianna

659
00:45:29,395 --> 00:45:33,195
Speaker 1: Rivera has two faces, so maybe he should be listed twice.

660
00:45:33,315 --> 00:45:38,355
Speaker 1: Problem number one This was announced during a Philadelphia Eagles practice,

661
00:45:38,635 --> 00:45:42,955
Speaker 1: so afterwards the reporters asked Philadelphia Eagles running back Saquon

662
00:45:42,995 --> 00:45:45,475
Speaker 1: Barkley about it, and he said it was news to him.

663
00:45:45,755 --> 00:45:48,795
Speaker 1: He never accepted a position on this council quote. A

664
00:45:48,835 --> 00:45:50,995
Speaker 1: couple months ago. It was brought to my team about

665
00:45:50,995 --> 00:45:53,075
Speaker 1: the council, so I'm not really too familiar with it.

666
00:45:53,555 --> 00:45:55,875
Speaker 1: I felt like I'm going to be super busy, so

667
00:45:55,995 --> 00:45:58,555
Speaker 1: me and my family thought it would probably be a

668
00:45:58,635 --> 00:46:02,355
Speaker 1: best interest to not accept that. I was definitely a

669
00:46:02,395 --> 00:46:05,395
Speaker 1: little shocked when my name was mentioned. I'm assuming it's

670
00:46:05,435 --> 00:46:07,795
Speaker 1: something great, so I appreciate it, but I was a

671
00:46:07,835 --> 00:46:11,795
Speaker 1: little shocked when my name was mentioned and this guy

672
00:46:11,835 --> 00:46:14,995
Speaker 1: had gone to the White House to meet Trump and

673
00:46:15,075 --> 00:46:17,995
Speaker 1: said he respected the office at least, and Trump still

674
00:46:18,035 --> 00:46:22,435
Speaker 1: lied about him. Of course, the real problem with this

675
00:46:22,555 --> 00:46:25,715
Speaker 1: President's counsel is that the reputations of everybody else but

676
00:46:25,995 --> 00:46:30,475
Speaker 1: Saquon Barkley are now damaged, if not ruined. They are

677
00:46:30,515 --> 00:46:33,995
Speaker 1: now all sharing an official government commission position with a

678
00:46:34,115 --> 00:46:40,115
Speaker 1: registered sex offender, a man arrested for statutory rape, the

679
00:46:40,275 --> 00:46:43,795
Speaker 1: former New York Giant Lawrence Taylor, who's listed there between

680
00:46:43,795 --> 00:46:50,075
Speaker 1: the two. Marianna rivers what he's guilty of, what he

681
00:46:50,115 --> 00:46:55,555
Speaker 1: was arrested for this is by definition pedophilia, so ruined

682
00:46:56,235 --> 00:46:59,475
Speaker 1: the reputations, well, Bryson Deshambo doesn't have any reputation. He's

683
00:46:59,475 --> 00:47:02,995
Speaker 1: a piece of shit, but anakasaurns them. On a panel

684
00:47:03,035 --> 00:47:06,915
Speaker 1: with a registered sex offender. Mariano Rivera on a panel

685
00:47:06,955 --> 00:47:09,475
Speaker 1: with a registered sex twice on a panel with a

686
00:47:09,475 --> 00:47:12,955
Speaker 1: registered sex offender. Jack Nicklaus on a panel with a

687
00:47:12,995 --> 00:47:16,515
Speaker 1: registered sex offender, He's also a piece of shit. Matthew

688
00:47:16,555 --> 00:47:20,675
Speaker 1: Kachuk just this week named the cover player on EA

689
00:47:20,795 --> 00:47:24,515
Speaker 1: Sports video game EA Hockey the new face of Hockey

690
00:47:25,355 --> 00:47:28,635
Speaker 1: on a panel with a registered sex offender, and think

691
00:47:28,675 --> 00:47:32,235
Speaker 1: of the front facing people. Can CBS still put Tony

692
00:47:32,355 --> 00:47:35,075
Speaker 1: Romo on its football broadcast now that he's on a

693
00:47:35,115 --> 00:47:38,315
Speaker 1: panel with a registered sex offender? Can TNT put Wayne

694
00:47:38,435 --> 00:47:42,115
Speaker 1: Gretzky on TV now that he's on a panel with

695
00:47:42,195 --> 00:47:44,915
Speaker 1: a registered sex offender? And wait? The commissioner of the

696
00:47:44,995 --> 00:47:49,115
Speaker 1: National Football League, Roger Goodell, can he remain commissioner if

697
00:47:49,115 --> 00:47:51,675
Speaker 1: he's on a panel with a registered sex offender? Is

698
00:47:51,675 --> 00:47:56,435
Speaker 1: the league not through Goodell normalizing what Lawrence Taylor did?

699
00:47:57,835 --> 00:48:01,875
Speaker 1: And wait? The commissioner of the National Hockey League, Gary

700
00:48:01,995 --> 00:48:05,235
Speaker 1: Bettman can he remain commissioner of the National Hockey He's

701
00:48:05,235 --> 00:48:07,755
Speaker 1: on a panel where the registered sex offender. I mean,

702
00:48:07,835 --> 00:48:11,835
Speaker 1: Lawrence Taylor was already Roger Goodell's problem, and Roger Goodell

703
00:48:11,915 --> 00:48:16,195
Speaker 1: clearly doesn't care about anything. He's Roger Goodell. If I

704
00:48:16,195 --> 00:48:18,435
Speaker 1: were Roger Goodell, I would get a I don't know

705
00:48:18,475 --> 00:48:22,875
Speaker 1: a facelift, and I'd changed my name. Lawrence Taylor was

706
00:48:22,915 --> 00:48:26,955
Speaker 1: already the NFL's problem. Now he's Hockey's problem. Too. Nice work,

707
00:48:26,955 --> 00:48:29,675
Speaker 1: Gary Betman. You just destroyed hockey for the sake of

708
00:48:29,755 --> 00:48:34,795
Speaker 1: Lawrence Taylor and Donald Trump, the President's new Council on

709
00:48:34,875 --> 00:48:41,155
Speaker 1: Fitness and stuff. Remember ettd Everything Trump touches dies, and

710
00:48:41,195 --> 00:48:44,995
Speaker 1: the old Groucho Marx jokes certainly applies here to Gretzky

711
00:48:45,035 --> 00:48:47,555
Speaker 1: and Ribera and Betman and Goodell and the others. You

712
00:48:47,675 --> 00:48:51,955
Speaker 1: should never want to belong to any Trump club that

713
00:48:52,035 --> 00:48:57,315
Speaker 1: would have you as a member. Two days worst persons

714
00:48:58,755 --> 00:49:43,155
Speaker 1: in the world. As we said Thursdays with Thurber. Now,

715
00:49:43,235 --> 00:49:45,875
Speaker 1: since there's no Friday podcast and we have not done

716
00:49:45,915 --> 00:49:48,075
Speaker 1: any Thurber in a long time, and as I said

717
00:49:48,115 --> 00:49:51,035
Speaker 1: before the break, I think this is the best story

718
00:49:51,075 --> 00:49:53,595
Speaker 1: to read aloud that he ever wrote, and I will

719
00:49:53,595 --> 00:49:56,595
Speaker 1: point out, as I have made many times this analogy

720
00:49:57,075 --> 00:50:01,875
Speaker 1: in terms of humor. James Thurber was the twentieth centuries

721
00:50:02,115 --> 00:50:05,835
Speaker 1: show Hey Otani, Show Hey Otani from Baseball, who at

722
00:50:05,875 --> 00:50:09,515
Speaker 1: times has been Baseball's best pitcher and at times has

723
00:50:09,555 --> 00:50:13,515
Speaker 1: been Baseball's best hitter. Show Heyotani of the Los Angeles

724
00:50:13,515 --> 00:50:18,595
Speaker 1: Dodgers is almost necessarily the most valuable player every year

725
00:50:18,675 --> 00:50:22,075
Speaker 1: because he can do as well as anybody else, or

726
00:50:22,155 --> 00:50:28,075
Speaker 1: nearly two things, when most other players can only excel

727
00:50:28,475 --> 00:50:32,555
Speaker 1: at one thing. Such is the story of James Thurber.

728
00:50:33,355 --> 00:50:36,515
Speaker 1: James Thurber was a brilliant writer, and in his spare time,

729
00:50:36,555 --> 00:50:40,155
Speaker 1: he was an equally brilliant, almost avant garde artist in

730
00:50:40,195 --> 00:50:43,675
Speaker 1: the same body. His simple drawings to pick the most

731
00:50:43,755 --> 00:50:48,115
Speaker 1: complex of emotions and comedic situations. His dogs are immortal,

732
00:50:48,475 --> 00:50:51,035
Speaker 1: and then there were his captions. Well, I can't do

733
00:50:51,075 --> 00:50:53,475
Speaker 1: anything with his drawings in a podcast, so I'll just

734
00:50:53,595 --> 00:50:56,635
Speaker 1: read and I will read you now in this episode

735
00:50:56,675 --> 00:51:01,275
Speaker 1: what is probably his most famous story from my life

736
00:51:01,275 --> 00:51:06,155
Speaker 1: in hard times, the night the bed fell James Thurber.

737
00:51:07,835 --> 00:51:12,155
Speaker 1: I suppose that the high water mark of my youth

738
00:51:12,195 --> 00:51:15,875
Speaker 1: in Columbus, Ohio was the night the bed fell on

739
00:51:15,995 --> 00:51:20,115
Speaker 1: my father. It makes a better recitation unless, as some

740
00:51:20,195 --> 00:51:21,995
Speaker 1: friends of mine have said, one has heard it five

741
00:51:22,075 --> 00:51:24,395
Speaker 1: or six times, than it does a piece of writing,

742
00:51:24,875 --> 00:51:29,035
Speaker 1: For it is almost necessary to throw furniture around, shake doors,

743
00:51:29,075 --> 00:51:32,755
Speaker 1: and bark like a dog to lend the proper atmosphere

744
00:51:32,795 --> 00:51:38,635
Speaker 1: and verisimilitude to what is admittedly a somewhat incredible tale. Still,

745
00:51:39,355 --> 00:51:43,315
Speaker 1: it did take place. It happened then that my father

746
00:51:43,395 --> 00:51:45,795
Speaker 1: had decided to sleep in the attic one night, to

747
00:51:45,835 --> 00:51:49,715
Speaker 1: be away where he could think. My mother opposed the

748
00:51:49,755 --> 00:51:52,955
Speaker 1: notion strongly, because she said the old wooden bed up

749
00:51:52,995 --> 00:51:56,235
Speaker 1: there was unsafe. It was wobbly, and the heavy headboard

750
00:51:56,275 --> 00:51:58,635
Speaker 1: would crash down on father's head in case the bed

751
00:51:58,715 --> 00:52:03,755
Speaker 1: fell and kill him. There was no dissuading him, however,

752
00:52:04,035 --> 00:52:06,355
Speaker 1: and at a past ten he closed the attic door

753
00:52:06,395 --> 00:52:09,435
Speaker 1: behind him and went up the narrow, twisting stairs. We

754
00:52:09,515 --> 00:52:14,235
Speaker 1: later heard I'm in his creakings as he crawled into bed. Grandfather,

755
00:52:14,275 --> 00:52:16,115
Speaker 1: who usually slept in the attic bed when he was

756
00:52:16,115 --> 00:52:20,275
Speaker 1: with us, had disappeared some days before. On those occasions,

757
00:52:20,275 --> 00:52:22,595
Speaker 1: he was usually gone six or eight days and returned

758
00:52:22,635 --> 00:52:26,315
Speaker 1: growling and out of temper with the news that the

759
00:52:26,315 --> 00:52:29,675
Speaker 1: Federal Union was run by a passel of blockheads, and

760
00:52:29,715 --> 00:52:31,755
Speaker 1: that the Army of the Potomac didn't have any more

761
00:52:31,875 --> 00:52:36,755
Speaker 1: chance than a fiddler's bitch. We had visiting us at

762
00:52:36,755 --> 00:52:40,115
Speaker 1: the time, a nervous first cousin of mine named Briggs Beale,

763
00:52:40,475 --> 00:52:43,315
Speaker 1: who believed that he was likely to cease breathing when

764
00:52:43,315 --> 00:52:46,115
Speaker 1: he was asleep. It was his feeling that if he

765
00:52:46,155 --> 00:52:49,115
Speaker 1: were not awakened every hour during the night, he might

766
00:52:49,195 --> 00:52:52,875
Speaker 1: die of suffocation. He had been accustomed to setting an

767
00:52:52,915 --> 00:52:56,195
Speaker 1: alarm clock to ring at intervals until morning, but I

768
00:52:56,435 --> 00:53:00,435
Speaker 1: persuaded him to abandon this. He slept in my room,

769
00:53:00,435 --> 00:53:02,035
Speaker 1: and I told him that I was such a light

770
00:53:02,115 --> 00:53:05,435
Speaker 1: sleeper that if anybody quit breathing in this room with me,

771
00:53:05,515 --> 00:53:08,875
Speaker 1: I would wake instantly. He tested me the first night,

772
00:53:09,155 --> 00:53:12,795
Speaker 1: which I had suspected he would, by holding his breath

773
00:53:13,235 --> 00:53:16,635
Speaker 1: after my regular breathing, had convinced him I was asleep.

774
00:53:16,795 --> 00:53:20,835
Speaker 1: I was not asleep, however, and called to him. This

775
00:53:20,915 --> 00:53:24,875
Speaker 1: seemed to allay his fears a little, but he took

776
00:53:24,915 --> 00:53:28,115
Speaker 1: the precaution of putting a glass of spirits of camphor

777
00:53:28,755 --> 00:53:31,075
Speaker 1: on a little table at the head of his bed

778
00:53:31,835 --> 00:53:34,435
Speaker 1: in case I didn't arouse him until he was almost gone.

779
00:53:34,555 --> 00:53:37,955
Speaker 1: He said he would sniff the camphor. A powerful reviver,

780
00:53:39,235 --> 00:53:41,515
Speaker 1: Briggs was not the only member of his family who

781
00:53:41,715 --> 00:53:46,195
Speaker 1: had his crotchets. Old Aunt Melissa Belle, who could whistle

782
00:53:46,315 --> 00:53:48,875
Speaker 1: like a man with two fingers in her mouth, suffered

783
00:53:48,955 --> 00:53:51,715
Speaker 1: under the premonition that she was destined to die on

784
00:53:51,755 --> 00:53:54,755
Speaker 1: South High Street because she had been born on South

785
00:53:54,795 --> 00:53:58,435
Speaker 1: High Street and married on South High Street. Then there

786
00:53:58,475 --> 00:54:01,595
Speaker 1: was Aunt Sarah Schauf, who never went to bed at

787
00:54:01,675 --> 00:54:04,475
Speaker 1: night without the fear that a burglar was going to

788
00:54:04,475 --> 00:54:09,435
Speaker 1: get in and blow chloroform under her door through a tube.

789
00:54:09,475 --> 00:54:12,115
Speaker 1: To avert this calamity, for she was in greater dread

790
00:54:12,115 --> 00:54:15,075
Speaker 1: of anesthetics than of losing her household goods, she always

791
00:54:15,155 --> 00:54:19,035
Speaker 1: piled her money, silverware, and other valuables in a neat

792
00:54:19,115 --> 00:54:22,395
Speaker 1: stack just outside her bedroom, with a note reading, this

793
00:54:22,475 --> 00:54:24,635
Speaker 1: is all I have. Please take it and do not

794
00:54:24,795 --> 00:54:28,955
Speaker 1: use your chloroform, as this is all I have. Aunt

795
00:54:28,995 --> 00:54:32,275
Speaker 1: Gracie's Chauf also had a burglar phobia, but she met

796
00:54:32,315 --> 00:54:35,795
Speaker 1: it with more fortitude. She was confident that burglars had

797
00:54:35,795 --> 00:54:38,755
Speaker 1: been getting into her house every night for forty years.

798
00:54:39,435 --> 00:54:42,355
Speaker 1: The fact that she never missed anything was to her

799
00:54:42,635 --> 00:54:45,195
Speaker 1: no proof to the contrary. She always claimed that she

800
00:54:45,355 --> 00:54:48,315
Speaker 1: scared them off before they could take anything by throwing

801
00:54:48,595 --> 00:54:52,435
Speaker 1: shoes down the hallway. When she went to bed, she

802
00:54:52,635 --> 00:54:55,675
Speaker 1: piled where she could get at them handily, all the

803
00:54:55,715 --> 00:54:59,275
Speaker 1: shoes there were about her house. Five minutes after she

804
00:54:59,315 --> 00:55:01,035
Speaker 1: had turned off the light, she would sit up in

805
00:55:01,075 --> 00:55:06,395
Speaker 1: bed and say hark. Her husband, who had learned to

806
00:55:06,435 --> 00:55:09,595
Speaker 1: ignore the whole situation as long ago as nineteen o three,

807
00:55:10,315 --> 00:55:14,155
Speaker 1: would either be sound asleep or pretend to be sound asleep.

808
00:55:14,875 --> 00:55:17,435
Speaker 1: In either case, he would not respond to her tugging

809
00:55:17,515 --> 00:55:21,315
Speaker 1: and pulling, so that presently she would arise, tiptoe to

810
00:55:21,355 --> 00:55:24,315
Speaker 1: the door, open it slightly, and heave a shoe down

811
00:55:24,315 --> 00:55:27,235
Speaker 1: the hall in one direction, and its mate down the

812
00:55:27,275 --> 00:55:30,875
Speaker 1: hall in the other direction. Some nights she threw them all,

813
00:55:31,355 --> 00:55:36,075
Speaker 1: some nights only a couple of pear. But I am

814
00:55:36,195 --> 00:55:39,395
Speaker 1: straying from the remarkable incidents that took place during the

815
00:55:39,475 --> 00:55:42,875
Speaker 1: night that the bed fell on father. By midnight we

816
00:55:42,875 --> 00:55:45,995
Speaker 1: were all in bed. The layout of the rooms and

817
00:55:46,035 --> 00:55:49,035
Speaker 1: the disposition of their occupants is important to an understanding

818
00:55:49,075 --> 00:55:53,235
Speaker 1: of what later occurred In the front room. Upstairs, just

819
00:55:53,355 --> 00:55:57,915
Speaker 1: under father's attic bedroom, where my mother and my brother Hermann,

820
00:55:57,915 --> 00:56:01,395
Speaker 1: who sometimes sang in his sleep, usually marching through Georgia

821
00:56:01,595 --> 00:56:05,755
Speaker 1: or onward Christian soldiers. Beale and myself were in a

822
00:56:05,835 --> 00:56:08,635
Speaker 1: room adjoining this one. My brother Roy was in a

823
00:56:08,715 --> 00:56:11,955
Speaker 1: room across the hall from ours, and our bull terrier

824
00:56:11,995 --> 00:56:16,275
Speaker 1: Wrecks slept in the hall. My bed was an army cot,

825
00:56:16,315 --> 00:56:18,795
Speaker 1: one of those affairs which were made wide enough to

826
00:56:18,835 --> 00:56:21,515
Speaker 1: sleep on comfortably only by putting up flat with the

827
00:56:21,555 --> 00:56:25,115
Speaker 1: middle section the two sides, which ordinarily hang down like

828
00:56:25,155 --> 00:56:28,355
Speaker 1: the sideboards of a drop leaf table. When these sides

829
00:56:28,355 --> 00:56:32,755
Speaker 1: are up, it is perilous to roll too far toward

830
00:56:32,795 --> 00:56:35,635
Speaker 1: the edge, for then the cot is likely to tip

831
00:56:35,675 --> 00:56:38,875
Speaker 1: completely over, bringing the whole bed down on top of

832
00:56:38,915 --> 00:56:43,995
Speaker 1: one with a tremendous banging crash. This, in fact, is

833
00:56:44,035 --> 00:56:47,675
Speaker 1: precisely what happened about two o'clock in the morning. It

834
00:56:47,795 --> 00:56:50,355
Speaker 1: was my mother who, in recalling the scene later first

835
00:56:50,355 --> 00:56:52,315
Speaker 1: referred to it as the night the bed fell on

836
00:56:52,395 --> 00:56:57,315
Speaker 1: your father, always a deep sleeper and slow to arouse,

837
00:56:58,115 --> 00:57:02,035
Speaker 1: I had lied to Briggs. I was at first unconscious

838
00:57:02,075 --> 00:57:05,395
Speaker 1: of what had happened. When the ironcot rolled onto the

839
00:57:05,435 --> 00:57:09,115
Speaker 1: floor and toppled over on me. It left me still

840
00:57:09,155 --> 00:57:11,875
Speaker 1: warmly bundled up and unheard, for the bed rested above

841
00:57:11,915 --> 00:57:14,715
Speaker 1: me like a canopy. Hence, I did not wake up,

842
00:57:15,035 --> 00:57:19,355
Speaker 1: only reached the edge of consciousness and went back. The racket, however,

843
00:57:19,475 --> 00:57:21,915
Speaker 1: instantly awakened my mother in the next room, who came

844
00:57:21,955 --> 00:57:25,595
Speaker 1: to the immediate conclusion that her worst dread was realized.

845
00:57:25,635 --> 00:57:29,115
Speaker 1: The big wooden bed upstairs had fallen on father. She

846
00:57:29,275 --> 00:57:34,475
Speaker 1: therefore screamed, let's go to your poor father. It was

847
00:57:34,515 --> 00:57:37,835
Speaker 1: this shout, rather than the noise of my cot falling,

848
00:57:37,915 --> 00:57:40,435
Speaker 1: that awakened Herman in the same room with her, he

849
00:57:40,555 --> 00:57:43,755
Speaker 1: thought that mother had become, for no apparent reason, hysterical.

850
00:57:44,315 --> 00:57:46,955
Speaker 1: You're all right, mama, he shouted, trying to calm her.

851
00:57:47,555 --> 00:57:52,275
Speaker 1: They exchanged shout for shout for perhaps ten seconds. Let's

852
00:57:52,315 --> 00:57:56,835
Speaker 1: go to your poor father, and you're all right. That

853
00:57:57,155 --> 00:58:00,755
Speaker 1: woke up Briggs. By this time I was conscious of

854
00:58:00,835 --> 00:58:03,915
Speaker 1: what was going on in a vague way, but did

855
00:58:03,955 --> 00:58:07,315
Speaker 1: not yet realize that I was under my bed instead

856
00:58:07,315 --> 00:58:11,115
Speaker 1: of on it. Briggs, awakening in the midst of loud

857
00:58:11,155 --> 00:58:13,715
Speaker 1: shouts of fear and apprehension, came to the quick conclusion

858
00:58:13,875 --> 00:58:16,515
Speaker 1: that he was suffocating and that we were all trying

859
00:58:16,515 --> 00:58:21,635
Speaker 1: to bring him out. With a low moan, he grasped

860
00:58:21,675 --> 00:58:23,675
Speaker 1: the glass of camphor at the head of his bed,

861
00:58:23,795 --> 00:58:28,555
Speaker 1: and instead of sniffing it, he poured it over himself.

862
00:58:28,835 --> 00:58:33,475
Speaker 1: The room reeked of camphor. Uugh ah choked Briggs like

863
00:58:33,515 --> 00:58:36,475
Speaker 1: a drowning man, for he had almost succeeded in stopping

864
00:58:36,475 --> 00:58:41,275
Speaker 1: his breath under the deluge of pungent spirits. He leaped

865
00:58:41,275 --> 00:58:43,475
Speaker 1: out of bed and groped toward the open window, but

866
00:58:43,515 --> 00:58:46,635
Speaker 1: he came up against one that was closed. With his hand,

867
00:58:47,075 --> 00:58:49,755
Speaker 1: he beat out the glass, and I could hear it

868
00:58:49,835 --> 00:58:53,595
Speaker 1: crash and tinkle on the alleyway below. It was at

869
00:58:53,635 --> 00:58:55,795
Speaker 1: this juncture that I, in trying to get up, had

870
00:58:55,795 --> 00:59:01,035
Speaker 1: the uncanny sensation of feeling my bed above me foggy

871
00:59:01,115 --> 00:59:04,035
Speaker 1: with sleep. I now suspected, in my turn that the

872
00:59:04,075 --> 00:59:07,115
Speaker 1: whole up was being made in a frantic endeavor to

873
00:59:07,275 --> 00:59:09,715
Speaker 1: extricate me from what must be an unheard of and

874
00:59:09,795 --> 00:59:12,835
Speaker 1: perilous situation. Get me out of this, I bawled, Get

875
00:59:12,835 --> 00:59:15,475
Speaker 1: me out. I think I had the nightmarish belief that

876
00:59:15,515 --> 00:59:21,595
Speaker 1: I was entombed in a mine gas. Briggs floundering in

877
00:59:21,635 --> 00:59:26,275
Speaker 1: his camphor. By this time, my mother, still shouting, pursued

878
00:59:26,275 --> 00:59:29,115
Speaker 1: by Hermann, still shouting, was trying to open the door

879
00:59:29,155 --> 00:59:30,875
Speaker 1: to the attic in order to go up and get

880
00:59:30,875 --> 00:59:37,635
Speaker 1: my father's body out of the wreckage. The door was stuck, however,

881
00:59:38,115 --> 00:59:41,635
Speaker 1: and would not yield. Her frantic pulls on it only

882
00:59:41,675 --> 00:59:44,555
Speaker 1: added to the general banging and confusion. Roy and the

883
00:59:44,635 --> 00:59:48,995
Speaker 1: dog were now up, the one shouting questions, the other barking. Father,

884
00:59:49,715 --> 00:59:52,315
Speaker 1: farthest away and soundest sleeper of all, had by this

885
00:59:52,395 --> 00:59:54,795
Speaker 1: time been awakened by the battering on the attic door.

886
00:59:55,595 --> 01:00:01,915
Speaker 1: He decided that the house was on fire. Oh coming, okay,

887
01:00:02,555 --> 01:00:05,955
Speaker 1: he wailed, in a slow sleepy It took him many

888
01:00:05,955 --> 01:00:09,195
Speaker 1: minutes to regain full consciousness. My mother, still believing he

889
01:00:09,275 --> 01:00:12,675
Speaker 1: was caught under the bed, detected in his I'm coming,

890
01:00:13,035 --> 01:00:15,995
Speaker 1: the mournful resigned note of one who was preparing to

891
01:00:16,035 --> 01:00:20,675
Speaker 1: meet his maker. He's dying, she shouted, I'm all right.

892
01:00:21,275 --> 01:00:24,475
Speaker 1: Briggs yelled to reassure her. I'm all right. He still

893
01:00:24,515 --> 01:00:27,595
Speaker 1: believed that it was his own closeness to death that

894
01:00:27,795 --> 01:00:31,635
Speaker 1: was worrying mother. I found at last the light switch

895
01:00:31,675 --> 01:00:33,595
Speaker 1: in my room unlocked. The door, and Briggs and I

896
01:00:33,675 --> 01:00:36,675
Speaker 1: joined the others at the attic door. The dog, who

897
01:00:36,755 --> 01:00:40,355
Speaker 1: never did like Briggs, jumped for him, assuming that he

898
01:00:40,435 --> 01:00:43,195
Speaker 1: was the culprit in whatever was going on, and Roy

899
01:00:43,475 --> 01:00:46,875
Speaker 1: had to throw Rex and hold him. We could hear

900
01:00:46,915 --> 01:00:49,795
Speaker 1: Father crawling out of the bed upstairs. Roy pulled the

901
01:00:49,835 --> 01:00:52,235
Speaker 1: attic door open with a mighty jerk, and Father came

902
01:00:52,315 --> 01:00:55,715
Speaker 1: down the stairs, sleepy and irritable, but safe and sound.

903
01:00:56,595 --> 01:00:59,515
Speaker 1: My mother began to weep when she saw him. Rex

904
01:00:59,595 --> 01:01:05,315
Speaker 1: began to howl. What in the name of God is

905
01:01:05,355 --> 01:01:11,395
Speaker 1: going on here? Asked Father. The situation was finally put

906
01:01:11,435 --> 01:01:16,195
Speaker 1: together like a giant gigsaw puzzle. Father caught a cold

907
01:01:16,195 --> 01:01:18,395
Speaker 1: from prowling around in his bare feet, but there were

908
01:01:18,435 --> 01:01:23,395
Speaker 1: no other bad results. I'm glad, said mother, who always

909
01:01:23,395 --> 01:01:27,235
Speaker 1: looked on the bright side of things, that your grandfather

910
01:01:27,435 --> 01:01:43,275
Speaker 1: wasn't here. I've done all the damage I can do here.

911
01:01:43,275 --> 01:01:46,755
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening. Most of our Countdown music was arranged, produced,

912
01:01:46,755 --> 01:01:49,875
Speaker 1: and performed by Brian Ray and John Phillip Schanel, the

913
01:01:50,075 --> 01:01:54,355
Speaker 1: musical directors of Countdown. Produced by Tko Brothers. Mister Ray

914
01:01:54,395 --> 01:01:58,395
Speaker 1: on guitars, bass and drums. Mister Chanelle handled orchestration and keyboards.

915
01:01:58,955 --> 01:02:01,635
Speaker 1: Our satirical and fifty musical comments are by the best

916
01:02:01,675 --> 01:02:05,915
Speaker 1: baseball stadium organist ever, Nancy Faust. The Olderman theme from

917
01:02:06,155 --> 01:02:09,435
Speaker 1: ESPN two, written by Mitch Warren Davis, courtesy of ESPN, Inc.

918
01:02:09,915 --> 01:02:13,755
Speaker 1: Is our sports music. Other music arranged and performed by

919
01:02:13,755 --> 01:02:18,275
Speaker 1: the group No Horns Allowed. James Thurber's The Night the

920
01:02:18,275 --> 01:02:23,395
Speaker 1: Bed Fell was written by James Thurber. The copyright abides

921
01:02:23,715 --> 01:02:27,635
Speaker 1: and it is held by the Thurber Literary Trust. My

922
01:02:27,635 --> 01:02:30,275
Speaker 1: announcer today is my friend Tony Kornheiser, and everything else

923
01:02:30,435 --> 01:02:34,755
Speaker 1: was as always my fault. That's countdown for today, Day

924
01:02:34,795 --> 01:02:39,595
Speaker 1: two hundred of America held hostage again, just two hundred

925
01:02:39,635 --> 01:02:42,155
Speaker 1: and sixty three days until the scheduled end of Trump's

926
01:02:42,235 --> 01:02:47,155
Speaker 1: lame duck lame brained term, unless he is removed sooner

927
01:02:47,755 --> 01:02:51,595
Speaker 1: by MAGA and Jeffrey Epstein or the actuarial tables, or

928
01:02:51,955 --> 01:02:56,515
Speaker 1: wandering around the White House roof. No, don't go near

929
01:02:56,555 --> 01:03:02,115
Speaker 1: the edge. No no. The next scheduled countdown is Monday

930
01:03:02,595 --> 01:03:04,995
Speaker 1: till then. I'm Keith Olberman. Good morning, good after noon,

931
01:03:04,995 --> 01:03:27,355
Speaker 1: good night, and good luck. Countdown with Keith Olderman is

932
01:03:27,355 --> 01:03:32,155
Speaker 1: a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit

933
01:03:32,195 --> 01:03:36,875
Speaker 1: the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.