Speaker 1: Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. This
Speaker 1: is a Countdown Bulletin podcast. I'm Keith Olberman. And at
Speaker 1: any other point in our nation's history, of presidential candidate
Speaker 1: who said what Donald Trump has now said about winners
Speaker 1: of the Congressional Medal of Honor would not only have
Speaker 1: had his nomination rescinded by his party, but its leaders
Speaker 1: would have expelled him and probably chased him out of
Speaker 1: the country, or at least chased him into hiding, as
Speaker 1: his campaign has accused its opponent's running mate of quote
Speaker 1: stolen valor Trump at his Ramshackle golf course last night
Speaker 1: in Bedminster, New Jersey, quote honoring Miriam Addelson, a wealthy
Speaker 1: widow trying to help him buy the election, and the
Speaker 1: government saying that the Presidential Medal of Freedom that he
Speaker 1: gave her was quote better than the Congressional Medal of
Speaker 1: Honor because the recipients of the ladder are usually deceased
Speaker 1: or injured.
Speaker 2: I have to say, Miriam, I watched Sheldon sitting so
Speaker 2: proud in the White House when we gave Miriam the
Speaker 2: Presidential Medal of Freedom. That's the highest award you can
Speaker 2: get as a civilian it's the equivalent of the Congressional
Speaker 2: Medal of Honor, but civilian version it's actually much better
Speaker 2: because everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor. That soldiers
Speaker 2: they're either in very bad shape because they've been hit
Speaker 2: so many times by bullets, or they're dead. She gets it,
Speaker 2: and she's a healthy, beautiful woman, So.
Speaker 1: They're read an equal even for an unstable narcissist with
Speaker 1: no concept of right or wrong. That is a statement
Speaker 1: that goes beyond any imaginable bounds of suitability for office
Speaker 1: or to be thought of as having had any respect
Speaker 1: for American veterans. There are adamant leftist anti war protesters
Speaker 1: in this country who have devoted their laws to trying
Speaker 1: to stop war or to desanctify its soldiers, who would
Speaker 1: be shunned by their peers if they made such a
Speaker 1: horrific degradation of wounded, brave, self sacrificing Americans, no matter
Speaker 1: who put them there or what they were fighting for.
Speaker 1: Donald Trump last night might as well have urinated on
Speaker 1: the graves of our greatest heroes and on their wounds.
Speaker 1: The Adelson remarks soiling the Congressional Medal of Honor and
Speaker 1: its recipients. Is hardly Trump's first denigration of veterans and
Speaker 1: even the war dead. During a twenty fifteen appearance in Iowa,
Speaker 1: Trump criticized Senator John McCain at his service in Vietnam.
Speaker 1: He called out McCain's time as a prisoner of war.
Speaker 1: He's not a war hero, Trump said, he was a
Speaker 1: war hero because he was captured. I like people who
Speaker 1: weren't captured, unquote. One year later, Trump attacked a gold
Speaker 1: Star family, the parents of a deceased serviceman, Kazir and
Speaker 1: Gahala Khan, Pakistani Americans whose son died in the Iraq
Speaker 1: War in two thousand and four. They called Trump out
Speaker 1: for his public attacks on Muslims and implied that Trump
Speaker 1: had never read the Constitution. Mister Khan, you will recall
Speaker 1: waves a small copy of the Constitution, he said he
Speaker 1: carried with them at all times. At the Democratic National Convention,
Speaker 1: Kazir Khan made the entire speech, and Trump insisted that
Speaker 1: he did so because his wife was not allowed to speak,
Speaker 1: drawing on the implication that Muslim women are subservient to
Speaker 1: their spouses, In fact, she was too emotional to say anything.
Speaker 1: He added that the Khan's son quote would be alive
Speaker 1: today quote if he had been president. He also suggested
Speaker 1: the US never would have entered a war with Iraq
Speaker 1: if he'd been president. Then, while in office, Trump infamously
Speaker 1: demanded that wounded veterans not be included in a military
Speaker 1: parade being held realistically in his honor. On the fourth
Speaker 1: of July, he told his Chief of Staff, General John Kelly.
Speaker 1: Per reports later traced to Kelly quote, Look, I don't
Speaker 1: want any wounded guys in the parade. Trump reportedly requested,
Speaker 1: this doesn't look good for me. Just last year, Kelly
Speaker 1: wrote a statement to CNN. What can I add? He
Speaker 1: wrote that has not already been said. A person that
Speaker 1: did not want to be seen in the presence of
Speaker 1: military amputees because it doesn't look good for me. A
Speaker 1: person who demonstrated open contempt for a gold Star family
Speaker 1: for all gold Star families on TV during the twenty
Speaker 1: sixteen campaign, and rants that our most precious heroes who
Speaker 1: gave their lives in America's defense are quote losers and
Speaker 1: wouldn't visit their graves in France un quote from John Kelly.
Speaker 1: That was a reference to an event in twenty eighteen
Speaker 1: at the American Military Cemetery in France. Trump there reportedly
Speaker 1: referred to American soldiers who had died in World War
Speaker 1: One as quote losers and quote suckers. Senior defense officials
Speaker 1: reported at the time that Trump made the comments before
Speaker 1: a canceled visit to the American Military Cemetery outside Paris,
Speaker 1: and stated that he didn't want to visit that cemetery
Speaker 1: because it was quote filled with losers un quote. Trump
Speaker 1: on the same trip later called one thousand, eight hundred
Speaker 1: US Marines suckers were being killed during the Battle of
Speaker 1: bellow Wood, one of the iconic events in American military
Speaker 1: history in nineteen eighteen, often overlooked. In twenty twenty, Trump
Speaker 1: downplayed the severity of the injuries of some troops after
Speaker 1: a missile attack on their base in Iraq. In January
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, Eleven American soldiers were impacted when the Ayen
Speaker 1: al Assad air base in Iraq was targeted in a
Speaker 1: missile attack by Iran. Eight sought treatment for concussions, three
Speaker 1: for psychological sequala. Trump told the media there had been
Speaker 1: no American injuries. At a news conference, he said, quote
Speaker 1: I heard that they had headaches and a couple of
Speaker 1: other things. I've seen people with no legs and no arms.
Speaker 1: I consider them to be really bad injuries. This latest
Speaker 1: blasphemy comes in the middle of a concerted attempt by
Speaker 1: his campaign to ride the limited military service of his
Speaker 1: vice presidential pick, Senator Vance of Ohio as some kind
Speaker 1: of indicator of patriotism and bravery, and the attempt to
Speaker 1: swift vote his Democratic vice presidential nominee opposite Tim Walls,
Speaker 1: because there are nuanced details at the end of Walls's
Speaker 1: twenty four year career in the military, a career which
Speaker 1: Walls resumed coming out of retirement after nine to eleven.
Speaker 1: A Trump Vance surrogate called Walls a quote coward just
Speaker 1: yesterday in Pennsylvania. And there is Trump's own original sin
Speaker 1: in this area. He somehow obtained five deferments from service
Speaker 1: in Vietnam in the nineteen sixties using quote bone spurs.
Speaker 1: Bone spurs that mysteriously ended at the same time Trump's
Speaker 1: eligibility for the military draft ended. Here again is what
Speaker 1: Trump said about the Congressional Medal of Honor last night
Speaker 1: in New Jersey.
Speaker 2: I have to say, Miriam, I watched Sheldon sitting so
Speaker 2: proud in the White House when we gave Miriam the
Speaker 2: Presidential Medal of Freedom. That's the highest award you can
Speaker 2: get as a civilian. It's the equivalent of the Congressional
Speaker 2: Medal of Honor, but civilian version. It's actually much better
Speaker 2: because everyone gets the Congressional.
Speaker 1: Medal of Honor.
Speaker 2: That soldiers they're either in very bad shape because they've
Speaker 2: been hit so many times by bullets, or they're dead.
Speaker 2: She gets it, and she's a healthy, beautiful woman.
Speaker 1: It's fair, and they're read. An Equal Countdown with Keith
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