Speaker 1: Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. Trump's
Speaker 1: losing streak has hit twenty seven days, his latest losing streak.
Speaker 1: MAGA knows it. The head of the Republican National Committee
Speaker 1: knows it. The Wall Street Journal knows it. The Indiana
Speaker 1: GOP knows it. The Ukrainians know it. Anybody who saw
Speaker 1: his pathetic, credit grabbing, disinformational tweet Saturday night after the
Speaker 1: Brown shooting knows it. His own economists know it, the
Speaker 1: terrorists know it. Even Trump knows it. Since the House
Speaker 1: passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act on November nineteenth, Trump
Speaker 1: has been sinking in quicksand sinking, and not more than
Speaker 1: one or two of his more insane, more desperate colleagues
Speaker 1: have even gotten close enough to hand him a rope
Speaker 1: for fear of being pulled down with him. His losing
Speaker 1: streak is today twenty seven days long, his latest losing streak,
Speaker 1: and they are beginning to blame him. We are facing
Speaker 1: almost certain defeats, says the purulent face of the RNC
Speaker 1: Joe Gruders about the midterms. Then, quote, this is an
Speaker 1: absolute disaster. Then if that wasn't clear enough, quote there's
Speaker 1: no sugarcoating it. This is a pending, looming disaster headed
Speaker 1: our way. And then I think, quoting me, quoting the
Speaker 1: late football owner Al Davis Gruters, says, the chances are
Speaker 1: Republicans will go down, and will go down. Hod just lose, baby,
Speaker 1: and boy has Trump been losing. He called affordability a hoax,
Speaker 1: got his arm twisted by his economists who know the
Speaker 1: last thing it is is a hoax. Tried to give
Speaker 1: a speech saying he will fix affordability rather than being
Speaker 1: crush under its weight politically, and still could not stop himself.
Speaker 1: Could not not mock those advisors, and not mock America,
Speaker 1: and not mock his own speech, and not mock affordability again,
Speaker 1: and even not mock the charts they gave him, and
Speaker 1: not mock Christmas presents. Quote you don't need thirty seven
Speaker 1: dollars for your daughter two or three? Is nice, she thinks,
Speaker 1: santi the results the next day, the Democrat Eileen Higgins
Speaker 1: swamped the MAGA loser in the election for mayor of Miami,
Speaker 1: and the Republicans coughed up what was thought to be
Speaker 1: a permanently red seat in the state House in Georgia,
Speaker 1: and Trump still kept mocking affordability, and Trump even mocked
Speaker 1: Trump twenty eighteen, twenty eighteen when he was caught saying
Speaker 1: shithole countries, and he denied he said shithole countries, and
Speaker 1: he lied and said he didn't say it, and his
Speaker 1: people who there and heard him say it, they lied
Speaker 1: and said he didn't say it. And now he says
Speaker 1: he did say it, and he said it again, and
Speaker 1: he said it about Somalia. And I don't know what
Speaker 1: it is, but somehow this group he has attacked seems
Speaker 1: to have been respected in this country, even by Republicans.
Speaker 1: And the shithole in question looks like Trump's mouth. And
Speaker 1: then there's nearby Indiana. Indiana is not a hot prospect
Speaker 1: to join the new Left, and it never has been.
Speaker 1: And yet Mike Pence was from there. And the Indiana
Speaker 1: Republicans who stared Trump down when he threatened to cut
Speaker 1: off all federal funding if they didn't readdistrict the way
Speaker 1: he wanted him to there from there, and they told
Speaker 1: him to go f himself. And then the Maga lieutenant governor,
Speaker 1: whose name is Micah Beckwith and is exactly as dumb
Speaker 1: as that sounds, first posted that threat online then deleted
Speaker 1: the post, and then, when confronted by reporters, repeated the
Speaker 1: threat almost word for word. Quote, Yes, these conversations happened.
Speaker 1: Beckwith said this to Politico. But it's not a threat,
Speaker 1: it's an honest conversation about who does the White House
Speaker 1: want to partner with. There are forty nine other states
Speaker 1: competing for all kinds of projects. Indianatol the White House today.
Speaker 1: They don't want to be a good partner to the
Speaker 1: Trump administration. And I suspect the White House will look
Speaker 1: to partner with other states before US. But did they
Speaker 1: actually say, here are projects you could lose out on
Speaker 1: if you do not deliver for us. Political Politico asked
Speaker 1: them that question, and mister Beckwith answered, quote, yes, unbelievable. Hey, Becky, One,
Speaker 1: don't blackmail. Two, don't blackmail people who aren't going to
Speaker 1: give in to blackmail. Three, when your blackmail fails, don't
Speaker 1: advertise that it's failed. And four, when you realize the
Speaker 1: validity of point three and you try to bury your advertisement,
Speaker 1: don't go back and advertise it again. Indiana thus becomes
Speaker 1: multiple Trump losses. He loses there like three times, and
Speaker 1: he also loses wherever he decides the next Indiana is
Speaker 1: and he looks, well, what's the opposite of impregnable? He
Speaker 1: looks pregnable. And there are multiple, multiple l's, not just Indiana,
Speaker 1: these beauty pageant also rans. He's tried to dress up
Speaker 1: as US attorneys Julianne Murray in Delaware Gone, the slimy
Speaker 1: Elina Haba Gone, Miss Uncongeniality, Lindsay Halligan going seven of them,
Speaker 1: by Trump's own admission going. And Trump's replacement evil plan
Speaker 1: is to eliminate blue slips in the Senate the way
Speaker 1: home state senators keep unqualified nominees from being qualified by
Speaker 1: the whores still working for the would be dictator. And
Speaker 1: John has responded to this by saying no, and Chuck
Speaker 1: Grassley has responded to this by saying, no, that's two
Speaker 1: more els in one game. No three l's in one game.
Speaker 1: He'd already tried to get them to eliminate the filibuster too,
Speaker 1: els el's els marching into the White House just in
Speaker 1: time for the construction permits to be denied for the
Speaker 1: new combination ballroom and Trump egos storage Hangar, I don't
Speaker 1: know what's going to happen to Obamacare, but He's not
Speaker 1: gonna gut it or replace it with the latest lame
Speaker 1: brained idea for a new scheme. Ran Paul's brilliant plan
Speaker 1: for you to buy your insurance on Amazon or at
Speaker 1: Sam's Club or at Costco. He Randy, maybe I can
Speaker 1: buy my insurance from your neighbor. He seemed to come
Speaker 1: out of his problems. Okay, Trump's healthcare plan fell in
Speaker 1: the Senate. Maybe he can find a new one on Amazon.
Speaker 1: Rdreie Taylor Green remains under the influence of a possibly
Speaker 1: transient but definitely tertiary stage case of conscience in open rebellion,
Speaker 1: planning one final bid to unseat Speaker Johnson before she
Speaker 1: leaves the House. The two thousand dollars tariff checks are gone,
Speaker 1: The Doge checks never happened. Buy your own insurance checks
Speaker 1: have apparently been replaced by Domino's new avoid thenoid insurance.
Speaker 1: Trump's approval numbers are frozen Pizza economy approvals down to
Speaker 1: thirty one percent, and if the Obamacare subsidies expire, that
Speaker 1: approval will drop below thirty and maybe take his overall
Speaker 1: approval with it. Because even his people realize he is
Speaker 1: turning this place into a shithole country. The Trump ells
Speaker 1: are everywhere. You can't spell kilmar Abrego, Garcia without a
Speaker 1: Trump l. The courts have ordered him to let go
Speaker 1: of the LA National Guard troops. He's losing in wars.
Speaker 1: He said he'd already settled, or would settle in twenty
Speaker 1: four hours or twenty four days or twenty four weeks.
Speaker 1: Ukraine is further from peace than ever. The Thailand Cambodia war,
Speaker 1: Trump said he ended on Friday, resumed on Saturday. His
Speaker 1: peace in the Middle East saw the Israelis kill a
Speaker 1: top Hamas commander over the weekend. An attack in Syria
Speaker 1: three Americans dead, including two service members, and he promised
Speaker 1: serious retaliation. And he would have sounded tougher if he'd said,
Speaker 1: I'm going to hit you real hard, like I said
Speaker 1: at the top. There are so many els, And for
Speaker 1: twenty seven days at least, there have been nothing but
Speaker 1: els that even Trump has begun to notice. So add
Speaker 1: that to the list of els. His ability to believe
Speaker 1: his own bullshit is showing holes. He still clings to
Speaker 1: this financial imbecility that tariffs will turn the economy into
Speaker 1: a money printing machine, even for people not named Trump
Speaker 1: or Musk or Bezos. But even he has now told
Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal, Yeah, he doesn't know when that
Speaker 1: money printing machine will actually turn on. The Journal interviewed
Speaker 1: him Friday in the Oval, and he must have stepped
Speaker 1: in some reality and couldn't get it off his shoes,
Speaker 1: quoting them. Quoting him, he acknowledged that he couldn't predict
Speaker 1: if that would translate into political gains for Republicans next fall.
Speaker 1: Asked whether Republicans would lose the House in November, Trump
Speaker 1: said quote, I can't tell you. I don't know when
Speaker 1: all of this money is going to kick in narrator,
Speaker 1: It didn't kick in. Wait, there's more. Quote. I've created
Speaker 1: the greatest economy in history, but it may take people
Speaker 1: a while to figure all these things out. Oh they've
Speaker 1: figured it out, Donald, They figured it out. Saturday night,
Speaker 1: when rushing, stumbling, waddling to grab at it, almost literally
Speaker 1: climbing over the bodies of dead students to claim he
Speaker 1: had found their killer, Trump posted this quote, I have
Speaker 1: been briefed on the shooting that took place at Brown
Speaker 1: University in Rhode Island. The FBI is on the scene,
Speaker 1: the suspect is in custody. God bless the victims and
Speaker 1: the families of the victim's exclamation point, F you, buddy,
Speaker 1: you've stepped on your dick again. You've stepped on your
Speaker 1: tiny dick again. While millions mourned and questioned, what is
Speaker 1: wrong with this goddamn country that we throw school kids,
Speaker 1: whether toddlers or teenagers, into the volcano like we were
Speaker 1: practicing the human sacrifice madness of the Aztecs, just to
Speaker 1: protect your right to walk around with a gun. Sure,
Speaker 1: what's another bunch of human hearts? What's another bunch of kids?
Speaker 1: As long as people know that Trump alone has found
Speaker 1: the real killer. Way, what's that you're saying? They haven't
Speaker 1: found the real killer. Hadn't found the real killer when
Speaker 1: he posted that. So now in just three months, Trump's
Speaker 1: bubbleheaded FBI director who didn't know the job meant work.
Speaker 1: He thought it only met a free jet. He wrongly
Speaker 1: said they'd caught the Charlie Kirk assassin. And now Trump
Speaker 1: has made the same mistake and tried to blame his
Speaker 1: mistake on others. And when you do that, and when
Speaker 1: you post that, you open yourself up to attacks from
Speaker 1: the other side, like Chris Murphy attacked on State of
Speaker 1: the Union yesterday. He said it opaquely, he said it
Speaker 1: with nuance. But make no mistake, this is a US
Speaker 1: senator blaming the President of the United States for this
Speaker 1: gun attack and the next gun attack quote. Right now,
Speaker 1: we don't have the leadership in Washington to do anything
Speaker 1: anything to respond to the shooting this weekend. Trump has
Speaker 1: been engaged in a pretty deliberate campaign to try to
Speaker 1: make violence more likely in this country, and I think
Speaker 1: you're unfortunately going to see the results of that on
Speaker 1: the streets of America. He's knowingly restoring gun rights to
Speaker 1: dangerous people. He is cutting off grants that have bipartisan
Speaker 1: support to try to interrupt violence in our cities or
Speaker 1: to try to get necessary mental health resources to families
Speaker 1: and children in need unquote. As I said earlier, this
Speaker 1: has been going on all of these els since at
Speaker 1: least the nineteenth of November, when enough MAGA congressmen realized
Speaker 1: that only one of these things could happen. They could
Speaker 1: continue to help Trump hide the Epstein files, or they
Speaker 1: could get re elected. That's why, of all these els,
Speaker 1: the biggest Trump loss in the last twenty seven days
Speaker 1: may have been the release of those four pictures of
Speaker 1: him with Jeffrey Epstein. The photos show nothing. The photos
Speaker 1: would therefore normally mean nothing, but they serve as a
Speaker 1: reminder that Trump tried to stop you from seeing photos
Speaker 1: of him with Epstein, that those photos that were released
Speaker 1: weren't part of that tranch in the files. That doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: It only raises a kind of instinctive speculation about how
Speaker 1: much worse those other Epstein Trump photos might be. It
Speaker 1: keeps the Epstein story alive when Trump could have killed
Speaker 1: it weeks ago, months ago, even if there was stuff
Speaker 1: more incriminating about him than say, a drawn of the
Speaker 1: naked woman made out to Epstein that he may or
Speaker 1: may not have drawn. But he's sure as shit signed
Speaker 1: right over the naughty bits. Instead of moving Epstein off
Speaker 1: the table and out of the picture, he's letting it
Speaker 1: drip drip drip on him. The photos mean nothing, yet
Speaker 1: here they are just another element that says this is
Speaker 1: Trump's scandal. The way the constant coverage of Clinton Lewinsky,
Speaker 1: even when there was no actual news for days, for weeks,
Speaker 1: kept that front of mind for all of the year
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight. I'll tell you something at MSNBC in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight the promo. But used to ask our
Speaker 1: staffers every day to give them something, anything, a news
Speaker 1: morsel that could turn into a thirty second promo for
Speaker 1: tomorrow's show. And on Thursday they used to have to
Speaker 1: turn something into a promo for Monday's show. Monday on
Speaker 1: the White House in crisis, we were locking in the
Speaker 1: crisis four days in advance. We were programming the crisis.
Speaker 1: And when we hit Friday, and those files are by
Speaker 1: law required to be released, whatever is released will be
Speaker 1: another Trump L. And whatever isn't released will be another
Speaker 1: Trump L. And lord knows how many l's there will
Speaker 1: be if there's something actually startling in the files. And
Speaker 1: that's the point. It doesn't have to be a good
Speaker 1: scandal to be a gripping scandal. It just has to
Speaker 1: have new stories every day. That's what Clinton Lewinsky's true
Speaker 1: meaning was. And as Philip Bump pointed out, Trump basically
Speaker 1: got elected by knowing this. There wasn't crap actually in
Speaker 1: wiki leaks or her emails, except that there was only
Speaker 1: something new in them. So in some more losses than
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixty two New York mets, or if you
Speaker 1: are a current New York Mets fan more losses than
Speaker 1: the twenty twenty five twenty six offseason New York Mets.
Speaker 1: And maybe it's only one hour a week, but even
Speaker 1: Trump knows it. During that hour, and way more than
Speaker 1: one hour a week, the Trump media industrial complex knows it.
Speaker 1: It's not my habit to quote the insufferable, inexhaustible phony
Speaker 1: Peggy Noonan. But when there's a column in the goddamned
Speaker 1: Rupert Murdoch goddamned Wall Street Journal titled quote Trump may
Speaker 1: be losing his touch, Yeah, I'm quoting it. One hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty six words. I swear that's it for this year.
Speaker 1: Just one hundred and thirty six words. And don't be
Speaker 1: thrown by the imaginary world in which Peggy Noonan lives.
Speaker 1: She still thinks Ronald Reagan isn't in hell, and now
Speaker 1: she thinks Charlie Kirk was a mediating force inside the
Speaker 1: Trump cult. Okay, just go with that, But the other
Speaker 1: points she makes are salient and deadly. Quote outside Washington,
Speaker 1: mister Trump's base is fighting with itself. America first is
Speaker 1: saying I'm not maga conspiracies all over Israel killed Charlie
Speaker 1: the assassination of Charlie Kirk, she writes, looks increasingly like
Speaker 1: an epical event. Did he understand how much he was
Speaker 1: holding together the Trumpian right Without the force of his
Speaker 1: mediating presence, they are cracking up percolating below unseen is
Speaker 1: the price you pay in time for success? The President's
Speaker 1: border triumph, sorry what? The president's border triumph will likely
Speaker 1: weaken his and maga's political position. He shut down illegal
Speaker 1: immigration on the southern border, which had been more less
Speaker 1: open for decades. But it was anger at illegal immigration
Speaker 1: noonan rights that kept his base cleaved to him and
Speaker 1: allied with each other. Remove the issue that made you,
Speaker 1: and you can no longer use it to gain votes
Speaker 1: or maintain unity. Unquote Oh no, oh, dear Trump's lost
Speaker 1: his touch. God damn shame not going to affect those
Speaker 1: midterms and give us enough Democratic congressman to impeach him
Speaker 1: and enough Democratic senators to remove him. Is it? Oh?
Speaker 1: Really you think so wow? That'll be fun? Let me
Speaker 1: quote this RNC blob gruters again, quoting me again, quoting
Speaker 1: al Davis again. Republicans will go down and will go
Speaker 1: down hobb okay. Two quick media notes The CBS evening
Speaker 1: news about Barry Weiss, edited by Barry Weiss, anchored by
Speaker 1: Barry Weiss, starring Barry Weiss, is not going so well.
Speaker 1: If she had not been put there to do something
Speaker 1: bad like this, her stay on this job might be
Speaker 1: as long as RONA. Romney's glorious hour and a half
Speaker 1: as an MSNBC commentator. It was Brian Steinberg and Variety
Speaker 1: who noticed this, and to whom all credit goes, And I'm
Speaker 1: just going to quote him and read his story from
Speaker 1: Variety that Barry Weiss town hall with Erica Kirk, the
Speaker 1: merry widow, the woman who used all the eyeliner left
Speaker 1: over after jd Vance got done. No real advertiser was
Speaker 1: willing to buy time on it. No real advertiser was
Speaker 1: willing to buy time on the CBS television network. Mister
Speaker 1: Steinberg writes headline, Big advertisers appear wary of CBS News's
Speaker 1: Barryweiss town Hall format during a Saturday night town hall
Speaker 1: led by Barry Weiss, the recently named editor in chief
Speaker 1: of CBS News, and I believe she liked the article
Speaker 1: so far most of Madison Avenue sought an off ramp.
Speaker 1: Steinberg writes the News special aired at eight pm on Saturday,
Speaker 1: one of the least watch hours in broadcast TV, and
Speaker 1: that may have contributed to a relative dearth of top
Speaker 1: advertisers appearing to support the show during the hour. Commercial
Speaker 1: breaks were largely filled with spots from direct response advertisers,
Speaker 1: including the taietary supplement super Beats, the home repair service
Speaker 1: HomeServe dot com, and Carfax, a supplier of auto ownership data.
Speaker 1: Viewers of the telecast on WCBS, CBS's flagship station in
Speaker 1: New York even saw a commercial for Giampet, the terra
Speaker 1: cotta figure that sprouts plant life after a few weeks.
Speaker 1: I wonder if CBS will still sprout plant life after
Speaker 1: a two weeks, continuing the article quote. A more moneyed
Speaker 1: class of sponsors was evident during the first commercial break,
Speaker 1: appearing in the nine pm hour on CBS a rebroadcast
Speaker 1: of a twenty twenty four episode of forty eight Hours.
Speaker 1: Marketers appearing included Amazon, Ferrero Group, and Procter and Gamble. Unquote,
Speaker 1: uh oh, Congratsbery Weiss and the Ellisons. You've turned CBS
Speaker 1: News into overnights. On superstation WTBS in nineteen seventy six,
Speaker 1: got a Ginsu knife collection for sale Airberry. But wait,
Speaker 1: what was that again about chiapets? Viewers of the telecast
Speaker 1: on WCBS. CBS was flagship station in New York even
Speaker 1: saw commercial for Chiapet the terracotta figure that sprout's plant
Speaker 1: life after a few weeks. Oh my god, Chia Pet Company,
Speaker 1: I'll give you one thousand dollars if you make a
Speaker 1: Barry Weiss chia pet. Please, oh please, please, please please please. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: something that a week ago would have outdrawn the Barry
Speaker 1: Weiss town Hall with Tammy fay Baker Kirk may now
Speaker 1: belong to the Ages as well as Vivid as parts
Speaker 1: of the latest Ryan Lizzer response to Olivia Newsy may
Speaker 1: have been the whole thing has collapsed under the realization
Speaker 1: that actually the only guaranteed audience for Lizz's segments have
Speaker 1: been Olivia's other exes. Hey her book first week out,
Speaker 1: first publication week, maximum visibility. As you probably have not heard,
Speaker 1: her book, the first week sold. With all that publicity,
Speaker 1: including the most thorough job of The New York Times
Speaker 1: ever missing the lead and the next twenty off leads
Speaker 1: in its history, that book sold and sixty five copies
Speaker 1: a book that sold five thousand copies the same week,
Speaker 1: placed fiftieth among nonfiction sellers. Not great, Bob. So, barring
Speaker 1: anything else that might come up later on in this
Speaker 1: to which I could add something that is either relevant
Speaker 1: or true, I'll bow out here. But I do want
Speaker 1: to read one last paragraph, because this is the easiest
Speaker 1: way for me to get mister lendsa an answer he
Speaker 1: apparently needs. Let me quote him. Quote Olivia, this person
Speaker 1: said was starting to tell people that I might kill her.
Speaker 1: I tried to explain that Olivia watched a lot of
Speaker 1: Law and Order growing up and has an active imagination,
Speaker 1: especially when it comes to being killed. She feared that
Speaker 1: her mother would kill her. She had told me that
Speaker 1: she thought Keith might kill her, and now I have
Speaker 1: to assume she told Keith the same thing about me.
Speaker 1: Of course, she repeatedly told me that she feared Bobby
Speaker 1: would kill her. Now she was saying that I might
Speaker 1: kill her. I never heard her say one way or
Speaker 1: the other about Mark Sandford's level of interest in killing her.
Speaker 1: That's a good line. So many people were out to
Speaker 1: kill her, and yet here she was, at thirty one,
Speaker 1: somehow very much alive. End quote. Okay, Ryan. I haven't
Speaker 1: talked to her since twenty fifteen, and by the way,
Speaker 1: every contact I've had with her since twenty fifteen was
Speaker 1: about what to do with her clothes or about the
Speaker 1: health of what had been our dogs, about which she
Speaker 1: had no interest, for which I will never forgive her,
Speaker 1: and which I think summarizes her. Once I did post
Speaker 1: on Facebook twenty eighteen, maybe that the place in Central
Speaker 1: Park that you two guys like to hang out at
Speaker 1: was my utter coincidence, right on the path I walked
Speaker 1: the dogs every day, and way too near my home,
Speaker 1: and it was a miracle we hadn't run into each
Speaker 1: other already. So maybe we should all make that our DMZ.
Speaker 1: But about the killing her question, exhale Ryan, she never
Speaker 1: told me she thought you might kill her. She only
Speaker 1: told me she thought you were stalking her. Also of interest,
Speaker 1: here a top governor tries to insist Democrats have a
Speaker 1: hand in political violence in this country. And this would
Speaker 1: just be stupid if this governor weren't a Democrat, and
Speaker 1: if he weren't the democratic governor whose fascist haters tried
Speaker 1: to burn him and his family alive in their own
Speaker 1: home during passover. Worst Persons is next This is Countdown.
Speaker 1: This is Countdown with Keith Oberman still ahead on this
Speaker 1: edition of Countdown. Sixty five years ago this month, a
Speaker 1: little boy named Theo Dall was hit by a New
Speaker 1: York City cab while being pushed across the street in
Speaker 1: his baby carriage. He was never the same, nor was
Speaker 1: his father, who, in part to entertain his stricken son,
Speaker 1: wrote a book called Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. And
Speaker 1: although the next development was not quite on that level
Speaker 1: of importance, the writing of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Speaker 1: led me to write to Theo's dad, who was the
Speaker 1: legendary both good and bad legendary Roal Doll, to write
Speaker 1: him a fan letter, and he wrote back, and he
Speaker 1: wrote back again, And these letters are referenced somehow in
Speaker 1: Roald Dahl's official biography. This very strange story ahead in
Speaker 1: things I promised not to tell first of believe it
Speaker 1: or not, there's still more new idiots to talk about.
Speaker 1: The roundup of the disagreants, morons and Dunning Kruger effects
Speaker 1: specimens who constitute today's other worst persons in the world.
Speaker 1: The runner up to the runner up Bronze, Anna Paulina
Speaker 1: Luna the congresswoman from Smolensk. I know, I'm sorry, I
Speaker 1: got that wrong from Florida. Problem is she might as
Speaker 1: well be and it might as well be Smolensk. The
Speaker 1: Russian Embassy in the US social media account has posted
Speaker 1: her photo and quote at the invitation by at Rep. Luna,
Speaker 1: Ambassador Dartkiev visited her Christmas reception on Capitol Hill. Wonderful
Speaker 1: event with warm atmosphere and exceptional hospitality. Continue working to
Speaker 1: make Russian American relations great again. Yeah. Sorry, anybody who
Speaker 1: thinks we should have great relations with Russia before the
Speaker 1: Russians overthrow the Putent dictatorship is to totally loyal to
Speaker 1: this country, but really dumb. Not loyal and dumb. Sorry,
Speaker 1: Russia is our enemy, but there are degrees of how
Speaker 1: truly not you can be. And from the Twitter ex
Speaker 1: account of the gadfly Jay in Kiev comes this addendum
Speaker 1: to that photo of Luna to whom the Russians gave
Speaker 1: their JFK quote files unquote, because why would they ever
Speaker 1: give America fake historical records or disinformation? Jay in Kiev
Speaker 1: notes and quoting him since August when her and Steve
Speaker 1: Whitcoff met some of Putin's representatives at a Miami hotel
Speaker 1: owned by Russian business partner of Witcoff. US Congresswoman Anna
Speaker 1: Paulina Luna has been a prolific member of the Russian
Speaker 1: government's Paid Influencers program, turning her ex timeline into display
Speaker 1: case of NonStop Kremlin talking points. Jay in Kiev writes
Speaker 1: and continues, what she does isn't illegal. Today she gleefully
Speaker 1: met her handler unquote yikes. I don't know if she's
Speaker 1: a paid influencer or a paid Influencer's program member. That's
Speaker 1: Jay's assertion. I do know she operates under an adopted name.
Speaker 1: She was born Anna Paulina Meyerhoffer. Right, your arm is Meyerhoffer,
Speaker 1: and she has the IQ of a goldfish on a
Speaker 1: good day to goldfish. The runner up worser, Governor Josh
Speaker 1: Shapiro of Pennsylvania. Now, look, I get what he's trying
Speaker 1: to do here, but it's Pollyanna to the point of ridiculousness. Worse,
Speaker 1: it's Pollyanna to the point of John fetterman esque. Remember
Speaker 1: that they tried to burn the governor and his family
Speaker 1: alive and burn them to death in his home in
Speaker 1: the Governor's residence just last April during the holidays, and
Speaker 1: he is still both sides political violence in America. Governor
Speaker 1: Shapiro writes, quote, it shouldn't be hard to mourn the
Speaker 1: loss of the Minnesota Speaker of the House, Melissa Hortman,
Speaker 1: after she was gunned down in her bed. It shouldn't
Speaker 1: be hard to follow Erica Kirk's eulogy with an amen
Speaker 1: and a prayer for her and her family. We have
Speaker 1: a crisis of political violence in this country and it
Speaker 1: requires all of us to do better every time. No,
Speaker 1: we don't. We have a crisis of conservative, fascist, maga
Speaker 1: republican political violence in this country. And I will say
Speaker 1: this again, the assassination of Charlie Kirk was and is indefensible,
Speaker 1: But so was Charlie Kirk. He was a terrible destructive force.
Speaker 1: And the sane washing of him calls for the execution
Speaker 1: of President Biden. Things like that that he did forcing
Speaker 1: kids to watch public hangings, that he called for putting
Speaker 1: public hangings on TV. Charlie Kirk called for that Saine washing.
Speaker 1: All that is appalling, And I get what Josh Shapiro
Speaker 1: is trying to do, but my god, man, the right
Speaker 1: wingers tried to burn you to death, and you are
Speaker 1: acting like this guy was Saint Charlie of Kirk and
Speaker 1: his rage filled wife is Jackie Kennedy. Preach all the
Speaker 1: condemn all political violence sermons you want, Governor, but the
Speaker 1: right is going to continue to attack physically Democrats and
Speaker 1: liberals and you know, our form of government, and as
Speaker 1: it turns out, any Republican who disagrees with them, like
Speaker 1: the ones in Indiana, and then they will insist that
Speaker 1: it's only the liberals who do all the political violence. Governor,
Speaker 1: They're gonna do that as they have now for twenty years.
Speaker 1: You should not help them. They are doing fine on
Speaker 1: this by themselves. Do not join the both sides in parade, Governor,
Speaker 1: especially since these are the people who tried to kill you.
Speaker 1: But our winner is Howard Lutnik, chief bullshit advisor to Trump.
Speaker 1: I mean, there are lots of toadies and there are
Speaker 1: lots of liars around Trump, but this guy may be
Speaker 1: the champion. I am indebted to my former NBC colleague
Speaker 1: Carl Kintenia on this one. It's priceless. As Carl noted
Speaker 1: on Face the Nation on April sixth of this year,
Speaker 1: Lutnik said, quote, the army of millions and millions of
Speaker 1: human beings screwing in little screws to make iPhones, That
Speaker 1: kind of thing is going to come to America. The
Speaker 1: army of millions and millions of human beings screwing in
Speaker 1: little screws to make iPhones, That kind of thing is
Speaker 1: going to come to America. Then Lutnick, same guy, same topic,
Speaker 1: goes on CNBC last Thursday, and he says, quote, Remember
Speaker 1: Americans don't have millions of people to screw in little
Speaker 1: screws in iPhones, but we do have capacity to run robotics.
Speaker 1: Remember Americans don't have millions of people to screw in
Speaker 1: little screws in iPhones, but we do have capacity to
Speaker 1: run robot So Trump's ass kissing bullshit artist is bullshitting
Speaker 1: us in both directions. In April, Howard Lutnik promised that
Speaker 1: Trump's America would be where millions of us would be
Speaker 1: screwing in the little screws to make iPhones. By December,
Speaker 1: he is promising that Trump's America will be where millions
Speaker 1: of us will not be screwing in the little screws
Speaker 1: to make iPhones. The arrogance and the degree to which
Speaker 1: this man will say anything to try to make it
Speaker 1: seem like Trump isn't screwing this economy into the ground
Speaker 1: is seriously astonishing, even in the context of the world
Speaker 1: in which we live today. Howard, may I suggest you
Speaker 1: screw your little screws in yourself, Lutnik Today's other worst
Speaker 1: person in the world. If the name Royal Dahl does
Speaker 1: not immediately ring a bell for you. He was the
Speaker 1: author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and thus the
Speaker 1: creator of Willy Wonka, and he wrote James and the
Speaker 1: Giant Peach, and all of his kids books combined have
Speaker 1: sold about a quarter of a billion copies Dead since
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety. Two years ago, Forbes placed Dall first on
Speaker 1: its list of the top earning dead celebrities, ahead of
Speaker 1: Prince and Michael Jackson. Royal Dahl made about five hundred
Speaker 1: and thirteen million dollars in twenty twenty one, compared to
Speaker 1: thirteen million by the late John Lennon. And that is
Speaker 1: where the problems began. And if you have not heard
Speaker 1: about the problems, the first is Royal Dahl was often,
Speaker 1: as somebody on Twitter put it succinctly, he was often
Speaker 1: the C word. He was at times anti Semitic, racist, misogynistic,
Speaker 1: and cruel, and his writing was at times anti Semitic, racist, misogynistic,
Speaker 1: and cruel. None of that has ever really slowed down
Speaker 1: his book sales, though, largely because first, kids who read
Speaker 1: books are actually smarter than nearly every adult thinks they are.
Speaker 1: And second, it seemed then and now that the more
Speaker 1: problematic a lot of Doll's characters were, the smarter he
Speaker 1: made them. The Umphilumpas of Willy Wonka are not Doll's
Speaker 1: finest moments. On the other hand, they do run everything
Speaker 1: in the chocolate factory. They know everything about the ticket
Speaker 1: winning kids and their foibles. And when Violet turns into
Speaker 1: a giant blueberry, and when Veruka gets devoured by squirrels,
Speaker 1: it is the Umphilumpas who know how to save them.
Speaker 1: So apparently the Umphluopas are doctors, or at least paramedics. Anyway,
Speaker 1: the reason Royal Dahl made five hundred and thirteen million
Speaker 1: dollars thirty one years after he died was that his
Speaker 1: estate sold the rights to the books to Netflix. By then,
Speaker 1: the book publishers had already brought in a company of
Speaker 1: so called sensitivity readers to rewrite the more troublesome parts
Speaker 1: of Dol's work. We're seeing the first results of this now,
Speaker 1: and it is literally what George Orwell described in his
Speaker 1: novel nineteen eighty four, erasing the past, replacing it with
Speaker 1: a new past, and leaving no indication that any editing
Speaker 1: or changing was done. While I'm assuming it still says
Speaker 1: that in nineteen eighty four, presumably all of that could
Speaker 1: be edited out of Orwell and we'd never know, right.
Speaker 1: But it's even worse than that, because the edits are
Speaker 1: being made not because of some pure if misguided desire
Speaker 1: to make changes reflecting the changes in morays and respect
Speaker 1: changes even the author might want to make. They're being
Speaker 1: done so that the books, according to the publisher, can
Speaker 1: continue to be enjoyed by all today, meaning they did
Speaker 1: this to literally sell more books. This is not even
Speaker 1: about why intentioned censorship. It's about profit. And if all
Speaker 1: that were not bad enough, the rewriting of ro al
Speaker 1: Dahl has from a quality viewpoint, gone about as well
Speaker 1: as the so called restoration of the painting of Jesus
Speaker 1: in Spain in twenty twelve. The painting is now known
Speaker 1: as monkey Christ or potato Jesus. Apart from the wholesale
Speaker 1: elimination of words like fat and ugly, the publishers have
Speaker 1: decided to take out references that no kid would ever notice.
Speaker 1: She went to India with Rudyard Kipling becomes she went
Speaker 1: to California with John Steinbeck. Why. In his story The Witches,
Speaker 1: Roul Dahl has the hero believe that all witches are
Speaker 1: bald and wear wigs and gloves, and that's a way
Speaker 1: to check. Don't be foolish, my grandmother said. You can't
Speaker 1: go around pulling the hair of every lady you meet,
Speaker 1: even if she is wearing gloves. Just you try it
Speaker 1: and see what happens. That would be an admonition not
Speaker 1: to believe that everybody with a wig is a witch.
Speaker 1: It has now been changed to don't be foolish, my
Speaker 1: grandmother said. Besides, there are plenty of other reasons why
Speaker 1: women might wear wigs, and there's certainly nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 1: It's like Shakespeare. Now. Look, it is one thing if
Speaker 1: you are giving a public reading of Tom Sawyer, and
Speaker 1: you may want to drop a couple of words here
Speaker 1: and there. I have performed James Thurber's stories since twenty
Speaker 1: ten on TV on radio on this podcast in Person,
Speaker 1: his epic story by the way, forecasting Trump the greatest
Speaker 1: man in the World, is coming up shortly. Thurber's daughter
Speaker 1: Rosie offered me the right to edit anything I felt
Speaker 1: I needed to edit for time or for taste, and
Speaker 1: said there was plenty in there. Her dad would be
Speaker 1: mortified by today that he wrote. Letting me edit it, though,
Speaker 1: is like saying, hey, you have a heart, so that
Speaker 1: means you can perform heart surgery. But the goal in
Speaker 1: doing that is to change as little as possible. There
Speaker 1: are adjectives that were once perfectly normal and seemingly liberal,
Speaker 1: and once thought even to be complimentary that you really
Speaker 1: need to just skip, So when you're reading them aloud,
Speaker 1: just skip them, but erase them permanently forever from Thurber's books,
Speaker 1: when maybe a note to new readers would be sufficient warning. Plus,
Speaker 1: if I'm changing anything about Thurber while transforming his work
Speaker 1: into a different medium like podcasts, I am necessarily going
Speaker 1: to edit things. A movie might leave out nine tenths
Speaker 1: of any novel, but just reading a novel aloud might
Speaker 1: change something as important as the emphasis on the way
Speaker 1: certain words were said from the way the author intended
Speaker 1: that emphasis to be. Besides which, all those changes are temporary.
Speaker 1: I'm not altering Thurber's text. I'm altering my reading of
Speaker 1: his text next. And the same goes for Royal Dahl.
Speaker 1: And a lot of people saying this are people who
Speaker 1: do not like Royal Dall. Sir Solomon rushed. He wrote,
Speaker 1: he was a self confessed anti Semite with pronounced racist leanings,
Speaker 1: and he joined in the attack on me back in
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty nine. Royal Dahl was no angel. But this
Speaker 1: is absurd censorship, puffin books and the doll estate should
Speaker 1: be ashamed, because that's the point. If we're going to
Speaker 1: edit or otherwise circumscribe every book or author, or film
Speaker 1: or producer with a significant problem, we're going to wind
Speaker 1: up with a world library of about fifty books and
Speaker 1: ten films. I mean, this isn't Florida. And artists, like people,
Speaker 1: are rarely all good or all bad, and often they
Speaker 1: have huge disturbing flaws which can, in their own way,
Speaker 1: teach you what not to do or be in life.
Speaker 1: The publishers defended doing this on the premise that Roald
Speaker 1: Dahl's works have always been edited and modified, that he
Speaker 1: permanently changed the description of those umpah lumpas several times
Speaker 1: to make it less offensive. And again that misses the
Speaker 1: point he made those changes, not his publishers, not his
Speaker 1: literary estate, not you, not me, him. And if you're
Speaker 1: wondering why I'm going on so long about this, it's
Speaker 1: because this is personal for me. I think I learned
Speaker 1: that truth that almost everybody is a mix of good
Speaker 1: and bad, often in big, bright, ugly letters, often with
Speaker 1: extraordinary self contradictions. I learned all that from Royal Dahl.
Speaker 1: Sometime in the second half of March nineteen sixty six,
Speaker 1: a letter unlike any other I had seen before arrived
Speaker 1: at our little house in the suburbs of New York City,
Speaker 1: where my parents packed me off each morning to the
Speaker 1: third grade. The words par Avian were printed in the
Speaker 1: upper left, and the postmark was from somewhere called Great Missenden,
Speaker 1: and the address see was me. It was a letter
Speaker 1: from Royal Dahl. I had a number of very special
Speaker 1: teachers in my life, but the first of them was
Speaker 1: Missus Marjorie Plant, who survived an entire school year of me.
Speaker 1: In nineteen sixty five and nineteen sixty six, we sidled
Speaker 1: down the hallway to miss Ritz for an hour or
Speaker 1: so of math every day, but the rest of the
Speaker 1: time we were Missus Plant's class. And when she was
Speaker 1: not leading us out to the glorious natural meadow in
Speaker 1: the pond just behind the elementary school and teaching us
Speaker 1: the name of every plant and every tree and every bird,
Speaker 1: she was reading to us, or getting us to read
Speaker 1: to her, or one day asking each of us to
Speaker 1: name our favorite author. Well, I didn't hesitate. My dad
Speaker 1: read to me each night, and it's probable somebody else's
Speaker 1: book was first. And I know he later read me
Speaker 1: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang by Ian Fleming, But the first
Speaker 1: books for me were Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and
Speaker 1: James and the Giant Peach by Royl Doll. And I
Speaker 1: don't know how many times Dad read each of them
Speaker 1: to me, but I now do know that somehow those
Speaker 1: books conveyed to me that books didn't just happen, That
Speaker 1: a grown up like my dad had written them deliberately
Speaker 1: for kids to read and to listen to. And this
Speaker 1: man had clearly included jokes that the kids would get,
Speaker 1: but the grown ups didn't seem to notice, and This
Speaker 1: was this man's job, the way being a draftsman and
Speaker 1: later an architect was my dad's job. That you could
Speaker 1: do this and people would pay you. This is how
Speaker 1: I understood about this. A thousand other writers and broadcasters
Speaker 1: flashed out the details and the specifics for me. But
Speaker 1: the man who opened the first door into the world
Speaker 1: in which perhaps I could write for a living was
Speaker 1: ro Al Dahl. So, Keith, who's your favorite author, Missus Plant,
Speaker 1: asked ro Al Dahl. Missus Plant, knowing her and knowing me,
Speaker 1: she probably said I knew it, and soon after she
Speaker 1: explained that we had an assignment that day. We were
Speaker 1: all going to write. Great. I thought, I'll write another book.
Speaker 1: I had already written something like forty books in Missus
Speaker 1: Plant's class, two or three pages with illustrations, with construction paper, covers,
Speaker 1: with staples, with titles. I wasn't just going to be
Speaker 1: a writer like Royal Dahl. I already was one. Not
Speaker 1: a book today, Keith, she said, I want you all
Speaker 1: to write a letter to your favorite author. I know
Speaker 1: how to get your letters to your author, so you
Speaker 1: don't have to worry about that part. You can ask
Speaker 1: them anything you want in the letter you can tell
Speaker 1: them anything about yourself, but I especially want you to
Speaker 1: tell them why you like their books, and who you
Speaker 1: are and how old you are. And on that day
Speaker 1: in March nineteen sixty six, my favorite author had written
Speaker 1: me back. I had a sense immediately of it being
Speaker 1: a special occasion. I believe only one author besides Royal Dahl,
Speaker 1: replied to anybody in our class. I do know the
Speaker 1: school thought it was a big enough deal to call
Speaker 1: the town newspaper to do a story on it. It's
Speaker 1: not as if I forgot the story, or the letter
Speaker 1: or the sense of wonder at its arrival, either. But
Speaker 1: despite the coverage in the weekly Hastings News, it still
Speaker 1: seemed like a very private family kind of thing. And
Speaker 1: then in twenty ten, somebody told me, maybe it was
Speaker 1: the publisher, that the private family thing had made it
Speaker 1: into the authorized biography of roy Al Dahl, a book
Speaker 1: called Storyteller by Donald Sturrock. He wrote this next part,
Speaker 1: I did not. I think it's okay for me to
Speaker 1: bother it here, quoting mister Sturrock, his stories were encouraging
Speaker 1: children the world over to read books, and that many
Speaker 1: of them loved his stories so much that they felt
Speaker 1: impelled to write and tell him so. The current rate
Speaker 1: of letters from children in the US is between fifty
Speaker 1: and sixty a week. He had written to Mike Watkins
Speaker 1: in nineteen sixty six. I try to answer them all
Speaker 1: with a postcard. Roald was always a diligent and engaging correspondent,
Speaker 1: and if he was in the right mood and thought
Speaker 1: a child's letter particularly imaginative, he or she would receive
Speaker 1: a fuller and more memorable response. When the sports journalist
Speaker 1: and television anchorman Keith Olberman was seven years old and
Speaker 1: head of maps in his class at school, he wrote
Speaker 1: to Dahl from Hastings on Hudson in New York and
Speaker 1: told him at some length about his own writing ambitions
Speaker 1: and successes. Roald's reply was thoughtful, generous, and full of
Speaker 1: gentle ironic humor. My dear Keith, he began, It was
Speaker 1: wonderful to receive a letter from a fellow author. It
Speaker 1: meant so much more than the usual ordinary message from
Speaker 1: a mere reader. As head of maps, you will be
Speaker 1: able to calculate very easily what a long way your
Speaker 1: letter had to travel in order to reach me in
Speaker 1: this little village, thousands of miles The postman, an elderly
Speaker 1: fellow who comes on foot, knocked on the door this morning,
Speaker 1: said I have a letter from you, from Kay Ulderman
Speaker 1: of Hastings, USA. I said, how do you know? He said,
Speaker 1: it says so on the envelope. He is a very
Speaker 1: inquisitive postman, and he likes to know who is writing
Speaker 1: to me. Who is Ulberman, asked the postman. I opened
Speaker 1: the letter and read it. He is a writer, I said,
Speaker 1: he has written more books than me. Oldraman's parents later
Speaker 1: told the local newspaper that the letter had given the
Speaker 1: boy the kick of his young life. Missus Ulriman added
Speaker 1: that it just about proves that there are still some
Speaker 1: very nice people left in this old, beat up world.
Speaker 1: If all adults acted with such loving attention to children,
Speaker 1: would it not be wonderful? Dahl was quite sincere when
Speaker 1: he argued that he thought children alone were decent judges
Speaker 1: of whether a book written for them was any good
Speaker 1: or not. In nineteen sixty two, he had written to
Speaker 1: a child critic of James and the Giant Peach to
Speaker 1: tell him that up to now, a whole lot of
Speaker 1: grown ups have written reviews, but none of them have
Speaker 1: really known what they were talking about, because a grown
Speaker 1: up talking about a children's book is like a man
Speaker 1: talking about a woman's hat. The author, mister Sterrock not
Speaker 1: only put me in the authorized biography of Royal Dall,
Speaker 1: he also put me in the index there. I am
Speaker 1: right between David Ogilvie, the advertising legend, and Sir Laurence Olivier.
Speaker 1: Left out of Sterrock's account and the quotes from my
Speaker 1: mother was the fact that mom was a fan of
Speaker 1: the actress Patricia Neil, Royal Dahl's wife, and she had
Speaker 1: read horror stories about their marriage and about Neil's stroke
Speaker 1: and Dol's tough love during her recovery. As I began
Speaker 1: to appreciate her point of view and Dall's books at
Speaker 1: the same time and his letter to me, I began
Speaker 1: to formulate a theory that not everybody was just one thing,
Speaker 1: that you could be good and bad and shouldn't be
Speaker 1: judged on just half of yourself. Naturally, I wrote my
Speaker 1: new pen pal back he had mentioned having a son
Speaker 1: about my age. In fact, Theo Dahl had been born
Speaker 1: in New York just like I was, but at the
Speaker 1: age of four months in his baby carriage, Theo was
Speaker 1: hit by a cab, and his injuries were so profound
Speaker 1: that for a while he was blind and Royal Dahl
Speaker 1: himself had helped to develop a shunt used to drain
Speaker 1: swelling in Theo's brain to make his life better and
Speaker 1: more worthwhile I did not know any of this when
Speaker 1: I mentioned, among other mundating details, that a seven year
Speaker 1: old was likely to tell an adult in a letter
Speaker 1: that my middle name was Theodore. I also apparently included
Speaker 1: some poems I had written. And I know this because
Speaker 1: sure enough Rol Dahl wrote back again. This next letter
Speaker 1: did not come for nearly a year. My dear Keith.
Speaker 1: It begins dated February second, nineteen sixty seven. Your last
Speaker 1: letter was a very good one, So were the poems.
Speaker 1: Imagine the impact of that from your favorite writer right
Speaker 1: after your eighth birthday. But Doll went on, I hope
Speaker 1: you will not become a poet when you grow up,
Speaker 1: because poets have a terribly hard time earning a living.
Speaker 1: I am writing a musical film, he went on, for
Speaker 1: Dick van Dyke, based roughly on Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
Speaker 1: the Flying Motor Car. Could I have mentioned liking this
Speaker 1: book by a different author in my letter to him
Speaker 1: or did he just decide to announce it to me.
Speaker 1: We'll be making it here in England next summer, and
Speaker 1: you can go and see it in nineteen sixty eight,
Speaker 1: when you are nine years old. You will be impressed
Speaker 1: at the things this car is going to do. With
Speaker 1: love from Roal Dahl, I'm sure I wrote again. I
Speaker 1: can almost remember he did not write back. I do
Speaker 1: not recall holding it against him, nor do I now.
Speaker 1: I do recall that when I followed his instructions and
Speaker 1: went to see his movie. I think, in fact it
Speaker 1: was my tenth birthday party in early nineteen sixty nine.
Speaker 1: I was disappointed. Too much girl chasing, not enough car flying.
Speaker 1: Still almost no one is all good or all bad,
Speaker 1: And every new reissue of every Royal Doll book could
Speaker 1: include a twenty page treatise about what was bad about
Speaker 1: him and the negativities in that book and his other writings,
Speaker 1: just so long as it is included instead of rather
Speaker 1: than in addition to the nonsensical rewrites that Puffin publishing
Speaker 1: is produced. Also, I think it might be appropriate to
Speaker 1: mention that though the letters from kids just in the
Speaker 1: US just in nineteen sixty six totaled around what twenty
Speaker 1: five hundred, he tried to answer them all with a postcard,
Speaker 1: or if you were very lucky, a letter, or if
Speaker 1: you were very very lucky, two letters, and to mention
Speaker 1: forty three years later in his official biography, I've done
Speaker 1: all the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening.
Speaker 1: Most of our countdown music was arranged, produced, and performed
Speaker 1: by Brian Ray and John Phillips Chanel, our musical directors
Speaker 1: who Countdown, and it was produced by TKO Brothers. Mister
Speaker 1: Ray was on the guitars, the bass, and the drums.
Speaker 1: Mister Shanelle handled orchestration and keyboards. Our satirical and pithy
Speaker 1: musical comments are by the best baseball stadium organist ever,
Speaker 1: Nancy Faust. The Olderman theme from ESPN two by Mitch
Speaker 1: Warren Davis appears courtesy of ESPN, Inc. And is our
Speaker 1: sports music. And some other music arranged and performed by
Speaker 1: the group No Horns Allowed. My announcer today is my
Speaker 1: friend Dennis Leary. Everything else was, as always my fault.
Speaker 1: So that's countdown for today. Day three hundred and thirty
Speaker 1: of America held hostage again about just one and thirty
Speaker 1: three days until the scheduled end of his lame duck
Speaker 1: and lame brain term unless he is removed sooner by
Speaker 1: Maga and Epstein or Indiana or Anosagnosia or Taile and
Speaker 1: All or affordability or the second Strike video. The next
Speaker 1: scheduled edition of Countdown is Thursday. Until then, I'm Keith Olberman.
Speaker 1: Good morning, good afternoon, goodnight, and good luck. Countdown with
Speaker 1: Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts
Speaker 1: from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you get your podcasts