Speaker 1: Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. Trump
Speaker 1: had already single handedly reignited his Arlington National Cemetery scandal
Speaker 1: yesterday by implying that the VA and the Department of
Speaker 1: Defense are lying about it entirely when Fox News doubled
Speaker 1: down on the lie, and Trump had suddenly basically put
Speaker 1: the entirety of the military establishment in the same position
Speaker 1: Senator Joe McCarthy tried to put it in in nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty four. The mistake deciding you and your lies are
Speaker 1: more important and will be more successful than the military's
Speaker 1: truth that destroyed Joe McCarthy. It could conceivably destroy Donald Trump. Quote.
Speaker 1: There was no conflict or fighting at Arlington National Cemetery
Speaker 1: last week. It was a made up story by Comrade
Speaker 1: Kamala and her misinformation squad. She made it all up
Speaker 1: to make up for the fact that she and Joe, etc.
Speaker 1: Et cetera. Before that, the Trump position had been that
Speaker 1: there was an incident that a woman staffer having per
Speaker 1: spokesclown Stephen Chung a quote mental health episode had caused
Speaker 1: the incident. A staffer who for Chris Losavita, the one
Speaker 1: who does not know its hallowed ground is a quote
Speaker 1: disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hollowed grounds
Speaker 1: of Arlington National Cemetery. Chung had also insisted nine days
Speaker 1: ago that exculpatory video existed and the Trump campaign had
Speaker 1: it and was prepared to release it if the quote
Speaker 1: defamatory claims continued. There has been no release video. There's
Speaker 1: been no evidence provided that any video exists, except, of course,
Speaker 1: the video that Trump's campaign illegally recorded at the grave
Speaker 1: sites of other dead American war heroes whose families did
Speaker 1: not give permission for such filming, and which in any
Speaker 1: case cannot legally be used for political purposes, which is
Speaker 1: exactly what Trump's gang promptly did. But this from Trump,
Speaker 1: this is an escalation. Regardless of how crazy he is
Speaker 1: or how crazy what he wrote sounds, Trump has now
Speaker 1: painted himself into a corner. He has entirely changed his
Speaker 1: version of this story. This is no longer a staffer
Speaker 1: overreacting or worse, this is a story quote made up
Speaker 1: by Kamala Harris that in turn implies that there is
Speaker 1: not any Trump videotape, exonerating the Trump team of what
Speaker 1: the Army has previously stated was an incident which at
Speaker 1: least one Trumpist at least put hands on the woman employee.
Speaker 1: This was already enough to put the two Secretaries of Defense,
Speaker 1: Lloyd Austin at the Veterans' Affairs Dennis McDonough in a
Speaker 1: position of no longer just having to defend a cemetery
Speaker 1: staffer who is justifiably terrified of retribution from Trump's psychotic
Speaker 1: cult and from Trump himself. Trump has now just said
Speaker 1: the whole thing was made up, made up by the
Speaker 1: Vice President, that implies that all statements from the military
Speaker 1: are fictional, that the army's public support for the employee
Speaker 1: is part of some kind of smear campaign against Trump.
Speaker 1: In some that the staff at Arlington National Cemetery, that
Speaker 1: the executives at the VA, that the Pentagon, that the
Speaker 1: military itself, that all of them are lying. And then
Speaker 1: the Fox Nickel Dime bullies chimed in and somehow made
Speaker 1: this worse for Trump. In terms of the incident, said
Speaker 1: Jesse Waters, the one who stalked a Think Progress writer
Speaker 1: on orders from Bill O'Reilly years ago, there was no
Speaker 1: incident from what I understand. A woman had a mental issue,
Speaker 1: and I don't know if it was TDS or something else,
Speaker 1: but it was handled if there was an altercation, said
Speaker 1: Janine Piro, the one who was charged with driving one
Speaker 1: hundred and nineteen miles an hour in a sixty five
Speaker 1: mile an hour zone. Get yourself an affidavit that's sworn
Speaker 1: to file yourself some criminal charges, or shut the f up,
Speaker 1: unquote advice. Miss Piro has never taken herself. At this point,
Speaker 1: the Pentagon does not have much choice. Trump has called
Speaker 1: everybody from the unnamed staffer at Arlington through the Pentagon
Speaker 1: to the Vice President not just liars but fabricators, part
Speaker 1: of a conspiracy against him. I am not usually big
Speaker 1: on in the honor of the military, but I do
Speaker 1: come from a line of veterans, literally stretching back to
Speaker 1: Ferdinand Lewis Jacob, my second great grand uncle on my
Speaker 1: mother's side. He fought in the Civil War, he survived
Speaker 1: three months as a pow at the Confederate death camp
Speaker 1: at Andersonville. And all those related veterans I knew, including
Speaker 1: my father and for all I know great grand uncle Ferdinand,
Speaker 1: were proud of their work in the military, but they
Speaker 1: all warned about the dangers of worshiping the military for
Speaker 1: its own sake, but Trump's pattern, sequence series compulsion to
Speaker 1: smear those who sacrificed anything for this country, whether it
Speaker 1: was voluntarily or because they were drafted, whether it was
Speaker 1: just a few months of annoyance at Fort Dix, or
Speaker 1: it was managing to not starve to death at Andersonville
Speaker 1: because he found a hidden onion bush like Ferdinand Jacob,
Speaker 1: or like getting shot down over Hanoi like John McCain,
Speaker 1: or it was dying like those Trump literally walked all
Speaker 1: over to take a campaign photo. There is a line here,
Speaker 1: even for the most cynical among us. There is a
Speaker 1: line here, and Trump has once again crossed it. There
Speaker 1: are means to protect the actual reputation of the military
Speaker 1: while also protecting the staffer, the woman who was verbally
Speaker 1: and physically abused in some way in real time and
Speaker 1: was then immediately slandered in acts of unvarnished misogyny by
Speaker 1: Stephen Chung and Chris los Avida. And if the orders
Speaker 1: have to come from the commander in chief, President Biden
Speaker 1: should give them. There is a woman here, the latest
Speaker 1: among thousands physically and or emotionally abused by Trump and
Speaker 1: his thugs. There is an American institution here, however flawed
Speaker 1: it has been at many times which Trump has suddenly
Speaker 1: decided and yet another episode of delusional paranoia he must break.
Speaker 1: They all deserve to be defended. The fundamental decency of
Speaker 1: this country demands they be defended. There needs to be
Speaker 1: a Senate hearing on this event. Start it immediately. If
Speaker 1: the VA or the Department of Defense have to investigate
Speaker 1: and report, do it, and do it now. If there
Speaker 1: is security video at Arlington, and one cannot imagine there
Speaker 1: is not, it must be released with the woman's image
Speaker 1: blurred and her identity otherwise protected. And the idea that
Speaker 1: just leaving this alone now will protect her is naive
Speaker 1: at best. These are Trumpsts. They have the selfishness and
Speaker 1: amorality and animal cunning of stalkers. They will identify her
Speaker 1: sooner or later, or maybe worse still, they will identify
Speaker 1: the wrong woman sooner or later. And the most certain
Speaker 1: and most complete way of defending this employee and the
Speaker 1: VA and the Department of Defense and the nation is
Speaker 1: to once again prove that Donald Trump's entire Patriotism Act
Speaker 1: is a bitterly cynical and corrupt confidence trick. That the
Speaker 1: last man in this country who should be able to
Speaker 1: pretend to be the victim of some sort of complex
Speaker 1: scheme concocted by the Vice president and the army. Is
Speaker 1: this creature Trump who evaded military service with bone spurs
Speaker 1: that go on and off like a bad Neon sign.
Speaker 1: The incident alone was enough to make a seventeen year
Speaker 1: service veteran, a first lieutenant erupt in righteous indignation. Yesterday
Speaker 1: the Trump campaign event at Arlington, was the first lieutenant
Speaker 1: told CNN a quote violation. It just blows me away.
Speaker 1: These men and women that are laying in the ground
Speaker 1: there have no choice unquote whether or not to be
Speaker 1: extras in yet another Trump sales video. The first Lieutenant's
Speaker 1: name is Jimmy McCain. He is the son of the
Speaker 1: late Senator John McCain. He says he has changed voter
Speaker 1: registrations and is now because of Trump, a Democrat who
Speaker 1: will vote for Kamala Harris. It was seventy years ago
Speaker 1: this past March, the last time a cheap, mentally ill
Speaker 1: politician tried to take on the American military, Even though
Speaker 1: it was one of those rare occasions when the military
Speaker 1: was entirely right and the civilian was entirely wrong. On
Speaker 1: that occasion, it was Senator Joseph McCarthy, at the height
Speaker 1: of his perversion of the Senate Subcommittee on Investigations, the
Speaker 1: pinnacle of that edition of the Red Scare, and McCarthy
Speaker 1: began to accuse the military of subversion by communists. He
Speaker 1: started it in nineteen fifty three, and as nineteen fifty
Speaker 1: four loomed, he had his Chief Council imply that the
Speaker 1: Army had drafted a McCarthy staffer, a man named G.
Speaker 1: David Shine, to try to hamstring McCarthy's investigation of the Army.
Speaker 1: The Secretary of the Army, in turn said that McCarthy
Speaker 1: and his lawyer had pressured the Army to give this
Speaker 1: Shine guy preferential treatment, even a commission, even it was
Speaker 1: rumored a deal by which McCarthy would slow walk its
Speaker 1: investigation of the Army if the Army gave Shine better treatment.
Speaker 1: McCarthy then insisted the Army had made that accusation in
Speaker 1: bad faith and as retaliation for his investigations. The next
Speaker 1: thing you knew, the Senate called hearings the Army. McCarthy.
Speaker 1: Hearings began on March sixteenth, nineteen fifty four. Soon they
Speaker 1: were being televised, gabbled to gabble all day on multiple
Speaker 1: television networks when there were only four of them. By
Speaker 1: June ninth, the army's civilian lawyer, Joe Welch was famously
Speaker 1: asking McCarthy, have you no sense of decency? Sir? By
Speaker 1: December second, the Senate had censured McCarthy. By nineteen fifty seven,
Speaker 1: hopelessly broken by alcoholism and almost forgotten, Joe McCarthy was dead.
Speaker 1: I go into such detail not to suggest that is
Speaker 1: what will or should happen to Trump just because of this,
Speaker 1: but because you would think Trump would remember that it
Speaker 1: was what happened to Joe McCarthy. Joe McCarthy's chief counsel,
Speaker 1: the man at the center of all this was, after all,
Speaker 1: the future Trump mentor Roy Cone. Roy Cone, venomous as
Speaker 1: he was, would have probably told Trump to make sure
Speaker 1: that there weren't security cameras at Arlington before implying that
Speaker 1: the entirety of the Army was lying about this. There
Speaker 1: probably was some point in Trump's life when he would
Speaker 1: have listened to roy Cone telling him that. However, I
Speaker 1: believe that today we are many decades removed from that moment.
Speaker 1: The other investigation I urged here yesterday has begun, albeit
Speaker 1: in the wrong chamber, with little hope of a meaningful
Speaker 1: outcome unless the Democrats take the House. But at least
Speaker 1: Congressman Jamie Raskin and Robert Garcia, representing the minority on
Speaker 1: the House Oversight Committee and the National Security Subcommittee, have
Speaker 1: launched an investigation into the report by The Washington Post
Speaker 1: that Trump may have been bribed with ten million dollars
Speaker 1: by the Egyptian president ELCSI in the waning weeks of
Speaker 1: the twenty sixteen campaign, and that his own Department of
Speaker 1: Justice covered it up. The Democrats could very well take
Speaker 1: the House, in which case this will not be some
Speaker 1: sort of Jamie Comer stage show with Marjorie Barney rubble
Speaker 1: Green holding up enlarged porn. Right now, it is a
Speaker 1: stake hammered into the ground, the way an announcement from
Speaker 1: the Defense Department or a Senate committee about releasing Arlington's
Speaker 1: security video would be a stake hammered into the ground.
Speaker 1: But as an aside, it is fascinating to contemplate just
Speaker 1: how much will rain down on Trump's head legally if
Speaker 1: he loses on November fifth. Add Egypt to that list.
Speaker 1: And now we must make sure somebody adds the Trump
Speaker 1: Arlington Cemetery scandals to that list. And as to the
Speaker 1: event central to the trials of Donald Trump, polling news
Speaker 1: continues consistent and strong but hardly conclusive. USA Today and
Speaker 1: Suffolk University Harris now leads Trump forty eight to forty three.
Speaker 1: That is, within their margin of error. One in ten
Speaker 1: voters say the televised debate next Tuesday might lead them
Speaker 1: to change their mind or they are undecided. The booze
Speaker 1: for Democrats USA Today concludes has extended down the ballot.
Speaker 1: In June, registered voters said they supported their local Republican
Speaker 1: congressional candidate over the Democrat by forty seven forty five.
Speaker 1: Now it's the local Democrat over the Republican by forty
Speaker 1: eight forty three, a swing of seven points for the
Speaker 1: House candidates. In the vote poll in June by USA
Speaker 1: Today and Suffolk, Trump supporters were twice as likely as
Speaker 1: Joe Biden supporters to report being very excited about voting
Speaker 1: for their candidate. The enthusiasm score was Trump fifty nine,
Speaker 1: Biden thirty now, while Trump's enthusiasm remains at sixty percent
Speaker 1: In the new poll of likely voters, Enthusiasm among Harris
Speaker 1: supporters is at sixty eight percent. Biden was a thirty percent.
Speaker 1: Some other interior numbers of importance. Voters favored Trump on
Speaker 1: the economy by six, it was fourteen. They favor him
Speaker 1: on immigration by three. It was thirteen. On national security
Speaker 1: and China, they favor him by four. That was ten.
Speaker 1: There is something of a scare from Michigan polling yesterday,
Speaker 1: but it is safe to take it with a grain
Speaker 1: of salt. The Detroit News and Channel four there did
Speaker 1: a Michigan pole with Glen Gariff Group. It's Trump forty
Speaker 1: four point seven Harris forty three point five, or, as
Speaker 1: the newspaper headlined it, presidential race a toss up in Michigan.
Speaker 1: The same polster had found Harris ahead by three tenths
Speaker 1: of one point in July, and that two needed a
Speaker 1: grain of salt because at the five thirty eight rankings
Speaker 1: of pollsters, Glen Garriff Group, which did the Michigan Pole,
Speaker 1: got a poll score of minus zero point two. It
Speaker 1: ranks one hundred and seventy fifth out of your top
Speaker 1: fifty polsters, and on a scale of one to three stars,
Speaker 1: it gets one and a half. There is also the
Speaker 1: other kind of number, and I'll just read this from Politico.
Speaker 1: The leader of House Republicans' biggest super pac told donors
Speaker 1: last month he needed thirty five million dollars more to
Speaker 1: compete with Democrats in the fall. Senate GOP campaign chair
Speaker 1: Steve Danes used his primetime speaking slot at the Republican
Speaker 1: convention to lament that massive spending from Democrats was keeping
Speaker 1: him awake at night, and his House GOP counterpart warned
Speaker 1: that their party's challengers trailed Democratic incumbents by a collective
Speaker 1: thirty seven million dollars at the end of June. The
Speaker 1: money quote panic is starting to set in. Oh no,
Speaker 1: not panic, Not panic by the Republicans. Oh damn well,
Speaker 1: at least for the sake of fairness. The Republicans and
Speaker 1: their propaganda channels have the game plan to win back
Speaker 1: the White House. The searing attacks on Kamala Harris's record
Speaker 1: and personal integrity that come day after day and week
Speaker 1: after week, that absolutely, under no circumstances make anybody an
Speaker 1: authority erupt in rage at them, nor anybody at home
Speaker 1: burst out into uncontrollable laughter. Fox White House quote correspondent
Speaker 1: quote Peter Doucy to Press Secretary of Karine Jean Pierre.
Speaker 1: Since when does the vice president have what sounds like
Speaker 1: a Southern accent? I have no idea what you're talking about. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean this is she was talking about unions in
Speaker 1: Detroit using one tone of voice. Is this same line, okay, Peter?
Speaker 1: Did she She's the same line in Pittsburgh, And it
Speaker 1: sounded like she at least had some kind of a
Speaker 1: southern at all. I mean, do you hear the question
Speaker 1: that I mean, do you think Americans seriously think that
Speaker 1: this is an important question? Yeah, she used a Southern
Speaker 1: accent in Detroit. You say Detroit, which I believe was
Speaker 1: the capital of the Confederacy, if my second great granduncle
Speaker 1: remembers correct. Peter Doocey, son of Fox's Steve Doocy, Peter Doocy,
Speaker 1: whose pre Fox resume consisted of work at Polestra dot
Speaker 1: net and of course other places. Well, no, no other places,
Speaker 1: just Polestra dot net. Then right to take your son
Speaker 1: to work day at Fox. What we need is Peter
Speaker 1: Doocey at the White House podium being asked why Fox
Speaker 1: has a NEPO baby covering the White House, to which
Speaker 1: his best answer would be day. I use the phrase
Speaker 1: money quote earlier, I will use it again here in
Speaker 1: an entirely different context. There is this for those of
Speaker 1: you so into campaigns and elections at politics might as
Speaker 1: well be porn. Mark Robinson is the sometimes out loud, stupid,
Speaker 1: sometimes dangerous Republican nominee for governor of North Carolina. The
Speaker 1: some folks need killing guy, a born again who is
Speaker 1: already lieutenant governor. There the North Carolina News outlet. The
Speaker 1: Assembly reports, according to Lewis Money, who worked in several
Speaker 1: of Greensboro's window list twenty four hour video pornography stores,
Speaker 1: Mark Robinson was a frequent customer in the nineteen nineties
Speaker 1: and early two thousands. As an asidal note it's a
Speaker 1: free country, resuming the quote, Money fifty two told the
Speaker 1: Assembly that Robinson came in as often as five nights
Speaker 1: a week to watch porn videos in a private booth.
Speaker 1: Never shake this man's hand. Five other men who said
Speaker 1: they were former employees or customers during this period also
Speaker 1: told the Assembly that Robinson visited two of these stores,
Speaker 1: Gents Video and News and I forty Video and News.
Speaker 1: In addition, in addition Money said, Robinson purchased hundreds of
Speaker 1: bootleg porn videos that Money sold on the side. Quote,
Speaker 1: he was good for at least one a week, Money said.
Speaker 1: The last one he described as a compilation of super
Speaker 1: hardcore films he acquired in New York City that were
Speaker 1: too risk to be sold in North Carolina. To risk
Speaker 1: to be sold in North Carolina, you say, but sold
Speaker 1: in New York and then brought back to North Carolina.
Speaker 1: Sold in New York. Well, just for the sake of argument,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna guess that he means the ones that were
Speaker 1: shot at Trump Tower. Just a guess. A spokesman for
Speaker 1: Lieutenant Governor Robinson called that whole thing fiction, and the
Speaker 1: reporters quote degenerates, Oh, degenerate, reporter's gone wild, save a
Speaker 1: copy for Mark Robinson. And there is a punchline upon punchline,
Speaker 1: mister money. That's mister money, presumably of gents video and
Speaker 1: news says that the final super hardcore compilation video, the
Speaker 1: Sizzle Reel, the New York stuff. He charged Robinson twenty
Speaker 1: five dollars for it, and Robinson still hasn't paid him.
Speaker 1: Also of interest, here, Tommy Timmy Tammy Laren steps into
Speaker 1: the worst persons Spotlight. They can't figure out why the
Speaker 1: Vice President of the United States can't take a phone
Speaker 1: call while on wireless earbuds like everybody else. And Elon
Speaker 1: Musk believes the world should be run only by high
Speaker 1: status males. Now, why would he want to exclude himself
Speaker 1: like that? That's next, This just countdown. George Carlin, pleasure
Speaker 1: to have you here. Thank you. This is the best
Speaker 1: news show ever. I toilet to one of your producers,
Speaker 1: and I want you to know that I've seen them
Speaker 1: all and it's just for especially the first thirty five minutes.
Speaker 1: Thank you. It's just unparalleled. I got bad news between
Speaker 1: you and I. We got six minutes to completely still
Speaker 1: that in. Yeah, that's good. Tell ahead of us on
Speaker 1: this initiative. Countdown. Football starts tomorrow night to continue a
Speaker 1: week long celebration of the beginning of yet another season
Speaker 1: in the National Football League. Permit me, the former host
Speaker 1: of Football Night in America, to tell you the saga
Speaker 1: of the year. The season started and then suddenly stopped
Speaker 1: because the players' union walked out on strike, and I
Speaker 1: went with them, and I got to go get drunk
Speaker 1: with all of them. The impossible sagas of Me the
Speaker 1: Rookie Reporter, and the nineteen eighty two NFL strike. Next
Speaker 1: in Things I Promised not to tell first, there are
Speaker 1: still more new idiots to talk about. The daily roundup
Speaker 1: of the miss Grants, morons and Dunning Kruger effects specimens
Speaker 1: who constitute today's worst persons in the world. He could
Speaker 1: go all the way, the brons, he could go all
Speaker 1: the way. We'd be satisfied if he just went away. Elon,
Speaker 1: Elon Musk, you remember Elon Musk. This one would be higher,
Speaker 1: but for two reasons. First of all, it's from Sunday,
Speaker 1: so it's getting a little stale. I mean, it's stunk
Speaker 1: to begin with it. It's not stinking that much more
Speaker 1: than it was Sunday, it's just old. The second reason,
Speaker 1: I'll note in a moment, you'll notice that Elon Musk
Speaker 1: turns out not to have been very bright, just very
Speaker 1: lucky with other people's ideas. He's made billions of dollars,
Speaker 1: and now he's burning through billions of dollars at a
Speaker 1: rate that will leave him on a fixed income by
Speaker 1: some time in the year twenty thirty one. If there
Speaker 1: is a year twenty thirty one, and if Elon has
Speaker 1: his way, there probably won't be a year twenty thirty one.
Speaker 1: His rockets don't work, his cars don't work, and his
Speaker 1: website doesn't work, but that's not stopping him because all
Speaker 1: he has is people around him telling him everything's better
Speaker 1: than ever, and he's now reduced to the level of
Speaker 1: a mediocre QAnon person online. Now we know why he
Speaker 1: bought Twitter to turn it into a right wing website
Speaker 1: that would argue that rich right wingers should be allowed
Speaker 1: to rule the world, and if we don't let them,
Speaker 1: they'll simply buy the world from us and rule it anyway.
Speaker 1: Somebody with the account titled autism Capital put this out
Speaker 1: and added also known as the Reich effect, and Elon
Speaker 1: retweeted it with the number three of his thirty observations
Speaker 1: on all tweets that's interesting or deserves thought or very interesting.
Speaker 1: This is interesting observation. Elon says, people who can't defend
Speaker 1: themselves physically, women and low team men parse information through
Speaker 1: a consensus filter as a safety mechanism, writes autism Capital.
Speaker 1: They literally do not ask is this true? They ask,
Speaker 1: will others be okay? With me? Thinking this is true? Well,
Speaker 1: this is provably false. The number of people who actually
Speaker 1: do this I don't know, but they're all Trump supporters.
Speaker 1: This makes them very malleable to brute force manufactured consensus.
Speaker 1: If every screen they look at says the same thing,
Speaker 1: they will adopt that position because their brain interprets it
Speaker 1: as everyone in the tribe believing it. Well, that's the
Speaker 1: premise of Elon Musk's website. Anyway. The conclusion here is
Speaker 1: only high t alpha males and a neurotypical people hey, autists,
Speaker 1: are actually free to parse new information with an objection objective.
Speaker 1: Rather is this true filter that's also provably untrue. This
Speaker 1: is why a republic, here's the punchline. This is why
Speaker 1: a republic of high status males is best for decision
Speaker 1: making democratic, but a democracy only for those who are
Speaker 1: free to think. Well, first of all, what a novel idea, Elon,
Speaker 1: a republic of high status males only because we've never
Speaker 1: had any government in this world. No country in the
Speaker 1: history of civilization has been run only by men who
Speaker 1: thought they were high status, usually erroneously. We've never had
Speaker 1: that before, even though there's never been up to this
Speaker 1: point a woman president of the United States, or see
Speaker 1: there's only been what three women prime minister is in
Speaker 1: the United Kingdom, and one of them didn't last as
Speaker 1: long as the head of Lettuce and that you know
Speaker 1: that whole thing. Yeah, I'm sure what a novel idea.
Speaker 1: Let's have some Let's have some high status males who
Speaker 1: are wrong about that too, being the ones making all
Speaker 1: the decisions. So not only is it stupid, not only
Speaker 1: does it go right into Elon Musk's ego, but the
Speaker 1: second issue is this guy autism capital is on four Chan,
Speaker 1: which is for people who are not smart enough nor
Speaker 1: discerning enough to be in QAnon. They want a democracy
Speaker 1: to exist solely of high status males because that would
Speaker 1: be best. Well, what on earth would that have to
Speaker 1: do with Elon Musk high status male? Does Elon Musk
Speaker 1: really consider himself a high status male with that haircut? Anyway?
Speaker 1: The runner up the Silver Act devote and alleged polster.
Speaker 1: We can thank for this a former poster named Adam
Speaker 1: Carlson who says he has signed up for Active Vote
Speaker 1: via their app. He said he said his name was
Speaker 1: Gregor Mendel and that he lives in Arizona and he
Speaker 1: put as his home address city Hall Phoenix, Arizona. There
Speaker 1: was zero verification of any of these things. He adds,
Speaker 1: my candidate preferences will be reflected in their next Arizona poll.
Speaker 1: He says, he then deleted all of the information. He
Speaker 1: was just doing this to prove a point. The activision
Speaker 1: folks are active vote folks, not activision. That was a
Speaker 1: game console, if I remember correctly. The active vote folks
Speaker 1: say that this is all part of the process and
Speaker 1: it allows the full range of voters, the real ones
Speaker 1: and the fake ones, to express their opinions. And I
Speaker 1: want to just thank Adam Carlson for revealing that we
Speaker 1: don't need to take seriously Active vote any further. Congratulations also,
Speaker 1: mister Carlson on supporting Reuben Diego for Senator. I guess
Speaker 1: we should call you Abbot Mendel, not Adam Carlson. And
Speaker 1: congratulations Abbot Mendel on your work with peas and heredity. Sadly,
Speaker 1: some of those recessive genes that you discovered all those
Speaker 1: years ago apparently gathered together to form Active Vote. But
Speaker 1: our winner, right wing troll Tommy larn you know her,
Speaker 1: blonde number three hundred and eighty nine on the right,
Speaker 1: I really can't get over Kamala using old school Apple
Speaker 1: headphones to avoid talking to the press. Tommy's life is
Speaker 1: in one long assumption. She's got a photo off c
Speaker 1: Span in which the Vice President of the United States
Speaker 1: is being escorted either to the helicopter or off the helicopter,
Speaker 1: while wearing attached to a phone, a pair of Apple
Speaker 1: iPad phones or iPod phones, or just Apple iPhones, but
Speaker 1: with the wire not the buds. We've seen a lot
Speaker 1: of shenanigans from this lady, Tommy writes, but this might
Speaker 1: be the most pathetic to date. Feels like her campaign
Speaker 1: specifically had her use those old school headphones instead to
Speaker 1: make the point she was on the phone and that's
Speaker 1: why she couldn't interact. Well, she did interact number one.
Speaker 1: Number two Tommy again is assuming several things that she's
Speaker 1: already stating as facts because she's assuming them, Which sends
Speaker 1: me back to that first group, that guy who said
Speaker 1: that we should be run by a bunch of high
Speaker 1: functioning something or others. In any event, the photo just
Speaker 1: has Kamala Harris waving to the press and not stopping
Speaker 1: for questions. You know, the headphones, Timmy, are there because
Speaker 1: the vice president of the United States is on a
Speaker 1: phone call, which is presumably not about dry cleaning. It's
Speaker 1: presumably about something you know important, and that's a secure
Speaker 1: mobile device that the phones are attached to. And if
Speaker 1: you were to wear earbuds or other wireless connections, Tammy,
Speaker 1: the conversation could be intercepted electronically, and you'd know that, Tony,
Speaker 1: if you'd ever had an important phone conversation or any
Speaker 1: kind of important conversation in the entirety of your worthless,
Speaker 1: useless life. Tommy Laren just not right. Two days worst
Speaker 1: person in the world. I thought I could see it
Speaker 1: through the swinging kitchen door of the Il Vagabondo restaurant
Speaker 1: on East sixty second Street in New York. What I
Speaker 1: thought I saw seemed to be an extraordinarily large man
Speaker 1: standing over one of the large kitchen sinks, holding one
Speaker 1: of the kitchen's big, flexible rubber water hoses and drinking
Speaker 1: from it. It was an unusual enough sight, but there
Speaker 1: was also a complication. That extraordinarily large man was one
Speaker 1: of my dinner guests, and his name was Gene Upshaw,
Speaker 1: the just retired offensive guard of the Oakland Raiders and
Speaker 1: president of the National Football League Players Association. Jean was
Speaker 1: six foot five, two hundred and sixty pounds, but he
Speaker 1: seemed much larger than that. If he wanted to drink
Speaker 1: out of one of the giant kitchen hoses, I wasn't
Speaker 1: going to stop him, Nor was anybody in the kitchen,
Speaker 1: nor was everybody combined on East sixty second Street, nor
Speaker 1: was anybody in the city on that Saturday night so
Speaker 1: long ago. Two nights later, Jean and the executive director
Speaker 1: of the National Football League Players Association Ed Garvey and
Speaker 1: its outside council Chip Yablonski, would officially take their union
Speaker 1: out on the last successful strike in pro football and
Speaker 1: introduced to the entire world of sports what was then
Speaker 1: and I literally mean then that evening on CNN, just
Speaker 1: before our trip to the restaurant whose kitchen hose Jen
Speaker 1: was now drinking out him would then introduced to sports
Speaker 1: what was then described by an nationally prominent sports writer
Speaker 1: live on TV as quote communism. Executive director Garvey had
Speaker 1: proposed a deal with the owners that would be based
Speaker 1: on giving the players a percentage of gross income fifty
Speaker 1: five cents out of every dollar taken in by football.
Speaker 1: It would be given to the players and within a
Speaker 1: structure allowing for individual players to negotiate individual contracts. The
Speaker 1: players would basically figure out how the rest of their
Speaker 1: fifty five percent would be divvied up among them. The
Speaker 1: owners would keep forty five percent and divvy it up
Speaker 1: any way they wanted to. Today, this is the basis
Speaker 1: of the contract offers made by the sports owners to
Speaker 1: the players' union. But in nineteen eighty two, on September eighteenth,
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty two, live on CNN with me as host,
Speaker 1: this was called communism by the Atlanta Journal Constitution sports
Speaker 1: writer Furman Bisher, whom I had been reading since I
Speaker 1: was a kid. Bisher was one of the guests in
Speaker 1: a space show which I anchored from New York with
Speaker 1: Garvey and Upshaw in the studio with me, Bisher went further.
Speaker 1: He called Garvy a communist, and I apologized, and Garby said,
Speaker 1: I have been called worse today. This was why we
Speaker 1: were all out to dinner at Il Vagabondo, an Italian
Speaker 1: restaurant so Italian that there was a BATCHI ball court
Speaker 1: in the middle of the main dining room. Our CNN
Speaker 1: executive sports producer Rick Davis had said that if I
Speaker 1: could talk Garvey and upshaw into going on our show
Speaker 1: on a Saturday. I could take them out to dinner,
Speaker 1: he added, no, and I mean it a nice restaurant.
Speaker 1: Garvey had already turned into a great source and a
Speaker 1: great friend with whom I would stay in touch for
Speaker 1: thirty five years. The day before, he had matter of
Speaker 1: factly told me, and only me, a sports reporter from
Speaker 1: an obscure TV cable network called CNN, that when the
Speaker 1: union's executive council met the following Monday, that there was
Speaker 1: only one option on its table, a strike. It was
Speaker 1: a huge scoop. Later, Garvey would tell me that the
Speaker 1: union had made a deal with Ted Turner, who happened
Speaker 1: to own my network. If the union could get the
Speaker 1: National Labor Relations Board to rule that the owners had
Speaker 1: forced that strike, the union would be entitled to break
Speaker 1: all its contracts with the National Football League and sign
Speaker 1: a new deal where the players and Ted Turner would
Speaker 1: co own all of professional football in this country. What
Speaker 1: you like to do? Play by play? Ed said, It
Speaker 1: didn't happen, obviously, but that also was a great scoop,
Speaker 1: and they tried it out in miniature. They played two
Speaker 1: glorified pickup games, one at the LA Coliseum one at
Speaker 1: RFK Stadium in Washington under the greatest sports league acronym
Speaker 1: of all time, All Star Season yep ass. It was
Speaker 1: also Ed Garvey. A month later, in the middle of
Speaker 1: a press blackout imposed by the National Labor Relations Board
Speaker 1: mediator who sneaked into my hotel room outside of Baltimore
Speaker 1: and gave me an exclusive interview. Anyway, Garvy arrived just
Speaker 1: after a housekeeper had knocked on my room door, and
Speaker 1: without waiting for an answer, had entered. That housekeeper saw
Speaker 1: the following scene, me in a suit sitting on a chair,
Speaker 1: the CNN cameraman sitting at a table with his big
Speaker 1: bulky camera and tripod, and the videotape deck operator who
Speaker 1: happened to be a woman lounging atop my still unmade
Speaker 1: bed watching her favorite soap opera on TV. The housekeeper
Speaker 1: took one look, literally shouted Lordie, and she backed out
Speaker 1: of the room, nearly knocking down ed Garvey in the process.
Speaker 1: Later in the strike, the mediator quit the talks one night,
Speaker 1: then the owner's guy also walked out, leaving Ed Garvey
Speaker 1: and the players by themselves. I sat Garvey down for
Speaker 1: another interview and I asked him, will the absence of
Speaker 1: the media and the league's negotiator make any tangible difference
Speaker 1: in the negotiations? And Garvey laughed without interruption for ninety seconds.
Speaker 1: Gene Upshaw, who in telling this story, I have left
Speaker 1: in the kitchen drinking from the hose all this time,
Speaker 1: And it's actually almost how long he did drink from
Speaker 1: the hose that night. He was just as good a
Speaker 1: friend and a source, whip, smart, and often too honest
Speaker 1: for his own good. Five years later, when he had
Speaker 1: succeeded Garvey as executive director and the players again went
Speaker 1: on strike against the NFL, I had a tip that
Speaker 1: the strike was collapsing because the owners had brought in
Speaker 1: scab players and they kept playing games anyway. I called
Speaker 1: a lawyer I knew in the union, and he was
Speaker 1: hemming and hawing when I heard him say, wait, Gene
Speaker 1: wants to talk to you. All Gene Upshaw did was
Speaker 1: off the record confirm that the strike had indeed collapsed,
Speaker 1: and he expected lots of union players to cross the
Speaker 1: picket lines the next morning. I said, I can use this,
Speaker 1: He said, You've always been honest with me. The least
Speaker 1: I can do is be honest with you. Matter of fact,
Speaker 1: you can say high placed union sources told you. Ah,
Speaker 1: screw it, you can quote me Keith. But wait till
Speaker 1: after midnight, my time, I got to call these guy. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: this meant that when I interviewed the now Los Angeles
Speaker 1: Raiders team union rep live on TV a few hours
Speaker 1: later in Los Angeles, and I asked him if the
Speaker 1: strike was in its final hours, he said no, and
Speaker 1: I said, he kind of is. And it was the
Speaker 1: head of his union who had told me so. Anyway,
Speaker 1: that night at il Vagabondo, Upshaw and Garvey and Chipyablonsky
Speaker 1: told me twenty stories I would have killed to use
Speaker 1: that night, but they were all off the record. I
Speaker 1: think I can mention a couple of them now, since
Speaker 1: it's Check's watch. Forty years later, at one bargaining session,
Speaker 1: one of the league's lawyers, Vince Lombardi Junior, was arguing
Speaker 1: with one of the player bargainers, linebacker Stan White of
Speaker 1: the Detroit Lions, who was also a lawyer. The players
Speaker 1: were asking for something that is still a bone of
Speaker 1: contention between the two sides, full access to their own
Speaker 1: team medical personal records. Vince Lombardi Jr. Looked at White
Speaker 1: and said, what are you going to do with them?
Speaker 1: Even if we gave them to you, You guys are
Speaker 1: too stupid to understand them. At that point, White, who
Speaker 1: might have been a lawyer but was also still a linebacker,
Speaker 1: leaped over the bargaining table and tried to get his
Speaker 1: hands around Lombardi's throat. There were also a few hours
Speaker 1: of shared insults about top NFL announcers and executives and players,
Speaker 1: and a good deal of wine at this dinner, and periodically,
Speaker 1: when there were no more breadsticks at the table, or
Speaker 1: antipasto at the table, or water at the table, Gin
Speaker 1: Upshaw would simply get up and go into the kitchen
Speaker 1: and get it himself. When the evening was over, my
Speaker 1: diary notes that we had spent for four men, four
Speaker 1: large men, of whom I was the smallest, with wine,
Speaker 1: with a generous tip at a top New York restaurant
Speaker 1: on CNN's dime. The staggering figure of one hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty five dollars still translates only to about four hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy bucks today. It was a lot of money
Speaker 1: then CNN was paying me twenty six thousand dollars a year. Anyway,
Speaker 1: we all walked out into a lovely New York September
Speaker 1: Saturday night. Garby, Pupshaw, and Yablonski were all staying in
Speaker 1: a hotel, not from where we had eaten and not
Speaker 1: far from where I lived, So I walked them back
Speaker 1: and Upshaw had one more immortal memory left to create.
Speaker 1: It happened that he was on the cover of that
Speaker 1: week's edition of Newsweek magazine. And as we passed one
Speaker 1: of the old, ubiquitous Manhattan newstands, which were just tiny
Speaker 1: shacks on nearly every corner of the city, Jean leaned
Speaker 1: down and into the little window through which the newsstand
Speaker 1: operator peered out, and he said, politely but firmly, have
Speaker 1: you got a copy of the one with me on
Speaker 1: the cover? Face? It nowhere else in the news world
Speaker 1: or in the sports world? Are you going to get
Speaker 1: that as your twenty twenty four NFL season preview? And
Speaker 1: all the damage I can do here for one day?
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening. Please share this podcast with somebody
Speaker 1: who doesn't already. Brian Ray and John Phillips Chanelle, the
Speaker 1: musical directors, have Countdown, arranged, produced, and performed most of
Speaker 1: our music, including this here what you're hearing behind me now.
Speaker 1: Mister Shanale handled orchestration in keyboards. Mister Ray was on
Speaker 1: the guitars, bass and drums. Although they did not actually
Speaker 1: write this, it was produced by Tko Brothers. Our satirical
Speaker 1: and pithy musical comments are by the best baseball stadium
Speaker 1: organist ever, Nancy Faust. The sports music when we have
Speaker 1: a sports segment is the Olderman theme from ESPN two,
Speaker 1: written by Mitch Warren Davis Curtisy VESPN Inc. Other music
Speaker 1: arranged and performed by a group called No Horns Allowed.
Speaker 1: My announcer today was my late friend George Carlin. Everything
Speaker 1: else was pretty much my fault. Let's countdown for this
Speaker 1: the sixty third day until the twenty twenty four presidential election.
Speaker 1: And yes I'm saying sixty third, others will say sixty second.
Speaker 1: Today I am including election day itself, because that is
Speaker 1: the day when a terrifyingly large number of people actually
Speaker 1: decide who to vote for on election day, on their
Speaker 1: way to the polls, or sometimes while they're standing there.
Speaker 1: In any event, the sixty third day until the election
Speaker 1: also the three hundred and thirty first day since convicted
Speaker 1: felon Donald J. Trump's first attempted coup against the democratically
Speaker 1: elected government of the United States. Use the September eighteenth
Speaker 1: sentencing hearing if it happens, use the mental health system.
Speaker 1: Use presidential immunity. The Supreme Theocratic Court has given it
Speaker 1: to you. President Biden. I say, if it's official, it's legal.
Speaker 1: So crazy, go nuts, have fun. The next scheduled countdown
Speaker 1: is tomorrow boltons as the news requires, until the next one,
Speaker 1: whenever that is. I'm Keith Olrimman. Good morning, good afternoon,
Speaker 1: good night, and good luck. Countdown with Keith Olderman is
Speaker 1: a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
Speaker 1: the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.