Speaker 1: Countdown with Keith Olderman is a production of iHeartRadio. I
Speaker 1: am beginning to suspect that Trump's lawyer Todd Blanche is
Speaker 1: going to find it hard to get paid, so his
Speaker 1: final defense witness so disrespected the judge that the judge
Speaker 1: cleared the courtroom in order to scream at the man.
Speaker 1: His gotcha moment from last week was disproved yesterday by
Speaker 1: not just videotape, but c span videotape at his gotcha
Speaker 1: moment from this week from yesterday that he got Michael
Speaker 1: Cohen to admit he had stolen money from Trump's company,
Speaker 1: turned out to have already been brought up in testimony
Speaker 1: a week ago, and both times it underscores that either
Speaker 1: Trump illegally listed that stolen money as a reimbursement to
Speaker 1: Michael Cohen, which they deny, or Trump illegally listed the
Speaker 1: stolen money as legal expenses, which is what he is
Speaker 1: on trial for doing. And lawyer Todd Blanche also let
Speaker 1: his client be caught not just dozing off like every
Speaker 1: other day in court, but to quote the New York
Speaker 1: Daily News, it appeared Trump was fully out and just
Speaker 1: woke up. His head was tipped back so far that
Speaker 1: he would have been looking at the ceiling when he
Speaker 1: opened his eyes. In other words, Trump was this close
Speaker 1: to drooling the drool of regret into the pillow of remorse,
Speaker 1: and there was a little issue afterwards. The first item
Speaker 1: letter A on the gag order against Trump defended is
Speaker 1: directed to refrain from making or directing others to make
Speaker 1: public statements about known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses. He talked
Speaker 1: afterwards about a witness. Wait, this just in't I'm being told.
Speaker 1: He talked afterwards about two witnesses.
Speaker 2: And he saw what happened to a highly respected lawyer today,
Speaker 2: Bob Costello. I've never seen anything like the highlight respect
Speaker 2: the last five weeks, Andy Madara, to show he saw
Speaker 2: from the Trump organization.
Speaker 3: Even if they're structuring a DATO up.
Speaker 1: And now I can't talk about it because again I
Speaker 1: have a even he knows he just broke the gag
Speaker 1: order after the last time, after the last ten times.
Speaker 1: To be exact, Justice Wan Meershaan was explicit that next
Speaker 1: time he would have to consider jailing Trump well. Trump
Speaker 1: talked about witness Robert Costello, the one whom the judge
Speaker 1: metaphorically kicked in the gonads as the day came to
Speaker 1: a roaring end. And then as you heard, he talked
Speaker 1: about witness Michael Cohen, and as the judge has also
Speaker 1: explicitly stated, it doesn't matter if he's reading or quoting
Speaker 1: somebody else's words, it's him talking about a witness. If
Speaker 1: there is any remaining doubt in Mershon's mind that the
Speaker 1: premise of the Trump defense is not some kind of
Speaker 1: refutation of the charges, but is instead merely an all
Speaker 1: out attack on the rule of law by any means available,
Speaker 1: an all out attack on the judge, on the court,
Speaker 1: on its authority to dare to thwart Trump, the man
Speaker 1: who wants to put the dick back in dictator. If
Speaker 1: there is any remaining doubt in Jan Merschan's mind about this,
Speaker 1: he must erase it. This is why the outburst from
Speaker 1: the witness, Robert Costello, who is an attorney, where he
Speaker 1: complained about Mershon's rulings in real time as they happen,
Speaker 1: This could be the last straw that finally sends Trump
Speaker 1: to the Big House. That was Trump's witness. The prosecution
Speaker 1: fought Merchon to keep him out. Merchon sided with the defense.
Speaker 1: The witness then metaphorically spit in Mershon's face. Not good
Speaker 1: on the old strategicy front, Bob. Regardless, I don't care
Speaker 1: if it's for the rest of Trump's life or just
Speaker 1: for the rest of the day. Mershon has to put
Speaker 1: him in jail now, and to my mind, today would
Speaker 1: be a good day to do it. They're gonna break
Speaker 1: for the holiday, come back next Tuesday, give him an
Speaker 1: all expenses paid, never to be forgotten Memorial Day weekend
Speaker 1: at Rikers Island. I mean, at this point it's pretty
Speaker 1: clear Trump won't really understand where he is anyway. As
Speaker 1: court began yesterday, he did not know what month it was,
Speaker 1: or where he was supposedly campaigning this week, or where
Speaker 1: the next election or primary or whatever is. He decided
Speaker 1: he was being kept from advocating for himself before the
Speaker 1: primaries in Hampshire and Iowa, which happened last January. Natzie
Speaker 1: Fagan and we go on day to day.
Speaker 3: And I didn't kind of tell Iowa, I'm sorry. I
Speaker 3: only ever Megan, I tell no, Andrew, sorry, I won't
Speaker 3: be over to Magan. I'm sitting in a nice box
Speaker 3: over there. As you know, I was supposed to be
Speaker 3: in a.
Speaker 4: Very different state.
Speaker 1: Is a different state, the state of being asleep? Am
Speaker 1: I right? By the way, the money Cohen stole, And
Speaker 1: by the way, I've seen nothing funnier in the last
Speaker 1: decade than Eric Trump writing that this just got interesting
Speaker 1: because Cohen admitted for the second time that he swiped
Speaker 1: thirty thousand dollars when Eric has self dealt on kids
Speaker 1: cancer charities in the millions. The money Cohen stole was
Speaker 1: reimbursement for a company that was helping him and Trump
Speaker 1: fix a CNBC opinion poll about influential businessmen fix it
Speaker 1: in Trump's favor, and they could only get Trump up
Speaker 1: to ninth on the list, so Trump stiff them. Also
Speaker 1: notable the Trump posse, the Republicans, the Renfields. A week ago,
Speaker 1: it was the Speaker of the House. I don't know
Speaker 1: how the hell he became Speaker of the House, but
Speaker 1: he's Speaker of the House. And a bunch of corrupt
Speaker 1: senators yesterday, Representative Keith's self, Representative Mary Miller, who is nuts,
Speaker 1: who quoted Hitler at a stop the Steel rally, whose
Speaker 1: hobby had one of those three percent militia stickers on it,
Speaker 1: and Representative Andy Clyde, also known as Andy clown, the
Speaker 1: one who said that January sixth was just a normal
Speaker 1: tourist visit. Yes, it has happened in our lifetimes. They
Speaker 1: are officially out of posse. Trump officially can no longer
Speaker 1: grab them by the posse. I'm still working sick with
Speaker 1: this sinus infection, so I'm particularly proud of that one line.
Speaker 1: In fact, I'm gonna say it again, Trump can no
Speaker 1: longer grab them by the posse. The other Trump headlines
Speaker 1: He's supposed to have a rally in the South Bronx
Speaker 1: day after tomorrow. He joked to donors that he fears
Speaker 1: he might get hurt there as a native of the
Speaker 1: Bronx and the descendant of South Bronxians, I would say
Speaker 1: this is the first sign I have seen in months
Speaker 1: that he may not be crazy. By the way, the
Speaker 1: New York Times reported the little joke that he made
Speaker 1: to his donors. Guess which reporter reported that, no, wasn't
Speaker 1: Katie Terry Trump's Taylor Swift. Meanwhile, Kid rock interview with
Speaker 1: Rolling Stone in it uses racial slurs, including the N word,
Speaker 1: boasts he is part of America's political problem, and then
Speaker 1: already drunk on wine and switching off to Jim Beam
Speaker 1: and Cola quote He's sitting in a dark leather chair
Speaker 1: shouting at me about something or other, when he reaches
Speaker 1: behind the seat, pulls out a black handgun and waves
Speaker 1: it around to make some sort of point rock then notes,
Speaker 1: and I got an fing g damn gun right here.
Speaker 1: If I needed, I got them everywhere. And somewhere Ted
Speaker 1: Nugent is chewing on his knuckles, going, I have to
Speaker 1: do better. I must do better than remember last week's Trump.
Speaker 1: Why the eighty thousand crowd in New Jersey, eighty thousand
Speaker 1: at Wildwood, New Jersey, one hundred thousand, two million, whatever
Speaker 1: it was. Nope, it's been withdrawn from New Jersey Insider
Speaker 1: NJ insider Lisa Fagan. I don't make these names up.
Speaker 1: Lisa Fagan, the Wildwood Press spokesperson the Associated Press originally
Speaker 1: cited as the source for the original crowd estimate, was
Speaker 1: quoted as saying the eye popping estimate was based off
Speaker 1: her own observations on the scene Saturday, having seen dozens
Speaker 1: of other events in the same space. Five days later,
Speaker 1: when asked to explain the wide variance between the AP
Speaker 1: reporting and the New Jersey dot Com video that reveals
Speaker 1: a crowd in the few thousands. Fagan provided a statement
Speaker 1: from Mayor Treyano of Wildwood at odds with what the
Speaker 1: Wire Service initially attributed to Fagan quote. As a tourist town,
Speaker 1: we speak in tourism numbers, Tryana wrote. When we see
Speaker 1: that volume of people attending a beach event, we know
Speaker 1: that eighty thousand plus people are in our town. Now
Speaker 1: I know that's Trumpian bookkeeping in a nutshell right there.
Speaker 1: Your crowd is maybe seventy two hundred. You announced it's
Speaker 1: eighty thousand or more because you and only you know that.
Speaker 1: You mean that that's how many people must be in
Speaker 1: the whole town, because there's seven thousand people in that
Speaker 1: one part of the town. And you know, you could
Speaker 1: criticize this, but remember it could be way worse. The
Speaker 1: mayor theoretically could have claimed that the crowd was three
Speaker 1: hundred and thirty three million, three hundred thousand, because that,
Speaker 1: of course is how many people would be in our
Speaker 1: country when there's seventy two hundred people in that one space.
Speaker 1: And lastly, in the Trump News this update on the
Speaker 1: presidential debates, did I tell you he would find an
Speaker 1: excuse to back out did I tell you that he
Speaker 1: would soon be preparing a series of excuses to back out,
Speaker 1: that eventually he would take the one that seemed the
Speaker 1: least stupid. Well, he hasn't gotten to the least stupid yet,
Speaker 1: but he's preparing to back out, and he will back out.
Speaker 4: I just want to debate this guy, but you know,
Speaker 4: and I'm gonna I'm going to demand a drug test
Speaker 4: to By the way, I am, No, I really am.
Speaker 1: Now to the sam Alito freak flag scandal Part three. No,
Speaker 1: he has not changed his story again. Still it's the
Speaker 1: why fault. Still, it's the school kids who could see
Speaker 1: the sign as they waited for the bus that hadn't
Speaker 1: been there for a month because it was remote learning.
Speaker 1: He hasn't changed the story since he changed it on Friday.
Speaker 1: Still has not suggested, by the way, in any of
Speaker 1: the variations of his stories, that he might believe that, say,
Speaker 1: a sitting justice of the Supreme Court of the United
Speaker 1: States letting any kind of protest flag hang in public
Speaker 1: from the flag pole in front of his own house
Speaker 1: for at least three days is wrong, whether it's a
Speaker 1: flag indicating stop the steal or steal the stop or
Speaker 1: Antifa or support for Canada. Doesn't seem to think there's
Speaker 1: anything wrong with that, has not denied that there was
Speaker 1: a protest, and has not for the second or for
Speaker 1: a moment, suggested that he and his family did not
Speaker 1: have the right to do that while they were still
Speaker 1: at the Supreme Court can considering cases that could have
Speaker 1: decided or reversed the outcome of the twenty twenty election.
Speaker 1: And still relative silence from the Democrats because because we
Speaker 1: have a bunch of cowards on our team. Although there
Speaker 1: is a good idea and we'll see if anybody does
Speaker 1: anything about it. There is a new development, a theory
Speaker 1: that the upside down flag from January twenty twenty one
Speaker 1: from Martha Ann Alito it was all her fault. What
Speaker 1: does sam Alito know from the flag sitting there and
Speaker 1: the giant flagpole in front of his house? What does
Speaker 1: he know from that? He never looks at the flag
Speaker 1: in front of his own house. He barely goes to
Speaker 1: his own house. Who's Martha Anne Alexandria Virginia. I don't
Speaker 1: know her. There is a new theory that the upside
Speaker 1: down flag is part of a political pattern for which
Speaker 1: Alito should be punished in some way. The former legal
Speaker 1: editor at BuzzFeed, Chris Geidner, reports that in late August
Speaker 1: of last year, as the witch who calls herself libs
Speaker 1: of TikTok continued to attack bud Light and the company
Speaker 1: that owns it, and the influencer Dylan mulvany, that somebody
Speaker 1: sold up to fifteen thousand dollars in stock in the
Speaker 1: parent company of bud Light. Guess who sam Alito August
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, indicating a pattern of political protest which
Speaker 1: violates the requirements that all judges, even the ones on
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court, must stay publicly apolitical. Well, I think
Speaker 1: that ship sailed a long time ago. Like that speech
Speaker 1: that he gave after he visited the Vatican last year,
Speaker 1: in which he mocked everybody who wasn't Catholic, I think
Speaker 1: sam Alito's concern about whether or not we might perceive
Speaker 1: him as political that may have waned. He may not
Speaker 1: wake up in the middle of the night going gee,
Speaker 1: I hope nobody thinks I'm political. But in any event,
Speaker 1: here's the argument. In August of twenty twenty three, according
Speaker 1: to the official filings, he sold between one thousand and
Speaker 1: fifteen thousand dollars in at least that amount and at
Speaker 1: least some of his stock in Anheuser Busch, and this
Speaker 1: federal Chris Geidner, writing at lawdork dot Com wrote, according
Speaker 1: to the Federal Judicial Financial Disclosure Reports database, Justice Samuel
Speaker 1: Alito sold at least some of his stock in Anheuser
Speaker 1: Busch and bought stock in Molsen Cores on Monday, August fourteenth,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. So he switched brands. Here's the problem
Speaker 1: with that. I have no respect whatsoever for Sam Alito,
Speaker 1: and I have no respect for the justices on the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court, who, because they are lifetime appointees, have basically
Speaker 1: said f you to everybody else in all the rules,
Speaker 1: and this includes the liberals. But the frick of scene
Speaker 1: of Dylan mulvaney and Bud Light began in April of
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three, and we're now talking about something towards
Speaker 1: the middle of August, August fourteenth, twenty twenty three. And
Speaker 1: you have to ask yourself if you accept the idea
Speaker 1: that a judge, or particularly a justice of the United
Speaker 1: States justice of the Supreme Court, has the right to
Speaker 1: own stock, which is a debate, and I can see
Speaker 1: arguments on both sides of it. Does he not have
Speaker 1: the right to bail out of a stock that has
Speaker 1: been failing from April onwards, even if it's his side
Speaker 1: of the political ball that has caused the failure. Does
Speaker 1: he not, by August have the right to sell up
Speaker 1: to fifteen thousand dollars worth of his investment and put
Speaker 1: it in a different beer stock. I just don't think
Speaker 1: this is the real pattern. Now, if he sold the
Speaker 1: stock and then she puts out the hit on Dylan mulvainy,
Speaker 1: that's another story altogether. That's insider trading. But to call
Speaker 1: the insider trading I think is nonsensical. Is Alito a
Speaker 1: political sheep in sheep's clothing? Yes, of course. And again,
Speaker 1: should Supreme Court justices be able to own stocks? A
Speaker 1: much better question, But even that's kind of thin gruel
Speaker 1: for this. On the other hand, as in all stories
Speaker 1: in the timeline in which we live, a vital detail
Speaker 1: of the original story was missed because all of us
Speaker 1: who are looking for stuff like this have been going
Speaker 1: at about oh thirty seven hundred percent of personal capacity
Speaker 1: since sometime in the summer of twenty fifteen. In the
Speaker 1: original New York Times story about sam Alito's stop the
Speaker 1: steel flag at his house. I own a host. Word
Speaker 1: of the flag filtered back to the court, people who
Speaker 1: work there, said in interviews. Word of the flag filtered
Speaker 1: back to the court? We who New York Times, you
Speaker 1: mean to Chief Justice Roberts, since he's nominally in charge,
Speaker 1: or or a janitor somewhere, or a clerk. I mean,
Speaker 1: remember who the clerks are, particularly on the conservative side,
Speaker 1: who they become. Laura Ingram was one of Clarence Thomas's clerks.
Speaker 1: I think that's all you need to know about who
Speaker 1: those people are. But what are we saying here? We're
Speaker 1: saying Chief Justice Roberts knew about this months ago, years
Speaker 1: ago and didn't do anything about it. Well, is that
Speaker 1: not enough? Just that, whether it's Roberts or somebody else,
Speaker 1: just that one phrase in the New York Times, word
Speaker 1: of the flag filtered back to the court, people who
Speaker 1: worked there set in interviews, and the rest of it
Speaker 1: in there. Does that not suggest we need hearings. Congressman
Speaker 1: Steve Cohen has moved to censure sam Alito. There is,
Speaker 1: of course, one small problem with that, which is that
Speaker 1: the House is controlled by the Democrats. No controlled by
Speaker 1: the Republicans. Well, there goes the idea that justice or truth,
Speaker 1: or morality or the law will be enforced to censure.
Speaker 1: Sam Alito would just use the Barney Rubble test, would
Speaker 1: require Congresswoman Barney Rubble to vote for it. But there
Speaker 1: is a Judiciary committee that is run by Democrats. It
Speaker 1: is in the Senate. Unfortunately, it is run by Dick Durbin,
Speaker 1: who is either afraid of something somebody has on him
Speaker 1: at the Supreme Court, or is the last guy in
Speaker 1: America who buys into this idea that the Supreme Court
Speaker 1: is somehow better than say, the Supreme Theocratic Court of Iran.
Speaker 1: This sanctity of the Supreme Court, he's the last one
Speaker 1: who believes it. I don't think sam Alito believes it anymore,
Speaker 1: and apparently Dick Durbin does. And they're not doing a
Speaker 1: damn thing except saying you really need to put in
Speaker 1: some sort of etiquette and social responsibility and morality clause. Oh,
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sorry. I didn't mean morality, just conduct
Speaker 1: caused eye. I'm sorry. There wasn't getting into morality. Clarence Thomas,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I'm sorry. We're not talking about all that
Speaker 1: stuff again with the videotapes.
Speaker 5: No no, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: Here was the theory. Originally, you could subpoena John Roberts
Speaker 1: and Sam Alito and ask them under oath, what about
Speaker 1: this flag jazz at a Senate hearing or somewhere else
Speaker 1: in which Democrats could force the hearing to happen, And
Speaker 1: of course somebody would sue to stop their testimony, and
Speaker 1: guess where that would eventually wind up. The Supreme Court
Speaker 1: would rule on whether or not those Supreme Court justices
Speaker 1: had to testify. And of course, even if by a
Speaker 1: chance Roberts and Alito or Thomas and Alito were subpoened
Speaker 1: and thus really felt the need to recuse, oh guess what,
Speaker 1: it's still four conservative votes to three liberal votes. However,
Speaker 1: as always, Brian Boutler off message once a Countdown contributor
Speaker 1: has a better idea. Subpoena not Roberts or Alito or Thomas,
Speaker 1: but subpoena the liberal justices Justice Brown, Jackson, Justice Socomior
Speaker 1: Justice Kagan. Subpoena them to come to the Democratic run
Speaker 1: Senate Judiciary Committee. Why, as Boiler points out, and I
Speaker 1: recommend subscribing to his site. Off message in January twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two, there was one Scotis vote against giving the
Speaker 1: January sixth Committee from the House access to the Trump
Speaker 1: White House records in its investigation of the insurrection? Who
Speaker 1: voted against it? Who was the one vote? Thomas? Why
Speaker 1: doesn't say you're lucky that you know it's Thomas? Civilians
Speaker 1: November twenty twenty two, Alito and Thomas both voted against
Speaker 1: or voted in favor in that case of trying to
Speaker 1: stop the Nuary sixth Committee from getting access to Kelly
Speaker 1: Ward's phone. Kelly Ward has since been indicted in the
Speaker 1: fake elector's plot in Arizona, and she is one of
Speaker 1: the first class nut jobs in the entirety of the
Speaker 1: fascist underbelly in this country. Alito and Thomas defended her.
Speaker 1: Why what was their reasoning? What was discussed before the
Speaker 1: ruling no idea? March twenty fourth, the quick ruling that
Speaker 1: erased the fourteenth Amendment this year? Also this year they
Speaker 1: wouldn't expedite a review of presidential immunity. They're still sitting
Speaker 1: on presidential immunity. They're trying to find that fine line.
Speaker 1: They're trying to do that razor's edge thing, thread the
Speaker 1: needle we're going to have presidential immunity, but it's not
Speaker 1: going to apply to Biden. You watch, and they would
Speaker 1: hear the bid to erase charging insurrectionists with the obstruction
Speaker 1: of official proceedings that was voted upon, and they're hearing it.
Speaker 1: And who voted what way, and what were the logical arguments?
Speaker 1: We don't know in all cases, who voted which way,
Speaker 1: who said yes, we will hear this case, who said
Speaker 1: we will not. All of the arguments they could make,
Speaker 1: all of the possibilities which can and has been made
Speaker 1: public in previous cases, has not been made public. It
Speaker 1: is all a secret. It is not just the Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: It is the secret goddamned Supreme Court. And they're doing
Speaker 1: whatever the f they want. And Buler's idea of how
Speaker 1: to interrupt that is since Democrats do not control the
Speaker 1: House and cannot impeach Alito and Thomas, and there is
Speaker 1: no way to get them off the court, and John
Speaker 1: Roberts does not have the guts to turn in his
Speaker 1: resignation and not only completely destroy the court without in
Speaker 1: fact shifting it to a liberal court, but turn the
Speaker 1: court over to somebody who is in there to reform
Speaker 1: it and force Thomas and Alito out. Boiler's idea is
Speaker 1: call the liberals to testify to who said what in
Speaker 1: those negotiations in those the liberations, the Alito and Thomas
Speaker 1: with Kelly Ward, the January twenty twenty two vote over
Speaker 1: giving the January sixth Committee the records from the Trump
Speaker 1: White House, the quick ruling erasing the fourteenth Amendment, the
Speaker 1: expedited or non expedited review of presidential immunity, the attempt
Speaker 1: to fabricate presidential immunity. Who said what? Justice Sotomayor, I
Speaker 1: know you don't want to be here, but we need
Speaker 1: to find out the truth. At minimum, expose the conservative justices,
Speaker 1: particularly Alito and Thomas, on the record as siding with
Speaker 1: the insurrectionists these cases. The Democratic Judiciary Committee investigation into
Speaker 1: insurrectionists on the Supreme Court waited a little bit. If
Speaker 1: you're saying, what's the point, well, what was the point
Speaker 1: of pro public at chasing down Harlan crow Irons Thomas's
Speaker 1: giant bus, his RV. What was the point of that?
Speaker 1: What's the point of the times going after? What did
Speaker 1: sam Alito know about the flag and when did he
Speaker 1: know it? Three years ago? How long have they been
Speaker 1: working on that. Who knows what else will shake out.
Speaker 1: The point I have always made is that the first
Speaker 1: thing that has to happen before anything gets fixed is
Speaker 1: somebody has to stand up and say this is wrong.
Speaker 1: And if you drag in Kagan and Sotomayor and Justice
Speaker 1: Brown Jackson, and you say you're under oath, we need
Speaker 1: to know what Clarence Thomas said about this, what Samuel
Speaker 1: Alito said about this. If it goes no further than that,
Speaker 1: there is a record, because who knows what else will
Speaker 1: shake out? Because that bud Lights story insider trading. The
Speaker 1: deal goes down in April, and the in trading the
Speaker 1: guy sells in August. That's not insider trading. That's not
Speaker 1: even smart trading. The bud Light story is mah, but
Speaker 1: the idea behind the bud Light story is not mah.
Speaker 1: While Alito was hearing a case last year to hamstring
Speaker 1: the EPA, his wife was giving an energy company mineral rights.
Speaker 1: If the EPA were hamstrung to what was in her
Speaker 1: one hundred and sixty acres that she inherited from Daddy
Speaker 1: in Oklahoma? Was that a cash deal? Did she and
Speaker 1: Hubby talk about that or did they not talk about
Speaker 1: anything like flags or one hundred and sixty acre mineral rights.
Speaker 1: Suddenly I'm turning into Tom Broke, I'm mineral rights in Oklahoma?
Speaker 1: Was that a cash? What was that? What do Kegan,
Speaker 1: Sodamayora and Jackson know about this? What can they tell
Speaker 1: us under oath? Bust up the Supreme I mean, what
Speaker 1: kind of standards are we holding up in the Supreme Court?
Speaker 1: It's utterly corrupt And there are three people who are
Speaker 1: nominally not corrupt, and they don't say anything. And nobody
Speaker 1: takes the chance of saying, let's poke around and see
Speaker 1: what's going to happen here, because what are we going
Speaker 1: to do? The Supreme Court is suddenly going to start
Speaker 1: ruling against liberals and against the Constitution. They're doing that now.
Speaker 1: We are already being beaten up by the bullies. Take
Speaker 1: the rock and hit the bully in the head. Every
Speaker 1: single smidge of corruption that can be brought to light
Speaker 1: not only increases the chances that we stop the corruption,
Speaker 1: but also it plays into the election. Who knows how
Speaker 1: many voters don't understand that the Supreme Court is corrupt
Speaker 1: now and will only get more corrupt as in a
Speaker 1: Trump presidency. Alito certainly Thomas retire, and Trump said over
Speaker 1: the weekend he wants to appoint new judges throughout the
Speaker 1: judicial system, including the Supreme Court, who will still be
Speaker 1: on the bench in the year twenty seventy. That's what
Speaker 1: he wants. That's what they want. They want this country
Speaker 1: to be ruled like Iran. The election is not just
Speaker 1: our hope of avoiding this now, it may very well
Speaker 1: be our last hope. Also of interest here in speaking
Speaker 1: of Iran, Robert F. Kennedy Junior's voting address the one
Speaker 1: on all those forms for all that ballot access, so
Speaker 1: he can be a spoiler for Trump. A he doesn't
Speaker 1: live there, the place on the address, and he doesn't
Speaker 1: live there. Nobody's seen him there. He's been voting from
Speaker 1: there since two thousand and eight. Also, right after the
Speaker 1: president of Iran was killed in that helicopter accident, who
Speaker 1: does rfk Junior bring up the president of Iran? And
Speaker 1: he said, the President of the United States, whoever that
Speaker 1: would be, And he really thinks it's going to be him.
Speaker 1: He said, the President of the United States needs to
Speaker 1: negotiate with the president of Iran. Only the guy he
Speaker 1: thinks is the president of Iran is not the new
Speaker 1: one that they haven't voted in yet, and isn't the
Speaker 1: dead one. He's three presidents of Iran ago. That's who
Speaker 1: Robert F. Kennedy wants to negotiate with. That's how crazy
Speaker 1: he is. Worst person's next. This is countdown. This is countdown,
Speaker 1: with Keith Olberman still ahead of us on this initiative countdown.
Speaker 1: I'm he missed Willie Mays's birthday, meaning I missed the
Speaker 1: opportunity to tell you of the day I, as a
Speaker 1: twenty year old broadcasting rookie, had to call him and
Speaker 1: interview him about the day he got banned from baseball.
Speaker 1: And before I could ask him one question, Willie Mays
Speaker 1: did a fake voice. And it was some fake voice.
Speaker 1: I can't even use it in telling you the story
Speaker 1: things I promised not to tell coming up at first
Speaker 1: is ever, there are still more new idiots to talk about.
Speaker 1: The daily roundup of the miss Grants, morons and Dunning
Speaker 1: Krueger effects specimens who constitute today's worse persons in the world.
Speaker 1: The Bronze Worser Politico, the increasingly right leaning insider publication
Speaker 1: in the increasingly right leaning media, landscape where they're all
Speaker 1: sitting around going how do we protect our phony, boloney
Speaker 1: jobs and our money in the case of the Trump
Speaker 1: winning and the country going fascist. I'll just read this
Speaker 1: quote from political writer calder McHugh. Honestly, calder McHugh, you're
Speaker 1: sure his name isn't Hugh mcaulder. Calder mcew who has
Speaker 1: an idea of how to stay in power even if
Speaker 1: the fascists take over Washington again. It's impossible to know.
Speaker 1: He writes exactly how Trump will behave if he returns
Speaker 1: to office. Well, first of all, let me just interject
Speaker 1: here bullshit. By all accounts, Trump has professionalized his twenty
Speaker 1: twenty four campaign, writes Hugh mcaulder, suggesting he learns something
Speaker 1: from his slap dash first campaign and his twenty twenty
Speaker 1: re election loss. Yes, he learned not to have any
Speaker 1: more elections. But you haven't learned that, have you, cal macuter.
Speaker 1: The question is whether his views on presidential prerogatives have changed,
Speaker 1: or whether he intends to be guided by loftier principles
Speaker 1: this guy writes, and it's not meant ironically loftier principles.
Speaker 1: Trump's idea of loftier principles are ideas that get him
Speaker 1: more money. Second half this is from the Politico Email newsletter,
Speaker 1: and it speaks to how corrupt corrupt is nowadays. Nobody
Speaker 1: even bothers to cover it up. Corruption at every level
Speaker 1: of American society is so deep that nobody said no, don't, don't,
Speaker 1: don't do that. They do this every week on the
Speaker 1: Politico Email newsletter. I guess it's the Saturday edition in
Speaker 1: which they have Great Weekend Reads curated by Ryan Liza.
Speaker 1: Ryan Liza, who used to be with The New Yorker,
Speaker 1: got fired for something we never found out what, involving
Speaker 1: their behavior patterns and their rules. Nobody ever explained what
Speaker 1: it was. I think I know what it was, but
Speaker 1: I'm not ready to tell you yet. But it was
Speaker 1: not It was not nice. Ryan Lizza Great Weekend Reads,
Speaker 1: and he lists eight or nine long articles that are
Speaker 1: usually appealing only to people who have lots of spare
Speaker 1: time and a very very low threshold or very high
Speaker 1: threshold for being bored. The first one Great Weekend Reads
Speaker 1: curated by Ryan Liza Semi Colan on the campaign trail
Speaker 1: by New York Magazines Olivia, Newsy Donald Trump is running
Speaker 1: for president while bumping into the past at a Manhattan
Speaker 1: criminal courthouse. They are their boyfriend and girlfriend, Ryan Lizza
Speaker 1: pimping Olivia Newsy's article about Donald Trump and the campaign
Speaker 1: trail and the trial. Boyfriend and girlfriend, and make no
Speaker 1: secret of this. Unlike her past relationships, there's no secret
Speaker 1: involved in this, the first one, and they're seven or
Speaker 1: eight other You couldn't have the presence of mind to say,
Speaker 1: why don't I put the one about you third? And
Speaker 1: you would you hand me that coffee? I put you
Speaker 1: third so it doesn't look like I'm the term technically
Speaker 1: is a log rolling, and I'm pushing your article because
Speaker 1: you're my girlfriend. Jesus, just pretend, pretend that there's some
Speaker 1: ethics involved. Runner up worser. This isn't really worse, but
Speaker 1: I needed a place to stick it, and I've been
Speaker 1: saving it because of this sickness for a little while.
Speaker 1: Here the Republican primary for the Senate in Maryland. Larry Hogan,
Speaker 1: the former governor or, the outgoing governor, sixty three percent
Speaker 1: of the vote. Robin Ficker was the runner up with
Speaker 1: thirty percent of the vote. Robin Ficker. I looked at
Speaker 1: this and I went Robin Ficker. Robin Ficker. Does the
Speaker 1: name sound familiar? This is my world's colliding. Until nineteen
Speaker 1: ninety eight, Robin Ficker was the heckler in professional sports.
Speaker 1: He went to every one of the Washington Bullets and
Speaker 1: then Washington Wizard's game. He sometimes had a portable megaphone
Speaker 1: with him. He sat in the front row, so right
Speaker 1: behind the visiting bench. He used insults, personal insults, derogatory terms,
Speaker 1: sat right behind the bench. Several coaches had to be
Speaker 1: restrained from going after him physically. And he was such
Speaker 1: a fan that when they changed arenas and reassigned everybody
Speaker 1: to new seats, they would not sell him those same
Speaker 1: front row seats, and so he stopped being a fan
Speaker 1: of the team. So a real dedicated fan who was
Speaker 1: not there just to make fun of the other players.
Speaker 1: I believe it was Charles Barkley, who wants in the
Speaker 1: middle of one of these Ficker monologues, threw a wet,
Speaker 1: sweaty towel and got it to wrap perfectly in a
Speaker 1: tight camera shot around Robin Ficker's face. He's eighty something.
Speaker 1: He runs for office every couple of years, and he
Speaker 1: was the runner up in the Republican primary for Senate.
Speaker 1: So when they talk about what an invincible candidate the
Speaker 1: Republicans have trotted out for the Senate from Maryland, just
Speaker 1: remember the guy he beat is the retired ex heckler
Speaker 1: from the NBA. But our winner the worst RFK Junior.
Speaker 1: Not a good week for being RFK Junior. Not a
Speaker 1: good month, not a good year, not a good decade,
Speaker 1: not a good lifetime. Ultimately, The New York Post reports
Speaker 1: that Kennedy quote lists his residents to vote as a Tony,
Speaker 1: Westchester County address which is in foreclosure. Proceedings for non
Speaker 1: payment court record show the independent candidate claims his voting
Speaker 1: address is eighty four Croton Lake Road in Katona, though
Speaker 1: he is not the owner of the million dollar in
Speaker 1: arrears property does not show up in residential searches for it,
Speaker 1: and some longtime neighbors and even local authorities were shocked
Speaker 1: at the notion it's his home. But RFK Junior also
Speaker 1: has the same address list that has his domicile or
Speaker 1: residents on his presidential nomination petitions filed in New Hampshire
Speaker 1: in recent months, according to the records which are obtained
Speaker 1: by the Post, and he's been voting being from this
Speaker 1: address since at least two thousand and eight, according to
Speaker 1: the New York Post, So everything about Robert F. Kennedy,
Speaker 1: including his eligibility for being on the ballot in places
Speaker 1: like New Hampshire, could be challenged if anybody would get
Speaker 1: around doing that. He's been lying about his address all
Speaker 1: this time, or he doesn't know where he lives, and
Speaker 1: we have more evidence supporting the later theory of those two.
Speaker 1: The day after the President of Iran was killed in
Speaker 1: a chopper accident, RFK Junior demanded that the President of
Speaker 1: the United States, presumably himself pres himself, negotiate with the
Speaker 1: President of Iran. Only you know, right now there ain't
Speaker 1: a president of Iran and it's getting worse from this point.
Speaker 1: Just listen to this hitting down with other world leaders,
Speaker 1: with people like President g and President Plutin and President
Speaker 1: Vaman dinnershad for the prime minister all the people President
Speaker 1: Akmadina Jodd, Mack Mood, Achmedina Jod or do you mean
Speaker 1: somebody else like Barney Achmadena Jod Because mack Mood Akmadina
Speaker 1: Jodd has not been president of Iran since August of
Speaker 1: twenty thirteen, his term expired. He's tried to run twice since,
Speaker 1: and he's two nuts even for the government of Iran.
Speaker 1: R f K Junior thinks he's president. It's been almost
Speaker 1: eleven years. R f K Junior, you will never convince
Speaker 1: me that the worm is dead. Two days. Worst person
Speaker 1: in the world. Now to the number one story on
Speaker 1: the countdown, and I have to confess this has been
Speaker 1: a strong effort. I hope you appreciate this. I'm playing
Speaker 1: Hurt full edition and my favorite topic me which I've
Speaker 1: he discussed and complimented myself. Now things I promise not
Speaker 1: to tell, and I am late to the party. It
Speaker 1: was two weeks ago yesterday, but Willie Howard Mays turned
Speaker 1: ninety three years old earlier this month. And he is
Speaker 1: the greatest defensive athlete I have ever seen in any sport.
Speaker 1: Saw him in person when I was a kid, and
Speaker 1: also one of the top five offensive athletes in any sport.
Speaker 1: And this is now the seventy fourth baseball season since
Speaker 1: his debut and the fifty first season since his retirement,
Speaker 1: and everybody ever in baseball in all that time has
Speaker 1: met him, and he is still rightly celebrated wherever he goes.
Speaker 1: Whenever his name is brought up in me amidst all
Speaker 1: this celebration and literally half a century or more of
Speaker 1: glorification of Willie Mays. When his name comes up, I
Speaker 1: think of only one thing. The first time I interviewed
Speaker 1: him in the off season of nineteen seventy nine eighty.
Speaker 1: And I'm not going to say it was a strange interview,
Speaker 1: but I am affecting that I will be getting over
Speaker 1: it any day now. Maybe it was at my first
Speaker 1: job for my radio network when God helped me. Willie
Speaker 1: Mays was seventeen years younger than I am now, Like
Speaker 1: I wasn't scared enough to talk to Willie Mays. He
Speaker 1: started that interview by doing a bit, a comedy bit
Speaker 1: that if I had done it, then they would have
Speaker 1: fired me. The other thing I think of is an
Speaker 1: amazing injustice that befell Willie Mays that nobody talks about
Speaker 1: and nobody registers anymore. Okay, the first part. So it's
Speaker 1: a Saturday afternoon, October twenty seventh, nineteen seventy nine, just
Speaker 1: forty three and a half years ago, and Willie Mays
Speaker 1: has just been banned from baseball because word has gotten
Speaker 1: out that he has signed a contract to do promotional
Speaker 1: events for a casine know in Atlantic City, and there
Speaker 1: is a news conference coming up in two days on Monday.
Speaker 1: Now try explaining this whole concept to any current sports fan.
Speaker 1: Any current sports fan now used to seeing retired players
Speaker 1: on TV telling them how to bet and who to
Speaker 1: bet on, or the sportscasters doing the games giving you
Speaker 1: the latest odds and how they have changed since the
Speaker 1: last period or inning started. Plus this was like three
Speaker 1: months after Willie Mays was inducted into the Baseball Hall
Speaker 1: of Fame, three months after the celebration of this brilliant career,
Speaker 1: and now they've banned him for life for something that
Speaker 1: today the commissioner would have sent him a note of congratulations,
Speaker 1: to say nothing of a large paycheck. And nobody has
Speaker 1: done an interview with Willy Mays yet because he has
Speaker 1: been traveling. And my phone rings in my little cubby
Speaker 1: hole at the United pres International Radio Network that I've
Speaker 1: only been working at since August three months, that's how
Speaker 1: long my full time broadcasting career has been to this point.
Speaker 1: And on the phone is maybe the top baseball reporter
Speaker 1: of the second half of the twentieth century, Keith. It's
Speaker 1: Milt Richmond. This man once reported in July nineteen fifty
Speaker 1: five that if the Milwaukee Braves did not start winning,
Speaker 1: that they would fire their manager. Exactly one year later,
Speaker 1: and they didn't start winning, and exactly one year later
Speaker 1: to the day, they fired their manager. Keith, write this
Speaker 1: phone number down. It's Willie May's. Milt never got excited
Speaker 1: about anything. He talked like this all the time. William
Speaker 1: Mays is expecting your call for an interview about this
Speaker 1: banishment story. And I squeaked yes, sir, and I went
Speaker 1: into one of our recording studios and I dialed Willie
Speaker 1: Mays's phone number. And I will not recreate the voice
Speaker 1: that I heard answer Willie May's phone, because while doing
Speaker 1: this voice was once considered to be a staple of
Speaker 1: American humor, even American humor written or performed by liberals.
Speaker 1: I mean, James Thurber's short stories are full of this voice.
Speaker 1: The voice is wildly racist. It is racist enough that
Speaker 1: if today you heard an African American man do it,
Speaker 1: even Willie Mays, you probably say.
Speaker 5: No, no, no, no, no, still racist. Don't do it, Willie.
Speaker 5: It was a voice similar to the actress Hattie McDaniel,
Speaker 5: who won the Academy Award in nineteen thirty nine for
Speaker 5: Gone with the Wind. She was a world class blues singer,
Speaker 5: a top patriotic fundraiser during World War Two, and she
Speaker 5: played maids housekeepers in maybe two hundred films. She also
Speaker 5: played one on a famous radio show, and was paid
Speaker 5: so little that while she was performing her role of
Speaker 5: the pretend maid, she had to keep working as a
Speaker 5: real maid. Okay, so I'm twenty years old and I
Speaker 5: have to interview Willie Mays about him getting banned from baseball,
Speaker 5: which is crazy enough. And I call and the phone
Speaker 5: is answered, and a gravelly but feminine voice that sounded
Speaker 5: exactly like Hattie McDaniel says hello, mister Mays's residence. And
Speaker 5: I'm a little thrown but I power through it somehow,
Speaker 5: and I explain who I am, and she says ahah,
Speaker 5: And I say where I'm calling from and she says uhah,
Speaker 5: And I say, Milt Richmond said, mister Mays was expecting
Speaker 5: my call. And she interrupts and goes, this is Willie.
Speaker 5: The Hattie McDaniel impersonation was being done by Willie Mays.
Speaker 5: Now I do not have this on tape. Silly me.
Speaker 1: When my bosses said you may not start recording before
Speaker 1: you get express permission from the interviewee to start recording.
Speaker 1: I believed them, and I lived by that rule. Anybody
Speaker 1: else would have a tape of this phone being answered
Speaker 1: and the Hattie McDaniel impression done by Willie Mays, because
Speaker 1: the first thing you do is record, so you don't
Speaker 1: have to remember to record, because otherwise you'll forget to record.
Speaker 1: But I'm afraid you are going to have to take
Speaker 1: my word for this, because why would I make this up.
Speaker 1: October twenty seventh, nineteen seventy nine, and I still haven't
Speaker 1: recovered mister Mays's residence. Happy ninety second birthday, Willy Mays.
Speaker 1: Now the injustice that Willy Mays suffered that nobody talks about.
Speaker 1: In fact, I've never heard him talk about it. This
Speaker 1: is something else that no fan believes today. The United
Speaker 1: States military used to draft Major League Baseball players and
Speaker 1: NFL players and NBA players and send them into the
Speaker 1: service in the middle of their seasons, in the primes
Speaker 1: of their careers, even if there was no war in progress.
Speaker 1: They only did it a couple of times after saying
Speaker 1: nineteen forty five, and usually that was thinly veiled racist
Speaker 1: political pressure, such as when they drafted Muhammad Ali in
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty six when he was heavyweight champion of the
Speaker 1: world and an activist Muslim, and he was twenty four
Speaker 1: years old when everybody else getting drafted was eighteen. Remember that.
Speaker 1: But in nineteen fifty two they also drafted Willie Mays.
Speaker 1: He had come up from the Miners the year before
Speaker 1: and had led the New York Giants from thirteen games
Speaker 1: back to the National League pennant, and he was the
Speaker 1: kind of all around whirlwind of a player nobody had
Speaker 1: ever seen before in Major League Baseball. And on May
Speaker 1: twenty ninth, thirty four games into his second season, boom,
Speaker 1: he was drafted and inducted, and he missed the rest
Speaker 1: of that season and all of the nineteen fifty three season.
Speaker 1: I can't think of a parallel today. Maybe maybe they
Speaker 1: draft in the middle of his second season somebody like
Speaker 1: Fernando TEIs and in the middle of May, he's gone
Speaker 1: for the rest of this year and next year because
Speaker 1: he has to go serve in the military. Now. They
Speaker 1: didn't draft Mickey Mantle, who also broke in in New
Speaker 1: York in nineteen fifty one, the way Mays did, and
Speaker 1: to be fair, Mickey Mantle had about four hundred medical
Speaker 1: problems that would have kept anybody out of the military,
Speaker 1: and it was all legit. But they also didn't draft
Speaker 1: the nineteen fifty one American League Rookie of the Year winner,
Speaker 1: Gil McDougald of the Yankees, who was a white guy,
Speaker 1: or Walt Dropo, who was the Rookie of the Year
Speaker 1: in nineteen fifty or Roy Sievers, who was the Rookie
Speaker 1: of the Year in nineteen forty nine, or or you
Speaker 1: get the point here. Now, trying to calculate should have
Speaker 1: beens in sports is a risky enough business, but you
Speaker 1: can get an approximation of what might have happened. If
Speaker 1: a player hits twenty homers in his first year and
Speaker 1: then misses two years, and then he comes back and
Speaker 1: he hits forty one homers in his first year back,
Speaker 1: you can extrap up of eight that he probably would
Speaker 1: have hit twenty seven homers in the first missing year
Speaker 1: and thirty four in the second missing year. Your numerical
Speaker 1: sequence is twenty homers and twenty seven homers, then thirty
Speaker 1: four homers, then forty one homers. You have to tinker
Speaker 1: a little bit with it in Mays's case, because he
Speaker 1: didn't miss all of that second season nineteen fifty two,
Speaker 1: He just missed from June on, and he'd had a
Speaker 1: slow start. He'd only hit four homers in the first
Speaker 1: two months of nineteen fifty two, so instead of twenty
Speaker 1: seven that year, maybe he only hits twenty four that year.
Speaker 1: So a good guess as to how many homers Willie
Speaker 1: Mays did not get to hit because he got drafted
Speaker 1: and all the white guys did not get drafted is
Speaker 1: all told fifty four. In real life, playing between nineteen
Speaker 1: fifty one and nineteen seventy three, Willie Mays finished with
Speaker 1: six hundred and sixty home runs. For most of the
Speaker 1: nineteen sixties, it was thought he was the man who
Speaker 1: would challenge Babe Ruth's career record, not Hank Aaron, but
Speaker 1: Willie Mays. Willie Mays hit six hundred and sixty homers,
Speaker 1: But if you give him those fifty four more homers
Speaker 1: he might have hit. If he hadn't been so curiously
Speaker 1: drafted in nineteen fifty two, Willie Mays would have finished
Speaker 1: with seven hundred and fourteen home runs. Seven hundred and fourteen,
Speaker 1: which is exactly how many Babe Ruth hit, So if
Speaker 1: he doesn't get drafted, maybe in nineteen seventy two and
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three and nineteen seventy four, we are seeing
Speaker 1: Willie Mays hit his seven hundredth career home run, challenging
Speaker 1: Babe Ruth's record, and then tying and breaking Babe Ruth's record,
Speaker 1: and then right behind him, Henry Aaron hits his seven
Speaker 1: hundred and fifteenth homer and then his seven hundred and
Speaker 1: sixteenth homer to break the all time record held by
Speaker 1: Willie Mays mister Mays's residence. That's not how it sounded.
Speaker 1: Done all the damage I can do here, Thank you
Speaker 1: for listening. Countdown Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillip
Speaker 1: Schanel arranged, produced, and performed most of our music. Mister
Speaker 1: Ray was on guitars, bass and drums, Mister Chanelle handled
Speaker 1: orchestration and keyboards, and it was produced by Tko Brothers.
Speaker 1: Other music, including some of the Beethoven compositions, arranged and
Speaker 1: performed by the group No Horns Allowed. The sports music
Speaker 1: is the Alderman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch
Speaker 1: Warren Davis Curtisy of ESPN inc. Our satirical and pithy
Speaker 1: musical comments are by Nancy Fauss, the best baseball stadium
Speaker 1: organist ever. Our announcer was my friend Larry David. Everything
Speaker 1: else was pretty much my fault. But once again I
Speaker 1: did a good job today. Considering that's countdown for this
Speaker 1: the one hundred and sixty ninth day until the twenty
Speaker 1: twenty four presidential election, the two hundred and thirty second
Speaker 1: day since Dictator Jay Trump's first attempted coup against the
Speaker 1: democratically elected government of the United States. Use the legal
Speaker 1: system such as it is, use the mental health system,
Speaker 1: use presidential immunity if it happens, Use the not regularly
Speaker 1: given elector objection option to stop him from doing it
Speaker 1: again while we still can. The next scheduled countdown is tomorrow.
Speaker 1: Still day to day. On that with the sinus, We're
Speaker 1: all day to day, especially me, till the next one.
Speaker 1: I'm Keith Oulrimman. Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and
Speaker 1: good luck. Countdown with Keith Olreman is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple
Speaker 1: Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts,