EPISODE 219: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN A-Block (1:42) BULLETIN: Trump is again attempting to foment a violent coup against the government of the United States and in so doing confirming that he is about to be indicted by Special Counsel Jack Smith and whatever charges Smith has ready he should bring them before his Grand Jury now and urge a judge to detain Trump without bail. “It’s about Election Interference” Trump wrote at the start of a social media post at 8:12 Eastern Time this morning, which ends “They are using the DOJ and FBI against me to Rigg the 2024 election. They’ll hit Hunter with something small to make their strike on me look fair. Nothing about these fascists is fair or honest. FIGHT!” The word “fight” is in capital letters and followed by an exclamation point and it is clearly not directed at his attorneys. He followed up two minutes later with quote “Election Interference. Don’t let it happen.” Again – that instruction to prevent his indictment or arrest was not directed to attorneys or family members or anybody else. It was directed to his mob – just as it was directed to his mob on January 6th. It is not political speech, it is not dissent, it is not protest, it is not free speech, it is stochastic terrorism. And the word that elevates this from Trump’s usual psychopathic communications is quote “fight” unquote. It should send cold chills down your spine because he used that word in its various forms SIXTEEN TIMES in that incendiary speech from the ellipse that sent the gang into the Capitol and sent democracy teetering on the edge of destruction. “We fight,” he shouted. “We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country any more.” And now, in literally the days before his indictment for stealing this country’s – and other countries’ - nuclear secrets and our military’s war plans for attacking Iran, he has used his social media account to again attempt to incite insurrection – and more immediately to somehow prevent the Department of Justice from indicting him for mishandling classified documents, for obstructing justice, possibly for destruction of evidence, suborning of perjury, and – though they won’t do this – for these posts today. (7:40) The remainder of this podcast is the original June 6 2023 edition as originally posted. SPECIAL COMMENT: The whiny visit of Trump lawyers to beg Jack Smith not to indict their client so he wouldn't yell at them again turns out to have actually confirmed ONE important fact. We can't be sure Smith has already decided to indict Trump on the stolen documents. But we CAN be sure he has NOT decided NOT to indict him - otherwise there would've been no need for the meeting. Others are thinking that way too: Trump's lawyers, trump, The Times, The Post, The WSJ, and CNN all think we are at the end game. And - a leak about leaking water? Isn't this where we came in with Trump? From draining the swamp to draining the pool, Jack Smith has been pressing the guy who helped move the classified document boxes about how he drained the Mar-a-Lago club pool and managed to flood the room where all the security video logs were kept. If that isn't a callback to about a dozen other plot points I don't know what is! B-Block (20:04) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: How can you apologize and make it worse? Ask Chris Licht! By lying during the apology, getting support only from those at other networks, and finally being accused by a tabloid of fudging the only feel-good part of your story. The weight loss wasn't 5 AM workouts: it was Ozempic. (29:48) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: A Nebraska lawyer wasted taxpayer money trying to silence a state legislator on an anti-trans bill because the legislator has a trans child. Elon Musk's newest conspiracy theory: the advertisers are out to get him. Can't we take Twitter away from him? And Congressman James Comer's whistleblower and informant and secret FBI document? They are all just a rehash of the Rudy Giuliani crap that didn't even fool Bill Barr in 2019. C-Block (35:45) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Lilou, in the Bahamas, needs neurological help (36:51) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: The most fun moment in one of those old "SportsCenter" Commercials? The Alexi Lalas one, where I got to pretend I was John Belushi, smashing a guitar in "Animal House."See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

EPISODE 218: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN A-Block (1:42) SPECIAL COMMENT: The whiny visit of Trump lawyers to beg Jack Smith not to indict their client so he wouldn't yell at them again turns out to have actually confirmed ONE important fact. We can't be sure Smith has already decided to indict Trump on the stolen documents. But we CAN be sure he has NOT decided NOT to indict him - otherwise there would've been no need for the meeting. Others are thinking that way too: Trump's lawyers, trump, The Times, The Post, The WSJ, and CNN all think we are at the end game. And - a leak about leaking water? Isn't this where we came in with Trump? From draining the swamp to draining the pool, Jack Smith has been pressing the guy who helped move the classified document boxes about how he drained the Mar-a-Lago club pool and managed to flood the room where all the security video logs were kept. If that isn't a callback to about a dozen other plot points I don't know what is! B-Block (15:00) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: How can you apologize and make it worse? Ask Chris Licht! By lying during the apology, getting support only from those at other networks, and finally being accused by a tabloid of fudging the only feel-good part of your story. The weight loss wasn't 5 AM workouts: it was Ozempic. (24:48) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: A Nebraska lawyer wasted taxpayer money trying to silence a state legislator on an anti-trans bill because the legislator has a trans child. Elon Musk's newest conspiracy theory: the advertisers are out to get him. Can't we take Twitter away from him? And Congressman James Comer's whistleblower and informant and secret FBI document? They are all just a rehash of the Rudy Giuliani crap that didn't even fool Bill Barr in 2019. C-Block (30:45) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Lilou, in the Bahamas, needs neurological help (31:51) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: The most fun moment in one of those old "SportsCenter" Commercials? The Alexi Lalas one, where I got to pretend I was John Belushi, smashing a guitar in "Animal House."See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

EPISODE 217: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN A-Block (1:43) SPECIAL COMMENT: As reports swirl, we seem to be on the verge of SOMETHING from Special Counsel Jack Smith and the Grand Jury. It is reportedly to reconvene this week after a month off. And DOJ is reportedly set to meet with Trump's lawyers. And now a new question: would DOJ make at least a token plea deal offer to him? A LOT going on. (7:29) SPECIAL COMMENT: Having learned nothing from anything, Just to convince the RNC to give the network a Republican Presidential Primary debate, CNN is reportedly ready to partner with a far right website - and even have one of its propagandists co-moderate the debate WITH a CNN star ON CNN. And NBC is also prostituting itself to get a shot at a Republican debate, sending Lester Holt to try to talk them into it. And we continue to have fallout from Tim Alberta's profile of CNN CEO Chris Licht in The Atlantic. Actually, it's less fallout and more an autopsy because Licht would have fared better if he'd gone into the Atlantic OCEAN. There is soooo much to discuss, but not too many possibilities as to what might happen next. As Burt Lancaster says to Tony Curtis in "Sweet Smell of Success": "You're dead, son. Get yourself buried." B-Block (35:50) POSTSCRIPTS TO THE NEWS: "When I took over ‘Meet The Press’,” said Chuck Todd on Meet The Press as he announced his own firing FROM Meet The Press, “it was a Sunday show that had a lot of people questioning whether it still could have a place in the modern media space. Well, I think we’ve answered THAT question and then some.” He's self-aware to the last. And Lauren Boebert caught in a huge lie: she didn't fail to vote on the Debt Ceiling in protest; she just didn't make it in time - and it's on tape. IN SPORTS: the ultimate fan protest in a replica uniform and the Mets with a novel Hall of Fame induction (46:10) WORSTS: Marine LePen DOESN'T prove her French party wasn't associated with the Russians, Elon Musk's lawyers make a court filing that essentially disproves "The Twitter Files;" And a "comedian" goes on NewsMax and makes what she thinks is a joke but is actually a 150-year old racist trope about fried chicken. C-Block (50:40) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Lola in Miami (51:40) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: The day my ability to tolerate Chuck Todd for one more moment snapped like a dry twig during a drought and I could no longer bear to even be in the...same fantasy football league as him.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

EPISODE 216: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN A-Block (1:43) BULLETIN: It's the Smoking Gun, and it's still smoking! After the drama of the original revelation of the "Bedminster Tape," a further shocking bit of news. The Guardian reports that on the tape Trump is heard lamenting that he DID NOT declassify the Mark Milley Iran document. This ratchets up Trump’s self-incrimination. “For several minutes of the audio recording, the sources said, Trump talks about how he cannot discuss the document because he no longer possesses the sweeping presidential power to declassify, now out of office, but suggests that he should have done so when he was still in the White House.” Thus on the tape he discusses the document… that he says… he cannot legally discuss. Trump is on tape, not just ADMITTING that after he left office he KEPT classified top secret MILITARY plans for an American war on IRAN but BOASTING he kept them, AND describing the details of the American attack strategy, AND attributing the document to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, AND describing it to at least four people none of whom had the requisite security clearance to even know the document existed, let alone hear any of the details, AND saying he would like to share those details with them, AND then acknowledging he couldn’t because even an ex-president can’t just declassify whatever he wants, AND acting as if he is holding the top secret document in his hands as he’s talking about it, AND the conversation took place not at Mar-a-Lago but at his golf course in Bedminster New Jersey, AND the recorded conversation took place in July 2021 before Trump returned ANY of the documents he stole, AND two of the other people were there working on the autobiography of Mark Meadows, AND one of the others was his former White House press aide Margo Martin, AND Trump knew he was being recorded, AND the story of the meeting appears IN the Meadows Autobiography, AND this may be the tip of the Trump Tapes iceberg. Quoting CNN’s exclusive: “During the summer of 2021, sources say multiple people were making recordings of Trump as he held conversations with journalists and biographers.” And this tape is in the hands of… Special Counsel Jack Smith. Apply every cliche you can think of: this is a Smoking Gun inside a weapons depot filled with nothing BUT Smoking Guns. And that bit about tapes is just the tip of the iceberg because this isn't just "The" Trump Tape. It's The FIRST Trump Tape. B-Block (27:31) IN SPORTS: The Dodger disaster continues. They folded to the pressure of "The Catholic League" (which is one loud guy named Bill) and uninvited a Nun Drag group supported by actual Catholic Nuns. Since? Dodgers rightly attacked by LGBTQ community and local fans, so they reversed and RE-invited. Now they've been attacked by a pitcher for The Washington Nationals who has called for fans to boycott the Dodgers, and their own star twirler has announced a Christian Night at Dodger Stadium - evidently BEFORE the team was ready to. (36:52) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Someone claiming to be the wife of a serving marine says the president needs to be "executed publicly." Elon Musk paid $44B for twitter. One of his co-investors now says it's worth $15B. And disgraced disloyal ex-General Mike Flynn has found a new calling: SELLING SPERM. C-Block (40:50) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Bentley was rescued by a clueless group which stuck him in a luxury kennel and he has to be ransomed! (41:40) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: I never wanted to do politics. Then one day I went from interviewing Chris Kattan on MSNBC to anchoring the 1998 State of the Union AddressSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

EPISODE 215: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN A-Block (1:43) BULLETIN: It's the Smoking Gun.  Trump is on tape, not just ADMITTING that after he left office he KEPT classified top secret MILITARY plans for an American war on IRAN but BOASTING he kept them, AND describing the details of the American attack strategy, AND attributing the document to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, AND describing it to at least four people none of whom had the requisite security clearance to even know the document existed, let alone hear any of the details, AND saying he would like to share those details with them, AND then acknowledging he couldn’t because even an ex-president can’t just declassify whatever he wants, AND acting as if he is holding the top secret document in his hands as he’s talking about it, AND the conversation took place not at Mar-a-Lago but at his golf course in Bedminster New Jersey, AND the recorded conversation took place in July 2021 before Trump returned ANY of the documents he stole, AND two of the other people were there working on the autobiography of Mark Meadows, AND one of the others was his former White House press aide Margo Martin, AND Trump knew he was being recorded, AND the story of the meeting appears IN the Meadows Autobiography, AND this may be the tip of the Trump Tapes iceberg. Quoting CNN’s exclusive: “During the summer of 2021, sources say multiple people were making recordings of Trump as he held conversations with journalists and biographers.” And this tape is in the hands of… Special Counsel Jack Smith. Apply every cliche you can think of: this is a Smoking Gun inside a weapons depot filled with nothing BUT Smoking Guns. And that bit about tapes is just the tip of the iceberg because this isn't just "The" Trump Tape. It's The FIRST Trump Tape.   B-Block (18:52) IN SPORTS: The Dodger disaster continues. They folded to the pressure of "The Catholic League" (which is one loud guy named Bill) and uninvited a Nun Drag group supported by actual Catholic Nuns. Since? Dodgers rightly attacked by LGBTQ community and local fans, so they reversed and RE-invited. Now they've been attacked by a pitcher for The Washington Nationals who has called for fans to boycott the Dodgers, and their own star twirler has announced a Christian Night at Dodger Stadium - evidently BEFORE the team was ready to. (26:52) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Someone claiming to be the wife of a serving marine says the president needs to be "executed publicly." Elon Musk paid $44B for twitter. One of his co-investors now says it's worth $15B. And disgraced disloyal ex-General Mike Flynn has found a new calling: SELLING SPERM. C-Block (32:40) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Bentley was rescued by a clueless group which stuck him in a luxury kennel and he has to be ransomed! (33:40) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: I never wanted to do politics. Then one day I went from interviewing Chris Kattan on MSNBC to anchoring the 1998 State of the Union AddressSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.