TRUMP DOUBLES DOWN ON DEFILING ARLINGTON NATIONAL CEMETERY 8.29.24 | Countdown with Keith Olbermann

[Music] Trump has doubled down on his defiling of Arlington National Cemetery title 32 part 553 subpart C conduct of Memorial services and ceremonies Memorial services and ceremonies at Army National military ceremonies will not include part of in political activities Trump's team exploited a memorial event at Arlington on Monday broke the law by privately photographing and filming it physically assaulted Arlington National Cemetery staff who asked him to stop he gave a thumbs up and smiled idiotically while literally standing on the graves of dead US military Heroes and now his campaign is trying to turn it into an online campaign advertisement by definition partisan political activity Trump people need to be arrested for this because it could have been trivial it could have been there was a miscommunication not even an apology like anybody in the Trump campaign were human enough or honest enough or respectful of our war dead enough to apologize just say it was a misunderstanding no they blamed the cemetery staffer they blamed the media they blamed vice president Harris for not being there to commemorate the sad anniversary of deaths in Afghanistan the commemoration Trump has illegally turned into a campaign ad the commemoration Trump skipped last year and skipped the year before because to Trump and to this robot JV Vance those buried at Arlington are just another product just another cell just another gimmick just another brand name to exploit but Vance and thank God Vance might be the least intuitive politician of this Century he makes Jeb Bush look like George Bush Vance escalated this by swearing at the vice president of the United States and blaming her because Trump has been exposed as a monster who smiled and gave a thumbs up while literally standing on the graves of dead American soldiers KLA Harris is so asleep at the wheel that she won't even do an investigation into what happened and she wants to yell at Donald Trump because he showed up she can she can go to hell that may be marrying lead for brains there finally learned how to pronounce her name just to Twist this knife further Trump's Thug Chris Lavita has now doubled down on the attempt by Trump's Steven Chong to blame the staff at the national cemetery for Trump breaking the law quote for a Despicable individual to physically prevent Trump's team from accompanying him to this solemn event is a disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hollowed grounds of Arlington National Cemetery you heard me right hollowed h o l l o w d as in hollowed out as in Trump's brain is hollowed out you know these manipulative trumpist bastards who hate the troops who hate this country can't even get the word right it's hallowed h a l l o w d to honor as holy hallow you want to make this worse still well to their credit the news organizations axios and Daily Beast added the notation parenthesis sick and parenthesis after L's unforgivable stupidity the former Obama staffer and army veteran a captain in Iraq and Afghanistan Brandon fredman noted that other news organizations like NBC simply cut and pasted hollowed as if it were the right word never mentioning it was not but CNN corrected Lavita before publishing they printed hallowed as if he had said that giving no indication that Trump's senior campaign adviser made an offensive mistake claiming he didn't and worst of all One news Outlet first cut and paste it hollowed then corrected it to hallowed without a sick or a note that lasita made the mistake or even that they the news organization changed it after publication and you already know that the news organization that managed to commit three separate journalistic felonies on one infuriating quote to cover for Trump the news organization that again has covered for Trump's barbarism you already know it was the New York Times and of course there Remains the context for this the real reason the trumpists did not just resolve this with a quick statement not even accepting responsibility just confirming a miscommunication America has caught on to Trump's insanity and the fact that he doesn't care if American soldiers die or are wounded or captured or are asked to shoot other Americans on the street Donald Trump is not loyal to the United States of America nor to the memory of anybody buried at Arlington National Cemetery nor at Flanders Field nor in the ardens nor at Brookwood and this issue his fake patriotism his flag hugging his suckers and losers Essence this is about to break wide open because hey remember this we're only 13 days removed from this we gave Miriam the presidential medal of freedom that's the highest award you can get as a civilian it's the equivalent of the Congressional Medal of Honor but civilian version it's actually much better because everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor that soldiers they're either in very bad shape because they've been hit so many times by bullets or they're dead Trump profaned the Medal of Honor then he has desecrated and blasphemed Arlington and all who lie there now the opposing soldiers the international despots and Generals the terrorists who killed the men on Whose Graves Trump might just as well have literally danced Monday they respected our war dead more than does Donald Trump scumbag I would argue that Trump's willingness to metaphorically die on this of all Hills with his trained monkey JD Vance by his side underscores that he has never been more dangerous than he is today because the reality has somehow pushed its way past the nearly infinite amount of self- reverence and the diseases and the mini strokes and made its way to Trump's core what's made its way to Trump's core is that he is now losing that at the current trajectory he is going to lose and lose badly and that there will be no immunity so thorough that it will keep him from dying in prison if he did not know that before he found out about it last night more polls more disasters for Trump these are Fox News polls done after the Democratic Convention done after Trump was endorsed by bear cub boy Arizona Harris 50 Trump 49 it had been Trump by five Georgia Harris 50 Trump 48 it had been Trump by six Nevada Harris 50 Trump 48 it had been Trump by five North Carolina Trump 50 Harris 49 it had been Trump by five that is a total swing in four states to Harris of 25 points meantime the Republican Commissioner of Miami Dade County in Florida commissioned a poll there it's Harris 47 Trump 47 Florida a long shot still to be sure is in play Harris 47 Trump 47 they are tied in Miami Dade the Harris campaign just bought time for TV ads tying Trump to project 2025 they bought it in the swing States and they bought it in the West Palm Beach Market wherein lies Mara crap Shack and maybe worse than everything else Trump is beginning to kill off Republicans down ballot especially the ones closest to him psychopathically the fox pole in Arizona scores the senate race there as Ruben gyo 56 carry Lake 41 401 41 last week of August how in the hell is Carrie Lake going to be able to afford to buy nine 100 more camera filters this late in this race the fox poow in North Carolina scores the governor's race there as Josh Stein 54 Mark deserves killan saying that of his opponent's Robinson 43 54 to 43 Stein the fox pole in Nevada scores the senate race there as Jackie Rosen 55 Sam Brown 41 the Florida politics website Poll for the fourth district Congressional race there shows the brand new Democratic Congressional nominee Whitney Fox at 48 compared to the incumbent Republican Anna Paulina if that is your real name Luna 44 I am not saying this will happen none of the people around Trump are this smart but Richard Nixon was driven from office half a century ago not by democrats but by Republican Senators and congressmen who went to the White House and explained to him that not only would he be impeached and convicted and removed from office but more importantly all of them were going to lose in the midterms because of him Trump doesn't care but Trump is not just on a trajectory to lose and lose outside the margin of insurrection but on a trajectory to take down his entire party on November 5th thus however he becomes indescribably dangerous he is seeing this for what it is electoral Victory or electoral theft through a contingent election or death in jail it is tangible to him now with definable features this is a man so detached from reality that he may think himself Immortal for all we know or Invincible or unbeatable and yet the reality is clearly beginning to get through and he has thus become the cliche of all cliches the cornered and wounded animal capable of trying anything yesterday Trump reposted four despicable memes even by Trump standards of despicability parenthetically a day after his spokesman mocked kamla Harris's campaign for unseriousness because it was posting memes spiritual Street Fighter 17 rru by Donald J Trump all roads lead to Obama ret truuth if you want public military tribunals a picture of trump with President Obama AKA Pro Boss retr by Donald J Trump indict the unselect j6 committee sedition ret truth if you want to lock them up from beware of penguin ret Truth by Donald J Trump funny and it's a picture of kamla Harris and Hillary Clinton I'm quoting this quote funny how impacted both their careers differently unquote and most importantly from proud American 1776 ret Truth by Trump how to actually fix the system and pictures in orange jumpsuits not very well done of Joe and Hunter Biden and Nancy Pelosi Hillary Clinton Dr fouchy Bill Gates and kamla Harris that last count proud American 1776 is one of Trump's favorites it recently reposted an image calling for the murder of Vice President Harris and Governor wal I guess we are fortunate that Trump yesterday anyway did not repost the work of an account labeled the rise of Rod which has posted five times on Trump's social in the last year pro- Hitler video and statements like quote Adolf Hitler was right the Holocaust was the hollow hoax Jews have been capitalizing on nword for thousands of years these are Trump's people these and JD Vance this is going to get far worse before it gets any better and it gets better only when Trump is defeated beyond the margin at which the corrupted Georgia electoral process can try to thwart the certification of kamla Harris's would be Victory it gets better only when Trump is tried found guilty and imprisoned in the interim it is essential to remember that as hopeful as we should be that we can defeat Trump's efforts to destroy America from within for his own personal benefit we must remember he is desperate enough to try anything now or more correctly since at heart he is a weak and pusillanimous coward he is desperate enough to try to get others to try anything now since it is Trump's people who have dragged Hitler into this from as far back as Charlottesville and even earlier right from that point to these creatures on Trump social let us invoke Hitler for a good reason we need to treat Trump right now as if he were Hitler Hitler with access to [Music] nukes okay this has to be lightened somewhat happily there are two stories of some amusement quality I cannot fully convey this this is a video it's a visual thing posted by a very talented guy named Dan Wilbur Who my old friend Lauren Michael should be calling about cameos it is a 90 second video of this Dan Wilbur as JD Vance complete with mismatched haircut and too much eyeliner trying to order the donuts go and find it on social media in the interim the audio is damned good on its own hey I'm JB Vance and I'm I'm running for vice president with whom I I'd rather not say well I'll just get whatever a normal human person would get you and what do you do for work right you work in a donut shop what's that it's a donut okay and what what about that it's also a donut okay how long you how long you been here how long you have you been a a black at a job and how long have you been black I'm sorry hey folks she doesn't want to be on camera so uh just blur her face out and and while you're at it blur my face out too I don't want to do this anymore I'm so sad I'm so tired hey you don't have any like lean protein back there right like some soilent or tilapia or something no just donuts oh donut it's like a a beignet or a cambush I would love to to eat those again have you ever been to Paris what if we tried this over again and I went somewhere else oh my God I just want to die how long have you been here how long have I been in here it feels like 30 years hey is there like a fridge back there you can put me in and and lock it I'm and I do not want to do this anymore extra points to Dan Wilbur for the soilent green shout out in there it's people let make people and more substantially humor-wise remember David McCormick he was the hedge fund loser who couldn't even beat Dr Oz for the Trump nomination for the senate in Pennsylvania two years ago this time they let McCormack have the nomination without opposition I guess because he brings his own opposition with him the polls have him down between five and 10 to Senator Bob Casey in Pennsylvania and this is because Dave McCormick is a dits and wokeness also a collection of dites with a screenshot new details released on Philadelphia shootings police say suspect is gang member from El Salvador breaking the man in Philadelphia who gunned down and tried to kill eight innocent Americans is an illegal immigrant he's a MS13 member from El Salvador Dave McCormack Republican nominee for the Senate from Pennsylvania retweets all this adding MS13 gang members are terrorizing philadelphians because of Harrison Casey's radical open border policies it's a bad thing it's a bad thing when people get shot it's also irrelevant to the Pennsylvania Senate race because as the casy communications team helpfully noted quote Dave this story is from this story is from Philadelphia Mississippi say good night [Music] Dave also of Interest here on this allnew edition if this is where you usually hit stop a couple of pieces of business first going to take tomorrow off I hope have to do a show Monday night for Tuesday I need the long weekend I really need the long weekend on the other hand next week we will cross the 500th episode Mark and also I am considering going to five shows a week again down the stretch something short on Mondays probably it's not a final call could still back out of it but it is the it is the stretch of more urgent interest the CNN uncommitted voter who turned out to be a committed Trump voter Scandal that gets worse is the guy who fooled CNN is now selling T-shirts celebrating the fact that he fooled CNN and The Saga of the time NBC tried to Blackmail Me by literally threatening to make my parents homeless because I said I wanted to quit the show in which we slandered President Clinton on behalf of the protot trumpists of a quarter century ago that Saga in full that's next this is countdown this is countdown with Keith obman [Music] still ahead of us on this all new edition of countdown somebody said to me the other day Boy Bill Clinton looked old at the convention and I stared into space and for a moment I was back in a tiny dingy office at 30 Rock a quarter of a century ago and an alleged certified social worker for NBC News was threatening to sue me bankrupt me and put my parents out onto the street if I tried to quit doing the MSNBC show that had accidentally formed around me in which each night we help the primordial version of the current fascist push in this country to try to run a coup against Bill Clinton ah good times great oldies the story of the threat to Blacklist me because I would not smear Bill Clinton ahead in things I promis not to tell first there are still more new idiots to talk about the daily Roundup of the misr morons and Dunning Krueger effect specimens who constitute today's worst persons in the world lebronze attorney general Ken Paxton of Texas I'm looking at you Ken I'm over here well he's in Texas he doesn't work for the people of Texas he's just a rogue lawyer using the power of the state to crush political opposition the other day the league of United Latin American citizens lulac did something it has never done before and it has been in business since 1929 it endorsed a presidential candidate guess which one and guess the response of private prosecutor Star Chamber Ken the Latino group lulac has written to the justice department asking for an investigation by the feds after Ken Paxton sent agents of Texas to raid the homes of the leader of lulac and other Latino Democrats in Texas laptops and cell phones seized the CEO of lulac says that last week Lydia Martinez an 87-year-old woman who lives in San Antonio and is a 35-year lulac member who works to expand voter registration among seniors and veterans in South Texas got a knock on her door she opened it to find nine officers in tactical gear with Firearms who said they were EX excuting a search warrant the 87-year-old Miss Martinez was questioned for more than 3 hours about her voter registration efforts Paxton's excuse and Paxton needs to be in prison was that there has been boat harvesting in Texas and illegal voting in Texas and he's going to get to the bottom of it of course there hasn't been any the record remains intact 99% of all illegal voting in this country is done by Republicans this bastard Paxton what he should get to the bottom of is hell to borrow the vice presidential candidates terminology for today from the Republican Party the runnerup worser CNN Gary tuckman whoever manages the place and I'm assuming here there's still somebody managing the place there's no evidence of that actually their journalistic malpractice is now on a $35 T-shirt with their disaster printed on it avail able for you without a prescription remember the CNN Bryant Rosado Scandal I mean it's from 3 days ago 35-year CNN veteran tuckman conducted a panel after the DNC acceptance speech by vice president Harris eight avowedly undecided voters having heard her speak they met with him on the air live from Allentown Pennsylvania one of the eight said they remained undecided six of the eight said they were now ready ready to vote for Harris one of the eight said he was also now ready to vote for Trump this is uh Bryant Rosado and after some pressing he revealed that not only did he go into that focus group intending to vote for Trump but that he told CNN and in fact personally told Gary tuckman that he was intending to vote for Trump he says tuckman approached him and a friend at a restaurant and he asked they asked him who they were voting for and they told him tuckman asked the men including Rosado quoting Rosado crazy part is that CNN invited me knowing I was a trump supporter then they said it'll be voters that are undecided not Democrats they told me to keep an open mind and to give Kamala a chance after the speech since she's the new candidate after Biden so I did # Trump CNN's initial Anonymous response to the Midas Network after this disaster was quote when building the panel of Voters who haven't decided on a candidate all participants made it clear that they indeed hadn't made a final determination this particular individual who said he had supported Donald Trump in the past expressed to us that after President Biden dropped out of the race his mind became open and he hadn't make a final decision on a candidate now the folks at the Midas Network report Rosado is using the notoriety provided by his CNN appearance to sell t-shirts for $34.99 each they show a screenshot of his CNN appearance along with the caption she meaning vice president Harris is not ready you know who's not ready CNN honest to God as one of the people who was there almost at the founding they should just go dark until after the election nobody would miss them I mean run the Kamala Harris Tim Walls interview tonight in fact have kamla Harris interview Tim Walls and vice versa send danab bash home just then do this interview and then shut the network down tone and bars until we assess whether CNN management is suffering an utter loss of cognitive ability he is selling T-shirts of how he screwed CNN and still there's somebody worse our winner Jesse Waters of fox you might ask yourself how anybody this stupid could be a prominent figure at Fox for 20 years and remember he was O'Reilly's henchman literally that long ago O'Reilly used to send him out to harass people the answer of course is fox looks for people like this they look for stupid people the Dumber a TV guy is the more he is to likely to overhear news that he vaguely understands and think only how are my bosses couching this if I couch it that way or even go further they'll give me more money that's Bill Hammer it's Harris Falkner and it's the champ of the mall this idiot Jesse Waters the debate on the air was over a ban on kids having cell phones in schools there's a lot to this debate on both sides it's actually a legitimate cause of concern whether it's on Fox or PBS but there's one angle for which there can be no debate phones for kids are vital lifelines in the event of emergency and that's where the topic had gone but waters on Fox with arrogance dripping from his voice said what kind of emergency would it be where you couldn't just call the school even Janine Piro saw what was wrong there she interrupted with quote Oh my God Waters of course only he knows anything then interrupts her why do you need to call your child right then in math class that never h you you call the token liberal on the program Jessica tarof then interrupts him and says simply school shooter now Waters is really annoyed get them a beeper he said that get them a beeper you and I hear somebody just incredibly stupid suddenly realizing he's made a disastrous mistake live on television he's backed into a corner and like a little Trump with eraser head hair he's just decided he's going to crack crash his way out cuz it's always work before what are they going to do fire him he's stupid they want him to be stupid that's the appeal what I hear is they're talking about kids and schools and emergencies and Jesse Waters the father of four kids claims to be I'd need to see a paternity test honestly the father of four kids immediately thinks of himself not the kids not the kids in schools where things like school shootings happen because of republic an like him not the needs of kids not the needs of his own kids but his needs him calling them in math class his emergency not the kids's emergency and this nonsensical fall back here give your child a beeper so that during a school shooting a loud 20th century noise goes off from his book bag or his belt Jesse Waters regularly says something stupid one critic noted the trade of the malicious snake Tucker Carlson even up for Jesse Waters at 8:00 every night is a win for those trying to destroy Fox because it is the Triumph of sheer stupidity over subversion but in this case this is really bad Jesse Waters doesn't give a crap about your kids Jesse Waters doesn't give a crap about his kids Jesse his kids should be taken away from him by the authorities water today's worst person in the [Music] world to the number one story on the countdown and things I promised not to tell and the further I get away from the day I left NBC the more I realize that almost everybody there and many who are still there was crazy remains crazy it is a nest for aggressive ingratitude and the rewriting of History to make sure that everybody who is a success did it all on their own sprang fully grown from the ground and nobody owes anybody anything and those are the good parts then there are the really crazy people the ones who are in charge of covering the election the ones who laid the ground groundw work years ago for the bottomless pit that American news media has fallen into particularly the curse that will if not corrected kill us all both sides ISM Chuck Todd disease sadly Katie tur disease outside of the NBC Chris lizard disease Ryan lizard disease New York Times at this Ohio Diner disease it started with the scumbag Roger Als at Fox News it migrated to Ken star and the Bill Clinton prosecution and it then became after the sufficient number of refs were worked the we can't dismiss these SLE balls on the right because even if they are SLE balls they have public support we need every viewer we can get it's a declining Marketplace instead of saying what American News once said to the SLE balls of any party like Joe McCarthy or father cogin or any of the others which was screw you we're going to write or broadcast about your pery every day until you die they looked at Ken star's read thin persecution of Bill Clinton and said well no they found nothing in in two months and in six months in 2 years but what if they find something later and it turns out we opposed them and we were wrong we get killed by right-wing media and our fascist bosses like Bob Wright Ken star and his Thugs who went after Bill Clinton played the American news media especially TV news like the proverbial $2 banjo no news in the Clinton Lewinsky scandal no problem a quick phone call to Lisa Meers at NBC or any of several correspondents at CNN ABC or CBS or anybody at Fox and suddenly there was breaking news and another alleged victim ready to do a teary on camera interview which had already aired a dozen times with Clips on every Network before anybody realized the alleged victim hadn't actually alleged anything it was putrid but worse it was profitable and if you questioned it if you said this this isn't journalism the other networks the other newspapers the others invested in this story a realtime 247 soap opera would go to any length to attack you and what would your own network do hell sir that's why I wanted to tell this story in full I haven't before almost by accident I had become the face of the star Clinton Lewinsky story on cable news early in 1998 and one day I had enough I decided to get out and the reaction at NBC News was to try toe prevent me from leaving it was going to be a hostage situation to literally threaten my career my income my future my family to try to force me to keep working there to keep pushing whatever Ken star was cooking until you are in the middle of that you can never really imagine what television Executives will do for Ratings or money I think sometimes they are worth worse than politicians by that point I had been in TV for 16 years I was already 39 years old I had some gray hair I'd already been through the grinding Machinery of local news in Boston and Los Angeles I had already made my mark on Sports Center and moved on I thought I had seen it all Dum me I had not however seen NBC News President Andrew lack nor had I imagined that he would actually have ready to go at a moment's notice an employee who would be willing to try to Blackmail me literally threatened to bankrupt me and my parents and put them as LAX employee phrased it quote on the street this was in the spring of 1998 as I said I had decided I didn't want to do the nightly show anymore that was devoted to covering the Bill Clinton Monica Linsky story whether there was any news about it that day or not and especially since the network was devoted to portraying the Clinton Lewinsky story as the worst thing to happened to America since the Civil War the problem was the shows I did for Andy laak MSNBC in 1998 they were making millions of dollars a week in profit and the rest of the network was losing money it had never had ratings before I wanted to do something else something else anything else 50% Linsky 50% something else inside NBC failing that outside NBC stay in news go back to sports do it in New York go to Los Angeles anything except the show as it was constituted so through his Personnel vice president Elena nackman off and otherwise fairly pleasant person there came a message from Andy laack in May of 1998 if you go see our personnel consultant a woman named Deborah burn and you talk to her frankly we will consider letting you leave NBC immediately I went first off Elena akov told me on Friday afternoon June 5th 1998 some of us understand where you're coming from about The Madness of covering this Scandal every night like this so you're the good sport Award winner for doing this today Keith you'll like Deborah burn she's a certified social worker and she's done great things for us she's saved a lot of people who are in trouble I don't mean ethical crises like yours Keith I mean people who were passed out drunk at their desks I didn't stop to ask her which she thought was worse in any event Elena walked me through a Labyrinth of hallways at 30 Rock in New York to the office of this Deborah burn she was a bespectacled bent looking woman of about 60 with badly dyed hair and a fiercely aggressive handshake she was not big but frankly I was not convinced I could take her in a fight if it came to that and from the get-go her manager suggested it might come to that I am not an employee of NBC or MSNBC and I'm not beholden to them Deborah burn began loudly and too quickly I work on a contractual basis meaning I don't get 10% of anything and I don't get money for attracting more business it was clear whatever money they gave her it did not go to office Decor there were a dozen filing cabinets no windows two lamps her high back chair a metal desk and the plain wooden chair at its side on which I was instructed to sit I'm not here to be critical of NBC or MSNBC or Andy lack I'm not here to be critical of you I'm an impartial Observer and I'm simply here to help naov the talent vice president was still there and burn turned to her for the record Elena I need you to Des cribe the company's position about Keith's employment Keith Elena said understands that if he chooses not to work for NBC as NBC wants him to work he will have to face consequences now this was a slightly changed story from the one Elena nakov had given me even minutes earlier but one she'd given me in her own office gone was The Good Sport Award winner crap obviously she said we're not going to release you from your contract Keith if you want to be on the beach for the next two years plus whatever remains after that so be it that's his contract status Deborah with a crisp thanks Deborah burn now dismissed the vice president of NBC News who left burn produced and opened an improbably large folder with my name on it in impr probably large letters so I could see they had a folder on me ostentatiously shuffled quickly through a hundred assorted documents got to a blank form of some kind and asked me to describe the circumstances that had brought me into her office I explained I was asked to come in I also explained my conviction that I had made a complete mistake going into news in the first place that I missed doing sports and that on top of all that there had now emerged this new kind of news which I felt was against my personal ethics and beliefs about what I should be doing or in fact what the media should be doing I threw in the word pollution a couple of times very Grand of me I thought she didn't look up at me once all of media is becoming polluted in the way you've described she yanked off her glasses and staring at me not with anger but with annoyance you should learn how to live with it it'll be a lot easier for everybody if you just do that you're not a child grow up maybe next time you'll learn to read the contract before you sign it I had to fight a smile this wasn't some sort of counselor this was Andy laak's enforcer she'd be threatening to break my legs before we were done they might bring in broka to narrate it I uh I did I did read the contract um thoroughly I said suppressing my laughter this isn't about the contract this is about my morals and and nobody else's morals I said not NBC not Mr LAX just mine I don't like the way the news industry is handling this story I have no delusion about being able to change the news industry I don't even feel it's my responsibility to try to change the news industry this is about my ethics and my incorrect choices related to TV news and TV sports now she put her glasses back on she wrote some notes she chuckled as she wrote them you may indeed Miss Sports as you put it and you may feel that sincerely but it's nonetheless an adolescent fantasy and as to the pollution of the media that's also part of this fantasy world you live in you're a grownup now and you have to live with the consequences of your actions you heard what Elena said if you try to break this contract NBC will punish you severely this is David and Goliath here Keith and you're just not seeing it I started to reply something about how I had come down there as a as a gesture of compromise at their request and then she shouted me down you'll have to learn to compromise she emphasized the word as if I had not only not just said it but as if she had just invented it this is what the company wants this is what the audience wants and you sign the contract that's your responsibility I've been an NBC employee for 20 years and they're very big and they're very successful and they just won't sit idly by this will be David and Goliath and I'm very sorry to have to break it to you but you are not Goliath I asked her why she had said she'd been an NBC employee for 20 years 2 minutes after telling me that she was not an NBC employee she looked at me she snickered she wrote that down too otherwise she just kept talking television viewers are fickle and if you're off the air for 2 years it'll be real difficult to get back on people will forget you that's the real world now Debra burn paused and looked over at nothing over in the corner of the room I have a daughter who isn't realistic she suddenly whispered just like you lives in a world of her own she judges others and moralizes to them too she's tall like you too it's difficult for parents to have to look up at their children and discipline them your height has always made it difficult for your parents to discipline you thus you you remain a a headstrong child the defeat in her voice was total and as disturbing as that and this whole line was getting I really did think somebody was going to pop out from between those filing cabinets to tell me I'd been punked or that this was a remake of candid camera or something I patiently explained to Deborah burn that I had not been born at my current height of 63 and2 in that in fact my mother was taller than me until I was probably 12 13 years old that my father was still taller than me until I got to college but your mother is short she blurted with great satisfaction I need descriptions of your parents of their personalities for my diagnosis and please stop giving me your obviously prepared answers I was still trying at this point I started to describe my parents she cut me off father passive of course this time I actually couldn't stop laughing I said that was not my father at all that he usually did what he damned well pleased this annoyed Deborah burn no he's passive I can tell I'm a professional Keith he didn't stand up to your mother did he he never told her to grow up or act her age did he that means he was passive I could see her writing the word passive in block letters on one of the forums on which she'd been putting her notes Sheen detached this page theatrically she stuck it into the the large pile of documents on the TR top of the thing and she grabbed a fresh page from a stack to her right what about your parents finances I explained they were both retired so you take care of them I began to answer that they were both extremely independent when she cut me off again I said so you are responsible for them financially don't evade me my amusement at this obviously deranged woman now began to be overcome by anger I swallowed both the anger and the amusement and I explained I handled their finances so you're their sole financial support just as Elena nman off's report to me indicates I thought so so you're the super star in the family are you I began to try to bring us back to this planet when Deborah burn Rose in her chair and leaned in toward me and tell me Kei what exactly will your parents do for money what will keep them from being out on the street when their precious Superstar is blacklisted from television this purported social worker who worked for NBC or didn't work for NBC or maybe both depending on which minute it was went into detail about the threat she was now making on behalf of NBC News MSNBC Andy lack Elena nackman off and our corporate parent GE even if I simply quit the Clinton Lewinsky show indeed quit television NBC would declare that my contract was still in force it would suspend me it would not pay me it would then sue me for the salary it had already paid me then it would sue me for the money it had spent on promoting the show then it would get a court order extending my contract indefinitely until the suspension ended and then it would suspend me some more let that sink in she said first time I ever heard that phrase let that sink in and then she didn't even pause for a second to let me let that sink in instead she burst out with this the greatest of all the nonsecretors on a day of nonsecretors you have what I would classify as a Howard Stern kind of personality well now I was back to actually biting my tongue to keep from laughing at the image of a bunch of therapists at a conference somewhere dryly discussing the parameters of the Howard Stern kind of personality dogmatic unbending presenting absolutely forceful opinions on the air that no one is permitted to disagree with imagine going on a date with Howard Stern I tried not to all he would be doing would be talking about himself it would be unbearable you're like him on the air and I can see that who you are on the air is who you are in life of course I've never seen your show I don't have cable been married I recovered from these nonsecretors quickly enough to explain that I had not been married engaged again no I thought I might be about to be ever had a long-term relationship of any kind I told her I had oh really how long term I answered 11 years and when did that end I calculated it had ended 4 years previously to the month in fact and you haven't had an 11-year relationship since I explained to her as pleasantly as I could while I looked to see if there were any emergency exits or calculated if there might be a window somewhere outside that I could throw myself through to get out of the building as fast as possible I explained to her as pleasantly as possible that I didn't know any way of squeezing an 11year long relationship into four calendar years so that my answer here would have to be no I told told you to stop giving me prepared answers right then again she switched tones and topics how much do you drink she demanded I said I almost never drank she dropped her pen and stared at me again well what does that mean I said I believed I'd had four glasses of wine during the current calendar year and it was June she took the glasses off and leaned in as far as she could without again rising from her chair or falling off it well then how much drug do you do told her I'd never use drug or drugs stronger than alcohol and before I could criticize her grammar she got red and angry then what's that smell on your breath look you you just don't get this do you look at my telephone Keith I did as instructed I looked at an ordinary Black telephone although given her EST Insanity for all I knew she would shortly reveal it was a direct line to Elvis Presley if I didn't want a black telephone and I have a black telephone I'll just have to make the best of it won't I I said I thought she was holding up very well under the strain of that disappointment I instantly regretted the snideness of that remark because it was just going to make things worse and then to my astonishment she sat back in her chair ran her hand through her hair and almost whispered thank you for saying that I appreciate it the pause in the storm did not last long you're seeing a therapist it says here you've been discussing these so-called ethical issues I said we've made a lot of progress well you can't resolve the work matters without getting at the core problems which are obviously personal and family related not to mention the alcohol and the drug so talking about work with your therapist is probably not going to solve this to the satisfaction of NBC so I will need to talk to your therapist and I want you to sign a release Here and Now permitting me to do so unless that is this therapist of yours is working towards making you adjust to the facts that you signed this contract and this is your job and this is the real world and this is David and Goliath and that's all there is to it and you're on the air tonight at 8:00 and that's it now she paused and stared off into space again like when she mentioned her daughter when I was in my early 20s I was traveling from Smith college to Montreal by train she suddenly announced my meeting with her went on for 2 hours it featured threats against my parents it had her yelling at me it had her accusing me of using alcohol and drug and yet this this was the only point where I really considered trying to make a break for the door the Montreal Canadians hockey team were on that train very drunk very happy very boastful of their conquests during their trips to the various cities of their hockey league and one of them I suspect given your fantasy world interested Sports you may have heard of him boom boom jeffre on he came over and tried to pick me up I nodded robotically and began to wonder if I suddenly leaped from the wooden chair and did run out of her office would she continue to tell this story anyway after I left we didn't talk of such things then not in the 1950s a married man an athlete a tall athlete now of course if I was a reporter and this happened I'd have to report it I'd put it on the news that's just the way the world has changed the real world that is Keith I suggested that at every news Organization for which I had worked the code had been the same that unless an incident involved the law or it diminished a player's ability or availability in a game we in fact didn't report it like at ESPN I related a story similar to her own that had occurred in Miami at the past World Series in 1997 well she resumed indignantly You might have gotten away with that under an old contractor in the 60s where a hippie like you might have fit in but this isn't 60s this is the real world of today and you won't get away with that kind of attitude under this contract or any other contract in the future you could even go back to your precious Sports and you'd soon find out about the real world don't kid yourself it'll be David and Goliath I said that the decision not to report the story in Miami was made under this contract by Executives from NBC Sports and now she sat bolt upright and slammed her glasses back on her face I can't get this done in just one session you know deathly afraid that she was about to recite another memory from the Glorious Days of rail travel I agreed to return the following Thursday knowing full well as I said so that I would never come back to her office even as a hostage or in a body bag well I don't know about you she said as she opened her door but I'm exhausted I told her indeed so was I which was rather unfortunate because now I had to go do two live hours of Television yes I guess you do she suddenly stared at my feet then quickly up at my head as if she were estimating what size I took in caskets but you're so much taller than I am so you'll recover more quickly MSNBC had arranged a car service to take me out to the studios in New Jersey from 30 Rock and I spent the entire trip writing all this down pages and pages of notes and quotes and boom boom jeffre on and my own height at Birth and I called my therapist on my phone and I asked her if there was a New York state number that I could call to complain about a certified social worker who seemed to be certifiable and who had just threatened me she gave me a number I called while still in the car and they said they had no record of any social worker named Deborah burn when I got to the MSNBC studios in sagus New Jersey now the home of MLB Network of all things I went to my little office I picked up a small micro cassette tape recorder that I kept in the desk there and I went in to see my executive producer Phil Griffin I explained how this woman burn had threatened me and I mentioned that I'd called the state social worker hotline and appeared that Deborah burn was operating without a license and as I did this I kept flipping that mini cassette machine from hand to hand hand until I was sure Phil Griffin had gotten the implication completely phony on my part but like James Jones says in Field of Dreams There Are Rules here no there are no rules here my executive producer buried his head in his hands needless to say the Deborah burn thing had blown up in NBC's face they went into a full-fledged panic at the news that she was not registered as a certified social worker and it turned out that was a clerical mistake it was her own clerical mistake she was registered but she was registered only under her maiden name but for the next few weeks NBC was completely on the defensive about me soon they were promising to make me Tom brokaw's Heir Apparent if I would only stay I said yeah but it says in Brian Williams contract that he's Tom brokaw's air parent the executive in question laughed and said no Brian only thinks it says in Brian Williams contract that he's Tom brokaw's a parent it can be you stick with the winsky story ow and layoff Ken star I don't have to think that one through too long if they could make poor Brian think that he was the heir parent when he wasn't they could make me think I was the heir parent when I wasn't as well and that price laying off kenstar that was a nonstarter the stalemate continued for a few weeks until as I have related here previously a friend in the sports division revealed that NBC had lied to me to get me to sign my contract with them that I was not not being paid as they had told me primarily by the news division but by the sports Division I then met with Monica Lewinsky's first lawyer Bill Ginsburg to discuss suing NBC over such illegal negotiation tactics Ginsburg thought just leaking the fact that we had met would spring me sure enough about 6 weeks later Lon akman off suddenly called my agent and told her they were willing to sell my contract to Fox Sports in Los Angeles yippe so do not doubt what television EX Ives are willing to do to protect their ratings and their profits even in the event of full-fledged fascism and do not doubt what a zealot with even minimal skills at media manipulation like Ken star can do to the news you watch or hear or read even after he's dead also most relevantly now as CNN's Talent face the prospect of conforming to the right-wing party line or suddenly finding themselves with a conservative co-host or finding themselves unemploy Floyd there's one more MSNBC story to tell that is relevant I went back there in 2003 and we did pretty well and then in 2010 they began to pressure me to change my tone and to add in more diverse voices and they did not mean women or members of minority groups or people like I'd hired like Rachel mat they meant conservative diverse voices that's when I began to pack my bags to leave and a few months later I left and then four years later they asked me to come back as long as I agreed to have a conservative co-host I passed but here's the problem I don't know anybody else pressured in those ways who has also passed not at CNN not at MSNBC not anywhere else do not doubt what some television talents are willing to do just to remain tell teleion [Music] talents I've done all the damage I can do here thank you for listening please share this podcast with somebody who does not listen send it to Deborah burn Brian Ray and John Philip chenel the musical directors of countdown arranged produced and performed most of our music Mr Chanel handled the orchestration and keyboards Mr Ray was on the guitars bass and drums and it was produced by TKO Brothers our satirical and piy musical comments are by the best baseball stadium organist ever Nancy faou the sports music is the Oldman theme from ESPN 2 written by Mitch waren Davis courtesy of ESPN Inc other music arranged and performed by the group no horns allowed my announcer today was my friend Jonathan Banks everything else was pretty much my fault that's countdown for this the 69th day until the 2024 presidential election the 1,330 day since convicted felon Donald J Trump's first attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the United States use the September 18th sentencing hearing if it happens use the mental health system you have this Available to You President Biden use presidential immunity to stop him from doing it again while we still can and anti-semitic anti-immigration gun nut Republicans please stop shooting at Trump the next scheduled countdown is Tuesday going to try to take tomorrow off going to try there'll be a bulletin if the news requires don't make me come out there till the next one I'm Keith Olman good morning good afternoon good night and good luck [Music]