CHUTKAN MAY DECIDE WHETHER DEMOCRACY LIVES OR DIES - 9.27.23

Dressing. Dressing. Oh, French dressing. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's good. I'm AJ Jacobs, and my current obsession is Puzzles. And that has given birth to my new podcast, The Puzzler. Something about Mary Poppins? Exactly. This is fun. You can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears. Listen to The Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts. Or wherever you get your podcasts. Sometimes the pop culture we love just teens hits differently in retrospect. Maybe it's a tabloid story we couldn't get enough of or an illicit student teacher relationship on our favorite show. We're Susie Bannockerim and Jessica Bennett, posts of the new podcast in retrospect. Where each week we'll revisit a cultural moment from the past that shaped us, and probably you, to try to understand what it taught us about the world and our place in it. You're the first person that I've talked to about this for years and years. Listen to In retrospect on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you find your favorite shows. Ready to be inspired? I am polling with the host of Eating Wall Broke Podcasts. Step into a world where I sit down to budget meals created by self-made entrepreneurs, influencers, and celebrities. Together, we revisit the very dishes that fueled their journey from humble beginnings. Every Thursday, listen to Eating Wall Broke on the Black Effect Podcast Network iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you listen to your podcast. The Black Effect Podcast Network is brought to you by Uber, earn like a boss at uber.com slash boss. Countdown with Keith Olverman is a production of iHeartRadio. Tonya Sue Chutkin is about to become the most important person in the 2024 presidential campaign, period. Maybe the most important person in the fight to prevent the sabotaging of democracy. Because if Judge Chutkin sides with Trump and against Jack Smith in the gag order case, she will be enabling Trump to claim that everything he does from here on in, every threat he makes, every conspiracy theory he stokes, every lie about President Biden he proclaims has been authorized by a federal judge. And you cannot stop him and the law cannot stop him and the constitution cannot stop him. And that fresh hell will make the current one we are living in, read like a quick dance in the spring rain to read the full 25 page Trump gag order filing answer is an exercise in realizing that for the right fee, there are lawyers who will invent and argue for your right to saw off their limbs. But more importantly, it soon becomes apparent that it is even more of an exercise by Trump to get the judge and thus the courts to in effect sign off on every one of his anti-democracy rages at every call for assassination by proxy, via mental gymnastics akin to proving a negative. The Trump lawyers response filed late Monday night right before the deadline bursts with Trumpian claims of rights that do not exist and precedents that do not authorize his dangerous rhetoric and constitutional means to destroy the constitution that are not part of the American system of representative government. Well, they don't exist now and they don't authorize him now and they are not part of America now. But if judge Chutkin finds for Trump, he will immediately claim they are all in effect and he will exploit them and 482 days from now. We may very well be living in an authoritarian state. Trump's lawyers gave away the subplot here in the first sentence, literally the first sentence. The answer to the Smith demand for a gag order begins quote, President Trump respectfully submits this response in opposition to the prosecution's motion to impose unconstitutional prior restraints. There it is. It is the special counsel violating the Constitution, not Trump who called for terminating the Constitution. There it is. It is the special counsel trying to hinder Trump, not Trump lying about who he's being prosecuted by and why and encouraging his cult to kill at least one likely witness in the case against him trying to hinder all of them. If Chutkin finds for Trump, Trump will proceed and boast that his threat that kicked this all off if you go after me, I'm coming after you, is constitutionally protected. He might as well put it on bumper stickers and MAGA hats. If you go after me, I'm coming after you. But that's not a threat. The entire document, apparently written mostly or largely by Todd Blanche, starts with the statement of a Trump lie as if it were a fact. Again and again, Trump's lawyers insist, repeat, assume the paranoid delusion that Trump may or may not believe but which he has sold to his mob since the day the special counsel was appointed, that he is being prosecuted at the direct orders of Joe Biden. And not because he, Trump, is the most venal criminal in the history of a nation amazingly abundant in evil bastards. Quote, this very motion came on the heels of adverse polling for President Biden. His administration's plan is quite simple. In Leisha 45 page, speaking indictment, discuss and leak its talking points in the press and then cynically attempt to invoke the court's authority to prevent Trump and those acting on his behalf from presenting his side of the story to the American people during a political campaign. If Judge Chutkin does not take the fascist conspiracy theory-laden argument and break it over Trump's head. He will then act as if every single thing said in it has been endorsed by the courts. It will no longer be Biden is prosecuting me. It will be as Judge Chutkin agreed Biden is prosecuting me. Failure to take the opportunity presented to her to smash Trump's delusional, extra legal arguments now will give them the authority of a court that did not bark in the night. And it will give him the authority to behave in public just as he behaved in public in the month before January 6th. Behave as a terrorist. The Trump argument against a gag order ignores the entire universe of reality. It is about, and it is only about, Jack Smith, as some sort of political minion, micromanaged by Joe Biden, quote, preventing Trump from defending himself in the political arena while giving President Biden and his surrogates, including those in the corporate media, free reign to say whatever they want, unquote. It is premised on the idea that every single conspiracy theory and paranoid construction of MAGA and Trump and the new American fascism is indisputably correct. And Trump's lawyers make no attempt to hide this, quote, no one can doubt that substantial segments of the U.S. public harbor deep suspicions regarding the prosecution's motives in this case. President Trump has a constitutional right to speak on this subject both as a political candidate and as a citizen of this country, unquote. Who caused that suspicion? Who nurtured that suspicion? Who has exploited that suspicion? No one can doubt that substantial segments of the U.S. public harbor deep suspicions regarding the sudden death of Ivana Trump and her inexplicable burial near the first tea at her ex-husband's golf course, but if I ran for president against Donald Trump, my entire campaign was based on some kind of assertion that it was obviously true that all those suspicions were justified because we all know how she really died and why she was really buried there, I would have to suffer the consequences legal and otherwise of this ridiculous and arrogant presumptions. Trump's presumptions are no less ridiculous and no less arrogant and in many senses far more slanderous. Now that he has poison society, he wants to pretend he had nothing to do with the poisoning. He's only commenting on the bad taste in the water. And once again, what judge Chutkin rules in this case will not just decide whether or not there is a gag order, but it will decide whether or not Trump gets away with making up a false rumor and then running for president by pretending it's not only true, but he's just speaking on suspicions that substantial segments of the U.S. public harbor after he did everything in his power for month upon month to get them to gas like themselves into being suspicious. There is, as ever, as in every utterance by Trump or in his defense, in this document, neither shame nor conscience. But the prosecution's examples are intentionally vague in order to chill the first amendment rights of president Trump and his counsel, unquote. That is one of 25 different references in the filing, 25 in 26 pages, 25 references to the first amendment. The document was in fact submitted roughly 27 hours after Trump promised boasted, crowed that if he regains power, he will go to news organizations like NBC and all the others and remove from them all of the protections provided to them by the first amendment. This is what judge Chutkin could solidify into what amounts to settled law in Trump land. His lawyers have also included a passage in here, which if Chutkin signs with them will be offered by Trump as proof that the courts have ruled he had nothing to do with the insurrection. The insurrection, the only purpose of which was to reinstall him in the White House by bloody force and which he inspired and he incited. It claims the special counsel launched, quote, gratuitous out-of-court statements, wrongly insinuating that President Trump was responsible for the events of January 6th. And one more perverse Easter egg. It cites from a precedent case, quote, if the first amendment has any force it prohibits Congress from finding or jailing citizens or associations of citizens for simply engaging in political speech, unquote. Forget for one moment that in this country the urging of violence against prosecutors and judges and potential witnesses who just happen to be chairman of the joint chiefs has never been considered protected political speech. It's more important to note which case that quote I just read comes from. That's what matters here. It is from citizens united and it is in there to set up an appeal to the Supreme Court, which as we now know from the latest pro-publica revelations about Clarence and Ginny Thomas and bribes, Clarence Thomas' Supreme Court corruptly decided citizens united and opened the Pandora's box of limitless political graft and venality disguised as free speech. And yet none of this that I have read you so far is the most cynical and the most disingenuous of all the things in the Trump answer to the Jack Smith demand for a gag order or some action-restraining Trump. Quote, the Constitution does not permit the censorship of President Trump for the unprovoked acts of third parties. President Trump has never called for any improper or unlawful action. It's Todd Blanche or whoever, and they cite a 2003 case for Ginny versus Black and quoting that, intimidation in the constitutionally proscribable sense of the word is a type of true threat, where a speaker directs a threat to a person or group of persons with the intent of placing the victim in fear of bodily harm or death. If Chuck confines for Trump and not for the special counsel, the distinctions without differences that are at the heart of Trump's lifetime of getting away with it will become codified and solidified and in cement. The judge has her choice. She can pick the side that will say that even the judge in the witch hunt against poor martyrdom J. Trump believes that telling a bunch of killers in psychopaths that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is guilty of an act so egregious that in times gone by the punishment would have been death, that that is not the same as telling them something like, oh, I want one of you to go kill the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. She can choose that side or she can pick the side that believes that who says something like that is more important than the precise phrasing that if the speaker inspired the January 6th coup attempt, the words are as calculated to inspire an assassination attempt as would be the, just to pick an example out of thin air, the doxing of President Obama, oh, right, jump did that too. Judge Chutkin's upcoming choice and the Jack Smith response is not due until Saturday is about far more than just a gag order for somebody who deserves it for the rest of time. This decision may actually decide the presidential campaign and thus in turn it may actually decide whether American representative government lives or dies. The other judges have been busy and Trump continues to lose at almost every turn in the nearest parallel to Chutkin's upcoming breath taking choice. In her upcoming gag order ruling, Judge Sarah B Wallace of Denver has limited what Trump and other parties in the 14th Amendment ballot in eligibility case there can say nothing quote that could reasonably be construed as a threat intimidation or act of harassment intended to coerce, compel or adversely influence any party, counsel or witness from fully and freely participating in these legal proceedings, including quote statements to the media or in public settings, including through social media that pose a substantial likelihood of material prejudice to this case. In Atlanta, Judge Scott McAfee has ruled that the identities of the jurors in the prosecution of Trump there for trying to steal the election in Georgia will remain protected. No names, no videos, no sketches, no recordings, no identification in any document by anything other than their juror numbers. Even in the Florida case, with Trump appointing Judge Eileen Cannon trying not to fall off the chair behind the bench, she has granted Jack Smith's motion to examine potential conflicts, including Trump's co-defendant's Walt Nauta and Carlos de Oliveira and their Trump supplied lawyers and she has ordered that backup attorneys stand by in case she has to throw the current lawyers out. And of course here in New York, the judge in the attorney general civil fraud case against Trump has already awarded much of the verdict to the prosecution. He's canceled the Trump organization's New York business certificates. He said that Trump and his sons, um, Oude and Kusey. That's right, isn't it? Oude and Kusey Trump that they quote repeatedly, unquote, violated New York state fraud law and in particular, Trump lied about how much he was and is worth by only about $3,600, million. The documents here clearly contain fraudulent valuations that defendants used in business. Judge Engoron said yesterday he then fined Trump's attorneys 7500 clams each for reusing legal arguments that had already been rejected by the judge twice. Judge Arthur Engoron literally just put Trump out of business here. Now, metaphorically speaking, it is up to Judge Chutkin to do exactly the same thing. Several of interest in this 300th edition of the podcast, Good God 300 episodes in 423 days. Well, what's coming up? What's the opposite of breaking news? Former baseball hero Kurt Schilling is a really, really dangerous hate-filled man with a bad memory. And Robert F. Kennedy Jr says he doesn't know what actually happened on September 11th. I know. Neither of these qualifies as breaking news. 300 episodes in 423 days, I'm going to have to revisit some oldies, but goodies somewhere, right? That's next. This is Countdown. Something about Mary Poppins? Something about Mary Poppins. Exactly. Oh, man. This is fun. I'm AJ Jacobs and I am an author and a journalist and I tend to get obsessed with stuff. And my current obsession is Puzzles. And that has given birth to my new podcast, The Puzzler, Dressing, Dressing, Frick's dressing. Exactly. That's good. That's good. We are living in the golden age of puzzles and now you can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears for 10 minutes or less every day on The Puzzler, short and sweet. I bet I know what this is and now I definitely know what this is. This is so weird. This is fun. Let's try this one. Listen to The Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's awful and I should have seen it coming. This is In Retrospect, a podcast about pop culture from the 80s and 90s that shaped us. I'm very much a product of the pop culture I consumed. Yeah. And I don't think that's a bad thing. I'm Jessica Bennett, a New York Times writer and bestselling author. I'm Susie Betacarum, an award winning TV producer and filmmaker. Every week we'll revisit a moment in cultural history that we just can't stop thinking about. From tabloid headlines to illicit student teacher relationships and one very memorable red swimsuits. I found myself in Pamela Anderson's attic as you do. I put that red swimsuit in a safe because it seemed everybody wanted it. They're digging deep to better understand with these moments taught us about the world and our place in it. I want you to really smell the axe body spray that emanated during this time. It was presented more as kind of like a crime topic. Okay. Not a love story. Not a love story. It had been branded on the uteruses of every single woman from C to shining C. Listen to In Retrospect on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Ready to be inspired? I am co-ling with the host of Eating Wild Bro's Talk. Step into a world where I sit down to budget meals created by self-made entrepreneurs, influencers and celebrities. Together, we revisit the very dishes that fueled their journey from humble beginnings. Every Thursday, tune in to catch your favorite icons like Mario, Blamin' Ro, and a cupcake millionaire, Minion, Francois. Listen to the untold stories beyond the limelight. Tales of sacrifices, audacious leaps, nights spent wide awake and the shadow of homelessness they conquered on their rise to fame and prosperity. Every Thursday, listen to Eating Wild Broke on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcast. The Black Effect Podcast Network is brought to you by Uber. Earn Like A Boss at uber.com slash boss. This is Countdown with Keith Olberman. This will be a full sports report. This will simply be a brief farewell and thanks and tribute to Brooks Robinson. I don't think enough people in baseball today understand that Brooks Robinson was the greatest third baseman to ever play the game, certainly defensively and offensively he was enough to lead the Orioles to the 1966 World Series Championship and another one in 1970. But this is about something else. Brooks Robinson was one of those rare sports immortals. Who to the end didn't quite believe that he was anything special. Brooks Robinson was nice, I think, to everybody he ever met. He treated them with respect, he deferred to them, he complimented them, he was always available for any small task or favor asked of him. All the fan stuff, all the, do you know Brooks Robinson, can I meet him stuff? Brooks Robinson accepted with happiness and with gratitude as we will accept the memory of Brooks Robinson with happiness and gratitude. Still ahead on countdown, I don't know if you've noticed this but occasionally I devote time on this podcast, people in media who have helped to destroy media, well it's that time again kids. Ladies and germs meet the man who hired Megan Kelly at NBC News and who had in a previous incarnation as the chief of that department turned MSNBC into all Monica Lewinsky and yes, I ran into him on the street in front of my house not long ago. Things I promised not to tell coming up, first time for the daily roundup of the Missions Morons and Dunning Kruger FX specimens who constitute today's, first persons in the world, the bronze, former Boston Red Sox picture, former ESPN baseball announcer, former are a lot of things from which he's always been oft, Kurt Schilling. Another user, Johnny Goodtimes reports that Schilling has retweeted the infamous online anti-Semite Lucas Gage, then apparently undone the retweet without any explanation. The Gage post-quote, anytime you see two Jews in leading roles debating each other in some political or moral conversation, you are witnessing the quote Jewish question right before your eyes, how dare this group that considers themselves separate, believe they have the right to not only dictate to the majority of that nation that of an unquote. You get the idea, it's anti-Semitic garbage, Lucas Gage is a scumbag. In passing I'd like to point out that once when he was still not a societal pariah, not a complete one anyway, Kurt Schilling went on my old partner Dan Patrick's radio show and announced that if he ever met me, he would punch me in the face. This was in about 2012, 2013 or so. Kurt Schilling and I met in 1993, so 20 years before he threatened if he ever met me. When he claimed to be a fan of my work on sports center and he was pitching for the Philadelphia Phillies and I was doing play by play of a Philadelphia Phillies game on ESPN, then in 1997 Schilling and I were both part of the NBC crew that broadcast that year's World Series. Schilling and Barry Larkin, then a player with the Reds, did the embryotic online coverage of the World Series. It's not loading and he asked me for tips about how to do television and they interviewed me, so Kurt is as smart as he is honest as he is unbigoted, which ain't much. They're runner up, speaking of which serial plagiarist Benny Johnson adds serial liar when President Biden joined a United Auto workers' picket line yesterday. He said, quote, I marched a lot of UAW picket lines when I was a senator since 1973, but I tell you what, first time I've ever done it as president. Johnson deliberately altered the quote so he could claim Biden said, first time I've ever done it in person. Johnson's lie was so egregious and clumsy and obvious that he got called out by the Pentagon correspondent of the conservative Washington Times. And he got called out by a conservative pundit named Carmine Sabia and then he got called out this Benny Johnson squam, got called out by an advisor to carry lake. When carry lakes advisors say you're doing it wrong, man, you must really be doing it wrong. By the way, good time to mention, if you hear that Trump and Biden both went to see striking auto workers, not quite another media fail, Trump is going to an event today reportedly arranged at a non-union auto plant and reportedly organized by the National Right to Work Foundation, which is exactly what it sounds like and which is taking time out from its busy attempts to bring back the 19th century and decertify the union at Starbucks to help Trump out a little bit. In the middle of an auto strike, Trump is going to meet with a group of scabs. At our winner, Trump stewed Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., you're wondering why he is like this. It is because every time he sees a third rail, he has to grab it and kiss it. Did a podcast with the CNN National Security analyst Peter Bergen and RFK Jr. brought up 9-11 and asked whether Bergen bought the 9-11 Commission's explanation that it was al Qaeda. Kennedy then confessed, quote, I don't know what happened on 9-11. I mean, I understand what the official explanation is. I understand that there is dissent. I know there are strange things that happened. One of those buildings came down that wasn't hit by a plane. Was it buildings happened or building 10? It was Area 51, Bob. You're thinking of Area 51. Bobby grabbed that third rail and kiss it and then make sweet, sweet love to it, Kennedy Jr. Today's worst person in the world. Something about Mary Poppins? Something about Mary Poppins. Exactly. Oh, man. This is fun. I'm AJ Jacobs and I am an author and a journalist and I tend to get obsessed with stuff. And my current obsession is Puzzles and that has given Berth to my new podcast, The Puzzler Dressing. Dressing. Oh, French dressing. Exactly. That's good. That's good. We are living in the golden age of Puzzles and now you can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears for 10 minutes or less every day on the Puzzler, short and sweet. I thought to myself, I bet I know what this is and now I definitely know what this is. This is so weird. This is fun. Let's try this one. Listen to The Puzzler every day on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. That's awful and I should have seen it coming. This is In Retrospect, a podcast about pop culture from the 80s and 90s that shaped us. I'm very much a product of the pop culture I consumed and I don't think that's a bad thing. I'm Jessica Bennett, a New York Times writer and bestselling author. I'm Susie Bennett Caram, an award winning TV producer and filmmaker. Every week we'll revisit a moment in cultural history that we just can't stop thinking about. From tabloid headlines to illicit student teacher relationships and one very memorable red swimsuits. I found myself in Pamela Anderson's attic as you do. I put that red swimsuit in a safe because it seemed everybody wanted it. We're digging deep to better understand what these moments taught us about the world and our place in it. I want you to really smell the axe body spray that emanated during this time. It was presented more as kind of like a crime topic. Okay. Not a love story. Not a love story. It had been branded on the uteruses of every single woman from sea to shining sea. Listen to In Retrospect on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. To be inspired, I am co-ling with the host of Eating Wild Bro's Talk. Step into a world where I sit down to budget meals created by self-made entrepreneurs, influencers and celebrities. Together, we revisit the very dishes that fueled their journey from humble beginnings. Every Thursday, tune in to catch your favorite icons like Mario, Blame and Ro, and a cupcake millionaire Minion, Francois. Listen to the untold stories beyond the limelight. Thousands of sacrifices, audacious leaps, nights spent wide awake and the shadow of homelessness they conquered on their rise to fame and prosperity. Everything ain't for you, everything's not your battle and everything's not about us. You come in, you play your role, you do what you're supposed to do, you go to f**k on me, feed your family. Every Thursday, listen to Eating Wild Broke on the Black Effect Podcasts Network, I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcast. The Black Effect Podcasts Network is brought to you by Uber, earn like a boss at uber.com slash boss. As usual, I heard Andy Lack before I saw him. I met him first in 1997 and spoke to him on the phone a couple of times and realized he was another one of those people you could hear without actually using the phone. To this foghorn is his utter fascination with himself. As I saw him approach from the east as my dog and I walked from the west, I tried to make myself small and invisible, but I really had nothing to worry about. As usual, Andy Lack was so absorbed with the sound of his own voice and the brilliant points he was making that I could have blasted, hello Andy! Adam threw a bowl horn and he would never have noticed. On the other hand, I noticed again that phenomenon of his career and life that his wife Betsy looks a little like every woman anchor he has ever hired. It was Andy Lack who in his second and finally incarnation as the head of NBC News decided that Megan Kelly should be brought over from Fox and given a reported $69 million over three years because I forget what he said, but the actual answer was she looked like his wife when she was younger. As several of my remaining friends at NBC had told me he had already demoted a couple of the minority anchors on MSNBC to make room for women anchors he liked who looked like his wife at various stages of her life. He probably never heard any of the racist, stupid, moronic things Megan Kelly had said on the air, nor any of the warnings he had been given about her because he was always talking, talking, talking. Makes me look like a mute. Back in 1998 at MSNBC the little sputtering nightly news magazine show Lack had hired me to do suddenly exploded. We went from literally 70 or 80,000 viewers a night in total to a million, then to a million and a half, then to two million a night, just as long as we continued to mention Bill Clinton and or Monica S. Lewinsky. So after a couple of months of this, I decided to quit. I had just left the office of my new therapist having spent most of the hour talking about the craziest person I had yet met in broadcasting, Andy Lack, the president of NBC News, when my phone rang out on 23rd Street in New York and it was Andy Lack. The background here is that the problem in short was that we had turned my not too successful magazine show of 1997 into the all Bill Clinton Monica Lewinsky show of 1998, that there was not enough new news about them every night did not matter. We did at least one show a night, often two, often for two hours each. If Monica Lewinsky's lawyer said anything more detailed than no comment, we stayed on the air until we ran out of guests. The whole thing, including television's crazed wall-to-wall reaction, was a carefully planned Newt Gingrich plot in which he thought he could actually impeach Clinton and then somehow impeach President Al Gore before President Gore could get a new vice president confirmed, which would mean the new new president would be Newt Gingrich. So I wanted out because we were no longer just covering this, we were participating in it. I said, let me leave or let me do something else, change the topic because I'm done. The problem was, every time I said something like, I'm done or I let my cynicism about the story escape on the air, the ratings went up. The year before MSNBC was lucky to get 100,000 viewers for one 15 minute period a month. Now we were upset if we did not get a million viewers a minute, MSNBC was actually making money. And that was almost entirely because of my shows. So when I wanted to quit people like Andy Lack wanted not to kill me, but to force me to stay there and keep talking, like that woman who does the news on North Korean television. To make that possible, Andy Lack tried everything, promises that I and not Brian Williams would be the next anchor of NBC Nightly News once he got rid of Tom Brokaw, more money, time off, threats, threats against my family, anything except the first step towards letting me change the show or leave it. The first step would have been just talk to me face to face. That was what he was calling to talk about on the warm afternoon of the 27th of May, 1998, how he how he couldn't talk to me. It was exactly as crazy as it sounds and it underscored what I saw that Friday evening on my dog walk. You think I can talk holy cow. Next I asked Lack if I could come into his office to talk to him about, he said no. I asked him if we could talk about it on the phone at some point, he said no, then he proceeded to talk about it. Well, he began if you're calling about this meaning of life business, if you just want to stir the pot about how you're not satisfied with the show at the moment, and I might add only at the moment, the nuance and subtleties of your career, well, I'd have to say no, we can't meet. Of course, in saying that, I'm always available to meet with you. I love you. For me, he paused for no discernible reason, possibly in the desperate attempt to remember what he had just said. In my mind, they're now appeared at the bottom of that news channel ticker that always goes across it, that flashed a message about not worrying about what I would hear next that all this was just some sort of test of the Andy Lack emergency random thoughts warning system. He suddenly resumed. It's just not the right time. It's premature. It's too early in the process. And in saying it's too early in the process, I'm not saying there is a process. I'm just saying that there shouldn't be a process yet because it's just not right time for this. And I don't think we've explored the options fully for improving how you see what's happening. And when I say, we, of course, I mean you and Phil Griffin, you and Phil Griffin because Phil's part of this process, not to imply there is a process, but rather he's just at the beginning of this situation, of the resolution of this situation, not that this is a situation that requires resolution necessary, because I think you know in life, you have many times, many durations, many seasons, many years where you might say you're unhappy or discontented or in some way not pleased with what you're doing, but you'll have plenty of opportunities to make changes in the direction of your life, obviously not now. You made these changes last year and you committed to it and I committed to it and you've done such an outstanding job, a thoroughly outstanding job, but I can't tell you how much we value you. And I was on Larry King last week and Larry said to me, I love older men. And I said, I love older men and he said, I wish I could be doing for you what he's doing for you. And this is not that you should think that I'm totally blowing smoke up your backside, but the critical acclaim, especially the insiders critical acclaim, the people whose opinions matter consistently rating you as the best at this on the cutting edge. And for that matter, the ratings have been outstanding and I'm fully committed to you in all senses of the word. But if you want to talk to me about in some way, changing what you're doing, it just doesn't enter into the equation because things are going so well. And we're just delighted with the program and you need to understand that on my radar screen, this isn't even on the fast track because why should I say to you, look, I want to change this completely successful show when it's been such a success and a complete one and a runaway hit and everybody says to me, how smoothly you've made the transition from sports and I can't talk to you about it because I love you. I mean, I'm fully behind you 100% and you have my support and my commitment and my resources and they're all at your back and call anytime you need them or you need me, but there aren't problems. So, and the thought of tinkering with it or adjusting it just is the farthest thing for my mind right now, but you have to understand I'm completely committed to you and fill than what you're doing. And I just can't talk to you about it now, although the door is always open and you know you can call me and talk to me at any time about anything. And when I say, I mean, anything, I don't mean this and I can envision changing things because I don't have to click. That was Andy Lack, the president of NBC News talking to me about not talking to me about changing the Clinton Lewinsky TV marathon. It is possible that after all these years, I did not quote his three minute spasm of words completely accurately, but if I did not, I got damned close. So the next time Megan Kelly says something stupid or tweets something stupid and it's got to be soon. He's due, just remember, don't just blame her, spread it around, blame the guy who stuck her on an actual television network with a reputation, Andy Lack. And say your criticisms of Andy Lack as loud as you want because just remember he's going to keep talking and he'll never hear a word of it. I've done all the damage I can do here. Thank you for listening. Countdown has come to you from the studios of the Olderman Broadcasting Empire, high atop the sports capsule building in New York. The music you've heard was for the most part arranged, produced and performed by Countdown Musical Directors Brian Ray and John Philip Chanel. Brian Ray handled the guitars based on drums, John Philip Chanel did the orchestration and keyboards. It was produced by TKO Brothers. Other music, including our Beethoven tunes, were arranged and performed by the group No Horns Allowed. Sports music is courtesy of ESPN Inc and it was written by Mitch Warren Davis. We caught the Olderman theme from ESPN too. Our satirical and pithy musical comments are by Nancy Faust, the best baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer today was my friend Tony Cornheiser and everything else was pretty much my fault. So that's Countdown for this, the 995th day since Donald Trump's first attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the United States. Convict him now while we still can. The next scheduled Countdown is tomorrow, Bolton says the news warrants. Till then, I'm Keith Olberman. Good morning, good afternoon, good night and good luck. Countdown with Keith Olberman is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm AJ Jacobs and my current obsession is Puzzles and that has given birth to my new podcast, The Puzzler. Something about Mary Poppins? Exactly. This is fun. You can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears. Listen to the Puzzler every day on the iHeart Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Sometimes the pop culture we love just teens hits differently in retrospect. Maybe it's a tabloid story we couldn't get enough of or an illicit student teacher relationship on our favorite show. We're Susie Bannock-Harram and Jessica Bennett, posts of the new podcast in retrospect, where each week we'll revisit a cultural moment from the past that shaped us and probably you to try to understand what it taught us about the world and our place in it. You're the first person that I've talked to about this for years and years. Listen to in retrospect on the iHeart Radio app Apple podcasts or wherever you find your favorite shows. Ready to be inspired? I am polling with the host of Eating Wall Broke Podcast. Step into a world where I sit down to budget meals created by self-made entrepreneurs, influencers and celebrities. Together, we revisit the very dishes that fuel their journey from humble beginnings. Every Thursday listen to Eating Wall Broke on the Black Effect podcast network iHeartRadio app Apple Podcast or wherever you listen to your podcast. The Black Effect podcast network is brought to you by Uber. Earn like a boss at uber.com slash boss.