EPISODE 105: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN

A-Block (1:45) SPECIAL COMMENT: The Taliban Caucus lights the Republican Party and the House of Representatives on fire, while on his first day, the New Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries perfectly whips his members to do literally do nothing more than bring their popcorn and watch everybody from Gaetz to McCarthy burn, baby, burn. It was a beautiful thing, and it left the full range of fascists from Tucker Carlson to Rep. Byron Donalds having to cobble together the nonsensical sophistry that their self-defenestration was actually democracy in action. If Jeffries can manage to keep the Democrats from reverting to their natural desire to do ill-timed good on behalf of the institution rather than let the Republicans shoot themselves again today, he will have won the 118th Congress no matter which Liz Truss the GOP eventually settles on in place of the wounded McCarthy.

B-Block (15:15) SPECIAL COMMENT No. 2: There is the tragedy of Damar Hamlin of the Buffalo Bills, and then there is the disgusting reality that the National Football League is now trying to gaslight us. OF COURSE the league intended to resume Monday night's game even after the stricken player fell. And now the NFL has lied about it and sleazily blamed Joe Buck, Suzy Kolber and all of ESPN, to cover up its own insensitivity and callousness. This is, of course, the history of the NFL, which did the wrong thing after JFK was assassinated, and after Mayor George Moscone and Councilman Harvey Milk were assassinated hours before a Monday Night Football game in San Francisco, and after it was told flights could not be guaranteed to get its players and media to games the weekend after 9/11. But this lie makes the Hamlin nightmare even worse - as does the rank exploitation of it by the anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists, who spit on the memories of Chuck Hughes and J.V. Cain and Hank Gathers and so many athletes who died on the field, from cardiac distress. (30:54) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: Trump and Michael Flynn are no match for Congressman-Elect George Santos.

C-Block (36:09) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: In 1973, Charles Crawford was interviewing me for his TV news story from one of the earliest baseball card shows. In 1983, he was sitting next to me on the anchor desk at CNN. He introduced himself and I said "we've met before." His reaction when I told him how and when is worth your time.

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Dennis Prager (Encore)