EPISODE 239: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN
A-Block (1:43) SPECIAL COMMENT: Jack Smith is reportedly ready to indict Trump on between 30 and 45 MORE counts. And he is preparing to indict several of Trump’s lawyers from the Fake Electors Scheme including (voluntary interview notwithstanding) Rudy Giuliani. And all that is reported by the same British newspaper that correctly nailed the Miami indictments two days before they were finally handed up. CNN adds that the main Trump campaign official in charge of the Fake Electors will take the immunity deal he was offered and testifying for the Special Prosecutor.
If the source for Britain's "The independent" is correct, Trump could be facing as many as 77 counts in a superseding indictment, although its sources are not clear if those charges would come in a superseding indictment in Florida or might be filed in a different jurisdiction (and we have already discussed the possibility of Trump being indicted in New Jersey for The Trump Confession Tape, plus all the crimes still on the table in D.C.). There is one intriguing new twist to the seemingly trivial question of where to indict. It will, quoting the story, “depend in part on whether they feel the Trump-appointed district judge overseeing the case against him in the Southern District of Florida, Aileen Cannon, is giving undue deference” to Trump. As to the hapless Giuliani, Feinberg’s source says that despite the ex-Mayor’s proffer offer to prosecutors, Rudy will quote “most definitely” face at least some charges from Jack Smith’s office, dating to his actions in the interval between the election and January 6th.
Also: Trump showed that secret map to the co-chair of a lobbying firm taking millions from at least three Chinese tech firms closely linked to the Chinese government. The “I should not be showing the map” map? The “so don’t get too close”map? Wednesday night ABC News identified the person Trump showed the classified map to as Susie Wiles, a Trump adviser and campaign official and his potential 2024 campaign chair. Last night the NEW YORK POST, of all news outlets, identified Susie Wiles as the co-chairman of Mercury Public Affairs, lobbying mouthpieces for at least three really bad, really dangerous Chinese firms including Alibaba – the online retailer and web services company that is actually partially owned BY the Chinese GOVERNMENT and which the Post says Susie Wiles’ company, Mercury, is STILL receiving payments from.
And the nightmare unfolds at the Supreme Court: Affirmative Action is struck down and although work-arounds are offered and President Biden lambasted the Fascist Theocratic Court's interference with the settled law of the nation and agreed that the court is not a "normal" one, when offered the cure, he shied away: "If we start the process of trying to expand the court, we’re going to politicize it, maybe forever, in a way that is not healthy, that you can’t get back.”
President Biden? It's irredeemably politicized NOW. It's FOREVER. It is ALREADY not healthy. And we can't get it back.
(17:54) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: The 5'7" Prime Minister of the UK violates the first rule of comparative height: NEVER give away 14 inches in a photo. Pirro, Ingraham, others at Fox mock Biden's use of CPAP machine despite own physical and emotional problems; New York Mayor Eric Adams must resign: he rages against a renters' advocate, compares her to a slaveowner, insults her repeatedly. She's an 84-year old woman who escaped the holocaust yet within seconds of her remarks he played the race card against her.
B-Block (28:06) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: Not only did Joe Biden spend most of his senatorial career fighting a reputation as a hothead, but when he decided to fight it he turned to advice about how to productively focus his anger to...me?
C-Block (39:10) FRIDAYS WITH THURBER: I succumb to Bothsidesism! If I have a long Biden story, I must offer a long Trump story. And Thurber wrote one, and somehow mana