IT'S NOT MAGA. IT'S MASA: MAKE AMERICA STUPID AGAIN - 3.17.23

EPISODE 156: COUNTDOWN WITH KEITH OLBERMANN A-Block (1:41) SPECIAL COMMENT: It doesn't MATTER whether Marjorie Taylor Greene really is so stupid that when she insisted yesterday she's never seen any Putin plan to invade Europe, she doesn't know Ukraine is in Europe. All that matters is whether she makes sure that something like 51% of the COUNTRY is so stupid that IT doesn't know Ukraine is in Europe. It's MAKE AMERICA STUPID AGAIN. And its weapon is a rapidly strengthening, rapidly escalating feedback loop centering around Fox "News" and we goddamned better do something about it soon. Because not only is it being used against Ukraine and for Russia, but it's now reached the equivalent to tertiary syphilis: McCarthy gives Carlson meaningless January 6 video which Carlson lies and says is 44,000 hours of the Zapruder film so that yesterday Rep. Barry The January 5th Tour Guide Loudermilk can lie and say "this means we need a new January 6 Committee to investigate the OLD January 6 Committee!" The long-term solution would be a truth based liberal television network with a billion dollars behind it, but who's going to do THAT? The short-term solution is Senate hearings into Fox "News" and Murdoch and whether its interest in destroying the current form of government is funded in any way by a foreign power. It doesn't have to BE funded by a foreign power. Just at the moment, we just need something we can put on against the Barry Loudermilk Hearings To Clear Barry Loudermilk! (10:20) IN SPORTS: Stop The World Baseball Classic before it kills again (18:35) THE WORST PERSONS IN THE WORLD: A bad day for Kellyanne Conway as she reveals Kushner was the only Trump family member to make billions during the Junta, and then shocks the world by confirming China is sending arms... to China! But she's no match for Marianne "Non Disclosure Disagreement" Williamson, and SHE'S no match for Ron "I Eat Pudding With My Fingers" DeSantis. B-Block (24:30) THINGS I PROMISED NOT TO TELL: It was the greatest scoop of my career to that point, an exclusive told in pantomime by the athlete we were staking out, another gift handed to me without a moment's hesitation by a hockey and football owner and curmudgeon named Harry Ornest. And it would've upended the entire coverage of the 1991 National Football League draft. Except the cameraman forgot to roll tape. I'll be getting over it any day now. C-Block (39:00) EVERY DOG HAS ITS DAY: Archie, a Missouri puppy, was shot in the leg (40:00) FRIDAYS WITH THURBER: Two of his stories of man not against others, but against life: "Nine Needles" and "The Mouse Who Went To The Country." See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.