TRUMP MUST GO DIRECTLY TO JAIL; VIOLATES GAG ORDER TWICE - 5.21.24

His gotcha moment from last week was disproved yesterday by not just videotape, but c span videotape at his gotcha moment from this week from yesterday that he got Michael Cohen to admit he had stolen money from Trump's company, turned out to have already been brought up in testimony a week ago, and both times it underscores that either Trump illegally listed that stolen money as a reimbursement to Michael Cohen, which they deny, or Trump illegally listed the

stolen money as legal expenses, which is what he is on trial for doing. And lawyer Todd Blanche also let his client be caught not just dozing off like every other day in court, but to quote the New York Daily News, it appeared Trump was fully out and just woke up. His head was tipped back so far that he would have been looking at the ceiling when he opened his eyes. In other words, Trump was this close to drooling the drool of regret into the pillow of remorse,

and there was a little issue afterwards. The first item letter A on the gag order against Trump defended is directed to refrain from making or directing others to make public statements about known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses. He talked afterwards about a witness. Wait, this just in't I'm being told. He talked afterwards about two witnesses.

a roaring end. And then as you heard, he talked about witness Michael Cohen, and as the judge has also explicitly stated, it doesn't matter if he's reading or quoting

somebody else's words, it's him talking about a witness. If there is any remaining doubt in Mershon's mind that the premise of the Trump defense is not some kind of refutation of the charges, but is instead merely an all out attack on the rule of law by any means available, an all out attack on the judge, on the court, on its authority to dare to thwart Trump, the man who wants to put the dick back in dictator. If there is any remaining doubt in Jan Merschan's mind about this,

he must erase it. This is why the outburst from the witness, Robert Costello, who is an attorney, where he complained about Mershon's rulings in real time as they happen, This could be the last straw that finally sends Trump to the Big House. That was Trump's witness. The prosecution fought Merchon to keep him out. Merchon sided with the defense. The witness then metaphorically spit in Mershon's face. Not good

on the old strategicy front, Bob. Regardless, I don't care if it's for the rest of Trump's life or just for the rest of the day. Mershon has to put him in jail now, and to my mind, today would be a good day to do it. They're gonna break for the holiday, come back next Tuesday, give him an all expenses paid, never to be forgotten Memorial Day weekend at Rikers Island. I mean, at this point it's pretty

clear Trump won't really understand where he is anyway. As court began yesterday, he did not know what month it was, or where he was supposedly campaigning this week, or where the next election or primary or whatever is. He decided he was being kept from advocating for himself before the primaries in Hampshire and Iowa, which happened last January. Natzie Fagan and we go on day to day.

cancer charities in the millions. The money Cohen stole was reimbursement for a company that was helping him and Trump fix a CNBC opinion poll about influential businessmen fix it in Trump's favor, and they could only get Trump up to ninth on the list, so Trump stiff them. Also notable the Trump posse, the Republicans, the Renfields. A week ago, it was the Speaker of the House. I don't know how the hell he became Speaker of the House, but

he's Speaker of the House. And a bunch of corrupt senators yesterday, Representative Keith's self, Representative Mary Miller, who is nuts, who quoted Hitler at a stop the Steel rally, whose hobby had one of those three percent militia stickers on it, and Representative Andy Clyde, also known as Andy clown, the one who said that January sixth was just a normal tourist visit. Yes, it has happened in our lifetimes. They are officially out of posse. Trump officially can no longer

grab them by the posse. I'm still working sick with this sinus infection, so I'm particularly proud of that one line. In fact, I'm gonna say it again, Trump can no longer grab them by the posse. The other Trump headlines He's supposed to have a rally in the South Bronx day after tomorrow. He joked to donors that he fears he might get hurt there as a native of the Bronx and the descendant of South Bronxians, I would say this is the first sign I have seen in months

that he may not be crazy. By the way, the New York Times reported the little joke that he made to his donors. Guess which reporter reported that, no, wasn't

Katie Terry Trump's Taylor Swift. Meanwhile, Kid rock interview with Rolling Stone in it uses racial slurs, including the N word, boasts he is part of America's political problem, and then already drunk on wine and switching off to Jim Beam and Cola quote He's sitting in a dark leather chair shouting at me about something or other, when he reaches behind the seat, pulls out a black handgun and waves it around to make some sort of point rock then notes, and I got an fing g damn gun right here.

If I needed, I got them everywhere. And somewhere Ted Nugent is chewing on his knuckles, going, I have to do better. I must do better than remember last week's Trump. Why the eighty thousand crowd in New Jersey, eighty thousand at Wildwood, New Jersey, one hundred thousand, two million, whatever it was. Nope, it's been withdrawn from New Jersey Insider NJ insider Lisa Fagan. I don't make these names up.

Lisa Fagan, the Wildwood Press spokesperson the Associated Press originally cited as the source for the original crowd estimate, was quoted as saying the eye popping estimate was based off her own observations on the scene Saturday, having seen dozens of other events in the same space. Five days later, when asked to explain the wide variance between the AP reporting and the New Jersey dot Com video that reveals

a crowd in the few thousands. Fagan provided a statement from Mayor Treyano of Wildwood at odds with what the Wire Service initially attributed to Fagan quote. As a tourist town, we speak in tourism numbers, Tryana wrote. When we see that volume of people attending a beach event, we know that eighty thousand plus people are in our town. Now I know that's Trumpian bookkeeping in a nutshell right there.

Your crowd is maybe seventy two hundred. You announced it's eighty thousand or more because you and only you know that. You mean that that's how many people must be in the whole town, because there's seven thousand people in that one part of the town. And you know, you could

criticize this, but remember it could be way worse. The mayor theoretically could have claimed that the crowd was three hundred and thirty three million, three hundred thousand, because that, of course is how many people would be in our country when there's seventy two hundred people in that one space.

And lastly, in the Trump News this update on the presidential debates, did I tell you he would find an excuse to back out did I tell you that he would soon be preparing a series of excuses to back out, that eventually he would take the one that seemed the least stupid. Well, he hasn't gotten to the least stupid yet, but he's preparing to back out, and he will back out.

Still has not suggested, by the way, in any of the variations of his stories, that he might believe that, say, a sitting justice of the Supreme Court of the United States letting any kind of protest flag hang in public from the flag pole in front of his own house for at least three days is wrong, whether it's a flag indicating stop the steal or steal the stop or

Antifa or support for Canada. Doesn't seem to think there's anything wrong with that, has not denied that there was a protest, and has not for the second or for a moment, suggested that he and his family did not have the right to do that while they were still at the Supreme Court can considering cases that could have decided or reversed the outcome of the twenty twenty election. And still relative silence from the Democrats because because we

have a bunch of cowards on our team. Although there is a good idea and we'll see if anybody does anything about it. There is a new development, a theory that the upside down flag from January twenty twenty one from Martha Ann Alito it was all her fault. What does sam Alito know from the flag sitting there and the giant flagpole in front of his house? What does he know from that? He never looks at the flag in front of his own house. He barely goes to

his own house. Who's Martha Anne Alexandria Virginia. I don't know her. There is a new theory that the upside down flag is part of a political pattern for which Alito should be punished in some way. The former legal editor at BuzzFeed, Chris Geidner, reports that in late August of last year, as the witch who calls herself libs of TikTok continued to attack bud Light and the company that owns it, and the influencer Dylan mulvany, that somebody sold up to fifteen thousand dollars in stock in the

parent company of bud Light. Guess who sam Alito August twenty twenty three, indicating a pattern of political protest which violates the requirements that all judges, even the ones on the Supreme Court, must stay publicly apolitical. Well, I think that ship sailed a long time ago. Like that speech that he gave after he visited the Vatican last year, in which he mocked everybody who wasn't Catholic, I think sam Alito's concern about whether or not we might perceive

him as political that may have waned. He may not wake up in the middle of the night going gee, I hope nobody thinks I'm political. But in any event,

here's the argument. In August of twenty twenty three, according to the official filings, he sold between one thousand and fifteen thousand dollars in at least that amount and at least some of his stock in Anheuser Busch, and this federal Chris Geidner, writing at lawdork dot Com wrote, according to the Federal Judicial Financial Disclosure Reports database, Justice Samuel Alito sold at least some of his stock in Anheuser Busch and bought stock in Molsen Cores on Monday, August fourteenth,

twenty twenty three. So he switched brands. Here's the problem with that. I have no respect whatsoever for Sam Alito, and I have no respect for the justices on the Supreme Court, who, because they are lifetime appointees, have basically said f you to everybody else in all the rules, and this includes the liberals. But the frick of scene of Dylan mulvaney and Bud Light began in April of twenty twenty three, and we're now talking about something towards

the middle of August, August fourteenth, twenty twenty three. And you have to ask yourself if you accept the idea that a judge, or particularly a justice of the United States justice of the Supreme Court, has the right to own stock, which is a debate, and I can see arguments on both sides of it. Does he not have the right to bail out of a stock that has been failing from April onwards, even if it's his side

of the political ball that has caused the failure. Does he not, by August have the right to sell up to fifteen thousand dollars worth of his investment and put it in a different beer stock. I just don't think this is the real pattern. Now, if he sold the stock and then she puts out the hit on Dylan mulvainy, that's another story altogether. That's insider trading. But to call the insider trading I think is nonsensical. Is Alito a political sheep in sheep's clothing? Yes, of course. And again,

should Supreme Court justices be able to own stocks? A much better question, But even that's kind of thin gruel for this. On the other hand, as in all stories in the timeline in which we live, a vital detail of the original story was missed because all of us who are looking for stuff like this have been going at about oh thirty seven hundred percent of personal capacity since sometime in the summer of twenty fifteen. In the original New York Times story about sam Alito's stop the

steel flag at his house. I own a host. Word of the flag filtered back to the court, people who work there, said in interviews. Word of the flag filtered back to the court? We who New York Times, you mean to Chief Justice Roberts, since he's nominally in charge, or or a janitor somewhere, or a clerk. I mean, remember who the clerks are, particularly on the conservative side, who they become. Laura Ingram was one of Clarence Thomas's clerks. I think that's all you need to know about who

those people are. But what are we saying here? We're saying Chief Justice Roberts knew about this months ago, years ago and didn't do anything about it. Well, is that not enough? Just that, whether it's Roberts or somebody else, just that one phrase in the New York Times, word of the flag filtered back to the court, people who worked there set in interviews, and the rest of it in there. Does that not suggest we need hearings. Congressman

Steve Cohen has moved to censure sam Alito. There is, of course, one small problem with that, which is that the House is controlled by the Democrats. No controlled by the Republicans. Well, there goes the idea that justice or truth, or morality or the law will be enforced to censure. Sam Alito would just use the Barney Rubble test, would require Congresswoman Barney Rubble to vote for it. But there is a Judiciary committee that is run by Democrats. It

is in the Senate. Unfortunately, it is run by Dick Durbin, who is either afraid of something somebody has on him at the Supreme Court, or is the last guy in America who buys into this idea that the Supreme Court is somehow better than say, the Supreme Theocratic Court of Iran. This sanctity of the Supreme Court, he's the last one who believes it. I don't think sam Alito believes it anymore,

and apparently Dick Durbin does. And they're not doing a damn thing except saying you really need to put in some sort of etiquette and social responsibility and morality clause. Oh, I mean, I'm sorry. I didn't mean morality, just conduct caused eye. I'm sorry. There wasn't getting into morality. Clarence Thomas, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. We're not talking about all that stuff again with the videotapes.

had to testify. And of course, even if by a chance Roberts and Alito or Thomas and Alito were subpoened and thus really felt the need to recuse, oh guess what, it's still four conservative votes to three liberal votes. However, as always, Brian Boutler off message once a Countdown contributor has a better idea. Subpoena not Roberts or Alito or Thomas, but subpoena the liberal justices Justice Brown, Jackson, Justice Socomior Justice Kagan. Subpoena them to come to the Democratic run

Senate Judiciary Committee. Why, as Boiler points out, and I recommend subscribing to his site. Off message in January twenty twenty two, there was one Scotis vote against giving the January sixth Committee from the House access to the Trump White House records in its investigation of the insurrection? Who voted against it? Who was the one vote? Thomas? Why

doesn't say you're lucky that you know it's Thomas? Civilians November twenty twenty two, Alito and Thomas both voted against or voted in favor in that case of trying to stop the Nuary sixth Committee from getting access to Kelly Ward's phone. Kelly Ward has since been indicted in the fake elector's plot in Arizona, and she is one of the first class nut jobs in the entirety of the fascist underbelly in this country. Alito and Thomas defended her.

Why what was their reasoning? What was discussed before the ruling no idea? March twenty fourth, the quick ruling that erased the fourteenth Amendment this year? Also this year they wouldn't expedite a review of presidential immunity. They're still sitting on presidential immunity. They're trying to find that fine line. They're trying to do that razor's edge thing, thread the needle we're going to have presidential immunity, but it's not

going to apply to Biden. You watch, and they would hear the bid to erase charging insurrectionists with the obstruction of official proceedings that was voted upon, and they're hearing it. And who voted what way, and what were the logical arguments? We don't know in all cases, who voted which way, who said yes, we will hear this case, who said we will not. All of the arguments they could make, all of the possibilities which can and has been made

public in previous cases, has not been made public. It is all a secret. It is not just the Supreme Court. It is the secret goddamned Supreme Court. And they're doing

whatever the f they want. And Buler's idea of how to interrupt that is since Democrats do not control the House and cannot impeach Alito and Thomas, and there is no way to get them off the court, and John Roberts does not have the guts to turn in his resignation and not only completely destroy the court without in fact shifting it to a liberal court, but turn the court over to somebody who is in there to reform

it and force Thomas and Alito out. Boiler's idea is call the liberals to testify to who said what in those negotiations in those the liberations, the Alito and Thomas with Kelly Ward, the January twenty twenty two vote over giving the January sixth Committee the records from the Trump White House, the quick ruling erasing the fourteenth Amendment, the expedited or non expedited review of presidential immunity, the attempt

to fabricate presidential immunity. Who said what? Justice Sotomayor, I know you don't want to be here, but we need to find out the truth. At minimum, expose the conservative justices, particularly Alito and Thomas, on the record as siding with the insurrectionists these cases. The Democratic Judiciary Committee investigation into

insurrectionists on the Supreme Court waited a little bit. If you're saying, what's the point, well, what was the point of pro public at chasing down Harlan crow Irons Thomas's giant bus, his RV. What was the point of that? What's the point of the times going after? What did sam Alito know about the flag and when did he know it? Three years ago? How long have they been working on that. Who knows what else will shake out.

The point I have always made is that the first thing that has to happen before anything gets fixed is somebody has to stand up and say this is wrong. And if you drag in Kagan and Sotomayor and Justice Brown Jackson, and you say you're under oath, we need to know what Clarence Thomas said about this, what Samuel Alito said about this. If it goes no further than that, there is a record, because who knows what else will

shake out? Because that bud Lights story insider trading. The deal goes down in April, and the in trading the guy sells in August. That's not insider trading. That's not even smart trading. The bud Light story is mah, but the idea behind the bud Light story is not mah. While Alito was hearing a case last year to hamstring the EPA, his wife was giving an energy company mineral rights. If the EPA were hamstrung to what was in her one hundred and sixty acres that she inherited from Daddy

in Oklahoma? Was that a cash deal? Did she and Hubby talk about that or did they not talk about anything like flags or one hundred and sixty acre mineral rights. Suddenly I'm turning into Tom Broke, I'm mineral rights in Oklahoma? Was that a cash? What was that? What do Kegan, Sodamayora and Jackson know about this? What can they tell us under oath? Bust up the Supreme I mean, what kind of standards are we holding up in the Supreme Court? It's utterly corrupt And there are three people who are

nominally not corrupt, and they don't say anything. And nobody takes the chance of saying, let's poke around and see what's going to happen here, because what are we going to do? The Supreme Court is suddenly going to start ruling against liberals and against the Constitution. They're doing that now. We are already being beaten up by the bullies. Take

the rock and hit the bully in the head. Every single smidge of corruption that can be brought to light not only increases the chances that we stop the corruption, but also it plays into the election. Who knows how many voters don't understand that the Supreme Court is corrupt now and will only get more corrupt as in a

Trump presidency. Alito certainly Thomas retire, and Trump said over the weekend he wants to appoint new judges throughout the judicial system, including the Supreme Court, who will still be on the bench in the year twenty seventy. That's what he wants. That's what they want. They want this country to be ruled like Iran. The election is not just our hope of avoiding this now, it may very well

be our last hope. Also of interest here in speaking of Iran, Robert F. Kennedy Junior's voting address the one on all those forms for all that ballot access, so he can be a spoiler for Trump. A he doesn't live there, the place on the address, and he doesn't live there. Nobody's seen him there. He's been voting from there since two thousand and eight. Also, right after the president of Iran was killed in that helicopter accident, who

does rfk Junior bring up the president of Iran? And he said, the President of the United States, whoever that would be, And he really thinks it's going to be him. He said, the President of the United States needs to negotiate with the president of Iran. Only the guy he thinks is the president of Iran is not the new one that they haven't voted in yet, and isn't the dead one. He's three presidents of Iran ago. That's who Robert F. Kennedy wants to negotiate with. That's how crazy

he is. Worst person's next. This is countdown. This is countdown, with Keith Olberman still ahead of us on this initiative countdown. I'm he missed Willie Mays's birthday, meaning I missed the opportunity to tell you of the day I, as a twenty year old broadcasting rookie, had to call him and interview him about the day he got banned from baseball. And before I could ask him one question, Willie Mays did a fake voice. And it was some fake voice.

I can't even use it in telling you the story things I promised not to tell coming up at first is ever, there are still more new idiots to talk about. The daily roundup of the miss Grants, morons and Dunning Krueger effects specimens who constitute today's worse persons in the world.

The Bronze Worser Politico, the increasingly right leaning insider publication in the increasingly right leaning media, landscape where they're all sitting around going how do we protect our phony, boloney jobs and our money in the case of the Trump winning and the country going fascist. I'll just read this quote from political writer calder McHugh. Honestly, calder McHugh, you're sure his name isn't Hugh mcaulder. Calder mcew who has an idea of how to stay in power even if

the fascists take over Washington again. It's impossible to know. He writes exactly how Trump will behave if he returns to office. Well, first of all, let me just interject here bullshit. By all accounts, Trump has professionalized his twenty twenty four campaign, writes Hugh mcaulder, suggesting he learns something from his slap dash first campaign and his twenty twenty re election loss. Yes, he learned not to have any more elections. But you haven't learned that, have you, cal macuter.

The question is whether his views on presidential prerogatives have changed, or whether he intends to be guided by loftier principles this guy writes, and it's not meant ironically loftier principles. Trump's idea of loftier principles are ideas that get him more money. Second half this is from the Politico Email newsletter, and it speaks to how corrupt corrupt is nowadays. Nobody

even bothers to cover it up. Corruption at every level of American society is so deep that nobody said no, don't, don't, don't do that. They do this every week on the Politico Email newsletter. I guess it's the Saturday edition in which they have Great Weekend Reads curated by Ryan Liza. Ryan Liza, who used to be with The New Yorker, got fired for something we never found out what, involving their behavior patterns and their rules. Nobody ever explained what

it was. I think I know what it was, but I'm not ready to tell you yet. But it was not It was not nice. Ryan Lizza Great Weekend Reads, and he lists eight or nine long articles that are usually appealing only to people who have lots of spare time and a very very low threshold or very high

threshold for being bored. The first one Great Weekend Reads curated by Ryan Liza Semi Colan on the campaign trail by New York Magazines Olivia, Newsy Donald Trump is running for president while bumping into the past at a Manhattan criminal courthouse. They are their boyfriend and girlfriend, Ryan Lizza pimping Olivia Newsy's article about Donald Trump and the campaign trail and the trial. Boyfriend and girlfriend, and make no

secret of this. Unlike her past relationships, there's no secret involved in this, the first one, and they're seven or eight other You couldn't have the presence of mind to say, why don't I put the one about you third? And you would you hand me that coffee? I put you third so it doesn't look like I'm the term technically is a log rolling, and I'm pushing your article because you're my girlfriend. Jesus, just pretend, pretend that there's some

ethics involved. Runner up worser. This isn't really worse, but I needed a place to stick it, and I've been saving it because of this sickness for a little while. Here the Republican primary for the Senate in Maryland. Larry Hogan, the former governor or, the outgoing governor, sixty three percent of the vote. Robin Ficker was the runner up with thirty percent of the vote. Robin Ficker. I looked at this and I went Robin Ficker. Robin Ficker. Does the

name sound familiar? This is my world's colliding. Until nineteen ninety eight, Robin Ficker was the heckler in professional sports. He went to every one of the Washington Bullets and then Washington Wizard's game. He sometimes had a portable megaphone with him. He sat in the front row, so right behind the visiting bench. He used insults, personal insults, derogatory terms, sat right behind the bench. Several coaches had to be

restrained from going after him physically. And he was such a fan that when they changed arenas and reassigned everybody to new seats, they would not sell him those same front row seats, and so he stopped being a fan of the team. So a real dedicated fan who was not there just to make fun of the other players. I believe it was Charles Barkley, who wants in the middle of one of these Ficker monologues, threw a wet, sweaty towel and got it to wrap perfectly in a

tight camera shot around Robin Ficker's face. He's eighty something. He runs for office every couple of years, and he was the runner up in the Republican primary for Senate. So when they talk about what an invincible candidate the Republicans have trotted out for the Senate from Maryland, just remember the guy he beat is the retired ex heckler from the NBA. But our winner the worst RFK Junior. Not a good week for being RFK Junior. Not a good month, not a good year, not a good decade,

not a good lifetime. Ultimately, The New York Post reports that Kennedy quote lists his residents to vote as a Tony, Westchester County address which is in foreclosure. Proceedings for non payment court record show the independent candidate claims his voting address is eighty four Croton Lake Road in Katona, though he is not the owner of the million dollar in arrears property does not show up in residential searches for it, and some longtime neighbors and even local authorities were shocked

at the notion it's his home. But RFK Junior also has the same address list that has his domicile or residents on his presidential nomination petitions filed in New Hampshire in recent months, according to the records which are obtained by the Post, and he's been voting being from this address since at least two thousand and eight, according to the New York Post, So everything about Robert F. Kennedy, including his eligibility for being on the ballot in places

like New Hampshire, could be challenged if anybody would get around doing that. He's been lying about his address all this time, or he doesn't know where he lives, and we have more evidence supporting the later theory of those two. The day after the President of Iran was killed in a chopper accident, RFK Junior demanded that the President of the United States, presumably himself pres himself, negotiate with the

President of Iran. Only you know, right now there ain't a president of Iran and it's getting worse from this point. Just listen to this hitting down with other world leaders, with people like President g and President Plutin and President Vaman dinnershad for the prime minister all the people President Akmadina Jodd, Mack Mood, Achmedina Jod or do you mean somebody else like Barney Achmadena Jod Because mack Mood Akmadina Jodd has not been president of Iran since August of

twenty thirteen, his term expired. He's tried to run twice since, and he's two nuts even for the government of Iran. R f K Junior thinks he's president. It's been almost eleven years. R f K Junior, you will never convince me that the worm is dead. Two days. Worst person in the world. Now to the number one story on the countdown, and I have to confess this has been a strong effort. I hope you appreciate this. I'm playing Hurt full edition and my favorite topic me which I've

he discussed and complimented myself. Now things I promise not to tell, and I am late to the party. It was two weeks ago yesterday, but Willie Howard Mays turned ninety three years old earlier this month. And he is the greatest defensive athlete I have ever seen in any sport. Saw him in person when I was a kid, and also one of the top five offensive athletes in any sport.

And this is now the seventy fourth baseball season since his debut and the fifty first season since his retirement, and everybody ever in baseball in all that time has met him, and he is still rightly celebrated wherever he goes. Whenever his name is brought up in me amidst all this celebration and literally half a century or more of glorification of Willie Mays. When his name comes up, I think of only one thing. The first time I interviewed him in the off season of nineteen seventy nine eighty.

And I'm not going to say it was a strange interview, but I am affecting that I will be getting over it any day now. Maybe it was at my first job for my radio network when God helped me. Willie Mays was seventeen years younger than I am now, Like I wasn't scared enough to talk to Willie Mays. He started that interview by doing a bit, a comedy bit that if I had done it, then they would have fired me. The other thing I think of is an amazing injustice that befell Willie Mays that nobody talks about

and nobody registers anymore. Okay, the first part. So it's a Saturday afternoon, October twenty seventh, nineteen seventy nine, just forty three and a half years ago, and Willie Mays has just been banned from baseball because word has gotten out that he has signed a contract to do promotional events for a casine know in Atlantic City, and there is a news conference coming up in two days on Monday. Now try explaining this whole concept to any current sports fan.

Any current sports fan now used to seeing retired players on TV telling them how to bet and who to bet on, or the sportscasters doing the games giving you the latest odds and how they have changed since the

last period or inning started. Plus this was like three months after Willie Mays was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, three months after the celebration of this brilliant career, and now they've banned him for life for something that today the commissioner would have sent him a note of congratulations, to say nothing of a large paycheck. And nobody has done an interview with Willy Mays yet because he has

been traveling. And my phone rings in my little cubby hole at the United pres International Radio Network that I've only been working at since August three months, that's how long my full time broadcasting career has been to this point. And on the phone is maybe the top baseball reporter of the second half of the twentieth century, Keith. It's Milt Richmond. This man once reported in July nineteen fifty five that if the Milwaukee Braves did not start winning,

that they would fire their manager. Exactly one year later, and they didn't start winning, and exactly one year later to the day, they fired their manager. Keith, write this phone number down. It's Willie May's. Milt never got excited about anything. He talked like this all the time. William Mays is expecting your call for an interview about this banishment story. And I squeaked yes, sir, and I went into one of our recording studios and I dialed Willie

Mays's phone number. And I will not recreate the voice that I heard answer Willie May's phone, because while doing this voice was once considered to be a staple of American humor, even American humor written or performed by liberals. I mean, James Thurber's short stories are full of this voice. The voice is wildly racist. It is racist enough that if today you heard an African American man do it, even Willie Mays, you probably say.

real maid. Okay, so I'm twenty years old and I have to interview Willie Mays about him getting banned from baseball, which is crazy enough. And I call and the phone is answered, and a gravelly but feminine voice that sounded exactly like Hattie McDaniel says hello, mister Mays's residence. And I'm a little thrown but I power through it somehow, and I explain who I am, and she says ahah, And I say where I'm calling from and she says uhah, And I say, Milt Richmond said, mister Mays was expecting

my call. And she interrupts and goes, this is Willie. The Hattie McDaniel impersonation was being done by Willie Mays. Now I do not have this on tape. Silly me.

But I'm afraid you are going to have to take my word for this, because why would I make this up. October twenty seventh, nineteen seventy nine, and I still haven't recovered mister Mays's residence. Happy ninety second birthday, Willy Mays. Now the injustice that Willy Mays suffered that nobody talks about. In fact, I've never heard him talk about it. This

is something else that no fan believes today. The United States military used to draft Major League Baseball players and NFL players and NBA players and send them into the service in the middle of their seasons, in the primes of their careers, even if there was no war in progress.

They only did it a couple of times after saying nineteen forty five, and usually that was thinly veiled racist political pressure, such as when they drafted Muhammad Ali in nineteen sixty six when he was heavyweight champion of the world and an activist Muslim, and he was twenty four years old when everybody else getting drafted was eighteen. Remember that. But in nineteen fifty two they also drafted Willie Mays.

He had come up from the Miners the year before and had led the New York Giants from thirteen games back to the National League pennant, and he was the kind of all around whirlwind of a player nobody had ever seen before in Major League Baseball. And on May twenty ninth, thirty four games into his second season, boom, he was drafted and inducted, and he missed the rest of that season and all of the nineteen fifty three season.

I can't think of a parallel today. Maybe maybe they draft in the middle of his second season somebody like Fernando TEIs and in the middle of May, he's gone for the rest of this year and next year because he has to go serve in the military. Now. They didn't draft Mickey Mantle, who also broke in in New York in nineteen fifty one, the way Mays did, and to be fair, Mickey Mantle had about four hundred medical problems that would have kept anybody out of the military,

and it was all legit. But they also didn't draft the nineteen fifty one American League Rookie of the Year winner, Gil McDougald of the Yankees, who was a white guy, or Walt Dropo, who was the Rookie of the Year in nineteen fifty or Roy Sievers, who was the Rookie of the Year in nineteen forty nine, or or you get the point here. Now, trying to calculate should have beens in sports is a risky enough business, but you

can get an approximation of what might have happened. If a player hits twenty homers in his first year and then misses two years, and then he comes back and he hits forty one homers in his first year back, you can extrap up of eight that he probably would have hit twenty seven homers in the first missing year and thirty four in the second missing year. Your numerical sequence is twenty homers and twenty seven homers, then thirty

four homers, then forty one homers. You have to tinker a little bit with it in Mays's case, because he didn't miss all of that second season nineteen fifty two, He just missed from June on, and he'd had a slow start. He'd only hit four homers in the first two months of nineteen fifty two, so instead of twenty seven that year, maybe he only hits twenty four that year.

So a good guess as to how many homers Willie Mays did not get to hit because he got drafted and all the white guys did not get drafted is all told fifty four. In real life, playing between nineteen fifty one and nineteen seventy three, Willie Mays finished with six hundred and sixty home runs. For most of the nineteen sixties, it was thought he was the man who would challenge Babe Ruth's career record, not Hank Aaron, but

Willie Mays. Willie Mays hit six hundred and sixty homers, But if you give him those fifty four more homers he might have hit. If he hadn't been so curiously drafted in nineteen fifty two, Willie Mays would have finished

with seven hundred and fourteen home runs. Seven hundred and fourteen, which is exactly how many Babe Ruth hit, So if he doesn't get drafted, maybe in nineteen seventy two and nineteen seventy three and nineteen seventy four, we are seeing Willie Mays hit his seven hundredth career home run, challenging Babe Ruth's record, and then tying and breaking Babe Ruth's record, and then right behind him, Henry Aaron hits his seven hundred and fifteenth homer and then his seven hundred and

sixteenth homer to break the all time record held by Willie Mays mister Mays's residence. That's not how it sounded. Done all the damage I can do here, Thank you for listening. Countdown Musical directors Brian Ray and John Phillip Schanel arranged, produced, and performed most of our music. Mister Ray was on guitars, bass and drums, Mister Chanelle handled orchestration and keyboards, and it was produced by Tko Brothers. Other music, including some of the Beethoven compositions, arranged and

performed by the group No Horns Allowed. The sports music is the Alderman theme from ESPN two, written by Mitch Warren Davis Curtisy of ESPN inc. Our satirical and pithy musical comments are by Nancy Fauss, the best baseball stadium organist ever. Our announcer was my friend Larry David. Everything else was pretty much my fault. But once again I

did a good job today. Considering that's countdown for this the one hundred and sixty ninth day until the twenty twenty four presidential election, the two hundred and thirty second day since Dictator Jay Trump's first attempted coup against the democratically elected government of the United States. Use the legal system such as it is, use the mental health system, use presidential immunity if it happens, Use the not regularly given elector objection option to stop him from doing it

again while we still can. The next scheduled countdown is tomorrow. Still day to day. On that with the sinus, We're all day to day, especially me, till the next one. I'm Keith Oulrimman. Good morning, good afternoon, good night, and good luck. Countdown with Keith Olreman is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts,