Flush twice... it's a long way to Sally Quinn's place!

Pundit Pap Special!
Olbermann's Must-See TV
by Dash Riprock

April 1, 2003 -- MOLINE (apj.us) -- MSNBC is exhibit A in the case of just how perverted and misguided cable news has become.

They are clamoring for all the wrong things for all the wrong reasons, hiring Joe "Don't ask about that dead woman in my office!" Scarborough, Dick Armey ("If stupidity ever goes up to $5 a barrel, I want the drilling rights to Dick Armey's head!" -- Paul Begala) and the reprehensible hate-monger Michael Weiner, who goes under the stage name Michael Savage -- all in a bid to compete with FOX for the basest moron demographic.

MSNBC recently 86ed Phil Donahue after a brief run, despite the fact that his ratings were healthy (better, in fact, than Chris Matthews' "Hardball"). Guess the boardroom heat was just too much for the weasels in charge of programming.

So, now that the network is absolutely dominated by hosts ranging from conservative to WAY conservative, they decided to replace Phil with Keith Olbermann.

And based on the debut show, they might have accidentally done something right.

Very right.

Olbermann has never been a liberal or conservative, but rather an intelligent talking head -- something so rare as to be almost unrecognizable when one appears. And this, of course, means that knuckle-dragging, know-nothing conservatives will be in full froth, since he tends to point out stupidity when he sees it. Since conservatives and their sainted deceiver-in-chief seem to have that market cornered these days, they're sure to go ballistic. But Olbermann will be damn hard to pigeon-hole and demean.

His new show, "Countdown with Keith Olbermann", is a nightly run-down of the top stories of the day. Olbermann has always had a finely tuned sense of the absurd, and luckily, it appears to be intact in this new venture.

Olbermann relies on news reports from NBC journalists and news footage from various news agencies (even foreign, thankfully!) to illustrate the stories of the day. And he appears to find some stories that the producers of other shows are afraid might offend the perpetually offended war monkeys.

Unlike his counterparts on the right, who have to revert to ham-handed and juvenile snide remarks about the group, gender, nationality, or sexual preference we should all hate this week, Olbermann simply reports the facts, and lets the facts show what witless morons we have at the top our of government.

This is fun. And it's also a good survival mechanism for Olbermann. He is a very sharp and deftly cutting writer, using quick jabs that will elude the more slow witted among us. There are several right wing foundations that spend millions to try to identify and squash any hint of dissent against this war and the "Waron Moron" dragging us through it from reaching our tender ears, but Olbermann is too sly. He's sure to give them fits. They'll just KNOW that there's some sort of "librel" shenanigans going on here... but where? Where? They'll have to work extra hard to try and distort what Olbermann says, because he tells the truth, and he does it in a sharp, subtlety stated, but unmistakable style.

It's sad to realize that it is truly such an oddity these days to see someone with those qualities on TV -- it is like looking up while washing dishes and seeing a brontosaurus stomping on the houses a block away.

If the war looks like the brutal, immoral catastrophe it is shown to be on Olbermann's show, the attack dogs of the elitist right (like over-bred show dogs, years of inbreeding among overly-privileged alcoholics and eccentric cranks has resulted in mental infirmities and ill-temper) will have a hard time pinning it on Olbermann. He plays it right down the middle, and the ditto-monkeys will find to their horror that they are just too stupid to pick up on the subtleties that serve to bring the ridiculousness and tragedy of the war into sharp focus.

A run down of this premier edition of "Countdown" led with, oddly enough, a countdown of the stories of the day.

Number Two was headed, "Desert Doctors -- Operation Operation" and showed a 3-year-old Iraqi girl laying on a stretcher while medics attempted to assess her condition, with the subhead, "Killed in fierce fighting south of Baghdad." This is what the Americans public, in all seriousness, need to see. Olbermann's voice over: "No Hawkeye, no Trapper John, no Radar O'Reilly, but it's M.A.S.H. 2003 just the same, and it's just as gory, and just as vital as the original."

This was followed by his report on the women and children shot dead at a US checkpoint by US troops. Olbermann noted that "Things like this were only supposed to happen in war games" -- and rapidly recounted how the rules were changed after a recent suicide attack on US troops resulted in the deaths of four servicemen, and how it had now resulted in soldiers riddling a van with bullets, then, later, finding out that it contained nothing but women and children -- 7 of whom were slaughtered in the incident.

He then went to Carl Rochelle for a report. Rochelle, a veteran journalist who was recently let go by CNN, suggested that this is what Saddam wanted to happen as a result of the earlier suicide attack, proving that no notion is too loony to be suggested by the compliant press.. By letting the reporters do the obligatory pro-US spin, Olbermann stays above it all and lets the impression speak for itself.

And it looks bad. Very bad.

Of course, the US armed forces are NOT always to blame -- though the very fact that Bush has lied, cheated, stolen, and bullied, bribed, bargained, and blustered in a mad desire to sent the armed forces to Iraq serves as a blanket indictment of all that happens as a result.

The buck stops with Bush. Period. There is one incontestable fact in all of this. No Bush, no war in Iraq.

They then showed a report from Baghdad by ITN's John Irvine, showing for once life on the streets of Baghdad, and stark footage of the damage that US bombardment has caused, and not some greenish blurry shot from 25 miles away, but from mere feet from the rubble and twisted metal.

Then a video report on the heart-wrenching scenes of the relief efforts. The wretched conditions, the walking zombies, the sick and dying children, a wounded man condemning Saddam, a Marine out to change the "hearts and minds" of these blighted and brutalized people, explaining the "message" they're trying to send to these desperate people: That we're not they're there to "help them, not to conquer Iraq, we're here (here he appeared to almost stifle a chuckle, though it must have been a suppressed cough) to give Iraq back to the people of Iraq."

Then on to the truly dim-witted "president" and his appearance before the friendly crowd of a Coast Guard installation. This stunningly inept clod was doing his usual tough-guy routine, complete with an ugly grimacing sniff (must be that honor and dignity thing) and reciting his deeply felt and bellicose promises while unable to utter more than the shortest phrase without glancing at his notes.

How can those liberals doubt that he's a deeply committed man?

It's as if we're being led by the stupidest lummox on the loading dock, the one that has watched every John Wayne movie three times (but was usually drunk when he did), coming away with an even more simplistic view of the world, good and evil, bravery and honor, than even those comic book movies presented. This menace hiding at Camp David is nothing but a man-child playing in the global sandbox, relying on simplistic and juvenile notions as to how to play the part.

I'm all for equal opportunity, and maybe the millions of Americans that suffer from arrested development deserve to have one of their own at the helm, which is reflected in a poll showing 66% of them support this bent charlatan in the White House. But I really think now was not the time.

It's like putting in the worst player you have when you've built up a seemingly insurmountable lead. A lead so huge most of the crowd has already left the building. Clinton left the country in the best shape it's been in for generations. We put Bush in, and though we feared it all along, we didn't think he could possibly do THAT much damage. So we crossed our fingers and hoped. Now we're watching in horror as he manages to blow the largest lead in history in a matter of minutes, with no end in sight.

He won't give up the ball and is paying off the referees, and has brought in a hired cheerleading squad. He's threatened the timekeeper to make sure that time never runs out because he's sure he'll win, despite the fact that he hasn't scored a point and the opposing team is racking up the score at an alarming rate. The fans, the team, the coaches are screaming themselves hoarse at him, but he acts as though he can't hear them. And we realize that we can't pull him out of the game for another two years.

Olbermann then launched into the Peter Arnett/Geraldo Rivera flaps. This is the sort of story he does best, and I wasn't disappointed.

He introduced the piece by saying, "And now, going to the marketplace of ideas and getting your credit card cut in half." He continued, "Which offense is worse, a reporter from an American network appearing on an Iraqi state run TV during a war, or another American TV personality giving away American troop positions during a war? We report, you decide!" -- in an obvious slap at Geraldo, Roger Ailes, and FOX Broadcasting.

This is why I like Olbermann. You have to read between the lines. Notice that Arnett is "a reporter" and Rivera a "TV personality."

Olbermann quoted Arnett having said that he won't apologize for reporting the truth -- but that he had said that "after he apologized profusely on the Today Show this morning!"

I heard Arnett on Today, and he apologized over and over to everyone he could possibly think of including the American people. I told him that as for me, he didn't need to apologize. Everybody does dumb things sometimes. I have a hard time thinking that he's affected anything whatsoever as far as harming the prospects of this war of aggression.

The real thing that got him in trouble was NBC's absolute fear of anyone remotely related to them uttering the slightest thing that could possibly be construed as not whole-heartedly, even blindly, pro-war.

Then it was on to Geraldo. As the clip of Geraldo scribbling in the dust was shown, Olbermann said, "There is Geraldo Rivera, the former journalist, now doing something or other for Fox. [HA!] He has been asked by the Dept. of Defense to leave Iraq after he gave away the position of US forces there, as illustrated. However Mr. Rivera himself says he has not been asked to leave, he is not leaving, and is in fact further inside that country than ever before. Then again, given the problems he experienced in Afghanistan locating the relative whereabouts of a friendly fire incident, his backside, and his elbow, he might actually be in Nutley, New Jersey without even knowing it."

I like Olbermann. Ha, ha, ha!

In the next segment after the break, he interviewed another in the endless supply of retired armed forces brass, this time former Air Force Lt. Gen. Michael Short. This fulfilled the "minimum armchair general requirement" of all news shows these days, but was done in a relatively dignified manner, without, say, resorting to a huge map and pushing around fake tanks and planes in an effort to allow frustrated impotent males that get ordered around their entire lives to indulge their General-for-a-day fantasies.

Olbermann introed the next piece by noting that US and British "military honchos were poised to fly in journalists" to capture the Iraqi citizens as they greeted the invading troops by throwing flowers and cheering the liberating heroes, but that this has proven to be yet another horrible myth foisted on us by the Cheney, Pearle, Rumsfeld cabal. Olbermann noted, "All photo ops have been suspended --- indefinitely", then went to another excellent ITN piece on the Brits' battle for Basra.

The bulk of the piece emphasized the enormous advantage in military and technological might of the British, and how it was a devastating attack that resulted in huge numbers of Iraqi dead. It showed how Iraqi tanks were picked off one by one, showing the smoking hulks still containing incinerated bodies, the pall of smoke hanging over everything.

The reporter said "Many Iraqis in Basra want to see Saddam Hussein defeated, but they're not greeting the foreign attackers with roses, just bewildered stares."

In another incredibly refreshing moment, Olbermann introduced a recurring segment of the show, saying memorably, "On the premise that you're grown up enough to handle reporting you might not agree with, we have established the Countdown Listening Post to give you an idea of how this conflict is being reported around the world." The female reporter that gives the report said that was an apt way to describe it because "you probably won't like half of what I'm saying right now ---" before showing anti-American protests occurring every day around the world as reported on foreign TV.

This is excellent stuff. Imagine actually trusting Americans to actually see how the rest of the world is reporting and reacting to this war! Actually trusting that allowing them to simply seeing other viewpoints won't suddenly mesmerize them and turn them into suicidal zealots determined to destroy America. Amazing! How absolutely daring!

Of course, this is sure to arouse massive fury from all the Moron-Americans out there that don't WANT to have to see that there are real people out there who don't like what we're doing to Iraq. And it will enrage the other groups on the right that desperately wants to keep the American public totally ignorant of ALL expressions against this war. They would only be happy if all Americans were under the delusion that the rest of the world fully supported our invasion of Iraq.

Of course, these conservatives, the dim-witted variety, take even mere coverage of protests and demonstrations against the Bush foreign policy as a PERSONAL affront, unable to separate themselves from the world-class thugs leading this country that they so loudly proclaim they love.

They're too dense to realize that this war is hurting America far, far more than it is helping. But they don't care. It's so much easier to just hate anyone who dares to oppose our policies, no matter that these same people don't even begin to understand the whys and wherefores of this war, or even less, the effect on this country and the world in the aftermath. It's simpler when all you need to remember is:
a) Saddam is evil, just EVIL and
b) we're helping to LIBERATE the Iraqis, even if it's from their very lives and possessions, and
c) that if you're not with Bush, you're against America there's no separating the two. It's all so nice, simple, perversely satisfying, and tragically wrong.

It's hard to imagine a bright spot in all this, but judging from Keith Olbermann's first outing, "Countdown" is surely one. He's even-handed, quick, a great writer, fast paced, funny as hell at the right moments, and most importantly of all, assumes that his audience aren't mindless sheep, that they can actually be trusted with ALL the information from which to make up their minds, and that they deserve better than blatant jingoistic propaganda spewed ad nauseam by every other cable news show.

Let's see how long MSNBC suits hold up when some freedom-hating right-wing groups start organizing a flood of semi-literate hate mail against the truth being shown or when some corporate exec's wife finds it offensive -- or, worse yet, when Karl Rove finds someone to put the arm on them and let them know it's being "noted" in the White House and that calls have been made to the CEOs of sponsors..

The show is an hour in length, which seems to fly by, as it is fast paced and the stories are compelling and cover a wide range of topics, from the strange new virus which emerged in Hong Kong to a tearful message from the mother of a slain soldier to stark coverage of a M.A.S.H. unit in Iraq.

The M.A.S.H. segment was incredibly powerful, especially the images of a doctor holding a mangled bullet in hemostats which he'd just pulled out of a soldier's arm and the constant stream of choppers and trucks bringing the wounded and dying.

A darling 3-year-old girl, barely conscious, was shown being loaded off the back of a truck along with a marine who died before he made it there. This gorgeous semi-conscious little girl was tended to, a medic raising her eyes, which slowly closed each time until at last they remained open, showing blank, uncomprehending eyes. More wounded arrived, and were stacking up around the abandoned building that served as a hospital. The girl with the shiny black hair and large dark eyes, we later learn, was unable to be saved, and died of her head wound shortly afterwards. A medic told of witnessing her drawing her last breath on this earth in a dusty army medical station only miles from her home.

The segment also showed the medics and soldiers involved in bringing in dozens of casualties, many looking like so much meat. The innocent young girl is not the only victim here. This is an eye-witness view of the beginning of deep psychological distress that will follow thousands of the troops back home.

This is reporting. This is real reality TV. And this will surely piss off the war fans, who of course don't want us to see this reality lest it hamper the campaign to multiply this fear, pain, psychological trauma, and needless loss thousands of times. We must liberate the Iraqis.

Then followed an interesting "flashback" segment, where they recounted the entire invasion to date. It was a very informative summation to see it all in a compressed style from beginning through the first few weeks. Because of the witless and disorganized coverage by TV news, it was almost impossible to gain a clear overview of what has actually happened. This segment, of course, was an important service, with footage of attacks spliced with statements by Smirk and Rumsfeld, shots of reporters in gasmasks and soldiers standing in raging dust storms as the Prince of War uttered some vapid statement in the background.

While the above segment was brutally powerful, the rest of the show moved easily from the serious to the not-serious-at-all, and never got bogged down in a depressing mood.

If this first effort is any gauge, Olbermann's "Countdown" (MSNBC, Monday through Friday, 8:00 PM Eastern) could turn out to be the best daily news show to catch. It presents a wide range of views on a wide range of topics and presents reports and interviews you would never find on any other show. Olbermann's brand of subtle and not-so-subtle irony and snappy writing, along with his finely honed wit (unlike "The Daily Show", Olbermann isn't limited to just humor) make this show a pleasure to watch, no matter that the prime story is a horrific war. I think it's destined to join Bill Moyers' "NOW" as one of the smartest and most informative shows on TV.

Catch it. You'll be glad you did.

-- Dash Riprock

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Dash Riprock is a free-lance smart aleck based in Moline, IL If he doesn't hear from his readers, he gets very cranky. Those forced to deal with him urge you to contact him at dashriprockapj@hotmail.com