You haven't lived until you've experienced one of Keith Olbermann's unhinged rants from what looks like a basement (or perhaps a rubber room) in the offices of GQ magazine, which pays the former MSNBC host to produce a series (over 80 so far!) of video commentaries ridiculously titled The Resistance.
In a recent video, Olbermann begins by calling for "the immediate arrest of Jared Kushner" for every crime from "money laundering, racketeering, and influence peddling" to "obstruction of justice and espionage, and possibly worse" for his supposed hanky-panky with Russia. "There is no other option that can be reasonably entertained," Olbermann declares. "Arrest. Kushner. Now" -- a command he intones a few times throughout the video, in case you forget the point of his rambling.
Speaking of reasonably entertaining, Olbermann's videos are far more than that. They are hilariously self-serious if you can stomach his melodramatic delivery for a full seven or eight minutes at a time.
He concludes this particular video -- one of his more boring ones -- by noting ominously that
Jared Kushner brings us not just into the White House; he brings us both figuratively and literally to the door of the Oval Office. Inside that door, there are people who appear not to understand why they are not permitted to break the law when they think it's a good idea to do so inside that door. There are people for whom running this nation is not a solemn and nearly religious responsibility but an opportunity for wins and power and financial corruption. Inside that door there is a man in charge who has never been stopped by rules and has never been held accountable when he breaks those rules.
But wait -- Olbermann is just getting warmed up. His summation delivery is so earnest, you can almost hear swelling strains of the national anthem in the background:
These people do not believe in the law. These people do not believe in patriotism. These people do not believe in the United States of America. These people - Kushner, his wife, Trump, General Allen, General McMaster, General Flynn the others - are in their souls, if not under the law, traitors to this country. And no matter which excuse Jared Kushner has for proposing to talk to Russia using secret Russian communications while surrounded by Russian spies inside Russian territory, there is but one answer: Arrest. Kushner. Now!
Olbermann ends with his comical trademark, "Resist. Peace."
The topic of the video aside -- there is absolutely no evidence of wrongdoing, much less treasonous activity, on Kushner's part -- it's hard to see this or any of Olbermann's other rants as anything but a parody of itself. They're so laughable that I'm beginning to believe Olbermann is creating not political commentary, but performance art.
