Keith Olbermann clearly needs some help. On his Thursday Countdown podcast, the former MSNBC and ESPN host unleashed deranged attacks on President Donald Trump and former President George W. Bush, accusing the former of being behind the Minneapolis Catholic school shooting and the latter of staging terrorist threats to get himself re-elected. The common thread, for Olbermann, is that Democrats need to come out and simply speak this “truth” in order to win.

Despite his claims of being a politically incorrect truth-teller, Olberman’s anti-Trump rant included the evidence-free assertion that Trump and others have committed some sort of crime:

You want these to be the last, maybe. You want the people who cause these nightmares: gun makers, and the lawmakers who prostitute themselves for gun money, Republicans, MAGA, Trumpists. You want them to pay for their crimes. You want people to recognize that standing ghost-like behind that subhuman creature shooting into a school chapel service yesterday. The figure in the background is Trump. Like in one of his own cheesy memes with gentrified white Jesus standing behind him, you want any of that to happen, you start with one thing. You have to say it.

He then took out some frustration on the Democratic consulting class, “You have to come out and say the truth, and you go from there. Not alter the truth because a consultant says there could be damage if you are perceived the wrong way.”

Trying to come up with an analogy, Olbermann continued ranting, “Twenty years ago this was the message inside the Democratic Party about the blatant exploitation of the terrorist threat that was being done by George W. Bush. ‘Don't you dare say he has made terrorism into a political weapon for the Republicans. ‘Don't you dare say he has made terrorism into a political weapon for the Republicans. Don't you dare say he's exaggerating threats, maybe staging threats, definitely timing headlines about threats to try to terrify the public into voting Republican,’ even though that is exactly what he was doing.”

Olbermann thinks if he dresses his screeds up as the truth, they become less outrageous. Unfortunately for him, that is not how truth works. Olbermann would go on to cite former DHS Secretary Tom Ridge as his source, but Ridge never claimed that. Ridge felt some in the administration were inflating the possibility of terrorist actions prior to the 2004 election, but those were internal debates, and Ridge admitted he won the argument on whether to raise the threat level, "A consensus was reached. We didn't go up. The process worked.” Ridge also claimed people, like Olbermann, "are hyperventilating" over his concerns about political interference.

Ridge’s feelings, as Ridge himself awkwardly conceded, are not the same thing as facts. Likewise, Olbermann’s claim that Trump was behind the mass shooting by a guy who had anti-Trump messages written on his guns is just primal rage therapy, and Olbermann should consider more intellectually rigorous forms of argumentation.

Here is a transcript for the August 28 show:

Countdown with Keith Olbermann

8/28/2025

KEITH OLBERMANN: You want these to be the last, maybe. You want the people who cause these nightmares: gun makers, and the lawmakers who prostitute themselves for gun money, Republicans, MAGA, Trumpists. You want them to pay for their crimes. You want people to recognize that standing ghost-like behind that subhuman creature shooting into a school chapel service yesterday. The figure in the background is Trump. Like in one of his own cheesy memes with gentrified white Jesus standing behind him, you want any of that to happen, you start with one thing.

You have to say it. You have to come out and say the truth, and you go from there. Not alter the truth because a consultant says there could be damage if you are perceived the wrong way.

Twenty years ago this was the message inside the Democratic Party about the blatant exploitation of the terrorist threat that was being done by George W. Bush.

“Don't you dare say he has made terrorism into a political weapon for the Republicans. Don't you dare say he's exaggerating threats, maybe staging threats, definitely timing headlines about threats to try to terrify the public into voting Republican,” even though that is exactly what he was doing.”