KEITH OLBERMANN HAS THE RIGHT INITIALS

So much goes by so swiftly, there's no point in trying to catch up. But KO's recent editorials must be noted as knockouts. I'm thinking particularly of his special commentary on lying, broadcast on Oct. 5. I presume you've seen it. If not, you missed the single best opinion piece on mainstream television. For that matter, it may have been the best to appear anywhere.

Watch it. Read it. Relish it. The Bullshitter-in-Chief "comes across as a compulsive liar," he says. He "has savaged the very freedoms he claims to be protecting from attack," and "it is now impossible to find a consistent thread of logic as to who [he] believes the enemy is."

It seems to me no accident that "Countdown," Olbermann's daily cable show on MSNBC, has doubled its audience. But if god forbid the Republicans retain control of the Congress after next month's mid-term elections, will MSNBC execs keep him on the air? Or will he be Donahued? Given their lack of principles in the past -- and notwithstanding Olbermann's own comment that "as long as you make them money, they don't care" --- let's hope they're not put to the test.

PS: A friend writes:

I've been watching him a long time & he just gets better. Did you catch his piece on the elimination of habeas corpus, the one where he draws a big red X through one article after another in the Bill of Rights? It's a classic.

PPS: Yes, I caught it. And this, too, the day before, "Habeas corpus sellout," by Nat Hentoff. And just this morning (Oct. 15) the NYT editorial "Guilty Until Confirmed Guilty." Another friend writes, "That Hentoff's piece appeared in The Washington Times gives me hope." Ha. Doan make me laff. The whole shebang is a mockery.