The Turing Test

Fandom: Fake News/Real News RPF
Title: The 28th Amendment VIII: The Lives and Times of Jon Stewart and Keith Olbermann
Rating: R
Characters: Keith Olbermann, Jon Stewart, Rachel Maddow
Summary: Words have power.
Warning: major/minor character death.
Note: Thanks to sarken for kicking this chapter into shape. I'm not sure that there is even anything left from my first draft, including the title of this work! Thanks also to enamourednhmrd for most excellent beta. Thanks to everyone who hung on until the end, everyone who wrote fic or made fanart for this universe, and everyone who voted today.

Disclaimer: Any similarity between the fictional version of the person portrayed here and the actual persons is purely coincidental. This is a work of fiction. This is not an attempt to defame the character of said person on the basis of libel, as the work is FICTIONAL (and NOT an intently false statement created with the express purpose of misleading others about the actual character of said person).

Any mention of 'The Daily Show', 'The Colbert Report', 'Viacom', 'Anderson 360', 'Countdown' any associated entities, or any copyrighted material pertaining therein is reasonably protected by the Fair Use Rule of the United States Copyright Act of 1976 and is not intended to infringe upon any copyrighted material.

Original Posting Date: 4 November 2008



With both President Huckabee and Vice President Palin’s resignations, Speaker of the House, Nathan Green (D-ID), was sworn into office today at 9 am. The Speaker is in favor of the 29th Amendment to repeal the 28th Amendment, but has announced he will not seek re-election and will instead be endorsing Jim Miller (D) for President. -Dan Mackenzie, Fox News, 3 May 2016.

Indiana became the necessary vote to ratify the 29th Amendment today. The Supreme Court is readying itself to hear almost thirty cases in which the nullification of the 28th Amendment will most likely make current legislation unconstitutional. -Anna Wilshire, Fox News, 23 June 2016

Senator James William Miller (D-NC) won the Presidential election last night with 325 electoral votes. Miller, who led the push for the ratification of the 29th Amendment in North Carolina, ran on a platform of reclaiming America’s glory and promises to step up protection of the Bill of Rights. -Carson Matheson, Fox News, 2 November 2016

Keith Olbermann, former political pundit, and Jon Stewart, former host of The Daily Show, testified before Congress today. Both gave testimony under a grant of immunity and told the committee about the hardships and civil rights violations they faced under the Huckabee Regime. Congress will continue to hear testimony for another week before voting on whether or not to repeal several laws only made constitutional by the 28th Amendment and the possibility of reparations to its victims. The House of Representatives has heard over a thousand hours of testimony about the 28th Amendment. -Don Dabinot, CNN, 18 Feb 2017

Asked for comments after testifying before Congress, Jon Stewart said, “I think that by passing the 29th Amendment, America has proved the system can work. It's slow and can be cumbersome, but eventually it can self correct. The price we paid in blood was too high, though.” -CNN, 26 Feb 2017

***

REPORTER: I'm Carrie Harper and with me today are Keith Olbermann and Jon Stewart, co-writers of The Lives and Times of Stephen T. Colbert and Anderson H. Cooper. I want to thank you two for being here and speaking with me. When you started writing "Lives and Times" did you expect it to be such a critical success as it was?

JON STEWART: No.

KEITH OLBERMANN: No.

JS: I wasn't even sure we'd ever be able to find a publisher for it.

KO: I wasn't sure we'd ever actually finish it!


R: You had troubles writing together?

JS: We'd both written books before.

KO: Though everyone seems to have forgotten that now. I keep seeing articles where "Lives and Times" is listed as my first book. It's strangely Orwellian, like there was nothing before Huckabee.

JS: Me too. And I'd written with an entire team behind me last time. So writing with just Keith, not that Keith isn't brilliant, but writing with just one other person was a new experience for me.


R: So, was the book your idea, Jon?

JS: No, no. This was all Keith's idea. I just thought it was a good idea and hopped on board.


R: How did he entice you?

JS: He said, “This needs to be written,' and I thought about it, and I agreed. Then we started writing. There may have been pancakes involved, I'm not sure.


R: Several critics suggested that you should have gone for a flashier title.

JS: We argued for weeks about the title.

KO: We did. Jon thought it was boring and I said it was accurate.

JS: And then I suggested it was both boring and accurate. Keith agreed, but the title stuck anyhow.


R: I've heard the two of you are learning Hebrew?

JS: We are.

KO: I want to be able to order coffee and get actual coffee.

JS: Our neighbors think this is hilarious. We've been using them to practice on.

KO: When we first got to Haifa, neither of us spoke any Hebrew, unless you count what Jon learned for his bar mitzvah and let's not.

JS: Please, let's not.

KO: And the information network in our apartment building is better than anything the KGB ever had in its heyday. We were there less than a week before the old ladies figured out we must have been recent American refugees and started bringing us challah and kugel. Mrs. Daz makes a mean kugel. They come over and speak Hebrew at us and we'd smile and nod.


R: So they supported your refugee status?

KO: Yes.

JS: Very much so. We weren't the first refugees in the building either. We also had a professor from Texas...

KO: .. Texas A&M...

JS: Right, Josh was from Texas A&M. Anyway, he'd come over right before the borders closed with his daughter to visit his sister in Haifa. He couldn't go back to his wife, who eventually died in one of the academic purges. He had these dogs, and he'd drag me out to the park and let the dogs play. I think it was just to get me out of the house. Keith had become a nomad, wandering the streets, and I'd become a recluse, unwilling to leave the four walls of our apartment.

KO: I was wandering a lot those days. Jon wanted extra locks on our doors and I was okay with that as long as he didn't actually lock any of them. We had totally different reactions to leaving the war zone. Of course, I couldn't go in coffee shops, too many people, so I just walked. We were the crazy Americans, but our neighbors really supported us.

JS: And used us for English practice. Mrs. Daz would bring over kugel and it would be a signal for all the kids to come and try out their new English phrases.

KO: Yeah, I think the first thing Jon taught them all was 'Settle down!' I bet their parents really loved that.


R: Was it hard to adapt to Israel at first?

JS: Of course.

KO: Yes.

JS: It wasn't just Israel though. It was this entire change from being in hiding, from running for your life, back to reality. It took a long time before I could walk in a room without cataloging all the exits and sitting with my back to the wall so I could see everything.

KO: He still does that.

JS: Yeah, yeah, you're right. I do. It saved my life a couple times, before.

KO: I know. My nervous ticks are totally different from Jon's, but I still have them.


R: Do you miss television?

JS: I miss the audience. The energy they gave off right before the show started. I miss getting to hear people laugh at my jokes in real time.

KO: I refuse to be used as a live in substitute for a live audience, but every once in a while Jon gets a laugh out of me.


R: Keith, when did you first meet Anderson Cooper?

KO: We'd met several times before we were introduced, and it was even longer before we actually became friends. We'd done some baseball reporting, just the stuff that happens when you both live in New York and work in media. We were both friends with Jon and Stephen [Colbert] and they started dragging us out to lunch during the '04 election. Mostly just to vent.
One day, they didn't show up. They got distracted by something, they were always getting distracted. Anyway, Anderson and I waited, and they never showed. It all went from there.

JS: It was actually all a plan to set them up. It was Stephen's idea. He though they'd either kill each other or fall in love, and either way it'd be spectacular to watch. Stephen always liked playing yenta.


R: Unlike many other people of the time, Keith, the two of you were not out in the open with your relationship, why?

KO: We were working at rival news agencies and Anderson always believed private lives should remain private. I think because so much of his life was lived out in the public eye that privacy was such a big deal with him.


R: Why didn't you leave the country when your friends and colleagues Rachel Maddow and Dan Abrams did? Was it so different not being out at the time?

KO: It was. We were really good at not getting caught, not letting on. I mean, Anderson knew he'd have to leave eventually if things kept going on as they were going, since basically everyone assumed he was gay. No one but Rachel ever assumed he was with me. Plus, at the time, no one thought it was going to be as bad as it got.

JS: There was a lot of 'if we stay and fight, we'll win because we're right' going on. I really believed it. I always believed in standing up and fighting. If it hadn't been for Stephen, I probably would've spent the Huckabee Regime in a cell next to Keith.


R: But eventually you decided that the US wasn't safe enough anymore.

KO: Right. Anderson found out in advance that the borders were going to close. People would just tell him things like that. Though the information we got was that they were going to close it Friday night and the borders were actually closed the Thursday before. We were planning to get out. I'd drive over with Erica [Hill] and Anderson was planning on filming his own border crossing. He always did crazy things like that. He was never afraid of getting caught.


R: But it didn't go as planned. You ended up spending four years in ADMAX Florence?

KO: Almost five years. I was put in the supermax block; 23 hours of solitary confinement, 1 hour of exercise a day. I never saw anyone else, except when they let Amnesty International in to prove they weren't torturing me or anything. They said they were afraid someone would try and kill me, but I think they were more worried that I would talk to people. Or maybe run the entire Underground from my cell.

Instead, I spent a lot of time thinking. About my life, about Anderson, about all the decisions I made in my life. When I was a child all I wanted to do when I grew up was be a sports announcer. I never imagined I'd end up as a political prisoner.


R: Is that why you decided to write again?

KO: I decided to write again because I needed something to do. I was going to write about sports, get back to my roots. I couldn't write anything. I needed to write about the past before I could write about the present.


R: Jon, you spent the Huckabee Regime working with the Underground. Did that have any influence on your decision to write again?

JS: There comes a point after living through something like that where you either hire a really expensive therapist or you write a book. So I wrote.


R: How did you end up in Israel? Keith, you aren't Jewish, correct?

KO: Correct. I was raised Unitarian Universalist. They're mostly gone now, or at least gone from America. Anyway, when Jon and I went to the US to testify the Israeli Ambassador, Orli Weiss, offered us a chance to emigrate. Not a lot of people know this, but Jon was against the idea. He wanted to stay in Canada with Rachel and Steve [Carell] and Dan [Abrams]. I needed to get away. I needed a fresh start, so Jon and I talked and we decided to take her up on her offer.

JS: I am Jewish, and I was the one who wanted to stay in Canada. In the end, however, Keith was right. We needed a fresh start.

***

REPORTER: I'm here with Rachel Maddow, head of the Center for American Refugees and contributor to the CBC. Hi, Rachel!

RACHEL MADDOW: Hi!


R: Why the Center?

RM: When I first came to Canada we didn't know how bad it was going to get. Dan Abrams and I crossed the border together the day the Amendment passed. I was out and it didn't seem prudent to stay. Within weeks the borders closed and Canada was dealing with an influx of American refugees. Dan and I had the knowledge and ability to help them and they needed our help, so we did.


R: Every year you go to Israel for two months?

RM: I do. Keith [Olbermann] and Jon [Stewart] relocated there after the trials and I go and visit them, as well as several other American refugees I know who ended up in Israel. When Huckabee 'suggested' that Jews should return to Israel, many of them did. Israel was willing to let them emigrate and it got them out of the United States which had become more and more hostile.


R: Keith Olbermann started your television career.

RM: In many ways he did. I owe him a lot, professionally and personally. He is my friend before anything else, and most of the work I did agitating for the release of political prisoners during the Huckabee Regime was because he was imprisoned in Colorado.


R: In the book he co-wrote with Jon Stewart, Keith Olbermann talks about your friendship and your involvement with the Underground.

RM: I was involved with the Underground movement. Anderson Cooper came up to the farmland Dan [Abrams] and I had bought after he escaped over the border and wanted to fight back. Now, you have to understand, Anderson Cooper was one of the strongest willed individuals who I ever met. You didn't notice it up front, but suddenly you just found yourself doing whatever he wanted. Not because he wanted you to do it, but because it was the right thing to do.


R: And Anderson wanted to start a resistance movement?

RM: Anderson wanted to free Keith. I'm not sure his plans went much further than that at first. Before the border closed, there'd been rumors and warnings. A lot of people who had nowhere else to go ended up at the farm. So when Anderson started talking about fighting back he had this ready made corps of highly committed and creative people who wanted to fight back to. Most of our infrastructure sprang up before Anderson had really thought about what he wanted to do. We had a large percentage of the cast and crew of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report living with us and they set up a newspaper. At first, it was more in the style of The Onion and was just something for them to do. And then it became one of the best ways we had to get news out to people in the Underground.

We also had about twenty interns living there, who had gotten separated from their families. You should never underestimate teenagers and college students. They were amazing. Without them, we would have folded in the first month. And Dan set up the legal department and got us almost fifty volunteer lawyers to work with the refugees. Steve Carell took over all our fundraising. He was amazing.

Anderson had no idea that when he said he wanted to fight back, all these things would spring up over night, but they did. We all wanted to make a difference.


R: You were instrumental in the release of imprisoned people's frozen assets after the 29th Amendment was passed.

RM: I was. Keith and Jon wouldn't have cared, but so many people needed help making themselves a new life, and it seemed like after all the things they'd gone through, they deserved their own money back. I didn't lose anything; I'd been all set to leave as soon as the Amendment passed, but most people didn't think anything like that could happen. Most of them weren't in any position to advocate for themselves, so I got some people together and we went to work.


R: Rumors circulated that you helped CLUMSY orchestrate bombings in the United States.

RM: I think those mostly come from the charges Anderson pled not guilty to before his execution. I never had anything to do with explosives and I don't think Anderson did either. I can't say that Anderson didn't for certain, but I suspect it was just another way of scapegoating him.


R: Now that the 28th Amendment has been revoked, do you think you'll ever return to America?

RM: I thought long and hard about this. I am proud that the system eventually worked. That through the amendment process the United States was able to change the Constitution without an all out war. I, however, lost so many people... Anderson, Jeff... so many people died who should not have. People died in front of the front doors of the place were I worked, the place where I lived. How can you go back to that? I could go back, they offered me my citizenship, but I can't.
R: You've become one of the most famous faces associated with resistance against the Huckabee Regime. How do you feel about that?

RM: It's a little bit crazy to me. People stop me in the street and want to hug me. That’s never happened to me before.


R: And that's Rachel Maddow, head of the Center for American Refugees. Rachel will be at McGill University tonight at 7 pm for a panel on American refugees. Thank you, Rachel.

RM: Thank you.

***

“Jon Stewart returned to the United States for the first time since he testified in front of Congress in 2017. Stewart came with long time writing partner, Keith Olbermann, to promote his new solo-effort Mayday, which covers his experiences working with the Underground as well as Olbermann's own solo-effort Stolen Voices.

“Stephen always said when he came on stage his goal was to make me laugh. And he did. He could make me laugh no matter how bad things got. He’s the reason I didn’t just stop and give up, the reason I continued to fight,” read Stewart at their first stop on the book reading tour in New York. "After Stephen died, I thought I would never be funny again."

"Words have power: I've never forgotten that," Stewart said. "When we were living in Chicago, we had basically no money. We were working on this underground radio show, trying to keep busy and keep warm. Our building had heating, but it was drafty and any time it was about 60 degrees was a good day. We wore gloves all the time: you should try working a laptop with gloves on. But our words got out. We talked, not just because it was the only option that we had open to us, but because words had always been our life blood."

When asked how it felt to be back in America, Olbermann said: "It was like being in a ghost town, except I was the ghost. We went to the memorial at 30 Rock, where all the protesters had been killed. Once, I had walked that ground every day. "

Stewart, who recently reconnected with his family who escaped before the borders closed, pointed out a park. "I used to take my son to play there. Now it'll be remembered as the place Elaine Czerny was lynched."

Olbermann replied, "Everywhere we've been, all those places we used to love, someone died or was hurt there. It's almost impossible to conceive. Sometimes I just have to look away. There were places who asked us to come and read, and we had to turn them down. I couldn't go back to Colorado. Not even the other side of the state. Every time I thought about it, I saw Anderson."

The last stop on the book tour was Indianapolis where Stewart spent his last years in America. His lover, Stephen Colbert, is buried in the St. Joan of Arc Cemetery, and Stewart and Olbermann visited the grave. A permanent headstone was installed just this year. Stewart commented: "When he was buried, we had no way of giving him a headstone. One of the men who went to the church we were living in made a wooden cross for his grave with his initials. I couldn't even put his name on the temporary marker, for fear something would happen to his body."

***

“Tonight I have with me Jon Stewart, author of The Lives and Times of Stephen T. Colbert and Anderson H. Cooper. His latest book, Return will be available in bookstores tomorrow. Thank you for being here with us, Jon,” said the reporter as he smiled to the camera.

“Thank you,” Jon said with a laugh. “It’s odd being on this side of the desk, even after so long.”

“That’s right, before Huckabee you had a television program in America.”

“It always surprises me that people don’t remember The Daily Show. For a long time, I thought that was what I’d be remembered for,” Jon said.

“You and your co-writer, Keith Olbermann, are one of the few people who lived through the time in America and are willing to talk about it. Maybe the dramatics of your story overwhelm the rest of your history.”

Jon nodded. “I’ll concede the point.”

“Why did you decide to write about your time in America in The Lives and Times of Stephen T. Colbert and Anderson H. Cooper and Mayday?

“Actually, it was Keith’s, Keith Olbermann, suggestion. He’d been trying to get back into the swing of sports writing and it wasn’t working for him. When he brought me the idea for The Lives and Times I jumped on it,” Jon answered.

“So it was a cathartic experience?”

“Yes, on many levels. Keith and I lost so many people. Stephen and Anderson, as well as other friends and relatives and coworkers. We lost our country. And we thought they needed to be remembered. Especially now that America is trying to rebuild, it needs to be reminded of its essential character. Father Mark Kowalski once told me, ‘People never die when they live in our hearts,’ and we want Stephen and Anderson and America and every single person who gave up their lives to help get our country back to live on in as many hearts as possible.” Jon took a sip of water and waited for the next question.

“Many people were surprised when both you and Mr. Olbermann came out.”

Jon nodded. “We decided that we couldn’t tell a true story without getting that out of the way. The Lives and Times of Stephen T. Colbert and Anderson H. Cooper is all about our relationship with two of the greatest men I have ever known. It would be a disservice to them to lie about the extent of our affection for one another.”

“What sort of lasting effect do you hope The Lives and Times of Stephen T. Colbert and Anderson H. Cooper will have?”

"A hundred years from now, some young kid will stumble across it in the dusty reaches of the internet, or whatever is passing for the internet those days, and read it. And maybe, they’ll think about the world they live and go do something to make it a better place,” said Jon.

“Do you ever regret the things you did back then?” asked the reporter.

“Some things I wish I hadn’t done, hadn’t had to do, had never been forced into a situation where it was necessary for me to do them,” said Jon. “Some things I did out of grief, which in retrospect maybe I could have done differently.”

Jon paused, looked the reporter in the eye and said, “I never regretted Stephen, though. Never.”

“Thank you. That was Jon Stewart, author, television host and survivor.”

***

REPORTER: Last week rumors were widely circulated that you [Keith Olbermann] and Jon Stewart were romantically involved, would you like to comment?

KO: We're not.

JS: It would be hilarious if we were. Rachel [Maddow] would get a kick out of it.

KO: I'm not sleeping with you just to make Rachel laugh.

JS: Are you sure?

***

Keith Olbermann suffered a heart attack last night and was pronounced dead on the scene after returning home from a reading of his latest book No Freedom in Silence at the University of Haifa last night.

At the reading, Olbermann talked about his time as a political pundit and sports reporter in a pre-Huckabee America. "One of the thing I miss the most is talking about baseball and [American gridiron] football. Politics is one thing, but sports were my first love and still are. There's nothing like getting to be the person who says on national television, 'The Cubs have won the World Series after a 110 year losing streak.'

A memoir of his time as a political prisoner under the Huckabee Regime, No Freedom in Silence, came out on bookshelves last Tuesday. Olbermann was incarcerated from 2009 to 2014 as a political prisoner of the Huckabee Regime to which his doctors attributed his declining health in recent years.

***

Today was the funeral of writer, comedian and activist Jon Stewart, born Jonathan Stuart Lebowitz. Stewart, 76, died of a stroke Thursday in his apartment in Haifa, Israel. While most famous for his written work, before the American Diaspora Stewart hosted a political comedy show: The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. He was also the executive producer of another political comedy show, The Colbert Report, which starred his good friend and eventual lover, Stephen Colbert. Stewart went into hiding under threat of arrest and possible execution after being called upon to testify in front of the American Congressional Committee on Media Corruption. During his time in hiding, he worked with the American underground as part of their underground newspaper and radio station. He eventually was smuggled into Canada with Keith Olbermann after the beating death of Colbert in 2014.

Stewart returned to America just once more, in 2017 during the Congressional hearings to revoke the 28th amendment. He testified to the atrocities he witnessed during the Huckabee regime. Along with Olbermann, he then immigrated to Israel. The two co-wrote The Lives and Times of Stephen T. Colbert and Anderson H. Cooper, which quickly became a bestseller in twenty-two languages. Stewart went on to write eleven more books as well as three co-written books with Olbermann. Olbermann died last year of a heart attack in the apartment he and Stewart shared for nineteen years.

Stewart was reunited with his children, Nate and Maggie, after his move to Israel. He also left behind a grandson and namesake, Jonathan. On the bequest of his ex-wife, Tracey, his body will be buried next to Stephen Colbert in the St. Joan of Arc Cemetery in Indianapolis, IN. In lieu of flowers, donations are being accepted for the American Refugee Assistance Center.


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