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‘Stop The Hammering’ Viral Video Leaked In Retaliation? MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell Reveals Culprit At Fault

By Roz Zurko
Published on: 15:55 PST, Sep 23, 2017

MSNBC anchor Lawrence O’Donnell was completely oblivious to the camera rolling when he had a meltdown this week that’s been shown over and over again on the various news channels, talk shows, and social media sites. “Stop the hammering” was O’Donnell’s first request, which was made in a civil tone. It was apparent the hammering didn’t stop as his request turned into a demand and “Stop the hammering” started to develop a sense of anger to it.

You couldn’t hear what O’Donnell was hearing in his earpiece during the clip, which offered yet another level of comedy to this viral video, according to the various commentators reporting on this event. From what O’Donnell was describing in the video, it sounded as if he heard some type of hammering coming from the control room and soon his irritation with the situation turned into full-blown, hand-pounding-on-the-desk anger.

O’Donnell was seen “raging at staff” during breaks in the live broadcast of The Last Word, demanding that they “Stop the hammering.” His rant soon became profane-laced as he attempted to get the folks in the control room to stop hammering whatever it was they were hammering at.

According to the Gothamist, the clip of O’Donnell was leaked to Mediaite after he was captured on camera on August 29 during a live broadcast of The Last Word. The clip is seen as hysterically funny by “fans of profane newscaster outtakes,” suggests the Gothamist. It was surmised that the clip was made available to the public through this leak because it was so funny, but that might be half the story behind the “Stop the hammering” video.

Page Six reports that the “Stop the hammering” video may have been “leaked in retaliation.” So who did the leaking? The senior NBC staffers are rumored to be the culprits to set this video free along the media superhighway as a sort of payback for O’Donnell’s antics during contract negotiations that went on earlier this year.

According to Page Six, they have heard from multiple sources how O’Donnell really peeved off Andy Lack, who is not only a head honcho at NBC, but also oversees MSNBC. What O’Donnell supposedly did to get on the wrong side of Lack while he was in talks about his contract with the broadcasting company was to tweet about the ongoing negotiations.

The description of the interaction between Lack and O’Donnell during that time was offered up by a “TV insider,” writes Page Six. That insider described “the deal-making “between Lack and O’Donnell as “tense and unusually public.” Due to limited access to this tape, as it is only available to a very small group of people, the insider said either the tape was leaked or authorized “by a source at the senior level.”

O’Donnell wasn’t looking for a scapegoat when hearing the tape was leaked. He called the idea that it was done in retaliation a “ridiculous conspiracy theory.” He also revealed the person who he believes is to blame for this “Stop the hammering” video and that person is Lawrence O’Donnell himself!

He told reporters, “There’s only one person to blame for this video — me. Andy Lack brought me to MSNBC when he created the network in 1996. We were friends before that and have always remained friends.”

You can see the “Stop the hammering” unedited version of the Lawrence O’Donnell meltdown video posted to YouTube by clicking here. There is some vulgar language in the video.

[Featured Image by Richard Drew/AP Images]

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