Aug. 11, 2025

The Dumbest Howard Stern Rumor Yet — And Why It’s 100% Wrong (Bonus Commentary)

Show Notes
Transcript

Forget the doom-and-gloom headlines — Johnny Mac dismantles the bogus “Howard Stern is finished” narrative. From made-up feuds to laughable ratings gossip, he explains why Stern’s not walking away quietly… and why a blockbuster farewell tour is the only ending that makes sense.

John’s free substack about the media (with the Howard pieces): Media Thoughts is mcdpod.substack.com

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WEBVTT

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Caloroga Shark Media. Hi, I'm Johnny Mack. My phone is

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blowing up with people asking me about this Howard Stern story.

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So I thought, let me just record a commentary episode.

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I'm not working off the script. I'm just talking off

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the top of my head. In case you missed it,

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the US Sun was the original source of this The

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US Sun last week. Let me pull up the proper headline,

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just to get it right. The Howard Stern Show to

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be canceled after nearly twenty years, right, So, canceled is

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a loaded word in twenty twenty five the US Sun,

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And I'll let you for yourself decide where that is

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in terms of reporting, somewhere between the New York Times

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and Daily Comedy News. Whatever you think of the US Sun,

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this is from the US Sun. An insider said, Stern's

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contract goes up to the fall, and while Sirius is

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planning to make him an offer, they don't intend for

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him to take it serious. And Stern are never going

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to meet on the money he's going to want. It's

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no longer worth the investment after you saw what happened

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with Stephen Colbert. It's just like they can't afford to

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keep them going. Okay, okay, okay, okay. So once we

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say the word cancel, now we're also talking about Stephen Colbert.

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Forget about the Stephen Colbert of it all. But that

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totally to the side. This has nothing to do with this.

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The source claims. If Sirius isn't going to give Stern

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a good offer, I don't think I would have anything

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to do with his ratings. It's more likely everything to

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do with the political climate. Now we'll see some more

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nonsense articles talking about how many people are listening to Howard,

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and I will get into that as well. Listen to me.

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Here's the premise of everything I'm going to say. And

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I say this as somebody who was already listening to

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WNBC as a was I even a teenager. Yet when

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Howard first came to the WNBC, I was already a

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listener to the station. And then this guy named Howard

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Stern started doing afternoons. I followed him to k Rock.

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I was at Serious Satellite Radio when the deal was announced.

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I was in Los Angeles the morning it was announced.

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I was there when Howard came on board, and we

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had fewer than one million subscribers. If I remember the

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numbers correctly, and I will tell you this. There is

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zero chance I'm not leaving the door open a crack,

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zero chance, zero chance that Howard Stern is gonna come

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back from summer vacation and be like, Yep, that's it, Robin.

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We're doing nine ten more weeks and that's it for

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my career. No way. Okay. I've heard people refer to

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the Derek Jeter farewell tour. That's what you're gonna get.

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Remember when Johnny Carson. Maybe you don't because I'm ancient,

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those of us who remember when Johnny Carson stepped down,

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you're going to get that. I always predicted Howard would

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do a two year farewell tour, and I'm still not

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sure that he won't. I guarantee you he does at

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least a one year farewell tour. Now write this down

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because people are just being stupid. Write this down. Okay.

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Howard has not really been in the news for like

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fifteen years, and now everybody's talking about him every day.

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He loves that. He absolutely loves that. Here's what's gonna happen.

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He's gonna come back in September off the summer break,

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and he's going to lightly talk about the rumors. He's

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gonna dangle. He's gonna say phrases like I don't know

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what's going to happen, Robin. He's going to joke about

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how they're getting to the end. He is going to

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milk this for the entire fall, and on the very

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last day into Christmas break. So I'm not sure how

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late into the month Howard works these days, But maybe

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Thursday December eleventh, maybe Thursday December eighteenth, if I have

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to pick, I'm going to pick Thursday December eleventh, Howard

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and serious announce, Oh yeah, we've extended a deal. Now

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will he get one hundred million dollars reportedly this time?

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I don't know. I have seen in the entertainment industry

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people renew for less and do less work. Now, I

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don't know how much less work Howard could possibly do

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with the summers off in the three day weeks. But

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both sides are going to want the farewell tour. They

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were going to want every celebrity coming in, Lady Ganga,

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Paul McCartney, all the greats coming in and telling Howard

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how wonderful he is as he tries to cement this

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legacy that he's not the shock jock, he's not the

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person that did the ted dance and sketch. He's not

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lesbian dial of Date guy, he's not Beast Reality dial

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a day guy. He's the respectful great interviewer that he's

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been trying to spend these last few years. There will

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be a farewell tour. The idea that Howard Stern is

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just quietly going to go into the night, no way,

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and conflating this with Colbert that's just nonsense. So more

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nonsense going around is this nonsense that Howard Stern has

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an enemy at Serious XM. Again, the source on all

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this the US Son. I'll let you determine how much

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you enjoy the writing of the US Sun. So this

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version of the story, which got amplified by page six.

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Who are sourcing the Sun? Is that Serious XM executives

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have to take pains to keep Alex Cooper and Howard

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Stern from running into each other. Now, please understand the

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geography of the Serious headquarters in New York City, where

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I worked for ten years. Now. I haven't been into

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building a ten years, so maybe perhaps possibly there's been

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a major change. But I do know some former co

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workers and no one has mentioned this to me. When

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I was there, Howard was off in his own compound.

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You couldn't get into howard Land unless your key card

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would let you into howard Land. Mine did not. And

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you never ever, ever, ever saw Howard Stern, except if

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you happen to be in the lobby when he was

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leaving for the day, walking from Howard Land to the

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freight elevator, which he would take down because you don't

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want to write a civilian elevator. You might run into

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some civilians. You didn't see him in the hallway, you

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didn't se him in meetings, he didn't see him in

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the bathroom. He's off in howard Land. So this idea

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that I don't know he's going to run into the

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hallway and see Alex Cooper. Even if Alex Cooper happened

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to be standing in front of the freight elevator, it

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would be a six second encounter. An insider told the son,

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she's the one that bugs him. She gets hundreds of

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millions of hits. She has this mega one hundred and

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twenty five million dollar deal, and he hates that this

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young bubbly woman is the new thing. They have to

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keep Howard away from her. They have to keep Howard

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away from when she comes to New York, so he's

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there three days a week. I don't know how often

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she's there. This is a non story. The source claimed.

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It's completely turned Howard's world upside down. He's been in

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radio forty years and this change has really shocked everyone.

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Alex and Joe Rogan. These massive podcasters have traditional radio

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guys stunned. This is all silly. I am also a

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college professor, and I have walked people through the math

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of the Howard Stern deal for over a decade. Now.

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Serious these days has a trillion different plans and I

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try to look into it and I don't understand it.

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But the math, the way I used to teach it

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when I worked there, Serious was thirteen dollars a month. Okay, Now,

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how many people do you think came over for Howard?

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When Howard came over, we had around a million subs.

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They've eventually got up to thirty million subs. Do you

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think one million people came over for Howard Stern in

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two thousand and six? Is that an absurd number? Let's

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use that number. So if a million people came over

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and paid thirteen dollars a month for twelve months a year.

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That's one hundred and fifty six million dollars. You give

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a hundred million to Howard, you make a fifty six

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million dollar profit. If the number's not one million, if

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it's two million, now you're making some serious change. I

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saw a report the other day that said Howard's audiences

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down to only one hundred and twenty five thousand listeners.

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I don't know where someone would get that number from.

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When I worked there, you had no way to know

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who was listening to what on the satellite radios. You

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could look at Internet data and extrapolate it from streaming.

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Maybe the newer radios have some two way capabilities that

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I'm not aware of. Maybe somebody did a survey with

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Nielsen Audio. I don't know, but fine, I'll accept your number.

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If we multiply one twenty five by twelve, by thirteen,

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we would reach nineteen million, five hundred thousand. So if

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the value of Howard Stern at that calculation is a

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nineteen and a half million, then you wouldn't be able

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to pay him one hundred million dollars, but you could

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pay him twenty million dollars. Get the Howard halo effect.

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Do the farewell tour and what you'll get from him

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is twenty million dollars worth of work. So whatever he's

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doing now, you'd get a fifth of that. And in

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the end, we used to joke when I work there,

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you don't actually have to do the show. You just

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need press release to go out. So, as I wrote

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in my sub stack link in the show notes, Howard

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could work. I don't know, fifteen days next year, as

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long as it's the right fifteen days and it's the

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maybe the January Birthday party, the big farewell event. Could

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Howard sell out the Garden once? I think he could.

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If weird al can, I think Howard Stern can. Maybe

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you do a big event there. You do a couple

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of farewell things. Paul McCartney comes in, Lady Gaga comes in,

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Tom Hanks comes by. You do fifteen of those. Here's

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twenty million, Howard. That might be enough. No, I'm not

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saying he's gonna do fifteen shows, but maybe he's gonna

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make a little less work a little less. But the

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idea that Howard Stern is just going to come back

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and be like Robin, We've got nine weeks left. It's

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been a great forty years. Zero chance. And that is

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some bonus commentary for today. I'm going to do another

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bonus commentary tomorrow about Mark Marin. I do not intend

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on doing this every single day, but I just had

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two topics on my mind that I wanted to share

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with you back in the morning with a normal episode