Well, on NBC's "Tonight Show" Wednesday, Jay Leno didn't, and the supposedly brilliant Keith Olbermann wasn't sure.
Imagine that.
A company that has been a hot topic in the news for at least the past six months, and these guys not only didn't know it was American, but also thought its initials stood for American "Insurance" Group (video embedded below the fold, relevant section at 3:50):
JAY LENO, HOST: Can I ask you a dumb question? Is this -- it's called. what, American Insurance Group? Is that the name?
KEITH OLBERMANN, "COUNTDOWN" HOST: I believe that's it, yes.
LENO: Is this even an American company, or is this one of these sort of things when you're chopping down trees, you call yourself the Evergreen Preservation Society? You know, I mean --
OLBERMANN: It's a brand name.
LENO: Is it even American at all?
OLBERMANN: It probably was at some point.
It probably was at some point?
You guys have been talking about this company for months, and you don't know its real name or that it's been an American company since founder Cornelius Vander Starr moved it from China in 1949 as a result of the Communist takeover there?
After all, it's only the largest underwriter of commerical and industrial insurance in the nation, while its subsidiary American General is one of our largest life insurers.
Nicely done, gentlemen. You make your company proud.
