Tag Archives: chris-matthews

Scarborough Calls on Petraeus and Gates to Fire McChrystal to ‘Keep the President’s Hands Clean’

Posted on June 22, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

During Tuesday’s Morning Joe, host Joe Scarborough called for the firing of General Stanley McChrystal. He boldly exclaimed that this discharge should not come from the Commander-in-Chief because “Democrats have to treat generals differently from Republicans.” He goes even further and states, “Were this a Republican, were it George W. Bush, McChrystal would have been fired yesterday,” and “the press would have understood it.” Of course, because during the last administration, the media was noted for giving former President George W. Bush the benefit of the doubt, especially with military decisions. Interestingly enough, a flashback to January 31, 2006, tells a different tale. During MSNBC’s three-hour post State of the Union coverage, Chris Matthews and Joe Scarborough, denounced President Bush’s message about Iraq. Matthews thought that President Bush “cashiered” General Shinseki’s remarks about wanting more troops and believed the “idea that these guys are free to think out loud, I thought, has been yet to be proven.” Scarborough echoed Matthews and cited that, “For the most part, the Generals and the Admirals, 99 percent of them parrot what the Pentagon and what the President wants.” [Full article available here ] However, it is now 2010, and it is no longer cool to have the courage to stand up or to think out loud against this administration. There is a new president, so Scarborough insisted, because he is a Democrat, “Gates and Petraeus both have to come out, they need to fire McChrystal, and keep the president’s hands clean.” Since, Scarborough served on the Armed Services Committee he should be aware that the President is the top link in the chain of command and therefore is the ultimate authority, but he wants to make it easier for this Democrat to not do his duty as Commander-in-Chief. Apparently, Scarborough’s conservative viewpoint is synonymous with other MSNBC hosts who parrots White House talking points.

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Newsweek Blogger: Tea Party Coverage Isn’t Harsh Enough

Posted on June 22, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Newsweek blogger Ben Adler thinks the national media are giving the Tea Parties gentle treatment. “Unfortunately,” Adler wrote in a June 21 post , “what appear to be false notions of objectivity – or perhaps a lack of interest in policy – is preventing that coverage from illuminating what the movement actually represents and what it would do if empowered.” Adler complained that a recent Associated Press article, ” Enraged to Engaged: Tea partiers explain why ,” failed to examine the ideology of the demonstrators in the grassroots conservative movement. “The piece examines how and why a variety of individuals became involved in the Tea Party movement without once asking what precisely the platform consists of,” Adler said, leading one to wonder if he even read the article. The 2,300-word “stemwinder,” as Adler called it, written by reporter Pauline Arrillaga, presented various segments of Tea Party ideology on five separate occasions. In the third paragraph, Arrillaga notes that the purpose of the Tea Party-affiliated Lincoln Club in Yucca Valley, Calif., is “to promote educate and advance conservative principles of fiscal responsibility small limited government, free enterprise, the rule of law, private property rights, and the preservation and protection of individual liberty.” Eric Odom, widely regarded as a founder of the Tea Party movement, told Arrillaga said the group’s purpose was, “to make sure that we’re represented by people who are looking out for our rights and upholding the Constitution… And if they don’t, to make sure we have an infrastructure to really take them out rather than have these thugs that are in there for 30, 40 years.” As Adler put it, Tea Partiers are “vehemently opposed” to raising taxes. “But when it comes to specifics, suddenly every program seems worthier than when demonized in the collective abstract. Which politician wants to cut spending on Homeland Security? Education for students with special needs? (Surely not Sarah Palin!),” Adler said in a reference to Palin’s son, Trig, who was born with Down syndrome. Adler complained that the AP would dare characterized Tea Party demonstrators as “concerned Americans trying to find their voices, and a way to channel their disgust.” He suggested they aren’t motivated by love of country or concern for the future, but by ignorance. Arrillaga’s article refuted the notion that Tea Party activists are “ignorant,” however. Bill Warner, Lincoln Club member, ran his own engineering firm for three decades. Hildy Angius is currently running the Republican Woman’s Club, and is a staunch Tea Party Activist. She is an ex-PR agent with a degree from New York State Albany. Eric Odom started the Tea Party movement fresh out of college. Tea Partiers come from all walks of life and have diverse academic backgrounds. Adler also predictable recycled a tired media-drive stereotype that Tea Party members are racist. He suggested they are too dumb to realize they’re racist. “Might it be possible that the Tea Partiers who profess no racial motivation are, let’s say, not entirely aware of their own visceral motivations? I’m sure if you asked the Southern voters who switched to Republican voting habits why they did so, many would say race had nothing to do with it. But why should journalists take that at face value?” Adler said. Adler’s assertion that the media have been soft on the Tea Parties might come as a surprise to anyone who’s paid attention to media coverage of Tea Parties. From the very first demonstrations in April 2009, reporters have attacked Tea Party members . According to a Media Research Center study , the media at first tried to ignore the demonstrations, but quickly moved into attack mode, portraying Tea Party protestors as extremists. Just last week, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews aired a “documentary” about the Tea Party portraying its members as racists, terrorists and conspiracy theorists. 

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Newsweek Blogger: Tea Party Coverage Isn’t Harsh Enough

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Tea Partiers Boycott MSNBC Advertisers Over ‘Slanderous’ Documentary

Posted on June 17, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Some Tea Party leaders are calling for conservatives to boycott MSNBC’s advertisers, after the network ran a documentary on June 16 that they say unfairly slandered the movement. Two of the Tea Party leaders interviewed in the Chris Matthews-narrated documentary are asking supporters to write, call and fax the offices of Dawn and its parent company Proctor and Gamble and request that they cease giving advertising dollars to Matthews’ “Hardball” program on MSNBC. FreedomWorks chairman Dick Armey and Kitchen Table Patriots member Ana Puig jointly called the documentary a “propaganda piece” and urged Tea Party groups around the country to boycott Dawn products. “The program ‘Rise of the New Right’ was low-ball journalism at its worst,” said the Kitchen Table Patriots in a statement released today. “Chris Matthews and his Hardball program slandered the Tea Party movement, and misled the American people by distorting facts about the Tea Party movement, its motivations and its history.” Brendan Steinhauser, a grassroots director at FreedomWorks, noted that other groups like the American Grassroots Coalition, the National Tea Party Federation, Tea Party Nation and Liberty Central have also signed on to the boycott. Critics say that Matthews’ documentary smeared Tea Partiers as “violent,” “conspiracy theorists,” and “racists” by relying heavily on insinuations, heavily edited sound bites, and allegations from left-wing activist groups. The introduction of the video splices back-to-back shots of militia members firing guns with Tea Party protesters holding up signs criticizing President Obama’s policies, as ominous music droned in the background. In one segment, Matthews appeared to insinuate that FreedomWorks leader Armey is supportive of “birthers,” a group of fringe conspiracy theorists who believe President Obama wasn’t born in the U.S. “While not embracing birthers, many conservative leaders refuse to separate from them,” said Matthews in a voiceover that led in to an interview Matthews held with Armey. “Barack Obama’s citizenship, is that a real case or not?” asks Matthews. “There’s a venue for that. Probably in the courts,” Armey replied. But Steinhauser, who organizes FreedomWorks’ national events, says that any suggestion that Armey sympathizes with birthers is “just ridiculous.” “[The documentary] obviously didn’t give his full answer,” said Steinhauser. “At our events we’ve been approached by just about every birther in the book. We kept [birthers] Allan Keyes [and] Orly Taitz as far as possible from our big September 12 event. I told them ‘that’s not who we are – go have your own rally.’ The movement out and out rejects that.” And other facts presented in the documentary don’t appear to stand up to scrutiny. At one point in the video, Mark Potok, a director at the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) warned Matthews’ that “we’ve gone from numbers like, you know, 170 militias to well over 500.” But the SPLC’s most recent report on right-wing groups released in Spring 2010 claimed that it only defines 127 organizations in the U.S. as “militias.” Steinhauser said that getting the message out about the boycott is just the first step in the campaign. “This is just the beginning stages. We’ve got some other things planned down the road in the days and weeks to come,” he said. For further analysis of Matthews’ documentary, see Lachlan Markey’s Newsbusters report .

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Tea Partiers Boycott MSNBC Advertisers Over ‘Slanderous’ Documentary

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Chris Matthews: Etheridge ‘Ambushed By Activists’ ‘Ginning Up A Skirmish’

Posted on June 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews on Monday said, “Democratic Congressman Bob Etheridge of North Carolina was ambushed by a group of unknown activists.” The “Hardball” host began his report on the Congressman’s attack on two students asking whether he supported President Obama’s agenda, “Next: ginning up a skirmish.” This came just a few hours after Matthews’ colleague Tamron Hall made similar on air allegations concerning the incident. Obviously, the folks at MSNBC have decided to present Etheridge as the innocent victim and the students he attacked as the guilty parties. Matthews ended the brief report, “By the way, no word yet on who those self-proclaimed students working on a project are” (video follows with transcript and commentary, h/t Freedom’s Lighthouse ):  CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Next: ginning up a skirmish. Democratic Congressman Bob Etheridge of North Carolina was ambushed by a group of unknown activists last week, and didn`t like it much. An edited version of the video first appeared on the Web site of a former Drudge Report editor. Here it is. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you fully support the Obama agenda? REP. BOB ETHERIDGE (D), NORTH CAROLINA: Who are you? Who are you? Who are you? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whoa! ETHERIDGE: Who are you? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Whoa! ETHERIDGE: Who are you? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`m here for a project, sir. ETHERIDGE: Tell me who you are. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re just here for a project, sir. ETHERIDGE: Tell me who you are. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re just here for a project. (CROSSTALK) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, could you please let go of my hand? ETHERIDGE: Who are you? Who are you? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Please let go of my arm, sir. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir… ETHERIDGE: Who are you? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, sir, sir, please… UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Congressman, please let go of me. ETHERIDGE: Who are you? UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. (END VIDEO CLIP) MATTHEWS: Well, after that video spread over the Internet, today, Congressman Etheridge issued a statement saying: “I deeply and profoundly regret my reaction. And I apologize to all involved.” By the way, no word yet on who those self-proclaimed students working on a project are. The bias on display here is both staggering and quite disturbing. Let’s assume for moment that these young men were activists. Is it against the law for activists to approach an elected official with a camera and ask a question concerning his or her position on an issue? These young men asked the Congressman, “Do you fully support the Obama agenda?” Is that verboten? If John McCain had won in November of 2008, and liberal activists got attacked by a Republican Congressman simply for asking, “Do you fully support the McCain agenda,” Matthews, MSNBC, and virtually every news outlet would be calling for this representative’s resignation. Instead, MSNBC on at least two occasions Monday defended the Congressman’s actions while condemning the students he attacked. Of course, this ignores the possibility that these were just students doing a project and they weren’t activists at all. What should most concern readers is if the folks at MSNBC have become so overwhelmed by their support for Obama and the Democrat Party that they are willing to go on the air and defend Etheridge’s actions while condemning those who HE could be guilty of assault and battery against, it is THEY that are the activists. That’s quite a statement about today’s so-called journalists, wouldn’t you agree? 

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Matthews Exclaims ‘Tea Partier Declares War!’ Warns of Movement’s ‘Lock and Load Mentality’

Posted on June 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Chris Matthews, on Monday’s Hardball, claimed that a Tea Party candidate, in his new ad, had just declared war and warned this was an example of the “lock and load mentality” of “the Tea Party folk.” Matthews, during his Sideshow segment, played a clip from a Rick Barber for Congress ad in which the candidate engages in an imagined conversation with Sam Adams and George Washington in which Barber tells the Founding Fathers how far the government has grown in it scope, with the actor playing Washington saying at the end it’s time to “Gather your armies.” Matthews took this as a sign that Barber was “advocating taking up arms against the government.” Matthews also asserted the tea partiers view the federal government as “a foreign occupying force” and told viewers they can see “more of this sort of thing” on his new documentary “Rise of the Right” to be aired this upcoming Wednesday night on MSNBC. The following teaser, ad clip and Matthews commentary were aired on the June 14 edition of Hardball: CHRIS MATTHEWS: Up next it’s a campaign you have to see to believe! A Republican running for Congress in Alabama, basically is advocating taking up arms against the government. This is the closet thing, well I’m not gonna say it. Well it’s the closest thing to “Let’s revolt!” that I’ve seen. You’re watching Hardball only on MSNBC. … MATTHEWS: Now to the Sideshow. First tonight, a tea partier declares war! Rick Barber, one of the candidates competing in the Republican run-off in Alabama’s second congressional district has just come out with an ad for TV that tells you the true dimension of the Tea Party mentality. The spot begins midway through an imagined meeting with Founding Fathers Sam Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and George Washington. Here it is. (Begin ad clip) RICK BARBER: And I would impeach him. And if that’s not enough, some of you men own taverns. Sam, you were a brewer. Mr. President, a distiller. You know how tough it is to run a small business without a tyrannical government on your back. Today we have an Internal Revenue Service that enforces a progressive income tax. Now the same IRS is gonna force us to buy health insurance, cram it down our throats or else. Now I took an oath to defend that with my life. I can’t stand by while these evils are perpetrated! You gentleman revolted over a tea tax – a tea tax! Now look at us! Are you with me? ACTOR PLAYING GEORGE WASHINGTON: Gather your armies. (End clip) MATTHEWS: Actually Washington put down the Whiskey Rebellion. Well this is the lock and load mentality you just saw there, of the Tea Party folk. They see themselves as involved in a battle with the federal government, which they view is a foreign occupying force, like the British during colonial days. For more on this sort of thing, watch our documentary, Rise of the New Right, this Wednesday at 7:00 o’clock Eastern.

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Chris Matthews Tells Charlie Rose That Bill Clinton Is a Hit In ‘Culturally Conservative’ Areas

Posted on June 14, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Have liberals blacked out the sex-and-perjury impeachment of Bill Clinton? MSNBC’s Chris Matthews appeared on the Charlie Rose show on PBS Thursday, and Rose asked him about how Sen. Blanche Lincoln had a “secret weapon” in her primary race in Arkansas. Matthews responded by laying it on thick about how great Bill Clinton is. Surely viewers giggled as Matthews talked about Clinton giving Lincoln “the full Bill.” Boy, that hug, that goes down in history, he had the French cuffs, looked like a million bucks, he put the full Bill around her. It was really an embrace. And you notice it was gender, because when she came out of that hug she was actually just overwhelmed physically, it was like you could see in her face, “I can`t believe the guy likes me that much and wants to help me that much.” It was great. It was very real. Matthews even claimed Clinton was a terrific asset in “culturally conservative Democratic” areas – as if being a “cultural conservative” isn’t at odds with what Bill Clinton represents. But Matthews is still channeling the more-conservative-than-Obama line from 2008, and then he broke down and said Clinton is great anywhere he goes: The big message coming out of this is, if you`re running, if you`re Joe Sestak running for the Senate this fall, you want him in western Pennsylvania, you want him in the culturally conservative Democratic areas. You want him in New Hampshire, another state where Bill Clinton is enormously popular is Pennsylvania and New Hampshire. If you`re running in Ohio, you want him there. You want him in Missouri, Kentucky — all that sort of state — you want him. In fact, you want him almost anywhere. There were some other notable tidbits sprinkled in: Carly Fiorina’s Deal with the Pro-Life Devil? “Fiorina, I don`t think can win a general election because she`s pro-life. She may have taken that position — opposition to Roe versus Wade, opposition to a woman`s right to choose an abortion. But she now has to stand by that politician in the general. I think that might a Faustian deal for her. That may be a real problem. They haven`t elected a pro-life candidate for high office since Deukmejian way back in the 1980s.” Teddy Roosevelt’s the only iconic figure on Mount Rushmore? Asked why a poll found John F. Kennedy should go on Mount Rushmore, Matthews explained: “I think it`s because his life had the arc of a hero, very much like Teddy Roosevelt. Who people think of when they think of Mount Rushmore, Teddy Roosevelt, he`s the one up there that`s really iconic.” Once again, Matthews ignores that many see JFK as the original TV-era cheating-horndog president. Crist will win, and caucus with the Democrats like Joe Lieberman . “I think Charlie is going to beat the band. He`s going to win the general anyway…Yes, he will be the senator, and I think he will organize for the Democrats.” Democrats won’t lose big in the Senate. “So they can win four or five seats as well as lose six or seven, so I think they can get away with only losing two or three seats in the Senate. In the House, I think they face — they`ll lose 40 seats is tough. I think they`re going to be pretty good — Rahm Emanuel will be pretty good – – they will be putting in the sealers. They will be holding off what they can.” Sarah Palin is an effective demagogue. Matthews previewed his “Rise of the Right” documentary by repeating the lines about how the tea-party movement is anti-government: “Sarah Palin is the queen of this group, the leader of this group. She represents the ability — if you listen to her, she`s very attractive and comes off in a traditional way as sort of an attractive woman from the west. “But if you listen to her, her agitation is brilliant. She gets people mad at their government, she gets people mad at them, the Obama crowd. She uses sarcasm, that demagogic language , which is very effective. If you listen to her rallies those people are angrier when she’s done. She’s very good at it and very smart at how to lead that crowd.”

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NYT’s Cooper: Obama Becomes Jimmy Carter If He Doesn’t Get Control Of Oil Spill

Posted on June 13, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Barack Obama’s presidency goes the way of Jimmy Carter’s if he doesn’t get control of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. So said New York Times White House correspondent Helene Cooper on the most recent installment of “The Chris Matthews Show.” As the opening segment’s discussion concerning the spill moved to a close, the host surprisingly asked his panel if  Obama can continue to “blame the previous administration, the oil patch guys, Bush and Cheney” for the disaster. Readers will likely find the answers quite surprising (video follows with transcript and commentary):  CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Bottom line politically, he can no longer, can he longer blame the previous administration, the oil patch guys, Bush and Cheney, or does he have to move on and take the heat? JOHN HEILEMANN, NEW YORK MAGAZINE: I think he has to move on. He has to move on largely because forgetting about what caused the spill, there’s now a disaster that’s going to play out over months in terms of how do we keep the oil off our shores, how do we get it out of the mashes, keep it off the marshes, how do we limit the impact now. So that is his challenge. And this is not going to be Bush’s or Cheney’s challenge. That’s on his front door. MATTHEWS: Present danger. Let me ask you this, everybody, right around here. We’re going to end with this: will he get on top of this whole oil mess in the Gulf, get on top of it? SAVANNAH GUTHRIE, NBC NEWS: I think they would argue that they are on top of it. I think his… MATTHEWS: What would an objective observer say right now? Are they on top of this? Will they get on top of it? GUTHRIE: Well, I don’t think we can say until the leak is capped. RICK STENGEL, TIME: I think they will use the crisis as an opportunity and he will build it into something that can be a national campaign. MATTHEWS: And he will look better after this is over than he did before? STENGEL: Well, he will look better than he did at the beginning. MATTHEWS: Okay. Helene? HELENE COOPER, NEW YORK TIMES: He has to. If he doesn’t, I think his presidency is, will go the way of Jimmy Carter’s. HEILEMANN: I think, I think, I’m with Helene. I think he has to. And I think if he doesn’t it will really cost him. Are media after more than seven weeks of watching a pathetic response to this disaster finally turning on the President they helped get elected, or is this just a moment of frustration? Stay tuned. 

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Matthews Perverts Tea Party Movement: Participants View Federal Government as British Occupiers

Posted on June 9, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews’s ratings lag  far behind those of his competition, Fox News’ Glenn Beck, on a regular basis . So is he perhaps trying to become the anti-Glenn Beck to bolster his stature in the cable news world? On MSNBC’s June 9 “Andrea Mitchell Reports,” Matthews commented on the Gadsden flag , as if it represented an attitude that viewed the federal government as a occupying force, comparable to pre-Revolutionary War America. “You know that Gadsden flag, the ‘Don’t Tread on Me Flag’ with a rattlesnake is so important,” Matthews said. “They believe, a lot of people in the right – that the federal government has replaced the British as the occupying force in North America and they have to be ready to fight it. It’s serious business.” But the scary thing, according to Matthews, is these people he has caricatured have guns. “Some have the guns, some don’t,” Matthews said. “Some have the Tea Party aspect. But it’s always that flag, ‘Don’t Tread on Me.’ They believe Washington is London.” And while it has been documented that the media have repeatedly – and unsuccessfully – tried to correlate violence with the Tea Party movement, Matthews continued to play the “scary business” card – that this movement was trying to circumvent the role of the Supreme Court as prescribed by the U.S. Constitution. “The scary part of this is, do they really believe in self-government in the end – self-government?” Matthews said. “Or is the government always going to be the enemy? And the other scary part is the Supreme Court doesn’t get the right to determine what’s constitutional. They do. And they’ve got guns. Serious business.”

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‘I forgot he was black’: Chris Matthews under fire for comment about Obama

Posted on January 28, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

How is this a bad thing??? MSNBC host Chris Matthews is under fire for commenting on air that President Obama has done so much to heal racial divides that “I forgot he was black” as he watched Obama's first State of the Union address Wednesday night. Matthews, who appeared on the cable network shortly after the speech, said of the president: “I was trying to think about who he was tonight.

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Source: Morgan Christie Dating Jon Gosselin For Publicity, to Rebel Against Her Family

Posted on January 28, 2010 by Benny Hollywood| Leave a comment

Jon Gosselin has been accused of dating Morgan Christie because she’s loaded. What the 25-year-old sees in him, however, has remained a mystery. Well, kind of

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