Chris Matthews admits bias and opposition against "Baloney war for the beginning."
By paulseale Comments (13) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Just when my friend John Combest declares that media bias has "jumped the shark" Chris Matthews comes out and admits something that we all know, that he is a biased partisan hack. So what? In this case, he admits that he has been against the Iraq war since the beginning. Here is the transcript:
MATTHEWS: It is like we are at war — we have killed 15,000 people that died over there in that war, we still get guys knocked off every couple of days, a couple more guys are killed — and yet it is not on the tube. It’s like, are we bored with the war now? Is that the new thing? We don’t cover a war guys are fighting? And I watch the news, I don’t see the war any more. It has been taken off television, and Bush must love it. Certainly Karl Rove loves the fact that the Iraq War has gotten boring for the American people.
IMUS: It probably had something to do with the tainted spinach, you know, if you’ve been thinking about it.
MATTHEWS: How can we be in a war and not watch it?
IMUS: Well, I don’t know, that’s a good question.
[snip]
IMUS: It must make you uncomfortable to read Frank Rich’s book, “The Greatest Story Ever Sold,” because it’s Frank’s essential thesis that they sold us this bill of goods — the administration did, you know Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld all them about the Iraq war — and it was you and the rest of the media went along with them…
MATTHEWS: Me?
IMUS: …like enablers with an alcoholic.
MATTHEWS: No. no. no. no. Don. Dono. You can check everything. Get your Nexis-Lexis out. Get your google out. Every column I have written from the day they started talking about Iraq has been against it. Now you are chuckling because you know damn well you’ve pulled my chain here. I have been a voice out there against this bullsh*t war from the beginning.
IMUS: OK, well, except you then.
MATTHEWS: OK. That’s nicer.
IMUS: Do we have to edit that for the radio, Lou?
PRODUCER: Yeah, we got it.
MATTHEWS: I have never used it ’til now because it was never more appropo. But you are right. The amazing thing is the President is winning now with a hand with nothing in it. They were wrong about the WMD, wrong about the connection to 9/11. Cheney said he didn’t even know there was going to be a war when we went in there. He was totally wrong, and yet he talks like god on television, and we are supposed to believe every word.
Why is this important?
Well, it is very important when a source calls them self a journalist to realize that much of what they are producing is opinion and not fact. In fact Matthews lies in his reply to Imus.
The Bush administration has never claimed that Iraq was behind 9/11. It has claimed that Iraq had ties to Al Qeada and other terrorist, and that is a fact. It also claimed that the possession of said WMD was a gathering threat.
I would also like to point out that there have been stories from Iraqi generals going on the record saying that the WMD were tranfered to Syria by Russian agents. The Isrealis even told us before the war started that Saddam was moving them.
In either case, what is important here is that we recongnize that the media is biased and is focused on in an antiwar effort which by its very nature is supportive of our enemies. In the past we would call that treason. What would you call that today?
I mean, who needs a propaganda wing if you are an opponent of the United States when you have "journalist" like Chris Matthews on your side?
Hat Tip: Hot Air
Cross posted from Arena of Ideas
He voted for Bush twice. He let it slip on his show once.
Matthews, like Pat Buchanan and other conservatives, is against the war. So what? That doesn't make him a partisan hack.
Matthews is a detached millionaire DC insider with sporatic leanings. I wouldn't call him partisan....he's just a hack.
Don't tread on me.
with Matthews' employment history and think he's not partisan. Partisan is all he is.
Matthews has worked for four Democratic politicians. He was a presidential speechwriter for four years during the administration of Jimmy Carter. He served as a top aide to long-time Speaker of the House of Representatives Tip O'Neill for six years. He worked in the U.S. Senate for five years on the staffs of Senators Frank Moss and Edmund Muskie before running for U. S. House of Representatives from Pennsylvania.
As far as his voting is concerned, all we have on that is his word and if you watch his show very much you have to know dealing with facts is not Matthews' strongest attribute.
-Matthews was chief among the cheerleaders when Bush delivered a nationally televised speech from the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln on May 1, 2003, in which he declared that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended," all the while standing under a banner reading: "Mission Accomplished." Despite lingering questions over the continued violence in Iraq, the failure to locate weapons of mass destruction, and the whereabouts of Saddam Hussein, Matthews fawned over Bush: "He won the war. He was an effective commander. Everybody recognizes that, I believe, except a few critics. ... He looks for real.
video: http://mediamatters.org/items/200604270005
-On the January 31, 2005, edition of Hardball, while praising that month's Iraqi election, Matthews falsely claimed that no insurgent attacks had occurred at polling places on Election Day. In fact, attacks on Iraqi polling places were widely reported during the January 30 elections.
video: http://mediamatters.org/items/200502020003
-Once said about Bush: "verybody sort of likes the president, except for the real whack-jobs" and his statement that Bush sometimes "glimmers" with "sunny nobility."
video: http://mediamatters.org/items/200511300013
-accused Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) of having employed a "bob and weave" with her position on the Iraq war, contrasting her with Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-CT), who Matthews said "hasn't cut and run."
video: http://mediamatters.org/items/200608080014
that you can find four quotes on the site David Brock runs when he's not doing what he does best about Matthews which you think proves he's not a partisan democrat.
The most these quotes prove is that Matthews has only a passing acquaintance with the truth, something I've already noted so there is nothing new here.
On the other hand, this is supposed to offset Matthews' actual bio. Staffer for congressional dems, speechwriter for a dem president, and a dem candidate for congress in hiw own right.
Nice try but you're giving hardworking morons everywhere a bad rap with this bit of trash.
Just like all the people we see here from dKos that supposedly voted for Reagan or voted for Bush and now are out repeating Democrat talking points.
Pat Buchanan is just a paleocon. They are pretty far out of step on just about everything with the rest of the conservative movement. You can count the number of issues Pat is with us on one hand. And all of economics and foreign policy wouldn't take any fingers.
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"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson
as being from Dkos simply they differ on some hallowed doctrine.
There are points of view that are neither "DKos" nor "Freeper".
Points of difference are not "talking points".
Don't think that the whole 60 million who voted for Bush are even close to being in lock step with your point of view. or vice versa for Kerry voters with Kossacks. You'd be in for a real shocker.
I know the tents are bigger than that whether many here give that impression or not.
Don't tread on me.
We get no trolls here... just people who honestly "differ on some hallowed doctrine." And it's purely coincidence that they are all saying the exact same thing, making the same absurd points that their counterparts on the talk shows are making.
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"I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it." -- Thomas Jefferson
the image is of a big nuclear bomb inside a big rocket with a big neon sign saying "WMD-Property of Saddam Hussein" and maybe Saddam's image in lights, too.
But a WMD could be in a petri dish or in a crop duster or a bagful of powder.
More expansively, the apparatus of a state can also be used for mass destruction, as Saddam used his more than once.
I've been writing about Matthews Imus appearances on my blog for awhile. Today he actually gave some credit to Bush. Which I have never heard him do before. This is what I wrote this morning:
The host of Hardball Chris Matthews was on to talk about the events of the day. Chris surprised me and took the side of the U.S. when commenting on the two [expletive deleted - ed.] at the UN. I almost expected Matthews to some how blame Bush and the U.S., but he didn’t. He even went on to give Bush credit for gaining ground the last few weeks. Matthews said the republicans may keep Congress. It looks like Chris realizes it’s not so good for ratings to be a whiney liberal butt boy for the left.
Here is the deal. I do not expect people to rubber stamp any politician. To keep them honest we must continue to question and probe.
What I do mind, however, is for "journalist" to actively take the sides of our enemy simply because they do not like who the commander in chief is.
One journalist asked Tony Snow if someone could oppose the war and essentially be some sort of a good egg. He said that he believed that you could. I am not so sure.
I believe that if you want the war to be done with, then you should support and help find an end with us being victorious.
That means that yes, we can and should internally question tactics, equipment, intellegence and so forth. However, the criticism should be constructive and in a manner which would be beneficial to our country; not in an effort to put pressure on us to essentially throw down our arms against our enemies and run.
That is what happened in Somolia and what we ended up getting was 9-11. Bin-Laden and his group believe that we were weak and all they had to do is keep hitting us and we would retreat.
Well, given journalist like Matthews, Olbermann and politicians like Reid, Pelosi and Murtha, he would be correct. They are all wanting to hi-tail it out as fast as they can regardless of the consequences.
This perception leads extremist who hate our very existence to believe that they can strike out at us with success. THAT breeds terrorism.
It is why we as a nation must try to unite again and fight our common enemies. I dont see that happening any time soon because it is a power play on Capital Hill first and foremost.
throw him on the pile of clueless, out-of-touch D.C. press corps hacks. In some ways, we are lucky that the Left leans so heavily on such transparent frauds as these.
And again: any Republican who appears on his insipid show is either self-loathing or delusional.