Overlooking his own complicity, Matthews criticized "mainstream media" for "continu[ing] to act as if most people support the war"
SUMMARY: MSNBC's Chris Matthews criticized the "mainstream media" for "continu[ing] to act as if most people support the war, and it's the outside weirdoes that oppose it," when "[t]hat's not true." However, Matthews himself falsely asserted just two days earlier on Hardball that a CBS News/New York Times poll released May 9 showed "for the first time" that Americans "really have a majority view that we were wrong to go to Iraq." In fact, eight CBS/Times polls dating back to July 2004 have shown that a majority of respondents believe the United States should have "stayed out" of Iraq.
During the May 12 edition of MSNBC's Hardball, host Chris Matthews criticized the "mainstream media" for "continu[ing] to act as if most people support the war, and it's the outside weirdoes that oppose it," when "[t]hat's not true." Matthews added: "[W]hy does the media still act as if it's a gung-ho country on this?" But as Media Matters for America noted, Matthews himself falsely asserted just two days earlier on Hardball that a CBS News/New York Times poll released May 9 showed "for the first time" that Americans "really have a majority view that we were wrong to go to Iraq." In fact, eight CBS/Times polls dating back to July 2004 and asking whether "the United States did the right thing in taking military action against Iraq" have shown that a majority of respondents believe the United States should have "stayed out."
Matthews made his false claim about the CBS/Times poll during an interview with Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-IL) and Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS). Two days later, he asserted that "the mainstream media continues to act as if most people support the war" during a discussion with Bill Carter, a New York Times staff writer and author of Desperate Networks (Doubleday, May 2006).
From the May 10 edition of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews:
MATTHEWS: And tonight, Washington wonders: With the president's second term now in deep water, how long can he go? How low can his polls go? A CBS/New York Times poll shows the president's approval rating now has hit a new low of 31 percent. Only 29 percent approve of the president's handling of the war in Iraq. And a solid majority think we never should have gone there.
[...]
MATTHEWS: Let me ask you, Senator Durbin: The American people, for the first time now, really have a majority view that we were wrong to go to Iraq. They don't believe in the president's decision, made sometime in 2001 or 2002, to invade in 2003. Are you -- you are now -- are you still where you were back then? You don't think the president should have gone to war in Iraq the way he did?
DURBIN: There were 23 of us who voted no, one Republican and 22 Democrats, and I was in their ranks. I still feel the same today.
From the May 12 edition of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews:
MATTHEWS: The fact is, Cindy Sheehan is more representative of most people's thinking now, as far left as she seems, because most Americans for months now believe it was a mistake to go to war. Yet the mainstream media continues to act as if most people support the war, and it's the outside weirdoes that oppose it. That's not true. The average American opposes this war.
CARTER: That's what the polls are telling us.
MATTHEWS: But why the media -- but why does the media still act as if it's a gung-ho country on this?
CARTER: I don't know. I think the media has been very much currying favor with the administration for a long time.
MATTHEWS: Why?
I guess this is one of Tweety's "parallel universe" moments.
Either that or it's a conspicuous if somewhat futile dodge to keep some of the slightly less astute members of his audience from noticing or commenting on the presence of the alternating hands of Mehlman and Rove up his behind working the ventriloquist's lever in his back
MATTHEWS: "The fact is, Cindy Sheehan is more representative of most people's thinking now, as far left as she seems, because most Americans for months now believe it was a mistake to go to war. Yet the mainstream media continues to act as if most people support the war, and it's the outside weirdoes that oppose it. That's not true. The average American opposes this war."
This is a strange way to go, in order to arrive at "The average American opposes this war":
It starts out mentioning Cindy Sheehan, but pauses to describe her as "far left"; it then correctly gets on track by saying "most Americans" instead of "The average American", but mischaracterizes their opinion by saying they "now believe it was a mistake to go to war"; and then veers into describing how the "mainstream media" acts on the matter (and in the process performs the triple half-gainer w/ a twist) by saying...
"the mainstream media continues to act as if most people support the war, and it's the outside weirdoes that oppose it. That's not true"
...and only then do we arrive at the definitive "The average American opposes this war."
Plain talk; straight forward; clear and definitive; worthy of the prize-winning debate team... that is, if the debate were between Bellevue College and the University of Bedlam.
What does Cindy Sheehan have to do with it?
Nothing as far as I can tell, and nothing for as long back as I can remember; as best I can tell, she is a fallen soldier's mom whose son was killed in Iraq. And while a mother's grief is powerful I'm sure (and I'm sure that grief may take many forms), I fail to see what she has to do with most Americans (even "average Americans") being against the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
What does the "far left" have to with it?
I don't know, that term was used to describe Cindy; and seeing as I don't know why she was invoked, I don't why the "far left" was either.
Now, is it true that most Americans only now oppose this invasion and occupation of Iraq; only "now believe it was a mistake to go to war"?
I think not, and post this fact:
On October 9 and 10 of 2002, when the House and the Senate considered H.J.Res. 114: To use the Armed Forces of the United States in order to defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq (back when Cindy had little fame, and perhaps even less grief), there were 23 U.S. Senators and 133 U.S. Representatives who voted "no" to that resolution.
And they spoke not just for themselves that day, but for the millions upon millions of American People they represent.
Did they speak for the "average American"? I don't know; I don't know him.
Did they speak for most Americans on that day in 2002?
I'll say this much: If it were not most Americans then who opposed the invasion and occupation of Iraq, then it certainly is now; for in the interim We the American People have found out that We were misled as to that "continuing threat posed by Iraq"...
We the American People were misled by the FALSE or FALSIFIED 'pre-invasion intelligence'.
And U.S. Troops continue to lose their lives because of it, to this day, everday.
Daily.
And it's grieving, it is.
And perhaps that's where a fallen soldier's mom should be invoked, for her grief, in whatever form it takes.
That makes sense now, I guess.
But I still don't know how it is that the words "far left" and "outside weirdoes" needed to be touched upon, on the way to stating "The average American opposes this war."
(Though it were far more accurate to say "most Americans", not the "average American", because the heck knows who he is?)
And who the heck can make sense of what passes for political discourse on the tv and the radio today; who the heck can make any sense at all, when Bellevue and Bedlam go to debating?
Especially when they debate immigration at a time such as this, a time of (continuing) grief in Iraq, and elsewhere.
Today, May 18, 2006, four more U.S. Troops were killed in Iraq (Northwest of Baghdad) by a roadside bomb.
That makes 50 U.S. Troops killed so far in the the first eighteen days of May in Iraq.
No single individual, that was not on the payroll (assuming he wasn't), did more to defeat Al Gore than Chris Matthews. His unrelenting attack, constructed almost entirely of bald faced lies, on Gore remains one of the great unexplained mysteries of political journalism. Of course he was joined in that bizarre war by many others. Hopefully some historian or investigative journalist, of the next generation, will someday tell us why.
Check out The Daily Howler for incisive coverage of exactly what you're talking about.
For a while (and apparently, still, to some minds), Cindy Sheehan is characterized as "far left". The views, as I understand them, of Ms. Sheehan are as follows: Her son died in Iraq, Sheehan later came to believe the Iraq conflict was unjust, and she wants to speak to the President/Boy King directly to voice her concerns.
Grieving for your dead son and wishing he hadn't died are not "far left" values. Nor is wishing to hold our Dear Leader responsible for getting us into this mess.
By this logic, if not believing in this "war" and wanting it to be over are "far left" values, I guess nearly 70% of the country is "far left". The Dems should win in November by a landslide!
of the people, by the people, for the people and accountable to the people is the new Far Left.
CARTER: I don't know. I think the media has been very much currying favor with the administration for a long time.
MATTHEWS: Why?
This is a riot. Let me see if I can answer this one. Hmmm, mega-sized mergers in the radio and television industries made possible by the GOP controlled Congress, White House, and the FCC generating huge profits. Or could it be multi-millionaires and billionaires involved with these mergers want to protect their hordes from taxation? Or could it be that companies like GE that own NBC wish to maintain funding for projects like the joint strike fighter engine which initally will gross 60% of 2.4 billion or 1.44 billion in these phase alone sans overruns (ha, that in itself is a funny joke) in the Pentagon's most expensive project. And overall the project is to run up to $45 billion in the development phase, not the actual building of fighters, $2 billion of which the UK will cover. For 60% of 45 billion (27 billion) you might say about anything. Or could it be multi-millionaires and billionaires involved in these projects want to protect their hordes from taxation? You chose, you are probably not wrong.
pose that question to himself. Matthews has been currying favor with Bush (although I believe that what he feels for Bush is true love) and the Republican power structure since they assumed leadership. Now he's going to try to pretend that none of it happened, I guess the polls have him spooked. When the Dems regain leadership they should boycott his show and definetly Fox.
Matthews isn't hard to figure out. The thing he fears most in life is people accusing him of having a political bias, one way or the other. He attempts to appeal to conservatives by worshipping Bush and in this case attempts to appeal to the left by painting the media as pro-war. In the end he just looks like a rambling blow hard who doesn't know which way is up.
I have to say that I find it significant that even Tweetie is now acknowledging that the decision to invade Iraq was made in 2001 or 2202. If a guy as totally smitten & adoring of Dubya as Matthews can now admit to this reality, then what does that suggest about the mindset of the rest of the country? It reminds me of the Nixon Administration's bemoaning that 'if we've lost Cronkite then we've lost the American people.'
Say what you will about Tweetie. Call him a phoney. Call him a panderer. Call hima smarmy little asskisser. No, seriously... go ahead & call him those things. Please! I can't get enough of it. He really is a serious dildo.
Anyway, as I was saying, call him any of those things. But do recognise one thing. He is also a bit of a barometer. His words, in this context anyway, are a confirmation that the American people are now in consensus that Bush & his neocon masters have lied, manipulated, & bullied us into a devouring morrass.
We just need to keep reminding them of this from now until November.
That was LBJ, not Nixon. And shortly after, the former announced that he would not run in the 1968 elections.
Perhaps that explains Matthews behavior.
Look at your bank balance. There's your "why."