Chris Matthews on Hardball moments ago, referring to books by David Corn, Mike Isikoff, and Ron Suskind detailing Bush administration practices: “You guys are writing books after the fact. It didn't do us much good at the time, though.”

In fact, Suskind's One Percent Doctrine was published in 2006, as was Corn & Isikoff's Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War.

And what good was Chris Matthews doing us “at the time”?

On November 28, 2005, just weeks before Hubris was published, Matthews said of Bush: “Everybody sort of likes the president, except the real whack-jobs, maybe on the left.” (It wasn't true.) Two days later, Matthews praised a Bush speech about Iraq - a speech Bush had not, technically, delivered yet -- as a “brilliant political move” and dismissed Democratic critics as “carpers and complainers.”

A month earlier, Matthews said Bush “glimmers” with “sunny nobility.”

In February 2006, after Hubris was published, Matthews said of Bush: “He looks like he's a wise man now ... almost Atticus Finch.”

Then, of course, there's Matthews embarrassing “Mission Accomplished” performance.

Oh, and his March 2006 endorsement of Bush's trustworthiness: “How can you not trust a man who says, 'I won't be able to win this war in my presidency; I'm leaving it up to other presidents in the future'?”

Matthews probably isn't the best person to call out the media for being critical of the Bush administration now, but not doing so when Bush was in office.

UPDATE: ... and Suskind and Corn are pretty far down on the list of people who deserve such criticism. Like, near the bottom. Or on another list entirely.