On the February 4 edition of MSNBC's Hardball, discussing Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's (D-NY) appearance earlier that day at the Yale Child Study Center -- which the Associated Press described as “an emotional reunion Monday with a colleague from the early days of her legal career as a child advocate” -- host Chris Matthews said, “Hillary Clinton, this question of tearing up, is this now become part of the story line of this campaign?” Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson remarked: "[W]ith some people it's sad movies; with some people, they see a puppy, they want to -- with Hillary Clinton ... it's an impending primary. It just breaks her down." Bloomberg columnist Margaret Carlson asserted that “I think the tears are genuine,” before adding, “I think the cause is maybe different than just going back to a place she once worked where she has good memories and they welcomed her.” She continued, “But that she's extremely fatigued -- as they all are -- under tremendous pressure. Because the pressure isn't just from without, the pressure is from within. 'What are you doing wrong? Why can't you fix it? Maybe you should cry more often.' All those kinds of things inside a campaign. And then the very thing she thought was hers.” Carlson said, “Remember, she was inevitable. Everyone around her told her that. And now she sees it not as inevitable and receding possibly from her grasp, and it's very distressing. I would cry, too.”
Carlson was responding to host Chris Matthews' question: “Margaret, what is your judgment on the veracity, the verisimilitude, the genuine nature of that scene we just saw of Senator Clinton where she was obvious -- well, she was taken to some extent with a very warm greeting from an old classmate?”
From the February 4 edition of MSNBC's Hardball:
MATTHEWS: Hillary Clinton, this question of tearing up, is this now become part of the story line of this campaign?
JILL ZUCKMAN (Chicago Tribune reporter): You're not suggesting that she teared up on purpose in order to win tomorrow, are you? I --
MATTHEWS: Well, you have that interesting grin on your face as you ask that question.
ZUCKMAN: I've got to say, I think that when people tear up, they tear up. I don't think you can really turn it on and off very easily. I mean, she doesn't --
MATTHEWS: She's not a method actress.
ZUCKMAN: I don't think she's really someone who cries very easily, and we certainly haven't seen much of it in the past.
MATTHEWS: I'm going to suspend my judgment until Gene has spoken.
ROBINSON: No, with some people it's sad movies; with some people, they see a puppy, they want to -- with Hillary Clinton, it's a --
[crosstalk]
MATTHEWS: It's me, I cry in movies. It works for me.
ROBINSON: -- it's an impending primary. It just breaks her down.
MATTHEWS: I usually cry at heroic scenes when somebody does something really great in the movies that you don't expect them to.
Margaret, what is your judgment on the veracity, the verisimilitude, the genuine nature of that scene we just saw of Senator Clinton where she was obvious -- well, she was taken to some extent with a very warm greeting from an old classmate?
CARLSON: I think the tears are genuine. I think the cause is maybe different than just going back to a place she once worked where she has good memories and they welcomed her. But that she's extremely fatigued -- as they all are -- under tremendous pressure. Because the pressure isn't just from without, the pressure is from within. “What are you doing wrong? Why can't you fix it? Maybe you should cry more often.” All those kinds of things inside a campaign. And then the very thing she thought was hers. Remember, she was inevitable. Everyone around her told her that. And now she sees it not as inevitable and receding possibly from her grasp, and it's very distressing. I would cry, too.
MATTHEWS: You know, I wonder what we're focusing more on this than we would if it were a male candidate. But, that said, [1972 Democratic presidential candidate] Ed Muskie, an old pal of mine -- I really looked up to him; I worked for him -- was blown away in a presidential campaign because he -- David Broder of your paper [The Washington Post] reported once that he had cried and then later said he may have gotten that wrong. It was an interesting bit of revisionism.