Special Election to Replace Late Sen. Kennedy

[Mr Bean]

Xammer90 accidentally makes the point I was going to make for me.
There are just as many (Perhaps slightly more, or slightly less) Liberals in the US as their are Teabagger hard core right wing republicans. In the past we simply would have called them hard core conservatives but with that 20% of the population that's hard to the right they have adopted the Teabagger lable so this is how I will refer to them.

In politics there are certain fundamental truths.
On the right the Republicans fear their base the Teabaggers. They go out of their way to appease them, everything to doing what they want to more minor motions as putting forward legislation they know won't pass because it looks good with their base. If they fail to appease the right they were be primaryed and have to fight two to four Teabagger "conservative party" opponents who will spend all of their time attacking him. In some states only one exists as an actually challenger, the others will simply be their to sling as much mud as economically possible. Suicide republicans in other words. They know they don't have a chance in hell. But that's not why they are running. They are running to defeat the seating Republican not to win themselves.

Thus Republicans must fear their base or their base can destroy them.

On the left the Democrats do not fear their base. If they pull a Lieberman they need fear nothing since Democratic voters memory is short and all will be forgiven by the time election time roles around again. As long as the right words are mouthed during election time they are free to do as they wish. To the point the House Bill contains language that comes close to effectively banning abortion(If you can't pay for one then it is banned for you. Do you want to take out a loan to pay for your abortion?). A central plank of the democratic party and they gave it away to appease what was supposedly another Democrat.

Thus the Democrats do not fear their base, for even core principles can be given away in the name of temporary political expediency.

[Darth Wong]

You're misinterpreting my point. There are probably as many actual liberals in the US as there are of those idiot teabaggers, but the liberals don't have a strong political or media voice, while the teabaggers do. As a consequence, the teabaggers are exerting rightward political influence, while the progressives are exerting ... nothing. Or very little, at least. Where's the righteous populist anger being broadcast over the airwaves?

It's not as simple as mere numbers. Even if there are as many liberals as Glenn Becks in the United States, they lack:

1) A national-level organized ideological advocacy network like FOXNews. MSNBC doesn't come close; its political bias is not even vaguely comparable to the concerted propaganda machine that is FOXNews.

2) Religious backing. It's true that there are many religious leaders who have liberal leanings, but the fact is that historically, religions have been much more successful at motivating people to action through hatred than through love. Sorry, but that's just an ugly part of human nature. "Love thy neighbour" and "That is an abomination to the LORD" may both be found in the Bible, but people have always had a much easier time acting on the latter than the former.

3) Nationalistic fervour. After decades of Cold War propaganda, the right-wing has created a political environment where right-wing thought is automatically thought of as being more nationalistic than left-wing propaganda, which is somehow viewed as being less loyal to the nation. Liberals must constantly apologize for the appearance of disloyalty to the flag, even if they have nothing to apologize for, because right-wingers are assumed to be loyal to the country's founding principles by default. It doesn't matter that you could make a list of core principles and find that right-wingers shit on them as frequently as left-wingers; this is the product of decades of indoctrination.

All of these things mean that liberals are far less likely to speak up and far less likely to be heard when they do.

[Glocksman]

Xammer90 accidentally makes the point I was going to make for me.
There are just as many (Perhaps slightly more, or slightly less) Liberals in the US as their are Teabagger hard core right wing republicans. In the past we simply would have called them hard core conservatives but with that 20% of the population that's hard to the right they have adopted the Teabagger lable so this is how I will refer to them.

In politics there are certain fundamental truths.
On the right the Republicans fear their base the Teabaggers. They go out of their way to appease them, everything to doing what they want to more minor motions as putting forward legislation they know won't pass because it looks good with their base. If they fail to appease the right they were be primaryed and have to fight two to four Teabagger "conservative party" opponents who will spend all of their time attacking him. In some states only one exists as an actually challenger, the others will simply be their to sling as much mud as economically possible. Suicide republicans in other words. They know they don't have a chance in hell. But that's not why they are running. They are running to defeat the seating Republican not to win themselves.

Thus Republicans must fear their base or their base can destroy them.

On the left the Democrats do not fear their base. If they pull a Lieberman they need fear nothing since Democratic voters memory is short and all will be forgiven by the time election time roles around again. As long as the right words are mouthed during election time they are free to do as they wish. To the point the House Bill contains language that comes close to effectively banning abortion(If you can't pay for one then it is banned for you. Do you want to take out a loan to pay for your abortion?). A central plank of the democratic party and they gave it away to appease what was supposedly another Democrat.

Thus the Democrats do not fear their base, for even core principles can be given away in the name of temporary political expediency.

That is an analysis I'd never considered before and yet explains much to this former conservative Repub.

[Elfdart]

You're misinterpreting my point. There are probably as many actual liberals in the US as there are of those idiot teabaggers, but the liberals don't have a strong political or media voice, while the teabaggers do. As a consequence, the teabaggers are exerting rightward political influence, while the progressives are exerting ... nothing. Or very little, at least. Where's the righteous populist anger being broadcast over the airwaves?

It's not as simple as mere numbers. Even if there are as many liberals as Glenn Becks in the United States, they lack:

1) A national-level organized ideological advocacy network like FOXNews. MSNBC doesn't come close; its political bias is not even vaguely comparable to the concerted propaganda machine that is FOXNews.

2) Religious backing. It's true that there are many religious leaders who have liberal leanings, but the fact is that historically, religions have been much more successful at motivating people to action through hatred than through love. Sorry, but that's just an ugly part of human nature. "Love thy neighbour" and "That is an abomination to the LORD" may both be found in the Bible, but people have always had a much easier time acting on the latter than the former.

3) Nationalistic fervour. After decades of Cold War propaganda, the right-wing has created a political environment where right-wing thought is automatically thought of as being more nationalistic than left-wing propaganda, which is somehow viewed as being less loyal to the nation. Liberals must constantly apologize for the appearance of disloyalty to the flag, even if they have nothing to apologize for, because right-wingers are assumed to be loyal to the country's founding principles by default. It doesn't matter that you could make a list of core principles and find that right-wingers shit on them as frequently as left-wingers; this is the product of decades of indoctrination.

All of these things mean that liberals are far less likely to speak up and far less likely to be heard when they do.

That's true to a point, but I think the real problem is that too many liberals suffer from the political equivalent of Battered Wife Syndrome and will support the Democrats no matter how many times they get knifed in the back. Even worse, I think a number of liberals (especially the spineless ones who call themselves "progressives") are masochists at heart and deep down they enjoy the boot to the face. The infantile obsession with "reaching out" is the giveaway, as Garry Wills points out here.

They say the Good Lord helps those who help themselves, and until liberals are willing to help themselves by not only staying home on election day, but actively taking down blue dogs and other fence-sitters the way the gun lobby and the Israel lobby do to those who cross them, they might as well wait for the Good Lord to help them. No one else will.

[The Romulan Republic]

That's true to a point, but I think the real problem is that too many liberals suffer from the political equivalent of Battered Wife Syndrome and will support the Democrats no matter how many times they get knifed in the back. Even worse, I think a number of liberals (especially the spineless ones who call themselves "progressives") are masochists at heart and deep down they enjoy the boot to the face. The infantile obsession with "reaching out" is the giveaway, as Garry Wills points out here.

I think you may be being a bit unfair here. A more likely reason is that their are no other viable Left-wing parties or independents, so its the Democrats or the GOP. Of course, it works both ways, because while no one wants to support a party that has no chance, as long as no one supports them they continue to have no chance.

They say the Good Lord helps those who help themselves, and until liberals are willing to help themselves by not only staying home on election day, but actively taking down blue dogs and other fence-sitters the way the gun lobby and the Israel lobby do to those who cross them, they might as well wait for the Good Lord to help them. No one else will.

Staying home on election day does nothing except abandoning your responsibilities as a citizen and hand the nation back to the GOP. I deeply fear that disillusioned leftist will do this in large enough numbers in up-coming elections to hand the country to someone like Palin, in which case possible scenarios range from a collapsed environment and economy to World War Three breaking out. For God's sake vote Independent or Third Party if you hate the Democrats so much. But the fact is you're still probably handing the nation to the GOP, because not enough people vote Independent or Third Party to make a difference.

[Nova Andromeda]

That's true to a point, but I think the real problem is that too many liberals suffer from the political equivalent of Battered Wife Syndrome and will support the Democrats no matter how many times they get knifed in the back.

[snip] ... until liberals are willing to help themselves by not only staying home on election day ... [snip]

-First, I would say that staying home is a terrible way to send a message. All you do is make it look like conservatives are more popular. What you need to do is actually go vote. When large percentages of the population start writing in their own name then the politicians will take note.
-Second, I'd like to add that too many progressives vigorously argue that we should vote for the best of two evils. While I may agree in a limited number of cases, as a general policy it will not keep the conservatives from destroying the U.S. since dissatisfaction w/ the Democrats will often lead to Republican victory.

[Phantasee]

Wait, back to the topic: Is it true that the Democratic candidate took a vacation during the campaign or something? From what I understand she pretty much didn't campaign during her campaign, and the Republican candidate went hard out of the gate.

[Nova Andromeda]

Wait, back to the topic: Is it true that the Democratic candidate took a vacation during the campaign or something? From what I understand she pretty much didn't campaign during her campaign, and the Republican candidate went hard out of the gate.

-Yes, she took about a week off, however, the Kennedys complained about her getting the campaign moving too soon after the funeral and the national Democratic organizations failed to support or fund her campaign. It was a mess the whole way around.

[MKSheppard]

1) A national-level organized ideological advocacy network like FOXNews. MSNBC doesn't come close; its political bias is not even vaguely comparable to the concerted propaganda machine that is FOXNews.

Krazy Keith Olbermann and Chris "Leg Tingle" Matthew, along with Rachel Maddow are pretty much the Mirror, Mirror liberal versions of Bill O'Falafalel and Gleen Beck.

The Big difference is........nobody watches MSNBC.

I tend to think the real reason there's so much FOX HAET is because unlike MSNBC or Air America, Fox News is fantastically successful at getting out their own brand of the news; while MSNBC etc bomb.

Also, it's really got to chap the "Edward R. Murrow" of this Generation, Krazy Keith, that his book "Truth and Consequences" from 2007; is 222,379 on B&N, while Glenn Beck's "The Real America : Messages from the Heart and Heartland" from two years earlier is ranked 7,299.

[Stark]

By 'their own brand of the news' you mean 'fiction', right? It's not news; it's current affairs entertainment. Describing 'Fox hate' as simply jealousy is childish in the extreme.

[Mr Bean]

Speaking of Keith when he first started doing his special comments they were insightful, interesting, well put together and a a breath of fresh air in the "Well we will have to leave it their" CNN/MSNBC standard of coverage. For his first year after he started doing those special comments most were spot on and above all contained verifiable facts and they were clearly labeled as opinion and compared to the standard Countdown format, they were blunt and to the point.

These last eight months as a podcast listen of his he's been on a long slow decline and since switching to quick comments they are a much more hit or miss afair. While some still call back to that first six months of special comments that were so well done. Mixed in are things that are frankly stupid, either because they are less comments and pure political attacks barely dressed up. Or simply Keith takes a few facts and runs away with them to establish his own narrative, one that makes sense or no. Keith Olbermann is not a gripping great interviewer, he's not a great newscaster except in sports where I aim informed he is 20% of that profession. Aside from his special comments he's got nothing going for him. When he sits down and puts work into it he can turn out some great commentary. But for whatever reason, he does not feel the need any more.

You note that Sheppy-po does not yet have bad names for Rachel Maddow. This is because Rachel in addition to being a joy to listen to (You can tell she loves her job) is by comparison much better at raw news delivery and her commentary when inserted is so much less jarring that Keith's. She does have her faults, for example her brain shuts down when it comes to Nuclear power. She has been educated that the atom is evil and damn the consequences of investigating how else we get power in this world. Remember Solar is good, Oil, Coal and Nuclear bad. Economies of scale? What name so?

But Sheppard to compare anyone to Glenn Beck? Come on now. You can make the Bill'O comparsion to Chris Mattews, both enjoy bringing guests on to yell at them. (But every once and awhile Chris catches someone short with an honest question like "What's appeasement") And while Keith brings on the same ten yes men (And two yes women) to come on and give answers to the questions they wrote out together much like Hannity (Without the I want to punch him smugness). No one can compare to Glenn Beck. Your standards have fallen far if you think Ed or Rachel or Keith or any of them can match Glenn at pure insanity in television form.

[Mr Bean]

Further comments on Rachel Maddow
Her reporting and interviews are a witness to behold. Almost Daily Show quality at times when she Interviewed the "cure the gay" Minster Richard Cohen. Or the series of reports on Rich Warren? Great stuff.
But certain issues...
That brain of her's which she uses so well on many issues just turns off and we get a 70's era Hippy. Nukes are bad, testing on animals is bad. Bio-engineered food could kill you!

[MKSheppard]

You note that Sheppy-po does not yet have bad names for Rachel Maddow.

Mainly because Matthews and Olberman are currently stealing the "Crazy" crown on the left aisle, similar to how Beck has that sewn up for the right. Maddow's made some pretty stupid comments, but she hasn't yet made a comment like Matthews that'll stick with her for a while; and she isn't deluding herself into thinking that she's the next Edward R Murrow.

But Sheppard to compare anyone to Glenn Beck? Come on now.

Actually, I think a Olbermann/Beck comparison is pretty much on -- both are incredibly prone to histronics -- Beck with his on air crying, and craziness; while Olbermann goes for his Speshul comments craziness and the delusion he's another Edward R. Murrow.

[Mr Bean]

Mainly because Matthews and Olberman are currently stealing the "Crazy" crown on the left aisle, similar to how Beck has that sewn up for the right. Maddow's made some pretty stupid comments, but she hasn't yet made a comment like Matthews that'll stick with her for a while; and she isn't deluding herself into thinking that she's the next Edward R Murrow.

I don't think she thinks she is, she's never made a play for the Murrow hat. She's up front with the fact she is a liberal and that she offers liberal commentary. Unlike Keith who has yes men she does get into controversial interviews and they are normally very... very good. Keith has made the play for the Murrow hat with his special comments and use of the Murrow signup. He may even see himself that way. But Rachel? Your projecting Shep.

Actually, I think a Olbermann/Beck comparison is pretty much on -- both are incredibly prone to histronics -- Beck with his on air crying, and craziness; while Olbermann goes for his Speshul comments craziness and the delusion he's another Edward R. Murrow.

Your comparing Glenn Beck
Glenn Beck?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAE87Q5Ype0
This Glenn Beck?
You can make the Billo or Smug McSmugington comparisons
But your talking about Glenn Beck a man who regularly makes shit up if he did not have his own TV show he'd be under as a paranoid schizophrenic. He's a sucker for every conspiracy theory rant out there. From FEMA Concentration camps to Barack is a evil Muslim born in Kenya to the constant statements that any day now the world is going to end because of the evil Communist in the White House is going to take your guns away and the dollar is going to be worthless. Oh and by gold, GOLD GOLD!

Come on, Olbermann goes on the air, he makes his special comments, sometimes they make sense sometimes not. They are just that though. Comments and nothing more. He is not telling you he is right he is tell you what he believes or believes to believe. Aside from that and the Murrow sign off what do you have to compare to the nightly nutter of Glenn Beck? Care to call up a few example where he beats...

You know I'll make it easier. Give me a few examples when Keith Olbermann matches Glenn Beck's level of crazy. Not beats, just matches. I'll even take "Is half as crazy as"

[Dominus Atheos]

1) A national-level organized ideological advocacy network like FOXNews. MSNBC doesn't come close; its political bias is not even vaguely comparable to the concerted propaganda machine that is FOXNews.

Krazy Keith Olbermann and Chris "Leg Tingle" Matthew, along with Rachel Maddow are pretty much the Mirror, Mirror liberal versions of Bill O'Falafalel and Gleen Beck.

Only someone who watches O'Reilly and Beck could possibly believe Chris Matthews is hardcore liberal.

It's been a while since I infodumped, so I may be a little rusty. (cracks knuckles)

This happened on hardball a month ago:

Today on MSNBC’s Hardball, Chris Matthews brought on John Heilemann from New York Magazine to talk about President Obama’s popularity with Democrats. When Heilemann noted that the “Democratic left” has been “trashing the health care bill” this week, Matthews said that those people were part of the “netroots” and not “regular grown-up Democrats”:

MATTHEWS: I don’t consider them Democrats, I consider them netroots, and they’re different. And if I see that they vote in every election or most elections, I’ll be worried. But I’m not sure that they’re regular grown-up Democrats. I think that a lot of those people are troublemakers who love to sit in the backseat and complain. They’re not interested in governing this country. They never ran for office, they’re not interested in working for somebody in public office. They get their giggles from sitting in the backseat and bitching.

This is a op-ed posted my Media Matters last year when Matthews was discussing running for the Senate:

Chris Matthews' interest in the Pennsylvania Senate seat currently held by Republican Arlen Specter raises the possibility of something that is all too rare among the nation's media elite: accountability.

It has long been clear that if we applied to journalists who cover politics the standards they purport to apply to politicians -- truthfulness, judgment, being in touch with regular Americans, and so on -- many of them would fare quite poorly.

Few journalists are as aggressive as Chris Matthews in purporting to speak for average voters -- or as quick to declare (liberal) politicians to be out of touch with those voters. And few have his track record of failing to live up to the standards he sets for politicians, particularly Democrats. But there is no real accountability in cable news -- no matter how often Matthews is wrong on the facts, or how frequently he offends the concepts of fairness and rational thought, there are rarely consequences.

True, Matthews did have to apologize after a particularly offensive string of commentary about Hillary Clinton earlier this year, though given his long track record of misogynistic comments, it is clear he got off easy even then -- particularly in comparison to his colleague David Shuster, who was suspended after an inappropriate comment of his own. Shuster likely paid the price not only for his own nasty remark about Clinton, but for his more famous colleague's long string of sexist commentary as well. As long as Matthews stops short of Imus-level offensiveness, MSNBC seems quite happy to continue broadcasting his false claims and inane commentary.

Should he run for the Senate, however, Matthews might finally have to answer for his dubious track record. And he'll have to do so outside of his comfortable cocoon of fellow Beltway journalists and political insiders who are too eager to get invited back to ever truly challenge him on his cable program. Indeed, he'll have to do so while facing the very "regular Americans" he has caricatured so grotesquely over the years.

True, Pennsylvania voters aren't much more likely than MSNBC executives to care about Matthews' long string of false claims on Hardball.

But they may well be less pleased than Matthews' bosses at General Electric with his at times effusive praise for President Bush -- and even less pleased with his insults of people who disagree with him. In 2005, for example, Matthews said of Bush: "I like him. Everybody sort of likes the president, except for the real whack-jobs, maybe on the left -- I mean -- like him personally." At the time the "real whack-jobs" who disliked Bush constituted a majority of the American public. The following year, Matthews called Bush "a wise man ... almost Atticus Finch."

Matthews' praise for Bush was at its most effusive when Bush gave his "Mission Accomplished" speech in 2003. Praising Bush's "amazing display of leadership," Matthews gushed:

He won the war. He was an effective commander. Everybody recognizes that, I believe, except a few critics. ... He's like Eisenhower. He looks great in a military uniform. He looks great in that cowboy costume he wears when he goes West. I remember him standing at that fence with Colin Powell. Was [that] the best picture in the 2000 campaign? ... The president's performance tonight, redolent of the best of Reagan ... He looks for real. What is it about the commander in chief role, the hat that he does wear, that makes him -- I mean, he seems like -- he didn't fight in a war, but he looks like he does. ... Look at this guy!

Later that day, Matthews was back at it:

We're proud of our president. Americans love having a guy as president, a guy who has a little swagger, who's physical, who's not a complicated guy like Clinton ... They want a guy who's president. Women like a guy who's president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president. It's simple. ... We want a guy as president.

Matthews' breathless claim that Bush had "won the war" was, of course, premature. But his affection for Bush remained intact. In October 2005, Matthews declared that Bush "glimmers" with "sunny nobility." Later that year, when Bush unveiled his "strategy for victory in Iraq," Matthews praised his "brilliant political move" and derided Democrats as "carpers and complainers." (Keep in mind, it had been more than two years since Matthews announced that Bush "won the war," and still the president felt the need to unveil a "strategy for victory." Yet Matthews didn't care; any criticism of the "strategy for victory" outlined by the president who had supposedly won the war nearly three years earlier was whining.)

If Bush could do little wrong in Matthews' book, it sometimes seemed Barack Obama could do little right, as Matthews frequently ridiculed the Democratic presidential candidate for a preposterous variety of purported shortcomings. (True, Matthews also effusively praised Obama at times, often contradicting his own previous -- and future -- criticisms. Matthews rarely appears burdened by a need to maintain consistent, coherent viewpoints.)

In April, Matthews ridiculed Obama for ordering orange juice in a diner. Let that sit in a moment: Barack Obama asked for a glass of orange juice in a diner, and Chris Matthews belittled him for it. That came shortly after Matthews announced that Obama's bowling form was insufficiently "macho" and said Obama's lack of bowling prowess "tells you something about the Democratic Party." A few weeks later, he suggested Obama was out of touch for playing pool: "Playing pool, not a bad start, but it's not what most people play. People with money play pool these days." Last year, Matthews seemed to suggest that Obama was a flawed candidate because he isn't "beefy" enough: "I don't see a big, beefy alternative to Hillary Clinton -- a big guy. You know what I mean? An ... every-way big guy. I don't see one out there. I see a lot of slight, skinny, second- and third-rate candidates."

The common thread in all these comments -- and many more -- is Matthews' belief that Obama couldn't relate to "regular people." And by "regular people," Matthews repeatedly made clear, he meant "white people":

• "How's he connect with regular people? Does he? Or does he only appeal to people who come from the African-American community and from the people who have college or advanced degrees?"

>

• "He can't walk into a dinette with five or six guys there, white guys, in some cases. ... He can't just shake hands and hang out."

>

• "They're the working-class white voters Hillary won and Barack didn't. Can Obama win over the regular folks against John McCain?"

>
Matthews even suggested that Obama is an "elite" who might not be able to "talk regular" to "the middle class." As evidence for Obama's purported excessive pride and elitism, Matthews pointed to ... the fact that Obama sometimes wears sunglasses when it is sunny. Most "regular people" probably don't think it's all that unusual to wear sunglasses, as long as the wearer isn't courtside at a Lakers game.

Indeed, Matthews himself can be seen wearing sunglasses in this photo of him sitting by the pool at his Nantucket vacation home. No doubt he was thinking about how to "talk regular" to the middle class at the time.

Hosting Ann Coulter in July 2006, Matthews told her, "You write beautifully," adding, "You have a brilliant brain." He described her as "the picture of heaven." Then Coulter called former Vice President Al Gore a "total fag," and Matthews ended the interview by saying of Coulter, "We'd love to have her back."

Which isn't to say he has always praised Coulter. During one broadcast, he asked guests if they find Ann Coulter "physically attractive" and declared that she "doesn't pass the Chris Matthews test."

Which brings us to the most troubling aspect of Matthews' on-air behavior: his treatment of women. When Matthews apologized for what he called a "callous," "nasty," and "dismissive" comment about Hillary Clinton earlier this year, he and MSNBC tried their best to pretend the controversy erupted over a single comment made about a single woman. In fact, Matthews' misogyny goes far deeper than that.

Matthews' comments about Clinton alone paint a clear picture: He has called her a "She devil" and "witchy" and said that men who support her are "castratos in the eunuch chorus" and compared her to a "strip-teaser" and questioned whether she is a "convincing mom" and said she speaks in a "scolding manner" and described her laugh as a "cackle" and suggested that "being surrounded by women" might "make a case against" Clinton being "commander in chief" and called her an "uppity" woman and described her as "anti-male" and obsessed about her "ambition" while ignoring that of the (all male) Republicans running for president.

But Chris Matthews hates Hillary Clinton. He has reportedly said so himself: "I hate her. I hate her. All that she stands for." (If Matthews does run for the Senate, he may soon discover that Pennsylvania Democratic primary voters share neither his hatred of Hillary Clinton nor his view that Barack Obama is insufficiently "macho.") Maybe he doesn't treat other women that badly?

Wrong.

He has described House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as "scary" and suggested she would "castrate" House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer. And he has wondered how she could disagree with President Bush "without screaming? How does she do it without becoming grating?" He claimed there isn't a plausible female presidential candidate "on the horizon" because there aren't any "big-state women governors" -- but Washington Gov. Christine Gregoire, Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano, Connecticut Gov. Jodi Rell, and Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius all run states with populations comparable to male governors who have recently run for president, including Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, and Bill Richardson. How large a state does a woman have to run before she qualifies as a plausible presidential candidate to Chris Matthews? One that is twice as large as Mitt Romney's Massachusetts? Three times as large?

One example of his infamously lecherous treatment of female guests was described by the New York Post as a case of Matthews "perving on CNBC hottie Erin Burnett on live TV the other night." Burnett is far from alone in receiving such treatment from Matthews. During one interview of Laura Ingraham, Matthews managed to stop short of asking the radio host on a date -- but just barely. The interview began with Matthews announcing, "I'm not allowed to say this, but I'll say it -- you're beautiful and you're smart" -- and ended in much the same way: "I get in trouble for this, but you're great looking, obviously. You're one of the gods' gifts to men in this country. But also, you are a hell of a writer."

In August 1999, Matthews hosted notorious liar Gennifer Flowers, during which he told her: "I gotta pay a little tribute here. You're a very beautiful woman, and I -- and I have to tell you, he knows that, you know that, and everybody watching knows that; Hillary Clinton knows that. How can a woman put up with a relationship between her husband and somebody, anybody, but especially somebody like you that's a knockout?" After Flowers told him, "Gosh, you make me blush here," Matthews replied, "t's an objective statement, Gennifer. I'm not flirting."

Glad he cleared that up.

None of this has ever seemed to get Matthews into much trouble with his bosses at MSNBC, who are reportedly interested in keeping him around after his contract expires next year. But if he runs for the Senate, with no record to run on other than years of television transcripts, he may soon find that Pennsylvania voters are less indulgent of his cheerleading for Bush, his near-constant ridicule of Democrats, and his frequently offensive treatment of women.

And finally this was posted at DailyfuckingKos just today:

The Obtuse Chris Matthews

What do you do with people in the media that don’t listen when you tell them things?

Howard Dean: The people that voted for Obama and Brown and the voters that stayed home overwhelmingly want a public option.

Chris Matthews: How do you explain that voters preferred Brown who wants to kill healthcare reform over Coakley who consistently supported the public option?

Pay attention, Chris.

Here’s the exchange from Hardball:

Matthews: Would you have 51 after what happened yesterday?

Dean: Yesterday, the problem was people wanted more. We did a poll—Democracy for America—did a poll. Eighteen percent of the people who voted for Scott Brown voted for Obama. Of those 18%, three out of five wanted a public option. They thought they didn’t go far enough. Of the Obama voters that we polled that stayed home, 80% wanted a public option.

Matthews: There’s two facts on the table here. The Democratic candidate was for the public option. She was very aggressive, very progressive. Martha Coakley was much more progressive than the President. She stuck to the line, “I want an individual mandate and I want a public option.* Period. She said it right to the end. Never broke from that. So she took the position you’re advocating now. A lot of people would think. The other guy said, “I’m going to kill it in its bed.” The voters voted for the guy who said I’m going to kill it in its bed. So, they had a choice between a public-option candidate and “kill it”, and they voted to kill it. So how do you explain that?

Dean: These voters were sending a message to Washington. They asked for change and they haven’t gotten change. …

Matthews: Governor, you’re whistling past the graveyard, here.

Dean: I don’t think so.

Matthews: She ran for the public option.

Dean: Our polling shows what it shows ….

Matthews: Scott Brown is walking around signing his name “Scott Brown 41”. “I’ll be the 41 guy who votes for the filibuster.”

Dean: There are a lot of people outside Washington that don’t think that bill ought to pass ’cause it’s too watered down… You know very well what voters do. Voters were sending a message to Washington: “We don’t want business as usual.” That’s what they were sending the message about.

Matthews: How do you know that?

Dean: Because we polled! American Research Institute. … We found out that of the Obama supporters who either stayed home or voted for Scott Brown they overwhelmingly wanted to do more on healthcare not less. …

Matthews: You just said the voters of Massachusetts agreed with you but they voted Republican. That makes no sense.

Dean: Oh, it does make …

Matthews: Are voters crazy?

Dean: There’s only one crazy person around here and I may hold up a mirror and you may see him in a minute!

(No video of this appears to be up yet. If you find a clip of today’s Hardball, please let us know!)

I know this is hard to understand, but the polls say what they say. People obviously believed that if they voted for Coakley, regardless of what she stood for personally (a public option), that it would mean the Senate bill would continue to have the same support and that we would probably get what Democrats have presented so far: an industry-friendly bill that doesn’t put any pressure on the for-profit sector to rein in costs. By denying Coakley the seat, they pretty much guaranteed that this won’t happen. People who want a public option stayed home or voted for Brown. The only way to interpret this is to believe that they wanted to stop the current direction and make Democrats take a different course. When they didn’t see a public option coming up, they checked out and stopped voting for the Democratic candidate.

Voters are right. We’ve seen over and over that Senators who say they want a public option nevertheless are voting with the White House to kill it. Coakley could tell people all she wanted that she wants a public option, but as long as the White House continues to drive the Senate bill forward she won’t be able to get it, either. If Bernie Sanders can’t stop an industry takeover of the healthcare bill, then what hope would Senator Coakley? And, under those conditions, what would be the point of voting for her?
* It may be that her support of the mandate actually killed her. This is not progressive. It’s a Republican idea that is designed to featherbed the insurance industry. It might have been an acceptable addition in order to get people to vote for a public option, but once that was taken out it serves no legitimate purpose and is an incredible invasion of privacy. Voters may have been unwilling to vote for someone that backed this idiot idea. I wouldn’t blame them.

Chris Matthews (or Tweety as most liberal blogs unaffectionately refer to him as) is simply a weather-vane that points in whatever direction the prevailing political wisdom is at the time. We real liberals will thank you not to equate him with us.

[Elfdart]

They say the Good Lord helps those who help themselves, and until liberals are willing to help themselves by not only staying home on election day, but actively taking down blue dogs and other fence-sitters the way the gun lobby and the Israel lobby do to those who cross them, they might as well wait for the Good Lord to help them. No one else will.

Staying home on election day does nothing except abandoning your responsibilities as a citizen and hand the nation back to the GOP. I deeply fear that disillusioned leftist will do this in large enough numbers in up-coming elections to hand the country to someone like Palin, in which case possible scenarios range from a collapsed environment and economy to World War Three breaking out. For God's sake vote Independent or Third Party if you hate the Democrats so much. But the fact is you're still probably handing the nation to the GOP, because not enough people vote Independent or Third Party to make a difference.

I should have worded this differently because I don't advocate staying home on election day except under the most unusual conditions. I was pointing out that when voters realize they just got screwed by their own candidate, the tendency is to just not show up on election day. What I want is for disgruntled voters to actively take down backstabbing politicians either with primary challenges or third party candidates to make sure the backstabbers lose. Staying home on election day, or not voting on a particular office or write-ins should be a last resort.

[ray245]

They say the Good Lord helps those who help themselves, and until liberals are willing to help themselves by not only staying home on election day, but actively taking down blue dogs and other fence-sitters the way the gun lobby and the Israel lobby do to those who cross them, they might as well wait for the Good Lord to help them. No one else will.

Staying home on election day does nothing except abandoning your responsibilities as a citizen and hand the nation back to the GOP. I deeply fear that disillusioned leftist will do this in large enough numbers in up-coming elections to hand the country to someone like Palin, in which case possible scenarios range from a collapsed environment and economy to World War Three breaking out. For God's sake vote Independent or Third Party if you hate the Democrats so much. But the fact is you're still probably handing the nation to the GOP, because not enough people vote Independent or Third Party to make a difference.

I should have worded this differently because I don't advocate staying home on election day except under the most unusual conditions. I was pointing out that when voters realize they just got screwed by their own candidate, the tendency is to just not show up on election day. What I want is for disgruntled voters to actively take down backstabbing politicians either with primary challenges or third party candidates to make sure the backstabbers lose. Staying home on election day, or not voting on a particular office or write-ins should be a last resort.

And how exactly are people going to do that? Make a lot of noise on internet blogs?

[Lonestar]

Only someone who watches O'Reilly and Beck could possibly believe Chris Matthews is hardcore liberal.

Obviously, only lukewarm liberals call West Point an "enemy camp". Kinda lends to the perception that he is a hardcore liberal, you know?

[xerex]

say what ! you guys forget that Matthews was a Bush cheerleader. the man is an oppurtunist who supports whoever is in power....he's a hardcore nothing. He has no core.

[Darth Wong]

Only someone who watches O'Reilly and Beck could possibly believe Chris Matthews is hardcore liberal.

Obviously, only lukewarm liberals call West Point an "enemy camp". Kinda lends to the perception that he is a hardcore liberal, you know?

Dude, this rebuttal does not even vaguely address DA's claim that Chris Matthews is a "weathervane" who points in whichever way he perceives the wind to be blowing.

[SCRawl]

Only someone who watches O'Reilly and Beck could possibly believe Chris Matthews is hardcore liberal.

Obviously, only lukewarm liberals call West Point an "enemy camp". Kinda lends to the perception that he is a hardcore liberal, you know?

I hadn't ever seen that quote before, so I looked it up. It was in reference to the president having visited there to "make his case", and that the crowd gathered was not sympathetic to his position. I don't believe for a second that Matthews was trying to say that West Point was, in general, an "enemy camp", but rather that it was a bastion of individuals who would be among the most hostile to the president and his policies.

A stupid expression to use, sure, but it seems to have been blown out of proportion.

[D.Turtle]

I think the following poll is very interesting and important as for why Brown won and Coakley lost. It is a poll of people who voted for Obama in the presidential election, but didn't vote for Coakley in the special election (mostly Brown or stayed home).

HEALTH CARE BILL OPPONENTS THINK IT "DOESN'T GO FAR ENOUGH"

* by 3 to 2 among Obama voters who voted for Brown
* by 6 to 1 among Obama voters who stayed home

(18% of Obama supporters who voted supported Brown.)

VOTERS OVERWHELMINGLY SUPPORT THE PUBLIC OPTION

* 82% of Obama voters who voted for Brown
* 86% of Obama voters who stayed home

OBAMA VOTERS WANT DEMOCRATS TO BE BOLDER

* 57% of Brown voters say Obama "not delivering enough" on change he promised
* 49% to 37% among voters who stayed home

PLUS: Obama voters overwhelming want bold economic populism from Democrats in 2010.

The exact numbers etc. at the link.

Basically, the Democrats have two choices at this point: Either continue trying to be centrist, bipartisan, etc and piss of their base, not achieve anything, still not get votes from Republicans, and lose any respect from independents for not doing anything, or they can be fucking bold, use reconciliation to pass the best, most liberal things possible, and maybe, just maybe, have enough support from their base to not lose too badly in the mid-term election.

[MKSheppard]

I don't think she thinks she is, she's never made a play for the Murrow hat. She's up front with the fact she is a liberal and that she offers liberal commentary. Unlike Keith who has yes men she does get into controversial interviews and they are normally very... very good.

I'd probably rank her as one of the best Librul commentators out there. Why she's stuck at Redeye nobody knows. It's interesting to note that MSNBC has turned itself into FOX NEWS ON THE LEFT during primetime, and this has worked out pretty well AFAIK, they're ahead of CNN now.

Come on, Olbermann goes on the air, he makes his special comments, sometimes they make sense sometimes not. They are just that though.

I've had the displeasure of flipping through a book compilation of his speshul komments -- yes, Keithy is vain enough to package them and sell them. And they can be pretty much summed up as:

Vietraq
Vietraq
Vietraq
Vietraq
Vietraq
Bush
Bush
Bush
Bush
Gitmo
Gitmo
Gitmo
Gitmo
Bush
Bush
Bush
Vietraq
Vietraq

And so on. Though he seems to have shifted to Vietstan, Vietstan Vietstan recently. No word on when he turns on Obama.

[Ziggy Stardust]

The problem with the whole Olbermann/Beck comparison is that the former, no matter how much you may disagree with him, actually bothers to present evidence and facts to support his claims (I am not saying he is always right, but he at least makes an effort at real journalism). Beck has never even TRIED to do so.

[Lonestar]

Dude, this rebuttal does not even vaguely address DA's claim that Chris Matthews is a "weathervane" who points in whichever way he perceives the wind to be blowing.

DA was saying that that "only" Beck and O'reilly watchers would consider Matthews a hardcore liberal. I gave a rebuttal that lines like calling West Point an "enemy camp" would create that perception amoungst people who don't watch FOX(I don't) that he is a "hardcore" liberal.

I hadn't ever seen that quote before, so I looked it up. It was in reference to the president having visited there to "make his case", and that the crowd gathered was not sympathetic to his position. I don't believe for a second that Matthews was trying to say that West Point was, in general, an "enemy camp", but rather that it was a bastion of individuals who would be among the most hostile to the president and his policies.

(1)It doesn't matter what you believe it meant. You, like most people, already have a preconcieved notion of what Matthews politics are.

(2)Do you honestly think that most people saw that line as "a bunch of dudes not sympathetic to the President's Agenda" and not "those cadets are bad guys?" If the title "enemy camp" had been applied to any civilian location it wouldn't have raised ire. Instead it was used by a guy on a network that is the most left-leaning of the three(the left is almost always percieved as anti-military, remember) in reference to the United States Military Academy.

A lot of people don't remember(and most on this board were in grade school back then) the absolute disgust most folks in the military had towards the last Democrat administration, and how early on that administration made a name for itself for being anti-military. Since Matthews supports the Dems, and Dems=anti military, then calling the USMA an enemy camp is entirely in keeping with what a lot of people percieve hardcore liberals to be.