In a breathtaking exchange with Ed Rendell this morning, Chris Matthews likened Hillary's strategy to Churchill's in opposing Nazi Germany. Churchill said to his advisors, even if we can't win, by fighting now, we'll be in a better bargaining position when the time comes. True, of course, but what a comparison.

Obviously, he was saying that Hillary may want to stick it out all the way, rack up six of the remaining eight contests, and then have plenty of clout in negotiating later. I would advocate that very course. But wow. Everyone on the set was either chuckling or shaking their heads, or outright clapping their hands to their foreheads.

Is Chris going to be forced into making another apology? I hope not, but NBC's record in this area is not encouraging for free speech advocates. Let Matthews be Matthews, dammit. He'll be Senator from Pennsylvania soon.

I've always thought Matthews was an idiot. Is there any reason to think I'm wrong?

It's odd. He's got a common touch, and gets really passionate about the workin man, but his audience is largely Beltway types. And total loser political junkies such as I.

Don't agree with him a lot of the time. Never attributed it to idiocy, however.

Was there a specific instance, or just a general impression?

I thought Matthews was an Obama-Zombie.

Jack

What's going on here? (Of course, you probably don't watch Matthews; he isn't right-wing enough for you, eh?) Gorgeous morning here, stunning views of most of the Front Range peaks, snow-capped. Soooooooo beautiful.

If MSNBC offered to pay me to watch Chris Matthews, I wouldn't do it. But I have seen enough video excerpts and comments regarding Matthews' berating of Hillary, to know that he is no Clinton fan. I thought he was in the barrel for Obie.

It's been nice here too, lately....very cool and mild...but it ain't the Front Range.

Jack

That pissed him off. And Reverend Wright. He's no fan of Hillary, but does wish that Obama would quit swinging between being a faculty lounge elitist and a black radical activist.

And he did have a decent point about the flag pin. He's like "so why can't this guy just wear one? does he object to it? why? sure, he can think it's a stupid issue, but that matters to people. so do it."

I paraphrase.

what he said this AM is not inconsistent with that,

Because, of course, he didn't say "Obama=Hitler" or even imply anything like it. What he said was "Clinton's strategy is like Churchill's strategy"

(Just like "Michelle criticized Hilary during primaries" doesn't equal anything like "Michelle vetoes Hilary")

Thanks, Urq, for the background. The bitter comment pissed ME off, too. And I have very little to be bitter about, for sure.

But what a friggin' insult to all working Americans, actually.

As for the flag pin, quite right. What's the big deal? Just wear one for gawd's sake & STFU. It does come with the turf of running for office, non? I saw a replay the other evening of the day when he refused to salute the flag or put his hand over his heart during the National Anthem -- it was back in Fall of '07, he was standing next to HRC and McCain, both of whom were behaving properly. (of course) AND McLaughlin then pointed out that BO's said refusal is actually a violation of Federal law -- something called "The Flag Code." Did you know that?

As a former military wife, sister AND mother, said refusal pisses me off, no end. The guy just has no class, surface evidences of same (degrees from Harvard, $ 4,000
Armani suits, etc, etc, blah blah) notwithstanding. I don't think he really enjoys being an American, actually. Thanks again for the info.

:-) Driving in today through SE Denver on the way to I-25, I passed one of my favorite parks. The City had the SHEEP guy out, with his flock and all, as the little cuties were helping 'mow the grass.' I love watching that & coming upon it as a surprise is always just the best, I almost did a Top Post about it but decided not to, what with all the hateful, snarky HRC-haters on here who would either downrate the post or attack me for trying to be nice, or something. You know who I mean. It really is a lovely scene, for sure!

next you'll be insisting he affix a "support our troops" bumper sticker to his car, and wear an Aids-awareness ribbon on his other lapel. Before long it'll be shorts with black socks and black shoes.

You, of all people, wouldn't be caught dead wearing an American Flag pin and you know it. Why do these things matter so much to the Far Right, and why do we continue to allow them to dictate and interpret every move and utterance a politician makes?

Wear it sometimes. Would wear it a hell of a lot more were I running for President of the United States. I thought it was a trivial issue, but Barack has some serious shit to overcome, and he should've thought of it before.

I don't quite get how beer-drinking bowlers in PA earning under $50k constitute the Far Right. Salt of the earth. But symbols matter.

Matthews's point was (paraphrasing) "when a soldier's coffin comes back, it's draped with a flag, that's real. when you hate america for some reason, you burn a flag, that's real."

Having dismissed it as a silly issue (compared with bitter and Wright angry unproud Michelle, which are far more damaging), he made sense to me there. I mean, why not just put one on from time to time?

Exactly, and pfui right back. It most certainly IS a trivial issue, and about time that this damn flag pin thing gets pushed to the side and we start talking about all those "coffins coming back draped in the American flag"...how about we start zeroing in and devoting endless column space on them? They were real, live people with families and loved ones, people who are now dead because of a useless war.

(Cue in the Star Spangled Banner here if it makes you happy).

McCain said from the beginning we were trying to do the war on the cheap, and we needed more forces. Rumsfeld and Dubya, alas, said stay the course. Keep patrollin around, do the same thing. That led to most of the casualties.

Now that McCain got his way, and we can finally see daylight, we got the Dems trying to pull us out. Just when we're sewing the thing up. Al-Qaeda, gone. Sadr, asking for terms. Iraqi forces, standing up pretty well.

Both Jack and I advocated pulling out when we were obviously beating our heads against a wall. Now that we made a dramatic shift, and are about to win, oh, yeah, let's pull out.

But the obdurate refusal to ever wear a flag pin, Michelle's never in her adult life being proud of her country, Wright saying "God damn America", Obama refusing to denounce an acquaintance who planted bombs and says he wishes he had planted more.

This stuff doesn't sell. And not just to the Far Right in Scranton. Put on the damned pin, man. It's politics. You'll lose if you don't. And why is it so distasteful?

I'm not nearly as angry as I sound, not to worry.