Matthews to Jimmy Carter: Will 'Right' Play 'Racial Card' Against Obama?

Chris Matthews invited on former President Jimmy Carter on Tuesday’s "Hardball," and not surprisingly tossed softballs at his former boss and prompted him to weigh-in on Jeremiah Wright as he asked: "Do you think his pastor will be used by people on the right to play the racial card?"

The following exchange occurred on the April 29 edition of MSNBC’s "Hardball":

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Do you think his pastor will be used by people on the right to play the racial card?

JIMMY CARTER: I don't have any doubt. They'll use everything they can by the racial card. That's what the Republicans have done, at least in the South, ever since 1964 when Lyndon Johnson ran against, against Barry Goldwater. And my mother was Lyndon Johnson's campaign, campaign leader in Sumter county. So yeah I think they will use everything they can against Obama if he gets the nomination.

A little later in the interview Matthews then asked the former president how America can change its image as "enemy of the world."

MATTHEWS: How do we get back to a country where your mom would join the Peace Corps? I mean that spirit, that sense of public service and the sense that we are part of the world, we're not the enemy of the world?