Noted Dick Cheney-basher Chris Matthews, on Thursday's "Hardball," finally found an area of common ground with the former Vice President – his endorsement of moderate Texas Republican Kay Bailey Hutchison over Rick Perry in the Texas governor's race. However, even a bit of praise from the MSNBC host came with a vicious shot, as Matthews sneered, "You might think an endorsement from Dick Cheney would be like a dinner invite from Uday and Qusay Hussein, but not in Texas."

After making the comparison to the brothers who infamously tortured Iraqi athletes for losing on the field, Matthews went on to ponder: "Can the torture man boost her backing from conservatives in beating secessionist governor Rick Perry?" [audio available here]

The following Matthews outbursts were aired on the October 29, "Hardball":

[Update, 8:25 pm ET: Audio link added below.]

CNN frequent contributor and Huffington Post's political director Hilary Rosen slammed John McCain's vice-presidential pick Sarah Palin as being unqualified on Friday's Newsroom program and accused the Republicans pandering to women, especially Hillary Clinton supporters: "Senator McCain obviously thinks this is going to go a long way to help those women who are attracted to Hillary Clinton. I think if you were attracted to Hillary Clinton, in many ways, it was because she's a qualified woman" (Rosen put emphasis on "qualified" by practically yelling the word). She later accused the GOP of trying to "change skirts and put it on another woman, and have it be an acceptable thing" (audio available here).

During his normal "Hardball" program on MSNBC on Thursday evening, Chris Matthews asked Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison if the "Republican party platform is inclusive enough on the issue of reproductive or abortion rights." Hutchison, whose name has been floated as a possible vice-presidential nominee for John McCain, didn’t give a straight yes or no answer, and mentioned that in her view, "...both the Republican and the Democratic platform generally have areas that are not mainstreamed, and I don't think that you can agree with either platform in its entirety, and I think you just have to understand that a candidate’s views are going to prevail and I think people choose the candidate."