Chris Matthews

Despite the revelations that, while having an affair with an intern, President Kennedy, pimped the teen out to staffers, gave the young girl drugs and helped her look for an abortion doctor, journalists Chris Matthews and former Newsweek editor Evan Thomas insisted that JFK and Jackie Kennedy had a "good," "full" marriage. [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

Thomas appeared on Wednesday's Hardball to spin for Kennedy. After Matthews played a clip of Mimi Alford talking about how she would have rubber duckie races with the President while taking a bath, Thomas deemed Kennedy "complicated." He added, "He obviously compartmented [sic] his life incredibly. I mean, I think, unbelievably, he had a good marriage even as he was doing all this terrible stuff."

If President Obama didn't already see a sea of red flags, a thunderbolt from Chris Matthews this morning should surely inform him that he has badly misstepped with his decision to force Catholic institutions to provide services that violate their religious principles

Appearing on Morning Joe, Matthews said that "even liberal Catholics are going to be proud" of Catholic leaders who stand up to Obama, and indeed that the Catholic response "may come to civil disobedience."  Video after the jump.

Something extraordinarily rare happened on MSNBC Thursday.

One of the network's admittedly liberal anchors, Hardball's Chris Matthews, scolded a liberal guest, New York magazine's John Heilemann, for echoing Obama administration talking points (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Only two days after admitting that Barack Obama has a problem with his "frightening" birth control decision, Chris Matthews on Thursday was back on offense. He berated Rick Santorum as a "theocrat" and knocked Reverend Franklin Graham as a "disgrace."

The Hardball host singled out Family Research Council President Tony Perkins as the representative of all those who would question Obama's faith. Matthews interrogated, "Tony, do you think this president is a Muslim?" He added, "Why [do] your people" make such allegations?

Barack Obama today deflected reporters from questions about the growing controversy surrounding religious organizations having to provide contraception to their employees.

As MSNBC's Chris Matthews reported on Hardball moments ago, the President stonewalled reporters saying, "Come on, guys" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Following a revealing interview with former JFK mistress Mimi Alford on Wednesday's NBC Rock Center, left-wing MSNBC host Chris Matthews, along with liberal historians Doris Kearns Goodwin and Richard Reeves, were invited on the broadcast to give a sycophantic defense of the womanizing president. [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]

Touting his new book, "Jack Kennedy: Elusive Hero," Matthews proclaimed: "The greatest heroes are often the most flawed." The Hardball host went on to gush over how Kennedy "colorized American politics....made it a technicolor movie, he made it exciting." In his characteristic fashion, Matthews concluded: "And so with it all, the total picture still arouses the country."

Washington Post political writer Melinda Henneberger shockingly stated, Wednesday, that "maybe the Founders were wrong" to guarantee religious liberty. Henneberger appeared on Hardball to discuss the Obama administration's decision to force the Catholic Church to provide birth control in health care.

Discussing the battle between the left and those who see it as a threat to the First Amendment, she declared, " Maybe the Founders were wrong to guarantee free exercise of religion in the First Amendment but that is what they did and I don't think we have to choose here. " Henneberger's awkward comment came as she attempted to defend the Catholic Church. [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

Closing out an interview with Sen. John Hoeven (R) of North Dakota on today's Andrea Mitchell Reports, substitute host Chris Matthews thanked the former governor and said he "loved visiting your state this summer" and that he loves Mt. Rushmore, having "sat there for two hours and just looked up at it" during his trip to South Dakota over the summer.

Hoeven corrected Matthews, saying he was from North Dakota. Matthews retorted that he "liked South Dakota better anyway." [video follows page break]

You don't often see a well-known liberal media member publicly criticizing the liberal media he's a part of.

But when Dan Abrams, the former General Manager of MSNBC and founder of the left-wing Mediaite, trashes his former network - in particular Hardball host Chris Matthews - as well as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other media outlets for their "Shameful, Inexcusable Distortion Of The Supreme Court’s Citizens United Decision," one should take notice:

Even Chris Matthews, who famously gushed about the "thrill" Barack Obama gave his leg, is troubled by the President's "frightening" decision to force Catholic charities to provide birth control through health care. Discussing the issue on Tuesday's Hardball, the host sputtered, "...How can you make the [religious] teacher pay for birth control without losing their authority, their moral authority?"

Matthews didn't seem sure how to broach the subject. Talking to E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post and Susan Milligan of U.S. News and World Reports, he warned, "It gets to that interesting point to me, which is frightening, when the state tells the church what to do." (Interesting?)

To paraphrase Ronald Reagan, there he goes again.

On MSNBC's Hardball Monday, host Chris Matthews said Barack Obama's smile "is worth five to ten points" on Election Day (video follows with transcript and commentary):

It's astonishing that someone whose profession is to talk politics still has not heard that the alleged gaffe of President George H.W. Bush being unaware of the existence of checkout scanners as he visited a grocery store during the 1988 campaign has been disputed, as the veteran MSNBC host repeated the alleged Bush gaffe while opening his syndicated Chris Matthews Show which aired on Sunday.

After guest Andrea Mitchell of NBC tried to correct him, he was still unconvinced and declared, "I'm still not letting him off on that."

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews on Tuesday asked a Mitt Romney supporting Congressman, “Why do you call the Washington Post a liberal newspaper?”

After the Hardball host told his guest, "It’s the most hawkish paper in the country," Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fl.) marvelously responded, "By your standards the New York Times is a right-wing newspaper” (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

MSNBC's Chris Matthews on Monday's Hardball comically used a little known Yiddish term to bash Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich.

"I'm rooting for Newt of course to stay in this thing. It will create mishegas for the Tea Party world and a compelling political spectacle for us" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

The former Tip O'Neill staffer-turned-political analyst who'd never heard of congressional insider trading until President Obama mentioned it in last week's State of the Union  insists he is unaware of the Bush Derangement Syndrome of many on the Left during the former president's tenure in the Oval Office. What's more, that's not his bias talking, it's just objective reality.

"There's a real level of national hatred of the president that I hadn't seen before. Certainly not under Clinton or under Dubya," MSNBC Hardball host Chris Matthews argued on WMAL radio's Morning Majority program this morning. "The hatred, the Hitler mustaches, all that stuff, I haven't seen that before," Matthews added, prompting co-hosts Mary Katharine Ham and Bryan Nehman to incredulously retort that, no, in fact, the Left used Hitler comparisons against the former president.

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews had some harsh criticism for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney Monday.

In a discussion about the viciousness in the GOP race, the Hardball host said, “I’ve never seen one, but it’s like a snuff movie we’ve been watching here” (video follows with transcript and commentary):

There was a truly delicious moment on MSNBC's Morning Joe Monday as the gang discussed the Republican presidential race from Florida.

When host Joe Scarborough recollected John F. Kennedy buying the West Virginia primary in 1960, Hardball host Chris Matthews, one of JFK's biggest fans, was seen visibly uncomfortable shifting position in his chair (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Barack Obama and his reelection committee must be thrilled to know the media are going to assist them in invoking class warfare this campaign season.

NBC's Chris Matthews certainly did his part Sunday practically beginning the syndicated show bearing his name asking the truly revolting question is Mitt Romney "Just too damn rich?" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

MSNBC's Chris Matthews is so hell-bent on trashing Arizona's Republican Governor Jan Brewer after her dust-up with President Obama that on Friday's Hardball he dragged out a poll from November showing a high disapproval of her in her state.

I guess Matthews - who just Tuesday revealed that he had never heard of Congressional insider trading until the President mentioned it during the State of the Union address - missed a poll released two days ago showing high favorability numbers for Brewer (video follows with transcript and commentary):

MSNBC's Chris Matthews claimed Thursday that the unemployment rate is lower now than when Barack Obama took office.

Such was said during a contentious Hardball discussion with Republican Arizona Congressman Trent Franks (video follows with commentary):

Thanks for sharing, Rachel, and confirming what we already knew.

The oh-so bright light in MSNBC's nightly firmament could barely contain her revulsion after Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels cited a familiar metaphor for America, that of the shining city on a hill, while delivering the official Republican response to President Obama's State of the Union address. (video after page break)

Far from being a "hardcore news junkie," you sometimes wonder if Chris Matthews even watches his own network. Following the president’s State of the Union Address on Tuesday, Matthews, while appearing as a guest on MSNBC's  ‘The Ed Show,’ claimed that he had never heard of congressional insider trading prior to that night. [See video below. MP 3 audio here.]

However, as Noel Sheppard pointed out, MSNBC’s Dylan Ratigan had in fact covered the very same story Matthews had never heard of in a recent broadcast.

On Monday I noted how Washington Post staff writer Greg Miller failed to report that alleged top-secret information leaker John Kiriakou was employed from 2009 to 2011 as an investigator on the Foreign Relations Committee for Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.).

Today in a follow-up story about Kiriakou's wife Heather resigning her CIA analyst post, Miller once again failed to mention Kiriakou's connection to Sen. Kerry. What's more, whereas in the second paragraph of his January 23 article, Miller noted that Kiriakou had served as "a senior Senate aide," Miller today failed to even note Kiriakou's two-year tenure as a staffer with the U.S. Senate.

The ignorance of television news anchors is at times breathtaking.

Chris Matthews, a man with two nationally televised programs, said Tuesday night on MSNBC that until President Obama brought it up during the State of the Union address, he had never heard of Congressional insider trading (video follows with transcript and commentary):

As NewsBusters predicted earlier, Obama-loving media were going to use Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's just-released tax returns to misinform the public for the benefit of the current White House resident.

Doing his part Tuesday was MSNBC's Chris Matthews who not only told his Hardball viewers "Romney paid a much lower tax rate than most Americans," he completely falsified recent Internal Revenue Service data by claiming that compared to Romney's "14 to 15 percent in taxes...most people who work hard, do well in this country pay about 35" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Tuesday night, President Obama delivers his third State of the Union address, and his sixth speech to a joint session of Congress since taking office in 2009. But there’s no need to spend a lot of time wondering about what the media will say after The Great One speaks, since — like a gaggle of corporate yes-men — journalists have gushed over every one of these major addresses.

“It was a big and bold speech,” ABC’s Terry Moran applauded on Nightline shortly after Obama’s budget address in February 2009, his first before Congress. “It was his debut and he wowed us,” MSNBC’s Chris Matthews enthused the next day on Hardball.

You know liberals are desperate if they’re playing the race card so early in the 2012 campaign cycle. The latest edition of MRC’s Notable Quotables is now out, and this week’s collection was heavy with media quotes attacking both Republican voters and their presidential candidates as racist.

Among the lowlights: NBC’s Ann Curry accusing Newt Gingrich of “intentionally playing the race card” when he talked about President Obama’s dismal economic record, and ex-CNN correspondent Bob Franken nastily asserting that conservative voters harbor “a real resentment against blacks,” and “would love to see us return to the good old days of Jim Crow.”

The worst quotes are below the jump; the full issue can be read at www.MRC.org. (PDF version)

In the past few days, there's been a lot of discussion about Mitt Romney's relatives in Mexico.

On this weekend's syndicated Chris Matthews Show, NBC's Andrea Mitchell said, "The Romneys that came back from Mexico to the United States, they crossed the border illegally" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

As NewsBusters reported Tuesday, MSNBC's Chris Matthews accused Republican voters in South Carolina of being racist.

On Thursday's Hardball, former South Carolina first lady Jenny Sanford told Matthews this depiction of her fellow residents "is absurd and nonsense and frankly just, you know, stirred up by people in the press" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

A day after calling South Carolina GOP voters racist, MSNBC's Chris Matthews on Wednesday referred to the Republican electorate as "lemmings" (video follows with transcript and commentary):