As expected Chris Matthews marked the anniversary of the Iraq War on last night's Hardball in typical negative tones he lets his kids indulge in Che Chic. Responding to a guest explaining kids in the Middle East wearing Bin Laden shirts were making an anti-authoritarian statement akin to the way American kids wear Che Guervara shirts, Matthews disagreed it was simliar and admitted: "I mean, a lot of our kids wear them. I see kids wearing them all the time, I think my kids wear them. It’s like a Robert Marley T-shirt at this point." The following is the full exchange between Matthews and Kristinn Taylor of FreeRepublic.com:
Kristinn Taylor: "But you know, the poll that matters is the poll in the streets. And if you remember, there have been all these predictions of, you know, great uprisings in the Arab street if we went into Iraq. Three years ago, the Arab street is still pretty calm."
Chris Matthews: "Yeah but I’m confounded sir, as well as you are, by kids wearing, when I meet them in East Africa, wearing bin Laden T-shirts and baseball hats and having big posters of the guy on store fronts. I’m, I’m confounded too. Because the only thing we know about him is he bombed us."
Taylor: "We have kids that wear Che Guevara shirts here in the United States."
Matthews: "Yeah, but they’re, they’re kind of cute at this point, aren’t they? They’re not about somebody out to get us now. I think there’s a difference. I mean, that’s kind of camp almost, isn’t it?"
Taylor: "No, no bin Laden is the ultimate, you know, symbol of sticking it to authority."
Matthews: "Yeah, but is Che Guevara the symbol of hate in the United States anymore?"
Taylor: "Yeah, yeah."
Matthews: "I don’t think so. I mean, a lot of our kids wear them. I see kids wearing them all the time, I think my kids wear them. It’s like a Robert Marley T-shirt at this point."
