The roundtable on MSNBC’s Hardball early Wednesday evening dismissed and ridiculed the findings of the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll finding that only Russian President Vladimir Putin is more disliked among Americans among U.S. politicians, selected global leaders, and major U.S. institutions.
As only liberal journalists could, the panel and host Chris Matthews brushed aside and even mocked Americans for “not actually looking at the facts” they feed them and somehow, in the minds of readers/viewers, fall short of some “high bar of what” journalism should be.
The poll finding arose as MSNBC reporter Alex Seitz-Wald used the “Tell Me Something I Don’t Know” segment to talk about how the media “are only slightly less hated than Vladimir Putin” to which Matthews began knocking voters but also media critics like the one whose work you’re reading.
“Well, let's get to that because I refuse in my career to be a media critic. I think people who criticize the media are not what I want to be. So, without getting more enemies than I have...I think the media is unpopular is because half the country, who are conservatives, have heard their leaders trash it. Continually and that's relentless and they blame the messenger,” Matthews complained.
MTV News senior national correspondent Jamil Smith largely echoed Matthews by denouncing the current state of American culture in which a certain segment of the country (read: non-liberals) are “not actually looking the facts and all facts are basically regarded as inconvenient obstacles rather than actual things we should be discussing.”
Going back to the aforementioned host, he somehow wondered if the poll didn’t include “talk radio” since it’s “vastly conservative” plus excluding Fox News in a statement that clearly showed Matthews doesn’t understand how polls work (where this poll simply gave respondents the label of “the news media”).
However, Matthews did concede that most movies are stocked with leftist themes: “I think movies tend to be liberal. I think they tend to be liberal. I think they're great, but they tend to have a liberal message, a positive message about equality and all that.”
Politico reporter Annie Karni was then given the chance to chime in as she gave a general summary of what it’s like to receive negative comments from readers to which Matthews brushed off as being because “just that they disagree with you”:
It’s funny. When I get negative e-mails or on Twitter people yelling at me as the media, it's always they have this vaunted image of like you've desecrated this sacred profession by whatever I've written and they seem to have this high bar of what it should be and that none of us are living up to that.
It’s worth noting that this result in the NBC News/WSJ poll comes about a week after Gallup released a poll that pegged the American people’s trust in the news media at its lowest level ever as only 32 percent ruled that they believe they do their best to “report the news fully, accurately, and fairly.”
The relevant portion of the transcript from MSNBC’s Hardball on September 21 can be found below.
MSNBC’s Hardball
September 21, 2016
7:52 p.m. EasternALEX WEITZ-WALD: From our new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, the least popular figure, Vladimir Putin. No surprise, number two, least popular? The media. We are only slightly less hated than Vladimir Putin.
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Well, let's get to that. Because I refuse in my career to be a media critic. I think people who criticize the media are not what I want to be. So, without getting more enemies than I have. So, what do you think Jamil? Cause I think the media is unpopular is because half the country, who are conservatives, have heard their leaders trash it. Continually and that's relentless and they blame the messenger.
JAMIL SMITH: Yeah, we’re in a culture where — yeah, against — exactly, you're blaming the messenger, you're not actually looking the facts and all facts are basically regarded as inconvenient obstacles rather than actual things we should be discussing.
MATTHEWS: Okay, by the way, the media doesn't include talk radio? Does it, which is vastly conservative. It doesn't include Fox News, right? Does it? I mean, when they say the media, I keep thinking — what or – should — I think movies tend to be liberal. I think they tend to be liberal. I think they're great, but they tend to have a liberal message, a positive message about equality and all that.
ANNIE KARNI: It’s funny. When I get negative e-mails or on Twitter people yelling at me as the media, it's always they have this vaunted image of like you've desecrated this sacred profession by whatever I've written and they seem to have this high bar of what it should be and that none of us are living up to that.
MATTHEWS: No, it’s just that they disagree with you.
KARNI: Yeah, exactly.
MATTHEWS: Anyway, your thoughts?
SEITZ-WALD: Yeah —
MATTHEWS: The media's a good word for people you don't like.
SEITZ-WALD: Exactly. It's like members of Congress. Everybody hates all of Congress, but they keep reelecting the member of congress from their own district. They keep reading whatever they’re going to be reading and watching.
MATTHEWS: Okay, don’t you like when people say, how come you never talk about this and you realize they learned it from your show.
SEITZ WALD: Right.
SMITH: Right.
MATTHEWS: Or how come you — I say, where’d you learn about that? From newspapers.
SEITZ-WALD: Well —
MATTHEWS: Anyway, thank you. We all agree here, of course. We're only here. We're only the media.
