Before Hardball host Chris Matthews and his panel predicted on Thursday President Trump Trump will be blamed for terror attacks if he cuts government spending, Matthews turned into a conspiracy theorist, inferring that Trump’s smile while declining to answer questions about a new WikiLeaks document dump was reason to question his “patriotic instincts.”
The topic of Trump’s smirk came up at least five times in the hour-long show with the first instance popping up less than a minute in.
“Today, Donald Trump brazenly refused to criticize the organization that worked with Russia in tilting the 2016 election in his favor...President Donald Trump, who’s election in November was helped by anti-secrecy group, WikiLeaks, declined the opportunity today to criticize them,” Matthews whined.
In introducing a clip of Trump declining to answer a shouted question at the White House, Matthews observed that “Trump smiled and said nothing.”
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Matthews welcomed on his first set of guests and this gave him the opening to question Trump’s patriotism, suggesting that Trump’s “siding up on that side of the Russians” in a symbolic pick-up game of basketball against the United States.
“And now, this big document dump and the information flowing out about the CIA and its operations and its ability to hack into people’s systems, he taking the weird smile, refusing to criticize. I think any other president would have criticized Wikileaks. What side’s he on,” he added.
Going to Tara Maller of the think tank New America, Matthews unleashed this bizarre tangent:
MATTHEWS: What’s the smile mean? I mean, anyway, who is he? The Mona Lisa? What’s the smi — what a kinda weird smile? I mean, it’s so cute.
TARA MALLER: I think he likes that he’s got information that other people don’t have.
MATTHEWS: Yeah.
MALLER: But you know what? The intelligence community has probably more information than he does, so unless he can show the information that he’s basing this on, I’m not sure what that smile is about.
Near the end of the segment, Matthews couldn’t let the smile go. Overblowing the situation, Matthews spoke as if Russia threw the election and caused voters to pick Trump when he whined that Trump “seem[s] to be smiling the graveyard here — our graveyard.”
Taking the place of his “Let Me Finish” commentary, Matthews’s closing “Trump watch” rant started with the confession that he “wonder[s] about Trump's patriotic instincts” in light of the election, Trump’s less-than-forceful Russia rhetoric, and WikiLeaks dumps.
Matthews continued:
Here he was today, given a chance to say something about a foreign group trying to undercut the U.S. government in the world and he gives us the smile of a Cheshire cat. What do we make of that smile? Is he the Mona Lisa enjoying a little secret of hers? Does he think it makes him cool to be enjoying the way the group that helped get him elected is helping itself to undermine our government's intelligence capability? Does he find that makes him superior to lesser men?
The far-left pundit concluded his dithering diatribe by suggesting that Trump’s not on the U.S. side but that of WikiLeaks and the Russians.
“These questions are not rhetorical. Sadly, they are obvious. That smile of Trump’s tells you the answer. He's dancing with the one that brung him and doesn’t mind a lick that we know it,” ended Matthews.
Here’s the relevant portions of the transcript from MSNBC’s Hardball on March 9:
MSNBC’s Hardball
March 9, 2017
7:00 p.m. Eastern
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Today, Donald Trump brazenly refused to criticize the organization that worked with Russia in tilting the 2016 election in his favor. The organization which we now know has been helping in an attack on CIA, this country’s chief intelligence agency. President Donald Trump, who’s election in November was helped by anti-secrecy group, WikiLeaks, declined the opportunity today to criticize them, even as WikiLeaks today released a trove of new documents stolen from the CIA. That material, which was acquired in major security breach of this country’s top spy agency, threatens to reveal the CIA's digital hacking around the world which could compromise the CIA’s ability to get information. But when asked to comment today, President Trump smiled and said nothing.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Okay, Thank you very much. Thank you.
PETER ALEXANDER: Document dump — document dump from Wikileaks, any thoughts?
[TRUMP STAYS SILENT, SMILES]
MATTHEWS: Well, whatever that means, WikiLeaks says the material was obtained from a former CIA contractor.
(....)
MATTHEWS: Let ask you Ken. It seems to me we’ve got a weird sort of like basketball as we were kids — three on that side, three on the other. Donald Trump is siding up on that side of the Russians, it seems, again and again and now with Wikileaks because that all helped him get the election won. It may not have won it for him, but it certainly helped him in destroying Hillary Clinton with all those leaks of her e-mail — over — all the e-mail at the DNC. And now, this big document dump and the information flowing out about the CIA and its operations and its ability to hack into people’s systems, he taking the weird smile, refusing to criticize. I think any other president would have criticized Wikileaks. What side’s he on?
(....)
MATTHEWS: What’s the smile mean? I mean, anyway, who is he? The Mona Lisa? What’s the smi — what a kinda weird smile? I mean, it’s so cute.
TARA MALLER: I think he likes that he’s got information that other people don’t have.
MATTHEWS: Yeah.
MALLER: But you know what? The intelligence community has probably more information than he does, so unless he can show the information that he’s basing this on, I’m not sure what that smile is about.
(....)
MATTHEWS: We got the Russians we knew were helping Trump get elected. We know that WikiLeaks helped that operation, they delivered all the information to us. We know that WikiLeaks and Assange is out there bragging how they’ve undermined the CIA, damaged our ability to hack into information around the world — really killed in many ways — you’re the expert, the FBI — the CIA’s ability to do its jobs and Trump seem to be smiling the graveyard here — our graveyard.
(....)
MATTHEWS: Trump watch, Thursday, March 9, 2017. I wonder about Trump's patriotic instincts, don't you? Here he was today, given a chance to say something about a foreign group trying to undercut the U.S. government in the world and he gives us the smile of a Cheshire cat. What do we make of that smile? Is he the Mona Lisa enjoying a little secret of hers? Does he think it makes him cool to be enjoying the way the group that helped get him elected is helping itself to undermine our government's intelligence capability? Does he find that makes him superior to lesser men? That he's got foreign allies ready to destroy this country's institutions with the same cheek that trampled Hillary Clinton's chances in the last election? Look, there's an old line from the labor movement that fits here -- which side are you on? Is Trump on the side of WikiLeaks and the Russians that do what they did in Hillary Clinton and greased him, Donald Trump, into the White House? Is he on the side of the group that shares Steve Bannon, his consigliere’s purpose of undermining our public institutions? These questions are not rhetorical. Sadly, they are obvious. That smile of Trump’s tells you the answer. He's dancing with the one that brung him and doesn’t mind a lick that we know it.
