In the span of seconds, the A-block panel of Thursday’s Hardball went from collectively laughing out loud about impeachment to then remembering how their side (the far-left) has insisted that impeachment (and what they hope to be the removal) of President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence will be a somber affair. So much for giving away the game, folks!
MSNBC host Chris Matthews and the Associated Press’s Jill Colvin built up to this flip-flop by boasting of how Pence’s team had hoped to keep him separated from the impeachment probe and the attempts by the left to suggest attempted collusion in Ukraine.
Matthews even aired a September 2 clip of Colvin asking Pence in Poland about the Bidens and Ukrainians, so well ahead of when this story came to the forefront. Imagine that!
At any rate, Matthews offered an analogy in which the Vice President was like a lobster trying to escape a tank: “Okay, it reminds me of a lobster tank when a lobster tries to climb out of the tank and the other lobsters pull that person — that lobster back in. These White House aides are not letting this guy out.”
The four-person panel then burst out laughing at Matthews’s analogy and were followed by NBCNews.com’s Heidi Przybyla quipping that “[t]here are lot of lobsters in the tank.”
When Matthews inquired about whether that’s “your final word,” she stated in the affirmative, but then warned that “there’s much more to come out,” including more about who from the administration were listening on the now-infamous Trump-Zelensky phone call.
Once again, imagine that! No word on Przybyla was stating that as a guess or if she knew of what the left and their media allies have cooking.
But again, seconds after the hobnobbing, Matthews closed the segment by gloating that “[t]he news gods keep bringing news” then ending with the delusional reminder that this shouldn’t be celebrated:
[T]his is a scary time for our republic and I’ve got to tell you, anybody that’s happy about this is crazy because the President was flawed before this. Now, he’s really done it to himself. I think he’s impeaching himself. Anyway, U.S. Congress — he did it again today.
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To see the relevant transcript from MSNBC’s Hardball on October 3, click “expand.”
MSNBC’s Hardball
October 3, 2019
7:15 p.m. EasternCHRIS MATTHEWS: And, apparently, also the vice president, because, meanwhile, officials close to Vice President Pence say — well, they say he was, “unaware of Trump’s efforts to press” Ukrainian President “Zelensky for damaging information about Biden” in early September when Pence delivered the message to Zelensky that U.S. military aid would remain frozen. Well, how’s that for a message? That’s according to a reporting by The Washington Post, which alludes to the apparent rift now developing between Pence and the White House officials who were suggesting that Pence would have known. They’re not letting him off the hook. They’re entangling him. At the time of Pence’s meeting, by the way, with Zelensky in September, it was a month ago, Rudy Giuliani’s effort to get Jordanian — or not Jordanian — Ukrainian dirt on Joe Biden was already so well-known that Pence was asked about it just a day after his meeting with Zelensky and here is that question from you, Jill. You were onto it. Let’s assume they were onto it. Here it goes.
JILL COLVIN [TO PENCE] [on 09/02/19]: Did you discuss Joe Biden at all during that meeting yesterday with the Ukrainian president, and number two, can you assure Ukrainian that the hold up of that money has nothing to do with efforts, including by Rudy Giuliani, to try to dig up dirt on the Biden family?
VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE: Well, on the first question, the answer is no, but we — we with President Zelensky yesterday, we discussed — we discussed America’s support for Ukraine and the upcoming decision the president will make on the latest tranche of financial support in great detail.
MATTHEWS: Jill, he didn’t answer you? He didn’t answer about the connection between that latest tranche and whether they’re playing ball and digging up dirt on Biden.
COLVIN: Yeah and I mean, the context that we know weeks later is the fact that there have been all these conversations between the President and Zelensky about what their definition of corruption was, and at that mere mention of that word and any type of conversation would automatically have referred to this dirt that they were looking for. I think we also just need to take a step back. This is such an interesting moment for Mike Pence too, who up until this point, has been pretty successful at somehow being very loyal to the President but not really kind of getting wrapped up —
MATTHEWS: Impious. Pious at the same time.
COLVIN: — indeed, but not getting wrapped up in all of the controversies surrounding it. He is now.
MATTHEWS: Okay, it reminds me of a lobster tank when a lobster tries to climb out of the tank and the other lobsters pull that person — that lobster back in. These White House aides are not letting this guy out.
[PAUL LAUGHS]
HEIDI PRZYBYLA: There are a lot of lobsters in the tank.
MATTHEWS: Is that your final word?
PRZYBYLA: Yes, I’m sure. That’s my final word, yeah, I mean, there’s much more to come out. The whistleblower, you know, the I.G. is going to be giving his report now behind closed doors, testifying on Friday. He’s going to —
MATTHEWS: It’s a he?
CONGRESSWOMAN TERRY SEWELL (D-AL): Yeah.
PRZYBYLA: — yes, going to fill in a lot of the blanks from that whistleblower complaint and —
MATTHEWS: Okay, thank you so much.
PRZYBYLA: — there will be other White House officials who I expect were in on that call —
MATTHEWS: Well, it’s probably tomorrow.
PRZYBYLA: — including Pence and his national security adviser.
SEWELL: We’ll be in the SCIF.
MATTHEWS: The news gods keep bringing news and this is a scary time for our republic and I’ve got to tell you, anybody that’s happy about this is crazy because the President was flawed before this. Now, he’s really done it to himself. I think he’s impeaching himself. Anyway, U.S. Congress — he did it again today.
