Chris Matthews abruptly resigns from MSNBC
'Hardball' host Chris Matthews announces his retirement, effective immediately, amid series of controversies.
On the Monday before Super Tuesday, longtime MSNBC host Chris Matthews came on the air and promptly, tartly announced he was retiring, that "tonight will be my last 'Hardball.'" His language and tone strongly implied he was being pushed out.
Politically, it felt like part of a pattern. At the same time that Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar suddenly dropped out of the race in an apparent attempt to solidify the anti-Bernie Sanders vote, MSNBC was acting in the opposite direction, shedding a host that had become a liability with the Sanders socialists, who are a decent chunk of the MSNBC audience.
The host's insensitivity to women on the set played a part, but the offenses were verbal. He wasn't accused of sexual assault (Matt Lauer) or a "crusty paw" and exhibitionism (Charlie Rose). He was accused of saying things that made women uncomfortable, like "why haven't I fallen in love with you yet?" That's not a smart way for a married man to talk, but it doesn't compare with more malignant, more physical abusers.
MSNBC HOST CHRIS MATTHEWS ANNOUNCES RESIGNATION AMID SERIES OF CONTROVERSIES
The larger part of this is Matthews falling out of step with the Democratic Party's lunge to the left in the Trump era. The MSNBC star reacted badly by comparing the Sanders victory in Nevada to the fall of France to the Nazis during World War II. He also ripped into Sanders for lauding Fidel Castro's literacy programs.
Because he worked at MSNBC, Matthews was never punished for comparing President Donald Trump with Hitler, Stalin or Satan.
"I have an attitude towards Castro," Matthews announced. "I believe if Castro and the Reds had won the Cold War, there would have been executions in Central Park and I might have been one of the ones getting executed."
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That's not just out of step with today's left. Anyone who's watched the American media from the Bay of Pigs forward knows that top journalists from Barbara Walters to Dan Rather to Katie Couric have sounded just like Sanders in hailing Castro's alleged "workers paradise" with literacy programs and "free health care" and "one of the lowest infant mortality rates in the world."
In this campaign, it seemed Matthews was still carrying on his great political love affair with Barack Obama, and his vice president, Joe Biden, who is now inaccurately categorized as the "moderate wing." He's best known for exclaiming how Obama's oh-so-American oratory gave him a "thrill" up his leg.
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Because he worked at MSNBC, Matthews was never punished for comparing President Donald Trump with Hitler, Stalin or Satan.
Historical metaphors were endlessly mangled. One night, he assailed Trump by blurring together Julius Caesar, Benito Mussolini and the cannibal-dictator Idi Amin. He criticized the president for alleged dementia -- and in rants like this, Matthews made people wonder about his own mental state.
Republicans were "North Korean soldiers," and Trump's children were "Uday and Qusay," the crazy, murderous offspring of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. The Washington Free Beacon counted that Matthews compared the Trumps with the "Russian royal family" the Romanovs -- who were executed in the communist revolution -- at least 15 times.
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The relentless babble of Matthews might recall for some bookworms the words of H.L. Mencken decrying President Warren Harding's English: "It is so bad that a sort of grandeur creeps into it. ... It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle. It is balder and dash."
Chris Matthews could be seen as a sort of Joe Biden of the pundit class. How could he get away with uncorking so many bizarre and over-the-top statements? Because at some point, everyone dismisses it as a personality quirk. Just as Biden's gaffes were just dismissed as part of being "wacky, lovable Uncle Joe," Matthews was just Captain Thrill Up the Leg. No one expected it would ever catch up with him.