Says Bush 'Snookered Us Again', 'Wasn't Even Exactly Elected'
By Alan Breslauer on 7/21/2007, 1:30am PT  

Guest Blogged by Alan Breslauer

"I think we in journalism have got to stop being so scared of being unobjective and to start focusing on our job which is to question, question, question," Chris Matthews told Jay Leno this week. Welcome aboard, Chris. Took ya long enough.

Leno begins his July 17, 2007 interview with Matthews by saying that the Hardball host has been "all fired up" this week. Well, that certainly describes Matthews in the video below. While he does take a couple backhanded, albeit deserving, shots at Tim Russert, he focuses his wrath primarily on the Bush administration, adding that "this crowd wasn't even exactly elected, you know."

While Matthews glosses over his own culpability when speaking of the failures of the press, he does deliver a powerful indictment on the Bushies and their vast propaganda campaign against the American people. Here's a particularly good rant:

MATTHEWS: The misinformation, the indoctrination that is going on. And the rest of the American have gotten so skeptical now. Do you think that the American people believe that the brass didn't have something to do with Abu Ghraib? Do you think the American people don't think we were given a bill of goods to get us in over there? Do you think anybody in America believes that we are going to get out if this surge doesn't work?

The latest I've heard this weekend was if the surge doesn't work Bush is going to want more troops. He has snookered us again. So I think we in journalism have got to stop being so scared of being unobjective and to start focusing on our job which is to question, question, question. String them out.

We got to stop treating politicians who get elected, and this crowd wasn't even exactly elected, you know, stop treating them like the dispensers of the truth. That's our biggest mistake. We put them on these Sunday shows and say, "Okay Daddy, tell us what the truth is.' And we write it down and type it up and we put it in the paper the next day.

I think we have got to be damn skeptical about this crowd because on WMD, on the connection to 9/11, on this surge, every step of the way, on the torture, on every step of the way --- we have been given misinformation.

In the last part of the interview Leno shifts the conversation to the 2008 presidential election and Matthews predicts a Hillary/Giuliani showdown. The video follows in full...




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