During Tuesday’s Democratic Presidential Primary coverage on MSNBC, Chris Matthews and Tim Russert both admit to ignoring the countless gaffes and blunders committed by John McCain.
Download | Play 
Download | Play (h/t Silent Patriot)
This is one of those clips that makes you want to throw things at your tee vee. (please don’t!) Matthews and Russert admit that MSNBC can’t — or refuses to — multi-task. The basic message was this: as long as there is a campaign battle between Obama and Clinton, they MUST ignore John McCain. Russert even admits to being flooded with e-mails about their abysmal McCain coverage, but he tells Democrats to just be patient, when the time is right, they’ll pay attention to the train wreck of a campaign being run by the aging senator from Arizona:
Matthews: …”You think the Democrat warhorses know that as long as there’s a fire going on in one of those rings, the Barack Obama ring, we’re not going to focus much on John McCain’s weaknesses?”
Russert: “Yes, they believed initially that ignoring the McCain campaign was beneficial and helpful to the Democrats, but as this has gone on, they see in their minds, and we get flooded with e-mails, Senator McCain making a mistake on Shi’a vs. Sunni, making a mistake about the first Persian Gulf War and the second, vis-à-vis oil, his own relationship with Pastor Hagee and why isn’t that talked about and reported on the way Reverend Wright’s relationship with Senator Obama is talked about. But, all that in time. It is only May. This has been going on for some time, but it’s going to be a long, long campaign and when Senator McCain is back in the media’s light, he’ll receive the same kind of scrutiny.”
This is outrageous. McCain is only out of the media spotlight because the McCain Media takes him out — intentionally — and it is detrimental to our election process. The free pass allows McCain to continue to raise more money, look more presidential than he really is and garner good poll numbers, which gives him advantages he doesn’t deserve and wouldn’t otherwise get if he were properly scrutinized. Timmeh says they’ve been flooded with e-mails about this, but he ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Send an e-mail to MSNBC and let them know that it is completely unacceptable to tell us that we have to wait for any amount of time or any reason before we see balanced coverage and scrutiny of John McCain’s disastrous campaign.
We’re going to hold on to this clip and refer to it often…
Filed Under: Campaigns/Elections, Election 08, Hardball/Chris Matthews, MCain’s Media, MSNBC, Media Bias, Media Criticism, Meet the Press/Tim Russert
No Trackbacks To “Matthews, Russert Admit They’ve Given John McCain A Free Pass“
What about the Pentagon Propaganda Program? There is a whole raft of things the Corporate Media is in denial about.
Pravda USA.
NOOOOOO! DON’T. Do not throw something at the tv. THROW THE DAMN THING OUT THE WINDOW. I’m in the process of ruining my keyboard, I’m pounding the keys so hard. Two grand old schmucks. GRRRRRRR!
Are General Electric’s Prime Time Butt Plugs to be trusted in scrutinizing Captain Queeg McCaine?
Well, Duh! Meanwhile, Bush and his cronies are robbing us blind and covering their asses. No mention of the congressional hearings, the plight of the middle class. Iraq. There is a war going on? These guys know they better start coming clean. Americans are already turning them off.
And tell tweety that it’s Democratic warhorses.
Translation:
“Joe and Jane Six pack (...dont mention the war...) are too dumb to walk and chew gum so we will continue (...dont mention the war...)
to pander to the most insignificant aspects for personality, we need to spin this thing out so are ratings stay up (...dont mention the war...) …
Jazz hands: “THAT’S DISINFOTAINMENT” Jazz hands
Ya it sucks but i have no problem with the MSM saving it’s McCain scrutiny for the general election. Its just I doubt they will.
Russert….Matthews…a couple of taterheads!
So…I could only watch the primary coverage for about 10 minutes last night…then I watched Stargate Atlantis…
So who won? Or or they gonna drag this out as long as they can?
If the seventy percent of sane Americans stopped watching the corporate media shills they will go away.
Stop watching and responding to these clowns like they matter. We are making our own media on the Internets.
They have had eight years under Bush to do the right thing, so don’t hold your breath now. They are fundamentally pawns of the Military Industrial Complex that Eisenhower warned us about.
and ‘later on’ will morph into ‘oh hell, that’s old news; who cares about old news’…
The “Media” has already decided: they want a McBush Presidency.
That way they won’t have to really work at what they do for another 4 years…and still get paid!
Sent. Now let’s see if our demands meet with any success.
The msm ignoring outrageous lies by the right is a long established pattern, and has let this white house avoid being impeached. It has however, been a two-edged sword and has made the internets the resort of serious citizens for the facts. That the msm has been discredited by its own inaction is not altogether a bad result.
I’m sure Arianna Huffington would have told him about poor McCain coverage if he would have her on his show. But alas, Russert is a coward and a sorry journalist.
Bush=28% approval
McCain=48% approval
Yet McCain is running on the Bush platform…
Russert belched:
Un-belched, but driving the whole thing:
Bullshit! Who are “they”?
Jesus, lets move on. The friggin primary is over. Listening to the morning news, you would think Bush already retired to Crawford. What about Dick Chaney’s main man being supenaed? What about the DOJ investagations. God, does the MSM think were that dumb?
In a past career, wasn’t timmeh this actor?
http://pub.tv2.no/multimedia/n.....86080m.jpg
Image that, a crusty old white man getting preferential treatment . . . is this for real?! [/sarcasm]
liberalHUSSEINmoderation @ 8:
Look out russet, …tweety, he’s a comin’ fer ya!!!
http://www.irishmax.com/images/Img11.gif
My Letter to Timmeh:
Probably won’t do a damn bit of good, but at least I feel better.
Screw the emails. These guys have to be in public at some point. Give them an ass-beating they’ll not soon forget.
Oh dear, our cash cow is dying!
New Cow?
New cow!
There’s no drama in the republican race. The US demographics who watch the news want to watch reality TV starring the candidates. “Next Up: Donald Trump presents: the Candidate!”
Bush is on right now bitching about his tax cuts being permanent. God! The man is not only clueless, he is delusional!
FilthyHarry @ 7:
If they can spin it into something juicy and scandelous they’ll use it. John ‘Senior Moments’ McCain is about 6″ shorter than Obama an is losing his mental facilities. He’ll look disasterous in debates. Let’s keep demanding debates, and watching them so they pull ratings.
At least he got honest for a moment, wonder how that slipped past the big wigs? He was also right on Clinton, it’s over. Hilary is done. Why the hell anyone would want to have a person as president who can’t keep a campaign in budget and borrowing is beyond me. If she can’t stay in the black with her campaign how can you expect her to turn our nations economy around?
They can’t cover McCain’s inconsistencies and flip flops because Obama and Clinton consume too much time?????? 24 hours a day, seven days a week, but they just don’t have the time!!!!! Poor babies.
But somehow, they do manage to find the time to spend an hour or more on a house fire in Seattle, car chases in California and Britney Spears stopping to fill up with gas.
This is the broadcast news equivalent of “The dog ate my homework.”
In a man-on-the-street interview four years ago a man recalled that during the 60s and 70s, with only three networks and 30-minute newscasts, “real” journalists managed to find time cover the Civil Rights Movement, Vietnam, and all the other important stories of the day.
Russert and Matthews and their ilk are full of it. Worse, more than half the people listening to that crap actually buy it.
They screwed up… they should have just kept their mouths shut about their inability to concentrate on more than one story at a time.
Now we know that they are willfully ignoring stories and that they’re incompetent.
from open left…
Just keep in mind that even though, for once, the media narrative seems to be turning in a way that will be helpful to Democrats and progressives, as an institution it is a fundamentally oppositional to our goals. We may be getting lucky with it right now, but that is only temporary. It is a singular victory, and not part of a larger pattern or positive trend.
fundamentally oppositional to our goals…..our mainstream media
P.D. @ 17:
Yes, they do. They are recycling lead-to-war-in-Iraq propaganda and just replacing it with “Iran”, and the public is buying it. Unfortunately I think most of the public is that dumb.
My fear, here, is that the Village will all simply say that they committed an error in judgment re: coverage, if anything is (rightly) made of this. And taken in isolation, one might almost charitably allow something like that. The thing is, and we all know this, that this is simply another angle of a media complicit in the coup of the last eight years. The Village needs to be held to account, and at very least, removed from public discourse.
THANK YOU C&L! Thanks for holding the media to account.
Of course he’s getting a free pass. McCain already presumes he’s President.
for some reason they did this 11:30 at night - when no one is watching, but hey at least we have the clip to show.
Your right Laure, Unfortunitily Americans are so self-absorbed, they don’t give a crap about anything except American Idol and tabloid news. Depressing.
They dont care who wins… they need a horserace, thats what matters to
these scaly worms.
P.D. @ 36:
Eff you… why ya gotta judge…
Sorry to offend you EliteLemming.
Cons are still going to go after Obama on Wright.
They’ll say . . . who in their right mind will vote for a guy who tossed his mentor and friend of 20 years overboard to the sharks for his own political gain?
Count Typo @ 23:
More bull.
LOL LA, I think that has been a staple of the REPUG handbook! Who are they kidding?
theWalrus @ 11:
And when they do a really crappy job, they’ll get promoted!! Woohoo!!! I guess I should’ve taught my kids to lie, cheat, and steal… I totally effed up their training for this age of piracy. Sorry kids!!
The way i see it, there’s nothing surprising or startling here. there is merely an admittance of what our spineless press has been doing for essentially the last eight years. It get me sick to hear how this is a liberal media. Where? Esamples please. The conservatives control talk radio and middle america feeds off rush. if he says it it must be true. Why heck, he’s fed to our troops in Iraq on our dime. talk about biting ourselves. and as far as television, o’reilley, hannity, they have huge ratings. again, middle america feeds off them. so enough on the liberal media. not true. So now we have russert and matthews admitting that as long as there is any life left in the Reverend Wright issue, they will continue to focus on that rather than going after that bungling fool on the other side. turns out he does have something in common with reagan. Will the American Press ever emerge once again as the last bastion of hope. Not until more helen Thomas’ emerge. Forget the rest of them. There efforts are all into reaching the top, keeping their anchor jobs …and selling books. screw them.
P.D. @ 42:
Almost everybody. Except for us 1%ers.
am so glad y’all caught that Timmeh quote - will prove handy “in time”
The biggest thing to me is that they ARE paying attention to the fact that millions are paying attention to them— and they seem to care. We can’t let down. Keep emailing them. Bush isn’t at 20% for nothing and all of MSM needs to know that going light on McSame (enabling) isn’t going to make them popular either. Maybe it’s all we’ve got. And somebody is listening!
P.D. you didn’t… I jus gots the hope… fer change… specialy at the gas pump… hahas… ;P
Suggesting that the media will cover the Obama/McCain race with any semblance of objectivity is an even bigger lie than I’m accustomed to hearing coming out of Tweety and Timmeh’s mouths. The Swift Boat Media for McCain is the wealthy elite’s last line of defense against having to pay their fair share of taxes and be accountable for their actions, and they’re not going down without a fight.
Oh, yeah, yeah (my best Beavis and Butthead voice) that’s right, when the GOP tells us to, wel’ll jump right on that McSame thingey, he he he.
I have never been so angry as Mondays, wall to wall pimping for Hillary, they called HER Hillary, and HIM Obama, it was non stop from 5 am on the left coast, in tandem, all day long, I was shocked. It was like they had orders to pimp Clinton at all cost.
I think I am almost ready to cancel my cable. I’m a gittin close.
L.A. don’t help the others too much… please…
You know, I think these guys actually believe their own bullshit.
EliteLemming @ 51:
Doesn’t matter most o