MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who had been a superb, hard-nosed print political reporter and bureau chief before he switched over to broadcast, had an exchange with GOP surrogate Rep. Eric Cantor which illustrates a problem Republicans are going to face this year: running as Republicans but not running as…Republicans.
In this clip, the machine-gun-talking Matthews is behaving as many old-school reporters would who believe in and insist upon getting a straight answer: he presses a key point and won’t accept a non-answer so he returns to his question repeatedly and won’t let his interview subject off the hook with spin or evasion. Matthews’ point — about Republicans trying not to really run as Republicans in an attempt to put some politically-healthy distance between themselves and the crew in the White House — is one the GOP may have to more effectively address as the campaign goes on.
On one radio talk show today the host said most of the blame is due to the Democratic Congress. That may not work as an convincing explanation this time, except to Rush and Sean fans.
Most telling Cantor quote: that it’s McCain and Obama who are on the ballot this year.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ympnzk9_b8MJoe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.