Please explain the Tweety thing - here he bashes Bush/backs Dean

[Woodstock]

Here he is pro-Dean/anti-Bush. I never watch his show - somehow the powers that be have it that when I watch TV, he isn't on it (or I'm not channel surfing and don't catch him.) So I'm confused. I know he is detested here - but he's clearly coming out in favor of a Democrat/against the Bush Administration below:

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=10419899&BRD=1712&PAG=461&dept_id=478996&rfi=6

...Matthews acknowledged that his personal favorite in the race is Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor who many see as the Democratic front-runner. "He came out of Vermont, a small state, with no foreign policy experience and with sheer guts he believed in one big idea and that big idea was: 'It was wrong to go around to the other side of the world to fight a war.'"

...Seldom shy about his opinions, Matthews said the Bush administration's rationale for going to war in Iraq was "nonsense" and totally dishonest. He laid most of the blame at the door of Vice President Richard Cheney.

"Cheney is behind it all," the former newspaper reporter and columnist said. "The whole neo-conservative power vortex, it all goes through his office. He has become the chief executive. He's not the chief operating officer, he's running the place. It's scary." Matthews painted Cheney as the guy "who put his thumb on the scale" to affect the balance between Secretary of State Colin Powell and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

"The ideologues started circling around the president," Matthews said, warming to his topic. "They saw a man who never read any books, who didn't think too deeply and they gave him something to think about for the first time in his life. This thing called pre-emption, the Bush Doctrine. They put it in his head and said 'Iraq, Iraq, Iraq.'"

[thebigidea]

1. he's detested because he flipflops like a dying trout on some shitty boat

Tomorrow he'll be doing the opposite.

Praising Bush, bashing Dean.

Tweety is a manic little monster...

[Woodstock]

4. but doesn't that put him in the middle

instead of right wing? I guess I'll have to grit my teeth and watch it...

[thebigidea]

6. no, it puts him in the "unreliable schizoid" camp

[janekat]

23. He is more in the middle - but I agree he is schizoid

There are certainly worse commentators in my book than Tweety. Sometimes I like him and sometimes he totally pisses me off. Just when I start to decide that maybe I like him - he turns around and rips up Gore and praises Bush.

[Woodstock]

2. here's another- Kucinich called him right wing but he was "soft" on Kerry?

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=349576

...The series, which reaches millions of viewers nationwide on MSNBC, “is quite biased in the direction of right-wing and corporate interests,” said Kucinich spokesperson David Swanson. “The host of ‘Hardball’ has made false and biased statements about this campaign.”

“Matthews asserted that only former Vermont Governor Dean had opposed the Iraq war, which was clearly a problem from our point of view,” Swanson said, noting that Kucinich voted against the war resolution in the House of Representatives. ..

After Sen. John F. Kerry’s appearance Monday, The Boston Globe’s Eileen McNamara criticized Matthews for tossing softballs to the Massachusetts Democrat. Yesterday she wrote that Matthews is a “longtime Democratic Party aide who plays a journalist on TV,” adding that “his partisan feathers are in full fluff.”

...

[blm]

13. soft on Kerry? Hah....

He acted mad that Kerry was in the race, and treated him exactly like that.

[JohnKleeb]

16. You dont think its corporate and right wing

:wow: btw kudos to Kucinich for calling Tweety out on his bullshit, hes not the first democrat to it, Bernie Sanders does it a lot.

[in_cog_ni_to]

3. HELLO!!!!

Tweety must have had a very high fever which made him delirious....he forgot whose ass he was suppose to be kissing. I have NEVER heard him talk about his beloved shrub like that! OK, has hell frozen over and no-one told me? I really am shocked!

[janekat]

25. Tweety attacks Bush a lot

n/t

[eleny]

5. He rides the fence for ratings

One cheek on either side of the dividing line. He's gotten to be a petulant bore.

[alphafemale]

7. I heard him admiring Dean's forearms once.

That's the closest I heard to admiration.

I generally avoid Tweety though. He comes off as a shrill nut.

[Demobrat]

11. His forearms?

Oh geez. That's even worse that Bush's butt in jeans.

[GabysPoppy]

8. My two cents

Tweety is a bully who backs down and runs like a scared rabbit when challenged.

I thought Al Sharpton was sensational on his show last night and Tweety held his words back a few times because he was an unarmed person in a match of wits with the Reverand.

He is also trying to position himself for the next administration because when * is kicked out he doesn't to be on a raft in the middle of the ocean without a paddle.

[Sagan]

9. notice how he NEVER blames *

It's Cheney's fault, it's Rumsfeld's fault... they deceived the Chimp..

Tweety will never hold the Chimp accountable for his failures, nor even for the fact that Tweety himself states -- that the Chimp is a powerless figurehead.

He's worse than useless. I wish he'd defect along with colmes.

[mlawson]

12. Didn't Tweety admit he voted for * ?????

I'm sure I saw that here a few weeks ago. So, he can't really blame * for anthing, having voted for him.

The only consistent theme he maintains is, that he really hates Clinton and Gore, and always bashes them, no matter what.

[janekat]

31. The only time I heard him say anything nice about Gore was when Gore

spoke out against the war in Iraq - way back when BEFORE it was popular to do so. Tweety then on and on about how great it was that Gore spoke out. For about two days - Gore was a hero. Now Gore is back to being dirt in Tweety's book.

[Blue_Roses]

15. I believe he's right

on that one. I too think Cheney is responsible for way more than he gets credit for! Matthews has that part right about Bush not reading books or thinking too much. He really isn't that bright. It makes it so much easier for Cheney to get away with what he does.

[janekat]

28. Tweety did say that Bush was like "Ted Baxter" several times

in one show.

[Julien Sorel]

29. I think this is the last-ditch Bush

defence against the Iraq war, and they're getting it ready now. Powell and Rumsfeld are already going to be gone; if the heat gets too much during a campaign, let it be known off the record that Bush is 'easing them out,' and you have your fall guys for the war, along with Cheney, who can be replaced as VP for 'health reasons,' if it comes to that. Since Bush made it known at the beginning that he was clueless and would be depending on his advisors, he would then start over with an essentially clean slate.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

10. he toys with his guests...he's a fucker and he voted for bush...he is....

a true 2 cent WHORE....

[grasswire]

14. he said it on c-span...

....when he didn't know the camera was on him. It was after a WH correspondents dinner and he was talking to that comedian who does Clinton impressions. (can't remember his name).

Tweety told him at length that he plays both sides, alternately. He said that's how he holds his audience. He roughs up one side, and then he roughs up the other.

The only time you can predict Tweety's behavior is when the issue is something that Catholics feel very strongly about, such as abortion. Then he is predictable. And that's why he savaged Kucinich.

[dolstein]

17. Matthews WAS an Tip O'Neill Democrat -- now he's a Bush Republican

You're kidding yourself if you think Matthews is going to use Hardball as a forum for promoting Dean in the 2004 general election.

Matthews sold his sold to the Republican Party long ago. He's passed the point of no return.

[Avalux]

18. Tweety is a strange dude

He's hard to nail down. If he were a woman, I'd say he's ruled by hormones. All I know is, the Freepers can't stand him. Visited there tonite and they're freaking out cause he brought up the Banner Lie (and sounded like one of us). They wanna hogtie him.

[UTUSN]

19. Just for Perspective: Tweety's Ratings

(Not linking, because it's from DRUDGE.)

*********QUOTE******
CABLE NEWS RACE
MONDAY NITE

FOX O'REILLY 1.9
CNN LARRY KING 1.6
FOX HANNITY/COLMES 1.2
FOX GRETA 0.9
CNN AARON BROWN 0.9
CNN ZAHN 0.7
CNN ANDERSON 0.6
MSNBC HARDBALL 0.3
MSNBC OLBERMANN 0.3
MSNBC SCARBOROUGH 0.3
CNBC BRIAN WILLIAMS 0.3
MSNBC ABRAMS 0.2
CNBC KUDLOW/CRAMER 0.2
CNBC BARTIROMO 0.2
**********UNQUOTE********

I agree with posts 17 & 18, that Tweezer is far gone from us. But longer ago than "Shrub Republican". My oft repeated theory is that he was a political flunky when he worked for CARTER & O'NEILL, where the operatives take their own status from the success or lack thereof of their boss, and thusly from admiring SUCCESS and POWER, and when RAYGUN smashed his bosses, Tweezer started his transfer over to the dark side, worshiping RAYGUN. Perhaps he didn't didn't actually vote for RAYGUN, but he's a belated "RAYGUN Democrat". As for the freepers not trusting him, I've said that every time somebody thinks they see him tossing us a crumb: The wingnuts DON'T TRUST HIM and neither should WE!

[Avalux]

20. Ugghhh

O'Reilly. Didn't really need to see that tonite. Anyone catch Terri Gross on Buchanan and Press? Buchanan ripped her a new one over the incident with O'Reilly....where he hung up on her. Wanted to know why she didn't handle him the way she did Franken; as if it was some sort of journalistic felony.

[CreekDog]

21. Tweety Said He Voted For Bush On Hardball...

I forget who he was interviewing but he said it coyly at first, like "you know who I voted for?" and then didn't answer his own question. About 1 minute later, he says, "I voted for Bush".

His general point was that he's a lot more conservative than most people think. Boy, he's out to lunch on his own image isn't he?

I found the show pretty much unwatchable since April 9th, the day the statue came down and he said something like "why can't these damn Democrats be proud of America?!" I wish I had the exact quote.

Nevertheless, I felt, Okay, that's enough. His show is pretty much crap. At least he had some substance and balance when he was writing his column. All gone now.

[UTUSN]

26. Said It to LUNTZ, Who Was, Oh SO *Shocked* n/t

[quaker bill]

22. That's for today

Lord only knows where he will be next week, or for that matter next show.

Next up, tweety drooling all over Ann Coulter, for the fourth time this month....

[fujiyama]

24. "Media Whore" is definetely

one of the best descriptions of Matthews. I used to think he had an interesting perspective being that he had some experience as a Washington aide. I always got the impression that he was right leaning, but I thought and still believe he's much more intelligent than O'Reilly (though that's really not saying much).

I only catch him occassionally because I couldn't stand his bashing of Gore and his bringing up Clinton all the time. He also seemed to have this strange fetish for Bush, and it went beyond any normal admiration for his policies. He always went on about how he was this great, normal man (and what was that stuff about him being a "man's man?")...

That said, he's been relatively consistant with his stance on the war. He seemed to be against it, though he did kiss Bush*'s a$$ around the time he landed on that aircraft carrier. He'll never actually blame Bush for anything, but at the same time he's admitted several times that Bush doesn't have any intellectual curiosity.

Yes, he is exactly what should come to mind when you think of "media whore".

[corarose]

27. Tweety is a Presstitute

Her will say whatever the person that is paying him wants him to say.

[Clete]

30. Back when things made sense, I used to read Tweety

in the San Francisco Chronicle. His articles actually were moderately liberal and informative. Somewhere along the line when he became a TV personality, his soul became possessed it seems by Lucienne Goldberg, and GE especially during the Clinton years, when he literally started foaming against all things that we liberals believe in politically. These days he doesn't even make sense anymore. Maybe an exorcism would set him straight again.

[leesa]

32. Tweety is an inconsequential lightweight who goes whichever way the

wind blows. I would expect that he is enormously insecure.