Let's play Hardball (with Chris Matthews)
Skullduggery
Michael Isikoff, Daniel Klaidman, Victoria Bassetti
4.0 • 2K Ratings
🗓️ 3 June 2021
⏱️ 52 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Chris Matthews surprised his audience one evening in March of 2020 by suddenly stepping down from hosting “Hardball” on MSNBC, the political roundtable show he’d helmed for over 20 years. Matthews, whose new book This Country: My Life in Politics and History comes out this week, joins Michael Isikoff, Daniel Klaidman and Victoria Bassetti on this episode to discuss the role of the media in politics, how the polarization of today compares to the era of Ronald Reagan and Tip O’Neill, and to talk about the moment Matthews stepped away from his program.
Plus, our hosts respond to a troubling tweet from Maggie Haberman of the New York Times about Trump’s plans to return to the White House — quicker than seems possible, under a sober reading of the U.S. Constitution.
GUEST:
- Chris Matthews (@HardballChris), Author; journalist; former host of MSNBC’s “Hardball”
HOSTS:
- Michael Isikoff (@Isikoff), Chief Investigative Correspondent, Yahoo News
- Daniel Klaidman (@dklaidman), Editor in Chief, Yahoo News
- Victoria Bassetti (@VBass), fellow, Brennan Center for Justice (contributing co-host)
RESOURCES:
- This Country: My Life in Politics and History by Chris Matthews (2021; Simon & Schuster)
- “Chris Matthews retires from MSNBC after string of recent controversies” by Brian Stelter (CNN, March 3, 2020)
- “Chris Matthews Tells Joy Reid ‘Nobody Needs to Defend Me, I Did Something Wrong” by Daniel Villarreal (Newsweek, June 1)
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| 0:00.0 | For more than two decades, Chris Matthews was one of the most recognizable personalities |
| 0:07.4 | on cable television, the fast-talking, garrulous host of MSNBC's Hardball. |
| 0:12.8 | But while Matthews is off the air now, his passion for politics and media punditry is |
| 0:18.0 | anything but diminished. |
| 0:20.0 | That shines through in his new memoir, This Country, My Life, and History, an account |
| 0:24.9 | of a colorful career that includes stints as a White House speechwriter for Jimmy Carter |
| 0:29.6 | and as the top aide to then-house speaker Tip O'Neill. |
| 0:33.6 | For all the ferocious partisanship of those days, it was an era when arch rivals like O'Neill |
| 0:39.0 | and Ronald Reagan could still work together, forge compromises, and even be friends. |
| 0:45.4 | In short, an era very different from today. |
| 0:49.1 | What has changed in American politics and the media and why? |
| 0:52.9 | We'll discuss with Matthews himself on this episode of Skull Duggery. |
| 0:59.9 | Hi, do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United |
| 1:08.4 | States. |
| 1:09.4 | And will to the best of my building. |
| 1:11.4 | Reserve, protect and defend. |
| 1:13.7 | Constitution of the United States. |
| 1:15.8 | So help me God. |
| 1:17.2 | So help me God. |
| 1:18.2 | So help me God. |
| 1:19.2 | So help me God. |
| 1:20.2 | I'm Michael Isgoff, Chief Investigator of Correspondent for Yahoo News. |
... |
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