illumined horizon

I just encountered this blog, and I haven't had a chance to sift through it. I actually like Hardball and kind of like Chris Matthews, he seems like kind of an odd duck (he has that hyped up on caffeine thing going on and he uses a lot of flowery and sometimes awkward language), yet somehow he made it to the highest levels of two major networks... He sort of reminds me of the mad talk host guy (Howard Beale) from the movie Network, but with Chris Matthews it seems like some one from the Illuminati got to him before he could fully achieve the subversive potential that that guy had. So instead of an angry curmudgeon for the masses, he's a slightly askew middle of the road talking head; who's no threat to anyone but can be slightly incisive at times.

Hardball is good as far as an establishment political program (let's face it we're not talking about Democracy Now). Hardball and Larry King (depending on the guest) are the only news TV shows, that I find are ever interesting (I know Lou Dobbs and Keith Olbermann are supposed to be two of the only real reporters left on television, but I don't find either of their shows stimulating). Most everything else is Fox News lite or that CNN pseudo-objective milquetoast.

As I said I haven't sifted through the blog yet, but it looks like the main gripes are comments made by Matthews where he compared Michael Moore to Osama Bin Laden; and comments made in another interview where he said that the Democrats had positioned themselves such that Al Qaeda was rooting for them. Additionally, the anti-Matthews bloggers take issue with some speeches Matthews has given to conservative groups, where Matthews commandeered some pretty copious paychecks.

None of this comes as any surprise to me or particularly irks me, I've long since given up on Chris Matthews having any liberal or progressive credentials (he's little more than infotainment). Probably the best and possibly the only use for his show; is the instant gratification brought by the occasional dose of inside the Beltway Washington-speak, that his program singularly provides. If he does become still another megaphone for the right, that is deeply troubling; but I don't think he's reached that nadir as of yet. There's nothing wrong with preemptive action (in fact in situations like this it's the best possible course), but I guess for me these actions just don't strike me viscerally enough to do anything about them. We're not talking the fall of a liberal icon, we're talking the rightward drift of a wonkish Washington insider; I for one won't waste any sleep or shed any tears over this controversy.