That guy is a moron.

The Obama campaign should revoke his endorsement.

BTW, what is an answer to the question Matthews asked? What has Obama accomplished politically, anywhere?

(doing well in school , giving speeches, and writing books don't count)

Also, Matthews failed to catch the fact that neither could Hillary's surrogate name any actual legislative accomplishment of Hillary's. She asserted that there were "numerous" such accomplishments, "all around the world," whatever that was supposed to mean, but she didn't actually name any specific example of Hillary's legislative achievement either.

Which was probably only because the Clinton campaign prepped her _not_ to mention the legislative achievement where Sen. Clinton authorized the Iraq invasion, or the one where she voted for censorship, or the bit where she passed the Patriot Act, or the time she backed Bush on Iran, or the vote where she made it easier for families to lose their homes in bankruptcy, or, well, actually pretty much anything Senator Clinton has actually done in Congress.

But, yeah, a painfully awkward moment, right up to the point where it sounded like the MSNBC studio crew applauded Olberman for making a dig at Matthews's expense after.

Don't change the subject, Rhube. What has Obama accomplished politically? (Not while in school or speeches or books.)

Um, pccostello, your complaint is almost as lame as the moron on MSNBC.  Obama *authored* ethics legislation that was passed *and signed*, and has *authored* bipartisan nuclear nonproliferation legislation, among other things.  Not to mention his work in the Illinois legislature on health care, police interrogation, etc.

Now, name me a major, non-symbolic bill that Senator Clinton has *authored* or *authored and passed* in her time in the US Senate.  I'm sure there's some, but given the time she's had (eight years to his two in the US Senate), I'd say Obama's record holds up quite well.

pc, Obsidian Wings did a good listing of the two candidates' Senate records a bit a go. The link is <href>obsidianwings.blogs.com/.../href>. Also, this very magazine had a great article about the work he has done with Sen. Lugar on the loose nukes problem.

Also, I'm sure you know of his state senate accomplishments (there was a great op-ed in the Post a few weeks ago about how he succeeded mandating police video tape interviews). Why don't you stop typing and start reading? Putz.

Chris Matthews is the biggest horses ass on TV, if you exclude the shills on Fox propaganda, the guy is such an obvious Republican supporter and his show Hardball is anything but, more like whiffle ball whenever there is a Bush administration official answering questions.  He must've had some kind of brain malfunction, he thought he was doing his show, he even said "this is hardball."

Matthews and Tim Russert need to be put out to pasture, because they're both dinosaurs who seem deeply out of touch the times, they're still stuck in the last century.

If you've even looked at any debate Obama's participated in, he touts his Senate ethics bill a lot. That should be at the top of anyone'e list who works for him, even if they haven't done prep.

pccostello, just to be clear, you're supporting Hillary because you approve of her legislative record? Because, for example, you support the Iraq war, you think credit-card debt should take priority over home mortgages in bankruptcy, you want to amend the First Amendment to ban flag-burning, you want to give President Bush a free hand on Iran, and you think the Patriot Act does a fine job protecting civil liberties?

The point is that nobody prefers presidential candidates on the basis of legislative accomplishment. Nor should they: presidents aren't lawmakers. Most of our best presidents had little to no legislative experience. Obama would bring about as much legislative experience and "accomplishment" -- more, actually -- to the presidency as George Washington (state rep), Abraham Lincoln (state rep), and Franklin Roosevelt (state senator).

It's just silly to ask which of two near-novice Democrats has more legislative achievement, especially when the race will ultimately be run against a Republican with a more substantive record of popular legislation than any of this year's Democratic contenders.

Wow, between this blog post and Kirchick's idiotic post (where were you Jamie, we were waiting anxiously!) it looks like they are really digging at the bottom of the barrel for ways to downplay Obama's victory.  I mean, what evidence!  One surrogate on Matthews couldn't name Obama's legislative accomplishments.  Stop the presses!  Wait, couldn't the surrogate at least acknowledge Obama's lengthy history of plagiarizing other popular American politicians!  I mean, I read on The New Republic about 12-13 times how this was going to make a difference in the election today (in Hillary's favor I might add).  

Does the media understand ANYTHING about modern politics?  Anything at all?  Bueller?  

Now, if we were talking about someone's haircut...

Obsidian wings had a nice piece back in 2006, before Obama declared, that listed some of his early senate work.

obsidianwings.blogs.com/.../barack_obama.html

Ethics Reform doesn't count because it only involves exceptionally rich politicians.

The work Obama did with Lugar on locking-down loose nukes doesn't count because that only affects people who still think that loose nukes from the former Soviet republics are actually an issue worth worrying about.  

I mean really, these have as much to do with the campaign as the Wisconsin primary - which doesn't count because Obama didn't capture the crucial elderly white women vote.

The whole night doesn't count because Obama gave a speech that wasn't crammed full of lofty, inspirational rhetoric - it had wonky policy stuff, and who really needs to hear that?

You Obama types, sheesh.  What will you think of next?

Rhubarbs,

Come on, Lincoln also served also one-term in the US House. Actually, If memory serves he opposed some popular war, claiming the President of the United States lied to get the United States into a war of aggression. Crazy anyone would make him President. How'd that turn out anyway?  

Is pccostello happy now? Now that the question's been answered for him/her? Let's have a conversation!

Tip of the cap to y'all, especially Rhubarbs and Adamvaught (I would've said the exact same thing if you hadn't beaten me to it....and y'know, if I was smarter).  

As mentioned above, go to Obsidian Wings and you can read all the gory details of everything Clinton and Obama have ever done.

There's certainly a trend of what they did; Obama focused on more under the radar, less flashy stuff like inner city education and nuclear nonproliferation, while Clinton did a bunch of stuff specifically for New York.  

Unfair? The "lack of substance" charge is the central criticism of the Obama campaign, and has been almost from the beginning. How anyone affiliated with the Obama campaign does not have a laundry list of accomplishments to reply to this charge is beyond me.

Nuclear proliferation? It addresses the central national security issue of our time. Lobbying reform? Ditto for domestic political issues. And those are just off the top of my head.

It is inexcusable that any Obama surrogate would not be able to respond to this charge. And Matthews was absolutely correct to pound him on it.

And I'm an Obama supporter!

Can somebody explain to be what is the purpose of sending out these hacks to fill up the airwaves with spin, besides filling up tv time with what amounts to free advertising?  When I'm watching the results come in on a primary night, I want to see:

1) the results

2) informed, supportable interpretation of the results (as an aside, is Chuck Todd the political equivalent of Bill James yet?)

3) the candidates' own speeches, as far as possible.

These preprogrammed apparatchiks spitting out bullet points are about as interesting to me as a three-hour lecture on paint drying.  For the moment I'm going to go with the idea that the whole incident was a form of dadaist commentary on the absurdity of the whole procedure.  That would at least make it interesting.