Chris Matthews: Clinton never had shot at greatness/never got opportunity Bush was given Tuesday

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 09/13/2001 | Chris Matthews

[discostu]

"I'm not going to fire a $2 million missile at a $10 empty tent and hit a camel in the butt. It's going to be decisive."

I sprayed my screen on this one. Having given a gem like that he better live up to it. There's plenty of people in the press that will be more than happy to point out everytime he hits a camel's butt.

[WIMom]

Well said! Bravo!

[The Grim Freeper]

He had a chance when a terrorist missile hit TWA 800. However, because he wanted a Nobel Peace Prize, he said he didn't want to have to handle the problem while on his watch. Some guy was on KSFO yesterday afternoon (on Babe in the Bunker's show), and was telling all about it and how George Stepinawfulstuff let the cat out of the bag recently, as well as someone else in Clinton's administration (can't remember the name). He also went on to detail how Gore got payoffs from the airlines (Delta, American, etc) in large amounts ($40K, $50K) immediately following his announcement that TWA 800 explosion was caused by faulty fuel tank.

I am relaying this second hand, so, if someone else heard this broadcast, please provide detail.

[Ole Okie]

What a clueless, sh!t-for-brains, typical @sshole thing to say. Allow me to paraphase: "I wish I could have gotten credit for ending World War II". If he'd been there, we probably would have lost.

Yeah, Sick Willie Clitoon would have fired a captured V1 rocket at a camel's butt and surrendered.

[Ann Archy]

You could have easily stopped with the quote by Bill Boy....that he would have liked to be President durig WWII, and that he was a man out of his time"...

Your posts are interesting...can you break them up o different threads so they aren't so long and more people could have the opportunity to read them?? Just a thught.

[Benrand]

That is the typical boome response..."I'm so much better that I just deserve to have achievement handed to me, no matter what the circumstance."

It's tacit admittal of how bad he is and how he could never see good in being President, other than just self-aggrandizing nothingness. So self-consumed.

[Syncro]

Yes Steve, he relly make tht comment and yes right in front of Hilliary!

Good info as usually Mia...Thanks

[TheGoodDoc]

Chris Matthews is one of the great figures in astrophysics.

The man is truly from outer space.

For eight long years, Clinton did nothing while Osama bin Ladin mass murdered Americans time after time, beginning with his first attempt to destroy the World Trade Center in 1993. Plenty of opportunity for "greatness."

Buttboy Matthews fails to understand that Bush would sacrifice his "greatness" in an instant, if he could save all those lives. Human excrement Clinton and his DNC apologists are upset that they are missing all the great photo-ops.

[Robert A Cook PE]

I disagree....though the graphics (perhaps) aren't "entrancing" - the combination of MANY different smaller quotes IS entrancing, and could NOT be done without the effort to pull it together.

Sooooooo. These people are NEVER going to "say everything" in one sentence, their supporters in the national press corpse AREN"T EVER going to put together these relationships and timelines into a single comprehensive package of condeming quotes ... like that of "minor" of China only signing the test ban treaty AFTER they got Lee's "computer tapes" of the software needed to verify their nuclear weapons, the supercomputer needed to run it, and the assumptions and design facts from this newly unclassified data to avoid design failures.

(After all, if you can be sure you avoid your competitor's errors and false starts, your own products need MUCH, MUCH less "testing" ....)

So, treason? Yes, but their liberal supporters will never "want" to believe it.....until Lee gets her Berkeley campus heated with the (direct) application of nuclear power.

[my_pointy_head_is_sharp]

Of course, you realize that this is a set up by Chris Matthews, don't you? He comes up with the proposition that Clinton never had a shot at greatness, never got the opportunity Bush was given. In Matthews' mind, Bush will blow his chance, and will not rise to greatness. It's all so predictable.

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

Gee, the Clinton clean-up crew is everywhere on TV this week. Has the Bush administration moved the technology sales oversight from the Commerce Dept. back to the Defense Dept. where it was pre-Clinton? Clinton's people neglect to mention the satellite and surveillance technology transfers to China. I'm sure we'll think back on Clinton's legacy many times in the following years. He may have to double his SS detail on U.S. soil.

[f.Christian]

You cut my favorite picture---Clinton Gothic...I was impeached to save the constitution---James/jane MadisonII.

Put it back!!

[Octar]

I enjoy your posts, Mia T. Thanks.

[Biblebelter]

You did an excellent job of culling this quote from the slobbering motor mouth of not ready for prime time media.

Mathews is a tease and a coward.

He is a tease because during the Clinton scandals,Mathews beat Clinton over the head with a pillow as if he was the kind of Democrat who takes a stand against criminality. This caused him to occasionally get in a cat fight with someone like Paul Begala but he never could condemn Clinton with anything more than the snide aside.

He is a coward not only because I suspect that his draft record would reveal that he is, but because any time firm military action is discussed, his dove or chicken credentials become manifest depending on what ever metaphor works best for you.

[Emily RN]

Mr. Clinton had a couple of chances. He just didn't recognize them. There was the first attempt at the WTC and the bombing of the USS Cole. For such a smart man looking for the opportunity of being a great leader... this might not have occurred if Clinton had been seriously looking for greatness instead of gratification.

[f.Christian]

bttt

[Mr. Bungle]

Once again, Chris Matthews shows his fixation on gamesmanship and the aesthetics of political portraits. The opening paragraph is sad testimony to Matthews' undaunted crusade to trivialize himself - with his sickening wistfulness for what Bill Clinton "might have been."

We've seen things like this from him before. It is stomach turning in its tasteless irrelevance.

[NixNatAVanG InDaBurgh]

Once again, Chris Matthews shows his fixation

He doesn't have McCain to slobber all over this time. I think the boy needs a real hero he can call his very own.

[Texbob]

Yes, he did have his chance at greatness when ask about getting Lewinski's in the oval office he lied and said No. So sexual preditor and Liar became his legacy.

[Dan Day]

As Clinton continured his search, he lamented that he could not see a big, clear task before him. Part of him yearned for an obvious call to action or even a crisis. He was looking for that extraordinary challenge which he could define and then rally people to the cause. He wanted to find that galvanizing moment. "I would have preferred being president during World War II" he said one night in January 1995. "I'm a person out of my time."

Translation: "I wish the US had gone through a big criss when I was in office, so I could have looked more Presidential."

The depths of Clinton's selfishness and craving for personal glory never ceases to amaze me.