In the latest “Lean Forward” ad, which aired during Sunday’s Up w/ Steve Kornacki, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews continued the network’s theme of pushing liberal policies on its airwaves.
The Hardball host declared that “the one lesson we learn again and again is that it matters who is elected. Whether it’s in a small suburb of Missouri or in the American presidency.”
Interestingly, Matthews’ reference to Ferguson, Missouri came on the same day as a front page story in the New York Times highlighting how Democrats’ efforts to turn out the black vote in November could determine control of the Senate.
The ad continued:
If you have not registered to vote, do it. If you have not made definite plans to get to the polls, get on your horse. Get it planned, get yourself organized or else don’t complain about the direction of this country. Nobody’s vote is more important than yours unless you don’t show up. Then everybody’s vote is more important than yours.
Matthews’ latest “Lean Forward” ad follows a series of liberal themed commercials for MSNBC narrated by Matthews. In May of this year, the MSNBC host proclaimed that the American Revolution was an example of how “liberalism always this year.” In June, the Hardball host declared “the Liberty Bell rang forth for…equal pay and marriage equality.”
Unsurprisingly, MSNBCs use of their “Lean Forward” commercials to promote liberal causes at the ballot box has been going on since for many years. In 2010, MSNBC’s Ed Schultz used the “lean forward” line as an explicit Democrat campaign slogan for the midterm elections. Following the reelection of President Obama in 2012, MSNBC's Rachel Maddow helped spike the football for Democrats by listing off a litany of Democratic “achievements” essentially a mirror-image of the DNC platform.
See relevant transcript below.
MSNBC
October 19, 2014
Lean Forward Ad
CHRIS MATTHEWS: We have a tough election coming up this fall. You can see it in the polling numbers. The one lesson we learn again and again is that it matters who is elected. Whether it’s in a small suburb of Missouri or in the American presidency. If you have not registered to vote, do it. If you have not made definite plans to get to the polls, get on your horse. Get it planned, get yourself organized or else don’t complain about the direction of this country. Nobody’s vote is more important than yours unless you don’t show up. Then everybody’s vote is more important than yours.
