The panel on the Thursday edition of MSNBC’s Hardball had plenty to say about Hillary Clinton’s e-mail scandal in light of the State Department Inspector General (IG) report with Sanders supporter/former Democratic State Senator Nina Turner (Ohio) rebuking Clinton for essentially “jump[ing] off the bridge” with her predecessors into private e-mail (even if it's against the rules).
Turner prefaced the line by admitting that Clinton should “just come totally clean” on the e-mail account and server account before pointing out how her mother “would chastise me about doing something that my friends have done” that wasn’t right didn’t mean she should either.
Host Chris Matthews briefly interrupted Turner with this head-shaking line about Clinton’s e-mail practices and Thomas Jefferson: “By the way, e-mails are relatively new by the way. Thomas Jefferson didn’t use e-mails.”
Turner then continued on with her story: “But, Chris, this is the point. She would say, if they jump off the bridge, are you going to jump too? I mean, this is the point. It's just don't totally dismiss it. Like, you got to totally own it.”
Earlier in the segment, Matthews sought to hoist blame not on Clinton but on her staff for not telling Clinton that a private server was a bad idea (and totally ignoring the fact that someone with Clinton’s stature couldn’t have realized that herself):
This is a tough one to try to get through cause it's murky. No one ever told Secretary Clinton when she was secretary don't use the private e-mail server. Nobody ever told her. Whose fault is that? That’s what I’d like to get to. Why — usually, when you go to school they say use eight and a half by ten paper or whatever, use a pencil and there's instructions to every part of our life, but there was no like literal, clear instructions to her, don't do that. Do this.
A liberal columnist but no loyal Clinton supporter by any stretch, The Washington Post’s Ruth Marcus proclaimed near the tail end of the segment that she need to take a moment and “express some sympathy for Hillary Clinton” because “[w]hen she says I don't want the personal to come out, that is the result of having years of having everything in her life excavated.”
As Matthews cut her off and urged viewers to read her latest Post column, Marcus hypocritically complained “[w]e understand why she’s sensitive” about having, say, a government account or the public viewing her e-mails because she had just ruled minutes earlier that Clinton has unfortunately created “a culture of enabling” around her.
The relevant portions of the transcript from MSNBC’s Hardball on May 27 can be found below.
MSNBC’s Hardball
May 26, 2016
7:18 p.m. Eastern
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Ruth, I know we were talking before. This is a tough one to try to get through cause it's murky. No one ever told Secretary Clinton when she was secretary don't use the private e-mail server. Nobody ever told her. Whose fault is that? That’s what I’d like to get to. Why — usually, when you go to school they say use eight and a half by ten paper or whatever, use a pencil and there's instructions to every part of our life, but there was no like literal, clear instructions to her, don't do that. Do this.
RUTH MARCUS: I think that there's two levels of fault. I think there was a culture of enabling around her. That’s true of a lot of politicians. You're the important person. You're the principal. Everybody wants to make you happy and satisfied. Your role as the principal is to have people around you who feel empowered to stand up to you and Hillary Clinton made a mistake but her staff also and the people who were working for her failed her by not telling her this was a truly bad idea.
(....)
7:20 p.m. Eastern
NINA TURNER: You got to — I mean, you got to just come — just come totally clean.
MATTHEWS: Can she?
TURNER: This is the problem. She keeps saying she did what other secretaries of states have done and I know growing up my mother, when would chastise me about —
CORN: Here we go!
TURNER: — doing something that my friends have done.
MATTHEWS: By the way, e-mails are relatively new by the way. Thomas Jefferson didn’t use e-mails.
TURNER: But, Chris, this is the point. She would say, if they jump off the bridge, are you going to jump too? I mean, this is the point. It's just don't totally dismiss it. Like, you got to totally own it.
(....)
7:22 p.m. Eastern
MATTHEWS: By the way, I — look, the argument she needs is look, it seems to me to be better off for everybody, as Hillary Clinton has said, if she used two e-phones — iPhones or whatever you call them. E-mail systems and if she just said, okay, is it government business? Okay, I’ll do that on that, okay? If there’s someone I’ve got to get some kid into Stanford because they gave me money to campaign. That's a different phone call that she should be allowed to keep to herself. Right? That’s something that she does on her own.
MARCUS: Right and let me express some sympathy for Hillary Clinton here, right? When she says I don't want the personal to come out, that is the result of having years of —
CORN: Ken Starr.
MARCUS: — having everything in her life excavated. We understand why she’s sensitive.
