For years, MSNBC’s Hardball host Chris Matthews has referred to Republican Senator Ted Cruz (Tex.) as Joe McCarthy or emulating McCarthyism and so he seized on Cruz’s fiery convention speech to claim Thursday night that he’s a McCarthyite playing “a perfect villain” for the Republican Party and Donald Trump.
Matthews also went as far as dubbing Trump “Mr. Winner” who became a victim getting “punched around” by Cruz that Republicans have since rallied against to prop Trump back up.
The disastrous host’s analogy began by stumbling on the word “drama” before finally forming a complete thought:
[A] drama needs a villain and Ted Cruz showed up for the job, won the audition. He is — he is the villain and also, people root for victims and in a strange way, Mr. Winner last night was the one who was being punched around. Cruz is a perfect villain. I mean, he really is.
This allowed Matthews to babble about Cruz “look[ing] just like Joe McCarthy” because “[h]e was born that way, that’s the way he is” in being “not popular.”
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He went onto mock Cruz’s line about “vote your conscience” as “malarkey” and accosted him for actively “betting on the failure of this ticket”:
As I said last night, his college roommate won't vouch for the guy and so when he came in here and faced, put the knife into Trump, by saying I'm not going to endorse the guy with that vote your conscience malarkey, everybody here knows what that meant which is I'm not to be trusted, I'm the bad guy. Obviously betting on the failure of this ticket.
Matthews concluded his old and tired trumpeting of Cruz as heralding McCarthyism by boosting Ohio Republican Governor John Kasich as having “played the role of St. Thomas More” by not backing Trump but not “trash[ing]” him.
As NewsBusters has chronicled since Cruz arrived on the national political scene, the liberal media have made it their mission to brand him as a 21st century Joe McCarthy on a litany of occasions in various settings that it’s seemingly impossible to count. For a sampling, go here, here, here, here, and here.
The relevant portions of the transcript from the 7:00 p.m. Eastern hour of MSNBC’s Republican National Convention coverage on July 21 can be found below.
MSNBC: Republican National Convention
July 21, 2016
7:17 p.m. Eastern
CHRIS MATTHEWS: Yeah. I think you need a drama — in any drama you need — I’m sorry a drama needs a villain and Ted Cruz showed up for the job, won the audition. He is — he is the villain and also, people root for victims and in a strange way, Mr. Winner last night was the one who was being punched around. Cruz is a perfect villain. I mean, he really is. He looks just like Joe McCarthy. He was born that way, that's the way he is. He is not popular. As I said last night, his college roommate won't vouch for the guy and so when he came in here and faced, put the knife into Trump, by saying I'm not going to endorse the guy with that vote your conscience malarkey, everybody here knows what that meant which is I'm not to be trusted, I'm the bad guy. Obviously betting on the failure of this ticket. I think that's what every politician sees. Pence, Mike Pence, is betting on the relative success of this ticket. Not necessarily winning, but doing pretty well and being a credit to the party. Maybe in the top 40s. But guys like Cruz, and a few others, are betting on its failure. Now, John Kasich, the host governor here who refused the role of host, is more interesting. He played the role of St. Thomas More. He's not going to support this candidacy but he's not going to trash it. It's very interesting to watch this as you guys say, a drama, a television show and it's now got a villain. His name is Ted Cruz.
RACHEL MADDOW: Yeah and that villain, the one great thing he brings to this is that he actually loves being the villain. You see like there aren't very many people in politics who, when they get booed and they get jeered it sort of makes them bigger. He likes talking to the people who are heckling him. He likes calling them out. I do — you know, Ted Cruz did train as an actor at a time in his young life and I think he likes being the bad guy and so that gives him an advantage for playing a role like this as long as it works out for him.
