On Tuesday, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews claimed that conservatives and Republicans are attempting to “delegitimize” President Obama by calling him “Obama” or “a liberal leader,” Matthews said.
“It seems there’s a very interesting compelling continuing effort to delegitimize this president,” he told “Bush’s Brain” author Wayne Slater.
“But they first of all referred to him, not as the ‘President of the United States’ but as a ‘liberal leader.’ They refer to the health care act of 2010 as ‘a bill.’ They refer to him as ‘Obama.’ They don’t say the ‘the president.’ They don’t say the ‘a law.’ They don’t even speak the language we normally speak in civilized political debate,” he added, as though he would know anything about “civilized political debate.”
“They’ve changed it so much that he’s actually not really supposed to be there,” he continued.
Sounding more like a tinfoil-hat conspiracy theorist than a thoughtful political pundit, Matthews insisted it was all part of a concerted effort to create the conditions where history would regard Obama as an illegitimate president, Noah Rothman added.
“And I’m not paranoid,” he concluded.
“I think that’s right,” Slater said, agreeing with Matthews.
According to Slater, opposition to Obamacare stems from the name that has even been adopted by Obama.
“Get him off the record books,” Matthews added.
As usual, neither Matthews nor Slater offered any real examples to back up their assertion.
Before Obamacare became law, it was “a bill,” just like any other law, and “Obama” is the President’s name.
A reader at Mediaite posted links to articles in which Matthews referred to the president simply as “Obama.”
“What part of the presidency does Obama like? He doesn’t like dealing with other politicians — that means his own cabinet, that means members of the congress, either party. He doesn’t particularly like the press…. He likes to write the speeches, likes to rewrite what Favreau and the others wrote for the first draft,” he said, according to a May 2013 article at Politico.
“Chris Matthews delegitimizes Obama,” the reader said at Mediaite.
Maybe Matthews should’ve looked in the mirror when he made his outrageous claim. Hat tip: Mediaite.
