People, Places, and Events for 3 March 2020. The Hardball Approach Takes Down The Show’s Host
Eras End in Minutes: The Last Seconds of Hardball
Mika on Chris: There Has To Be a Better Way
Variety Magazine on Chris Matthews’ Abrupt Exit from MSNBC
One of the stated goals of Nightshift News is to experiment with different forms of internet publishing, using the newsite format as a starting point. Today, we changed the format up again. Kept all the links (and even added some new ones) that drive traffic to the site, but changed the way stories are featured. You’ll get it immediately: the new format is one main story, in depth, with multiple links, not just one.
Today that story is the abrupt retirement of news moderator/political reporter Christ Matthews from the show he created, “Hardball”, which has run for over twenty-years on the network now known as MSNBC. Matthews had the coveted 7PM time slot, M-F, which lead into the Killers Row of MSNBC’s nightly political block: Chris Hayes, Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O’Donnell and Anchorman Brian Williams closing down the block with his 11PM (EST) show.
There were rumors and mumblings that something was coming for Matthews and it involved an exit from the network. Rumors circulating at 30 Rock said that discussions were underway to ease Chris into retirement after the 2020 elections were over; until then, they needed his voice and perspective and history to help the network cover the 2020 elections are going to be even more chaotic and unpredictable than the 2016s. On deep background, undisclosed sources said that Chris was loosing his fastball, and had made some uncharacteristic statements recently. The most egregious perhaps being his comment about Bernie Sanders winning the Nevada primary, in which he compared the win with the Nazis marching into France (he apologized to Sanders and to Jews). But there was more. He confused one black legislator with another (Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina confused with candidate Jaime R. Harrison, a Democrat running for Senate in that state, both African-Americans) (he apologized for that mistake). Matthews came under fire for a withering cross examination of Elizabeth Warren after one of her debate performances (Warren herself was pretty relentless on the debate stage in going after Bloomberg, but got a pass because she’s….Elizabeth Warren, even though it was sticky, swarmy, “gotcha”moment that she did not rise above). And then the dam broke and allegations from years and even decades past started to rise as the pack saw another wounded victim and closed in for the kill. The final blow was a recent article about an alleged incident with Matthews written by a female writer. True or not, it had an impact.
So, more consultations with MSNBC brass and It was decided to speed up the time table, and typical of Matthews, who knows how to counter punch and come off the ropes, he felt enough was enough and decided to step down: his timing, his terms, leaving colleagues in shock and his time slot facing an indeterminate future. Steve Kornacki filled in last in last night (2 March 2020) but he’s not a long-term solution; Steve is a numbers guy, not a people guy and he doesn’t have the actual on-the-Hill experience that Matthews does. The name being floated is Shepard Smith, the ex-Fox News anchor who built a reputation for on-air elegance and left Fox News rather than continue to distribute Fox/Trump talking points propaganda. But…it’s early in the game. Shepard, though, is a good solution.
For Chris–this one is tough to take. He built the show, built the brand, and it can even be argued, built the MSNBC evening block. And now it’s over. Matthews is a restless force of energy, and the rhythm of his life has been irretrievably altered: the rush of preparation and going on the air and intellectually dueling–nightly–with some of the best minds in Washington and New York is gone. Left behind is an entire group of regular contributors and experts to the show who will now have to wait to see where they will contribute next. Filling that time and directing that energy will be tough for Matthews, but do not expect to see him on the air again. He’s made his mark, produced a very good body of work, and now he can just let it stand, as he should. One thing Chris said in his fairwell address–and he left the set after he finished it, Kornacki in New York had to do the rest of the show, much to Kornacki in New York’s Surprise–was that a new generation was coming through and it was time to let them take the reins. We saw the first indications of that new generation at work with MSNBC’s Road Warriors in the 2016 Election: Hallie Jackson, Katy Tur, Kasie Hunt, Jacob Suboroff, Chris Jansing, Kristen Welker, and Kornacki have all shown a remarkable ability to deliver very polished segments. They’re all good, but none have the remarkable a-life-in-Washington perspective of Chris Matthews.
You don’t know when and you don’t know why
I feel like an old memory hangin’ round
And man, we’ve got to face it, it’s a young man’s town
Some why bitch an’ moan and say they done you wrong
Just teach ’em what you know and pass it on down
‘Cause man, you gotta face it, it’s a young man’s town
Full of young man’s dreams
And all God’s children gotta learn to spread their wings
And sometimes you gotta stand back
And watch ’em burn it to the ground
Even though you built it, it’s a young man’s town
Man, that’s just the way that the story goes
There’s nothin’ you can do when the fields have turned brown
An’ man, you gotta face it, it’s a young man’s town
Full of young man’s dreams
And all God’s children gotta learn to spread their wings
And sometimes you gotta stand back
And watch ’em burn it to the ground
Even though you built it, it’s a young man’s town
And watch ’em burn it to the ground
Even though you built it, it’s a young man’s town
Good night, Chris…it was a great run and you will be missed.
The Nightshift publishes direct links to the world’s greatest English language newspapers to facilitate research and encourage understanding of the world’s events of the day as well as provide resources to follow certain segments of sports, business, society, art, and weather.
Our other site, donaldpierce.com is online and posting on finance, music, entertainment, sports, travel, design, medicine and whatever….check it out. Also, the playlist for March 2020 is at the bottom of this page; just click the button and our friends at Spotify will take care of the rest. Music is added to (and deleted from) the playlist everyday. Enjoy.
New York Times Morning Briefing
The Irish Times (Dublin, Ireland)
The Wall Street Journal (European edition)
Washington Post (Washington, D.C.)
The Los Angeles Times (Los Angeles)
South China Morning Post (Hong Kong)
Bloomberg.com (New York)
The Jerusalem Post (Jerusalem)
The Local (Oslo)
Sputnik (Moscow)
The Buenas Aires Herald (Buenas Aires)
The Sidney Morning Herald (Sidney)
Deadline Hollywood (Hollywood)
FiveThirtyEight (New York City)
Politico (Washington, DC)
Lawfareblog (Washington, DC)
Wired (San Francisco, CA)
Fast Company Compass Newsletter
Straits Times (Singapore)
NOAA/National Hurricane Center (Miami)
Golf WRX
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