Is this more about Chris Matthews...or about Barack Obama? Watch the clip and then read the brief text below it. (Hat tip: Drudge Report)
I didn't watch the speech. Claire and I opted for a tape of Holiday Inn but Matthews' remarkable line apparently came in response to the lackluster response the speech got from the West Point cadets. Der Spiegel points out that the powers that be at the Academy tried their best to create enthusiasm -- but a bad speech is a bad speech.
...One can hardly blame the West Point leadership. The academy commanders did their best to ensure that Commander-in-Chief Barack Obama's speech would be well-received.
Just minutes before the president took the stage inside Eisenhower Hall, the gathered cadets were asked to respond "enthusiastically" to the speech. But it didn't help: The soldiers' reception was cool.
One didn't have to be a cadet on Tuesday to feel a bit of nausea upon hearing Obama's speech. It was the least truthful address that he has ever held. He spoke of responsibility, but almost every sentence smelled of party tactics. He demanded sacrifice, but he was unable to say what it was for exactly.
An additional 30,000 US soldiers are to march into Afghanistan -- and then they will march right back out again. America is going to war -- and from there it will continue ahead to peace. It was the speech of a Nobel War Prize laureate...
One more note about the Matthews performance: Kathryn Lopez noted on her Facebook page the large number of e-mails she received that expressed outrage at his description of West Point as "the enemy camp." She adds this line from one of them, "Later in this clip Matthews says West Point is where Bush and Wolfwitz went when they wanted to 'rabble rouse'. So not only is West Point 'maybe the enemy', but they are 'rabble to be 'roused'"?
