Earlier on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," amid the usual chattering of Scarborough, Buchanan and Barnicle, Chris Matthews was playing the oldest, tiredest Beltway game in the book: Assessing the past, based on knowledge from the radically altered present.
Why weren't we focused on Egypt a month ago? Matthews demanded to know. How did we fail to vividly see its imminent, revolutionary stirrings? Why didn't pertinent information from eyes on the ground there reach the very top here? Where was our human-intelligence infallibility and why, in short, weren't Egypt and its president at the very core of intense interest among all U.S. foreign-policy apparatuses?
This "presentist" game never seems to exhaust the punditocracy, but it sure does me. I realize there are enormous pressures on network talent to think of something to say, to fill those endless cycles of 24/7 bugabooing; but I also marvel at experienced hands, such as Matthews, who so desperately resort to the quickest of instant "insights":
Why weren't we obsessed with Egypt before it became obsessable, and what else -- other than reviving the world's largest economy and fighting one war and concluding another and virus-infecting Iran and fending off the latest lunacies from the right and ... and ... and ... -- was President Obama doing that caused him to miss an invisible revolution?
It had been a few months since I watched "Morning Joe." I think I'm good for a while.
I haven't watched Morning Joke since around October 2008. I have no use for outsiders who are only interested in pushing their own talking points.
Posted by: majii | February 04, 2011 at 01:44 PM
Well, why weren't the leading lights at Morning Joe alerting us to the revolution-to-be in Egypt?
Posted by: Bulworth | February 04, 2011 at 01:59 PM
Ceasing to watch any talking heads at all has done wonders for my blood pressure.
Posted by: janicket | February 04, 2011 at 06:53 PM
And how come Obama wasn't on top of that ambassador to Luxembourg thing, what's wrong with that guy?
Posted by: JS | February 04, 2011 at 08:11 PM
Yesterday I decided give up on any television show that covers politics. What I don't understand is why people, like the tweeter, assume that Obama did not know what was happening on the ground. Of course he did.
Thank you pm. I always enjoy reading your thoughts.
Posted by: Dorothy Rissman | February 05, 2011 at 12:51 PM
1st time reading this blog. I am happy to see there are a few smart voices out there.Mr Mathews and most others in media have failed the american public miserably. Such a shame. Thank you for not being afraid to be smart in this age of the dumbing down of America.
Posted by: Southern girl | February 05, 2011 at 01:10 PM