CHRIS MATTHEWS, host:
Everywhere Clinton goes, I think he helps us--Democrats to vote Democrat. And
not only to vote Democrat, but to show up.
D'ja miss me, baby? Clinton's back with his book and he's smoking, but will
he inhale John Kerry?
Strange bedfellows. Four years ago George Bush used "Bad Boy" Bill to win
the presidency. Now he's out there cleaning up Clinton to win in 2004.
What's the president's game?
Anything I can do, she can do better. Can Bill Clinton cool down Monica and
warm up Hillary between the same two covers? And can Mrs. Clinton become
"Madame President"?
Plus, my thoughts on the time-out Ronald Reagan gave us for some good
behavior. All that and more with a superb roundtable on your weekly news
show.
Announcer: From Congress to the West Wing, he's been a Washington insider,
now he's one of the capital's top journalists: Chris Matthews.
MATTHEWS: Hi. I'm Chris Matthews. Welcome to the show. Let's go inside.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Interview: NBC's Andrea Mitchell, Chicago Tribunes' Clarence
Page, CNBC's Gloria Borger and the Washington Post's John Harris
discuss former President Bill Clinton's upcoming book and effect
on the 2004 campaign and a possible White House run for Hillary
Clinton
CHRIS MATTHEWS, host:
Andrea Mitchell has covered the Clintons for NBC News, Clarence Page writes a
column for the Chicago Tribune. Gloria Borger co-hosts "Capital Report" on
CNBC and writes a column for US News & World Report, and John Harris is a
Washington Post reporter who covered the Clinton White House and is writing a
book about it.
First up, d'ja miss me, baby? Bill Clinton is lusting being back in the
limelight, and it's not the first time.
President BILL CLINTON: (From file footage) While the evening is young and we
don't know yet what the final tally will be, I think we know enough to say
with some certainty that New Hampshire tonight has made Bill Clinton the
comeback kid.
MATTHEWS: Well, he's back again. The question is, with Clinton making a
splash...
(Clip from "Jaws")
MATTHEWS: ...is it safe to get back in the water?
Andrea, this is going to be a splash.
Ms. ANDREA MITCHELL (NBC News): You are unbelievable, Chris Matthews. You
know all politicians love attention, and all presidents and ex-presidents
love attention. No one loves attention more than Bill Clinton. You can just
see it in his body language, see it in his laughing too hard at that very good
Bush joke in the East Room of the White House.
MATTHEWS: So...
Ms. MITCHELL: He just loves the attention that he's getting. And he's
worked very hard for this, he's got a big advance to pay off, and he's going
to be everywhere.
MATTHEWS: Well, let's take a look at what he said to Dan Rather.
Pres. CLINTON: (Courtesy of CBS News/"60 Minutes"): I think I did something
for the worst possible reason, just because I could. I think that that's the
most--just about the most morally indefensible reason that anybody could have
for doing anything, when you do something just because you could. And I've
thought about it a lot, and there are lots of more sophisticated explanations,
more complicated psychological explanations, but none of them are an excuse.
Only a fool does not look to explain his mistakes.
MATTHEWS: Is that the worst thing he's ever said about Monica Lewinsky, `She
was so easy, that's why it was wrong'? I mean, that's what he's saying there.
Ms. GLORIA BORGER (CNBC): Yeah.
MATTHEWS: Gl--Gloria:
Ms. BORGER: Obviously--he also says, `I've thought about it a lot,' Chris.
You've got to believe he's thought about it an awful lot. And what he also
goes on to say, I gather, is that impeachment for him was a badge of honor.
So he moved, you know, very quickly from the Monica thing...
MATTHEWS: Right.
Ms. BORGER: ...which he's guilty, guilty, guilty, to impeachment which he
says...
MATTHEWS: Right. Well, let's dwell a little--little longer on the Monica
thing. Clarence, he must have known in writing a book and signing that first
deal for a huge amount of money...
Mr. CLARENCE PAGE (Chicago Tribune): Mm-hmm.
MATTHEWS: ...that part of the deal would be he'd have to do another
confession.
Mr. PAGE: Of course.
MATTHEWS: He'd have to go back and rick--rip the scab again, do it all over
again.
Mr. PAGE: Mm-hmm.
MATTHEWS: Is that what he's about here, is the cash?
Mr. PAGE: Oh, of course. Of course. And--and you--you're an author, I am,
you know, they'll be doing this--this part of it.
MATTHEWS: And you got to sell it publicly, that part.
Mr. PAGE: But he loves being in the limelight. He loves--loves being in the
limelight. But this isn't about Monica, Chris. It's about Clinton. He knows
he has to face up to this, so he sounds perfectly contrite. What else can he
say? `I--I saw my opportunity, and I took it. Shame on me.'
MATTHEWS: Right.
Mr. PAGE: We all know that. This gets the--the issue out of the way,
though, and then he can really talk about what this documentary that's coming
out this summer is about, which is that there was a vast right wing
conspiracy...
MATTHEWS: Right.
Mr. PAGE: ...out to get Bill Clinton.
MATTHEWS: The Harry Thomason piece?
Mr. PAGE: Absolutely.
MATTHEWS: Let me ask you, John Harris, it seems to me that once again spin
works the following way: You say something true, and then quickly, while
people are believing you, you lie to them. The issue wasn't just Monica, it
was lying in the deposition, it was the whole question of obstruction of
justice and the fact that he, for nine months, all during 1998, never told
anybody the truth. And that's what dragged it on and gave Ken Starr his
opportunity. Now he's blaming Starr.
Mr. JOHN HARRIS (Washington Post): Right. But, you know, the most truthful
speech that Bill Clinton every made was the one that was the most
controversial, when he finally confessed but didn't do it with contrition, but
went on the attack. People say, `Will he just tell the truth?' He's telling
the truth in this book. He does feel deep grievances. He does feel he was
shafted. He's going to say so.
Mr. PAGE: And he's not alone either.
Ms. MITCHELL: You know...
MATTHEWS: Right. You--you join him.
Mr. PAGE: Well, a lot of people agree--well, a lot of people agree that...
MATTHEWS: That what?
Mr. PAGE: Well, you know, look at--you don't see Congress going after the
Bush administration for the discrepancies and questions around--about Iraq,
etc., because they got a Republican Congress on their side. Clinton had a
Republican Congress that wasn't on his side.
Ms. MITCHELL: Well, Chris, from his perspective, and from the perspective of
true believer Democrats, which is largely his audience, he believes and they
believe that the stakes are so different. That the Monica thing was personal,
moral failure, but not on as grand a scale as war, death, terrorism.
Mr. PAGE: Torture.
Ms. MITCHELL: I mean, they can blame--torture--they can blame so many
things, in their minds, I'm saying.
MATTHEWS: I know that ar--it's because the bumper sticker argument, his lies
didn't kill anybody.
Ms. MITCHELL: Right.
Mr. PAGE: Well, that's true, isn't it?
Ms. BORGER: But I...
MATTHEWS: Right.
Mr. PAGE: Well, thank you.
MATTHEWS: I'm hearing you.
Ms. BORGER: But he's Clinton. He's going to make the case in this book that
it was Ken Starr who had a moral failure, that Ken Starr had an obsession with
proving this at a, you know, great waste to taxpayer money, etc., etc. And I
believe, from what I gather, is that, you know, he's going to admit to his own
moral failing, but I think Ken Starr is going to really come under severe
attack here and hardly anybody else will.
Ms. MITCHELL: It's--it's, you know...
MATTHEWS: Let's take a look at what he said about the press.
Ms. MITCHELL: ...Ken Starr as--as Jugaro or Cap--Captain Ahab.
MATTHEWS: And he went after the press. I guess he's talking about everybody
here. Here's how the press covered the Lewinsky affair. This is what the
president said the other day to Howard Kurtz. "The mainstream press was
basically in the tank with Ken Starr until the issuing of the Starr Report."
John, do you accept the fact there was a vast mainstream conspiracy?
Mr. HARRIS: Yeah, if you accept that as newspeople trying to find out what
was going on inside the Starr investigation, which we all were. And, you
know, he felt a--aggrieved by that. But we were trying to find out what was
going on, you know.
MATTHEWS: This is what we're talking about, and a lot of people--what they
spend? What's this book going to cost them, Clinton book "My Life"?
Mr. HARRIS: Thirty-five bucks.
MATTHEWS: So once you make that investment, you're going to read 900 pages of
this stuff. You're going to talk to all your friends about it on the beach.
Everybody's going to be talking about this book just because the sheer
financial investment this country's going to make. This book will sale--want
to make some bets here--a million copies.
Ms. MITCHELL: Well, it's already sold out the pre-advance.
Mr. PAGE: Yeah.
Ms. MITCHELL: All the book's are...
MATTHEWS: A million copies. Clarence:
Mr. PAGE: It's already a best-seller without a copy being sold yet.
Ms. MITCHELL: It's already...
MATTHEWS: A million people buy this book, they're all grown-ups. Kids aren't
going to buy the book.
Ms. MITCHELL: I'd say--I'd say...
MATTHEWS: Grown-ups are going to buy it, they have spouses. The--the
multiplier effect, the reverberations of this book is nothing to take likely
in this camp.
Ms. MITCHELL: It's well beyond a million already.
Ms. BORGER: Right.
Ms. MITCHELL: And it's--it's going to be two and a half, three million as
far as copies go.
Ms. BORGER: And--well, also the big question is will he beat Hillary's
sales?
Ms. MITCHELL: Oh, I think absolutely.
Ms. BORGER: So there's a bigger competition going on.
MATTHEWS: A bigger question is--a bigger question, when you finish this book
will you be inclined to vote Democrat in this year's presidential election?
Feeling that he was screwed, feeling that he was put upon by an overzealous,
crusading--moralist crusading Christian, whatever, and he was just--happened
to be in the way of that guy's doggedness.
Mr. PAGE: I think so. But remember, Chris, the fact of the matter is people
don't buy books they disagree with, you know? This is not going to be a
best-seller on the conservative book club list, right? You know, people do
buy--especially 35 bucks? They're going to buy a book because they like
Clinton. You know, not very many people who don't like Clinton are going to
be buying it.
Ms. BORGER: And a lot of this book, I'm told--I haven't read it yet--is about
his life and his growing up. And, you know, it--it is his life story, and a
lot of people are going to say, `Oh, OK. OK. OK. OK. OK.' I--I don't know
how gripping that's going to be. Just as with Hillary Clinton's book,
everybody loved those chapters on Lewinsky and all the rest, but the rest of
it was a policy book, right? So I don't...
Ms. MITCHELL: Micro-credit in--in the--in India.
MATTHEWS: Let's go...
Ms. BORGER: That's right. That's right.
MATTHEWS: Let's go--let's go to the political question. We checked in with
the MATTHEWS METER this week. We asked 12 of our regulars: Does Bill
Clinton's reemergence, and it's coming, help or hurt John Kerry? Seven of our
dozen say Clinton helps Kerry, two say he hurts, and two say it doesn't
matter.
John Harris:
Mr. HARRIS: It helps. And he's handled this so much better than Al Gore.
He hasn't made it a big psychodrama, he hasn't made it a big story, `Will he
align himself with Clinton or distance himself?' He just said `Clinton's a
fact of life. I'm going to deal with it.' He's much better off with that
approach.
MATTHEWS: John Kerry has?
Mr. HARRIS: Yes.
MATTHEWS: And--and do you think...
Mr. HARRIS: He's done it well. He's handled the Clinton factor well.
MATTHEWS: Let me just suggest something how he could help. Let's talk about
how he could help. The problem that Kerry has is not that people don't think
he's smart, not that people don't think he's probably qualified to be
president, it's can they get excited about him? Clarence, how will Clinton
help?
Mr. PAGE: That's right. Clinton is a great cheerleader. He can sell Kerry
better than Kerry sales Kerry, and especially with the party's base.
MATTHEWS: You can cell--you can sell Kerry better than Kerry.
Mr. PAGE: Well, you know, you're right there. I feel like I probably
could...
MATTHEWS: If you tried.
Mr. PAGE: ...and I'm independent. But what the heck, you know, but--but
the fact is, Clinton does generate excitement, especially with the base and
especially with African-Americans. You know, and he'll be out there on the
campaign trail and probably in more Black areas than White areas, for that
matter.
MATTHEWS: And that will help in a lot of states, Arkansas...
Mr. PAGE: Absolutely.
MATTHEWS: ...for example, and North Carolina.
Ms. MITCHELL: Louisiana.
Mr. PAGE: States Al Gore shouldn't have lost, yeah.
Ms. BORGER: Tennessee.
Ms. MITCHELL: And John Kerry doesn't have political sex appeal, Bill Clinton
does. And that's why we're talking about John Edwards. That's why there's so
much pressure for John Edwards to be a running mate. This--Bill Clinton
becomes the running mate before he has to make that choice.
MATTHEWS: So you put it together and you got John Kerry, staunch, very tall.
He looks like--as I said before, like he's from Mount Rushmore, you know?
Ms. BORGER: Right.
Ms. MITCHELL: The Abe Lincoln.
MATTHEWS: And you get these two Southern boys, hot tickets, out there
popular--in populace. Does that give this ticket the lift it needs to really
be a successful Southern ticket? John:
Mr. HARRIS: I--there's...
MATTHEWS: I mean, Florida, Arkansas, Louisiana, North Carolina.
Ms. MITCHELL: Well, Clinton...
Mr. HARRIS: Forget it. The South--this is not about the South, it's about
the border states.
Mr. PAGE: Right.
MATTHEWS: But don't you need the South to get the border states? Don't you
have to do 40 percent down there to get 50 percent in Missouri?
Mr. HARRIS: I think that's right, but you're not winning the South.
MATTHEWS: I know.
Mr. HARRIS: I mean, a Southern candidate might do.
Ms. BORGER: I--but I think...
Mr. PAGE: But the borders states are crucial. Gore shouldn't have lost
them, and he did.
Ms. BORGER: But I'm--I--but, you know, overall Clinton's going to remind
people that he created 22 million jobs.
MATTHEWS: Yeah.
Ms. BORGER: That's a very big issue here. You know, 1.2 million...
MATTHEWS: OK.
Ms. BORGER: ...people are--are not employed. So I think that he's...
MATTHEWS: Let me tell you something--one problem. I'm sorry. We only have a
minute. But this is all positive for the Democrats, but it also reminds them
of why a lot of people voted for Bush. His number one selling point was
Clinton, Clinton's mis-behavior. Everywhere he went in that campaign from the
first stop, `When I take the oath of office, it won't just be to the
Constitution, it will be to uphold the honor of the Oval Office.' Clinton,
Clinton, Clinton. Does this hurt the Democrats in those culturally
conservative...
Ms. MITCHELL: Yes.
MATTHEWS: ...Christian states like Ohio, Missouri, Kentucky, the states we're
talking about?
Ms. MITCHELL: It does to the extend that--I mean, George Bush and the way he
welcomed Bill Clinton to the White House, that was the George Bush that a lot
of people vote for, the--the person who respects the office and, no matter
what he thinks of Bill Clinton, because of reasons of history, the guy who
puts on the jacket in the Oval Office. That's why he welcomed Bill Clinton
that way, and a lot of people still feel that way.
MATTHEWS: Let's go back to the MATTHEWS METER one more time. We asked our
group, `Who won this week, Bush or Kerry?' And again, it's Kerry's win mostly
be default. I mean, it's been a bad time here. But two think Bush won the
week, and Howard Fineman thinks the third man won, Bill Clinton. Anybody
agree with that?
I'll be right back with that other Clinton. Is she a live contender for 2008?
I think so.
Plus, my thoughts on the week America warmed itself with history.
(Announcements)
MATTHEWS: Is Hillary a bonafide option for the presidency?
Plus, my thoughts on the way we said goodbye to Ronald Reagan. Stick with me.
(Announcements)
MATTHEWS: Welcome back. This week the Clintons returned to their old
stomping grounds for the unveiling of their White House portraits. You can
see Hillary already pining for the West Wing, but will Bill be happy down the
hall? Remember this: The former president mimicking himself at a--as a
future House husband.
(Beginning of video showing the White House Correspondent's Dinner on April
29, 2000)
Ms. HILLARY CLINTON: I wish I could be here more, but I really think Bill
has everything under control.
Pres. CLINTON: Honey, wait! Wait! Wait! Wait! You forgot your lunch!
(End of video clip)
MATTHEWS: It's so good. It's so good. Bill working over the East Wing,
hanging around the house, keeping things together while Hillary goes to the
big places, makes the big decisions.
Ms. MITCHELL: I want to know...
MATTHEWS: Can you believe it?
Ms. MITCHELL: ...if she--if she gets elected president someday does she get
a second portrait in the White House?
MATTHEWS: That's true. Well, does he get one? Let me ask you, first
question, does Hillary want to be president?
Ms. MITCHELL: Yes.
MATTHEWS: Clarence:
Mr. PAGE: Oh, yeah.
MATTHEWS: Gloria:
Ms. BORGER: Sure.
MATTHEWS: John:
Mr. HARRIS: Yeah. She's got a sense...
MATTHEWS: OK.
Mr. HARRIS: ...of mission about her life and has for a long, long time.
Ms. MITCHELL: Yeah.
MATTHEWS: And the implications, John, are if she wants to be president, she
would have to run in 2008.
Mr. HARRIS: Might--there's just a little implication for John Kerry...
MATTHEWS: And therefore she'd have an open opportunity. Can she succeed to
become president realistically if John Kerry wins the nom--wins the presidency
this fall? Is she blanked out, basically, if he wins the nomination this
fall?
Mr. HARRIS: Pretty hard to envision.
MATTHEWS: Ergo...
Mr. HARRIS: I think she might reset herself.
Ms. MITCHELL: I don't agree.
MATTHEWS: Can we all--Clarence, you be the politician. If she can't win if
he wins, does she want him to win?
Mr. PAGE: I'm projecting ahead how old she'll be eight years from now.
I--does--does Kerry want her to win?
MATTHEWS: Does--does Hillary Clinton want Kerry this year if she wants to be
president.
Mr. PAGE: In her heart of hearts, no. She does not want him to win because
she wants to run four years from now. However, she's a Democrat...
Ms. BORGER: Yeah.
Mr. PAGE: ...and she has got to be very careful, her and her husband. They
got to put on a good show whether they want Kerry to win or not.
Ms. BORGER: I, you know...
Ms. MITCHELL: The worst thing they could--they could do is to in any way be
blamed if Kerry should lose.
MATTHEWS: Have you noticed her not doing her best for Kerry last--last couple
of months? Have you noticed she's been sort of out of it already?
Mr. PAGE: Well, Kerry's been out of it.
MATTHEWS: Yeah.
Mr. PAGE: I mean, the fact is...
Ms. BORGER: I think...
Mr. PAGE: ...we know Kerry's been running even or better...
MATTHEWS: I just said she's not on the ballot yet.
Ms. MITCHELL: I don't think...
Ms. BORGER: Chris, you know, I think it's--it's our--it's our profession to
question the Clintons' motives. Everybody always questions the Clintons'
motives about everything. And, of course, we will about Hillary Clinton.
MATTHEWS: It's the business we have chosen.
Ms. BORGER: But I believe--I believe it's the--right. It is our--it is our
cross to bear. But I--but I think Hillary Clinton will campaign for him. She
will campaign for him very hard, and she will say, `Whatever happens, I will
see what happens down the road.' She was not somebody who all along was
planning to run for the Senate. Charlie Rangel went into her one day and
said, `Hey, maybe you want to run for the Senate,' and it was an idea she kind
of...
Ms. MITCHELL: You don't think that was a setup?
Ms. BORGER: I--well, maybe I'm naive here...
Mr. PAGE: I do believe it.
Ms. BORGER: ...but I--you know, but I do believe that she wouldn't go out
there and say, `Well, I'm going to kill this Kerry candidate.'
Mr. PAGE: Right. Right.
Ms. MITCHELL: Let me disagree on one thing.
MATTHEWS: Go ahead.
Ms. MITCHELL: I don't think that even if it's eight years from now that
that's a problem necessarily. I don't think it rules her out. Let's face it,
men older than that have run for president.
MATTHEWS: She'll be 64 in eight years. That's doable.
Ms. MITCHELL: So--so what? It's doable.
MATTHEWS: She's in good shape.
Ms. BORGER: She'll be 64. But...(unintelligible). We don't know the
answer.
MATTHEWS: Let me ask you about the--let me ask you about the conundrum.
Assuming they're still married--and we hope everybody says married who's
married--it seems like a nice thing to want. She's in the White House as
president of the United States, "Madame President," which I guess we could get
used to. We've gotten used to change. Down the hall where they pencilled in
and organize the social calendar is this guy named Bill Clinton--former
president of the United States, one of the most well-known people in the
world, if not the most popular--sitting down the hall putting--putting
together, `Well, should it be a tent, or should we have a state dinner in the
East Wing this year?'
Mr. PAGE: No.
Ms. MITCHELL: It leaves him with the Christmas tree decorations--decorating
the Christmas tree.
MATTHEWS: Will he take that job? Will he take that job?
Ms. MITCHELL: No. He'll redefine--he'll redefine the job.
MATTHEWS: What job will he have?
Ms. MITCHELL: It will be social policy in some sort, maybe health care.
Ms. BORGER: Right.
Mr. PAGE: No, no, no, Matt.
MATTHEWS: But how does--how does the voter--how does the voter know that he's
not going to be in the room when the decisions are made? And isn't that a
problem?
Mr. HARRIS: Well, it was a problem the first time around. He'll probably
have to get used to it if she gets elected. That's...
MATTHEWS: So two for the price of one?
Mr. HARRIS: He thinks he--I think he thinks he has the same job whether John
Kerry gets elected or Hillary someday, that is to go be Middle East envoy
where he is respected.
MATTHEWS: You mean a particular job.
Mr. HARRIS: That particular job. Off to the Middle East...
MATTHEWS: You don't think he'll be hovering...
Mr. HARRIS: ...to finish Camp David.
MATTHEWS: Here she's got a crisis, it's a 9/11 situation. Hillary's trying
to deal with it, right? Bill's down the hall. He's going to stay down the
hall, or is he going to--`Hill--Bill, get down here. We need you.'
Ms. BORGER: No.
Ms. MITCHELL: No. I don't think she'll let him in the room.
Ms. BORGER: No.
(Matthews laughing)
MATTHEWS: She won't let him in the room?
Ms. BORGER: And Chris--and Chris...
MATTHEWS: That's unbelievable.
Ms. MITCHELL: Not in the situation room.
Mr. PAGE: That's right. That's right.
Ms. MITCHELL: He's not the vice president, no.
Ms. BORGER: What makes you think...
MATTHEWS: Do we all agree that she--that the president--if he's--our
president, Bill Clinton, previous president--if he ends up being a first
husband, that he'll be kept out of the room where the big decisions are made
in a crisis?
Ms. BORGER: No. No.
MATTHEWS: Who believes he'll be kept out of the room?
Mr. PAGE: I do.
MATTHEWS: You two.
Mr. PAGE: I do, absolutely.
Ms. BORGER: I--I'm not--I'm not so sure. I think...
MATTHEWS: John, will he be kept out of the room?
Mr. HARRIS: What room are you talking about? They're--they're going to work
together.
Ms. BORGER: But I think, you know...
Mr. HARRIS: The secret of their marriage is they think--the--each thinks the
other is the smartest person on the planet.
MATTHEWS: Right.
Mr. HARRIS: And that is what keeps them together. And...
MATTHEWS: But who gets elected matters, too.
Ms. MITCHELL: She has to define herself.
Ms. BORGER: Right. She has to define him.
Ms. MITCHELL: The first woman president--if she is the first woman
president--has to define her turf, especially in national security. She can't
have people thinking that he's on--got his hand on the--the hotlines to
whatever the crisis is.
Ms. BORGER: But, I--Chris?
MATTHEWS: So he's not going to be her--her lifeline, huh? Like in "Who
Wants To Be A Millionaire"?
Ms. MITCHELL: No.
Ms. BORGER: But, Chris, it has to be an issue they would define during the
campaign. I could see her in the political campaign getting asked this
question and say, `This is the role Bill Clinton will have if I'm elected...
Ms. MITCHELL: Right.
Ms. BORGER: ...president of the United States.'
MATTHEWS: Right.
Ms. BORGER: And maybe he would be an envoy to the Middle East, or maybe--but,
`This is the job he will have,' and get it out of the way.
MATTHEWS: OK. Can I ask you a tough question? You, Clarence, because you're
going to hate this question. If he was a problem when he had a busy life in
the White House, what will it be like when he's not so busy?
Mr. PAGE: You know, people don't--they haven't noticed, but Bill Clinton's
done a lot. He's probably raised more money for AIDS in Africa than anybody
over the last three years. He's got a lot of things that--that he can do...
MATTHEWS: He can do causes.
Mr. PAGE: ...and will continue to do. And this--this is a lot like people
were asking about George W. `How much will your father be in the White
House?' Well, as you've seen, that has not been an issue.
MATTHEWS: But he'll be living there.
Mr. PAGE: I don't think the same--I don't think it will be an issue for Bill
and Hillary either.
Ms. BORGER: You don't know that.
Mr. PAGE: That's right. That's right, Bill's going to be on the road a lot.
MATTHEWS: It's fascinating. A strange new world. Perhaps, a brave new
world.
Mr. PAGE: Oh, yes.
MATTHEWS: Andrea, tell me something I don't know.
Ms. MITCHELL: Well, you know this, but I think our audience should know
this. We lost Bob Teeter this week, and he was the gold standard in the
business of polling, of not only being innovative, but being a wonderful
advisor and a truth teller to politicians in all parties. And we--we will
always miss him.
MATTHEWS: Right.
Mr. PAGE: And I agree.
And--and watch for a Senate--Senate Democrats to keep hamm--hammering away on
these two issues of torture and the 9/11 Commission, especially the Bush
administration's withholdings of the torture memos.
MATTHEWS: Will the Republican chairman of that committee--Armed Services
Committee, John Warner, go along with that?
Mr. PAGE: They are--on--on--on Armed Services side, John has been trying to
keep peace right now. He's not going to go along with it though in any way
that's going to really cause--force this administration to really open up.
MATTHEWS: Gloria:
Mr. PAGE: Orrin Hatch, conservative Republican from Utah, has 60 votes for
stem cell research. In the Senate he's going to bring it up and he'll fight
with the White House.
MATTHEWS: Will the president sign?
Ms. BORGER: Don't know.
MATTHEWS: John Harris:
Mr. HARRIS: Family competition here. Women buy more books than men,
Hillary's book is going to end up out-selling the president's.
MATTHEWS: Ooh. We'll be back to check with you on that one.
A great roundtable, Andrea Mitchell, Clarence Page, Gloria Borger and John
Harris. I'll be right back with some thoughts about our week long tribute to
America. Don't miss it.
Announcer: Close captioning provided by...
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Commentary: Peaceful week of Ronald Reagan's funeral
CHRIS MATTHEWS, host:
What made that week of Ronald Reagan's funeral so different? How do you
explain this time of peaceful patriotism? It's dangerous to say so so soon,
but it could it have been as much about us as about the man we laid to rest?
First of all, it was a pleasant break from the hard-to-take daily news of
suicide bombers, blown-up Humvees, angry crowds and hot foreign terrain. It
was a week that America came home to honor the memory of a popular president.
Second, it was a week off from politics. That was the uniter in the Reagan
week. The American people want to be a people again, not a pair of warring
tribes. Why do you think there was all that excitement about a Kerry/McCain
ticket? And why do you think President Bush's praise this week for Bill
Clinton came across so well? Many Americans just want a break from the
fighting, the nastiness, the feeling of being split in half as a country.
Now we're back at it. and I can think now we can run this national election
the right way, a way that will make us better, stronger as a country. I
remember a time when Democrats and Republicans, guys like Ronald Reagan and
Tip O'Neil, conservatives and liberals, could duke it out and both fellas
ended up with higher respect not just from each other, but from the country.
Go check the approval numbers.
The week of Reagan reminded us of that. And if funerals are really for the
living, the one we just had was as good as it gets.
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Sign-off: The Chris Matthews Show
CHRIS MATTHEWS, host:
That's the show. Thanks for watching. And happy Father's Day.
Next week, a fascinating look at the clout of this medium, television, in this
year's presidential election. See you back here next week.
