Inauguration covered by has-beens

On inauguration day, MSNBC put together a panel led by Rachel Maddow that included Chris Matthews, Brian Williams and Steve Schmidt to provide live coverage of the occasion. The network would have been hard pressed to come up with a more mediocre group of has-been losers.

Williams lost his NBC anchor spot on the “Nightly News” for exaggerating the details of his military travels during the Iraq War. He was suspended without pay for six months and is now working on MSNBC. There is some doubt as to whether Williams will ever return to his former anchor chair.

Schmidt gained notoriety for his work as the chief strategist on the John McCain 2008 presidential debacle. Schmidt spent the 2016 presidential campaign explaining to anyone who would listen that Donald J. Trump had zero chance of winning the Republican primary. When the impossible occurred, Schmidt retreated, retrenched and proclaimed that Trump would never beat Hillary Clinton in the general election. He was so sure of this that as late as Nov. 5, Schmidt advised the Trump campaign to write a dignified concession speech to President-Elect Clinton.

Far and away the most biased comments came from Matthews. During a discussion of what role Trump’s son-in-law would play as a senior advisor, Matthews remarked, “It’s hard, Rachel, it’s hard to fire your son-in-law. That’s the tricky part. But Mussolini had a great solution to that. He had them executed.” Not content with the Mussolini comparison, Matthews pronounced Trump’s inaugural address as “Hitlerian.” Matthews is famous among unbiased newsmen for feeling, “this thrill going up my leg” while listening to a speech by Barack Obama.

Trump’s depiction of, “children trapped in poverty in our inner cities; an education system flush with cash, but which leaves our students deprived of knowledge; and the crime and gangs and drugs” has been described as raw, angry, aggrieved and dark. In addition, his statement, “This American carnage stops right here and stops right now” has drawn criticism from liberals for his usage of “carnage.”

According to the website “The Statistics Portal,” for the last six years, from 2011 through 2016, a total of 946 U.S. soldiers were killed in action in Afghanistan. If you Google, “How many murders in Chicago,” from 2011 through 2016, you get a total of 2,994 victims — more than three times the number of soldiers killed in a combat zone. That’s 946 killed in combat, 2,994 killed in Chicago.

Should this American carnage stop right here and stop right now?

Rube Render is the Curry County Republican chairman. Contact him at: [email protected]