We have seen some “chatter” about the second-straight brilliant episode of Hardball today, and hot damn, this is some seven-diamond comedy here. Matthews is interviewing Republican radio host “Kevin James,” who screams in some white-trash voice about Obama being an appeaser for a couple minutes, before — around 4:00 into the clip — Matthews annihilates him, calls him “pathetic,” says “you don’t know anything,” and does this for several minutes. Nice work. Do it again tomorrow! [MSNBC]

Last night John McCain appeared on Chris Matthews’ Hardball “College Tour,” live from Pennsylvania’s Villanova University. And who asks the second Student Question but Peter Doocy, and it is about doing shots of whiskey, and he’s the personification of Frat, and he’s the son of Fox & Friends co-anchor Steve Doocy — quite possibly the biggest (yet most harmless) douche on Fox News. They are the same person, except one of them has a national teevee show. The clip is below! MORE »

*AWW, SAD TWEETY:* Chris Matthews opened Hardball today with a long explanation/apology about his kinda sexist comments against Hillary Clinton. Check out the video and transcript on Media Matters — the “WHOA” at the end, that’s priceless. And speaking of Media Matters, screw those guys. They quoted us on their just-as-longwinded, just-as-worthless manifesto against Chris Matthews earlier today. We enjoy making fun of this puerile douchemongerer nearly as much as Mike Huckabee enjoys a good thoroughbred in the sack. But an earnest movement against this Aspies flapmouth? Please, spare us. [Media Matters]

Clues for Discovering Closet Fascists: Do they complain that the Senate is bad without Trent Lott and John Breaux? Do they say “it must be no fun with you guys gone”? Do they say “I would like to be a Senator if I could hang out with you guys”? Do they call Trent Lott and John Breaux “great veteran political heroes and legends of the Senate”?? Maybe if Trent had never resigned, Chris Matthews wouldn’t have had all these problems.

Sweet candied Walnuts! Get this: John McCain is in his motherfucking 70s but has a mother. You know, one of those things that children and young adults have. Well, Friday was “Bring Your 95-year old Mother To ‘Hardball’ And Watch Her Say Crazy Shit On National TV” Day for our campaigners, and Walnuts heeded the call. Watch Roberta McCain, in the video above, explain why congressman… er, senat… well some doo-hickey government employee Mitt Romney and his magic pajamas-wearing ilk are ruining the world. You’re next on her hit list, youse whiskey-toting Irish papists.

Romney gives Roberta McCain a ‘pass’ for Mormon comments [CNN] MORE »

You know those ridiculous “Join Rudy” YouTube ads about how Fred Thompson’s a transsexual and Mitt Romney’s a scientologist? Well, they didn’t actually win the MSNBC Hardball Chris Matthews video awards, which is apparently a real thing. [Inside Cable News]

Tammy Haddad is out as a ‘Hardball’ producer, possibly because Chris Matthews is now the second-least watched host on MSNBC. Guess who he’s beating, though! [Tammy Haddad Out As Chris Matthews EP [HuffPo]

Patrick Fitzgerald cut some kind of mysterious deal with Tim Russert to get the TV entertainer to briefly testify, but Scooter Libby’s lawyers want to know what Russert was promised and why “prosecutors failed to ask Russert a number of important questions.” MORE »

As the drawling Joker-esque GOP op Ed Rogers made clear on Hardball, Barack Hussein Obama has a very sinister Muslim middle name that’s just one “Saddam” away from being “Saddam Hussein.” MORE »

We couldn’t help but feel yesterday that Salon got set up. The charges against Allen (used the N-word, dead deer head in black family’s mailbox) seemed a bit too good to be true and bit poorly sourced. Then journos looking into the story began getting flooded with refutations, character witnesses, and counter-accusations from Allen HQ. Then the good Senator’s blog had a couple remarkably well-researched posts responding to the charges by Monday afternoon. Suddenly the story was about Salon itself, or the trustworthiness of Scherer’s only named source, or that weird deer story, and it seemed like Allen’s guys had finally learned damage control. MORE »

Seriously, if it was anyone else, we’d barely notice, but when Hardball (now partnering with EXPERT POLITICAL ANALYSTS AT THE NATIONAL JOURNAL) presents two still pictures and brief clip of Gene McCarthy while talking about McCarthyism (in a prepared, edited video), it’s hilariously embarrassing. MORE »