The venom bubbling below the visible anger of MSNBC’s three nightly hosts — Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow — was unmistakable after President Obama’s speech, in which he praised former President Bush and the brave troops who gave their all to get us to this point.
For those like Matthews, Olbermann and Maddow, President Obama’s admission is a defeat for their network, which spent the last seven years of Operation Iraqi Freedom seeking to undermine the mission there through hearsay, spin, lies and general misinformation. Olbermann and Maddow, who have basically built their careers by fanning the flames of the public discontent, were visibly shaken; they had once proudly professed that Iraq was a lost effort from the start, yet through it all the fine men and women of the military, some giving life and limbs, were able to secure victory and thus spell the leftists’ defeat.
The venom rest in the fact that President Obama, a President many of them feel they help get elected, would praise the former President Bush – whom Olbermann and Maddow detest to his core — would receive public praise from one of their own for standing behind those troops that lead the surge efforts in Iraq.
Current and former hosts of various MSNBC programs during Operation Iraq Freedom allowed their programs to be used as vehicles for various astroturf anti-military groups that sought to undermine our efforts not only in Iraq, but Afghanistan as well. Matthews, Olbermann and Maddow seemed pleased as punch when it was thought U.S. combat troops might be leaving Iraq last month with their tails between their legs. Maddow even reported on the withdrawal from Baghdad’s Green Zone.
But their delight turned into horror in the days following as President Obama started to credit the surge of troop into Iraq as bring about enough stability for the United States to officially end combat operation in the country: it was for them in fact Mission Accomplished!
MSNBC spent the last seven years cheering for the defeat of U.S. troops in Iraq and the nation’s complete failure post-Saddam. Now those troops will return home victorious, Iraqis will have the chance to build their version of a shining city on the hill, while for MSNBC the lesson learned is: “no defeat is as bitter as the defeat you suffer, while cheering for the defeat of others.”