So says his boss Phil Griffin, anyway. It should be noted that Griffin doesn’t specify which nation.
If you take MSNBC President Phil Griffin at his word, “Hardball” host Chris Matthews is the cable network’s top employee.
“Everything he does, especially as he gets older and succeeds, is really impressive,” Griffin told a crowd at Washington, D.C.’s P.J. Clarke’s restaurant Tuesday night gathered to celebrate Matthews new book, “Tip and the Gipper: When politics worked.”
“Chris is now either the No. 1 or 2 guy every night since we moved him to 7 p.m.,” said Griffin, referring to Matthews new time slot at the network. “He also beats everybody in the competition — meaning Fox, our big challenger — one out of three nights. And we hope to do that regularly. It’s impressive what he’s done. We call him a national treasure at MSNBC. If you’ve ever seen Chris at an airport, you know what that means. Everyone comes up to him.”
The same is true of TSA agents. Are they a national treasure as well?
Griffin is right that Chris is either the No. 1 or 2 guy every night. Well, he’s half-right. But beating FNC one out of three nights? Really? Is Griffin rounding way, way up, or does he just not know how math works? It’s definitely not a required skill at MSNBC…
To be fair, Griffin came to praise the geezer, not to bury him. Matthews was sitting right there. But at least Griffin could’ve come up with something nice to say without just plain lying. “His voice sure does carry,” that’d be a good one. Or, “Well, he’s never boring, gotta give ‘im that much.” Stuff like that. But just making up ratings? Come on, man.
Speaking of which, after Griffin whined to Nielsen about Megyn Kelly’s ratings last week, they got back to him: Too bad, crybaby.