Two Versions of the Truth

The Atrios blog caught a telling moment on "Hardball with Chris Matthews," during its recent interview with Melanie Morgan of Move America Forward, the right-wing outfit that recently sponsored a feel-good tour of Iraq. As Morgan squared off against Iraq war veteran Paul Rieckhoff of Operation Truth, Matthews admitted that some of his guests tell him different versions of the truth when the cameras are rolling than when the cameras are off: "What I keep doing here is asking people on and off camera who come on this program, high-ranking officers, enlisted, former officers. I get sometimes, not all the time, two different versions, the version they give me on the air and the version they give me the minute when we‘re off the air. The version they give me when we‘re on the air is gung-ho, we‘re doing the right thing, everything is moving along. The version they give me off the air is, Rumsfeld is crazy. There aren‘t enough troops over there. We‘re not taking this seriously enough, or, we shouldn‘t be there, sometimes."

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