Veteran Taking on Chris Matthews is Project 21’s Kevin Martin

David Almasi reports on the “veteran who took on Chris Matthews” after the Matthews-Edwards “civility” debate on Hardball earlier this week, noting that the black veteran in the video that has been circulating rather vigorously on talk radio and the Internet today is none other than Project 21‘s Kevin Martin.

From David Almasi:

When Ann Coulter appeared on MSNBC’s “Hardball” program June 26, Chris Matthews brought on Elizabeth Edwards via phone to ask Coulter to stop attacking her husband in books, columns and media appearances. Coulter refused, but she didn’t fight back as hard as she could. That’s where Project 21’s Kevin Martin came in.In a clip that is posted on Breitbart and was referenced by Rush Limbaugh on his June 29 show, Kevin confronts Matthews after the show is over to ask why the same criticism is not being leveled at senior Democrats in the House and Senate who are slinging the mud at the Bush Administration and impugning the integrity of our troops in Iraq in the same manner that Coulter is being called on the carpet for.

Not that The National Center defends Coulter for calling John Edwards a “faggot” at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (in fact, we were highly critical of her remarks), but those who throw stones should not be living in glass houses.

Thanks for pointing that out, Kevin. You may not have gotten on the air in “Hardball Plaza” that night, but your web coverage is probably getting better ratings!

To contact author David Almasi directly, write him at [email protected]

P.S. from Amy: For those interested, here’s the transcript (paid subscription required) from Rush Limbaugh’s show today:

RUSH: I want you to hear audio. There is video to this. It’s available at I think Breitbart.com and LiveLeak.com. I was advised to watch this, and I did, and it’s Chris Matthews being berated, if you will, by a black Army veteran after the Ann Coulter show on MSNBC earlier this week.VETERAN: No, no, no, no, no, I want to know why politicians are off limits, but US troops are not. People who actually put on the uniform, go out and fight and die. Okay, she is calling in and complaining about one person that said something in a book. Ann Coulter is not elected to the senate, okay, John Kerry is, Dick Durbin is. Ok, and if we want apologies and personal attacks to stop.

MATHEWS: Wait, who has been attacking the soldiers?

VETERAN: Okay, let’s see, Dick Durbin has compared them to the Nazis, “Abu Ghraib is now open under new management.” Okay, but our soldiers are not out there blowing them damn selves up, and I as a veteran take a genuine–

MATHEWS: So you don’t think they should have criticized Abu Ghraib?

VETERAN: No, hey, look, policy is made by civilians. Troops only do what they can.

MATHEWS: I’m going to tell you something. This administration has denied that was a policy from the top. I believe it was, you don’t agree.

VETERAN: I believe–

MATHEWS: No, you believe–

VETERAN: Wait, wait, wait. Wait a damn minute Chris, if you want to talk about policy made from the top, let’s talk about the mess made over in Rwanda.

RUSH: Rwanda. This is a black veteran and what his point was, “What are you wasting time here with Ann Coulter? You’ve got one person.” He says, “I’m getting sick and tired, you never criticize politicians. You’re always criticizing people out there, one person who wrote something in a book but you don’t criticize John Kerry, you don’t criticize Dick Durbin. You don’t criticize anybody who’s elected. Ann Coulter is not elected to the Senate.” Matthews said, “Who’s been attacking the soldiers?” What kind of question is that? Who’s been attacking the soldiers? How about the entire Democrat Party leadership in both the House and the Senate? What do you call it when you invest in defeat? What do you call it when you say the surge is worthless, when you say that we’ve lost the war in Iraq, what are you doing? When you run around and impugn the integrity and the intelligence of enlisted personnel by saying, “Ah, they come from the wrong side of the tracks. That’s the only place they can go to get an education. That’s the only place they can go to have a future. They don’t really want to be in the military,” what do you do? How do you not know that the troops are being attacked by Democrats if you host a cable news show, as Chris Matthews does?

Of course this guy fired right back, “Well, Dick Durbin called the troops Nazis,” and so forth, and it was Ted Kennedy who said that Abu Ghraib is now open under new management, comparing our running of Abu Ghraib to Saddam Hussein. Now, this was cool, because this is a veteran who’s fed up with this kind of coverage, and he was in the audience, and he sought Matthews out after the show to give him piece of his mind. To Matthews credit he stood there and talked to him. There was a camera rolling, and I think Matthews knew it.



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