MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript
Interview
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MATTHEWS: Howard, of course (INAUDIBLE) You know, Biden -- you worked
with him for all those years in the Senate. Tell us about the real Joe Biden, not the guy that "Saturday Night Live" loves to destroy.
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D), NEW YORK: The real Joe Biden -- he`s the real deal. He`s a kind person. He`s a decent person. And best of all, when he was in the Senate, there were maybe four or five senators who instinctively knew how to talk to average people without thinking about it. That`s in his bones. That`s who he is. That`s who he -- what he believes in. And there`s no pretense about him. He was popular in the Senate because he was the real deal.
MATTHEWS: Howard?
HOWARD FINEMAN, HUFFINGTON POST MEDIA GROUP, MSNBC POLITICAL ANALYST:
Yes, well, I watch the club from the outside, and that`s absolutely right.
You can tell who`s liked and who`s not, who`s trusted and who`s not. And
Joe Biden was trusted. He`s the guy who always took the train from Washington back up to Wilmington.
MATTHEWS: Because?
FINEMAN: Because that`s where he lived --
MATTHEWS: And because his two kids were orphaned.
FINEMAN: His kids were orphaned. His first wife died in a tragic accident. He`s the kind of guy who liked to ride the train, who liked to talk to people on the train.
SCHUMER: Right.
FINEMAN: His dad was a car dealer. He`s an average guy. He went to state schools. He knows how to speak the real language.
He is -- you know "The Onion" newspaper, the humor newspaper? They`ve
got a guy they call Onion Joe Biden, and he`s a guy with tattoos and a muscle T who`s always polishing his Pontiac. And that`s an exaggeration, but on the other hand, that`s who Joe Biden is.
And the other thing about Joe Biden, though, is that -- and I think the senator will agree with me -- he was one of the best-informed, most detail-focused guys.
SCHUMER: Right.
FINEMAN: He was chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, chairman
of the Judiciary Committee. This is not just a show horse by any means.
This is a guy --
MATTHEWS: It helps if you`re 29 years old when you get elected to the
Senate!
FINEMAN: Well, yes, but --
SCHUMER: True.
FINEMAN: -- but -- but he`s a -- he`s a -- he`s a -- he`s was a serious senator and legislator, which is the other reason why people such as Senator Schumer respected him.
MATTHEWS: Well, you know, I understand --
SCHUMER: And when he -- you know, when he walked that train and talked to people every night, it`s because he liked to do it.
FINEMAN: Yes.
SCHUMER: There`s no TV, no cameras, no anything.
MATTHEWS: OK, let`s take a look --
SCHUMER: He`s a people person.
MATTHEWS: Here`s Joe Biden giving his salute to the working people at a campaign rally in Detroit this week. Let`s watch him.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOSEPH BIDEN, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Romney and Ryan
don`t seem to think so much of y`all, of you guys. They view you, the
working women and men of America, as the problem. We view you and know you to be the solution in America!
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
BIDEN: Look, folks, we know who built this country and we know who`s going to rebuild it. It`s you! And instead of vilifying you, we should be thanking you! We owe you!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTHEWS: Let`s talk about a group that I`m very familiar with, Senator -- and Howard, you know I am. They`re called Reagan Democrats.
SCHUMER: You bet.
MATTHEWS: They decide every frickin` election. They tend to be conservative Catholics. Let`s call them what they are. They`re Notre Dame subway (ph) alumni. That`s who they really are. Some didn`t go to college, didn`t go to a great college. They make up their mind in October.
They are the October surprise. Biden, his role in getting at least half of them --
SCHUMER: You got it.
MATTHEWS: -- to vote for the Democrat.
SCHUMER: You got it.
You know, the very people that Mitt Romney is trying to win away from Barack Obama, the greatest antidote to that is Joe Biden, because he talks to them.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
SCHUMER: Joe Biden`s greatest effect is not going to be here in Charlotte.
It`s going to be in Milwaukee and in Pittsburgh and Toledo and in Akron. He will be all over those states. He will talk to those people, and he will do it in a way that convinces them that Barack Obama is the right choice.
In a certain sense, he`s a secret weapon. And, by the way -- and Howard knows this -- he played that role in the administration. I dealt with Joe on so many issues, and at times when in those rarefied moments the great thinkers were way up here and you needed somebody to bring them a little bit back to earth, the person we in the Senate always called was Joe Biden.
And he earned the president`s trust. He earned the respect of the people in the administration, pretty much for the same reason that the senators liked him so much, because he`s the real deal.
FINEMAN: But let`s talk religion and ethnicity for a minute because that`s what`s also at stake here.
In terms of the swing vote, those people that you`re talking about, the Notre Dame subway alumni, many of them are Catholics, many of them are working-class Catholics and people who have traditional social values, but sort of more Democratic Party-oriented economic thinking. Those are the people that Joe Biden has talked to his whole life.
SCHUMER: Who he is.
FINEMAN: That`s who he is. That`s the people he`s talked to.
(CROSSTALK)
FINEMAN: And in the administration, he was an advocate for looking at those policies. He didn`t win every battle. By the way, he lost the battle over what Catholic hospitals are required to do in terms of providing abortion and contraception services.
But I think people in his community know that he and Bill Daley and those others fought that fight, and they know he is their guy. In the key states of Ohio, Wisconsin, and Michigan, and Iowa, what I think of as the sort of big 10 states of the swing states, that`s where Joe Biden is going to be focused in the last weeks and months in the campaign.
SCHUMER: You know, Chris, I wrote a book about the American average swing voter. They`re called the Baileys. There are three or four politicians who just instinctively speak to the Baileys.
MATTHEWS: You`re one of them.
SCHUMER: And the Baileys trust them.
(LAUGHTER)
MATTHEWS: I know you`re in that list.
(LAUGHTER)
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
SCHUMER: Joe Biden`s at the top of that list. He knows how to do it.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: I saw you give the speech -- I saw him give the Fordham graduation speech.
SCHUMER: Fordham, yes.
MATTHEWS: He always brings the house down.
Let me ask you about this debate that is coming up. You`re a pro. You`re a pro. You`re watching. You`re in the game. Joe Biden has to debate on October 11 Paul Ryan, national television.
SCHUMER: Right.
MATTHEWS: The whole country`s going to be watching, the kid against the pro. How`s it going to look?
SCHUMER: Oh, Joe Biden -- I remember what they said. Oh, how`s he going to handle Sarah Palin? He whooped her. He beat her hands down.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
SCHUMER: The same thing is going to happen here with Ryan.Joe Biden -- Paul Ryan can have all his statistics and all of this. Here`s what Joe Biden is going to do. First --
MATTHEWS: How do you do that statistic thing again, that dance? OK. I want to get that statistics thing. OK. Go ahead.
(LAUGHTER)
SCHUMER: We`re going to do it tonight after Obama`s speech.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
FINEMAN: Chris, I --
(CROSSTALK)
SCHUMER: I just want to say this. What Biden will do -- and here he`s going to be particularly good against Paul Ryan.
He is going to be able in a gentle way that people care about to actually mock the kind of mistruths that Paul Ryan has talk -- has been doing not only at the convention speech, but before.
He is really going to show Paul Ryan for who he is, not in a mean way, but in a way that matters to people. He`s going to knock it out of the park against Paul Ryan. He will have Paul Ryan flummoxed.
(CROSSTALK)
FINEMAN: Now, having covered -- having covered Joe Biden at various hearings that he`s conducted when he was on the Hill, he will be very prepared.
SCHUMER: Yes.
FINEMAN: I reported on The Huffington Post the other day that he`s already spent 60 hours in debate prep. He`s studying hard for this.
He wants to be underestimated on this in terms of mastery of the facts, but he`s not going to be -- he`s going to perform. He is going to know everything about every Paul Ryan budget proposal inside and out by the time that debate takes place.
SCHUMER: You got it.
FINEMAN: You watch.
He`s got a really great debate prep guy named David Ginsberg, who was head of opposition research in a couple of campaigns. Joe Biden is studying every minute he`s got, and he will -- he`s hoping that he will surprise people with his mastery of the facts.
MATTHEWS: Well, I have to say, as a guy like Joe Biden, I never was elected to the Senate at 29 or anything like that, but when he got the nomination for vice president out in Springfield and Barack Obama named him, I was verklempt, because it was the first time in history a regular Catholic guy from the neighborhoods got elevated that high in the world.
You know what I mean?
SCHUMER: The real deal.
MATTHEWS: It was a big deal.
Anyway, thank you.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
MATTHEWS: I want to thank you, Chuck Schumer, senator from New York.
FINEMAN: What`s the Irish word for verklempt? I don`t know what it is.
MATTHEWS: I don`t know.
SCHUMER: We`re not going to say what it is.
MATTHEWS: I`m going to think of something, but I have to be so careful here. And I`m saying it anyway.
SCHUMER: Exactly.
MATTHEWS: Dewy-eyed.
Anyway, thank you, Chuck Schumer, Senator.
SCHUMER: Dewy-eyed.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: I`m being careful. Senator Chuck Schumer.
SCHUMER: Hey, can I just -- one more thing.
MATTHEWS: Yes.
SCHUMER: This Chris Matthews, when he said Democrats say the capital of Japan is Tokyo, Republicans say it`s Osaka, and the press reports it might be Tokyo, it might be Osaka, he hit it out of the park and told every journalist, tell the truth.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
MATTHEWS: Thank you.
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