We can add former CIA agent Valerie Plame's name to the list of guests on MSNBC's Hardball that can't stop themselves from playing the "both sides" are equally terrible game. During a discussion about President Obama's recent meeting with world leaders on how we can keep nuclear weapons out of the hands of ISIS, and on Donald Trump's completely irresponsible remarks on whether even more countries ought to have nukes, Plame managed to turn the conversation into an attack on the intelligence of Bernie Sanders and his supporters.
MATTHEWS: I've got to get back to Valerie on this. You worked all those years... what do you think people in the agency, the CIA you worked in, are thinking when they hear discussions about “I don't want to take nuclear weapons off of the table,” or “Oh, you know, maybe Japan will end up having a nuclear weapon and we'll have to live with that fact.”? Your thoughts.
PLAME Yeah. Probably the same reaction as the high ranking communist leader; amusement and horror at the same time. It's absolutely frightening, and in fact, across the board with the presidential nominees we are not seeing enough discussion of this truly existential issue.
You have Bernie Sanders, who's pulling in tens of thousands of college students and you know, they're all for free college education, great, and health care. They only have the vaguest notion that perhaps to end World War II we dropped a bomb on Japan. There really is a huge gap of knowledge, and no matter what you care about, if you don't get this one right, none of the other ones matter.
Matthews, who loves to take shots at Sanders at every opportunity, to no one's surprise, said nothing to counter her and instead responded by telling Plame "That's incredible."
