Matthews On Jon Stewart, Chris Wallace Showdown: Stewart Is ‘So Friggin Smart’

Chris Matthews welcomed David Corn and Alex Wagner to dissect one of the “great prize-fights of all time in television” between Jon Stewart and Chris Wallace, regarding bias in the media. The left-leaning panel, unsurprisingly, declared Stewart the clear winner, but they did manage to squeeze in a couple of critical comments about Stewart between their overflowing praise.

Matthews unabashedly declared about Stewart, “whatever you think of his politics, and I think he’s generally right, he’s so friggin smart that you cannot take him on mano-a-mano.” Corn was excited to praise Stewart’s performance too, declaring that Wallace should “never try to outwit a true wit” and that Wallace was basically “up against Mark Twain.” In fact, Corn thought, the fight was so unfair that Stewart had the grace of a ballet dancer, while Wallace’s arguments were as stimulating as an IRS tax auditor.

Wagner offered up some criticism of Stewart however, suggesting that at one point Stewart had a “holier than thou sort of a rant” that wasn’t flattering. Yet in the end, all agreed with each other that Fox’s “fair and balanced” slogan is a joke, since Wallace admitted that Fox balances out the rest of the media and since Fox serves as a “bullpen for the Republican nomination.”

Watch the clip from MSNBC below:

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