Does anyone know why Chris Matthews was NOT on Hardball tonight?

[IkeWarnedUs]

At the risk of being seen as completely paranoid, does anyone else wonder if Chris Matthews was pulled off of Hardball (at least for today) because of his performance yesterday? He really seemed on the verge of coming right out and saying 9/11 was LIHOP. His eyes opened and he was pissed at what he was seeing.

To put my question in context, here in Chicago an NBC news person did a 1 - 1 1/2 minutes segment on the BBC story linking the Bush and bin Laden families and the Carlyle Group. He was off the air for 4-5 days and told me himself that night he was flown to New York to meet the next morning with the heads of NBC and GE and told YOU WILL NOT TALK ABOUT THIS AGAIN!!!!!

Yesterday I started thinking, I wonder how long NBC will let Matthews talk like this before they pull him. I just caught the last 15 minutes of the show.

I hope I'm wrong.

[kodi]

1. easter vacation

.

[sallyseven]

2. Maybe he had the night off it is Good Friday.

Oberman is not on either. Long Easter Weekend. he did work extra on the day of the hearings. Maybe they won't pay overtime.

[ThomWV]

3. Tell Me Again ....?

I saw something about him going off last night. What happened? Who, when, what?

[slor]

4. Imus called him a fat loud mouth this morning...

maybe his feelings were hurt.

[Qanisqineq]

5. Why? I thought Imus liked him? (n/t)

[The Backlash Cometh]

15. I think Imus called Bush a rather unpleasant name today.

jerk? nimrod? idiot?

Something along those lines. Basically, he was amazed that Bush would stay on vacation after that PDB came out on August 6th, 2001. Imus is right on this one. Why would Bush stay on vacation instead of come back to Washington to shake some trees?

[LostInAnomie]

6. His lips got stuck on Bush's ass

[peacetalksforall]

7. Matthews is serious about religion...

Therefore, kind of a hypocrite when he contributes to defamation as he did when joining in on the character assassinations of Clinton and Gore.

[Jane Austin]

10. I think he got serious again rather recently.

Also cut down on his drinking, which he said had gotten out of hand.

[grasswire]

8. devout Catholic

...that's why.

But I'd like to hear more about Imus trashing him. Any more details?

[loftycity]

9. Wow , I believe it .....your friend would of had to have been

flipped after bing told that. OMG. The new world order is here!

[IkeWarnedUs]

11. It's been here a while

That happened in November 2001.

[PCIntern]

12. Imus said that about Tweety

and that that's why , and I'm paraphrasing, it was hours ago, that 'we' have Tim Russert and Brokaw. He also said that Schieffer over at CBS was OK but one of his henchmen didn't agree. Imus got pissy with him.

[eleny]

13. I bet Tweety looked like "Butters" when he was little

I was watching South Park last week and when I saw the little Butters character with the patch of blonde hair, Matthews popped into my head. It hasn't ruined South Park for me. Just cracked me up.

[The Backlash Cometh]

14. This story would go skyscrapper high if Matthews was pulled off

for his interviews yesterday. If they did that to him, then we would understand why he's been leaning right for all these years and we'd be the first to pick up the cause.