This MSNBC scribe even interviewed the heckler on the spot (it took Fox News until last night to nail down an interview with the guy; Fox generally played catch-up to MSNBC on HecklerGate all day yesterday, ramping up its coverage—Brit Hume: “Bill Clinton gets red in the face again…”; John Gibson: “Clinton has been given to wagging his finger a lot lately. Is he going ‘round the bend?”—only yesterday afternoon.). “First Read” reported that “Holeman said he thought Clinton was ‘gasping for air,’” and that:

Holeman also described Clinton’s reaction to him as “irate.”… “I think [Clinton] even hit me in the face with his hand,” he said. “He did give me a little pop. It was okay, because I understand his tenacity for his wife.” Clinton did engage Holeman for a few minutes, at times pointing directly at him. It was unclear whether he did make physical contact, however.

Wow! A heckler “thinks” Bill Clinton “hit” him and the reporter witnessed Clinton “pointing directly at” the heckler, although it was “unclear whether [Clinton] did make physical contact.” Holy Conflict!

Cut to MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough yesterday morning, pushing both the Conflict and the Conventional Wisdom:

Last night I got an e-mail from one of the embeds saying Bill Clinton wagged his finger, poked his finger, and actually hit a guy. Then we got an e-mail an hour or two later saying [Bill] was shouting at a pro-life demonstrator…As far as whether or not [Clinton] made physical contact, it doesn’t appear there’s a whole lot of evidence that happened…Let’s listen to the man’s account of his confrontation with Clinton…. [Roll embed’s footage of man saying “I think he even hit me”]… There is something going on with Bill Clinton right now, and we have been talking about it really off-the-air more than on-the-air… Let’s take people behind the scenes because for two months now you’ve had some of the top political reporters in America whispering, “What’s wrong with Bill Clinton?” There’s something going on there. Why is he so out of control?

(CNN’s Jeanne Moos had an answer for Scarborough later in the day, CNN having decided to treat HecklerGate a tad more lightly than MSNBC: ” ‘Why is he so out of control?’ Probably because he keeps hearing stuff like that from the media. We’re far more annoying than hecklers…”)

And so on MSNBC on Monday, Sunday’s Two Heckles became One Big Story of One Angry Bill, complete with white-spotlighted footage of the former president wagging his finger at one heckler. Drama! Or, as MSNBC’s Contessa Breweer confessed yesterday as she took her turn flogging HecklerGate: “But, wow! It gives us something to talk about, something exciting in the middle of a campaign rally!”

Later yesterday morning, MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski quizzed NBC’s Andrea Mitchell about whether any of this was “helping Hillary Clinton.”


MITCHELL: …I think you can argue in Ohio and some of these other states, Bill Clinton is a big asset. And stirring up a crowd like this, turning the crowd against a protester, an anti-abortion protester at a very liberal Ohio crowd, you could argue that that might be helpful. Again, these clips when they’re played over and over again, that does not help the campaign.


BRZEZINSKI: I know, but you wonder—you bring up a point of how popular he is. He draws a huge crowd. Could it be the few in the media are picking this apart, but in general, he draws a crowd and basically helps her?


MITCHELL:… I think that could be a very good argument….


“Picking this apart” further, Brzezinski later asked MSNBC’s Pat Buchanan and Rachel Sklar of The Huffington Post to chew it all over some more.


BUCHANAN: [Bill Clinton is] distracting from the battle between Hillary and Obama…The focus is on how Bill Clinton is handling hecklers and I’m not sure…

BRZEZINSKI: I know! Look at us! (Laughing). Really, let’s…


BUCHANAN: You’re eating up the last twenty-four hours before the Wisconsin primary talking about [Bill Clinton].


BRZEZINSKI: Rachel, let me ask you this, the impact on Hillary Clinton’s campaign. The fact that right now we’re analyzing video of Bill waggling his finger at a heckler’s face and discussing whether or not it actually touched his face…


RACHEL SKLAR: I think you’re answering your own question. It’s clearly not good for Hillary when the discussion is…


BRZEZINSKI: I mean, is this our fault or is Bill Clinton putting himself out there in a way that we cannot ignore?


SKLAR: It’s unfortunate for the Clinton campaign and for Bill Clinton that this happened on a slow news day… I think anytime that Bill Clinton does wag his finger, people get very excited. That wagging of Bill Clinton’s finger is something they want to impute to him, even if he doesn’t do it. So Bill Clinton losing his cool has been a theme in this campaign, whether or not he actually does. I think in certain respects, he’s had every right to be annoyed or exasperated or frustrated. I think it’s very rude for an Obama supporter to yell, “Obama, Obama!” and disrupt his speech.


BRZEZINSKI: That is rude. And why not speak out and speak back? Although annoyed, exasperated, and frustrated could be the way the Clinton campaign, Pat, feels about the Obama campaign…


BUCHANAN … What they’re reflecting is the frustration, the anger, and the exasperation of being hassled when he’s fighting to try to get back on the campaign trail…At the same time, Mika, let me say, when candidates, for example, some of them get a reputation for making gaffes…so they keep the camera on them, every single move he makes. One slip, here we go again. And they use these things to reinforce it. And that’s what we’ve got with Clinton putting the finger in the guy’s face…