Poll: Could Chris Matthews Actually Win? Really?

Controversy! MSNBC's Chris Matthews is putting out feelers for a Senate run in Pennsylvania, and some people think he shouldn't be -- at least not while he's still employed as the host of a nightly news show.

No doubt there's something to be said for the critics' protests, and NBC News would do well to heed them, considering the other wounds the organization's credibility has sustained this year.

But there seems to me a more pertinent question to ask: Does Matthews seriously think he has the slightest hope of surviving a Senate race intact? This, after all, is the YouTube/"Macaca"/Mayhill Fowler era of politics, when a single civilian with a smart phone can bring down even the most well-armored candidate. And Matthews has shown he's capable of inflicting astonishing amounts of unintentional self-damage, not just in private, unguarded moments, but while sitting in brightly lit studios, making prepared speeches and giving interviews to national magazines. This is the man who hit on a female colleague on-camera, accused the Bush Administration of unspecified "criminality," and credited Hillary Clinton's entire political career to her husband's philandering. Oh, and he made himself the poster boy for media bias with his remark about Barack Obama sending a "thrill up [his] leg."

Then again, he is pretty entertaining. I don't know. Your turn: