November 15, 2025 • 9 mins
From the former host of MSNBC's Hardball and acclaimed Kennedy biographer Chris Matthews comes a centennial tribute about why Robert F. Kennedy's revolutionary vision offers the roadmap America needs today. LESSONS FROM BOBBY: Ten Reasons Robert F. Kennedy Still Matters (November 11th, 2025/$26.00 hardcover) will be published just ahead of Kennedy's 100th birthday on November 20th.Bobby Kennedy exemplified moral leadership and political bravery. He led us in pursuit of ideals. He took risks for peace and united us. Look at our country now, with its wide and deepening divisions. 100 years after his birth, RFK matters more than ever. On Bobby's centennial, Chris Matthews, one of America's foremost political commentators and Kennedy biographers, gives us ten electrifying lessons for today taken from Bobby's life. Take them as a roadmap. America is great when it tries, at its best, to be good. This special anniversary book also includes a selection of Bobby Kennedy's greatest speeches.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/arroe-collins-like-it-s-live--4113802/support.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/arroe-collins-like-it-s-live--4113802/support.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
We live in a society where there is so much
going on all at one time. How are you expected
to keep up? Arrow dot net A R r Oe
dot Net. Not one podcast. There are seventeen to choose
from because it deals with everyday life and how we
are moving through it. Arro dot Net. Thank you so
much for your support. Good morning, Chris. How are you
(00:20):
doing today?
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Good morning Arrow? I'm fine. I'm but lowid saw I
going for two hours of this, but I think I
got it. That's so boyd Well.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
In that two hour conversation that you're having with so
many people across this beautiful nation. Has anybody brought up
the fact that the reason why I am so glued
to lessons from Bobby, and I'm telling you I am
glued to it is because I'm trying to understand Pambondy
even more because I believe in my heart Bobby set
the standard. Bobby has always been the standard.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Let's do this on the air. I'm ready, I'm.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Ready to rock when you are, man, what is your
vibe on that?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Okay, let me just tell you here's the difference between
Pambondia Attorney General today and Bobby Kennedy, for whom The
building of the Justice Department was named after by George W. Bush.
President Bush, let me tell you he took his orders
from the federal courts. When the federal courts said, you
have to let people who are black ride interstate buses.
(01:14):
You can't put him in the black waiting room. You
can't tell him to use the only black bastom around.
You got to let him ride like everybody else, in
the front of the bus, middle of the bus, wherever
he was the one doing. Supporting that. He was supporting
the federal ruling that James Meredith, who had applied properly
to old myths to go there and did everything right
and served in the military, did everything right, filled out
(01:35):
the application, asked the Justice Department to help him get
his civil rights. He got in there and today not
just the SEC football teams, but his statues on the
campus there for being admitted as the first African American
back in sixty two. Same thing with George Walls. He
did all that stuff to open up civil rights and
(01:56):
at the same time, this is what's interesting and would
make them different. He believed in law and order. Yes,
he believed that people in the streets have to obay
the law. Even if Martin Luther King gets killed, you
still have to stop burning down the cities. You have
to obey the law. And a lot of liberals do
not say that loud and clear.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
One of the things that really fires me up as
a journalist as well as a fan of our US
government is the fact that you include Bobby's most famous
messages in this We need this. I need to have
full documentation in my hands and so I can read
it and digest it and do it over and over again.
And you were not afraid to put those messages in
this book.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Yeah. I mean, I've studied the Kennedy's. I know their
difference is there's the difference between Jack and Bobby. Jack
with a tough leader, a little bit cold, a little
bit brutal in a way of ruthless, if you will. Bobby,
when I do all the studies, comes out as the
real human being who understood nuance. He didn't particularly like
(02:54):
Lynnon Johnson, for example, but I think he understood the
way things work and the way you have to be
and variety. When you lose an election, you got to
be able to take a loss, and he did.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
He was.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
He took that loss in Oregon right before he got killed,
and pat U Cannon was in the audience that said
he couldn't have done a better job accepting defeats than
he could if he'd won that election. Uh. He impressed
his enemies.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Please do not move. There's more with Chris Matthews coming
up next. The name of the book, Lessons from Bobby
ten Reasons why Robert F. Kennedy Still Matters. We are
back with Chris Matthews. You opened the book with a
quote from John Lewis. I sat there and I was
I just embraced it as what I did. I did
did not jump onto the next page immediately because I
(03:43):
really wanted to feel what John was putting. And then
and it's it's just one of those things where it
just it sets the tone for the entire book, John Lewis.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
John Lewis said in that quote that he believed in
Robert Kennedy is somebody that can unify and save people
if you will. He also said, after Martin Luther King
had been killed and Jack Kenny had been killed, he
said to himself, but we still have Bobby. And when
Bobby was going it was he went with him into
(04:14):
Indianapolis that I the King was killed. Doctor King was killed.
He was the one who was with him when he
was had to tell the crowd of African Americans a
tough neighborhood, your hero, the hero of the country in
many ways, has just been shot by a white guy.
And then he said something very surprising for him. He said,
a member of my family was also killed by a
(04:35):
white guy. Now, when I heard that, I said, well,
that doesn't make any sense, because if a white guy
kills a white an, it's not a racial issue. Was
just something else, something from Castro or something involved with it.
But he said it in a way to say, I
know what suffering is. I think it was just remarkable.
And I don't know how many people that had the
(04:56):
police said, we're not going into that neighborhood with it,
no shot down guard tonight. It's not going to have that.
You're going in there on your own. And he had
to be told at the last minute by a guy
who was standing next to with the microphone on. They
don't know yet. We don't have any social media back then,
no who cell phones. We don't know. The community here
doesn't know that King has been killed by a white
coup and he had to tell them.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
It was something you bring something up in the book
that I used as a quote this past week because
Charlotte was dealing with a transit issue in the way
that we were voting, and I quoted, or I came
really close to quoting your book when I said, you've
got to look to the train tracks to where the
real city is because and I pulled that from your book,
because I believe that you are so spot on when
it comes to that look to the train tracks.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
You know, one thing I discovered in my brain when
I was working on this today was that who lives
closest to the train tracks? Yep, it's not the other
side of the tracks. It's poor people. The real estate
within the train tracks noise, which is relentless, is cheap.
The people they don't afford housing within walking distance of
(06:03):
a train tracks in the Northeast especially, but every place
it's cheap. So white people and black people both share
the same real estate. And in the case of Bobby
Kennedy's train going by there when he was his body
was on that plane train, the black people in Philadelphia,
I grew up twenty thousand people strong singing the battle
himn of the Republic, the Civil War sun and in
(06:26):
between the tracks between Philadelphia and Trenton, Trenton and Newark
were white people standing in the right next to the tracks,
in many cases saluting, which made me think they were
enlisted guys in the army saluting with their family. There
were birth orders standing next to them, saluting their hero,
(06:46):
Robert Kennedy, And I go, how did that happen? How
did the black people say? This guy's opening the door
for us the soul rights and this guy not just
in the South, but this guy is doing this. And
he was honestly saying, I'm learning, he said. At one
point he said, I didn't lose a lot of sleep
over negroes. He actually used the old term which everybody
(07:07):
used time properly speaking before Jesse Jackson got us all
saying African Americans, I believe. And he was saying that honestly,
I wasn't a big civil rights advocate. And then he
saw what the head of his top eight, John siegen Thorp,
had his head bashed in into Montgomery during the Freedom rides,
and he saw the angry of the white crowds oh
(07:31):
Miss and Oxford, the anger of those people who didn't
want James Burder to go to their school, even though
he had applied properly, he'd been in the military, done
everything right, and they didn't want him there. And today
we have SEC crowds going crazy over integrated football teams.
It's just very different.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Would you say that that Bobby Kennedy sat with the
people because that's how I grew up watching and basically
embracing Bobby because that always inspired me that he was
with the people. And I think that's why I became
a broadcaster, because Bobby was with the people.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Well, let me give you a real extreme example. Remember
you probably read about this. He would go through crowds
in LA and people would be an open car. Unbelievable.
He'd ride an open car, you know, he'd be an
open car, people grabbing. They were not just his couplings,
but everything on him. They would take from him. They
would somehow would get his shoes. I could never forget
(08:27):
how you got a guy's shoot. They would pull his
shoes off. And he said, right before he died, he said,
you know, you can go give speeches to people, but
they don't really connect with you until they physically get
cold in you. Unless they grab you, and he sort
of said, I'm doing this maybe instinctively, but I know
the only way I can connect with some of these
sometimes angry crowds is to let them touch me.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
And in the end, you know, somebody said this is
beautifully right, and it was Jack Neil Newfield said this
original He dealt with the and financeers and astronauts and celebrities,
movie stars, and yet he was killed reaching for the
hand of a seventy five hour a week Mexican American dishwasher.
(09:16):
That was Bobby's life.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
You got to come back to this show anytime in
the future. Ten minutes, you know, is never enough with you, Chris,
but you continue to push his strength forward and I
just cannot wait to talk with you again about everything
that you're exploring.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Thank you, Eric, so much. Good luck for you.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Be brilliant today.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Okay, sir, thank you
We live in a society where there is so much
going on all at one time. How are you expected
to keep up? Arrow dot net A R r Oe
dot Net. Not one podcast. There are seventeen to choose
from because it deals with everyday life and how we
are moving through it. Arro dot Net. Thank you so
much for your support. Good morning, Chris. How are you
(00:20):
doing today?
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Good morning Arrow? I'm fine. I'm but lowid saw I
going for two hours of this, but I think I
got it. That's so boyd Well.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
In that two hour conversation that you're having with so
many people across this beautiful nation. Has anybody brought up
the fact that the reason why I am so glued
to lessons from Bobby, and I'm telling you I am
glued to it is because I'm trying to understand Pambondy
even more because I believe in my heart Bobby set
the standard. Bobby has always been the standard.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Let's do this on the air. I'm ready, I'm.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Ready to rock when you are, man, what is your
vibe on that?
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Okay, let me just tell you here's the difference between
Pambondia Attorney General today and Bobby Kennedy, for whom The
building of the Justice Department was named after by George W. Bush.
President Bush, let me tell you he took his orders
from the federal courts. When the federal courts said, you
have to let people who are black ride interstate buses.
(01:14):
You can't put him in the black waiting room. You
can't tell him to use the only black bastom around.
You got to let him ride like everybody else, in
the front of the bus, middle of the bus, wherever
he was the one doing. Supporting that. He was supporting
the federal ruling that James Meredith, who had applied properly
to old myths to go there and did everything right
and served in the military, did everything right, filled out
(01:35):
the application, asked the Justice Department to help him get
his civil rights. He got in there and today not
just the SEC football teams, but his statues on the
campus there for being admitted as the first African American
back in sixty two. Same thing with George Walls. He
did all that stuff to open up civil rights and
(01:56):
at the same time, this is what's interesting and would
make them different. He believed in law and order. Yes,
he believed that people in the streets have to obay
the law. Even if Martin Luther King gets killed, you
still have to stop burning down the cities. You have
to obey the law. And a lot of liberals do
not say that loud and clear.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
One of the things that really fires me up as
a journalist as well as a fan of our US
government is the fact that you include Bobby's most famous
messages in this We need this. I need to have
full documentation in my hands and so I can read
it and digest it and do it over and over again.
And you were not afraid to put those messages in
this book.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Yeah. I mean, I've studied the Kennedy's. I know their
difference is there's the difference between Jack and Bobby. Jack
with a tough leader, a little bit cold, a little
bit brutal in a way of ruthless, if you will. Bobby,
when I do all the studies, comes out as the
real human being who understood nuance. He didn't particularly like
(02:54):
Lynnon Johnson, for example, but I think he understood the
way things work and the way you have to be
and variety. When you lose an election, you got to
be able to take a loss, and he did.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
He was.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
He took that loss in Oregon right before he got killed,
and pat U Cannon was in the audience that said
he couldn't have done a better job accepting defeats than
he could if he'd won that election. Uh. He impressed
his enemies.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Please do not move. There's more with Chris Matthews coming
up next. The name of the book, Lessons from Bobby
ten Reasons why Robert F. Kennedy Still Matters. We are
back with Chris Matthews. You opened the book with a
quote from John Lewis. I sat there and I was
I just embraced it as what I did. I did
did not jump onto the next page immediately because I
(03:43):
really wanted to feel what John was putting. And then
and it's it's just one of those things where it
just it sets the tone for the entire book, John Lewis.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
John Lewis said in that quote that he believed in
Robert Kennedy is somebody that can unify and save people
if you will. He also said, after Martin Luther King
had been killed and Jack Kenny had been killed, he
said to himself, but we still have Bobby. And when
Bobby was going it was he went with him into
(04:14):
Indianapolis that I the King was killed. Doctor King was killed.
He was the one who was with him when he
was had to tell the crowd of African Americans a
tough neighborhood, your hero, the hero of the country in
many ways, has just been shot by a white guy.
And then he said something very surprising for him. He said,
a member of my family was also killed by a
(04:35):
white guy. Now, when I heard that, I said, well,
that doesn't make any sense, because if a white guy
kills a white an, it's not a racial issue. Was
just something else, something from Castro or something involved with it.
But he said it in a way to say, I
know what suffering is. I think it was just remarkable.
And I don't know how many people that had the
(04:56):
police said, we're not going into that neighborhood with it,
no shot down guard tonight. It's not going to have that.
You're going in there on your own. And he had
to be told at the last minute by a guy
who was standing next to with the microphone on. They
don't know yet. We don't have any social media back then,
no who cell phones. We don't know. The community here
doesn't know that King has been killed by a white
coup and he had to tell them.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
It was something you bring something up in the book
that I used as a quote this past week because
Charlotte was dealing with a transit issue in the way
that we were voting, and I quoted, or I came
really close to quoting your book when I said, you've
got to look to the train tracks to where the
real city is because and I pulled that from your book,
because I believe that you are so spot on when
it comes to that look to the train tracks.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
You know, one thing I discovered in my brain when
I was working on this today was that who lives
closest to the train tracks? Yep, it's not the other
side of the tracks. It's poor people. The real estate
within the train tracks noise, which is relentless, is cheap.
The people they don't afford housing within walking distance of
(06:03):
a train tracks in the Northeast especially, but every place
it's cheap. So white people and black people both share
the same real estate. And in the case of Bobby
Kennedy's train going by there when he was his body
was on that plane train, the black people in Philadelphia,
I grew up twenty thousand people strong singing the battle
himn of the Republic, the Civil War sun and in
(06:26):
between the tracks between Philadelphia and Trenton, Trenton and Newark
were white people standing in the right next to the tracks,
in many cases saluting, which made me think they were
enlisted guys in the army saluting with their family. There
were birth orders standing next to them, saluting their hero,
(06:46):
Robert Kennedy, And I go, how did that happen? How
did the black people say? This guy's opening the door
for us the soul rights and this guy not just
in the South, but this guy is doing this. And
he was honestly saying, I'm learning, he said. At one
point he said, I didn't lose a lot of sleep
over negroes. He actually used the old term which everybody
(07:07):
used time properly speaking before Jesse Jackson got us all
saying African Americans, I believe. And he was saying that honestly,
I wasn't a big civil rights advocate. And then he
saw what the head of his top eight, John siegen Thorp,
had his head bashed in into Montgomery during the Freedom rides,
and he saw the angry of the white crowds oh
(07:31):
Miss and Oxford, the anger of those people who didn't
want James Burder to go to their school, even though
he had applied properly, he'd been in the military, done
everything right, and they didn't want him there. And today
we have SEC crowds going crazy over integrated football teams.
It's just very different.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Would you say that that Bobby Kennedy sat with the
people because that's how I grew up watching and basically
embracing Bobby because that always inspired me that he was
with the people. And I think that's why I became
a broadcaster, because Bobby was with the people.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Well, let me give you a real extreme example. Remember
you probably read about this. He would go through crowds
in LA and people would be an open car. Unbelievable.
He'd ride an open car, you know, he'd be an
open car, people grabbing. They were not just his couplings,
but everything on him. They would take from him. They
would somehow would get his shoes. I could never forget
(08:27):
how you got a guy's shoot. They would pull his
shoes off. And he said, right before he died, he said,
you know, you can go give speeches to people, but
they don't really connect with you until they physically get
cold in you. Unless they grab you, and he sort
of said, I'm doing this maybe instinctively, but I know
the only way I can connect with some of these
sometimes angry crowds is to let them touch me.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
And in the end, you know, somebody said this is
beautifully right, and it was Jack Neil Newfield said this
original He dealt with the and financeers and astronauts and celebrities,
movie stars, and yet he was killed reaching for the
hand of a seventy five hour a week Mexican American dishwasher.
(09:16):
That was Bobby's life.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
You got to come back to this show anytime in
the future. Ten minutes, you know, is never enough with you, Chris,
but you continue to push his strength forward and I
just cannot wait to talk with you again about everything
that you're exploring.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Thank you, Eric, so much. Good luck for you.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Be brilliant today.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Okay, sir, thank you
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Ruthie's Table 4
For more than 30 years The River Cafe in London, has been the home-from-home of artists, architects, designers, actors, collectors, writers, activists, and politicians. Michael Caine, Glenn Close, JJ Abrams, Steve McQueen, Victoria and David Beckham, and Lily Allen, are just some of the people who love to call The River Cafe home. On River Cafe Table 4, Rogers sits down with her customers—who have become friends—to talk about food memories. Table 4 explores how food impacts every aspect of our lives. “Foods is politics, food is cultural, food is how you express love, food is about your heritage, it defines who you and who you want to be,” says Rogers. Each week, Rogers invites her guest to reminisce about family suppers and first dates, what they cook, how they eat when performing, the restaurants they choose, and what food they seek when they need comfort. And to punctuate each episode of Table 4, guests such as Ralph Fiennes, Emily Blunt, and Alfonso Cuarón, read their favourite recipe from one of the best-selling River Cafe cookbooks. Table 4 itself, is situated near The River Cafe’s open kitchen, close to the bright pink wood-fired oven and next to the glossy yellow pass, where Ruthie oversees the restaurant. You are invited to take a seat at this intimate table and join the conversation. For more information, recipes, and ingredients, go to https://shoptherivercafe.co.uk/ Web: https://rivercafe.co.uk/ Instagram: www.instagram.com/therivercafelondon/ Facebook: https://en-gb.facebook.com/therivercafelondon/ For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iheartradio app, apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.