This Insurrectionist has been monitoring Morning Joe since its inception. But perhaps never in the ensuing nine years has there been a segment quite so somber as the one that led Wednesday’s show. The subject was Aleppo, the images were horrific, and the accusation laid at the feet of President Obama, the Western allies and the UN was that their inaction has led to the slaughter of countless thousands.
The segment opened with a statement at the UN by US Ambassador Samantha Power condemning Assad, Russia and Iran. But as Joe Scarborough observed: “those were damning, damning words. But they were damning words of the Obama administration.” Scarborough was referring to the fecklessness of the Unites States in the face of the slaughter. Scarborough chillingly reported that “you actually have mothers going to priests saying will God forgive me if I kill my child so ISIS doesn’t torture them when they get them and kill them?”
It was Mike Barnicle, surprisingly, who suggested that the United Nations should be “shut down” because of its failure to do anything to end the Syrian bloodshed. Said Scarborough, agreeing, “they come here in September [for the General Assembly] and they have parties. That’s all they do.”
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Speaking before the UN Security Council yesterday, Ambassador Samantha Power directly addressed President Assad and his allies.
SAMANTHA POWER: To the Assad regime, Russia, and Iran, three member states behind the conquest of and carnage in Aleppo, you bear responsibility for these atrocities. When one day there is a full accounting of the horrors committed in this assault of Aleppo, and that day will come sooner or later, you will not be able to say you did not know what was happening, you will not be able to say you were not involved.
We all know what was happening, and we all know you were involved. It should shame you. Instead, by all appearances, it is emboldening you. Are you truly incapable of shame? Is there literally nothing that can shame you? Is there no act of barbarism against civilians, no execution of a child that gets under your skin, that just creeps you out a little bit? Is there nothing you will not lie about or justify?
JOE SCARBOROUGH: Those were damning, damning words but they were damning words of the Obama administration.
MIKA: I know.
JOE: Her words were damning to the United States of America. Her words were damning to, yes, the British Parliament and the British people and the German people and the French and the entire West. I guess I really shouldn’t blame the French because Hollande actually told Barack Obama that he was willing to blow up, be part of an operation that would blow up planes on the ground that were killing children and women and destroying hospitals.
How Samantha Power, with all due respect, a woman that I respect, but how she sits there and says those words working for an administration that has been mute on this issue or backed down when they actually finally did show some spine. It’s unspeakable. These pictures are not just the legacy of Putin and Assad. These pictures are the legacy of the United States and their President.
. . .
MIKE BARNICLE: The stories that poured out of the refugees, I realize it’s early in the morning. But the stories that he told me that were told to him, he said he had 50 to 55 people who were in shock, traumatized by what they endured, that had seen their sons, their husbands, beheaded in front of them some of them. Some of them had seen their daughters raped. Some of them had seen their kin, their husbands or other children burned to death. Burned alive. And this is what — this is what has been going on for five years.
. . .
MIKA: You have women choosing suicide to the alternative.
JOE: By the way, one of the things that we didn’t mention yesterday, but you actually have mothers going to priests saying will God forgive me if I kill my child so ISIS doesn’t torture them when they get them and kill them?
. . .
WILLIE GEIST: Samantha Power just said it right there in that clip we just played. She said we all know what was happening. She was addressing Assad and Putin. She could have been saying it for herself and for President Obama.
MIKA: She’s very frustrated.
. . .
BARNICLE: Another thing that’s clearly evident from the past five years is they should just shut down the United Nations. Just shut it down.
JOE: Shut it down.
BARNICLE: Because they do nothing. They have done so little in this regard.
JOE: Mike, thank God you said that. You know what they do? They come here in September, and they have parties. That’s all they do. This is disgraceful. If there were ever, ever a legitimate cause for the United Nations it would have been over the past five years, and protecting these refugees, but they did nothing. They sat back and did absolutely nothing.
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