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Morning Joe Tag

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 10, 2017 2 Comments
On today's Morning Joe, Mika Brezezinski didn't hesitate to tell Trump spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders "you're actually not telling the truth right now" while discussing the firing of FBI Director James Comey. Mika's jab came in response to Sanders' assertion that everyone—including Scarborough—has come to the same conclusion: that there is no evidence of collusion between the Russians and the Trump campaign.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 09, 2017 28 Comments
Is Mika Brzezinski feeling empowered by her recently-disclosed engagement to Joe Scarborough? On today's Morning Joe, Mika confidently proclaimed that "I know my little meltdowns make you all laugh. They're always right." Mika went on to predict, "I'm telling you right now, these guys [in the Trump admin] are going to find themselves fumbling on their own lies, to the point it brings them down. And it's going to start with the press secretary but it's going to end up on the president's desk."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 08, 2017 39 Comments
On today's Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough said he didn't want to bring religion into the health care debate. But he then proceeded to do just that. He said that he's not judging anybody, but then said that the Republican health care bill can't be defended "morally." Scarborough:
"I'm sorry, don't want to bring religion into this, but if you are a Matthew 25 Christian and you believe what Jesus says, that we will be judged on how we treat the poorest among us, then there is no legislative justification for cutting $650 billion in health benefits. And then turning around in the same bill and benefiting the richest among us $800, $850 billion.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 05, 2017 15 Comments
When did the word "optics" enter the political lexicon? In any case, the Morning Joe crew today ripped the look of the Republican Rose Garden ceremony of yesterday at which President Trump and House members celebrated the passage of their health care bill. Donny Deutsch said they were "a bunch of fat, middle-aged, rich white guys." When Willie Geist mentioned that Mika had said that the photo looked like a golf course ribbon cutting, Joe Scarborough interjected: "it's a country club with restrictive membership. Obviously, you have to be white, and a male, to be there."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 04, 2017 16 Comments
This isn't the first time that Mika Brzezinski has said something critical about Clinton world. So maybe it was just a coincidence that on the day it became public that she and Joe Scarborough have become engaged, Mika took a real shot at the decision not to go after Huma Abedin for forwarding classified emails to her husband Anthony Weiner, ostensibly for the purpose of having him print them off. Said Mika, "I don't understand how Hillary Clinton's e-mails are forwarded to Huma Abedin's husband so he can print them out. What? What? I don't know. Maybe there's no law against it. Seriously, maybe there's no law against it . . . It's incredible. It's everything that was wrong with the campaign." When Joe said that in fact there was a law against it, and suggested the Clinton campaign thought it was playing by different rules, Mika concurred: "totally different rules."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 03, 2017 10 Comments
"Pathetic." "Arrogance." Those were the key words that Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski used on today's Morning Joe, respectively, to describe Hillary Clinton's excuse-making for her loss. As our Mike LaChance—the artist formerly known as Aleister—has noted, Hillary was interviewed by Christiane Amanpour yesterday. Clinton paid lip service to her own mistakes, but ultimately concluded that "the reason I believe we lost were the intervening events in the last 10 days," citing the Comey letter and Wikileaks. Scarborough: "So who's going to say it on the set? Who's going to say it? Anybody going to say it? That was pathetic. I'll say it. Let me go out, I'll get killed." Mika went on to repeatedly speak of the "arrogance" of Hillary and the Clinton campaign. Sample: Hillary's comments show "this arrogance, and this sense that this was a coronation was so engrained in her."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 02, 2017 37 Comments
The entire opening segment of today's Morning Joe was devoted to Joe and Mika's suggestion that President Trump is, literally, demented. The show repeatedly cited Douglas Brinkley's claim that in his recent interviews, Trump showed himself to be in a "confused mental state." Joe made his view very explicit. Focusing on a statement Trump made about the Civil War, Scarborough said: "my mother has had dementia for ten years. That sounds like the sort of thing my mother would say today." Scarborough went on to twice suggest that the president can't remember what he said five minutes ago. Mika portentously declared that "we're going to say—maybe no one—I'm not sure he's okay. I'm not sure he's okay. You have that feeling with people who are not okay, where it starts to dawn on you that they are not okay."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 27, 2017 13 Comments
It's unanimous! 7.5 billion to zero! No one in the entire world likes Donald Trump! That would be the conclusion you'd have to draw if you watched the segment NBC's Richard Engel prepared for today's Morning Joe on international reaction to Trump's first 100 days. From the UK to South Korea, the West Bank to Germany, there was amazing consensus against Trump. Among people Engel aired, the best anyone had to say about Trump was British news anchor Alistair Stewart's observation that at least we've literally survived his first 100 days. Said Stewart: there isn't "all-out nuclear conflict—although it is openly talked about."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 21, 2017 21 Comments
The one sure thing about politics that this Insurrectionist has learned can be summed up in two words: "things change." So just like James Carville, who was wrong when in 2009 he wrote a book predicting that Dems would rule for 40 more years, it would be a bad mistake for Republicans to gloat, rest on their laurels, or assume they'll control both houses of congress for the foreseeable future. That said, the current sorry state of the Democrat party was put into sharp focus by Elijah Cummings on today's Morning Joe. Asked by Donny Deutsch to mention three "up-and-coming stars in our party," Dem Congressman Cummings named Adam Schiff, Barbara Lee, and Tim Kaine. Really?

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 20, 2017 24 Comments
During today's Morning Joe discussion of the ouster of Bill O'Reilly at Fox News, Joe Scarborough asked, "Do they remake over the entire network? Is anybody else in the [Murdoch] family's crosshairs right now?" Replied New York Times reporter Jeremy Peters: "I think you have to look at somebody like Sean Hannity, and question whether or not his almost propaganda-like attitude and programming every night is going to be acceptable in the minds of the family, which is clearly trying to shift the network in a different direction."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 19, 2017 13 Comments
Is Joy Reid going to rap DNC Chairman Tom Perez on the knuckles for failure to abide by her anointed nomenclature? As we noted this past weekend, MSNBC host Reid reprimanded Republican Katon Dawson for speaking of the "Democrat" party. She warned Dawson that "we're going to have a talking-to," she instructed him, "we say 'Democratic' on this show." Perez appeared on Morning Joe and CNN this morning to discuss yesterday's congressional primary in Georgia. And—ruh-roh—Perez twice spoke of the "Democrat" party! On Morning Joe, he said, "we're building a Democrat National Committee whose mission is not simply to elect the President of the United States." And later, on CNN, Perez said, "the Democrat party, we have to walk and chew gum."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 17, 2017 17 Comments
Today's Morning Joe had some good advice for Democrats if they want to start winning again, particularly at the House level. They need to stop imposing ideological purity tests on their candidates and nominate candidates who resonate culturally in swing districts. The good news for Republicans is that there is no sign that Dems will heed that wise counsel. To the contrary, Morning Joe was replete with indications that Dems have forgotten how to win, preferring to go down with their liberal guns a-blazing. Excerpts:

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 14, 2017 11 Comments
Looks like President Trump's dropping of the MOAB might have had an even bigger impact on Morning Joe than it did on ISIS. In March, the show was in full Apocalypse Now mode about President Trump. Take this excerpt from my item of March 6th: "Joe and Mika waxed apocalyptic, claiming the country is 'in crisis' and questioning President Trump’s 'stability.' At one point, Mika even seemed to choke up as she said, 'this is really a dark time which could get worse.'” Cut to today, when, in the wake of foreign policy success on the Russia, China, Syria and Afghanistan fronts, Morning Joe's tone on President Trump has changed radically. There was praise across the board, from Joe, Mika and Willie, as well as from regular guests David Ignatius, John Heilemann and Mark Halperin.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 12, 2017 7 Comments
Morning Joe has been on a Steve Bannon-bashing spree the last couple of days, with various panel members predicting his departure from the White House. As Mika Brzezinski put it yesterday, "the end is nigh" for Bannon. But Mark Halperin made a strong case for Bannon on today's show, saying that being conventional is not what got Donald Trump elected, and that "Bannon is one of the few people in the White House and in Trump's life who is creative, who's innovative, who takes risks, who advocates taking risks. Someone has to be for that."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 10, 2017 14 Comments
Surprising consensus on today's Morning Joe that Barack Obama blew it bigly in Syria by punting on his redline. Even Obama fan Mike Barnicle admitted, "Syria was a serious mistake that the Obama administration made." Foreign policy honcho Richard Haass said "history's going to be rough on this. This is going to be the defining moment for the Obama presidency." It wasn't just the panel that trashed Obama's mishandling of Syria. Joe Scarborough noted that not only did leading Dems like John Kerry and Hillary quickly come out in support of Trump's strikes, but that Dems were saying things that were "almost disloyal to Barack Obama, saying we could have never moved this quickly."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 03, 2017 21 Comments
Kibitzing about Donald Trump's mental health is a favorite MSM parlor game. But Morning Joe took it to a new level today, devoting its long, opening segment to the matter. Donny Deutsch and Joe Scarborough were the ringleaders, playing Drs. Freud and Jung, respectively. Excerpts:

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on March 31, 2017 17 Comments
On today's Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough argued that the MSM is failing to cover the story of the Obama admin "unmasking"and leaking the names of Trump campaign people caught up in the intercepts of Russians. According to Scarborough, 95% of the story is the attempt by the Russians to influence the election. But that still leaves the 5% that the MSM is ignoring because the people unmasked were disliked, and in the case of Michael Flynn, "loathed" by the media. In contrast, said Scarborough, the improper activity was "by people who, let's face it, most of the people in the media like and admire."
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