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Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 16, 2017 35 Comments
How are Dems playing their reaction to the news that President Trump shared intelligence information with the Russians during a White House visit? Judging by the statement from former Obama special assistant Ned Price, they've turned it up to 11. Appearing on today's Morning Joe, Price said:

"Last week we had this hearing of all national security officials on worldwide threats. And of course, they covered ISIL, they covered Syria, North Korea. I think we have to start asking ourselves: at what point does this administration itself become a threat we have to be concerned about?"

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 16, 2017 34 Comments
On his Fox News show last night, Tucker Carlson ripped Mika Brzezinski for quoting, on yesterday's Morning Joe, unflattering things that Kellyanne Conway allegedly said about Donald Trump in private, off-the-air conversations. Tucker cited Mika as an example of journalists who have "degraded and humiliated themselves" out of their anti-Trump "hysteria." Tucker: "TV anchors almost never reveal what their guests have said off-camera, and for good reason. People come to TV studios so they can speak on TV. They do not come with the expectation that their private conversations will wind up broadcast to the country."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 15, 2017 38 Comments
Earlier this month, Joe Scarborough compared President Trump to his own mother, "who has had dementia for ten years." Joe was back on his Trump-is-crazy beat on today's Morning Joe. After Mika cited a Washington Post article quoting an anonymous source who wondered whether President Trump "is in the grip of some kind of paranoid delusion," Joe weighed in, saying he's heard reports all weekend that "the president is running around, screaming at television sets. He's increasingly isolated." Joe then upped the ante, adding that there are "reports at his club that he's going off, detached. Almost detached from reality."

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on May 12, 2017 23 Comments
Three months ago, as we reported here, Mika Brzezinski barred Kellyanne Conway from Morning Joe, accusing Conway of propagating "fake news." Continuing her war on Kellyanne, Mika is now trying to keep Conway off the air on a rival network. Said Brzezinski on Morning Joe today: "note to CNN, sorry, I love CNN, but you've got to stop putting Kellyanne on the air. It's politics porn. You're just getting your little ratings crack, okay? But it's disgusting.

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 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 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 24, 2017 46 Comments
On this evening's Hardball, Matthews said "New polls this week show the president with ocean-bottom job approval. That said, his supporters stick like a bathtub ring. Among those who voted for him, says the Washington Post, 96% said they have no regrets about supporting him." The non-stop attacks from Dems and the MSM haven't shaken support for President Trump among those who voted for him. A frustrated Matthews let his vexation show by comparing Trump supporters to that stubborn ring around the bathtub.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 23, 2017 55 Comments
Jesus: social justice warrior? Apparently so, if you believe Jacqui Lewis, senior minister of the very liberal Middle Collegiate Church in NYC. During her appearance on Al Sharpton's MSNBC show this morning, Lewis described Jesus as a "brown-skinned Palestinian man who understood he needed to resist." The notion that Jesus was Palestinian has been thoroughly debunked. He was Jewish, after all. But that hasn't stopped anti-Semites like Barack Obama's former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, from also making the claim.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on April 22, 2017 11 Comments
As we've documented, Joy Reid has a habit of shutting down conservatives on her MSNBC show who say things she doesn't like. So today, Reid invited on her kind of conservative. Kirsten Haglund, billed by the show as a "conservative commentator," was highly critical of the way Ivanka allegedly mixes business and public service. Haglund's criticism was indistinguishable from that of the liberal panelists. But what really put the lie to the notion that Haglund is a "conservative commentator" was this line from her: "Ivanka and Jared are more moderate. I hope they would use that influence [on Trump] a little bit more." So Reid's idea of a "conservative" is someone who wants to see President Trump pushed to the left. Got it!

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 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 15, 2017 38 Comments
For someone who styles herself an advocate of diversity, Joy Reid has a funny way of shutting down diverse voices. Legal Insurrection has documented how in the past she has silenced and even ejected guests who ran afoul of her speech codes. Back at it today, Reid reprimanded Republican consultant Katon Dawson for referring to the "Democrat" party. "On this show, we say Democratic," instructed Reid, telling Dawson that "we're going to have to sit down. We're going to have a talking-to." Being lectured by Joy Reid: now there's something to look forward to!

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."
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