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While the rest of the Morning Joe crew was espousing their new found love for Helen Thomas and former MSNBC reporter Chip Reid, Carl Bernstein managed to get Chuck Todd's back hair up by reminding him that the White House press corps yelling at the Press Secretary is not exactly what anyone should consider real journalism.

While I whole heartedly agree with Todd that it is important to hold these people accountable, Bernstein's points about this entire ordeal looking petty, and about where real journalism happens, which is reporters getting out there and knocking on doors, and digging into whether someone's actually telling you the truth or not, fact checking what you're told, etc. is what should be considered actual journalism is valid as well, and he managed to make Todd look petty while making it.

Todd tried to defend what the White House press corps does on a daily basis, and not very well IMO. When you're making excuses for asking Michael Jackson questions you've already lost the argument Bernstein was trying to make.

I want to know where these birds were with their love of Helen Thomas when the Bush White House refused to call on her for the better part of eight years? I'd also like to know if they're going to continue to support her if she asks some tough questions on things like these bank bailouts, spying on everyone which hasn't stopped, or these mindless wars that we're still sending our troops off to fight and die in. Is that going to make the "news" cycle on Morning Joe? Somehow, I doubt it.

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MSNBC's irony alert button is broken. For some reason the producers of Morning Joe thought anyone should care what Rudy Giuliani thinks about Mark Sanford's marital problems. And they managed to make it through the entire segment while completely ignoring Giuliani's own affairs. Imagine that.

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(JA: Heather posted this clip originally on: Friday Jun 26, 2009 7:00am)

Eric Cantor is asked by MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan to explain just what the GOP's plan is for health care reform, and again, Cantor fails to give any details as to just what their plan is, other than saying no to a public option and offering consumers more "choice". Even Ratigan points out at the end of the interview that Cantor didn't answer his question.

As Jason Linkins pointed out at the HuffPo, Cantor had some similar trouble on the same show when asked by Mike Barnicle what the GOP's plan was for health care reform back on May 6th, 2009.

So we have the second failure on the same show within a little over a month for Cantor to actually respond in a meaningful way with details and to give them some specific answers on just what the GOP's health care plan entails. Willie Geist's response when Ratigan pointed out that Cantor didn't answer the question....we'll have him back on again to explain it.

Well if you couldn't pin him down the last two times you had him on the air to spout off Republican spin on health care reform with no specifics, what makes you think your viewers can expect anything different the next time you have him on Willie? It's a good thing you "real reporters" out there do such a fine job of holding our elected officials feet to the fire when you have the chance, unlike us "Cheetos-eating" bloggers out there you take such joy in insulting.

If the cast of Morning Joe wanted to have an honest debate on health care reform and what should really be done to fix the mess we're in with so many uninsured and the escalating cost of health care, they'd be making Cantor debate the likes of Bernie Sanders or Michael Moore who support single payer for some real health care reform.

I expect that to happen about the time hell freezes over.

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Joe Scarborough attacks Paul Krugman for his op-ed The Big Hate:

Scarborough: I’m just gonna say it. As somebody that has to sort through a lot of hate mail, a lot of hate email, a lot of viciousness. Paul Krugman’s name is attached to a lot of those emails. They use Paul Krugman as their shield for their left-wing hate. This is because Paul Krugman, like a lot of extremists on the right, they only see their side. They have a closed-minded world view. Paul Krugman uses this tragedy, uses this death to try to knock down his opponents on the right.

Unbelievable. Project much Joe?

From The Daily Show. Jon Stewart slaps around the cast of Morning Joe.

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The cast of Morning Joe while fear mongering about the EFCA can't manage to name a single successful unionized company, even though they work for one. Media Matters and TPM are already all over this one. Jamison Foser at Media Matters:

The Morning Joe crew was on an anti-union tear this morning, claiming the union label on a company means "sell." Mika Brzezinski went so far as to say of unions: "They cripple the system that makes a company work." Collectively, the journalists on Morning Joe couldn't name a single "successful" unionized company.

.....

Oh, what the heck, let's take one more example. GE is one of the world's largest companies; in 2006, its revenues were greater than the gross domestic products of 80 percent of UN nations. The company made more than $18 billion in 2008 -- again, billion with a b, and again, those are profits, not revenue. All that despite (or, perhaps, because of) the fact that 13 different unions represent GE workers.

Continue reading »

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In response to reporting on the GM bankruptcy, Joe Scarborough compares President Obama to Kim Jong Il. Way to stay classy Scarborough.

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Joe Scarborough continues his torture apology tour on Morning Joe and the man is just getting nuttier by the day. Maybe if Cheney decides to run in 2012 he can get Scarborough to sign on as his campaign manager, since it sure as hell looks like he's auditioning for it.

Think Progress found this little gem I thought was too good not to pass on and I'll let them take it from here:

Joe Scarborough’s defense of torture and its apologists has grown so desperate that he’s now resorting to quotes from fictional characters in Hollywood movies to support his position.

[.....]

In the movie, Cruise’s character gets commander Col. Jessup, played by Nicholson, to admit that he ordered two young Marines to assault and kill their colleague. The Cheney-esque Jessup defends his decision by saying, “[his] death, while tragic, probably saved lives” and “[y]ou have no idea how to defend a nation. All you did was weaken a country today.” So in that sense, yes — Cheney’s speech yesterday was “straight out of ‘A Few Good Men.’”

But to refresh Scarborough’s memory, at the end of the movie, Jessup ends up going to prison for his actions. “[Y]ou’re under arrest, you son of a bitch,” Cruise tells Nicholson’s Cheney-esque character in a dramatic scene at the end of the movie.

We can only hope Cheney's fate is the same as Jessup's but I don't see much hope of that happening. In the mean time we have Joe Scarborough who if nothing else, continues to serve a source of entertainment when he does things like this, and who's irony alert button seems to be broken under the force of the man's own ego.

Scarborough fails Schultz's challenge and cannot name a single Democrat that wants Nancy Pelosi removed as the Speaker of the House. Ed Schultz tries his best to beat back the usual fear mongering from this crowd and in the end....everyone wants a Truth Commission. Yeah, we'll see about that.

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I think Joe Scarborough is attempting to make his show almost as unwatchable as Fox News. First he decides to attack Jesse Ventura for his comments on The View:

SCARBOROUGH: Perhaps Jesse should stop smoking whatever Jesse's been smoking and keep his mouth shut about things he knows absolutely nothing about. This is a guy who, by the way -- I must continue to say this -- that got paid two million dollars by this network, did one show and sucked so bad that they sent him back to Minnesota and said "we never want to see you again."

I wish I was that bad. Perhaps I am. Maybe they'll fire me and I'll take my money and go to Florida. [...] Seriously, that's the sort of stupidity -- it's just -- it should seriously be a crime to be that dumb and on TV. [mocking Jesse's voice] We only waterboard Muslims. Oh God.

Let's bring in Rudy Giuliani. Former Republican mayor of New York City, former presidential candidate, Rudy Giuliani. This seems like a great place to start. [begin douchey sarcastic voice] Why is it that people like Jesse Ventura are so concerned about how we treat people like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed? Why is that?

h/t to Bob Cesca for the transcript and apparently he was as disgusted after watching this as I was. I'll let him take it from here.

Jesse Ventura was a Navy Seal who survived the SERE program and served in Vietnam. He "knows nothing" about torture and war, Joe? And you do? That's rich.

As for your question to Giuliani, Jesse is worried about torturing people like KSM because it endangers our soldiers.

Scarborough then goes into an angry tirade when Carlos Watson dares to suggest that waterboarding doesn't work.

SCARBOROUGH: I’ve got to stop you right there. How do you dare come on this set and say that’s [waterboarding] not effective? That’s just not the truth! And if you have any evidence that it is not effective, let me know right now!

We're not the only ones who noticed Scarborough's angry defense of torture this morning.

Think Progress has taken up Scarborough’s challenge, with this comprehensive document explaining why Bush’s enhanced interrogation tactics were a failure.