Suddenly, Joe Scarborough Is A Solution Machine

The Morning Joe Rebuttal for December 21st, 2009


Observations:


1) So there’s a list: reinstate antitrust, tort reform, and interstate availability that apparently cures cancer. Where was this list on any day previous to today? When have any of these items been presented as a bill to any congressional body by a Republican? Seemingly without memory, Joe Scarborough has provided a list of what’s missing from reform as he attacks the bill that is going to pass the Senate as of this morning. It is uniquely dishonest for a person who would never submit a solution to provide one from the sidelines only when beaten.


I’d like to have seen Mr. Scarborough do what he does best: call out the Republicans on the futility of obstructionism when the other side has 60 votes. It’s a landmark bill, but apparently Republicans are happy to sit on the sidelines when every single person willing to trade a difficult vote was going to the bank, and every progressive that could be taken for granted was having his pocket picked. That’s like passing on stock in Microsoft in 1982.


Now I shouldn’t say the Republicans got nothing, because they bathed in the cash shower from the health care industry lobby to maintain their disciplined obstruction, but if you’ve lost to the other side, and your money is just going to fund a much tougher campaign next time through, have you maximized?


2) Elections do have consequences, and the Democrats are going to lose seats in 2010. But, 2012 is another story, and the Republicans are going to need so many things to go wrong to get through two election cycles with growth while not doing a single good thing, all the while not making it obvious where their endless supply of campaign funding is coming from. It’s very interesting to point to the 2012 election with a mandate of further gains on health care reform, and banking reform, and cloture reform with a different business cycle and the results of continued Democratic majorities taking a stab at job growth, fiscal discipline and deficit reduction.


Think that’s a pipe dream? If Joe Scarborough didn’t have a personally promotional campaign daily about the effect his tenure in congress had on a balanced budget and deficit reduction, Bill Clinton would get 100% of the credit for the surplus years that ended the 90’s and greeted George Bush. Even with JS pointing to himself, Bill Clinton still gets 90% of the credit. So if you want to try and make a point that Democrats have no business talking about the surplus years, they can claim scoreboard and your attempts to take credit will only come off like sour grapes.


3) While I never expect an about face from Joe on his unending vitriolic stream of abuse directed at Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, it’s becoming obvious that he loses credibility with each demonstrable victory by them. This has become like saying you don’t like Kobe Bryant’s approach to basketball, when the world knows these people are accomplishing feats that you apparently can’t comprehend, let alone achieve.


Ever since Pelosi delivered the House bill, your dismissive tone when uttering her name with a grimacing difficulty has had an opposite effect. What is it when altruism leads you off a cliff? Are you going to do the same thing now with Reid, attempt to keep the attack up on a daily basis and hope the world hasn’t noticed your discredit is actually not holding up to history? Like a Fox viewer who doesn’t like the state of things so they listen to Glenn Beck say stuff that isn’t true but designed to tell the audience what they want to hear, will you continue to trumpet the denial of facts on the ground?


Ratings will probably go up, but the truth is still required at some point, so don’t wait too long.


That’s all for today, see you tomorrow.