Imagine the audacity of a freshman senator presuming to speak out forcefully on foreign affairs! What? You thought we were alluding to Barack Obama, who after less than a year in the Senate and with no discernible foreign policy credentials began a campaign to become Commander-in-Chief?
No, no, no! We were talking about Tom Cotton, of course! On today's Morning Joe, Mika Brzezinski castigated Cotton as a "toddler" and a "fool" for writing that letter to Iran. For good measure, Al Hunt said that, like America, Iran has its "crazies" too. Did Hunt just equate Republican senators who sign a letter to those in Iran who have killed Americans and others around the world with impunity? So who's crazy now?
Mika was inspired by a clip of Bob Schieffer on yesterday's Face the Nation sarcastically asking Cotton whether he was planning to write to other rogue regimes, like North Korea. Cotton's wry smile was worth the price of admission.
Note: in contrast with Barack Obama's pre-Senate first-hand foreign policy experience, which consisted of living in Indonesia as a child, Cotton toddled around Iraq and Afghanistan as a Bronze Star veteran of two combat tours.
BOB SCHIEFFER: Are you planning to contact any other of our other adversaries around the country? For example, are you planning to check with the North Koreans to make sure they know that any deal has to be approved by the congress?
. . .
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: I loved Bob Schieffer's question. That absolutely crystallizes the stupidity and really, like, the toddler-like quality that exists in the senate.
JOES SCARBOROGH: Toddler? Toddler-like quality?
BRZEZINSKI: He's a toddler. He's a toddler. Yes, he is.
SCARBOROUGH: No, no. He's a United States Senator who --
BRZEZINSKI: Who has made himself into a fool.
. . .
SCARBOROUGH: You need to apologize to Tom Cotton right now.
BRZEZINSKI: No, I think we're good.
SCARBOROUGH: For calling him a toddler?
BRZEZINSKI: I think this was really -- it was really immature.
SCARBOROUGH: What if I called a Democratic senator a toddler?
BRZEZINSKI: You could do that.
. . .
SCARBOROUGH: Al Hunt, a lot of talk about that letter. At the end of the day does it have a significant impact in the negotiations or is it much ado about nothing?
AL HUNT: I suspect it doesn't but the fear that I think some have is that the other side, the Iranians have their crazies, too, and that this will embolden their crazies to try to kill the deal. I don't know if that's the case though. I don't think it's affects the American negotiations at all. I think the general sense is, I'm not going to call anybody a toddler, but it was a dumb thing to do.
