Monday morning’s Morning Joe featured Way Too Early host Jonathan Lemire to lament the “lack of enthusiasm” for President Biden in his reelection bid among Democrat voters, as well as why this should not have been the case, and the subsequent heated discussion caused co-host Mika Brzezinski to erupt like a volcano about how these Democrats should “get over” anxieties about Biden’s age in the upcoming election, railing at them to “be like Gavin Newsom” and “do better.”
Lemire began by admitting that “being nervous is a—a—a permanent condition for Democrats,” but that this had particularly been the case with the beginning of Biden’s reelection campaign over the weekend. He bemoaned the reduction in popularity that Biden had been getting because of his obviously increasing age, an issue that has been “reinforced when he says something people don’t quite understand” (certainly a polite way of putting it) or on the multiple occasions that he had fallen down.
He complained that there were even Democrats who thought that Biden had “done a good job to this point” who did not want to vote for him again because of the age factor. He said that this age factor was among other issues that “shouldn’t matter” to voters, because his record of getting things done as president should apparently overrule these concerns.
This was where Scarborough and Brzezinski engaged in their little yelling match over how irrational and anxious the Democratic Party was as a whole with regards to this issue. Like the rumbling before the blast, Brzezinski started it all by sighing loudly during the points of the discussion when the others had been talking about these concerns that Democrats had, indicating her extreme distaste for them.
Scarborough, sensing her displeasure, acknowledged that he knew that she didn’t “like talking about this” issue. She angrily snapped at him with the bold claim that “every single Republican candidate would love to have Joe Biden’s problems…that their only issue…is that they’re older.”
Scarborough, baiting her into making a bold statement, asked her why she was “upset that every Democrat you talk to says this?” Taking the bait, she responded with an explosive, “get over it”: “Because, get over it. He's your candidate. Start talking about the—be like Gavin Newsom. Do better.”
Essentially, Brzezinski seemed to want Democrats to simply ignore Biden’s concerning aging signs and vote for him regardless of them, on the grounds that he had done enough in his current term to justify voting for him again. Her brazen, angry “get over it” and “do better” to those other members of her own party who were only concerned about an elderly president, could not have been taken well, to say the least.
After having egged Brzezinski on by his questioning, Scarborough proceeded to proclaim that he was “not one of those people” who were “going around talking about [Biden] being too old to run.”
Ah, yes, those horrendous people who actually had somewhat of a conscience, and who knew that a person must have a certain ability level to be able to run a country, even if he had displayed some ability in the past that may have gone away. How dare they.
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Transcript of the segment below (click Expand):
MSNBC’s Morning Joe
06/19/23
7:28 AM ET
JOE SCARBOROUGH: We shall see. I'll—I’ll ask you the same thing, Jonathan Lemire. The White House has to hear the constant drum beat, and, we've gone through it. Joe Biden always underestimated. Joe Biden always wins.
But, man, the—the—the drum beat just gets stronger and stronger every—every week, I mean, you know, he—he makes a statement like "God save the queen" at the end of a state—at the end of a speech, everybody is calling, going, "This is the end! This is the end!”
[Loud sigh from Mika Brzezinski]
You know, it seems every time there's something that happens, everybody gets on the phone and they start talking, and, again, overlook a lot of the successes. I mean, do they think they have a communication problem? Do they think they need to be more assertive, getting all of these wins out there?
JONATHAN LEMIRE: Well, being nervous is a—a—a permanent condition for Democrats, but they are particularly nervous right now about President Biden, despite his impressive—there’s no other way to say it—impressive track record in office at this point, and the White House is well aware of it. They can read the poll numbers. They see the lack of enthusiasm among other—about Democrats for Biden for ‘24 onward, even as they think he's done a good job to this point.
They certainly see concerns about the president's age, yes, it’s reinforced when he says something people don’t quite understand, and no one in the White House knew what the "God save the queen" line was on Friday, we asked around. You know, they were nervous when he fell a few weeks ago onstage in Colorado, thinking that, what would happen if he had, like, broken a bone or something, coming in—out of that fall and had to wear a cast for awhile, what’d that look like?
And again, these are things that shouldn't matter, perhaps, because of his record, and we can—they—we could point to it, we do on this show all the time, about the resume he has. But we also have to be realistic. We're reporting what we are hearing out there and what, frankly, what the polls suggest…
SCARBOROUGH: Well…
LEMIRE: …is that Democrats are anxious about this.
SCARBOROUGH: Yeah. And—and Rev, I—I know, you know… leaders are hearing it. The New York Times has called you.
[Loud sigh from Mika Brzezinski]
I know you don't like talking about this.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: I mean—I think every single Republican candidate would love to have Joe Biden's problems. They would love to—
SCARBOROUGH: Well—
BRZEZINSKI: —that their only issue—
SCARBOROUGH: But—but why are you getting mad—
BRZEZINSKI: —is that they're older.
SCARBOROUGH: Why are you getting—
BRZEZINSKI: I’m getting mad because—
SCARBOROUGH: —up—ups—upset that every Democrat you talk to says this?
BRZEZINSKI: Because, get over it. He's your candidate. Start talking about the—be like Gavin Newsom. Do better.
SCARBOROUGH: So—so—
BRZEZINSKI: Do better. There's a lot to talk about.
SCARBOROUGH: So—so Rev, it's kind of hard to run a presidential campaign when everybody, every Democrat it seems, is going around talking about him being too old to run and I get—I’m not one of those people. I am not. You look at his record, you look at the fact, again, that he has outperformed all expectations consistently.
And yet, this Democratic Party, which, actually, let's—let’s face it, they said he was dead on arrival after Iowa, after New Hampshire, before South Carolina. He's proven them wrong time and time again and, yet… I'm sure you've heard it—you’ve heard it, too.
