Condemning Roseanne Barr’s ugly, racist tweet from Tuesday morning about former Obama administration official Valerie Jarrett should be relatively simple. However, the panel on MSNBC’s Deadline: White House took things further and then some.
In the show’s B-Block, the panel linked the now-cancelled ABC star’s comments to Sarah Palin on the 2008 campaign trail, “borderline evil” people in the White House “hurting this country,” how “white people have lost their damn minds,” and Trump supporters are “moral monsters that are running around this country.”
After The Washington Post’s Ashley Parker observed that Trump rallies bring out “a frenzied, dark side in people,” host Nicolle Wallace found it worth dredging up how awful Sarah Palin made her life and that of panelist Steve Schmidt while overseeing the McCain-Palin campaign.
“[S]ome of that had its birth in the Sarah Palin crowds. I mean, you and I both saw it and while, across the Midwest, John McCain was reprimanding his supporters when they called President Obama — then-Senator Obama a Muslim. Sarah Palin reveled in what you just described,” Wallace sneered.
Schmidt agreed, slamming the people who actually did support the ticket as having “made us cringe.” The long-winded faux Republican then turned his aim to the Trump administration, shouting that “any of these people who are working in a political capacity in this White House, they are complicit with this” and “not serving the better angels of our country.”
As he’s prone to do, Schmidt continued uninterrupted for a few minutes and linked Roseanne to our discourse. He painted an apocalyptic present day with “deliberate,” “purposeful,” and “premeditated” actions carried out by the “borderline evil” people working in the White House to destroy America (click “expand”):
WALLACE: Do you call anybody out? Secretary Mattis?
SCHMIDT: I carve out people in vital, national security functions that are serving in —
WALLACE: Who?
SCHMIDT: — non-political capacities? I’d put Secretary Mattis into that role. For example, when Pompeo goes out last week and he talks about, well, no, these words just kind of get thrown around out there. B.S. Part of a deliberate disinformation campaign by this President. We've never seen the level of lying. We've never seen the level of race-baiting. You know, we think about the greatest president this country has ever produced, Abraham Lincoln. We think about Lincoln calling to the better angels of our nature. Donald Trump, every day from the moment he wakes up to the moment he retires, summons our worst demons and the people in that White House are in on it with him. They are coarsening the country. The level of lying, the level of deceit, the level of attacks on our institutions, the sundering of the country for political purposes, all of it, it is deliberate, it is purposeful, it is premeditated. They know exactly what they're doing. There's a political strategy to it. It is not providential. It is not accidental and you either look at that and you recognize not only is it bad, it's borderline evil and it is hurting this country and last word about Valerie Jarrett, who served from the moment of President Barack Obama's inauguration to the moment of Donald Trump's inauguration. She served with dignity, with honor, with the qualities of probity and rectitude that are completely missing from anybody that is serving in this White House and so, Valerie Jarrett when we look at her conduct as a senior official of the government of the United States compared to these people, give me a break.
Princeton University professor and MSNBC contributor Eddie Glaude followed suit, telling Wallace that the President is “not the iceberg” of racism in this country but rather “the tip of the iceberg.”
“We could talk about the politics, we could talk about what's happening in the White House and folks who complicit with it. But for a lot of black folk in this country, it seems as if, in a generality, white people have lost their damn minds and we have to raise our children in the midst of this,” Glaude lamented.
Citing Barr’s unacceptable comments, plus two recent incidents at a Starbucks and Waffle House, Glaude linked those to previous generations of African-Americans being lynched. He then, in part, continued (again, click “expand” and emphasis mine):
We find ourselves in a historic moment right now where we have to worry about raising our kids. We have to worry about whether or not they will have opportunity. So we could talk about the politics, but there's something and Steve, you've get at this — you’ve touched on this. There's something deeply insidious that’s borderline evil here and it's not just simply Donald Trump. It's about the moral monsters that are running around this country and claiming it as their own and making so many people vulnerable and it’s — you know, my son just graduated yesterday on Sunday and I'm thinking about how joyous he was, how I saw that big beautiful smile and then I got to worry about him, Nicolle. We have to worry about — why? Because we can't seem to look the ugliness or who we are — not just simply Donald Trump, but who we are and who we have been so that we can imagine oust ourselves better...[B]ut we have to fight we have to fight for a better America and we can't cede it to these folk who are, in some ways, nurturing themselves in hate and that's going to require not only voting. It's going to require getting out and doing the heavy lifting in our neighborhoods with people who often don't look like us.
At the end of the day, don’t try and make the case that liberal media outlets like MSNBC want to unite the country. If anything, they only want to see further division to drive up ratings and satisfy corporate liberals who make up their advertising base.
To see the relevant transcript from MSNBC’s Deadline: White House on May 29, click “expand.”
MSNBC’s Deadline: White House
May 29, 2018
4:23 p.m. Eastern
ASHLEY PARKER: I covered Donald Trump on the campaign trail in 2016. I traveled. I went to just about every single one of his rallies and I want to be clear. I — I don't believe and I think it is overly simplistic and unfair and inaccurate to say that all Donald Trump supporters are racist or sexist.
NICOLLE WALLACE: Of course.
PARKER: But the thing I was struck by was at these rallies I heard phrases and words, racist, sexist, anti-Semitic that in covering other campaigns, Democrat and Republican, I had never heard before and you would never expect to hear in a public forum and I was always struck by it felt like at these rallies a permission structure was created for people to say things and do things that they would never do or very few of them would ever do in regular life and it was very striking. I would be interviewing someone before the rally and they could not be more polite and respectful and more thoughtful and then suddenly the rally started and it just sort of brought out a frenzied, dark side in people and I think that is also some of what we’re seeing here.
WALLACE: I mean, if we’re going to be honest, Steve Schmidt, some of that had its birth in the Sarah Palin crowds. I mean, you and I both saw it and while, across the Midwest, John McCain was reprimanding his supporters when they called President Obama — then Senator Obama a Muslim. Sarah Palin reveled in what you just described.
STEVE SCHMIDT: Post the economic crash when it was clear we were going to lose, we had supporters in these crowds that were frustrated. It made us cringe. Our candidate denounced it. But let’s come forward now to 2018. We have a president of the United States and first off, any of these people who are working in a political capacity in this White House, they are complicit with this. They are not hostages. They are not serving the better angels of our country. They are in on it 100%. The coarsening of this country with this mean-spirted, racist nonsense that spews forth —
WALLACE: Do you call anybody out? Secretary Mattis?
SCHMIDT: I carve out people in vital, national security functions that are serving in —
WALLACE: Who?
SCHMIDT: — non-political capacities? I’d put Secretary Mattis into that role. For example, when Pompeo goes out last week and he talks about, well, no, these words just kind of get thrown around out there. B.S. Part of a deliberate disinformation campaign by this President. We've never seen the level of lying. We've never seen the level of race-baiting. You know, we think about the greatest president this country has ever produced, Abraham Lincoln. We think about Lincoln calling to the better angels of our nature. Donald Trump, every day from the moment he wakes up to the moment he retires, summons our worst demons and the people in that White House are in on it with him. They are coarsening the country. The level of lying, the level of deceit, the level of attacks on our institutions, the sundering of the country for political purposes, all of it, it is deliberate, it is purposeful, it is premeditated. They know exactly what they're doing. There's a political strategy to it. It is not providential. It is not accidental and you either look at that and you recognize not only is it bad, it's borderline evil and it is hurting this country and last word about Valerie Jarrett, who served from the moment of President Barack Obama's inauguration to the moment of Donald Trump's inauguration. She served with dignity, with honor, with the qualities of probity and rectitude that are completely missing from anybody that is serving in this White House and so, Valerie Jarrett when we look at her conduct as a senior official of the government of the United States compared to these people, give me a break.
WALLACE: It reminds me of the line in The American President, she's way out of your league, Mr. President.
SCHMIDT: Indeed she is.
WALLACE: Let’s watch Valerie Jarrett just now.
VALERIE JARRETT: I think we have to turn it into a teaching moment. I'm fine. I'm worried about all the people out there who don't have a circle of friend and followers who come right to their defense, the person who's walking down the street, minding their own business and they see somebody cling to their purse or want to cross the street. Or every black parent I know who has a boy who has to sit down and have a conversation, “the talk” as we call it and as you say, those ordinary examples of racism that happen every single day and I think that's why I'm so glad to be here this evening talking with all of you.
WALLACE: Eddie Glaude, Valerie Jarrett, just the embodiment of grace under fire, but her words were actually the same words Mika Brzezinski used after Donald Trump tweeted about her bloody facelift. Mika said, in her first public comments, Mika Brzezinski, the co-anchor of Morning Joe, a show you and I are lucky enough to appear on often, Mika said I'm fine, but almost exactly what Valerie said. I'm worried about the people who don't have a voice, who don't have a platform, who don’t have friends to speak up for them. Can you speak to that part of what Valerie's trying to articulate there?
EDDIE GLAUDE: Sure. So, let's be clear that Donald Trump is just an exaggerated indication of what's happening in the country. He's the tip of the iceberg. He's not the iceberg itself and what Valerie Jarrett points our attention to — directs our attention to is this, Nicolle. We could talk about the politics, we could talk about what's happening in the White House and folks who complicit with it. But for a lot of black folk in this country, it seems as if, in a generality, white people have lost their damn minds and we have to raise our children in the midst of this. We have to — we have to — when those two black men in Starbucks, they were somebody's babies even though they were grown men. That child that a police officer hung up by his feet at the Waffle House, that's somebody's child and so, here we are in this environment, where many of us, in our past, and in histories of our families, have had people strung up from trees, have had to deal with legal segregation and ongoing insult and injury and harm. We find ourselves in a historic moment right now where we have to worry about raising our kids. We have to worry about whether or not they will have opportunity. So we could talk about the politics, but there's something and Steve, you've get at this — you’ve touched on this. There's something deeply insidious that’s borderline evil here and it's not just simply Donald Trump. It's about the moral monsters that are running around this country and claiming it as their own and making so many people vulnerable and it’s — you know, my son just graduated yesterday on Sunday and I'm thinking about how joyous he was, how I saw that big beautiful smile and then I got to worry about him, Nicolle. We have to worry about — why? Because we can't seem to look the ugliness or who we are — not just simply Donald Trump, but who we are and who we have been so that we can imagine oust ourselves better. But again, as I'm prone to do, I'm being a moralist.
WALLCE: You got me, though. I want you to keep talking. Tell me what do we do next, Eddie Glaude?
GLAUDE: I think it involves an honest confrontation. You know, I’ve been — I'm working on this book on James Baldwin and Baldwin, at the moment in which he died, he was deeply and profoundly disillusions that the country had once again failed to deal with the contradictions at its heart. But he said we had no time to despair, that those of us who have a vision of democracy, who have a fundamental respect for the dignity and standing of all Americans, no matter their zip code, no matter the color of their skin, no matter who love, no matter their gender, that we have to get out here and not just listen, but we have to fight we have to fight for a better America and we can't cede it to these folk who are. in some ways. nurturing themselves in hate and that's going to require not only voting. It's going to require getting out and doing the heavy lifting in our neighborhoods with people who often don't look like us.
