Joe Scarborough has said that he doesn't know whether Morning Joe member Willie Geist is a Democrat or a Republican. I'd say Willie leans left on social issues but is not reflexively liberal on other matters. Today, with Scarborough absent from the Morning Joe set, Geist actually rode to the defense of Rand Paul.
The Republican Senator from Kentucky has been taking heat from Dems over telling Hillary Clinton at yesterday's Benghazi hearings that had he been president, he would have fired her for her handling of the matter. Panelist Donny Deutsch made a predictable attack, calling Paul "pathetic, amateur hour" and an "idiot." But Geist weighed in to say that Paul "had a right to challenge" Clinton, and that he's "not supposed to just sit there and celebrate her," and that he was "doing his job." View the video after the jump.
DONNY DEUTSCH: One other thing about Rand Paul, and this was also a look at the faces of the Republicans: Rand Paul, Ron Johnson and John McCain, looked so pathetic, and to me, there's something called decorum. And when Rand Paul sits there and to the second-highest [sic] ranking official in our country and someone who has done a spectacular job says I would have had your job, that's pathetic. That's the amateur hour. And that's the Republicans.
WILLIE GEIST: He's got a right to challenge her on it. I mean, he's not supposed to sit there [inaudible] and just celebrate her. He was doing his job.
DEUTSCH: There's a difference: "I would have relieved her of your duty"? That, that's an idiot.
Note: before calling Paul an "idiot," it might behoove Donny to get his fourth-grade civics straightened out. Contrary to what Deutsch claimed, Hillary is not "the second-highest ranking official in our country." As Secretary of State, she actually ranks fifth.
