Macho MSNBC host Joe Scarborough continued to expose his troubling obsession with outward manifestations of masculinity. Macho Joe was back at it Tuesday during Tuesday's Morning Joe, twice referring to the Republican Speaker of the House as "little" Mike Johnson.
We've documented his multiple boasts about his own toughness, as when Macho Joe threatened to make a Capitol tourist "eat" his camera if Joe found him snapping pics somewhere Scarborough didn't like.
And then there was Scarbrough boasting he'd never let anyone "emasculate" him the way Donald Trump supposedly did to J.D. Vance. Just to name a couple of examples.
You'll note in the first part of the clip, that Scarborough began to simply say "Mike Johnson," but then interrupted himself, circling back to say "little" Mike Johnson. In other words, this was a very intentional snipe at Johnson's physical stature. Later in the clip, Scarborough refers to Johnson as the "little Speaker."
Yes, Joe, at 6'4", you're much taller than the 5'8" Johnson. But when the going got hot for you back when you were a congressman, you quit the House and ran away to spend the proverbial "more time with your family."
In contrast, not only did Mike Johnson manage to get himself elected Speaker, but he had the strength to hold the fractious Republican caucus reasonably together on a range of issues.
We don't recall Scarborough mocking Nancy Pelosi's modest height. On the contrary, Scarborough and Co. were always filled with praise for her strength as Speaker.
And Scarborough's fascination with height was especially ironic considering that one of his go-to phrases was to speak admiringly of "Madisonian democracy," and to bewail the supposed Republican threat to it.
Know how tall James Madison was, Joe? 5' 4" - making him the shortest of all American presidents.
Here's the transcript.
MSNBC
Morning Joe
2/20/24
6:29 am ETJOE SCARBOROUGH: The message that Xi getting right now from Mike John -- little Mike Johnson, and Donald Trump, it's just devastating. And the message is this, Republicans, who for the past 50 years have been the main force to push back hard on communism, they've, they've surrendered to the communists. They've surrendered.
Mike Johnson surrendered to the communists, to the ex-communists, to the wanna-be communists. Mike Johnson surrendered. Donald Trump surrendered a long time ago to Vladimir Putin. Surrendered to Xi a long time ago. He has nothing but praise for Xi, for Kim Jong-un, these communist leaders, Mika. And that is a message that Xi is receiving loud and clear. That it's not just Donald Trump now. It is the Republican party. Once the bulwark against communist aggression, it is the Republican party, Ronald Reagan's old party, that has now collapsed.
. . .
How grave is the situation? It's, it's, it's grave for Ukraine. It's grave for freedom in Europe. It's grave because we fought a Cold War for 42 years, for 42 years, from Harry Truman to JFK to Ronald Reagan to, to Zbigniew Brzezinski, to Madeleine Albright, to Colin Powell: you name it!
You name it. Republicans and Scoop Jackson. Republicans and Sam Nunn. Republicans and Democrats alike dedicated, devoted their lives to freeing the lives of Europeans enslaved by Russia [pounds fist on table], by Soviet Russia.
And here we are. Here we are. We have a guy who wants to be president again, and his pathetic, little Speaker who are actually doing Vladimir Putin's bidding.
