Even for the shameless Joe Scarborough, this was shameless.
Today's top story is, incontrovertibly, Joe Biden's pardoning of his son Hunter, and Ol' Joe having repeatedly lied in promising not to do so.
But on today's Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough was unwilling to describe the pardon as even one of the two top stories of the day, saying instead that numbers one and two were Trump's nominations of Kash Patel and Pete Hegseth.
Jonathan Lemire hit the usual MSNBC notes. The Patel pick was "a nod to the extreme right-wing portions of Trump base, the Steve Bannon ultra-MAGA sector."
Mika Brzezinski went along with Scarborough's lineup, also consigning the pardon story to third place.
A full 43 minutes into the hour, Mika teased the pardon segment, promising the show would be back from a commercial break in 90 seconds. But when Morning Joe returned--surprise!--no pardon talk, just more kvetching about Patel and Hegseth!
Instead of leading with Biden's pardon and his lies about it, Scarborough buried the story 52 minutes deep into today's show. And even when he—finally— got around to the subject, the pusillanimous Scarborough didn't opine a peep about the pardon and Biden's lies about it, hiding behind his panelists who hashed it out.
There was no outrage over the pardon or Biden's lying before the election that he wouldn't issue a pardon. There was merely pallid analysis of how the Justice Department felt about it, and how the Biden family was pained by the prosecutions.
At the end of the pardon segment, Scarborough couldn't resist circling back to his prized subject of the day, teeing up former Obama US Attorney appointee Joyce Vance to warn of the "dangers" of the Patel appointment.
Scarborough's craven performance was presumably part of his effort to rehabilitate his reputation as a dependable toady of the liberal establishment, after having received harsh criticism in lib corners for his pilgrimage to Mar-a-Lago after the election to kiss the Trump ring.
Jimmy Stewart, star of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, with its iconic filibuster scene, would have been impressed by Scarborough's 51-minute filibuster to put off a discussion of the Biden pardon.
Here's the transcript.
MSNBC
Morning Joe
12/2/24
6:00 am ETMIKA BRZEZINSKI: Republican Senator Mike Rounds of South Dakota, expressing his support for current FBI Director Christopher Wray, after Donald Trump announced over the weekend he will nominate loyalist Kash Patel to that position, one which shouldn't normally even be open for a nomination. We'll have the latest about that controversial selection from the President-elect.
Also ahead, we'll dig into newly-surfaced allegations against Trump's pick for Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, as reports of whistleblowers have surfaced detailing years of troubling behavior.
And we'll go to President Biden's pardon of his son Hunter, who is set to be sentenced later this month on federal tax evasion and gun charges.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: We've got a lot of great guests straight ahead to talk about the two big stories this morning. One, of course, Kash Patel. Two, the breaking news overnight regarding Pete Hegseth--more information.
We'll also get to the Hunter Biden pardon, later.
. . .
MIKA: Still ahead on Morning Joe, we're going to get to President Biden's controversial decision to issue a full and unconditional pardon to his son Hunter, and the swift reaction from Capitol Hill. We're back in 90 seconds.
. . .
SCARBOROUGH: Joyce, before we let you go, I do want to ask you about your concern about Kash Patel possibly being the FBI Director. Again, a possibility. Donald Trump would have to fire Christopher Wray first, as he said, he wants to do. But then, he's talking about putting in somebody who has promised to jail judges, jail journalists, go after people inside the Justice Department who did not go along with the 2020 conspiracy theories about stolen elections. What are the dangers of putting in somebody that has promised us he's going to jail journalists if they didn't go along with the Stop the Steal conspiracy theory?
