On Thursday, a day after Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski unleashed a disgusting slur against Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, mocking him as a “wannabe dictator’s butt boy,” the MSNBC journalist was absent from the show. Co-host and husband Joe Scarborough deemed this a “long-planned family event.”
On Wednesday, Brzezinski slimed the former CIA Director and questioned his patriotism in response to a Fox and Friends interview about murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Brzezinski snarled, “Why doesn't Mike Pompeo care right now? Are the pathetic deflections that we just heard when he appeared on Fox and Friends, is that a patriot speaking? Or a wannabe dictator's butt boy?”
On Thursday, Scarborough opened the show by announcing her absence: “Well, good morning. It is Thursday, December 13th. Mika has the day off with her family, a long-planned family event which she's sorry she's not here.” In the 7am hour, he underlined her disappearance to co-host Willie Geist: “Willie, of course, Mika is off today for a planned family event as we said before.”
Her remarks were so bad that MSNBC tried to bleep them out, failing by a few seconds. Later on Wednesday, Brzezinski retreated, tweeting she regretted her “SUPER BAD choice of words.” Despite her all caps “SORRY,” the Washington Post deemed this a “non-apology” that “didn’t help.”
Though the comments certainly are disgusting, most of the criticism comes from the fact that they sound homophobic. Not from the fact that a major cable channel host called the United States Secretary of State a “butt boy.” Just last week Brzezinski’s husband called for civility in discourse in order to “save your humanity.”
Transcripts on Brzezinski’s absence are below:
Morning Joe
12/13/18
6:00amJOE SCARBOROUGH: Well, good morning. It is Thursday, December 13th. Mika has the day off with her family, a long-planned family event which she's sorry she's not here because we'll be talking about baseball most of the morning. She’ll be back with us tomorrow. I'm just joking. We're doing politics.
7:06
SCARBOROUGH: Willie, of course, Mika is off today for a planned family event as we said before.
