After praising Joe Biden’s acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention as the best address MSNBC on Thursday night switched back to bashing Donald Trump as the “indecent,” “very bad man.”
Rachel Maddow began with what you would expect no matter what Biden said or how he said it: “I have seen a lot of Joe Biden speeches in my life. He was elected to the Senate the year I was born, and he's been in national politics for a good chunk of my life and this part of his business. I've never seen a Joe Biden speech anywhere near as good as that.”
Brian Williams then wondered whether the Democrats were successful. So he turned to a Democrat a socialist and a former Republican who is determined to elect Democrats. Not surprisingly, they liked the Democratic effort!
Coming up for us after our first break here, the DNC says its mission was to set up this nominee, this ticket in the strongest possible position to reclaim the white house. We will ask Claire McCaskill, Lawrence O'Donnell, Steve Schmidt for starters if they wish to declare mission accomplished when we come back.
Schmidt then framed the election as nothing less than a battle of good vs. evil.
In the end, what the American people got to see is a fundamental choice laid out. And the choice is as simple as this: It is between a good man and a very bad man. It's between a decent man and an indecent man. Between a moral man and an amoral man. Between a global statesman who is respected around the world and an international laughingstock and a clown. It's between somebody who is fidelis to the American Constitution, to democracy and somebody who has an illiberal and autocratic disposition and personality.
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A partial transcript is below.
MSNBC convention coverage
8/20/2020
11:16 PM ETRACHEL MADDOW: I have seen a lot of Joe Biden speeches in my life. He was elected to the Senate the year I was born, and he's been in national politics for a good chunk of my life and this part of his business. I've never seen a Joe Biden speech anywhere near as good as that.
...
MADDOW: When he said we will never have our lives back until we deal with this virus. right. Why can't somebody from the top say that more plainly? Like all of the fights we're having about schools and testing and who's to blame. In terms of accommodating, in terms of reopening, in terms of the way we live and the futures we are offering to our families right now, it is all about getting the virus under control and then we can do what we need. And for Biden to say it so clearly in a short, direct sentence that fits on a frikin bumper sticker, it just feels like exhale.
...
BRIAN WILLIAMS: Coming up for us after our first break here, the DNC says its mission was to set up this nominee, this ticket in the strongest possible position to reclaim the white house. We will ask Claire McCaskill, Lawrence O'Donnell, Steve Schmidt for starters if they wish to declare mission accomplished when we come back
...
STEVE SCHMIDT: I think with no hyperbole that this might be the most important political speech that I've heard in my 49 years. And I say that as somebody who's worked at the highest level of American politics, worked at the highest level of two presidential campaigns. We won one, we lost one.
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SCHMIDT: In the end, what the American people got to see is a fundamental choice laid out. And the choice is as simple as this: It is between a good man and a very bad man. It's between a decent man and an indecent man. Between a moral man and an amoral man. Between a global statesman who is respected around the world and an international laughingstock and a clown. It's between somebody who is fidelis to the American Constitution, to democracy and somebody who has an illiberal and autocratic disposition and personality.
So the Vice President tonight laid it out. I think it was so powerful when he said what has not been said but has been needed saying for so long, which is that, “Hey, I understand that not everyone's going to vote for me but I'm going to work as hard as the American president for the people who opposed me as I will for the people who supported me.” What he was saying in that moment is we're all in it together. And the president of the united States is not the chief of a warring faction of the country that's at war with the other half of the country. We saw decency tonight. We saw empathy tonight. We saw dignity. We saw the possibility of American renewal and restoration laid out in the greatest speech that Joe Biden has delivered in his long public career. But also one of the most important political speeches framing the most fundamentally important choice this country has faced in an election since we voted in November of 1864 and decided in that election whether we would remain a United States, whether the union would endure or not.
WILLIAMS: Claire McCaskill, those were powerful words from our friend and colleague Mr. Schmitt.
