Mr. Scarborough Goes to Mar-a-Lago

It is already clear that the defeated forces of the liberal government will not stage a sequel self-styled “resistance” movement. it greeted the initial ascension of Donald Trump to the presidency. But another blow to the mythology of the resistance came from one of the key anti-Trump channels – President Joe Biden’s favorite political talk show, MSNBC Morning Joe— has already prostrated himself before the Trump administration, which has not yet taken office.

Over the weekend, the show’s co-hosts, power couple Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, made a pilgrimage to President-elect Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home, repeating the self-deprecating ritual adopted by Kevin McCarthy after the Jan. 6 coup attempt at the U.S. Capitol and dozens of other conditional “Never trembled” from the right. (For dark fun, check out Righteous outrage MSNBC over the McCarthy episode.)

In a typically serious statement to the audience, Scarborough and Brzezinski justified their praise of a leader they had previously called a fascist, based on the threadbare logic that drives all scaremongering political journalism: opening up channels of communication with Trump would give them invaluable access to the highest reaches of government. In another gentle refrain of a high-Beltway anthem, they called their cowardly capitulation to authoritarian rule a healing gesture on behalf of a horribly polarized populace. “Five years of political war have deeply divided Washington and this country,” Brzezinski grumbled. “We have made clear our deep concern about President Trump’s actions and words as a result of the escalating public debate.”

This is the kind of rhetorical contrivance that should prompt Susan Collins’ lawyers to write a cease-and-desist letter. Let us begin by condemning a leader who tried to seize power by canceling free and fair elections — and who has already drawn up plans to carry out mass deportations and revoke birthright citizenship in the early days of his second term — for crimes against proper language and crimes against civility. it’s like calling Charles Manson a mediocre songwriter. But Brzezinski, herself a thoroughbred revivalist of the DC establishment, was just getting started. The task before the audience, she explained to the audience, is to “do something different” – now the host of the show will “not only talk about Donald Trump”, but also “talk to him”. Continuing the list of centrist journalistic clichés she rattled off over the phone, she added: “Hyperbole and personal attacks don’t work. My hair doesn’t work on fire. We’ve all seen it.”

In fact, what we’ve all seen — at least those of us with memories more functional than a ferret — is that the spectacle of Scarborough and Brzezinski talking to Donald Trump has already turned out to be an unmistakable journalistic disaster. During the 2016 Republican Party primary cycle. Trump has made many amicable and intelligent appearances on the morally meaningless set Morning Joe that he had most likely rubbed a track on the carpet in the green room. At a debate in Manhattan, Scarborough admitted to giving advice to the candidate in the debates, as well as unabashedly sharing his thoughts on potential prime ministerial picks, both on and off the air. In a February 2016 interview on the show, Trump announced, “You guys have been supportive and I really appreciate that.”

Indeed, the 2016 cycle also gave us a preview of the exact moment of supreme journalistic humiliation we are currently experiencing. After Scarborough and Brzezinski spread campaign rumors that then-Trump campaign chief Kellyanne Conway was attacking Mitt Romney, Morning Joe the team was denied access. That’s why they turned to what they do best: convulsively pandering to the government for the sake of ratings. Throughout the harrowing ordeal, Scarborough boasted that he was in regular phone contact with Trump, while Brzezinski went on a special diplomatic mission to Trump Tower to have coffee with Ivanka. Those efforts to get the band together led to Brzezinski’s scathing criticism after Trump’s performance at the 2016 second presidential debate: “Oh my God, that was epic. No Republican in America could do what he did last night. It was vintage Trump. He produced an all-day show that rocked the political world.” After the 2016 election, the show became a a virtual random Trump sycophancy search engine; he ended up in the MAGA tank so far, that Washington Post media critic Margaret Sullivan grouped Scarborough with Mark Halperin and Sean Hannity in the pantheon of experts who have given up trust for access.

Of course, the show’s host network soon went into resistance TV mode during Trump’s first term, and Scarborough and Brzezinski played merrily along, promoting wall-to-wall coverage of the Russiagate saga and other breathless storylines, creating the illusion that the walls will close soon on their former chum. Trump naturally went after his ex Morning Joe contributors with taste; in 2020 he repeated the ugly rant against Scarborough, suggesting he was playing unpleasant role in the death of a young employee when he was a member of the House of Representatives, serving in the vanguard of the Gingrichite Republican Revolution.

Return a Morning Joe thus, for MAGA, it is a depressing and all-too-familiar fable about government-directed political coverage. The only major deviation here is CNN’s Brian Stelter’s report that the latest profile of journalistic cowardice is personal as well as professional; according to Stelter, Brzezinski and Scarborough sources afraid of audits and other retaliatory steps from the emboldened apparatchiks of Trump’s second term. Last week, former Trump adviser and campaign manager Steve Bannon warned MSNBC personalities and producers on his podcast to “keep your records” if Justice Department Matt Gaetz targeted them. Scarborough and Brzezinski clearly took note and acted accordingly. The only wonder in the whole sorry saga is not that they betrayed any principle of resistance to Trump; is that anyone ever thought to consider them as real journalists.