All-male Morning Joe panel laughed as Barnicle compared Clinton to "everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court"
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SUMMARY: Discussing the most recent Democratic presidential candidates debate on Morning Joe, political and social commentator Mike Barnicle said Sen. Hillary Clinton "look[ed] like everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court," eliciting laughter from the all-male panel that featured MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, Willie Geist, and David Shuster.
On the January 23 edition of MSNBC's Morning Joe, during a discussion of the January 21 Democratic presidential candidates debate with an all-male panel that included co-hosts Joe Scarborough and Willie Geist, and guest co-host David Shuster, political and social commentator Mike Barnicle said of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY): "when she reacts the way she reacts to [Sen. Barack] Obama [D-IL] with just the look, the look toward him, looking like everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court, OK? Looking at him that way, all I could think of ... was this fall, if it's [Sen. John] McCain [R-AZ] that she's facing, McCain is likable. She's not." All three MSNBC co-hosts laughed at Barnicle's comparison of Clinton to "everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court," with Scarborough interrupting Barnicle by laughing loudly before saying, "I'm sorry. Go ahead."
From the January 23 edition of MSNBC's Morning Joe:
BARNICLE: The thing that strikes me, Joe, and I'd be interested in hearing from the three of you on this, is that the more you are around this campaign, the more you hear and witness the dynamic in this campaign, this spring offensive leading up to February 5, you wonder: Is Hillary Clinton in her intensity, with her desire, obviously, to win early, to lock up this nomination early, is she sacrificing the fall? Is she opening up an avenue for the Republicans that might not be there with another Democratic candidate, and that would be the likability aspect? She comes off as not a very likable person.
[...]
GEIST: Mike, going back to your question about likability, I think you're on to something there. When I watched that debate the other night, first of all, there seems to be this thin veneer of Hillary Clinton's likability, like she's holding something in to be likable.
BARNICLE: Yeah.
GEIST: And so, when that moment came out, when he brought up the Wal-Mart thing, you got the idea that she'd been holding back on the slum lord thing for a long time, but she said, "Oh, you want to play that way? Let's play that way. How's that slum lord you've been hanging out with?" So I agree with you that as more of these moments come out, it will hurt her perceived likability anyway. That's my impression.
BARNICLE: Yeah, I think you're right, Willie. The other thing that came across the other evening -- at least to me, but I'm, you know, pretty low-intellect here looking at the thing -- is, when she does the slum lord stuff, when she reacts the way she reacts to Obama with just the look, the look toward him, looking like everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court, OK? Looking at him that way, all I could think of --
[laughter]
SCARBOROUGH: I'm sorry. Go ahead.
BARNICLE: All I could think of was this fall, if it's McCain that she's facing, McCain is likable. She's not.
Today's Daily Howler absolutely skewers MSNBC:
http://www.dailyhowler.com/
The problems there are huge and probably intractable.
CARL:
Thanks for the link. Great stuff.
I wonder if these guys learned ANYTHING from Chris Matthew's "Misogyny Gone Wild"?
If they HAVEN'T learned, then they're inadvertantly promoting the woman they ridicule as everyone's harpie es-wife, because there is demonstrable backlash against their old-boy patronizing.
If they HAVE learned, could it be they wish to ENHANCE Hillary's chances by firing up the voting base of women, by their redneck goober comments?
I wonder if any of these guys is even deep enough for such things as "reverse psychology", or not to slap at a hornet's nest?
The joke also makes no sense.
What's the reference to "probate" court? Unless their presumption is that Obama is somehow owed the nomination, the heir apparent, and she's some kind of after-the fact interloper...
This joke is also much more than sexist, alas, if that's the meaning of it. What else is it?
"All I could think of was this fall, if it's McCain that she's facing, McCain is likable. She's not."
I love how opinion has replaced fact. Now, everything is relative!
My D.I.s favorite saying was "opinions are like @ssholes, everybody's got one."
And all I can think of is that these guys sure have a lot of opinions...
Too bad this isn't up for discussion!
The big problem with these guys is that their "opinions" are moronic. Since when is "likeability" a valid issue, or any way to elect a responsible leader?
These are the same guys who told us that Bush would be better to have a beer with. The point is, Tommy, that they're idiots.
MSNBC needs a full time analyst assigned to all of their on-air staff people. One can only imagine the sexist work atmosphere over there.
If MSNBC is run by left-wingers, why do they have Joe Scarborough and Tucker Carlson hosting shows?
Tucker Carlson has terrible ratings. He's not helping MSNBC to survive.
They keep Carlson to please rightwing GE executives, not because he's good for the network per se.
September 24, 2007
NEW YORK -- After 15 months at the helm of MSNBC, legal analyst Dan Abrams is stepping down as general manager and returning to hosting full-time, the cable news network announced Monday. In a statement, NBC News President Steve Capus praised Abrams and said his return on-air will help strengthen the network's lineup. Phil Griffin, a NBC News senior vice president who has had oversight of the cable network, will take over its daily operations in mid-October, when MSNBC moves from its New Jersey home to NBC's Rockefeller Center headquarters.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=109x30936
I really don't expect anyone who considers the NY Times "ultra-liberal" to concern themselves with facts.
Dan Abrams hasn't added a single host since he got promoted.
If he wanted to promote leftwing ideas, there would be a Rachel Maddow Show and a Sam Seder Show on MSNBC by now.
And a welcome change for many, including myself. At least we could stop arguing about the “MSNBC agenda”. Hell if Fox News can do it on the other end of the spectrum, why not MSNBC and the libs?
I like one supposedly of Marine origin.
Clean mind, clean body....take your pick.
Those false statements and their propagation are on Air America right now, Ms. Maddow is on it.
No, this is what you get when you put a bunch of pampered overaged frat boys together whether you monitor them or not.
Your posts are particularly weak today.
"I like McCain better than HRC" is stating your opinion and is probably what Barnicle should have said.
"McCain is more likable" is stating right wing propaganda as a fact.
As anyone with common sense knows;
Pundits are giving their opinions, which may or may not be propoganda depending on your point of view, and anyone having a difficult time distinguishing fact from that opinion is in sad shape.
It has nothing to do with the point of view of the audience and everything to do with the motives of the speaker/writer/filmmaker etc.
"McCain is more likable than HRC" is not stated as an opinion and fits the definition of right wing propaganda perfectly.
There's an absolutely brilliant Daily Howler today about the big, big problems at MSNBC:
http://www.dailyhowler.com/
The problem there is bigger than these guys.
This was the point HRC tried to make at the debate: Obama said 2 different things, one not related to the other.
For Obama to now say he didn't say they were "good" ideas is a weak defense and besides the point.
Of course the press, who some people still think just reports things, totally ignored what Obama really said.
Tommy, is there anything Liberals don't find offensive?
Let me just add to your point by saying that many columnists, Barnicle included, often inject humor into their writing. And they do this when appearing on these political cable network morning/evening shows as well.
Anyone who has seen clips of Hillary Clinton vs Barak Obama at that debate would get Barnicle's humor here.
J,
I think they get it, they just can't be intellectually honest about the fact that it's home grown animosity between the two candidates and the evil media minions had nothing to do with it.........so the reflexive blame game sours immediately and a little personal responsibility is in order, and that tears many of them apart - they just can't do it. "must find someone to blame.....must find someone to blame........rinse, repeat.........."
How inane can you get?
TOMMY: And you’re assuming that most viewers have “common sense”?
The sad truth is that there are probably more casual viewers who take what they hear on cable news shows as being just that – NEWS – and not commentary. Maybe the only solution is a law requiring a “Commentary” label across the top of the screen whenever the label fits?Before cable news networks, most respectable TV news sources used to do just that – but now that cable news networks have proven it not necessary, even the major broadcast networks have given up on the practice.
It’s definitely gotten much harder to decipher fact from fiction – even with “common sense”.
It really shouldn't be around the poker table, anyway.
What a low-class country we have become. It's as if the last 50 years never happened. Ah, the forces of Reaction.... or the kind of people who get hired these days.
Barnacle and Matthews are DEMOCRATS like Ronald Reagan was a Democrat.
Democrats AT ONE TIME, until they learned the pay and perks were better from the Rightwing Corporate Masters.
Why not ask that maverick McCain is she reminds him of his first wife.
Better yet, let's ask McCain's first wife if John-boy is as likable as they say he is.
Or Newt's wife. Nothing like being asked for a divorce while you're in the hospital.
While we are out fighting wrongdoing, let's add this to the list!
This is as bad as Republican Senator Mitch McConnell referring reporters to the Free Republic website for "facts" about the Frost family during the S-CHIP discussion.
The good ol, good ol strait upright Gop. Did you go though any of the coments? A conservative, liberal mix. Some gruges being held for years, interesting and local as well.
If the Seattle P.I. doesn't pick up on it, I'll mention it to them.
>>And while MM is coming to the defense of scorned women
That's a dishonest way to frame the debate and throw in Bill Clinton. MM is not "coming to the defense of women." It is pointing out that Hillary, one of the toop Democratic nominees, is being treated is a sexist way.
"True enough. And while MM is coming to the defense of scorned women, let's not stop at first wives, but let's defend all women who have been treated unfairly by politicians. And let's begin with the Clinton legacy . . ."
Thomp,
Why would we start with the Clinton legacy? Let's start with all those who vociferously claimed that they were "family values" candidates. I know you don't like Clinton, but shouldn't we point out those first who claim moral high ground? What about all those who claimed to be in the "moral majority." We have only had one President who had a divorce, do you remember who that was?
So you take glee in the marriage problems of rudy and newt, or the drug problems of limbaugh, because of the rightness of your position? Please elaborate.
Thomp,
"So you take glee in the marriage problems of rudy and newt, or the drug problems of limbaugh, because of the rightness of your position? Please elaborate."
Personally, I don't take glee in any of that (I know you didn't post this to me). I just hope that it leads to a softening of their rhetoric on those subjects and hopefully and admission of them being wrong on some level.
I have a hard time with people who preach family values and don't practice them.
I sincerely wish that Rush Limbaugh would use his drug problems to reach out, say he was wrong when he said: "And so if people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to be accused and they ought to be convicted and they ought to be sent up.”
People will make mistakes. Its how they react to them and their reflections on previous behavior which makes me take a measure of them.
"Also, if you're to be true to progressive values, shouldn't we not delve into anyone's truly personal aspects of their lives, be they liberal or conservative."
I completely agree, Thomp, with one exception: If a candidate is marketing him or herself as superior morally in an aspect of their private lives and they mess up, they should be exposed. This goes for any candidate bragging, liberal or conservative, who claims a higher ground on a topic, but make sure all of the facts are covered first. (I.E. Newt Gingrich bragging on family values)
Sorry, I honestly couldn't tell if you were kidding or not.
Our "glee" is not a personal spite - our glee is in the irony of their hypocrisy. There is a big difference in the way each of us think – so again, you are expressing a view that is based on, and exemplifies, the way only a Republican would see it.
Hey! In the name of Justice, stop the presses!
Did this barnicle character really use that "probate court" joke on the air? If so, then I'm an offended party, I am! I'm the true and rightful owner of that intellectual joke property...
It's this barnicle character who's gonna be the joke on the steps of the Courthouse, when I get through suing his butt for PLAGARISM!
That'll be his new title: not "political and social commentator" (as the above item has it) mike barnicle, but PLAGARIST mike barnicle is how you'll refer to the guy, when I get through with him over his stealing my "probate court" joke!
Anyway, thanks for listening to an offended party sound out, against the plagarist mike barnicle.
Sincerely, George Carlin
(You can start the presses back up)
http://www.cnn.com/US/9808/19/barnicle/
...oh by the way, that comment wasn't actually written by the comic George Carlin, or any other George Carlin of any other profession. So there is no fraud or misrepresentation here. I'm not George Carlin...
But I might be a joke thief!
Wanna hear a funny routine I just invented in my own mind, called the "Hippy Dippy Weatherman"?
True, I just made it up, it's funny as all get out, and it's mine all mine... it's not George's or anyone else's intellectual property, so I'm not a plagarist if I do my "Hippy Dippy Weatherman" bit for you... wanna hear it?
Sincerely, mike barnicle
No, it wasn't a locker room, it was, once again, our very well-respected, elite, six-and-seven-figured media analysts and pundits.
Why is there no story about John Stewart's Daily Show showing Hillary glaring at Obama with lazer beams coming from her eyes last night?
Where are you when I need you. Sueefeld?
Daily Show- Advertises itself as comedy and yet somehow makes more serious points than most cable news programs.
Morning Joe (and most other pundit chatfests)- Advertise themselves as serious political analysis and often fail to make any point other than that the people who are paid far too much money to comment on current events are neither smarter nor more qualified to give serious editotial commentary than anyone else in this country.
So are you saying that if Stewart or maybe a Leno had said:
The other thing that came across the other evening -- at least to me, but I'm, you know, pretty low-intellect here looking at the thing -- is, when she does the slum lord stuff, when she reacts the way she reacts to Obama with just the look, the look toward him, looking like everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court, OK? Looking at him that way, all I could think of --
You would be ok with it?
So it's not what was said but who said it?
6 of one, half a dozen of the other. The remark is more dumb than funny, but if it were part of a comedy monologue it would just be a bad joke. "Oooh, ex-wife jokes, how very 1970s and tired of you." The laser eye gag would probably have fallen pretty flat introduced in the middle of of a chat fest too. It would have seemed cheaped, artificial and pointless. Both context and speaker identity are very important in communication.
Presented in the context of supposedly serious politcal commentary it tells us more about the speakers than the subject. Unfortunately what it tells us is that for some reason really awful wacky morning DJ wannabes and terrible stand up comics can easily get jobs as pundits.
This mixing of comedy and politics is a pretty tough thing to do without offending people and it is really best left to professional comedians. Political analysis can apparently be done by anybody who knows a guy at the network.
Actually, I agree, Moonbatyoubet. I was mostly poking fun at Sue, as it's something I would have expected her to chime in with.
But I also think that it's because of Jon (excuse my earlier spelling) Stewart's success that other "serious" news shows now think they can get away with such "humor".
Pearls From The Peniled
There are Wonks and there are Wags and then there are wanker waggerers. As Jon Stewart would say, "These guys are just dicks!"
By the way, glaring is proof HRC's no robot. Of course, if she didn't stare and spoke only in an expressionless monotone, these ball-chasing puppies would surely label her "a passionless robot."
Goooood Puhhh-peees!
... and my last few posts have been disallowed due to "profanity" that I cannot spot.
Could it be, a tech error?
I think so...I had a post the other day rejected because (I think) it had the word assume in it. it's the only thing I can come up with
TEX,
Things I like and four synonyms.
These clearly sexist comments on morning Joe seem to be typical of the spin being put on the debate by the main stream press. Especially MSNBC. What I would like to know is why no one seems to be reporting on the fact that Obama was the one who initiated the the confrontation? His entire demeanor was hostile and confrontational. Hillary is right, he had obviuosly come to the debate with the intention of picking a fight. Why is Obama getting away with revising his comments about Ronald Reagan by claiming that what he meant to say is actually what he said? I heard his original comments and in the context that they were spoken it certainly seemed to me that he was praising both Ronald Reagan and the GOP. I did not hear him say that Reagan was a "transformational president because he was able to persuade democratic voters to vote against their own best interests" as he now claims. If he admires Ronald Reagan and the policies of the GOP for the last 10 or 15 years that's fine. Let him state his reasons for making those statements, but don't call the Clintons liars for challenging him on his position. Debate it like a man and stop taking cheap shots!
I believe that the debate demonstrated, once again, that Hillary can go toe to toe with her critics and knows how to play hardball with the big boys! I also thought it was interesting to note, that although John Edwards was also extremely critical of Obamas' Reagan remarks, Obama did not challenge him. Obama seems to want to make this look like a fight between him and "The Clintons". Note to Obama: Bill is not running for president,. Hillary is. Get used to it. You are in a fight with a woman, one who knows how the game of politics is played and is a worthy adversary, you would do well to begin to treat her that way.
I had an old history professor who had worked in the Kennedy administration. He taught us that when the women of a country finally get fed up with conditions, they take to the streets and reform the country. I think I have about had enough of MSNBC and this silly, belittling chatter by the male hosts. I thought the network was an effective counter to misinformation from other sources, but If Keith Olbermann does not counter these guys, I will be totally disappointed in it. I went out of the way to add MSNBC to my programming not long ago but I now wonder if it was worth it. As an aside, the comparison to McCain is insulting. McCain, although a war hero, did not have the courage to speak out when a woman (sadly) made scurrilous remarks not long ago about Hillary. (My father was a gentleman and treated his sons and daughters with respect. He would not have stood for any of this behavior.)