“You saw a level of chaos that’s been unmatched in presidential history,” says Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle while the panel reviews President Donald Trump’s “bizarre” day in the press, where he doubled down on his “fire and fury” threat to North Korea and further criticized Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. “You saw a President of the United States literally trying to goad an unstable regime into doing something completely crazy that would change our world forever. You saw a President of the United States who clearly doesn’t understand the concept of legislating in Washington D.C. — that you do need, at some level, at some point, a friend to help you….You saw a president alienate huge parts of his own party, if he does have a party. You saw a level of selfishness and self-absorption on the part of the President of the United States — it’s unmatched in history…So, this is schoolyard stuff from the President of the United States.” Listen in on more of the conversation here.
“Does Donald Trump need Mitch McConnell?” asks Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle of The Daily Beast politics editor Sam Stein as the panel discusses President Donald Trump’s public criticism of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for the Republican Party’s failure to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Listen to the conversation about the status of the Trump White House and Stein’s response here. Only on MSNBC.
Listen in on Morning Joe as senior contributor Mike Barnicle and The Washington Post foreign affairs columnist David Ignatius discuss President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash “fire and fury” against North Korea. “In talking to people in Washington…I was struck by their fear that this is less-than-rational behavior coming out of the Oval Office — not the White House — but the Oval Office. Their fear is that the accidental start of a war could easily occur,” says Barnicle, who recommends the President read – or at least listen to – John Hersey’s classic “Hiroshima,” which tells what happened on August 6, 1945, when Hiroshima was destroyed by the first atom bomb ever dropped on a city, told through the memories of survivors.
“David, what role did the President’s incendiary comments play…in the North Koreans seemingly ratcheting up very quickly their response with regard attacking Guam?” asks Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle of The Washington Post foreign affairs columnist David Ignatius as the panel talks about the escalating nuclear crisis with North Korea, following President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash “fire and fury” against North Korea. Listen to Ignatius’ response here and why “we cannot do this attack alone.”
“Donald Trump…artfully but fraudulently…managed to, without really saying it, identify with a huge, huge percentage of people in this country who suffered grievous losses in 2008 and 2009: They lost jobs, they lost income, they lost retirement savings, they lost their homes – many of them – and a lot of them also put their sons and daughters at risk of losing them in a war that’s being fought for 16 years. These are the people, the composition, the basis of what the Democratic Party used to be, and they fled because of optics,” explains veteran columnist Mike Barnicle as he joins the Charlie Rose panel with Bloomberg View’s Al Hunt and Neera Tanden, President of the Center for American Progress, to discuss the current problems facing the Democratic Party. Listen to more of the discussion only on PBS.
Joining Charlie Rose to discuss the current issues facing the Democratic Party, veteran columnist Mike Barnicle says: “I think the larger problem for the Democrats is they basically have to answer a question individually and collectively as a party: `Who are you? What do you represent?’ The Democrats…have to get younger. Their message has to be more encompassing. It’s got to be economic. It’s got to be cultural. It’s got to be social. It’s got to address things like education reform, what robotics are going to do to your job, what artificial intelligence might do to your children’s jobs, what’s going on in your kids’ schools. Do you have daycare, can you afford childcare? A whole range of social issues. They’ve got to be unafraid to wade into that.” Hear more of the conversation here with Charlie Rose, Al Hunt of Bloomberg View and Neera Tanden, President of the Center for American Progress only on PBS.
During the conversation about President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash “fire and fury” against North Korea, Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle says: “It is a frightening selection of words. I think everyone agrees on that, and an imposed threat that was made public by the President of the United States yesterday. The threat is more powerful if it’s made privately and directly to the Chinese or certainly through channels to North Korea.” Tune in to hear the conversation between Barnicle and The Washington Post’s foreign affairs columnist David Ignatius on the President’s latest move. On MSNBC.
“Phil Rucker, John Kelly has carried quite a load in his military career. He’s now White House Chief of Staff. He attracts enormous support and respect from anyone who knows him, who has worked under him. How does he cope with this in this White House? What’s going on there?” asks Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle of The Washington Post White House Bureau Chief Philip Rucker during a wide- ranging conversation about White House Chief of Staff John Kelly and the polls showing slipping support for President Donald Trump. Listen to the discussion and Rucker’s response here.
“Joe, that trust number and that base number; what are you thinking about if you’re a political adviser to the President of the United States?,” asks Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle of host Joe Scarborough as the panel reviews President Donald Trump’s lowest poll numbers in a CNN survey, which reports that President Trump’s approval rating among Republicans is down to 59 percent and 73 percent of Americans don’t trust most of what the White House says. Listen to Scarborough’s response here.
“Joe…let me ask you. You’re sitting out there in your district or your state. You’re looking at these numbers about your President of the United States. Someone stands up and starts really hammering the President in a town hall meeting. What’s the strength of your reflection and your support for your Republican president?” hypothetically asks Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle of host Joe Scarborough during a panel discussion about President Donald Trump’s sliding poll numbers and the uptick on Republican and constituent frustration with POTUS. Tune in to the conversation here.
“What’s happening in places where climate change is enveloping local communities, where climate change affects people who actually work for a living? We were talking about South Carolina. A place that’s a hot bed of politics all year around, but it is also a legitimate hot bed. If you’re going to work in a factory in South Carolina you might be paying more in air conditioning bills from like April through October. Probably the bill equals the gross national product of Switzerland. Your thoughts?” asks Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle of The New York Times national reporter Yamiche Alcindor during a conversation about the realities of climate change in America. Listen to Alcindor’s response here.
“Both the House and the Senate are back home in their districts and in their states, and they’re having these meetings and anecdotally, you hear the most frequent questions they’re getting asked are: `What are you people doing in Washington. You seem to be doing nothing, other than trying to take away my health care.’ That’s what they have to respond to,” says Morning Joe senior contributor Mike Barnicle as he and host Joe Scarborough discuss the struggles Republican lawmakers are having with their constituents and President Donald Trump’s low and discouraging poll numbers. Listen in on the conversation here.
“Visually and verbally it struck me as someone taking the podium, a young guy, who in his earlier life – I don’t how many times – he probably had his lunch stolen from him. `And give me the Twinkies too.’ And now this is his get-back moment,” comments veteran columnist Mike Barnicle as the MSNBC Deadline: White House panel discusses White House advisor Stephen Miller’s heated exchange with with CNN reporter Jim Acosta at a press briefing over an immigration proposal backed by President Donald Trump. Hear the exchange and the ensuing conversation here.
Joining Nicolle Wallace’s MSNBC program Deadline: White House, veteran columnist and MSNBC contributor Mike Barnicle says of the Trump Administration: “The irony is that they came into office with Steve Bannon’s theory about redoing all elements of government: Downsizing the State Department, reordering gender equality in the military, destroying the existing health care bill and coming up with another health care piece of legislation. But, what’s happened is that every day, every single day, either by tweets, actual verbiage or actual action, Donald Trump has redefined and downsized the presidency both in Congress and, I think, among large elements of the American public. I don’t know that the definition of the presidency and the way people think of the presidency will remain the same.” Listen to more of the conversation here.
“It’s a pretty simple landscape that we’re looking at because in every instance that we’ve mentioned here today — whether it’s Russia, whether it’s the drafting of the statement on the plane, whatever it is, the source of conflict with the truth is the President of the United States. And that leads to an unbelievable burden on people like (Chief of Staff) John Kelly or John Dowd – one of his lawyers,” said Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during the ongoing discussion about the widening Investigation into the Russia controversy that surrounds President Donald Trump’s Administration and the recent disclosure that POTUS, while returning home from the G-20 summit, personally crafted his son Donald Trump Jr.’s misleading statement about his meeting with a Russian lawyer. Tune in to the conversation here.
“Many have asked and wondered how or why such an exceptional guy like General Kelly would take the task of trying to turn the absurdly incompetent, chaotic Trump presidency into a functioning vehicle. And the answer is simple and obvious: Because he loves this country and does not want to have it fail or falter at the gate of a future filled with both promise and peril. His only ambitions are for America,” writes veteran columnist Mike Barnicle for The Daily Beast. Read Barnicle’s column here and learn more about the new White House Chief of Staff Gen. John Kelly — details of his Boston childhood and some of the factors that helped shape his fine character and values.
https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-boston-neighborhood-that-made-john-kelly
Listen in on the discussion between Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and The Daily Beast politics editor Sam Stein about the big job ahead for new Trump Administration Chief of Staff Gen. John Kelly. From stopping the President’s often misguided tweets to changing the perception about a White House in chaos to staffing up the Administration, what will Gen. Kelly tackle first and can he be successful with all the obstacles he faces?
While the Morning Joe panel discusses the vast changes in President Donald Trump’s Administration and the appointment of Gen. John Kelly as the new White House Chief of Staff, veteran columnist Mike Barnicle explains: “General Kelly…has a sense of the chain of command, a loyalty to the chain of command, but a larger loyalty to his country. If there is, and they’ve been lucky so far, there’s been no international crisis yet really. We’re on the verge of one with North Korea, obviously. But General Kelly will be the guy you want there and if anybody does anything that he thinks harms the country, that’s where the rubber hits the road.” Listen to the conversation here, including comments about the role of the President’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, her “sense of entitlement” and “flawed sense of her own importance.”
During the conversation about President Donald J. Trump’s ongoing troubles within the West Wing, Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle explains: “It’s interesting when you think about the role that Republicans – Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, Bob Corker, other respected Republicans in the Senate and House – might well have to play as this continues. They might well have to go to The White House to tell the President: ‘Mr. President you’re not only playing with fire – you are on fire. And you’ve got to stay away from Bob Mueller’.” Hear more of the discussion with Nicolle Wallace, John Heilemann, Steve Rattner and Eddie Glaude Jr. only on MSNBC.
“His problem, the country’s problem, the world’s problem is: The president is the communications director. He’s his own communications director,” explains Morning Joe veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during a panel discussion with The New York Times correspondent Michael Schmidt about President Donald Trump’s convoluted interview with the paper and news that a new communications director is about to be named. Watch the exchange here. Only on MSNBC.
