Joe Scar­bor­ough’s L‑O-N‑G Defen­sive Rant On Frum Dis­pute, Trump Vis­it

Even by Joe Scar­bor­ough’s his­to­ry of long rants, this one was L‑O-N‑G—and very defen­sive.

For over 20 min­utes on today’s Morn­ing Joe, Scar­bor­ough raged on in defend­ing his and Mika’s approach on two mat­ters.

First, on yes­ter­day’s show, David Frum com­ment­ed on the report that some of Pete Hegseth’s Fox News col­leagues had expressed their con­cern to an NBC News reporter about Hegseth’s drink­ing. Said Frum: “If you’re too drunk for Fox News, you’re very, very drunk indeed.”

In response, after the seg­ment with Frum end­ed, Mika said: “The com­ment was a lit­tle too flip­pant for the moment we’re in.”

Scar­bor­ough said that Mika’s com­ment “turned into a col­umn,” with the head­line, “The Sound of Fear.” Odd­ly, Scar­bor­ough did­n’t note that the col­umn had been writ­ten by none oth­er than… David Frum.  In the col­umn, Frum sug­gest­ed that Joe and Mika have been intim­i­dat­ed, and that Mika’s com­ment was an attempt to “appease.’

In response, Scar­bor­ough went to great lengths in an attempt to prove that he is not a fear­ful guy.

“Let me tell you some­thing. I was­n’t fear­ful in Con­gress when Newt Gin­grich and lead­er­ship said they were going to destroy me, run peo­ple against. I said, go ahead, make my day. Was­n’t fear­ful on this show. Nobody has once told me what to say here. Well actu­al­ly, one per­son did one time. One leader did one time. I said, I’ll you what: if you think you can do such a damn good job, why don’t you come here and do the show four hours a day? I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m fine quit­ting. But I’m going to do my show. I’ll do going to do my show the way I want to do my show. 

Muy Macho Joe even went full Clint East­wood, brag­ging that he told Repub­li­can lead­ers who threat­ened him, “Go ahead. Make my day.” Scar­bor­ough also addressed the crit­i­cism that he and Mika have received from oth­ers in the media for hav­ing recent­ly gone to Mar-a-Lago for a back­ground con­ver­sa­tion with Pres­i­dent-elect Trump.

Scar­bor­ough’s point, which has some mer­it, is that the very media out­lets that are crit­i­ciz­ing him are, behind the scenes, also seek­ing to get inter­views with Trump or with peo­ple close to him. Scar­bor­ough quot­ed a reporter who said he’d be fired if he turned down an oppor­tu­ni­ty to inter­view the Pres­i­dent-elect.

Scar­bor­ough being Scar­bor­ough, he also man­aged to work in boasts about his report­ing prowess, men­tion­ing that he had inter­viewed Mid­dle East lead­ers, and endured the anger they expressed direct­ly at him, and had sat for an hour in the Ely­see Palace with French Pres­i­dent Macron. 

Scar­bor­ough closed with a vari­a­tion on Sean Han­ni­ty’s famous encour­age­ment to his view­ers, which in turn is from the Bible, “Let your heart not be trou­bled.”

Scar­bor­ough encour­aged his lib­er­al fans, that despite the prospect of anoth­er Trump term:

“I say this now to peo­ple who watch the show and love the show. Peo­ple who are fear­ful and con­cerned. Let me tell you some­thing: we should have no fear. [Do] not show fear. [Do] not be fear­ful!”

Here’s the tran­script.

MSNBC
Morn­ing Joe
12/5/24
6:02 am ET

MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Shall we dive in?

JOE SCARBOROUGH: What you think? We heard about some­thing that hap­pened yes­ter­day.

MIKA: You can. Absolute­ly.

SCARBOROUGH: Is it all right? Point of per­son­al priv­i­lege? 

MIKA: Point of per­son­al priv­i­lege.

SCARBOROUGH: So yes­ter­day, we had a good friend of ours on the show. And a who’s been a guest for some time. A guy who, he knows, has been one of my heroes for years now. A great writer, David Frum. He writes for The Atlantic.

David came on the show yes­ter­day, and we’re hav­ing a good con­ver­sa­tion. But we were talk­ing about the Fox News employ­ees that actu­al­ly talked to Court­ney Kube and oth­er peo­ple at NBC News, and said that he [Pete Hegseth] had been drink­ing too much there.

And I was dev­as­tat­ed. It was a dev­as­tat­ing report. And David flip­pant­ly said, he was jok­ing, he said, “If you’re too drunk for Fox News, you’re very, very drunk indeed.” 

We went on with the seg­ment. And just to let you know how things work here, I was ask­ing Mika, should we address that or not? Because if some­body had said that about any news out­let, we’d usu­al­ly say some­thing about it. To ref­er­ence the entire net­work.

So at the end, and I want to get the words right, Mika said this: “The com­ment was a lit­tle too flip­pant for the moment we’re in. We dis­agree with Fox News, but there’s some good peo­ple over there.”

MIKA: A lot are wor­ried about Pete Hegseth.

SCARBOROUGH: We also, of course, talk­ing about those peo­ple so wor­ried at Fox News about Amer­i­ca’s nation­al secu­ri­ty, that they were talk­ing to an NBC News reporter –

MIKA: Com­ing for­ward.

SCARBOROUGH: Com­ing for­ward, say­ing Hegseth was not qual­i­fied.

… 

This got turned into a col­umn, and a head­line, that said, let’s see, what was the head­line? The Sound of Fear. Now, that was­n’t the sound of fear, that was the sound of civil­i­ty. 

And, in say­ing that Mika had apol­o­gized, she did­n’t apol­o­gize.

MIKA: No, I did­n’t.

SCARBOROUGH: She sim­ply said it was too flip­pant. Now, I would rec­om­mend, if we’re in a stage where, a com­ment like this caus­es a melt­down. And I saw George Con­way, anoth­er guy that we have on the show –

MIKA: Who we love.

SCARBOROUGH: — We love George. Say­ing, [adopts melo­dra­mat­ic voice] “Read this arti­cle, it’s going to make you very sad, but you must read it all. Oh! Because of the fear­ful times we’re in.”

Well, there’s some prob­lem with the times that we’re in.

MIKA: You can’t be fear­ful.

SCARBOROUGH: You can’t be fear­ful. Just because some peo­ple have said that we’re fear­ful. Let me tell you some­thing. You can talk to any­body that’s worked in the front office of NBC and MSNBC over the past 22 years. I tell you, I’m not fear­ful.

You talk to any­body who served with me in Con­gress. They will tell you: not fear­ful of lead­er­ship.

… 

And I am telling you, “the sound of fear,” the apol­o­gy, none of that is true. But guess what? This is what’s been going on now for sev­er­al weeks.

You know, we went down to talk to the Pres­i­dent-elect. And peo­ple wrote arti­cles that were just false. But you know what we did? We did the cor­po­rate thing. Cor­po­rate said, don’t say any­thing. Just keep your head down. What did the roy­als say? Nev­er explain, nev­er com­plain. What­ev­er. 

… 

SCARBOROUGH: I think, actu­al­ly, if they have a chance to talk on the back­ground –

MIKA: I think, actu­al­ly, they might be doing that.

SCARBOROUGH: — with the incom­ing Pres­i­dent and Pres­i­dent-elect, they would do it. In fact, as some­body wrote dur­ing this out­ra­geous­ly stu­pid, imma­ture series of arti­cles that lied time and time again about us, reporters said, I’d be fired if I had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to go in and talk to some­body who’s the incom­ing Pres­i­dent of the Unit­ed States, and they did­n’t do it!

Ask any jour­nal­ist at the New York Times, the New York Post. And that’s the fun­ny thing, peo­ple at the Wash­ing­ton Post espe­cial­ly. Hair on fire media report. How dare they? How dare they? At the same time that the Wash­ing­ton Post is doing the same thing. Try­ing to speak to the pres­i­dent on back­ground. Try­ing to speak to peo­ple around the pres­i­dent on back­ground. That’s what reporters do.

And by the way, guess what? That’s what I’ve been doing for years. When I go speak to Mid­dle East lead­ers on back­ground, some who are not good peo­ple. Guess what? I do it to get infor­ma­tion and back­ground and give it to you. I bet you did­n’t know! Cause I did­n’t tell you. Because it was a back­ground con­ver­sa­tion. 

When I went to the Ely­see Palace last sum­mer, and I spoke to Macron for about an hour in his office about Ukraine, about the EU, about the abil­i­ty of NATO. About his prob­lems with Unit­ed States. I did that, but I did­n’t repor­tit.

The only dif­fer­ence between what we did on that vis­it and what the New York Times and Wash­ing­ton Post, Wall Street Jour­nal, every­body else is doing is. We were trans­par­ent. We actu­al­ly told you.

… 

You know why I went to lead­ers in the Mid­dle East who were angry at the Unit­ed States, and I sat there and I lis­tened to them attack­ing me per­son­al­ly for 45 min­utes because of U.S. pol­i­cy? You know why I do that? To get the read of the leader. To get the read of where the coun­try’s going. [Shouts] So I can come back here and talk to you and let you know what the hell is going on!

… 

But let me tell you some­thing. I was­n’t fear­ful in Con­gress when Newt Gin­grich and lead­er­ship said they were going to destroy me, run peo­ple against. I said, go ahead, make my day. 

Was­n’t fear­ful on this show. Nobody [inaudi­ble.] By the way, I always have Repub­li­cans say, oh, they’re telling you exact­ly what to say. No! Nobody has once told me what to say here.

Well actu­al­ly, one per­son did one time. One leader did one time. I said, I’ll you what: if you think you can do such a damn good job, why don’t you come here and do the show four hours a day? I’m fine.

MIKA: Oh, that’s hilar­i­ous.

SCARBOROUGH: I’m fine. I’m fine quit­ting. But I’m going to do my show. I’ll do going to do my show the way I want to do my show. 

And I say this now to peo­ple who watch the show and love the show. Peo­ple who are fear­ful and con­cerned. Let me tell you some­thing: we should have no fear. 

… 

We should hold the line. Accept what we accept, with Mar­co Rubio and oth­er appoint­ments like that. But hold the line in these oth­er areas. But not show fear. Not be fear­ful!