Morning Joe co-host Mike Brzezinski is a liberal, but one that isn’t one to drink up the Democratic Kool-Aid and apparently not hesitant to call out her own side when they’re acting stupid. The latest source of her ire is Sen. Elizabeth Warren, who has been on the warpath—planting her flag of opposition as the incoming Trump administration takes shape. Warren had initially said she was willing to work with President-elect Donald Trump. That doesn’t appear to be on the table anymore.
Yesterday Brzezinski straight up said that she was getting tired of Warren’s theatrics and her angry disposition, calling it exhausting to watch. The show played a clip, where Warren took to the Senate floor to say that the GOP has control of Congress, but without majority support, that the majority of Americans voted for Democratic Senate candidates over Republican ones, and that a majority of Americans voted for a Democrat for president over a Republican.
“The American people didn’t give Democrats majority support so we can come back to Washington and play dead. They didn’t send us here to whimper, whine, or grovel,” she said. Hey Warren, you may not know it, but you’re whining.
Commentator Mike Barnicle noted that every day she’s acts like she's a candidate for president, but added that it should be interesting to see if the Senate Democrats break down into two factions this new Congress: The progressive, angry wing headed by Warren and the more pragmatic faction led by incoming leader Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY).
Brzezinski said that she liked Warren, but she’s getting tired of the act—and that leading by anger isn’t constructive. Willie Geist said that she was offering a voice to the millions of voters who think Trump will be a disaster, which Brzezinski responded by saying that there’s a significant portion that think otherwise—and that you need to reach out to these people instead of retreating into a liberal bubble (via The Hill):
MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski says she has grown tired of Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s (D-Mass.) rhetoric about America.“I’ve got to tell ya — I love her, but I’m getting tired of this act. I mean, she’s just got to stop,” Brzezinski said Tuesday on “Morning Joe."
“I’m sorry, it’s getting exhausting. She might want to be a little inclusive. Because she’s sounding like the people she’s accusing of being exclusive.
She also said that Warren’s shrill antics were tested on the campaign trail, when Warren campaigned with Clinton. It didn’t work. Brzezinski said that it was over the top and a tad unhinged.
“At some point we have to look at what happened. And look at the people we lost along the way,” she said, adding that many of these people are the ones who Warren has fought for and flipped for Trump. Now, the angry Massachusetts senator doesn’t even want to talk to them—it doesn’t make sense.
As for Warren’s crap talking points about majority support. She’s wrong. The GOP won three million more votes than Democrats in the House elections, Clinton isn’t winning the popular vote; she’s winning a plurality of it (50+1 is a majority, Ms. Warren), and yeah—maybe the Democrats got more votes than Republicans in senate elections, but a) California drove up that margin since no Republican was on the ballot; b) Texas had not senate contest. I’ll let Guy delve more into this misleading drivel from the Left:
Only one-third of Senate seats were up for election in 2016, as Senators serve six-year terms. By happenstance, this cycle featured a barely-contested Senate race in heavily Democratic New York, and a race in California that featured no Republican nominee at all. Vote-rich Texas did not have a Senate contest this year. So tabulating the raw "popular vote" is even less useful in the Senate context than in the presidential race, which is at least truly national. What's more telling is that the GOP won almost all of the swing state Senate elections, including a robust showing in the diverse swing state of Florida, and a blowout in crucial Ohio. Those were the bellwethers. In making the unserious "minority rule" point above, this individual oddly ignored the national aggregated popular vote of House races -- which, like on the presidential level, is actually nationwide in nature. Perhaps that data point was excised from the argument because Republicans handily won that count by more than 2.7 million votes, coming much closer to an outright national majority than Mrs. Clinton did. Relatedly, Republicans also now control 34 governorships, accounting for 68 percent of the national total (with similar dominance in state legislatures).
That state legislature figure is 69/99 by the way. Republicans are pretty much a few chambers away from being able to pass constitutional amendments, but we’re somehow the minority party when we control the White House, Congress, the most state legislatures ever, at least two-thirds of the governorships, and have the most state-elected lawmakers in office since 1920. Someone is sniffing glue here. In fact, any liberal who thinks this is just emblematic of the problems facing the Democratic Party. You’re a decimated wreck of a political organization. You’re a regional party confined to the coasts and urban areas. Warren’s speech seems to forget that her party has been eaten alive from the inside out under Obama. Folks, this is what life under a bubble looks like and when these folks lose in elections, the temper tantrum is ugly, unhinged, but I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s exhausting. It’s widely entertaining. Nevertheless, when January comes, the schadenfreude ends and the real work begins; we have to deliver.