Journalist Charlie English joined Morning Joe to discuss with Willie Geist and Mike Barnicle his new book “The CIA Book Club: The Secret Mission to Win the Cold War with Forbidden Literature,” which tells the story of the CIA’s covert operation to smuggle millions of banned books into Eastern Europe during the Cold War, particularly Poland, to undermine Soviet censorship and promote intellectual freedom. Watch their conversation here.
Tune in for this Morning Joe conversation with Willie Geist, Mike Barnicle and former Ohio Gov. John Kasich who joins Morning Joe to discuss Senate Republicans pushing to pass President Donald Trump’s sweeping tax-cut and spending bill, despite divisions within the party about its expected $3.3 trillion hit to the nation’s debt pile. “A Republican Party led by Donald Trump is on the verge of inflicting a tsunami of personal grief on millions of Americans. One in five Americans are on Medicare, and one in five Americans who are on Medicare. They’re not wealthy….Governor Kasich, I want to know what you think of the differences in the Republican Party and this Republican White House from the days when you were in the House…(the) difference in politics today as compared to then, in terms of getting things done for people,” asks Barnicle. Hear Kasich’s response about how “unbelievably terrible” it is that lawmakers have put their own self interest above solving the nation’s problems. “The Republican Party was my vehicle not my master,” explains Kasich.
“If you go out to the country and look at Democratic governors, Democratic legislators in various states, you’ll see a different Democratic Party. You’ll see people fighting back, you’ll see people organizing protests. You saw the huge reaction this weekend. Millions of people, five million people, around the country, parading against Donald Trump and the military parades and all of that, and they were largely led by local Democrats, state Democrats, from state, to state, to state. Washington D.C.—forget it. They are hopeless,” says veteran columnist Mike Barnicle about Democratic politicians at the federal versus state level during this Morning Joe conversation with Joe Scarborough about a recent Quinnipiac University survey that found most Democrat voters disapprove of how their party’s lawmakers in Congress are handling their jobs.
“I would suggest and submit that Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s appointment is the most dangerous of the cabinet appointments. And I say that thinking of my grandchildren, because I think he poses a threat to normal health conditions of young kids in this country and even of adults in this country, but specifically young kids,” says veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during this Morning Joe conversation with Joe Scarborough about Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. who has unveiled the eight people he has chosen to serve on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vaccine advisory panel – just two days after taking the unprecedented step of removing all 17 sitting members. Find out more here.
Listen in on this Morning Joe conversation with three members of Red Sox Nation – Joe Scarborough, Jonathan Lemire and Mike Barnicle – as they unpack the stunning blockbuster trade in Major League Baseball that sent Boston Red Sox slugger Rafael Devers to the San Francisco Giants. “Rafi is a terrific kid, but that’s the underline – the kid. He’s a child, a spoiled child, and the fact that he began disagreeing with the Red Sox front office when they made a trade for Alex Bregman, a much better defensive third baseman and a much better all-around ball player than Rafi. Rafi is one of the top ten hitters in Major League Baseball, but he’s no Alex Bregman offense and defense. So, I mean, that’s what happened there,” says Barnicle about his beloved Red Sox making a franchise-altering decision with their trade of Devers.
Richard Haass, Council on Foreign Relations president emeritus, joined Morning Joe to talk with Jonathan Lemire and Mike Barnicle about America’s relationship with its European allies in the President Donald Trump era following the chief of Germany’s foreign intelligence service warning that his agency has “concrete” evidence that Russia is planning an attack on NATO territory to test if NATO’s Article 5 guarantee of mutual assistance will be honored. “Are we now a nation alone?” asks Barnicle. Hear Haass’ response here.
Listen in on this Morning Joe conversation with Jonathan Lemire and Mike Barnicle as they discuss a Quinnipiac University poll that shows President Donald Trump’s approval rating is underwater on every issue as immigration protests have erupted in major cities including Los Angeles, New York, Atlanta, Dallas, and Washington, D.C., in response to recent ICE raids. “With regard to the president’s popularity on this, again, we go back to the visual. People see on their home screens watching the news; they see men jumping out of SUVs, wearing masks, grabbing American citizens off the street, and within 24 hours, that citizen—he or she—might end up in Texas at some prison or in Arkansas at some prison, whether they’re taken off the streets in New York, or Boston or Somerville, Massachusetts—where that happened to a young woman. So, you’ve got all of that going on at the same time. This portends to be a long, hot summer because…the contagion factor has now set in, as we were just reporting from city, to city, to city, people are out, and sometimes the local police departments aren’t up to handling to it. This is a troubled country with a troubled issue,” says Barnicle about the current immigration protests in America.
“This is literally a tale of two cities. There’s the tale of one city being told by the administration—by sending the National Guard and the combat ready Marine Corps, onto the streets of an American city. Then there’s the other tale of another city, Los Angeles itself—and when told by the mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, and the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, you realize the facts of the tale of the two cities. And the facts are that Los Angeles is calming down, that there are no riots in the streets, that the activities of the protesters is confined to about four or five square blocks in a city—a tumultuous, large, sprawling city in America. Four or five blocks, that’s it,” says veteran columnist Mike Barnicle during this Morning Joe segment with Mika Brzezinski and Katty Kay about the immigration protests in Los Angeles over the ICE raids which led President Donald Trump to deploy the National Guard and Marines to the city.
“Suzy, there’s so much in here in the book for people just getting off the launching pad as well as others; but I want to take you back to a specific moment that you mentioned in the book. You’re going to Stanford, and you’re taking your son to college, his freshman year, and they’re playing ‘Bridge Over Troubled Waters,’ and you’re starting to cry, okay; but, you know, it seems like the snap of a finger that, that occurred, but in terms of things that happen in the culture around us, it seems like ancient history. So today, young people or people, middle age, whatever, confronting job possibilities, job opportunities, the introduction of artificial intelligence in our lives. What does that do?” asks veteran columnist Mike Barnicle of Suzy Welch who joins the Morning Joe panel to discuss her new book “Becoming You: The Proven Method for Crafting Your Authentic Life and Career.”
Watch this Morning Joe conversation between Mike Barnicle and Chris Matthews about Elon Musk’s rebuke of President Donald Trump’s sweeping domestic policy bill, calling the GOP megabill currently making its way through Congress a “disgusting abomination.” Only on MSNBC.
The Morning Joe panel congratulates Mike Barnicle on his sons—Nick and Colin Barnicle—winning the Sports Emmy for Outstanding Documentary Series for their Netflix docuseries “The Comeback: 2004 Boston Red Sox” that tells the story of the Boston Red Sox’s historic comeback, breaking an 86-year World Series drought and overcoming a 3-0 series deficit. “They won for a documentary called “The Comeback,” a three-part documentary on Netflix that surprised everyone because sports documentaries don’t usually shoot to the top of the top ten Netflix list and if it does, falls off right away; but this stuck on there, and it told a terrific story that was about more than baseball. It was about: Don’t give up, come back,” says Barnicle about his sons’ docuseries. Watch the segment here.
Watch this Morning Joe conversation with Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski and Mike Barnicle as they remember actor George Wendt who has died at 76 years old after earning six consecutive Primetime Emmy Award nominations for his role as Norm Peterson on the popular sitcom “Cheers,” which ran for 11 seasons. “Every character was perfect,” says Barnicle. See the tribute here.
“How is it that one specific political party, the Republican Party, seems gravitated towards, captured by, and clings to one individual—Donald J. Trump. How did he do this? How did he transform politics in America and become so all-consuming to so many people, including Democrats, including people making $50,000 a year or less, including laborers, firefighters, police officers? What is it about him? You have to look at your enemy in order to defeat an enemy. You have to know who you’re fighting. It seems to me and a lot of other people, I think, that the Democrats simply have never sat down and defined who he is and how to go about that,” says veteran columnist Mike Barnicle as the Morning Joe panel of Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski and Anand Giridharadas discuss the Democratic Party’s failure to pull American voters away from President Trump.
“He is certainly used to being surrounded by death and dying. He’s carried a cross for his children and his wife, who were killed within days after he won his first election to the United States Senate in the early 1970s. He lost his son, Beau, during the later parts of this…last decade. So, he’s used to the sadness, and there’s a permanent sadness to Joe Biden that is hard to register. On this one…I don’t know enough about the diagnosis in terms of the medical future for Joe Biden, but there are treatments, as Mika pointed out. The family is going to seek second opinions and further treatment options. So, we’ll see what happens, but he’s had a tough ride these past six or seven months both publicly and now personally,” says Morning Joe contributor Mike Barnicle during this conversation with Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough about the news that former President Joe Biden was diagnosed with an “aggressive form” of prostate cancer.
Watch this Morning Joe conversation between veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and Norman Ornstein, a political scientist with a new article in the New Republic about mental health month. “Most people who live an ordinary life know that mental health is a huge issue from grammar schools on up through life. A lot of people are aware of that; but how do we as a country and you as a specific individual get Congress to pay attention to one single group of people? Not that they’re the most important, but one single group of people massively affected by mental health, and I’m talking about veterans of wars. The VA clinics in this country are overrun, an epidemic of people going in, not being able to find help because they’re understaffed or it’s closed. They’ve got to drive another 80 miles to find another VA facility. What do we do about that? They gave to us. What do we do for them?” asks Barnicle in a discussion about how we as a society can better assist American veterans who are suffering due to their mental health. Listen to Ornstein’s response here. Only on MSNBC.
Watch this Morning Joe discussion with veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and Semafor’s David Weigel about Weigel’s latest article: “Trump’s falling in polls. Why aren’t Democrats benefiting?” “How does that happen to a party?” asks Barnicle. Weigel shares his findings here.
“We accept it as passengers. We accept that when we go to the airport there’s going to be a delay in our flight. We’re going to sit on the runway. Yesterday because of the Newark situation…we sat on the runway for an hour and a half to two hours. We take off. We’re coming to New York. It’s very rainy and cloudy out, obviously on the ground. We’re coming in for a landing, plane’s coming in, and all of a sudden, we swoop upwards. The pilot comes on the air and says, you know, “sorry about that; the runway was a little overcrowded. We’re going to take another round and take a run at it again.’ And that happens too often, and it’s a miracle that something really, truly tragic and horrific has not happened—especially on the east coast of America with all of these airports in such a small geographical area and FAA traffic control problems,” says Morning Joe contributor Mike Barnicle during this conversation with Joe Scarborough, Mika Brzezinski and Willie Geist about the ongoing issues with the Federal Aviation Administration and air traffic control in America, following air traffic controllers temporarily having lost communication with aircraft flying in and out of Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey.
Tune in for this Morning Joe panel discussion with Mika Brzezinski, Mike Barnicle and U.S. Army Col. Jack Jacobs (Ret.), a Medal of Honor recipient for his actions during the Vietnam War, on this 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War ending. Hear Jacobs’ views on the “selective service” in Vietnam and how it divided the country.
“We went to Vietnam really in the early 1960s…it was the first time that we were really in someone else’s country fighting not for them, but for us—to get out of there; but years later we’ve done it again and again. We’ve done it in Iraq, and we’ve done it in Afghanistan. What impact do you think the failure, the defeat of the United States in Vietnam, had to do with the diplomacy going forward in terms of other countries that we invaded or went to?” asks veteran columnist Mike Barnicle of Richard Haass, President Emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, during this Morning Joe panel conversation about the impact of the Vietnam War, a “war of choice,” as Haass terms it, on America 50 years after the war ended. Watch the conversation here.
Watch this Morning Joe conversation between veteran columnist Mike Barnicle and Richard Haass, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, about the Russia-Ukraine War and the Trump Administration’s push for a peace treaty, following Russia having launched one of the most devastating bombardments on Ukraine’s major cities since the war began, killing at least 12 people, hours after President Donald Trump said he believed he had struck deals with both sides to end the war. “So, along this line of thinking about the pause and the fighting, the cease fire, the all caps warnings that the president issues on Truth Social. Where is the European Union’s role in this with regard to Ukraine?” asks Barnicle. Hear Haass’ response only on MSNBC.
Mike Barnicle is a veteran print and broadcast journalist recognized for his street-smart, straightforward style honed over nearly four decades in the field. The Massachusetts native has written 4,000-plus columns collectively for The Boston Globe, Boston Herald and the New York Daily News, and continues to champion the struggles and triumphs of the every man by giving voice to the essential stories of today on television, radio, and in print.
