May 26, 2010
DAY 40
All of the above.
May 26 Morning Joe
Discussing the lack of WH response to the Gulf – including barry flying to Sen Boxer’s fundraiserS and the EPA director going to a Democratic fundraiser. barry thought it would be ok if he announced he was going to the Gulf on Friday before he left for California. Then he added the press conference and then ordered troops to the AZ-MX border, which he had not mentioned in his kumbaya meeting on Tuesday with Senate Republicans, which of course included Sen McCain, who had been asking for help.
Chuck Todd’s comments were directed at the fundraisers.
NRSC
Transcript follows
Transcript provided by NRSC
[not exactly verbatim - but nothing mischaracterized or omitted - emphasis added]
JOE SCARBOROUGH: first though, chuck, i want to go to you with what we’ve been talking about this morning regarding the white house appearing to be tone deaf. we’re stunned that president obama went to san francisco instead of new orleans at the same time the head of the epa was heading to new york city for a fund-raiser for democratic be senators and they would have done it if politico hadn’t outed them. i’m stunned. who is in charge of making these decisions because whoever it is needs to be put in a back room.
[How much longer are the going to pretend the "WH didn't know". That is not an excuse. It provides proof they're not on top of things. During an EPA disaster - they should know where their EPA director is at all times. And why is that type of an official doing partisan fundraisers?]
CHUCK TODD: what’s worse, ignorance or incompetent on this one? and the sad thing is the white house didn’t know about this. so that is okay, didn’t know about this lisa jackson fund-raiser. that means somebody, who was not thinking? it doesn’t take a lot of common sense. you’re right. the minute politico reported this, it was like they frantically tried to figure out what happened and how this happened. but then that gets to the whole other point of this which is, who’s using political common sense over there? so it’s either being stupid, arrogant or ignorant and none of the responses are a good one on this one. i think it gets at this whole — they’re overwhelmed not the right word but just every part of this oil spill thing that just, they seem a step behind.
SCARBOROUGH: the president’s getting pounded from all sides now, of course, republicans are going to pound him for whatever he does. but democrats increasingly hostile. the president decides, and i swear, i don’t understand this at all. to get on a plane and fly to california to have a political fund-raiser in san francisco while people are complaining about the fact that he doesn’t go to new orleans.
TODD: i think that’s why they announced the new orleans trip before he left. i think that’s why they’re announcing today they’re doing a presidential news conference tomorrow, at the white house before he goes to chicago. you know, imagine if the gulf visit had happened not only after this san francisco fund-raiser but after a four-day weekend in chicago. he’s headed to chicago on thursday night for the holiday weekend. here’s the thing. there are those inside the white house that know these appearances don’t look good and this is this conflict they on some how they sometimes believe that schedule is etched in print. that somehow you can’t just tear up the schedule. they’ve done it before. we saw them tear up the schedule on health care when they canceled the indonesia trip realizing that boy, you’re just leaving house democrats at that time, it was democrats that they were hanging out to dry there. so it seems as if they get so rigid sometimes on the schedule that –
SCARBOROUGH: it’s odd.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: this goes all the way down the line in terms of the organizers of the epa fund-raiser, jose, you’ve had lots of exposure to politics. you’ve run for office. talk to me about barbara boxer. what are these people thinking? why would they move forward? i know why they.
SCARBOROUGH: barbara boxer, that’s easy. but mario, i’m stunned that the president would, again, go to san francisco and that nobody in the white house would say stop.
JOSE DIAZ-BALART: you know elections are expensive and they’re getting increasingly more expensive and people are looking for every single penny. they’re not going to my brother’s but they’re looking at any possible way of getting any kind of money. these elections are fundamental. it looks as though november is it going to be a year which people are going to make vast changes in how they voted in the past and maybe they’re looking for.
[No amount of money is going to overcome not responding to the Gulf...or the Christmas bomber, or the lack of emotion at Ft Hood or the fact that the Times Square bomber was even allowed back into the country...Money is not going to buy the 2010 election like it did barry's.]
SCARBOROUGH: shouldn’t somebody at the white house have told him no?
DIAZ-BALART: you would think so.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: how about the people who are actually — i’m sorry, go back to barbara boxer. go back to whoever is organizing this epa fund-raiser. i’m sorry. i don’t get it. by the way, barbara boxer might do better with the people she wants to raise money from and get money from, this is not the time for me. i appreciate your support but right now i feel we all need to go. what’s happened? am i being naive?
DIAZ-BALART: i don’t know you can tell let’s take a pause from fund-raising. it’s not the time to get more money in my coffers. it’s a tough call to make.
SCARBOROUGH: So Jose, yesterday we were talking about how the white house started moving on both fronts. we had breaking news like 2:59 that the president finally was going to new orleans. then we had breaking news three minutes later he was sending troops to the border. there’s a white house that realized they needed to start being seem.
DIAZ-BALART: didn’t mention it to the republican senators during the meeting on immigration reform and other issues.
