Cross posted to the MRC's NewsBusters blog
On Wednesday's Morning Joe, during a discussion of former Vice President Joe Biden's surprisingly strong showing against Senator Bernie Sanders in the Super Tuesday Democratic presidential primaries, MSNBC contributor and historian Jon Meacham declared that Biden would be a "more rational choice" historically over President Donald Trump, as he lamented that Trump had repeatedly been "unthinkable" during a period of a "terrible constitutional tilt-a-whirl."
At 6:39 a.m. Eastern, Meacham lauded Biden as a "genuine, empathetic figure" as he began his analysis:
JON MEACHAM, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: And I think the message was the country is, in fact, both hungry for and now in sight of a stabilizing force. We spent five years on this terrible constitutional tilt-a-whirl where everybody is exhausted by a President who veers from unthinkable to unthinkable to unthinkable. And Vice President Biden -- whatever his faults -- he is, as you and Mike (Barnicle) were saying, the most human of people. Whatever one can say about him, he is a genuine, empathetic figure who is much more part of the vernacular of presidential leadership.
He then labeled the former Vice President as "historically the more rational choice" as he added:
MEACHAM: He is a coherent reply of the American people to say, "Who do we want to be President?" Joe Biden is an answer that makes sense historically more so -- far more so than the incumbent, and -- given the ideological and philosophical positions of Senator Sanders -- Biden is historically the more rational choice. You can disagree with me and people get all upset about that, but that's just a historical fact. We tend to elect people like Joe Biden more so than people who are farther to the extremes of either side.
Regular panel member and sometimes fill-in host Willie Geist then commented: "And that's been his case, right? American doesn't want a revolution now -- they want to stabilize after the Trump years."