On Friday's Morning Joe on MSNBC, Zbigniew Brzezinski, former Carter national security advisor and father of show co-host Mika Brzezinski, ranted: "The United States is becoming rapidly one of the most socially unjust societies in the world." Panelist NBC chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell declared: "I agree with just about everything that Dr. Brzezinski has said..."
Mitchell lamented: "The disparities between rich and poor is this country are the underlying tension." She noted how, "You see the exaggerated forms of it on both sides. With what we saw with the Tea Party, the objection to a social compact on health care a couple of years ago. And then, the emergence of the Occupy movement. That's a real movement. There is real passion and anger there."
Here is a transcript of the December 2 exchange:
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8:19AM ET
ZBIGNIEW BREZINSKI: The West today is somewhat corrupt, uneasy about its own value system. The United States is becoming rapidly one of the most socially unjust societies in the world. And that is raising basic questions about the relevance of the West to a world that is now universally awakened. Stirring, restless, conflicted.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: Now when you say "socially unjust" -
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Wow. Yeah. Please explain that.
SCARBOROROUGH: Yeah, explain how the United States of America -
MIKA: It's a strong statement.
SCARBOROUGH: - you believe is becoming socially unjust. One of the most socially unjust.
ZBIGNIEW: The income disparities between the rich and the poor in the United States are now the most severe in the world . . .
MIKA: Andrea.
ANDREA MITCHELL: I agree with just about everything that Dr. Brzezinski has said, except that I'm not as optimistic as you are about the Eurozone [Brzezinski had predicted that Europe will solve its financial crisis]. The disparities between rich and poor is this country are the underlying tension. You see the exaggerated forms of it on both sides. With what we saw with the Tea Party, the objection to a social compact on health care a couple of years ago. And then, the emergence of the Occupy movement. That's a real movement. There is real passion and anger there.
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- Kyle Drennen is a news analyst at the Media Research Center. Click here [1] to follow Kyle Drennen on Twitter.