"Lawrence O'Donnell Calls Himself A 'Socialist,' Slams Glenn Greenwald On Morning Joe" (with video)

Jack Mirkinson (HuffPo), with video (06:52):

Lawrence O'Donnell and prominent blogger Glenn Greenwald engaged in a heated debate on Friday's "Morning Joe" about the political direction the Democratic Party should take in the wake of their midterm election losses.

Two days before he came on the MSNBC show, Greenwald had fired the first salvo in the debate. In a post on Wednesday, he singled out O'Donnell as an example of cable news pundits always advising Democrats to move to the right in order to win elections:

...Almost every time I had MNSBC on [during the coverage of the midterm elections], there was Lawrence O'Donnell trying to blame "the Left" and "liberalism" for the Democrats' political woes. Alan Grayson's loss was proof that outspoken liberalism fails. Blanche Lincoln's loss was the fault of the Left for mounting a serious primary challenge against her. Russ Feingold's defeat proved that voters reject liberalism in favor of conservatism, etc. etc. It sounded as though he was reading from some crusty script jointly prepared in 1995 by The New Republic, Lanny Davis and the DLC.

On Friday, O'Donnell seemed ready to respond. When Greenwald said that the notion that liberalism had suffered a defeat at the ballot box on Tuesday made no sense -- since nearly 95% of the Progressive Caucus in the House had been reelected, while the conservative Blue Dog Democrats had suffered massive losses -- O'Donnell leapt in.

"Glenn, Glenn, Glenn, Glenn, that's the silliest thing you can say," he told Greenwald. The liberal Representatives, he continued, lived in safe districts, whereas the Blue Dogs lived in tight swing districts. MORE...

Howie P.S.: If Lawrence is a socialist, he's a mighty thin-skinned one.