LOGROLLING IN OUR TIME

Morning Joe last Wednesday, promoting Newsmax:





Newsmax yesterday, promoting Joe Scarborough:





Should we give credence to the presidential talk that resulted from Scarborough's trip to New Hampshire over the weekend? Or was the point of the trip just hype for Scarborough's TV show and books? Self-serving hype seems far more likely -- watch how the little featurette in the clip below (hat tip: NewsBusters) begins with Scarborough autographing one of his old books, and then note that the title of his current book remains on the screen the rest of the way:





But also notice the plug Mika Brzezinski gives to Newsmax at the beginning of the clip (although she slips the first time and calls it "Newsmac"). This is a follow-up to last Wednesday's promotion of Newsmax's venture into TV, which started with a really bombastic ad for the new channel:





It's a mutual benefit society. Newsmax, I guess, is using Scarborough to try to get mainstream cred, while Scarborough is using Newsmax to try to get wingnut-lunatic cred. If it works, everybody wins!

Except, of course the vast majority of Americans, who'd be better off if both Scarborough and Newsmax just went away.