EP 515: Joe Scarborough Discusses Harry Truman's Lasting Legacy

I talk with Joe Scarborough, host of Morning Joe on MSNBC, about our mutual affection for the politician dismissed as the “strange little man” from Missouri, why Harry Truman couldn’t even get respect from his own wife and mother-in-law, and how historians have gradually rehabilitated the legacy of our 33rd President. Joe tells the story of the twin crises that kicked off the Cold War and the speech redefined US foreign policy. We discuss how Truman pulled America out of its isolationist past, the Republican Senator who helped him do it, and how they forged a bipartisan coalition that held for more than 70 years and eventually defeated communism. He discusses Donald Trump’s efforts to reject the Truman Doctrine and undermine longstanding alliances such as NATO, the degree to which President-elect Biden can undo Trump’s disastrous foreign policy, and whether Joe Scarborough, a former Republican Congressman, thinks that he will ever return the GOP.

Order Joe Scarborough's book Saving Freedom: Truman, the Cold War, and the Fight for Western Civilization on Amazon, Audible, or wherever books are sold. Watch him on Morning Joe weekday mornings from 6-9 eastern on MSNBC, and follow him on twitter at @JoeNBC.