"Paid family leave." You must use those exact words in that exact order or Mika Brzezinski will go into nitpick overdrive. Such was the case on the March 28 edition of Morning Joe when Mika was interviewing Congressman Raul Labrador who committed the high sin of saying several terms meaning just that yet annoying her by not reciting the exact approved liberal term.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Let’s bring in from Capitol Hill a member of the House Freedom Caucus, Republican congressman Raul Labrador of Idaho. So, thank you. Welcome to the show. I guess I’ll start off with asking you what you have against paid family leave at this point since you seem to be against it.
RAUL LABRADOR: Well, I just don’t think it’s the government’s role to give businesses more things to do and to pay for. That’s something that a business should decide. And it’s not for the government to be telling people about that.
BRZEZINSKI: We’re at the point, though, where it does not exist. And you don’t think at this point — I mean, do you — do you think you would like to have paid family leave in your family? Do you think that would be important for perhaps your family moving forward in the best way possible?
LABRADOR: It should be up to the business. I owned a business for ten years. I paid for my — the insurance for the people that worked for me. I gave them leave whenever they needed leave and I helped them out. It should be up to the individual business person to decide that. I just think —
BRZEZINSKI: You gave paid family leave in your company?
I must hear you say those exact words in order to satisfy my inner liberal. Say it! SAAAAY IT!!!
LABRADOR: I gave leave.
BRZEZINSKI: You gave leave but not paid?
LABRADOR: No — yes, I paid for it, I just didn’t have — don’t know what your definition of paid family leave —
BRZEZINSKI: Well, that would be you take leave and you’re paid during the time on family leave.
LABRADOR: Whenever they had a family issue, we pay for them. They had vacation, they had sick days, they had a bunch of things. Those things cost me money and I did it willingly. I don’t think the government should be forcing that. I know you want the government to force more spending, but I don’t.
BRZEZINSKI: So, your company gave paid family leave?
LABRADOR: We gave paid vacations —
BRZEZINSKI: Paid vacations, that’s different.
Hmmm....paid vacations for whatever reasons, including family leave. That's the same thing as paid family leave but Mika MUST hear those exact words. No other terminology will suffice as we enter the final act of Mika's Surreal Liberal Comedy Theater.
LABRADOR: We gave paid insurance, we gave a lot of benefits. And it should be up to the businesses to decide whether you do that.
BRZEZINSKI: You didn’t think it was a responsibility of your company to give paid family leave?
LABRADOR: You know, Mika, you and I disagree on this issue and we can go around and around on it and I don’t think that’s what I came to the show to do, to talk about this issue. That’s not what you guys invited me to be on the show for.
BRZEZINSKI: Okay. I think it’s very pertinent to the health care bill and to everything that we’re talking about.
LABRADOR: It has nothing to do with the health care bill.
BRZEZINSKI: Paid family leave is, many Americans would say, is something that we really need to focus on, especially women who work.
LABRADOR: I think most Americans —
BRZEZINSKI: So it’s curious —
LABRADOR: Okay.
BRZEZINSKI: It’s not something that you feel is the responsibility for your employees? For you to give them?
LABRADOR: Mika, I’m not going to talk to you about this. This isn’t what I came on the show for. I thought we were going to talk about the health care bill and not about this issue.
Mika, you liberal loon, I gave my employees time off with pay when they needed it but since I won't kowtow to your PC hangups with the exact terminology you so desperately need to hear, you have a nitpick conniption fit.
