Matt Taibbi challenges Scarborough to debate after MSNBC host hints Russia hoax critics are on Putin 'payroll'

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Journalist Matt Taibbi took MSNBC's Joe Scarborough to task Monday after the "Morning Joe" host suggested that critics of the mainstream media's Russian collusion narrative are on Vladimir Putin's "payroll." 

On Monday, Scarborough panned a statement sent out late Friday by former President Donald Trump that asked "Where's Durham?" in reference to the ongoing into the origings of the Russia investigation by former Connecticut U.S. Attorney John Durham.

Scarborough then took aim at those who were critical of the media's coverage of the unsubstantiated narrative, which was heavily led by MSNBC. 

"I’m amused by so-called reporters who are- I don’t know if they’re useful idiots for Russia or if they’re on Russia’s payroll," Scarborough began. "I don't know and I don't really care, but there are some gifted writers who spend all night and day trying to dig through, looking for instances of where the press screwed up on Russia stories, pushing this 'Russian hoax' fallacy."

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"It's just- it's a joke because if you look at the totality of it, if you look at the totality of everything that happened, the media screwed up at some points and sometimes they screwed up badly, but more often than not they got it right and they get most of it right," the MSNBC host continued. 

Taibbi, a vocal critic of the media's Russia coverage during the Trump years, fired back in a piece published on his Substack in which he challenged Scarborough to invite him on "Morning Joe" for a debate.

"Implying that anyone who didn’t buy into the moral panic on Russia was a traitor was a fairly constant theme in media and politics in the last four years, with NBC's smear of Tulsi Gabbard as a 'favorite' of 'Russia’s propaganda machine' being one of the ethical low points of the era. Why should Joe Scarborough be above the same tactics?" Taibbi asked before invoking other journalists critical of the media, including Glenn Greenwald, Aaron Mate, and Washington Post media critic Erik Wemple. 

"The humorous thing about this is that the group of writers who have spoken out on this topic is small enough that we all communicate with each other," Taibbi wrote. "We’ve been able to calculate that I was actually the last of the Russiagate skeptics invited on MSNBC, on January 13, 2017 — before Trump’s inauguration — when I joined Chris Hayes and Malcolm Nance to discuss what at the time was a red-hot story." 

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Taibbi then pointed out the "irony" that the press, particularly liberal TV networks, have "not allowed any critics of the story" to appear on such outlets for the past four years, a trend he predicted would only continue. 

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"Still, it’s worth asking Scarborough: if you’re so certain this issue is a 'joke,' surely you won’t mind discussing it?" Taibbi told the MSNBC host. "If you’d rather not have me on, I’m sure someone on the more critical side would be happy to walk you through exactly how far short of 'right, more often than not' your network has been in the last five years or so. Most of the major outlets were terrible on this story, but MSNBC’s particular brand of suckage was visible from space during the key years of Russiagate. Which I’m happy to lay out for you."

"Come on — no matter how it turns out, it’ll be great TV!" Taibbi added.