Morning Joe panel slams Trump’s Ohio rally: Strutting around like Mussolini and ‘changing America for the worst’

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough and Donny Deutsch charted the asymmetrical political debate between President Donald Trump and his would-be Democratic challengers.

The "Morning Joe" host and contributor pointed out that Trump was prancing around stages acting like fascist dictator Benito Mussolini while Democrats needled one another on policy minutiae -- and they warned that won't beat the president in 2020.

"When Mussolini is standing up on the terrace like this, with a face like that," Deutsch said, affecting a scowl, "to me, the parallels with Trump in terms of that self-satisfaction at the chaos he's creating, the parallels are stunning there."

Americans watched Trump strut across the stage in Cincinnati, Scarborough said, after watching Democrats bicker over the details of their policy plans -- which he mimicked in an exaggerated nasal voice -- instead of projecting strength against a "demagogue" president.

"Let's talk about the man who is changing America for the worst, Donald Trump," Scarborough said. "They don't have to take the bait, but they always do, and there doesn't seem to be a Democrat that understands where we are right now in history against this man."

Deutsch said the Democrats had an unacceptable image problem as they seek to remove Trump from the White House.

"The Democrats have become the party of nerds," he said. "I mean, that's what goes on there. The Republicans are the party of strength -- and reprehensible many, many times -- but people follow strength. There's a nerdiness that's happened to the Democratic Party where your voice did it perfectly, and that's it. We've become a wimpy party, and people don't follow wimps."