MSNBC's Morning Joe rains hell on Trump for overreacting to Iran

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough rained hell on President Donald Trump for escalating conflict with Iran -- which had faced internal political dissent until the U.S. assassinated general Qassim Suleimani.

The "Morning Joe" host said Trump has failed to respond to previous provocations by Iran, and instead chose the most extreme option available after an attack on the U.S. embassy in Baghdad.

"The Iranians shoot down a drone, we do nothing," Scarborough said. "The Iranians target Saudi oil fields, nobody does anything. They're allowed to stir chaos in Basra, nothing happens."

"How can Donald Trump seemingly have decided to appease the Iranians one time after another after another, to such a point that we were actually stating on this show just last week that the president's refusal to ever respond to their acts of aggression are only going to empower them even more?" he added. "How does the president go from refusing to shoot down an Iranian drone, responding in kind there, to actually targeting the No. 2 person in Iran?"

Scarborough said the action was completely disproportionate and made little strategic sense.

"Yes, the killing of the American contractor was a great tragedy, but there's nobody in the Middle East, there's nobody in the United States that doesn't suggest the killing of Suleimani will lead to many more deaths than just one," he said. "It seemed that the United States had Iran on the run. Again, the protests may not have been destabilizing to the government in the long run, but the Iranians were facing the worst internal dissent since 1979, since their founding 40 years ago -- worse than the dissent in 2009."

"Instead of facing internal dissent now they're facing a more unified country than ever before," Scarborough added. "Instead of facing pushback from the Iraqis, who were actually starting to tire of Iranian influence, it is now the Iraqis who are turning on the United States of America. Why this brinkmanship? Why now? What will be the rewards politically over the next 10 years?"