Mike Barnicle: proud member of the Barack Obama "terrible deeds in the name of Christ" school of moral blindness . . .

Joe Scarborough opened today's Morning Joe with a protracted and impassioned plea for America—and in particular President Obama—to call out radical Islam by name. Mika Brzezinski was dubious, citing unspecified "difficult times" in the past when presidents used the wrong language. But taking Mika's misgivings a giant step further, Mike Barnicle flatly declared that we can't call radical Islam by name because "we're the Crusaders."

What could be driving Barnicle, other than a desire to defend at all costs President Obama's revolting linguistic reticence?

MIKA BRZEZINSKI: There have been times, difficult times, where a president has misstepped because of the wrong words used. What should he be saying?

JOE SCARBOROUGH: This is radical Islam. We're fighting radical Islam. We're fighting a group of people that have the most fundamentalist, base reading of the text of the Koran and they are seeking a religious end to the world. Their vision of --

BRZEZINSKI: -- in what context should he say that? Should he be surrounded by certain members --

SCARBOROUGH: Let's not exaggerate --

BRZEZINSKI: I'm just asking, what's the message--

SCARBOROUGH: When 21 Christians have their heads carved off, say they were killed because they were Christians. When Jews are shot up in synagogues, say anti-semitism is sweeping across Europe. When Islamic radicalism accounts for the majority of terror attacks over the past 15 years, say that. Not because you're hammering Islam but because -- because Muslims are saying the same thing. I guess, Mika, the more important question is, why is he not saying this? Why is he trying to put a smoke screen over the truth? What is he afraid of?

MIKE BARNICLE: Let me ask you, off of that, do you think at one level of the discussion about what the president is going to say when he appears in public and says something, do you think there is the discussion about language in terms of if we say this we have the Saudis and we have the Egyptians and we have the Jordanians sort of coming our way. So don't say this because we don't want to put them in a tough position.

SCARBOROUGH: No, because they all agree. They call it Islamic radicalism. They call it Islamic extremism.

MIKE BARNICLE: But they can do that. We can't. We're the Crusaders.