Won’t stop teasing Chris Christie: Just eighteen minutes into the show, Maddow was teasing Chris Christie.
She wanted us rubes to watch her full hour. So she started teasing the short and somewhat dishonest segment with which she would end the program:
MADDOW (12/12/13): All right. The one story in politics right now that feels like it was lifted from outtakes from The Sopranos today got even more New Jersey than it was yesterday. And it looks like it now may be turning into a real problem for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, and that story is coming up.Yay! A real problem for Governor Christie!
Stay with us.
In fact, Rachel had no particular evidence of any such thing. She has been pushing this topic since Monday night, when she started her program with a 19-minute segment about it.
Can we talk? On Monday night, she had no evidence that Christie has done something wrong. As of last night, she still had no such evidence.
She did have her “Sopranos” hook, and her jibes about New Jersey.
Increasingly, Maddow’s show is becoming a showcase for silly partisan snark—silly, and sometimes a trifle dishonest.
Midway through last evening’s program, Rachel teased Christie again. She did so at such length (282 words) that we’ll only cite her final lines, in which we were told that Christie “is apparently dead serious about” the subject in question “when he talks about it in private. And the way we know that, and we do know it now, is coming up. And it is a remarkable story.”
It sounded good—and the wait continued. It was a bit like the wait New Jersey residents had endured at the George Washington Bridge!
Alas! With four minutes left in last night’s program, we were still waiting for that “remarkable story” concerning Christie. Rube-ishly, we had been waiting 38 minutes since we received our first tease!
You might say we’d been “watching that space.” So far, nothing had happened concerning the hated Christie!
Finally, in the last four minutes, Rachel ran through her report. The bulk of that time was devoted to giving the background all over again, as she had done, in full-length segments, on Monday and Wednesday nights.
Here’s the background:
Back in September, a minor New Jersey official had closed three lanes of traffic from Fort Lee onto the George Washington Bridge. This created a week-long traffic jam which crippled the town of Fort Lee.
The minor official was a high school friend of Christie’s. First, the minor official lied about why he had done this weird, stupid, dangerous thing. Last week, though, he resigned his post with the Port Authority.
How weird! It seems he may have done this to punish Fort Lee because its mayor wouldn’t agree to endorse Christie for re-election. But that remains pure speculation—and there is still no sign that Christie was involved in this ridiculous conduct.
Was Christie involved in this stupid conduct? Everything is possible! For ourselves, we’d be inclined to call it unlikely. Again, there has never been any evidence that he was involved.
But so what? Increasingly, Maddow’s show is devoted to giving us gong-show partisan bullroar. On Monday night, she devoted the first 19 minutes of her program to this remarkably minor affair, skipping the three million serious topics she could have discussed at that time.
(She ended by bringing on a New Jersey Dem to suggest that of course Christie did it. He presented no evidence in support of this claim. Nor was any requested.)
On Wednesday night, Rachel did another full segment about the very stupid conduct in which Christie has been shown to have played no part. Last night, she teased this piddle all through the program, retaining us for the full hour.
The first tease came at 9:18. She did the segment at 9:56, and it was mainly a recap.
Maddow has covered some very important topics during her years on the air. Last night, as the teasing persisted, she did a segment about the new “rape insurance” bill which just became law in Michigan.
Maddow has a lot of tools. She’s smart enough that she could serve as an emissary to the wider world on these important topics. But she seems to want to make lots of dough, and she seems to think that we her viewers are dumb and highly tribal.
Last evening, she proved it all night long, teasing the hated Christie. We've always heard that love and hate are two sides of one coin.
We’d call this a bit dishonest: On all three nights, there was no evidence showing that Christie was involved in this stupid conduct.
There was no evidence Monday night. Last night, there was still none.
So far, there’s no evidence whatsoever. But so what? Rachel seems to think that we her viewers are dumb:
MADDOW (12/12/13): It’s still kind of a hilarious story. But it is becoming significantly less hilarious for Governor Chris Christie.Just a thought:
How long can he go on before he actually explains what happened here?
There is still is no explanation for what happened here that makes any sense and seems to be borne out by the facts. What happened, and when is the governor going to explain it?
Now it’s time for The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell. Have a great night.
Christie can’t explain what happened if he doesn’t know what happened. In three nights of substantial time loss, Rachel has presented no evidence suggesting that he does.
Maddow is a former Rhodes Scholar. Surely, she understands that logic, but she seems to assume we do not. We’d have to say that this is the way her cable program is drifting.
What kind of ratings did last night’s teasing produce? People! Watch this space.
"Christie can’t explain what happened if he doesn’t know what happened. In three nights of substantial time loss, Rachel has presented no evidence suggesting that he does."
ReplyDeleteWell maybe he can explain why he would call the Governor of New York to try to pressure him to get New York officials to back off on questioning what happened.
Your phone call allegation is a rumor. Cuomo hasn't said this call took place.
Delete"But she seems to want to make lots of dough"
ReplyDeleteWhat an envious, shit-sucking bone-gnawer.
Why don't you go away?
Degenerate, sickening troll. Bob, you are allowing such a degenerate troll to ruin the comment section and you need to ban this monster.
Delete"Why don't you go away?"
Deletehahaha!
"Why don't you go away?"
Deletehahaha!
Commenters: save this one for reposting when we discover, inevitably, that Christie DID have something to do with it.
ReplyDeleteBeutiful logic on dislpay.
DeleteFolks don't you see? If Christie is later shown to have been involved then that retroactively justifies darling Rachel's current evidence free assertions!
Logic is dead.
Not only that, but according to Confused, Christie's involvement is inevitable!!
DeleteIt not even possible that he wasn't involved.
Its not even possible that his friend was simply being stupid on his own accord.
Never mind that there is absolutely no positive evidence that Christie was involved.
Never mind that Christie would have to be an idiot of absolutely monumental proportions to be involved in such stupidity.
How dare Bob only say that it is possible (but unlikely)!!
It inevitable!!!
"evidence free assertions"
DeleteWait a minute! Time out. What pray tell were her "assertions"? She never made any. All she did was report a story that seems to be pretty big in NY/NJ that I had never heard about. It seems important enough for 5 subpoenas to have been issued by the State Assembly.
Again, Maddow is not making allegations or assertions, she's simply reporting what others are saying. And as hard as people have been trying to get an explanation for what occurred, there's been lies and obstruction from the people responsible. Christie is the fucking governor and he makes jokes. And yes, it was reported in the Wall Street Journal that Christie called Gov. Cuomo to complain. It's not a fucking rumor.
*****
A spokesman for Mr. Christie said Thursday that the governor talks to Mr. Cuomo regularly “on any number of mutual-interest topics. Those conversations are private.”
A spokesman for Mr. Cuomo declined to comment. Asked in a radio interview Thursday whether he had spoken to Mr. Christie about the bridge matter, Mr. Cuomo didn’t answer the question. “I don’t know anything more than basically what has been in the newspapers,” he said.
The call between the two ambitious governors was another illustration of how the controversy has mushroomed into a headache for Mr. Christie.
http://www.salon.com/2013/12/12/report_christie_asked_cuomo_to_rein_in_investigator_of_george_washington_bridge_closure/
*****
A nice non-denial denial.
Maddow says, as quoted in the blog post above, "What happened, and when is the governor going to explain it?"
DeleteSo, you cleanly say "She never made any" re: assertions.
She told her viewers that the Governor owes us an explanation.
Surely it's possible, but be careful to remember
ReplyDeletethat wishful thinking is not the same thing as proof.
Why not stop watching her program, since you dislike her so much.
ReplyDeleteThe same reason people rubberneck at car wrecks.
DeleteHaving grown up in NJ, where my parents lived till they died a few years ago, and still in regular contact with my friends (agemates, others there, many of whom have been distressingly, to me, rah-rah Christie), all I can say is, whoa, does Bob have any idea how NJ and NY work? WSJ has been on this story from the beginning. (Why does Bob never cover WSJ, btw which reaches more people than NYT? Just wondering.) Anyway, even if Christie did not know what his minions were up to (and I'm perfectly willing to believe he didn't know they were up to this specific inanity), shouldn't we judge a politician in part by his minions? Not just the odd "bad apple." I don't hold against Lamar Alexander his former chief of staff, for instance -- not without more evidence, but "a pattern of behavior" as you might call it? This is a real story, and Bob's attempts to report, partially, what Maddow reported, to a readership of his posts that probably doesn't follow all the coverage, are another example of his peculiar contrarianism (that's my generous interpretation).
ReplyDeleteBob's summary of Rachel's reporting is also partial and unfair, btw, in case some readers here are relying on Bob for a full and fair summary of her report.
First, it is odd that as big as this story is in New York and New Jersey the only person I heard about it from was Maddow.
DeleteCould it be that there's a conscious effort by national reporters who are so enthralled with Christie the straight shooter straight talker from New Jersey and the Republican everybody can love that they would like this story to go away?
I'm beginning to think if TDH was around in 1972 he would be writing articles mocking Woodward and Bernstein for chasing a third rate burglary story.
Yes, there's no evidence that Christie was involved. That's part of the fucking story. So far there's been outright LIES offered as an explanation and stonewalling and jokes from the Governor. The guy was his political appointee after all.
Amen. Nothing to see here, folks.
Deletemm, we'll see how it plays out. The national news has had other fish to fry in the last week or so (when the story might have gotten more national traction), plus,it's the holiday season, when news gets flabby under any circumstances. Today's NYT had another story on it all (Christie's stonewalling and jokes you refer to, maybe, or still more of that). Maybe the story will outlive the holiday season.
DeleteTangentially to something else I was working on, just a few weeks ago I came across an account of the theft of the Town Records of Elizabethtown in 1699 by someone (everyone knew who it was but couldn't prove it -- and no, not a Lenape or African slave who might have had grounds) trying to discredit the land claims of the first (English, maybe a few Dutch) settlers there. It's in NJ's DNA.
Ah, the TDH logicians. Ever bumping their noses into one tree or another, always missing the forest.
ReplyDeleteAn alternate motto for TDH might be: "Nothing to see here folks."
Yes, Christie's involvement, even if by surrogate, will inevitably be revealed. The logicians can run circles around their trees. We've seen movies like this before and have a pretty clear idea of how they turn out.
One of the most marvelous aspects of being rich and powerful in the USA is not only do you get to bask in your power and privilege unmolested, but you're fortified by an army of lower orders who essentially volunteer to protect your privilege. "Nothng to see here, folks." What a country!
ReplyDeleteWhether it's the election race for NYC mayor or Port Authority shenanigans, TDH should stay far away from NY/NJ politics. Bob doesn't seem to have much knowledge of the players or the issues. Just a helpful tip from another long-time dissatisfied blog reader.
DeleteI don't really know anything about Maddow's story, and, perhaps as a non NJ resident, I don't care anything about Maddow's story. Let us assume that the worst of what Maddow implies is true, and that Christie would chose to punish people who live in his state in that fashion. Well, that pretty much says to me that Christie is so stupid his dreams of The White House won't get very far.
ReplyDeleteWhat strikes me as dishonest about this post is the inference that The Daily Howler is let down by Maddow, that her work has become increasingly problematic this year, that She has discussed serious problems in the past, etc. The Daily Howler has been berating Maddow with little equivocation in highly person terms from Day One. So this has a little of the "more in sorrow than in anger" tone The Daily Howler used to mock.
Indeed, I've always found Maddow a dubious figure since her "Air America" days. If She does, on occasion, do a worthwhile show, doesn't the liberal make a deal with the devil when they sit through the rube bait? Maybe, but there are too many commercials anyway, most people don't watch these programs, particularly on the left.
One more time: Maddow's single worthwhile contribution was a flawed but worthwhile book on Military spending. This book might have triggered some worthwhile exchanges on this critical subject. People like The Daily Howler where not interested. Whatever and finally, this just plays like Bob's excuse making to return to one of his tired targets.