Devolution watch: Maddow's problem with the truth!

TUESDAY, APRIL 26, 2016

The bullroar never stops: Just for today, we can't face returning to Rachel Maddow's April 15 jihad against Candidate Kasich.

The jihad started with a false claim about a major bill signing—a bill signing which involved Governor Kasich and some "grown-ass white men."

Soon, the jihad moved to a string of allegedly horrible statements by Kasich, statements involving women. Yesterday, we showed you the first of these horrible statements. It was part of a trivial event from 2011—a five-year-old event which was mildly embarrassing, but also just massively pointless.

This is the way we rubes get played by the new and devolved Rachel Maddow. The dissembling is constant on her program. The bullshit never stops.

We'll return to Kasich tomorrow. For today, consider last Friday's masterful snark concerning Governor Snyder.

Last Monday, Snyder did something which was perhaps a bit odd; he accepted The Flint Drinking Water Challenge. Some residents had challenged him to drink their still-problematic water. In response, he went to the home of two Flint residents, drank some water from the tap, filled gallon jugs with their water, and said that he would drink their water for the next month.

Is it safe for Snyder to do that? Is it safe for him to encourage Flint residents to return to drinking their city's water as long as their faucets are equipped with filters?

We'd like to see an expert address those very basic questions. Maddow prefers to play the roles of propagandist, dissembler and fool.

Last Friday night, the devolving cable star mocked Snyder in the way shown below. Even as she was mocking Snyder, she may have been playing us rubes.

You can take your choice about this snark. Maddow didn't know what she was talking about, or she was just lying again:

MADDOW (4/22/16): Hey, Michigan Governor Rick Snyder is going to Europe, for a week.

Aaaah. Of course he is!

When we last saw him, Governor Rick Snyder was at this nice house in Flint, Michigan, taking away gallon jugs of water from the kitchen faucet of this family to show how safe he thought it was to drink water from the tap in Flint, Michigan, as long as you pour it through a filter.

The governor said he would be drinking Flint water not just that one day in that nice lady's kitchen in Flint. He said he would be taking Flint water away and drinking it for thirty days.

But now, as the governor jets off to Germany, Switzerland, Italy and the Netherlands, his spokesperson is now clarifying that when Governor Rick Snyder said he'd be drinking Flint water for thirty days, umm, he didn't mean thirty days in a row.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

So this European jaunt will not feature state-paid water carriers bringing those jugs of Flint water with him everywhere he goes. He apparently will resume his publicity stunt about Flint water when he comes back.

As usual, Maddow was being hilarious with her masterful snark. Rolling her eyes at the governor's flip, she offered this masterful quip:

"When Governor Rick Snyder said he'd be drinking Flint water for thirty days, umm, he didn't mean thirty days in a row."

Snyder's spokesman was now "clarifying" this point, the less than obsessively honest star wittily maddowsplained.

Hilarious! She also damned Snyder's plan to drink the water as a "publicity stunt." More on that below.

As usual, Maddow was being hilarious, and also wonderfully snarky. That said, here's the problem:

On Monday, when Snyder launched his "publicity stunt," it was clearly stated that he wouldn't be drinking Flint water when he traveled. Here's the way the stunt was reported in Tuesday's Detroit Free Press, headline included:

EGAN (4/19/16): Snyder: At work, at home, I'll drink Flint water

Gov. Rick Snyder said he visited a Flint home on Monday and drank filtered water out of the family's kitchen tap, adding that he plans to continue drinking filtered Flint tap water for the next 30 days to show it is safe.

Snyder told reporters in Flint that he filled three gallon jugs with the water. "I'm going to start drinking that tonight and do it for the next 30 days," Snyder said during a visit to a water distribution station at Greater Holy Temple Church in Flint.

Asked if his family also would be drinking the water, Snyder said his wife "Sue is on board with this." His three children no longer live at home.

Snyder's actions Monday followed developments Friday, when the governor encouraged Flint residents to start using more filtered tap water instead of bottled water and was told by a state official that Flint residents wanted him to start drinking the tap water first.

"I completely understand why some Flint residents are hesitant to drink the water and I am hopeful I can alleviate some of the skepticism and mistrust by putting words to action," Snyder said. "Flint residents made it clear that they would like to see me personally drink the water, so today I am fulfilling that request. And I will continue drinking Flint water at work and at home for at least 30 days."

Snyder spokesman Ari Adler said two media outlets were invited to the home to watch Snyder drink the water. Snyder's office later releasing photos of him drinking the tap water.

The governor said he won't always be able to drink the Flint tap water when he is traveling, but he plans to drink it when he is at his downtown Ann Arbor home and when he is at work in his office in the Romney Building in Lansing.

Oops. The part about not drinking Flint water when he was traveling had been explained on Day One. Snyder said he would drink Flint water "at work and at home," but not "when he is traveling."

Maddow and her gonzo staff managed to blow right past that. (The staffers specialize in laughing off camera at Maddow's masterful jokes.) Maddow also failed to mention a statement by Snyder's spokesman, in which it was explained that TSA rules would make it impossible to take Flint water abroad.

Snyder also said that he would extend his Flint Challenge a week to make up for the business trip. Maddow didn't mention that either. In the tribalized world of a life form like Maddow, it's better for us not to know.

Did Maddow know she was giving a false impression when she so masterfully snarked? We have no idea. Let's just say it has been a long time since she and her devolving program tried to get basic facts right.

Let's turn to a question that actually matters. Should Snyder be encouraging Flint residents to return to drinking tap water, as long as they're using a filter? That would be a very good question to pose to an actual expert. Maddow's too lazy and too uncaring to waste her time doing that.

She also disappeared one of the apparent reasons for Snyder's decision to take the waters. When Flint residents don't use their water at all, this slows the ability of the city's restored corrosion control program to recoat the city's lead pipes, restoring them to safe status.

"Many residents have resisted using any tap water, filtered or not, and experts warn that a drop in water use may slow Flint’s recovery," the New York Times reported on April 19. Elsewhere, it has been speculated that this is one of the reasons for Snyder's decision to take the waters in his "publicity stunt."

It would be interesting to hear what an expert would say about these matters. Is it safe for residents to to drink Flint water now if they're using a filter? Is it wise for Snyder to encourage them to do so? To what extent is the restoration of safety delayed when people don't use their water at all? Is Snyder's "publicity stunt" a good idea?

We'd like to hear an expert answer those questions. Maddow is too lazy, uncaring and propagandistic to waste her time with that.

We're not sure we've ever seen a program devolve in the way Maddow's program has. We continue to wonder if something is "wrong" with this program's multimillionaire big gigantic huge star.

Whatever the answer, her program has devolved to the point where it's bullshit pretty much all the way down. Tomorrow, we'll return to the Kasich jihad, to the allegedly horrible things the grown-ass fellow said.