AT MADDOW SHOW, IT'S TIME FOR A CHANGE: Stop Rachel Maddow before she poofs more!

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 23, 2016

Part 3–A low-IQ night in the life: Last Tuesday evening, Rachel Maddow joined Brian Williams for many long hours of babble.

In the current election season, the peculiar pair serve as co-hosts for MSNBC's "campaign coverage." Last Tuesday, they anchored the channel's endless, time-killing treatment of that day's primaries and caucuses.

There was no Maddow Show that night. The next evening, the increasingly peculiar show returned to the air with a wide array of peculiar reports by its host.

When the Maddow Show resumed last Wednesday night, it had an array of news events on which it could have reported. That Tuesday, to cite one example, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee had held its second hearing on the lead-in-water mess in Flint. The committee heard testimony that day from four major players:

Susan Hedman, the EPA official who resigned in the wake of the rolling mess in Flint;

Darnell Earley, the former emergency manager of Flint, an appointee of Governor Snyder;

Dayne Walling, the former mayor of Flint, who served in that post until late last year;

Professor Marc Edwards, the Virginia Tech water expert who played a key role in bringing the mess in Flint to light. As we noted yesterday, he savaged the EPA for its alleged role in Flint.

Last Wednesday, another important event occurred. President Obama nominated Merrick Garland to serve on the Supreme Court. Especially given Maddow's focus on Flint, her show had a lot of reportin' to do when it returned to the air Wednesday night.

What viewers actually saw that night was the program's standard array of silly, ridiculous segments.

How silly, how self-indulgent, does Maddow's "reporting" now get? Last Wednesday, Maddow never mentioned the congressional hearing on Flint which had occurred the previous day. Midway through her peculiar broadcast, she did find time for this complete, short segment which, like so many of her segments, was All About Herself:

MADDOW (3/16/16): I'm a crier. Movies. Music. Particularly live music.

Good commercials. Bad commercials. Well-crafted tweet. Doesn't really matter.

If it works, it works. I have leaky waterworks. I cry all the time.

And so, as a crier, I'm more than sympathetic, I am empathetic about crying in public. Even by elected officials, even by sports hero–by anyone, particularly when it is tears of joy, right?

You know, years of hard work, hoping and planning, it all pays off. There's that release. There's that rush of emotion.

Today, we got one of those moments in an unexpected context. And for criers everywhere, I think I can say that that is a good thing in and of itself.

But that story is next. Stay with us.

"I cry all the time," Maddow said, sharing another secret concerning her special existence.

There's always time on this ridiculous show for Maddow to tell us about herself, thus helping us learn to adore her more completely. This Monday, she built a whole segment around another self-indulgent theme, in which she let the "Maddowsketeers" contemplate the specialness of their club's Dear Leader.

Rachel Maddow is a crier. Also, she loves coffee:

MADDOW (3/21/16): I love coffee. I drink way too much coffeecanyoutell?

[Cleverly talks too fast]

Every sip of even bad coffee, like truck stop coffee, makes me marginally more happy than before I took that sip. I love coffee.

That said, coffee feels terrible when it comes up the other way, like when it comes flying out of your nose and splatters over the new iPad of which you're reading the Sunday edition of the New York Times.

Like, for example, when you're reading this story. Headline, "Republican leaders map strategy to derail Donald Trump."

Oh! Really! Sip!

At last! Sip!

What is this strategy? Sip!

What will they do?

They are, quote, "preparing a 100-day campaign to deny him the presidential nomination starting with an aggressive battle in Wisconsin's April 5th primary." Starting April 5th?

Aaaaarrrh! Ha ha ha ha!

[Pantomimes spitting coffee all over new iPad]

Maddow went on to misinterpret a major part of the Times report which had produced this wonderfully entertaining reaction. Entertainingly, she extended the sipping-my-coffee theme all through the segment's clowncar performance.

Maddow entertained us rubes all through this Monday's "news show." Earlier in the show, Maddow pretended that she was doing the drumming when NBC's election night theme music played.

"If I don't do that, the symphony doesn't sound quite right," the childish multimillionaire childishly said.

("I I I I I I I," the analysts shouted in protest.)

At the start and end of another short segment on Monday night, Maddow performed a series of giant, Sarah Palin-style winks as she referred to the size of Donald Trump's hands. The mugging and clowning never end when this giant corporate clown gets behind the wheel of her car, calling attention to her wonderful skills and sharing the pointless details of her pointless, peculiar life.

Let's return to last Wednesday night, the evening after the hearing on Flint:

On Wednesday evening, March 16, we got to hear that Maddow's a crier. We didn't hear a single word about that hearing on Flint.

That said, Maddow's soliloquy about her tears wasn't her only time-wasting drivel. Released from the need to play the grown-up when perched beside the rehabbed Williams, she returned to the role of Peter Pan, clowning and offering silly analyses all through her sillybill program.

She opened one ridiculous segment that night by saying this:

MADDOW: OK, this is a little bit of a doozy and you will not see this elsewhere.

You won't see this anywhere else? "There may be a very good reason for that," the analysts pitifully cried.

Believe it or not, the segment Maddow started that way concerned the selection of delegates to the Republican convention from the U.S. Virgin Islands. Why did Maddow devote a full segment to this particular doozy?

Rather plainly, because the potential delegate in question, an insignificant player named John Yob, got punched or shoved or whacked on or near the jaw last fall, when he was working for Candidate Rubio.

It was utterly pointless then; it's massively more pointless today. That said, let's let our caffeinated town crier explain it:

MADDOW (3/16/16): OK, this is a little bit of a doozy and you will not see this elsewhere.

But before we have to start covering fistfights and soccer punches and kick-the-protester scrums at Donald Trump political events, back before Donald Trump made national presidential politics look like this in our country, it used to be a rare thing to see a punch thrown in major party national politics. It used to be really rare. It used to be newsworthy when there was a small punch, a shove even within the context of presidential campaigning.

But that is what happened last year when Marco Rubio's deputy campaign manager got into a little physical skirmish at a Republican conference in Michigan. This happened in September. A bunch of the Republican candidates and their campaign staffs were all hanging out on Mackinaw Island in my favorite state of Michigan and something went wrong in a bar.

And you can see here on this tape that we've looped here that one of these staffers landed a punch or shove or some kind a whack on or near the jaw line of another guy who was attending that conference, so, you know, it's exciting. Bar fight or bar punch or bar shove, or not that much of anything. But this happened.

"We've looped here that one of these staffers landed a punch or shove or some kind a whack on or near the jaw line of another guy who was attending that conference?"

Truer words were never spoken! Maddow kept playing the tape of that punch, shove or whack; we stopped counting after nineteen replays. "So, you know, it's exciting!"

This absolute nonsense triggered an entire segment about the possible selection of one delegate from the Virgin Islands. The hearing on Flint was never mentioned. We were drip-fed that doozy instead.

Maddow's conduct was ridiculous all through the evening. In fairness, she did two segments about Obama's selection of Garland, though the segments produced little of value.

One segment ended with Maddow weirdly predicting "such an unbelievable moment in Democratic politics" if Obama refuses to withdraw the nomination after a Clinton win this fall. The other segment ended no better, with Maddow offering a long set of speculations about Obama's motives in picking Garland.

"That said, I'm completely making that up," she laughingly said as she ended her silly rumination.

"We noticed," the analysts said.

Maddow never mentioned the previous day's hearing on Flint, at which major players had testified. Instead, she performed a snarky segment about the way to spell the name of Michigan's lieutenant governor, who will replace Governor Snyder if Snyder is recalled or decides to resigns.

"By the way, the lieutenant governor's name is Brian Calley, C-A-L-L-E-Y," she snarkily said at the end of the segment. "Everybody's learning to spell it now. C-A-L-L-E-Y."

Maddow invited viewers to watch Thursday's hearing on Flint. She never mentioned the hearing which had occurred that Tuesday.

Rachel Maddow tends to mug and clown all through her nightly program. We learn about her crying and her love for coffee. We learn about the fish she catches. We learn that she has a new iPad.

Increasingly, though, Maddow's highly peculiar show has become an entertainment/propaganda blend. In our view, her conduct is an open insult to her viewers. Consider the way the she opened last Wednesday night's program.

We tuned in hoping to see a segment about the hearing on Flint. Instead, she opened with her favorite vaudeville routine. The very peculiar star of the show "poofed" all the Republican hopefuls again!

If you want to see the way "poofing" is done, you can just click here.

[Warning: Probable IQ loss.]

Maddow never mentioned the previous day's hearing about what happened in Flint. As part of the deal you get when you join The Maddow Club, she was never going to tell you about the scathing critique Professor Edwards had aimed at the EPA. As liberals, you just shouldn't hear that!

If you become a Maddowsketeer, the EPA is part of your club. GOP candidates are not. As part of the package, the very peculiar host of your club pleasures you and your low IQ with insulting nonsense like that shown below.

This is how last Wednesday's program began. To enjoy the fun which comes with each poof, you can watch this insulting segment:

MADDOW (3/16/16): Good evening, Chris. And thanks, my friend. And thanks to you at home for joining us this hour.

We knew this day would come. We did not know exactly when. As recently as yesterday there are people paid to talk for a living who were assuring us that this day would definitely not come today.

But it's come today. The time has, in fact, arrived. And my friends, we must now gather together to poof Marco Rubio.

We started with 17. Seventeen! Seventeen people all got in over the course of last spring and summer. Nobody got out until September 11th, when the first one we got to poof was–

Rick Perry.

[Perry again gets poofed]

Ten days later, we got to poof–

Scott Walker.

[Walker again gets poofed]

Then we went almost another two months without being able to poof anyone until finally:

Buh-bye, Bobby Jindal.

[Jindal again gets poofed]

A month after that, right before Christmas, we got to poof Lindsey Graham.

Poof.

[Graham again gets poofed]

And then between Christmas and New Year's, we were supposed to poof George Pataki. But it was between Christmas and New Year's, there was a lot of other stuff going on, and it was George Pataki. And honestly, we kind of forgot to poof him.

But Governor Pataki, we owe it to you.

[Snaps fingers]

Poof. December 29th.

[Pataki gets poofed again]

Then after Iowa, at the start of February, in quick succession we got to poof Mike Huckabee.

Rand Paul.

Rick Santorum.

[The three get poofed again]

A week and a half after New Hampshire, it was a conflagration of poofing as we lost, in quick succession:

Chris Christie, poof. [snaps fingers]

{Christie gets poofed again]

Carly Fiorina, poof.

[Fiorina gets poofed again]

And Jim Gilmore, poof.

[Gilmore gets poofed again]

Then a week later, after South Carolina, the Bush family's long multigenerational winning streak ended in that state and we got to poof– [snaps fingers]

Jeb Bush.

[Bush gets poofed again]

And now, we've arrived in the month of March and the first week of March, we pulled a little bit of a Pataki on this show when I forgot to poof Ben Carson.

There was no real reason I forgot to poof Ben Carson. Every time I started thinking about it and working on that segment, I just got distracted, my mind wandered. It was totally on me.

Earlier this month, I forgot to poof Ben Carson when he quit on March 4th.

But he did quit. Poof.

[Carson gets poofed again]

And then we were down to four.

And so the field of candidates that was so giant to begin with, we've had to poof so many of these people over the past few months to get down to this little group we've got left.

You would think we'd be used to it and it wouldn't be a big deal anymore. But it always feels like a big deal when somebody drops out of the race. And now in particular, when you're down to this tiny number of people still left in the race, it is kind of dramatic to lose one.

It's also dramatic to lose people from the Republican race right now, to keep poofing people off what started as such a giant roster of candidates, because now we're starting to think seriously about the prospect that maybe the Republican Party will poof everybody off this list. That they will not just get down to one, they will get down to none.

I mean, it is a fairly open discussion in some Republican Party circles right now about whether the Republican Party will add a new potential nominee to the mix at their convention in Cleveland, somebody who's not been running in the race already for the past year.

[...]

I mean, maybe the Republican Party really well have ended up considering all 17 of their potential declared candidates this year and maybe they will reject all of them. But we're not there yet. And today, it really is a big deal for this epic race on the Republican side that it has now gone from four people to three people.

So, let's do it. Are you ready? Say it with me now.

Senator Rubio, three, two, one:

Poof.

[Rubio gets poofed for the first time]

For what it's worth, all these people, except Rubio, had been poofed at least one time before. Maddow had already re-poofed the whole list on her clownish February 12 show.

That said, it's one of her favorite vaudeville tricks. So instead of discussing what happened in Flint, she burned away the start of her show by poofing everybody again.

Is it true? Does it "always feels like a big deal when somebody drops out of the race?" Our corporate clown didn't poof Candidates O'Malley, Chaffee and Webb when they left the Democratic race. The Maddow Mouse Club is thoroughly tribal. When it comes to poofing, no Democrats need apply!

(So far, Maddow hasn't poofed Scalia. We won't be surprised if she does.)

Maddow mugs and clowns and discusses herself night after night, week after week. She pimps overt propaganda as she cavorts and plays.

Judged on a journalistic basis, Maddow is a corporate clown running a corporate gong-show. That said, her endless clowning and propaganda raise some basic questions.

Is there any journalistic supervision at her alleged "news channel?" What does it say about us the liberals that we put up with this Hannityesque, embarrassing low-IQ mess?

One more question comes to mind when we watch this peculiar clown perform. Is something "wrong" with Rachel Maddow, the clown at the wheel of this embarrassing car?

More and more, we wonder if the answer is yes. Her behavior is strange and she doesn't look right.

More on this question tomorrow.

Tomorrow: Journalistic disgrace to the side, should people be concerned?