Rachel Maddow Plays Glenn Beck

By pushing the new anti-Russian McCarthyism as an attack strategy against President Trump, Democrats – and progressives like Rachel Maddow – are encouraging a costly and dangerous New Cold War, writes Norman Solomon.

By Norman Solomon

When Rachel Maddow finished a 26-minute monologue that spanned two segments on her MSNBC program last Thursday night, her grave tones indicated that she thought she’d just delivered a whale of a story. But actually it was more like a minnow — and a specious one at that.

MSNBC host Rachel Maddow.

Convoluted and labored, Maddow’s narrative tried to make major hay out of a report from Moscow that a high-ranking Russian intelligence official had been dragged out of a meeting, arrested and charged with treason. Weirdly, Maddow kept presenting that barebones story as verification that Russia’s President Vladimir Putin had directly ordered the hacking and release of Democratic campaign emails in order to get Donald Trump elected president.

It was a free-associating performance worthy of Glenn Beck at a whiteboard. Maddow swirled together an array of facts, possible facts, dubious assertions and pure speculation to arrive at conclusions that were based on little more than her zeal to portray Trump as a tool of the Kremlin. Even when sober, Joe McCarthy never did it better.

We might dismiss her performance as just another bit of stagecraft on “MSDNC,” but Maddow was in sync with widespread fear-mongering by pundits and Democratic Party loyalists who think they’re picking some low-hanging fruit to throw at Trump. But what they’re doing is poisonous — and extremely dangerous.

The standard memes demanding hostility toward Putin virtually never address some crucial questions. Such as: What are the plausible results of escalating a new Cold War? Is it wise to push the U.S. government into evermore assertive brinkmanship with Russia? Wouldn’t the degree of success in that endeavor increase the degree of danger that the antagonisms will spiral into a military confrontation and, from there, into a nuclear holocaust?

Such questions don’t seem to bother the likes of Maddow, who has largely built her TV career on mocking, impugning and denouncing Republicans. Fair enough, except when it isn’t — and when it latches onto a Democratic party line of attack: no matter how bogus the reasoning or how dire the potential consequences for humans and all other life on this planet.

Talk show host Glenn Beck addressing right-wing rally at the Lincoln Memorial on Aug. 28, 2010. (Photo credit: Luke X. Martin)

Sliding through a kind of time warp, Maddow’s performance on the night of January 26 was akin to what the most extreme Republicans have reveled in doing to incumbent Democrats in past decades — baiting them as accomplices of the Kremlin and warning against actual détente between the two countries.

To be clear: Donald Trump has already shown himself to be a horrendous president in countless ways that matter, from his Cabinet appointments to his numerous corrosive statements to his executive orders on subjects ranging from family planning for women overseas to immigration at home. Why spin into agenda-driven conjecture and illogic when there are so many empirical reasons to directly challenge Trump?

But for countless U.S. reporters and pundits as well as Democrats in Congress, the temptation to attack Trump as a servant of Putin is irresistible.

Norman Solomon is co-founder of the online activist group RootsAction.org. His books include War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death. He is the executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy.

62 comments for “Rachel Maddow Plays Glenn Beck

  1. Zachary Husser
    February 4, 2017 at 17:41

    What Rachael Madow asserted in her commentary had more truth than what Republicans have been saying for 8 years, but especially the out right lying of Donald Trump on all issues! Talk about a whale of a liar versus a minnow and you have Donald Trump versus what Rachael has said and continues to say. The difference is Rachael’s reports are researched and Trumps are off the top of his ignorant beliefs. Take the one you believe!

  2. February 1, 2017 at 20:38

    You will know them by their propaganda.

  3. Tina
    February 1, 2017 at 13:26

    Maddow is no progressive.

  4. tony
    January 31, 2017 at 14:59

    Real progressives are not war-hawk Russia bashers.

    • BitterLeftie
      February 2, 2017 at 06:32

      Why would any progressive support a right-wing thug called Putin?

      • Lois Gagnon
        February 2, 2017 at 18:56

        You don’t have to be a Putin supporter to resist obvious psy-op manipulation to ratchet up tensions for regime change. It is possible to walk and chew gum at the same time.

      • February 2, 2017 at 22:26

        The only thug is urself. Putin is not right wing he is centrist nationalist and I suggest u study political science 101 the basics. We in the Us r really ignorant when it comes to basic politics. Obama labelled as a progressive left when he was classic Nixonian statelist. Hillary being labelled left and Trump fascist is beyond the Absurd. Trump policies with regards to trade healthcare and labor r left of anything the dem’s have produced . Carter was the only liberal centrist the democrats have produced since JFK anyone after that was right wing progressive.
        POST SCRIPTUM: YESTERDAYS NEWS GETS WRAPPED IN TODAY’S FISH

  5. drummerboy
    January 31, 2017 at 10:12

    omg. what a fever swamp I wandered into. Hillary’s the Devil. Putin’s cool. Bernie woulda won. Rachel Maddow is a pathological liar. (I’ll grant that she loves to clown around.)

    Anyway, do us a favor and keep out of our way as we try to save the country, OK? You’re not helping.

    • Joe J Tedesky
      January 31, 2017 at 11:34

      Okay drummerboy you got it. Excuse me though while I move a little more to the left, and if by chance I should wander a little to the center, be sure you don’t run me over as you barrel on through to the right. Remember this America is made up of a lot of different kinds of people, other than you, and these others have worked very hard for a very long time to achieve what freedoms they have earned so far, so just be careful as you speed towards the right you don’t take us all off of the cliff you are rushing towards to experience sudden death.

      Oh, when you are done screwing up this country, be sure to give it back, so we crazy’s can fix it to be what it should be…..where all men/women are created equal.

      No apologies for the comments here on consortiumnews because this ain’t Breibart.

    • Joe J Tedesky
      January 31, 2017 at 13:06

      Read what an American who became a naturalized citizen some thirty years ago has to say of why they came here to America, and from what they were escaping, drummerboy. I’m not just directing this American immigrant’s words to you drummerboy, but at all of those like me who every once in awhile needs to hear such words which were written by this great American our country has gained, and if for no other reason but as to be a reminder of why we love this country so much, and all the various people in it…even you drummerboy.

      ……………………………………………………………………………………………….
      Copied from another site, the writer’s name isn’t important, but they’re words are paramount to our survival.

      I grew under a dictatorship that used the pretext of security to suspend the constitution; curtail the courts; muzzle the press; and eventually to rule with extreme brutality for over 50 years now. I will not even name that country for this is besides the point except to say that this method is the playbook of all who seek power for its sake. I left that country and came to the US in the early eighties and studied and worked and served this country proudly and on the day of my naturalization registered to vote. To me that right and privilege was and remains the true mark of my newfound liberty.

      I can share with my fellow Americans that fear; scapegoating; division; and propaganda are the universal tools of tyrants. In the name of security rights are trampled; a group or a minority is conveniently used to deflect attention and direct resentment; insinuation of unpatriotic citizens sows discord; and propaganda creates the cult of personality.

      I am not only referring to the all too familiar regimes that Americans defeated in the last century and liberated million of people around the world but to current regimes that continue this same methodology today. Ultimately there is no difference between registering Jews and forcing the wearing of the Yellow Star of David and registering this or that nationality or religion. It presupposes classes of citizens and is just one step closer to dehumanization: the first essential step to persecution.

      Therefore I am asking my fellow citizens and especially those that have strong emotions stemming out of despair of the gridlock in Washington; out of disgust at the income inequality; out of fear of seeing the future of their children worse off than their current status; to harken to this great document called the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence and continue to forge this Idea Nation. This Nation whose motto is e Pluribus Unum: from the many we are one. This Nation that is ruled by laws and not by men and with a government of the people, by the people, for the people, and that will rise above all attempts to undermine its values and principles and to divide its citizens.

      I urge you to read the Constitution and to remember that every official swears an Oath of Office that preserves protects and defends the Constitution of this great nation. I urge you to remind your representatives of whatever party that this is their highest and the ultimate call to duty. I would dare say that without our Constitutional Rights and Responsibilities we are ultimately no longer the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.

      • Bill Bodden
        January 31, 2017 at 13:37

        Very well said on both comments, Joe. There are many responsible and informed people questioning the mental health of Donald Trump. The same questions may very well be directed at his followers.

        • Joe J Tedesky
          January 31, 2017 at 15:10

          Thanks Bill, because with drummerboy’s usage of words and by his tone, unlike your comments where I always take away something of value, drummerboy leaves me stupefied by his superior attitude which he adorns as he looks upon the rest of us as nothing but a hindrance to his plan to make America great again.

          Although drummerboy may possibly be a Rachel Maddow fan, and one who likes to demonize Putin, I hardly find drummerboy to be a member of the true left of our society. With this latter comment of mine in regard to drummerboy’s political persuasions I will only say this, that these Hillary Maddow fans are why we Americans now find ourselves with a totalitarian in our White House.

          Bill you and a few others here have been a mentor to my being able to see through the issues of our day clearly, and I thank you and the others sincerely for your being there. I am not always right, in fact there are comments I wish I could have taken back….such as suggesting what Putin should say, but I honor the opinions of even those I don’t at first agree with. This objectivity is what allows us to grow, and in the end make honest and good decisions, based on the information and thought which others have so eloquently put before me….so thank you all, and drummerboy I want to correspond with you in the future, just make your comments worth our comprehending them with intelligent thought.

          One last thing drummerboy I still have my original set of 1964 Ludwig Classic silver sparkle drums…what do you play?

  6. Gregory Kruse
    January 30, 2017 at 23:48

    I’m sure Olbermann regrets welcoming her to MSNBC.

    • Lois Gagnon
      January 31, 2017 at 00:28

      Nope. He’s ranting about a Russian conspiracy to take over the US as loudly as she is. They’ve both lost their minds.

      • Realist
        January 31, 2017 at 02:21

        Indeed.

        “What a terrible thing to have lost one’s mind. Or not to have a mind at all. How true that is.”

        — Dan Quayle

    • Stefan
      January 31, 2017 at 08:18

      Olbermann has gone completely insane – that is the only conclusion I can draw from his rants.
      Or he is just too weak for the bag of money he receives for spewing his nonsense.
      They way he rants about USA having been conquered by Russia, makes me think he truly belongs in a straitjacket.

  7. Sammy TT
    January 30, 2017 at 23:04

    What a ridiculous article. Critiquing a fellow journalist without actually addressing the story or the underlying facts she reported. And then of course spin all this into Maddow as part of some grand conspiracy to launch a new Cold War against Putin’s Russia.

    Ask the questions: Was the head of Russia’s cyber-espionage arrested? Why? Where is he? What are the charges? What are the connections, if any, to the Russian hacking of DNC and other American political institutions? Do some damn journalism — or don’t and just critique the reporting that doesn’t fit into your worldview or biases.

    • Bill Bodden
      January 30, 2017 at 23:57

      Check this for particulars of Maddow’s rant: Does Rachel Maddow Want Russia Bombed? by David Swanson – https://consortiumnews.com/2017/01/30/rachel-maddow-plays-glenn-beck/

      Check this for a transcript of the show: http://www.msnbc.com/transcripts/rachel-maddow-show

      • Sammy TT
        January 31, 2017 at 14:07

        I watched the Maddow segment and have read follow up reporting on it. And I read Solomon’s piece as well as Swanson’s. I understand the concerns over saber-rattling with Russia. But neither piece addresses the underlying facts of Maddow’s report — that the head of FSB’s cyber-espionage unit was snatched and grabbed from an FSB meeting, had a hood put over his head, and hasn’t been seen or heard from since. What are the charges? Where is he? Why was he arrested at such a pivotal moment in time — just as U.S. intelligence was putting more details together on the Russian hacking story.

        I wish we on the left could do a better job avoiding our own group think — as if every question or report on what’s happening in Russia is part of a grand conspiracy to launch WWIII. That is not what Maddow was doing with her report, and to claim otherwise is chasing your own biases down a rabbit hole.

  8. January 30, 2017 at 22:14

    Thank you for a moment of awareness in this torment of politico-psychosis. I deleted her FB fan page because of the hundreds of comments devoted to the next war against Russia, mixing up everything, fascism, Leninism, hatred and denial and incapable of the slightest thoughts about the reasons why and how T is now where he is.

  9. Damian
    January 30, 2017 at 21:36

    I think I saw that Maddow is truthful/accurate about 30? of the time.
    I use to live that station. But, then the election cycle began . They spent crazy airtime on Trump…. In some cases , exclusively. They made their bed. Now they have to sleep in it

  10. Paul G.
    January 30, 2017 at 19:34

    Maddow is no progressive, may once have been but now is a classic liberal. I once heard her advocate bombing Syria-must be a R2Py’ er. I thought at that point she had really fallen into the abyss of beltway blindness and was totally, as they say in the intelligence field-compromised.

    The only thing she proves is how an astronomical salary can warp or compromise one’s perspective into just another Washington Consensus talking head.

  11. Rajer Pell
    January 30, 2017 at 19:10

    She is un-watchable. And what a fan I was during the Air America days. Almost every one of those AA starters are now dead to me: Franken, Randi Rhodes, Maddow…

    • Lois Gagnon
      January 31, 2017 at 00:25

      I used to listen to Rachel on her local morning radio show in Northampton, Ma. She was good back then. Now I can’t stand her. I think these once progressive pundits all get caught up in their celebrity status and the paycheck that goes with it. They learn not to rock the gravy train.

  12. Realist
    January 30, 2017 at 18:40

    Maddow, Hayes, O’Donnell and Reed are all clearly suffering from an extreme case of Putin Derangement Syndrome. So is Keith Olbermann, though he does not have a media soapbox any longer. On occasion, Chris Matthews can be half-way rational about wanting peace with Russia, but then he will suddenly lapse into a groundless tirade against Putin too, as though he received instructions to crank out the propaganda over his earpiece.

    As all rational thinking human beings must realise, blaming Putin for i) “hacking the election” and ii) “stealing the election” from Hillary to the benefit of Comrade Trump is purely contrived codswallop meant to i) excuse her disastrous campaign, ii) delegitimize Trump as president and iii) obstruct him in the performance of his duties. I know the public personae of all these cable TV personalities quite well, having watched them daily for a decade or more (over two decades in the case of Mr. Matthews). It has been sad to see them all either i) losing their minds to what are clearly delusions or ii) selling out to support a narrative dictated by forces behind the scenes in the media and probably higher up in the Deep State to boot. They all perfectly depict the distinction between i) serving an ideology (which most of us readers of Consortium News practice and respect–I am ideologically driven to seek the truth, justice, peace and the other virtues touted in the Preamble to the Constitution–I daresay most readers here share that) and ii) serving a strictly partisan agenda, which simply seeks to win for your faction regardless of the compromises and hypocrisies that must be endured.

    Clearly MSNBC has transmogrified into nothing more than a mindless tool of the DNC. They have become that which they condemned in Fox News for its blind support of the RNC, telling any lies and demonizing any person to achieve their goals. Sell-outs like Maddow would now take us to the brink of nuclear war to appease George Soros and whatever other oligarchs are pulling the strings of the neocons and neoliberals fronting for the “Democratic Party,” (may it rest in peace!). Rachael, you have become exactly the people you hated for years as a lip-flapping talking head. You have become Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, and Mark Levin. You have clearly descended far below Kelly Anne Conway, whom I am sure you consider beneath yourself, in terms of honesty and integrity. Strange universe we live in where so many public people can spontaneously betray the values they espoused for most of their careers.

    At least that’s how I see it. And, I’ll tell you one more thing, Maddow. You fools are too stupid to realise that there are legions of people like myself who saw your public transformation in support of liars, demonizers and war mongers and were prompted not to vote for the Democrat for once in their lives. Whether we liked Trump or not, you snarky dead-enders for Hillary made all the difference in the election. True adherents of liberal values and aspirants of peace in this world were not about to sign on to Hillary’s personal wrecking machine because it was “her turn” or because you thought everyone in the country would fall for her insane “Putin is the devil and Donald Trump is his puppet” political campaign ploy. Those asinine pronouncements on your part had the exact opposite effect, lady. Enough true liberals either voted for Trump, voted for Stein, or simply did not vote at all. Think about it: where did the critical turnabout in voting patterns take place that threw the election to Trump? It was in the traditional “blue” (liberal) states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, and also in critical swing states like Florida and Ohio. (I’ll grant that you got every Hispanic vote in California, the state’s largest voting bloc and the basis of Hillary’s popular vote majority, totally fair and square but that was till nowhere near enough to win the country. Both you and Trump can put a sock in it and leave the statistical analysis to Nate Silver.) You raging maniacal hyper-partisans of the War Party lost because of people like me who read this blog and are influenced by truth and rational thought not slogans and bullshit. Are we happy as clams about Donald Trump? Honestly, after you guys sabotaged the Sanders campaign, he was the best of a very bad lot. His status as an unknown quantity significantly outweighed any reason to vote for the thoroughly known evil of Hillary Clinton. We shall see what Trump does with his opportunity. I know you partisans will not do it, but the country should give him a chance before moving straight to impeachment, revolt, deposition or assassination. That’s a big difference between your partisan philosophy of governance and my rational empirical approach. I need evidence before believing assertions and accusations. That’s why the “Russia did it” argument wins you NO points. So far you fanatics got nothing. Come back when he has actually destroyed the country or made a mockery of the constitution. I know you will sure be disappointed if he actually improves the situation.

    • sierra7
      January 31, 2017 at 13:44

      Now that’s what I call a, “….healthy rant”!!!!

    • Greg Herr
      January 31, 2017 at 18:14

      A standing ovation to you sir. I didn’t vote Democrat for once in my life for exactly the reasons you stated.

      • BitterLeftie
        February 2, 2017 at 06:30

        tRump is happy you didn’t vote for the Democrat.

  13. ranney
    January 30, 2017 at 18:25

    Richard I just read the Palast article you linked. It’s great and I hope everyone reads it.

    Evelyn, I totally agree with you on Rachel. I was pleased to see Consortium publish this article. When Rachel first joined MSNBC I really liked her and told my friends to watch. I thought she was honest and articulate. Now I get sick when I turn her on and hear her start in on one of her “teaching” lectures. I turned her off as she started last Thursay, so I missed what Norman Soloman saw, but I can just guess. My heart sinks and I become depressed every time she starts in on Russia, because I know that adoring fans believe every word – and she is lying, and she knows she is lying! Rachel has a PHD in history or foreign affairs (I forget which – maybe it’s both). Dr. Maddow is obviously very bright, so why is she content to lie on a daily basis? Is it really the money? Like you Evelyn, I also thought Chris Hayes was honest, and I think he was at the start, like Rachel, but the MSNBC rot has started to settle in with him too.

    It’s true, there isn’t a single newscast, network or cable, that is reliable. PBS is also frantically lying. When they have two people on to discuss foreign affairs they very carefully allow only anti Russian speakers on. You will never hear the truth about Ukraine, etc from anyone on PBS or any other MSM TV news.

    • Miranda Keefe
      January 30, 2017 at 19:02

      “It’s true, there isn’t a single newscast, network or cable, that is reliable.”

      Check out RT and especially “Redacted Tonight.”

      • Linda Furr
        January 30, 2017 at 23:18

        Regarding RT News: you’ve got to watch Peter Lavelle’s panel discussions on CrossTalk for the absolute truth in foreign policy. The US NEVER gets this kind of honest, intelligent foreign policy analysis …as tragic and comedic as it always always is.. (we are such suckers in this country!)

        And to understand real economics, watch RT’s Kaizer report with the wild, brainy Max Kaizer and wife, Stacey Herbert, his loving, soothing, sharp-as-a-tack, stay-on-the-subject straight-woman. The people they interview are the world’s top, honest economists and as human as you and I.

    • BitterLeftie
      February 2, 2017 at 06:29

      “she knows she is lying”. You sound exactly like a right-wing loon. Perhaps the far left and the far right are closer that we realise

  14. rosemerry
    January 30, 2017 at 18:11

    Rachel Maddow being called progressive is demeaning the word progressive. Samantha Bee is also spoiling her humor by being so narrow. Hillary Clinton did not deserve to win to win the Presidency, the Russian Hacking stories were unsubstantiated and are now stale news, the idea of keeping Russia as an enemy is 25 years out of date, and if the Democratic party want to win any time soon it needs to completely reform or remake itself for the PEOPLE, not the few rich and the neocons.

    • BitterLeftie
      February 2, 2017 at 06:28

      How’s tRump working out for you, eh…

  15. John Neal Spangler
    January 30, 2017 at 17:29

    I t just shows the democrats have gone far right into Fascism. They need an outgroup to scapegoat and build their hate campaign on

  16. Richard Coleman
    January 30, 2017 at 17:22

    Nobody seems to realize that the anti-Russia/Putin frenzy started and kept up by the DEMOCRATS is shielding, giving an alibi and COVERING UP for the real culprits who DID steal the election: The GD REPUBLICANS!! (Sorry for the shouting but…..you know)

    http://www.gregpalast.com/election-stolen-heres/

    (Download before it’s ruled Russian fake news and pulled)

  17. cavallo
    January 30, 2017 at 17:05

    To be fair, this piece should be corrected to note that Glenn Beck was fond of the chalk blackboard as compared to the whiteboard referenced in the article.

  18. evelync
    January 30, 2017 at 16:38

    My husband had tried to warn me from the start that she was a windbag, with her own agenda, particulars unknown; instinctively anti Republican, with an ideological twist.
    He couldn’t take her – “whenever anybody gets up in that strident tone of voice it means they need that tone of voice because they have nothing to say. If she had something to say she would not need that self important stridency.”
    He tells me he was driven out of the room many a time during the years that I watched her religiously.
    I guess what finally woke me up was the ugly way she treated Bernie Sanders. She was a disrespectful shill for the war hawk neoliberal Secretary Clinton. It shocked me at first – her self importance associating herself with the Clinton schtick pretending to be even handed but showing her true bias repeatedly.
    The last straw for me was the dirty trick – interviewing both Bernie and Hillary separately on the same subject supposedly on the same day and then “finding Hillary” afterwords to give her another shot at twisting Bernie’s words. (The subject had something to do with women’s issues.) It was pretty ugly. (can’t remember the context right now, but within a few days they backed away from the faux narrative they were trying to help Hillary create by twisting Bernie’s words. It was like a messed up theatrical production.)
    Rachel Maddow eventually succeeded in driving me away from MSNBC.

    The last person there who had some self respect and independence I thought was Chris Hayes. Maybe he still does but when Joy Reed took over for him a few times I quit watching cause she’s a shill too. And verrry pleased with herself, like Maddow.

    The shrieking over Russia trying to build Russia into a boogeyman has weaned me off everything on cable except CSPAN and PBS concerts and cooking lessons on their alternate channel.

    Norman Solomon has captured the essential RACHEL with a playwrite’s skill:
    “When Rachel Maddow finished a 26-minute monologue that spanned two segments on her MSNBC program last Thursday night, her grave tones indicated that she thought she’d just delivered a whale of a story. But actually it was more like a minnow — and a specious one at that.

    “Grave tones”, indeed! Bravo!

    • Miranda Keefe
      January 30, 2017 at 19:00

      I lost respect for Chris Hayes when he was interviewing someone about the Democratic Primary and she started talking about Bernie instead of Hillary and Hayes didn’t know the camera was on him and as soon as she mentioned Bernie he literally put his finger to his mouth in a ‘shush’ motion to tell her to stop talking about Bernie.

      Rachel? I realized what she as years and years ago when she thought Obama appointing Jack Lew was fantastic.

      She has no soul as far as I’m concerned. She knows exactly what she is doing, how she manipulates the truth and distorts things.

      What frustrates me is how my cultural liberal friends trust her and let MSNBC, CNN, The Washington Post, and the New York Times shape what they think.

  19. Debra Landreth
    January 30, 2017 at 15:26

    Way to go Rachel. Keep up the good work. We have to keep and eye on Trump and his Russian friends.

  20. Bob In Portland
    January 30, 2017 at 15:23

    In his Playboy interview in 1967 Jim Garrison, the only DA who has tried to prosecute the conspiracy to kill JFK, said this:

    “In a very real and terrifying sense, our Government is the CIA and the Pentagon, with Congress reduced to a debating society. Of course, you can’t spot this trend to fascism by casually looking around. You can’t look for such familiar signs as the swastika, because they won’t be there. We won’t build Dachaus and Auschwitzes; the clever manipulation of the mass media is creating a concentration camp of the mind that promises to be far more effective in keeping the populace in line. We’re not going to wake up one morning and suddenly find ourselves in gray uniforms goose-stepping off to work. But this isn’t the test. The test is: What happens to the individual who dissents? In Nazi Germany, he was physically destroyed; here, the process is more subtle, but the end results can be the same.”

    He saw what was happening back then. Rachel Maddow is part of that “concentration camp of the mind.”

    • Daniel
      January 30, 2017 at 17:49

      Excellent reminder of a true hero and the sad state the US has become. The lengths people are going to right now to contort themselves against our history and current reality are very disheartening, especially when we seemed so primed for a real truth revolution. But the powers that exert themselves over us, powers resulting from theft and deceit, are working overtime right now to further obliterate truth and reason for exactly this reason. As a result, people are becoming more confused, not less. Minds are being blown and most can’t take it.
      Thank God for sites like this, where reason and debate live, sussed out by professional reporting and context. I’d bet I speak for most here when I say I do not automatically believe everything I read here, but I don’t come to blindly follow. I come for the wisdom in the reporting, often spending more time on the comments than articles – healthy debate that susses out (or at least does not shy away from) some reasonable form of reality, from which we can draw our best conclusions. And the logic presented here, is proved true day in and day out, year after year. Patterns of behavior among the ruling classes develop. Things become obvious when you begin to see them. And you can almost predict them. If we’re going down on the Titanic, I at least want to be in the company of those who can honestly say it is due to an iceberg.
      Maddow, like Hillary, is but one cog in the Empire’s lies-and-war machine, better than some, worse than others, but all bad for a Democratic Republic. No one should be paying any attention to her or anyone like her – uncritical mouthpieces and mean-clique leaders all.
      Thank you Robert Parry and all of the writers and commenters here for helping keep this thinking person sane.

    • RB
      January 31, 2017 at 04:41

      brilliant quote

  21. delia ruhe
    January 30, 2017 at 14:32

    Many are sipping the Democrat Kool-Aid and a few intrepid souls aren’t. It’s the risk a nation takes by allowing only two political parties, one that’s right, which, in true binary fashion, makes the other one wrong.

  22. ger
    January 30, 2017 at 14:30

    At a salary of about $7,000,000 annum, I doubt Maddow will stray far from the script written by her Comcast Masters.
    Scratch “progressives like Rachael Maddow” insert “neoliberals like Racheal Maddow”.

    • BitterLeftie
      February 2, 2017 at 06:25

      As opposed to the dills appearing on Russia Today. You reckon they can say anything critical about Russia or Putin. You are too funny

      • Duh fuq
        February 7, 2017 at 16:42

        What do you, live in Russia or something? What is your obsession with RT? You’re crying with several loaves of bread under your arm. If you want news critical of Russia, you have PLLLLENTY of U.S. de-facto-state-news to “choose” from.

  23. Bill Bodden
    January 30, 2017 at 14:01

    Thank you, Norman Solomon, for this excellent commentary. Just one question, “How could you endure listening to (and watching) that woman for 26 minutes?”

  24. Mark Goretsky
    January 30, 2017 at 13:47

    It was enough for me watching Rachel Maddow’s shallow torrents once or twice in the past. She made an impression of a regular benevolent talking head. But her “performance” link in the article shows that now she’s becoming a malevolent hate monger. To bad for those who are “informed” by her narrow vision of international matters.

  25. Zachary Smith
    January 30, 2017 at 13:25

    I found a youtube video of Maddow gloating about Hillary’s coming victory, and couldn’t keep watching for even a full minute. (I knew this woman existed, but had never, ever watched her before)

    Maddow isn’t stupid, so by default that leaves her as delusional. Or dishonest. But I’d bet on her creating her own fantasies, then running with them.

    • Lee
      January 30, 2017 at 13:39

      She introduced herself as an idealist, Which is a good career pitch. Now she is simply a careerist

  26. Desmond Kahn
    January 30, 2017 at 13:18

    Thank you, Norman, for writing this. I just read a post on the Daily Kos titled, “Rachel Maddow Nailed it” about this, and I came away asking myself, “She did?”. Keep up your good work.

    • Bill Bodden
      January 30, 2017 at 17:23

      Daily Kos is another Democratic (sic) party mouthpiece.

  27. Joe J Tedesky
    January 30, 2017 at 12:42

    All this concern and fuss over Russian involvement and influence in our American political system shouldn’t have Russia only in the sights of these ‘pissed off Hillary lost’ Democrate’s. I’ll concede to an investigation of foreign influences that maybe going on behind the curtain of our government, but I want Russia to be held to the same standards as Israel and Saudi Arabia is held too. Furthermore if our politicians and celebrities stop referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin as a Hitler, and pull out of the tradegy we caused in Ukraine, well then it might leave the Russians to do what they do best, and that is by us simply leaving them be good Russian. I think Russia should be left to being Russian, and we Americans should reel in our interrupting their livelihood, because by our playing god we have hurt our important relationship…and that maybe a huge understatement if we take into consideration the Maddow’s of our American society, so quit with the Russia bashing.

  28. Mark Thomason
    January 30, 2017 at 12:17

    They would have been the first to attack this entire approach, if they were not doing it themselves.

  29. jo6pac
    January 30, 2017 at 11:59

    Watched her show once when it first came on, just another gate keeper of the demodogs.

    Zorn, that’s who she is and the left isn’t allowed on Amerikan tv so most are on RT. Sad.

    Thanks NS

    • BitterLeftie
      February 2, 2017 at 06:23

      RT is just a propaganda arm of the Kremlin. *rolls eyes*

      • Bob Loblaw
        February 5, 2017 at 03:41

        Have you even watched any RT shows?
        The Big Picture, Watching the Hawks, The Keiser Report all attack the mainstream narrative and expose truths ignored or mocked regularly in the American mass media. To say the Kremlin propagandizes us with these critical truths is saying the Kremlin cares more about us than our own politicians.

  30. exiled off mainstreet
    January 30, 2017 at 11:42

    She has jumped a particularly risky fascist shark in a particularly dangerous fashion in light of the nuclear war potential were her views to prevail.

  31. ammythomas634
    January 30, 2017 at 11:24

    serydriytu66rt

  32. Zoran
    January 30, 2017 at 11:05

    There is no real left in US. She is just another Wall Street warmonger.

    • Virginia Fiocca
      January 31, 2017 at 03:00

      Finally some truth!! I absolutely agree. hillary Clinton is the reason Trump was elected. People are tired of the same old self aggrandizing politicians.

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