“Hi, I’m Rachel Maddow. I host a TV show on MSNBC. I also live in Western Massachusetts, in the beautiful hilltowns of Hampshire County.
“This week, our new U.S. Senator, Scott Brown, sent a fundraising letter that says I’m running against him for Senate when he’s up for re-election in 2012.
“I’m not running against Scott Brown. I never said I was running against Scott Brown. The Massachusetts Democratic Party never asked me to run against Scott Brown. It’s just not true. Honestly. I swear. No, really.
“Senator Brown never even tried to find out if it was true, before using the made-up threat of me running against him, to try to scare donors into giving him more money. He sent the letter all around the country, to the out-of-state conservative activists who provided so much of the funding for his successful Senate campaign.
“Do you remember when Mitt Romney ran for President after being our Governor and he went around the country insulting Massachusetts, talking about what an awful state we are? To have our new Senator raising money around the country by saying how terrible one of his Massachusetts constituents is, kind of feels the same way to me.
“It’s standard now for conservatives to invent scary fake threats to run against — things like the made-up ‘death panels’ in health reform, or the fake controversy about the president’s birth certificate. Senator Scott Brown’s only been in DC seven weeks, but he already seems to be fitting right in with how conservatives operate there.
“I’m running this ad not because I’m running against Scott Brown — I’m not, he made that up — but because he’s the Senator for all of us, and maybe this will make him think twice the next time he wants to smear one of his constituents to raise money out-of-state.
“My show airs at 9PM Eastern in Massachusetts on MSNBC. So far, Scott Brown refuses to come on. Maybe he’ll change his mind — I hope he does.
“Sincerely,
“Rachel Maddow”
She makes my pragmatic heart go pitter patter.
…here he is attacking Obama for calling the Rethugs bluff on repealing health care…
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p>Thanks to Josh Marshall and TPM for this.
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p>Short timer.
I would love to see her run for Congress in MA-01 when Olver retires.
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p>There is a Facebook page to draft Rachel for the 2012 Senate race, started by her WHMP radio colleague Bill Dwight and another activist named Jon Hite. Rachel has, according to Dwight, never encouraged this effort but has never asked him to stop it…
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p>http://www.facebook.com/group….
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p>So it’s not that she’s never been asked to run, but that (according to her) she’s never been approached about running by any party official. This would imply that she was not the recipient of the Walshgate email.
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p>Franken’s history may be an interesting parallel. When Dayton retired as Minnesota senator in 2006, Franken was mentioned as a possible candidate but demurred — the fact that he despised Coleman and would rather run against him was certainly a factor in that decision. She doesn’t want to make any move toward running new, certainly, but what would happen in early 2012 if the most plausible “Democratic” professional politician running were Steve Lynch?
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p>She was the subject of “The Interview” on TRMS a few days ago, with her producer standing in for her as interviewer as she “recused herself”. The best part of the interview was the chyrons, e.g., “Rachel Maddow, like Scott Brown, drives a pickup”, and “But she is neither a nude model nor a lawyer”, and “Maddow owns a large dog and has only average posture”…
Hey, if Scott Brown continues to run against Maddow, maybe that’ll get her to consider it? If the only way to get him to stop campaigning against her is to run and beat him… đŸ™‚
a certain Illinois Senator insisting he wasn’t going to run for President, not long before he started running for President.
the party of reckless accusation: A recent addition to the pile: Rep. Cantor’s recent certainty (certainty!) that he was being shot at by some HCR advocate.
“BothSides(tm)! You’ve to got cover BothSides(tm) media, or we’ll complain!”
“Yesterday, suspected Nazi arsonists burned down the Reichstag. Elsewhere in Berlin, a Communist elbowed a Nazi in line. We appeal to both sides to stop raising tensions.”
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p>”One of the fire hoses used to quell a Civil Rights demonstration was nicked by a protester, the governor claimed today. There will never be intelligent discourse on racial harmony in Alabama as long as both sides resort to violence.”
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p>”We hereby call on an investigation into St. Peter and the Roman army for their violent acts around the movement lead by Jesus of Nazareth.”
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p>”In the wake of Pearl Harbor, remember that Japan’s claims in Southeast Asia will not be resolved easily as long as both sides insist on shooting at each other.”
Next door, Rob Eno (formerly Eabo Clipper) presents us with a video of Rep. Dingell. This is a clip that has been extremely popular on the Right blogosphere. In it, Rep. Dingell answers the question as to why it takes so long for the ACA to go completely into effect. Obviously there is a fair amount of government machinery to put into place to get something like that working, but Dingell unhappily phrases this as needing time to “control the people”. He means the bureaucracy, obviously, but Mr. Eno — as well as his Accusing-is-fun brethren on the right — are happy to have you think that Dingell is really saying that the purpose of ‘Obamacare’ is take away freedom, to control the public.
There was also a memo circulating among Republicans last week that they claimed was from the Democratic leadership and that Boehner’s office was turning over to the press.
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p>Only they didn’t know who wrote the memo. That, of course, didn’t stop them. Accusing is fun.
In 1954, William F. Buckley and Brent Bozell wrote McCarthy and His Enemies wherein they argued that McCarthy’s accusations were so useful that their sloppiness could be overlooked.
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p>William F. Buckley is the intellectual grandfather of these people. Accusing has been fun for them for a very long time.
That may be true to a degree – but I think, more importantly at this time in political history, their intellectual father is Lee Atwater.
He had no problem with lying to advance his agenda.
I did find it interesting that the “story” in the Globe did not mention the tweet or the Rachel Maddow in 2012 Face Book page, set up by someone else, but both are mentioned in the Herald story.
How the heck are you??? Long time no see!
she’s absolutely, positively one of my favorite people in the entire world… and I’ve never even met her. Her show is consistently both the only one I try to watch every night… and the only one in which I feel as though I’ve learned something every night. Her coverage of all the intimidation by the right that’s gone on during the HCR debate is, imo, Pulitzer worthy (or whatever awards they have that’s the same thing for tv news).
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p>To be able to see her in a live tv debate for political office with Scott Brown or any other crazy conservative would just about make my life. He would be creamed.
Scotty boy will sitting on a bench with a box of chocolates annoying strangers with bizarre stories.
While the hateful comments about Rachel today on Boston.com are sad and predictable (Scott’s followers are soooo classy), the fact remains that he sent this fund-raising letter to out-of-state donors, using those scary words “liberal” and “far left” and MSNBC. Btw, yes the ad did run in the print edition of the Globe (page A 7, i think). It’s a shame Scott feels the need to do a Romney and go to out-of-state folks to trash Rachel, who lives in Western Mass and is a constituent. Scott oughta man up and go on her show just to address the things he said about her. But I’ll betcha he won’t.
The adulation Maddow will provide will be insufficient.
and I can not stomach Scott Brown, so when I read about this, I just found the entire thing odd. I guess Maddow/Brown fans get it.
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p>One needn’t be a “fan” of either Maddow or Brown or someone who watches television to understand the politics at work here.
public I think one must.