Today: Melissa Harris-Lacewell speaks reasonably and Rachel yells at Rick Perry.
Happy Hour
As you may recall, President Obama’s press conference on health care got completely overwhelmed by his single answer on the Henry Louis Gates arrest.
Rachel welcomed Melissa Harris-Lacewell, always a blend of good humor and good sense, to talk it out.
I wish more pundits would make the same point that Rachel hits when she notes that we need to be paying attention to who wants to get a real conversation going and who just wants to keep the screaming pumped up to 11.
I’m amazed at how many people who should know better have been disingenuously stirring up the racist base for political gain over the past year. How do they live with themselves?
Senator Roland Burris (D — Illinois) may have the right idea in having his tombstone all set up. Maybe every elected official should be required to have a mockup of his or her tombstone in the office at all times and be issued an impartial aid to carve things on it.
That way they would at least have to look at “Exploited The Deepest Fears of Some of the Worst Members of Our Society To Score Points” every morning and every evening and really think about what that means in the long run.
Also, once a year, the lowest-paid and/or most harried aide would be able to jump out from behind the tombstone, dressed in the costume of his or her choosing. Not necessarily as a teachable moment. Just for fun.
Remember the HMO
Rachel started this next segment off with sort of a potpourri of the most appalling things people have said in the health care debate lately, but then she segued into just flat-out yelling at Governor Rick Perry (R — Texas) for being an idiot.
You want to watch this clip. Maybe with headphones on at if you’re at work, but trust me, you want to watch it. It’s very gratifying.
Lou Dubose of The Washington Spectator joined Rachel to try to explain Perry and, by extension, Texas.
I felt like I got little wisps of understanding, but in the end I don’t quite see how any state could elect someone who always looks like he’s thinking, “Handsome devil, ain’t I? Don’t I look like James Brolin and Tom Selleck had a kid?”
Ms. Information
Rachel reported that exiled Honduran President Manuel Zelaya made an attempt to get back into his country on Friday. After a failed attempt at flying in earlier in the month, this time he tried just walking over the border from Nicaragua.
Honduran soldiers formed a barrier, so Zelaya jumped back over to Nicaragua.
One day his bold act will be known as the Hokey Pokey of Defiance.
The minimum wage went up on Friday! Now someone who works full-time and, as Rachel pointed out, never gets cut early from a shift or takes a sick day or a vacation, will make a whopping $15,080 per year.
Rachel also noted that the average yearly cost of family health insurance is $13,150. Don’t blow all your spare cash on fancy name-brand gumballs!
C Street Band
For once Rachel’s reporting made me less afraid of the secretive religio-political group The Family.
Because while they may be good at consolidating power and moving money around, they really suck rocks at thinking up good, plausible cover stories.
Congressman Bart Stupak (D – Michigan) has recently been telling reporters that gee, willikers! He simply knows nothing at all about The Family or the C Street house, even though it turns out he has lived at C street since at least 2002.
Senator Mark Pryor (D — Arkansas) told the Arkansas Times that he’s not a member and that Jeff Sharlet, author of The Family, is a “nut job.”
By the time he hit the air Friday night, Sharlet had already called Pryor’s office, which had already backed off of both of those statements. Whoopsie!
One More Thing:
Family member Senator John Ensign (R — Nevada) has released a statement saying that he won’t be releasing any more statements about his affair, claiming that the complaints by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington prevent him from doing so.
Darn those frivolous ethics complaints! They’ll get you every time! Well, I guess that settles it.
Except that CREW has released a statement in turn pointing out that their complaints don’t prevent Ensign from explaining himself at all.
Family members: Seriously. Get. Your story. Straight.
The second anyone starts questioning you, you lose your minds and start screaming easily debunked nonsense.
I’d be happy to fly in and lead an improv workshop. My rates are very reasonable.
News of the Weak
Kent informed us that Belarusian authorities seized 25 copies of an issue of Pride 09 magazine featuring Rachel on the cover. Customs officials said that all 25 copies couldn’t possibly be for the personal use of the head of Project GayBelarus.
So. Belarusians need Maddow, but they have to receive her in small doses. Let’s all do our part for international goodwill: Everybody pick your favorite Belarusian and send him or her a Rachel Maddow picture this week.
Next week, Uzbekistan!
