Getting Meta: Rachel Maddow Covers Why Journalists Cover The Birther Movement

Video

by Alex Alvarez | 8:57 am, April 28th, 2011

» 19 comments

Rachel Maddow walked something of a fine line on her show tonight, balancing covering birtherism (“Reporting on spending press time covering ‘birtherism’ itself, I think is a defensible thing.”) and lending even more coverage and attention to Donald Trump and the headline (and ratings?)-grabbing birther movement. Maddow set out to figure out why (non-Fox News) journalists would devote time to covering the whereabouts of Barack Obama‘s birth certificate, pointing out CNN reporter Ed Henry‘s recent question regarding why the White House had not, at the time, released the President’s long-form birth certificate:

Legislation undermining the President’s legitimacy as an American, questioning whether he should have even been allowed to run for the presidency in the first place, That legislation that has been drafted by Republicans at the State level and at the Federal level. Republicans pushed it at the Federal level in 2009, and they are now pushing it in more than a dozen state legislatures.

Cashing in on a feeling that has to go unspoken, on a sentiment that rejects the idea that somebody who looks like President Obama can be an American president. That’s why Republican politicians have been pushing this as an issue.

Grifters have been pushing it because this turns out to be a particularly monetizable conspiracy theory for the right. So this conspiracy theory is pushed by Republican politicians because there’s racist political gain to be had from it, and it’s pushed by grifters because there’s money to be had.

Why is it being pushed by journalists?

It’s a segment that ends up serving as a nice booked to Ann Coulter‘s appearance on The O’Reilly Factor, where she mentions that many in the conservative establishment have long distanced themselves from the birther movement and theorizes that MSNBC’s coverage of the birther movement is calculated to make conservatives “look crazy.”

Watch the segment, via MSNBC:

Birth Certificate, Birther, Donald Trump, msnbc, Rachel Maddow

http://www.perceptionasreality.blogspot.com/ skoorbekim

More Birther?!
Cover how Maddow selectively edited Paul Ryan’s town hall…
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/glenn-beck-explains-how-the-unions-are-using-teachers-firefighters-and-co ImNotBlue

Journalists covered the birther story? I thought Mediaite said MSNBC covered it the most. Have they hired journalists?
Judge Mental

[I]t’s pushed by grifters because there’s money to be had.
Why is it being pushed by journalists?

She just answered her own question.
Liberal Tormentor

Oh sweetie, you aren’t a jouralist. JournOlist, maybe. Even that’s a stretch.
danger_mouse

The fact that over a dozen state legislatures have crafted ‘birther’ laws is an extremely troubling develepment. Blaming MSNBC for reporting on the antics of these state government bodies is just as redundant as blaming the weatherman for reporting on a hurricane.

Rachel Maddow is not making any of these Republican congressmen/senators at the state or federal level to say the things they are saying. You may not like the fact that she is highlighting the craziness coming out of their mouths, but I for one am glad to know just which folk think that the duly elected President is ‘foreign’ or ‘no way he could have gotten into Havard without help (wink wink)’
Liberal Tormentor

Hey Danger Mouse, maybe Rach could start highlighting the 50% of crazy dems that think it’s possible that Bush knew about and let 9/11 happen.
Pablo

danger_mouse said:
The fact that over a dozen state legislatures have crafted ‘birther’ laws is an extremely troubling develepment.

Why? What’s wrong with having candidates prove their eligibility before you put them on the ballot?
Liberal Tormentor

Pablo, these are the same people that think it’s racism for asking someone to prove they are a citizen before they can vote.
Jerps

Most of Mediaite is letting us know what cable news is talking about, so I don’t blame Alex for covering Rachel covering journalists covering the birther movement covering Obama covering silly coverage.
danger_mouse

Pablo said:
Why? What’s wrong with having candidates prove their eligibility before you put them on the ballot?

So basically, before Obama was elected, previous candidates for any position in the country were allowed to contest elections based on good faith pledges right?
Pablo

danger_mouse said:
So basically, before Obama was elected, previous candidates for any position in the country were allowed to contest elections based on good faith pledges right?

Yup. And then we had 3 years of hysteria that could easily have been avoided by a simple compliance measure. Why not prevent that from happening again? And why would The Most Transparent Administration Evah have a problem with that?
Pablo

Liberal Tormentor said:
Pablo, these are the same people that think it’s racism for asking someone to prove they are a citizen before they can vote.

Or even proving they are who they claim to be. How racist is that, right?
cjd ohio 1

msnbc has no political agenda…….rachel maddow …….lol
CAconservative

I see it more as, blood in the water, for the news media. Obimbo has begun to hemorrhage and like the news-sharks tend to do, they are circling a dieing politician, and will soon be feeding off of what’s left of his dead incumbency.
blurgh.

Liberal Tormentor said:
Pablo, these are the same people that think it’s racism for asking someone to prove they are a citizen before they can vote.

No, it’s the same people who beleive it’s racist for asking the first non-Caucasian president to prove not only that he was born in the country but that he was smart enough to attend and graduate from two Ivy league universities.
Barack Must Go

Mister Maddow has even less credibility than even Barack Obama as of late. Just when you think a guy could not possibly stoop any lower ” BOOM ” goes the left wing bomb thrower dynamite….AGAIN.
chatmandu002

Nothing but Radical Madcow playing her/he usual game.
Glackin

My oh my how the song of the after-birthers has changed.
In unison, too. Not a single one out of step!
Sort of like the Rockettes, without the legs.
More of a goose-step than a high kick.
kayaker3

Well, ca conservative and liberal tormentor, it looks like you hitched your proverbial tea party agenda to the wrong wagon. Obama made bluthering fools of all of them, trump, beck,combs and all the other so-called fox news lemmings that can’t even get out of their own way, much less have an original idea that doesn’t involve some imaginary conspiracy theory. You guys thought you had this big, beautiful hot air balloon, however, it just got shot down and will no longer fly. What’s your next ploy, your next fabricated propoganda theory you’d like to pawn off on the unintelligible, uninformed citizens? Not to worry, murdoch, and the koch brothers will come up with something.