The Rachel Maddow Show (TV Series 2008– ) Poster

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6/10
when people criticize Rachel Maddow by emphasizing her physical appearance, it says more about them than it does about her
lee_eisenberg30 August 2014
"The Rachel Maddow Show" is no "Democracy Now!" - there are things that which Rachel Maddow resists discussing - but it's infinitely better than anything on Fox News (aka Fox Noise and Faux News). Maddow clearly does research in her reporting. The criticism of the show is usually either that it's a partisan show, or emphasizes Rachel Maddow's lesbianism and physical appearance. This is not an argument, but rather an ad hominem attack. Even if it's a partisan show, Maddow DOES interview people with opposing viewpoints, namely Pat Buchanan (the surprise is that ultra-bigot Buchanan is willing to be in the same room as a liberal Jewish lesbian). But most importantly, TRMS is an intellectual show: it includes segments about scientific topics, including environmental issues. I consider it a good show.
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5/10
Time for a Rachel Change in Style
max-82-4942455 August 2015
Warning: Spoilers
Rachel is smart, sometimes funny (although not quite as amusing as she seems to find herself), wise on many issues, and often nicely provocative. It is her consistently didactic style that is much in need of change. Without making that kind of professional adjustment, she will continue to wear out her welcome, as polls over time have suggested has happened. If a point can be made once, Rachel seems to feel compelled to make it twice. And then, having repeated the point, Rachel apparently is convinced that folks probably won't understand unless she says it again -- perhaps this time in a little different form. And on and on, until we've heard the same observation made 15 times. And then, well...maybe she'll add a 16th. Her program on Tuesday, August 4, 2015, on the Fox choices for the 10 top Republican Presidential candidate contenders invited on stage for the 8/6/15 televised debate illustrates my point well. The entire first half of the show -- all of 30 minutes -- was spent making, emphasizing, and repeating one point. It was, in one sentence: Fox used polling selectively, in an attempt to aid the Republican party, by adding John Kasich as the 10th invitee rather than Rick Perry. An interesting observation -- at least the first 5 times Rachel (and one guest) made it. By the time she was making it -- using slightly altered language -- the 20th time, a viewer like me was ready to scream, or, more effectively, change channels. Nothing else in the news worthy for discussion on August 4th, Rachel? Do you believe your viewers are dim-witted stooges who likely flunked kindergarten and need pedantic, schoolmarm-delivered screeds each evening? If so, you're wrong. If you are as smart as people claim, Rachel, learn how to adjust your style to better appeal to those of us who are capable of understanding political observations the first time they are made.
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7/10
Where is she when you need her?
stephensolomita26 May 2018
I watch Rachel's show regularly whenever she happens to show up. But she's taking more and more time off these days. She's almost never there on Fridays and usually takes a day off during the week. She should try doing the kind of job most Americans have to do. Let her stand on her feet for ten hours at a cannery, up to her elbows in fish guts. Maybe she'd come to appreciate how easy she has it.

A couple of months have passed since I wrote this review and nothing has changed. Rachel was off last night (10/1) and last Friday. This is a TV personality who makes $7,000,000 to host a one-hour show. She's not the only one, Mika and Joe so seldom appear together that I'm starting to believe their engagement is off.
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10/10
Simply the best!
michalchik3 October 2008
Rachel Maddow is brilliant, well educated, very hard working and just a nice person. It shows in all her work. If you want to hear the news that is important she scours all the major news sources for the stories and homes in on the stuff that really matters. Her commentary is erudite and daring. She takes on the B.S. fearlessly and is expert in adding context that shows up deception, spin and hypocrisies. She is humble enough to admit when she is reporting something outside her area of expertise and readily admits it when she makes mistakes. To top it all off she has a goofy-gentle sense of humor that makes the news fun. If all newscasters were as good as her we would live in a country that really would be a shining beacon on the hill.
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10/10
Exceeded all expectations
lastliberal15 September 2008
I know back in the day when I listened to Air America that Rachel Maddow was something special. She impressed me then as someone who had a keen grasp of what was happening and could translate it into terms that anyone could understand.

I believe that it is not only her impressive academic credentials that contribute to this, but a serious work ethic that causes her to do copious research on a subject.

This was evident as I watched her tonight. She knew her stuff! She is a charming personality that makes the news worth watching. The mainstream media on every evening during dinner can learn a lot from her.

So, skip Charlie and Brian and Katie, and get you news from Rachel. You will be a better informed American.
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1/10
The show has degraded in to a conspiracy oriented show
Cinephiliac700027 February 2019
Fans of The Rachel Maddow Show don't just buy in to the conspiracy theories peddled by Rachel Maddow, they actually buy in to all of the fearmongering that gets added in to her broadcasts. Ms. Maddow has amassed a fortune by pitching Russian conspiracies with a nonstop mix of fear, paranoia, and extreme political ideology.
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10/10
Most-informed mainstream Newsperson; a brilliant Journalist
maxpuppydaddy28 March 2015
Rachel is the real deal. She FAR exceeds any other talking head in acumen and intelligence, and actually puts in the grueling hours and painstaking research required to earn her very impressive "truth percentage rating" in comparison to the tabloid noise we see on FOX and CNN. But, as with any minority voice that seeks to wade through the morass that is American politics, MSNBC is NOT being awarded by the American viewership for its decision and daring to remain THE Progressive Voice for this country. Alas, those that at least try to find truth are NEVER popular. Nor are those who chuckle at the AMAZING amount of base ignorance that resides in rural RED State America.

No, MSNBC is struggling...and likely will continue to suffer low viewership numbers and "ratings", because of an important difference that sets them apart from CNN and FOX: their ongoing refusal to rely on an old, reliable "news" approach that seeks to grab attention and evoke an emotional response.

MSNBC's level of fear-based PANDERING is lower than other networks. Thank GOD for that.

Rachel and MSNBC are both undeniably partisan, and just as determined to get their message out as FOX or CNN....but they resort LESS to pedantic and immature fear-mongering to try and sway opinion, and are sometimes the ONLY Cable News Network to avoid being drawn into aiming to stir our predictable, human base impulses or sling silly and crass American myths and legend out to the public masqueraded as truth and "patriotism." The recent Ebola-driven events that all news agencies breathlessly covered as it arrived in America are a clear example of the distinction MSNBC supplies when it comes to panic-stirring. MSNBC's stubborn refusal to denigrate the CDC wrongly, or to create unwarranted fear and panic by endorsing what NEVER remotely presented any threat to average Americans is what exemplifies courage in reporting the news.

What you won't find on Rachel's Show are "are YOU a REAL American" or "are you PATRIOTIC enough" litmus tests that remind historians of 1933 Germany and the Nazi Party's Goebbelized approach to using demonization of a particular demographic in order to summon up a mythical Bogieman and then drive a false, fear-based pandered narrative.

Rachel Maddow IS MSNBC....the network's main political taproot, and the major attraction. She has had to overcome the continual myopic and silly RIGHT-WING's hate-driven anti-gay narrative, and their cadre of childish sexual stereotyping that seems so common, emanating from the hetero haters in the world.

Rachel has responded to adversity and challenges with the utmost class and authority, and despite the Right's blatant sexism and misogyny, Rachel has emerged as a hero among both normally-adjusted heterosexuals and gays, alike. All of the FOX News nasty asides and envy-driven criticism of Rachel has only exposed the crank-call maturity level that sane Americans ascribe to all folks foolish enough to spew sexual- orientation-based personalized attacks.

Bottom Line: Rachel's approach to informing Americans is fact-based, accepts challenges when they are warranted, provides humility and story revision when mistakes are made or discovered.

As the Huffington Post recently remarked: "We would be lost without Rachel Maddow. Indeed!

(Note: Reviewer is an older, White, straight Independent male)
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1/10
Worst show ever
vecmjb26 March 2019
Poor excuse for journalisn. Just a bunch of whining and complaining.
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9/10
Partisan, of course, but informative.
rmax3048238 October 2010
Warning: Spoilers
I'm not sure what this entry is doing on IMDb.com, a site I thought dealt with movies and television series like "Law and Order" but -- okay.

MSNBC is decidedly "liberal" in its bias, just as Fox News has become not much more than a promotion of conservative -- not necessarily Republican -- values. Her program is about the only one I depend on for a relatively accurate presentation of one of the liberal perspectives, as well as a critique of the conservative positions. Of the other "opinion journalists" at MSNBC, Keith Olbermann should leave his ego to the Smithsonian. Ed Schulz, with his "hot buttons", is a bag of wind that appears to be MSNBC's mostly closely matched answer to the numbskulls at Fox. Chris Mathews has an irritating habit of interrupting all of his guests, whether he disagrees with them or not, but Mathews' humanitarianism is so fundamental and he himself so spiritually pure that I give him a pass.

I used the term "one of the liberal perspectives" before because "liberal" and "conservative" aren't single pigeon holes into which sometimes dramatically different positions can be dumped. Maddow, for example, has at times been quite critical of President Obama and other Democrats.

Chiefly, I admire Rachel Maddow and her show for two reasons.

(1) She has a D.Phil. from Oxford and the scholar's habit of doing lots of research on a subject, then citing her sources. If she gets something wrong, she says so and apologizes. She uses accurate charts and graphs and explains them in a way that's easily understood, though not oversimplified. She'd make a good professor. Well, in a way, she already is.

(2) Her emotional tonus is stable and its default setting is "slightly cheerful." Claims that she "smirks" tell us more about the claimant than about Maddow. She is unfailingly civil and polite, even on those rare occasions when she's able to book hostile guests. She doesn't bloviate. She doesn't get angry. She may call individuals or political movements "names," the way third-graders might, but she does so rarely -- far less often than her counterparts either on Fox or MSNBC. And to compare her in this regard to Ann Coulter is something of a joke in itself. Coulter has no equal as a purveyor of gossip and smear. She's great at it.

But, as in all such shows, some days are slower than others and sometimes there is considerable repetition, and some of the event threads she follows are less interesting than others, at least to me.

She's about the only talking head on either Fox or MSNBC that I feel I can actually LEARN something from -- aside from the bias of the head itself. I'll just mention one example. A few months ago, Maddow took a walk through the neighborhoods of Baghdad with correspondent Richard Engel. She was the audience's proxy, while Engel explained the people and things they were looking at. The sequence was edited, of course, yet I felt I learned more about Iraq's behavior stream in those segments than I had ever known before. Just for instance, not all Moslems give two hoots about observing the rules about fasting on Ramadan. They're like Christians, with their varying degrees of allegiance to their religion.

I won't go on, except to say that among all the clutter and the glitz and the swooping banners and the breaking news and the electronic percussion and the fanfares of both Fox and MSNBC, her show comes as a big relief. I don't need to reach for the aspirin.
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1/10
Propaganda in it's worst form filled with Lies
KyleBel8 June 2017
I'm not affiliated with any party, but if I had to say I was anything it would be Liberal.

So, when all of my friends who share the same political view as myself told me about this show and how it was a "Must Watch" I was excited. Well after a few months of watching this and seeing real news as it comes out I realize that this show is nothing more than Propaganda, worse than you'll find on the other side of the spectrum.

She over hypes every event, with countdown clocks, live updates, pretty much any trick and tactic to get you to watch and when you tune in 90% of the time it ends up being nothing near what she's been hyping for past day or week.

It's truly a disappointment because someone with this reach, audience, and platform could use it for some good. Maybe rooting for the country you live in to do good instead of hoping for it to fail miserably. It's kind of sad how the Democratic party and their news outlets have given up on Patriotism in America
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10/10
Finally, a normal show, in touch with mainstream Americans!!!
Rachel is a sort of relief for me. After years of hearing extreme views coming out of America, I'd given up on the country. Rachel and before her, Keith Olbermann were and are proof that Americans aren't completely of their rockers. Sanity ensues.

One of the greatest moments on the show was when Rachel took one of the verbal droppings of the McCain campaign and said: "Wait, should we call this just ... LYING!?!"

Well said, Rachel, it's about time someone called these jokers out.

While Olbermann is really well spoken, eloquent and very passionate, Rachel is more toned down, has more of a sunny disposition and is in general more fun to watch. Olbermann is good too, but his subjects are sometimes so dark, which of course isn't HIS fault, that I get away feeling upset and depressed. Aww, it's hard to choose between them, love, love, love em both!!!

PS Someone who thinks Coulter is funny, is sick and twisted and a pox on all your seven houses.
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Rachael
brendabolton31 August 2018
Love her show! The only news hour that I record so that I don't miss her.
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6/10
Too Much Time Off
jztherapist4 August 2018
The Rachel Maddow show is excellent. When she's there! Which isn't very often I honestly don't think a week goes by that she's nowhere to be found for at least part of that week. As of this writing, she's been gone for an entire week and that's in addition to multiple days she's been MIA during the last several months.

Hopefully, her health is good and that's not the reason that she now works part-time. What's ironic is that her mentor and benefactor, Keith Olbermann (whom she promptly forgot she knew once she had her own show and he was let go by NBC) pulled the same nonsense. There one day, gone two...there a full week, gone the next week.

What is it about Phil Griffin that he allows such liberties to be taken by these multi-million dollar part-timers? Maybe he's not there either and doesn't know that he's got hosts who consider it a right and not a privilege to be handsomely paid for so very little air time!
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1/10
Make no sense at all.
sierramadre-3121729 April 2019
Gives out a drawn out analytics which leads to pretty much nothing. Can't follow her reasoning at all. The show is extremely boring. Very little to no concrete data supporting here thoughts. I don't think she would ever take a chance debating a random citizen that can poke many holes in her reasoning. Been trying to ride on the hate Trump agenda with many predictions that have completely been proved to be untrue. The show is obviously very biased and understandably given the station she represents, but it is also filled with false hoods. Can't watch this show more than a few minutes without being disgusted.
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10/10
The Best New Thing in the World
buslady9-942-4105818 March 2014
Warning: Spoilers
To say Rachel does her homework is an understatement. Her knowledge,research,real time factual accuracy, well-balanced humor mixed with serious focus makes her an indispensable jewel in the MSNBC crown. It would be almost impossible for a blue collar working class person to glean important current affairs information without her polished synopsis of national and world events. The interview segment of her show offers an opportunity to see and hear the detail behind the headline news and personalities that impact the lives of, well, all of us. As a member of the baby boomer generation, Rachel (as well as all of her MSNBC colleagues) I have renewed hope that the progressive cause(s) will be carried into our increasingly complex future. She is the Best New Thing in the World!
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10/10
The best show on TV
SeriousMoviesOnly31 May 2019
This is by far the best show on cable TV. Rachel Maddow is brilliant and nevertheless for every appearance she does tons of research before going on air.
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1/10
Boring propaganda
PubChampion3 September 2020
I decided to watch a few shows just to see what's behind the high ratings. Turned out it was an all-out anti-Trump propaganda. What was a big surprise though was how excruciatingly boring the show was. I neither learned anything new nor was ever entertained. It was even more boring than watching soccer! Hannity is just as biased in the opposite direction, but compared to Maddow he's like watching football or aussie rules.
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10/10
Maddow's is the ANTIDOTE to the Propaganda od the greedy 1% who have won the Class War.
omegaed8 June 2018
I try never to miss her show. I appreciate the depth and background in her stories. The perfect antidote to the GOP lying propaganda campaign. Best news analysis on the Cable.
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1/10
Is this shait still on?
kpk_cioby22 September 2020
I would assume like most political pressure for people who failed poorly and lied or messed up their job, to be fired or quit. But apparently this doesn't extend to the media where literally you can lie for years, be proven wrong and still hold an award for your lies.
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10/10
Up to Date
sharnalou13 August 2018
Rachel has been very informative on what is happening to our country right now in the era of Trump and the administration running this country. For the past year she has been my go to person for what is genuinely happening and I believe with her show and investigative team America is much more aware of the truth.
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1/10
One of the worst talk shows on TV ever in history
thebricks7 August 2020
She's never let it be a secret that she was biased towards the left, let's make that clear. Prior to Election Day 2016, she was rather smug and kept it together, staying on the high ground. After the election results were announced, you could see that she had begun to snap and lose all touch with reality. No one thought Trump was going to win but after months of telling the American public they were bigots for not accepting your hard left "progressive" proposals, were you really surprised they didn't vote for Hilary?

Ever since then, she's had an axe to grind with the boogeymen Russians, who are apparently the kingmakers now in politics, lol. Every episode is about how the Russians stole the election, basically implying Americans will always vote liberal and if they don't, someone interfered. The arrogance and entitlement of this woman is unbelievable. It explains why she is so liberal. The show really is an IQ test and if anyone you know likes watching it, that's a huge red flag.
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10/10
Most insightful host on t.v.
ladysek8 June 2018
Rachel is the best in the business. Her investigative journalism and political insight are second to none, and she is able to break down complex narratives like no other. The absolute best!
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No stars
kmyra82 October 2020
Been painful to hear this clown for years- please -make it stop
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1/10
Only tuned in Once and that was it.. Mainstream Propaganda Meme
wbsimsjr-324051 July 2020
I happened to tune in when she was doing an interview with a figure head of one of the largest foreign governments that has a huge investment in our media propagating their "holiness", despite the rest of the world calling them out on many, many human rights and violence incidents. It turned my stomach as she went after the opposing "look behind the propaganda" guest. The sheer rudeness was not called for, especially if you're trying to pass yourself off as an "unbiased" truth seeker.. It is fairly standard behavior/methodology for puppets, to simply over-talk, cut off, ridicule and use any other vice to circumvent having to deal with reality.

Thoroughly disgusted with this type of sensationalist, diversionary trash, that is beneath rags like the "Enquirer" But I thank her.. It did make me wake up and get my news from more reputable sources, the BBC/ITV and begin researching topics on my own.
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10/10
Intelligent and Informative Television
tindalllisa24 April 2020
I'm 56. I remember Ted Koppel being my baseline of a trusted news source. If I wanted to know, I wanted to hear what Ted had to say about it. Now, that's Rachel. I also remember watching things like the Gulf War being beamed into our living rooms every night and seeing history happen in real time. That's how I feel now watching Rachel's coverage of this pandemic. I record TRMS every night while I'm at work, and watch it first thing when I get home. Her nature is investigative. Her style is plain-spoken. Her spirit is inspirational. Her wit is sharp and dry. Rachel is a beacon. A pathfinder. Beseeching us to heed and follow, unless you know a better way, and then, by all means, share your better way with us so that we can all make our way out of danger. When we have a real president, I hope she is awarded with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
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