Although I often disagree with her there are many things about Rachel Maddow I like.
For one thing I am, like her, a dyed in the wool science geek and I always enjoy her moments of geek.
In addition, while she is clearly partisan, she had always seemed to adopt a somewhat greater degree of fairness than some of her colleagues at MSNBC (or to be fair her opposite numbers at Fox).
Certainly she’d be more likely to go after a Republican than a Democrat, but she usually tried to balance things out. If she pointed to corruption on one side she’d acknowledge that there as
also corruption on the other.Which is why I was a tad disappointed at her when she took on the FEC tonight. The reason for her report was the scandal involving John Ensign (someone I consider a pure scumbag for the record) and the reported coverup efforts by Tom Coburn (a crook if he did that).
She was upset (and rightly so) that the FEC took a wink and a nod attitude towards these scandals, and rightly so.
However the FEC did not suddenly become crooked or corrupt in 2010, this kind of thing has been going on for years. The story would have been much better if it had taken a broader look at how the FEC has let off both Republicans and Democrats for corruption (including Harry Reid, just to keep the focus on Nevada) over the years.
I’m pretty sure (or at least hopeful) that Ms. Maddow does not adopt the view that only Republicans are corrupt. I suspect there are some out there who think so, just as there are some who think the reverse but they are in the minority. However the fact she chose to make this a limited story rather than a broader one was a bit disappointing.
