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Why Rachel Maddow Getting Her Own Show Matters ... A Lot
By Steve Benen, The Carpetbagger Report
Posted on August 20, 2008, Printed on May 26, 2012
http://www.alternet.org/story/95753/why_rachel_maddow_getting_her_own_show_matters_..._a_lot
I'm very rarely encouraged by any of the decisions made by major news outlets. Yesterday afternoon, however, was a spectacular exception.
Rachel Maddow has been sounding off about politics on MSNBC so often she might as well have her own show.
And now she does.
The liberal commentator and Air America radio host, who has become a breakout star for the cable channel during the presidential campaign, is taking over the 9 p.m. slot following Keith Olbermann, whom she often subs for on "Countdown." Olbermann broke what he called a "fully authorized leak" yesterday on the left-wing Web site Daily Kos. Dan Abrams, the former MSNBC general manager who had been hosting "Verdict" at that hour, will continue as NBC's chief legal correspondent, become a "Dateline" contributor and serve as a daytime anchor for MSNBC.
A recent profile of Rachel in the Nation noted, "Maddow didn't get here by bluster and bravado but with a combination of crisp thinking and galumphing good cheer. Remarkably, this season's discovery isn't a glossy matinee idol or a smooth-talking partisan hack but a PhD Rhodes scholar lesbian policy wonk who started as a prison AIDS activist."
Steve Benen is a freelance writer/researcher and creator of The Carpetbagger Report. In addition, he is the former lead editor of Salon.com's Blog Report, and has been a contributor to Talking Points Memo, Washington Monthly, The American Prospect, the Huffington Post, the Guardian, Crooks & Liars, Salon.com’s War Room, Political Wire, and Seven Days.
© 2012 The Carpetbagger Report All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/95753/
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