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In the Souls of the People
Rachel Maddow has won the prestigious John Steinbeck Award, given to writers or artists "whose work captures the spirit of Steinbeck's empathy, commitment to democratic values, and belief in the dignity of people who by circumstance are pushed to the fringes." Saying his father "would have adored" Maddow, Steinbeck's son Thomas cited his sense of trust in her, the feeling she projects that, "I’m part of an alliance."
The phrase "In the Souls of the People" comes from Chapter 25 of The Grapes of Wrath. From the 1930s, Steinbeck consistently wrote with unflinching honesty about the people who were pitied and rejected by others. Americans were his people, regardless of their position in society,
From our beginning, in hindsight at least, our social direction is clear. We have moved to become one people out of many. At intervals, men or groups, through fear of people or the desire to use them, have tried to change our direction, to arrest our growth, or to stampede the Americans. This will happen again and again. We have failed sometimes, taken wrong paths, paused for renewal, filled our bellies and licked our wounds; but we have never slipped back - never.
84 Comments so far
Show AllRachel Maddow is little more than a Democratic Party shill.
It's Orwellian. Really, she belongs in a list with Studs Terkel and John Sayles? Give me a break. She thrives on network that finds Cenk Uygur too radical (and I wouldn't even put Cenk up for the award). Apparently The Steibeck Center has now also been co-opted and its ostensible message wholly inverted - like the Nobel Peace Prize, like the claims that MLK would have supported recent wars.
I watch or listen to her little if at all. I NEVER hear her say anything remotely critical of the capitalist system, its political integument or wholeheartedly in support of the working class.
Not to mention her "don't ask, don't tell" policy on the crimes of the Zionist regime in Israel. What occupation? What Israel lobby?
Sad moment for this prestigious award and for journalism in general.
Yup. Can't believe she actually has fans on this site.
Believe it. I'm one of them.
you mean you're not watching MSNBC right now?
No offense, Lingum, but I hope you're being facetious or sarcastic.
If Maddow has enthusiastic fans on the editorial staff, doesn't it stand to reason that the site would attract and appeal to like-minded visitors?
Hey there O.S.........I have often posted that it seems Ms. Zimet is quite a big fan of R.M. Same perspective and 'humor'.
OS,
I was being facetious and sarcastic--and at the same time!!!
...and a very compliant one at that.
I do believe Obama will appoint her to be his next press secretary. Who better to shield our liberal president from questions about all the shock and awe he's about to impose in the next 4 years?
Diana, i hadn't thought of that one......Excellent prediction.
We need more "shills" like Rachel Madow. She tells it like it is. Go to it Rachel.
She does? Somehow I must have missed her show on the assault on Gaza by the IDF?
Who the hell is Rachel Maddow?
A big congratulation to you, Rachel.
Love you Rachel!
Maddow makes a lot of money progressive-washing her beloved D party. I would like to see more fundamental critique of our political system and not just superficial political fluff based on assumptions that only one-dimensional D/R politics represent our interests. But that does not sell or get ratings does it?
Don't listen to me I'm just cynical, pessimistic and overly critical. For some folks things are going quite well.
Couldn't have said it better myself.
Of course, but the massive faux snews core is fighting the good and balanced fight for justice in media, for free, I suppose!?
Congrats Rachel
Agree with Phantom Blot and dkshaw. Maddow has been to the Obama WH more than any other journalist: seven times; three of those included face time with the prez. Oh, she gives him a little spank now and again to make it look good, but the woman is definitely working for the system.
I've never seen the quote on that before, but -- yup.
Unforgiven666: reference to rachel's visits to the WH: http://rabblerouserruminations.wordpress.com/2012/01/17/if-there-was-ever-any-doubt-about-msnbo-and-another-obama-shill/
Good for her! Congratulations Rachel!
Rah, Rah. Where can we send the pom poms?
Maddow does a good job of taking apart Republican lies and contradictions, but she's deaf, dumb and blind to the same lies and contradictions when they're Obama's.
Obama's a warmonger for personal political gain. Maddow's OK with that.
Obama says drones don't kill innocents. Maddow is silent.
Obama wants to sell a payroll tax "holiday" as the first step in the destruction of Social Security. Maddow's a cheerleader.
Obama sacrifices clean drinking water for the profits of fracking natural gas companies, and sacrifices public health for the profits of Monsanto and purveyors of GMO food. Maddow doesn't see a problem.
Obama says offshore drilling is safe three weeks before the biggest environmental disaster in U.S. history. Maddow doesn't see a connection.
Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act, allowing the military to arrest U.S. citizens on U.S. soil and imprison them indefinitely without charges or access to a lawyer. Maddow doesn't mention it.
Does her work capture "the spirit of Steinbeck's empathy, commitment to democratic values, and belief in the dignity of people who by circumstance are pushed to the fringes?" Hell, Maddow is a cheerleader for Obama's plan for "guest worker" wage-slaves and LOWER pay for all U.S. wage-earners, to make the U.S. "more competitive" with other countries!
No matter how bad it is, no matter if she hated it when Bush did it, whatever Obama does is just fine with Maddow.
Hear Hear Naturally!
I wonder if the usual suspects offering their Maddow apologia has a frigging job; since it seems to be their life work defending various Dem shills like Maddow, et al.
Actually, shills are employed to be shills so have jobs.
Everyone who doesn't vote for a 3rd party candidate isn't a shill btw. Blanket statements make you look very closed minded.The problem is we can do _MATH_. When casting a vote, we know that the guy not pulling 3% isn't going to win and that we need to vote between the two who actually are going to win and do the lesser evil. That is called _REALITY_.
If we had a candidate that could actually pull in the voting polls as a viable winner, and still support our values, believe me, we'd vote for him. Instead we have to listen to people who can't do _MATH_, attack us for not voting for a pie in the sky that won't count period when the results come in.
The truth is, that regardless of who we vote for, the electorate will decide the real winner and it will be the same _MATH_ that dictates who the electorates will choose as who the general population chooses.
But anyway, back to your hostile attempt to make anyone voting for Obama a shill. I think he belongs in jail, but will vote for him because I can do MATH. Maddow can probably do _MATH_ too.
What exactly do you think you know about hostility? Have you fought in one of Bush or Obama's illegal wars or killed non combatants?
I guess you have a lot invested in the status quo. You morons live in a vacuum along with an anti-septic view of human life. As long as you got your corporate pay check, SUV and pretty little house in the burbs; no need to give two shits about the poor and suffering world wide who have to live every day with a marginal existence thanks to Obama and his corporate paymasters. Selfish little whiner.
This is what you and poor Maddow are never going to get: and the reason is neither of you have the guts for it since it might bring a rebuke from your DNC handlers.
"I swore never to be silent whenever and wherever human beings endure suffering and humiliation. We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."
- Elie Wiesel
Some credit: Maddow does some good work. Unfortunately, she is an unabashed shill for GE's military wing, sometimes actually glorifying military killing hardware as "neat geek stuff." It's creepy, and notably, NOT embodying the notion:
"whose work captures the spirit of Steinbeck's empathy, commitment to democratic values, and belief in the dignity of people who by circumstance are pushed to the fringes."
And she loves military officers, often bringing back a gay fighter pilot during the don't ask don't tell debates. Air force pilots commit the greatest amount of mass murder in modern wars. A terrorists is a man with a bomb but no airplane.
Her point was of course to gain gay acceptance. All of the military are guilty of murder as a collective if you want to go there. And who knew all Airforce pilots were murderers. That means people flying jumbo jets are murderers. At least murderers should have an equal chance to be gay if they want.
Do you speak for Maddow? How the hell do you know what her point was concerning gay soldiers? Do you have anything even remotely interesting to add to this discussion or is it your sole purpose here the dispensation of the sacrament of incremental change to the other 'true believers'?
When you say something intelligent, I'll clap.
I suspect that Mr. Steinbeck might have admired Edward R. Murrow, Eric Sevareid or Walter Cronkite. It's not likely that Ms. Maddow would share the same esteem as these gentlemen.
The gentlemen you mention did manage to keep their traps shut about a fair bit of shit for quite some time. Perhaps it would help if she were a man instead of a lesbian?
Know what would help? If Maddow wasn't a D party apologist and mouthpiece ... that would help.
Yes.
Although a life-long fan of Steinbeck, I sadly recall that he supported the Vietnam War at the end of his life. Tony Vodvarka
Ms. Maddow, you're no John Steinbeck.
Maddow is a bourgeois liberal. Steinbeck, and so many of his contemporaries, from Upton Sinclair to Diego Rivera, to Arthur Miller, were socialists. Liberalism and socialism have nothing to do with each other. One might as well given the Steinbeck prize to John Stossel or Tom Friedman.
Tossing Friedman's name in there is bad enough, but Stossel? For fuck's sake...
Do you even know what a socialist is?
Yup. I was a dues paying member of the SP-USA for a number of years.
Although, I am dissapointed about this tidbit on Steinbeck in his last years, from Wikipedia:
"In 1967, at the behest of Newsday magazine, Steinbeck went to Vietnam to report on the war there. Thinking of the Vietnam War as a heroic venture, he was considered a hawk for his position on that war. His sons both served in Vietnam prior to his death, and Steinbeck visited one son in the battlefield (at one point being allowed to man a machine-gun watch position at night at a firebase, while his son and other members of his platoon slept)."
Live and learn!
I wonder why this wasn't publicized more; based on the sketchy description, Steinbeck comes off as the anti-Jane Fonda.
Speaking of which: a friendly but not very bright former co-worker occasionally forwards "junk" e-mail. Dumb reactionary wingnut stuff is mixed in with well-meaning "alerts" (invariably hoaxes), jokes, chain-mail glurge, etc.
The other day I got a real wingnut beauty-- a screed denouncing Jane Fonda for her infamous visit to Hanoi! I didn't read it too closely, but apparently the e-mail was composed to protest an award recently (?) given to Fonda. It included long, angry denunciations from alleged Vietnam-era POWs.
I only glanced at it before deleting, but it was actually funnier than most of the humorous items she usually sends. I thought, WTF? Jane Fonda? What year is this?
I wonder if those sons were in there because of the draft. I'll bet they were.
And I also know what a liberal is, in the classical sense.
Only is the USA (and some extent in Canada) is liberalism associated with being politically left. For example, the rightist party in Australia is "Liberal Party", and the "Liberal Democratic Party are the Torys current coalition-mates in the UK.
And also, why in the 1990's was there this abrupt change, practically without notice, of the left associated with the color blue, and the right with the color red? All sorts of interesting theories are possible for that. Lets just say that the USA remains the laboratory for Bernays and Lippmans propaganda models, and the results are impressive indeed.
Of course, everywhere else in the world blue is associated with conservatism and economic-liberalism, red with the left and socialism.
I like Rachel. I remember her telling Americans about the many secret wars Obama Administration has going on. I don't remember hearing it from other news programs.She exposes many things that Obama does wrong. She is young and sometimes it seems that she cannot contain her happiness for getting that show. She is still bursting with joy. However she is brilliant and does a great job. Republicans hate her and think of her as the gotcha girl. She proves they lie and double speak. I do not like when she has a cocktail segment on the program and demonstrates how to mix drinks. There are too many alcoholics in our nation.
genie: That bit about Rachel criticizing Obama from time to time is true and is frequently thrown at me by Maddow-loving Obots, who know very well that, bottom line, she's one of them. The PTB and corporate media allow Rachel a certain degree of latitude to do her spanking, otherwise the shilling would be all too obvious.
"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate. " -- Noam Chomsky
First I've heard about Rachel promoting alcohol consumption on her show. If so, then she's a sell-out to Big Booze as well as Big Brother.