Why I love Rachel Maddow, part 2.

On last night’s Rachel Maddow Show, the eponymous Maddow was interviewing Republican Congressman John Culberson of Texas about the bailout, or credit contraction, or whatever they’re calling it today. He was actually quite coherent and persuasive for a Republican. At the end of his interview, when Rachel thanked him for coming on her show, he said “Yes sir.” Quickly recovering, he added “Yes, ma’am. Thank you.”

With great good humor Rachel came back with “That’s all right. Hey, happens all the time!”









According to the stunted semiotics of American culture, short hair = male. I remember being called “sir” myself when my hair was as short as Rachel’s (funnily enough, with that short cut, courtesy of a little divey barber shop on St. Mark’s Place in the Village, I also turned more female heads than I ever had before). I would glance down at my not insignificant chest and then shoot the offender a raised eyebrow, triggering blushes and stammered apologies, which I would shrug off much as La Maddow did.

Maybe I just haven’t been watching enough television news, but I have never before seen a pundit on a mainstream news program inhabit her glorious androgyny with such insouciance and charm. (Rachel's butchness is toned down for television, and those sweeping eyelashes are enough to set anyone’s heart aflutter, so maybe John Culberson was so bowled over by her brilliance that he was momentarily blinded to her gender. Perhaps somewhere in his reptile brain that brilliance registered as, by definition, male.) Ellen DeGeneres doesn’t count (well, okay, she does count, especially with those adorable wedding pictures, Portia at her side, winning hearts and minds in blithe repudiation of the anti-gay marriage ballot initiative trolls).

It’s awesome to watch Rachel’s disarming friendliness, acerbic wit and sardonic facial expressions winning fans and establishing her as a heartthrob for women and men, hets and queers alike. She’s striking a blow for hot, brainy, funny dykes everywhere – though few on the national stage are as hot, brainy and funny as our Rachel. She’s a groundbreaker, and she’s making it look fun.