Randi Rhodes:I'm from Russia

[bigdarryl]

Three years ago she was saying she was black WTF!!! Randi are you a nut job? I'm listening to her break down the Chechen and Russian war in 2001 she is very knowledgeable until she starts claiming her nationality.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. She's not black and she's not Russian.

She was born in Brooklyn, and Rhodes isn't her real name. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randi_Rhodes

She is also one of the most annoying talk show hosts in the entire universe, second only to Chris Matthews.

[bigdarryl]

2. Why does she do that?

Now I see why her peers call her nutty.She claims her and big Ed don't get alone and he called her a B

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

16. Her peers call her nutty? I've never heard that. Ever.

[SalviaBlue]

26. Her peers? All of them?

Why would you make such a statement? Peers: Stephanie Miller, Thom Hartmann, Mike Malloy, Bill Press? Oh, big Ed.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

29. And they all like her. She and Steph are good friends. She and Ed made up years ago.

She and Press, Hartmann are also cool. Malloy as well.

The only person I heard her having a problem with is Larry O'Donnell because she though he belittled her. I disagree. He DIDN'T belittle her, but sometimes Randi can be very sensitive and think people hate her when they don't. That's the only thing that bothers me about her. She takes shit personally sometimes. Larry has no animosity towards her.

[Cleita]

3. Part of her immigrant family came from the Ukraine.

She has talked about it long before this happened.

[Dreamer Tatum]

4. In that case, I'm from the ocean. nt

[Cleita]

6. I have no doubt you are. n/t

[BainsBane]

7. Ukranians don't refer to themselves as Russian

[Cleita]

14. I don't know. Randi can say what she likes. All I know is that she has spoken about it before

all this has happened. She looks it. She has those great blue/green eyes. I spent 10 days with her on a cruise ship a few years back so I got to be near her close up and talk to her on occasion. She's a very nice person.

[BainsBane]

17. I have nothing against her

I'm just saying Ukrainians don't like Russians. They've been occupied by them way too much.

[frylock]

38. The Ukraine is weak.....

[RZM]

28. That all depends

In Western Ukraine there's much more nationalist sentiment. But in Eastern Ukraine Russian tends to be the language of choice. You can see it in election results as well. The West tends to vote for the nationalist candidates while the East votes for the more pro-Russian candidates.

In the middle it's often kind of in between. People have mixed identities and many see themselves as kinda sorta Russian, which is similar to how many Russians have always seen them.

There are plenty of exceptions, but that part of Europe has always contained mixed/shifting identities.

[BainsBane]

30. Okay

I'll take your word for that. You obviously know more about the country than I do. I'm just going on people I've met here in the US.

[RebelOne]

8. It is strange that a few years ago that most DUers

were lauding her radio show as great and everyone saying how wonderful she was.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

12. Randi is awesome! She is one of the smartest hosts in radio. We need her voice and we

need her knowledge. She knows what she's talking about.

[bigdarryl]

23. That she is VERY smart and knows history

That's why I listen to her

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

27. You should continue to listen to her. Not all of the time, but MOST of the time, she gets it right.

I'm not saying that she's not egotistical at times. She is, but so is Schultz, Hartmann, even Rachel at times.

[SalviaBlue]

31. There are very vocal people who HATE her.

I found out a long time ago not to post about her. The haters come out in force and call her names and say shes a drunk, etc.

I really appreciate her knowledge. She is outspoken, confident, smart, funny and loud and some people can't handle it. I love it.

[Cleita]

36. If she were a drunk, I would have seen it on the cruise we were both on because there

was plenty of wine flowing and lounges to go to for music or gambling. Yes, she had a glass of wine at dinner. Her table was next to mine. And we went to the lounges for entertainment and dancing, but I never saw her drink a lot and I never saw her drunk even though she was on vacation and should have had the golden opportunity to do so where she wouldn't be judged.

Some people just don't like her because she's outspoken and can puncture through a BS statement like javelin.

[SalviaBlue]

37. I think you hit the nail on the head...

she is an outspoken woman. And, as all outspoken women know, some people don't like that.

[frylock]

40. she's arrogant and rude..

I was an avid listener, and there were many things she said that made me cringe and turn off the show.

[RandiFan1290]

5. Her family

She was talking about her family tree. She has been doing the ancestry.com thing because they are a sponsor of her show. The "black woman" thing was a joke she was copying off of a Phil Hendrie bit. It's not that big of a deal.

[Floyd_Gondolli]

9. "Randi are you a nut job?"

Survey says....Yes!

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

10. She and her family are Russian Jews. When she claimed that she is "black," she obviously meant

it as tongue and cheek. She was invited to the CBC by Maxine Waters who dubbed Randi "black". Of course, again, tongue and cheek. Randi is obviously not black. And she has admitted that her real last name is not "Rhodes". She selected that last name because she's a fan of the guitarist Randy Rhodes.

As for she and Ed Schultz, they made up at the 2008 DNC and are cool now.

Doesn't anyone have a sense of humor anymore?

[bigdarryl]

18. She was claiming she was black as fact

And was not joking.She never once said she was joking

[SalviaBlue]

32. FAIL

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

33. Darryl, she never claimed that she was black. She would joke that she's black and a

journalist. She's obviously neither, hence the joke. I've been listening to Randi know for nearly 15 years. She has never claimed as such and meant it. In fact, she has always made jokes about her being pasty white. She uses that term to describe herself, too, as "pasty white".

[mucifer]

11. She is Jewish. Most Jewish Americans are of Russia or Poland dissent.

I am also Jewish and I have grandparents who came here from Russia and Poland.

We are identified culturally with being Jewish than being Russian or Polish because we were never really accepted there.


BTW I agree with Bigdarryl, she is VERY annoying. I used to listen to her on the radio and I could swear she didn't want Al Franken to be senator. She was saying stuff about him while he was running that was very odd.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

15. My only gripe with Randi is that sometimes her ego gets in the way. I don't think she means any

harm. I think she's leery of Democrats who she feels have sold out.

We still need her voice because she's very knowledgeable.

[bigdarryl]

13. One more thing she claims her niece is her daughter

And she's not its her deceased sisters kid.She took custody of her when her sister died of breast cancer.She needs to stop lying on the air about her personal life

[Cleita]

19. She and her then husband adopted her niece and raised her. So she is her daughter by adoption.

I don't understand why this hair splitting is necessary.

[JI7]

20. that's not really lying, if she raised her after a certain point the relationship becomes

more of mother daughter than aunt/niece.

[RandiFan1290]

22. Wow

What a nasty thing to say. She adopted that child as her own and cared for her. She has never hid that from anyone. Her sister would be proud. Why don't you call her if you think you have such an inside scoop?

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

24. Randi has stated such MANY times over the years. She has not lied about that. She adopted

her sister's child when her sister died. That may not make her a mother in the biological sense, but she IS her legal guardian, a mother through adoption. She adopted Jessica. Not lying.

Do you listen to her more than just on occasion? Because if you did, you'd know that Randi has relayed this story of her sister's untimely death due to cancer and the adoption of her sister's child many, many times.

[SalviaBlue]

34. OK... that's it

You are a nut job.

[SalviaBlue]

21. I love Randi...

Haters gotta hate.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

25. Obviously. I don't know where the hate comes from. Randi used to cut people off and yell

at wingnuts that call into her show. She no longer does that and handles them very calmly these days. It's only when they start yelling at her and calling her names that she goes off. She used to do that much more often than she does today.

[SalviaBlue]

35. I noticed that too.

I told my sister a couple of years ago that I thought Randi got some kind of training to better handle the nut job callers. She does a really good job these days. She knows her shit.

[mucifer]

39. I stopped listening to her because she was yelling at people who AGREED with her

she was just too impatient to actually listen to her callers. It happened frequently.

But, that was years ago. She might be better now.

[Liberal_Stalwart71]

43. Try listening to her again. Randi is much better today than she used to be. She's calm and collected

and she's very reasonable. She is also really good at converting former wingnuts. I love it when they call into her show and explain that they are now Democrats or are no longer Republicans after years of listening to her. I particularly like the ones who apologize after having argued with her years before only to do their research and discover that she was right all along. She never gloats to those people. She's always gracious.

[dionysus]

41. she camed down a lot after meeting the Howard... i think.

[dembotoz]

42. we have WAY too few voices on the radio to bitch and whine like this

I live in Milwaukee--our only somewhat progressive station-black urban talk- recently switched formats to some sort of Sinatra rat pack crap. we only get 24/7 republican hate radio

I would LOVE to be able to turn my nose up at miss Rhodes.

When I get into a market then I can get progressive talk--I love her show.

Any kind of water tastes good to a man dying of thirst.

[mucifer]

44. You can't get WCPT in Chicago or 92.1 in Madison?