Rachel Maddow confronted notorious corporate lobbyist Rick Berman over his advocacy for corporate interests that are at best extremely questionable, and at worst downright detrimental to the public's health.
Rick Berman is responsible for such "educational" websites as FishScam.com, a site dedicated to informing readers that high mercury levels in fish are not bad for you, as well as SunLightScam.com, which claims that tanning beds pose no health hazards. Berman runs his operation through non-profits so he can hide the identities of those paying him to, say, advocate that trans fats can actually unclog your arteries.
One of Berman's specialties is creating fake grass-roots websites and movements, most recently against ACORN, that claim to be representing the average outraged American but in fact are far more likely to be funded by corporations looking to obscure the truth.
Berman, to his credit, calmly made his case (after a lengthy and fairly damning introduction from Maddow) that he simply represents one side and is trying to balance the debate. He also defended his use of non-profits to conceal the identities of his donors as something that happens on both the right and the left, framing it as a free speech issue.
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