Rachel Maddow Previews the SCOTUS Marriage Decisions: VIDEO

After Rachel Maddow's segment on the GOP and gay rights, she spoke with SCOTUSblog publisher Tom Goldstein about when the Supreme Court marriage decisions will come down, what the likely outcomes might be, and how some of the individual justices might vote.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

Rachel Maddow: The GOP is on a Collision Course with Gay Rights: VIDEO

Rachel Maddow reports on the Republican Party and gay rights, noting that the GOP is about to have to make some tough decisions regarding their positions, highlighting the "brutal" questioning of Marco Rubio this week on his homophobic positions on ENDA and immigration. Maddow notes that even Rob Portman, with a gay son, opposes ENDA.

There are currently only three Republicans (below) who do.

Says Maddow:

"You apparently cannot support something like non-discrimination for gay people and have any future in Republican Party politics. Nobody who has any real prospects of being a national leader in Republican politics in the next few years has anything other than 100% anti-gay policy position on something like non-discrimination... And that is awkward given that the country, as a whole, is in a really, really different place than that."

Rachel notes that the Supreme Court decision will make that difference suddenly come crashing down.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

Rachel Maddow is Astonished by Virginia's Sodomy-Obsessed GOP Gubernatorial Ticket: VIDEO

Rachel Maddow takes a look at the sodomy-obsessed, anti-gay, socially conservative Republican gubernatorial ticket of Ken Cuccinelli and EW Jackson in Virginia. Also on the Virginia GOP's obsession list: voodoo and Satanism.

"This really is what the Republican Party is like right now...Virginia will be the first statewide election we've had since the presidential election and THIS is who the Republican party has put together as their best face in that state. And it's not just Virginia..."

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

Rachel Maddow Reviews Michele Bachmann's Greatest Hits: VIDEO

Or misses, as the case may be.

But Maddow also notes that while it's easy to laugh at Bachmann and dismiss her, it's important to remember the influence she had within her own party, and Matt Taibbi's Rolling Stone quote:

"You will want to laugh, but don't, because the secret of Bachmann's success is that every time you laugh at her she gets stronger."

Adds Maddow: "Michele Bachmann over the course of her career has been like an exploratory probe to find the edge of the possible in Republican Party politics."

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

Rachel Maddow Dissects What's Wrong with the GOP: VIDEO

Rachel Maddow looks back at Bob Dole (aka the beginning of time) and the vast move to the right of the Republican Party since his campaign for President in 1996. Dole/Kemp's campaign website is still live today. Maddow looks back at it as a time capsule.

Mediate writes:

She brought up how Dole touted his support for the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Violence Against Women Act, the Voting Rights Act, food stamps and the Americans with Disabilities Act, among other things. She said that it would be “impossible” to imagine this being part of any Republican campaign platform in the year 2013, pointing out how Republicans in Congress gutted the Clean Water Act, voted against reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, and are now targeting food stamp programs.

So what does the Republican Party need today? McCain/Palin campaign manager Steve Schmidt joins Maddow to talk about the mechanisms that are pulling the GOP into unelectable territory.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...

Rachel Maddow Digs in to the IRS Tangle with Partisan Politics: VIDEO

Rachel Maddow looked into reports, and Obama's expression of outrage over, the IRS allegedly targeting conservative groups, explaining the rise of 501(c)4 groups, why it is a farce that groups like these are not set up to be political actors, and how the IRS ended up singling out Tea Party groups.

Said Maddow:

“There is a reasonable fear by all of us, by any of us, that the kind of power the IRS has could be misused, that the IRS, as an agency of the federal government, could be used by the federal government to retaliate against political enemies or to try and shape political outcomes in some way. It’s been done before, we’re all reasonably worried it will happen again.”

Maddow later interviewed Congressman Adam Schiff (D-CA), who around the time of the 2004 election looked into actions by the IRS against a progressive church in his district. The church had been issued an aggressive audit shortly after a pastor there had delivered an anti-war sermon.

Watch, AFTER THE JUMP...