Rachel Maddow has established a reputation for strident liberalism and mockery of conservativism that has catapulted her to a prime-time spot on MSNBC’s lineup right after “Countdown” and sometimes, in my view, violated journalistic integrity.

But with her opining in favor of the “Employee Free Choice Act” (EFCA) on March 9th, she really flew off the handle. The whole performance may have been sufferable were it not for the arrogant and destructive tone in which it was delivered.

For those who don’t know, EFCA, otherwise referred to as “card-check,” would alter how unions are formed. Unions can currently be formed under two circumstances: a) a majority of employees sign cards indicating that they want to form a union, a very public process, and b) a majority of employees vote via secret ballot to form a union. Under current law, employers can choose which measure their workers must use; should EFCA pass, workers will choose, instead.

The bill was introduced on Tuesday in the Senate by Tom Harkin (D-IA) and in the House by George Miller (D-CA). They held a press conference announcing the bills introduction, but more to stir up interest at a time when it doesn’t stand to get much coverage.

President Obama, though on the record being in favor of the bill, has declined to push hard on an issue that is incredibly contentious and unlikely to garner any Republican votes in the Senate; because it’s absent from his core agenda, nobody is really paying much attention to it yet.

By making a big deal about the bill (it was her lead story, it she went on about it for some five or ten minutes) at the time of its announcement, she’s showering coverage on an issue that already will get its share of media attention when it is considered on the floor of Congress (at the time when bills normally get coverage). By giving this gift of syrupy, entirely-biased coverage to one issue at a time when issues seldom get covered, she’s effectively serving as a the bill’s supporters’ own spokeswoman. Is that what news anchors are supposed to do?

EFCA is good, Maddow told us, because “there is a whole industry that has sprung up to help companies make their union or no union election process really intimidating for the workers.” I agree with her that the threat of employee intimidation is central to the debate over the measure. But not the way Maddow portrays it.

Say you’re an employee for a firm with no union. If EFCA passes, to paraphrase Washington Post op-ed columnist Michael Gerson, large men will come to your house late at night and ask you sign a piece of paper to form a union. You will sign.

EFCA really doesn’t help the American worker. It helps union leaders who have certain elements of the Democratic Party bought and paid for. What exactly is wrong with a secret ballot? That’s how we choose all of our leaders; it should be good enough for choosing to unionize, too.

It’s a core democratic precept: to make your voice heard without fear of reprisal. It’s in countries where voting is not anonymous that the greatest violations of democratic values take place. The same threat exists if it becomes harder for workers to unionize via secret ballot. So when, as Maddow tells us, John McCain says that EFCA “is a threat to one of the fundamentals of democracy,” he’s onto something.

Other than union bosses, EFCA is only good for those who think the formation of unions is inherently a good thing, no matter the historical context or the economic climate. But a workforce that is near-fully unionized often ends up hampering companies, and as a result, the nation’s economy.

GM is in trouble for a variety of reasons, but the exorbitant demands placed on them by the United Auto Workers for decades certainly were a contributing factor. Western Europe’s public services are constantly under threat of strike, and businesses there are weighed down by excessive employee compensation and rigid hiring and firing regulations that simply make them uncompetitive in the wider market.

Certainly, one of the reasons the US was able to maintain strong growth for most of the 2000’s while most of Western Europe was stagnant by comparison was because unions do not dominate business here like they do over there. When Mitch McConnell warns about the US turning into Europe, he has a point, too.

Finally, what made Maddow’s presentation despicable as opposed to simply disagreeable was the contemptuous, disrespectful, and smarmy tone with which it was delivered. She sarcastically belittled the notion that auto workers for US companies should be paid as much as the employees of their foreign competitors (even though this will happen if the companies are to receive federal loans to stay afloat), stating:

Think about that being your argument in America in a recession—your argument is to reduce American wages unilaterally from Washington. It‘s kind of easy to remember if you keep that in mind.

The condescension dripping from her voice was palpable. And she failed to actually engage the issue in serious, intelligent terms. Maybe we should cut wages if it helps avoid massive, cataclysmic job losses resulting from the collapse of huge firms.

She also engaged in trite, tired, and rankly partisan insults against Republicans as a whole:

The Republican Party does not have a leader right now, but they do apparently have an organizing principle. And this is it. If you find it easier to join a union, the world will end and we would prefer that Americans got paid less.

These kinds of glib, blatantly-oversimplifying-the-issue attacks only serve to incite the ire of the opposition and disrupt any attempt at mutual respect based on honest, open discussion of issues. At best, they belong in a DNC fundraising e-mail; they have no place in any newsroom.

Which is why Maddow is like the Democrats’ Limbaugh; she embodies the worst stereotypes of our beliefs, and espouses in spades the qualities that Republicans would love to convince swing voters that all liberals possess: effete arrogance that assumes those who disagree with her are culturally backward and have a lower IQ. It’s her approach that could eventually wreak havoc in Democratic ranks the way Limbaugh recently has done for Republicans.