Political nepotism: Spot the missing words
The NYTimes has a round-up of blog posts decrying Jenna Bush’s new job at the Today Show and assailing nepotism run amok in the world of political families.
Can you spot the missing words?
One starts with “K” and ends with “Y.”
And rhymes with “TENNEDY.”
Also missing: A word that starts with “B” and ends with “N.”
And rhymes with “JIDEN.”
See chapter 3 of Culture of Corruption for more.
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Longtime readers will remember that I have roasted GOP nepotism and cronyism repeatedly when unqualified candidates have benefited from family ties.
It’s a virus that knows no political boundaries.
God save us from Beltway bipartisanship.
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Commenter Freddy: “Name recognition can get you the job, but you still need to produce to keep it. Unless, of course, you report for the NYT!”
Power Line’s John Hinderaker: “If Ms. Hager had been hired to perform neurosurgery, this hand-wringing about ‘meritocracy’ might have some force. But doing a once-a-month feature on a soft-news TV show? Good Lord, get a grip!”
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Not all nepotism is equal in the Age of Obama.
No big stink over this on the nutroots side of the aisle. Rhymes with “DAXELROD:”
Axelrod’s Son Hired by Huffington Post
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, July 28, 2009; 7:04 PMDavid Axelrod’s son is following his father’s career path — that is, the one he had before becoming a political strategist.
Ethan Axelrod is joining the Huffington Post, the liberal Web site that has been largely supportive of President Obama. His dad, now a White House senior adviser, was a Chicago Tribune reporter until he quit in 1984 to help run a Senate campaign (and still has a soft spot for newspapers, though his old one is in bankruptcy).
“I’ve been interested in journalism for a while,” the 22-year-old Axelrod said Tuesday. “I heard through my father that they were expanding, so I applied for it.”
The younger Axelrod started yesterday as editor of the Huffington Post’s new local edition in Denver, the third of a dozen planned sites that have already launched in New York and Chicago and will next target Los Angeles. He applied for the job, was interviewed by Arianna Huffington along with other candidates, and was tapped after submitting a mockup of the Denver home page. The site goes live in September.
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Name recognition can get you the job, but you still need to produce to keep it. Unless, of course, you report for the NYt!
Is it really nepotism if they are elected? I mean, yes…obviously they come onto the picture with a million and one advantages, but to me it doesn’t seem quite the same.
I wish Jenna all the luck in the world. She did exactly as much or as little to deserve her place as anyone else. And Greenwald so nails it. How much fawning was there over Luke Russert after his father died?
The horror.
Our society is doomed. Why, America is in her last hours, and will burn to the ground just like Rome because of this horrific example of nepotism.
And yeah, we get to find out what Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Sullivan think about Jenna Bush Hager’s new job. Great read. I feel so much better now that I know. Wonderful article. Cool story bro. *big thumbs up*
It’s the Today Show.How can anybody being hired for the Today Show warrant any reacton,other than”So what?”.It would be different if she was on something of real importance like”Don’t Forget the Lyrics”or “Biggest Loser”,maybe” America’s got Talent”
Did she get the job because who her father is, Yes. Instead of a government job she as to prove herself to keep it.
Huffington Post-Nepotism? Arianna did marry rich as did Teresa Heinz and thus John Kerry.
The Kennedy’s always did manage to muscle money but with no big thug in chief to lead them I wonder how well this next generation will do. Caroline can’t say Good Morning without a script and the remaining boys can stay sober long enough to say Good Night. The Kennedy boys are terrified of ObamaCare really-they are afraid it won’t pay for their liver transplants.
Well you see, there’s education, and then there’s urban education. THEN there’s also literacy.
The Today Show. Sounds perfect.
The NYT cares about meritocracy? Socialists, progressives, collectivists and communists care about meritocracy?
Really?
REALLY?
Hey Chelsea,
Hows that job working out for you? You know what they say. All the good looking people get hired first. What happened in your case? Stanford education or Stanford Alumni?
The New York Times?
Is that thing still around?
Obviously the lad doesn’t understand politics.
Nepotism isn’t about the larva, it’s about access to DADDY. I guarantee you, if ‘Ethan Limbaugh’ or ‘Ethan Beck’ or ‘Ethan Malkin’ had applied to the job at the HuffingPost the only call would have been to security to escort them out of the building. Meanwhile ‘Ethan Stephanopolus’ would be sucking down estrogen infused herbal tea with Arianna.
Well said!
Yawn. Its the NY Times. Wake me when a real news source has something to say.
Just more of the same.
They want to replace Ted Kennedy up in Taxachusetts with AFK.
And I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts if Ethan Limbaugh were to go looking for a job with the Heritage Foundation or Fox News, he would be received rather warmly.
By the way, I am pretty sure I saw John Bolton the other day, walking toward Union Station on Mass Ave, coming from the direction of the Heritage Foundation. I was walking toward one of the best wine stores in the District, which is two blocks east of their headquarters.
Got to funnel our tax dollars right to the elite class so they can maintain power. Why beat around the bush? Go ahead and be aggressive about it. They are in power and they have no shame. Lets roll!
Let me get this straight…she is essentially doing Op-Eds for a glorified TV News/Periodical. And the New York Times let’s WHO write op-eds for them when ever they want? That list is full of nobodies with names. Who the Hell are they to talk?
What did you think of the hair/mustache color mismatch? I saw him in person once and was surprised that it didn’t look as bad in person. Maybe the strong studio lights exaggerate it.
It makes sense to see Bolton near Heritage. He is doing a lecture there very soon. And he seems to show up on their blogs from time to time. But, I don’t think he has a position at Heritage at this time but I haven’t checked recetntly.
And the wine store two blocks from Heritage is pretty good… And Cafe Berlin nearby is very good. It was a favorite lunch spot a few years back.
The only place you can work where failure is a option is federal and state govt. BO and his cronies are proving that…
Private corporations will give some leeway for a name, but will eventually break the contract if their prodigy isn’t producing.
from a Rasmussen article available at:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/publ…ntire_congress
I’m afraid Jenna Bush was only hired by NBC in order to try and use her to their liberal, political ends. They’ll be waiting for that “gotcha” moment they can use against George W. Bush. I can’t believe she was suckered into a job with this tabloid journalism station.
It’s a shame that these politicians have been entrenched so long they feel they have the right to leave their seat in Congress to an heir apparent. This push to seat Ted Kennedy’s widow is the latest attempt. It would have worked with Caroline too if she hadn’t of been so obviously inept.
I like the idea of voting every one of them out – good and bad and re-electing new members. The rules of seniority and handing out plush committee chairmanships should be abolished too. You become a committee chairman by drawing lots. And then, top it all off with term limits.
Serving in Congress should be more like “community” service rather than a lifetime appointment.
The other thing missing from this story: the fact that the Today show approached Jenna Bush Hager, not the other way around.
She didn’t wake up one day and say, “Hey, I think I want to be on the Today Show. I wonder how I can make that happen…”
They reached out to her. She hadn’t even been thinking about it. Surely it’ll be up to her to do a good job, but she didn’t go begging for the job in the first place.
This may in fact be reverse nepotism, but I don’t think it reflects badly on Ms. Hager.
Chillaxe man! It’s not like she was pencilled in for a vacant senate seat!
Michelle, the post in NYT is simply another long winded tale about how much the author hates Bush. It is not rational and it has nothing to do with fair play. I am not sure that this Bush hatred is worthy of any more discussion. It’s like trying to have a conversation with one of the resident trolls here. It just feeds their ego, and these egos are already enormous. Instead I would rather see your posts on how a lunatic fringe paper receives taxpayer funds so that it can continue to spew forth hateful bile at American citizens. That is a desperately needed chapter about this culture of corruption.
Jenna Bush Hager is a beautiful, articulate and well-educated woman, who has demonstrated through her actions her commitment to the very things on which she is hired to comment. She is poised and apolitical, much as is her mother. I expected the irrational braying from the far-left fringe. I was surprised to see how many others have joined in.
If I were to lay a bet, it would be that Jenna Bush Hager voted for Obama.
As we know from Palin Derangement Syndrome and Malkin Derangement Syndrome, many are threatened by a beautiful, articulate woman asked to comment about ANYTHING.
I think she’ll be great.
at least she is going to be a tax paying non gubmint employee, unlike most of the politicians in missouri. two carnahans, one emerson, one clay, one blunt, and i only know about the eastern mo politicians. talk about the family business. i thought once pigs got fattened up at the public trough they were slaughtered, but these pigs just pass on their spot at the trough to their feeble minded offspring.
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It’s early to comment on the sons and daughters of our presidents. Time will tell who is smart and hard working–and who is just “riding coattails”.
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I think of Teddy Roosevelt’s son–brave man who died in WW1. And President Bush 43–not perfect–but pretty good in most respects.
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John Bibb
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John, if you’re referring to Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., Teddy’s eldest son with his second wife Edith, he did indeed serve in WW1. But he survived that conflict to serve in WW2, where he was the only general to land with the first wave of troops per his own written request that he be allowed to go in with that first wave; prior verbal requests had been denied. The Medal of Honor citation reads:
About a month after that landing he died as the result of a heart attack; he reportedly had a number of health problems, including arthritis (possibly related to injuries sustained in the first war) and the heart problem that eventually claimed his life.
As a side note, I’ve read that Teddy Sr. and Teddy Jr. are one of two father and son sets to have been awarded the Medal of honor; the other is Arthur and Douglass MacArthur.
As for Jenna, this gig with the Today Show scarcely rises to the level of nepotism that we in the Bog State have endured (many of us un-willingly) – we may get stuck with Joe “Hugo is my good buddy” Kennedy if Debacle Patrick gets his way; yes, there will be a vote in January of 2010, but in the interim Patrick wants the legislature to change the law (again!) to let him appoint someone to hold Teddy’s seat – and no matter what they promise, there is nothing in the state’s constitution that would prohibit that seat-warmer from running. The term Spamalot seems more appropriate than the other title the press loves to use.
Addendum:, John, I forgot about Quentin Roosevelt, who did die in aerial combat in WW1 – all of Teddy’s sons served in the first war, and Teddy Jr., Kermit, and “Archie” also served in WW2 as well.
Michelle, I am hearing a rumor through a source I usually trust.
They state that Ted Kennedy neither wrote nor personally signed the letter that was sent to gov Patrick.
That Ted was brain dead and that even Obamas choice to vacation in Mass was politically motivated. That once the president was there the family had already agreed to pull the plug and the rest is history.
I have no idea how much is fact, but there it is.
jbh45 said:
The only place you can work where failure is a option is federal and state govt.
Yep.
Elizabeth Cheney Perry:
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs
Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State For Near Eastern Affairs and Coordinator for Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiatives
Iran Syria Policy and Operations Group (State Dept. Bureau of Near East Affairs)