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Cronyism: That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means.
Michelle Malkin is perhaps the world's greatest practitioner of "I know you are, but what am I" conservatism. The Bush administration faced a great deal of corruption allegations -- from Jack Abramoff to the U.S. attorney scandal to Halliburton. So, Malkin writes a book titled Culture of Corruption about the Obama administration not even seven months in. Bush was accused of stacking his administration with unqualified cronies like former FEMA Chief Michael Brown, so Malkin has taken to use the word "crony" to describe people affiliated with Obama at every turn.
What's embarrassing though, is that she doesn't seem to know what the word "crony" means in a political context. For example, she's taken to calling Michelle Obama "the first crony" and David Axelrod Obama's "crony Chicago advisor."
The reason Michael Brown was called a crony is because his job seemed to have been given to him because of his political connections to the president, not because of his background in disaster response. That's what cronyism is: It's the awarding of plum jobs to unqualified people for political reasons -- and it was rampant in the Bush administration, from the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq to the Justice Department.
David Axelrod has had a long career advising everyone from Harold Washington to Deval Patrick, so being a political adviser in the White House is ... a job he's eminently qualified for. As for Michelle Obama, is Malkin implying that she isn't "qualified" to be first lady and is only getting the job because of a pre-existing personal relationship? That's kind of bizarre, because as far as I can tell the only qualification for being first lady is to have a pre-existing relationship with the president called "marriage."
At any rate, the overuse of the word "crony" is obviously just a rhetorical technique meant to associate the Obama administration with some undefined corruption. But it's telling that Malkin doesn't even seem to know what the word means. In fact, that would explain why the GOP is blocking qualified political appointees like Tom Perez: To them, "crony" just means someone they don't like and has no relationship to a person's qualifications.
-- A. Serwer
COMMENTS (9)
What is really TELLING is that you (and I) waste our time parsing (i.e looking for meaning) Malkin's rantings.
A fruitless endeavor.
Posted by: catclub | October 2, 2009 1:12 PM
What I think Malkin means is: Didn't Barack and Michelle work together prior to nuptials? The MARRIAGE is built on cronyism! My god, how deep does it go???
Posted by: @debenham | October 2, 2009 1:19 PM
I;m not sure this poster knows what "political" or "crony" mean.
The essence of cronyism is rewarding personal friends (or friends of friends -- people with connections).
You are really misuing the word "political" here. In fact, appointing people to political offices SHOULD be done for political reasons -- but that is not the same thing as appointing cronies.
Posted by: The Fool | October 2, 2009 2:24 PM
I'm not sure this poster knows what "political" or "crony" mean.
The essence of cronyism is rewarding personal friends (or friends of friends -- people with connections).
You are really misusing the word "political" here. In fact, appointing people to political offices SHOULD be done for political reasons -- but that is not the same thing as appointing cronies.
Posted by: The Fool | October 2, 2009 2:25 PM
oops
Read the 2nd post. It has fewer typos.
Posted by: The Fool | October 2, 2009 2:28 PM
Let's say you are the fossil-fuel industry. You have nothing to offer in exchange for your profits but war, global warming, traffic congestion, and general misery. Wouldn't be nice to have some bait to drag around and keep fish away from your secrets?
Posted by: fpteditors | October 2, 2009 2:46 PM
Well, Michelle M is right and Michelle O is a crony. Barack O only gave Michelle O the job as his spouse because he was utterly corrupted by her willingness to engage in acts of sex. Now if that isn't cronyism, what is?
Posted by: SRW1 | October 3, 2009 12:47 AM
SRW1; you know full well that the Republican stance on first ladies is that they stand there smiling like a lobotomized dolphin and never, ever admit to having sex with the president more often than required to produce the admitted number of children. By having a personality, Michelle Obama is undermining our democracy!
Posted by: NBarnes | October 3, 2009 12:43 PM
NBarnes, "a lobotomized dolphin"? Well played. I know that Ms. Bush has been referred to as Pickles (for some reason), but I kind of like "Flipper" now.
What I want to know is when did Ms. Malkin start writing this book? Was she prescient enough to begin before the last election?
The Republican strategy seems to be attack anything that moves - doesn't matter if the attacks make sense, they'll make up for quality with quantity.
Posted by: Bill | October 5, 2009 2:09 PM