Different Treatment For Similar Rich Kids
April 22, 2017 at 3:28 a.m.
By Gary [email protected]
Clinton appears grinning from ear to ear on the cover in a black leather jacket, white v-neck T-shirt and jeans.
“How cool does Chelsea Clinton look on our Power of Women N.Y. cover? Read her great interview with @RaminSetoodeh in tomorrow’s issue!” tweeted out co-editor-in-chief Claudia Ellerton this week to promote the edition.
It is a glowing account, replete with phrases like, “but she’s still got a full plate as she fights for the causes that are important to her.”
But that’s to be expected. Chelsea, after all, is adored by the media. And whether she likes it or not – and even though she denies it – she is being puffed up by said media for an inevitable run at national politics.
My guess is the media will continue to bathe her in a positive spotlight for the foreseeable future.
I mean, come on. She’s 37 and she’s receiving a “Lifetime Achievement” award touting her “humanitarian work” from Variety.
Google her name and you will find dozens of articles applauding her “courage,” “prowess,” “tenacity,” “determination,” “fearlessness” and “brave thoughts.”
Here’s an excerpt from The Atlantic during the campaign:
“She speaks slowly and deliberately, her voice low and modulated. After weeks of hard campaigning, she has grown slightly hoarse. But otherwise there are no rough edges to her. No seams. No rambling or verbal filler. Like Hillary, Chelsea is neither an inspirational nor a motivational speaker. But her soothing aspect is strangely compelling, like that of a meditation guide or a priest.“
Uh huh.
Make no mistake, the fawning will continue.
It’s not that Chelsea has no skills. She has a bachelor’s degree in history from Stanford and a masters and doctorate in international relations from Oxford. She also completed an M.P.H. degree at the Mailman School of Public Health of Columbia University and taught graduate classes there.
So far, she’s been a college professor, a hedge-fund manager (helping run her husband’s hedge fund) and an NBC correspondent, which is kind of a diverse career path, wouldn’t you say? I mean, she drew a $600,000 annual salary from NBC and I don’t think she had any network experience when they hired her.
In the eyes of the media, she is her own person. She is separated from the dalliances of her father and the brushes with potential prosecution of her mother.
And that’s as it should be.
But significant accomplishments – earned or other wise – notwithstanding, it’s the way the media gushes over her that’s so annoying. And it probably wouldn’t be nearly so annoying if there was at least a little bit of parrity among the treatment of rich, entitled children of famous people.
Know any other daughters of famous people who attended the best schools and got handed wonderful jobs?
Sure you do.
Ivanka Trump.
Trump attended the Chapin School in Manhattan until she was 15, when she transferred to Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingford, Conn.
After graduating from Choate, she attended Georgetown University for two years, then transferred to the Wharton Business School at the University of Pennsylvania, from which she graduated cum laude with a bachelor's degree in economics in 2004.
Ivanka is bilingual, speaking English and French, and has an basic knowledge of her mother's native language of Czech.
Before joining the family business in 2005, she briefly worked for Forest City Enterprises. She formed a partnership with a diamond vendor, Dynamic Diamond Corp., to create Ivanka Trump Fine Jewelry, which was sold at her first flagship retail store on Madison Avenue in Manhattan.
The store later moved to the fashionable Soho district.
That store closed and the company lists Trump tower as its flagship boutique and it’s only retail store. The brand also is available at fine jewelry stores in the U.S., Canada, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, the company states.
She has her own line of fashion items, including clothes, handbags, shoes and accessories, which is available in major U.S. department stores.
She also served as executive vice president of development and acquisitions at the Trump Organization, stepping down this year to take a position in her father’s administration.
So how is she portrayed in the media?
Virtually every headline you see is pejorative.
CNN: Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump hit the slopes again.
Chicago Tribune: Retailers grapple with polarizing Ivanka Trump brand.
AOL: Queer chef refuses to be interviewed by Ivanka Trump's website, issues the perfect rejection of Ivanka Trump’s lifestyle brand.
Huffpo: Ivanka Trump's Eyes Seem To Be Changing Color, And This Is Probably Why – and – Librarians School Ivanka Trump After Tone-Deaf Tweet.
Washington Post: Ivanka Trump and the Cult of the First Daughter.
Daily Beast: Ivanka Preaches Organic, Silent While Dad OKs Toxic Pesticide.
She was skewered on “Saturday Night Live” by Scarlet Johansson, who later characterized Ivanka’s take on empowering women as “old-fashioned, it’s so uninspired and actually really cowardly.”
Never mind that Ivanka has worked to push females in entrepreneurial roles and has urged a national child-care initiative. The media focuses only on the fact that her father wants to cut Planned Parenthood funding. This, of course means Ivanka – by association – is part of the war on women.
Chelsea is a proponent of the Alliance for a Healthier Generation. Has anybody bushwhacked her with a question about her father’s well-documented penchant for fast food? Of course not. Chelsea also speaks out against sexism. Anybody asking her about pop’s record on that issue?
And now that Ivanka has started hanging out at the White House, every bit of business she conducts is scrutinized as a potential conflict of interest – which, frankly, it may well be.
That’s fair.
The trouble is, none of that scrutiny was heaped on Chelsea when she was helping run the Clinton Foundation while campaigning for her mother. Conflict? What conflict?
And you know the weirdest thing about all this? Ivanka is a registered Democrat.
Clinton appears grinning from ear to ear on the cover in a black leather jacket, white v-neck T-shirt and jeans.
“How cool does Chelsea Clinton look on our Power of Women N.Y. cover? Read her great interview with @RaminSetoodeh in tomorrow’s issue!” tweeted out co-editor-in-chief Claudia Ellerton this week to promote the edition.
It is a glowing account, replete with phrases like, “but she’s still got a full plate as she fights for the causes that are important to her.”
But that’s to be expected. Chelsea, after all, is adored by the media. And whether she likes it or not – and even though she denies it – she is being puffed up by said media for an inevitable run at national politics.
My guess is the media will continue to bathe her in a positive spotlight for the foreseeable future.
I mean, come on. She’s 37 and she’s receiving a “Lifetime Achievement” award touting her “humanitarian work” from Variety.
Google her name and you will find dozens of articles applauding her “courage,” “prowess,” “tenacity,” “determination,” “fearlessness” and “brave thoughts.”
Here’s an excerpt from The Atlantic during the campaign:
“She speaks slowly and deliberately, her voice low and modulated. After weeks of hard campaigning, she has grown slightly hoarse. But otherwise there are no rough edges to her. No seams. No rambling or verbal filler. Like Hillary, Chelsea is neither an inspirational nor a motivational speaker. But her soothing aspect is strangely compelling, like that of a meditation guide or a priest.“
Uh huh.
Make no mistake, the fawning will continue.
It’s not that Chelsea has no skills. She has a bachelor’s degree in history from Stanford and a masters and doctorate in international relations from Oxford. She also completed an M.P.H. degree at the Mailman School of Public Health of Columbia University and taught graduate classes there.
So far, she’s been a college professor, a hedge-fund manager (helping run her husband’s hedge fund) and an NBC correspondent, which is kind of a diverse career path, wouldn’t you say? I mean, she drew a $600,000 annual salary from NBC and I don’t think she had any network experience when they hired her.
In the eyes of the media, she is her own person. She is separated from the dalliances of her father and the brushes with potential prosecution of her mother.
And that’s as it should be.
But significant accomplishments – earned or other wise – notwithstanding, it’s the way the media gushes over her that’s so annoying. And it probably wouldn’t be nearly so annoying if there was at least a little bit of parrity among the treatment of rich, entitled children of famous people.
Know any other daughters of famous people who attended the best schools and got handed wonderful jobs?
Sure you do.
Ivanka Trump.
Trump attended the Chapin School in Manhattan until she was 15, when she transferred to Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingford, Conn.
After graduating from Choate, she attended Georgetown University for two years, then transferred to the Wharton Business School at the University of Pennsylvania, from which she graduated cum laude with a bachelor's degree in economics in 2004.
Ivanka is bilingual, speaking English and French, and has an basic knowledge of her mother's native language of Czech.
Before joining the family business in 2005, she briefly worked for Forest City Enterprises. She formed a partnership with a diamond vendor, Dynamic Diamond Corp., to create Ivanka Trump Fine Jewelry, which was sold at her first flagship retail store on Madison Avenue in Manhattan.
The store later moved to the fashionable Soho district.
That store closed and the company lists Trump tower as its flagship boutique and it’s only retail store. The brand also is available at fine jewelry stores in the U.S., Canada, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, the company states.
She has her own line of fashion items, including clothes, handbags, shoes and accessories, which is available in major U.S. department stores.
She also served as executive vice president of development and acquisitions at the Trump Organization, stepping down this year to take a position in her father’s administration.
So how is she portrayed in the media?
Virtually every headline you see is pejorative.
CNN: Jared Kushner, Ivanka Trump hit the slopes again.
Chicago Tribune: Retailers grapple with polarizing Ivanka Trump brand.
AOL: Queer chef refuses to be interviewed by Ivanka Trump's website, issues the perfect rejection of Ivanka Trump’s lifestyle brand.
Huffpo: Ivanka Trump's Eyes Seem To Be Changing Color, And This Is Probably Why – and – Librarians School Ivanka Trump After Tone-Deaf Tweet.
Washington Post: Ivanka Trump and the Cult of the First Daughter.
Daily Beast: Ivanka Preaches Organic, Silent While Dad OKs Toxic Pesticide.
She was skewered on “Saturday Night Live” by Scarlet Johansson, who later characterized Ivanka’s take on empowering women as “old-fashioned, it’s so uninspired and actually really cowardly.”
Never mind that Ivanka has worked to push females in entrepreneurial roles and has urged a national child-care initiative. The media focuses only on the fact that her father wants to cut Planned Parenthood funding. This, of course means Ivanka – by association – is part of the war on women.
Chelsea is a proponent of the Alliance for a Healthier Generation. Has anybody bushwhacked her with a question about her father’s well-documented penchant for fast food? Of course not. Chelsea also speaks out against sexism. Anybody asking her about pop’s record on that issue?
And now that Ivanka has started hanging out at the White House, every bit of business she conducts is scrutinized as a potential conflict of interest – which, frankly, it may well be.
That’s fair.
The trouble is, none of that scrutiny was heaped on Chelsea when she was helping run the Clinton Foundation while campaigning for her mother. Conflict? What conflict?
And you know the weirdest thing about all this? Ivanka is a registered Democrat.
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