Is That Legal?

It's almost as though she's some sort of beliefless hack, shifting her political opinions and motivations to increase her book sales and popularity among the rabid rightwing base.

I'm suddenly reminded of Pynchon's failed-kamikaze-turned-Nazi Ensign Morituri. (Except I think he is portrayed as having something resembling remorse in his character.)

Much as I dislike Malkin's public persona, I wonder what her life and career will be like if or when she stops being useful to the wealthy and powerful bigots who are presently her cash cows.

Given that you didn't give a link to read more of Malkin's article I had to grab it off proquest. In fact you completely twisted her words. She was saying how because Asians were successful they were redefined as "White", how race-based affirmative action hurt Asian people and how the abolition of it in California led to "a 16 percent increase in admissions for Asians and Pacific Islanders at Boalt Law School in Berkeley, and a 18 percent increase at UCLA Law School".

Nowhere in the article did she even come close to saying that "as an Asian American, she might someday not qualify for racial set-asides for minorities."

You need to update your post with an apology to Malkin.

ELM: Nope.

Malkin's beef is that even though she has overcome what she calls "the encumbrance of her skin color," she has become "invisible" in today's racial politics.

Does it strike you as not a little unusual -- by the standards of the Michelle Malkin of today, at least -- to see her talking the language of racial identity, a language she deplores?

Look at the column's title! Could it be any clearer that she wants Asians in, rather than "whitewashed out of," the "racial preference debate?"

And in the context of her cheerleading for the most fervent of the anti-immigrant crowd, isn't it just a wee bit funny to see her in disbelief that "brown-skinned people" would join with "pink-skinned bigots" as they "rail about the problem of too many of 'them'"?

I myself can barely stop laughing.

Incidentally, the entire column is available here.

maybe if she stops being useful to the "wealthy and powerful bigots" who are her puppet msters they will send her to the super secret underground dungeon set up by bush & co for dissenting conservative columnists

Thanks for a link to the column that's on the open web, though it should probably be in the main post rather than inside the comments.

Editors, not columnists, generally write the headline- so I don't think we can infer anything from that. In fact, if you look at the part of the article the phrase is from it's a very different meaning: "Whitewashing Asians out of the post-209 college admissions equation allows for simpler, more inflammatory rhetoric." She's talking about how counting Asians as "white" allows Affirmative Action proponents to frame the issue as one that benefits whites rather than how Affirmative Action hurts certain types of minorities and "benefits" certain other types.

That's her point.

Eric, I think you've missed her point entirely. I think it's pretty clear that she is against racial preferences "for minorities" that result in discrimination against Asian-Americans.

In the piece, she complains that as an Asian American, she might someday not qualify for racial set-asides for minorities.

I am not making this up.

Well, actually, I think you're making it up. Nothing that Malkin says amounts to arguing that Asians should qualify for affirmative action.

Instead, her article clearly proceeds in two parts.

First, as an Asian, she had personally experienced racism from whites who saw her as just another brown person.

Second, after personally experiencing racism, she found it immensely ironic that Asians were all being defined as "white" in the affirmative action context. She wasn't saying this because she wanted Asians themselves to benefit from affirmative action. She was obviously saying this because she found it outrageous that affirmative action supporters were lying and claiming that the abolition of affirmative action would benefit only "white people."