Mika Brzezinski and her 7% Husband
In the guise of pitching her book on career and family yesterday, Mika Brzezinski had this to say:
Finding a job is hard enough, but have you ever considered the odds and the challenges of finding a good man?
Bad news, girls. The odds are definitely better on getting the right job than getting a good partner for life. Someone who will grow with you. Someone to develop memories with. Someone who was there in the beginning. Someone who will be there at the end.
Don’t push away that chance if you’re one of the lucky ones who find that partner. And remember, you can always change a job. I hear it’s much harder to switch out a husband.
Now maybe this will come as a surprise to someone born into fame and connections like Mika, but it’s not actually all that easy to find a job. As CNN pointed out the other day, statistically it’s actually harder to find a job right now than it is to get into Harvard (or Mika’s alma mater of Williams).
Since the beginning of the recession in December 2007, job openings declined from 4.4 million to 2.4 million and the number of officially unemployed persons grew from 7.5 million to 15.7 million, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
If the 15.7 million officially unemployed workers were to apply for those 2.4 million jobs, the chance of any one of them finding a job are about 15 percent, or roughly the same odds as being accepted to the University of Pennsylvania.
[snip]
The exclusion of these so-called “discouraged” workers from statistics means that the official number of unemployed severely understates the weakness in the labor market. If you include these workers, the unemployment rate would rise to 13 percent, or 21.3 million.
If these workers were to apply for the 2.4 million jobs available, the odds of securing a job would be 11.2 percent, or roughly the same as getting into the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[snip]
Adding part-time workers to the number of officially unemployed and the discouraged workers, as labor market expert Leo Hindery, Jr., has observed, results in a rise in the real unemployment rate to 19.2 percent, or 30.6 million people.
The odds of any one of these 30 million securing one of the 2.4 million full-time jobs available is 8 percent, the same as the admissions rate of the Ivy League gold standard, Harvard University.
Now, maybe Mika had an exceptionally difficult time finding her husband. After all, if it was harder finding him than finding a job, that means she must have had around a 7% chance of finding him.
Or perhaps someone with Mika’s connections just has no fucking clue how hard it is for average people to actually find a job. Perhaps Mika has just inadvertently revealed that she is a newsperson who doesn’t have the faintest clue what is happening out there in the real world, as millions of people struggle to find some way to make a living.
I’m guessing it’s the latter. Which sort of defeats the purpose of pitching your book–proving that you are completely unaware of and therefore incapable of providing advice on careers to real people.
I’ve only been able to stomach watching Morning Joe a few times, but I’ve never seen Mika do anything but nod her head at whatever Joe is saying. Is she a stage prop?
Mika grew up on a huge estate in McLean Virginia, one of the wealthiest enclaves in America. She has no fucking clue.
Oh, Lordy. You’d have to live in Hobe Sound to be any more swaddled from reality.
Or Jupiter Island, Florida
My first college roommate grew up in McLean.
On Chain Bridge Road next to the Robert Kennedy place.
She was a nice girl, but WTH she was doing in a small, academically rigorous, Midwestern, liberal arts college always puzzled me. It rapidly became clear it puzzled her too.
She tried. I tried. But for us, young as we were, the cultural chasm was too broad.
Looking back, and growing up, I now understand and can forgive the fact that If you know, absolutely know, that your landing will always be soft no matter what you do, and that the money will never stop, no matter what the rest of the world loses, your world view is different. Really different.
Not that she was a party girl. She was not. But her life was all spun sugar and fairy godmothers with not a wicked witch in the plot.
Mika reminds me so strongly of her. Nice girl. Hard worker. Really trying to understand.
But no clue. No clue at all.
.
DingDingDing fuckin’ Ding!
Needs to get out on the streets more. Interview some real folks. Not sure she is capable
I could never understand Mika.
Her father is so articulate…
Just look at Evan Bayh. His father was pretty damn good, too. Sounds like Mika and Evan have something in common. Both are ignorant tools.
If you aren’t already familiar with this, Christopher Moore’s “Lamb” might interest you.
*grump*
Picking on someone from privilege for not knowing about the tough job market because of their background is the same as picking one someone from poverty for not knowing which fork to use at a formal dinner.
She’s clueless, granted. But she wrote that book from HER viewpoint. She didn’t pretend to have been a street kid or cronically unemployed or anything she not.
Boxturtle (Book probably sucks, though)
FWIW, I’d imagine there are a whole lot more poor people who learned from their mothers which fork to use than there are privileged people who have any touch with reality
As always, YMMV
She is not just “someone from privilege.”
She is a newsperson, someone who pretends that her viewpoint is not that of privilege, but that of a neutral observer able to see and report on actually existing reality.
If that were generally known, then people might begin to wonder if “government” ought to be asked to accomplish something other than wage war on ‘scary brown people’.
Maybe there would be less wiping of brows while saying, “Whew! That was a close one! Good that the recession is over now. We can get back to doing what we were doing before that inexplicable-yet-cyclic-and-hence-unavoidable downturn happened.”
I had no idea how hard it is.
The last two jobs (geologist) I got I was heavily recruited for and had people begging me to start immediately.
When the last project I was working on died during the financial meltdown last year, I kinda goofed around for a month and did some little contract work. Since then I have had two separate jobs fall apart at the last minute (one was in Honduras and was nixed due to the coup). In the past two months I have probably sent out 40 resumes for job openings where I swear the job descriptions plagiarized my resume, and I can’t even get a callback or e-mail letting me know that my resume was even acknowledged. That is how bad it is.
I’m sure Mika’s looking on the “bright side” of the unemployment figures: with all that “free time,” folks will have an opportunity to read her book. Of course she doesn’t realize that if they do so, they’ll be picking it up off the shelf at their local Barnes & Noble [NOT purchasing it], settling down in a chair to skim a few pages, in between their use of the free internet @ B&N to surf for job possibilities.
Have heard Mika repeat the Iran “has a nuclear weapons program”
several times. Plenty of MSM “group think” still going around
Good post, but those admit numbers are a bit stale — rates have dropped a lot since ’06.
http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/lowest-acceptance-rate
The 8% for Harvard is current. I was just looking for a decent one for Williams, which has reportedly GONE UP since 2006. So, in spite of Williams being the root source of all that is evil in this world, I was giving Mika the benefit of the doubt.
Oh, an Amherst alumna picking on Williams, who would ever have guessed THAT could happen. ;-)
Most excellent point there Ms. Kouril!
Williams has to have the dumbest nickname in all of college sports. The Ephs(Yes, seriously!!).
Far be it for me to defend the purple cows. But don’t you think the UCSC Banana Slugs are fair competition?
I love the Banana Slugs. UCSC is a college that is waaaaaaaay out there. Students still dress like hippies. It’s great.
Just avoid the beach roller coaster. No brakes.
Spoken like an Amherst grad. Are purple “A’s” superior to purple hooved beasts?
We’re Jeffs, thank you. You know, specialists in biowarfare and the like?
Hey, not far from here resides the Scottsdale Community College Fighting Artichokes. Although I still like Banana Slugs better.
Sure makes it easy to cheer for the Hilltoppers, even when we’re #120.
I thought the Artichokes were a AA team near Salinas.
Well, their rival are the “Lord Jeffs”, so I dunno…..
But the greatest “shorter…” cheer: Eph U!
Isn’t that what all college cheers are about?
[If only we could play Norfolk every week: “We don’t smoke, we don’t drink, Norfolk, Norfolk”]
Ah Mary, you’re missing the famous cheer from the Governors of Austin Peay State University:
“Let’s Go Peay” (pronounced, of course …)
I’d like to thank Mika for providing the fodder this week of all weeks when Amherst and Williams football teams meet on the gridiron in the final game of the 2009 football season.
The two teams are ranked first and second in league standings, and the competition is more highly anticipated this fall than usual due to the cancellation of last spring’s rugby match:
LOL.
I also cannot stomach watching Morning Joe and especially now that unbelievably they are selling Starbuck coffee called Joe. Incredible. But I digress.. originally Mika came off as intelligent and a nice balance to the otherwise conservative talking heads. But in the last year she has become, as someone else pointed out, a prop. She acts like an abused wife in her submissive role which is very unfortunate. I saw her on her own show once and she was actually smart again. So, I’m sure she’s been given the talk that she is there only to support Joe and otherwise to keep her mouth shut.
You are spot on. She is iconic of the abused wife syndrome. And Joe? .. Fill in the blanks.
I read a couple of interesting books by Deb based on her psych studies back in the 80’s. She found that in groups of women, the talk was generated equally. In groups of women with one (or more) man present, the women allowed the man to dominate the conversation whether he had anything relevant or interesting to say or not.
On Morning Joe who loves himself, Mika’s a bobiko -I think that’s the Japanese term for an ornamental object.
Versailles clown posse. Yeah they’ve got so much to teach me.
Don’t forget, ladies, that being a mommy is the MOST IMPORTANT JOB EVAR!
Ouch! I read that article first thing this morning and had to wait two hours until I fixed breakfast because it made me so sick to my stomach.
She had a lot of stupid things to say, didn’t she?
Parenting is a big challenge and easier when you’re younger? *#@%!!!
Mika,
I wear the pants,
you wear the dresses,
you clean up,
when I make the messes.
/s
Ha! Good one!
“A good man is hard to find” and vice-versa. (Sorry, couldn’t help myself).
I just knew that someone was going to remember that. :)
You beat me to it.
Given the large pool of newspersons out there who fit this description, and the liklihood that maybe half or so of them are male, I suggest Mika might want to look there for her soulmate/partner. They’d have a lot in common, and that base is so important for lifelong growth and stability.
Thank you.
How in the name of all that is holy did this knothead get into Williams? Did she ever graduate? That’s like George Bush getting into Yale.
Apparently transferred there from Georgetown as junior.
She would have been at Williams for two years while I was at Amherst. I wonder if I ever tackled her on the rugby pitch.
Unlikely.
You always crack me up, Marcy. One of the smartest women I know (of) without an ounce of goody two shoes. I just imagine you had to have pissed off a lot of insecure guys in your classes at college — ticked off that the smart chick left them in the dust.
By the way, have I ever mentioned to you that you’d be great on video?
Judging by the amount of time Mika spends on morning Joe
and other news shows,I think it might be her husband
who needs someone who is there~
And for what it’s worth, finding a good woman is a lot harder than finding anything else of value. It took me over forty years to find a really terrific woman and good human being without all sorts of psychological and personal problems and hang-ups. It isn’t accidental that the writer of proverbs waxed lyrical over the value of a good woman. They weren’t anymore common 3000 years ago than they are now.
Mind you, Ms. Mika isn’t saying what she considers a good catch. A mackerel? A swordfish? A great white?
If her catch needs to be a GQ model, multi-millionaire Goldman Scratch vice president under 35 and resident in NYC or Malibu, the odds are rather less than 7% she’ll find what she wants. But good luck to her in her career counseling role. One day, after her oddly perfect teeth begin to tarnish and the botox box is empty, she might have to look for work by demonstrating she knows what she’s doing.
My brain hurts from laughin!! LMAO (“when the botox box is empty”, that was hillarious)
There are none so blind as those who will not see. There are lots of good men out there Mika. Most of them live on C Street in DC.
(you forgot your close snark tag)
Hey you, wait a minute! My husband lives on C Street SE in DC! Hands OFF, ok?
It is clear to me that the woman in the photograph accompanying this writing has no basis speaking on difficulties finding employment, as employment is clearly not part of her world.
Didn’t Mika say that “Pat Buchanan says what we’re all thinking”?
Yes she did.
She’s no liberal. No liberal would ever say such a thing.
Hey there have been quite a few times I have found myself agreeing with Pat Buchanan the last seven or so years. Against the invasion of Iraq, says it like it is about the Israeli Palestinian conflict and the I lobby and for this he was long ago labeled as an anti-semite.
At the Dem convention last year in Denver I stood in front of the MSNBC live broadcast near Union Station. Buchanan often went on and on about Obama. It is obvious Buchanan likes him. At one point I yelled out several times “Pat we know you are a closet Independent” He turned around looked at the crowd and at me and chuckled. I would almost put some money on it that he may have voted for Obama
When the pendulum has shifted so far right (wrong) that Buchanan looks as though he is a moderate you know the political situation has shifted
a couple of weeks ago on Chris Matthews he said he’d voted for Obama. Chris half turned his head and said “no you didn’t” but he didn’t turn to face him, didn’t look Pat in the eye or let him continue… Chris just went on his usual “talking over” routine.
Leen, if you put money on your guess, be sure to get odds from Chris Matthews.
I’d say missy mika has found her 7% husband……….and his name is scar.
John Wayne, the Searchers, Scar?
My personal name for joe the twit she kowtows to on a daily basis. :-(((
Oh thank you for writing this! She is awful and is so out of touch with reality. Watching her is truly painful, and she only gets worse with time. I think it’s a stretch to call her a “newsperson” too. Her book will probably tank like Joe’s did. She’s on one huge ego trip. Why though, I’m not quite sure?
Unfortunately, this is not just a position of privilege, as anyone who watches Sex and the City and Oprah is aware. What these women mean is that there are not enough men who make as much money and are as educated as they are. Black women have been in the lead with this complaint. It is a problem, with women entering college and law school at a much greater rate than men. But it is a bigger problem for the men in the military and in prison.
What in the world does that mean? Does that mean because I don’t have a college degree I’m somehow useless to all the women going to college or have graduated college?
That’s complete and utter nonsense.
And American women wonder why the request for K1 Visas increases every year…
I am saying that is often the subtext when women refer to men as not being marriage material and when women say there are no men out there. I think it is messed up.
Dude, don’t take it personally, it’s a biological imperative thing. If you are successful in whatever you are doing, that will give you almost equal attraction credits (I don’t know why; pheromones?); especially when economic times are good (men still earn more than women generally).
Our culture has done a good job of sublimating some of these natural impulses, but obviously the impulses are still there. High prison and military populations are unnatural diversions with ginormous impacts on the society in many invisible ways.
Okay, I hear you and I agree which is why the singles seen is dominated by 30-40something never married career women…
Our culture has twisted traditional relationships.
When you have a society that offers free or low cost education (Western Europe) you don’t have the same dynamic of women asking for somebody in their weight class (Boxing Term). Here lesser women (non-college educated) want to punch above their weight and think in extremes when looking at the potential pool of men (as you said the lack of available ideal partners).
There plenty of good men to go around. Some educated, some not, all equally intelligent overall.
If you buy into the nonsense you need to live alone in a Mc Mansion on the side of the hill in a gated community, drive a car that cost more than most families make in a year and your own cubical with your name on it somehow makes you “an ideal catch” that’s being delusional.
I don’t really take it personal Carol, I just find it terribly interesting and its subject matter I’m constantly involved in. I have a Passport that solves most of my problems. Fuck changing the game, I changed the rules…
I’d think Mika would be advising women to go into the military & prison to have a better field to search for their mates.
More simply put, her definition of a good man is a man with money. I think most of us would be outraged at that being the definition of a good woman.
ot
Palestinian Authority’s Future Is in Question
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/world/middleeast/10mideast.html?_r=1&hp
Mika, Mika, Mika. Do you mean the woman who changes the tone of her voice when presenting “the news” so we can all believe that she is a real journalist, the woman to defends female idiots because they are female and then wants all “us gals” to think she is a great feminist, oh please. I have almost completely stopped watching Morning Joe as it is nothing more than “make news.” Mika has always reminded me of the girl who didn’t quite make the cheerleading squad in high school so to make up for that became overly friendly, smiley, cheery, you know like “Legally Blonde. “
Uh, yes she is a prop. And a prude. And a serial user of the “some would say” brand of so-called journalism. Her father called Joe “stunningly superficial” He ought to add his daughter to the mix.
I don’t understand why anyone would watch joe and mika. Obviously it is not something that any of you watch to gain a real understanding of the world. The questions surrounding his dead assistant, his actions concerning her death, and the lack of any real investigation cause me not to be interested in anything he says. If mika is such a bobblehead, what value does she add? We know that most of what repugs say is contradictory or a lie. I would rather listen to Amy Goodman or read FDL.
Have you seen her husband? It’s Jim Hoffer from channel 7 eyewitness news. He’s got some kind of hair plugs or something. I don’t mean to sound superficial but, this guy is fugly! My sister keeps saying that Mika must have been fat or something because she can’t figure out why she married this man. She’s attractive and could have done much better. Perhaps he’s a really nice guy but, damn! As a woman it pains me to say this but, many women are usually so desparate to get married that they’ll marry the first guy who asks.
OMG, I just Googled the guy. It looks like he went as Dracula for Halloween and forgot to take off his make-up.
When/if mika decides to be more than just a stoolie or doormat for the morning schmoe her writing may have more credence. I can’t respect the oogling and idiocy. She’s nothing more than a prop.
Duh. That would be Deborah Tanner.
Mika is the tip of the iceberg that congeals the Conventional Wisdom. People who make more than $200,000 a year )(and in absolute terms there are a lot of them) are in the top 1 percent of the income distribution. They make up the core of the DC hangers-on, the one’s not at the top but who read the Post and go tsk,tsk, whatever are those liberals doing? They consider themselves middle class, despite 99 percent of the American population being poorer than they are. The only see the 1 percent who are richer.
American discourse is dominated by the one percenters. It’s not just selfishness, it is the boobocracy in action. I see it all the time in my academic colleagues, most of whom consider themselves liberal, but love David Brooks, and can’t for the moment imagine that he might be just like George Will, a party hack. This is what comes from being rich but not admitting it. Mika is just a couple of steps up the food chain.
You give her way too much credit referring to her as a “newsperson”.
I don’t consider what Mika does a job. All she does is string a few words together every now and then. My first grade students can do better than that–and they are cuter.
I stopped paying attention to her months ago, she was sitting next to some sports figure and fawning all over him, I thought she was going to give him a lap dance. Needless to say, I didn’t think she had much talent then and she has even less now.
Boy, I hope this is the first in a series of Mika stories.
Did you see how she treated Sy Hersh this morning?
No lapdance?
Funny, when you used “7% Husband” in your title, I thought of Sherlock Holmes’ 7% solution.
The Morning Joe show is bad enough with Scarborough but I absolutely vomit whenever Mika the mouse makes any kind of comment.