The Access Market

Maureen Dowd, wandering off the reservation for the moment, isn't enjoying a Chelsea morning:

With her 1 percenter mother under fire for disingenuously calling herself “dead broke” when she left the White House, why would Chelsea [Clinton] want to open herself up to criticism that she is gobbling whopping paychecks not commensurate with her skills, experience or role in life?

As the 34-year-old tries to wean some of the cronies from the Clinton Foundation — which is, like the Clintons themselves, well-intended, wasteful and disorganized — Chelsea is making speeches that go into foundation coffers. She is commanding, as The Times’s Amy Chozick reported, up to $75,000 per appearance.

Chozick wrote: “Ms. Clinton’s speeches focus on causes like eradicating waterborne diseases. (‘I’m obsessed with diarrhea’ is a favorite line.)”

I believe the term is logorrhea, but we'll leave that aside. Back to Dowd:

There’s something unseemly about it, making one wonder: Why on earth is she worth that much money? Why, given her dabbling in management consulting, hedge-funding and coattail-riding, is an hour of her time valued at an amount that most Americans her age don’t make in a year? (Median household income in the United States is $53,046.)

Since someone has to answer the rhetorical questions, here you go:

• She's not worth $75,000 by herself. Having access to the Clintons is worth quite a lot, though, and if you don't think that the Clintons pay attention to their benefactors, you're not paying attention. The Clintons pay attention to everything.
• It's not just 34-year-olds who don't make 75 large per annum; it's most Americans, period. 

But Dowd's not done:

There was disgust over Politico’s revelation that before she switched to a month-to-month contract, Chelsea was getting wildly overpaid at $600,000 annually — or over $25,000 per minute on air — for a nepotistic job as a soft-focus correspondent for NBC News.

Chelsea is still learning the answer to a question she asked when she interviewed the Geico gecko: “Is there a downside to all this fame?”

The Clintons keep acting as though all they care about is selfless public service. So why does it keep coming back to gross money grabs? It’s gone from two-for-the-price-of-one to three-for-the-price-of-20.

Why do the Clintons do this? Seriously? Because they can. Dowd may tut-tut and clutch her pearls a bit, but she'll have their back when it really matters. And why not take the money? People are willing to give it to them. I offer my wisdom for free on this blog and it's worth every penny. In my day job I charge a little more than that. It's what the market will bear.