Michelle Malkin

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Michelle Malkin

Born:	October 20, 1970 (age 36) Philadelphia, PA, USA
Occupation:	Author, syndicated columnist, television personality and blogger
Spouse:	Jesse Malkin
Website:	Michelle Malkin, Hot Air

Michelle Malkin (née Maglalang) (born October 20, 1970) is an American columnist, blogger, author and political commentator. She is a social and political conservative. She makes frequent guest appearances on national syndicated radio programs and on television networks such as MSNBC, Fox News Channel, and C-SPAN, and is currently a columnist for Townhall.com and the Jewish World Review.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Background 1.2 Career 2 Viewpoints 3 Negative reactions to her viewpoints 4 Students Against War and publishing personal information 5 Alleged leftist intimidation campaign 6 YouTube videos 7 Jamil Hussein 8 Notes and references 9 Books 10 External links 10.1 Malkin's sites 10.2 Anti-Malkin

[edit] Biography

[edit] Background

Malkin was born in Philadelphia to Filipino parents, Dr. Apolo and Rafaela Maglalang, in the United States on a work visa. Her maternal grandfather fought under General Douglas MacArthur.^[1] She grew up in Absecon, New Jersey, and graduated from Oberlin College. In 1993, she married Rhodes Scholar and RAND Corporation economist Jesse Malkin, with whom she has two children.

[edit] Career

She began her career at the Los Angeles Daily News, working as a columnist from 1992 to 1994. Years later on her blog, Malkin recalled these days in her reaction to Jessica Cutler when Cutler claimed to be unable to live on a $25,000 salary in Washington:

"How can anybody live on $25K/year?? When I was 24 and making less than that, I did it by eating Spaghetti-O's, Ramen noodles and Swanson pot pies for dinner; driving a Toyota Tercel with no air conditioning; and sleeping on a $30 futon." ^[2]

In 1996, she moved to Seattle, where she wrote columns for The Seattle Times, and participated in a panel at an Asian American professional conference with John Carlson debating Initiative 200, a ban on racial preferences. She became a nationally syndicated columnist in 1999. Malkin's column, syndicated by Creators Syndicate, appears in over 200 newspapers nationwide as of 2005. She is also a frequent commentator for FOX News Channel.

In June 2004 she launched a political blog which quickly became highly popular, at most times residing among the top five conservative political blogs.^[3] After initially allowing reader comments, she disabled them, attributing her decision to an intolerable level of obscene and racist comments.^[4]

Malkin's blog occasionally highlights investigative reports from other sites, most notably an investigation into financial irregularities at Air America Radio.^[5] She is frequently used as an example of the blurred line between bloggers and reporters, given such investigations and her widely distributed columns and appearances on multiple media outlets.

Her first book, Invasion: How America Still Welcomes Terrorists, Criminals, and Other Foreign Menaces, was published in 2002 and was a New York Times bestseller.

In 2004, she wrote In Defense of Internment, defending Japanese American internment by the United States Government during World War II and relating this theme to the contemporary War on Terrorism, taking some heat from Asian American civil rights organizations who had been uniformly opposed to this historical policy. The "Historians' Committee for Fairness", a group of professors, condemned the book for not having undergone peer review and containing a central thesis they argued was false.^[6] Opponents also attempted to ban the book from the Manzanar relocation center National Historic Site but failed when the management refused to "censor dissenting viewpoints".^[7]

Malkin's third book, Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild was released in October 2005.

On April 24, 2006, Hot Air, a "conservative Internet broadcast network" went into operation, with Malkin as founder and CEO.^[8] She has a daily newscast on Hot Air called "Vent With Michelle Malkin."

[edit] Viewpoints

After the arrest of the spy Leandro Aragoncillo was announced, Malkin wrote, "If it means now that the White House will be applying extra scrutiny to naturalized Americans of Filipino descent working at the top levels of government and in the military, well, yes, I support that. It's obviously overdue." ^[9]

Malkin has criticised the media for being preoccupied with cases in which attractive girls go missing, and referred to this phenomenon as "Missing Pretty Girl Syndrome" or "Damsel in Distress" Syndrome.^[10]

Malkin is outspoken in opposition to the granting of automatic U.S. citizenship to babies born to tourists and temporary workers (so-called "anchor babies"), saying, "Citizenship is too precious to squander on accidental Americans in Name Only... Hamdi was raised in the Saudi kingdom. He spoke their language, not ours. He went to their schools, not ours. He embraced their culture, their religion, and their way of life. Not ours." Malkin articulated her position on "anchor babies" with regards to the case of Yaser Esam Hamdi, an American citizen born to Saudi parents who were working in the United States on temporary work visas.^[11]

Malkin has expressed support for Joshua Belile, the Marine who has been investigated for composing and performing his controversial song Hadji Girl.^[12]

In 2004, Malkin and several other bloggers accused blogger and columnist Andrew Sullivan of making bogus fund-raising claims.^{[13] [14]} Shortly thereafter, Sullivan created a parody Malkin Award for "shrill, hyperbolic, divisive and intemperate right-wing rhetoric."^[15]

When University of Kansas religion professor Paul Mirecki claimed to have been beaten up by two male attackers because of his criticism of creationism and "intelligent design", after linking^[16] to a newspaper report with a photo showing Mirecki's injuries,^[17] Malkin (along with others) raised the possibility that the claimed attack was a hoax.^[18]

On The O'Reilly Factor on December 4, 2006, she declared that San Francisco is "a hate filled city". Mr O'Reilly disagreed with her opinion. On February 16, 2007, while guest-hosting for O'Reilly, Malkin said "I have to tell you, in general, I’m skeptical of anything that has Bill of Rights tacked on to it” in discussing a proposed Passenger Bill of Rights. She later explained and defended her comment by quoting from a liberal blog ^[19]

[edit] Negative reactions to her viewpoints

Malkin occasionally posts hate mail she received, which often consists of racist or sexist epithets.^{[20] [21]} According to Malkin, she has been "attacked as an 'Aunt Thomasina and a sellout and a race traitor' by liberals of Asian background".^[22]

In November of 2004, the Norfolk, Virginia-based Virginian-Pilot ceased running Malkin's nationally syndicated column.^[23] Fellow columnist Bronwyn Lance Chester explained, "I think [Malkin] habitually mistakes shrill for thought-provoking and substitutes screaming for discussion. She's an Asian Ann Coulter."^[24] Malkin responded "I'm not Asian, I'm American, for goodness' sake. I would take the comparison to Ann Coulter as somewhat of a compliment. I have a lot of respect for Ann Coulter."^[25]

[edit] Students Against War and publishing personal information

In April 2006, Students Against War, a campus group at University of California, Santa Cruz, staged a protest against the presence of military recruiters on campus, and sent out a press release containing contact details (names, phone numbers and e-mail addresses) of their three-person "ad-hoc press team" for use by reporters. Malkin included these contact details in a blog post criticising SAW and UCSC.^[26] Malkin claims the contact information was originally taken from SAW's own website, but that later SAW had removed the information and had "wiped the info from the cached version."^[27] SAW "politely asked"^[28] her to remove the contact details; Malkin refused, writing in her blog "I am leaving it up." Furthermore she wrote "As for SAW, my message is this: You are responsible for your individual actions. Other individuals are responsible for theirs. Grow up and take responsibility."^[29] Malkin noted that none of the three students contacted her with that request, and posted a screenshot from one of several Indymedia websites where the complete press release was still available.^[30] After Malkin's post, the three SAW contacts received abusive emails and phone calls, including death threats.^[28] Malkin also received hostile e-mails.^[31] Subsequently, people opposed to Malkin published her private home address, phone number, photos of her neighborhood and maps to her house on several websites. Malkin has stated that this forced her to remove one of her children from school and move her family.^[32]

[edit] Alleged leftist intimidation campaign

On 30 June 2006, David Horowitz noted on his blog^[33] that the New York Times had printed photos and other details of the summer homes of Richard Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.^[34] The next day, Malkin referred to this incident and alleged that "[t]here is a concerted, organized effort to dig up and publicize the private home information of prominent conservatives in the media and blogosphere to intimidate them."^[35] Two days later, the Center for American Progress reported that Rumsfeld's office had given permission for the Times story and that the Secret Service said there was no security threat.^[36]

In a lengthy follow-up post, Malkin stated "The reactions were predictable: the usual moonbats accused me of hypocrisy by dredging up and lying about the infamous episode with UC Santa Cruz anti-military thugs who retaliated against me for republishing their public contact info by broadcasting my private home address and publishing photos of my neighborhood."^[37]

[edit] YouTube videos

Malkin created a "Conservative YouTubers" group at the YouTube website in July 2006.^[38] In October 2006, she stated that "[a]nti-jihad YouTube users have reported having their videos yanked and accounts suspended" as a result of a campaign by "members of the Religion of Perpetual Outrage".^[39] Later she noted reports that YouTube had failed to remove recruitment videos for street gangs posting recruitment videos^[40] and "jihadi propaganda".^[41]

In February 2007, Malkin accused YouTube of double standards after Nick Gisburne, a member of the "Rational Response Squad" who had posted videos critical of Christianity without any difficulty, was suspended for posting material critical of Islam.^[42]

[edit] Jamil Hussein

This section documents a current event. Information may change rapidly as the event progresses.

Main article: Jamil Hussein controversy

Along with bloggers Curt of 'Flopping Aces' and Bob Owens of 'Confederate Yankee', Malkin has questioned the existence and veracity of Jamil Hussein, who has been used as a source by the Associated Press in over 60 news stories about Baghdad. In November 2006, she expressed doubt about an AP report that six Sunni civilians had been burned alive as they left Friday worship services as part of an attack that destroyed several mosques.^[43] Malkin later visited Baghdad herself, and verified that the mosques are still standing and there were no independent reports of the burnings.^[44]

On January 4, 2007, the Associated Press reported that Hussein did exist and was now in danger of being arrested due for his activities with the press.^[45] Malkin later wrote:

As I noted on the 4th, the AP reported that the Ministry of Interior in Iraq has now said a Captain Jamil Hussein does work in the al Khadra police station. I regret the error. But no blogger should apologize for raising legitimate questions about AP's transparency, its reliance on local foreign stringers of dubious origins, and information that sources such as Hussein have provided the AP. I will continue to pursue some of the unresolved issues related to this.^[46]

No other journalists have managed to talk to Hussein,^[47] and Owens now claims to have evidence that "Jamil Hussein" is a pseudonym.^[48][49]

The Associated Press has questioned Malkin's attack on their credibility. AP Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll has said "I never quite understood why people chose to disbelieve us about this particular man on this particular story... AP runs hundreds of stories a day, and has run thousands of stories about things that have happened in Iraq." Carroll pointed out that critics like Malkin should be more concerned with the fact that Hussein could face imprisonment for being a source to journalists, than with how AP handled the situation. "I think a little perspective is warranted here," she said. "While this has been going on, hundreds if not thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed and hundreds of serviceman have died."^[50] AP itself has lost four employees to violence in Iraq to date.

[edit] Notes and references

[edit] Books

• Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild, Regnery Publishing, 2005, ISBN 0-89526-030-1
• In Defense of Internment: The Case for "Racial Profiling" in World War II and the War On Terror, Regnery Publishing, 2004, ISBN 0-89526-051-4
• Invasion: How America Still Welcomes Terrorists, Criminals, and Other Foreign Menaces, Regnery Publishing, 2002, ISBN 0-89526-075-1

[edit] External links

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[edit] Malkin's sites

• Malkin's official site
• The Hot Air site
• Archive of Malkin's columns at Townhall.com
• The Immigration Blog which is hosted at Malkin's official site
• Photos by Malkin and other Hot Air staff on Flickr

[edit] Anti-Malkin

• A series of blog posts by professors Eric Muller and Greg Robinson critiquing In Defense of Internment
• Is Michelle Malkin a Journalist? - a journalist, blogger and critic of Malkin says no

Persondata
NAME	Malkin, Michelle
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Author, journalist
DATE OF BIRTH	October 20, 1970
PLACE OF BIRTH	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH