Megyn Kelly Leaves NBC with Her Full $69 Million and Gives Meritocracy the Finger

Megyn Kelly has been off the air on NBC since October, when she shared some unfortunate and completely unsurprising thoughts on blackface and Halloween costumes: "But what is racist? Because you do get in trouble if you are a white person who puts on blackface on Halloween, or a black person who puts on whiteface for Halloween. Back when I was a kid that was OK, as long as you were dressing up as, like, a character."

On Friday, NBC announced that the network was formally parting ways with Kelly, who kicked off her short-lived stint on the network by giving airtime to conspiracy theorist and school shooting-denier Alex Jones. It's not clear what about this caught NBC off-guard or even why they gave Kelly a talk show in the first place. Whatever her strengths may be as a reporter, setting people at ease and projecting warmth and charm have never been her strong suit. The ratings for her time slot jumped as soon as she was pulled. And it's pretty on-brand for her to go to the mat for Halloween blackface after vigorously insisting on-air in 2013 that Santa is white.

Anyway, the joke is still on NBC because the network has paid out the remaining half of Kelly's contract, meaning she's walked away with a total of $69 million for her year and a half of work.

It's as strong an argument as that one Koch relative who makes money bag shirts that meritocracy isn't really a thing. But don't worry: She's already confirmed that she'll "definitely" be back on TV, so some other lucky network will get to do this all over again.