I could see ME snobbery over monitoring. In my experience (I make my own speakers so I can't be snobby because nobody gives a rat's ass) when I've had my monitoring screwy, I could not work worth a damn. The closer I got to good monitoring, the more I could do good work.
As for the processing, it's much easier to take any flexible piece of equipment and make it sound bad than make it sound good, so it's a moot point. I've just finished trying to wreak havoc on the WIMP project with literally $30 worth of software. I had to do a lot of workarounds. I was peak limiting by selecting them one by one in the wave editor and reducing them to 80% volume, over and over and over... it's so much more about 'what you're trying to make the sound do' than 'what you have in your chain' that the chain is ALMOST irrelevant.
That's why they say 'Driver, not car'.
My rule of thumb is, if they're going on about the chain but don't devote a thought to speakers, they aren't MEs, they're mixers. If they have expensive monitoring but haven't done a thing for room treatment, they're not great MEs. It's as simple as that. And you can make room treatment VERY cheaply, so this is not a matter of needing mucho dinero.
I envy Brad's Nautilus- but they wouldn't work in my room. I don't have enough space for a radiation pattern like that. Nearfield first-reflections would kill me. I'm running very directional horns and firing them at a strongly diffusive back wall with spot absorbers all over the nearfield-reflection spots. That's MY snobby-factor- and there's lots better out there, but I know to make the most of what I got.