As utterly obnoxious–and insulting to voters–as the White House’s “war on women” was, there were moments when I actually felt a pang of sympathy for the loyal foot soldiers dispatched to pillage the news cycle. Carrying the banner of this base anti-intellectualism required a certain shamelessness that was off-putting, but at times strangely pitiful. One such example came after Rush Limbaugh insulted the 30-year-old liberal activist Sandra Fluke, and in response Neera Tanden, once an adviser to both Clintons and to President Obama and now president of the Center for American Progress, was reduced to tweeting this:
Outraged Rush is attacking all women thru Sandra Fluke? Pl sign CAP’s petition: http://cap.af/xNDJwc – I #standwithsandra & hope you will 2
That the Obama White House has taken men and women of repute and transformed them into Axelrodian snark artists long preceded Tanden’s tweet. But it caught my attention because it seemed to be the reductio ad absurdum of modern liberalism. Until, that is, Elizabeth Warren bailed her out.
Warren, the Democratic Senate candidate challenging Scott Brown in Massachusetts, was the subject of a rather bizarre controversy this week when it was revealed she claimed Native American heritage as her career in academia proceeded, only to drop the dubious claim once she reached the pinnacle of her academic career track: Harvard Law faculty. She has not handled the controversy well, to say the least. And the wreckage of her campaign’s attempts at spinning this make you want to look away.
But don’t. Because Warren is playing an important role in our political discourse: she is the ghost of liberalism future. Warren’s alleged use of affirmative action, if true, would have to be the most egregious abuse of the system at the expense of minorities we’ve seen yet. Elizabeth Warren is, as a white woman, statistically speaking very much a member of this country’s majority. The only category in which she is a true minority is wealth: Elizabeth Warren is very, very rich.
But Warren was not done making a mockery of a system she seems to have exploited, and in so doing risked discrediting. To call her on these shenanigans, she explained, is sexist. Hot Air has caught her repeating this claim, making it a pillar of her defense. First, her campaign spokeswoman said this: “Once again, the qualifications and ability of a woman are being called into question by Scott Brown who did the same thing with the Supreme Court nomination of Elena Kagan. It’s outrageous.”
Then Warren waded into it herself, saying of Brown: “What does he think it takes for a woman to be qualified?”
The sad part about all this is that Warren is clearly intelligent and dedicated to her (redistributionist) cause. Back in August, Christopher Caldwell wrote a piece on her in the Weekly Standard in which he praised her earlier writing as “brilliant and counterintuitive work.” Though many on the right object to Warren’s politics, no one thought she was ill-equipped intellectually for the important debate on economic policy now sweeping the public sphere.
Yet in the age of Obama, this is how campaigns are run. Warren may have interesting things to say, but she, too, has become something of a liberal cliché. Despite her obvious smarts, she has reflexively fallen back on charges of sexism, even when they are so ridiculous as to make you cringe. If Warren, a rich, white, Harvard professor, is a victim, everyone is.
Why does this matter? Because it reveals that the left thinks affirmative action is a joke, another cudgel with which to attack political opponents at the expense of minorities who might, thanks to liberalism’s insistence on keeping students in failed school districts, actually put the policy to some good use. And because if Elizabeth Warren is unable to advance coherent liberal policy arguments, then there may be none to advance.
Elizabeth Warren's tribal name: Little Big Liar
I thought it was Spreading Bull.
Ethnic pride in "1/32 Cherokee heritage" or feigining active duty in a ginned up "war on women" aren't the strategies of a campaign that is confident of its electoral chances in November. We shall see.
Squaw Little Big Liar. Liz feels the Indians were sexist, thus Squaw.
Few doubt that the very succesful can have empathy for the poor. That members of this group may seek to make the world a better place……even if many of us disagree with their approaches to this problem…….isn't…or shouldn't be the question regarding Ms. Warren. What should be asked is why…..why so often….she fibs about her past. Not just with the Native American issue. That's one thing. Her life story is another, If folks outside of Massachusetts could see Ms. Warren's TV ads they'd come away convinced that she spent a childhood in abject poverty. That she lives today as a middle class American. Nothing could be furthur from the truth. Elizabeth Warren's father was a succesful corporate lawyer. She never had to struggle financially. For her 16th birthday she received a used MG to drive to school in. And today she lives in a home valued at over six milllion dollars. I don't begrudge her any of her success. Good for her. But, why all the lies? Why?
Without the lies she has nothing to believe in.
Modern liberalism isn't a tragedy, but rather, a farce.
The moral of this sordid little story? That no matter how intelligent the liberal, liberalism will sooner or later compel her to behave like an absolute idiot.
Dennis Miller revealed Elizabeth Warren's official Native American name: n"Spreading Bull"
I thought it was: Dances with Pinocchios
I'll have to take you at your word that she has the smarts to be a Harvard law professor. However, one has to wonder. Why did she feel the need to lie about her background if she could do it honestly? She has played the race and the sex card…both ina disgracefully dishonest fashion. Why does all this garbage come out of Harvard law?
Elizabeth Warren lacks the educational credential — graduation from Harvard, Yale, or Stanford — necessary for admission to the legal academy. She graduated from Rutgers-Newark School of Law, one of America's top 82 law schools. In other words, the best school in Newark. As a white woman, Elizabeth Warren would not be welcome on a law faculty, because those people are horribly snobby. As a Cherokee princess, she would be in high demand.
Right on, poguemahoney. The amount of nonsensical dribble churned out by the plutocracy at the least sign of serious challenge to the money hegemony is breathtaking.
If she's dumber than a fence post she is smart enough.
Wow…what a piece of crap article. I wonder you don't turn your immaculate scrutiny on the Conservatives and their claims everyone that disagrees with them is waging a war on….everything; train that immaculately critical and perfect eye upon their death panels, their Birtherism, their hysterical "Socialist" and "communist attacks, their Kenyan anti-colonialism attacks…etc etc etc etc etc…the list is so long it is wearying. If you are truly so very upset over all of this "anti-intellectual" discourse that will soon bring the world to an end perhaps you should train that eye upon your own party first. Of course you won't, being the greasy little propagandist you are.
"greasy little propagandist"? n nWell, we have the pissant papist perspective.
Adolescents change the subject when they have no facts to refute the thesis presented. Watch those pimples junior.
" I wonder you don't turn your immaculate scrutiny on the Conservatives " n nSuch an absurd non-point. n nI wonder why you don't use your immaculate brain?
So you approve of the death panels and fake "certificates of live births?" Kool-Aid is toxic, ask your EPA!!
I see you have the straw man strategy down…take some positions of a few radical wing nuts and paint everyone who disagrees with you as subscribing to them. I suppose the statements by Van Jones and Louis Farrakhan represent to entirety of liberal thought.
For a very long time liberal "arguments" were part of the mainstream discussion only because conservatives (and moderates) actually took them seriously, as if unable to believe someone would put forward a national "narrative" composed solely of nonsensical and pathetic balderdash. But rather than taking advantage of that the liberals just kept piling on more nonsense fully expecting that, with the aid of extreme left wing media, they will continue on the same road. nBy now, with the election of a totally unqualified person as a president of the country, a person who run his entire campaign and subsequent term in office, entirely on the premise of this nonsensical liberal narrative, this has reached a critical mass and is increasingly no longer treated as a serious argument by all, except the most gullible, conservatives and moderates. You can see this in many forms, from the total rejection of Obama's childishly naive and destructive agenda by non-liberal legislators, to large outpouring of support for the wrongly accused and virtually lynched, "white Hispanic" George Zimmerman, to widespread ridicule of Cherokee Woman "Stands with a Pout" Warren claims that she did not use affirmative action pretense to advance her career.
Two additional examples come from the chilly reception the Supreme Court gave to the administration's arguments in the health care litigation and the Arizona immigration case. The Solicitor General's positions elicited derisive laughter and not much more.
I think it speaks volumes that Elizabeth Warren, a woman and therefore a beneficiary of "affirmative action" policies, felt a need to bolster her "credentials" by listing herself as Native American. With a double minority status how could she fail? n nEvidently, in the bizarre world of affirmative action/diversity preferences one leg up is not enough. n nThis strange charade has gone on long enough. We are currently marking the 150th anniversary of the Civil War. It has been seven generations since slavery was outlawed. Brown vs. Board of Education was 60 years ago, and the Great Society was nearly 50 years ago. After 15 trillion dollars in anti-poverty programs and two generations of affirmative action we need to step back and honestly evaluate the effectiveness of these programs. n nIf there is no end in sight, or at least a light at the end of this two-track tunnel, we must admit that we have institutionalized race and gender-based discrimination and created privileged classes (some animals are indeed more equal than others). n nElizabeth Warren is not under-privileged, she is gaming the system.
I myself wouldn't weep for the dismantling of affirmative action but this mess didn't come out of a vacuum. The institutionalized abuse of affirmative action quotas got its head of steam up in the 70's with the bureaucratically entrenched exploitation of resentment and grievance and here we are: some rich white chick trading on her mythical Native American "heritage" because she tell us, she was lonely, and hoped to be invited to Amerinda dances.
Totally agree with one exception: it's a big stretch to call this woman a chick!
After $5 Trillion goes to the War on Poverty, which has been an unmitigated disaster, Progressives instead of admitting the failure of the WOP, doubledown with the affirmative action program, that has been gamed by a Liberal Woman, incredible.
“Warren is unable to advance coherent liberal policy arguments, then there may be none to advance.”r nr nHellloooo?!
Nobody working for the next paycheck gives a damn about the 'war on women' or the 'war on housewives'. They feel if there's war afoot, they're the first casualties. The 2008 economic 'meltdown' is still smelting. We bucket along, one promise after another. But Republicans can't go into the fall expecting success from vague formula to disguise same-old deregulate/tax cut standby.
Well what do you want. President Obama or President Romney?
Too bad Barney Frank and Chris Dodd blocked both Bush and McCain's attempts to avoid the economic meltdown.
The President apparently claimed to be Indonesian to get a scholarship that was for foreigners only. Ms. Warren claimed to be 1/32 Native American for roughly similar purposes.
In each case, the individual in question felt that they were entitled to something, and were going to get it, irrespective of the rules, or the facts.
In a related story, Al Gore still strenuously insists that he is an expert on the environment in spite of having scraped by with a D in the class in college.
It seems that “progressives” can’t stop pretending to be something they aren’t. Or maybe they just believe that their hearts are so pure that the rules just shouldn’t apply to them, as they do to everybody else.
clear ether
eon
What is so sad is that the liberal lemming voters will continue to vote for Warren, the CA. dunces that for decades now has made Ca. the worst state for business health, and for every pol who has ruined almost every large city in the NE and West and all of them have Dems in charge. Red States keep healthy, and Blue states keep getting worse. Whether it is Detroit, Mich, NYC, Phila, Balt., DC, LA, SF, the leftist social, eco. ed., policies have destroyed our heritage, history, and values plus our free enterprise system. Obama is just the cream of the withered crop..This article on Warren is just proof it this and she is just another Forward socialist type.
Liberalism contains no truth. It uses no facts, it cannot use logic, and it has no argument. This is the natural result of an ideology that believes that the end justifies the means. Warren's behavior is also indicative if liberalism's effect on society. We have become a "beat the system" society, where even the most privileged liberals have no qualms about gaming the system if it will give them the slightest advantage. Like any liberal, she is thoroughly corrupt. n nAre there corrupt conservatives? Of course. But conservatism as an ideology does not believe in victory at any cost. Conservatism as a political system does not set up policies that are designed to be gamed. For example, the sub-prime loans that were designed to get unqualified people into federally guaranteed mortgages.
I'll remember this comment the next time I hear Michele Bachmann say that evolution is "just a theory". Or maybe I'll think of it the next time I hear a Republican say that global warming is caused by "sun spots". For a group that "contains not truth", we do have science on our side. n nOh, sorry, I forgot science lies. n nNext time, you might want to check out politifact.com before you speak. n nOh, wait, I just remembered the media is controlled by Maxists.
You embody many logical errors here: n n* Michelle Bachman and "some" conservatives do not believe Darwinian evolution to be true, and they misstate when they say it's "only" a theory, BUT you will find many Irish Catholic liberals who hold the same view. It's not just a "conservative" thing. n nYou utterly misstate the position of skeptics, liberal AND conservative, about "global warming". First, it's been demonstrated many times by credentialed scientists that there is nothing unusual about the earth's climate today, and that the climate ALWAYS changes. Second, one of the counter ideas to the utterly and totally theoretical CO2 argument, which relies entirely on computer models ( that are not "experiments" and their results not "data") is that changes in solar output are a source of cooling and warming. Sunspots have nothing to do with cooling or warming, (tho they are indicia of solar activity) and you apparently lack the scientific background to know that. How does that make you any better than Bachman? n n* Name one serious person who says "science lies". You will find some people who think some aspects of science are false, and some scientists liars, and among such people some who will be able to offer a case as to why and how, but you will find such people on both sides of the political spectrum . You will also find people of all persuasions who believe nonsense. How about you: do you believe in accupuncture, aromatherapy, rolfing, dianetics, naturopathy, chriopractic, auras, Feng Shui, frankenfood, homeopathy, Freudianism, …..? They all pass as "science" and all are fraudulent. n n* objectively, much of the media IS controlled by leftists. Some are Marxists, but a lot are just self-described liberals and "progressives". Your blanket statement is just another one of your over-the-top generalizations that you IMPUTE to conservatives. Next thing, you 'll be telling us that conservatives "hate government" — the same conservatives who revere the system of government embodied in the Constitution. n n* if the depth of your knowledge comes from politifact.com, deep down. you're shallow.
Elizabeth Warren, liberal darling who was famously quoted as saying that Rich people wouldn't have gotten there without the largess of Government, is a total fraud. Interestingly, this seems to have gotten little coverage outside of a couple of Boston Herald articles, and sadly I'm sure this won't be the last we hear from this woman. The real question is how she now performs in the upcoming election. If she does win, despite this absurdly fraudulent behavior, then the state of MA, and quite possibly, the rest of the nation, is totally screwed.
Sadly, the Spreading Bull mishap may have no effect. Blumenthal was elected in CT even though he lied about service in Vietnam. We are already screwed.
Maybe Prince George's County Executive Rushern L. Baker III can get Warren to front his elusive casino emporium. Declare National Harbor a reservation.
Liberalism is filled with hypocrisy like that, accusing everyone else of "selfishness" while you selfishly live high off the hog and tell everyone else to sacrifice. Where I grew up, in WA, everyone lived in nice houses on a reasonable amount of land with good cars that they drove everywhere, but these people have the nerve to say that everyone else needs to ride mass-transit and live in tall towers in apartments slightly smaller then they are, and to talk about how "guilty" they feel about "not doing more for the environment."
I'm 1/32 Liberal! Where's MY FREE STUFF!
Liberals who live by the sword, die by the sword. Liberals manufacture fictional crises then legislate entitlement programs around them all so that they, themselves, can use loopholes to take advantage of them. n nWarren is just one of many who have lied to take advantage of entitlements, so much so that she started believing the lies. Liberals convince themselves, and each other, that they are the only intellectuals that are doing good by the downtrodden and disadvantaged. They pat each other on the back at cocktail parties and $25K per plate fundraisers. Over time they actually convince themselves it's all true. n
Scott Brown has been very fortunate in his opponents. Had the democrats come up with someone who was just a competent politician, and not a Democratic superstar, he would have been toast. Instead, they chose a couple of Democratic caricatures. Martha Coakley was one of the witch hunters in the Fells Acres Day Care Center preschool trial, and Elizabeth Warren is now revealed to be an affirmative action hustler. The Democratic Party in Massachusetts has shown itself to be very foolish.
Problem being that in order to be a competent liberal politican in MA, the first requirement is that you be liberal. That pretty much eradicates any chance that you can be competent. Liberalism is a mental disease causing one to force reality away from the decision making process. That, by itself, limits available competent politicians.__If they can't run on their make-believe Camelot royalty record, they are helpless.
First of all, I can't imagine any minority, who took advantage of the liberals program, ending up enjoying the experience. How would you like it if, every day you're in college, someone is reminding you that, without them you wouldn't be there. It's no wonder there is so much hatred expressed by many academics.
When will someone produce a CDIB (Certified Degree of Indian Birth) card for Pocahontas? (calling Dan Rather) The BIA knows she's a liar. Barry Oh? profited from affirmative action too. It's like a cancer. ~(Ä)~
Fauxcahantas
The issue is simple: Affirmative Retribution is a war on conservative white males, and intended to benefit anyone else…. n nThe real shortage: Republican female law professors. Big time. But we never hear that….
Warren: Me heap big Senator! Wantum wampum for poor! Wantum protect papoose! Wantum clean river flow to Water God from Sky! Wantum eagle feathers for me, wantum chicken feathers for you!