Elizabeth Warren's "Pocahontas" Problem?

[tpfkaw]

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You know who else has a Cherokee great-great-great grandmother?  Yours truly, and everyone else with at least one parent from the Lower Midwest.  I've never even *considered* actually representing myself as "Native American" on college/job applications etc., because that's first of all pretty dishonest and second of all I would've thought there's no way it could actually work.  Apparently it can, laughably enough - maybe I should put it on my grad school application along with my essay about how whitey keeps me down.

[tpfkaw]

Jindell and Rick Perry have Native American roots and when a Democrat has it, it is a net negative but they are prez material.

They didn't exploit it for career gain.  (Also it's somewhat more recent, I believe).

[tpfkaw]

I don't care about "cheating" a system that is unjust to begin with - race-based affirmative action. In any case what she wrote is technically correct. This shouldn't be a big deal.

There are some people who will care strongly if this is roughly as the right here is painting it, but many of them likely won't be voting for Brown anyway. Any problem for Warren will be to a significant degree a matter of turnout (which was also a large part of Coakley's problem), and that could indeed end up being a problem, but it's somewhat less likely in a Presidential year.

I, for one, am getting increasingly tempted to vote for Brown (as opposed to writing in Carla Howell or something) for the sole purpose of keeping Warren out.  This is also absolutely *not* going to play well in Southie or Quincy or Worcester or anyplace else where folks "work for a living."  The Herald should take this and run with it.

I don't care about "cheating" a system that is unjust to begin with - race-based affirmative action. In any case what she wrote is technically correct. This shouldn't be a big deal.

Awesome!  Harvard, here I come!

[tpfkaw]

"High cheekbones, like all the Indians have."

If a Republican in a high-profile Senate race had said this, it'd be all over the national news and there would be a big long thread in which all the liberals, Nathan included, would be yelling about how this is proof of how evil and hateful all Republicans are.  (Not that I like Republicans, but there *is* an *obvious* double standard).

[tpfkaw]

She is a complete joke and I'm someone who wanted her to live up to the hype. Can't say I'm surprised though.

Why does MA field such awful Democratic candidates from an infinite pool of options? I guess years of just relying on the Kennedys contributed.

You pretty much hit the nail on the head.  Political machines are very insular, clubby, and downright weird, and the candidates they nominate often reflect that (the saving grace being that non-existent oppositions frequently nominate mentally-ill and/or extremist candidates running "paper" campaigns).  Warren is proving to be the Democratic equivalent of Katherine Harris or Sharron Angle; she may well lose an election that the Democrats ought to easily win by 15 points or more if they nominated someone even remotely likeable or who even pretends to be a moderate.

The other reason why they don't have a nominee is because in a political machine there generally isn't an "infinite pool of options" - there are so many multi-decade incumbents that the bench is pretty short.  Not only that but everyone high-profile wants to wait for a sure victory before running, and won't declare for an election in which they have even the possibility of losing.

[tpfkaw]

Let's talk about something of substance instead, like ethics.

http://bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/05/03/brown-staff-treads-line-blends-official-work-with-campaign-activity/464XAe7Tu1n4WwUBIgquMI/story.html

May not be anything, but it's certainly more worth discussing than this. How much more of this sort of thing is really going on? It should be looked into.

So your opinion is that nobody receiving a government salary should be allowed to work on a political campaign?  Good to know!

[tpfkaw]

Let's talk about something of substance instead, like ethics.

http://bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/05/03/brown-staff-treads-line-blends-official-work-with-campaign-activity/464XAe7Tu1n4WwUBIgquMI/story.html

May not be anything, but it's certainly more worth discussing than this. How much more of this sort of thing is really going on? It should be looked into.

So your opinion is that nobody receiving a government salary should be allowed to work on a political campaign?  Good to know!

The law says they can't campaign on federal time. Brown needs to explain exactly how much his official staff is involved with his campaign.

And the article says they weren't campaigning on federal time, making it quite literally much ado about nothing, unlike Warren lying (or at least maintaining a very dubious half-truth) for career gain.

I mean, people in this thread are saying this proves Brown is desperate, but if your best "scandals" are that his daughter's on his health insurance and one of his congressional staffers posted a video to his campaign youtube account...

[tpfkaw]

i was never a big fan of Warren in the first place. She just strikes me as a caricature of a neurotic female pol similar to someone like Bella Abzug. The democrats should have found a less foot-in-mouth candidate like Lynch or McGovern.

Lynch is pro-life, McGovern is Fidel Castro and FARC's #1 US fan.