So, I tried to watch Bernie Sanders’ big speech yesterday, which was entitled “How Democratic Socialism Is the Only Way to Defeat Oligarchy and Authoritarianism.”
The speech was touted (preposterously, IMO) by at least one pundit as akin to then-candidate Obama’s famously effective “race” speech in Philadelphia. Obama’s speech, if you’ll recall, allowed the candidate to put the Reverend Wright flap behind him. Sanders’ speech was allegedly delivered to quell the specter of “socialism” that hangs over Sanders’ campaign.
I think Republicans are defanging the negative connotations associated with the word “socialism” by slapping the label willy-nilly on everything that benefits a non-corporate person. But while there’s zero chance I’ll vote for Sanders in the primary, I was interested to hear what he had to say about democratic socialism because I figured he’d use the occasion to stake out a difference between himself and a candidate I am interested in voting for: Elizabeth Warren.
I’ll level with y’all: I got bored and wandered off early in the speech. But I did read the transcript, and you can too here, if you’re interested. I can’t really recommend it, though, because it was basically a recycled stump speech from the 2020 race, which is basically a recycled stump speech from the 2016 race.
Americans in general have a hazy understanding of what the word “socialism” means. I am no exception, but here’s my definition: The distinction between social democracy as practiced in, say, Sweden, and democratic socialism has to do with ownership of the means of production. Democratic socialists want the people to own the means of production — eventually, and by democratic consensus — whereas social democrats are mostly focused on regulating capitalism and ensuring its fruits are shared more equitably.
If that’s the correct definition, Sanders is a social democrat, not a democratic socialist, according to his speech yesterday, as was FDR, whose political heir Sanders says he aspires to be. Elizabeth Warren is also a social democrat by that definition, and so is every candidate who wants to transform the way wealth is distributed in the United States in a truly significant way.
Anyhoo, since Sanders failed to make a case for himself over Warren in a definitional sense, the job was left to his paid and unpaid media spokespeople, including one perched over at The Post, Elizabeth Bruenig, who had to resort to misrepresenting Warren’s views in a column entitled “So, what’s the difference between Warren and Sanders?” Bruenig accuses Warren of tinkering around the margins in the conclusion:
But for those who see our political moment as a crisis greater in breadth and content than a few unenforced or misbegotten laws, Sanders’s wide-ranging, historical approach may have greater appeal on its second try than its first.
Ms. Bruenig shouldn’t count on that. The real difference between the two is getting clearer by the day.
germy
germy
rikyrah
I thought that I would see a lot of stuff on the Twitter about the speech. Saw zilch
rikyrah
The Native American issue isn’t going away for Warren. She needs a response.
???
I’m surprised very few of you fail to realize none of y’all should actually want me asking the question, “when did Elizabeth Warren realize she was White?”
Y’all shouldnt want me asking that question. pic.twitter.com/81l2N5fBfe
— Amene (@Ange_Amene) June 13, 2019
joel hanes
One real difference is that Warren has a plan, and some experience in making plans into reality, while Sanders has morally-motivated aspirational talking points, and shows no sign of understanding that a plan is needed, nor any ability to make an actual plan — much less do the political work to make a plan actually work.
In short, she’s an effective politician, and he’s a crank.
Chyron HR
@joel hanes:
BIRD
PODIUM
Any questions?????
japa21
Yep. Warren actually knows what she is talking about and is actually competent. Sanders not so much.
Betty Cracker
@rikyrah: I don’t think there’s any possible response Warren could give that would satisfy people who are still upset about that issue. She fucked up. She admitted she fucked up. She apologized. People who are angry about it will either decide they can’t vote for her because of that or not.
low-tech cyclist
Yeppers. Sanders is rhetoric, Warren is substance.
rikyrah
@Betty Cracker:
I don’t think that we’re discussing the same thing. What exactly do you think is Warren Native American issue?
matt
I thought this piece & the comments over at LGM were pretty good about describing dynamics (keeping Corbyn in charge of Labour in the UK) that are also in play with the Sanders phenomenon in the USA.
Basically, cults of personality tend to destroy political parties in democracies is the brief takeaway.
http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2019/06/the-immutability-of-the-corbyn-leadership
matt
@rikyrah: Nothing personal, but that’s dumb. There’s no actual issue – it’s just a drummed up Republican attack that’s 95% bullshit (i.e Warren’s career was due to affirmative action which is false and no Democrat should amplify that kind of specious racist bullshit). The 5% that’s not bullshit has already been addressed. While it’s unfortunate that they found a Native American to flip out about the DNA thing, that doesn’t invalidate that DNA evidence proves Native American ancestry for Warren.
low-tech cyclist
@rikyrah:
I think “I made a mistake, I shouldn’t have done that, now let’s talk about our President who lies almost continually, and who’s used the office of the Presidency to enrich himself and his family” will more than suffice.
low-tech cyclist
@rikyrah:
Since you’re the one who’s brought this up in two threads so far today, what do YOU think is Warren’s Native American issue?
rikyrah
@matt:
But, it hasn’t been addressed. And, you poo-pooing it doesn’t make it so.
low-tech cyclist
@rikyrah:
I suppose we could take turns taking guesses about what you think the unaddressed issue is.
Or you could just tell us.
MattF
I’ve been hearing hair-splitting arguments about ‘What is socialism?’ since I was in high school– and yeah, I went to an unusual high school and no, I’ve never read Marx and don’t care about the mysteries of the dialectic. The actual result is that arguments like this recall my teen-aged angst about what clique I wanna hang out with in the cafeteria.
Ask instead, ‘Who is behaving ethically?’, ‘Who is using the notorious ‘worse is better’ argument?’, ‘Who is just trying to get you mad?’ Hard questions, but it’s better to mull over hard questions than try to figure out who your real pals are.
Leto
@low-tech cyclist: She already did, but like the Gilibrand/Franken issue it won’t go away. It’s the same as the people who bring up Warren was a republican though the 80s. Also the author of that tweet saying, “You don’t want me asking the question I just asked” is rhetorically dumb. Go ahead and discuss the issue you’re dying to discuss.
Barbara
@rikyrah: You need to specify what you think it is. Otherwise it’s just a lot of insinuation intended to amplify a problem by not specifying what it actually is. Like, “but her emails!”
schrodingers_cat
How is this different from communism? Do they also want 5 year plans and to get rid of the stock market?
rikyrah
@low-tech cyclist:
I thought her bumbling of the DNA test was her Native American Issue. It showed no thought, or planning, and she didn’t frame it well, but, I was like, she could do better.
But, then, we get the card where she calls herself Native American, and the Harvard Law School article designating her the first tenured ‘ woman of color’ professor.
THAT is a problem.
As someone wrote on another blog:
Betty Cracker
@rikyrah: I assumed the tweeter was making a point related to Warren’s past claims of NA ancestry and perhaps also to Warren’s compounding that error with a DNA test, which is super-controversial in NA communities. The tweet raises the issue in a novel way, but if it’s not related to that, I have no idea what it’s about.
Cheryl Rofer
I just turn off on this argument. The word “socialism” and its relatives have been so badly used in American political discourse that they mean nothing at all. If the candidates are smart, they will talk about what they plan to do and mention that word only to say that when a rightwinger uses it, it’s only as a smear.
Barbara
@schrodingers_cat: I always understood the difference as being that the default assumption in a communist economy is that there is no private property at all. Whereas, socialist economies are socialist by degrees — property is by default privately owned, with the state assuming ownership and control of various elements based on fairness and efficiency. E.g., in some nations, utilities might be publicly owned, whereas, in others, all kinds of factories might be publicly owned. Most western nations realized over time that it made zero sense to own enterprises such as coal mines and automobile factories, after nationalizing them after WWII. Countries like China still own or control a lot of enterprise that would be private here or in Europe, but have relaxed control over “personal” assets like real estate, as well as smaller scale enterprises. Still, state owned enterprises are vast, especially in things like shipping and banking.
ETA: If FDR is Sanders’ model, he is clearly not a Democratic Socialist. He is a Social Democrat. I don’t know why he feels the need to describe himself that way.
Rick Smeltzer
What’s not to like about Warren? She appears to be the smartest candidate in the field so far & has a plan for everything. Bernie isn’t a Democrat, so I won’t vote for him. He needs to bow out gracefully and let the real Democrats secure the nomination.
Leto
@rikyrah: I’m glad this wasn’t discussed Feb 9, 2019. Literally no one has covered this breaking issue.
Wait, the Boston Globe covered this last September and determined, “it had no bearing on Warren’s hiring at distinguished universities, including Harvard.” Shut the front door!
I’m glad whoever you quoted above in that tweet has finally caught up to 2017. Way to stay on top of current political events. I’m sure you’re going to make the right decision in 2022.
Brachiator
@rikyrah:
But there is no real issue here. And what would be the point of responding to random Twitter noise.
The people who most want to keep this alive are generally white racists. And, as always, that piece of garbage, Trump.
It is no surprise that white conservatives bring this crap up not just to attack Warren, but to rail against affirmative action.
AThornton
The basic idea of Socialism, per Marx, is: from each according to their ability, to each according to their work
There’s a thundering horde of mutually antagonistic groups “having a debate” (Read: Shouting Match) about how, when, where, what, who, and why it can be implemented. These generally divide rather neatly into Authoritarian as in the various flavors of Marxist/Leninism currently exemplified by the PRC and Libertarian such as the Social Democratic Parties in Europe.
Cacti
@rikyrah:
Looks like the hive mind is starting to swarm on you.
None of them think it’s an issue, therefore there is no issue. And now the name calling will commence.
Peale
@Brachiator: it’s like asking Barack Obama when he stopped identifying himself as a Kenyan American. If Warren thought she was Native American then why not run for Senator as a Native American even if she were proven mistaken.
Brachiator
@matt:
A critical difference is that Corbyn is the leader of the Labour Party, while Sanders is trying to use the Democratic Party to launch his ambitions.
Aziz, light!
My otherwise white (well, Jewish) nephew in Tulsa has a small amount of Cherokee heritage (enough to give him tribal membership), and recently gave his newborn daughter a Cherokee name. It’s not uncommon for people from that part of Oklahoma to have a little Indian blood, and to want to express a little pride in that fact. For a flaming liberal like my nephew, it’s a way to assuage the guilt of being an Oklahoman, which is a word that now means “stolen from the Indians.”
If someone in Harvard’s public affairs office tried to score some diversity points by classifying Warren as a PoC, I don’t hold that against her. I am not persuaded that she ever tried to use her very small degree of Indian heritage for personal gain.
I hate to see this Republican framing doing so well. It’s just another way to split Dem votes and suppress turnout in 2020.
Dorothy A. Winsor
montanareddog
@Barbara:
He is incapable of being a team player which is why he is not a member of the Democratic Party. So, my guess this is just his branding, to paint a more positive justification for not being a Democrat.
Major Major Major Major
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@rikyrah: @rikyrah:
That’s the part that she needs to address. Seeing the card in her handwriting is impactful. This legitimately bothers a lot of people, and it will matter politically.
Fair or not, it is a significant political vulnerability for the general election. It will define her in the eyes of low information voters, like “emails” did for Hillary.
Claiming that she was justified in doing so because she had a tiny amount of Native American ancestry (while enjoying the privileges that come with being perceived as “white” in our racist society) is not a great response.
Apologizing and acknowledging that her behavior was a result of her ignorance of her white privilege, and connecting her growth in awareness of her own privileges with (white) America’s growing awareness of the same – that might be a better approach.
She might want to consider delivering a high profile speech on race and white privilege, in a similar vein to Obama’s 2016 speech intended to put Rev. Wright “controversy” behind him. So good timing might not be until some time in 2020.
I love Warren’s policy chops, but I’m concerned about her political liabilities among low-info voters going into 2020.
Immanentize
I’ve listened to Warren’s NA answers for years and I totally understand her response.
She was told by her parents that she was part NA.
Her father’s family scorned her mother and that side of the family because they all thought they were part NA (NA is also a type of stand in for poor and outsider)
This was in part responsible for her parents eloping, rather than getting a big happy wedding.
She believed her parents.
My parents almost couldn’t get married because my father was Catholic and an immigrant. My Mom’s family called him an “animal” and a “machine tool.”
Meanwhile, the Catholic Church wouldn’t marry my parents because she was a Methodist and (probably more important to the priest) not slovak. Luckily all my grandmothers and grandfathers on both sides were better than their other relatives and welcomed my Dad and Mom into the respective families. I fully understand her story.
I have worked with Tribes in the Northeast and in the Southwest. I can also explain a bit about the sub-stories regarding heritage versus tribal membership….
But instead, here is picture of Elizabeth Warren before she was a blond
schrodingers_cat
This blog post title reminds me of the debate between People’s Front of Judea vs. Judean People’s Front.
FlipYrWhig
Every last fucking thing Sanders does smacks of dorm-room bullshitting, like, “Dude, I know for a fact that in AMSTERDAM you can [$THING], but The Man won’t let us have that.”
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
Ha! Very funny. And so true.
schrodingers_cat
@FlipYrWhig: He is the Putin (Soviet) plant to destroy the D party.
Fair Economist
I think it’s very telling that Warren is doing far better with voters following the primary closely than with those not yet following. She’s very compelling, and the more you know about her the more you like her. She’s going to get a big boost from the debates; she has good stage presence *and* great ideas and debates are a great platform for her.
FlipYrWhig
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon: Hmm, I guess it’s too bad she’ll have to be matched against a mistake-free opponent of sterling character. :/
BobS
A definition of socialism I like is ‘the public ownership of the production and/or administration and/or delivery of goods and/or services.
This seems to encompass everything that makes the United States function- city services like police/fire/ems/libraries/road maintenance/public schools/public parks/museums, etc, county services like airports/parks/sheriff’s/courts/health departments, etc, state services like public universities/health departments/state parks/bridges/Medicaid, etc. and federal services like Social Security/Medicare/VA/national parks/national defense/interstate highways/NASA/NIH/CDC, etc
Everyone is touched by (and benefits from) socialism.
Major Major Major Major
Cacti
Will most voters care about the fine distinctions between a Social Democrat and a Democratic Socialist? Not likely.
Would most voters care that Wilmer honeymooned in the Soviet Union, attended Sandinista rallies, and blew rhetorical kisses at Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez? Bigly.
If Wilmer somehow ended up as Dem nominee, it would be a GOP blowout in McGovern/Mondale territory.
Leto
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Only problem with that is it’s up to her boss to enforce any type of punishment (per federal employee regulations). Lol, ok.
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:
Are you a fellow low-info voter? She’s been apologizing since last September. Only people who have been in a coma since, roughly, 2015 will not know the Pocahontas smear that’s been repeatedly leveled at her by Trumpov. This question already came up at some of her first town halls back in Feb/March. She handled it the same way as she did in September. Either you accept that or you don’t.
This won’t be put behind her. It won’t matter how many “high profile” speeches she gives. Republicans/Trumpov will keep using it. Progressive “allies” will keep trotting this out. “But her emails!” Indeed. I’m glad we moved from Buttigieg to Warren. Good shit here.
FlipYrWhig
@BobS: That’s a rather broad definition, innit? Isn’t it just saying that everything you could call “public” you could also call “socialist”? Is that helpful?
Baud
That’s how I interpret it as well.
kindness
I respect Bernie but won’t vote for him unless he wins the nomination. You see, I unlike BernieBros don’t think biting off my own nose spites my face all that much.
Now BernieBros have a special circle of Hell for themselves.
schrodingers_cat
@Cacti: It definitely looks like BS was a Communist during the Cold War or had Communist sympathies at the very least.
burnspbesq
The question (among others) for which Bernie has no good answer is “what does it mean to ‘own the means of production’ when the most valuable assets get in their cars and drive home every night?”
It may simply be that socialism and the so-called “knowledge economy” (whatever that means) are inherently incompatible.
Another Scott
Sorry for the OT, but I got a 553 error on trying to send an e-mail to “[email protected]” with Gmail. In case someone here can relay it…
Hi,
I’m using Chrome on Win10.
https://balloon-juice.com/2019/06/13/another-co-op-acting-oddly/ is behaving weirdly. If you go to that page, the left flyout button (previous post) appears, but the right flyout button (next post) doesn’t.
If you go to the main page (https://balloon-juice.com) then you see that there is indeed a next post – https://balloon-juice.com/2019/06/13/social-democracy-vs-democratic-socialism/
and on that page, the previous post flyout button works.
It only seems to be Anderson’s post that has this missing-next-post-flyout-button issue.
I assume that the old cruft of bailing wire and duck tape is manifesting itself, but I thought I’d let you know.
Thanks for your efforts.
Cheers,
Scott.
Fair Economist
It’s pretty silly to argue over the meaning of the word “socialism”. It was very loose and poorly defined term even before the Republican starting using it as a meaning-free slur for 70 years. We should be asking “is XXX a good policy” and “who can best implement it if it is?” Whether any given policy is called “socialist” has nothing to do with whether it’s a good idea.
Cacti
@Fair Economist:
In a perfect world that might be true. But this is America. We don’t do nuance here. Attach the word “socialist” to something, whatever it is, and a majority of the public will shut down any further thinking on the subject. We’re not enough generations removed from the Cold War for that to have changed.
Mike in NC
Fat Bastard and FOX & Friends have boiled down his 2020 election strategy to (1) denouncing any Democrat as a Socialist, (2) outlawing all abortion, and (3) building The Fucking Precious Wall.
Another Scott
@rikyrah: She has and has had a response. https://facts.elizabethwarren.com/heritage/
I don’t see how she can be any more transparent about this stuff.
It’s not an issue of facts. It’s all about attempting to damage her as a politician.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
I didn’t get to hear Sanders’ speech, but I read the transcript. And yes, it’s largely his stump speech. Interesting that he cites so many Democrats, but he could never join the party.
Major Major Major Major
Didn’t Elizabeth Bruenig recently have to delete her twitter account after the internet found out she was anti-abortion?
mad citizen
@schrodingers_cat: My favorite Life of Brian bit!
Brachiator
@Fair Economist:
True enough. But the main thing to keep in mind is that the GOP uses the word to mean “un-American.”
J R in WV
@Immanentize:
Here is a different link to an article with that 1986 portrait from the Texas Tribune, when Warren was teaching at UT Austin.
No one would look at that young woman, in OK, and suspect she has Native American relatives somewhere in her heritage. Right? No one.
My mom had hair like that when I was a kid. But her hairdresser turned her into a blond while I was in Jr High, huge change in her appearance. Same with Senator Professor Warren, going blonde changed her look a whole lot. My grandma, mom’s mom, wore a sun bonnet or wide brimmed hat when she worked in the yard or garden. Always!
I’m never going to give 1986 portrait one of those ancestry companies my DNA, but I would bet I have about the same percentage of Native American heritage as Warren does. You should see my cousins on that side of the family, some are really tall thin hawkish nose Indian looking. I’m round faced bald white boy, but the same heritages.
Warren is right there with Harris for me. Either of the two, we’ll support both of them by working for them both through the primary season.
Later on I’ll try to write another book about socialism and communism, and the huge differences between the two, which involve central planning and a top down command economy (communism) versus a market driven economy (socialism AND capitalism).
prostratedragon
@Immanentize: That picture supports my utter lack of surprise that she turned out to have some Native American ancestry — I had suspected. (African American me actually gets asked about that fairly often, and a couple of generations back some family had to deal with being known “half-breeds,” to use the exact words of the time and place.)
But in view of the national situation that will face the next President and the evidence that Warren is one of the best on offer to lead in confronting it, I see no reason to care about this right now.
lurker dean
@Cacti: yes, some very nasty people on here, as i experienced recently and which you noted at the time. they cannot simply make their point, they need to be as obnoxious and assholey as possible about it.
mad citizen
@Cheryl Rofer: Perfectly stayed Cheryl. The term is a dog whistle to the low information voter. I wish the media and/or whoever’s our nominee simply asks the other side to define the term when they use it.
I’m a trained economist and had to look it up the other day to refresh myself. There are so many variants of economic models on our planet.
CathieFonz (used to be Cathie from Canada)
@rikyrah: “But her heritage…”
Brachiator
@Cacti:
I don’t know that the voters will care, but I could see Trump making a big deal about it. Unless, of course, Putin tells Trump to avoid the subject.
Citizen Alan
@schrodingers_cat:
I would say the difference (always allowing for how theory breaks down in practice) is this: Socialists think the people should own the means of production. Communists think The State (i.e. a dictatorship of the proletariat) should own the means of production. I certainly don’t think that the state should own everything, but I do believe that there are areas which are so vital to the public interest that their operation should not be left to the profit motive and the vagaries of the market place. Case in point: I don’t believe that any free society should tolerate the existence of private prisons.
O. Felix Culpa
I’m no good at linking on my smart phone, but google “Elizabeth Warren apologizes for DNA test.” You’ll find that obscure outlets like CNN, FTFNYT, NPR, and WaPo (to name a few) all carried that story on Feb. 1, 2019.
What more is she supposed to do? And why keep repeating RWNJ bullshit? But her emails, indeed.
Leto
@Another Scott:
Maybe she can resign, take up knitting, and add a few cats? I’m sure that will satisfy the “woke” crowd.
Low info voters will remain low info, no matter how much information you shovel their way. It’s a proud American tradition since our founding.
Citizen Alan
@Cacti:
I said rather loudly to some people between 2008 and 2016 that the reason they called Barack Obama a socialist was the same as the reason they called him a Muslim — because they knew they couldn’t get away with calling him a n****r in public anymore.
O. Felix Culpa
@O. Felix Culpa: Because FYWP won’t let me edit, I agree that her DNA test was a bad move. But she’s apologized for and hopefully learned from that mistake. It’s fine if she’s not your first choice, but are we seriously going to crucify one of our best candidates for ONE mistake – which she has addressed?
Ohio Mom
When I first moved to Cincinnati from New York (after undergraduate school), one of the more curious things to me about midwesterners was how many of them claimed “Indian blood,” and felt it necessary to share this information with me.
I think it was partly that the word “blood” sounded weird to me. I associated it with laws against blacks and Jews for having one drop, which is not at all a positive connotation.
Also, even as a mathematically-disinclined person I wondered how much socializing Native Americans and whites actually did to create so many descendants. The numbers didn’t seem to add up.
Maybe it was something of a fad way back when to claim Native ancestry?
There’s a good argument to be made that Warren has shown she can learn and evolve, and that those are important and necessary traits for a president.
But I suspect this issue will continue to follow Warren in the same ways that emails followed Clinton, and for the same illegitimate reasons.
mad citizen
Was just refreshing with the Karl Marx wiki page. I had a whole class on comparative economic systems in college. Had to read a Marx bio. We should at some point talk about his carbuncles.
Karlo Marx and Federick Engels
Came to the checkout at the 7 11
Marx was skint but he had sense
Engels lent him the necessary pence
O. Felix Culpa
@Ohio Mom: Claiming native ancestry is commonplace in Oklahoma, given its unique and tragic history.
Leto
@Citizen Alan: Didn’t stop them from doing it in official emails, texts, and local radio shows. They just threw in Muslim and Kenyan to spice things up.
Barbara
@Major Major Major Major: Sirota is an idiot. Social insurance isn’t socialism, not the way most people understand it. The other guy is an even bigger idiot.
Major Major Major Major
@Barbara:
I’m sure you’ll be shocked to learn he’s a senior speechwriter for the Sanders campaign.
Brachiator
@O. Felix Culpa:
White folks claiming native ancestry used to be common in America, so much so that it was exempt from the noxious racial purity laws enacted in the early 1900s.
laura
I see socialism in America as libraries, post offices, public schools, public transportation, civic spaces, public goods, social goods – those things we have a right to, individually and collectively.
And I’m very much in favor of worker owned businesses such as food co-ops, and where in family businesses, the family does not want to continue running the business and worker ownership can keep it up and running and avoid the laying off of workers.
And I think some industries ought to be nationalized – like healthcare.
Yes, I’m a wild eyed crazy dreamer, but I’m not the only one . . .
trollhattan
@O. Felix Culpa:
You’re not exaggerating, not even a little. MIL was a California Okie, moving out west as a little girl to escape the depression and Dust Bowl. The third of three girls when she was born the parents were so disappointed not having a boy they left it to the doc to name her. His choice was Wynema. I doubt anybody knew back then but this seems to be the source of that name.
Late in life she began speaking of her American Indian ancestry, I suspect wistfully but then grandpa didn’t talk much about his past either. Nobody paid much mind given she was in her 70s and it’s not as though she tried to cash in.
NotMax
@rikyrah
Yawn. Do. Not. Care.
Like pettifogging over how many angels can rhumba on the head of a pin.
brantl
@Barbara: Because part of the name of the Nazi party in Germany was “social democratic”.
Ruckus
@Immanentize:
I was told that I had a grandmother, with a not remembered number of grands in front of that, who was pure Blackfoot Indian. Which would make me 1/64 Blackfoot. Which I found out would get me zip as a minority. And that is the same level as EW. So I can make the same claim and it means nothing. This is all political, all a perception of nothing.
Betty Cracker
@Leto:
That’s the bottom line. I’m not saying anyone’s anger over the issue is illegitimate,* and if voters choose to write Warren off as a candidate over it, that’s their right. But to frame it like she hasn’t addressed the issue is bullshit.
*As an example of an issue I can’t let go of, even after the candidate provided a thorough apology: Tulsi Gabbard’s anti-gay rights activism. I know she was raised in an anti-gay cult. She says she’s changed her mind and has apologized for her anti-equality activities. Good for her. But she was a lawmaker and an adult in the 21st century who actively opposed gay rights. There’s nothing she can do to earn my primary vote.
O. Felix Culpa
@Ohio Mom: There was a lot of co-mingling, some consensual and some not. I have several friends from Oklahoma who claim native ancestry, all fair-skinned, green-eyed, with high cheekbones. One is an enrolled member of the Choctaw nation, the others are not. But to look at them, you couldn’t tell the difference.
James E Powell
@Betty Cracker:
It will be enough for the millions of Americans who say they will vote for a woman but not that woman to justify their vote for Trump. With them, it doesn’t take very much.
Chip Daniels
I keep trying to make the case for using “socialize” in the verb form, rather than “socialism” in the noun form.
The difference being, that we already have plenty of the factors of production socialized: Water, power, sewer, gas, harbors and airports; Police, fire, emergency services; Much of health care (for the very young, indigent, military, elderly);
We have lots of quasi- socialized entities; Military contracting, telecoms, agriculture;
We have lots of industries heavily regulated that serve as effective monopolies like insurance and cable providers.
The point here is that there is no choice between “Capitalism” and Socialism”; those two choices don’t exist, anywhere except in fevered dreams of internet geeks.
What we are choosing between is various menu options of how much and where and to what degree we socialize the factors of production.
schrodingers_cat
@Citizen Alan: What does that mean in practical terms? Every commercial enterprise should be run like a co-operative. Or run by an elected government?
schrodingers_cat
@mad citizen: Mine too.
Bill Arnold
@Ohio Mom:
Was pointed at a woman in my family tree (done way before ancestry web sites) who I was told was NA. Ohio, this was, mid/late1800s. Dunno, maybe there was a large NA population there (there was), and some cultural aspects both settler and NA that encouraged intermarriage. There was an time when this information was socially embarrassing then at some point mid 20th century these details surfaced and were talked about.
Never thought much of it, of course happy to be at least a little bit mixed ’cause that’s a good thing genetically.
Martin
@Ohio Mom: Native ancestry is an argument that you have a more valid claim to that land. It seems odd, but it’s of a part of white supremacy in the same way that modern supremacists all seem to be indigenous european cosplayers.
By being part native, you give yourself a defense against manifest destiny cultural aggression (great grandmother was native, so clearly my white ancestors made common cause with the indigenous and weren’t part of that genocide shit) as well as giving you an even stronger claim to oppose immigration and cultural expansion. It’s shows you’re sensitive to the preservation of longstanding cultural traditions by having a genetic right to live there, but your native blood is minimal, so you’re not like the native losers who got shuffled off to a reservation somewhere. You get it all – the privilege of whiteness along with the genetic right to oppose immigrants and tell others to fuck off, you earned this land from your tatanka hunting kin, and no foreigner is going to come in and take your hot dish away.
JaneE
@rikyrah: I have never met an Okie who wasn’t part Cherokee (or Osage). Including my parents. 4 greats grandmother to me, so you know my parents didn’t have much Indian blood. My mother was a platinum blonde in her younger days. The United States Census still recorded their race as Indian. We didn’t get to be white till my folks moved to California.
Another Scott
@Martin: In the Atlanta suburbs there were common claims of Cherokee blood in my pack when I was growing up. Henry Louis Gate’s “Finding Your Roots” noted that actual demonstrable claims of Native American heritage are much rarer than people expect, and it’s more likely to be a family way of explaining darker skin tone (less stigma, and less risk of legal discrimination, to have Native American blood than to have African American blood) than anything else. Makes sense to me.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
OT. The odious Boris Johnson won the first round of the Tory leadership contest going away. He won 114 votes, about a third of total voted cast. The odious Jeremy Hunt came in a distant second. The odious Andrea Leadsom was one of three candidates eliminated.
They keep going until 2 remain, and then 120,000 party members vote for leader of the party, who becomes prime minister. Democracy!
ETA. Boris Johnson looks like a mashup of Trump and Wilmer.
Betty Cracker
@James E Powell: I’m not worried about voters using Warren’s past NA ancestry claim as an excuse to vote for Trump. IMO, anyone who would even consider voting for Trump isn’t the sort to truly have concern about white people appropriating NA culture or gaming affirmative action results. I do worry about trolls of various stripes latching onto the issue to foment strife within the Democratic Party and depress turnout and supporters of other candidates using it in a misguided attempt to build their candidate up by tearing other candidates down.
Edited for clarity.
Barbara
@Martin: You are a deep thinker. Most people just think it would be a cool factoid that makes them more interesting. Like DNA tests of all kind — “oh wow, it turns out I’m 1/4 Italian! No wonder I like pizza so much!” Yes, once you start gaining an understanding of native history, the bleakness and the tragedy, there is no way to look at it in such a casual and lighthearted way. I am happy that people are more aware now than when I was a kid, just as I am glad for how much less awful the world is for LGBTQ people, but I think we need to temper the reflexive use of historical attitudes as a cudgel, especially when that cudgel is being wielded by people who not only don’t care about that progress but would be all too happy to return us to a much darker place.
joel hanes
@Betty Cracker:
which is super-controversial in NA communities.
I’ve seen statements by tribal organizations that they understand what happened, and are OK with Warren.
I’ve seen tweets and comments by people who are not in tribal leadership positions claiming to be incensed.
I’ve seen many comments by non-NA people that ignore the former and repeat the latter.
IMHO, it’s the exact equivalent of “but her emails”
Emerald
@rikyrah: There might be an innocent explanation. My family (we’ve been in California since 1914) was originally from Marietta, GA. I was always told that we had Cherokee ancestry back there in the woodpile somewhere. It was a bit of a prideful thing.
Then I spent five years in your town of Athens, GA, and found out that most of the white folks in Georgia claimed to be part Cherokee. Just a little bit.
I also found out that for most of them it was almost certainly not true.
It’s entirely possible that Warren was told as a child that she had this ancestry. She was told the story of her father’s family being against her mother (or was it grandmother?) because of Indian ancestry. Most likely she believed it, just as I did.
Now, I would never have listed that on a university form—there is that–but my supposed ancestry was far more tenuous than hers, according to family legend.
She might just really have believed it and been proud of it. She might actually have expected it to show up in the DNA test too. Otherwise, why take the test?
cintibud
I absolutely just don’t get the issue with Warren’s ancestry story.
I have a Hispanic last name. My parents came from a very Hispanic area in rural Colorado. They were bilingual. Our family came to Santa Fe in 1590.
I was born in Dayton OH. I am white. I know less Spanish than a good high school student after completing Spanish 1. I talk like the typical Ohio hick.
Sometimes I checked the Hispanic/Latino box on forms. Sometimes I checked White. I was never aware of it making any difference in my life, although it is possible it help some past employer or school to note some diversity. Sometimes I would talk about the history to make an interesting story. I have never knowingly experienced discrimination although there are a couple incidents I am not sure about. That would have not been true if the family stayed in Colorado but in Ohio when I was growing up “If you’re white, you’re alright”.
Another interesting note – We have always been told we are also descendants of the Revolutionary war general Arthur St. Clare via my maternal Great-Grandmother Mary St. Clare. Coincidentally he was also the first Governor of the NW (Ohio) territories and was stationed in Cincinnati.
I have since heard disputes of the General St. Clare ancestry. Am I now disqualified from running for high office?
And yet another one – after years of being told by our mother that we had NO NA ancestry two of my siblings had DNA testing done and discovered they had over 20% Native American ancestry! So do I, I assume. Does that mean if I have a DNA test myself and report that I have an NA background that I am now disqualified from running for high office?
I think the impression that is given is that Warren used her claim of NA ancestry to get an edge over “White” people. Yet I haven’t seen that there was any evidence of that. Am I mistaken? Sounds more like Warren likes talking about her family history the same way I do.
O. Felix Culpa
@Betty Cracker: Anger over that misstep is legitimate, but continuing to hold it against her after she has apologized and STOPPED DOING IT is not, IMHO. Why we Dems hold such crushing standards for our own is beyond me. Make one admittedly stupid and tone-deaf mistake and you’re out, regardless of your other qualities and rectification efforts. Who will be left? On that basis, we might as well all commit collective seppuku now.
Barbara
@cintibud: I know, part of me wishes she or someone on her behalf would ask if it is a problem to have Native American ancestry. As for DNA tests, some tribes condemn them out of hand, but apparently others find them helpful in identifying possible members (typically, smaller tribes), and in general, so many Americans think DNA tests are a cool thing that it’s hard for me to think that many people are going to condemn her for trying to figure out whether family lore had a basis in reality. Me, I don’t care and don’t want to give my information, but it is my understanding that so many people have submitted DNA for testing that 90% of Caucasian people living in the U.S. can be easily profiled or discovered through DNA. So it almost doesn’t matter what I think or do anymore.
Leto
@joel hanes: This. If tribal leaders are ok with her apology (which they were), anything past that is muck raking.
@Betty Cracker: And this. The low info Trumpov voters don’t give a shit and will continue to smear her (as well as not give a shit about NA issues). Trolls will continue to pull this out in an attempt to divide. It’s irritating when our own people trot this shit out like it’s something that hasn’t been addressed.
joel hanes
@Emerald:
She might actually have expected it to show up in the DNA test too.
Uh, it _did_ show up in the DNA test.
That’s what makes this issue so stupid.
She very likely _does_ have a NA ancestor, about seven generations back.
https://www.factcheck.org/2018/10/the-facts-on-elizabeth-warrens-dna-test/
But she so stated in ways that offend some, for reasons that are deeply rooted in the ways that tribal membership has been defined and enforced. IMHO, had Warren ever attempted to claim the rights under law that go with membership in some recognized tribe, this would be a candidate killer.
Just One More Canuck
Betty C at top:
this sounds like the title of a four hour Maoist screed
joel hanes
@cintibud:
after years of being told by our mother that we had NO NA ancestry two of my siblings had DNA testing done and discovered they had over 20% Native American ancestry! So do I, I assume.
IIRC, most people with Mexican heritage probably have more or less NA ancestry. But because of the centuries of privilege accorded to Spanish heritage, many Mexican families have chosen to emphasize the Spanish side of their ancestry, and downplay the Mayan or Aztec or Mixtec.
Twenty-five years ago, the Mercury News columnist with the Latinx name and black hair startled his community with a column titled “Yo Soy Indio!”.
cintibud
@joel hanes: I’m pretty sure that’s what happened in my family. My wonderful parents never displayed prejudice to us kids, but there was certainly a prejudice towards NA where they grew up which was probably internalized but never came out in our lily white suburban neighborhood. Our Spanish ancestry was always emphasized and the Scot-Irish (St. Clare) noted, We were told we were NOT Mexican. (Some truth to that – Santa Fe was under a Spanish flag much longer than it was under a Mexican flag. I was also told that the simple farmers that lived in that part of Colorado at the time of Mexican independence (The common clay of the new West. You know… morons.) considered themselves loyal subjects of the King of Spain and would rather be associated with the USA than those reactionaries thousands of miles away in Mexico City.
FlipYrWhig
@Just One More Canuck:
Cultural Learnings of
AmericaSocialism for Make Benefit Glorious Nation ofKazakhstanAmericaEmma
@rikyrah: Here’s what she should say. “The President and his followers attacked me for saying my family believed we had Native American ancestry. I proved I did. Nothing has changed otherwise, Next question?”
GideonAB
I agree with those who are saying that
there is no issue for Warren.
She thought she had Native American ancestry
and this is what she said in her career
Emma
@GideonAB: Not only she thought. The damned test proved that she did! Her family history was TRUE. Why do we keep on ignoring that?
GideonAB
@Emma
Oh, I agree you with fully.
I just did not want to duplicate your comment or others by
going through all the details.
ochone
Hi Betty
Whenever I check out Balloon Juice a few times a week, I notice the pretty brutal snark about Sanders. And I don’t get it. He wants fairer distribution of wealth, educational affordability, healthcare for everyone, decent incomes. Fine if he’s not the fave candidate here, but why the snark?
I have basically 2 criticisms of him, namely the democratic socialist label, when in reality at this point he’s an FDR democrat. So a needless problem. And secondly, the purism about Medicare For All, which is open to a lot of demagoguery (they’re taking away your insurance!!!).
Strikes me Balloon Juice is a fairly tight-knit community where most people are in agreement about how bad he is, so this may come across as faux-naive. But it is actually a genuine question. Thanks.
GideonAB
@ochone
My problem with Sanders is some of things he harps
on are things he himself did not address when he
was a Senator and Congressman.
He had also problems explaining why single payer failed in Vermont.
He was asked about this in a primary debate and his best
answer was, ask the governor of Vermont.
Perhaps Betty has similar concerns
Steve in the ATL
@ochone:
1. He refuses to be a democrat, except when he wants to use our infrastructure to run for President/grift.
2. He has no plan to execute any of his ideas. Even after years of being pressed for details he hasn’t bothered to come up with any. Unlike Hillary or Warren or even Beto.
3. He’s obnoxious and shouty.
4. He pisses inside the tent.
5. He critically weakened Hillary’s candidacy long after he had lost the primary, and didn’t push his cultists to support her.
There’s more, but I don’t care. What I have typed is plenty.
Major Major Major Major
@ochone: every candidate in the D primary wants those things, it doesn’t immunize him from criticism.
PaulB
Paraphrasing a bit, as I’ve always like this quote: “For those who understand, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not, no explanation will suffice.”
It doesn’t matter what Warren says, how often she apologizes, how she phrases her responses, etc.: the attacks will still persist. The far better strategy is to say something to the effect of, “I’ve already addressed that and here is the link to my website where you can read my response in full. Next question?”
Ruckus
@ochone:
BS wants to run as democrat, when he isn’t one.
He has no plans for what he says he wants to do.
His record in congress is pathetic.
He is way too old:
That’s the short list.
Betty Cracker
@ochone: I liked Sanders for years for the reasons you mention and thought it was a good thing when he joined the 2016 race because I figured it would give the HUGE problems of wealth inequality and money’s distorting influence on politics the airing they deserved. I even donated to his campaign when he announced back then, but boy did I come to regret that.
Someone here (can’t remember who) used the analogy of a Cinderella team in the Final Four up against a big-name and frankly better team having to use fouls more and more to keep up. That’s what happened with Sanders vs. Clinton. I think he started the race to get his issues on the table but then got addicted to the adulation and lost sight of the original goal. He got nastier and nastier as he felt he had a real shot and accused Clinton of being corrupt and “the establishment” of cheating him out of the nomination, neither of which was true.
Sanders kept up that attack well past the time it was clear his shot was over and he was attacking the Democratic Party’s nominee. Both accusations were eagerly taken up by Trump. Sanders’ crybaby cult caused havoc at the Democratic National Convention and continued to lie and pout all the way up to election day. IMO, Sanders didn’t do enough to rein them in and did not wholeheartedly support Clinton as she had done for Obama after their bitter primary.
I don’t blame Sanders alone for Clinton’s loss — there were tons of factors, including voter suppression, foreign interference, media malpractice and Clinton’s own missteps. But Sanders was one of those factors, IMO. And during the 2016 race, it became clear to me, especially during the disastrous NYDN interview, that he wasn’t prepared to be president and that it was all a big ego trip. I lost all respect for the guy. That said, if he’s the 2020 nominee, I’ll hold my nose and vote for him.
NotMax
@https://balloon-juice.com/2019/06/13/social-democracy-vs-democratic-socialism/#comment-7312208
IMHO, a select seven:
1) Congressional track record thinner than a sheet of onionskin paper.
2) Espousing concepts of destinations, devoid of any means or path of getting there.
3) Demonstrated unwillingness and aversion, skirting outright animosity, to actively supporting many other legitimate candidates and/or nominees.
4) Nurtured perception of rigid my way or the highway ontology.
5) Uneasy, strained or iffy relationships with a long list of matters directly pertaining/relevant to minorities and to their gravity.
6) Too many on the record occasions of thin skinnedness/petulance/hypocrisy (see: release of tax returns, etc.)
7) History of joining and then dropping out of the party for his own convenience.
Shorter version: Empty barrels make the most noise.
NotMax
My bad. Fix to include the nym.
@ochone
IMHO, a select seven:
1) Congressional track record thinner than a sheet of onionskin paper.
2) Espousing concepts of destinations, devoid of any means or path of getting there.
3) Demonstrated unwillingness and aversion, skirting outright animosity, to actively supporting many other legitimate candidates and/or nominees.
4) Nurtured perception of rigid my way or the highway ontology.
5) Uneasy, strained or iffy relationships with a long list of matters directly pertaining/relevant to minorities and to their gravity.
6) Too many on the record occasions of thin skinnedness/petulance/hypocrisy (see: release of tax returns, etc.)
7) History of joining and then dropping out of the party for his own convenience.
Shorter version: Empty barrels make the most noise.
GideonAB
@bettycracker
I still remember the early Sanders stuff where he was reluctant
to even mention Clinton and was all about his ideas.
Barbara
@PaulB: Yep. 100% agree.
Marcopolo
@Steve in the ATL: This. Thanks to Steve for hitting almost all the high notes. I’d embellish on 4 & 5 that running on the idea that the D party is (almost) as much of a problem as Republicans, making his candidacy vs Clinton into a purity issue (and she was not pure) & then misleading his supporters that he still had a chance of winning past, say April 2016 (and the reason he didn’t was because everyone was out to get him), meant he really poisoned the well for a lot of his supporters to get behind voting for the D in the general election and to this day a lot of those folks have a negative view of the D party. The behavior of his delegates at the DNC (and various state level conventions prior to that (i.e. Nevada) was emblematic of that. And his campaign did seem to attract an inordinate number of asshole supporters (though maybe we shouldn’t lay all the blame for that on BS & it is quite possible a lot of those folks were just agents of chaos, or bots, or whatever).
I find it sort of striking that in his speech yesterday, BS pretty much said the kind of politics he wants to do follows along the line of what FDR did in the 30’s & 40’s. FDR never made himself out as anything other than a Democrat. I suspect if Sanders were arguing that he wanted to return/reform the D party–from the inside–to the ideals of FDR as opposed to having to create this entire democratic socialism red rose superstructure on the outside that I would have a more generous opinion of him. There are a lot of very valid critiques of the Democratic party particularly as it pertains to where its funding comes from & who has influence in it & and whether it is working for average folks in America but the party is a really really big tent and there is plenty of room inside of it to do that. You can’t say the same for the Republican party atm. And the majority rule system the folks who wrote the Constitution set up pretty much leads to a two party system of governance & more often than not a binary choice in the voting booth.
Finally, and I don’t know if anyone else here has seen this weirdness play out locally, I will give credit to Sanders for inspiring a number of younger folks (30 & under) to become much more actively engaged in organized politics. There are quite few “kids” who were activated by his campaign and who have now run for office & worked on local campaigns in St Louis. It is a counterpoint to the folks I also know who were BS supporters in 2016 who are now turned off from politics entirely–“its all a rigged system, etc…” The world is a strange place like that.
Barbara
@ochone: My biggest problem with Sanders is that he sees the world through the lens of class and utterly discounts issues of gender and racial discrimination. Secondary, he is scathing of people who disagree with his “class is everything” view of the world.
evodevo
@Ohio Mom: Yes…and they were all Indian “princesses” from what I heard lol – there WAS a lot of interaction between Cherokee and white settlers in eastern Ky in the old days, but other than that most Native Americans were driven out of Ohio, Ky and Indiana at a very early stage. Some escaped the “removal” by laying low and taking up farming in Ohio and Indiana, but not a lot…
Betty Cracker
@Barbara: Question for you since, while we don’t always agree, I respect your thoughtful responses: Do you think there’s a similar blind spot wherein folks think racism / misogyny, etc., explain all our ills and leave class/money out of it?
I’m an all-of-the-above gal myself, and while I reject Sanders’ myopic view, sometimes I wonder if in rejecting the issues he raises as the entire explanation, we forget he’s not completely wrong…
Chris Johnson
@Betty Cracker: For what it’s worth I’m with you there.
I’m with the Democrats and NOT Sanders, in spite of a perceived impression of exactly that: there has been a blind spot or an intentionally orchestrated and likely Russia-prompted talking point, where racism and misogyny were said to be the ONLY reason people failed to align with the Democrats and Hillary Clinton.
This in spite of Trump repeatedly and persuasively lying that he was going to fix people’s money problems (and, presumably, their class problems by placing them again in a thriving upwardly-mobile middle class) by essentially killing globalism. If people were suspicious of globalist/neoliberal ideology, Trump played right into their fears and vowed in lie after lie that he would fix it all, and that only he could and would do that.
I’m not going to argue the merits of Sanders’ arguments especially since I no longer believe he is in any way the right standard bearer for those arguments. (Also, you asked Barbara, and I’m not Barbara :D )
What I will say is: that blind spot has driven me freaking bonkers at times, I get upset about it, and I believe it is being exploited by Russia and not necessarily a true picture of the real Democrats. Some of em/some of us, perhaps. I do not believe this ‘it is entirely racism/misogyny and nobody is ever motivated by class/money’ attitude represents the base, or voters, or the American people. I think it’s an angle of attack that’s been identified as an alienating position, and that Russian trolls have worked just as hard to exaggerate that position as they have worked to get the hairy-leftist contingent to believe ‘Russiagate’ is a big hoax by career politicians self-aggrandizing themselves.
If you mingle in enough different political circles you start to see the fractures and division points, and then you see the coordinated efforts to hammer home specific attitudes, always to hopefully a receptive audience. Somebody wanted Dems to be insisting that class/money wasn’t a thing. While also wanting the fringe to be insisting that class/money was the ONLY thing.
All-of-the-above, yes. But exploiting this wedge stuff is enemy action.
Barbara
@Betty Cracker: He is not completely wrong but his failure to comprehend how racial and gender bias are integral to perpetuating income inequality makes his prescription for solutions half baked and unlikely to sway the working class voters he apparently holds in highest regard.
cleosmom
@Chyron HR:
Is the BIRD running for public office next year?
Patrick Linnen
@Betty Cracker: It is not so much as a ‘blind spot’ as a “We’ve been told before to wait for our turn, and before that, and before that as well.” (Not including myself in that ‘We’.) Look at Civil Rights history in both the Racial and Gender Issue contexts. “Jam tomorrow and Jam yesterday, but never Jam today.” is a rather familiar refrain.
Senator Sanders has his hammer and his nails. And has a history of ignoring topics that would make solving his issues easier.
patrick II
@Barbara:
You might think social insurance isn’t socialism, but I know a fair amount of Republicans who would disagree with you because they have been taught otherwise. Listen to some old Reagan speeches about Medicare. And the next time you hear them attempt to privatize social security (which they will at the first chance they get), or privatize schools, or fire departments, you will hear the same thing.
I knew one guy who had a Libertarian girlfriend who wouldn’t share a shower because she thought it was socialism. Well, maybe not, but any co-operative effort that is not for profit and especially those run by the government are probable cases of socialism in most conservative’s eyes.