US Politics: Ready, Set, Announce! Bookering the Odds

[Fragile Bird]

52 minutes ago, Triskele said:

I guess that one of the things being pointed out on the new Warren revelation that she put "American Indian" on her bar card from years ago...is that before this broke she'd sort of denied whether it was her or an aid that led her to claim this at Harvard.  But that's called into question now with this new revelation since it was clearly she that filled it out.  Without any comment on how big of a deal this ought to be it sure feels like something that the press will have a hard time dropping.  

Wow, just imagine, she believed her family stories that her great-grandmother or great-great-grandmother was a native American and was proud of the fact. And DNA testing says that's likely true. Ruins her career.

As opposed to Donald Trump's family saying for decades they were Swedish. And grandpa never went to Canada to run a whorehouse during the gold rush even though there are public records of it, and moved back to Bavaria or wherever and used the whorehouse money to start a business.

I remember reading a story about how the first native casino was opened in, iirc, Connecticut. The group backing the casino had to find enough members of a tribe, 50 or 100 or some small number like that, to make the application. The test of whether or not you could be a member of a tribe, again, iirc, was you had 6.25% native blood. Wasn't that similar to Warren's number? If it's good enough for a casino application, it should be good enough to shut up Trump, shouldn't it?

eta: that native % for the casino might have been 3.125%...

[Varysblackfyre321]

3 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Wow, just imagine, she believed her family stories that her great-grandmother or great-great-grandmother was a native American and was proud of the fact. And DNA testing says that's likely true. Ruins her career.

As opposed to Donald Trump's family saying for decades they were Swedish. And grandpa never went to Canada to run a whorehouse during the gold rush even though there are public records of it, and moved back to Bavaria or wherever and used the whorehouse money to start a business.

I remember reading a story about how the first native casino was opened in, iirc, Connecticut. The group backing the casino had to find enough members of a tribe, 50 or 100 or some small number like that, to make the application. The test of whether or not you could be a member of a tribe, again, iirc, was you had 6.25% native blood. Wasn't that similar to Warren's number? If it's good enough for a casino application, it should be good enough to shut up Trump, shouldn't it?

eta: that native % for the casino might have been 3.125%...

Even before the DNA test, I really didn’t see the big issue here. It was decades ago, and ultimately hurt no one. Honestly, I would bet most people who made it an issue, were the same type to balk at liberals for thinking sports team using Native Americans caricatures  as mascots is an offensive practice.

[Mudguard]

4 hours ago, Triskele said:

I guess that one of the things being pointed out on the new Warren revelation that she put "American Indian" on her bar card from years ago...is that before this broke she'd sort of denied whether it was her or an aid that led her to claim this at Harvard.  But that's called into question now with this new revelation since it was clearly she that filled it out.  Without any comment on how big of a deal this ought to be it sure feels like something that the press will have a hard time dropping.  

It's very unlikely that Warren got any benefit from putting American Indian on her bar application paperwork, if her state bar is run like other states.  Generally, membership into the state bar requires passing the bar exam and a background check.  Race doesn't come into the evaluation.  If she applied to jobs, such as a government job, where being a disadvantaged race can provide an advantage through affirmative action, then that would be really bad.  She put Native American on her state bar paperwork and her Harvard paperwork, which spans almost 20 years.  It's not unreasonable to assume that she put Native American on her other paperwork, including job applications during that time.  The optics of this looks pretty bad, and I can't see Warren winning the nomination.  She missed her chance.

3 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

Wow, just imagine, she believed her family stories that her great-grandmother or great-great-grandmother was a native American and was proud of the fact. And DNA testing says that's likely true. Ruins her career.

As opposed to Donald Trump's family saying for decades they were Swedish. And grandpa never went to Canada to run a whorehouse during the gold rush even though there are public records of it, and moved back to Bavaria or wherever and used the whorehouse money to start a business.

I remember reading a story about how the first native casino was opened in, iirc, Connecticut. The group backing the casino had to find enough members of a tribe, 50 or 100 or some small number like that, to make the application. The test of whether or not you could be a member of a tribe, again, iirc, was you had 6.25% native blood. Wasn't that similar to Warren's number? If it's good enough for a casino application, it should be good enough to shut up Trump, shouldn't it?

eta: that native % for the casino might have been 3.125%...

The results of Warren's DNA test estimates that Warren likely had a Native American ancestor 6 to 10 generations ago.  That would put the percentage of Native American DNA between about 0.1 to 1.5%.  To put that into perspective, Europeans and Asians have about 1 to 2% of neanderthal DNA, and neanderthals went extinct about 40,000 years ago.  I think Warren has about an average amount of Native American DNA for a European American born in Oklahoma, which isn't saying much.  

[Mudguard]

16 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I was just getting ready to come post that.  After the historic gains in 2017, this string of bad news bodes ill for the elections later this year.  So far, however, it appears that the Fairfax allegations are not very credible, so I hope Northam resigns and Fairfax takes over.  I'm not quite sure what to make about the AG's announcement. 

 

Have you had a chance to read Vanessa Tyson's statement against Fairfax?  I think it might have come out after your post.  Her statement seem extremely credible.  At least as credible as Ford's statement against Kavanaugh.

So Viginia's government is headed by two racists and a rapist.  If you want to be charitable, you can insert the word "former" before racist and rapist, but I don't think that makes it much better.  For the good of the party, I think they have to resign.  Them sticking around makes it harder for Democrats to maintain the moral high ground over Trump and the Republicans.  If they are still around in 2020, Trump and Republicans are going to hammer Democrats on this.

[maarsen]

9 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

*nods head*

Maple syrup kills!

Can no one spare a thought for the poor trinketless moose left wandering Canada? 

[karaddin]

On 2/5/2019 at 2:51 AM, Fez said:

 The big existential threat is catastrophic climate change, and that seems to be staying on pace regardless of who wins.

Late reply and I haven't caught up on the thread yet but this really is the giant in the room. We can't even get people to accept the big flashy stuff like massive melting of ice - the fascist right in fact still think its great optics to be laughing about it -

But I don't see as much discussion of stuff like this:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/jan/15/insect-collapse-we-are-destroying-our-life-support-systems

Probably because its a) more complicated and needs more knowledge to understand and b) so enormous there's not really a way to psychologically cope with it. It hasn't exactly been a long time since "worst case scenarios" were being ridiculed as absurd by the majority of people, those worst cases are now more like the best realistic case if we finally get our shit together - only avoidable by emergency complete stop right now. Worst case is no longer just a hell scape but if we cause a complete collapse of the biosphere we're just utterly fucked.

[Fragile Bird]

4 hours ago, Mudguard said:

The optics of this looks pretty bad, and I can't see Warren winning the nomination.  She missed her chance.

The results of Warren's DNA test estimates that Warren likely had a Native American ancestor 6 to 10 generations ago.  That would put the percentage of Native American DNA between about 0.1 to 1.5%.  To put that into perspective, Europeans and Asians have about 1 to 2% of neanderthal DNA, and neanderthals went extinct about 40,000 years ago.  I think Warren has about an average amount of Native American DNA for a European American born in Oklahoma, which isn't saying much.  

Ah yes, I had forgotten how small the numbers were. But I still find the sneering directed at her to be loathsome.

As has been discussed whenever the issue has come up, there are millions of Americans who believe their ancestry includes Native American. People in the US (and elsewhere) have been spending bucks to get DNA tests to confirm (or not) those family stories.

If you count 25 years to a generation, 6 generations is just the mid 1800s, say, after the Civil War, and even 10 generations is only 1769. Even if you use the patriarchal lineage suggested use of 35 years, you’re talking about 1809 and 1666. Damn, Elizabeth Warren’s family has been American for a long time!

And a bloody lot closer than Neanderthal times, ya know. That comparison has been the most, pardon my language, fucking inane comparison drummed up by Republicans mocking Warren imaginable.

Ancestry.com uses a tv commercial where a woman looking into her ancestry discovers the family of George Washington is in her lineage, and she brags about hanging a picture of ‘Uncle George’ in her house. But Warren being proud of her lineage gets jeers of Pocahontas.

People in England brag that 16 generations ago the grand sire was the Duke of something or other or the king’s bastard. Probably both.

If you follow the now proven aspect of Trump’s habit of accusing people of doing things that he has actually done (‘fake news’because He called papers himself to plant fake stories, ‘fake polls’ because he told Cohen to try to manipulate on-line polls) I repeat, the Trump family lied about their ancestry. They claimed to be Swedish during WW II and continued to do so afterwards to fool Jewish people renting their apartments. Not only that, but Trump embedded the lie in The Art of the Deal, saying his father immigrated from Sweden. He only admitted to being German when asked to be the grand marshal of a German-American parade in New York.

Think about him lying for years about where Obama was born. Because he lied for years about where his father was born.

And why rant on about this? You have two Democrat leaders who essentially made fun of the ancestry of 10% of the US population and everyone is calling for their resignation on one hand, and on the other hand the same people are mocking Warren and calling for her to end her political aspirations because she was proud of her ancestry. Only in America.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

14 hours ago, Zorral said:

Isn't there somebody here who worked for her?  I was thinking about that when reading this piece just now on the Huff Po.

 

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

15 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Only these three things in life are certain: death, taxes and Democrats re-litigating the 2016 primary until the sun goes nova and burns the Earth to a cinder.

No, there is another. Death, taxes, relitigating the 2016 election and Felipe Rios down by eight in a big game with less than a minute to go and the length of the field to drive. The latter is the most consistent thing humans have ever witnessed.

[Ormond]

5 hours ago, Mudguard said:

It's very unlikely that Warren got any benefit from putting American Indian on her bar application paperwork, if her state bar is run like other states.  Generally, membership into the state bar requires passing the bar exam and a background check.  Race doesn't come into the evaluation.  If she applied to jobs, such as a government job, where being a disadvantaged race can provide an advantage through affirmative action, then that would be really bad.  She put Native American on her state bar paperwork and her Harvard paperwork, which spans almost 20 years.  It's not unreasonable to assume that she put Native American on her other paperwork, including job applications during that time.  The optics of this looks pretty bad, and I can't see Warren winning the nomination.  She missed her chance.

The results of Warren's DNA test estimates that Warren likely had a Native American ancestor 6 to 10 generations ago.  That would put the percentage of Native American DNA between about 0.1 to 1.5%.  To put that into perspective, Europeans and Asians have about 1 to 2% of neanderthal DNA, and neanderthals went extinct about 40,000 years ago.  I think Warren has about an average amount of Native American DNA for a European American born in Oklahoma, which isn't saying much.  

I am somewhat sympathetic to Warren as I know just how common the claim that one has Amerindian ancestors is in the South, among both Whites and Blacks, 

 

1 minute ago, Fragile Bird said:

Ah yes, I had forgotten how small the numbers were. But I still find the sneering directed at her to be loathsome.

As has been discussed whenever the issue has come up, there are millions of Americans who believe their ancestry includes Native American. People in the US (and elsewhere) have been spending bucks to get DNA tests to confirm (or not) those family stories.

If you count 25 years to a generation, 6 generations is just the mid 1800s, say, after the Civil War, and even 10 generations is only 1769. Even if you use the patriarchal lineage suggested use of 35 years, you’re talking about 1809 and 1666. Damn, Elizabeth Warren’s family has been American for a long time!

And a bloody lot closer than Neanderthal times, ya know. That comparison has been the most, pardon my language, fucking inane comparison drummed up by Republicans mocking Warren imaginable.

Ancestry.com uses a tv commercial where a woman looking into her ancestry discovers the family of George Washington is in her lineage, and she brags about hanging a picture of ‘Uncle George’ in her house. But Warren being proud of her lineage gets jeers of Pocahontas.

People in England brag that 16 generations ago the grand sire was the Duke of something or other or the king’s bastard. Probably both.

Think about him lying for years about where Obama was born. Because he lied for years about where his father was born.

And why rant on about this? You have two Democrat leaders who essentially made fun of the ancestry of 10% of the US population and everyone is calling for their resignation on one hand, and on the other hand the same people are mocking Warren and calling for her to end her political aspirations because she was proud of her ancestry. Only in America.

 

It is one thing to be proud that one has an ancestor from a particular group. It is quite another thing to designate oneself as being "Native American" on the basis of such a small % of ancestry from that group on an official form, even if one does not receive any tangible benefits from it. It seems to show a complete confusion between one's genetics and one's actual place in the culture.

And the Ancestry.com commercials are loathsome in my opinion precisely because they get people to confuse genetic ancestry with culture and real membership in an ethnic group. I'm sorry, but a Black American does not become part of a West African culture simply by putting on a dashiki and eating peanut soup. And someone who grew up being actively part of a German-American cultural group should not "trade his lederhosen in for a kilt" just because Ancestry tells him more of his genes supposedly go back to Britain than Germany. As someone who teaches a course in cross-cultural psychology, I find that stuff to be offensive. 

I recently found out that my mitochondrial DNA is from haplogroup B2C, which is a Native American group. I had no idea I would have any Native American ancestry until that result came up, and I had my DNA retested by a different group to make sure it was correct. My Native American ancestry is probably in the same "6 to 10 generations back" as Elizabeth Warren's. I will probably never know for sure what Native American nation my ancestry is from, though given the geography of where my ancestors on the all female line were from, the best guess is Munsee (the group living in the New York City area when Europeans arrived.) I have become very interested in learning about the Munsees and their culture, but even if I could prove that my ancestor was from that group, I think it would be both stupid and offensive to call myself Munsee or Native American. I was not raised in any Native culture and there is no way simply having B2C mitochondria should get me that designation.

There is also the problem of Warren completely ignoring the fact that most Native Americans in the USA do not want membership in their groups to be defined by genetics at all. This is partly because many Native American nations had a long tradition of adopting people into their groups, even as adults, and giving them full rights as members, even before Europeans arrived. Even in cases where one has to prove having a great-grandparent who was a member of the group in order to get benefits from casinos, etc., most Native American groups want that defined as to whether or not the great-grandparent was officially on the tribal rolls, not by doing any analysis of the genes. A great many Native Americans in the United States are really suspicious of genetic testing precisely because they do not want the government defining membership in their group by genes alone -- and most of the testing of Amerindian people's genetic ancestry has therefore been done in Canada and Mexico, NOT in the United States. Native Americans in the USA have tried to explain all that to Elizabeth Warren and feel that she has ignored them on this issue.

So I am sympathetic to Warren's family (and think they are damn lucky the DNA tests showed she did have a tiny bit of Native American ancestry, as many people would have had Native genes from a single ancestor "wash out" over that many generations), but I do think someone who is a Harvard professor should have a better understanding of this and find her calling herself "Native American" to show an incredible lack of judgment. 

[Guest]

5 hours ago, Mudguard said:

Have you had a chance to read Vanessa Tyson's statement against Fairfax?  I think it might have come out after your post.  Her statement seem extremely credible.  At least as credible as Ford's statement against Kavanaugh.

So Viginia's government is headed by two racists and a rapist.  If you want to be charitable, you can insert the word "former" before racist and rapist, but I don't think that makes it much better.  For the good of the party, I think they have to resign.  Them sticking around makes it harder for Democrats to maintain the moral high ground over Trump and the Republicans.  If they are still around in 2020, Trump and Republicans are going to hammer Democrats on this.

Yeah, I posted that before her statement came out, or at least before I'd heard that she had issued a statement and was basing my opinion on the WaPo investigation that was unable to corroborate her story. 

Of all 3, I think the AG might possibly be able to survive this, as he got out in front of the story and his apology seemed genuine compared to the word salad that Northam tossed out. 

All that being said, it could be possible that VA voters simply choose to overlook the blackface thing, because apparently that's been a common thing there until recently.  Who the fuck knows now?

[Cas Stark]

The issue with Senator Warren isn't her personal family history or her alleged pride in her [non existent] Cherokee heritage, but whether or not she sought any material advantage by presenting herself [a blonde, 99% European white woman] as a person of color.  She has always maintained that all of those mysterious entries in various places that list her as a woman of color and a Native American were nothing at all to do with her, not her doing, done without her knowledge.  That's why seeing the card written in her own handwriting claiming to be a Native American is an issue.  Not her pride or her family lore, but her trading on a heritage that she doesn't possess and then repeatedly, sanctimoniously lying about it. 

[lokisnow]

Wasn’t there an anti affirmative action Comedy movie in the 1990s or 1980s about a white guy dressing in blackface to get into Harvard? Seems worth rewatching now, given Warren and the Virginians if only to be horrified. :-p

[Mlle. Zabzie]

1 minute ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Yeah, I posted that before her statement came out, or at least before I'd heard that she had issued a statement and was basing my opinion on the WaPo investigation that was unable to corroborate her story. 

Of all 3, I think the AG might possibly be able to survive this, as he got out in front of the story and his apology seemed genuine compared to the word salad that Northam tossed out. 

All that being said, it could be possible that VA voters simply choose to overlook the blackface thing, because apparently that's been a common thing there until recently.  Who the fuck knows now?

I had a long conversation with my mother about this. She's lived in VA since 1970, and grew up in Tennessee.  She's shaken.  As she put it, she has known for at least her whole adult life that blackface is wrong.  She's pretty sure her parents would have identified it as wrong, so it's baffling to her that someone in the 1980s thought it was ok.  And she said that she couldn't think of anyone ever in her social circle who ever had or would have worn blackface (and as she put it, she didn't grow up that differently than these guys, except she's older).  EXCEPT, now she's wondering whether she was completely naive and a greater proportion of people she thought simply shared her base values do not or did not at all.  She's really struggling.  Also, she said about VA "it's a dumpster fire - fun to watch but don't get downwind."  Further, she said, the fact that #4 in line was as a result of a name pulled out of a bowl is disgraceful.  Also, she's not exactly liberal, so this is sort of interesting to watch.

[Fragile Bird]

59 minutes ago, Ormond said:

It is one thing to be proud that one has an ancestor from a particular group. It is quite another thing to designate oneself as being "Native American" on the basis of such a small % of ancestry from that group on an official form, even if one does not receive any tangible benefits from it. It seems to show a complete confusion between one's genetics and one's actual place in the culture.

And the Ancestry.com commercials are loathsome in my opinion precisely because they get people to confuse genetic ancestry with culture and real membership in an ethnic group. 

(Snipped for length)

Ormond, I absolutely agree with you! Warren’s pride in her ancestry should not have resulted in her claiming to be Native American when she obviously is not, and I should have made that clear. But I don’t see it as having been devious or intentionally misleading in the way saying you were from Sweden was, because you were actually trying to fool people. Trump now admits his ancestry is German and everything is ok, Warren has now apologized for using Native American but now she’s unfit to be president. It’s just so damn galling, like almost everything associated with Trump. The picture is clouded, of course, by accusations she did it to gain an advantage. I think she did it because she had some kind of romantic pride about the idea of a connection, simply because I have met people who told me about their family ancestral stories with the same kind of pride.

On the other hand, up here there’s been a big literary controversy over an award-winning writer, Joseph Boyden, who’s novels are about Canadian aboriginal people and who has claimed native ancestry, who has been accused of having no native heritage at all. That’s always a strange situation. But last century there was a beloved native writer/speaker/advocate named Grey Owl who turned out to be a UK immigrant who loved all things native and felt spiritually connected to native culture.

And I’m sure you know that in the UK there are groups devoted to ancestors of people like Shakespeare, Jane Austen and all kinds of kings and queens. People just want to know this stuff.

I was reading an interview of people in various African countries who sneered at the term ‘African-American’, saying the people who use the term are Americans, not Africans. Too much distance after 150 years or more.

[Morpheus]

1 hour ago, lokisnow said:

Wasn’t there an anti affirmative action Comedy movie in the 1990s or 1980s about a white guy dressing in blackface to get into Harvard? Seems worth rewatching now, given Warren and the Virginians if only to be horrified. :-p

Soul Man starring C. Thomas Howell

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/gqk5ey/remembering-the-absurdly-racist-blackface-comedy-soul-man

Though the cast argues to this day that it its not racist or anti affirmative action. Rae Dawn Chong blames Spike Lee for the negative perception of the movie.

Of course, more recently, there was Tropic Thunder which the media largely seemed to embrace, “because it was making fun of blackface”, but many people were not convinced that it was justified

https://www.theroot.com/and-the-blackface-oscar-goes-to-1790868842

[Fragile Bird]

1 hour ago, Cas Stark said:

The issue with Senator Warren isn't her personal family history or her alleged pride in her [non existent] Cherokee heritage, but whether or not she sought any material advantage by presenting herself [a blonde, 99% European white woman] as a person of color.  She has always maintained that all of those mysterious entries in various places that list her as a woman of color and a Native American were nothing at all to do with her, not her doing, done without her knowledge.  That's why seeing the card written in her own handwriting claiming to be a Native American is an issue.  Not her pride or her family lore, but her trading on a heritage that she doesn't possess and then repeatedly, sanctimoniously lying about it. 

Uh, I don't think that's actually true, you're repeating attacks Republicans have made on her.

https://www.cnn.com/2016/06/29/politics/elizabeth-warren-native-american-pocahontas/index.html

Bah, I tried to quote from the story and I couldn't.

She has always expressed pride in her family stories about native heritage, but as the linked story points out, at every step of her career people have always viewed her as a white woman. "All these entries"? Two? The meaningless bar one in Texas and the self-identification one at Harvard? Someone at Harvard was pretty stupid, not being able to figure out she was a white woman with an ancestry she identified with.

 

[Ormond]

30 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

Ormond, I absolutely agree with you! Warren’s pride in her ancestry should not have resulted in her claiming to be Native American when she obviously is not, and I should have made that clear. But I don’t see it as having been devious or intentionally misleading in the way saying you were from Sweden was, because you were actually trying to fool people. Trump now admits his ancestry is German and everything is ok, Warren has now apologized for using Native American but now she’s unfit to be president. It’s just so damn galling, like almost everything associated with Trump. The picture is clouded, of course, by accusations she did it to gain an advantage. I think she did it because she had some kind of romantic pride about the idea of a connection, simply because I have met people who told me about their family ancestral stories with the same kind of pride.

 

Perhaps part of the difference between you and me is that I personally don't particularly associate Warren's issue with Donald Trump. I really had no idea that Trump had ever claimed to be of Swedish ancestry until you mentioned it on this thread. I was very familiar with the "Pocahontas" slur about Warren years ago, as it was used against her by some Libertarian acquaintances of mine way before anyone thought Trump would be a real Presidential candidate.  I think Trump is massively unfit to be President, but a claim that his ancestry is Swedish would be the least of the reasons. 

And my problem with Warren's judgment on the issue is more with how she seemed to double down on the claims after it became an issue, not because I think she received tangible benefits for it. It just makes her look tone deaf to reality. 

P.S. And I think the lack of judgment is more relevant to her "electability" rather than her ability to perform Presidential functions. 

[OldGimletEye]

OMG!, the New Green Deal sounds radical, crazy, and maybe even "socialist".

I think given the IPCC latest report on climate change what is radical here is to continually sandbag on the issue. The gas lighting on this topic is far more radical.Seems we should had have this conversation about two decades ago.

Thank you AOC for trying to get this issue front and center, even if it makes "reasonable centrist" sweat bullets. And for those of them, who need "detailed plans" here, evidently, is the begging of one.

https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2019/2/7/18211709/green-new-deal-resolution-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-markey-resolution

Quote

The Green New Deal has become an incredibly hot item on the political agenda, but to date it has remained somewhat ill defined. It’s a broad enough concept that everyone can read their aspirations into it, which has been part of its strength, but it has also left discussion in something of a fog, since no one’s quite sure what they’re arguing about.

On Thursday at 12:30pm ET, Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) will introduce a Green New Deal resolution that lays out the goals, aspirations, and specifics of the program in a more definitive way. This is as close as there is to an “official” Green New Deal — at last, something to argue about.

Quote

There are Democrats who think deficit fears have been exaggerated and there’s nothing wrong with running a deficit to drive an economic transition. And there are Democrats who have gone full Modern Monetary Theory, which is way too complicated to explain here, but amounts to the notion that, short of inflation, the level of the deficit is effectively irrelevant, as long as we’re getting the economy we want.

As far as paying for something like, this my approximate thought as far as intergenerational equity goes is tax for some of it and then debt finance the rest of it. Countries, like say England, have often run big debt/GDP ratios during national emergencies. They did when fighting Napoleon and then when they had to fight two World Wars. They went over a debt/GDP ratio over 200% in both those cases. I'd submit that the threat of Climate change is every big as a military conflict.

..........................................................................................................

Moving on:

It's hard to think of bigger idiots than people like Kevin Warsh (who evidently even became the butt of macroeconomist's jokes: "Don't be a Warsh"), Larry Kudlow, or Stephen Moore.

But David Malpass gives them all a run for their money.

Trump appoints one of the biggest knuckleheads clowns around to lead the World Bank.

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/2/5/18212138/world-bank-nomination-david-malpass

Quote

President Donald Trump will select David Malpass, currently the undersecretary of treasury for international affairs, as the US nominee to lead the World Bank, the Washington Post and Politico have reported.

He would replace Jim Yong Kim, who abruptly stepped down in January.

Trump is obviously confused, deranged, or incoherent on a whole bunch of policy topics, everything from our non-existent immigration problem, to climate change, and other matters.

Obviously monetary policy isn't the only one, but his bat shit crazy and contradictory actions on this particular issue, illustrate rather nicely the bizarre thinking that goes on in Trump's head. He gets mad at Powell over interest rates, but then continues to hire people like Malpass for various appointments. It's difficult to understand the thought processes that goes on in his head.

Can we just say Trump didn't get the "best people"?

The very smart David Glasner sums up what needs to be said about Malpass and rightly warns us to be very leery of anything produced by the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal.

Quote

Note: On August 5, 2011, one month after I started blogging, I wrote the following post responding to an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal by David Malpass, an op-ed remarkable for its garbled syntax, analytical incoherence, and factual misrepresentations. All in all, quite a performance. Today, exactly seven and a half years later, we learn that the estimable Mr. Malpass, currently serving as Undersecretary for International Affairs in the U.S. Treasury Department, is about to be nominated to become the next President of the World Bank.

 

Quote

As for Malpass’s next sentence, where to begin?  I won’t dwell on the garbled syntax, but, even if that were its intention, the Fed is obviously not succeeding in discouraging thrift, as private indebtedness has been falling consistently over the past three years.  The question is whether it would be good for the economy if people were saving even more than they are now, and the answer to that, clearly, is:  not unless there was a great deal more demand by private business to invest than there is now.  Why is business not investing?  Despite repeated declamations about the regulatory overkill and anti-business rhetoric of the Obama administration, no serious observer doubts that the main obstacle to increased business investment is that expected demand does not warrant investments aimed at increasing capacity when existing capacity is not being fully utilized.  

The "poor savers!" argument got very popular with conservatives. Evidently, they think the FED just picks interest rates out of a box.

And for "reasonable centrist" that now have suddenly and spontaneously gotten a keen interest in the details of policy, while I have some issues with MMTers, they are lot closer to the truth of matters, than clowns like David Malpass ever was.

 

Quote

Actually the Wall Street Journal in its editorial today summed up its approach to economic policy making rather well.

That’s what it comes down to for the Journal.  If Obama is for it, we’re against it.  Simple as that.  Leave your brain at the door.

 

[Cas Stark]

11 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

Uh, I don't think that's actually true, you're repeating attacks Republicans have made on her.

https://www.cnn.com/2016/06/29/politics/elizabeth-warren-native-american-pocahontas/index.html

Bah, I tried to quote from the story and I couldn't.

She has always expressed pride in her family stories about native heritage, but as the linked story points out, at every step of her career people have always viewed her as a white woman. "All these entries"? Two? The meaningless bar one in Texas and the self-identification one at Harvard? Someone at Harvard was pretty stupid, not being able to figure out she was a white woman with an ancestry she identified with.

 

It only makes the hypocrisy worse then, that everyone viewed her as a white woman, but still kept listing her as Native American and a minority in various registries in order to increase their diversity quotient, and of course, it is unprovable whether she received any advantage or not.  It doesn't make sense to me, given the decades long push in academia to diversify their faculty, that a self identified Native American wouldn't have been an advantage.  And yes, I have read the Boston Globe piece from a few years ago.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/after-new-document-is-revealed-warren-struggles-with-questions-of-identity/2019/02/06/bf380538-2a24-11e9-b011-d8500644dc98_story.html?utm_term=.a0adb78a5922