Elizabeth warren

Why Elizabeth Warren’s college debt plan sucks

Last month, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, hustling to get to the left of her rivals in the crowded Democratic field, proposed that the federal government forgive up to $50,000 in student loan debt for people in households earning less than $100,000 a year (amounts forgiven would shrink at higher income levels). The proposal is projected to cost $640 billion, though some estimates suggest the figure could be north of $900 billion. As one might expect, Warren’s proposal disproportionately benefits affluent families, since working class and low-income households are much less likely to have attended college at all — much less to have racked up substantial student debt.

elizabeth warren college debt

The madness of the Democratic impeachment crusade

Since the release of the Mueller report, with each passing day comes a new and increasingly strident demand to impeach Donald Trump. The New York Times, Washington Post, and various prestige magazines are cluttered with such demands, casting impeachment as an imperative for the survival of American democracy. Mueller might have affirmatively concluded that no conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia ever came close to being established, but that hasn’t stopped Democrats and their journalist allies from barreling full-steam ahead down this rabbit hole.

warren impeachment

Elizabeth Warren, Mother of Dragons

In the 2020 primary, you win or you die. That’s the subtext of a new essay in The Cut by Democratic presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren, entitled ‘The World Needs Fewer Cersei Lannisters.’ Liz has had a few headline-grabbing moments over the last few days. She issued a renewed call for Trump’s impeachment following the release of the redacted Mueller report. Now she’s piggy-backing off the hype around the biggest show in the world, writing episode reviews for New York magazine’s women’s site. Cockburn supposes they have to plug the holes left by those layoffs somehow. – Game of Thrones spoilers below – So who is Sen. Warren’s favorite character on the show?

elizabeth warren game of thrones

2009 vs 2019 challenge: Washington, DC edition

‘A week is a long time in politics,’ Harold Wilson supposedly once said. If the former British Prime Minister is correct, then 10 years is akin to several millennia. But just how much can a decade really change us? The latest social media trend, the 2009 vs 2019 challenge, is seeking to answer that very question. The premise is simple: find a photograph of yourself from 2009 and post it alongside one taken this year. For many younger folk, the comparison has a feel-good factor, as 10 years later they find themselves more stylish and attractive (they have undergone the ‘glow-up’, if you will.

2009 vs 2019 cover

Yet again, bluff and bombast are Trump’s policy

Well, well, well. So President Trump isn’t serious about Syria. Sen. Lindsey Graham has announced that President Trump is pondering his declaration that its time to bring the boys back from the wasteland of Syria within 30-days. ‘I think we’re in a pause situation,’ Graham said on Sunday. Trump himself tweeted, ‘we’re slowly sending our troops back home to be with their families, while at the same time fighting ISIS remnants...’ This is classic Trump. Announce a bold policy, create a furor — and then move on. Disarm North Korea? Extract real concessions from Canada and Mexico? Improve relations with Russia? Bulky China into a trade deal on American terms? Build a wall?

donald trump bluff bombast

Why are Democrats blue?

It is a curious fact that while English conservatives identify with the colour blue and English lefties with the colour red, the opposite is the case in America. I have struggled to recollect why the Democrats chose blue in 2000 but rather suspect it had something to do what Dr Christine Blasey Ford would call the ‘prefrontal cortex’. Many human decisions are taken on emotional grounds and emotion, as we are taught, is often governed by childhood memory.

elizabeth warren richard blumenthal bernie sanders kirsten gillibrand democrats blue

The invisible 2020 Democratic primary is already underway

Is there a possibility Hillary Clinton will launch her third presidential campaign in 2020? If you ask former chief political strategist Steve Bannon, there is no doubt in his mind the former First Lady, US Senator, Secretary of State, and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee is itching to run. ‘She’s looking for a rematch’ against Donald Trump, Bannon told Curt Mills in a Spectator USA exclusive. Whether or not Clinton enters the race, Democrats across America will have plenty of choices when candidates officially declare their bids next year.

2020 democratic primary joe biden

I feel for Elizabeth Warren. I pretended to be Jewish for a year

As a child, I was fond of a catchy little ditty called ‘I’m An Indian Too’ (‘A Sioux!’) Though she’s 10 years older than me, I wonder whether this ear-worm also stuck in the consciousness of the Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren, whose claim of Native American descent has recently been rubbished by both a DNA test which revealed her to be around 1/1024th of this persuasion (most of us are more unicorn than this, surely?) and the Cherokee Nation Secretary of State, Chuck Hoskin Jr, who accused Warren of ‘undermining tribal interests with her continued claims of tribal heritage.

julie burchill israel flag pretended

Teepee or not teepee? That is the question

It has long been fashionable for Americans to claim descent from Rebecca Rolfe (née Pocahontas) the heroical daughter of Chief Powhatan of Virginia. Woodrow Wilson’s wife was one, the actor, Glenn Strange, another. Then people started claiming any family connection whatsoever to Mrs Rolfe’s descendants, as the Bushes now do. Soon the great contagion spread to the point where everyone in the State of Virginia was descended from Mrs Rolfe, and then all the smart-sets from all the other states joined the rush for Native American blood of their own.

elizabeth warren campaign cherokee

Will Elizabeth Warren’s DNA results help her claim Trump’s scalp?

Geronimo! Elizabeth Warren, whom President Trump has repeatedly mocked as ‘Pocahontas,’ has now issued the results of a DNA test indicating that she does indeed have Native American ancestry going back some 6-10 generations. A video released by Warren shows her receiving the news from one Carlos Bustamante, a professor of genetics at Stanford University. According to Bustamante, ‘The facts suggest that you absolutely have a Native American ancestor in your pedigree.’ Trump has been fixated with Warren’s heritage.This was supposed to be his new ‘birther’ issue. In Iowa last week, he observed that he would like to ‘finally get down to the fact as to whether or not she has Indian blood.’ Why this was the case he did not indicate.

elizabeth warren