Democrats are getting into position to run for president. Elizabeth Warren did what she needed to do.
Confront him. Hit back.
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| Click. The Guardian. |
Trump drives serious people crazy and he pulls them off message. It is one of the secrets to his success. Keep people talking about his message instead of their own.
Panelists on Ari Melber's show on MSNBC were confident Trump had done it again. He had Elizabeth Warren talking about her DNA instead of about people losing health care, consumers being exposed once again to greedy bankers, and a tax bill that favors the very wealthy at the expense of our children. She is off message, they said.
She is on message. She stood up to Trump. So there, Donald Trump!
The one, big message every Democratic candidate needs to make is that he or she won't be pushed around, and that requires them to be fearless and direct when dealing with Trump. Ignoring his insults is not understood by the public to be "going high." Talking about health care and taxes and consumer protection is not interpreted as being "on message."
It is interpreted as dodging Trump. It looks weak.
Trump's big meta message in his campaign and in office is that he is a fearless bully who will keep American safe because is is unafraid of doing controversial things. He will lie and exaggerate and do shameless things and he can get away with it. He is bad but he is our bad guy. America First.
Michael Avanatti, the maybe-candidate identified in the media as the "porn star lawyer," understands and articulates the point this blog has made for two years. The election is not about policy debates. It is about who knows what to do in a fight.
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| Click: CNN |
Does he or she stand tall or does he or she deflect and run away when confronted by an opponent. Trump wins because he feels free to mock and humiliate others and he gets away with it. Little Marco, Lying Ted, Mexican rapists, Crooked Hillary, and now as president, the forgetful Dr. Ford and Pocahontas Elizabeth Warren.
Trump understands the power of humiliation. Obama humiliated him at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. It made Obama look presidential and Trump look weak, the silly little man with a reality TV show making decisions about a TV show. Trump sat there and fumed.
Weak.
Trump was routinely humiliating Warren with his Pocahontas jibe. She wasn't confronting him directly. Weak.
But Elizabeth Warren is a US Senator and expert on law and economic justice. She could win if she demonstrated she knows what Avanatti knows, that it is not enough to have the popular side of issues.
At long last she hit back. It might be too late. She let the Pocahontas insult sit out there for two years, and Trump will say anything to keep up the insults. So you took the test, he is saying. You are a fraud, he says.
She is doing the right thing, but needs to hit back harder if she wants to be president.
5 comments:
CNN editor considered Warren's DNA report a "swing and a miss".
Absolutely right, just like Obama's birth certificate she called the bluff and put him on the defensive. Now she can credibly point out he's welshing. It'll take a few tweets but he'll shut up. I hope she beats him over the head with it for the next two years!
There is a downside: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/10/16/elizabeth-warren-angers-prominent-native-americans-with-politically-fraught-dna-test/?utm_term=.00eaf2785a8b
Hi Peter, For some reason the link shown is incorrect--and when I tried to post correction it automatically "corrects" my link?? It is to an article in the WA Post about Cherokee Nation criticizing Warren for using Native American heritage for political reasons--I'd sent the link but it won't accept it. :(
This is a good example of why Republicans are better at politics than Democrats. Even when a candidate is as repulsive as trump, they will collectively hold their nose, toe the line, and stay together in order to advance the issues they care about.
Does the Cherokee Nation have valid points in their attack against Warren? Absolutely. Does it really make sense for them to give fuel to trump’s fire at the same time when he is appointing judges who uphold laws that restrict Native American voting rights? Does it make sense for them to help efforts that disengage progressive voters in states where Republicans are purging Native Americans from the voter rolls without recourse? No.
Democrats are very good at finding faults among their own, assembling the circular firing squad and taking ourselves down. Meanwhile, trump walks away unscathed, emboldened to do exactly what we are fighting against.
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