Liberal Democrat and political consultant Bob Shrum, who is notoriously lambasted for his winless record in presidential elections, told Politico he thinks the Boston Herald‘s coverage of Elizabeth Warren’s phony claims of Native American ancestry is a form of “race baiting”:
On the other hand, the Herald’s drumbeat coverage, Shrum contended, amounts to a form of “race baiting.”
“The implication is she got her job through affirmative action,” he said. “It’s not true. It plays to the resentful right, and it’s hatred for affirmative action.”
Shrum is right about one thing — conservatives who believe in merit and equality of opportunity and not an equality of result loathe affirmative action policies, especially in higher education. But Shrum mistakenly conceded that he actually thinks Warren is a Native American, if he thinks the outrage over her claims of Native American ancestry is about the fact that “she got her job through affirmative action.”
And Shrum’s belief that Warren is a Native American despite all the evidence to the contrary is precisely what has people outraged.
The Elizabeth Warren case is about Harvard boasting to its own student newspaper–and to the New York Times–that its law school had a Native American professor.
The Elizabeth Warren case is about Warren being listed in professional directories of minorities and not removing herself from them, presumably because she wanted to meet more of “her people” even though she made no overt efforts to participate in activities put on by Native American student associations or groups.
The Elizabeth Warren case is about, as Breitbart News first reported, Harvard listing Warren in EEOC reports, which allowed the school to more easily comply with diversity requirements. And in these reports, Warren had to “self-report” her minority status because there is no presumable way an administrator could have deemed her to be a Native American by simply looking at her.
The Elizabeth Warren case is about the old, legacy media falling down on the job and engaging in near malpractice–laughingly so–in order to protect their liberal darling, mistakenly thinking they are still in an era in which they could monopolize what is and is not news.
The Elizabeth Warren case is about, after outlets like Breitbart News debunked and disproved Warren’s earlier claims of Cherokee ancestry, Warren insulting the intelligence of Americans and voters in Massachusetts by insisting she is still Native American because her family members had high cheekbones and, most recently, because her mother told her that she was.
The Elizabeth Warren case is about a lot of things that reflect badly and dishonorably on Warren. But race is not one of them.
By saying that the drumbeat coverage of Warren’s supposed Native American heritage is a form “race baiting,” Shrum revealed two things about himself. First, he, like many liberals and Democrats, see race where there is not any and reflexively and instinctively use race as a political weapon.
Second, Shrum believes the fairy tale that Warren is part Native American.
The former is despicable. The latter is just sad.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.