Wednesday, October 9, 2019

Republicans and Jacobin Attack Warren After Finishing Biden Off

The Republican National Committee said Tuesday that Ms. Warren had been “caught lying.”.....
In a post on Twitter last week, Meagan Day, a writer for the socialist magazine Jacobin, drew attention to an interview Ms. Warren gave in 2007 in which she discussed the end of her career as a public-school teacher and did not describe being forced out because she was pregnant.... NYT - Elizabeth Warren Details Her Account of Losing Teaching Job Because of Pregnancy
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/08/us/politics/elizabeth-warren-fired-pregnant.html
I still favor Bernie but Wow: RNC and Jacobin tag team Warren to brand her a liar. Since Jacobin/DSA "Bernie or Bust" has seen Biden fade after the Trump attacks and has now joined the right wing Trumpites in an attack on Warren. Frankly, these campaigns, sometimes bordering on hysteria -- like how DARE the press actually say Bernie had a heart attack --  have begun to turn some leftist Bernie supporters off. I went to the original Meagan Day tweet and note how disparaging it is toward Warren (by the way, the Jacobin/DSA crowd attacks on both Hillary (deserved) and Warren, two prominent women, are also giving some women thoughts that there is something valid in the attacks of some Bernie Bros turning off progressive women.
 
The ref to Jacobin caught my eye since I started hearing the same attack on right wing radio - Bernie and Sid - did this hit job the other day as they switch from Biden attacks and now go after leading Dem candidates one by one as they become a threat. The essence of the attack was that Warren did not really face firing over being pregnant in 1971 despite a lot of proof that this was policy in many schools -- the idea of kids seeing a pregnant teacher might cause trauma.

So left wing press like Jacobin and some in DSA are playing pin ball with the right - with similar intent I believe -- right wingers to leave their Trump as the only candidate and the left to leave Bernie as the only candidate -- and I believe some on the left would rather see Trump win than any Democrat other than Bernie.

A DSA memo disparaged the impeachment movement with the usual attack on Dems. A prominent left wing supporter of Bernie surmised this was about:  
Making sure there's no pro-Democrat option if Bernie loses.
The logic is, in effect, to try to stop any potential left-center coalition after the primaries, ie. promoting Bernie-or-Bust - as if we'll have another choice besides the Democratic nominee in November 2020, whoever that is. We won't.
Reality check for ultra-left: Reports about Bernie cutting back on campaigning:  
It may turn out to be Warren or Bust with Bust being Trump. But watch the attacks on Warren continue.
All over the internet you can find people calling Elizabeth Warren a "former public school teacher" and saying it was her "first career." Warren was a public school teacher for one year. She immediately left the classroom, went to law school, and became a law professor. Come on 
The NYT article fundamentally supported Warren's claim she was if not openly fired, sent a message she wasn't wanted when she became noticably pregnant:
Historically, it was common for American teachers to be pushed out of their jobs during pregnancy, either through termination or the requirement of an unpaid leave of absence. In 1974, the Supreme Court ruled some of these policies unconstitutional. But not all such policies were explicitly written down and tracked, giving many female teachers little legal recourse....
Ms. Warren told CBS News that she had been hiding her pregnancy.
“I was pregnant, but nobody knew it,” she said. “And then a couple of months later when I was six months pregnant and it was pretty obvious, the principal called me in, wished me luck and said he was going to hire someone else for the job.”... The Republican National Committee said Tuesday that Ms. Warren had been “caught lying.”
Want to read more Jacobin attacks on Warren from the left?

Elizabeth Warren’s Public Education Problem By Eric Blanc

The Sanders Climate Plan Can Work. Warren’s Can’t. By Carl Beijer
 
The left has been attacking Warren for her former positions and the disturbing choices to give TFA people a role in her campaign. But I also found some Bernie baggage, a former major ed deformer.

Nina Turner, Bernie Sanders’s Campaign Chair, Led Charge for Education Reform as Ohio Legislator

And here is another Bernie backer, a woman, on differentiating Bernie from Warren, which is not a bad thing if done honestly instead of looking like a right wing hit job.  From The Bern Identity
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1177039402997956608.html.


5 comments:

Anonymous said...

There is nothing wrong with making a positive case for Bernie on education, and there is a strong case that can be made. But it seems that there are those who would rather attack Warren, joining with the right wing and doing so on the flimsiest of grounds. That is destructive, and it can only hurt Bernie.

Anonymous said...

Norm this article is brilliant- trump is the enemy. jacobin and prominent leftists continued attack on warren makes our side look bad. Norm and I are Bernie supporters, but too many of our comrades spend their time making the case against fellow democrats, rather than trying to beat Trump. Make the case for Bernie, make the case against Trump, but stop attacking our own. Bernie or bust is a ridiculous stance. These types of attacks turned off Hillary supporters and will now turn off fellow dens and libs. _Mike Schirtzer

Anonymous said...

Obviously, given the age and health (not to mention the Socialist ideas), Bernie is a no-go from the get-go for mainstream voters. Just as obviously, "Middle Class Joe" has a well deserved reputation as one of the worst double-failures in the history of Democratic primaries (review the plagiarism dropout scandal and the later sub-1% Iowa result in 2008) and this Ukraine issue is just the final blow. So it is Warren all the way with the Dems and establishment media now. And it has nothing to do with Republican attacks. Finally, Trump v Warren has blowout potential. (Anyone who is confused about who will be on the winning side in the blowout needs to get out more.)

Anonymous said...

This seems a bit out-of-date. The 78-year-old Bernie had a heart attack just a few days ago and he'll doubtlessly withdraw from the race. Nothing to do with Republican or Democratic attacks (criticisms) on Socialism. This is the primary season and with Biden disintegrating before our eyes it is clearly Warren as the frontrunner by a huge margin. All she has to do is change her message to a moderate one and she's got a shot at beating Trump in a general election.

Pogue said...

Bernie will not withdraw from the race. Warren is being propped up by the DNC and the MSM. She is a fake progressive and will not fight for what Bernie will truly fight for. This is an election primary - we want to know what the candidates are all about and if we can trust them. The sides are no longer Republican and Democratic since they take money from many of the same big-money donors. The sides are working/middle class vs. the super rich. Trump is not the problem, he is a symptom of a corrupt political system and main stream media. That system HAS to change. Once more people realize this, the sooner we can make this country better.