The Audacity of Warren

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., listens to a question during the question and answer part of her campaign event Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2019, at the University of New Hampshire in Durham, N.H. (AP Photo/ Cheryl Senter)

Did you see the video of Elizabeth Warren happily bragging about taking three of the last six dollars from a college woman who desperately wants to see her elected to the White House?

Elizabeth Warren, who has a net worth of $12 million, talking about how a college girl with $6 in her bank account donated $3 to her campaign

Nothing better than rich people telling poor people that the only way to combat poverty is to give all of your money to rich people pic.twitter.com/ZJJDi5zWyL

— Ashley StClair 🇺🇸 (@stclairashley) February 12, 2020

Undoubtedly Warren was very pleased to be “standing up” for her stans. She’s fighting for the little guy. She’s in it to win it. She persists. Pick your cliche. The conservative internet took the opportunity to ridicule Warren for so willingly taking the money of a poor college student. She is surely rethinking that response today.

But it wasn’t necessarily Warren’s thoughtless response that bothered me the most. It was that it didn’t even occur to her to think about it in any other context. Warren (and every other Democrat) has framed herself as a champion of the little guy. Unlike many of her Democrat colleagues, I believe Warren actually believes that about herself. Warren believes it about herself so much that she doesn’t need to do any other examination of her perspective or what it might look like from the outside. The audacity of Warren is not that she really believes she is like everyone else but that she believes everyone else is like her.

From Warren’s perspective, she’s the only candidate who can beat Trump. As desperately as she wants to win, how much more do her supporters want her to win? From her perspective, the story of a hungry college student giving their last pennies to her political campaign is inspiring. It’s about sacrifice and the desperation to beat Literally Hitler™. It’s a worthy cause. She genuinely believed the story she told would be a great illustration of how passionate her base is. Instead, it showed us how out of touch she is.

If I were writing her talking points, I’d have told to tell the story a different way. I’d have told her to say that upon learning she had just $6 in her bank account she immediately directed her staff to refund the money, take her out to lunch and make sure she had a nice bag of leftovers to take home with her. I’d have her say that her campaign is about uniting Americans, supporting each other and making sure everyone is fed and educated, and if we can’t do that personally for the hungry stranger in front of us, how can we ask Americans, in general, to do it with policy?

The audacity of Warren is that she really didn’t think it was her job to care for that woman in front of her…she thinks it’s your job. That is the audacity of the entire Democrat platform. When the opportunity comes for any of the candidates and talking heads to lead by example they reject it nearly every time.

Americans should reduce their carbon footprint (and consequently their standard of living), yet Bernie Sanders and Al Gore make no apologies for their multiple mansions and lavish lifestyles.

Americans shouldn’t be so rich because rich people are money-hoarders who only earned their wealth by stealing it from the lower classes. However, Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton and every other filthy-rich politician continue to be rich. I have yet to hear any of them say they are redistributing their own income in the interest of “fair share”ness.

Americans should be forced into socialized medicine, but not the ones who actually work in Congress. Those Americans will retain their right to private, top-tier medical care. If any one of the Democrat candidates uses the public healthcare system when they’re ill, I have yet to hear of it.

Americans should reduce their spending in order to pay more taxes for the benefit of society, but the government has no responsibility to reduce its own spending in order to more efficiently use the dollars they already have.

It is shockingly ignorant to so gleefully campaign on the notion of “redistribution for thee but not for me!”

And let’s not forget that Warren herself is proudly anti-school choice and wants public schools to be the only option for poor children, despite the fact that she sent her own child to a private school. She even lied right to the face of a woman who challenged her on that hypocrisy.
Warren’s flub was an unfiltered look into the campaign platform – and a party platform – that is big on platitudes but short on leadership. If I were that young woman who gave my last $3 I’d be ticked that Warren didn’t say, “Hey, this one’s on me.” What a wasted opportunity to literally put one’s money where her mouth is.

But that is the audacity of Warren.