April 11, 2012

Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard lawprof, learning to campaign.

"She is new at it, and learning on an unusually prominent stage."
Despite her folksy approach, the response of those who meet her for the first time is often polite formality, not the warmer, more familiar type of exchange that voters tend to have with [incumbent Senator Scott] Brown.

At a St. Patrick’s Day lunch in Quincy, Ms. Warren gamely joined a dais full of local politicians and offered a few jokes that promptly fell flat.

“I’ll get there with you guys,” she ventured after a joke about Rick Santorum fizzled.
What was the joke? Can we get video?
Yet two days later, at a much larger breakfast in South Boston, Ms. Warren breezed through a comedy routine, drawing particular laughs when she said she had heard that Mr. Brown’s barn jacket cost $600.

“Wow, here’s a guy who could use a consumer advocate,” she said.
Who was at this "much larger breakfast"? Why can't the NYT anticipate my questions and answer them?!
Like Mr. Brown, she is also using social media to share personal details that might help her connect. On Saturday, she posted a picture of herself on Facebook dyeing eggs with her young granddaughters. She has posted on Facebook and Twitter about her golden retriever, Otis, and about the fact that she bakes “a wicked apple pie.”
Pictures please. Or at least links. Blah. I'm just visualizing generic grandkids, Easter eggs, and golden retriever. By the way, I added the specificity of "Easter." The NYT just has here dyeing eggs. Maybe she had a non-Easter agenda. I shouldn't presume.

By the way, the new Rasmussen poll has Warren ahead of Brown 46% to 45% (and he was leading her by 5 in February). Interestingly: "Warren leads among those who rate their finances positively; Brown leads among those who consider them poor." Isn't it funny that the more well-off tend to go for a Democrat who offers to speak for the less well-off?

Ah! I've found the Elizabeth Warren joke about Rick Santorum. Commenting on the absence of Gov. Deval Patrick at the St. Patrick's Day event, she said: "He's in Rick Santorum's favorite place today- the Virgin Islands."

I can see why the NYT left that one out.

52 comments:

Scott M said...

"He's in Rick Santorum's favorite place today- the Virgin Islands."

Awful. And I know awful. Besides...she's not married to a hot chick from a Digney Fignus video. No way she's going to win lacking that.

DADvocate said...

ROFLMAO!! That barn jacket joke was hilarious!!! OMG, please stop!! I can't take it any more!! Please!! No more!! Please don't tell the joke about his boots!! I'll die!1

Sydney said...

I don't get the Virgin Island joke. Is the Virgin Islands his favorite place because he's Catholic and believes in the virginity of the Holy Mother? Or is it his favorite place because he believes in abstinence as a form of birth control? Or is he one of those rich Republicans with a winter home in the Virgin Islands?

Anonymous said...

Isn't it funny that the more well-off tend to go for a Democrat who offers to speak for the less well-off?

Politics is the new church of the rich not-otherwise-churched left.

The logic is very simple:

1. Christ said we should take care of the poor.

2. The federal government takes care of the poor.

3. Therefore we should follow Christ and grow the scope and reach of the federal government.

Sydney said...

Isn't it funny that the more well-off tend to go for a Democrat who offers to speak for the less well-off?

That's so they only have to hear what they want the less well-off to believe, not what they actually believe.

Matt Sablan said...

"I'm the daughter of a maintenance man who became a professor and fought against big Wall Street Banks," she said. "If that doesn't ring a bell, you might remember me as the elitist professor from Hollywood who's running against Scott Brown."

-- That was actually funny. You know why? Self put-downs are the best. That's why I thought Brown's joke was funny too:

"Brown said that as he was flying back to the Bay State Thursday, a woman approached him and said "Aren't you that good looking Republican from Massachusetts? It's an honor to meet you Mr. Romney.""

The Virgin Islands joke I don't see how it is funny, except as a play on virgins.

Hagar said...

These days, the Republicans are the party for the rich, and the Democrats for the very very rich.

Larry J said...

The logic is very simple:

1. Christ said we should take care of the poor.

2. The federal government takes care of the poor.

3. Therefore we should follow Christ and grow the scope and reach of the federal government.


The logic could be as follows:

1. Christ said we should take care of the poor.

2. The federal government takes care of the poor.

3. Therefore the federal government is Christ.

C R Krieger said...

What about Marisa DeFranco, her primary opponent?  Lawyer DeFranco understands we have an immigration problem and we have a real drug problem, and while I don't know this, I bet she understands that a crisis with the Drug Cartels is coming.

Regards  —  Cliff

Anonymous said...

BTW (don't know where else to post this) but did you all see this, Mitt in an unscripted and 'regular' moment, talking with Sean Hannity before a taping.

I think this was supposed to be damning of Mitt as an aloof and out of touch rich guy who talks about horses, but I find it really compelling.

He stays at the cheap hotel because he watches where every dollar goes.

And he jokes that Ann needed time off from him, and about how he's OK if he wears the same tie for two days of show (taped in one day) and looks like a schlep.

Michael in ArchDen said...

Wouldn't the Virgin Islands joke been funnier with Tim Tebow, than Rick Santorum? After all we know Rick isn't a virgin!!

edutcher said...

The Lefties are really getting nervous about this one.

Brown is way ahead in money and he's cuter.

And, yeah, the polls will tighten. Depends on how many are out of work in MA by Election Day and how well Brown can connect Lizzie to Zero.

MOE is 4.5, so be skeptical.

Anonymous said...

3.Therefore the federal government is Christ.

Yeah, that's probably more in line with their true beliefs.

the wolf said...

Rick Santorum doesn't think your 14-year-old daughter should get government-supplied contraceptives. That's why he's in the Virgin Islands. Woot woot! Who's with me here!?!?

Blue@9 said...

Who was at this "much larger breakfast"? Why can't the NYT anticipate my questions and answer them?!

Ha, you read like I do!

Interestingly: "Warren leads among those who rate their finances positively; Brown leads among those who consider them poor." Isn't it funny that the more well-off tend to go for a Democrat who offers to speak for the less well-off?

Cue stale liberal narrative: Republicans manipulate the poor to vote against their own interests!

Fen said...

Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard lawprof -

That doesn't mean what it used to.

Does she understand Marbury V Madison? We prob need to check.

Calypso Facto said...

Isn't it funny that the more well-off tend to go for a Democrat who offers to speak for the less well-off?

and

The logic is very simple:

1. Christ said we should take care of the poor.

2. The federal government takes care of the poor.

3. Therefore we should follow Christ and grow the scope and reach of the federal government.


I think it's this way among rich Dems:

1. Christ said we should take care of the poor, but

2. I don't like spending my own money on the poor, so

3. If I get the federal government to take care of the poor with other people's (or other generation's) money, then

4. I'm rid of my nasty cognitive dissonance. Win-win for rich, smug me.

Fen said...

Christ: "We should take care of the poor"

Democrat: "Sorry, I already gave at the IRS. I pay them to take care of the poor for me."

Christ: [....]

Widmerpool said...

Reporting from ground zero, as it were, I think Brown has an excellent chance. The Dem party in Mass is pretty clearly a "liberal-hack alliance," as some have called it. While Ma Warren send s thrill up the legs of liberals, with the hacks not so much. It is pretty clear that Menino (Bos mayor) and many of the attendees at the St Pats breakfast (a hackorama) clearly are more comfortable with Brown. They will sit on their hands.

Holmes said...

I remember similar apologist columns for Sarah Palin. "She's new to this national politicking, and is learning on an unusually prominent stage." Followed by much airbrushing of any potentially embarrassing details or remarks. I remember it well.

ricpic said...

Warren used the term wicked and walked in the St. Paddy's Day parade? Wicked is THE defining lower class term in New England, as in wicked hot or wicked cold or wicked good. The St. Paddy's Day parade is strictly for townies. Liz must want it wicked bad to mix her Harvard self like that with the benighted not once but twice.

Known Unknown said...

Is Warren normally a funny person?

I always find it a disconnect when pols do "jokes" and it's obvious they are not naturally humorous people I think it would be better to just be yourself and not try to do humor if it's not something you normally do.

Christopher in MA said...

Is Warren normally a funny person?

Funny how? You mean like a clown? Like she amuses me?

No, she isn't. But the Dems are fighting the last war. They're convinced that the only reason Brown won was that he lowered himself to appeal to the rubes outside Cambridge, Brookline and Newton. Martha (Marsha, Marsha) Coakley, the thinking goes, was just too cool and rational for the bumpkins who live in gawdawful shitholes like Bellingham or Medford.

Hence the persistent puffery of the Boston Globe, trying to downplay Warren's class-warfare elitism and her shrieky economic illiteracy by highlighting her supposed triple-decker, parochial-school, had a paper route and sold lemonade in summer childhood.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Why do you assume that Warren would call them Easter eggs? The NYT did not use that phrase.

Scott M said...

by highlighting her supposed triple-decker, parochial-school, had a paper route and sold lemonade in summer childhood.

I thought the tax burden in Massachusetts had long before run all the sensible lemonade stand operators into tax-friendly nearby Rhode Island.

Anonymous said...

Why do you assume that Warren would call them Easter eggs?

I think the political correct term these days is renewable chicken pods.

ricpic said...

In Rhode Island the kid purveyors of lemonade lace it with grappa.

KCFleming said...

Warren is as folksy as one would expect from a hectoring, finger-wagging, anal retentive librarian.

Sister Mary Elephant redux.

C R Krieger said...

Re Ms Warren and Marbury v Madison, we know how she feels.  WARNING, shamesless self reference here—she says the SCOTUS should stay out of ACA, it is a "policy" issue.  When my local paper, The [Lowell] Sun, publishes her picture, she looks like a scolding school marm.

Regards  —  Cliff

AllenS said...

“a wicked apple pie.”

Who wrote that for her, Joe Biden?

WVs: romick titso

Christopher in MA said...

Hey, CR, you're in Lowell? I'm just up the road in Bradford (OK, Haverhill, but we do have our own Bradford PO). I wonder how many other Massholes haunt the Althousiverse.

Anonymous said...

"..Despite her folksy approach, the response of those who meet her for the first time is often polite formality, not the warmer, more familiar type of exchange that voters tend to have with [incumbent Senator Scott] Brown.."

Members of the Central Committee who are candidate members of the Politburo have never been known for their warmth.

Sigivald said...

“Wow, here’s a guy who could use a consumer advocate”

That, in a nutshell, is probably the lion's share of exactly what's wrong with Warren and her worldview.

Yes, she was making a joke, I know.

But it's a joke that reveals a wide vista of utterly faulty assumptions.

(I find it bemusing that almost without exception every time some "Consumer Advocate" claims they're "helping" me, they're just being an interfering bastard.

This means you, Nader.)

MadisonMan said...

In Rhode Island the kid purveyors of lemonade lace it with grappa.

How can they compete with Del's?

David said...

A much larger breakfast meant that she had whole wheat toast with her granola, and a bran muffin. She just had granola at the first breakfast.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Warren is a hater and like most haters she has a stick up her ass.
She has zero warmth and zero charisma.

DADvocate said...

Mr. Brown’s barn jacket cost $600.

Oh, jeez. I'm still laughing. Just can't stop. OMG. I think I'm gonna die.

rehajm said...

Brown wins the election and celebrates late into the night. Then he wakes up early the next morning, puts on the sweats and walks the family yorkie. He picks up the poo.

(Gunning Fog says you only need 8 years of education to get that...)

Anonymous said...

She has zero warmth and zero charisma.

It's smug, self-righteousness that characterizes the elite left these days.

It's the hubris.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

"I'm the daughter of a maintenance man who became a professor and fought against big Wall Street Banks," she said.

Interesting, she totally skipped the middle. From working class girl to academic elite. That explains a lot.

Freeman Hunt said...

"What did the one dollar bill say to the one hundred dollar bill? See you at Romney's house! Ba dum dum. No wait, I've got more! Why did the butler cross the road? To answer Romney's door? Bada-BING! No! Don't go! This one's great. What did Santorum say to his wife? I hate sex! Ha ha! C'mon, people!"

dbp said...

"I wonder how many other Massholes haunt the Althousiverse."

Chelmsford

Michelle Dulak Thomson said...

sydney,

I don't get the Virgin Island joke. Is the Virgin Islands his favorite place because he's Catholic and believes in the virginity of the Holy Mother? Or is it his favorite place because he believes in abstinence as a form of birth control?

I think it's the second. And a lamer attempt at humor by a politician I haven't heard in my lifetime.

wv: lckeyear butions

Nope, try again: ckgrest ainterfo. Apparently wv expects you to distinguish a lower-case "l" from a capital "I" when seen through whatever distorting haze they apply. If you can't, you're a robot!

William said...

The subliminal message of dying eggs is that she's in favor of birth control and abortion.....Her father the maintenance man who went on to become a professor has an impressive CV. Too bad he's not running.

Alex said...

Just lump in Brown with the "war on women".

Mary Beth said...

I looked up her Facebook update about Easter eggs.

"I love Easter. When I was growing up, I loved to dye eggs with my mother and grandmother." She goes on to talk about dying eggs with her grandchildren.

DADvocate said...

PLEASE! MAKE HER STOP! I CAN'T TAKE IT!

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I would love to see Meade do an impression of that time Warren was in her "talking tour" .

Known Unknown said...

"Mr. Brown’s barn jacket cost $600."

Is someone going through his garbage, looking at receipts?

Saint Croix said...

Isn't it funny that the more well-off tend to go for a Democrat who offers to speak for the less well-off?

The Democrat party is the party of insiders, connections, union jobs, corruption, cynicism and scamming the system.

So of course rich people love the Democrats!

The Republican party is the party of the people who hate that shit. We are the party of small business owners and job creators.

So it's bullshit (in the extreme) that Warren Buffett and Bill Gates and the rest of the super-rich are liberals because they are nice to the poor. Ha!

Look what liberals do to the schools!

Liberals are mean to the poor. Mean and cynical.

You can make an argument that rich people are liberals for social reasons (i.e. abortion, homosexuality, hostility to religion, etc). In other words, they vote for higher taxes because money is irrelevant to them.

Do you believe that?

Super rich people like money. That's why they have it! And they vote their pocketbooks. Yeah, taxes go up in an Obama administration. But the super-rich can avoid paying all that.

The "more well off" vote Republican. It's the super-rich who think they can buy influence. And that's all this is. It's not "funny" that the super-rich vote for higher taxes. It's a lie for the gullible.

Rusty said...

Super rich people like money. That's why they have it! And they vote their pocketbook.


Except Steve Jobs. He hated money. I know because I read it here.

willem said...

What does one do with a Howdy-Doody Methodist throwback from Oklahoma? Send her to Harvard and watch her become the Hegelian Queen of I am better than you because, of course..

You can take the girl out of the trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park out of the girl. It's the Whiskey Tango bigotry we be her demise, that over functioning condescension not unlike Hitlerian self-cleansing. I'm amazed that the land of the Kennedys would want to be ruled by self-righteous Okie Princess who too long ago forgot where she came from. Warren is the worst kind of Rube; it's that notorious "convert" problem one sees in religion.

"Therefore we should follow Christ (be nice like Jesus even though he never really existed) and grow the scope and reach of the federal government."

There's no better way to guarantee employment for our elite university alumni that to expand the government and let them dominate every nook and cranny of federal policy development and operation.

Government has become the new welfare program for the distempered and miseducated alumnus of our finest universities. Someone should describe it as a parody of Fiddler on the Roof; e.g, "Fiddler on the Route."

"Tuition - tuition."

"Tu-i-tion!"

The Democrat's non-dischargable tuition debt bomb loaded in the bomb bay of FannieMae/FreddieMac may yet do what nuclear weapons could never accomplish. What was once Education has become an orgy of squander and national dissembling to assumptively worship postmodern derivatives of european cultism and utopian Prussian ideologies from the 1840s, giving Harvard it's Elizabeth, Hegelian Queen.