Elizabeth Warren And Our Racist President
By 
Warren’s formal announcement speech in Lawrence was great, and reporters Have Concerns about Identity:
In forcefully populist language, Warren sought to carve out a distinctive position in the crowded Democratic field, citing achievements like the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which regulates banks and other financial institutions. Other Democrats are also speaking out on inequality, but Warren is hitting particularly hard on the notion of creating new operating rules for the capitalist system.
“It won’t be enough to just undo the terrible acts of this administration,” Warren said. “We can’t afford to just tinker around the edges — a tax credit here, a regulation there. Our fight is for big, structural change.”
During the roughly 45-minute speech, she repeatedly stressed her image as a fighter, linking her family’s economic struggles to a promise to battle for middle-class Americans. Supporters hope that reputation will eclipse any image of her as someone who misrepresented herself as a Native American for years.
But even some of those who attended the kickoff had concerns about the strength of her candidacy, given the identity issue and President Trump’s aggressive campaign style.
“Aggressive campaign style” like adorning a flagrantly racist tweet with a joke about genocide.
As Paul recently suggested, all signs point to supposedly objective reporters discussing Warren through the lens of this thoroughly debunked non-scandal. (Yes, Warren did do one very maladroit thing in response to the vast over-coverage this bullshit has received, and yes also there’s every reason to believe that had she not done that the narrative would be that it’s her fault that the issue continues to be vastly over-covered because she has not responded to it in exactly the right way.) And it simply doesn’t have to be this way:
Warren would like to have a debate about economic policy with Trump.
Trump would like everyone to fall back on racial identity instead.
You, as a citizen or a journalist or whatever else you are, are allowed to choose whether or not to take the bait on his provocations.
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) February 10, 2019
The speech is great.