Electoral College Reform

If we must have an electoral college, here is how it could be structured.

Consider, the U. S. House of Representatives represents the people, each state is proportioned representatives according to its population.

The Electoral College represents the electorate, the voters, therefore electors should be apportioned according to the number of registered voters in each state.

Then, when the election is over, those electors will vote in proportion to the registered voters who actually voted.

For example, if a given state has five electors, based on voter registration, but only 60% of those voters cast their votes, then only three of those electors would get to cast their vote.  And their vote would be proportioned to the winning candidates.

Weltschmerz week of Oct 29

Musings not so good week of Oct 29

With wind and rain on Monday and Tuesday, our fringe effects of Hurricane Sandy, power was out from midnight Mon to noon Tues, not too much to put up with, but Tessa, little terrier mix, was sick with fever and lethargy and apparent pain—difficulty moving from one place to another, and needing help to get onto or off the couch.  And I had a toothache. 

As rain diminished later on Tuesday, I made an appointment with the vet for Tessa, and took her in at 3:15.  While he could not pinpoint her problem, he was able to rule out Lyme and other tick-borne diseases, and a couple of others, gave her shots of antibiotic and anti-inflammatory drugs, and pills to take twice a day for fifteen days.  I also got a refill of Frankie’s allergy pills, which are also administered twice daily.  I am happy to say Tessa has made an amazing recovery, is really all better now.  It remains to be seen what happens when her drug regimen is over.

On Wed I voted early at the courthouse, there was a line, not intolerable, chatted with some friends, manned Democratic headquarters in the afternoon.  Did some phone banking.  On Thursday I mailed copies of 13 pages that we had done to the state hdqtrs.   Received new pages by email from state hdqtrs, with a note, “Forward.”

I went to the dentist on Fri a.m., was diagnosed with abscessed tooth, and was prescribed an antibiotic for that.  I then stopped by the Dem hdqtrs—not open in the morning, and someone else had duty in the afternoon, but I needed to drop off some materials.  After I exited the building, I realized that I had locked the key inside the building, had carefully locked all the doors before exiting.  We keep the key to the front door in a lockbox at the back door.  Well, at least I had not locked my car keys inside, and my cell phone was working, so I called Dorothy and laid it on her.  I just could not bring myself to try to track down somebody with another key.   Then I went to Southern States to get some feed, and discovered that I could not find my debit card.  No problem, I just wrote a check.  I stopped by dollar store to get some tinned cat and dog food, ‘cause they have our brands cheaper than elsewhere.  They have a system where they just take the blank check and run it through, and then you sign on the little window.  But it wouldn’t take my signature, and she couldn’t get it to work; after several tries to reboot the machine, etc., we finally switched to another machine and had to start all over.  In the meantime, rummaging around in my purse I found the wayward debit card and was able to use that.

I came home and took a long nap.

But these travails are all trivial compared to what is going on elsewhere, and I know much was preying on my mind.  There was a pall hanging over the nation in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, the overwhelming, heartrending scenes of devastation, and the reality that this was the fruition of long years, decades even, of denial of scientific evidence of global warming, failure to take any action to mitigate the inexorable progress of climate change, and consequent disastrous weather events.   As well, watching the antics of voter suppression, concerned with how this would affect the election, and most of all, affect our democracy. 

Then, on Friday evening, I was watching the msnbc special on Hurricane Sandy, a tribute and benefit concert.  After some banter and music, a scrolling of scenes from the beaches and communities devastated by the storm.   Much moved, I sat at my computer and started making the following notes:

Did anyone really think it would end with Katrina?  Or did anyone think anything would be done to prevent such a horrible event occurring again?  Storm of the century, indeed.  The century has barely begun and we have already had two “storms of the century.”  And don’t even think about the drought, the wildfires, the floods, the tornadoes, and elsewhere, Africa drying up, Asia washing away, Arctic and Antarctic breaking up, glaciers melting, Australia not sure whether to expire under wildfires or floods—and now, watching those scenes from Staten Island, Rockaway, the Jersey beaches, the blizzards, it doesn’t even bear thinking about. 

And it didn’t have to be this way. 

It was at this point that it was like a huge stabbing pain in my heart, and overwhelmed with despair, I burst into tears.  I cried and cried, all the pent up despair over the years, decades even, of watching the failures to heed the warnings of scientists about global warming/climate change, the denial, the refusal to take any action over this, the gravest problem facing the world.  While we crept inexorably toward the tipping point, the point of no return.  While the whole world watched, and waited, and hoped.  And now, it is too late.

 

 

Happening Today--Fracking Demonstrations

Fracking demons sep 22 2012

Over 150 Organizations to Call for Ban on Hydraulic Fracturing Through the Global Frackdown

September 22 Day of Action Will Unite Stakeholders Around the Globe to Demand Clean, Sustainable Energy Solutions

WASHINGTON - September 21 - The global grassroots movement to protect public health and the environment from the risks associated with hydraulic fracturing (fracking) will intensify this weekend as concerned citizens around the world come together for the Global Frackdown. The first coordinated international day of action against fracking, the Global Frackdown will unite activists on five continents through over 150 events on September 22 to call for a ban on fracking in their communities, and to advocate for the development of clean, sustainable energy solutions. Initiated by Food & Water Watch, over 150 consumer, environmental and public health organizations including CREDO Action, Environment America, Democracy for America, Friends of the Earth and 350.org are expected to participate in the Global Frackdown.

“Fracking and drilling for oil and gas poses a direct and immediate threat to our drinking water, our health and our communities,” said Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter. “While big oil and gas continues its spin campaign to obscure the dangers of this toxic, polluting process, people around the world are taking a stand through the Global Frackdown.”

Worldwide, opposition to drilling and fracking has escalated dramatically over the past year, and the oil and gas industry has intensified its public relations campaign to obscure the dangers of fracking from the public. Earlier this year, The American Petroleum Institute launched its Vote 4 Energy campaign, an astroturf effort to promote drilling and fracking during the 2012 election and promote candidates who support the oil and gas industry’s agenda.

“It should be a no-brainer—if fracking causes your tap water to light on fire, it should be banned," said Zack Malitz, campaign manager at CREDO Action. "We're telling environmental regulators, politicians and governments all around the world that no community should be sacrificed so that the fossil fuel industry can make more money. We need to ban fracking now.”

To date, over 270 municipalities in the United States have taken action against fracking, and Vermont, France and Bulgaria have stopped the process. There is a moratorium on fracking in the Czech Republic, Romania, the German state of North Rhine Westphalia, New Jersey and New York. This week, it was also announced that the oil and gas company OMV would also halt drilling in Austria, due to escalating public opposition.

"The events taking place around the world as part of the Global Frackdown prove that people are tired of the lies from big oil and gas,” said Jim Dean, chair of Democracy for America. “Time and again, studies prove fracking is unsafe—for our communities, our families and our country. We've learned our lessons from Love Canal and the Horizon oil spill—when money is involved, corporations lie to the people to keep their profits up. It's time to end the lies."

“Fracking operations are contaminating drinking water sources and making nearby families sick,” added John Rumpler, senior attorney for Environment America. “This dirty drilling has to stop.”

Over 150 events are planned for the Global Frackdown, and each will challenge local decision makers to oppose fracking. Major actions in the United States include a rally in the Los Angeles County community of Culver City, which shares part of the largest urban oil field in the country; a rally and human sign near San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge; a rally in Longmont, Colo. to promote a ballot measure that would make Longmont the first Colorado city to ban fracking; actions across Ohio, including rallies in Cincinnati and Mansfield; and several actions in New York where Governor Andrew Cuomo continues to consider opening up the state to fracking.

Major actions overseas include a rally on the steps of the European Parliament; demonstrations in front of Parliament buildings in South Africa, Bulgaria and the Czech republic; marches in Argentina; grassroots activities in Paris and the south of France; and screenings of the film Gasland in Spain.

“This past summer, we’ve gotten one stark reminder after another of the human and economic costs of a climate system starting to spiral out of control,” said Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth. “Substituting one bad fossil for another doesn’t solve the climate crisis. But the good news is that communities all over the world aren’t buying what the oil and gas industry is selling: more extreme energy fueling more extreme weather. They’re organizing inspiring actions all over the world to turn up the heat on the fossil fuel industry and its bought-and-paid-for political cronies.”

An increasingly controversial form of energy extraction, fracking involves blasting millions of gallons of water mixed with carcinogenic chemicals underground to release natural gas and oil from tight rock formations. Drilling and fracking has been linked to water contamination and climate change, and the process has been responsible for industrializing rural areas, destroying property values and undermining local economies.

"Big oil's plan to frack the world will keep us addicted to fossil fuels at a critical moment when we need to immediately transition to clean, safe, renewable energy," concluded Duncan Meisel, anti-fracking campaigner at 350.org. "This is the world's richest industry, and they're doing all they can to buy off politicians in order to frack our communities, but this event shows that the entire world is ready to stand up to stop them."

For a full list of events and partners, visit www.globalfrackdown.org.

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Food & Water Watch is a nonprofit consumer organization that works to ensure clean water and safe food. We challenge the corporate control and abuse of our food and water resources by empowering people to take action and by transforming the public consciousness about what we eat and drink.

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Birth Control Prevents Abortion

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	Free birth control cuts abortion rate dramatically, study finds By Brian Alexander, NBC News Contributor October 5, 2012, 7:26 am NBCNews.com A dramatic new study with implications for next month’s presidential election finds that offering women free birth control can reduce unplanned pregnancies -- and send the abortion rate spiraling downward. When more than 9,000 women ages 14 to 45 in the St. Louis area were given no-cost contraception for three years, abortion rates dropped from two-thirds to three-quarters lower than the national rate, according to a new report by Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis researchers. From 2008 to 2010, annual abortion rates among participants in the Contraceptive Choice Project -- dubbed CHOICE -- ranged from 4.4 abortions per 1,000 women to 7.5 abortions per 1,000. That’s far less than the 19.6 abortions per 1,000 women nationwide reported in 2008, the latest year for which figures are available. Among teen girls ages 15 to 19 who participated in the study, the annual birth rate was 6.3 per 1,000 girls, far below the U.S. rate of 34.3 per 1,000 for girls the same age. The study’s lead author, Dr. Jeffrey Peipert, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Washington University, expected both measures to fall, but even he said he was “very surprised” by the magnitude. In all, Peipert said, one abortion was prevented for approximately every 100 women who took part (the actual estimate is 1 per every 79 to 135 women). The results were so dramatic, in fact, that Peipert pushed the journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology to publish the study before the Nov. 6 presidential election, knowing that the Affordable Care Act, and its reproductive health provisions, are major issues in the campaign. “It just has so many implications for our society,” he told NBC News. Several factors contributed to the declines, he argued. First, a large majority of the women in the study were encouraged -- and chose -- to use intrauterine devices, or IUDs, and hormonal implants over more commonly used birth control pills. Because birth control pills require strict adherence, and people forget to take them, that method fails about 8 percent of the time. IUDs and implants are over 99 percent effective. Second, program enrollees included high-risk populations like women and girls who’ve already used abortion services once -- and are more likely to have a second abortion -- and women and girls who are economically distressed and may not have means to obtain contraceptive products and services. That’s important because an IUD, including the device and the physician’s service to place it in the uterus, can cost between $800 and $1,000. Since an IUD lasts at least five years, it saves money in the long run over a monthly cost of roughly $15-$25 for pills, but the up-front charge is prohibitive for many women. James Trussell, a Princeton University professor of economics and public affairs and an expert in family planning called the results “terrific, great work, and a very important demonstration project.” But it’s also politically fraught. The Affordable Care Act requires insurance plans to cover contraceptive costs. That’s led to conflicts among the Obama administration, the Catholic church, and the church’s political allies who argue that requiring a Catholic employer to provide such insurance contradicts the church’s teaching and represents a breach of religious freedom. Conservatives have also objected to contraceptive coverage on cost grounds. Some have focused their anger at Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown University law student who agitated for the Catholic school to offer an insurance plan that covers contraception. Radio host Rush Limbaugh famously called her a “slut” and a “prostitute.” But experts, including Peipert, point out that no-cost contraception saves money. According to a 2011 study from the Guttmacher Institute, unplanned pregnancies costs the United States a conservatively estimated $11 billion per year. “The way I look at it as a gynecologist with an interest in women’s health and public health and family planning, is that this saves money,” Peipert said. “When you provide no-cost contraception, and you remove that barrier, you finally reduce unintended pregnancy rates. It doesn’t matter what side one is on politically, that’s a good thing.” The Catholic Church is unlikely to be moved. “If, as supporters of the contraceptive mandate argue, it will pay for itself in reduced medical expenses, so will free embryo engineering and other eugenic services, including infanticide, doctor-assisted suicide, organ harvesting, and genetic manipulation,” wrote Thomas Joseph White, director of the Thomistic Institute at the Dominican House of Studies in Washington, D.C., and R.R. Reno, in the conservative journal First Things. But to academic experts, the results of CHOICE are clear. “What the study suggests to me,” said John Santelli, professor at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, “is that it’s totally supportive of the president’s provisions on reproductive care and preventive services for women in the Affordable Care Act.” In a 2009 study, Trussell and colleagues reported that long-acting contraceptives like IUDs were far cheaper than an unintended birth, an abortion, and especially an ectopic pregnancy. Trussell argued that cost savings go “well beyond” those immediate medical savings. They don’t, for example, take into account costs associated with longer term issues such as economic stress on the mother and family, a teenager who doesn’t finish high school or skips college because she’s had a baby. Research has also shown that neglect, stress, anxiety, or simply a low level of nurturing in early life has effects on a child that can last far into adulthood. It may influence, for example, the cycle of teen pregnancy and crime. “It’s hard to imagine how politicians wouldn’t like to spend a dollar to save four,” Trussell said. As to the objections like those of White, he concluded that “it makes no sense whatsoever. Regardless of your views on abortion, virtually everybody says preventing unintended pregnancies is smart.” Brian Alexander (www.BrianRAlexander.com) is co-author, with Larry Young Ph.D., of "The Chemistry Between Us: Love, Sex and the Science of Attraction," (www.TheChemistryBetweenUs.com), now on sale.

 

Independents and Mugwumps

How is that the appellation “Independent” has come to be applied to a person who has no convictions, no philosophy, no political acumen, no opinion, no knowledge, no information, no wisdom?  Can this person even name the candidates of the major parties?  Has this person read the platforms of the major parties?   Has this person watched any speeches or debates?  Has this person read any books or columnists about economics?  On election day, one month hence, will he toss a nickel as he walks into the voting booth?  My mother called such an independent a mugwump, which she described as sitting on a fence with its mug hanging over one side and its wump hanging over the other.

According to Thomas E Mann and Norman J Ornstein, in their book It’s Even Worse Than It Looks, “…[independents’]  presumed centrism or pragmatism in most cases reflects political disengagement and a lack of knowledge about the parties, candidates, or policy choices, rather than a considered position in the center.  They are classic referendum voters, when times are bad, their instinct is to throw the bums out, not to carefully attribute responsibility or parse alternatives.”

Upon reflecting on this question, I realized that I am a true independent.  For years I have read, listened, researched, questioned, paid attention to issues and policy, watched the president, the legislature, the Supreme Court, the debates, and reached conclusions independently as to the issues that I believe to be important.  Determining that these issues best comport with the platform of the Democratic Party, I register as Democrat, support Democratic candidates, and vote Democrat (mostly).  This does not mean that I do not recognize that there are Blue Dog Democrats, and DINOS (Democrats in name only), that I do not take issue with Democrats whom I believe betray Democratic principles, that I do not hold their feet to the fire, write or call them to express my opinion, and yes, at times, not vote for them.  And of course, there are others just as independent who choose to be Republican.  The important thing is, we independents do not choose a party, and then suspend our own judgment to adhere to everything they espouse.

Of course, those who register as Independents, or “No Party,” (as in West Virginia), may be smarter than we think.  They do not have to worry about being called to be pollworkers, to man political headquarters, do phone banks, display yard signs, bumper stickers, and buttons, campaign for any candidate, contribute to candidates, help with candidate events, or write letters to the editor.  The personification of apathy.

Conservative Lexicon

Far-Right Conservatives Invent New Language

September 2, 2012

By John Viall

 

I don’t know about anyone else, but I’ve been having trouble figuring out what many conservatives are saying lately. In one breath they tell me President Obama is a Muslim. The next moment they nod grimly and warn: “He’s a communist.” Occasionally, they insists that he’s both at once; and on the nutty fringes it’s not hard to find those who say the president is a Nazi, a communist, a socialist, a fascist and the Antichrist all wrapped up in one.

My confusion only deepened when Rep. Allen West, a Florida Republican, was asked at a recent town hall meeting how many “card-carrying Marxists” he thought there were in Congress.

West hardly missed a beat, telling his stunned audience that there were eighty.

When pressed to clarify such statements later, Mr. West backed off slightly, but his campaign manager, Tim Edson, insisted when speaking with reporters that labels weren’t the point. And by that, I believe he meant “words in an actual dictionary.” Maybe none of the Democrats in Congress were actually card-carrying commies. So what?

“We can quibble about the terminology used to describe them,” Edson grumbled, “but it’s clear. Whatever you call people that oppose capitalism and free markets and individual economic freedom —maybe it’s ‘socialist,’ maybe it’s ’communist’ —but that’s the point the congressman was making, and he stands by the words.”

It struck me, on reading Edson’s response, that he would have been just as happy if his boss had called Democrats in Congress toaster ovens or card-carrying poltergeists. And that’s when it finally hit me. For fringe conservatives, at least, labels no longer meant what they meant in the English language.

You could call the president or any liberal a communist, a curmudgeon, or a cucumber. It wouldn’t make an ounce of difference.

I DECIDED IT WAS TIME TO ACT and started trying to put together a new right-wing lexicon. Here’s what I have so far:

Kenya: an island in the Hawaiian chain where President Obama was born.

Bush tax cuts: magic legislation guaranteed to create jobs; passed in June 2001 when unemployment stood at 4.5%. Additional cuts in May 2003. Still in effect when U. S. economy crashed in 2008; still in effect in October 2009 when unemployment hit 10%. Cannot be repealed under any circumstances because this will cause a rise in unemployment.

Free enterprise: it’s just what patriots (see below) do; includes the right of British Petroleum to pollute the Gulf of Mexico without government regulation, the right of Wal-Mart to bribe officials of Mexico and drive out competition and the right of Rupert Murdoch’s people bribe police and hack into private cell phone and email accounts of citizens.

Fox News: the last bastion of truth where free enterprise is always worshiped.

Patriot: any American who listens exclusively to Fox News, who agrees that taxes on billionaires can never be raised because it will make them sad, or something; a person who feels it is better to deny health care to other Americans, because, well, if you love America, you don’t want poor Americans to love America and be healthy, too; may also be an American who supports family values and would love to die for his or her country, except when they might want to commit adultery, personally, or actually have the chance to enlist and get shot at by real enemies of the United States. (See: Cheney, Gingrich, Romney, etc.)

Patriotism: what a billionaire or millionaire feels when he or she sees other people’s children sent off to fight to protect his or her freedom, while simultaneously keeping tax rates low (flag pin displayed in your lapel proves your patriotism, but serving in the military under the actual real flag does not if you’d like to marry your same-sex partner).

Unplugging granny: the act of disconnecting an elderly American from a life support system; inevitable result when godless, secular, humanist liberals (who are really Nazis) try to extend health care to millions of other Americans who can’t afford to be connected in the first place.

Red-blooded American: often, a grumpy older individual, predominantly white and Christian, but not always; may own several guns and tote a Bible. Fears Big Government, because government is the problem not the solution, especially when government might curtail in any way government-provided health care benefits. The opposite of liberal Americans (also known as Fascists) who believe all Americans should have access to affordable health care. (See: socialized medicine, following.)

Socialized medicine: any attempt to extend health care coverage to a 38-year old stay-at-home mother who suddenly develops multiple sclerosis, a 27-year-old type-1 diabetic who has just been denied coverage because of preexisting conditions and a 53-year-old factory worker who has lost his coverage after his company (see free enterprise, above) in Wisconsin closed operations and moved all assembly operations to China.

Job creator: any business person who can figure out how to avoid paying taxes to the government he or she purports to love (often seen wearing a flag pin) by hiding profits in the Cayman Islands and simultaneously closing American factories and shipping jobs to India.

Public sector workers (also union thug, below): men and women who undermine individual economic freedoms and pose an insidious threat to free markets because their jobs cannot be outsourced to Mexico or Honduras.

Religion, freedom of: one of the most important rights granted to us through the wisdom of the Founding Fathers; any attempt to require a Catholic institution to offer birth control coverage to female employees is an “attack on religion.”

Speech, freedom of; petition, right to; assembly, right of: what conservatives do when they gather to hear Sarah Palin speak. Not to be confused the right of the Dixie Chicks to criticize the president or with the Occupy Wall Street movement, since those people look funny and according to Fox News don’t bathe often enough, and even if they did it wouldn’t matter because they’re communists, anyway. Conservatives know that the U. S. Constitution was intended originally to protect only red-blooded Americans (see above), which includes those who agree with every syllable Glenn Beck ever uttered, including any babbling he did when he was still a baby.

Terrorist cell: any group of Muslim Americans who might wish to exercise their religion, freedom of (see above) by building a mosque, pretty much anywhere in America.

Judicial activist: a liberal judge who might vote, for example, to overturn The Defense of Marriage Act.

A strict constructionist: a conservative judge who might vote, for example, to overthrow the health care law; also a judge who might vote to overthrow the decision of a state supreme court and award an election to a conservative candidate. A strict constructionist understands that the Founding Fathers (see below) who wrote the U. S. Constitution intended corporations to be considered persons so they might speak their institutional minds and dump their tens of millions into all elections.

Slut: a young college-age woman who disagrees with Rush Limbaugh and can’t imagine why anyone would sleep with that fat bag of puddings.

Union thug: any worker who organizes along with others to try to win the slightest improvement in wages or benefits; includes 22-year-old first-year female teacher, 5′ 3″ and 125 pounds, waving grade book in menacing fashion; also 58-year-old social worker, and grandmother, who hopes to safeguard her retirement (not to be confused with an unplugged granny.)

Founding Fathers: the fifty-five men who wrote the U. S. Constitution; who knew corporations were people, while also believing that an absolute commitment to freedom meant women, blacks and poor, white men didn’t actually need the right to vote; this group includes Alexander Hamilton, who originally argued in favor of monarchy.

Bill of Rights: list of inviolable rights, meant to protect angry conservatives who want to carry concealed weapons into bars, saunas, day care facilities and funeral parlors. Does not protect Americans who don’t want to be strip-searched when arrested for crimes as inconsequential as failing to carry a pooper scooper. Also: Muslims and others who look “different” are not covered.

liberal (also known as Nazi, fascist, socialist, communist): any person who has ever spoken out about any of the abuses of any large corporation, even when talking in his or her sleep; anyone who believes the average working-class American might be getting screwed; anyone a red-blooded American doesn’t agree with on any topic, including NASCAR; and anyone who denies that Charles and David Koch are captains of industry and infallible job creators.

I’M STILL WORKING on my lexicon, but if good and honest liberals and good and sensible conservatives will only define their terms, we might get somewhere in the end.

 

Say It Isn't So

Say it isn’t so…Romney didn’t really darken his skin for his appearance with Univision, did he?  And ineptly, at that?

Say it isn’t so…Romney isn’t now touting Romneycare, is he?

Say it isn’t so…Romney doesn’t really use his Latino-looking, Spanish-speaking son to warm up Hispanic crowds, does he?

Say it isn’t so…Romney isn’t still using the phrase “illegal aliens,” even when speaking before a friendly Hispanic crowd, is he?

Say it isn’t so…Romney is confused about whether he is for the 1%, against the 47%, or more recently, for the 100%?

Say it isn’t so…Romney didn’t really chide Obama for saying you can’t change Washington from the inside, when he himself said the same thing in 2008, did he?

Say it isn’t so…Ann Romney, when asked what she would say to Republicans [critical of her husband], didn’t really say, “Stop it,” did she?

Say it isn’t so…Sen Scott Brown (R-MA) didn’t really try to skip the debate with Elizabeth Warren by claiming he was needed for votes on Senate legislation, did he?  Until Sen Harry Reid postponed all voting so that Brown could keep his promise.

Say it isn’t so…Sen Scott Brown (R-MA), during debate with Elizabeth Warren, didn’t really chastise her for claiming to be “Native-American,” a “person of color,” when clearly, "anyone can see that she is not," did he?