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Calling Liz Warren “Pocahontas” Is a Good Thing
Sen. Elizabeth Warren is known for lying about being Native American to get a job at Harvard, but she’s not the first “Fauxcahontas” I’ve come across. As some on Ricochet know, I was once in the cheese business. About 20 to 25 percent of my business was with the DOD. They bought what was commonly referred to as commodity cheese. Think gasoline. For the most part gasoline is gasoline is gasoline as long as it meets certain standards. If an intersection has four gas stations, everything being equal, you buy from the one with the lowest price. The cheese that the DOD bought was like that.
The contracts were given to the lowest bidder, period. Bids were priced to the tenth of one cent. If two bidders were tied, the contract was rebid. Ties were fairly common. My gross markup was often about 10 percent. This gives you an idea how competitive it could be. I usually had a dedicated crew of about 30 souls including truck drivers assigned to this segment of the business. As competitive as it could be, I still thought it was worth it. They bought large volumes which helped my buying power and they paid well (most of the time).
All was well until sometime in the late ’80s. That is when affirmative action was introduced to the bidding process. In all their wisdom, Congress gave “minority ” bidders a 10 percent advantage. Even after its introduction, I got my share of business. It wasn’t something that could easily be replicated.
Then in about ’92/’93, I began losing every bid and so did all my competitors except for a new one. It was a minority bidder in Wisconsin identified as a female Native American. This went on for months. I had no choice but to institute the first-ever layoff at my business. This company came out of nowhere. Rumors started up, claiming that things were not as they appeared. Deliveries were not being made in a timely manner, if at all. The owner did not appear to be Native American. I hired a private detective.
I turned out that the owner wasn’t Native American — in fact, she wasn’t American at all. She and her husband were Russians. They were allowed in the US because they claimed religious persecution. They were Jewish, perhaps, at least that was their claim. What they really were was crooks. They had rented a small, bankrupt cheese plant and got favorable terms from the local government and bank. They defrauded their bank, were borrowing against their DOD contract, and not delivering the entire amount so they could pocket the difference.
You ask how this could happen. It took a long time to sort out. The minority status was self-reported and the DOD was not allowed to challenge the claim. Even with my PI report, they were forbidden to intervene, even as their logistics system was in chaos. After a certain time, if a bidder didn’t deliver, they could rebid the contract but, as crazy as it sounds, the minority bidder also could rebid — and did. I finally bit the bullet and got my congressman, Rick Santorum, involved.
I never found out how he did it, but Santorum got it straight quick. Within two weeks, I was getting contracts again. After a couple of years, the Native American Russians went to jail. Meanwhile, I had 30 displaced people whose lives were totally disrupted. They all had family. Two divorces were blamed on the layoff. I lost half of my team and had to hire and train new employees. All because of a Fauxcahontas or a Lieawatha.
Sen. Liz Warren probably didn’t affect as many lives, but she took someone’s position who was more worthy than her. She undoubtedly filled young skulls full of leftist mush at Harvard. Her very Senate seat is fake owing to deception. She is a thief and a liar. I have more respect for someone who shoplifts at a convenience store. If I had the same opportunity as President Trump, I would call her a lot worse than Pocahontas.
Published in Politics
She is not only offended, she is angry, and motivated to be sure to vote in the off-year 2018 elections. Our Republican legistlature intentionally set the election for state-wide offices to be on off-election years given that the electorate in non-Presidential years is more conservative. That has served us well. But with Trump angering so many people, he is sparking a huge democratic turnout.
That would be something.
This question as framed by @garyrobbins suggests a particular viewpoint, I think. It would be interesting to know what the answer would have been to “what do you think about Elizabeth Warren claiming Native American heritage for employment purposes and Donald Trump calling her Pocahontas because of it?”
I spent many hours for a part of my childhood with Native American friends from various Southwest/Plains tribes and try to keep in touch. All but two voted for Donald Trump. My friends work hard, some at their own businesses. Some still have family on a reservation. They are proud of their heritages, and if there’s any one stereotype I’ve noticed them disliking it’s the view some outsiders have of all “Indians” as government freeloaders.
As with any segment of American society, there are differing views.
Interesting first-hand account of doing business with fed govt. Thanks for the post, @phcheese.
Wow as a lawyer you have a rough time with facts. Black turnout was not higher than white turnout. It was ten percentage points higher than it had been in 04.
Also I find it hard to believe that there would be the number of Navajo voters to affect statewide elections. I am willing to be proven wrong on that point, but for now I am not buying it.
Is it as a lawyer hehas trouble with facts or because he is a lawyer. If not careful this post could deteriorate into lawyer jokes.
Anyone hear the one about a Arizona Trump hating lawyer that went in a cowboy bar? He——
Facts are stubborn things. “Black voters turned out at higher rate than white voters in 2012 and 2016.” April 29, 3013. Article by Rachel Weinberg in the Washington Post.
Fred Barnes has written that a third of the Democratic votes in Virginia were to “send a message” to the Republican Party.
Gary, please review the facts in this article, relative to black versus white voter turnout in 2016.
And please provide a link (that isn’t behind a paywall) to the Rachel Weinberg article, which according to your statement she won’t write for another 996 years. I haven’t been able to find it yet with a simple Google search.
I don’t doubt that she was hurt or offended, but to blame Trump for that is simply unreasonable. She was hurt and offended because she misunderstood what he was saying, and most likely because she has been influenced by the non-stop, race-baiting campaign by the Left, to make Donald Trump into a racist monster. Which is not say he’s without any tinge of racism. Still, Trump’s flaws don’t excuse the Left’s insistence on finding racial division and hatred where it doesn’t exist. They don’t excuse the media from using Trump’s attack on a racially-appropriating senator as an opportunity to make Native Americans feel as if they were being attacked or insulted by Trump.
The Left’s racism and race-baiting is to blame for the racial unrest and tension that we see today. Why are so many never-Trump Republicans so eager to join them in this project?
Because Trump is uncouth.
As was General Patton, did not make him a bad General. I am not a fan of oncouth either but this war.
I’m on your side, brother, but for some, the distaste seems to run deep. They act like Andrew Jackson, Warren Harding, and LBJ never existed.
One very interesting aspect of all of this is that, if Trump had all the couth of Bush, Romney, and Pence, he would still be accused of racism, misogyny, and other forms of bigotry.
America just re-elected a black president a few years ago, and yet now we’re accused of being a nation run by white supremacy.
The race card has been overcharged.
That was a great article. It points out that if the black turnout had increased to 2008 and 2012 levels in Philadelphia, Detroit and Milwaukee, Trump would not have had that razor thin 100,000 margin in those three states. It also shows that instead of trying to create knockouts in Iowa and Arizona, Hillary would have been well served to shore up her “blue wall” that cracked and fell in 2016.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2013/04/29/black-turnout-was-higher-than-white-turnout-in-2012-and-2008/?utm_term=.a6a959baa940. I misspelled the author’s last name. It is Weiner.
The first three paragraphs are:
“The Associated Press is out with a study of the 2012 election concluding that the black voter turnout rate exceeded the white turnout rate for the first time. It’s almost certainly true that black turnout was higher than white turnout last fall — but that also was true in 2008.
“Using census data and exit polling, the AP found that black voters were 13 percent of the electorate even though they make up only 12 percent of the population. White voters represented 72 percent of the electorate, outperforming their 71.1 percent share of the population, but not to the same degree they have in past elections. The total percent of voters in each ethnic group who turned out is not included. Census data on voter turnout will be released in May.
“The AP does give exact numbers for 2008 turnout — 66.1 percent for whites and 65.2 percent for blacks. But Michael McDonald, a professor at George Mason University who specializes in analyzing voter turnout, has crunched the numbers differently. If you exclude people who did not respond to the census, the black turnout rate also surpassed white turnout four years ago, 76.6 percent to 73.6 percent.”
True, however we would have laughed it off. I, for one, am not laughing it off, as Trump is clearly out of the bounds of normal or acceptable behavior.
As soon as someone says “clearly ” it’s usually not even close. I remember that from the classes on the law as an undergraduate.
So you believe that Trump is within the bounds of normal or acceptable behavior?
And this, apparently, justifies false allegations of bigotry, to make Trump seem even less normal and acceptable than he truly is, along with any number of other ways to undermine the president of one’s own party.
If we’re truly concerned that Trump is indulging in unacceptable behavior, like racism, the correct response is not to make false accusations. The boy has cried wolf too many times.
They told us it was racist when he alleged that some Mexican illegals were rapists. When we go back and watch the speech, it was not a racist comment.
They told us it was racist to question Barack Obama’s birth certificate, as if no white candidate’s birthplace or citizenship had ever been questioned. As if citizenship were determined by race. This was likewise false.
They told us he was mocking Native Americans, by calling someone “Pocahontas.” In fact, he was ridiculing a white woman who claimed to be Native American.
They told us he was a racist for criticizing people who happen to be black. In fact, he criticizes all manner of people, for any trivial thing.
They told us he was a racist for failing to send a dead murderer to GITMO.
They told us he was a racist for applying “extreme vetting” to nations which his (black) predecessor had also singled out as problematic.
The race card has been overcharged, cut up with scissors, and put throught the shredder. No one will take that card, anymore. No one can take allegations of white racism seriously, anymore, because too many people have done what you’ve done too many times. Too many false allegations.
That’s how you get Trump.
This is it! Of course! I should have seen it before. Gary is actually working on Trump’s re-election campaign!
I love the levity that you provide.
Clearly, no wait that opinion is like a beauty contest. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I get your opinion and respect it. But it was in, actuality, a binary election. Trump won, Hillary lost. I see no impeachable actions on his part. It’s time you move on, dead horses begin to stink after a year. Don’t make me tell that Arizona lawyer going into a cowboy bar joke.
I’m a results man, Gary. I try not to be fooled by what people say, but rather see the results they create. That’s why I like Trump. What he says (and tweets) is distraction, but most of his results are pretty good. That’s far better than the typical politician whose words are great, but his actions are not so great.
Every time you go on about Trump, you drive marginal people into his camp. Were my words levity? Perhaps. There’s an old phrase, “Many a true word is spoken in jest.” Maybe I just reverse that to “Many a funny word is spoken in truth.”
Very true. The pastor of my church is very conservative – as in, his moral concerns about Trump start with his serial monogamy – and he was talking to an anti-Trump mutual friend. The preacher’s advice was, essentially, ignore what Trump says; look at what he does. I had never seen it that way before, and I thought it was very good advice.
His actions don’t excuse some of the things he’s said, but if we’re to blame him for the latter, we must credit him for the good things he does.
Trump has done a good job on judges and regulations. Or, rather, he is listening to the right people about them.
How about his tweetwriter?
An inverted evil advisors situation? I don’t believe I’ve ever seen that suggested before.
They can do 280 character tweets now so it’s at least possible.
So far he has done well with his Ex-Im appointment. I wish you would have done just as well on that issue.
This article was much better than its title suggested.
Thanks Tom, my next post title will be Don’t Judge A Book By It’s Book By It’s Cover. As boring as cheese sounds there were a lot of adventures and misadventures in the naked city.
One additional question just now occurred to me: What would have happened if you and all the other legitimate bidders had claimed Native American status. The DoD wasn’t allowed to challenge it, so what could have gone wrong so long as you fulfilled your contracts?