Elizabeth Warren profile: portrait of a savvy politician who appeals to working people, and who can get stuff done

Sheelah Kolhatkar's 10,000 word New Yorker profile of Elizabeth Warren is mostly a "color piece," giving a sense of where Warren is coming from, personally and politically; as such, it's a good read, but mostly redundant if you've already read Warren's (very good) 2018 book This Fight Is Our Fight: The Battle to Save America's Middle Class; that said there's a couple of key political insights that are very timely for anyone trying to figure out whom to support in the Democratic presidential primary (I am a donor to both Warren's and Sanders's primary campaigns).

First is the relationship between Warren's rhetoric and Trump's, which bears some similarities in that both campaign on economic justice for the "forgotten" people of America. As a staffer says, the inflammatory "rigged system" rhetoric is deliberate, "Its not enough just to inspire. You have to inspire and fight for something. You have to name a villain."

Warren describes the difference: "Donald Trump says, Your life isnt working, and the reason is all those people who dont look like you. Theyre not the same race as you, they dont worship like you, they dont talk like you. So blame them. His answer is: divide working people. Its racist. And, ultimately, it makes everyone poorer."

Kolhatkar also provides a glimpse of how well Warren's proposed wealth tax is playing out, as Warren reminds people that middle-income voters -- whose only substantial asset is likely to be their home -- already pay an annual wealth tax in the form of property taxes: "All I want to do thats different is include the Rembrandt and the diamonds!" (to which an audience member yells, "And the yacht," and Warren agrees, saying "And the yacht with the Imax theatre!"). Read the rest