Dances With Warren

May 2, 2012 By 33 Comments

Warren claims she never authorized Harvard to note her ethnicity. But the blue-eyed blonde had listed herself as a minority in the American Association of Law Schools directory from 1986 through 1995—the same year the school bestowed the tenured Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law designation upon her. Despite her earlier public boasts, she told the Boston Herald: “I believe that I was recruited at Harvard because I’m a good teacher and recruited for my other jobs because I do good work.”

If so, why did Warren publicly advertise her “minority” status when seeking work in academia? Why did Harvard repeatedly showcase her as an example of institutional success in recruiting a racially diverse faculty? Why do so many unchecked boxes confront applicants if minority status really plays no role in the hiring process?

What appears as a political scandal is more significantly an academic one. But whereas the controversy may undermine the Democrats’ chances to retain the U.S. Senate, it will likely have no impact on the racially-obsessed hiring policies of top universities. There, affirmative action proves less about minority advancement than about white liberals feeling good about themselves. Rarely does this manifest itself so clearly as the extreme cases in which pale-faced professors such as Ward Churchill and Elizabeth Warren trade on questionable heritages for career advancement. Usually, affirmative action just serves as a way for white liberals to claim that an industry they control differs from the surrounding society that they decry. This can only be achieved through official discrimination (which academics ironically claim plagues the off-campus culture) that they insist not be called “discrimination” on school grounds but rather “affirmative action.”

People so obsessed with superficial characteristics in hiring also tend to be superficial in what passes for them as a minority. The importance is not necessarily hiring an American Indian but the appearance that they have hired an American Indian. Quotas, and the accompanying bragging-point percentages, tend to have that dehumanizing effect. People become statistics.

Elizabeth Warren enjoys a $350,000 academic sinecure and $1.7 million mansion. But she still calls herself a populist. With 31 of 32 roots of her family tree extending to Europe, will she still call herself a “minority”?

A black-faced C. Thomas Howell discovers in “Soul Man” that his racial deceit resulted in his African American love interest losing out on the Harvard Law School scholarship that he had unfairly won. Whose spot did soul-woman Warren pouch?

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About

Daniel J. Flynn is the author of numerous books, including "Blue Collar Intellectuals: When the Enlightened and the Everyman Elevated America," now available from ISI Books. Read Daniel's blog at www.flynnfiles.com.

  • Chezwick

    My wife is an ethnic minority….and when my daughter was a freshman in High School, in anticipation of her eventual application to university, we decided to change her racial designation to reflect her mother's ethnicity. Doing so was absurd, humiliating and hypocritical, but it undoubtedly helped her gain entry into a major university and acquire the scholarship money to pay for it.

    We're of modest means and needed to employ any and every advantage to afford higher education for my daughter. And so – against my better judgment and principles – I gamed the system and pimped her off as an ethnic minority. I'm not proud of myself, but if I had it to do over again, I'd surely do the same thing. This is the world we live in – a leftist world of inverted racism. It's ugly.

    • Chezwick

      For the record, she's an outstanding student and an outstanding human being. I'll take at least a degree of credit….for I did my best to impart my values to her and to teach her to think for herself. She scrutinizes my conservative opinions as thoroughly and skeptically as she does her liberal boyfriend's opinions…..and regardless of her ethnic classification, she's 100% American!

      • megapotamus

        Whatever hoss. Ya gotta do what ya gotta do. Academia at large is basically fraudulent. It is witless credentializing but a near necessity and a capriciously priced one.

    • ajnn

      i intend to do the same [my wife is also non-white] and i, too, acknowledge my own hypocrisy and bad faith.

      bad faith in service to our children. sounds almost ethical/moral. i hope no adverse unforeseen consequences are visited on my child because of me.

  • kafir4life

    We had a poster here a while ago, a "revert" to the gutter cult, who claimed to be part Cherokee and part Chinese. If I remember right, he went by the name of Ca-Ching or mohamad mikey, or something like that. Maybe he'll chime in here regarding his fellow native, Lizzy. Doubt it tho'. Last we heard he was headed to somalia for summer camp.

  • Bubba Ignatowski

    The Keep America Beautiful ’70s-era “Crying Indian” was Iron Eyes Cody, an accomplished actor. I suspect he would be crying a lot more these days.

    • KarshiKhanabad

      And of course, Cody was Sicilian, not Indian, but he was a heck of a good actor. I read once that there used to be a "Sicilian Mafia" in Hollywood,consisting of Italian guys turning out in war paint as extras in Westerns where the Indians charge en masse.

      If Elizabeth Warren is Indian, then so is Ward Churchill. One 32nd Cherokee? Heck's fire I'm one 32nd Creek and I haven't been to Oklahoma in thirty years and that's where you find most of both of those.

  • StephenD

    I have a cousin that got her education because she could prove our, at least, 25% Cherokee Heritage. My point is…she had to PROVE it. If her name was Sanchez or if she were Black, these "benefits" come without question. But if you are Native American…show your Tribal Affiliation! As if you were a German Shepard Dog…you must show your papers to be legit! No. To me, Affirmative Action programs all are a invitation to corruption and in its attempt at equalizing the playing field actually diminishes us all. MERIT is all that should matter; Moral Merit as well as Academic Merit. Period.

    • Chezwick

      With you all the way Stephen. And if we use ANY criteria to try and "level the playing field", it should be means. Why should a middle-class black or Hispanic from the suburbs be seen as more "disadvantaged" than a poor white from Appalachia or South Boston?

    • Raymond in DC

      I still recall the case of an American fellow of no known minority background who legally changed his name to something like Rodriguez or Garcia for the sole purpose of taking advantage of preferences granted to those with Hispanic surnames. Such are the extreme lengths some people will go to take advantage of a flawed system.

      • StephenD

        Ray, Chez, it’s funny you mention Boston Chez and Ray, it was this case I recall:

        In 1975, the Malone twins, now 33 years old (this was printed in 1988), took the Civil Service test for firefighters and failed. But in 1976, according to their lawyer, Nicholas Foundas, their mother found a sepia-tinted photograph of their great-grandmother, who, she told them, was black. In 1977, they reapplied to take the test, contending they were black.

        Philip Malone scored 69 percent and Paul Malone 57 percent, below the 82 percent standard minimum for white applicants, according to the Massachusetts Department of Personnel Administration, which monitors Civil Service tests and hiring.

        The twins won appointments in 1978.

        But I guess…it's only fair right? LOL

  • Schlomotion

    A simple search engine search will show that Daniel Flynn is the one who constantly lords and harps on race and racism, not Elizabeth Warren. While there are only cursory references to Elizabeth Warren being part Cherokee, there are copious examples of Daniel Flynn accusing "the left" and specific people on "the left" of being racists. Daniel Flynn is a race-baiter who works for racists at DHFC and WTKK, allegedly representing in his Irish twang, the local conservative color for the kind of dopes who read The Herald.

    • ajnn

      huh ? you mean warren is not listed as an american indian ? thanks.

    • Kathleen3

      You may consider taking an anger management course. Warren, the Progressives and Harvard's hypocrisy has been exposed. Don't kill the messenger (Daniel Flynn).

    • poppakap

      Once again Slomo blathers esoterically and evades the issue at hand. I simply love how these crypto-commies deflect the conversation every time the light is shined on their hypocrisy. Perhaps Trotsky was right when he suggested that the communists were bound to fail if they continued their inability to engage in self-criticism.

      I present exhibit 1 (of millions): Slomo.

    • ziontruth

      "…there are copious examples of Daniel Flynn accusing 'the left' and specific people on 'the left' of being racists."

      Maybe it's because that's the truth. The Marxist Left would be nothing if it couldn't make hay of racial tensions—propping them up in the first place, then presenting itself as the "cure." The Marxists' accusations of "Republican racism" are nothing but projection: No one more than the "Progressives" have consistently turned their backs on the Republican MLK's "Content of their character" in favor of a perpetually vengeful, endlessly grudge-bearing philosophy of "righting" past wrongs with opposite wrongs.

      Their railing against the idea of a colorblind society—which they now castigate as "a tool of White Privilege," no less!—is instructive. Tell me, what is the difference between the way a Stormfronter and a "Progressive" relates to the plight of black people in America today? Though the one says, "It's because blacks are genetically inferior" and the other says, "It's because White society is keeping the blacks downtrodden," both share the same core of denying the prospect of meritocracy and the can-do spirit. Only that the Stormfronters are more honest in putting it in its true ugly form, while the Marxists present it wearing a pretty, friendly "We want to help you" mask.

      It's time the Marxists were called on their racial fixation, which has done more to poison the wells of political discourse in the past decades than anything else. Flynn is to be commended. As Kathleen said, he's just the messenger.

      • Schlomotion

        It looks to me like all the articles on "White Identity" are being published on Frontpage this week, not on Stormfront or some Marxist rag.

        Sure. I'll buy it that Flynn is "just the messenger," since his message is not original, and since his boss is Greater Media and The Lobby.

  • theleastthreat

    Let's not lose sight of the point of this article, which isn't about race or ethnicity but the overuse/misuse of race and ethnicity in public advancement. There's nothing wrong with being a native American. There is something wrong with claiming roots you don't have and profitting from it. That is called fraud. Also, it appears the misuse of one's background (or made up background) can open doors that qualifications and achievement won't open, so why not just abandon heritage as part of the reason to get past a prestigeous doorway and just go with merit?

  • tagalog

    Family tradition counts, eh? Well, I guess the fact that my family came here from England 400 years ago and has lived here ever since makes me a "Native American" then. Full-blooded at that (ah, Nuremburg Laws…). Get that berth at Harvard ready for me!

    • intrcptr2

      Funny that.
      Last week I went to Temple U. to see Spencer et al, but I was a tad late. After realizing we would not get in, a couple of us got into a very brief chat. The lady, who wanted to confront Gellar for her blatant racism [sic], I took to be Ethiopian (As so many, very pretty, but married). She spoke with a rather proper accent, and told us she is English. She is also Muslim. She practically fell over when I told her that I am most assuredly native American, since I was born here. The OWSer wearing the hammer and sickle was also highly amused and befuddled. She had to run, so the argument ended abruptly.

      My mother's mother naturalized from Canada sometime in the 30s (Wild guess), and my aunt traced a portion of the family back to the late 1700s. I too have a family lore of a drop of Indian blood (My mother's father was an orphan; the girl wandered in from the fog and left just as mysteriously); but no proof, which really is just as well.

      For these types, one's skin is pretty much all that matters, unless one philosophically/politically disagrees with the "program".

  • Supreme_Galooty

    I don't care if she is 150% Outer-Mongolian, she is on the faculty at Harvard. Massachusetts would be better represented in the Senate by Abner the Lost Adverb. (Hat Tip: Wm. F. Buckley, Jr.)

  • http://www.maghrebchristians.com Youssef

    Egypt’s military chief of staff said on Wednesday the army may transfer power to an elected president on May 24 if the vote is decided in the first round, state television reported.

    Read more: http://www.maghrebchristians.com/2012/05/02/egypt…

    Youssef

  • Randy

    This is important because it reveals Warren's lack of character.

  • Questions

    My ex-wife is 1/32 Seminole. Frankly, I would have died laughing if she called herself an "Indian" or "Native American." (She didn't.) All this reminds me of former Sen. Ben Nighthorse-Campbell, R-Colo., who was 1/16 Indian, yet wore that one-sixteenth on his sleeve as if we were all supposed to applaud.

    • Lady_Dr

      Sen. Ben Nighthourse-Campbell's father spent his youth in an Indian boarding school, and was a member of a tribe. He was given the name Nighthorse when he went to live on the reservation. And being from Colorado, and a maker of Indian jewelry, I think he has SOME claim to being American Indian, whereas this woman is a law professor and lives in Massachusetts.

  • Daniel

    Can any action be taken against Warren for fraudulently misrepresenting her ethnicity? Probably not, but it would be sweet, yes?

    • Lady_Dr

      Sweet indeed – anyone know a Tea Party or GOP lawyer who will get on this.

      Of course the best thing would probably just ridicule her out of office (although I'm not sure if the people of the People's Republic of Mass. would understand this, they've been on the DNC plantation so long).

    • Jim

      Claiming something like ethnicity to get a financial advantage is fraud, at least misrepresentation. And there are laws against that.
      Such laws are not, however, precise enough to deal with it under common law or existing statutes probably and need a separate heading.
      When you commit fraud getting unemployment benefits or a pension, the laws are really well drafted to cover theses eventualities and could serve as a model.

  • mrbean

    Me a great Cherokee Chief called Smelly Bean Eater and I no like fake Indian Warren. Nomally I would take scalp but in her case, I would take beaver pelt to hang in my teepee.

  • Davidka

    In 1973 it was almost impossible for a newly minted college graduate to get a teaching job anywhere. There were just too many well qualified applicants and almost no openings. However, I had a cousin who was 1/4 Hispanic and (very important) named Sanchez. She was barraged with job offers from school districts ONLY because of her name; she didn't even have a teaching degree or any interest in teaching, nor had she applied anywhere.

    This racial nonsense has been going on for decades.

  • pierce

    This candidate is getting an awful lot of coverage from the media. Is it because she is HARVARD, like our President, or because she is a NATIVE AMERICAN. Perhaps she is a trend setter, like the newest Supreme Court Justice, Elena Kagan. There is no question Harvard is THE place to be for an education, but I find it unbelievable that every one in Mass. is going gaga over her, can she walk on water, and not frozen water? I'll not answer that…………..

  • Milton

    Ms. Spreading bull needs to go away!

  • theebl