Still eight months out from the 2020 Iowa caucuses, it’s far too early to say how the Democratic presidential field will whittle down, especially as it pertains to the crowded left-wing lane. Of the top ten candidates (per their RealClearPolitics averages), only former vice president and current front-runner Joe Biden; South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg; and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.; have refused to endorse both the Green New Deal and “Medicare for all.” So this is a race dominated by an agenda that can only be described as “centralizing” at best and “socializing” at worst.
Yet even in that left-wing lane, there’s a variety of awful, and as it turns out, the worst policy agenda thus far isn’t from the self-described socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. Instead it’s from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.
To her credit, Warren has tried to run as a policy wonk, attempting to turn “Warren has a plan for that” into some sort of feminist meme. The only problem is that all of her plans are bad.
I’ve already dedicated tens of thousands of words to describing why the Green New Deal and “Medicare for all” are terrible ideas. Warren’s not unique in endorsing those. But she is unique in endorsing so many other abysmal policy proposals.
Bernie wants an exorbitant estate tax which would theoretically accrue $2.2 trillion over an unspecified period of time because, as his staffers have noted, “it would only take effect once [rich people] die.” It’s a bad idea that wouldn’t even fund 10% of the first decade of “Medicare for all.” But at least it’s constitutional, unlike Warren’s plan.
Warren has bragged about her wealth tax, which would raise $2.75 in its first decade. With the exception of income taxes, which are explicitly allowed by the 16th Amendment, the Constitution forbids the federal government from collecting direct taxes that aren’t apportioned by population. Warren can brag all she wants about scalping the rich, but the measure probably wouldn’t pass the courts, let alone Congress.
There’s a case to be made that lifetime tenures have increasingly politicized the Supreme Court as the stakes of each appointment increase with U.S. life expectancy. A simple and sensible way to combat this effect is the imposition of term limits, as Bernie has backed, which would devalue to potency of each court appointment without unfairly skewing the balance of power towards one party or another. Or you can go full fascist, as Warren has, and try to pack the courts.
But wait, it gets worse. Warren has embraced not only the worst of the Left, but also the most irritatingly and economically illiterate of the Right, with her calls to break up Facebook and Amazon.
Warren is also now lacquering her federal jobs guarantee in Trumpy jargon, promising that her “economic” plan will posit “aggressive intervention on behalf of American workers,” including but not limited to attacking currency manipulation, requiring the federal government purchase American goods, and increasing the centralization of research and development in the federal government and within American borders. (Lest you wonder if this will be paired with her nationalizing other private industries, such as, say, prescription drugs, it certainly will be.)
With Bernie receding in the polls, Warren has a chance to dominate the left-wing lane of the primary. After all, she’s a woman of color — well, depending on who you ask — going up against frontrunner who would be older on Inauguration Day than Reagan, our oldest president ever, was on his last day in office.
But none of Warren’s posturing, much less this nationalist pivot, sets her up to beat Trump. Those 100,000 Americans in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania will hardly be endeared to Warren’s thinly veiled elitism, and disaffected Republicans and centrists hurt by Trump’s protectionism will hardly be enthused by Warren’s Trumpy trade policy.
Warren’s plans are not good. Or maybe I’m just sexist or something.
