Elizabeth Warren
Related: About this forumEzra Klein & Matt Yglesias react to Elizabeth Warren's Confronting Fed Chair Yellen & TPP Comments
Elizabeth Warren is furious over Obamas proposed trade dealUpdated by Ezra Klein on February 26, 2015, 10:30 a.m. ET
(Nice Video of Warren Confronting Fed Chair, Janet Yellen at the link)
http://www.vox.com/2015/2/26/8114291/elizabeth-warren-tpp
Elizabeth Warren has a talent for making huge fights out of obscure nominations and economic policy provisions. On Tuesday, Warren took aim at Scott Alvarez, the Federal Reserve's powerful general counsel, for his views on banking regulation. Virtually no one knows who Alvarez is. But he's arguably one of the five or six most powerful economic policymakers in Washington. He's the Leo McGarry of the Fed. Warren is unusual in possessing the policy chops to know that Alvarez matters as well as the political heat to make liberals care about him.But making Scott Alvarez a household name is child's play compared to Warren's latest fight: whipping up outrage over the Investor-State Dispute Settlement provisions in the Trans-Pacific Partnership deal. In a Washington Post op-ed today, Warren writes, "ISDS would allow foreign companies to challenge U.S. laws and potentially to pick up huge payouts from taxpayers without ever stepping foot in a U.S. court."
Warren goes on to argue that the rules of that arbitration end up favoring corporations both in the complaints that get hard and the decisions that get rendered. Interestingly, this isn't just a liberal crusade: the libertarian think tank Cato has a lengthy brief slamming the ISDS as "an unnecessary, unreasonable, and unwise provision to include in trade agreements" that, among other sins, "is not even essential to the task of freeing trade."
This puts Warren on a direct collision course with the Obama administration: passing the TPP deal is one of their top priorities this year.
So can Warren get people to care about ISDS? Maybe! As my colleague Matt Yglesias wrote in his newsletter last night, Warren "has a unique knack among today's elected officials for seizing on things that are languishing in obscurity and making them blow up. The greatest trick the special interests ever played was getting the world to stop paying attention. Warren makes people pay attention."
http://www.vox.com/2015/2/26/8114291/elizabeth-warren-tpp
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Why Elizabeth Warren is so great
by Matt Yglesias
I don't always agree with Elizabeth Warren, but Danielle Kurtzleben did a piece for us this week that I think shows what makes her such a vital figure. At Janet Yellen's monetary policy hearing, Warren took aim at the Federal Reserve's General Counsel, Scott Alvarez. Alvarez is one of the people with the highest importance-to-fame ratios in the whole American government. His existence to say nothing of his work is incredibly obscure. But Warren used her considerable celebrity and her dorky charisma to shine a light on it.
And she has a unique knack among today's elected officials for seizing on things that are languishing in obscurity and making them blow up. The greatest trick the special interests ever played was getting the world to stop paying attention. Warren makes people pay attention, and it's great.
http://tinyletter.com/mattyglesias/letters/i-m-writing-a-newsletter
ladjf
(17,320 posts)the lady obviously has some brains, and that's a good thing. nt
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)I find her just about the single most convincing member of congress with only a very few exceptions.
ladjf
(17,320 posts)I agree with most things she has said so far. However, she has only been in the Senate for a short time. I don't know whether she is "on the level" or simply using her intelligence to make the best political calculations for her interests. That's not a criticism of her but more of a reflection of my own thought processes.
At this point, however , I would prefer her over Ms. Clinton, who I definitely don't trust.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)Chance. I recommend it. I enjoyed it.
djean111
(14,255 posts)they keep bleating that we already have court cases and such - and they either don't see or don't care that this sets up a separate corporate court system, outside of a country's courts.
If Warren was incorrect, the authors of that article would have said so. This is what Bernie and Grayson have pointed out, too.
WTF is pretty much all I can summon, at present.
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)It's "HOLY CRAP!!!" awesome.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)tclambert
(11,134 posts)Sen. James Inhofe (the senator with the snowball). The resulting matter-antimatter explosion could crack the Earth into pieces.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)zeemike
(18,998 posts)Could not resist it...besides it kicks this post I recommend...
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)I get the distinct impression that Elizabeth Warren is one of the Very Few® people in government that still represent the best interests of the average American.
If there are more that represent our interests why don't they speak up in a substantive way on issues that concern our future?
Seems like all we get is a bunch of thinly disguised weasel words.
Like many of you, I am sick to death of the bullshit.