Yes, this is exactly how I’d describe the woman who single-handedly got a new federal agency established, which has so far returned over $5 billion to consumers since 2011. She just wants to look good.
Perhaps you should take your outrage and aim it at the current heads of special interests and corporations who already have that power and influence, and stop falling onto your fainting couch because Warren has said she’d uplift minority voices. Do you think the world is currently a better place because those voices are currently excluded from the decision-making process?
Warren saying she would bring a trans person onto her decision-making team is the exact opposite of “turn[ing] humans into props” and exactly what actual inclusivity looks like!
When Warren says that a candidate will not get the job without the approval of one unelected person, she is ceding her right and task, and the right and task we the people have given her as president, to make her Cabinet as she sees fit.
So when you say “The president’s main job is selecting people to do things,” I agree so much I don’t want someone else shoved into that process so Warren cede her power and responsibilities in favor of a PR campaign.
No one person is a universally-competent expert in all subjects. If you think people don’t already influence or advise the president on who to hire, you’re a god damned idiot. This is no different than anyone else being able to say “you shouldn’t hire X because Y”, the only specific issue in question here is where “Y” is “thinks trans people are human beings”.
Not every decision Ms. Warren has made is wrong; not every one is right., I can measure one idea against another without going insane, thanks.
I do aim outrage at the current heads of special interests and corporations who already have that power and influence – with who I volunteer for, donate to and will vote for.
Finally, let me ask you this: Mr. Sanders wants Medicare for all. Ms. Warren has said she will, every year, read the names of transpeople who have been killed in the rose garden. Which of those two is actually going to improve someone’s life in a tangible way?
I know other people advise the president; the president normally doesn’t say up front that that person’s pick will supersede their own. Why is this so tough to get?
You’ve now departed from your original point entirely and are pulling in entire other policies (which Warren also supports, just with a different transition schedule) in order to claim that she’s treating people like props under entirely different circumstances. Reading the names of murdered trans people in public is visibility. It’s making sure that they are honored and not forgotten. Exposure and sunlight is still essential to human rights movements, and the fact that she’s expressed an intention to do that is a good thing. It’s also a part of her approach to trans rights (another part, which you seem to have an enormous problem with, is listening to them when they say “this person would discriminate against me, please don’t hire them”), not the entirety of it.
Why is it so tough to understand that “I will ask people if they believe a candidate nominee will treat them with respect” is such a monstrously outlandish thing to confess to?
Uh, not the Cabinet, sir. Sorry. See Article II for more.
Again, the fact that we keep having this conversation tells me a lot. Like, would you want Warren to say “My nominee for Secretary of Transport will have to earn the approval of a NASCAR Driver,” or “My nominee for the Secretary of Agriculture must be approved by an Iowa farmer”?
If not, why not? And can you see through the transitive property (not a pun) how this is, in fact, deeply concerning?
Your first sentence is a little misshapen, but this is a good-faith, non-hostile answer to what I think you’re asking.
I believe in asking people if a candidate/nominee will treat them with respect. I think as Hypothetical President, Ms. Warren should consult with as broad and diverse a constituency as possible before hypothetically naming a candidate for Sec. of Ed – students, parents, etc, etc, from every community and every way of life and origin and self-identification and the whole beautiful spectrum of human identity and possibility.
I don’t believe in asking one person and giving them approval. That is a “monstrously outlandish” thing, to me, and your use of ‘people’ and not ‘person’ shows that, perhaps, on some level you agree. Because there’s a difference between many people having input and one person having the power of ultimate ‘approval.’
That would be dumb, because straight students already receive ample consideration and protection in our society. There’s no need to amplify their voice when it’s already well-amplified enough.
by a gay student
Sure, because gay rights are still extremely poorly standardized in the educational environment, and having someone involved who would be able to voice their concerns with candidates for a Cabinet-level position would be good and important.
by a white student
That’s completely unnecessary, because we live in a white supremacist society and the voices of white people are already over-represented in government.
by a black student
Holy shit yes please, minorities are horrendously under-represented and have been discriminated against by the government for generations, let’s listen to them when they tell us what they need to make their lives better!
Do you understand the difference between these things yet, and that they are not universally interchangeable?
So to leave our Hypothetical Trans Teen out of this for the moment, would you have a problem with Warren convening a group of straight white cis men and women, asking them for their recommendations, and then rejecting a certain candidate based on the input of one of those advisors? Like, if one person with educational experience says “don’t hire this person, they’re manifestly unqualified”, do you think Warren should listen to them, or just nominate them anyway? If you think Warren should bow to that input and nominate someone else as a result, why do you think a trans person having that same degree of say is a horrific abdication of presidential power and responsibility?
It’s almost like Warren wasn’t saying that the decision on a potential Sec. of Education nominee would be determined exclusively by a trans high school student, but rather that the student’s opinion on the potential nominee’s support of trans students would be taken into account.
besides warren selling out and trying to snap up all of the trans votes and the billions upon billions of dollars that represents - she’s got no principles at all it would seem… /s
biden has apparently been reduced to running ads with false claims about sanders
i guess when people run out of actual issues, they just make up stuff.
As pointed out above, your entire premise for objection is crushed by Articles I & II. The ridiculous strawman you’ve built, that ONE PERSON would have total control over who becomes EdSec isblown away by the constitutional process.
In addition, there is the practical, real-world process where a team is assembled to generate lists of potential nominees for cabinet positions, based on the strength of their CV and alignment with the incoming president’s policy priorities. The lists are further shortened to a dozen or so candidates, who may be interviewed by the team (which may be made up of both elected and unelected members), and the incoming president usually prioritizes the short list for actual nomination. Warren’s proposal could be interpreted as including said trans teen as part of the selection team or interjected into the development of the short list. Either way, the president isn’t going to nominate a bad nominee on the say so of one teenager, she has many options, of whom several will have a strong background in trans rights.
Which is what the whole thing comes down to. ETA: And apparently what you object to.
You seem to have that exactly backwards. The reason people are impressed with Warren is because she’s the only one consistently walking the walk.
No matter how many times various posters here have pointed out that it isn’t a situation in which one young person has all the power, you keep coming back to that claim. Would the term “focus group” help? Companies regularly have focus groups to help them see how their product/service would be perceived by their future customers. So for example, if you’re planning on creating a new type of turkey burger, asking only vegetarians and vegans to give their opinion wouldn’t really help as much as having a small focus group of people who might actually use the product/service when available. The youth isn’t making any decisions for the company, they’re just helping make the final product better by giving their educated opinion during the process. They’re a focus group of one. That’s all.
Because many of us are currently living in a country in which our President, if he doesn’t like what an expert – on, say, military or medical issues – has to say, he overrides their informed decisions. A truly wise person knows they couldn’t possibly know everything on every subject better than the experts.
The “mind-blowing” part (at least for one person here) is that Sanders will likely choose his nominee for Secretary of Education the same way Warren will, likely also consulting a trans student now that Warren has brought up the idea.
