Watch the video of the eminent economic geographer talking about housing in SF -- and other American cities.

There were so many interesting moments in the presentation by eminent economic geographer Michael Storper April 30. One of the more remarkable things he said: For the richest 30 percent of the population, housing costs as a percentage of income have actually gone down in San Francisco. That’s right: The issue isn’t a “housing crisis” for the top third of the population; it’s an affordable housing crisis for everyone else.

Storper talked about why he doesn’t think the theory of “filtering” — that is, the idea that if you build high-end housing prices will eventually fall at the other end of the spectrum — doesn’t work.

Watch the videos via 48hills.org. at https://48hills.org/2019/06/michael-storper-on-housing/
 

 

 

Berkeley lost one of its most inspired raconteurs and a longtime fixture in the African-American community with the sudden death of Donald Lee Warren, the longtime owner of Don’s Headquarters barbershop on Shattuck Street. Warren, who was 68, was known for his quick, acerbic wit and social commentaries. He was a barber for more than 50 years and served several generations of men and boys in many local families. He was also an entrepreneur and property owner who built deep ties to the local community in Berkeley as well as his hometown of Richmond. He died at home of natural causes on May 29th.

Walking into Don’s Headquarters was often like entering a television talk show that focused on the politics and social changes of the day. “Don,” as he was fondly known by customers and friends, was the sharp-tongued host of the show. His knowledge of American history, politics and African-American history regularly astonished the assembled customers, who ranged from UC Berkeley professors and researchers to city workers or terrified little boys brought by their fathers for their first haircut. He was a remarkably well-read interpreter of American political life. What kept his customers coming back to the Headquarters was not only excellent barbering, but Don’s cutting and humorous commentary and the startling honesty often expressed by the men gathered in his shop. With Don at the helm, the Headquarters sometimes seemed the Platonic ideal of a black barbershop: On any given day the place was loud with blunt truth telling and filled with peals of laughter and verbal fireworks. Several longtime customers noted repeatedly after his passing that Don ministered to much more than their grooming needs. His was also a social ministry that offered men and boys an open space for honest expression and conversation about the black experience in America. He also used his property and businesses to strengthen the local community, from giving young kids their first jobs to allowing an international charity to store donated books and educational equipment for South African schools in his building. 

Donald Warren was born on August 2, 1950, in Martinez, CA. He was the eighth of the nine children of Harvey and Rosie Mae Warren. The family moved to Richmond, CA, where Don was raised and attended Richmond High School, graduating in 1968, before barber college. He is survived by several siblings and a host of nieces and nephews.

Our President is fond of giving nicknames to anyone he dislikes, which is almost everyone respectable people like.

No, delete that “our”. My late friend Joe Agos used to sit at the table in the front window of the Caffe Mediterraneum on Telegraph during the regime of Bush the Elder and scowl at the morning’s New York Times.

“So”, Joe would say. “What are The Americans doing today?” He preferred to disassociate himself from the manifest wrongdoings of his elected officials. And yet by today’s standards Bush One looks almost like a minor secular saint.

Let’s just say, then, that “the so-called” President gives derisive nicknames to his adversaries. But today I’ve thought of the perfect name for him: “Mafia Don”.

I realize there might be some pushback from the originals, who could feel that using this name insults their ancient brotherhood, and they could even be right. But Mafia Don has obviously patterned his own business dealings after the original Mafia’s management style.

This has seldom been more clearly demonstrated than when George Stephanopoulos asked him if he’d report advances from foreign governments to the FBI. 

 

“Who would ever call the FBI?” 

Not me, buddy, he said, never called the FBI in my whole long career. 

Wasn’t there a line about this in one of the Godfather movies, or in The Sopranos? We take care of our own problems in our own way, don’t we? Was that what the guy said? 

No one should be surprised at this behavior from a man who openly expresses his admiration for a person he’s often cited as a mentor, one of the sleaziest characters in the whole 20^th century, Joe McCarthy’s counsel and later Mob lawyer Roy Cohn.  

 

There’s a lot of angst in the chattering classes about globalization, much of it deserved. However there’s less talk about the special kind of globalization presided over by Mafia Don and members of his family both by blood and by adoption.  

Clearly, they have allies in mobbed-up circles all over the world. It’s not just the oligarchs in the Slavic countries, where now-defrocked consiglieres Michael Cohen and Paul Manafort used to hang out. This week’s revelations about Mitch McConnell’s wife, Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, reveal administration ties to the Chinese elements who inhabit the twilight zone where gangsters and capitalists overlap, memorialized in many kung-fu movies. 

And let’s not forget the rest of the sordid stories from the Trump cabinet, a parade of some of the crookedest people ever to hold high office in a country where we’ve historically had our share of corruption. These run to the good ol’ boy model, the courthouse gang if you will (Scott Pruitt, Ryan Zinke, Rick Perry, Sonny Perdue) with a bit of Tammany Hall on the side (Mike Flynn, Rudy Giuliani). Let’s also remember the smalltime operators who like just a little graft thrown their way: e.g. Ben Carson’s fancy furniture caper. 

The lingering stench of corruption has been hanging over the White House for the last two years, and over Mafia Don himself for even longer. Unfortunately similar political corruption stories can now be found all over the world, with or without Trump ties. He seems to admire any kind of strong man in any kind of country, unabashed dictatorship or putative democracy: North Korea, Hungary, the Phillipines, Italy…you name it, if a government is crooked and someone’s making money from that, Mafia Don cheers. 

Governments come and go, but corruption persists. 

Here’s a little story. Forty years ago, more or less, I was commuting to San Francisco to work at the Bay Guardian while I was in law school. I generally took the E bus, which ended at the Transbay Terminal. Somehow I got wind of the fact that semi-dubious elements in the development industry had their eyes on the terminal, an interesting though not ideal 1939 Moderne building in a key location.  

At that time, believe it or not, magazine distribution was still a lucrative industry (Olden Days for sure). One rumor had it that The Mob controlled magazines, especially “dirty” magazines, which were big before the Internet put them out of business. A major feature of the terminal lobby was a huge magazine stand. 

Lowell Bergman, now a distinguished professor at UC’s Journalism School, was in those days the acknowledged expert in local freelance reporting circles on organized crime. I asked Lowell what he thought was happening with the terminal, and he confirmed, based partly on some legislative hearings he referred me to, that shady Mafia-type elements were likely to be involved in both real estate development and magazine distribution, and getting ahold of the terminal site would be a logical goal for them.  

With his encouragement, I wrote a modest story which the Guardian ran. The next day as I walked through the terminal to catch my bus home I was accosted by a little guy with a heavy accent. 

“I wanna talk to you,” he said. “Come into my office. I’m the manager of the magazine stand.” 

I was young and fearless (=foolish) so I met him there. He turned the deadbolt in the lock after me. 

“We never wanna see another story about that again,” he said, glowering. 

I told him I really had to leave, because a friend was waiting for me outside the office, which fortunately was true. And as it happens, even though his threat confirmed my speculation, I couldn’t find out anything else about the topic, so I never did write another story about him and his associates. Now they’re long gone, but their influence lingers. 

Fast forward to recently. Magazines are dead or dying, but the development industry lives on. In the interim, “the interests”, whoever they are, have finally managed to privatize the terminal site for an enormous building project, the Salesforce Transbay Terminal with adjacent Salesforce Tower, which includes a dysfunctional nod to the public purpose of mass transit which may never materialize as promised. Completion and occupation have been delayed because structural defects have been discovered, attributable to Chinese suppliers.  

Does any of this point to the same kind of organized crime participation anticipated 40 years ago? Maybe yes, maybe no. How would I know? 

It does not yet have a magazine stand, so there’s that. 

But what I do know is that the pattern and practice of corruption in the development industry, where the Mafia Don got his chops with help from Roy Cohn, not only lingers but has spread worldwide. The federal government is now dominated by the kind of sleazy stuff previously associated with cities like Chicago and countries like Italy.  

Does the electorate know or care? If you believe the polls, some do and some don’t, and the polls differ in their tallies. A lot of this country has learned to tolerate and even expect corruption, so might not hold it against Trump in 2020. Sad. 

 

 

You have to hand it to Senator Scott Wiener, he never gives up flogging for the housing industry. Last year, SB-827, this year, in slightly modified form, SB-50. Wiener's bill has stalled in the Senate, but his mantra and methods haven’t changed much. Cite a manifest problem, in this case homelessness and a lack of affordable housing, relentlessly posit the same, and only, solution over and over--just build more housing, and the problem will be solved. Repeat.

But why should he change? The California Building Industry Associ9ation (CBIA) has picked Weiner as Legislator of the Year, and the bulk of his campaign contributions come from builders. (from an article entitled “Scott Wiener’s SB 50 is a WIMBY Bill.” (Wall St. in My Back Yard.)

As Naomi Klein explained in Shock Doctrine, even crisis and calamities can be opportunities, for consolidation and amassing of power and profit.

SB-50 and SB-827 before that would preempt local zoning "near transit and jobs," eliminating local controls or input, to allow up to 85 feet high condo and apartment buildings. In San Francisco, this definition would mean almost all local zoning control would be eliminated, by state dictat, to solve the housing “crisis.”

But there are reasons why the bills have so many skeptics, including the very groups and people that might seemingly benefit. More market rate housing is NOT going to get housing for people sleeping on the streets or in cars, nor assist the working poor (those with "low-mod” income levels in the Bay Area would be considered wealthy in many parts of the country) who could really benefit from affordable housing. According to the June, 2018 Fortune, households of four people in San Francisco, San Mateo or Marin counties earning $117,000/yr. are considered “low income,” according to HUD guidelines.

Wiener and his developer allies make the simplistic argument that building more housing, even all luxury housing, will ultimately bring down the cost of all housing, the-supply- and-demand solution. Never mind that “trickle down” originated with Reagan and that Trump's single-minded pursuit of the recent tax cuts, supposedly to lift all of us up, disproportionately benefited the wealthy. Surprise, surprise. 

Investment is flooding into parts of California, and parts of cities, because of profits to be made. If profits diminish, the wealth will go elsewhere, or parcels will be land-banked for another day. Developers are not in the social service industry. 

Tenants will likely lose out if SB-50 passes, since existing apartment buildings, constructed before 1978 and under rent control where it exists, and affordable homes in low-income neighborhoods, will likely be demolished, since new construction of multi-unit buildings is exempt from rent control under state law. (Wiener’s new bill did have some fig-leaf “protections” for existing buildings with tenants, with vague language calling for bureaucracies to be set up by cities, for said buildings to be identified. Take that to the bank, as my mother used to say.) 

At least San Francisco has some provisions for inclusionary zoning. As mayor, Jerry Brown opposed it, and, since Brown’s tenure, Oakland never discourages developers. If SB-50 passes, it couldn’t stop demolitions even if it wanted to. 

As many have pointed out, the housing crisis is basically job creation, job concentration, and income inequality problem. The tech boom in the Bay Area has dramatically distorted the economy. The problem is concentrated in the three tech-centric counties of San Francisco, San Mateo, and Santa Clara, and SB-50 was rightly seen by Democratic legislators from outside these counties as a local “fix” imposed state-wide. For contrast, check out low-rise, laid-back downtown Bakersfield sometime. 

As a long-time North Oakland resident I’ve seen the dramatic changes first hand: modest bungalows bought up by flippers for as much as $800K, blown up for maximum square footage and number of bathrooms and bedrooms, often with an auxiliary “nanny” unit added on the same lot, and then resold in the neighborhood of $2 million. And counting. Often all cash offers, quick SOLD signs voiding the need for PENDING ones. 

Numerous market rate, 5 story rental unit projects are under construction in my “neighborhood shopping district” of Temescal, but Telegraph Ave. is jammed. BART, having perfected providing safe, clean, affordable mass transit, and acquisition of new train cars, has graduated to the developer business big-time, including the construction of a 24 story market rate condo project at the MacArthur BART station. All on land acquired by eminent domain in the 60s and early 70s. 

Solutions?: 

For starters, cities need to stop subsidizing tech industries. Yes, Twitter comes to mind. Subsidies, if there are any, should go to creating truly affordable housing, not just a few of the least desirable units with sunset provisions in otherwise market rate projects. 

Spread the tech blessings. Why obliterate the unique character of our cities, why we moved or stayed here in the first place, to accommodate more tech with high wage workers, when there are so many less expensive areas of the country with affordable housing and workers with skills that would welcome the opportunities? Amazon should reconsider places like Cincinnati that it passed over for the Bronx. 

A new Homestead Act, providing incentives for people to own a house in under-populated parts of the country. As Elizabeth Warren has pointed out, families owning their own house has been the classic American strategy of getting a financial foothold—the house just doesn’t have to be in Hillsborough. 

Wiener himself is an unlikely spokesperson for truly changing the status quo, and his sympathy for the needy seems faux. He opposed San Francisco’s Proposition C to address homelessness. As the Nov. 4, 2016 Truthout noted, he has opposed funding for homeless LGBT youth, and supported punishing homeless people by separating them from their belongings. 

In this dark period, with so much being lost or threatened under the warped presidency of Trump, Weiner’s relentless cheerleading and promotion of more market rate housing as a magic bullet to fix the manifest problem of the yawning divide between rich and poor is disheartening, and cruel to those who want to believe. The accompanying chorus of YIMBY chants of “more housing, any housing, everywhere” is acrid theater. 

There IS a crisis, but Wiener’s a Pied Piper. 

For more information: check out livablecalifornia.org for an analysis of SB-50 and its impacts. One surprise for me: the AARP, exceedingly cautious when it comes to advocating for saving Medicare ands Social Security from unrelenting attacks, quietly endorsed SB-50. When their representatives refused to return phone calls, we dropped out of the organization. 

 

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Robert Brokl is an artist/community activist. He and his husband, Alfred Crofts, were married in 2004 and 2008 in SF City Hall, and both were leaders in the successful effort to pass the Berkeley gay rights ordinance, before being approved in Oakland and then San Francisco, as depicted in the movie, Milk. 

 

The City of Berkeley Draft 2019 Hazard Mitigation Plan on page ES-8 included the following projection of extreme heat events in Berkeley.

Projections indicate that the number of extreme heat days, warm nights, and heat waves will increase exponentially: by 2099, the City of Berkeley is expected to average 18 days per year with temperatures over 88.3 degrees F.

It is not even officially summer and Berkeley has already had three days of extreme heat, June 9 - June 11, we may not have to wait until 2099 to have 18 days per year of extreme heat. 

In fact, even before the current heat wave the Policy Paper by David Spratt and Ian Dunlop from Australia published in May 2019, projected that without immediate aggressive response, catastrophic climate warming of 3º C may arrive as soon as 2050 

A Climate Emergency Declaration and a resolution to be Fossil Fuel Free by 2030 does not make Berkeley a climate leader when follow through is tepid at best and absent more often. 

Response to climate and being fossil fuel free needs to be the top priority in every decision, every vote, every plan.

Congress is becoming more and more irrelevant. Their prime responsibility is to exercise due diligence when waging war. This has been completely usurped by the White House who declared an “emergency” to fast-track arms sales to Saudi Arabia. The emergency authorization allows Raytheon, a prime American Defense Contractor to build highly secret smart bomb parts in Saudi Arabia. In a wonderful Christian gesture, all is forgiven for the high crimes of 9/11 and the killing of Khashoggi. I can hear the loud cheers from Trump supporters and Evangelicals eager to share US weapons secrets with our great Saudi friends.  

I wonder whether Jared Kushner received payment for his efforts or was this a gesture of unselfish patriotism. These are the same Saudis who imprisoned women’s human right activist Loujain Al-Hathloul for her demands on lifting the kingdom’s ban on female drivers and overhaul its suffocating male “guardianship” system. She has been held in solitary confinement and faced abuse, including electric shocks, flogging and threats of sexual violence. 

These are the same Saudis who along with another of our great UAE partners pledged $3bn aid money to prop up Sudan’s murderous militias fearful that the winds of democracy might reach Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. Super Christian, Vice President Pence must be so proud of our ongoing support for the Saudis who continue to kill Yemeni men, women and children in large numbers which I suppose dovetails with our own great Christian values. 

Jesus must be so proud!

Politicians of the world, Rejoice for you can still tell lies during elections. 

The High Court of Britain has thrown out the case against prospective Prime Minister Boris Johnson. During a recent election he had made claims that withdrawing from the European Union would save £350m (US$400m). The figure was challenged by his opposition at the time and subsequently in a legal action. The action was apparently 'politically motivated and vexatious', an unusual occurrence in any honest election. 

The real concern is how honest are politicians, and especially prospective politicians, during elections. It's not just a matter of kissing babies, shaking hands with people you will never speak to again or pledging monies to marginal electorates but to the themes they propose, better education, less poverty, freedom from drugs and in some countries just freedom itself. These are the things everybody wants and yet no one can seem to deliver them despite many honest attempts. Perhaps politicians should only promise what they can actually deliver. 

A relatively recent change has been the rise of fake news and attacks on the freedom of the press. If the truth is not known as shown with the Chinese Government's description of the Tianamen Square's massacre as 'Justifiable' then it disappears into the mists of times. There have been many attempts to remove or at least cleanse history with even some people claiming that horrors of the Holocaust did not occur. Fortunately there still are people who tell the true stories even if the cost is their own lives. 

We all need to tell the truth but especially our leaders.

One of the frequent promises made by the program hosts on KPFA Radio (94.1 FM) is this: "We don't allow corporate advertising on our airwaves, so corporations have no influence on the issues we cover." If that were true, it would certainly justify KPFA's claim to be a "fiercely independent" radio station – but unfortunately, it is not. 

KPFA's paid programmers actually welcome a great deal of corporate involvement in their broadcasts, by consistently featuring guests on their shows who are supported by think tanks or foundations that are funded directly or indirectly by corporations. 

The Center for American Progress (CAP) is a Democratic Party think tank that has sponsored a significant number of guests who have appeared on KPFA's airwaves over the years. The name of this think tank makes it appear that it is liberal and socially responsible in its activities.  

Actually, CAP is funded by some of the most socially irresponsible corporations in the world, and they exert considerable influence on its positions and actions. In short, whenever KPFA features a guest from CAP, it promotes the interests of the global business community. 

Initially, CAP kept its list of corporate donors secret so it could obscure their influence. CAP was criticized for this by the Sunlight Foundation and other open government groups because it wields considerable influence over legislation in Washington DC. It has recently been revealed that CAP's corporate donors include:  

Walmart, CitiGroup, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Pfizer, Eli Lilly, America's Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), Comcast, General Motors, and PG&E, as well as military contractors Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics and BAE Systems.  

This is only a partial list. CAP has many other corporate donors as well. Many of CAP's corporate members contribute thousands of dollars per year to be part of its exclusive "Business Alliance" – which guarantees them special access to important officials in Washington DC.  

However, this clear corporate connection does not trouble KPFA's management or program hosts. Apparently, it is sufficient that the positions taken by CAP slant decisively towards establishment Democratic Party policies.  

During Obama’s tenure as president, from 2008 to 2016, the Center for American Progress was so beholden to Democratic Party interests that it became known informally as “the second White House.” It is unlikely that this characterization was ever mentioned on KPFA radio. After all, KPFA must maintain its fiction of being "non-partisan" in order to maintain its nonprofit tax deduction. 

You may have heard that the CAP recently sponsored a number of hit pieces that were critical of Bernie Sanders – because he is decidedly not a centrist corporate Democrat. In response, Sanders issued a statement about CAP's disingenuous actions: 

“The Center for American Progress is an organization whose massive annual budget is bankrolled by billionaires and corporate executives that profit from finance, pharmaceutical companies, fossil fuels, and sending American jobs overseas ... I worry that the corporate money CAP is receiving is inordinately and inappropriately influencing the role it is playing in the progressive movement.”  

The fact that these insidious corporate influences may effectively undermine legitimate leftist movements does not seem to concern any of the KPFA hosts who feature CAP spokespeople on the air.  

Why does this matter? 

Kris Welch, a 45+ year radio host on KPFA, recently claimed on one of her programs that the station provides its listeners with the "free flow of information that the public needs so people can be informed and make up their own minds." That sounds good on its face, but the "free flow of information" should certainly include informing listeners of the affiliations of guests who are interviewed and indicating their potential conflicts of interest. Otherwise, how can a listener reasonably evaluate the information that is being presented?  

Later on during the same program, Welch declared that KPFA is "different from the Koch brothers, because they don't trust the intelligence of the American people." Yet David Brock, the Democratic Party strategist who helped start a number of the corporate-dominated think tanks that provide guests to KPFA, openly stated his desire to be "just like the Kochs" in his fundraising and advertising practices. Apparently, Welch and others at KPFA regard certain activities to be unacceptable if they are done by the right wing but entirely acceptable if they are done by the left wing. 

We can judge how much KPFA trusts the intelligence of its listeners by paying attention to how callers are treated when they phone in during the public affairs broadcasts. If a caller expresses agreement with the guest and the program host, he or she is typically treated politely and respectfully and is allowed ample time to comment or ask questions.  

But woe to the callers who are brave enough to try to challenge a statement that is made on the air -- or draw attention to hidden financial ties. Such callers rarely have an opportunity to finish their remarks because they are often cut off before they conclude. If they do finish, they are typically treated dismissively.  

And after their calls have been dropped and they cannot respond, they are sometimes even insulted. This is a disconcerting practice of programmers such as Philip Maldari, who hosts "Sunday Show" every weekend. His condescending approach is an insult to the community. Why should Maldari be the self-appointed gatekeeper of the ideas that KPFA's listeners are permitted to hear? 

The disrespectful and dishonest behavior that KPFA's program hosts sometimes exhibit is exactly the opposite of trusting the intelligence of the listeners. This issue has been brought to the attention of Quincy McCoy, KPFA's general manager, many times, but he either fails to respond or simply backs up the actions of the hosts. It appears that McCoy, too, fails to trust the intelligence of the listeners. 

By featuring guests who are members of organizations like CAP, KPFA actively promotes the interests of the corporations standing behind these guests. But don't think CAP is unique. Other corporate Democratic think tanks and foundations whose spokespeople have appeared on KPFA include Campaign for America's Future, New America Foundation, and numerous others. 

Is KPFA free of direct corporate advertising? Yes. Is KPFA free of corporate influence? Certainly not. But the station goes to great lengths to hide this from its listeners. 

Worst of all, listeners who try to point out these hidden corporate connections are silenced on KPFA’s airwaves and summarily dismissed by management. It seems clear that a radio station that resorts to censorship and stonewalling to hide the conflicts of interest of the guests on its programs is not operating with integrity. 

KPFA claims to be a beacon of free speech; the "flagship of the Pacifica Radio Network"; and a model for community radio stations across the country. Shouldn't it place its highest value on integrity, rather than considering this approach a last resort – to be tried only if all else fails? 

Listeners who have concerns about KPFA's unacknowledged corporate connections, consistent Democratic Party bias, and chronic lack of transparency – should share their thoughts with Quincy McCoy, KPFA's general manager.  

Listeners may also want to ask Mr. McCoy why he felt justified in deleting more than 16 years of archived programs for one of KPFA's most popular programs, "Guns and Butter", formerly hosted by Bonnie Faulkner. Community donations paid for the permanent preservation of these programs in KPFA's archives. McCoy's unilateral decision to destroy these recordings was a violation of the public trust. 

Of course, it should have been the community's choice – and not McCoy's – to determine the disposition of these valuable historical records. Instead, he flushed them all down the "memory hole", just as happened in the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell's dystopian horror novel, 1984.

The walls of my high-school gym were covered with pithy aphorisms such as: "When the going gets tough, the tough get going." The most memorable was: "Life is a grindstone; whether it wears you down or polishes you up, depends upon what you are made of." Certainly, a presidential campaign is a grindstone; in the process most candidates get ground up, while a few thrive. Somewhat unexpectedly, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren has adapted to the arduous 2020 campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination and is beginning to shine.

Warren was the first Democrat to enter the presidential campaign -- December 31, 2018 -- and, ever since, has been campaigning non-stop. I like Elizabeth, but initially had some concerns about her as a presidential candidate: I thought she would come across as an academic or a scold. This hasn't happened; instead. as she slogged though non-stop campaign events, Elizabeth has gotten more confident and, to my eyes, softened. She's still smart as a whip, but her intelligence hasn't gotten blocked her message; she's found a way to communicate with her supporters without dumbing down her ideas. (So far this year, Warren has held more than 80 town-hall meetings.) 

(By the way: I'm struck by how smart the Democratic candidates are, in general; whether it's Elizabeth Warren or Pete Buttigieg or Kamala Harris or Amy Klobuchar or Corey Booker... Trump is going to have a tough time debating any of these candidates -- if he participates in the debates.) 

Six months after entering the presidential campaign, Elizabeth Warren has found a way to differentiate herself from the other candidates: her now familiar refrain "I have a plan for that." If Joe Biden's shtick is "I'm everybody's Uncle Joe... I'm likable and electable" and Bernie Sanders is "I may look like someone's grandfather but I'm actually a revolutionary," Warren's political identity is, "I may be a woman but I'm the smartest person in the room." 

Warren has blended her personal story -- impoverished single mom who becomes a Harvard Law School professor-- together with intelligence and liberal populism. This has produced a potent political cocktail. Elizabeths's brew showed up at the April "She the People" candidate forum in Houston. Many expected Democratic presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Corey Booker to dominate the event, but it was Warren who stole the show. Since then Warren has played to increasingly enthusiastic crowds. (And she's sold a lot of "Warren has a plan for that" t-shirts.) 

As a consequence, Warren's poll results have improved. A recent Des Moines Register poll(https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/politics/iowa-poll/caucus/2019/06/09/iowa-poll-biden-leads-democrats-bernie-sanders-elizabeth-warren-pete-buttigieg-caucus-2020/1360801001/) of prospective Democratic Iowa caucus-goers found Senator Warren was in third place (15 percent) after Joe Biden (24 percent) and Bernie Sanders (16 percent). But another question indicated that Warren is close to a tie with Biden: "Among those who plan to caucus in person, 61% say Biden is on their list in some way... Just as many — 61% — say Warren is on their list. That includes 15% who choose her as their first choice, 14% who pick her as their second choice and 32% who say they are considering her." 

The Warren presidential campaign is experiencing a surge. The latest Economist/YouGov poll (https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/4etmv6wq62/econToplines.pdf) asked prospective Democratic voters: "If the Democratic presidential primary or caucus in your state were held today, who would you vote for?" 26 percent responded "Joe Biden;" 16 percent responded "Elizabeth Warren;" 14 percent were not sure; and 12 percent responded "Bernie Sanders." All other candidates were in single digits. (By the way: the same poll indicated that while Sanders is the best known candidate, he has the highest unfavorable rating at 33 percent.) 

Writing in Mother Jones, David Corn (https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/06/elizabeth-warren-plan/?) pointed out another reason for Warren's momentum: "In February [Senator Warren] announced she would not raise campaign cash via high-ticket dinners and receptions or through dialing-for-dollars calls to wealthy would-be donors. The campaign promoted this as a move demonstrating that Warren would not grant access to rich contributors; she would not be selling influence and would instead rely on small-dollar donors... This decision that burnished her reformist credentials had a critical impact on the campaign: It unshackled her schedule." 

So, what will it take for Senator Warren to win the Democratic presidential nomination? 

The Iowa caucuses occur on February 3, 2020. One the next 8 months, Warren should keep doing what she is doing. ("Nevertheless she persisted.") At the moment, only she has found a winning formula. 

Of course, Joe Biden is the frontrunner, but If Warren maintains her current pace she'll differentiate herself from Joe Biden on the basis of personal energy. And most Democrats will realized that Warren has more depth than Biden. 

Many believe that Warren's primary competition will come from Bernie Sanders. From here it seems that Warren has two advantages: First, she can "out wonk" Sanders; Bernie has a lot of ideas but Warren has more and they are better elaborated. Warren's second advantage is that she is a woman. Right or wrong, a lot of female Democratic voters blame Sanders for Hillary Clinton's 2016 loss -- remember the "Bernie Bros." 

It's a long road ahead, but from here the ultimate winner will probably be Elizabeth Warren. She's emerged from the grindstone with a clear campaign message and identity. 

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