I wanted to support Elizabeth Warren. She does have a more ambitious agenda and though I think her wealth tax is unnecessary when we can restore other taxes to the same effect, I like many of her ideas. But why does she tell so many unnecessary lies. Silly lies, easily disproven
It does not matter that Trump's lies are more frequent and malignant. Women are presumed to be less truthful than men. Hillary was vilified for being scrupulous in her language, accused of parsing her words, etc. Being female, the effort to be honest was perceived as inauthentic
So a woman running for office really cannot afford a reputation for lying about her personal story. The silly lies that were completely unnecessary such as the private school lie, are perceived as more egregious than lies about policy and politics.
The question becomes "If she will lie about this, what else...?" That is a far more dangerous question to hold in mind thank "there's Trump bullshitting again." People see Trump as a bullshitter and Warren as a liar. That's not good.
It's hard for women to run for office. There are double standards. Here's the thing, knowing that Trump is the Prince of Lies does not excuse Warren's lies. Her lies reveal an unease with part of her life story. She's running a populist campaign, attacking privilege
Here's the thing. The Kennedy's were far, far richer than Warren and didn't feel inauthentic when they talked about poverty and inequality. Perhaps they were speaking from a sense of noblesse oblige, but they didn't try to erase their privilege.
Warren could have talked about her rise from the middle class to the well-off and not felt embarrassed about her privilege, but she tried to erase that privilege with lies. That's not good.
For some reason, lies about policy are more easily overlooked than lies about who you are as a person.
