Harvard Law professor Elizabeth Warren has gone viral with a scathing speech against class warfare captured on video. The Democratic Senate candidate in Massachusetts and former White House financial reform advisor slammed Republicans for saying Democrats are engaging in “class warfare” against the rich.
Republicans have called out President Barack Obama recently for allegedly engaging in “class warfare” tactics by attempting to increase taxes on the rich in his new deficit reduction plan. The phrase has become the new rallying cry for many Republicans, such as House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), who have both accused Obama of “class Warfare” against the wealthy.
Elizabeth Warren, who recently announced she was running for Ted Kennedy‘s former Senate seat in Massachusetts, blasted Republicans for forgetting who made the wealthy rich in the first place.
“I hear all this, you know, ‘Well, this is class warfare, this is whatever. No. There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own — nobody,” Warren says in the video that has gone viral around the world.
“You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear. You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police-forces and fire-forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory — and hire someone to protect against this — because of the work the rest of us did.
“Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea. God bless — keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is, you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.â€
President Barack Obama also shot back at the Republican accusations of class warfare during a speech on Monday, saying his debt reduction plan is “not class warfare. It’s math.”
National Republican Senatorial Committee Communications Director Brian Walsh responded to the Elizabeth Warren class warfare video on Thursday by saying in a press statement:
“Given the Boston Herald’s recent revelation that Professor Warren was paid almost $200,000 by a major insurance company to help in their legal battle against asbestos victims – on top of her $350,000 salary at Harvard – it sounds like she’s speaking from experience when she says ‘there is nobody in this country who got rich on his own.’â€