Could Elizabeth Warren's "heritage" problem be a sleeping winner for Dems?

[hexola]

Think about this...

Lets say she takes the test - discovers she has no detectable NA heritage.

Fine - but how typical is this?

Even the commercials for these services address this issue.

"We thought we were German - we weren't German at all."

I think this is very common - people have a surname and think they are of that ethnicity - which is a ridiculous assumption.

I roll my eyes when I see that "Its just a hat" commercial - c'mon...you take a DNA test - and then change your personal identity...please.

The farther you push back to find a connection - the smaller that chance becomes.

What does this say?

It says - look how quickly we become Americans - and could quell big picture fears about immigration.

The pot continues to melt. It works.

[FSogol]

1. Other than some Trumpanzees, no one cares.

[hexola]

2. It would start to sound really dumb - once this threshold is passed.

I think it would get old even for them.

2020 - if we get there - wont be anything like 2016.

There won't be 17 Republicans - that gave Trumps shallow one liner style and advantage.

He wont have that this time.

[samnsara]

3. This happened to my family.. my mother who is nearly 90 always bragged of her NA

..Heritage. My sis took a DNA test...NO NA DNA. The rest of us took the test...no NA DNA..Mostly what we thought..English, Welsh, Irish...blah blah. My mother was...needless to say...very sad by the results.

[hexola]

4. Thank you - you see folks - this is happening to everyone.

You can't make assumptions based on family tree.

Get it done Liz - get it out there...

"Elizabeth Warrens DNA Test is in - 100% AMERICAN!"

See how I flipped it around there..!?

[haele]

7. That may be as your mom may not have passed down the genes.

Or it may be that she heard the story from other relatives from a generation or so back who were hiding an Irish heritage during a period where "Irish need not apply". Being "enough Cherokee" to explain tricks of speech and non WASP looks, but "not enough" to have been forcibly emmigrated during the 1830's was a way many people of Irish, and eastern European heritage thought they could get past immigrant bars in the later 1800's.
So long as that native blood supposedly got mixed in before the war of Independence, that is. It made for a romantic story -like something Cooper or Longfellow would write about - and created an illusion of American heritage the family could cling to as the children assimilated into the society around them. I've noticed that families where such "Indian background" stories come out of tend to be in the Southeast and up the Eastern side of the Midwest, where the frontier had pretty much been settled over by the 1850's and 1860's - and there were no reservations around for long-time locals to practice their civic bigotry on.
And the NA heritage always seems to be from either a Princess or a heroic lone Scout who saved a White settlement...damn you J.F. Cooper...

Haele

[WePurrsevere]

9. Ethnicity (Admixture) doesn't work like most think but...

More so with NA.

If you'd like to learn a bit more about how the ethnicity part of DNA works I suggest these two articles. They're pretty basic but may help clear misunderstandings about how the tests work and don't.

This one is specific to NA DNA...
Http://www.rootsandrecombinantdna.com/2015/03/native-american-dna-is-just-not-that.html

This is more general...
http://www.legalgenealogist.com/2014/05/18/admixture-not-soup-yet/

FWIW, partially for the reasons outlined in the two links above, I absolutely don't think Warren should take a public test. There are ways she could take one and keep it private if she chose too but this push to make her take a test is ridiculous and insulting.

[LexVegas]

5. "no detectable NA heritage" Jesus Christ.

Some white people hate to think they may not be pure. Others would give anything to have a "detectable" minority heritage.

I think its funny.

[BannonsLiver]

6. Despite the "get off my lawn" OP from another poster

There are some surprises in these tests. But of course if you have no curiosity, intellectual or otherwise, they offer little appeal. Also if you are a paranoiac (Thanks Mooch!) they're probably not a good idea.

[NutmegYankee]

8. DNA tests are not an indicator of heritage. Only of what genes got passed on.

For instance, my sister and I came out with different results. Clearly siblings, but I inherited a lot more Irish genes.

[WePurrsevere]

10. Exactly! I really wish the DNA type testing sites would make it more clear...

how DNA works at least the basics and with the ethnicity (admixture) aspect.