Cher Is More Cherokee Than Elizabeth Warren

There's a new twist in the story of Elizabeth Warren. Originally, her tenuous attachment to the Cherokee nation--she claimed to be 1/32nd Cherokee--was predicated on the "high cheekbones," a Cherokee trait, apparently, passed down by a female ancestor. Turns out, not only is there no evidence to back up the tribal provenance of her great-great-great Grandmama, but

Warren’s great-great-great grandfather was a member of a militia unit which participated in the round-up of the Cherokees in the prelude to the Trail of Tears.

Don't you hate when that happens?

Now, I have no Native American in my background, but a great aunt of mine--my maternal grandmother's older sister--did have distinctly Asian features, so maybe way back in that family branch someone was raped by one of Genghis Khan's marauders. Not that there's a box for that on any application--or any cachet--in that. My great aunt, along with the rest of my grandmother's family, was fortunate enough to escape from Kishinev just prior to the second great pogrom there, in 1905. (There had been a first one in 1903.) So Warren's discovery would be like me finding out that, blood-wise, my grandmother's family belonged to the rampaging Cossacks instead of the helpless Jews. Except, of course, that I never tried to gain any sort of advantage from the connection, and that it isn't four generations removed.