She proposed a wealth tax, and Bernie followed. She had the best-developed plans on universal child care, rebuilding the State Department, catching tax evaders, and a litany of other issues.
Plans outlive campaigns. They sometimes get passed into law by politicians who opposed them. Obviously, it's best for a plan when an ideologically aligned campaign wins.
That's why I hope Bernie Sanders can defeat Joe Biden. The Warren plans are a natural outcome of negotiations between Sanders and Democratic centrists in a good Senate situation (if Sanders sees that Warren was right about the filibuster). I'll tell you a story.
Obama's health care plan during the 2008 primary didn't include the individual mandate that Obamacare is famous for. When John Edwards had introduced a plan with a mandate in February 2007, unions celebrated it. Lefty policy types taught everyone how mandates prevent adverse selection from messing up insurance. Hillary Clinton took up Edwards' plan and argued its merits against Obama.
Though Obama won the election, the mandate supporters won the argument. After the November victory, Senate committee chairs suggested that they'd be open to passing something like the Edwards / Clinton plans. After an epic legislative struggle, the mandate Obama opposed became part of what we now call Obamacare.
(The mandate got converted into a tax by the Supreme Court, but it's still there. The public option was less lucky. It was part of everyone's plan at first and Pelosi got it through the House on first passage, but it was sacrificed to Joe Lieberman for his filibuster-breaking 60th vote. Warren was right to push for eliminating the filibuster.)
When plans win the debate, the planners gain power. James Kvaal, the staffer who built the party-driving policy shop of 2007-2008 for Edwards, became policy director for Obama. I expect the same for Warren's staffers, which creates useful inside pressure for the plans.
Things as big as Medicare for All could pass even under Biden if everything breaks right: Biden's public option 2021, 4-5 new Democrats from the very favorable 2022 Senate map, M4A in 2023. That was Warren's plan to pass the plan, and with good work on the inside it's not impossible to walk Biden into it. Everything is easier with Bernie, but it wouldn't be the first time old Joe has changed a position.
Warren contributed a lot more than ideas. The destruction of Michael Bloomberg's campaign was huge. Bloomberg must have been very interested in buying the Clyburn endorsement and taking the place Biden has now. I doubt Clyburn would sell, but I wouldn't want democracy to face that risk. Warren devastated Bloomberg in the Nevada debate, and democracy was saved.
But I'll return to the ideas, because that's what we academics do. And Warren is one of us. The big point I've been making here is something obvious to us: the success of an idea is distinct from the fortunes of its creator, let alone its creator's Presidential campaign. And for some of us, the ideas matter most. We're just here to help them along and find others who will.
The campaign ends here. But for the plans, it's just another day. Elizabeth Warren will still be fighting for them, and we will too.