What are Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Flaws?

boring as fuck middle class mediocrity wanker

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rzNLXxo01Q

idgi is she saying she would get death threats for voting no or yes. is a conversation of understanding when you vote no instead of present? you didn't have time to vote no?

I doubt I have much in common with @two5five but what they say is completely right -- the psychic merging of political culture with fan culture (and election discourse with sports discourse) is completely awful -- politicians aren't stars to be worshiped, they're people with jobs they can be good at or bad and we are, at least nominally, their employers.

people being a fan of elected officials (and supreme court justices, and jen psaki) is on my top ten most hated list

The tweet posted by snore is Page 3 of Ocasio-Cortez's statement. Here are Pages 1 and 2.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FAE75muXsAMZL0Z.jpg

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FAE76BlXMAQtiMS.jpg

"also if I run for the Senate my opponents would run ads saying I voted no"

yeah she could have written the same essay if she voted no because it has tons of reasons for voting no. weird!

The statement would make sense if she was explaining why she voted present instead of yes.

then it makes sense. she first voted 'no', then changed her vote to 'present' before the tally was made final.

tfw when your politics are all about defending bad politicians. I'm sure it will work out well for you all.

oh ok. sort of a rohrschach test i guess.

xp

If she runs for Senate I'm sure this will stop centrists from calling her an anti-Semite.

To those who asked me to quell the volatility of this moment in our community, which constituted the majority of constituent feedback our office received

Is this the argument for not voting 'No'? It's confusing because immediately before she's talking about feedback received after the vote.

it's just a word salad of community and weeping and procedural things

Your pain: felt.

"The tweet posted by snore is Page 3 of Ocasio-Cortez's statement. Here are Pages 1 and 2."

zzzzz...

Very disappointing vote and worse explanation.

yeah I mean if this is your on-ramp for running for Schumer’s seat it’s fucking sad and gross but ok whatever I guess. but maybe just do it and stfu about it. no need to do all this performative hand-wringing or you’ll turn into the caricature they’ve tried (and failed) to make you into on Fox et al

Three fucking pages of it

I'm open to learning whatever I don't understand about this, but I thought the statement was fine? As an extremely loose and off the cuff take, she's to the left of some of her constituents and walks a certain line. If you go to your people and they say, as our representative you should do (X), isn't it your job to represent them at the end of the day? If you believe they're wrong, you can undertake and/or support organizing & community education to change their understanding of the issue, which is a longer term project.

Also call your representatives because they respond to who they hear from.

isn't it your job to represent them at the end of the day

No? We don't let that excuse Republican politicians representing their reactionary constituents.

Uhh my understanding is that reactionary-friendly GOPers are there because, absent gerrymandering and voter suppression, which is, again, about mobilizing *people*, their voters elected them to do reactionary things.

One metaphor I heard from an organizer was: Elected officials are like balloons on a string, tied to a rock on the ground. You can only move the balloon so far without moving the rock, ie, the voters/constituents.

Reactionary Republicans are there because a large chunk of the country is reactionary, without voter suppression and gerrymandering the number would only be marginally different. Their voters elect them to do reactionary things but that's what I'm saying - I've yet to encounter the progressive who thinks Greg Abbott is fine because his voters really wanted that abortion ban, he's just doing what his constituents demand.

A realpolitik argument that Cortez and Bowman had no choice but to make the chickenshit votes they did is extremely questionable and not really a response to expressions of disappointment and disdain that they made those votes.

it’s becoming clearer and clearer to me that officials elected to office should just do whatever milo wants them to do

or don’t punt on “the Iron Dome” I mean gtfo with that bullshit.

I ‘get’ that if your intention is indeed a senate run in NY (or virtually any state, especially the Red ones loool) youre going to adjust your pol calculus, but I def don’t think it’s incumbent on otherwise supportive folks to graciously defend her Hard Choices

i definitely disagree with her vote, but half of the phrase “leftist politician” is still “politician”—the nature of the gig does not coexist with ideological purity (for dems, at least). it’s worth pointing out that until very very recently, “supporting” israel was one of the few slam dunk easy positions for pols of either party to have

the promise that she represents, for me, is a dem caucus full of people like her instead of people like the stiff she replaced

so maybe what i’m saying is that as silly it is to stan a politician, it’s just as silly to write off perhaps a talented messenger for social justice after one bad vote (or party dress)

just as silly to write off perhaps a talented messenger for social justice after one bad vote (or party dress)

I think there are a negligible number of people writing her off for the Iron Dome and dress who hadn't written off AOC (and any other Democrat) by February 2019.

Criticism comes in hot because she hasn't been written off.

I read her explanation as "I voted present because I objected to the process, which was too rushed for me to even consider the substance." But that seems like an equally valid reason for voting no, especially when you know the bill is going to pass overwhelmingly and your vote won't actually make a difference to the outcome. People vote "no" for all kinds of reasons.

I think there are a negligible number of people writing her off for the Iron Dome and dress who hadn't written off AOC (and any other Democrat) by February 2019.

number of people writing her off after iron dome and tax dress: 25,044
number of people who wrote her off (and any other democrat) by feb 2019: 814

what a stupendously silly world this is. anyone who wrote her off by feb 2019 live in a dream world where they get to float above everything and criticize while never having any better idea _that can actually happen in real life_

brb, i am going to go stand by the traffic light and make clear that i was always against traffic and that i write off anyone who goes near "roads"

i made a joke somewhere upthread about how it was going to take approximately 2 seconds for holy leftists of purity to start out-righteousing each other over rejecting AOC. she's not untouchable, far from it, but i just fucking hate this kind of garbage and can't stand to be near it. reading a book about lee krasner now and she talks about how she attended a billion union communist meetings in the 30s in new york and it was so fucking nauseating that it pissed her off for life. krasner otm, it's excruciating to be in this world

worst world

there, maybe i've out-cynicized the entire wretched worst world, now. i stand to the left of it, pointing at the world and everything in it, all of us, saying "no! it's bad and i knew it first. and my ideas are so perfect that it's just me and 23 other people in this hemisphere who could even dare to implement it."

then again, i do believe palestine should be obliterated and israel finally established as the righteous kingdom of heaven on earth, so it makes sense that i would defend AOC, who is filled with hatred and never does anything good for normal people

criticizing EVERYTHING is the easiest fucking thing on earth to do. you will never be wrong, eventually

enjoy your miserable weekends on this dying earth

https://img.freepik.com/free-photo/pleased-good-looking-happy-man-with-ginger-hair-brislte-showing-thumbs-up-smiling-broadly-giving-positive-feedback-sharing-his-positive-opinion-grey-wall_176420-27439.jpg

Politicians are designed to disappoint. Hers was an awful position; I expected nothing less from her or anyone else.

lousy overrated self-serving politicians deserve nothing but contempt and to say criticising lousy overrated politicians is criticising EVERYTHING is somewhat hyperbolic! Nothing will ever change with this gradualist approach, especially when by the time she's a big dog in the Dems at the current rate of meltage she'll have melted more than the polar ice caps.

It was inevitable she'd get piled on for a deservedly craven move, whether hero or hack.

A revolution of annoying people, led by charismatic leaders to the left of AOC

Shes a useful figure when everyone feels like doing their little bit tbf

"the promise that she represents, for me, is a dem caucus full of people like her instead of people like the stiff she replaced"

What you are seeing is 'people like her' becoming the very 'stiffs' they replace. One vote at a time.

The longer one's in power, the greater the likelihood for awful votes. I'm not sure why she's different.

she replaced joe Crowley, who voted for the iraq war

If AOC ends up being half as good as she was at the beginning she'll still be better than half of the Dems

Decent career WARL (wins above replacement legislator)

sabermetrics lols, i'm about it