Do you believe? Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a hypocrite.

For the measly sum of $4500, will you do your part in reducing outside influence for congress critters?

Yep. Voting against cost of living increases for members of Congress may sound nice, but doing so only increases pressure on them to keep dark money loopholes open.
This makes campaign finance reform *harder.*
ALL workers deserve cost of living increases, incl min wage workers.
https://twitter.com/AOC

What a champion of the working poor. "We don't get paid enough to be honest".
From a bartender to a congressional hero.

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snoopydawg's picture

Imagine that congress only takes bribes because they aren't paid enough. I'm seeing people saying that they have to pay for two houses and other stuff, but they do get allowances for that as well as per diems for food even though they get theirs paid for by their lobbyists masters.

I can see giving the staff raises, but not until congress fixes the minimum wage and cost of living for SS and SSI and SSDI! Sheesh what a twit..

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

@snoopydawg

it's ridiculous. Not to mention their three day work week--and even that is not every week. Meanwhile a frickin' minisule increase in the minimum wage gets phased in so slowly that inflation has far surpassed it before it becomes effective.

Oh, and just that base salary alone is $174,000 a year.

So....how much was she making working as a bartender again?

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wendy davis's picture

@snoopydawg

tweet without clicking through:

@aoc warns us that if she doesn’t vote herself a $4500 raise, the pressure on her to resort to graft will be irresistible.

when strife delivery had called her a capitalist, and that 'we need actual socialism!', i'd said yeah, but you can't get away from her anywhere without 'socialism has come to amerika'. and i'd been thinking of this that day, but couldn't find the correct publication on my word document again at the time:

not to mention the AOC as wonder woman (or whatever) comic book, a new netflx video, but it really is pretty entertaining all in all. especially that so many fall for her cons.

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That tweet has the same tone deafness as the All/Blue lives matter people with a huge dollop of political naivety. Does anyone really believe $4500 will keep “dark money” influence out of politics? That’s an insultingly dumb statement and I find it impossible to believe anyone could believe that. If she’d stopped with the cost of living argument it would be easier to agree with, even if Congress is an unsympathetic recipient. But throwing that in was just dumb.

Maybe I’m bitter because I have my annual justify your existence day review coming up and I’m not even counting on a cost of living raise. Maybe I should tell my boss if I had a cost of living raise, I wouldn’t need to steal office supplies. (j/k)

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

WaterLily's picture

@Dr. John Carpenter I hear you.

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"You think crooks will stop at nothing. Well, I, AOC, believe my fellow crooks will stop at $4500."

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Wink's picture

to fry. AOC my girl.
She is one of a handful
of blue wavers actually
bringing the noise to Capitol Hill.
Many there needing to order more
Negan Sh!ttin' Pants™ she scares them so.

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the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.

@Wink

kind of threat to the Blue No Matter Who establishment, would we be reading and hearing a lot less about her?

So far, she seems like a perpetual motion self-promotion machine. And not a very bright or mature one, at that. She seems to be for anything she thinks will play well with Sanders' base but without being especially serious about it. Twittering on about M4All without having a single specific in mind was an example. And she antagonizes people gratuitously, including her fellow house members. I don't think her antics bode well for her ability to get things done.

As far as being leftist, AOC just about lost me when she voted for Pelosi for Speaker on the supposed ground that Pelosi was the most left of all the candidates.

My mind is still open, but quite dubious.

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@HenryAWallace speakership election just the other day. There were mostly candidates to Pelosi's right running. I don't recall a major candidate to her left, and if s/he existed, there was no serious organized public movement for that opponent to be elected.

Even the co-chair of the Dem Progressive Caucus, Rep Jayapal, early on announced her support to re-elect NP. That was as clear a signal as any that there would be no true progressive challenge, that NP would regain her job.

AOC easily is one of the most dynamic, charismatic, articulate and intelligent Dem House members that we've seen in decades. There are many issues, long neglected, which need immediate attention and so she has much to comment on. As there has been a muted and weak show of leadership by Dems and the old guard in Congress, I find it not unsurprising that a young member with great ability would step up to speak out.

And who cares if she ruffles some feathers. Some feather-ruffling has long been needed. Many of us are sick and tired of wimpy Dems giving away the store on issues just to be able to say they can work with their colleagues across the aisle. The feeble pre-AOC status quo is what got us Obama and his weak tea policies.

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@wokkamile

However, I do not see her as very intelligent or very articulate. Not yet, anyway. I see her as someone with a huge ego who piggybacks on what she thinks are the applause issues and trumpets them. There is, IMO, an important place for that and a good use for that in this country, where the message is so homogenized. However, so far, she has not yet backed up her applause lines.

No one needs high intelligence to recognize that "Medicare for All" is currently an applause line for the left, especially for those who don't think very much about it. Those who do think beyond applause lines know that a bill title means less than nothing: see the "Patriot" Act. Or, for that matter, see the "Affordable" Care Act.

But, for a national legislator to tout M4All while having not a single specific, not even as Alligator Ed pointed out downthread, resurrecting HR 676? Not smart.

This tweet about a pay increase for people already being compensated at a BASE of $174,000, plus more perqs than anyone can shake a stick,plus titles, media fawning, etc. mentioned in the same breath as disdained and disrespected minimum wage workers? Not smart. (Too much like Hillary's tone deaf comparison of being a Democratic US Senator in a Republican majority Senate to a plantation for my taste.) Claiming an increase $4500 a year is necessary to stave off corruption by our public servants, such as she is? Not smart.

As far as alienating people whose votes you will need if you expect to actually accomplish something, it's fine, if it accomplishes something beyond seeking more applause for oneself. Otherwise, it's merely counter-productive and a potential obstacle to accomplishing something in the future. Also, not smart. (I thought my prior post had made the distinction between pissing off gratuituously and pissing off purposefully, but perhaps not.)

JMO

As my prior post stated, I am trying to avoid knee jerking in either direction. But, I am skeptical, and with good reason, I think. So, far, I certainly cannot divide the Democratic Party into pre-AOC and post-AOC. As far as Obama, most of us thought he talked a good game, too, until we saw that he actually delivered on next to nothing good.

Again, only time will tell.

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@HenryAWallace @HenryAWallace

No pictures of Bernie and Pelosi posing together. I don't trust AOC and beginning to like her less and less. She insults our intelligence and leaves the same bad taste Warren leaves in my mouth.

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"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

@dkmich @dkmich

relatively unknown politician, maintaining near total radio silence.

Yet, she is the freshman House member whose name is most familiar to me. (Much as Obama was once the name most familiar to me among freshman US senators. Hell, media was proclaiming him a wunderkind and Presidential timber WHILE he was making the keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention (that speech often being the way that the Democratic Party signals its choice of future Presidents).

I did not notice it during live coverage--but I was still a Democrat then. However, a year or two ago, I saw videotape of "news" anchors on all the "major" networks cut away from the speech itself to make that kind of remark, FOX News being a possible exception.

During the 2015-16, with Hillary at nearly 100% name recognition and Bernie far below that, media was barely reporting on Bernie, who was only one of two candidates for the Presidential nomination of the Democratic Party who had support worth mentioning. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of people were waiting on line for hours in state after state to attend his rallies.

When NPR was challenged on its lack of coverage, its ombudsman replied that Bernie had done nothing newsworthy and, if and when he did, NPR would cover it!

Excuse me, but for the last century and a half, all our Presidents have been either Democrat or Republican. And you have two people running for the Democratic nomination. So, anything either of them does during the primary campaign is "newsworthy," whether it's Hillary passing out in public or Bernie getting something like six thousand in OVERFLOW at rallies in LA and Boston while Hillary was doing her best to hide from everyone but big donors(and the public was cooperating by staying away from her events in droves).

BTW, if I were Bernie and I saw Pelosi walking toward me while a a camera was in the room, I'd excuse myself from whatever I was doing at the moment and head for the men's rest room. He suffered enough from being at Hillary's side.

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Alligator Ed's picture

@HenryAWallace She is cunning but not as smart as she thinks she is. She and her campaign manager somehow got $1M from the Justice Democrats (a misleading organization bearing only 1 precondition). She gets inordinate press coverage--why? Her "proposals" are half-crazy. No M4A support--why didn't she revive the Conyer's bill at least or promote a plan of her own?

She doesn't want to. That's why. She is a scheming phony is is smart in some ways but her hypocrisy is easily evident for those who look for it.

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@Alligator Ed

Great point about at least having HR 676 in her back pocket in case anyone asked/pressed for specifics--which frankly should have been an easy one to predict.

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@HenryAWallace has she actually accomplished anything yet? The amount of fawning press she gets with nothing behind it sets off my BS detector hugely. I think your post nails it.

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Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

@Dr. John Carpenter

comments, too.

Well, she has accomplished gratuituously pissing off some House members she may need in the future.

She's also been scolded by The View for not taking a breath and learning where the House cloak room is before mouthing off. (Whoopi Goldberg, with nods and agreement from the others around the table.) However, I consider that a plus. If anyone overrates themselves, it's the "ladies of The View thinking they have all the political knowledge they need to mouth off about politics on national television. However, they do have lots of fans, esp. in the NY area where the votes AOC needs for re-election are located.

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Alligator Ed's picture

Give those congress critters a legal raise and they will still glom onto all the dark money they can. Who does AOC think she's kidding. AOC might be the best "plant" Trump could have infiltrated into the Dem party. She's nuts and the Congressional Dems are nuts. They are insanely pursuing a course of reckless stupidity. They have no program except except for "Orange Man bad".
Yeah, and don't tell me about former champion of the people and now Clinton asskisser Bernard Sanders. Bernie, your time has gone. You're done like my mother's brisket--incinerated in flames by
Clintonian obeisance.

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pros and cons on each side of this issue, it's hardly clear cut against. On the housing allowance and per diems, they don't apply to their work in D.C. or their residences connected to their work in D.C.
Also the COLA request would include staff, which is being underpaid currently compared to the private sector.

On your twitter cite to AOC, it links to her entire Twitter feed. There is a down-arrow to the right of each tweet where you can click and hit Embed Tweet to allow you to copy and paste here, so we get just the relevant tweet.

As it was, I had to wade thru 30 other tweets to get to the one referenced. However I did learn of a number of good things AOC was doing in a number of other areas, so thanks for reinforcing my sense that she is a breath of fresh air for progressives in Congress. AOC is headed for the senate or governorship, and beyond.

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Pricknick's picture

@wokkamile @wokkamile
for the tip. I've never used twitter so I'm ignorant of how the site works.

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Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.

Wink's picture

for sure. Move over Kirsten!

@wokkamile @wokkamile

Half of the Dim Caucus is pissed at her??
And that's a bad thing??
She's practically called out some to be Primaried.
My kind of Congress critter!

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the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.

Us to believe that these critters pay for their election using their own salaries? I think we all know that a salary increase of 4500 for them has nothing to do with their donors, don't we? How does a salary increase get rid of dark money then? Answer is it doesn't, not in our wildest dreams does it do one damned thing. Now, how she cannot know that fact with all the rhetoric about inequality she rightly talks about I surely do not get....

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur