US "The Squad" Megathread - Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Talib Derangement Syndrome

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I honestly only know about American politics from what I read on the Internet but since we all love shitting on leftists I figured we'd get a kick out of this. Also it's trending on Twitter so you know it's important.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...irect=on&noredirect=on&utm_term=.960552c9ba53

NEW YORK — Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old political novice running on a low budget and an unabashedly liberal platform, upset longtime U.S. Rep. Joseph Crowley on Tuesday in the Democratic congressional primary in New York.

The surprise victory by the community organizer in a district that includes parts of the Bronx and Queens came after an energetic, grassroots campaign that mustered more than enough support in a low-turnout race that many had expected to be an easy win for Crowley, a member of the Democratic House leadership.

“The community is ready for a movement of economic and social justice. That is what we tried to deliver,” said Ocasio-Cortez, who has never held elected office and whose candidacy attracted only modest media attention.

She told The Associated Press after her victory that she didn’t have enough money to do polling in the race, but felt in her gut that her message had a chance to connect.

“I live in this community. I organized in this community. I felt the absence of the incumbent. I knew he didn’t have a strong presence,” she said.

Crowley has been in Congress since 1999 and hadn’t faced an opponent in a primary election since 2004, when Ocasio-Cortez was just a teenager. He was considered a candidate to become the next House speaker if Democrats win the majority.

“It’s not about me,” Crowley, 56, told his supporters at a campaign party following his loss. “It’s about America. I want nothing but the best for Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. I want her to be victorious.”

He later played guitar with a band at the election night gathering, and dedicated the first song, Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run,” to Ocasio-Cortez.

Crowley represents New York’s 14th Congressional District, where he is also the leader of the Queens Democratic party.

Ocasio-Cortez was outspent by an 18-1 margin during her race but won the endorsement of some influential groups on the party’s far left, including MoveOn, as well as the actress Cynthia Nixon, who is running for governor. She defeated Crowley by 15 percentage points.

Born in the Bronx to a mother from Puerto Rico and a father who died in 2008, Ocasio-Cortez said she decided to challenge Crowley to push a more progressive stance on economic and other issues.

She attended Boston University, where she earned degrees in economics and international relations, and also spent time working in the office of the late U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy.

After graduating, she returned to the Bronx where she became a community organizer. In the 2016 presidential campaign she worked for U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders.

Among her issues is expanding the Medicare program to people of all ages and abolishing Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. She recently went to Tornillo, Texas, to protest against policies that have separated parents from their children at the southern U.S. border.

Ocasio-Cortez gained some internet attention for a campaign video called “The Courage to Change,” a two-minute spot for which she wrote the script and featured footage from her own home.

Crowley is chair of the House Democratic Caucus, the fourth-highest ranking position in Democratic leadership in that chamber of Congress.

His loss drew the attention of President Donald Trump.

“Wow! Big Trump Hater Congressman Joe Crowley, who many expected was going to take Nancy Pelosi’s place, just LOST his primary election. In other words, he’s out! That is a big one that nobody saw happening. Perhaps he should have been nicer, and more respectful, to his President!” he tweeted.

The Republican candidate for the office, Anthony Pappas, is running unopposed and had no primary. Pappas teaches economics at St. John’s University.

She was a Bernie campaigner, is supported by BLM, and wants to abolish Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. Also this was in a solid-blue Congressional District so you know she's a shoo-in for next Congress.

But hey, we did get to see Trump laugh at Crowley on Twitter.
 
Dark-money group backing AOC spent $20,000 on anti-Biden Facebook ads

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Both ads have been shown about half a million times, if not more, to South Carolina voters since Dec. 19.
It seems likely that the ads are meant to appeal to African-American voters in particular, based on the the prison-related message and also on an electability argument, factors many political strategists believe resonate with that demographic group. It’s not clear how Organize for Justice has used Facebook’s powerful targeting tools to seek its voters; Facebook doesn’t publish the choices that advertisers make.

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Dalia al-Aqidi is a Muslim Iraqi refugee who says she's tired of hearing Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., play identity politics while using language she believes is "dividing" America.

So she is launching a campaign to unseat her in November.

Al-Aqidi, who discussed her newly launched campaign in an interview with Fox News, joins a growing field of Republicans looking to take on Omar. "She needs to be stopped," al-Aqidi told Fox News in a phone interview. "I truly believe that I'm strong enough to beat her at her own game."

She explained that in a race between the two of them, Omar would be limited in using her background as a Muslim woman who came to the U.S. as a refugee from Somalia to distinguish them — because they are "basically the same" in that backstory, she said.

Al-Aqidi decried the use of identity politics on the campaign trail.

"Muslims, Christians, Jews are all Americans," she said, while going on to blast Omar's past comments that have been labeled anti-Semitic.

"Every time she opens her mouth she says something either anti-U.S. or anti-Semitic," al-Aqidi said. Omar has apologized for past tweets about Israel that played on anti-Semitic tropes.

Al-Aqidi also alleged that Omar is more interested in raising her own political profile than helping her constituents.

"I am loyal to the country that gave me a chance, gave me a brighter future," she said, claiming that Omar "continually tries to weaken the country and divide us."

Omar's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on al-Aqidi's candidacy and accusations.

Al-Aqidi, who has 31 years of experience as a journalist, including as a White House correspondent for Alhurra, a U.S.-based Arabic channel that airs in the Middle East, says that one thing she has learned is that regularly attacking your opponents is not an effective strategy in politics.

“Conflict resolution is an art. You cannot do anything without a conversation. You talk to the other side and try to figure out something that will be acceptable," she said.

"Trashing the other side will get you nowhere."

As for her own platform, al-Aqidi says her main concerns are security at home and abroad, the economy – where she says President Trump is "doing great" – and education.

"I'm ready to fight and I believe that I could win," she said.

There is a fairly long line of candidates hoping to take on Omar and the other members of the group of freshman congresswomen known as the "Squad."

Omar is facing primary challenges from Democratic community organizer John Mason and attorney Antone Melton-Meaux. On the GOP side, al-Aqidi joins businessman Lacy Johnson, special-education professional Danielle Stella, minister and missionary Lucia Vogel, activist Alley Waterbury, and former auto sales manager Brent Whaley.

Squad member Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., also has a cadre of opponents from both parties hoping to unseat her, and Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., is facing a GOP challenge from David Dudenhoefer, the chairman of his district's Republican party. Of the Squad, only Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., remains unopposed.
 
A profile by New York magazine indicates Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is being urged by those within her camp to challenge either Chuck Schumer or Kirsten Gillibrand for a Senate seat.


Lupe Todd-Medina, founder of a political public relations firm, tells City & State that taking on Schumer would be a “kamikaze mission.” “She is too politically smart to take on an incumbent challenge where the downsides are so high,”

AOC is too smart to take on a hopeless fight? This is the wrong horse to bet on.

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I don't know how much juice Gillibrand really has, but if Ocasio tries to primary Schumer he will skin her alive.
A New York Senate seat is one of the most precious offices in the world.

Aside from that though the timing doesn't match up. AOC's district is going to be eliminated due to the census and Congressional redistricting in time for the 2022 elections. By the time Gillibrand is up for reelection it's going to be 2024 and AOC will have been out of Government for two years.

Go ahead and take a look at Beto if you want to see how fast a star cools off after losing their office.

That isn't to suggest that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is just going to go away. She's likely to follow a similar career path as Sarah Palin and will continue to provide lulz for years.
 
That isn't to suggest that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is just going to go away. She's likely to follow a similar career path as Sarah Palin and will continue to provide lulz for years.

Oh no, don't think she's going to be as relatively low profile as Palin. Sure she got various appearance gigs and book deals, but the Narrative Machine has a lot of use for AOC once she's safely not actually threatening their status quo anymore. She'll get a prominent talking head job, probably more than one, they'll crank out books under her name one or two a year and buy every single one the New York Times Bestseller label whether they warm shelves or not, she's got too many hands up her ass for that muppet to be shuffled off into the Sesame Street closet any time soon.
 
Oh no, don't think she's going to be as relatively low profile as Palin. Sure she got various appearance gigs and book deals, but the Narrative Machine has a lot of use for AOC once she's safely not actually threatening their status quo anymore. She'll get a prominent talking head job, probably more than one, they'll crank out books under her name one or two a year and buy every single one the New York Times Bestseller label whether they warm shelves or not, she's got too many hands up her ass for that muppet to be shuffled off into the Sesame Street closet any time soon.
See, this is where I disagree. I don't think she is a Wall Street Puppet.

From my observations, they really did not expect her to win over an actual establishment big dog. She replaced someone that Pelosi herself had been meaning to hand off the reigns of power to eventually, one of her top lieutenants.

What I think AOC is, is a gamble that failed. They failed to get the Senate, but had control of the house, and now had several Progressive members. I'd propose they propped her up so hard believing that was where the country was going and ALSO believing that giving her establishment support would mean she'd fall in line and be a good girl.

The problem, is that she didn't. The only thing Socialists love more than their meager ration of food is to stab other people in the back. And AOC did a lot of stabbing. Rather than a decent figurehead to spout establishment bullshit from a youthful mouth, they got a completely idiotic firebrand who mostly burned down her own general side. Notice, AOC is talked about a LOT less in the media.
 
What I think AOC is, is a gamble that failed. They failed to get the Senate, but had control of the house, and now had several Progressive members. I'd propose they propped her up so hard believing that was where the country was going and ALSO believing that giving her establishment support would mean she'd fall in line and be a good girl.
This exactly. The Democrats actually really wanted Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. They were hoping that by playing nice with her they could convince her to be a more standard and successful politician.

Then they could all benefit from her star power and fundraising ability.
 
See, this is where I disagree. I don't think she is a Wall Street Puppet.

No, she's a puppet of a far-left rich wannabe kingmaker. That doesn't mean that both she and he won't let a few other hands up the muppet hole when their interests align. They don't have to have planned for her to make use of her... they'd just prefer her in the Fourth Estate spouting her lines than in the legislative branch fucking things up. That's the whole point of what I'm saying... they don't want her where she is, but that doesn't mean they won't use her up before throwing her out once they've gotten her out of that position.
 
No, she's a puppet of a far-left rich wannabe kingmaker. That doesn't mean that both she and he won't let a few other hands up the muppet hole when their interests align. They don't have to have planned for her to make use of her... they'd just prefer her in the Fourth Estate spouting her lines than in the legislative branch fucking things up. That's the whole point of what I'm saying... they don't want her where she is, but that doesn't mean they won't use her up before throwing her out once they've gotten her out of that position.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is basically just a more successful version of Greta

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is basically just a more successful version of Greta

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Older version, maybe, more successful remains to be seen. You know that kid's parents are making fat stacks out of (possibly literally as well as metaphorically) whoring her out, and there's a lot less scrutiny of money and gifts flowing to her than there is on AOC. (Not that the scrutiny on AOC or any other politician counts for that much, since the usual approach to discovering hard evidence of corruption is to shrug, go "Meh", and file a report that has less impact than the citation for tardiness a guy working at Wal-Mart gets.)
 
Oh no, don't think she's going to be as relatively low profile as Palin. Sure she got various appearance gigs and book deals, but the Narrative Machine has a lot of use for AOC once she's safely not actually threatening their status quo anymore. She'll get a prominent talking head job, probably more than one, they'll crank out books under her name one or two a year and buy every single one the New York Times Bestseller label whether they warm shelves or not, she's got too many hands up her ass for that muppet to be shuffled off into the Sesame Street closet any time soon.
Jesus fuck. It makes the stomach churn to think of her endless appearances on CNN as an expert commentator in the coming years.
 
Ah yes, the wannabe kingmaker. He ended up being collateral damage. This woman really seems to enjoy the company of weak men.

Saikat Chakrabarti, the former chief of staff for New York Democrat U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, abruptly resigned his post last week, and now an investigation is focusing on two political action committees he helped found.



Even better, sources indicate that Ocasio-Cortez’s minimum salary policy may have actually been a ployto help Chakrabarti “dodge public financial-disclosure rules

 
Yep. On paper, Christians and Jews are "fellow people of the book" (or something sounding like that), meaning they worship the same correct God even if they do so "incorrectly", and are to be accorded some dignity because of this. Saner minds will still say it's unacceptable to be told to pay a self-deprecation tax just for existing, but there you have it.

It's more sinister than that. A Christian is not allowed to marry a muslim woman and she can't exactly stop being muslim. A muslim man is free to marry christian women as long as they convert. With time the religious minority will have less and less of everything, as a group they can never gain anything in an Islamic society.
Muslims wants and needs will always come before the subhumans with a different religion, so it's not a great place to be.
 
It has been over since the 1970s, we in the decline phase now.
We're more in the Late Roman Republic stage. My prediction is that America will go the way of Rome. JFK and Trump are our version of the Gracchi brothers, except they we're actually good unlike the Gracchi brothers. We're going to have an American Caesar in the next few decades. We're in the stage around when Gaius Marius and Sulla clashed if I we're to compare the US to Rome.

The World Wars we're our version Punic Wars for some context.
 
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