• Welcome to the new Internet Infidels Discussion Board, formerly Talk Freethought.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

A.O.C. and Eric Adams Have Not Spoken in Nearly a Year - The New York Times - "Mayor Adams and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who represent divergent wings of the Democratic Party, have not spoken one-on-one in nearly a year."

That last time was when EA met NYC's Congressional delegation last year.
And while the mayor received a warm reception from his fellow Democrats, there was a notable exception: Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the party’s outspoken progressive star, was uncharacteristically quiet. Days earlier, Mr. Adams warned guests at a fund-raiser about the dangers of democratic socialists, who happen to count the second-term congresswoman as their most famous member.

Representative Nydia Velázquez, a congressional mentor of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s, sought to clear the air, pleading with the mayor to treat “everyone with respect.”

Yet since then, the friction has continued between Mr. Adams and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, two ascendant political stars and unusually gifted communicators representing sharply divergent wings of the fractured Democratic Party: Mr. Adams as an avatar of “pragmatic” moderatism, as he has described his policies, and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez as an ardent, left-wing warrior.

...
The friction between Mr. Adams and Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, who both declined to be interviewed, belies a bevy of personal similarities: Both are ambitious Democrats, people of color raised in the New York City area by families with working-class roots, their bootstrap backgrounds deeply informing their politics and personal style. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez famously worked as a bartender; Mr. Adams recounts being a childhood member of a gang and a victim of police brutality.

Political observers say the schism between the two seems to be underlaid by a complicated mix of personal disdain and policy differences. But there is also a dash of political calculation: an almost symbiotic relationship, with each finding a useful foil in their own backyard, someone on whom to focus their fire and to use to polish their own brand.
Click to expand...
 
The two don't see eye to eye on policy issues.
Late last month, Mr. Adams called for an increase in the police budget during his State of the City address, as well as agreed to hire nearly 600 new correction officers.

Even before that announcement, however, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez had already rejected many of Mr. Adams’s early ideas — including his approach to policing and austerity measures he announced in February.

In an Instagram post. she noted that the mayor was “cutting virtually every city agency’s budget while raising the NYPD’s,” adding, “It’s a no for me.”
Click to expand...
EA's spending priorities seem like typical right-wing ones -- lots of government spending on punishment but not much for anything else.
Many mainstream Democratic leaders blamed progressive leaders and ideas like “defund the police,” as well as rising crime, for the party’s poor showing in the 2021 election cycle, including losses in moderate areas like Long Island, where the state’s bail reform laws turned off swing voters.

Supporters of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez reject that assertion, noting that Mr. Adams only narrowly won the primary, in a ranked-choice vote with relatively low turnout.

They also contend that the progressive agenda trumpeted by Ms. Ocasio-Cortez — focusing on climate change, housing, labor issues and health care — is far more aligned with New York values than Mr. Adams’s ethos of being tough on crime and friendly to real estate and business interests.

“Let’s not overstate the mayor’s mandate,” said Tiffany Cabán, a city councilwoman from Queens and an ally of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, noting victories by more liberal candidates in citywide races for public advocate and comptroller. “It’s clear that his approach is actually the outlier.”
Click to expand...
Also,
Stylistic differences also divide the two politicians, leading to criticism from both sides. Mr. Adams’s supporters, for instance, find Ms. Ocasio-Cortez to be self-righteous; the congresswoman’s backers find Mr. Adams to be arrogant.

There is no question that Mr. Adams has felt pestered by liberals like Ms. Ocasio-Cortez and Ms. Cabán, as well as their socialist partners in Albany, like State Senator Jabari Brisport of Brooklyn, who says that the mayor is merely “repackaging Republican talking points and ideology for a Democratic audience.”

“It’s definitely not a progressive agenda,” Mr. Brisport said. “It’s the Mayor Adams agenda.”

Mr. Adams’s supporters contend that despite the mayor’s aggressive stance on law enforcement issues, he has much in common with the progressive wing of the party, noting planned investments in public housing, child care and mental health services.
Click to expand...
I'll believe it when I see it.
 
AOC Says a 'Health Issue' Sidelined Her for the Last Week or Two
From her Instagram account:
Hey all!

Just wanted to check in. I had a health issue sideline me for the last week or two (don't worry, it wasn't COVID and I'm fine now), but it was right when a series of major events happened.

I'm back at it today, but was MIA for a bit to recover. Just wanted to provide you all some assurance that the silence wasn't political or anything as I know that worried some.

Anyways, back to regularly scheduled programming! Might do an IG live later this evening to catch up 🎥

✌️💜
Click to expand...

Eliza Relman on Twitter: "in some lighter news -- @AOC confirmed to me that she's engaged (link)" / Twitter
noting
AOC Confirms She's Engaged to Longtime Partner Riley Roberts
She added in a message to Insider that they got engaged in Puerto Rico last month and were "taking some space to savor" their engagement before beginning the wedding planning process.

"We got engaged last month in my family's hometown in Puerto Rico," she tweeted. "No future details yet, we're taking some space to savor this time before diving into planning."
Click to expand...

Eliza Relman on Twitter: ".@AOC's team is fundraising (and promoting @JCisnerosTX' campaign) off her engagement news (pic link)" / Twitter
We're so excited to share some personal news... Alexandria is engaged! 💍

We know that there's a lot going on right now, especially with the Texas-28 runoff in 5 days. But even as we power through the work that must be done, it is important to enjoy the moments of joy along the way.

Please join us in congratulating Alexandria and Riley by signing the card, and if you'd like, leave a message! We'll collect all your responses and send them over to the newly engaged couple.
Click to expand...
 
 
Last edited:
NY Times (via lpetrich) said:
The two don't see eye to eye on policy issues.
Late last month, Mr. Adams called for an increase in the police budget during his State of the City address, as well as agreed to hire nearly 600 new correction officers.
Click to expand...
Good! Bill deBlowjob's defunding should be reversed.

Many mainstream Democratic leaders blamed progressive leaders and ideas like “defund the police,” as well as rising crime, for the party’s poor showing in the 2021 election cycle, including losses in moderate areas like Long Island, where the state’s bail reform laws turned off swing voters.
Click to expand...
The bail deform law is a singularly bad policy for NY Dems. It allows perps to commit a wide array crimes over and over again and be released each time with nothing more than a desk appearance ticket. It gives no latitude to judges.

Supporters of Ms. Ocasio-Cortez reject that assertion, noting that Mr. Adams only narrowly won the primary, in a ranked-choice vote with relatively low turnout.
Click to expand...
As opposed to AOC herself who won her primary in a vote with an abysmally low turnout (<12%).

I think partisan primaries are a bad idea anyway. But Erik Adams would have prevailed in a jungle primary as well no doubt.

They also contend that the progressive agenda trumpeted by Ms. Ocasio-Cortez — focusing on climate change, housing, labor issues and health care — is far more aligned with New York values than Mr. Adams’s ethos of being tough on crime and friendly to real estate and business interests.
Click to expand...
To paraphrase Coolidge, the business of New York is business. Without the tax revenues brought by thriving businesses, the city can't afford all the other priorities. And a good way to spook commercial activity is to let crime run rampant.
Bad enough that Manhattan elected a pro-crime DA. A similarly pro-crime mayor would have been a one-two punch against a city already troubled by the apparently never-ending pandemic.

“It’s definitely not a progressive agenda,” Mr. Brisport said. “It’s the Mayor Adams agenda.”
Click to expand...
Good thing too!
 
Found myself on page 1 of this megathread, and found this gem from January 2019:
Ford said:
Don2 (Don1 Revised) said:
I am okay with the fact that Ocasio-Cortez is a socialist. In fact, given that she 1. is a democratic socialist, 2. triggers conservative snowflakes, 3. has a great personality, and 4. looks pretty, I think I am in love. No, wait, it's not love, it's obsession.
Click to expand...

Nothing against AOC, but I'm much more favorable to my former Representative and now Senator Kyrsten Sinema. She's kinda hot.
Click to expand...
Did not really age well, lmao!
 
Derec said:
I think partisan primaries are a bad idea anyway. But Erik Adams would have prevailed in a jungle primary as well no doubt.
Click to expand...
I agree with that.
Derec said:
lpetrich said:
They also contend that the progressive agenda trumpeted by Ms. Ocasio-Cortez — focusing on climate change, housing, labor issues and health care — is far more aligned with New York values than Mr. Adams’s ethos of being tough on crime and friendly to real estate and business interests.
Click to expand...
To paraphrase Coolidge, the business of New York is business. ...
Click to expand...
So anything goes when it's called "business"? No matter how criminal or crooked or dangerous to the rest of society it is? It's always a sight to see when right-wingers find some criminals that they want to coddle.
 
lpetrich said:
So anything goes when it's called "business"? No matter how criminal or crooked or dangerous to the rest of society it is? It's always a sight to see when right-wingers find some criminals that they want to coddle.
Click to expand...
Who said anything about "criminal or crooked" businesses? I took issue with AOC being against Adams for being friendly to business interests. A city needs business, so why would a mayor be hostile to it? That makes no sense, except in the mind of a socialist.
 
Team AOC on Instagram: “@aoc answered your questions and shared her thoughts on how we keep each other safe in an Instagram Q&A earlier this week. Swipe to read.”
Question: are we screwed? 😫

Alexandria shared her thoughts on hope and community

My honest view is that things are likely going to get harder before they get better, and we will need to stick together.

What is important in moments like these is to not think in binaries. Good/bad, screwed/not screwed. There is no doubt that things are bad. Some things, really bad. And they may likely get worse. But that does not preclude the fact that slowly but surely, some good can be growing as other things fall apart.

This is not some syrupy sweet silver lining case for optimism. Rather, it is really about a choice all of us will have to make in life, either consciously or unconsciously: will be a person who is safe and creates good for others? Will be a person who stands up? Will be a person who primarily minds my business and serves myself or try to be part of something bigger? Or will I just be a passive, "neutral" observer of it all?

What I sometimes tell my staff is that the world we are fighting for is already here.

It exists in small spaces, places, and communities. We don't have to deal with the insurmountable burden of coming up with novel solutions to all the world's problems. Much of our work is about scaling existing solutions, many created by small committed groups of people, that others haven't seen or don't even know are around the corner.

So while we can't change the world in a day, we CAN and do have the power to make our own world within our four walls, or our own blocks. We can grow from there with the faith that somewhere out there, everywhere, others are doing the same. And we will come together. That's why if you're a parent, how you parent matters. If you're a neighbor, how you are a neighbor matters.

Many of our biggest problems are results of massively scaled up isolation from others. That means many of our solutions can be found in creating community.

Ultimately, we live in this world and in this time. We have no choice but to engage in it while we're here. Even running away is a form of engagement. So will your engagement hurt or heal? Build or bring down? There is no neutral choice, so we can at least do our best to make good ones and learn and do better the next day.

You are allowed to be scared. To grieve. To be angry. But you are also allowed to create good, to be soft, and enjoy the small reprieves.

Struggle lasts as long as we do.
Click to expand...
Very beautiful. And also very pragmatic.
 
AOC is concerned with state and local elections as well as with national ones.

Team AOC on Instagram: “The first of New York's two primary elections this summer is on Tuesday, June 28. Here's what you need to know about how to make a plan to vote and who @aoc has endorsed for local and state-wide primaries. Visit the link in our bio for more NY election resources.”

Lt. Gov: Ana María Archila -- lost to inc Antonio Delgado: 61.6% (24.9%) 13.6%

Queens
Jeffrion Aubry (AD 35) -- inc won 62%*, 38%
Zohran Mamdani (AD 36) -- unopposed?
Juan Ardila (AD 37) -- won 44%, 26%

Brooklyn
Emily Gallagher (AD 50) -- inc won 80%*, 20%
Marcela Mitaynes (AD 51) -- inc won 82%*, 18%
Samy Nemir Olivares (AD 54) -- lost to inc 52%*, 48%
Phara Souffrant Forrest (AD 57) -- inc won 67%*, 33%
Keron Alleyne (AD 60) -- lost 73%, 27%

Manhattan
Illapa Sairitupac (AD 65) -- lost 49%, 35%
Delsenia Glover (AD 70) -- lost to inc 60%*, 30%

Bronx
Jessica Altagracia Woolford (AD 81) -- lost to inc 62%*, 38%
Jonathan Soto (AD 82) -- lost to inc 56%*, 36%

Hudson Valley & Upstate NY
Vanessa Agudelo (AD 95) -- lost 47%, 33%
Sarahana Shrestha (AD 103) -- won against inc 52%, 48%*
Justin Chaires (AD 111) -- lost to inc 66%*, 34%

Democratic Socialists Gave a Solid Performance in Yesterday’s Elections
Phara Souffrant Forrest faced the toughest primary challenge, in a campaign where opponents unsuccessfully accused her of being absent in the district since she is a new mother. Forrest beat her next closest challenger by more than 30 percent. Emily Gallagher, Marcela Mitaynes, and Zohran Mamdani will join Forrest for their second terms in Albany after winning their respective primaries handily.

...
But not all insurgents were defeated in New York. Mid-Hudson Valley DSA’s Sarahana Shrestha edged out establishment Democrat and thirteen-term incumbent Kevin A. Cahill, an upset that represented the chapter’s second electoral victory in a calendar year. Last year, MHV-DSA helped propel Phil Erner to victory over a fourteen-term incumbent on the Ulster County Legislature. For the Many incumbents in New York City played a unique role in Shrestha’s campaign, caravaning north to give speeches and knock doors for the climate organizer.
Click to expand...
Sarahana Shrestha had an AOC-like victory, it seems.
 
AOC won the NY-14 Democratic primary by being the only candidate to compete in it.

The Republican side had more of a contest: Tina Forte 67.9%, Desi Cuellar 32.1%.

Tina Forte is a MTG-ish sort of candidate, someone who showed up at the Jan. 6 insurrection, while Desi Cuellar is a more traditional sort of conservative.

From 6 months ago:
Log Cabin Republicans (NY) boosted QAnon U.S. Capitol insurrectionist - "She has actively supported QAnon conspiracies & promoted former President Donald Trump’s lie that the election was stolen"
Forte is running for a seat to represent New York’s 14th Congressional District, located in New York City, currently held by Democrat Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Forte will face the other Republican challengers, Desi Cuellar, Pura De Jesus-Coniglio, and Miguel Hernandez in the Republican primary on June 28, 2022.

Snopes reported that Forte promoted and attended the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Additionally she has actively supported QAnon conspiracies, promoted former President Donald Trump’s lie that the election was stolen. Forte also appeared in a video with Proud Boys leader Henry “Enrique” Tarrio.
Click to expand...
But PDJC and MH dropped out, leaving TF and DC.

PDJC endorsing TF:
Tina Forte for Congress on Twitter: "My friend @bxpastorpura is an attorney, pastor, and community leader in The Bronx.
I am honored to have her support in my campaign for Congress. Thank you Pura! #SaveNY (pic link)" / Twitter
then
Pura De Jesus-Coniglio on Twitter: "❤️ Always Blessings to you ...my friend Tina! #gooutandvotetomorrow #NY14 #congress" / Twitter
 
Swammerdami said:
LOL. I think you post more about AOC than anyone except Mr. Petrich!
Click to expand...
I don't know about that one way or another. The old forum had the feature where you could see the reply frequency by poster, but I do not think the new one does.

In any case, I usually reply to something lpetrich or somebody else writes about her. It's not like I often, or hardly ever, initiate points of conversation about AOC.
 
Derec said:
Swammerdami said:
LOL. I think you post more about AOC than anyone except Mr. Petrich
Click to expand...
In any case, I usually reply to something lpetrich or somebody else writes about her. It's not like I often, or hardly ever, initiate points of conversation about AOC.
Click to expand...
But, here you are doing it again keeping AOC elevated to noticeable.
 
Despite his defeat, Desi Cuellar may continue to run as a Conservative Party candidate. Another candidate, an Independent, is Hasime Zherka.

The Republican primary had 2,252 voters in it. Let's see how this number compares to previous primaries in NY-14
  • 2020: D: 62,589
  • 2018: D: 29,778
I could not find much on NY-14 primaries before that, so I looked in Home Page - New York State Board of Elections It only has primaries back to 2002, but I found out from it that Joe Crowley never faced a primary challenge from 2002 to 2016. As a comparison, I looked at 2018 and 2020, and the BoE had details of the Democratic primaries for both years.
 
AOC on the Fight for Abortion Rights and Whether She’ll Ever Be President | GQ
AOC's Fight for the Future

Almost four years after her improbable arrival in Washington, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has become the political voice of a generation—and a cultural star whose power transcends politics. Now, as the country hurtles toward the midterm elections, AOC opens up about the battle over abortion, her own shot at the presidency, and why it's critical that men step up now.

For her first two years in Washington, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez walked the few blocks from her apartment to her congressional office nearly every morning, a routine she felt forced to change after a treasonous mob stormed the Capitol. Now she drives most days—a comically short commute she considers a necessary safety precaution. But for some reason—she’s not quite sure why—the congresswoman decided to walk to work on what would become Washington’s most tumultuous morning since the insurrection.

As she reached the Capitol grounds on June 24, a group of men stopped her for a photo. “I said ‘Hello’ and ‘How are you all doing?’ ” she’d later recall. “They’re like, ‘Well, you know… We’ve definitely been a lot better, given this morning.’ ”
Click to expand...
Then she learned that the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade that day.
... but somehow much of Washington still managed to appear blindsided. Democrats had expected to spend the afternoon celebrating the passage of a new gun control law. Now their day had morphed into a wake.
Click to expand...
Talk about lack of clue. What did they expect?
Out on the steps of the Capitol, a group of lawmakers gathered to sing “God Bless America,” a preplanned photo op that now read as hopelessly out of touch: Angry Americans were spilling into the streets and elected Democrats were singing campfire songs. Ocasio-Cortez knew where she needed to be. It wasn’t at a sing-along.

“Sometimes people ask, ‘Oh, what’s the point of protest?’ ” she told me later, recalling that day. The act of protest, she said, creates community. And participation by political leaders sends a message. “It’s really important for people to feel like their elected officials give a shit about them,” she said. “Not from on high, but from the same level.”
Click to expand...
She understands activism very well. So she went to a protest near the Supreme Court building.
Soon, she was speaking into a borrowed megaphone, helping to lead the call-and-response. “Into the streets!” Ocasio-Cortez shouted, pumping a clenched fist in the air. Within minutes, a sobbing young woman found the congresswoman and threw herself into her arms. “I’m so scared,” she wept. “I’m so scared.”

...
“A lot of that was about a human need,” Ocasio-Cortez said of why she took to the streets that day. “About providing just a very real position that this is not over and we’re not giving up.”
Click to expand...
 
In those weeks after Roe’s demise, Ocasio-Cortez was ubiquitous: at rallies and on television, demanding that her colleagues move with urgency to protect access to reproductive health services and calling on men in particular to share their stories of how they had benefited from decades of legally protected abortion. The battle for bodily autonomy and human dignity, she said, will only be won if men themselves join in the fight.

“For almost every woman that has gotten an abortion, there’s a man who has either been affected or liberated by that abortion too,” she told me. “In this moment it’s really only going to be the vulnerability of men, and men talking to other men, that gives us the greatest hope of shifting things the fastest, soonest.”
Click to expand...
She seems very farsighted about this issue.
“I think there’s plenty of well-meaning reasons why men may feel like it’s not appropriate for them to talk about it,” she continued. “I think sometimes the way white folks don’t like to talk about race and they say, ‘We just want to center the person who’s most impacted, so it’s not my role to do anything or take a space and speak up.’ But we know that when white folks take up space and say the right thing in rooms of other white people, that is the most shifting activity that can happen, more sometimes than any protest or any person writing a letter to the editor or anything like that. And we need men to be speaking up in that way as well. But I think men, sometimes they think, I’m not a woman. This doesn’t affect me the most.”
Click to expand...
Then
“Men suffer from being under patriarchy,” the congresswoman said. “They don’t go to the doctor. They suffer from much higher rates of completed suicides. Even though they report lower levels of depression, that doesn’t mean that they suffer from it less. Just a couple years ago the American Psychological Association released a very deep paper and a campaign about how these traditional cultural markers of masculinity—stoicism, competition, domination, dominance—are leading to mental health issues for men. There’s a stigma around men being vulnerable.”

... “I think something that’s really powerful for men is to share their stories of growth.”

... “There are amazing men in this world, and not men as a final product. There are men on incredible journeys, internal journeys, journeys of transcending beyond just anger as the acceptable masculine emotion,” ... “Men who dive into their compassion, into their sadness, into their insecurity and explore it and work through it.”

... “The most powerful and persuasive things a person can say on any given issue,” ... “is sharing their personal experience and personal story.”
Click to expand...
It's so nice to see someone in public office show such depth and learning.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom