Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

[Derec]

She wore a white pantsuit when she met President Boric of Chile.
She and Colombia Vice President Francia Márquez both wore floral-print dresses, something that she found a pleasant surprise.

Who the fuck cares. What did Borić wear?

There are many times that I absolutely envy my male colleagues who can wear the same outfit or two all week and no one notices or cares. They can just focus. Picking clothing all the time can be tiring and it takes a lot more energy, money, and time from women especially when you consider the hair and makeup required to be perceived just as well-groomed as a man who splashed some water on his face.

Who cares that a woman wears a few outfits all the time in a professional setting? Show me people that care.

But men are also judged if they venture outside a pretty repressive box of navy suits.

Are they really? I can see some snickering if they come dressed as Saul Goodman or the Pimp Named Slickback, but the business suit palette is broader than just navy blue. Ever hear of charcoal?

That's why Tressie McMillian Cottom thinks it legitimate to discuss what Kyrsten Sinema wears -- KS isn't very talkative about herself and what she wants to do.

I do not see what the one has to do with the other.

 

[Derec]

Good that AOC is willing to mention some unflattering aspects of President Petro's past.

Does she really view these things as a negative though? After all, he was a left-wing insurrectionist. Those tend to get a pass. I mean M19 just murdered people. They didn't do anything serious like put their feet up on Nancy Pelosi's desk or steal a lectern.

 

[lpetrich]

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on How She’s Changed - The New York Times - "The congresswoman from New York says she’s different from when she first took office. But she’s not ready to call herself an insider."

Now in her third term, with a high-ranking position on a powerful House committee, she has learned to maneuver in Congress, making allies on the left and working with her political adversaries. She says that might make the progressive wing of her party “suspicious,” but she’s comfortable having more influence on the inside.

She's now the Vice Ranking Member of the Oversight Committee; second in command for Ranking Member Jamie Raskin.

The ranking member of a committee is the head member from the opposite party from the committee head.

About what has changed about her,

I think I have a sense of steadiness and confidence in what I’m doing. My election was characterized by so much upheaval, both nationally and personally. We were in a time of great political upheaval when President Trump was elected. The Democratic Party at that time was kind of lost in many ways. We were in transition between an older party and a newer one, in terms of where we were coming from ideologically.

The transition still has a way to go, but successes like Minnesota are encouraging.

When I first came into office, I was unproven in a way that I think many other people may not be, right? There are a lot of people that are elected with a history of legislating. And I very much felt that I had to prove two things at the same time that were often at odds with one another.

I had to prove to the people that elected me that I am committed and very well grounded in all of the values and issues and fights — from taking on a party establishment that can be very calcified to continuing to fight for landmark progressive issues like Medicare for all, and comprehensive changes to our immigration system or criminal justice reform.

And the second was that I had to prove to this world of Washington that I was serious and skilled, and that I wasn’t just here to make a headline, but that I was here to engage in this process in a skilled and sophisticated way. That I did my homework, so to speak.

She was elected to no previous office, and she wasn't very notable as an activist, so she was an almost complete unknown. But both of those things have in common that she has to prove that she is both competent and willing to do the necessary work.

 

[lpetrich]

When I first came in, I came into an environment that I sensed was never going to give me a chance, and into a party that was extremely hostile to my presence, extremely hostile to my existence. That’s one of the reasons I dug so powerfully into my work.

AOC mentioned something more personal in a previous interview, that they didn't like that she deposed an old friend of theirs, Joe Crowley. It also didn't help that she wasn't some middle-aged corporate lawyer.

One of my first hearings ever was questioning Michael Cohen, and I remember the commentary at that time was, “She’s just going to put on a show.” And I knew that I was capable of more than that. I think anyone who is used to being underestimated can relate to that experience.

Then how she's viewed by left-wing activists.

Part of it is because we haven’t really had a political presence like this in the United States before. I think very often you had this consummate insider that was bankrolled by corporate money and advancing this, frankly, very neoliberal agenda. And those were the people that we were used to seeing in power.

She then goes on to say that many left-wingers don't know how to relate to having political power.

Then on working with Republicans on legislation like forbidding Congressmembers from trading stocks. Back in 2019, she worked with Ted Cruz on legislation to forbid Congressmembers from becoming lobbyists when they leave office. That didn't go very far, though AOC noted a difficulty: an ex-Congressmember can become a lobbying consultant.

"In order to get elected to the House, it requires just an absolutely ridiculous sum of money and access to capital that most people do not have."

There are elements of the libertarian right, or the Freedom Caucus, that oppose the level of defense contracting in the military budget. Civil rights and privacy violations are another area where I have discovered some elements of common interest. They’re very few and far between, but where we identify them, I think it’s important to burrow in on them and see what is possible.

 

[lpetrich]

Then AOC and Twitter:

Elon Musk taking over Twitter has dramatically changed the media environment. You’ve had this mass exodus from the platform. It’s become much more difficult for me, myself, to use. And that I think is reflected in my presence on some of these platforms.

What would make you get off X, formerly known as Twitter?

You know, this is a conversation that I’ve had. If one monitors my use of that platform, it has fallen precipitously. I think what would constitute a formal break is something that we actively discuss — whether it would require an event or if it’s just something that may one day happen.

 

[lpetrich]

About her recent Latin American trip, “We are here because fascist movements are global, and as a result, progressive movements also have to be global if we’re going to rise to the challenges of these times.” she goes off on an interesting tangent:

Let’s say you were from a very different part of the political spectrum than I am, and you believe that we have to take this very strong, realpolitik approach, that we must be countering China in the most aggressive terms possible. Let’s say you believe all of those things. I still think that even if you were motivated by that, we would still come to similar conclusions, which is that we must reckon with our interventionist past in Latin America because it has created a trust problem among our neighbors in the Western Hemisphere.

When a country has had a history of interventionism, of supporting coups, of spying on our neighbors, why would you trust them now? And so whether you’re doing it for moral reasons or realpolitik reasons, it’s not just about it being the right thing to do. I think it’s a smart thing to do in order for us to reset and build trust and relationships with our hemispheric partners.

Then,

In the Republican debate, you had Ron DeSantis say that perhaps an invasion of Mexico might be in order to stop drug trafficking.

Such a suggestion is so reckless that it’s difficult to even capture. But the political incentive for Ron DeSantis to say something like that speaks to the lack of real attention that we pay domestically to our role as a member of this hemisphere.

 

[lpetrich]

Speaking of our closest neighbors, I want to talk about immigration. Under Biden, more asylum seekers are being held in private detention centers than under Trump. Families are still being separated. The Biden administration kept Trump-era policies that sped up deportations and made it harder for legitimate claimants to come to the U.S. So, what grade do you give the administration on immigration?

Immigration is arguably this administration’s weakest issue. This is one area where our policy is dictated by politics, arguably more so than almost any other. There are very clear recommendations and suggestions that we have made to the administration to provide relief on this issue, and it’s my belief that some of the hesitation around this has to do with a fear around just being seen as approving or providing permission structures, or really just the Republican narratives that have surrounded immigration.

In effect, trying to appease Republicans and right-wingers. But that has not worked very well, since right-wingers have claimed that President Biden has an open-borders policy.

But under the Trump administration, you did make the southern border an issue.

Yes. And again, I will be visiting the border.

That will be very welcome.

 

[lpetrich]

Then about someone running against NYC Mayor Eric Adams in 2025.

That sounds like a yes — you’d like someone to run.

It’s important for us to have choices, and I say this as a person who has had elements of our party mount primary challenges against me, and I don’t take it personally.

That was Michelle Caruso-Cabrera. MCC, like AOC, is a Caribbean Hispanic woman with a hyphenated name.

Do you feel more comfortable in the Democratic Party now? The way you described it initially was fraught. They rejected you, and you were definitely trying to change the party. You have said you’ve pushed the party leftward. Many would agree. So is it OK to be a regular Democrat now?

The activist in me always seeks to agitate for more. I think despite there being progress, many people are still woefully underserved in this country. But the Democratic Party has changed dramatically in the last five years. Even if you just look at the numbers, I believe it’s something around 50 percent of House Democrats have been elected since 2018. And so what is considered center and moderate now is dramatically different than what it was five years ago.

It's been a struggle for the Democrats to move away from Clintonism. "Sure, I'd like to do lots of nice things, but I'm totally helpless." Even nice things that they ran on. Barack Obama seemed to me a sort of Bill Clinton II. The two Presidents were also endlessly attacked by right-wingers as if they were usurpers, and they often seemed like whimpering cowards in the face of such attacks. AOC is nice in that she fights back, and that she doesn't apologize to right-wingers and Republicans.

We started this conversation talking about how you entered politics at a particular moment, and not a good one. And you acknowledged that your tenure has been tumultuous, with attacks on democracy and on your own person. Do you like your job?

I certainly think I like it a lot more than I used to.

There have been times where this work has been extremely challenging, and I didn’t know if I would survive in this position. But I see myself as having a very great responsibility, because at the end of the day, the representation of working-class people in our Congress is still extremely low. Women still only constitute 27 percent of our Congress. People of color, Latinas — there have only been, I don’t know, two to three dozen Latinas that have been elected in the history of the United States. And so I’m motivated by an extraordinary sense of responsibility, not just for representation, but to deliver on policy.

At 33 years old, first winning my election at 28 — this has taken a large degree of learning. I’m also very hard on myself, and I have to sometimes put into perspective that I am comparing myself to the skill set and performance of people 20, 30, 40 years my senior. But again, it’s something that is very important, and I maintain that one of my responsibilities is to hold the door open for those who are to come.

 

[lpetrich]

AOC urges US to apologize for meddling in Latin America: ‘We’re here to reset relationships’ | Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez | The Guardian - "Democratic congresswoman calls for acknowledgment of past intrusion in effort to restore trust in US leadership in the region"

The Democratic congresswoman from New York was speaking after a visit to Chile in advance of the 50th anniversary of the coup against Salvador Allende, a democratically elected socialist president actively opposed by Washington.

“I believe that we owe Chile, and not just Chile but many aspects of that region, an apology,” Ocasio-Cortez told the Guardian in an interview at her campaign headquarters in the Bronx. “I don’t think that apology indicates weakness; I think it indicates a desire to meet our hemispheric partners with respect.

“It’s very hard for us to move forward when there is this huge elephant in the room and a lack of trust due to that elephant in the room. The first step around that is acknowledgement and saying we want to approach this region in the spirit of mutual respect, and I think that’s new and it’s historic.”

Monroe Doctrine (1823) | National Archives

President James Monroe’s 1823 annual message to Congress contained the Monroe Doctrine, which warned European powers not to interfere in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere.

Thus claiming an exclusive right to meddle in Latin America. And meddle the US did, a century ago sending armies to occupy parts of Latin America, and more recently supporting coups and reigns of terror.

Ocasio-Cortez believes a reckoning is long overdue. She said: “Latin America, I believe, due to its proximity, was absolutely unique in US interventionism during the cold war, and that was under [secretary of state] Henry Kissinger and President Nixon.

“I think a lot of Latin America is still very much grappling in the present day with the consequences of coups that were supported by the United States, with Operation Condor that Henry Kissinger helped largely lead. What we see is the ramifications of decades of those policies and how they shape US-Latin American relations today, I think primarily around trust.”

 Operation Condor

Operation Condor (Spanish: Operación Cóndor, also known as Plan Cóndor; Portuguese: Operação Condor) was a United States-backed campaign of political repression and state terrorism,[10] involving intelligence operations, CIA-backed coups, as well as assassinations of left-wing and socialist leaders in South America from 1968 to 1989.[11][12] Operation Condor was officially and formally implemented in November 1975 by the right-wing dictatorships of the Southern Cone of South America.[13]

Due to its clandestine nature, the precise number of deaths directly attributable to Operation Condor is highly disputed. Some estimates are that at least 60,000 deaths can be attributed to Condor,[8] with up to 30,000 of these in Argentina.[14][15] The Archives of Terror list 50,000 killed, 30,000 disappeared and 400,000 imprisoned.[9][16] Additionally, American political scientist J. Patrice McSherry gives a figure of at least 402 killed in Condor operations which crossed national borders in a 2002 source,[10] and mentions in a 2009 source that of those who "had gone into exile" and were "kidnapped, tortured and killed in allied countries or illegally transferred to their home countries to be executed ... hundreds, or thousands, of such persons—the number still has not been finally determined—were abducted, tortured, and murdered in Condor operations."[17] Victims included dissidents and leftists, union and peasant leaders, priests, monks and nuns, students and teachers, intellectuals, and suspected guerrillas.[10]

 

[lpetrich]

AOC's delegation visited the  Museum of Memory and Human Rights in Chile - Memory and Human Rights Museum - CIPDH - UNESCO

Rep. Ocasio-Cortez calls on US to declassify documents on Chile's 1973 coup | AP News

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said Thursday in Chile that it was imperative for the United States to declassify documents that could shed light on Washington’s involvement in the South American country’s 1973 coup.

“The transparency of the United States could present an opportunity for a new phase in our relationship between the United States and Chile,” Ocasio-Cortez said in Spanish in a video posted on Instagram alongside Camila Vallejo, the spokesperson for the left-leaning government of President Gabriel Boric.

...
“In Chile as well, a similar request was made … that aims to declassify documents from the Nixon administration, particularly certain testimonies from the CIA director. This is to attain a clearer understanding of what transpired and how the United States was involved in the planning of the civil and military coup, and the subsequent years that followed,” Vallejo said. “This is very important for our history.”

Back to The Guardian.

“The first element of it is just acknowledgement,” she said. “We’re not even at the point of an apology because we haven’t even gotten to an acknowledgement, and that’s why I believe the declassification of these documents is going to be so critical to our relationship to Chile, as well as also acknowledging the unified rightwing movements that the US has very much historically been exporting to Latin America. I don’t say that just in a governmental respect. I say that in terms of the rightwing movements that are growing in the United States.”

 

[lpetrich]

Then noting Steve Bannon working with right-wingers all over the world, like Brazil ex-President Jair Bolsonaro's supporters.

“I think we’re seeing something similar happen in Chile, where there is a concerted effort to erase history and a concerted effort to manipulate public perception of what happened in the 11 September 1973 coup against Salvador Allende and for the United States to declassify these documents, in addition to their diplomatic significance, could also be inoculative against those who seek to erase the history of what has happened in this region.”

She seemed to endorse building a left-wing network to counter this right-wing network.

That means finding a way through the messiness of multiparty democracy to prove it can produce results that autocracy cannot. The congresswoman added: “At the end of the day, for democracy to prevail, democracy must deliver, and I believe that’s where progressive politics come in. We must secure material improvements to the lives of working people, from healthcare to the climate crisis.”

 

[lpetrich]

‘There’s a very real danger here’: AOC on 2024, the climate crisis and ‘selling out’ | Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez | The Guardian

The campaign office of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez sits deep in the Bronx, across the street from a Chinese takeaway and 99-cent discount store, near enough to a railway bridge to hear the rumble of passing trains. The front window of the plain redbrick building is dominated by a big, smiling photo of the US congresswoman and notices that say: “We welcome all races, all sexual orientations, all gender identities, all religions, all abilities,” and “We say gay in the Bronx”. Inside, the words “¡AOC! ORGANIZING BASE” are printed in giant purple letters on a wall.

...
It is, Ocasio-Cortez acknowledges, a mixed picture. “What is difficult is that the climate crisis does not really care about the political complexities that we very much have to grapple with in our work,” she says, wearing a blue dress with floral shoulder pattern and sitting on a long wooden seat dotted with black and yellow cushions.

Blumenauer, Ocasio-Cortez, Sanders, Introduce Climate Emergency Resolution | Congressman Earl Blumenauer

Today, Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), and Senator Sanders (I-VT) introduced the Climate Emergency Resolution, which demands that the President wield both existing authorities and emergency powers to unleash every resource available to mitigate and prepare for the climate crisis.

Though President Biden hasn't quite declared a climate emergency,

Even so, the congresswoman says: “I believe he understands the scale of the crisis. I think what we are up against, which perhaps should be discussed more for those of us in the climate movement, is the geopolitics of this.”

She goes on to describe a challenge that is bigger than one man or one nation. “The shift in energy represents a real threat to traditional power globally. As we shift away from non-renewables, we are talking about threatening power among some of the most influential institutions in the United States, in Latin America and globally. That is something that is going to have profound ramifications, all of which I don’t even believe we can fully appreciate yet.

Renewable energy deprives fossil-fuel companies of income, reducing their influence. Oil companies could half-survive in a renewable-energy world by making synthetic fuels and synthetic chemical feedstocks, but there's not much future for coal companies.

“I think that is what drives an enormous amount of blowback and resistance. When you look at, for example, the influence of the Koch brothers in US democracy, they basically have historically purchased enormous amounts of influence over the United States Senate. They are oil barons. These are fossil fuel companies that have exerted huge amounts of influence both in US democracy and in global interests.”

AOC has said elsewhere that she hopes that these oil barons don't become replaced by solar barons.

Although she's right to be concerned about that, I suspect that that will be more difficult with renewable energy than with fossil fuels. That's because renewable-energy extraction and distribution is much less centralized and much more localized than fossil-fuel extraction and distribution.

 

[lpetrich]

Then the issue of Ukraine. Supporters of it end up supporting the US military-industrial complex.

Ocasio-Cortez articulates the uneasy accommodation: “It’s a legitimate conversation. I think on one hand, it is important for us to underscore what a dramatic threat to global order Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is and continues to be. We must defend democracy. We cannot allow this reversion into almost a late 19th-century imperial invasion order – it is so incredibly destabilising and dangerous. We must fight against that precedent. We must protect the democracy of Ukraine and the sovereignty of Ukraine 100%.

A lot of online left-wingers say that she's some horrible imperialist for taking that position.

“I think it’s also relevant to acknowledge that this is happening on the heels of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and how many of us were raised growing up saying this was going to be temporary, and it became a forever war. I believe that acknowledging the anxieties of our history of that is relevant.

That's a reasonable point.

 

[No Robots]

The unsung hero behind Donald Trump’s crushing fraud case: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez​

 

[lpetrich]

Back in 2020, AOC stated that she and Joe Biden would be in different political parties in most other countries. But for 2024, she has endorsed Joe Biden. Why the change?

“I think it means that we have a US political system that’s not parliamentary, to my envy of many other countries,” she replies deftly. “There were so many people that were so up in arms about that comment, which I likely maintain to this day. But I find that parliamentary systems allow for a larger degree of honesty about the political coalitions that we must make. It’s not anything negative towards the president or towards anybody else.

It's great that she's willing to go public about that. It's hard to find a US political reformer who appreciates parliamentary systems, let alone a US politician.

“It’s just a reality that we have very different political coalitions that constitute the Democratic party and being able to define that, I actually think grants us much power. It’s to say, listen, I am not defined by nor do I agree with all of the stances of this president, and I’m sure neither does he with mine.

“But that does not mean that we are not in this together against the greater forces and questions of our time, and I think being able to demonstrate that ability to coalesce puts us in a position of far greater strength than, say, the Republican party who are at each other’s necks to the extent that they can’t even fund the government.”

In effect, supporting Joe Biden as the lesser of the two major evils, though she would say about him that he's good but not as good as he could be.

She likes to talk about structural features of systems, but I've never seen her mention Duverger's law, a clear example of that.

 

[lpetrich]

Here is what I'd consider far left: World Socialist Web Site - Marxist analysis, international working class struggles & the fight for socialism
Along with some fairly sensible articles on the Trump trial and the ouster of Kevin McCarthy as US House Speaker, it has this: The UAW bureaucracy's fraudulent "Stand-up" strike will end in a sell-out of auto workers Fraudulent? I can understand their saying that the UAW's strategy is doomed to failure, but calling it a fraud?

From About the WSWS

The WSWS is the online publication of the world Trotskyist movement, the International Committee of the Fourth International, and its affiliated sections in the Socialist Equality Parties around the world.

AOC brags about her transformation into a loyal agent of US imperialism - World Socialist Web Site

The interview, titled “The Evolution of AOC,” was conducted to give Ocasio-Cortez a platform to defend herself from what she called a growing “suspicion” among workers and young people that she is nothing but a standard Democratic Party politician.

Her weak attempts to justify her right-wing role in Congress only confirmed those suspicions are correct.

Right-wing???

It is becoming increasingly obvious that Ocasio-Cortez’s role in Congress has not been to translate left-wing opposition into “internal change,” it has been to suffocate “outside energy” and “translate” it into support for the Democratic Party and facilitate its right-wing policies.

Then grumbling about her supporting Joe Biden for re-election to the Presidency.

The Times asked Ocasio-Cortez why the congresswoman believes “those on the left” continue to “accuse you of compromising on your progressive ideals as you work within the party system?”

She said left-wing criticisms are “because we haven’t really had a political presence like this in the United States before” and her critics are “bewildered” by the prospect of being in power. “I think over time there’s been an inherent association between power, ascent and quote-unquote selling out,” she said, referencing a belief “that there’s no way in this country you can accrue any kind of power without there being some Faustian compromise.”

In effect, if you get power, that means that you are a sellout. Some people do sell out, it must be conceded, like Barack Obama and Kyrsten Sinema.

 

[No Robots]

^Yeah, the Trots are horrible. Driving them out of the NDP in Canada was a pleasure.

The Left is generally willing to fight its own extreme fringe elements. This gives the Left a huge advantage over the long term.

 

[Toni]

She wore a white pantsuit when she met President Boric of Chile.
She and Colombia Vice President Francia Márquez both wore floral-print dresses, something that she found a pleasant surprise.

Who the fuck cares. What did Borić wear?

There are many times that I absolutely envy my male colleagues who can wear the same outfit or two all week and no one notices or cares. They can just focus. Picking clothing all the time can be tiring and it takes a lot more energy, money, and time from women especially when you consider the hair and makeup required to be perceived just as well-groomed as a man who splashed some water on his face.

Who cares that a woman wears a few outfits all the time in a professional setting? Show me people that care.

But men are also judged if they venture outside a pretty repressive box of navy suits.

Are they really? I can see some snickering if they come dressed as Saul Goodman or the Pimp Named Slickback, but the business suit palette is broader than just navy blue. Ever hear of charcoal?

That's why Tressie McMillian Cottom thinks it legitimate to discuss what Kyrsten Sinema wears -- KS isn't very talkative about herself and what she wants to do.

I do not see what the one has to do with the other.

Thank you, Derec! It is refreshing to read a man posting about the sexist focus on how a woman dresses vs what she says/does.

I will say that when well known women wear a particular type of clothing or from a particular designer, that does tend to boost the sales/popularity of that or similar items or designers. Michelle Obama often wore American designers.

 

[lpetrich]

he did not, as she claims in the interview, “come from a background of direct action and activism,” and she had no political principles to betray. She was an intern in the foreign affairs office of Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy and sought a career in Democratic Party politics. She was picked up by the Democratic Party group Brand New Congress in 2017 as a candidate and joined DSA only after she was vetted, in order to boost her “left” bona fides. Her “evolution” was from an aspiring Democratic politician to an actual one.

She didn't aspire to become some Clintonite corporate Democrat. She interned for Teddy Kennedy when in college, and she was out of politics for some years before she started doing activism in 2015, campaigning for Bernie Sanders. Brand New Congress was far from a mainstream Democratic group. It was founded by some Bernie Sanders campaigners who likely thought of founding an additional party, but instead decided to found a PAC that would act as a party within the two major parties, using the existing political landscape to their advantage. As she was returning from the Standing Rock protest camp, BNC contacted her about running for office, and she accepted.

Ocasio-Cortez is significant more as a political and social type than as an individual. She epitomizes the present-day pseudo-left, comprised largely of careerists who evince a total lack of principles and historical knowledge, let alone any connection with the class struggle or genuine socialist politics. They easily and readily become the objects of manipulation for the ruling class.

Then dismissing the Democratic Socialists of America as a faction of the Democratic Party.

During her tenure in Congress, Ocasio-Cortez, along with other DSA members, voted to illegalize a strike by 100,000 railroad workers last December and force through a contract the workers had rejected. She cast a vote to provide $40 billion in weapons to far-right forces in Ukraine and endorsed the US/NATO war against Russia, which threatens a nuclear holocaust. She refused to vote against providing $1 billion to arm the Israeli military’s suppression of the rights of the people of Palestine.

AOC has talked about that would-be RR strike, and it seems to have been an awkward issue for her.

As to the Russia-Ukraine war, which side is the WSWS on?

The most significant statement made in the interview was Ocasio-Cortez’s disavowal of any opposition to American imperialism. “I wouldn’t necessarily characterize my foreign policy goals as oppositional to the president’s or to the United States,” she said. “I am a member of Congress. I have sworn an oath to this country, and I take that oath very seriously.”

Which the WSWS interprets as support for US imperialism.

She argued that past military interventions, coups and dictatorships have “created a trust problem among our neighbors in the Western Hemisphere.” This is how the CIA might describe the consequences of the mass suffering and death created by the crimes of US imperialism in Central and South America. It’s all just a “trust problem,” rather than the irreconcilable conflict between the financial interests of US corporations and the basic needs of the Latin American masses.

...
Ocasio-Cortez combines support for Biden’s foreign policy with refusals to criticize his reactionary domestic agenda. When the Times asked her why she had ceased calling attention to the Biden administration’s immigration policies, even though his administration has retained Trump’s restrictions on entry and asylum, Ocasio-Cortez responded with her signature blend of pseudo-academic nonsense and political pabulum:

“This is one area where our policy is dictated by politics, arguably more so than almost any other,” she opined. “There are very clear recommendations and suggestions that we have made to the administration to provide relief on this issue, and it’s my belief that some of the hesitation around this has to do with a fear around just being seen as approving or providing permission structures…”

Then saying about the DSA,

The DSA’s political role is to (1) corral social opposition behind the Democratic Party; (2) block the development of an independent revolutionary movement; and (3) provide the pro-capitalist, imperialist Democratic Party with a “left” veneer to better carry out its policies.

What a conspiracy theory.

 

[lpetrich]

^Yeah, the Trots are horrible. Driving them out of the NDP in Canada was a pleasure.

Trotskyites? What were they like?