She ain't an imperialist, donno what to tell you all.
https://twitter.com/GuillaumeLong/status/1329836004287639554
"Individual actors don't matter, systemic material conditions determine what may happen. Anyway, here's a single bad take from a Twitch streamer some people like, which proves that the (tankies|anarkiddies) are once and for all cancelled..."
Individual actors don’t matter, systemic material conditions determine what may happen.
This sounds straight out of a PragerU video lol
The fact that she's still a Dem detracts from/cancels out her good qualities as an individual politician. She implicitly promotes Dem entryism and tailing the neoliberal Dems by staying in the Democratic Party, which is a capitalist party "through and through", to paraphrase Pelosi. There's an actual systemic materialist basis for criticizing AOC and by extension the rest of the Squad and DSA Dems; any individual instance of AOC falling short is a symptom of this broader problem.
Don't make me tap the sign
spoiler
Almost everything has aspects that are good and aspects that are bad, arguing over whether something is "good" or "bad" in its entirety is both meaningless and impossible to ever resolve
Just subdivide every issue into more and more granular sub-issues, and make an absolute pronouncement for each one. No nuance necessary.
like Bernie she's still mostly a lib but she's one of the best libs
I see her as a social democrat who has successfully stolen the Obama "hopium" torch from being passed down to a neoliberal like Mayor Pete. I think it will open up the possibility of social democratic compromise in the future, once people start to see that it's the only remaining way to preserve capital.
As somebody who worked with her election campaigns here in queens I feel exactly the same way. She’s not perfect but way fucking better than that rat. I have a feeling they’ll be running in the primaries against each other in 8 years
Yeah, she's not perfect, but I think she's playing an important role by forcing conversation on things like the Green New Deal. That kind of stuff is needed to help break the spell of capitalist realism.
Congrats on the successful campaign!
That photo op was a clear ambush. I'm not surprised that people fell for it tho as you can just make things up about certain people and everyone will fall for it.
Idk what you're talking about, surely the (allegedly) CIA linked coup supporters wouldn't stage a photo op with a popular outspoken opponent of the coup... they couldn't possibly have known that her base would be divided on the op.
That's kind of wacky :crazy-frog-trans:
I just realized, we really have to be prepared to accidentally talk to weird CIA people because they are going to be talking to us and like you said, try and divide us.
There definitely are folks online, and in a more limited fashion in person, which seek to sabotage leftists groups/movements.
Look at the ops they did back in the 50-70s under COINTELPRO, infiltrating groups and starting rumors about prominent members, intimidating and blackmailing, proposing actions that would harm groups public image in order to stifle membership.
I mean if you read them, you can tell they're still using the same tactics today.
People definitely need to do a better job of mitigating this, I think.
Problem is everyone believes the group they disagree with are COINTEPRO.
A lot of points here is why I think bigger left-ish groups like the DSA need to move towards greater centralism.
Let the local chapters come up with programs for local issues, but anything national comes down from a national committee. I realize this is basically how it works today, but the delegates are based on chapter membership (1 for every 4-5 members/chapter), not something like 1-2 delegates per chapter.
A big chapter can be infiltrated and have outsized influence on the results of the convention.
It's way too easy for people to just come up with random resolutions and ideas that may already have an outlet for action and just jam up the whole process. This kind of happened at DSA2019 NC
I am fairly convinced I saw this in action during the Occupy movement.. I 95% sure the cops were paying homeless people to do most of the things on your list. It sucks because they're homeless and nobody really pushed back.. but it was every day and fairly obvious.
The DSA needs centralism, but with its current member/leadership, greater centralism will make them turn into yet another weak "progressive" group like MoveOn.org or something
Now I'm sincerely concerned about being called a fed for being wordy even though thats just because of my autism.
The problem is that there's also a lot of prominent "Leftists" who might not be in the CIA, but are also very much not down for the cause. I'm sorry, but anyone who has mingled in elite circles needs to be treated with suspicion as a matter of fact. It's piss-easy to infiltrate the Left as some sort of non-profit career ghoul by consuming the right media and parroting some memes.
During the latest BLM protests multiple different people in my city alone (all of whom were somewhat respected young black folks themselves) were paid by the city to redirect protestors away from the core area and stop them from fucking with a police precinct. This shit is proven not remote speculation as documents have been leaked.
This was being done by local departments, not anything higher level than that. "Counter insurgency" as it relates to left wing infiltration happens not just from the government but also from private organizations themselves.
The point is, if it remotely looks like an op, it's better to just assume that it is one, because those folks are at best just useful idiots being manipulated by an actual operation.
as documents have been leaked
link?
my city
link if you can do it without doxxing yourself.
If AOC hadn't frequently said she "deferred to the [Democratic] Party line" on foreign policy issues, I would not have believed the photo op.
I'm glad she learned about the conditions in Bolivia, and decided to stand with the Bolivian people. That does not absolve the fact that her first instincts are to parrot the Democratic Party line on international issues.
She is a political opportunist who will fall in line with her imperialist party in order to further her political aims. I generally support her political aims, but I can also recognize her opportunism and criticize her.
The Democratic Party did not whip opposition to Bolivia. The most reactionary line in the Democratic Party on Bolivia was "investigate the voter fraud and hold new elections."
Supporting Bolivia did not impede AOC's social democratic aims. If the Democratic Party whipped their rank-and-file to the degree they did with Libya or Syria, I'm confident AOC would have had a different line.
If AOC hadn’t frequently said she “deferred to the [Democratic] Party line” on foreign policy issues, I would not have believed the photo op.
She said that one time, that I know of, regarding Venezuela 8 weeks into her first term. She's since spoken out against rightwing coups in SA and taken actual legislative action to prevent the US from directly arming people in Bolivia.
Its ok to critique her and other "good libs", but at some point you have to put some of these things into a little more context. Maduro didn't need her to do anything - he has Venezuela locked up.. he's like the next Castro almost in terms of his resilience. She lent her support where it was needed.
Last edit: Having said all that - rather than make hypothetical up... continue to critique AOC when she actually does things that are bad as they happen. Like with Ilhan Omar and the Armenian Genocide thing, wtf was that? She got roasted and apologized. Do it in the moment and it's good...
Maduro does not have it "locked up"
I went to a meeting the Venezuelan ambassador organised last year where they explained they were calculating the deaths the US siege has cost Venezuela and placed it 80,000 deaths and their citizens were losing weight as staple goods were becoming harder to distribute
They repeated the same on Telesur
Her answer on that was shit and everyone knows it. Ilhan Omar outright unequivocally denounced Guaido having any such legitimacy. aoc could have just done the same. I think it just needs to be said that anti imperialism is not just not doing imperialism, it involves actively countering imperialism.
Maduro didn’t need her to do anything - he has Venezuela locked up
He needs help ending the US siege on Venezuela!
The government AOC works for has prevented necessities from entering the country, sanctioned companies which work with Venezuela, and pressured international bank to freeze assets owned by the Venezuelan government.
She said that one time, that I know of, regarding Venezuela 8 weeks into her first term.
And what has she said on Venezuela since?
Last time I heard her comment on Venezuela, it was to clarify her idea of "socialism" was more like Finland & Sweden, and completely different from Venezuela.
It is politically convenient for her to enable imperialism against Venezuela because the Democratic Party is invested in that imperialist endeavor. If she attempted to correct the record on the situation in Venezuela, she would face tremendous backlash from her superiors and the Liberal media. Backlash she did not face for supporting Bolivia.
And she appears to still support the coup against Venezuela.
I was a leader in advocating for Venezuelan freedom
Jesus Christ. It's good that she materially opposed the coup in Bolivia, but if she could do literally anything about Venezuela, that would be great. Or, for that matter, Nicaragua, Iran, Syria, or the DPRK. Like, literally anything.
It seems like her support is contingent on whether or not the general public has been convinced that a country is "authoritarian".
she rt’d some shitlib thread about the dems failures with latinos going beyond rejection of m4a/gnd where the author happens to be a gusano. not ideal but a super fucking long way from “she supports the coup in venezuela”. get serious
She said that one time, that I know of, regarding Venezuela 8 weeks into her first term.
And it was a non-answer to an obvious trap question from the fucking National Review.
If we're materialists here, why are we getting upset every time someone doesn't snap at right-wing bait? Why are we dissecting every statement someone makes in the first place? Words don't matter anywhere near as much as actions do. Why care about some answer AOC gave two years ago when she's helping keep U.S. weapons out of the hands of a coup government?
Max Blumenthal does not work for the fucking National Review my god...
You do highlight the fact that her statements on Venezuela are not a one-time thing. It's an ongoing line she has parroted since 2018.
Words don’t matter anywhere near as much as actions do. Why cares about some answer AOC gave two years ago when she’s helping keep U.S. weapons out of the hands of a coup government?
Choosing not to act is an action.
Her actions and words shows that she supports the US siege of Venezuela. Her actions in solidarity with Bolivia is evidence that she has some power to influence the conditions in these countries. This is all the more reason to criticize her line on Venezuela.
Ocasio Cortez, sometimes referred to as AOC, was asked in an interview with the National Review if she sees President Maduro as legitimate, for which she replied, "I defer to caucus leadership on how we navigate this."
https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/AOC-Refuses-To-Condemn-Venezuela-Coup-20190504-0029.html
Criticizing her over some unspecified hypothetical action she could have taken is weak sauce, especially when she has some concrete good action on her record.
Yes, you are quoting one of the several times she said exactly that.
Criticizing her over some unspecified hypothetical action she could have taken is weak sauce, especially when she has some concrete good action on her record.
It is fair to criticize a representative of a government who is carrying out a starvation campaign against a socialist country, especially if they refuse to comment nor take action.
I don't understand the brain worms it takes to reach a different conclusion.
If you're going to keep saying she's said this repeatedly, let's see some links.
especially if they refuse to comment nor take action
Can she unilaterally change U.S. policy towards Venezuela? No? Then it becomes a question of what she's actually able to do. So what is she actually able to do -- that would have any real effect -- that she isn't doing? Is she failing to do anything that wouldn't just immediately be shot down?
Link to interview with Blumenthal? IIRC a lot of people lost their shit over the bait question meant to alienate her from the braindead american populace before she could gain any influence...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BrapYLtkBhY
the bait question meant to alienate her from the braindead american populace before she could gain any influence
"The US must end the economic siege and illegal coup of Venezuela" can be said in response to any "bait question" about Venezuela. Her line of Venezuela is politicking within the Democratic Party.
Ok so that video was clearly him just seeing her as she was about to enter a meeting and he caught her at the door.
If you're so pissed that nobody is taking those hard stances why don't you run for something?
AOC is uncancelled!
I said a few months ago that foreign policy isn't her number one issue, so we should be patient before judging too harshly. She seems to be getting better. Nice!
The fact she responded to that Rabin thing by canceling her appearance there shows she can listen.
we should be patient before judging too harshly
A great guideline for anyone who will at least seriously criticize capitalism. We're not getting anything done without millions of more leftists, and we're not going to grow any type of leftist movement if we shit on anyone in our orbit at the drop of a hat.
Yup and it's why the only relevant criticism of AOC is that she spends an excessive amount of time talking about herself rather than engaging in raw populism like Bernie did which was just talking about issues and being anti billionaire.
The primary focus at this point for the socialist cause in the US is to make as many people as possible open to further radicalization, and that's best done with a very rigid policy focused line over personalities.
did you just call the Democratic Party of the US a "socialist organization"? that's top-tier lib cringe
The only time she ever used the word "bourgeois" was to attack socialists for reading
Shes a lib, easily one the best libs in North America and Europe
But dont piss in my face and tell me its raining
And y'all motherfuckers claiming the Bolivan flag shit was an op when an antiwar activist whos been active since iraq war says the below
We were not contacted. For weeks. After pressing the issue, always taking care to remain courteous and respectful of process, we were subjected to a galling and contemptuous bureaucratic runaround that sometimes felt like applying to – and being rejected by – an exclusive private school.
This three-month process involved repeated visits to her office, where our reception ranged from chilly to downright intimidating, endless emails and telephone calls, bureaucratic excuses and dissimulations, and eventually, after much persistence on our part, a half-hour vetting via conference call by a Washington staffer.
The result? As we say in Queens, bubkes.
By contrast, a group of imperialist sympathizers who had been promoting the coup for months were granted instant access. On November 16, four days after the military coup that destroyed Bolivian democracy, Ocasio-Cortez met with a group of pro-Áñez, pro-Camacho activists led by one Ana Carola Traverso. Traverso’s connections to the Bolivian coup plotters have been extensively documented online.
In sum, a gang of coup supporters, not constituents, were granted instant access, a photo op and promises of ongoing support. Actual constituents, opposing the coup, were shown the door.
Our reception by Rep. Ocasio-Cortez was radically different from that I received from her predecessor, Joe Crowley. When, in 2004, I requested a meeting on behalf of the Queens Antiwar Coalition, we were granted prompt and respectful access to the Congressman. We did not have high hopes of changing his vote on the Iraq, but we felt it was important that he hear from his constituents.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/02/14/ocasio-cortez-to-constituents-on-bolivian-coup-drop-dead/
Socialism is when you have zero socialist policies, enter a capitalist party then fail to get healthcare for the parasitic labour aristocracy in the imperialist heartland whilst providing cover for radlibs to vote for a war criminal monster rapist
Its when you grift radlibs into voting for a capitalist political party with a war criminal rapist that imprisoned a generation of blacks
And the more votes you can get of radlibs to vote for a capitalist party, the more socialister it is
Sorry comrade im not very well read in theory so ill just check Aocs twitter for latest development in revolutionary theory
https://mobile.twitter.com/AOC/status/1127270688925134849
Socialism is when you tax the rich
Also from that article:
We were greeted warmly in [Crowley's] rather funky local office – a striking contrast with AOC’s soulless corporate-style digs, where underlings refer to her as “the Boss” – and were encouraged to speak our piece. Crowley never pretended to be an opponent of US imperialism, but he gave us a respectful hearing, stated his position, and engaged in what felt like meaningful discussion of the war. At a minimum, as Twitter’s bluecheck pundits would say, we felt “seen.”
They're saying that they prefer an openly-imperialist politician who's friendly over a less-friendly politician who made some material progress towards keeping U.S. weapons away from the coup government. That's poor judgment to say the least.
None of this shit -- not her statements, not her office decoration, not her photo ops -- matters half as much as what she actually does.
AOC also supports US imperialism
https://www.leftvoice.org/aoc-lines-up-with-pelosi-bolton-and-trump-in-support-of-coup-attempt-in-venezuela
I defer to caucus leadership on how we navigate this.” That was how Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, U.S. Representative for New York’s 14th congressional district, responded to a question by the National Review about how she views the US-orchestrated coup attempt in Venezuela.
Zero substantive support, then. It's a non-answer to a bait question; she's not even on a foreign relations committee.
Exactly....like meeting with fash and having a photo op during a coup
Glad you see my point
Caring more about a photo op than a bill to keep weapons away from a coup government is pretty :LIB:
See, AOC is what I used to think the dems were when I was a dumb lib. A progressive centrist that isn't a total chud. She's basically American Jacinda Ardern. If all the dems were like that then I actually wouldn't mind dems so much. The problem is these people are a minority in a party that is largely ex-republicans and republican sympathisers that want them corporate donations.
She's a lot better than Jacinda Ardern, who is really just a massive fraud.
It is really sad that AOC and Bernie sanders are two of the only people that constitute public governmental representation of the American "left." Half the left barely even like these people and we constantly argue over them. The right wing will throw the full weight of their support behind every QAnon maniac, bible thumper, or Ayn Rand disciple that can tie their shoes.
It fucking sucks
I hate when conservatives talk about how media or whatever is “dominated by the left” when it’s like 99% capitalist media and the 1% is barely recognized
It’s so annoying that we got no parties either, Green Party is barely leftist and barely impactful and PSL is growing quickly but is non viable right now
America fucking sucks.
Let's see how she does when the Biden administration wants to destroy Venezuela, especially if he offers her some domestic legislation as an incentive.
Am I the only one who is unimpressed by this? It's a nice symbolic gesture but really shows the limits of socdem electoralism.
You can still fund the fascists but you have to pretend they'll only use it for democracy.
I don't think this appropriations bill has passed anyway.
It shows the limits of having only a handful of decent members of congress.
They did, though. They went from "straight up imperialism" -- occupying and directly ruling parts of the Global South -- to the financial neocolonialism we see today. It's still awful, but by any reasonable measure it's a reduction in imperialism.
Plus, all of those countries were reliant on the arch anticommunist United States. How much did we Gladio their leftist movements, and how much did we leverage them into our imperial projects? A social democratic government in 2025 America won't necessarily look like a social democratic government in 1965 Britain.
European Social Democrats ended imperialism is peak white savior lol
National liberation movements crushed imperialism in their respective nations. The imperialists bribed the comprador bourgeoisie of these nations to maintain economic control after the national movement. The neocolonial governments then de-mobilized the masses with symbols of nationalism.
Your congressional gf ain't ending imperialism sorry
European Social Democrats ended imperialism
Oh good thing I didn't say that, then
Like all these socdem governments on Britain ,Germany, France and Europe in general in the last half a century that reduced their straight up imperialism ,anti communism or even participation in it when they got into power and had straight up majorities
They did, though
Yes, if only we would slap more symbolic gestures onto the side of American imperialism
You can't pass a whole lot with 4 decent people in the House. Assuming we'd be in the exact same spot with a meaningful caucus of decent people is unrealistically pessimistic.
