'It is bizarre to watch AOC be accused of being a fake class warrior in the midst of a live class war in Washington with trillions of dollars at stake.' jonathanchait writes
Photo: Erik Pendzich/Shutterstock Monday night, after Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez appeared at the Met Gala wearing a dress emblazoned with the slogan “Tax the Rich,” her critics exploded in indignation. The complaint assailed AOC’s “fraud,” “hypocrisy,” and peddling “empty political slogans.”
But of course AOC is not, and does not claim to be, an “actual revolutionary.” She is an advocate of dramatically more egalitarian economic policy, but not an advocate of executing the rich. Her agenda is not based on a moral critique of the rich, but a rather banal observation that rich people can stand to have less money in order to finance social needs for those in greater need.
AOC’s glamorous evening hobnobbing with the rich is orders of magnitude less consequential than her intention to tax their fortunes. What’s truly shallow is the fixation with symbolism and cultural association rather than the concrete fiscal transfer taking shape right now. It is bizarre to watch AOC be accused of being a fake class warrior in the midst of a live class war in Washington with trillions of dollars at stake.
One result of this trend is that Democrats have increased their cultural power. The dominant position progressive ideas have held in academia for decades has spread to entertainment, media, and even many businesses. Conservatives are not just working the refs when they claim to feel marginalized. Holding right-wing beliefs while living in a place like New York, Washington, or Los Angeles has become a genuinely alienating experience.
It surely isn’t Met Gala attendees who will make use of expanded Medicaid in red states or free community college. The people dismissing programs like that as undesirable or unaffordable are the conservatives who posture as tribunes of the working people. For all Donald Trump’s déclassé behavior and political appeal to non-college-educated voters, neither his administration nor his political allies ever challenged the party’s plutocratic cast. His administration’s signature domestic policy revolved around a giant tax cut for the wealthy and business owners, and a failed effort to throw middle-class people off their health insurance to finance another tax cut for the wealthy.
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