The tale of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s dance moves is as stupid as stupid gets.
Contra the most recent fake news narrative, conservatives could hardly care about a video going viral of a younger Ocasio-Cortez happily dancing and having fun. Some of us, in fact, find it adorable.
The saga began when an anonymous, unverified Twitter user by the name of “AnonymousQ1776” posted a clip of the New York Democrat dancing online. The user claimed the video of Ocasio-Cortez romping around on a rooftop was from high school. (It’s actually from 2010, when she was a student at Boston College.)
That tweet—and the user’s account—were quickly deactivated or deleted. Why? Probably because the user realized his or her attempt at trolling the freshman congresswoman was dumb. We all like dancing and having fun.
But that didn’t stop the media and Ocasio-Cortez herself from capitalizing on the moment to pretend it was some sort of coordinated attempt by Republicans to demean her.
“Attempt to smear Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with college dancing video backfires,” wrote CNN.
“’I love this’: bid to discredit Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with college dance video backfires,” wrote The Guardian.
“It is unsurprising to me that Republicans would think having fun should be disqualifying or illegal,” said Ocasio-Cortez.
Later, she tweeted a new video of her dancing into her congressional office. “I hear the GOP thinks women dancing are scandalous,” she wrote. “Wait till they find out Congresswomen dance too!”
https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1081234130841600000
Of course, the media picked up on that, too, furthering the narrative that conservatives actually care about Ocasio-Cortez’s college mashup. Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., got in on the fun, too.
Just to go on record. I’m for *more* dancing in politics not less. pic.twitter.com/aCu9xofwM0
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) January 4, 2019
All this hype, based on a single, anonymous tweet from a user who, for all we know, could have been an Ocasio-Cortez staffer or a liberal supporter.
In the world of real news, conservatives—including myself—didn’t see anything “scandalous” about Ocasio-Cortez’s dance moves at all. If anything, we were a little jealous.
Rather, what we find “scandalous” are the radical, socialist policies the freshman congresswoman supports.
These ideas include Medicare for All, tuition-free college, gun control, and the Green New Deal. The latter, a truly radical attempt to fight climate change by eliminating nearly all fossil fuels from the electric grid within 12 years, would create “widespread economic chaos.”
In December, Ocasio-Cortez called the New Green Deal “the civil rights movement of our generation.” In order to pay it, she floated a federal income tax rate as high as 70 percent in a forthcoming “60 Minutes” interview scheduled to air this weekend. According to Americans for Tax Reform, that means combined with city and state taxes, New Yorkers could pay a tax rate as high as 82.7 percent.
“What is the problem with trying to push our technological capacities to the furthest extent possible?” Ocasio-Cortez asked in the “60 Minutes” interview. “There’s an element where yeah, people are going to have to start paying their fair share in taxes.”
We already know that taxing the rich doesn’t increase revenue in any meaningful way. And coming off another strong jobs report, it’s clear the economy needs the opposite.
So no, it’s not Ocasio-Cortez’s dance moves that conservatives are concerned about—it’s the scandalous, socialist policies that she supports.