Last winter we explored the question “Why is conservative media obsessed with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez?”. For the naysayers in that now-closed thread, we now have proof that the folks at Fox are obsessed with her: Study: Fox News is obsessed with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez:
The notion that it’s all about ratings doesn’t hold water for me, tho it’s not surprising they’d lie about their motivations here: they lie about everything.
Yes, quite obviously.
Republicans are afraid of her, and with good reason. Did anyone see her brief questioning of Michael Cohen, where within a few questions she opened the door to a Congressional look at Trump’s taxes and finances? Or her rebuttal of the idea that environmental concern is an “elitist” concern?
They’re obsessed because she fits their caricature notion of a liberal: Millennial, a woman, minority, young, supports socialism, etc. The only thing missing, in their minds, is that she’s not lesbian or a Muslim and hasn’t openly embraced “death to America” or something.
They regard her the same way liberals would regard a Republican politician who was a white man, KKK Klansman, rich, called for women to be barefoot and in the kitchen, identified as fundamentalist evangelical, and got a lot of money from the Koch Brothers.
Which of “Millenial”, “woman”, “minority”, “young”, or “supports socialism” is comparable to a Klansman, again? Which of those terms implies bigotry like keeping women in the kitchen? Which one advocates a theocracy?
Considering how many other young liberals in Congress have those same or similar characteristics, with much less obsession from conservative media, I seriously doubt that’s the reason why. I suspect that it has something to do with her communication/media skills and charisma, at least partially.
My point is, she fits the preconceived notion the same way such a GOP politician would fit a liberal preconceived notion. If you asked a conservative to draw up a preconceived notion of a Democratic villain, it would probably look something like AOC.
Not clueless ivory tower white professors? Not shiftless, lazy, unemployed welfare-takers? Not Hollywood weirdos? You really think the “preconceived notion of a Democratic villain” is a young, attractive, minority, middle class political outsider with media skills?
EDIT: Now that I read that again, AOC might be utterly terrifying to GOP leaders.
I agree with all that, but I think its also the fact that shes pretty. A lot of 60 year old white men want to fuck her and they know she finds them disgusting both physically and morally.
But also her parents are puerto rican, so shes an immigrant as well as a minority.
But I think another big thing (which you mention with her being young) is that a lot of conservatives know deep down inside that she will still be here in 20 years and they will not. The median age of a fox news viewer is almost 70, while AOC is 29. Deep down inside conservatives know in 20 years many of them will be dead and AOC won’t even be 50 yet. She represents the fox news generation sliding into irrelevancy while the next generation take over and change America into something they don’t like (a multicultural, multiracial, feminist nation with center left politics).
Plus shes unapologetic in her liberalism. She doesn’t give up before the fight starts or beg for consensus. She just puts forth her ideas.
She’s a squeaky wheel. They wouldn’t pay nearly as much attention if she came in to learn quietly for the most part and lay off freelancing on social media.
I see the phenomenon as comparable to the attention Sarah Palin got 10+ years ago, where they can’t lay off pointing out (what they feel is) all the insipid bullcrap that comes out of her mouth. In spite of the obvious asymmetry in the difference in power and overall makeup of parties when reversed, it’s the same kind of irresistible bait.
A lot of you are overthinking this. They aren’t scared of her. They mostly really do, rightly or wrongly, think she is and will go down in history as a laughingstock.
Maybe. We’ll see. If she’s a young and highly skilled liberal politician, then they should be afraid of her. I think she might well be, but we won’t know for sure without more time.
There’s no way in hell that right wing media would pay her so much attention if they weren’t afraid of her. If they thought she was a laughingstock they would ignore her and let her do herself in. They’re focused on her like an enemy.
Im willing to entertain this as a possibility. However, I’d like it if you (or someone) could clarify what exactly it is in AOC that the right is scared of? I’ve always had the impression that the right wing media constantly covers AOC because they desperately want her to be the face of the Democratic Party and not just that of the progressive extreme.
I would guess because she might be a very highly skilled communicator, especially at such a young age and with so little experience. If she’s as skilled as I think she might be, then after 10 or 20 years of experience, she could be as formidable a liberal communicator as Bill Clinton or Barack Obama. Politicians as skilled as that become president, as a rule, barring extremely damaging scandals.
I don’t think we’re talking about a rational, deliberate thing here, even by Fox News standards for such terms. She’s simply gotten inside their heads, end of story.
They should be afraid of her, though. Because she doesn’t spend her afternoons phoning rich people to ask for campaign contributions*, she has time to prep for and show up at committee hearings, and she’s asking good questions of witnesses without any showboating.
*This is really a twofer problem for Dem Congresscritters. First, they spend a few hours a day, every day, talking with rich people who they need money from - so they have to spend a lot of time listening to rich people and absorbing their needs and wants. If you’re a GOP pol, this just puts you more firmly into the camp you were already in; if you’re a Dem, it makes you less of a Dem.
And second, it just plain gets in the way of their doing the job we elected them to do.
Shes a first term democrat with no seniority. Why would they care so much?
They may be miscalculating the makeup of eligible voters in the country today but they care about her because they believe the vast majority of voters-including democrats-are more to the center than AOC and will be turned off from voting Democratic in upcoming elections because Democrats are too extreme.
They all need mirrors for Christmas.
They use her to paint the party, especially the future of the party as out of ideas except for her loony ones, and there are also culture war issues she is not shy about entering that make for great ratings. And there is undeniably some truth that highlighting her is focusing on a locus where rifts and tension within the party can be found, which their media will then accentuate.