A new breed of Democrats is giving fans an all-access backstage pass to the political sausage-making. Is this transparency, or TMI?
ON HER FIRST morning in Washington, DC, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the 29-year-old democratic socialist from the Bronx, was doing a much needed load of whites. “The thing that most people don’t tell you about running for Congress,” she told me, looking mock-furtively over her shoulder to indicate the secretive, insider nature of what she was about to say, “is that your clothes are stinky all the time.”
With that, Ocasio-Cortez, who knocked off then-House Democratic Caucus Chairman Joe Crowley in last June’s primary and was elected without much difficulty in November, shut the washing-machine door, pushed her quarters into the slot, and bid me farewell. In a few hours, she’d leave for her first day of orientation for members of the 116th Congress, a three-week crash course in civics (and the usual HR paperwork) she called “Congress camp.”
I didn’t say goodbye, because I wasn’t there; I just follow Ocasio-Cortez on Instagram. Since her stunning upset last summer, she has been a proudly disruptive force in Democratic politics. Before she’d even taken her seat, she joined climate activists in a protest inside Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s office and made noises about backing primary challenges against some of her new Democratic colleagues.
But how she’s doing this is almost as radical— in 15-second snippets and live-streamed confessionals, all crafted for an audience that couldn’t care less about Meet the Press. On her Instagram feed, Ocasio-Cortez pulls back the curtain on Washington in ways big and small, fielding questions while prepping mac and cheese in her Instant Pot or pausing in a quiet moment to explain why she joined that protest in the speaker-to-be’s office.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة March/April 2019 من Mother Jones.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة March/April 2019 من Mother Jones.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
In the Name of the Mother - How Shyamala Gopalan Harris raised a presidential contender
Shyamala Gopalan Harris did not believe in coddling. Pay her daughters, Kamala and Maya, an allowance for doing chores? “If you do the dishes, you should get two dollars,” scoffed the woman who this past summer, almost two decades after we spoke, would launch a million coconut memes. “You ate from the damn dishes!” Reward the future vice president of the United States—and possible future president—for good grades? Ridiculous. “What does that tell you?” her mother chided. “It says, ‘You know, I really thought you were stupid. Oh, you surprised Mommy!’ No.”
Kill the Messenger - The anti-disinformation field is retreating under attack.
A few months ago, a man crawling along a rooftop in Pennsylvania tried to murder Donald Trump at a campaign rally. Hours later, press releases started to circulate, from analysts, think tanks, politicians, and pundits, all offering to cut through the swell of confusion and misinformation.
Food + Health / Global Warning - Why Project 2025 is an environmental catastrophe in the making
When President Joe Biden took office, Democrats held a slim majority in the House of Representatives and a single-vote edge in the Senate. Despite the monumental odds, he has presided over the most productive presidential term for climate action in American history. Under Biden’s direction, the federal government took up the arduous task of incorporating climate considerations into scores of administrative operations and procedures. The epa cracked down on superpollutants and issued stricter emissions regulations for passenger vehicles. The Inflation Reduction Act, the biggest climate spending bill Congress has ever passed, brings the nation closer to its goal of slashing carbon emissions in half by 2030.
Trumpnesia - To get a second chance, Trump needs voters to forget his disastrous presidency.
One of the most oft-quoted sentences ever penned by a philosopher is George Santayana’s observation that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” In 2024, this aphorism is practically a campaign slogan. Donald Trump, seeking to become the first former president since Grover Cleveland to return to the White House after being voted out of the job, has waged war on remembrance. In fact, he’s depending on tens of millions of voters forgetting the recent past. This election is an experiment in how powerful a memory hole can be.
WHEN IN DROUGHT
This obscure yet adaptable grain could be a healthy staple for a warming planet.
BAD HABITS
A spate of recent horror movies recycle tired tropes about nuns-and reveal society's ongoing discomfort with independent women.
Taking the Fifth For a glimpse of the Supreme Court after a second Trump term, look at the radical circuit court that's already driving America to the right.
Imagine obamacare is dead and millions of Americans have lost health coverage.
THE ARCHITECT
TRUMP WANTS TO BE KING. RUSS VOUGHT HAS A PLAN TO MAKE IT HAPPEN.
Losing Faith
As an evangelical leader, I enticed lawmakers and federal judges to adopt a conservative Christian agenda. Donald Trump’s rise proved how wrong I was.
GOD'S COUNTRY
These Christian nationalists have a plan to take over Americafrom small towns to the highest court in the land.
