(This post may contain disputed claims. We make no assertions as to the validity of the information presented by our Opinion Columnist. We are an opinion blog, not a traditional news outlet, and this post should be treated as such. Enjoy.)Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the newly-elected congresswoman from New York, suffered a very public meltdown over the weekend. It all started to unravel when her past was exposed for the world to see.
Newly-elected Socialist Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has stolen a page out of the Democratic playbook, pretending that she was subjected to a poor upbringing in a rough neighborhood in order to endear herself to mindless voters on the political left who, apparently, will believe anything they hear.
However, Ocasio-Cortez was caught in her outright lie over the weekend, and when she got called on it, she suffered a public meltdown of epic proportions.
It all started when the congresswoman-elect tweeted out a photo of her congressional office, making the mistake of adding that she’s just your average girl from the Bronx.
“Don’t be fooled by the plaques that we got, I’m still / I’m still Alex from the Bronx,” tweeted the admitted socialist.
Except that she’s not. Far from it, actually.
Conservative political commentator Michael Knowles was quick to remind Ocasio-Cortez that she actually grew up in the elite neighborhood of Worchester, which is miles from the Bronx and a world away in terms of lifestyle.
“The average household wealth of the town in which you grew up is $1.2 million,” tweeted Knowles.
This instantly set the socialist princess off and caused her to double-down on her fudged bio, facts be damned!
“Yep. As everyone knows, I grew up between two worlds + experienced 1st hand how a child’s zip code can shape their destiny,” responded Ocasio-Cortez. “It was scrubbing those households’ toilets w/ my mother that I saw and breathed income inequality. I decided to make a difference. You decide to do this,” she told Knowles.
“You didnât grow up b/w 2 worlds. You grew up in Westchester then lied abt it then changed your bio when the lie was exposed,” Knowles shot back. “I grew up in the (less) affluent (more) diverse neighboring town, spent many wknds in the Bronx. The difference: I don’t lie abt my upbringing to feign victimhood.”
In what amounted to a failed attempt to defend Ocasio-Cortez, Twitter user Brad Simpson wrote, “Amazingly, @michaeljknowles there are communities where rich people and working people live right next to each other, in the same zip code even! They are called cities, and many are marked by striking inequality even where average wealth (a meaningless figure) is high.”
“Right, but @Ocasio2018 didn’t grow up in a city. She grew up in a small, homogenous, affluent suburb, where she attended excellent schools before pretending she grew up in the Bronx,” explained Knowles.
That’s when Ocasio-Cortez really lost it, launching into an error-laden rant about “mansplaining.”
“In which a Republican literally tries to mansplaining *my own childhood* and life to me,” she wrote. “And in true mansplaining form, he’s doing it wrong with an great degree of confidence. It begs the question: is the GOP really ‘sending us their best?'”
It’s hard for most middle-class Americans to envision living somewhere where the average household wealth is $1.2 million. That is simply unattainable for most of us, who will be lucky to earn that much money over the course of our entire lives.
If you are one of the lucky few who is fortunate enough to grow up in such a privileged environment, the least you could do is not lie about it to seem like the sort of “rags to riches” story everyone loves.
Perhaps Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s upbringing sheds some light on why her views surrounding certain government systems like socialism are so skewed — she grew up with such privilege that she has no idea what it actually takes, fiscally speaking, to make ends meet.
Whatever the case may be, she’ll fit right in in Washington, seeing as how she’s already made a career out of lying.
