AOC on what she meant by ‘Woke 1.0’:
“What I was referring to, even in the context of that interview, was how we make the progressive movement one that isn’t rooted in judgment, castigation, or being closed off. To me, it’s about pivoting: fighting for the same things and not changing our principles, but doing so in a way that welcomes people, including those who perhaps weren’t always exposed to or educated about some of these issues and fights.”
AOC: When most people run for office, they run very often as a second act or they run after a long career in lower levels of the ballot. But I was put in a very unique position. I was the youngest woman in history to get elected to congress. When you start your congressional career at 50, you’ve lived a lot of life.
People have pursued education to the extent that they wanted to, their first carrers to the extent that they wanted to, family to the extent that they wanted to. And I got elected at the beginning of a lot of my life.
So I’ve often tried to approach this as how do I do the most good and also try to have the same experiences that everyone else has tried to have. And how do I balance that with what is best for the country.
RT @MorePerfectUS: This farm in upstate New York almost had a data center move in right next door, but then NY got the first statewide data center moratorium in the country.
We went with @AOC and @GovKathyHochul to talk to farmers who are thrilled the data center wasn't built, and who are still on alert for what happens when the moratorium expires.
AOC: We believe that it shouldn't just be New Yorkers that have their water and their energy and their air protected, but that these should be rights available to every American.
I've traveled to other places in the country like Memphis and Georgia where communities did not have these protections, where data centers were installed without local consent or knowledge. They were given incredibly large tax breaks which contributed to the erosion of schools and infrastructure because they're not kicking in.
And we've seen how it's been pursued the wrong way. But when we enact these moratoriums, when we establish standards, when we guarantee protections to everyday New Yorkers, we can see that there are ways to pursue innovation in a healthy way.
RT @progupdates: AOC speaking at a community center: This is how the world changes. This is what we've always said. It's not in the big moments and marches. It's when we're in places like these that create those big moments and marches. And we will have a better world. We simply will. I know that sometimes it can be scary, but we have no other choice.
AOC: The best thing we can do to rein in runaway costs of private institutions is by having fixed affordable high quality services of public institutions. Which means tuition free colleges and universities accross the United States of America
AOC: I had 3 million dollars spent against me in a primary and barely anything registered in terms of what I had out at that time. But we were able to win this way. In fact, the pollsters and the consultants about a week or two before my election said that I was down by 35 points. I appreciate numbers. I don't deny when we see those things. But when I saw that number, I knew that it was wrong.
AOC: When your community isn't funded, when your schools are under resourced, when your food system and food you get in the grocery store is barely edible and unhealthy, and you don't have access to education infrastructure, public safety, you internalize the idea that you don't matter.
Because that's what all those policies say. "We don't have to fund that school because it doesn't matter. You have to make these investments because they don't matter. We don't have to raise these wages because it doesn't matter." And people slowly start to internalize them.
But the only way that we turn this around is by helping working people across the street from all different kinds of geographies and backgrounds. And say "you know what? We do matter". And that's why we have to fight for higher wages, guaranteed healthcare, quality education all the way up to tuition, free, public colleges, and universities. We should fight for clean water and clean air and no chemical dumping in our rivers and our streams and certainly no data centers that are here to compromise our entire water supplies.
