Ocasio Cortez’s Election Ain’t The Moon Shot – Huey Long Got Elected Too, Remember?

Alexandria Ocasio Cortez is making the claim that her election – and that of other such progressives – was akin to the Moon shot, that 1960s attempt to land a man on the Moon. Someone really needs to advise her a little on history, for Huey Long got elected too didn’t he? And you could run Ms O Cortez on the Kingfish’s plans for years. Actually, his seem rather more sensible, given that we’ve now got the evidence of the failure of such plans to study, a luxury he wasn’t afforded.

This is something I’ve mentioned before:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Not knowing all this shows Ocasio-Cortez’s knowledge of history. Of course, after all of these events, we all had a look around the world and decided that we ought to do it differently. Which we do today, as apparently Ocasio-Cortez doesn’t know.[/perfectpullquote]

History, hell, just experience of what people have tried and doesn’t work, doesn’t seem to be the Young One’s strong suit. Presumably we’ll find out what she is good at by the by. I’m also not the only one to have made the observation:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””] Newly elected Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is seeking to fill 13 slots in her soon-to-be congressional office and has sent out an ad for interested applicants to apply. Might I suggest an historian? After all, with tweets like the one she just penned, comparing the migrant caravaners to Jews fleeing Nazi Germany, surely someone with solid historical sense could lend a frequent office hand. [/perfectpullquote]

Which leads us to her comparison to the Moon shot:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Democratic Socialist Ocasio-Cortez compares her election victory to moon landing[/perfectpullquote]

Really? Yup, really:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””] Democratic Socialist darling Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Friday said fellow progressives’ and her election victory – in an overwhelmingly Democratic district – was akin to the 1969 moon landing and the 1964 Civil Rights Act. “We’ve done what we thought was impossible,” she told a crowd during an event hosted by an environmental group, the Sunshine Movement, that aims to combat climate change. “We went to the moon. We electrified the nation. We established civil rights. We enfranchised the country. We dig deep, and we did it. We did it when no one else thought that we could. That’s what we did when so many of us won an election this year,” Ocasio-Cortez added. [/perfectpullquote]

Other countries managed to offer the vote to all adult citizens. That reference to electrification is worrying to anyone who recalls Lenin, who defined Bolshevism as the electrification of the Ukraine. And again other countries managed to get electricity to the populace without populists. So too civil rights. But it’s the Moon shot that really interests there. That was the first time that thing was done. And the election of a populist demagogue to Congress well, this isn’t the first time that has happened, is it?

Huey Long for example, the Kingfish. It’s actually instructive to see what his “Share Our Wealth” plan was.

[perfectpullquote align=”full” bordertop=”false” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””] The key planks of the Share Our Wealth platform included: No person would be allowed to accumulate a personal net worth of more than 300 times the average family fortune, which would limit personal assets to between $5 million and $8 million. A graduated capital levy tax would be assessed on all persons with a net worth exceeding $1 million.
Annual incomes would be limited to $1 million and inheritances would be capped at $5.1 million.
Every family was to be furnished with a homestead allowance of not less than one-third the average family wealth of the country. Every family was to be guaranteed an annual family income of at least $2,000 to $2,500, or not less than one-third of the average annual family income in the United States. Yearly income, however, cannot exceed more than 300 times the size of the average family income.
An old-age pension would be made available for all persons over 60.
To balance agricultural production, the government would preserve/store surplus goods, abolishing the practice of destroying surplus food and other necessities due to lack of purchasing power.
Veterans would be paid what they were owed (a pension and healthcare benefits).
Free education and training for all students to have equal opportunities in all schools, colleges, universities, and other institutions for training in the professions and vocations of life.
The raising of revenue and taxes for the support of this program was to come from the reduction of swollen fortunes from the top, as well as for the support of public works to give employment whenever there may be any slackening necessary in private enterprise. [/perfectpullquote]

Or as we can put it, take all the money off everyone else and spend it on nice things. Even free college is there.

Which is what makes Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s election entirely unlike the Moon shot. That was an original production and there’s nothing new about the Young One at all. But then it’s a general truism that there’s nothing quite so conservative as a progressive. She’s actually advocating century old policies and seriously, that’s pretty conservative. But then populist demagogues, give them a vote and they’ll take a mile.