Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez launched a protest in Nancy Pelosi's office over green energy yesterday, and - HURRAY - we are relieving the 2016 primaries on Twitter!
AOC - as we are apparently now calling her - was an activist. Now she is a lawmaker. Those can require different skills. AOC is very skilled in front of a microphone. Pelosi is not. AOC also freaks out Fox News, than again, so does Pelosi.
There is a legitimate question as to what Pelosi's job should be right now. She's the most effective legislative strategist the Democrats have. The problem is that Democrats can't actually pass anything because of the Senate. One thing Pelosi has been very good at is absorbing blow after blow from hte RW media and ignoring it and moving on. She's incredibly tough.
If Democrats had control of the Senate, I wouldn't hesitate for a moment to make Pelosi Speaker, because she will shepherd through bills that would put Trump in a bad spot. Perhaps she can do the same for McConnell. There is an argument that perhaps she would be a better Majority Leader with someone else assuming the mantle of Speaker. The problem is that the immediate names on the roster share the same problems as Pelosi: they are older and not especially media adept.
Pelosi should meet with the Freshmen and put into place a plan whereby she will groom a next generation of leaders to step in and take her (and Steny Fucking Hoyer's) place. Probably in 2020, maybe in 2022. She will need to make a positive case for why she should be the face of the Democratic Party until we pick a 2020 nominee. But the incoming Freshmen would do well to remember that Nancy Smash got the ACA through an ideologically diverse House. She's earned the right to be Speaker again. Just not forever.
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