Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez may look like the picture of health, but the New York Democrat is obsessed with her own impending death.
At least that’s the impression she gave in a recent interview with Wesley Lowery, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who penned something akin to a schoolboy love letter for GQ about the Congresswoman everyone wants to date.
Nestled among several paragraphs of obsequious prose about her strength and courage against foes like the “treasonous mob” on Jan. 6 or her victimization at the hands of meanie political opponents were two statements from Cortez that reveal a paranoia about her own demise.
The first time she touched on this theme was recalling Arizona Republican Rep. Paul Gosar’s satirical superhero anime and the fear that a cartoon sword struck into her heart.
“Others may see a person who is admired, but my everyday lived experience here is as a person who is despised,” Cortez humbly said of herself.
“Imagine working a job and your bosses don’t like you and folks on your team are suspicious of you. And then the competing company is trying to kill you,” she said, apparently conflating a political cartoon featuring politicians vanquishing their foes with real-life violence.
Later, Cortez would again foretell of her own death, and this time Lowery would play up the drama of such a moment for the reader.
“Over the course of our conversations, the congresswoman typically answered in a confident, fast-paced patter — each sentence closely chasing the tail of the last,” Lowery wrote.
“But now her speech slowed to a crawl and, for the first time in the hours we had spent speaking, she broke eye contact, burying her gaze in the arm of her chair. Tears pooled in the corners of her eyes,” he said. (Can’t you almost hear the swell of violins in the background?)
Do you think that AOC was being truthful?
What came next from the “Squad” member was a dire prediction that, as of press time, has yet to come true.
“I hold two contradictory things [in mind] at the same time,” Cortez began, pivoting from her self-aggrandizing narrative to a new take on her own victimization.
“One is just the relentless belief that anything is possible. But at the same time, my experience here has given me a front-row seat to how deeply and unconsciously, as well as consciously, so many people in this country hate women,” she claimed.
“And they hate women of color,” she added.
“People ask me questions about the future,” Cortez continued.
“And realistically, I can’t even tell you if I’m going to be alive in September. And that weighs very heavily on me.”
Not only is Cortez alive and well this month, but the self-described oppressed woman of color is also gracing the cover of October’s issue of GQ and featured in Lowery’s piece with accompanied by a dazzling photo spread.
Presenting GQ’s October cover star: @AOC. The congresswoman opens up on the critical need for men to join the fight for abortion rights, whether she believes she’ll ever be president, and much more https://t.co/uwWSexYB8h pic.twitter.com/UqOnSNwZ2y
— GQ Magazine (@GQMagazine) September 7, 2022
Although Cortez’s teenage drama queen claims are red meat for sycophants on the left and wonderful fodder for political commentary on the right, these hyperbolic claims about her victimization and safety do nothing for the cause of women in politics.
The female trailblazers of yesteryear who fought to fit in in a man’s world would be shocked and horrified to learn that the hysterical woman stereotype they fought so hard against is now worn like a mantle by Cortez.
Of course, there’s a good chance that she believes her heartwrenching tales raise her political profile — but that’s just the point.
It goes with the territory that serving in public office is difficult, unpleasant, and sometimes dangerous. The fact that Cortez happens to be a woman doesn’t give her any more street cred than her male counterparts.
If women in politics are to be taken seriously, they need to act seriously and not like celebrities or models — and especially not like damsels in distress.
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