OPINION:
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, in an emotional tweet, slammed the former president, Donald Trump, for failing to provide money to her Hurricane Maria-victimized and ailing grandmother, whom she now says is being forced to live in subpar housing.
And all the grown-ups in the room go: Well, why aren’t you reaching into your own rich pockets to help her out then?
But this is the way of the socialists — the thine, not mine, method. It’s OK for AOC to live a life of roughly $174,000 per year via her taxpayer salary, with a couple of apartments to her name, wearing cushy clothing that costs thousands of dollars per outfit.
“Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who pretends to be a champion of the people & believes the unemployment went down because [we’re] taking two jobs, just posed in a photoshoot with a $3,500 outfit, $625 shoes all while saying the rich have too much power,” tweeted conservative commentator and author Charlie Kirk in September of 2018.
But to spread her own wealth to her own supposedly suffering family members?
Perish the thought. That’s what taxpayers are supposed to do — so say the socialists.
“Just over a week ago,” Ocacsio-Cortez just tweeted, “my abuela fell ill. I went to Puerto Rico to see her — my 1st time in a year+ bc of COVID. This is her home.”
The accompanying photo showed a somewhat dismal residence with bare walls, bare floors and barely any furniture.
“Hurricane Maria relief hasn’t arrived,” Ocasio-Cortez continued. “Trump blocked relief & for PR. People are being forced to flee ancestral homes, & developers are taking them.”
Twitter posters were quick to pounce.
“Shameful that you live in luxury while allowing your own grandmother to suffer in these squalid conditions,” wrote one.
And another: “You make nearly $200,000 a year. Why not peel off a few bucks for a family members in need? That’s literally what family does for one another.”
And one more: “Imagine being a representative and having your grandmother living like this for years because you didn’t realize it, and when you finally visit her, what occurs to you is to tweet against Trump and take the opportunity to ask for socialism.”
Bingo.
A socialist’s favorite tool: exploitation.
If Ocasio-Cortez truly cared about her grandmother, she wouldn’t have turned to Twitter to slam Trump, to slam conservatives, to slam taxpayers, to slam the American system.
She would’ve quietly dug into her own resources to provide — she would’ve been embarrassed that she had let her grandmother fall into such a plight — she would’ve quickly rectified the situation as quietly as she could, so as to help her loved one without publicly showing her own shameful forgetfulness of her own kin.
But she didn’t. She didn’t do that.
She instead used her grandmother to score political points.
And in so doing, she only underscored the utter despicable immorality of socialists. They’ll use whatever tools they can, even an ailing grandmother, to make a case for redistribution of wealth — as long as it’s not their own wealth that’s being redistributed.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “Socialists Don’t Sleep: Christians Must Rise Or America Will Fall,” is available by clicking HERE.
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