Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez exposes just how easily lobbyists manipulate policymakers – AOL
Uploaded by on May 14, 2019 at 5:45 pm
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Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) used her Twitter feed on Monday to show voters how corporate lobbyists influence legislators.
The freshman lawmaker shared an Intercept report about a resort event that was attended by dozens of senior staffers of both Republican and Democratic lawmakers. The party was filled with music, wine and talking points from health care industry lobbyists who urged the staffers to fight Medicare for All proposals.
“This event wasn’t about fixing the health care system,” Wendell Potter, president of Business Initiative for Health Policy, told the Intercept. “It was about protecting the health care industry, no matter the cost to patients, families, workers or employers.”
🎶What would you do if I sang out of tune,
would you stand up and walk out on me?/
Lend me your ears and I’ll sing you a song/
and I’ll try not to sing out of key. /
Oh, I get by with a little help from my friends /
mm, gonna try with a little help from my friends 🎶
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This was one of my papa’s favorite songs. Before he passed away, he built a trellis for my mother by hand in our backyard. He wanted to inscribe this lyric around the edges, but never got the chance. I have always felt that this is a love song, but a love song for friendship.
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This #internationalwomensday, I’m thinking about (and grateful for) sisterhood. At the heart of sisterhood, like so many meaningful relationships, is love. And to me, loving people isn’t about who you’re trying to be a “rockstar” in front of. Love is about who you’re unafraid to let see you sing out of tune. 🎤
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📸: @rashidatlaib + @azizthefrenchie
Own your power.
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For so many, it’s radical to feel comfortable in your own skin – and to know that you are more than enough, just as you are.
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One of my favorite quotes is from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr: “Everybody can be great…because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.”
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So take up space. Speak up. Hold the door open and take others with you. Accept that you will be criticized no matter what – that is the price of fighting for change and innovation. I consider constructive criticism a blueprint for improvement and a medicine for ego.
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Ultimately, the people who get down, stay focused in adversity, and do the thankless work of change are the ones who transform society. We can all be a part of that, if we so choose. We can all knock a door, register our cousin to vote, or educate ourselves on an issue we’re curious about.
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We are all capable of awakening and commitment. And because of that, we can all be great.
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📸: @gigilaub
IT’S OFFICIAL: OCASIO2018 IS ON THE BALLOT FOR NY-14! 🔥
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This is what ~5,500 grassroots signatures, collected by 141 volunteer witnesses, held by 1 overwhelmingly grateful candidate at midnight looks like! 💪🏽💪🏽 #peoplepower
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All weekend, high-priced opposition lawyers were crawling over our petitions to find any excuse to bump me off the ballot.
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Ultimately, our grassroots 5X effort was too overwhelming. As of midnight last night, no objections were filed to our campaign for Congress.
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Ocasio2018 is on the ballot for NY-14 all thanks to YOU. THANK YOU to our supporters, door knockers, petition captains, donors, prayer squads, EVERYONE who helped make this happen in all ways large and small.
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Now it’s time to kick it into high gear. Join us in the Bronx THIS SAT for our organizing rally and Barnstorm. You are all officially invited – so you have no reason to say “I’ve never been to the Bronx” again! COMMIT NOW: LINK IN BIO.
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Ocasio-Cortez said this was just business as usual for much of Washington as lobbyists “schmooze policymakers in secret” into accepting their industry-friendly talking points to stay on message:
This is how corporate lobbying works:
Lobbyists ID bills they need to kill to keep profits high (no matter the human cost), come up w/ “sensible” talking points to mask intent + say policy is “misguided,” then schmooze policymakers in secret into accepting said talking points. https://t.co/EB9TDkANYj
When I was looking at lobbying from the outside, just as a normal voting citizen, it appeared to me as more transactional in nature than it actually is.
It’s not necessarily that a lobbyist calls you and says “vote/don’t vote for this bill or we won’t donate to you again…” /2
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