AOC And Kamala Harris Ponder The Universe - 'It's So Big!'

Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana said this about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the young, outspoken progressive Congresswoman from New York: 'She's the reason directions are on shampoo bottles'. 

That unkind but accurate remark - the woman is no Einstein - has troubled her, for although her public persona is one of confidence and political immeasurability, no one likes to be thought dumb; and in private meetings with her closest staff, she tried out her intellectual firepower - touching all the economic bases - Hayek, Friedman, Adam Smith - to see just how up to the give and take with likes of very smart men like the Treasury Secretary. 

 

She knew nothing about these conservative thinkers - of what use were they to a little Puerto Rican woman from a poor Congressional district whose voters knew little more than rice and beans, hanging out on the stoop in the barrio, and drinking Cuba Libres?  She talked only of La Raza, the great Puerto Rican and Dominican people, and the wave of Latino power surely on the horizon.  

Gone would be the public housing blocks in the South Bronx, white-engineered concentration camps for people of color, and in their place would be elegant, windowed high-rises, even more towering and impressive than anything downtown.  Gone would be the pulperias and tiendas with empty shelves, and in would be Whole Foods and the myriad boutique groceries of the Upper East Side. 

This took no intelligence, no intellect, and certainly no knowledge of economics or economic history; so when tested on Milton Friedman, AOC was befuddled.  Her aides gave her helpful prompts. 'Free to Choose', one hinted, but the Congresswoman looked just as lost in the weeds as ever. 

'Ok, free to choose, but what? A pastrami sandwich?', and with that she slammed her fist on the retro-Fifties Formica counter of her kitchen, and shouted, 'Basta.  I am who I am'. 

So everyone but the poor souls in the barrio saw what Senator Kennedy did - an airhead.  The meme of AOC cheering ('Great news!! My IQ test came back negative') went viral and pursued the lady insistently, fueling her doubts about her brainpower. At first she laughed at the ridiculousness of the outrage - MAGA fools attacking a woman of color, obviously - but she could not shake what was becoming a persistent image.  The President referred to her as Low IQ AOC, and knowing snickers were everywhere. 

 

'I am not stupid', she yelled at the mirror, channeling Richard Nixon who told the American people, 'I am not a crook', when he was perhaps the worst one the Republic had ever seen.  'I am a smart woman'. 

When she met with Kamala Harris, the other important woman of color in Washington, the defeated candidate for President who ran against Donald Trump and was given a humiliating defeat.  She wasn't supposed to lose, her supporters said.  How could a black woman possibly lose to that ignoramus? But lose she did and went limping off back to California but not before  testing the waters in Washington for a possible reprise of 2024. 

It was then that she met AOC who was getting surprising national political traction and considering a run for the presidency in 2028. Kamala knew that she needed to suss out the opposition get a feel for what she might be up against. 

 

AOC was at first reluctant.  She, not Harris, was the frontrunner this time, and being seen with a deadbeat loser was not the thing go do; but encouraged by her staff who saw an advantage in a female woman of color duet, she did. 

Now, Kamala Harris was no brighter a light bulb than AOC, and during her campaign she offered nothing but treacle, nostrums, and inane patter about the historical moment, the defining moment in American history when a black woman would lead America and the free world.  However in every non-scripted interview, she made no sense whatsoever, babbling and turning discourse into a cat's cradle of non-sequiturs and odd irrelevant bits.  It was clear that this potential leader of the free world not only had not a single idea in her head, but expressed whatever came to her in a stream of nonsensical phrases. 

One can only imagine what the AOC-Harris meetings were like.  They might have easily have talked about knitting and rice cakes, neither one interested in probing policy or political commitment, both far beyond both.  They probably reveled in their dual identity - women of color in high places - but the identity politics of the Left had created fissures in the color meme.  Harris was a remote black, half black with a Jamaican professor father far removed from the 'hood and an Indian mother; and AOC was a Puerto Rican - two different inclusivity camps with little in common except this forced racial similarity. 

They both emerged smiling and waving to the cameras after their first meeting, and announced that there would be a second. 'Would this be the democratic ticket in 2028?' the press asked to which the duo smiled broadly and chimed in, 'Time will tell'. 

It was about that time that the first photos of the far reaches of the universe were published by the Rubin Observatory - remarkably clear images of galaxies, stars, and nebulae millions of light years distant.  Seeing them, the vastness of space and yet its astounding population gave many a spiritual boost and others only a recognition of the insignificance of human enterprise. 

'I never realized it was so big', said AOC, not sure what to make of the Rubin images. 'I mean, I knew it was big, but not that big', and for once a scintilla of intelligence managed to work its way up and out the woman's brain. 'What does it all mean?'. 

Of course that was as far as her reflections went. In all her rise to political influence had such questions ever been relevant. She knew what she was about, and it was all about her, the first Latino woman of color to become President of the United States; so asking such existential questions was new for her and she didn't know what to make of it.  Am I losing sight of the prize, she wondered, or losing focus?

Not surprisingly Kamala Harris looked at the Rubin images and was equally flummoxed.  She also knew the universe was big, but not that big, 'and so crowded', she added, wondering at the millions of tiny bright dots everywhere.  The idea that they were so far away that they had already flamed out and died by the time their light reached Earth was simply incomprehensible.  'I knew they were far away', Kamala said, 'but not that far'. 

So when they met, the subject of the universe might well have come up, but since neither one had a clue about making sense of the world around them let alone understanding galactic doings, they probably let it go with a few remarks about space.  'I might like to go there', AOC had commented a few years before when the Hubble telescope sent back its first images of outer space; but she had been a very young woman, a space cadet, a little girl imagining wondrous things. Now it was an entirely different story. 

Kamala actually made reference to it in one of her increasingly frequent public appearances, trying it out as intellectual embroidery on a hopeful message about inclusivity; but as usual got tangled in the weeds and made no sense whatsoever. 

Neither AOC or Kamala Harris is likely to get very far in their pursuit of the presidency.  The American electorate in the whole might not be much brighter than either one of them, but they know a stone dummy when they see one; but the ladies will keep on coming, hammering away at nothing, tossing out the same tired ideas until they disappear. 

America needs dummies like the two of them really appreciate people of intelligence, insight, innovation, and real importance.  A clown show at best, a side show at worst, but there you have it.  European intellectuals may sniff and snicker at America, but here dumb is as dumb does, so better watch out.