The synergy of AOC's strategic decisions
Feb. 28th, 2019 08:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsCongresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AKA AOC) made a big splash yesterday with a line of questioning to Michael Cohen that established, from a congressional witness, that Donald Trump likely committed tax fraud and used properties in her congressional district to facilitate that crime, laid out a case for determining the truth of the witness's claims that required access to Trump's legendarily hidden tax returns, and determined that Donald Trump's accountant, Allen Weisselberg, would be a key witness from whom testimony would be required.
She did this in five minutes. It was a remarkable performance.
These two are related.
I once had lunch with my congressman at the time, the now-retired Jim McDermott, and I asked him how he voted on issues that required a lot of technical knowledge. He said that there are people in Congress who are specialists at pretty much everything, and he goes to them. Often those people are staffers, and sometimes those people issue explainers with different degrees of wonkiness. The objective is to herd the representatives who barely understand the one-page bullet-points (about genetic engineering, climate change, nuclear policy, internet security, whatever) to appreciate that those who know more feel strongly on an issue and to vote accordingly.
Because of her pay schedule choice, AOC's staff isn't made up of trust fund kids whose parents will cover the apartment costs, nor is it made up of high-aspiring in-party activists looking for a high-paying job that sets their base going rate higher. Instead, her staff is made up of people who (a) are from her district and know it's issues, and (b) are motivated to be there. AOC has literally said she's going to hit the "I'll pay you enough to take money worries off the table while you work for me" point, which is where you find the passionate wonks and technicals. AOC's staff is middle class: making enough money to spend their days concentrating on their jobs rather than spending all their cognitive resources worrying about money, but not so much that having empathy weakens their effectiveness.
AOC's success has as much to do with how she, as a former bartender, developed an ear for hearing bullshit, and has weeded out the bullshitters, and the staff she hired is made up of highly motivated people who don't fear the masses, don't fear for their financial futures, and don't fear their boss. She does her homework, and they work with her, and for her, in a way the trust-fund babies and party-ambitious apparatchiks never will.
Together, they gamed out the line of questioning she would use on Cohen. They rehearsed possible answers, and worked hard to make it all fit in her five-minute schedule.
It's not just her blue-collar background, and it's not just her internet savvy, and it's not just her sense of what constitutes fairness in a pay schedule. Those three things combined act as multipliers to bring her another multiplier, a highly competent, technically proficient, and morally united staff. She is herself talented and witty and Internet-capable on her own, but having a staff she trusts and who will do the work with her is what makes her devastating.
She did this in five minutes. It was a remarkable performance.
According to FOX News, when your boss sets your pay rate at something different from the going market, that's communism. They're not very bright over there.
AOC had one other moment this week that caused the usual kerfuffle from the usual suspects: she announced that she was restructuring her congressional staff's pay schedule. Her chief-of-staff would max out at $80K a year, half of what other congressional CoS's make, but her bottom-rung staffers would get paid $52K a year, the minimum needed, according to official estimates, to afford an apartment within a one-hour commute of her offices.These two are related.
I once had lunch with my congressman at the time, the now-retired Jim McDermott, and I asked him how he voted on issues that required a lot of technical knowledge. He said that there are people in Congress who are specialists at pretty much everything, and he goes to them. Often those people are staffers, and sometimes those people issue explainers with different degrees of wonkiness. The objective is to herd the representatives who barely understand the one-page bullet-points (about genetic engineering, climate change, nuclear policy, internet security, whatever) to appreciate that those who know more feel strongly on an issue and to vote accordingly.
Because of her pay schedule choice, AOC's staff isn't made up of trust fund kids whose parents will cover the apartment costs, nor is it made up of high-aspiring in-party activists looking for a high-paying job that sets their base going rate higher. Instead, her staff is made up of people who (a) are from her district and know it's issues, and (b) are motivated to be there. AOC has literally said she's going to hit the "I'll pay you enough to take money worries off the table while you work for me" point, which is where you find the passionate wonks and technicals. AOC's staff is middle class: making enough money to spend their days concentrating on their jobs rather than spending all their cognitive resources worrying about money, but not so much that having empathy weakens their effectiveness.
AOC's success has as much to do with how she, as a former bartender, developed an ear for hearing bullshit, and has weeded out the bullshitters, and the staff she hired is made up of highly motivated people who don't fear the masses, don't fear for their financial futures, and don't fear their boss. She does her homework, and they work with her, and for her, in a way the trust-fund babies and party-ambitious apparatchiks never will.
Together, they gamed out the line of questioning she would use on Cohen. They rehearsed possible answers, and worked hard to make it all fit in her five-minute schedule.
It's not just her blue-collar background, and it's not just her internet savvy, and it's not just her sense of what constitutes fairness in a pay schedule. Those three things combined act as multipliers to bring her another multiplier, a highly competent, technically proficient, and morally united staff. She is herself talented and witty and Internet-capable on her own, but having a staff she trusts and who will do the work with her is what makes her devastating.
no subject
Date: 2019-03-01 01:24 am (UTC)