Thread by @_waleedshahid

Steny Hoyer scoffs at @AOC’s proposed 70% marginal tax rates on millionaires and billionaires.

Hoyer is clearly confused about how to respond and is offering mealy mouthed Republican-lite talking points in place of a vision of Democratic governance.

Hoyer and the Democratic Party leadership's instincts were forged under the conservative backlash of the 1970s and subsequent ‘Reagan Revolution.'

For too long, Democrats thought they could win by moving towards the GOP, and giving their voters half-measures approved by donors.

.@AOC's politics were formed during a revival of grassroots social movements like Occupy and #BlackLivesMatter that learned to speak to often-neglected constituencies.

Now she's showing Dems they can fight to take money + power from the elite and give it to all working people.

Alexandria's agenda is not a litany of progressive issues; it’s an agenda to renew and expand the social contract by directly addressing the crises that will define American life for years to come.

The tactics of insurgents like @AOC may irritate party leaders to no end, but the friction still serves to provide the Democratic Party an actual vision and ideology to govern through the systemic crises in our country: inequality, climate, racism, and oligarchy.

They need her.