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COMMENTARY Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is Under Fire Because She’s Right

THE MADISON TIMES — he big guns are out for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the charismatic first-term legislator from New York.

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By Jesse Jackson

The big guns are out for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the charismatic first-term legislator from New York.

In an apparent swipe at Ocasio-Cortez, Donald Trump used part of his rambling State of the Union address to say he was “alarmed by new calls to adopt socialism in our country.”

Billionaire former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz cited Ocasio-Cortez’s support for a 70 percent tax rate on income above $10 million a year as one reason he may decide to run as an independent for president, and not as a Democrat.

The young congresswoman isn’t easily cowed. She called out Trump, saying “I think he’s scared.”

She continued: “He feels himself losing on the issues. Every single policy proposal that we have adopted and presented to the American public has been overwhelmingly popular, even some with a majority of Republican voters supporting.”

Ocasio-Cortez is exactly right. Schultz may think calls for Medicare for all are “un-American,” but the vast majority of Americans support it. Consider the following:

Reuters poll: 70 percent support Medicare for all, including 52 percent of Republicans.
Fox News poll: 70 percent support raising taxes on those making over $10 million a year.
Bloomberg poll: 62 percent support tuition-free college.
Kaiser Foundation poll: 92 percent support having Medicare negotiate with drug companies to lower drug prices.
Hart poll: 63 percent support $15 minimum wage.
Yale/George Mason poll: 81 percent support the Green New Deal plan.

There is a wide gulf between the political center and the moral center.

Dr. Martin Luther King used to teach that “cowardice asks the question, is it expedient? And then expedience comes along and asks the question, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? Conscience asks the question, is it right? There comes a time when one must take the position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular, but he must do it because conscience tells him it is right.”

Politicians worry about donors. They hear from lobbyists, from special interests, from corporations that can spend unlimited money in political campaigns without revealing it.

The moral center is concerned with what is right—and what can work.

What is different now is that the moral center—what is right—is also increasingly popular. The political class is running scared because more and more people understand that the rules have been rigged to benefit only the few. So, Trump and Republicans and billionaires like Schultz yell “socialism,”

“Venezuela,” “extremism,” “radicalism.” They need to spread fear to protect a discredited political center.

Don’t fall for it. Medicare for all isn’t socialism; it’s common sense. A living wage isn’t radical; it’s a moral imperative.

We now suffer an extreme inequality not witnessed since before the Great Depression. It is time for the moral center to make itself heard.

And now a new generation of leaders is rising that just may be ready to take on the fight. Like AOC, they will come under intense fire. They will succeed only if we build a popular movement strong enough to overcome the resistance.

AOC is young and smart and charismatic, and she and her colleagues may help us begin to heal a nation.

This article originally appeared in The Madison Times

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Activism

Oakland Post: Week of June 4 – 10, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of June 4-10, 2025

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Remembering George Floyd

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing.

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Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)
Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)

By April Ryan
BlackPressUSA Newswire

“The president’s been very clear he has no intentions of pardoning Derek Chauvin, and it’s not a request that we’re looking at,” confirms a senior staffer at the Trump White House. That White House response results from public hope, including from a close Trump ally, Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. The timing of Greene’s hopes coincides with the Justice Department’s recent decision to end oversight of local police accused of abuse. It also falls on the fifth anniversary of the police-involved death of George Floyd on May 25th. The death sparked national and worldwide outrage and became a transitional moment politically and culturally, although the outcry for laws on police accountability failed.

The death forced then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden to focus on deadly police force and accountability. His efforts while president to pass the George Floyd Justice in policing act failed. The death of George Floyd also put a spotlight on the Black community, forcing then-candidate Biden to choose a Black woman running mate. Kamala Harris ultimately became vice president of the United States alongside Joe Biden. Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison prosecuted the cases against the officers involved in the death of Floyd. He remembers,” Trump was in office when George Floyd was killed, and I would blame Trump for creating a negative environment for police-community relations. Remember, it was him who said when the looting starts, the shooting starts, it was him who got rid of all the consent decrees that were in place by the Obama administration.”

In 2025, Police-involved civilian deaths are up by “about 100 to about 11 hundred,” according to Ellison. Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African-American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing. During those minutes on the ground, Floyd cried out for his late mother several times. Police subdued Floyd for an alleged counterfeit $20 bill.

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Oakland Post: Week of May 28 – June 30, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of May 28 – June 3, 2025

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