Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) has ramped up her Robin Hood narrative this week. Speaking on the podcast of multi-millionaire Ilana Glazer, AOC opened her scarlet painted lips, and the world was treated to yet another of her AOC-isms. In her effort to demonize America's wealthy, the New York congresswoman breathed life into a trope that is as old as the Bible.
In the book of Ecclesiastes, we are reminded that there is nothing new under the sun. The wealth-envy narrative that AOC is espousing mixes morality with money, puts them into a cocktail shaker, and when it's poured out, it becomes something of a mess. Here’s what she said:
"You can't earn a billion dollars…You can abuse labor laws. You can pay people less than what they're worth. But you can't earn that."
This is how the representative from the 14th congressional district of New York thinks: Every billionaire is somehow a crook. Teasing that out would make Michael Jordan (net worth $3.5b), LeBron James (net worth $1.7b), and Tiger Woods (net worth $1.3b) the worst types of people. Not to mention Oprah Winfrey, Melinda Gates, and Miriam Adelson – whose net worths are $3.2b, $29b, and $29.8b, respectively.
AOC and All Those Evil Rich People
Demonizing those who are wealthy is a favorite narrative on the left. AOC has been beating this drum practically since the day she was elected. In 2021, she sported a ball gown emblazoned with "TAX THE RICH" on the back, which she wore to the Metropolitan Museum of Art Gala, which is not exactly an event filled with the homeless. Following a House Ethics Committee investigation, Ocasio-Cortez was ordered to pay an additional $2,700 for the dress. Four years later, she still hadn't coughed up the money. The latest reports are that she accepted the ethics violations cited by the committee and said she would pay for them. Whether she followed through and finally ponied up the money is unclear.
Still, this hasn't stopped her incessant bloviating about the evil rich. Following her assault on billionaires, The Washington Post editorial board wrote a scathing opinion piece on AOC, which ended with:
"To say that it's impossible to earn a billion dollars legitimately is to put an arbitrary limit on human potential. And presuming that anyone who becomes too successful must be cheating shows a lack of imagination as to what humans are capable of accomplishing in a free society."
Even criticism from the left is unlikely to stop AOC from railing about the few among us worth a billion dollars or more. She is promoting the vilest form of politicking because it ratchets up class warfare and appeals to our basest instincts: envy. In its purest form, this is what socialists like Ocasio-Cortez are championing. It's as old as the book of Exodus, where the Ten Commandments are printed. And let us not forget the last commandment: "You shall not covet your neighbor's house … your neighbor's wife … nor anything that is your neighbor's (paraphrased)."
Taxing the rich is a form of covetousness because it takes one person's property and assigns it to another. It also doesn't account for the fact that many billionaires own companies that employ others. Not everyone is taken advantage of and works for slave wages. Many private enterprises pride themselves on treating their employees well.
Forcing one social class to fund another by having the government confiscate their wealth is not a winning strategy. All too often, those who end up with the most of everything are the ones in power. Just look at Venezuela. Perhaps Ms. Ocasio-Cortez should take a trip to Caracas to see just how wonderful things are for the people who live there? All sarcasm aside, taxing the rich is nothing new under the sun. It didn't work before, and it won't work now.
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