While US women come to odds, a new political star is threatening to tax the super-rich

Cracks in the sisterhood? Debbie Wasserman Schultz is not happy with the Women’s March, USA Today, Friday:

I walked away from the Women’s March on Washington two years ago absolutely electrified by the promise of what a movement built around sisterhood and solidarity could accomplish. Today, sadly, I must walk away from the Women’s March organisation …While I still firmly believe in its values and mission, I cannot associate with the national march’s leaders and principles, which refuse to completely repudiate anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry. I cannot walk shoulder to shoulder with leaders who lock arms with outspoken peddlers of hate. Instead, this weekend, I will join a movement of women around the nation who are participating in local marches that have distanced themselves from those national Women’s March leaders who still ally with bigotry.

In New York, TeenVogue.com was dazzled by new congresswoman ­Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez:

I believe this moment and where we are right now is a resurgence from where the civil rights movement left off. We are here to carry the torch forward, because when we talked about racial and economic justice, racial and social justice, we started to really extend those issues to the issues of economic justice, environmental justice, and the intersectionality and interconnectedness of all of our fights.

Who is this new superstar? Bloomberg Businessweek, Thursday:

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the media-genic 29-year-old from the Bronx, is the youngest woman ever elected to the House of Representatives. In an appearance on 60 Minutes with Anderson Cooper … on January 6, she was talking up the Green New Deal, a plan to move the US to 100 per cent renewable energy by 2035. Cooper challenged her by saying the program would require raising taxes. “There’s an element, yeah, where people are going to have to start paying their fair share. Once you get to the tippy tops, on your 10 millionth dollar, sometimes you see tax rates as high as 60 or 70 per cent.” Seventy per cent? The top rate under the tax law that passed in December 2017 is 37 per cent. And now, suddenly, a number so extreme that no one in polite society dared utter it became a focal point of debate. Ocasio-Cortez’s fans — she has 2.4 million followers on Twitter alone — loved it.

Amelia Irvine adds some flesh. The Federalist, Friday:

(She’s been) dubbed “the most buzzed-about first-term member of the House of Representatives”, and The Atlantic credited her with an “unusually transparent approach to public relations”. She’s a former Bernie Sanders volunteer and a self-styled democratic socialist. Despite all the fanfare, her recent 60 Minutes interview shined a bright spotlight on a painful fact: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will make it harder for young women in politics to be taken seriously in the future. In mere minutes, Ocasio-Cortez managed to affirm nearly every negative stereotype about the female sex, from the trope that we’re no good at math to the notion that you shouldn’t trust us with a credit card … Ocasio-Cortez is not the feminist hero most media coverage has made her out to be.

Should Wall Street be worried? Yes, according to CNN, yesterday:

Horizon Investments chief global strategist Greg Valliere has described congressional rookie Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as a very real concern for the stockmarket because of her perceived willingness to put the financial industry’s nose to the grindstone as part of her political strategy.