Radio Yerevan on Blue-Collar Ted

 

Question to Radio Yerevan: Is it true that today's Democratic party represents rich, angry Hollywood celebrities like Seth Rogen better than it does blue-collar union workers in the energy and manufacturing sectors like Senator Ted Cruz?

Answer: Yes, but...

First of all, Rogen is a union member (Screen Actors Guild) in an industry that is arguably a kind of manufacturing in structure, and certainly supports 2.6 million jobs including 927,000 in direct production and distribution and consists of 93,000 businesses in all 50 states, 87% of which employ fewer than ten workers, and generates $17.2 billion in exports with a trade surplus of $10.3 billion, four percent of the total U.S. trade surplus in services; and three other unions, according to him, which I have no reason to doubt. Which Cruz is not, having spent his entire working life, after a couple of years at a private law firm (1997-98) and a stint with George W. Bush's successful first presidential campaign (1999-2000), in government jobs. 

And moreover while both Rogen and Cruz are half-Canadian, Rogen is a child of Jewish labor activists (his parents met in Israel at Kibbutz Beit Alfa and one of his father's jobs was as an assistant director of the Workmen's Circle) who dropped out of high school at 16 (both parents had lost their jobs), though the job he got was with Judd Apatow so it worked out pretty well, while Cruz's parents owned a seismic-data processing business at the time he was born, and were able to educate him privately in Houston, leaving him time to participate in "the Free Market Education Foundation, a program that taught high school students the philosophies of economists such as Milton Friedman and Frédéric Bastiat" and send him to Princeton (where he was a debate team star) and Harvard Law School.

And second of all, Cruz is pretty rich himself (Mrs. Cruz is a managing director at Coastal Elitist Goldman Sachs Bank) and modestly more famous than Rogen, with a YouGov rating of 90% to Rogen's 86%, though much less favorably viewed by the public (underwater at 35%-37%, where Rogen is disapproved by practically nobody, at 52%-12%).

And Cruz looks pretty fucking angry to me, too, in spite of his Victorian squire facial hair

And third of all, the thing Rogen was calling him out for was so unutterably stupid

Nice tweet Sen. Cruz! Quick question: do you also believe the Geneva Convention was about the views of the citizens of Geneva?

Asking for everyone who believes US Senators should be competent and not undermine our elections to incite insurrection against the United States https://t.co/mMf8iDo72G

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 21, 2021

That is actually plagiarized from Trump or his writers, who came up with the thing in 2017. The citizens of Pittsburgh showed what they thought of withdrawal from the Paris agreement by opting to stay in, by official mayoral decree, and a following rally:

WESA Radio Pittsburgh, 3 June 2017.

The anti-Trump march was planned weeks ago, but took on a more focused message of “Pittsburgh says yes to Paris” following Thursday’s announcement that the U.S. would pull out of the Paris Climate Accord.  In making that announcement Thursday, Trump said, “I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris."

“Pittsburgh said yes to the better candidate,” said rally organizer Tracy Baton referring to the fact that Pittsburgh voters overwhelming chose Hillary Clinton in the November election.

“Pittsburgh says yes to the future, Pittsburgh says yes to clean air and water, Pittsburgh says yes to the truth that our government needs to be accountable,” Baton said.