(Optional Musical Accompaniment To This Post)

In Tuesday's Washington Post, Max Boot, the former imperialist cheerleader now d/b/a Never Trumper extraordinaire, addressed one of the nation's pressing problems: the popularity of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, rookie congresswoman from New York and subject of a current conservative obsession bordering on a full-on manic episode. I admit, I was dubious about AOC. I thought that her joining Bernie Sanders in trying to submarine Sharice Davids in a Democratic primary was an obviously avoidable blunder, and I thought the hype surrounding her upset of Joe Crowley far exceeded the actual political accomplishment.

But then, for reasons we will get to in a minute, the entire conservative movement decided to make her a national brand, and it did its job splendidly well, and then she did the rest. Did they actually think that a collection of aging gray-boys was going to out-heckle a former NYC bartender? Did they think they were going to beat someone of her age and obvious savvy on social media? (Didn't getting whipped like rented mules by the Parkland survivors teach them anything about that?) She literally danced in their faces, and then she danced in their faces again. And people loved it in ways the gray-boys will never understand.

Scott Heins Getty Images

She's still a rookie. She will make rookie mistakes. But already she's been shrewd enough to realize what a favor the Republicans are doing her by helping build her brand, and she was shrewd enough to push Nancy Pelosi just far enough before backing Pelosi for Speaker. And, when she cast her vote for Pelosi, the Republicans in the House chamber booed, and looked even more ridiculous.

Did they actually think that a collection of aging gray-boys was going to out-heckle a former NYC bartender?

Admittedly, I've never seen anything quite like this before. True, as our politics have become more personality-driven, a phenomenon that tracks through history almost precisely with the improvement of communications technology—FDR was the first radio president, JFK the first television president, and, arguably, Barack Obama's was the first Internet presidency, leading inevitably to the Twitter presidency* that afflicts us today—it becomes easier to create a face for your political moment, or to have one created for it by someone who doesn't have your best interests at heart. AOC is young, vital, outspoken, and a woman. And she has the rare talent for getting both sides to agree that she is the face of this particular moment, and to play the role to the hilt, smiling all the way. She is next-level political charisma, reimagined. And she knows how to use it.

Through all the hype, AOC recently has thrown herself headlong into one of the most vital domestic issues of the day: the fight to roll back the economic snake-oil first injected into our national politics by Ronald Reagan. In an interview with Anderson Cooper, she proposed a top marginal tax rate of 70 percent, or 20 percent lower than that which existed under Eisenhower, but 20 points higher than it was after JFK's tax cut, and almost 30 points higher than it is now after nearly 40 years of Laffer-curved fairy tales.

Melina Mara Getty Images

And, suddenly, the conservatives who gleefully promoted her as a kind of goofy mascot found themselves facing an empowered young congresswoman who was taking aim at the cornerstone of their modern economic infrastructure. And the guns of privilege turned on her. Hence, Boot's column, in which he wrote the following:

In some ways, Ocasio-Cortez reminds me of Sarah Palin, a comparison neither woman will appreciate. Palin was another talented young communicator who made a big splash in national politics before having her lack of knowledge painfully exposed. Instead of studying up, Palin gave up any pretense of seriousness and has now disappeared from the debate. This is a cautionary tale for Ocasio-Cortez. She is a politician of immense gifts who can have an outsize impact — but only if she masters the intricacies of policy and curbs her fatal attraction to political celebrity and vacuous soundbites. Trump has gone dismayingly far with his reliance on “alternative facts,” but it’s not a formula that his opponents should emulate.

We pause here for a brief "harumph."

Harumph.

We continue.

Aaron P. Bernstein Getty Images

I believe that AOC could name one newspaper that she reads every day. I believe she could name one decision of the Supreme Court with which she disagrees. I believe she knows that Africa is not one country. This puts her three points ahead of Sarah Palin, and we're just getting warmed up here. To be perfectly fair, Boot does dismiss many of the conservative cheap-shots at AOC as absurd and counter-productive. (He's digging on the dance video, I think.) And he is trying to make a case that AOC shoots before she aims on certain big issues, which she does to an extent, although he relies overmuch on the Washington Post and its idiotic Pinocchios.

But misspeaking doesn't make you Sarah Palin, and fudging numbers and barbering facts doesn't make you Donald Trump. If the latter were the case, then one could argue that Max Boot was Trumpian before Trump, since he threw himself behind a case made from fudged numbers and barbered facts that got us lied into a war in Iraq. He even defended that position as recently as 2013. (He has since repented, allegedly. We'll see about that if Iran starts hotting up.) Was George W. Bush a Trumpian? Was Dick Cheney? Condi Rice? If they're weren't, then AOC isn't, either.

She's making all the right people crazy, and that's a good thing. And she's using the ability to make them crazy to develop some clout of her own. I don't know where she's going to end up, and that's all right for now.

Respond to this post on the Esquire Politics Facebook page here.

Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io