Elderly Democrats: It’s Time to Go

I’m looking at you, Nancy Pelosi

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Photo illustration by Slate. Photos by Alex Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images and Wong/Getty Images.

Democrats are doing it again. They are making the same mistake that has cost them a generation of Supreme Court seats, and as of last November, a presidency. With each passing day it becomes more obvious: the people at the top of the Party’s food chain are too damned old.

Despite having witnessed the catastrophic consequences of hanging on to power until it’s too late—Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death is the most devastating example—Democrats continue to operate under the charade of immortality. To put a finer point on it, despite who the they would have us to believe is running things (i.e., Hakeem Jeffries) the Democratic Party is in an inextricable stranglehold of a council of elders who refuse to accept the fact that their best days are in the rear view mirror. And their leader is Nancy Pelosi.

The latest example of Pelosi’s geriatric eminence grise just manifested itself on the House Oversight Committee. Thirty-five year old congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY), one of the Party’s most popular politicians among the demographic Democrats desperately needs to inspire, was just passed over to assume the role of Ranking Member in favor of Gerry Connolly (VA), who is seventy-four.

AOC, as she is known to her millions of social media followers, was expected to win the post going away until Pelosi, currently laid up with a broken hip, put the kibosh on her ascendancy. In her mission to save us from the scourge of progressivism, Pelosi whipped votes on behalf of Connolly, who in addition to being long in the tooth, is suffering from esophageal cancer.

In a world where the ability to navigate our fragmented news environment is key, for Democrats to pass over AOC, who has over 23 million followers across TikTok , Instagram, BlueSky, and Muskville, isn’t just wrongheaded, it’s tantamount to political malpractice.

Don’t get me wrong, Connolly isn't a bad guy. He’s well respected and certainly knows the job. But does the Democratic Party, or anyone in their right mind for that matter, really believe a septuagenarian with throat cancer is better suited to battle the committee’s MAGA Republicans than AOC?

I respect Pelosi and what she has accomplished over the years. But (and I speak as one born in the era of black and white television when I say this) when elderly politicians start falling down marble staircases, the last thing they should be doing is playing political puppet-master. Call me an ageist if you like, but if you've spent any time around eighty year-olds, you know I’m right. MSNBS’s Chris Hayes summarizes the craziness of this Democratic shitshow:

Think about it: What if Joe Biden had been the transitional president he promised he would be? Had he done so, a host of younger Democrats would have campaigned in a primary. Based on the way she just performed, Kamala Harris stood a good chance of emerging as the presidential nominee. But instead of three months and change, she would have had almost two years to make her case to voters. Maybe she’d have been the next president.

Instead, Biden decided he was the best candidate to face Donald Trump, despite being the oldest person ever to run for the presidency. Only when his lack of mental acuity became horrifyingly evident (and the money dried up) did he step aside for the younger Kamala Harris.

To be sure, a few younger Democrats have moved up the ladder. That said, ten of the Democrats in slated to assume committee leadership roles in the next Congress are over seventy years old. California representative Maxine Waters, who is eighty-six years old, will be the ranking member on the House Financial Services Committee. I’m sure we all love Auntie Maxine, but come on.

When Chrysler went bankrupt in the eighties, the company brought in Lee Iacocca, a former Ford executive who’d spearheaded the development of the Mustang, and several other models. Aside from successfully turning Chrysler around, Iacocca is known for saying, “Lead, follow or get out of the way.”

Old guard Democrats have had decades to lead, so paraphrase Iacocca, they should either follow or get the hell out of the way.