Comedian Jen Kirkman exploded Twitter on November 18, after she came up with a huge train of thought posted over innumerable tweets, explaining how progressive, leftist Democrats are a weapon of Russia, Kremlin and, of course, Russian President Vladimir Putin himself.
In case you haven't heard, Russia has been accused of downright putting Donald Trump in the White House — a Republican candidate, and one that could hardly be called a centrist — for the last couple of years. This narrative has become very convenient for the Democrats and their backers, as it allows them to label anyone expressing support for Trump a paid Russian troll, and even call President Trump himself a hideous agent of the Kremlin.
One of those lawmakers is newly elected Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), who unexpectedly gained popularity and support after she called for accusations about Trump's alleged Russian connections to finally be abandoned, so that Democrats could focus on progressive policies addressing social issues their supporters care about. Ocasio-Cortez also said she will support more left-leaning, progressive challengers to incumbent Democrats, whom she views as "moderates" and "centrists." According to the Daily Dot, such challengers could force incumbent Democrats to adopt more progressive policies themselves if they are to keep their seats in US Congress.
Enter Kirkman, who believes Ocasio-Cortez is backed by the Kremlin.
If your reaction was "Wait, what?," then here is our attempt to summarise Kirkman's lengthy Twitter train of thought.
According to Kirkman, Ocasio-Cortez is "dividing" the Democratic Party by pulling it to the left and downplaying the alleged Trump-Russia collusion. And this is what Moscow wants, she says. Kirkman insists Moscow has commanded its omnipotent army of paid internet trolls to support Ocasio-Cortez and attack and label everyone who disagrees with or criticises her as "sexist" and "racist."
"I'm not saying anything about HER or she's some kind of Russian agent," Kirkman wrote on Twitter. "I'm saying notice the online hysteria and conversation arising around her. How excited Putin must be that a Dem wants to primary Dems. And he sends in his online trolls to split the party that just got in."
"It's not sexist to point out that her using her platform to attack Dems and minimize Russia investigations is bad for democracy," Kirkman added.
Sadly, what started as a curious, strange but arguably cohesive conspiracy theory quickly devolved into a difficult to follow stream of words.
"We experienced this level of hysteria with [Sen.] Bernie [Sanders]. He was talked about as the savior who will bring revolution. When criticized, his supporters and bots cried that he was but a simple working man, a victim of the nasty establishment. It's happening with her. She's not a child," Kirkman wrote, referring to Ocasio-Cortez.
Then she went into a lengthy description of how she has always been "radical" and "vegetarian since 14," and thus no one should call her a "centrist." Those who are interested can read the entire tirade on Kirkman's Twitter here.
Unsurprisingly, such a cascade of tweets could not go unnoticed by other users, which immediately brought Kirkman to the "Trending" section of the social media platform.
At this point, we still don't know if all those users are paid trolls or just regular people expressing their opinions.