It's a doozy.

Scott Adams has for a year or more, been making the point that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a gifted persuader. Just as he noted about Donald Trump. Trump's gifts for persuasion (and corresponding gift for manipulating the mainstream media to suit his purposes) was one of the main reasons for Adams' prediction in 2016 that Trump would win both the GOP nomination and the general election. A prediction widely ridiculed at the time yet, in the event, accurate.

Adams has a popular Periscope platform which attracts a large following and his viewers have been pushing back on Adams regarding his assessment of Ocasio-Cortez. His viewers arguments, could they be synthesized, might be something like "sure, she is good at manipulating social media but she is inexperienced and unknowledgeable." Though I suspect they would use stronger wording than "unknowledgeable."

I think this disagreement between Adams and his followers is primarily due to definitional issues. Adams rarely focuses on the policy detail of a Trump or Ocasio-Cortez. He is primarily focused on the individual's persuasion skills. As long as their policies are not head-smackingly bad, he will favor the person with strong persuasion strengths.

Most his viewers, I think, set greater store on accumulated knowledge, experience, and achievements. So while they acknowledge her social media persuasion skills, they still don't see her as anyone other than a stupid person advocating policies which will actively harm them.

It has been almost a running joke for a good while, this gap between viewers and host. No big deal, just a mutual incomprehension why the one cannot see the others discernment.

Earlier this week, AOC sent out a tweet which changed all that.

One of the things that genuinely surprised me in Congress is the sheer mediocrity of witnesses called forth by the GOP in hearings.

Yesterday they brought in a guy w/ a polka dot bowtie backed by oil lobbyists arguing that fossil fuels are “healthy.” HEALTHY.

It’s embarrassing. https://t.co/B17AsEZuCP

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) May 2, 2019

For most, this is just political badgering, not a real argument at all. It is a fairly standard attack of the extreme left on classical liberal world model of freedom and markets. The fact that the classical liberal world model of freedom and markets has also created global prosperity, unprecedented degrees of health, wealth, prosperity and peace are a given.

It is also a sustained mystery which those on the right acknowledge. They understand that the left wants things to be better still. They marvel that the left wishes to kill the goose which has laid the golden egg.

Somehow, for some reason, this is the tweet which has triggered some sort of reinterpretation cascade for Adams. He still sees the exceptional persuasion capability. He has an enormous tolerance in terms of factual rectitude because, focused as he is on persuasion, he recognizes that factual accuracy is often incidental to persuasion.

His commenters are all shrugging their shoulders, effectively saying "What's the big deal? We have always known that she is unaware of important knowledge. Why is this demonstration of ignorance the straw that breaks the camels back?"

I suspect, in this instance, however, she is undermining her persuasion skill with the obviousness of her ignorance and that calls everything into question for Adams.

Adams' periscope.