and here's most of the culture warring demonization stereotypes all gathered in one toon (note details lke "no ice" on the sign):

Except the thing is, it's complicated: they are mostly not homeless, the pay is decent, the practice was started by an entrepreneurial group of 20-somethings in the late 80's, there are now several cos. that offer the service including for Supreme Court cases, lobbyists--who may represent lefties, too--rebill for the service as an expense and it saves their clients fees for a more expensive person, others have complained about the practice in the past, including other more moderate Congresspersons, and if you have been read WaPo, or a similar publication with coverage of Congress like a concerned informed citizen might, you'd know about it long ago, and also things like how there was a Capitol Hill police investigation in the 1990's about illegally selling inside access, etc.

Ocasio-Cortez learned lobbyists pay people to avoid waiting in lines. She’s horrified.

By Eli Rosenberg @ WashingtonPost.com, Feb. 14

[....] looks can be deceiving.

“We’re not homeless,” one line-stander told a Washington Post reporter in 2005. That report described the job:

It’s seasonal work, based on when Congress is in session, and it’s last-minute and usually at most three days a week, since members like to take long weekends. But over the years the old-timers have gotten to know the halls of government well. They know the tunnels and the shortcuts, which hearing rooms are bigger than others, and which ones will be a squeeze.

Some of this institutional knowledge was honed during the glory days of line-standing. Before Sept. 11, 2001, the line-standers say, there was less supervision on the part of Capitol Police, and competition was fierce. Smart line-standers would bypass their colleagues by entering the office buildings through less-used entrances. There would be dashes through underground tunnels, sometimes ending with headfirst dives, or so the lore goes. One company went so far as to recruit college track runners.

[The line starts here: A Washington Post story on line-standing from 2005]

Ocasio-Cortez is not the only freshman lawmaker to be surprised by the practice.

Former senator Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) took issue with it after she too had stumbled upon it in the corridors of Capitol Hill after she took office in 2007.

“This is the people’s government, and these should be the people’s hearings,” McCaskill told The Post at the time. “I have no problem with lobbyists being in hearings, but they shouldn’t be able to buy a seat.”

McGehee said she had a similar reaction when she first heard about line-standing decades ago, but said they’ve since become an accepted part of life on Capitol Hill.

“The people who have the most resources and then get the most access are the ones that can afford to pay line sitters,” she said. “It’s a system that disadvantages people without money.”

So while little harm is done with this instance, it brought a much bigger point to my mind. If we are to be honest, all sounds like fun and games at first, and for a good cause of advocating people's access to government as opposed to lobbyists

 But isn't this actually also a perfect example of social media with a slant taking over paid reporting?  And in the process, not telling the whole nuanced truth of a situation, but  people doing just knee jerk outrage commentary? Reporting isn't making law. Is her job reporting or fixing? If her job isn't fixing, who is going to do it? The masses on her feed? How?

What did Mr. Deeds accomplish? I forget. I believe it's about populism if I recall correctly.

It think this is populism. A populism that also supports Trump world way of doing things: forget investigating the realities and the solutions, spin the outrage factor and move on to the next.