Upstart socialist representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez taunts Democrats:
None of you understand.
I'm not locked up in here with YOU.
You're locked up in here with ME.
This is a literary reference to occultist Alan Moore's limited comic book series Watchmen, or the collected issues in graphic novel format, or the movie adaptation of the same name. Watchmen was the first comic book taken seriously as a literary work, and it is clearly intended to be serious literature.
For those unfamiliar with the work, the plot is this:
In an alternate history, vigilante cops started wearing masks to fight masked criminals, becoming the first costumed crimefighters. Then a tragic accident transforms a scientist into the first and only superhuman being. The government dubs him Dr. Manhattan and teams him up with the costumed crime fighters to win the war in Vietnam. As a result, Richard Nixon remains president into the 1980's when the main story takes place.
Superheroes have been outlawed, and former superheroes are being killed by assassins. Because some of those killed never revealed their identities, one particularly paranoid vigilante - who never stopped his violent crusade against society's filth - named Rorschach - suspects the government or some other sort of inside job. AOC's quote comes from a scene where Rorschach has been caught, arrested and thrown into prison, taking advantage of the opportunity to massacre some of the scum he couldn't reach from the outside.
Ultimately they discover that the assassins are working for Ozymandias, the smartest man alive and one time leader of the Watchmen, a group of superheroes. (The question "Who watches the Watchmen" is literally asked - darkly but without irony.) He has engineered a deadly hoax that will kill millions of people, tricking the Americans and Soviets into abandoning their nuclear arms race, saving humanity and ushering in a golden age of peace, prosperity and clean energy. Dr. Manhattan realizes that he has to go along with Ozymandias plan, even though it is evil and wrong, to save humanity, but Rorschach refuses to compromise his principles, forcing Dr. Manhattan to murder his former ally for an evil man's scheme. In the coda we see that Oxymandias's plan has indeed created a utopia, but a fringe news outlet discovers Rorschach's journal, so there is a possibility that the truth will come out, whatever the consequences.
For those unfamiliar with the work, the plot is this:
In an alternate history, vigilante cops started wearing masks to fight masked criminals, becoming the first costumed crimefighters. Then a tragic accident transforms a scientist into the first and only superhuman being. The government dubs him Dr. Manhattan and teams him up with the costumed crime fighters to win the war in Vietnam. As a result, Richard Nixon remains president into the 1980's when the main story takes place.
Superheroes have been outlawed, and former superheroes are being killed by assassins. Because some of those killed never revealed their identities, one particularly paranoid vigilante - who never stopped his violent crusade against society's filth - named Rorschach - suspects the government or some other sort of inside job. AOC's quote comes from a scene where Rorschach has been caught, arrested and thrown into prison, taking advantage of the opportunity to massacre some of the scum he couldn't reach from the outside.
Ultimately they discover that the assassins are working for Ozymandias, the smartest man alive and one time leader of the Watchmen, a group of superheroes. (The question "Who watches the Watchmen" is literally asked - darkly but without irony.) He has engineered a deadly hoax that will kill millions of people, tricking the Americans and Soviets into abandoning their nuclear arms race, saving humanity and ushering in a golden age of peace, prosperity and clean energy. Dr. Manhattan realizes that he has to go along with Ozymandias plan, even though it is evil and wrong, to save humanity, but Rorschach refuses to compromise his principles, forcing Dr. Manhattan to murder his former ally for an evil man's scheme. In the coda we see that Oxymandias's plan has indeed created a utopia, but a fringe news outlet discovers Rorschach's journal, so there is a possibility that the truth will come out, whatever the consequences.
