While the portrayal of American politics as a spectrum isn't really terribly accurate - it's more complex than that - it catches the broad strokes. You have the right (you're reading an example of right-of-center discourse right here, right now, at RedState) and then you have the left. You have the left-of-center, like former Senator Joe Manchin, the far left, the farther left, the loony left, and the utterly bat-guano crazy left.
And out past that, you have "The Nation."
Yes, I read "The Nation." As Sun Tzu said:
If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained, you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.
We have to know our enemy, and so I read "The Nation" and "Mother Jones." On occasion, when my stomach can stand it, I even watch "The View." We do this, dear readers, so you don't have to. You're welcome.
Now, I told you all that so I could tell you this: One of "The Nation's" regular writers is John Nichols, a leftist who would have made Che Guevara wet himself in a fit of envy. In his latest, Mr. Nichols informs us of how happy New Yorkers are to have the chance to elect a communist mayor.
Fifty-six percent of New Yorkers supported a democratic socialist for the Democratic Party’s nomination to lead the nation’s largest city, according to New York City’s ranked choice voting tabulation. The results, which were released Tuesday, gave Zohran Mamdani a resounding 56-44 victory over former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, confirming that Mamdani’s campaign had upended not only the calculus of municipal politics of New York City but also of a national Democratic Party that is struggling to identify its ideological direction following its 2024 election setbacks.
Mamdani’s grassroots campaign helped fuel the highest turnout in a Democratic mayoral primary since 1989. He secured a striking 545,334 primary votes in round three of the ranked choice voting process, and declared, “Democrats spoke in a clear voice, delivering a mandate for an affordable city, a politics of the future, and a leader unafraid to fight back against rising authoritarianism.” He also achieved a much-coveted goal of the left: expanding the electorate by getting tens of thousands of new voters, particularly young voters, to the polls.
The headline is the really funny bit: "New Yorkers Aren't Afraid of a Democratic Socialist Mayor."
See Also: Trump Warns New York City May Have Funding Cut Off If They Elect ‘Total Nutjob’ Zohran Mamdani Mayor
Oh, John Nichols may have a point. (And indeed, it must be difficult to find a hat to fit it.) New Yorkers may not be afraid of a Democratic Socialist mayor. Now.
To those Great Apple residents who favor the commie candidate, I will say this:
Wait until his defunding of the police has driven the last few honest cops out of the city, and the streets devolve to a "Escape from New York" hellscape, only without a one-eyed, gritty hero to come in and sort some bad people out.
Wait until his "government grocery stores" give the populace a vivid illustration of life in the Soviet Union, in which you get to stand in line for six hours for the potato ration, and thrill to the announcement that the chocolate ration has been increased from 20 grams to 10 grams.
Wait until the tax base leaves. As in, decamps. They can, after all. A strong plurality of the people who voted for the commie Mamdani, after all, did so because they can afford a Democratic Socialist mayor; his tax increases won't hurt them that much in the greater scheme of things, and they can always move to Florida, Texas, Louisiana - but not Alaska. The winters! The winters! Those long, dark, icy winters! But when all these folks leave, then where will the money come from to pay for the government grocery stores?
Wait until the homeless move in en masse, in the expectation that a commie mayor will keep the flow of free Schiff going. That's OK, though; someone in San Francisco will probably be willing to share the poop-map software.
Wait until the commie mayor turbocharges "sanctuary" policies, filling the city with illegal aliens, and all that comes with that - turf wars over drug sales, smuggling, human trafficking, all of that entertaining stuff.
What's really entertaining about all this is the number of people who will proclaim, about all the previous times in which socialism has delivered nothing but misery, that those attempts "weren't real socialism," and that all they need is the right Top Men in charge, to get it right this time.
The problem is, it never works out that way.
They (New York) chose a candidate who said, “This entire race was about the question of affordability, and ultimately I have run a campaign that speaks about the tools that city government actually has to deliver that affordability in the wealthiest city and the wealthiest country in the world.”
If the commie Mamdani wins, it will be neither affordable nor wealthy, very soon. What it will be is the worst aspects of the Soviet Union, all combined. New York voters have decided what government they want, and if Mamadani wins, they're going to get it, good and hard.
So, you say you're not afraid of a Democratic Socialist mayor?
