The heat keeps me mainly home these days, I write, read a bit, moan about my painful hobbling, and spend too much time watching and listening to the news. I mostly listen to political news reports and discussions which are usually dire and make one feel angry and powerless. It moves me back to my usual pleasurable but mindless escapism, watching a variety of ball games, and detective series.
Election night, I watch the coverage of NYC’s municipal races, with little hope that my candidate, the pragmatic progressive, Brad Lander (he seems to be a decent man), will win. I learn that Zohran Mamdani, who has run an almost seamless campaign and has excited younger New Yorkers, wins handily over the gifted but dark, ruthless, and beholden to big money and developers Cuomo, who seemed rigid and unable to admit to any defects. For example, he was never able to apologize for his behavior with women staff members while running or for hiding data about deaths of nursing home residents. I also have my reservations about Mamdani, who can seem shallow and offered early in the campaign sound bites like “free buses” and city-owned grocery stores as prime policies, but I assume he will have more sophisticated and strategic advisers when he takes office. Still, most US progressive mayors have had difficulty running cities like Chicago where Brandon Johnson has struggled with governing since his surprise election, and has faced numerous issues including a migrant crisis, crime, high taxes and a public school system that’s in chaos. A poll taken in February shows 81 % disapproval of his record, and that’s with 71% of those polled saying they supported Kamala Harris in the 2024 election.
Being a mayor is a thorny and difficult job, and I would rather have a cynical, power-driven pol like Cuomo fail than another fresh, young progressive like Mamdani, who seems to be genuinely committed to social change. But of course, I will vote for him in the coming election, with the hope that he will break the pattern of progressives being in the right on many issues. But often being unable to see that idealism is inadequate by itself to make a dent in the complexity of the urban problems they confront, from the violence of prisons to the failure of the schools. Modest, incremental goals may make more sense than a grand transformative vision, especially when dealing with governing cities.
But of course, I will vote for him in the coming election, with the hope that he will break the pattern of progressives being in the right on many issues, although still unable to see that idealism is inadequate by itself to make a dent in the complexity of the urban difficulties they confront. Problems that range from the violence of prisons to the failure of the schools. It’s clear that modest, incremental goals may make more sense than a grand transformative vision, especially when dealing with governing cities.
