Zohran Mamdani is learning what every candidate elected with support from the left learns eventually: you can’t win.
Last week on the third anniversary of the October 7th massacre, Mamdani issued a statement that he probably thought was carefully balanced between lamenting the attacks while also hitting Israel for its response. He made sure to touch the “genocide” base with regard to Israel while ignoring the fact that Hamas attacked Israelis because they were Jewish.
Nonetheless, the predictable happened: he was denounced from both sides. The attacks from the pro-Israel faction weren’t surprising, but the pro-Palestinian side made up a big part of the Mayor’s base. And yet, that shouldn’t really be surprising either. The left can never be satisfied.
Having been a mayor of a liberal city who was first elected in 2003 with support from the left, I can relate. I’ve been able to experience and study the left up close. I once even considered myself, maybe not exactly part of it, but certainly sympathetic to most of its causes and friendly with some of its leaders.
So, here’s my educated (painfully, educated) opinion of why the left can never be happy. It comes down to two things.
First, the left has causes. These causes are like religious tenets. They’re grounded in certain moral beliefs. It really is very much like religion. There are things that the left simply believes and to stray from them is heresy. So, any compromise quickly becomes a sell-out and the politician who makes the compromise is an apostate — even worse than a conservative who opposed everything they wanted from the start. As a result, and because compromise is at the heart of governing, the left can’t govern. Contrast this approach with dealing with business or unions. These groups are transactional. They want things that are specific and usually quantifiable. So, they ask for the world and then settle for just one hemisphere and call it a good day’s work. They may even say “thank you.” Two words that the left has never put together.
Second, nothing is more sacred on the left than victimhood. Some on the left go so far as to pretend to be a member of a victimhood group, so coveted is this status. There is nothing so evil as to be “privileged.” And because many on the left are just that, they either have to pretend they’re not or they devolve into a kind of self-loathing in which they must attack their own culture and identity. But to govern means to be powerful and if you’re powerful you must turn in your victim card. You are now The Man. For the left, everything is wrong about that. You’ve lost all your victim cred. You are now awful and disgusting by definition. You are The Oppressor. Shame on yourself.
To win elective office is to assume the responsibility of making decisions on behalf of others, sometimes imposing new laws over them or forcing them to pay higher taxes. That kind of power should be exercised with caution and restraint. It requires a seriousness of purpose and a respect for both the office and the people who entrusted you with it. When I was Mayor I used to wear a suit to work everyday, mostly because I wanted to show that level of respect. I wanted to look like a serious person and hope that the suit wasn’t empty.
But if your entire self-image is built around the romantic notion of being a revolutionary, standing in the street and shaking your fist up at the windows of those in power, it can be hard to adjust to now standing behind those same windows. Once elected, the poetry of protest has to give way to the prose of governing. All of a sudden your job is to represent everyone, even those who disagree with you. For most on the hard-left this is all a bridge too far.
But, so far, I think Mayor Mamdani has navigated the transition pretty well. I confess to liking the man, while disagreeing with most of his politics. He ran a brilliant, mostly positive campaign while my people, the moderate Dems, trotted out Andrew Coumo. Como was tired, uninspired and deeply damaged goods. If this is the best my wing of the party could offer out of eight million New Yorkers, then we deserve to be on the run. And you know what? Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries are Coumo without the sex scandals.
And since his election Mamdani has mostly done well. Sure, he’s helped by a compliant press that wants him to succeed, but still I think he’s navigated a virtually ungovernable metropolis with about as much skill and grace as anyone could muster. Contrast that with the edgy and angry Abdul El Sayed, Ilhan Omar or Rashida Tlaib and Mamdani represents the happy face side of socialism.
But he had to know he was facing down a no-win situation on October 7th. If I were him I would have announced a day of quiet reflection and prayer for peace in the Middle East. And I would have stayed at Gracie Mansion where I would have spoken not a word.
In any event, the Mayor is learning his predictable hard lesson: the left is insufferable. It’s human nature to throw up your hands at those who refuse to give you an inch to maneuver while wanting to work more with those who will accept half a loaf and then get to work with you on the next project. So now let’s watch as he moves to the center.
