New York City is careening toward electing an openly socialist mayor, Zohran Mamdani, who is advocating a passel of policies that have never worked and are guaranteed make the problems they purport to address worse rather than better.
I've been watching as the elastic bands of political tension in these blue cities stretch to the breaking point, figuring they really cannot accept more strain before they begin to pull back. Perhaps we're just not there yet.
I think that the Left's shift from working class to well-to-do elites is what's stalling the reckoning with the results of leftist policies. They don't feel the pinch of their actions - yet.
Yes, they are (un)wittingly being lured into voting themselves into misery. What they seem to fail to realize beyond that is, while you can vote your way into socialism, usually (though perhaps not always, with Milei as an example otherwise) you have to shoot your way out. And the leftist powers that be (and have been) in NYC for a very long time have seen to it that NYCers are ill equipped (if equipped at all) to do so.
Being one of those transplants you spoke of (I moved to NYC from Germany in 2008), I was just watching a video on how the area around the Frankfurt main train station has become some sort of zombie land. If I then take a step back, my strong hunch is that for people who have attained (a modicum of) economic security, it is relatively uncomfortable to think of the masses of human beings who, for whatever reason, are still crawling in the mud of basic needs insecurity.
The tendency of (idiot) compassionate humans to then "vote for" (move towards) policies that seek to address their own discomfort with that experienced difference is as predictable as it is dangerous. Not that compassion itself is bad, but if I skip the step of first addressing the fact that it is MY discomfort I am seeking to address, I will not be nearly as aware in that by projecting my discomfort as "OPM financed solutions" on many others who may have developed much less disruptive forms of dealing with the underlying difference (and the real problems those differences can bring!), and then create havoc.
Yes, living in an environment in which economic security separates people into "rich and poor" can, depending on the nature and causes of the difference, lead to a lot of fomenting violence between those groups -- if, say, the people who are rich are purposely keeping the "poor" people poor, like slave owners prohibited slaves from attaining property or liberty. But once the rich people are not doing anything to actively keep the poor people from attaining a better life, it then becomes a very tricky game of how to address any remaining differences...
David Mamet called socialism "the abdication of responsibility," and as you note, just about every socialist I've crossed paths with is more interested in being compassionate with the fruit of someone else's labor rather than by personal action. And with being on the receiving end of Marx's "from each according to his ability" aphorism.
Nothing wrong with compassion. But, as I and many others have noted repeatedly, it's not compassion if one uses force to compel others to act or provide.
As for economic security? We see what socialism has done to that everywhere it has been tried.
Cuomo took a shot at Mamdani for living in a rent-controlled apartment while being relatively well off, but, as far as I have heard, no candidate is advocating for a housing free market - end rent control, but also end restrictive zoning and environmental rules that choke off the supply of new housing, driving up home prices and rents.
Housing, and also healthcare. are among the issues where "conservatives" (whatever that means these days) and even some libertarians make the mistake of defending a semi-socialist status quo that is not theirs to defend.
This is New York. Rent control is a way of life, and anyone who speaks truth to that won't get out of the starting blocks. Doesn't validate it in any way, but it's a reality.
I've been watching as the elastic bands of political tension in these blue cities stretch to the breaking point, figuring they really cannot accept more strain before they begin to pull back. Perhaps we're just not there yet.
I think that the Left's shift from working class to well-to-do elites is what's stalling the reckoning with the results of leftist policies. They don't feel the pinch of their actions - yet.
Yes, they are (un)wittingly being lured into voting themselves into misery. What they seem to fail to realize beyond that is, while you can vote your way into socialism, usually (though perhaps not always, with Milei as an example otherwise) you have to shoot your way out. And the leftist powers that be (and have been) in NYC for a very long time have seen to it that NYCers are ill equipped (if equipped at all) to do so.
As long as there are legitimate elections, there is a non-violent way out of misery.
"Legitimate" elections is the key there. Will a socialist allow such elections once power is attained?
It's only a city, and the mayor in NYC has a city council to deal with. He doesn't have that much power.
Being one of those transplants you spoke of (I moved to NYC from Germany in 2008), I was just watching a video on how the area around the Frankfurt main train station has become some sort of zombie land. If I then take a step back, my strong hunch is that for people who have attained (a modicum of) economic security, it is relatively uncomfortable to think of the masses of human beings who, for whatever reason, are still crawling in the mud of basic needs insecurity.
The tendency of (idiot) compassionate humans to then "vote for" (move towards) policies that seek to address their own discomfort with that experienced difference is as predictable as it is dangerous. Not that compassion itself is bad, but if I skip the step of first addressing the fact that it is MY discomfort I am seeking to address, I will not be nearly as aware in that by projecting my discomfort as "OPM financed solutions" on many others who may have developed much less disruptive forms of dealing with the underlying difference (and the real problems those differences can bring!), and then create havoc.
Yes, living in an environment in which economic security separates people into "rich and poor" can, depending on the nature and causes of the difference, lead to a lot of fomenting violence between those groups -- if, say, the people who are rich are purposely keeping the "poor" people poor, like slave owners prohibited slaves from attaining property or liberty. But once the rich people are not doing anything to actively keep the poor people from attaining a better life, it then becomes a very tricky game of how to address any remaining differences...
David Mamet called socialism "the abdication of responsibility," and as you note, just about every socialist I've crossed paths with is more interested in being compassionate with the fruit of someone else's labor rather than by personal action. And with being on the receiving end of Marx's "from each according to his ability" aphorism.
Nothing wrong with compassion. But, as I and many others have noted repeatedly, it's not compassion if one uses force to compel others to act or provide.
As for economic security? We see what socialism has done to that everywhere it has been tried.
Cuomo took a shot at Mamdani for living in a rent-controlled apartment while being relatively well off, but, as far as I have heard, no candidate is advocating for a housing free market - end rent control, but also end restrictive zoning and environmental rules that choke off the supply of new housing, driving up home prices and rents.
Housing, and also healthcare. are among the issues where "conservatives" (whatever that means these days) and even some libertarians make the mistake of defending a semi-socialist status quo that is not theirs to defend.
This is New York. Rent control is a way of life, and anyone who speaks truth to that won't get out of the starting blocks. Doesn't validate it in any way, but it's a reality.
Well, like George Will said, New York needs to “run the experiment” - elect Mamdani and let an overt socialist take the blame for socialism’s failure.