Victor Davis Hanson
American Greatness
After his first-place win in the New York City mayoral primaries, Zohran Mamdani is furiously denying everything that he once glibly thought was cutting-edge and cool.
So, like a good postmodern relativist, Mamdani now claims he didn’t really mean that violence was merely a “construct.”
I suppose Mamdani asked Jewish New Yorkers—the target of 44 percent of all hate crimes in the city—and discovered that their concussions and blood were all too real.
As a good soldier in the ranks of Black Lives Matter, Mamdani now insists he did not trash the police and advocate defunding them. Neither did he really, really mean to claim falsely he was African-American when he applied to college nor did really, really mean to do a video mocking the Jewish holiday of Hannukah.
Mamdani once thought it was cool to boast about defunding the police when he was an edgy, rising, left-wing community activist.
But then it was smarter to play it down as a candidate. And now it is essential to lie and deny it as a front-runner.
As a good communist, Mamdani echoed Karl Marx by bragging about his ultimate agenda: “the end goal of seizing the means of production.”
But whose “means of production” would Mamdani start seizing?
Trump Tower? Tesla dealerships? Amazon warehouses?
Mamdani warns us, “I don’t think that we should have billionaires, frankly.”
Then, please tell us, how would you get rid of them?
Confiscate their money? Tax them at a 99 percent rate?
Maybe dox them and let the public handle the rest?
Mamdani brags he would “globalize the intifada.”
Given that most define the intifada (“shaking off”) as the two violent Palestinian waves of terrorism against Israel, what then does Mamdani mean by globalizing it?
Is the violence at universities like Columbia insufficient without escalating to the old PLO or current Hamas levels?
Mamdani said that, as mayor, he would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he came to New York City.
But what crime would Netanyahu be guilty of?
Trying to stop another Hamas October 7 massacre of Jewish civilians?
Attempting to prevent the Iranians from getting a nuclear bomb and thereby fulfilling their daily promise of destroying Israel?
If Mamdani believes the democratically elected Netanyahu deserves to be jailed, then would he similarly arrest a visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping for putting a million Uyghurs in labor camps?
How about arresting Venezuelan communist dictator Nicolas Maduro, who has “disappeared” some 20,000 of his own people?
How about Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, whose government executes homosexuals?
Or is it just Jewish leaders who would be subject to Mamdani’s warrants?
Mamdani promises to target “richer” and “whiter” neighborhoods for higher taxes.
But in all analyses of median family household income, so-called whites rank far from the top at a distant eighth.
Who, on average, ranks as the richest ethnic group in America?
Asian immigrants of Indian ancestry—like Mamdani and his own family.
So, why didn’t the supposedly erudite Mamdani say he was going after the statistically “richest” group in the nation for his tax hikes—like Indian-American households?
Or was race more important than income in Mamdani’s Marxist view of collective enemies?
Mamdani touts free transportation, rent control, and state-owned grocery stores as if they were new ideas. But they are stale, old-fashioned policies that have failed everywhere from the Soviet Union to Castro’s Cuba—and often here in blue-state university cities.
Mamdani reflects a pattern of affluent, left-wing, and highly educated immigrants from impoverished countries.
Barack Obama’s father, Kamala Harris’s father, and Rep. Ilhan Omar’s parents fled the poverty, violence, and corruption of their homeland only to find prosperity, even affluence, amid the safety and the rule of law in the United States.
They and their American-born children were often the recipients of generous government scholarships and favorable preferences in admissions, hiring, and career advancements under affirmative action and diversity/equity/inclusion protocols.
But instead of appreciating the unique security and magnanimity of their adopted country, they so often embraced boilerplate invective against America as an unkind, unfair, and unequal place.
For Obama, America needed to be “fundamentally transformed.” For Omar, her adopted homeland was one of the “worst” countries, and she added it had become even worse than the Somaliland dictatorship she fled.
For Mamdani, whose parents rank in the top one percent of income and educational brackets, the America his family sought as a refuge must be transformed into one of the socialist-communist nations of the sort that have failed everywhere.
The glib Mamdani has canned answers for all of his past embarrassments—except one.
Why would he wish to turn New York City into a social basket-case like Uganda, which his now-rich parents fled to reach America in the first place?
His concepts are irresponsible, juvenile and well revealed when you reorganize the letters in his last name: I, Mad Man!
As a NYC resident I see both parties are to blame here. While the Democrats tried to distance themselves from the incumbent. Not like some who lazily blame his meetings with Trump to discredit his Democratic worthiness , but on his old school corrupt politician swagger, and his flamboyant party lifestyle .
So instead they dust off Andrew Cuomo, who if he had any self introspection, would have ran a hard working, apologetic campaign and try to appeal to the younger and centrist voters on why as a former governor, and “victim “of the left woke agenda he would be best to lead our great city…..
Instead he mailed it in…took the big donations..fielded no tough interviews…like Hillary Clinton he campaigned nowhere where he needed to sway people. Proving his most ardent critics point , that his hubris makes him a bad candidate as well as a bad person
I ask now as a voter WHERE was the Republican Party ? Giuliani and Bloomberg won this city as Republicans. Amazingly if you look at the post primary election maps. Neighborhoods of hardworking families and homeowners of ALL races did not go for Mamdani. Parts of Northeast Quuens ,Staten Island voted the same as most of the Bronx , Southern Queens and East Brooklyn. These are working and middle class places that see the fraudulence of Mamdani .
So we trot out tired, beret wearing Curtis Sliwa, on yet another vanity campaign. While his call-outs of the left are usually on point, he is not taken seriously by people and plays to a small cr
Another stellar piece of literary genius Victor. Your fans expect nothing less. Mamdani is now the ‘poster boy’ epitomizing the old phrase of “If you can make it in NY, you can make it anywhere!” NY city is now a paragon of political ambiguity and this guy should not be a surprise to anyone based on the insanity we have seen over the past four years. Just another pseudo-intellectual left wing, radical lemming joining the ranks of the others you mentioned. I’m just very thankful and blessed that I was able to pass along the traditional values I was brought up with to my two kids. Glad your surgery was a resounding success and you are on the road to recovery. God bless America, POTUS, his family, the administration, our military and especially our Veterans!
But will the New York Times publish VDH’s article before the voting for NYC Mayor begins? (Silly Question, I know.)
I agree with Baron about the juvenile behavior & prolonged adolescence of Boomers of which I am one. As to Mamdani, first & lasting impression of the guy is that he’s incredibly glib. Increasingly, he comes across as another privileged, half-educated, self-contradictory AOC gaming the system.
Interestingly, the demographics of NYC seem to have changed. Per Victor, 15% of population is Jewish, down from 25%. Meanwhile, Muslims are about 1.5 million or 12.5% of population. While Mamdani’s out courting black voters, Christian Hispanics will not support a Marxist Muslim for Mayor. Liberal whites & pro-Hamas Jews will have to decide for whom to vote.
My understanding is that 7% voted. Like Los Angeles no one cares or participates. Maybe 10% for Adams will seal the deal come November.
“Those who clamor for the public ownership of the means of production are clamoring for public ownership of the mind.” -Galt
Jaroslaw Martyniuk I understand the frustration of watching Vladimir Putin’s bombing of civilian centers in Ukraine, but how much can President Trump actually do to stop that? He is opposed at every turn when he takes action, misquoted and taken way out of context. He has accomplished so much in the 6 months of his second term. Expecting perfection or victories on every issue is unreasonable. Please give him time. Maybe sanctions and tariffs will greet Putin, if Europe and others buying his oil will cooperate. Wouldn’t that be nice!
Problem perhaps is that the vast majority of people’s ancestors were servants or slaves of some sort, and the authoritaruan/totalitarian political ‘overcoat’ feels normal and comfortable to them.
For this reason, in the first democratic experiments in Ancient Athens, only people of property, with a stake in society, had the right to vote, not the slaves…. Sadly we now live in ‘mobocracies’ (‘ochlokraties’) so such stupidities as we see here can even win.
“They and their American-born children”
I think u need a little edit here: I-liar Omar was born in Somalia
The for J Schwartz. They think human nature is theraputic. Others think it is tragic. Everything else is pretty well commentary.
Very well stated, VDH: “As a good communist, Mamdani echoed Karl Marx by bragging about his ultimate agenda: ‘the end goal of seizing the means of production.” That says it all.
On another matter of utmost importance, I can’t help noticing that you have very little to say about Trump’s latest conversation with Putin. You seem to write about everything under the sky except this elephant in the room, a subject of crucial significance to America’s foreign policy and reputation. See WSJ piece below, and readers’ comments crushingly critical of Trump’s embarrassingly feeble reaction to Putin’s genocidal war on Ukraine.
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/trump-is-disappointed-with-putin-russia-ukraine-war-d7e6b127
How did the New York City electorate come to embrace this outcome? Do voters genuinely believe he holds the solutions to the city’s long-standing challenges? Has the voting population shifted so heavily toward progressive ideologies—or have so many disillusioned residents already left—that this new majority now decisively shapes the city’s future? Notably, some of his strongest support came from affluent progressive white neighborhoods—ironically, the very places he associates with the so-called ‘old white billionaire’ power structure.
@Jonathan Schwartz, so many like the idea of a totalitarian state, because it lets them stay children forever. Especially a state that grows out of a liberal social net society. They like that the State promises to fulfill their every want. The State will make all the tough decisions for them. It’s something deep in our nature to want this.
Now, we used to prize and promote growing out of that phase, of overcoming that part of our nature and becoming adults. But in the 70 years of Boomers, we became a youth culture, and each generation, generally, demanded more from the State, expected more from the State.
We have become a society where many are simply overgrown adolescents.
That’s why, at least in the West. In other societies, of course, such States establish themselves through force and violence.
It seems we should be more concerned with voters who would make such a selection than the selection himself.
Moments of doubt of keeping the nation’s original purpose are increasing in frequency the more one ponders the voting record of big city inhabitants.
Once again you nail the hypocrisy of the radical Left. If Mandami is elected, which I sincerely hope is not case, NYC will be thrown back decades to the days of Beame, back into the days of high crime, filth, and apathy…
As with all socialist utopians, they embrace the root of all evil: the desire for the unearned.
How did the New York City electorate allow this to happen? Did they truly believe he holds the answers to the city’s deep-rooted challenges? Is the voting population now so dominated by progressives—or have so many disillusioned residents already left—that this new majority can unilaterally shape its future?
Thank you Mr Hanson. Every thing you educate us about is truth n so uplifting yo hear you tie it all together for better understanding. I wish all Smericans read n follow you. Please continue to keep us informed.
Why do so many human minds find totalitarian utopianism so romantic.?
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
H. L. Mencken
Mamdani disavows with a wink and a nod to his voters who want to appear edgy as well.
How did the New York City electorate allow this to happen? Did they truly believe he holds the answers to the city’s deep-rooted challenges? Is the voting population now so dominated by progressives—or have so many disillusioned residents already left—that this new majority can unilaterally shape its future? Ironically, some of his strongest support came from affluent progressive white neighborhoods—the same places where he claims the ‘old white billionaire’ boogeyman still reigns.
Thanks Victor! It’s hard to believe (or is it?) that this charlatan communist appeals to so many New Yorkers. But then again, are his supporters legal American citizens? Many questions remain to be answered.
Thank you, sir, for a thoughtful expose on Mamdani. He is clearly a radical and should receive zero votes in the general election for Mayor of New York City.
The folks who voted for this man should take your Hillsdale course, “American Citizenship and its Decline” and learn a few things…..
There were Jewish ‘leaders’ of Conservative and Reform congregations in the congressional district represented by Omar who proclaimed they spoke with her and she was not to be feared. They said they had N understanding with her.
Similarly, there were many NYC Jews who voted for MF Mami.
It disgusts me when I see my people demonstrate such stupidity,