What the hell were all the previous New York mayors doing?
I’ve been to New York several times, and found it wonderful. Has Mamdami made it even better?
The message that hits hardest is the conclusion.
Mayor Mamdani is proof that if your political representatives don’t fix stuff, strengthen your community and make people’s lives better it is simply and only because
THEY DO NOT WANT TO
Look at Mamdami. Look at Trump. Look at Mamdami. Look at Trump again. You ought to wonder what the President is doing.
We had an Italian foreign exchange student living with us one year. That seemed cruel, to have Morris, Minnesota as your American experience, so we took the whole family to New York City for a week over Christmas. It was a great time, and a better representative of what America can be than a small rural town.
“You ought to wonder what the President is doing.”
No wondering necessary, we can smell it from here! (Europe)
This is the kind of thing I want politicians to promise and follow through with. Too often, I don’t even hear the promises.
Serving the people.
Most Republicans are ☆¤# assholes but the libertarian one who wants the Epstein files to be released is facing a primary challenge this week.
Normally only a few million $ is spent on a primary campaign, but now more than $ 20 million have been spent on his opponent. The money comes mainly from out-of-state donors.
Having even one half-decent Republican is something Orange Cult Leader finds unacceptable.
Guilinani was obsessing about broken windows and his own thankfully thwarted Presidential bid.. kinda anyhow.
Is Rudy the coulda been POTUS almost as bad as Trump dead yet?
Nah, guess I’d have heard unless has it happened really recently like minutes ago.
Guilinani was obsessing about broken windows and his own thankfully thwarted Presidential bid.. kinda anyhow.
Is Rudy the coulda been POTUS almost as bad as Trump dead yet?
Nah, guess I’d have heard unless has it happened really recently like minutes ago.
@ birgerjohansson : “Normally only a few million $ is spent on a primary campaign, but now more than $ 20 million have been spent on his opponent. The money comes mainly from out-of-state donors. Having even one half-decent Republican is something Orange Cult Leader finds unacceptable.”
Compare and note what happened to Jamal Bowman and Cori Bush in their primaries. Look overseas at what happened rto Corbyn in the UK.
Wingnuts have said his balancing of the budget came from the billions the governor gave the city.
But NY has had revenue sharing since the 1800s so such money from the state has always flowed to cities and towns.
So this begs the question, where did that prior money go?
Not all of this has been done (like fast free buses), not all of it was done by Mamdani (the scaffolding was a Council initiative), some of it was already happening before Mamdani (like the mental health teams), some of it was done by his predecessor (trash containerization), and some of it was done by the governor (universal childcare). I like the guy and voted for him (he was also my assembly member), but when the comic author says they aren’t from here, it shows.
It’s also the conclusion that I do consider to be somewhat incorrect.
Your president certainly couldn’t fix things if he wanted to.
@ ^ drdrdrdrdralhazeneuler : “Your” POTUS sure could do a lot better if he wanted to and was, well, a very different POTUS. A very much better POTUS. A her frex.
A not literally demented fascist fromthe non-Fascist rather than the Fascist party of the two parties the yanks have..
Kamala.
Obama.
Even Biden.
But, hey, .. soem people’s fucking vanity and failure to understadn the stakes and importance and reality of what they doing mattered more and here we are.
That shoud, never be forgotten or forgiven.
Especially never repeated inthe very faint, unlikely possibility there’s ever another chance.
The [current] President of the United States is making money hand over fist. What I do not know is where he is stashing it. Anyone?
@ ^ petesh : I doubt he knows himself given his dementia but I’m sure his puppetmasters do and are very happy with it.
@8. markmckee : “So this begs the question, where did that prior money go?”
Trump’s pockets.
Metaphorically anyhow.
Effectivey his or one of his hangers on and grifters and families . With cuts for the kakaistocrats.
The thing is, US Americans are having to relearn that government done right can really help ordinary people in their lives. Earlier generations knew this, but from Reagan onward politicians (Republicans especially but also many Democrats) have been persuading so many in the US that government sucks and only private businesses can do things effectively. They’ve been so good at pushing this message that it will take a lot of work to undo the effects of the propaganda.
The thing is, US Americans are having to relearn that government done right can really help ordinary people in their lives. Earlier generations knew this, but from Reagan onward politicians (Republicans especially but also many Democrats) have been persuading so many in the US that government sucks and only private businesses can do things effectively. They’ve been so good at pushing this message that it will take a lot of work to undo the effects of the propaganda.
Who knows? Maybe other mayors, governors, and politicians will learn to follow suit and use this as a model. Oh noes that is not the MAGA way!
Social democracy is the best form of democracy.
Millionaires should absolutely be taxed at higher rates than the average worker.
I’ve hosted two French foreign exchange students when my sons were high school students. The Twin Cities is slightly more exciting than Minnesota, but New York isn’t somewhere I’ve ever wanted to visit.
The first one we took to a street fair that featured a classic car show, and musical performance by the legendary B.B. King. I wasn’t aware that my student was also learning bass guitar, but he was pretty ecstatic at watching the technique and fingering from a few feet away. Getting to meet B.B. King was the highlight of his trip.
We took the second one to a cabin on the North shore of Lake Superior near Grand Marais. He enjoyed the woods and all the French place names, but the biggest surprise was eating in a Grand Marais restaurant. Our server was from Ireland, and he couldn’t understand at all when she asked what dressing he wanted on his salad. When I explained his baffled and panicked expression by telling her that he was French and having difficulty understanding, she immediately got one of the French Canadian dishwashers to come translate. They had a very good conversation about visiting America, and it made them both very happy to be able to communicate easily instead of having to speak English.
It was a great memory, and Superior is very easy to point out on a map.
Incidentally, I had no idea that ‘Detroit’ is a French term for a landform.
StevoR @ 7
The Republican Bill Cassidy has just been primaried aka purged.
@11 StevoR
Indeed. Biden and Harris decided early on not to hurt Israel’s feelings, and in so doing to throw the election and lose to Trump on purpose.
You have already forgotten about it.
Ahem, beholder: Biden and Harris decided early on not to start a war because of hurt Israel’s feelings.
Trump went and did just that.
And… You have already forgotten about it!
@ Morales
Somehow you left out, “but continue to enthusiastically arm and fund genocide”.
Of the various levels of politicians, MAYORS are the ones that can make the largest difference in the lives of citizens. If they want to. And if they’re not kneecapped by other politicians.
@20. Trump helping troll “beholder” : As usual lying and attacking the only alternative to the fascist Trump cult party claims :
Guess that explains why Biden actually won the election and was POTUS for four years.
Also why Kamala Harris was robbed of the presidency by voter suppression and actually won if all the votes that should have been counted were counted. Plus quite possibly Musk cheating as well.
Trump helping troll “beholder” do you really think people here are as stupid as your evil orange idol? Or stupider? Because your piece of Conspiracist feces quoted above makes less sense than Creationism and Flat Earth theory put together. You really are insulting everyone’s intelligence here. Even Silentbob’s.
#22. Silentbob : Somehow you left out, “but continue to enthusiastically arm and fund genocide.”
That’s “left out” because that wasn’t true. It would be wrong to include that because it isn’t true.
As previously repeatedly noted to you; Biden took actions against the genocide, called for restraint from Israel, criticised Netanyahu, sanctioned extremist settlers and even withheld some weapons.
The regime that continues to enthusiastically arm and fund genocides – plural – is the Trump regime which the Trump helping troll you defend for some reason argues for, in reality voted for and supports.
beholder and Silentbob, you both seem to have forgotten that it is official US Government policy to ensure Israel retains a QME over its numerically superior adversaries in the Middle East. The US is obligated to resupply Israel’s murder-delivery systems regardless of who the fuck the president is.
So what if Israel wastes their rockets killing Palestinian children living in tents because their homes have already been destroyed by the IDF? The US has to supply them with more.
But if you want a whataboutism, at least neither Biden or Harris urged nazyahoo to escalate the war to “finish the job”. While I freely admin the orange menace’s comments were about Hamas specifically, the IDF is well known for its remarkable ability of finding Hamas combatants disguised as schools and hospitals, and of course little children, and we know the orange menace cares little for little children which is why, unlike Biden or Harris, the orange one did not urge restraint.
And don’t forget also when trumplethinskin was talking up deporting all Palestinians to Israel’s numerically superior adversaries in the Middle East so that Gaza could be redeveloped as the new Riviera, filled with Trump hotels and golden monuments to Donald the messiah.
But because you still claim that Biden and Harris are the evil ones, beholder and Silentbob, GFYs.
Nick, policy is non-binding for Trump. Quite evidently.
Appealing to it is therefore worthless in his case.
e.g.
– Withdrawal from the Trans‑Pacific Partnership
– Withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement (later rejoined under a different administration)
– Abandonment of the long‑standing U.S. position supporting a two‑state framework as the baseline for Israel–Palestine diplomacy
– Reversal of decades of policy on the status of Jerusalem by recognizing it as Israel’s capital
– Reversal of the traditional U.S. stance on settlements by declaring them “not per se inconsistent with international law”
– Reversal of the post‑1979 policy on Iran by exiting the JCPOA nuclear agreement
– Reversal of long‑standing refugee‑admissions levels and procedures
– Reversal of traditional alliance rhetoric toward NATO, including conditioning support on spending targets
– Reversal of long‑standing trade policy by imposing broad Section 232 steel/aluminum tariffs on allies
– Reversal of the traditional U.S. posture toward the WTO dispute‑settlement system by blocking Appellate Body appointments
John. While that may be the case for trump, it was not so for either Biden or Harris, which is the pointy end of my earlier comment. It is obviously difficult to defend the Palestinians when you are legally bound to arm their oppressors.
Not so trump because, well, trump.
Yes. Sorry, I realise I was a bit imprecise.
The distinction being previous administrations did it because they followed norms and thought keeping policy stable over administrations was the way to keep the USA strong. And they were cavilling about it, things were changing. The Israel lobby was losing steam. The Overton window was creaking a bit.
So, when you wrote “The US is obligated to resupply Israel’s murder-delivery systems regardless of who the fuck the president is.” I wanted to note that in this case, it had zero to do with obligations and everything to do with being a megalomaniacal sucker who was played like a fiddle by Netanyahu and the Christian Zionists from his base.
Arm, yes. Condone genocide, not so much.
Ooos, today is “going under the knife day”, I guess it will take some time until the next post from PZ.
.
In case you are reading this, good luck with tve recovery.
springa73
How early are we talking? I ask since it was an earlier generation (the so-called “Greatest Generation”) who fell for Reagan’s bullshit in the first place. Perhaps they should’ve known better.
And this sort of thing is why the moneyed class that thinks the world exists to be their sandbox have, with the assistance of many politicians over the generations, worked to ensure that people think of government as ‘the other’ and that ‘communism’ and ‘socialism’ are just horrible words rather than actual political positions that people might try looking up. Because if the ‘peasants’ actually realized that a lot of good things in the U.S. actually were already socialism by any reasonable definition of the term (such as Medicaid) or that more socialism might make their lives better rather than letting the top 0.01% skim off all the extra created wealth while bankrupting everybody else… they might actually start demanding real change rather than reflexively showing up for the Two Minutes Hate at all things socialist.
Walter @31, I was around at the time, I well remember the rah rah rah “Win one for the Gipper” rah rah rah and was bemused at the pageantry and spectacle of his campaign and triumphant win.
(Which amused me a lot, though I know its origin, since to ‘gip’ means to rip-off or cheat someone in proper English)
Gipper is pronounced with a hard G.
gyp meaning to cheat is pronounced with a soft g, and is a racial slur.
True. The drollery is orthographic, not phonetic.
But, you know, the big banners and that. The Gipper.
Anyway, as I recall, he was the most popular candidate I’ve ever seen for USA boss; compared to him, Trump is second-rate. Not least because he was a proper actor, not just a reality-TV hack. :)
OK, good video, this one, IMO:
That claim is, to put it simply, bonkers.
We’re still here – drop by anytime.
Gipp was a surname for a real person portrayed by Reagan. Had nothing to do with rip-offs or cheating, though Reagan did take his nickname as his own. Gipp died young and served as an inspiration for his football team.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Gipp
Heh.