The Mamdani Mirage

As a Russian expat of a certain generation, I’ve argued with Americans about socialism many times before.

I wrote yesterday that we get more value out of disagreement than we do out of reflexive unanimity. In my three months on Substack, few posts have generated as much debate as my Tuesday night column about socialist mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s primary win in New York City.

As a Russian expat of a certain generation, I have argued with Americans about socialism many times before. It was entertaining to see some people try (and fail) to lay the same old rhetorical traps—social welfare, the Nordic countries, and so on. My friends, I’m quite familiar with these arguments. But I’ll indulge you.

Let’s start with Paul Stone, who commented within minutes of my column on Mamdani going live (I do hope you actually read the piece!):

If Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid didn’t already exist, would you oppose them as fringe, radical ideas?

You are putting words in my mouth. I am not an advocate of socialism. I am also not a fan of unrestrained capitalism. I have seen the excesses of the former in the Soviet Union and the latter in modern-day Russia. A social safety net is a good thing. Some government regulation of business is necessary and important. My north star here is not Karl Marx, but Theodore Roosevelt, who said:

Both the preachers of an unrestricted individualism, and the preachers of an oppression which would deny to able men of business the just reward of their initiative and business sagacity, are advocating policies that would be fraught with the gravest harm to the whole country.

— President Theodore Roosevelt, message to Congress, 1908

Calling social security “socialism” is a rhetorical sleight of hand employed by partisans on both right and left. The left uses it to swindle people into accepting fringe ideas alongside common sense policies. The right uses it to get people to reject those common sense policies as fringe ideas.

What about the Nordics and other such countries? Aren’t they proof-of-concept for a socialism that works and is compatible with democracy?

Of Zohran Mamdani’s policy agenda, one reader adds:

Come on, US Dem socialists support Western/Northern European social democracy, not Soviet/Eastern Bloc system.

In terms of public policy, if we look at some of Mamdani’s actual proposals—agree or disagree with them—and ask whether he and his fellow American democratic socialists are like European social democrats, the answer here is: sort of, with two caveats.

First, European nations are smaller than the US and have their national security subsidized by Washington, meaning they can undertake more ambitious domestic programs. Next, many scholars—both proponents and opponents of socialism—have drawn a line between European social democracy and socialism. That distinction is not an accident. Democracy is key to social democracy, whereas in democratic socialism, democracy is reduced to a mere adjective.

In terms of worldview, however, US socialists like Zohran Mamdani are more in line with their Soviet forebears than their Western European social democratic cousins. Mamdani is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (a misnomer in more than one regard), which regurgitates Russian propaganda on Ukraine, affirms the Iranian theocratic dictatorship’s “right to self-defense,” and takes a hardline anti-Zionist stance on Israel that would make Leonid Brezhnev blush.

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What of the bigger picture for the Democratic Party after Mamdani turned the tables on establishment scion Andrew Cuomo? Reader Max P. admonishes us to…

Read the room. There’s something in the air. It’s called revolution and brought on by moderate Democrats that just refused to impeach a Nazi. Again.

First of all, I think Democrats were right to not impeach Trump in the latest attempt related to Iran. There were other impeachable offenses in the first term and such misdeeds are a safe bet in the second. This was not one of them. So we can move on from that point.

As for the “revolution in the air”—I hesitate to treat Mamdani’s primary victory as so determinative. Republicans will certainly latch onto the New York leftist sensation to tar other Democrats with his politics. And it is a cute narrative for elite media.

But if we are assessing this objectively, we need to take a more holistic view of Democratic politics and the circumstances of Mamdani’s victory.

Starting off, the 33 year-old Mamdani beat a historically bad opponent at a time when Democratic voters are understandably frustrated with the party establishment. Cuomo embodied that establishment—plus baggage. He didn’t even run a visible campaign to try and make up for it. There certainly exists a core of Mamdani voters who believe in his message wholeheartedly, but there is likely also a sizable contingent that simply rejected Cuomo.

Also, why is it only a trend if it’s a DSA leftist who wins? Why shouldn’t Democrats follow the example of a pragmatic liberal like Mikie Sherril, who beat challengers to her left in the New Jersey gubernatorial primary? When the far-left wins, they are keen to spin it as conclusive evidence that theirs is the only way. When they lose, they’re suspiciously quiet—or they start to point fingers. The bigger picture is more complicated than “revolution in the air.”

If nothing else, the New York City mayoral election will be an interesting race to follow. As always, I’m eager to read your comments, and I’ll be back with more responses next week.

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