Cenk: your plank idea for barring private equity from buying residential is a good one; but it is not enough! Consider also getting behind PLANNED microhousing. Once the zoning is greenlit, it can be accomplished in TWO YEARS!!
See “Better way” in this post, that details the specifics:
Microhousing can be very cool, and since a person owns the home and when it has its unique identity, they are psyched about its upkeep (as opposed to the ambivalence of being a unit in an affordable housing building…)
(<joke>“Trees not included”</joke> -but nothing would stop you from adding trellises and vines to the units, to make the neighborhood greener…)
You and I are on the same page about the City RUN markets, Cenk; for addressing access to affordable nutrition, he should just expand the opening of low-cost independent markets (Aldi, Trader Joe’s, whoever…) through the use of tax abatements and providing lower-cost real estate for them to open in more neighborhoods throughout New York.
By the way: I see a lot of online jubilation across the country for Mamdani’s win. I think the reason for it is that a tremendously rich and powerful cartel (NYC real estate) was unable to bury Mamdani’s campaign with money. More voters wanted him; that’s what it came down to.
I see a lot of rose colored glass thinking online: “Is he a blueprint for changing over the Dem Party?!” Guys: wake up from your fever dream! The present makeup of the Dem Party will not permit people like him to handle levers of power (and I saw a number of overt Dem neocons saying that out loud today in response to his win!)
It’s much more realistic to have an alliance for House Reps running on the Independent ticket, aligned on the issues of working class rights and conditions, and to fight pollution. At the end of the day, money-backed Dems will not be able to stop such balloting and voting; they can stop it on the Dem ticket, as evidenced by Hogg getting chucked out and AOC being passed over for the oversight committee!
I completely agree with Dore on the needlessness of the protracted lockdown; I call it “The Great Closing” (having just as much impact as The Great Depression -we still haven’t economically recovered from the spate of stimulus spending…)
I respect Carville’s shrewdness; but on this one he’s probably out of his depth.
Mamdani won because the New York City Dem machine got overconfident. Being labeled as a “socialist”, they figured his chances were poor.
Unless Adams were to convincingly start attacking Trump, he won’t win in November. New York City is a magnet for egomaniacs; Trump reminds NY voters of many of the people they have to deal with every day.
What if Cuomo flip flops and runs? It will split the anti-Mamdani vote between him and Adams (UNLESS Adams were bribed enough to drop out; but I doubt his ego will let him -and he can risk a loss because he has plans for a crypto job after this…)
Completely agree with Cenk in this video: if an illegal has been convicted of a crime (not merely charged…), why wouldn’t you allow ICE to deport them? (unless it could be found that they face torture or death in their country of origin…) This open border policy of many Dems has only invited the Steven Miller+Trump nightmare…
Exactly what I would expect a scared manchild to say.
He’s scared of a REAL pro-working class politico, as opposed to the sham Trump proved himself in spades to be.
Oh…let me go work my whopping extra 5 hours of overtime a week for which I will have to wait A YEAR to get! Let me blow ALL my wages on “quaint” groceries because Luttnick and Navarro jerked around with illegal across-the-board tariffs!!
Tax abatements for Trader Joe’s, Aldi’s, and even Gristedes and other markets if they want to provide a low-cost alternative.
There’s just no way City run markets will run as competitive an operation as those low-cost alternatives, unless they were to be directly subsidized -and they will cost more than chains that have experience doing this. Once this were to fail/not be a success, he will get pushback trying to implement other prog solutions for problems that are presently unaddressed…
Wow; check out this courteous interview of Mamdani by Spectrum! They are normally rabidly pro-Repub, but it looks like they got the memo on his inevitability…
If Bernie plays his cards right, maybe Mamdani will let him speak at one of his rallies!
[Note: While Sanders was doing rallies all over the country, he failed to show up here in NYC before Mamdani’s primary vote. With the Adams chips scandal and Cuomo’s piss-poor campaign, he doesn’t need Sanders’ assistance at this point. Just go do your speeches, Bernie -wotever. Don’t bother to form a committee to vet an alliance of Independent candidates for 2026…]
PS Even if Adams were to step aside soon (probably for an inducement? for a warehouse of chp bags??), Cuomo still couldn’t win…
A quick recap as to what’s going on: Adams has responded to the admin by saying, <sarcasm>”No. no; your offer of being HUD secretary is much too generous…”</sarcasm> (I’m quite sure he telegraphed to them that he would like a crypto job…) Adams is remaining in the race now simply as a spoiler candidate for Cuomo, seeing as how he did not get what he had indicated was expected.
Even if Adams had stepped out (too late now to make a difference…), I doubt Cuomo could win given how horrible his Indie campaign has been going.
It’s pretty inevitable Mamdani will be a wrecking ball for Trump, and Trump’s advisors know it. Trump claims he has a trick up his sleeve to knock him out from a win, but of course Trump claims lots of things -right??
This will get real fun when both Mamdani and Newsom are tag-teaming him on social media…
The only play left for the Trumpkins will be to bribe a false witness against Mamdani to make a false charge just before the election. It would later be disproven, but the objective would be to spook voters headed to the polls (note to Mamdani campaigners: this could be deflected if you get his voters to do mail-ins…) I hope State prosecutors are ready to act against that (note that you cannot be pardoned by a president for State offenses…)
I can see this happening given the inevitable drip…drip…drip of attacks against Trump by Mamdani…
Not crazy about the Turks pushing the abstract and wishy-washy term “Populist”! Many popular regressive viewpoints in MAGA can be classified as “populist”. I understand you were trying to lose the anti-capitalist baggage of the term “Worker”, but it’s time for working people to reclaim their identity and have some pride about their status in a constructive society.
I’m sure Plattner is quite proud when he’s called pro-worker.
Note: I myself am pro-capitalist but also a vehement anti-monopolist. The DOJ’s Antitrust division has been catatonic since 2000. What happened to the decree that stated that google had to sell off the chrome browser monopoly?!
Note that a “worker” is not a nepo-hire or trust-funder who simply cosplays at holding a job for status. A “worker” works because they have to make a living!
Also note: no job is “beneath” anyone [though if the work is very hard, sometimes the pay is…]
