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There’s an easy answer to the internal Democrats’ debate whether this week’s election was a mandate for the political left or an anti-Trump vote for mainstream progressives: Bernie Sanders or Barack Obama ?
Would Democrats in Wisconsin or Georgia or Pennsylvania prefer New York City mayor elect Zohran Mamdani or Mikie Sherrill, just elected Governor of New Jersey, to head a ballot in their state or be the face of the party ?
Democrats’ banner night was a repudiation of Donald Trump by the heirs of Obama world not, despite what Fox News wants you to believe, a triumph of the radical left.
If Democrats want to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory then let the right wing and too much of the media -- “Left is lifted by verdict of voters,” headlined the Washington Post --set this false reading.
The poster child for that narrative is the 34 year old Mamdani’s stunning victory. He is a compelling communicator, ran a brilliant campaign against the discredited Andrew Cuomo. If I’d been a New Yorker I’d voted for him, realizing much of his ambitious agenda will be limited.
Politically, as goeth New York City, so goeth New York City. The New Jersey and Virginia contests -- combined with more than three times as many voters as the Big Apple -- were more potential harbingers with mainstream progressives highlighting Obama at their final weekend rallies.
These campaigns and others, criticized Republican actions to cut Medicaid to help fund tax cuts for the rich; favored extending the Obamacare health insurance tax subsidies; espoused immigration reform with a tough border policy and easier path to citizenship. A number of Democrats railed against the thuggish tactics of Trump’s ICE storm troopers. In Pennsylvania’s Bucks County an ICE-supporting sheriff was voted out of office.
I didn’t hear many of these candidates embracing government-run health care or public ownership of private enterprises. They also don’t fit into the faux center-right positions of former Democratic bigshots like Mark Penn.
This was reflected in other votes Tuesday.
Pennsylvanians decisively voted to retain three Democratic state Supreme Court Justices in a campaign led by Gov. Josh Shapiro, no favorite of the left. The overwhelming California vote for gerrymandering congressional districts -- directed by Gov. Gavin Newsom who has moved away from some left wing positions --- was not ideological but presented as an answer to the Texas Republicans trying to rig the midterms with a partisan redistricting.
Georgia unseated two public utility commissioners as Republican incumbents were pushovers in allowing multiple increases in utility rates. The Democratic challengers didn’t advocate the state taking over the utilities as socialists might.
Colorado voters approved a measure with a small tax on those making over $300,000 a year to fund free lunches for public school kids. The tax averages about $10 a week; it only affects 6% of the population, hardly confiscatory socialism.
Already some are misreading Tuesday. New York City Comptroller Brad Lander has put out word he’ll challenge Democratic Congressman Dan Goldman as insufficiently left wing. That would delight right wing Republican House members who know the liberal Goldman, a former prosecutor, is a formidable foe. And a few Senate Democrats, reacting to the elections, want to make shutdown demands beyond insisting on extending the health tax subsidies.
They should talk to the newly elected Governors. Sherrill , a former Navy pilot and prosecutor and Spanberger, a former CIA agent, both won by double digits and carried down ballot Democrats in with them, can’t be painted as radical or Communists, as Trump and Fox News falsely label Democrats.
Spanberger’s victory was impressive, reversing big Republican gains four years earlier. Sherill’s was even more so. She easily won a competitive primary, tight walked a delicate balancing act of dealing with an unpopular Democratic Governor, while politicians and pundits complained she was running a mediocre campaign.
She proved them wrong, If you view politicians as stocks, Mikie Sherrill is a better long term bet than Zohran Mamdani.
Jeez ! Can you pundits stop crapping on every dem win ! Perfect is the enemy of the very good ! Take the W and move on !
Your actions on this site continue to try and divide the Democratic Party, no mater what your words say. Why not just come out and say what you truly believe, You love the rich, you love the corporations and you love mediocre, corporatist Democrats. You continue to demean progressives. You say you like winners, but you continue to make snarky, often nasty remarks about Mamdani, AOC and Bernie. I've had it with Politics War Room with James Carville and Al Hunt. I want podcasts that mean what they say, not speaking out of both sides of their mouths, and try to minimize the success of the Progressive Democrats. Why not join the Republican Party, it seems that's where you want to be. If you can't embrace the winners in the Democratic Party, move on (pun intended).