New York Muslim Mayor

[Howth Head]

The strange, unlikely alliance of middle-class, radical left liberals and Islam has been well covered in recent years. It's as common here among the flag-waving Trinity college types that you see at Palestinian rallies as it is among the kind of NY progressives who voted for Mamdani. A rejection of Western values, (self) hatred of the US and Christianity seems to be at the core of it.

How the Left Fell in Love With Militant Islam

What could the far left have in common with Islamists who seem to stand for everything they are against?

www.newsweek.com

If you remove the Islamic imagery from Islamist extremism, you'll find a world outlook based on a Marxist world view—a power struggle between the exploiters and exploited that demands a revolution to set things straight. This world view fuels and is fueled by resentment and indignity. It sees right and wrong as a binary. It is a viewpoint in which boils everything down to power dynamics. There are oppressors and the oppressed, colonizers and the colonized, good and evil. It is a totalitarian way of thinking—all human relationships are seen through power dynamics and cannot be examined through any other lens. In other words, the boxed-in way both groups see the world is the same. Their causes are just vessels to carry their revolutionary ideology.

 

[Salvadore]

Why does the election of a new mayor in a city in a foreign country matter to us here in Ireland?

I think it matters greatly in this instance.

The new mayor’s performance will be closely monitored. It’s an opportunity to challenge the stereotypical view of Muslims in mainstream US.

If he can demonstrate that he can manage productively for the benefit of all New Yorkers, it might just convince more people to look beyond their traditional world view in terms of how they consider immigration.

Of course, if he fails it will have the opposite effect so the risk is significant. I wish him well.

 

[Sister Sara]

big a story as it's been made out to be.

The big story is that a city that underwent the largest terrorist attack in its history at the hands of Islamic extremists has voted for a candidate that the media, and politically powerful spent millions trying to depict as a Muslim with extremist terrorist views.

They failed, and the people of New York saw through the corporatist propaganda.

I doubt the Republicans will be spending long analysing the results here, but the Democrats sure will.

Maybe, maybe not. But there are rumblings afoot in the MAGA camp. Majorie Taylor Green is not afraid to call out the double-speak on the MAGA 'America First' side. Namely, Trump and the US political fawning and slavishness to Israel.

The point being, the messaging from the top is not holding and Mamdani's election is further evidence of that.

My tuppence is on investment going down and unemployment & crime going up

He wants to raise the minimum wage to $30 an hour by the end of his term. From our experience here, increases in the minimum wage coincided with increases in labour participation.
I'm not saying increasing the minimum wage is a cause of that, but over 25yrs the link is there to see. To increase labour participation there needs to be investment in jobs too.

 

[Sister Sara]

A rejection of Western values, (self) hatred of the US and Christianity seems to be at the core of it.

I think, with respect, this, and the article you posted is typical of the type of redundant thinking that populations are seeing through.

"A rejection of Western values" - what are Western values, who decides? My understanding is that those values are determined by the will of the people. In the context of Mamdani, the will of New Yorkers.

So called 'self-hating' Jews are now being joined by 'self-hating' Christians. It's nonsense language - every bit as much as if I decided you were a self-hating free-speech democratic!

If you believe in Western values of democracy and freedom of speech, the right to oppose as well as the right to support, then these labels are just click-bait to propagate something sinister where nothing sinister exists - unless you are fundamentally opposed to Western values of democracy and free speech?

The author of the article manages without any apparent awareness that this 'Marxist' angle could relate to any period since the creation of the State of Israel. What he conveniently misses or stupidly so, that the current and massive rise in support for Palestine amongst the public only occurred in the last 2 years.

He amazingly side-steps the last 2 years as if nothing of any profound consequence has just occurred to the people of Palestine.

 

[arbitron]

The big story is that a city that underwent the largest terrorist attack in its history at the hands of Islamic extremists has voted for a candidate that the media, and politically powerful spent millions trying to depict as a Muslim with extremist terrorist views.

This is a very good point.

"A rejection of Western values" - what are Western values, who decides? My understanding is that those values are determined by the will of the people. In the context of Mamdani, the will of New Yorkers.

If we take the enlightenment seriously (free expression, autonomy, empiricism, equality before the law, etc.) then those same "Western" principles would logically support: abortion rights, trans rights, strict separation of church and state (goodbye Catholic schools and hospitals), inheritance tax, euthanasia, drug decriminalisation...!

 

[Marsupial]

It's as common here among the flag-waving Trinity college types that you see at Palestinian rallies as it is among the kind of NY progressives who voted for Mamdani. A rejection of Western values, (self) hatred of the US and Christianity seems to be at the core of it.

Happily, some of the more enlightened graduates of our Third level Madrasas, are still able to see that the emperor has no clothes.

 

[Purple]

If you remove the Islamic imagery from Islamist extremism, you'll find a world outlook based on a Marxist world view—a power struggle between the exploiters and exploited that demands a revolution to set things straight. This world view fuels and is fueled by resentment and indignity. It sees right and wrong as a binary. It is a viewpoint in which boils everything down to power dynamics. There are oppressors and the oppressed, colonizers and the colonized, good and evil.

That sounds very like the prevailing opinion within the revolutionary Colonials in His Majesties Colonies in North America around 1775... just sayin'

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

The big story is that a city that underwent the largest terrorist attack in its history at the hands of Islamic extremists

That to me is the biggest story. 3.4% of New Yorkers are Muslim.
One view would be that this is an obscene desecration of the living memory of 3,000 victims of that ideology.

The Democrats got over 90% of the vote in this election. It may embolden the left wing of Democrat supporters. It will also reinforce the MAGA base in their convictions.

 

[Sister Sara]

One view would be that this is an obscene desecration of the living memory of 3,000 victims of that ideology.

That is one view for sure, but an extreme and unlikely one. There is no evidence that NY'ers have turned their backs on the victims of 9/11.

It must be something else.

A more logical view is the realisation that the Islamophobia propaganda that was peddled through the media for best part of a decade following 9/11 doesn't work anymore. In someway's because the important matters such as housing, rents, food, healthcare are what really occupy peoples lives and the only candidate to address these issues in any meaningful way during the campaign was Mamdani.

 

[Purple]

A more logical view is the realisation that the Islamophobia propaganda that was peddled through the media for best part of a decade following 9/11 doesn't work anymore. In someway's because the important matters such as housing, rents, food, healthcare are what really occupy peoples lives and the only candidate to address these issues in any meaningful way during the campaign was Mamdani.

Of maybe it's because he's a secularised Muslim. Therefore he's not part of that group of fundamentalists which any secular nation should be cautious of if it espouses the ideals outlined in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In the case of the USA they should be more worried about the Christian fundamentalists but that's a different discussion.

 

[Sister Sara]

Of maybe it's because he's a secularised Muslim.

Yeh, it could be that. That and the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights that was on the minds of NY'ers when casting their votes.

I'm going to stick with campaign material - affordable accommodation, affordable and reliable public transport, affordable groceries etc.

 

[Purple]

Yeh, it could be that. That and the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights that was on the minds of NY'ers when casting their votes.

I'm going to stick with campaign material - affordable accommodation, affordable and reliable public transport, affordable groceries etc.

As in the other thread on Ms Connolly you are completely misquoting my posts in a way that misrepresents what I said. How very Trumpian of you.

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

How very Trumpian of you.

Worse, almost BBC like.

 

[Sister Sara]

you are completely misquoting my posts

I didnt misquote you, I agreed with you that maybe its because he is a secularised Muslim.

The simple answer is we don't know for absolute certainty why NY's voted in Mamdani but if I was a betting man I would put my money on cost of living issues.

 

[Purple]

if I was a betting man I would put my money on cost of living issues.

People always go to the extremes when they are hurting financially. It makes people more likely to ignore economic science and reason and elect leaders who offer simplistic populist solutions to complex problems and 'other' the social or economic group or ethnicity which they point to as the root cause. In the last 120 year history is littered with the corpses of hundreds of millions of people to prove it.

I'm not saying that Mamdani is such a leader. I'm saying that the same factors which elected him also elected Trump and far worse in the past.

That's why the solution to the failure of Centralist politics isn't more socialism or more capitalism or any other 'ism' or ideology, it's making centralist politics work.

 

[Sister Sara]

Worse, almost BBC like.

Seriously? You took a routine campaign of bread-and-butter cost of living issues and inferred it could be

that this is an obscene desecration of the living memory of 3,000 victims of that ideology.

Never mind BBC, Fox News how are you?

 

[Sister Sara]

I'm saying that the same factors which elected him also elected Trump and far worse in the past.

That's why the solution to the failure of Centralist politics isn't more socialism or more capitalism or any other 'ism' or ideology, it's making centralist politics work.

I agree. But centralist politics is failing because it is not coping with the bread and butter issues of cost of living, accommodation, public services. Trump and Mamdani have promised to resolve this. Whatever about Trump, as far as I know the Mayor of NY has little (if any) power to make impact on these issues. At best, he will be a ceremonial figure that will speak out. Somewhat like what our own President can do.

Why is centralist politics failing? Using the US an example, there does not appear to ever be a shortage of money for weapons and war. For schools, hospitals etc, the budget is tight.
In my opinion, there is a complete detachment from the power and wealth in Washington to working people on the ground and this is detachment is widening.

Here, in Ireland, it took riots on O'Connell St for the government to alert to the prospect that maybe there are issues with undocumented migration into the country. Even though they have all the information at first hand from migration authorities and had watched over a near decade how the UK ultimately left the EU in no small part because of undocumented migration.

 

[Purple]

I agree. But centralist politics is failing because it is not coping with the bread and butter issues of cost of living, accommodation, public services. Trump and Mamdani have promised to resolve this. Whatever about Trump, as far as I know the Mayor of NY has little (if any) power to make impact on these issues.

No, the Mayor of New York has significant real power.

Why is centralist politics failing?

Because of the structures we have created to deal with the issued. Far left or right wing government imposed on those same structures will be more divisive and far less effective.

Using the US an example, there does not appear to ever be a shortage of money for weapons and war. For schools, hospitals etc, the budget is tight.

That's completely incorrect. There's plenty of money for both if they so wish, if they improved their structures and reduced their waste. That should be done in an ideology free zone.

In my opinion, there is a complete detachment from the power and wealth in Washington to working people on the ground and this is detachment is widening.

Quite possibly but that's due to Super PAC's and gerrymandering by both Parties which has weakened the democratic franchise of the citizen. Both Parties are to blame for that. The solution isn't more extremism imposed on that system but the reform of that system.

Here, in Ireland, it took riots on O'Connell St for the government to alert to the prospect that maybe there are issues with undocumented migration into the country. Even though they have all the information at first hand from migration authorities and had watched over a near decade how the UK ultimately left the EU in no small part because of undocumented migration.

The riots were a result of the ill informed view that housing shortages are caused by undocumented migrants coming into the country. Firstly there are somewhere between 15,000 and 30,000 of them in the country and secondly the housing shortage is the result of money printing inflating asset prices and the State's intervention in the housing market (Planning, legal system, buying private homes to turn into council houses, RPZ's etc).

 

[Sister Sara]

No, the Mayor of New York has significant real power.

That's interesting to know. Thanks.

There's plenty of money for both if they so wish

There is always plenty of money for war not both, that's the point. And with people like deranged Lindsey Graham foaming at the mouth it is a tragedy where the US has ended up

Killing all the right people

I don't believe most Americans endorse this nonsense, I don't believe most Republicans do either. This is anti-American, anti-Western, far-right extremist ideology.

The solution isn't more extremism imposed on that system but the reform of that system.

You are inferring that Mandani's campaign is extremist?!?!

That is what we were talking about after all.

He is saying nothing that any moderate would not endorse for the functioning of a stable society. The extremists are already in control and need to be ousted.

Firstly there are somewhere between 15,000 and 30,000 of them in the country and secondly the housing shortage is the result of money printing inflating asset prices and the State's intervention in the housing market (Planning, legal system, buying private homes to turn into council houses, RPZ's etc).

Yes, and the decision for money printing asset inflating was whose idea? Those already in power or those wanting to change who is in power? The housing crisis is not exclusive to Ireland, there are clear similarities in UK, parts of Europe and in US.

Money printing in the trillions has found its home and those who did not benefit, ie the younger generation without a home or any realistic prospect of ever affording one. Some of them have started to blame immigrants who arrive here with next to nothing, yet somehow these poor immigrants are seeing as taking everything.

 

[Duke of Marmalade]

corporatist propaganda.

Is she related to our old friend the Military Industrial Complex?