[michaelbarton]

I hope this win signals (to both parties) that voters are receptive and will get engaged when a clear message is presented about cost of living and quality of life issues. Some of which are taken for granted in most other western countries.

I’m no political wonk, and I’m curious what others with more insight might say about his ability to fund and implement his polices.

I’m reminided of Obama and his hopeful message but he was mostly stymied on policy goals. Specifically Obamacare as an example ended up being watered down

[jjj123]

Only speaking for myself (also not a political wonk): I do not expect Mamdani to be able to enact all of his policies. Not because of money but because of political opposition from the powerful.

I felt the same about Bernie and Medicare for all. We have the money to do it, but the powerful will not let it happen.

However: that doesn’t mean we should elect politicians that won’t even try to make these things happen. It’s important to have a North Star to shoot for, to move the Overton window of what’s worth discussing and to keep an eye on what political machinations block it from happening. I will never vote for a politician who pre-compromises with an imagined opposition, because that tells me they have a different North Star than I do in the first place.

[Lord-Jobo]

Absolutely, elect enough Mamdani’s and the powerful will not be able to stop the changes. It’s the expectation that a single Mamdani or Sanders can fix much that has lead to extreme apathy from much of the electorate.

[mmooss]

> political opposition from the powerful

Mamdani is one of the powerful now.

[reenorap]

Obama was hated by San Franciscan progressives because he came in with all of these promises and then backtracked on almost all of them. He basically turned into a Bush-lite, and he even maintained every single one of Bush's policies as well as deadlines. For example, he talked a lot about abortion and then immediately said it wasn't a priority for him once he got into office. He never closed Guantanamo and in both elections said he didn't support gay marriage.

ACA is a failure and the only thing it did was make it mandatory and unaffordable at the same time. Income inequality skyrocketed under him as well. Anyone who wasn't rich enough to afford some sort of asset like stocks or real estate was left behind and is now suffering.

[xivzgrev]

I'll give you one reason, among many, it wasn't a failure. It made it illegal to deny people health insurance coverage based on pre existing conditions. That was a big step forward in a broken system to restore some humanity to the system.

[victor106]

I heard this somewhere and its true of every politician:

you campaign in poetry and govern in prose.

ACA is NOT a failure. It did address some really critical pain points but left others. There is no bill that can address every single pain point in a system that is as complex as the US healthcare.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Obama was hated by San Franciscan progressives because

Because San Francisco progressivism doesn’t win on a national stage.

[xtiansimon]

“…the only thing it did was make it mandatory and unaffordable at the same time.”

That’s such a fraught statement, because the _opposite_ is claimed by supporters of the ACA after the repeal of the mandatory rule.

I’m old enough to remember the failed attempts for healthcare reforms under President Bill Clinton. The ACA felt like a miracle. It wasn’t what everyone wanted, but it was a start with principles. It has only been legislatively weakened over time, rather than improved.

Whatever alternative, employers should not be where we look for our healthcare. Can’t understand why anyone would trust their employer or expect good outcomes in the post-lifelong employment age.

[troupo]

> ACA is a failure and the only thing it did was make it mandatory and unaffordable at the same time

Isn't it because Republicans spent a busy decade destroying it?

[johnnyanmac]

>ACA is a failure and the only thing it did was make it mandatory and unaffordable at the same time.

Compared to what? Is it really better to just be uninsured and go bankrupt over an ambulance ride?

This point alone makes your entire post suspect, even though parts of it are indeed true (it's a real shame guantanomo was not closed down).

[jasondigitized]

Let's not forget, Edward Kennedy passing away really through a monkey in the political calculus early days for Obama.

[csomar]

He also bailed out Wall St.

[AbstractH24]

I hope Mamdani turns out to be as good as Obama was.

What was so impressive about Obama was his incredible leadership skills and ability to get elected president DESPITE his racial and ethnic background. That the things the far left saw which drove them to support him were not the ones that led him to be such a good leader for the country.

In 2008, I spent most of the year backpacking through Europe before starting college in the fall. So I truly don't remember much of Obama's first campaign or the tone of it at the time. But there is very little evidence in my mind that Mamdani has any of Obama's abilities. Hopefully either I'm missing something again, or he'll rise to the occasion despite the lack of evidence to suggest it.

[couchdive]

most importantly he made this 100 yard dash immediately after winning the primary, not when met with congressional objections as president elect.

[jmye]

> ACA is a failure and the only thing it did was make it mandatory and unaffordable at the same time.

This is absolute, unequivocal bullshit. I get that you aren't under 26, that you don't need subsidies, never were denied coverage for having had the audacity to get sick years before, and that you've never had to pay for expensive care, so you probably don't know what you're talking about in the first place, but suggesting it was a "failure" is absurd. The idea that actual coverage was less affordable after the ACA passed is such spectacular nonsense I don't even know where to start.

Sometimes it's ok to NOT have big, strident opinions on things you know you don't even slightly understand, and to ask questions or approach things with curiosity, instead.

[surge]

I always called him a Bush-lite too, such a disappointment. Did everything I disliked about Bush and nothing about the things he said he'd do. If anything some of the things he did were worse, like executing a US Citizen with a drone without trial or crime to get a man that wasn't even there.

[zimpenfish]

"He never closed Guantanamo" is missing a lot of context. See [0] for more context around Congress blocking his efforts[1].

(While searching for a decent article, I found [2] which has the hilarious-in-retrospect quote: "It just doesn't happen in, you know, traditional American justice that someone is essentially arrested and disappeared with no access to attorney" - oh the sweet innocence of 2017.)

[0] https://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/obama-congress-guanta...

[1] Which, to be fair, were hamstrung by his refusal to override the Republicans - a sensible approach (at the time) because a) the right wing would have gone mad (see: literally anything Obama did) and b) it opens the door for ruling by Presidential fiat which, sadly, was kicked wide open by Trump-1 and the entire wall removed by Trump-2 with the help of SCOTUS. On the whole, though, Obama wasn't as good as promised, definitely.

[2] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/obama-failed-close-guantan...

[tekbruh9000]

Americans are in charge whenever America fails.

Stop calling concepts like ACA a failure and look in the mirror.

Then ignore it all and go enjoy some TV, video games, grubhub any obligation to yourself away; you earned it.

[nialv7]

I kinda feel Obama is more of a Trojan horse. It was not he tried and failed to get what he campaigned for implemented, it was more like he did a U turn after he got elected. e.g. he called for universal health care but once he was elected he started saying it was "too radical".

I hope the same doesn't happen with Zohran. If he was going to fail after all, I wish that will at least be after he had fought as hard as he can.

[JumpCrisscross]

> he called for universal health care but once he was elected he started saying it was "too radical"

ACA was the most radical package that could have passed, and it still cost Democrats the Congress.

This line of argument reminds of the folks who complained about Sinema and Manchin. You know what we’d have with a few more Sinemas and Manchins in the party right now? A majority.

The bill that passes is better than the ideal that doesn’t.

[jrm4]

I genuinely can't believe, still, that I have to spell this out for people.

Obama did not do a U-turn. It is the worst naivete to think that what happened was "he had big ideas and he changed his mind." He had to bring up big ideas to get elected, and then he got elected the first Black president and some of you seem entirely too dense to actually grasp what that means. President. Not King.

Subject to all of those checks and balances you hear about and then some.

You people act as if he could wave a wand and just sweep away everyone and everything who was against his big ideas, when the opposite was at play.

Please, grow a better sense of politics.

[adrr]

There was a government option in the original ACA. Dems couldn’t get the votes to overcome the filibuster in the senate to pass it. It had nothing to do Obama u turning. It was an amazing feat to get it passed in congress and get 60 votes in the senate.

[Slow_Hand]

The Affordable Care Act wasn't a complete solution - and I don't get the feeling universal health care was necessarily achievable - but it is the reason that I have health care and mental health services today. So I consider it to be a meaningful - if incremental - improvement. I imagine there are quite a few people aside from myself who are happy to have it.

[ajross]

> [Obama] called for universal health care but once he was elected he started saying it was "too radical".

He "called for" a bill that would pass (barely, as it required a filibuster-proof majority that will never happen again in our lives), and it did. It's absolutely infuriating to me the extent to which the American electorate fails to understand basic civics. Presidents take all sorts of legislative positions, but they don't run congress and never have.

And so the cycle continues. Presidential candidate says "I thinks Foo is good", electorate takes that as a promise to deliver Foo. Foo fails to appear, electorate gets mad and votes for the other guy promising to deliver Bar.

Never mind that MetaFoo actually passed, Bar is impossible, and the Barite party wants to enact hungarian notation via martial law. Electorate is still pissed off about Foo, somehow.

[Ericson2314]

There will be lots of pressure to on Zohran to do the same. But hopefully the cautionary tale that is Obama will be learned from.

[tartoran]

I feel Obama was trying to appease the Republicans as well, he appointed many of them who back stabbed him shortly after. Maybe he was trying to no be too radical just because he was black and knew how racist a part of America was and it turned out it was right, Trump mainly got elected because "Democrats" put a black person in the White House. In retrospect, yeah, maybe he should have been more radical.

[solumunus]

Not too radical to be good and effective, too radical to break through current political constraints. You have to confront the reality of what can actually be achieved within the system you’re working in.

[dboreham]

Proper Obamacare wasn't implemented because healthcare industry interests held up legislation until the midterms at which point the Republicans took over congress.

[jayd16]

Yeah, can you believe all those progressive bills he vetoed?

...I mean c'mon now. Congress passed what they could and it cost the Dems greatly. Why are we pretending Obama could have gotten more?

[Tiktaalik]

Run from the Left, govern from the Right. A pretty classic political electoral strategy of centrist liberals.

[NewJazz]

Sometimes I think about what we could have had.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthy_Americans_Act

[js2]

And 15 years before that was Hillarycare (1993):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinton_health_care_plan_of_19...

(Fuck you Bill Kristol.)

There's a long, sad, littered history of attempts at universal care in the US:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_health_care_reform_...

[metalman]

"I’m curious what others with more insight might say about his ability to fund and implement his polices."

Zohran has the largest, youngest, mandate in NYC in a very long time. The key is thats it's NYC and the place has an energy all it's own, and Zohran has that, and understands that NYC is always broke falling down, rich, and building up. Think about it, this guy just stood up, and Gotham said Hey!, you!, YES! NYC is pumped and ready to out work, out think, and out party, the entrenched, but tired and old, establishment. Lead, follow, or get out of the way(and cheer)

[AbstractH24]

I don't know about age breakdown, but in sheer percent of voters, Mamdani has essentially the same mandate Trump had a year ago.

Make of that what you will.

[paxys]

>50% of the TV ad spend in the Virginia governor election was on anti-trans ads, so no, don’t hold your breath.

[_DeadFred_]

People should also remember Democrats won contested Governor ships as well. This wasn't just a Mamdani election/victory night, though the far left want to make it look that way.

[vga42]

Demagoguery is at least a 2000 years old concept.

[woodpanel]

I have some confrontational views about this, but in good faith I’d like to invite some discussion with it (not an American).

TLDR: You will see more Mamdanis in other cities. This is a treasure trove for MAGA. Expect at least 12 years of secure nationwide wins for whoever is championing that platform

> I’m reminided of Obama and his hopeful message

This is the gist of the PR campaign, voters fell for. It goes in line with him getting away with being “grassrootsy” when in fact he got tremendous funding from the typical NGOs (Open Society etc) and is a son of a Professor who was/is basically paid to tell American and African Top 5% why white people are bad.

His win also shows the effect migration has on elections. Immigration inherently is a deal where incumbent residents define the terms, and when the other party returns the favor by electing anti-incumbents into office some incumbents will have profound buyer’s remorse.

Fertile soil for the right.

Mamdani’s success also puts a spotlight on foundational problems of the democrats.

After all Mamdani is charismatic, yes, but more importantly he appealed on the issues. His policies will be abysmally failing to resolve the problems he criticized, yes - but that is unimportant to the voter. Important is that he believably criticized them.

How is it, that these well-established circles of the democrats, these well oiled machines, where in states like CA or NY (or most US cities) mayorships, senatorships, congressional seats, and governorships are basically handed out by the DNC, fail to win on those issues? It’s not like making life affordable is not a core branding of the party.

Well, it appears that the DNC gerrymandered itself to death. The dissolution of political contest from the public into internal primaries has stymied the platform’s vitality to a point where it can be easily hijacked by radicals.

Expect many more Mamdani-esque wins locally. Which will mean many wore wins for MAGA nationally.

[jasondigitized]

Let's revisit this take after the mid terms. Also, if not this, then what is the solve?

[johnnyanmac]

>How is it, that these well-established circles of the democrats, these well oiled machines, where in states like CA or NY (or most US cities) mayorships, senatorships, congressional seats, and governorships are basically handed out by the DNC, fail to win on those issues?

You should know this better than the US, but our "democrats" are center right for the rest of the world. The goal is to sound progressive but then act in neoliberal ways to appeal to donors, after the attention isn't on them. I call these "Establshment Democrats", more concerned with keeping the status quo and being a PR machine to the people than actually making policy that benefit the people.

That's why Mamdami can cut through by saying the things that Establshment Dems hated. And early on in his campaign when he gained momentum you can see the resistance against him by the Establishment, up to Cuomo decided to run independent after the primaries. I can't speak for the common person, but those actions speak a lot louder than any words Mamdami said.

There is a rift in the US Left, but I think it's one Estblashiment Dems had coming for a while now. If absolutely nothing else, the rampant destruction of the country by the Trump admin has absolutely activated people in ways not seen since 9/11. And when people are active, words aren't enough anymore. They want action, to not see military roaming their streets and kidnapping US citizens. They want to see actual ways to fix the economy as these trade wars sap at their wealth.

The collorary here is that the MAGA movement is also causing a rift in the US Right. There's definitely Esablishment Republicans that do not like this situation either. And there's the fact that all this is propped on one obsese, Dementia-ridden, 79 year old man. If/when he passes, there's going to be a huge power vacuum, and none of the headrunners are ready to fill that.

If anything, the split on the Right will be worse than the split of the Left, when it eventually happens. At least the Left is having new blood to try and push that rift from the bottom up compared to the house of cards that is Trump and everyone who tried bundling under him.

[sharts]

Pretty sure both parties already know this. They both just don't want that to be a topic of conversation to control the window of what can / cannot be discussed in terms of what benefits the parties.

These people are not dumb. They are just very very interested in self-dealing.

[johnnyanmac]

A warmongerer dying on Election Day (when elected officials haven't voted on War in 80 years) is an interesting sort of irony.

[JumpCrisscross]

> who concealed that he was a warmongering, neoliberal hack

Obama pitched himself as a pragmatist. He governed as a pragmatist. It honestly looks like Mamdani has the sense to do the same.

[lateforwork]

> Nobody’s health insurance is better or cheaper than before.

Speak for yourself. Before Obamacare if you had a pre-existing condition you couldn't switch jobs. There were lots of lower-priced health insurance... but had low life-time maximums (like $50K) which means it was useful only for doctor visits.

[sethherr]

I got to stay on my parents health care for additional years because of Obamacare - as have millions of others. That gave me flexibility to experiment and during that time I learned to program.

[techblueberry]

The people who have healthcare and didn’t before think it’s better.

[lotsofpulp]

> Nobody’s health insurance is better or cheaper than before.

It’s far better than before. You can’t be denied for pre existing conditions, there is no benefit limit, and a lot of preventative care is included.

>(before someone argues this, be aware that your state (taxes) heavily subsidizes this)

No, state taxes have nothing to do with ACA. The biggest subsidy is from young people due to the age rating factor capping highest premiums at 3x the lowest premiums. The second biggest subsidy is healthy to sick people, since pre existing conditions aren’t a factor in premium. And the federal government is what subsidized the premium tax credits for people with lower income.

[Spooky23]

He’ll have a hard time getting most of his stuff through. Rent regulation and busses are controlled by authorities that work for the governor, and she is facing an election against Sara Huckabee Part 2 - Elise Stefanik. The MAGAs will dump lots of cash into that race, and there’s plenty of dudes who will vote for her.

You’re mostly wrong on healthcare. The increased state costs are people who didn’t know they were Medicaid eligible who are now enrolled. The biggest failure imo of Obamacare is that it encouraged consolidation and creation of regional health networks, which have increased prices.

[myko]

This is fantasy. Obamacare slowed the rising cost of healthcare, fullstop. It helped people get coverage who could not before. It was kneecapped and could have been better, but acting like it wasn't an improvement is so far from reality it is ridiculous.

Yes, a single payer system would be better, but this was better than doing nothing.

[Group_B]

It still did a lot of good, but didn’t solve the root causes of our terrible healthcare system. It’s more of bandage on the system we have.

[actsasbuffoon]

Before the ACA, insurance companies were allowed to have these things called “lifetime limits.”

Basically, once your healthcare got expensive, they could just cut you off and say they wouldn’t cover you any further. And because of pre-existing conditions (which the ACA also eliminated), you couldn’t get new health insurance. You were basically fucked.

My mom got cancer a few years before the ACA passed. So far as I’m concerned, the old insurance system killed my mom when she was only 40 years old. I lost my only surviving parent, and my little brother lost his mom when he was only 10 years old. So forgive the utterly flabbergasted look on my face as I read your comment.

[chris_wot]

If only you had free public healthcare. But you don't.

[762236]

His policy proposals have been repeatedly disproven throughout recent history. Thank you for your attention in this matter.

[vvpan]

What has been dis-proven?

[bdangubic]

Obamacare being what it was is 1,000,000% Obama’s failure - he’ll tell you this same thing over coffee too. Just outmost disaster through and through how it was implemented.

Zohran can easily fund which is why every single GOP Senator and Congresman went publicly against him. Can’t have people get any crazy ideas that they could actually have nice things. WTF does Congresman from a some shithole county in Alabama give a fuck about who Mayor of NYC is? but GOP is a well-oiled machine so it was all-hands-on-deck to prevent these ideas from infecting the nation…

even though this seems like a victory, starting in about 10 minutes the entire GOP message for 2026 is going to be “Zohran is Democratic Party now” and it just might work

[cryzinger]

Zohran is the Democratic party now? Thank god, it's about time! :P

[doubletwoyou]

got any tips on what to look for on how obama bumbled obamacare? not too familiar on the subject myself