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Zohran Mamdani won three US House of Representatives seats last week. Claire Valdez in NY-7, Brad Lander in NY-10, and Darializa Avila Chevalier in NY-13 each won the Democratic primary after being endorsed by Mamdani, knocking-off two incumbants in the process. These are all 80-20 Democratic districts, so there is no realistic chance of any of them losing in the November.
Darializa Avila Chevalier is the one still making headlines a week later. She is, as far as anyone can tell, an actual communist. Rumors are that she personally founded Columbia University Apartheid Divest when she was a student there in 2016. Her stance on policing? She's against it.
Center-left politicos are currently melting down that someone like this won and is being accepted by the party apparatus. Credit to them for denouncing socialism I guess, but did they not know who their base is? Did they completely forget all of those "defund the police" chants from 2020? Did they not know that those people vote Democrat?
Some people want to kick Chevalier out of the party, bless their hearts. This wouldn't work even if it were feasable. Democrats need votes from leftists to be competative nationally. A party at war with its own base cannot stand.
I don't think she can be kicked out, seeing as how she's DSA not Democrat. But I also think she's not going to do much more than make a few fiery speeches, possibly try a few stunts and get slapped down for them (like early career AOC did) and settle down to cultivate a political career (like AOC did). She was selected by the same king-makers (the Justice Democrats) who got AOC and a slate of others elected, so my take on all this is: (a) it's New York, this sort of stuff will run locally but not nationally and (b) she will not, in fact, rock any boats; she'll work on keeping her seat by keeping on the right side of the college-educated white liberals who elected her.
If I'm being cynical (no, me?) expect an appearance in a couple of years time at the next Met Gala with her own designer togs emblazoned with the right-on messaging just like Sandy from the block 😁
The DSA win has already flipped Newsom on the wealth tax (he opposed it before, he supports it now); Hakeem Jeffries has already feted them. The Democrats know this is the future of their party.
Possibly. Getting seats in Congress, yeah, but are there any DSA senators and not just House of Representatives? As for Newsom, I think he realises California is where his bread is buttered, even if he runs for president it'll be a Kamala-style result, so keeping on the good side of the edge cases until he can wangle some kind of move away from California into the higher echelons of the party (if there is such a thing). I wonder if he'd be interested in running for the Senate? But given the backlash against Scott Wiener, this is risky and demonstrates why he'd have to stay on the good side of the crazies.
DSA winning seats in select local districts is entirely possible. DSA as new third national party and being relevant on a national scale? I don't see it, and if any DSA affiliate did manage a run for national office (like AOC and the presidency, something often wistfully mentioned) I think the person would have to considerably soften their policy positions. Go all-in on "new, high-paying, union jobs" (which we all know are now a dying if not dead breed) and economic populism, cool it on "Stalin was the greatest person who ever lived, I find it really hard to pick my favourite between him and Mao".
By my count so far there's Platner in Maine plus AES in Michigan, though the latter still has to win the primaries. Am I missing anyone else?
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The DSA is not going to be a third national party; it is taking over the Democrats. And with the Democrats it gets the Democratic juggernaut. Policy positions don't matter because the Democratic right flank is secure -- no matter how far left they move, they won't lose people to the Republicans, because it's simply socially unacceptable for people who have gone Democratic to ever vote for Republicans.
Even if it's socially unacceptable, that doesn't mean it doesn't happen (I'd guess it happened pretty significantly in 2024). And things that are socially unacceptable are socially unacceptable until they're not. Depending on just what a DSA takeover of the Democratic party is like, I could see that changing pretty quickly. I just hope it doesn't get to that point; people are naturally very excited/depressed right after a particular election result, but I'm hopeful that this doesn't portend a trend.
The DSA might lose the Democrats some seats in New Jersey (some of our most Democratic areas are also our most Jewish, and not squishy Palestinian-supporting Jews either), but I'm fairly sure that in general, the social unacceptability of Republicans is deep-seated and effective. The success of Graham Platner --- death's head tattoo guy -- polling ahead of Susan Collins (squishy Republican, often breaks the party) in the Maine Senate race demonstrates that.
Susan Collins always polls behind a democrat at this point in an election cycle, I wouldn’t read too much into that democrat being graham platner.
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Newsom is triangulating, not flipping. He opposes a state wealth tax that is actually on the ballot and has a real chance of passing; he supports a national wealth tax that is entirely theoretical and will not be passed anytime soon (hopefully...). This allows him to deflect future primary criticisms of him being in the pockets of billionaires by saying it's just the badly implemented and foolish state level tax he opposes.
He doesn't actually care about wealth taxes as a policy one way or another, except insofar as they help or hinder his way to the White House. But his current strategy balances the competing stories he's selling to donors and primary voters in a reasonable way.
Well he kinda is in the pocket of billionaires, just not all the billionaires. But the tech and Amazon-type golden goose needs to be kept alive and not slaughtered to open it for more eggs, and Newsom is smart enough to realise that. So Keep California Safe For Moguls, and the rest of the country has no moguls (except maybe Noo Yawk) and he doesn't care if the Easterners are stupid enough to kill their geese.
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All accounts of Newsom I've heard from Democrats who would be close enough to him to know - which isn't many, to be fair - has him pegged as an empty suit with no beliefs of his own that will say whatever is necessary to gain power. This was criticism levied against prior Democratic POTUS candidates Hillary Clinton and John Kerry, neither of whom succeeded in their runs. Presuming that these accounts about Newsom are true, surely Newsom himself knows the relatively low recent success rate of Democratic POTUS candidates with this kind of personality. So I'm left wondering what his play for the POTUS is, since it's been considered essentially common knowledge that he would run in 2028 since at least 2024 (the oft-repeated claim that Trump's election in 2024 means the end of democracy in America notwithstanding). Perhaps he will shock the world and just not run in 2028 and is playing 4D chess to set himself up for a successful 2032 or 2036 run?
While I have heard the same I would also have caution - Newsom from what I can tell is like Vance, lots of accusation about phoniness/empty suit/whatever and it's convincing enough that people close to them and on the same side agree.
On the other hand plenty of people disagree and think they got the stuff. This is in contrast to the classic empty suit: Hillary, who seems privately hated by everyone.
Additionally Newsom is legit charismatic, in a way that Vance, Harris, and Clinton are not.
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Honestly I don’t think he would even make it out of a fair Democratic Party primary. He would whiff it big with the Deep South, which is the most important region in Democratic primaries. Now given the recent track record I think there’s a good chance he gets a rigged primary and wins that, but he would flop in the general against basically anyone. He’s the white male Kamala Harris.
Among the California electorate, he's consistently run 7 or so points ahead of Kamala. That's still a touch below the average Democratic politician--Kamala always did extremely poorly, even among California Democrats--but he's a stronger politician.
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It's worth noting that, whatever their other faults, Kerry and Hillary did survive the primary process and get nominated. If his model is "I have the most control over the outcome of the primary process; the general election will be decided on economic macrotrends," then it makes sense.
The other Clinton was the ur-triangulator, and he was very successful, though the political climate now is sufficiently different that it's hard to draw useful generalizations from it.
Newsom isn't optimizing for Democrat-as-President; he's optimizing for Newsom-as-President. It's impossible for him to sell himself as a principled left wing ideologue or a committed moderate reformer. Given his biography and character traits, maybe he's making the calculation that, win or lose, baldly embracing reptilian cunning and ambition is a better strategy for him than trying to win people over based on trying to sell another narrative.
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Yeah, my view is that he was really obligated to Biden who swung the party behind him and supported him all the way during the recall election that failed. Newsom might have managed that on his own, but Biden's support was the signal that everyone better settle down and stop making waves for the rest of the Dems.
Ambition, since he is a politician. Vanity, since he's Gavin. Yearning for more, since the governorship is as high as he can get and that's term-limited. Manoeuvring for influence and moving into a position where he's a string-puller in the party at large, perhaps. He's still young in political terms, maybe if he figures the Clintons are on the way out eventually he wants the new dynasty to be the Newsoms?
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