Ross Douthat At The NY Times: ‘The Contradictions Of Liberal Populism:
Are a lot of wealthier, liberal-minded, New Yorkers really prepared to go full de Blasio if their own money and hard work end-up on the table (er, I mean, the People’s Table)?
Douthat:
‘…it seems to me that in New York and nationally, the class interests of the so-called HENRYs (“high earners, not rich yet”) still basically align with some form of late-1990s Clintonism rather than the more sweeping post-Obama populism than liberals are getting excited about today.’
De Blasio will have to maintain the kinds of real-estate, Wall Street, and union negotiations that all NYC mayors have to maintain (he is a landlord of sorts, managing the rents), but he’s clearly going heavy on the unions. I’d say he’s not just committed to public education, mainly through wealth extraction, he’s committed to his own coalitions and bedfellows controlling public education. It may prove tough to keep wealthier New Yorkers on-board alongside the grit and ever-present corruption of big-city machine politics.
Many NYC and national media outlets seem committed to a kind of soft liberalism that clearly leans Democratic on many issues, so de Blasio can’t afford to neglect the deep reserves of mainstreamed green public sentiment, sex and gender equity issues, and technocratic diversity-speak that form the stuff of campaigns either. Fewer media outlets may want to be seen on the fast track to progressive paradise and Leftist solidarity, but will simply feel more comfortable holding the soft liberal ideals aloft any chance they get, especially if it gets ugly.
On that note, Thomas Sowell, ex-Marxist, had this to say about de Blasio’s inauguration speech in the ‘Trickle-Down Lie‘:
‘But, contrary to Mayor de Blasio, this is not a view confined to people on the “far right.” Such liberal icons as Presidents John F. Kennedy and Woodrow Wilson likewise argued that tax rates can be so high that they have an adverse effect on the economy.’
***Thanks to a friend, I nominate this SNL skit for an appropriate de Blasio nickname.
Related On This Site: What Will De Blasio’s New York Look Like?-Some Links…Sandinistas At The NY Times: ‘A Mayoral Hopeful Now, de Blasio Was Once a Young Leftist’…Two Links On Diane Ravitch & School Reform
Richard Epstein At Defining Ideas: ‘City Planners Run Amok’…Virginia Postrel At Bloomberg: ‘How The Elites Built America’s Economic Wall’...The Irish were a mess: William Stern At The City Journal: ‘How Dagger John Saved New York’s Irish’
Politicians and politics likely won’t deliver you from human nature, nor fulfill your dreams in the way you want: anarchy probably won’t either: Two Sunday Quotations By Albert Jay Nock in ‘Anarchist’s Progress’
Josh Barro At Business Insider: ‘Dear New Yorkers: Here’s Why Your Rent Is So Ridiculously High’