I'm confused. That's the poll I was referencing, and it says 45%. Am I missing something?
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Zohran Mamdani
- Thread starter The Atheist
- Start date
I'm confused. That's the poll I was referencing, and it says 45%. Am I missing something?
plague311
Great minds think...
I thought you were referencing New Yorkers, not just general favorability across the nation. I found one that relates to both so I was confused as well but have since sorted it out, per my edit to my previous post.
Ah, I saw your edit. Yeah I was talking in general, makes sense there's going to be some variations in subgroups and such but it's good they're optimistic about the future.
Tristan Chi
Critical Thinker
Yawn. Social democrats are the default here. Pretty benign although slightly boring.
Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
I notice you totally ignored the whole question of how bringing up an example of a candidate that got attention just because they "said something different" and failed might be relevant to other candidates who similarly got attention for "saying something different".
Great, so what do you want to talk about...
We can talk about how he is bringing in a rent freeze, despite the fact that the majority of economists (including many left-leaning ones) think rent controls are a bad idea, because it causes a reduction in housing supply. And while it may be a popular policy (at least at first) it tends to cause more harm than good in the long run.
Maybe we can talk about how he originally suggested a 9.5% property tax increase (which would affect pretty much every homeowner, not just the wealthy ones like you suggested), and then had to walk his proposal back? If he is going to make a bunch of high-priced campaign promises, perhaps he should, you know, figure out how he's going to pay for them BEFORE he gets elected. Do you really want someone with a bunch of half-thought out policies who is going to fail because he didn't plan everything through?
Or we can talk about how he promised he was going to have Netanyahu arrested if he ever came to New York, and then had to admit he wouldn't do that, because regardless of how bad of a person Netanyahu is, he just doesn't have the authority. We can discuss which is worse... the idea he might have promised something that couldn't be delivered (bad enough during an election; remember, we mocked Trump for making the same sort of "cannot be done" promises), or the idea that a mayor might try to exercise direct control over law enforcement. (Normally we should be leaving the whole "arrest that man" decisions up to the police and/or the prosecutors. Allowing a mayor to make law enforcement decisions is opening up things for abuse. Remember, Trump gets criticized because it is thought he is influencing the prosecution of people like Comey and James; Mamdami should be held to the same standard.)
Or maybe we can talk about how someone in his administration was planning on meeting the Iranian ambassador, until the meeting was cancelled because city people meeting representatives of a country you are at war with is probably a bad idea. Supposedly Mamdami did not know about the meeting, but it does bring up the question about why his commissioner (someone named Ana Archila, a person with no experience in international relations) had arranged the meeting in the first place. Perhaps he should re-think some of his staffing decisions.
Now none of these (except for maybe the rent controls thing) should be considered an insurmountable problem, more the sort of actions you might expect from someone "new to the office". And he has had some success (for example dealing with winter storms) But it should also keep people from thinking he is some sort of "champion" until you see how things play out over the long term.
Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
I think its a little early to say he as done "really well". You really need to wait and see how things will play out.
Supposedly he is opening up 2000 free childcare slots to start, but that is just a small fraction of what is needed. It will be years before the program is in place city-wide and targets all age ranges.
And, there are other issues. How to find the funding (initially the state will be paying for a lot of it, but that might not be permanent), how to get the appropriate staffing, etc.
And there are additional problems/questions... will people who work outside "core" 9-5 hours have access to daycare? If spacing is limited at first, what will you do if there are 2 people who both need a free slot?
The Atheist
Psychopath
- Joined
- Jul 3, 2006
- Messages
- 38,103
Sorry, but those walls of text may be interesting, but I'm too busy chuckling:
Maybe 4 or 5 times the next-highest number.
Maybe 4 or 5 times the next-highest number.
Brainster
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- May 26, 2006
- Messages
- 22,348
The combination of those two would have been quite a whack to property owners--a large increase in one of your biggest expenses combined with no increase in rental income would almost certainly result in scrimping on maintenance, which is already a common complaint about rent-controlled apartments in NYC:
That used to be the advantage of being a hardcore leftist; you didn't have to worry about where the money is going to come from, because the odds of your winning were so small.
mumblethrax
Species traitor
- Joined
- Apr 5, 2004
- Messages
- 5,203
The proposed property tax hike was not a means of paying for his agenda. It was a means of closing the budget gap he inherited from his predecessor (which was much larger than anticipated, due in part to chronic underbudgeting). There's no way he could have anticipated the need to do so during the campaign, so it's silly to expect that he would have figured it out beforehand.
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Donal
Philosopher
- Joined
- Sep 8, 2006
- Messages
- 9,378
Why do people do this?
"Hey, your solution didn't solve every single problem that exists, so we'll just stay with the status quo that we all agree is awful." And then claim they are being "too radical" implementing big changes?
plague311
Great minds think...
Oh thank God I'm not the only one thinking this because it was killing me reading through the whole rant.
"A rent freeze is terrible!"
"Is it worse than what's happening now?"
"It could be! There are leftist economists that think so!"
"Ok"
"The Childcare idea doesn't cover every age range and it doesn't cover every hour of the day for everyone!"
"Ok, is it worse than what they have now?"
"...."
"His subordinate did something stupid, and he didn't know about it! Is that what you want?"
"The event got caught, canceled, and hasn't happened again. What now?"
"...."
"Mamdani has ideas that will cost money and he hasn't figured out a way to pay for it! He's using outside resources to patch the budget!"
"So he's using resources that are available, he's balanced the budget (at least in the short term), which neither of his predecessors did, but now, for him, this is a huge ◊◊◊◊◊◊◊ travesty?"
That's why I literally posted a poll saying that New Yorkers think the city is "trending in the right direction". To New Yorkers, you know the people that matter here, he seems to be championing the little people. That's a good thing.
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Out of curiosity, what kinds of things have been tried to help with the rent freeze/no motivation to maintain problem? On the face of it wouldn't they be able to offer subsidised maintainence or something if your property is subject to rent freeze, or would that just end up going poof in a cloud of kickbacks and like 1 can of paint?
theprestige
Penultimate Amazing
This is one of those Country of Europe things.
"Our socialists are by and large reasonable people, who appreciate free markets and political compromise as much as they appreciate a robust and equitable social safety net... So American socialists must be just as nice."
Somehow it never seems to occur to Europeans that Americans might bring all of the hubris, bombast, ignorance, and ugliness that seems to be the American idiom to socialism just like they bring it to everything else.
Yawn. Pickup trucks are common here. Pretty benign although slightly boring.
Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
I don't think subsidizing maintenance would really be a solution, for a number of reasons.
First of all, I think it would be politically unpopular. The question "Why are you giving money to these greedy landlords" would invariably be raised.
Secondly, lack of maintenance is not the only problem rent controls cause. A reduction in supply and an increase in demand also results (even if the units are maintained adequately.)
Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
Because I am not part of the cult that seems to be springing up around Mamdami?
Keep in mind that at no point did I say the childcare program was a failure. Nowhere did I say that it was necessarily a bad idea. Nowhere did I say that the 'status quo' was acceptable.
All I said was that AT THIS POINT IN TIME, calling it a 'success' before even the first child is placed is premature.
It may be the greatest thing to happen to child-care since the invention of vaccines. Or it may crash and burn as they realize that cannot find the manpower or funding to properly implement it. Or it may be somewhere in the middle... a combination of good and bad. I certainly hope it is closer to the first than the second.
But acknowledging that there are unknowns that could cause serious problems to the program should not be considered some sort of evil sin.
plague311
Great minds think...
Yet celebrating a man that's giving New Yorkers hope for the future and genuinely doing what he feels is best to help the citizens under his purview seems to be? You seem to be at the complete opposite end of the spectrum. You seem almost insulted that people are giving props to a man that's, at least according to the people, making their city better. Why is that?
Trausti
Illuminator
Do they? It appears that the rent control board is to take costs/maintenance into consideration when setting rates, but there's no handouts for landlords.
I'm not denying this but I would like to see your sources, because you admit to ignoring many news sources.