In Show Notes this week (dropping early next week) 99 and I were talking about the NYC mayoral race. There is such a difference in the coverage within the city versus outside of it. The national outlets I follow (more left leaning, admittedly) can’t get enough of Mamdani with Cuomo cast appropriately as the narcissistic ogre that he is. Inside Gotham the media is very different. And ultimately, that might make the difference if Cuomo winds up winning the primary. But if Zohran pulls this off…Oh boy. Sparks are gonna fly all over the country. On the left, the right, the middle. Everywhere.
Here’s why. Most people wouldn’t consider NYC a bellwether because it’s so firmly blue. So why would a primary even matter outside of our little bubble? Because NYC isn’t as blue as you think.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s blue-ish. But the most notable modern NYC mayors were both Republicans. Sort of. Giuliani was obviously a Republican and Bloomberg switched parties so many times it’s hard to keep track. But he’s a fucking billionaire and governed very much like a Republican. Like many other blue states and municipalities, NYC will “bullet the ballot;” always blue on the national stuff but more parochial and conflicted when it comes to local representation.
When it comes to Andrew Cuomo, there are so many other factors at play beyond the headline narrative of “comeback Cuomo is done apologizing.” (I have stories.) But for the average voter this is truly shaping up to be a campaign of ideas. New versus old. Insurgent versus establishment.
Those outside of the city might be surprised to know that AOC is not representative of New York. Not even close. Even here she is the outlier. Among the multiple shades of blue in NYC, the old guard establishment liberal reigns supreme and progressivism is much less welcome than one might imagine.
The bottom line is this. If Mamdani wins it will send shockwaves through the Democratic Party, particularly among insiders who recognize that NYC is far from a progressive bastion. Even if he doesn’t win but makes Cuomo sweat, the message will be received loud and clear. Zohran is proving once again what Bernie did (twice): progressive values resonate and the biggest obstacle to the progressive agenda isn’t the GOP. It’s the Democrats.
Other things I’m obsessing over…
As Kyle points out here, it would be interesting to have someone like Jon Stewart reshape the Democratic Party agenda. Instead we’ll allow self-proclaimed “centrists” like Stephen A. Smith to use their celebrity to generate a wider platform for…for what? I’m sorry, but the SAS hot takes are bad enough. Can we please move past the celebrity politician angle?
A new poll has Zohran Mamdani ahead of Andrew Cuomo for the first time ahead of the Democratic Mayoral Primary in NYC. Polls are whatever but if he pulls this off, good Lord. And I mean that. The Lord is good. And I’m an atheist.
I’ll be honest. Living and breathing this shit everyday takes a toll. I think watching Eddington would give me a fucking heart attack.
-Max
Killer Left Take of the Week
In the spirit of collaboration and giving flowers to deserving fellow leftists, we’re introducing a new segment to highlight a great Left take. The inaugural KLT goes to Leeja Miller for her takedown of Stephen Miller and the firing of veteran journalist Terry Moran.
Donald Trump overrode Governor Gavin Newsom to federalize the California National Guard to police the streets of Los Angeles. Protests over ICE’s deportation tactics are growing, prompting the Trump administration to leverage extreme authority over the protests, with Pentagon head Pete Hegseth warning that he will call in the Marines if necessary. All of this calls into question the limits of presidential authority in domestic civil disturbances and whether Posse Comitatus is still the law of the land. While it’s still on the books, it has been effectively gutted over the past 30 years by multiple administrations through procedural changes to the U.S. Code that have gone largely unnoticed.
Here’s a snippet from the pod:
Max: The cumulative effect of these changes has been to create a theoretical framework where presidents possess virtually unlimited authority to deploy military forces within the United States.
This specific deployment of California National Guard troops in LA illustrates how these authorities now function in practice. President Trump’s invocation of both Title 10 and arguments about “rebellion against U.S. authority” allowed him to override Newsom’s objections and deploy federal forces for immigration enforcement—a use that would have been unthinkable under the original Posse Comitatus framework.
Source: U.S. Census | Chart generated by Perplexity based on U.S. Census Projections
Getting older. In our episode on the May jobs report we did a little back-of-the-napkin math from Census data to illustrate the decline in the 25 to 54 demographic over the next decade. This is the demographic economists pull what they refer to as the “Prime Age Labor Participation” range. The reason this is significant is that the Fed utilizes this data range to gauge the overall health of the labor market. So when Jerome Powell stands firm behind the claim that the labor market is “strong” it’s because there is currently 83% employment among this demographic.
But as the population ages, this is the demo that loses the most absolute population. Widen the lens and the total 18+ labor participation rate falls to 62% currently. With more layoffs coming due to AI, a likely recession this year, and slow long-term recovery under a Trump administration willing to let Americans fall through the cracks, basic math suggests that the overall labor market will decline precipitously. But if they keep building policy around participation in this specific demographic, it will give a false sense of security to the Fed and others that everything is hunky dory, because they’ll be dealing with participation among a smaller pool of workers.
Headlines
Not To Be Ageist, But…
Even if the Democrats are able to regain control of the Congress, it’s hard to imagine our legislators having the wherewithal to combat the tech sector now that Peter Thiel and the like have embedded themselves inside the government. As the Times recently wrote, “When the current Congress was convened in January, there were nearly 120 members who were 70 or older — 86 in the House, including nonvoting delegates, and 33 in the Senate.” Congress typically lags behind innovation when it comes to regulation, and in this case it may never catch up.
From the article:
“As usual, immigrants bore the brunt. The government used AI to trawl through the personal data of thousands of students to find thought crimes. Palantir used its vast data collection apparatus to help the government locate and track undocumented residents. To ensure those immigrants could never collect benefits, the Social Security Administration simply reclassified thousands of people as dead. At the Border Security Expo in Phoenix in April, acting ICE Director Todd Lyons expressed his wish that the government could streamline the logistics of mass deportation. What was needed, he said, according to the Arizona Mirror, was ‘like Prime, but with human beings.’”
This Jacobin article rightly points out how unions still possess the power to galvanize the masses as a force for good. The Los Angeles protests kicked off with the arrest of popular leader David Huerta, a powerful reminder of what happens when you fuck with the organized working class.
From the article:
“It is not just that ICE’s assault of Huerta was an unequivocal image of the agency’s unchecked brutality (though it was), nor simply because Huerta is a galvanizing and clear-eyed public speaker (though he is), nor even because Huerta’s personal identity feels particularly poignant in our age of mass deportation (seeing Huerta, a US citizen descended from Mexican immigrants, manhandled by masked agents leaves no doubt that Stephen Miller’s white supremacist fantasies include disappearing migrants and citizens alike). It was, of course, principally because Huerta is the president of a powerful union, which possesses the infrastructure to immediately organize 750,000 members in California — not to mention at least tens of thousands of community members in solidarity with them.”
The world is a fucking tinderbox and it feels increasingly clear that the Trump administration is happy to let it explode if it distracts from growing tensions at home. Nowhere is this more urgent and real than the exchange of provocations between Israel and Iran right now.
From the article:
“‘Israel has never been stronger and the Iran terror axis has never been weaker,’ Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in February. Iran has been warning that it would retaliate harshly against any Israeli attack. ‘Iran is currently at its highest level of military readiness, and if the United States or the Zionist regime attempts any act of aggression, they will be caught by surprise,’ an unidentified Iranian official told Press TV on Thursday. It is unclear whether Israel has the military power to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities, built deep underground and inside mountains, without direct US involvement – the billions of dollars in military aid that the US gives Israel every year notwithstanding.”
“This November, Brazil will host COP30 in Belém, on the edge of the Amazon rainforest, in what is bound to be a moment packed with symbolism, high expectations, and global significance. This week, Christiana Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac, and Paul Dickinson explore what’s at stake, what Brazil wants to achieve, and whether the world is ready to move from ambition to implementation.”
This recommendation came in from Unf*cker Grantavius: “Great story so far and a good look into why those manufacturing jobs are NOT coming back.”
“After struggling to build its products on three continents, Apple was lured by China’s seemingly inexhaustible supply of cheap labor. Soon it was sending thousands of engineers across the Pacific, training millions of workers, and spending hundreds of billions of dollars to create the world’s most sophisticated supply chain. These capabilities enabled Apple to build the 21st century’s most iconic products—in staggering volume and for enormous profit.”
“Half of the population will be not employed, and everyone has a gun.”
UNFTR YouTube Highlight
Trump is touting his new “Trump Accounts” plan as part of the Big Beautiful Bill Act recently passed by the House and sitting in front of the Senate. The plan would provide $1,000 to every baby born in America between 2025 and 2029 in a tax deferred account that allows matching each year of up to $5,000. It’s a way to encourage savings at a young age and works similar to the successful 529 education funds, but there are key differences. This video dissects the plan and reveals that it’s mostly political theater. It’s really another giveaway to Wall Street that increases inequality because of the way it’s structured. But there’s another reason why the GOP is so keen to pass this plan that has nothing to do with making babies rich and everything to do with erasing entitlements.
“Beyond Pesticides is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., which works with allies in protecting public health and the environment to lead the transition to a world free of toxic pesticides. The founders, who established Beyond Pesticides (originally as National Coalition Against the Misuse of Pesticides) as a nonprofit membership organization in 1981, felt that without the existence of such an organized, national network, local, state and national pesticide policy would become, under chemical industry pressure, increasingly unresponsive to public health and environmental concerns.”
UNFTR Member Question of the Week
You can replace Trump with any current world leader. Who would you choose?
DefinitelyNotB0lsh: I feel selfish even saying this because they need Zelenskyy more than we do. But fuck it would be nice to have an actual leader.
WildEyedBob: Greta Thunberg. Youth, passion, and a laser focus on climate justice would all be welcome changes in our leadership. Putting her body in harms way to try to bring aid to Gaza puts any question of her courage to rest.
"Secret DJ" Bill Schwulst: Freedonia’s President Rufus T. Firefly.
Kastag7: Xi Jinping for the lulz. Also, he’d have to write and honest comparison of the US and Chinese government experience.
.jpg?upscale=true&width=1120&upscale=true&name=MAKING%20RICH%20BABIES%20(1).jpg)
