During a Friday presser from the Oval Office, President Donald Trump offered some rare kind words to New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani after their meeting, saying, "I think he is gonna surprise some conservative people, actually."
I don’t really know what I put there that qualifies as purity testing? If it’s the final paragraph, I should say that it was intended to be unserious; I just wanted an excuse to continue the ‘fetter’ bit.
As stated, I think the situation is very unlikely, to the point that it’s not worth seriously considering unless we have a demonstrable, compelling reason to believe that a flip is presently happening. My point was rather to say that Fetterman’s flip was less unexpected than it would initially seem given what information existed at the time, and if he’d gotten the kind of attention Mamdani did when he was running, it likely wouldn’t have been as surprising as it ended up being. Conversely, however, even after the intense scrutiny Mamdani has received from both the media and people on the left and right, it would be a genuine surprise to me if he was being anything other than truthful about his beliefs and intentions, and so the two aren’t really directly comparable. It is speculation, yes, but it’s not as if it’s entirely baseless, and it leads into the conclusion of ‘all we can do is wait and see. There’s not a reason to be worried at this time, but there are plenty of reasons to be hopeful.’
Plus (and to your point), even if Mamdani turned out to be less progressive or less effective than I’d hoped, so long as he’s this side of sane about the current fascist takeover, then I’d say we should count him as an ally, regardless of anything else mentioned.
I don’t really know what I put there that qualifies as purity testing? If it’s the final paragraph, I should say that it was intended to be unserious; I just wanted an excuse to continue the ‘fetter’ bit.
As stated, I think the situation is very unlikely, to the point that it’s not worth seriously considering unless we have a demonstrable, compelling reason to believe that a flip is presently happening. My point was rather to say that Fetterman’s flip was less unexpected than it would initially seem given what information existed at the time, and if he’d gotten the kind of attention Mamdani did when he was running, it likely wouldn’t have been as surprising as it ended up being. Conversely, however, even after the intense scrutiny Mamdani has received from both the media and people on the left and right, it would be a genuine surprise to me if he was being anything other than truthful about his beliefs and intentions, and so the two aren’t really directly comparable. It is speculation, yes, but it’s not as if it’s entirely baseless, and it leads into the conclusion of ‘all we can do is wait and see. There’s not a reason to be worried at this time, but there are plenty of reasons to be hopeful.’
Plus (and to your point), even if Mamdani turned out to be less progressive or less effective than I’d hoped, so long as he’s this side of sane about the current fascist takeover, then I’d say we should count him as an ally, regardless of anything else mentioned.