Why All The Fuss About Mamdani?

Writing about Zohran Mamdani has been on my todo list for a while.  I'm finally getting around to it on election night.  

As I begin writing, NPR has declared Mikie Sherrill the winner of the New Jersey governor's race (with 57% of the vote) and Abigail Spanberger the winner of the Virginia governor's race (56%), but they haven't declared a winner in the New York mayor's race.  Mamdani is ahead with 49% of the vote followed by Cuomo with 41% of the vote, with 60% of the votes counted.  

Who is Mamdani?  Mamdani is a special candidate.  He's articulate, quick witted, innovative, funny, and has great charisma.  

He was born in Uganda.  His dad is a Muslim Indian from Gujarati.  He also happens to be a university professor at Columbia.  His mom, a Hindu Indian, and a Harvard graduate, is the world renowned film maker Mira Nair.  His family moved to South Africa and then, when Mamdani was seven, to the United States.  

His was a relatively privileged childhood - though he was a dark skinned male in racist USA.  I imagine he met a lot of very interesting people around the family dinner table.  He graduated from Bowdoin College and before running for office, was a hip hop artist.  (All this from Wikipedia.)

Given his African and Indian  roots and family's achievements, I reckon that his world view is much bigger and more inclusive than most USians.  

Why has the winner of the Democratic primary been so attacked, to the extent that the loser in that primary,  Andrew Cuomo has run as an independent in today's general election?

Basically he's been attacked with several of the GOP 'epithets.  Words that most people couldn't accurately define, but just know they mean the person is a terrible person.  Let's look at them:

• Muslim 
• Socialist
• Progressive

He's also been called 'anti-Semetic' based, apparently, on the fact that he's Muslim and has publicly said that Israel is carrying out genocide in Gaza.  It's hard to distinguish what people say he has said from what he has actually said.  When I googled 'what has Mamdani said about Gaza?'  many, if not most, of the sites that came up were Israeli media.  

Muslim in GOP dialect means 'terrorist', non-Christian, anti-Semite 

Socialist means the same as Communist to the target audience and it means bad things.  Not sure what the people who get riled up over these terms think they mean.  But something anti-capitalist and anti-personal freedoms, and clearly anti-American..  

Progressive, as Trump uses it, means anti-American, pro-trans, and anti-white.

The basic things that Mamdani has campaigned on, as I understand it watching from Alaska, are making New York housing more affordable in part with a rent freeze, free transit and child care, and taxing the very rich to help pay for it.  

So who is the opposition?  This would seem pretty obvious

• the very rich see him as a threat 
• landlords (often part of the very rich) don't want anyone who wants to keep rents "affordable' 
• people who are strongly pro-Israel   
• establishment Democrats

When we first came to Anchorage we went to a couple of AIPAC presentations.  I was very impressed by how well organized, how well spoken, and how prepared they were with every detail of their presentation.  But it was also clear that they were very hardline pro-Israel.  If anyone had an even slightly critical question about Israel, it was politely, authoritatively and firmly answered,  There was no acknowledgement that things might not be perfect.  In response to AIPACs hard line, another less rigid Israeli lobbying group - J-Street formed.  

We saw after the primary that New York Democratic politicians were reluctant to endorse Mamdani.  In part, probably in large part, AIPAC  (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) was lobbying politicians strongly - like House Minority leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, whose district is in New York - NOT to endorse Mamdani.  Jeffries only endorsed Mamdani on October 24, less than two weeks before the election.  

Another factor that some have pointed out, is that older Democratic leadership, have gotten set in their ways - their policy positions, how they interact with Republicans, the the perks of office.  But a younger, less white, less male cadre of politicians believe their stands on some issues are out of date and week; and their genteel behavior are no match for the ruthlessness of the Republicans.  People like AOC and now Mamdani challenge their seniority and everything else.  

Making Mamdani seem like an enemy of Israel matters in New York because it has the largest Jewish population in the US.  There are conservative Jews who are strongly pro-Israel no matter what.  But probably more Jews are concerned about how Israel has killed so many Palestinians and are strongly opposed to Netanyahu.  

In Mamdani's case, electing a Muslim, means, it would seem, to AIPAC electing a politician they can't control.  

Another group that strongly supports the Israeli government are Fundamentalist Christians.

 

But not every Muslim fits the GOP stereotype.  Certainly not Mamdani.  He's taken his life experiences and charm and created a monster volunteer group to get out the vote.  He doesn't back down at charges of being progressive.  But he does all that with his charming smile.  

As I finish this post, Mamdani has not been declared the winner  with 50.4% of the vote to Cuomo's 41.6%  

He's going to have a lot of powerful people still fighting his agenda.  But he's surprised the establishment - both the party establishment and the New York establishment with his unique and successful campaign for mayor.  Let's see if he can keep that organization going and and make New York City a more affordable place to live.  

I think he's the future of the party, but the old guard won't just roll over.  

Anchorage Stands With Ukraine As Trump and Putin Seem To Be Heading Here

I say seem because so many people think that one or the other or both will pull out at the last minute.  But the first protest (that I know of) was this afternoon.  Lots of peoples, lots of rumors, lots of questions, lots of noise, lots of cars and trucks honking with the protestors, cars with Ukrainian flags. 

You'd think that Putin and Trump meeting in Alaska to discuss a cease fire in Ukraine would be at the top of the news, but Trump leaves so much debris in his wake, that there are a dozen stories competing.  And so none get the attention and outrage they deserve.  

• Texas redistricting and California's response.  
• Federal troops taking over Washington DC.  
• Masked and armed thugs claiming to be ICE continuing to sweep up dark people without regard to their legal status, including US citizens, and shipping them off to distant detention centers, and possibly off to countries which apparently are getting payoffs to take them from Trump, 
• The massive wealth vacuum in the White House, cementing the Rose Garden and making the East Wing of the White House into a glitzy ballroom
• Shaking down universities and other institutions that pursue truth
• Firing the head of the BLS because he doesn't like her employment data
• Leaning on institutions to erase all history of people who aren't white

I could go on, but you get the point.  But much of what Trump does these days is terrible by itself, and a distraction from releasing the Epstein files.  Is that what this trip to Alaska is?  

It was supposed to go from 4:30-6;00 on one of the busiest corners in rush hour Anchorage - Northern Lights and Seward Highway.  I got there about 5:20 after picking up our weekly CSA vegetables at Grow North Farm in Mountain View.  

I couldn't tell you how many people were there altogether - 500?  1000? 1500?  Couldn't say.  Lots.  Planning really started at a meeting on Monday!

There were lots of rumors flying and I'm going to check out one right after I post this.  That rumor was that the Russian delegation asked for 400 visas and then for rooms.  They finally got put up at the University of Alaska Anchorage dorms.  I'll go over there shortly and see if I see any Russians.  

Rooms are scarce.  It's high tourist season.  So pictures for now and I'll fill in when I get back from the UAA dorms.  

[UPDATE: 11:10pm - Back from campus. The rumors are true.  See the next post for more details and pictures.]

This is an Estonian journalist.  Estonians have a strong interest in what happens in Ukraine.  They have lots of Russians and are a very small country that borders Russia.  

And below a Polish journalist asked my friend John some questions.  

Her 

I understand that this flag was sewn here in Anchorage this week.  It has a lot of smaller pieces sewn together sort of like a quilt.  

This guy was still there well after six when most folks had gone home already.  

This is Erin Jackson-Hill who heads Stand Up Alaska and was the driving force at the center of this rally.

 

ICE-Free Refugee Day Celebration (And More)

RAIS (Refugee Assistance and Immigration Services) is among the groups that help folks under the umbrella of Catholic Social Services in Anchorage,  (I'd also say I've never seen a trace of proselytizing  in any of the RAIS activities.)

Yesterday, Thursday, June 26, was the first day of their summer CSA program pick up.  That's Community Supported Agriculture - a program where consumers pay farmers upfront and then pick up fresh vegetables every week.  In Alaska, that is necessarily limited to summer.  

I first learned and blogged the term CSA in March 2009 when I was a volunteer with an NGO (non-governmental organization, what we call non-profit) in Chiangmai, Thailand.  Here's that post which talks about CSAs in general and what was happening in Chiangmai specifically.  

Because it was the first day of Grow North Farm's 2025 CSA distribution there was also a celebration for World Refugee day. with music, dancing, art activities, and food from around the world. (That sentence was more or less lifted and edited from the email I got from RAIS.

For the rest of the summer, in addition to the subscribers picking up their veggies, there will be booths where other refugee farmers will be selling their crops.  Here's a blog post from 2022 showing you the variety of things for sale. It's always colorful and people are often wearing the clothing they would wear in their original countries.  There are also people selling baked goods.  The one that captured me last summer - the Egyptian Kitchen - won't be here this summer.  They are in Egypt until fall.  Lots of folks will miss their incredible home made cookies.  

Yesterday, I only saw a couple of tents where people were selling veggies and preserved food.  Most of the booths were services available in Anchorage.  The library was there - my mind's going blank - and there were a number of groups with various arts and crafts activities for kids.  

I spent more time at the Choosing Our Roots table, because it was a group I knew nothing about.  This is Adam in the photo.  He's head of the Board of Directors.  Later, the Executive Director Chami joined us.  Basically this groups helps queer youth find housing and get their feet on the ground.  They work with various groups including Alaska Housing, Alaska Children's Trust, Covenant House, and RAIS.

'Youth' means about 15 to 25.  Chami said she herself had been homeless with a baby and worked herself out of that situation and is now a social worker (I'm pretty sure that's what she said) and a licensed therapist (I'm sure she said that).  So she can counsel these youth with first hand experience of what they are going through.  

This was a very colorful (in the literal sense of that word) event and a photographer's buffet.  Except it wasn't.  Many of the people, for cultural reasons, do not want to be photographed.  

And as the title hints, two different people I mentioned this event to responded, "So ICE will be there?"

So no, I don't want to give ICE any assistance in identifying potential targets.  

I took only a few pictures.  Of course I should have taken pictures of the vegetables, but I wasn't thinking.  We got, as our CSA email listed:  

• Radish
• Spinach
• Sorrel
• Bok Choi
• Either Chamsur or Arugula

Don't know what Chamsur is?  Well, the RAIS email tells us not only what it is, but also how to use it.

"Chamsur is the Nepalese word for Garden Cress - a green which is popular in mountainous regions of Nepal and Afghanistan. Nepalese farmers brought seeds to Fresh International Gardens to experiment with growing Chamsur in Alaska - it proved to be well suited to Anchorage and has grown at the farm every year since! 

Include garden cress in any soup, salad, or sandwich for a tangy flavor. The taste is very similar to that of arugula, so it works great in any wraps, sandwiches, or salads! Add this Green Salad with Garden Cress to your list of tasty summer salads! Or use both your spinach and chamsur in this Chamsur Palungo recipe."

Don't know what to do with sorrel?  Another hint from the email:

"Sorrel is another tangy green, bright and lemony and makes a lovely Ukrainian Sorrel Soup - perfect for a rainy summer day."

I did take a few pictures and I've smudged out the faces of kids and people who might not want ICE to know they were there.  

And if ICE was there, they were unmasked and unarmed and just chilling with everyone else.  Here are a couple of pictures.  

I'm trying folks.  I've got pieces of about five posts that haven't been posted.  So many other things are luring me from the blog.  

I'm trying to decide if I really want to duplicate last summer's 1000 miles (1600+ kilometers) of biking.  I'm at 740k so far.  (That's slightly ahead of last summer.  But there were bike-able days in March this year, and last year I was biking hard the second half of the summer.)

I'm doing Duolingo Turkish everyday.  Sometimes I feel like it's hopeless because it's focused on everything but my speaking.  And while I'm gathering vocabulary and a loose understanding of the grammar (and all the fascinating but maddening suffixes which change tense, change who is acting, indicate coming and going, and many other conditions), I don't think I can actually use it to make oral conversation.  Speaking uses other muscles and parts of the brain than reading, writing, and even listening.  But Turkey is the last place on my list of places I promised myself I'd go to another time.  I passed it up while I was a student in Germany and decided more time in Greece for then, and Istanbul later.  Later is going to be never if I don't do it soon.  

And now I'm taking letters every Monday afternoon to my two Senators and my member of Congress.  I'm trying to find different ways to try to break through to them.  But I do believe that numbers matter to legislators, so I encourage others in Anchorage to join the group.  Just go to their offices (510 L Street for the Senators, 6th and 7th floors, and half a block away (1016 W Sixth Ave Suite #406) between 4pm and 5pm on Mondays.  There's no formal gathering, just people coming and going.  And if you miss a week or two, not a problem.  But I am getting to know the staff.  Begich has a second office in Fairbanks.  And Murkowski and Sullivan offices in Fairbanks, Juneau, Ketchikan, Matsu, Soldotna.  So you folks can also make weekly drop-offs.  

Biking gives me a chance to see what's new and changing in Anchorage, so I have pics on some of those things to put up.  I did post about the closing of Lake Otis at 42nd.  Lake Otis is back working, but work on 42nd continues.

There's somebody working on an ordinance to change local Anchorage elections to ranked choice voting (the State has that, though Republicans are trying again to do away with it) and I'm trying to get more info on who is doing this and how it's going.  I know an Assembly committee had it on their agenda this week.  This would be a great improvement.  

Frustration with Democratic establishment and their problems with the bright young, articulate, members of their party, culminating, most recently, with the Islamaphobic responses to Mamdani's apparent primary win in New York.  For example. Christopher Bouzy, the creator of Twitter alternative Spoutible, writes, "Democratic Leadership Told Rep. Jasmine Crockett She's Too Black and Too Loud."

Gardening and regularly visiting the Alaska Botanical Garden as part of one of my bike routes.  

Don't despair.  Find beauty every day.  Get outside and move your body.  (The biking and gardening) Find good folks to be around.  Find ways to resist.  

There are organizations offering lists of ways to fight back daily.  Taking action is the best antidote for hopelessness.  Here are two that send me regular (not daily) emails with list of ways I can resist:

Peoples Action Institute  

The Digital Drumbeat

Anchorage NO KINGS - "So many problems, so little cardboard"

 Counting the crowd seemed impossible.  There wasn't a spot for me to get higher so I could see the whole gathering.  The May 1 rally had probably over 3000.  This seemed larger, but I couldn't really count.  There were people up on a parking garage nearby and I considered going over there, but instead stayed wandering through the crowd.  The Anchorage Daily News said "thousands" which isn't wrong.  

The crowd was seriously angry about what's happening to the US, but the mood among all these other people who felt the same was cheerful and friendly.  I didn't see any law enforcement uniforms.  I also didn't see a lot of non-white faces.  There were some, but it was pretty white crowd.  And dogs.  And a number of kids.  

These folks at Vet memorial.  On the right
"so many problems, so little cardboard"

The Vet Memorial is on the park strip, a few blocks from the main rally that was on L Street in front of the building houses the offices of our two US Senators.  

There were lots of people headed to L St. with signs as I biked there.  

Mostly I'll let the pictures do the talking.  

  

This one repeats the 'so little cardboard' sentiment, and how I feel.  The president (and his team) do so many impeachable acts, that they all become a blur.  And then someone says something like, "Well, different people have different numbers."  

Well, yeah, but the damning ones are right on the mark or close to it.  This president's done more things before lunch on any one day, that would have gotten any other president in serious trouble, if not impeached.  

So I like this sign - "Ugh! Where do I  Begin?"

On the back he did begin a list.  

I marked the approximate locations of the Anchorage offices of Alaska's two (GOP) Senators.  

It's Alaska, so we don't reject all kings.

That's a chain saw the guy with the clown nose is carrying

You can get a sense of how big the crowd is by looking at how close I am to that building.  The lots we were on were crammed with people, from here up to right in front of the building.  See the closer picture above with the Senators' offices marked on the picture.  

There's the parking garage where I could have gotten a better crowd size picture.  There were folks up there already.

The window washer was cleaning windows up above us and when I watched him, he was ignoring us and working busily.  

The green sign is the back side of "Ugh!  Where do I Begin?"

There are more photos, but you get the picture.  There were speakers, but unless you were on that block, you really couldn't hear them.  

When the hour or so was up, the crowd marched to the Park Strip and joined the folks at the Juneteenth celebration.  

The Rest Of The May Day Anchorage Protest Photos

I  got help from Apple today to fix my problem with AirDropping the pictures on my phone to my laptop.  We did it through Chat.  They denied being AI and wrote they were in the Philippines.  The fix was to go into my phone settings, down to 'transfer or reset phone' and then 'reset'.  I was nervous that I'd lose a bunch of things, but so far it seems ok.  And when I tried to upload the photos it worked.  

So here are more of the photos from the May 1 protest in Anchorage.  The original post is here.