Why did the Democrats cave in on the shut down? It seems clear that the main issue was not electoral backlash, since most of the senators who caved are not up for reelection, and the politics were trending in the Democrats’ favor, or at least not against them. The main issue was the filibuster. There was growing pressure from Trump on the Republicans to get rid of it, and the Democratic leadership had every reason to fear its elimination. Why? It has very little to do with preserving their power while they are in the minority; that ship has obviously sailed. The Democratic leadership doesn’t want to get rid of the filibuster for the same reason the Republican leadership doesn’t […]
I wasn’t going to address the controversy over what Zohran Mamdani did or didn’t say about the phrase “globalize the intifada.” But now that Hakeem Jeffries, the Minority Leader of the Democrats in the House, has decided to weigh in on it, on the Sunday morning talk shows no less—specifically, by invoking the fear that Jewish New Yorkers like me are supposed to be feeling when we hear the phrase being used—I think it’s worth a comment or two. Jeffries claims that Mamdani needs to “clarify his position” on the phrase, which is silly, because the only reason Jeffries is even talking about Mamdani’s position is that he has clarified it. On June 17, Tim Miller, an interviewer for The […]
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Categories
Jews, Middle East, Palestine and Israel, The Left, The Right, The State
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Tags Andrew Cuomo, Brooklyn College, Edith Wharton, Hakeem Jeffries, Kirsten Gillebrand, Margaret Litvin, Peter Beinart, Zohran Mamdani