Can't say I'm surprised, but Yang lost his New York mayoral race. However, I am going to say I'm somewhat surprised at the margins. I was under the impression Yang was going to get 3rd place or so, at around 14-15% of the vote on the first round, with it going up as ranked choice voting did its thing. Instead, we're seeing Yang at only 11-12%, in 4th place. So, Yang not only lost, but he did badly, and got totally stomped.
I assumed Adams would win as his polling was strong, but he was only at like 18-20% last I checked in the polls, he's at around 31-32% right now. This reminds me of the 2020 race, with Biden winning the primary overwhelmingly. Honestly, I thought the big loss for yang would come from progressives, and I guess that is somewhat correct, but honestly, I didn't think Adams would do this strongly. What do people see in establishment politicians like Adams? Like I get there's a moderate establishment faction of the democratic party, and I get that they got a lot of support, as well as support from the media, which controls the narrative, but I didn't expect him to win by such a margin. Also, I feel like progressives dropped the ball there, and I'm going to be throwing shade at them too. Yang got so much crap over every statement he made, but Adams seemed to get a pass, even from progressives. Progressives were so focused on purity testing everything Yang ever said and done, while ignoring Adams is even more conservative. If I'm pissed at anything, it's that.
To be fair, Yang didn't do himself any favors. Yang tried to play fake politician by pandering to moderates on certain issues like Israel, and it just made progressives pissed. I know a lot of yang gangers think, given progressive hostility, that the solution for Yang is to pivot to the center, but that's a lie. Centrists have no interest in someone like Yang, if they did, don't you think I would be more charitable to them on this blog? They don't want UBI, or medicare for all, or nice things. They're centrists. Mild conservatives. There's zero reason for someone as progressive like Yang to appeal to them. They're just gonna end up going for Biden or Adams anyway. No, Yang is like an alt-progressive. He's progressive, but a different progressive ideology than progressives. He fails progressive purity tests, but he's also very progressive in his own right. I would know, I have a similar ideology. But he has no coalition. He's going up against both the establishment, that wants nothing to do with an outsider like Yang, and progressives who are becoming increasingly closed minded toward anyone not in their own echo chamber. And to a large extent, Yang's loss is his own fault.
Now, this doesn't mean I blame him. To gain favor with the centrists, IMO, involves selling your soul, giving up all aspirations for actual change, and being as boring, dry, and unwilling to do anything as they are. I don't think the yang gang has a centrist route to winning, because centrists have no intention (en masse at least) of ever embracing UBI. That leaves the progressives, who aren't as theoretically opposed to it, but it conflicts with their emerging ideological vision which ranges from being more traditionally FDR/social democratic to literal socialism. Even though I take swipes at progressives, I believe someone like Yang ultimately needs to work with them to win. And that means that Yang needs to freaking shape up. Yang made many missteps that earned him the ire of progressives. The Israel thing for instance. Open mouth, insert foot. That's on him. At the same time, sometimes they are unfair to him and attacked him worse than the centrist wing did. We on the left tend to eat our own sometimes. I know I take swipes at the left sometimes, but most of it is ideological, and theoretical, and come election time I'm far more accommodating. After all, I supported Bernie, twice. I supported Bernie over Yang even because Yang just has a lot of shortcomings. And I voted green both times in the general. So I'm a friend to progressives, if progressives are a friend to me. I don't feel as welcome among progressives as of late, but that's mainly due to them crapping on UBI and Yang unfairly and making quite frankly unreasonable demands. But generally speaking, I'd rather side with a FDR style progressive over establishment trash.
Anyway, if Yang wants to have a political future, and I admit, this is hard, he needs to build his brand and create a sizeable coalition. Something that can challenge both the establishment, and the burgeoning progressive movement. Also, he needs to gain some political instincts fast. While there's a lot of factors beyond his control here, there's a lot he did wrong, straight up, and he needs to own that.
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