OPINION:
Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea are all one needs to know about when considering whether to support the “warmth of collectivism” touted by recently installed New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani (“The ‘warmth of collectivism’ is a bloody lie,” Web, Jan. 3).
Mr. Mamdani has compared that philosophy — better known as communism, socialism or progressivism — with rugged individualism and somehow deemed it the better way to go for the common man. Historians can remind Americans of the hundreds of millions of deaths caused by such regimes, but that intelligence, as before, will likely fall on deaf ears among those hungry for handouts, those ignorant of consequences and those who believe they are embracing a harmless, fashionable ideology.
Even today, here in America, a comparison of Democratic jurisdictions’ crime statistics, homelessness, hunger and failing public education systems with the outcomes in conservatively governed locales demonstrates vividly the failure and danger of these leftist systems. It may be that like those attracted to a siren song, people who vote in favor of such diminishment simply do not understand the consequences of that to which they are attracted.
If the new mayor is successful in implementing his “warm” agenda, then New York City will suffer even more from a savagely harmful dream. The winners will be an elite, selected few who will grasp increasing amounts of power and the spoils that prosper in the midst of corruption and self-aggrandizement. Sen. Bernard Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are two grand examples.
H. LEE LAPOLE
Loveland, Ohio
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