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Candidates for New York mayor face off in final debate<\/p>\n
Andrew Cuomo, Zohran Mamdani, and Curtis Sliwa clashed over Trump, housing, crime, and sexual harassment claims.<\/p>\n
I am writing this on a plane between New York\u00a0City\u00a0and Detroit, which is fitting, because\u00a0I have lived in both\u00a0places.\u00a0Each of them will\u00a0elect a new mayor\u00a0this week, and traditionally if\u00a0Americans\u00a0assumed\u00a0which one would be facing major\u00a0ugly\u00a0issues\u00a0at election time, from\u00a0crushing economics to\u00a0homelessness to\u00a0nasty accusations between the candidates,\u00a0they might\u00a0assume\u00a0Detroit.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Not anymore.\u00a0<\/p>\n
At the quarter pole of the 21st\u00a0century, it\u00a0is\u00a0New York City\u00a0in the spin cycle\u00a0of chaos, with a\u00a0mayor\u2019s\u00a0race\u00a0that is\u00a0ugly and roiling the populace<\/a>. The Big Apple, which has been dealing with\u00a0a\u00a0population exodus\u00a0over the last five years\u00a0while\u00a0remaining\u00a0the most expensive city in the nation,\u00a0may be\u00a0on the precipice of electing\u00a0Zohran\u00a0Mamdani,\u00a0a\u00a0controversial\u00a034-year-old\u00a0<\/a>with no\u00a0real experience\u00a0in running anything.\u00a0<\/p>\n This would follow three different mayors over the last 12 years: Michael Bloomberg, <\/a>criticized\u00a0for\u00a0favoring the rich, adopting a \u201cstop and frisk\u201d police policy, and\u00a0regulating sugary drinks; Bill DeBlasio<\/a>,\u00a0who was\u00a0seen as arrogant,\u00a0bad\u00a0on the homeless\u00a0issue and\u00a0police, and\u00a0more interested in running for president, and Eric Adams<\/a>,\u00a0so\u00a0embroiled in\u00a0a federal indictment\u00a0for\u00a0bribery and\u00a0fraud,\u00a0and\u00a0\u201ctoo-cozy\u201d\u00a0criticism\u00a0with the\u00a0Trump administration,\u00a0that his bid for reelection fizzled quickly.\u00a0<\/p>\n During that same time, Detroit has had\u00a0just\u00a0one mayor, Mike Duggan<\/a>, who led the city out of bankruptcy, heavily\u00a0eliminated\u00a0the blight issues,\u00a0brought down crime, brought up investment,\u00a0and recently boasted an 84% approval rating.\u00a0<\/p>\n Slight\u00a0difference, huh?\u00a0<\/p>\n The Best of New York?\u00a0<\/p>\n In New York,\u00a0Mamdani\u00a0has divided\u00a0the voters\u00a0\u2014 and\u00a0in many ways,\u00a0the nation \u2014\u00a0as to his intentions, his\u00a0qualifications\u00a0and his honesty.\u00a0<\/p>\n His proponents see him as a fresh face unbeholden to the political machine, an advocate\u00a0for the poor and the\u00a0marginalized, a\u00a0Muslim\u00a0man who\u00a0knows what it means to battle\u00a0hate,\u00a0and\u00a0a young guy\u00a0who\u00a0gets that the cost of renting an apartment in New York is insane, like\u00a0pretty much everything\u00a0else there.\u00a0<\/p>\n His critics see him as\u00a0a\u00a0slick\u00a0product of the social media age,\u00a0an anti-rich, antisemitic\u00a0activist\u00a0with unworkable ideas borne from the\u00a0Democratic\u00a0Socialist party\u00a0to which\u00a0he proudly\u00a0claims membership. They\u00a0paint\u00a0him as a\u00a0hypocritical\u00a0poser, claiming to\u00a0be\u00a0marginalized when his father is an Ivy League professor and his\u00a0mother\u00a0an Oscar-nominated film director.\u00a0<\/p>\n Many\u00a0New Yorkers don\u2019t like\u00a0Mamdani,\u00a0but\u00a0their\u00a0alternatives\u00a0are\u00a0hardly exciting:\u00a0There\u2019s\u00a0former-Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who resigned in disgrace over sexual\u00a0harassment\u00a0charges\u00a0and seems to be running for the last office he\u00a0can, or\u00a0Curtis\u00a0Sliwa, the omnipresent founder of the Guardian Angels, who ran four years ago and had no chance, and has no chance this time, either.\u00a0<\/p>\n The\u00a0real question in New York may not be why\u00a0Mamdani\u00a0is leading, but why, in a city of\u00a08.5 million people, are these three the best they can\u00a0come up with?\u00a0<\/p>\n Detroit gets public support\u00a0<\/p>\n Now consider Detroit.\u00a0Duggan, a White mayor in a city that is 77% Black and 8% Latino, has\u00a0led for a dozen years of relative calm.\u00a0When other cities \u2014 including New York \u2014 raged,\u00a0burned\u00a0and saw massive looting\u00a0during the George Floyd aftermath,\u00a0Detroit\u00a0held steady. It endured COVID-19\u00a0better than many major metropolises.\u00a0Businesses continued to\u00a0invest in\u00a0downtown. And after years of diminishing\u00a0population, the numbers are going the other way.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n A\u00a0recent poll shows that 76% of Detroiters <\/a>think the city is heading in the right direction.\u00a0Seventy-six percent?\u00a0<\/p>\n