OP-ED: Zohran Mandami will be New York’s version of Olivia Chow

Sue-Ann Levy writes, "To those New Yorkers about to vote in a Socialist as mayor, I would only say, 'Be careful what you wish for.'"

Source: Facebook

To those New Yorkers about to vote in a Socialist as mayor, I would only say, “Be careful what you wish for.”

This is what I predict under Zohran Mandami, should he win: A debt and crime-ridden city. Free buses and subways are full of the indigent and homeless. A severe carving out of NYC’s tax base as those who have means vote with their feet and choose to leave the city.

A spike in drug addicts urinating and defecating on the city’s streets and a police force made impotent, unable and unwilling to deal with the criminal element.

Of course, there’s the influx of Jew-hating immigrants who will be encouraged to scream Islamophobia every time someone looks at them the wrong way.

I’ve spent many years covering politics — municipal and provincial — and can truly say that radical leftists are great at getting elected but terrible at governing.

I refer specifically to David Miller, mayor of Toronto from 2005-2009 and Kathleen Wynne, premier from 2013-2018.

• Both put Toronto and Ontario hugely in debt and walked away with barely a second thought. Wynne, in fact, destroyed the provincial Liberal party and they have yet to recover.

However, I bring you specifically to the current socialist mayor, Olivia Chow.

There are so many similarities between Mandami and Chow, I find it unbelievable.

As I’ve discovered, socialists operate from the same playbook, down to not only embracing the same policies but repeating the same narratives like taxing the rich to give freebies and bailouts to the more impoverished and illegal immigrants.

Both have very little experience needed to run a huge city, in particular the 34-year-old Mandami, who never really held down a job except for being a rapper and a lackey on one of his mom’s films.

Chow is not much better, having never worked in the private sector. She went from Toronto school trustee to councillor to MP (under the tutelage of her then husband and NDP leader Jack Layton), to university lecturer, to mayor.

She has lived off four public sector pensions.

Both are anti-Semites, although Chow’s determined lack of support for Toronto’s Jewish community really only came out after the atrocities of 10-7.

Mandami has made no secret of his support — in no particular order — for Jihad, Palestinians, Hamas and Intifada.

He is unapologetic about calling the Israel-Hamas conflict a “genocide” – untrue and inflammatory.

He comes by it honestly. His father, Mahmoud, a Columbia professor, sits on the Hamas-linked Gaza Tribunal, which has called for the U.S. and Israel to face war charges. He is also said to have pushed the boycott of Israel at Columbia.

Mandami talks incessantly about affordable housing, although the only way he thinks he can accomplish this is by taxing the rich white neighbourhoods and billionaires. Chow is of the same mentality but her repeated tax hikes–used mostly for frivolous expenditures– have hurt the middle class and seniors as well.

Mandami has gone one step further by pledging to offer free buses and government-run grocery stores, the latter straight out of the Cuba handbook.

As the Iron Lady once mused, the problem with socialism is that sooner or later, you run out of other people’s money.

If Mandami is elected, I predict there will be an exodus of the wealthy from NYC either to other states surrounding New York or to Florida, which, of course, will severely impact the tax base he hopes to use to fund his schemes.

Like Chow, Mandami wants to send social workers and crisis councillors to the streets and subways to deal with mentally ill and violent criminals.

That has worked so well in Toronto, ridership is way down and the TTC is struggling financially, with a recent report showing buses and streetcars arrive on time just 61% of the time.

Transit riders say they’re still afraid to take the TTC, especially in winter when the subway cars become a moving shelter for the homeless.

He has also talked about defunding the police, a far-left narrative repeated ad nauseam

In Toronto, the police have not been defunded, but they certainly have been neutered. All one has to do is watch how the intimidation by terrorist sympathizers has escalated on Toronto’s streets as the police cross their arms and watch.

Mandami has also talked about bringing in safe injection sites, which have proven to be an absolute disaster in Toronto.

I have written many stories about the drug addicts who park themselves often screaming incoherently on the sidewalks outside such sites – sometimes defecating and urinating in full public view.

The commonalities among voters who brought in Chow and are about to elect Mandami are striking as well.

In Toronto, a far-left contingent of easily manipulated voters, seduced by freebies and handouts, and led to believe the right of centre candidates were frightening, put Chow in office.

The vote was split between candidates on the right, allowing Chow to dance to a win.

The same appears to be coming to pass in NYC, where Curtis Sliwa and Andrew Cuomo will put Mandami in office by the refusal of one of them to drop out of the race.

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The only difference here in Toronto is that the honeymoon has long worn off and many find Chow an embarrassment, not to mention a horrible mayor.

I predict the same will happen in NYC – sadly – but not until it’s far too late.