Reflecting on Zohran Mamdani’s inauguration speech yesterday, Corey Robin argues that the Left must now embrace excellence rather than ceding it to the Right, fighting for the flourishing of all people as the aspiration of a truly democratic society.
Personally I’m pretty sure that Mamdani first got Trump to respect him (for his unusual steadfastness), fear him even (for his ability to rally broad support), and then, against this unspoken background unsettling Trump, showed Trump how he could benefit in terms of public esteem by working together with him. Among other things, Mamdani obviously also drove home the sentiment to Trump that they share the same fate of being a very smart and important person “in here” who is being treated very unfairly by a laughable media class “out there”, and managed to bond over that.