Given the clear signal that tens of thousands of people have helped Zohran Mamdani become the Democratic candidate for Mayor (over 50,000 volunteers) and over 400,000 people voted for him in the New York City primary for Mayor, at least some of whom are in our base, and that the wealthy capitalist and real estate interests are being driven wild by his possible Mayoralty, I would like to ask that we write about him without the snark we sometimes use in describing socialists who do not stand for revolution.

Rather, we should respectfully describe his campaign as an example of how public opinion is shifting. This permits, at least in NYC, a wider discussion of alternative ideas of organizing society. Naturally it begins in people considering the reform of capitalism and that is generally good.

The growing wall of resistance from capital to his campaign shows how difficult reforming capitalism is. 

If he wins he may be able to temporarily freeze the rent, or get the buses free, but the latest wild threats from Trump to give less funds to the city demonstrates the notion that every improvement in one area of life in NYC won by working people will be met by a take-away somewhere else.
In fact a win by Mamdani is likely to prove the Marxist position that state power is not a neutral force.  Building a just and more egalitarian society requires that the working class seize the power of the state by revolutionary means and empower the working people to achieve an end to capitalism and the establishment of a communist society.

I plan to work on the Mamdani campaign along with members of my base. I do not plan to do it to stop him from getting elected but to challenge capitalism. A  movement of hundreds of thousands fighting for working class reforms and immigration rights and anti-Zionist positions and against the power of wealth is a movement we should be part of while respectfully in the pages of our paper challenging the notion that “socialists” can take power from the wealthy and usher in the millennium. Only revolutionary communists can do that. While we fight for reforms, it is with the knowledge that reforms are transitory. In an era of increasing inter-imperialist competition, rising Fascism and growing threats of World War, the folks working on the Mamdani campaign along with others can grow into the base of the Party.

Let’s not disrespect them or for that matter their candidate. Argue about the logic of their political position, struggle with and struggle against.