Zohran Mamdani Is Shaking Up Politics Like a Champion—And the Old Guard Doesn’t Know What Hit Them!

Ever wonder if politics could ever be—dare I say—actually fun again? Well, Zohran Mamdani’s New York mayoral campaign is shaking up that dusty old notion with the kind of joy and wit the city hasn’t seen since Jimmy Walker was cutting loose back in 1929. Over the weekend, Mamdani threw a scavenger hunt where the prize was nothing more glamorous than a bag of potato chips—yes, potato chips!—and a chance for folks to snap a selfie with him at the finish line, right at the Little Flower Cafe. If you didn’t know better, you’d think this was a quirky community event, not a political campaign. But here’s the thing: Mamdani’s approach is flipping the script, proving politics isn’t just about holding power—it’s about getting involved, laughing a little, and maybe even loving your city again. Meanwhile, his critics, like former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, are grumbling about “dangerous socialists,” yet Mamdani and his supporters keep spreading that infectious energy. Could this be the recipe we need to break free from the joyless grind of politics and step into a space where mockery, mirth, and meaningful change coexist? If so, maybe, just maybe, we’ve found a way through the madness. LEARN MORE

Anybody who tries to harsh the mellows of Zohran Mamdani’s supporters in New York City at this point would reduce Howdy Doody to toothpicks. There hasn’t been a political campaign that’s spread this much joy around the city since Jimmy Walker danced all over Fiorello La Guardia and Norman Thomas in 1929.

Over the weekend, Mamdani sponsored a scavenger hunt in which the only prize was a bag of potato chips—which itself was a dig at incumbent Eric Adams—and a chance to have your picture taken with the candidate at the finish line, which was at an appropriate location, the Little Flower Cafe. Fiorello would have approved. From NY1.

Before Mamdani began his multi-hour photo line, he spoke to the press about the goal of the scavenger hunt. “As New Yorkers joined us, whether by walking or using public transit, they got to see what has been evident to so many of us for so long, which is that politics is not something that you have. It is something that you do,” he said.

Participants said the event was a way to connect with both Mamdani and the city.

“I think actually trying to have fun in politics and do a little bit of a community building exercise, a way to actually learn about our city—I’ve never known another politician to do it,” scavenger hunt participant Kavi Pandia said.

Predictably, Andrew Cuomo went on with his new pals at Fox News with a big old stick up his ass.

Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo stopped by a Brooklyn church Sunday and was interviewed on Fox News, where he called Mamdani a dangerous socialist.

“They are socialists. It’s Bernie Sanders, it’s AOC, it’s Assemblyman Mamdani. And I think it would be a death knell for New York City, and he is dangerous, frankly,” Cuomo said.

Do I have to point out that both Sanders and AOC are more significant national political figures than Andrew Cuomo is, largely because they win elections and don’t try to canoodle with the staff, and that Mamdani is on his way to being more significant too? No, I guess I don’t have to do that, but it’s fun nonetheless.

Nothing has been more central to the rise of authoritarian conservatism in this country than the widely encouraged notion that politics essentially are a sucker’s game best left to the people most adept at rigging the wheel. That attitude sucked all the joy out of political involvement. It doused every flame in a torchlight parade. It was abetted by an elite political media that both-sides’d itself into a corner.

The fact is that modern American conservatism has been spoiling for fascism ever since the 1960s. It has been fueled by Christian fascists, financed by oligarchical fascists, and carried forward by people who’ve acted more and more like fascists since Barry Goldwater let all the lions out of the cage in 1964. And that is how we have come to the point where we are now: stuck with a half-mad fascist with coronary arteries the width of cocktail straws and surrounded by people who have tasted the power of fascism and liked it immensely.

Fascism is a joyless business. Its humor is cruel and stupid. Its sense of irony has withered and died. It understands satire as well as a goat understands opera. Which is why what Camille Zapata has wrought on behalf of Gavin Newsom has been so effective. Her targets are incapable of responding because they don’t understand the field of play onto which she’s forced them to compete.

Mamdani has the same gifts. Politics as a form of anger and vengeance begs for joy and wit and mockery. Politics should be fun. If that becomes general in the land, we might actually come through this.