The Wild Reed

Thursday, November 06, 2025

Thank you, Omar!

They may have won this race, but we have changed the narrative about what kind of city Minneapolis can be. Because now, truly affordable housing, workers’ rights, and public safety rooted in care are no longer side conversations; they are at the center of the narrative.

– Omar Fateh

Yesterday morning, when it was confirmed that incumbent Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey had won reelection, Minnesota state senator Omar Fateh, the Democratic socialist who was Frey’s leading challenger and the candidate I was supporting, shared the following on social media.

Thank you, Minneapolis!

While this wasn’t the outcome we wanted, I am incredibly grateful to every single person who supported our grassroots campaign.

I’ll keep fighting alongside you to build the city we deserve. Onward.

In response, I posted these words:

Thank YOU, Omar! You ran a deeply meaningful and inspiring campaign, one that I and so many others were honored and happy to support. 👍🏼💗

Above: Standing at right with Sen. Omar Fateh and my friend Joseph – Minneapolis, September 17, 2025.

I supported Omar Fateh’s campaign for the same reason I’m supporting the political campaign of Butch Ware and previously the campaigns of Marianne Williamson, Jill Stein, Bernie Sanders, Ilhan Omar, Nina Turner, and Elijah Manley – because of its progressive platform, its person-centered platform.

It’s the type of platform that compelled one supporter to post on Facebook back in August: “Omar Fateh has shown he’s not just another politician – he’s a movement. While others cling to insider deals and big-money donors, he’s standing firmly with working people, amplifying the voices of residents who are too often ignored. The establishment may try to block him, but the people of Minneapolis are rallying behind him because they see in him an incoming mayor who fights for justice, equity, and real change.”

Sadly, not enough Minneapolis residents rallied behind Omar, for as Brett Wilkins of Common Dreams reports:

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey fended off a challenge from democratic socialist Omar Fateh to secure a third term by winning enough support in the second round of the city’s ranked-choice voting system.

City election officials declared Frey, a Democrat, the winner Wednesday morning after tabulating second- and subsequent-choice votes. Frey won 42% of first-choice votes, followed by Fateh with 32%, former pastor DeWayne Davis with 14%, and entrepreneur Jazz Hampton with 10%.

Fateh – a Democratic state senator and son of Somali immigrants – congratulated Frey on his victory.

“They may have won this race, but we have changed the narrative about what kind of city Minneapolis can be,” he said. “Because now, truly affordable housing, workers’ rights, and public safety rooted in care are no longer side conversations; they are at the center of the narrative.”

. . . Fateh’s campaign drew comparisons with that of New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, another progressive state lawmaker and democratic socialist who was bombarded with racist, Islamophobic, and xenophobic hate by prominent right-wing figures. Like Mamdani, Fateh hoped voters would focus on his record of serving his constituency in the state Legislature.

Among the dozens of bills authored by Fateh were a successful proposal to fund tuition-free public colleges and universities and tribal colleges for students from families with household incomes below $80,000, including undocumented immigrants, and another measure that exempted fentanyl test strips from being considered drug paraphernalia.

Fateh was also the chief state Senate author of a bill that would have ensured that drivers on ride-hailing applications like Uber and Lyft were paid minimum wage and received workplace protections. Although the bill was approved by both houses of the state Legislature, it was vetoed by Democratic-Farmer-Labor (DFL) Gov. Tim Walz, sparking widespread outrage among progressives.

Initially chosen over Frey by state DFL delegates, Fatah’s endorsement was rescinded in August by state party officials, sparking widespread outrage from progressives including Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), who condemned the “inexcusable” move, which she chalked up to “the influence of big money in our politics.”

– Julia Conley
Excerpted from “Frey Defeats Democratic Socialist Fateh
to Win Third Term as Minneapolis Mayor”
Common Dreams
November 5, 2025

On Tuesday, November 4, Omar addressed those who had gathered for his election party at a downtown Minneapolis hotel about the campaign he had ran against Frey.

Omar gave his speech before the final outcome of the election was known; in other words, prior to a second round of rank choice voting to determine the winner of the Minneapolis mayoral race.

Earlier today Mukhtar M. Ibrahim offered an insightful and hopeful take on the mayoral campaigns of Omar Fateh in Minneapolis and Kaohly Vang Her in St. Paul.

A Hmong refugee’s daughter will soon govern St. Paul. A Somali trailblazer changed the politics of Minneapolis.

The 2025 mayoral elections didn’t just decide who leads the Twin Cities. They revealed who the Twin Cities are becoming.

Kaohly Vang Her’s victory in St. Paul and Omar Fateh’s strong showing in Minneapolis mark a generational shift in political power, one led by immigrant communities, renters, working families, and young voters who are reshaping what leadership looks like across Minnesota.

Her’s win is historic. In just three months, she built a campaign rooted in grit, community, and pragmatism, door by door, conversation by conversation. The first Hmong woman to lead a major American city, she represents both continuity and change: a candidate fluent in policy and deeply grounded in the lived experiences of her constituents.

Across the river, Omar Fateh ran an excellent campaign that transformed Minneapolis politics. He may have fallen short of unseating a two-term mayor, but he redrew the map, geographically and ideologically. His coalition brought renters, students, and working-class families into the center of city politics, pushing affordable housing, public safety, and economic justice to the top of the civic agenda.

Together, these campaigns signal a broader shift.

The old model of Minnesota politics, dominated by establishment networks and legacy coalitions, is giving way to a more dynamic, diverse, and grassroots-driven era. Representation has evolved from symbolism to strategy, from presence to power.

For years, both Minneapolis and St. Paul have called themselves progressive cities. These elections showed what happens when that label is tested, when new leaders from communities once seen as outsiders claim their place inside the institutions of power.

The next chapter of Twin Cities politics won’t be written by the same hands. And that may be the story’s greatest promise.

I conclude this post by sharing the following compilation of messages from supporters of Omar and his campaign. These comments were posted on Omar’s Facebook page over the last two days. They are accompanied by photos also posted on the Omar for Mayor Facebook page.

• Well done, Omar! You have succeeded beyond doubt, and measure. Your triumph lays with your integrity, honesty and tenacity. You may have not gone the length, but sometimes victory is simply showing up and persevering.

• Congrats, Omar! You are still the winner of the young generation who are looking upon you. Don’t give up. Move forward, young man. Sky is the limit. 🙏

• A loss can sometimes mean more than a victory. You gave it your all, great fight, and best of luck next time, Champ!

• You have done something that most people would never dare to try. This is not the end — it’s just the beginning. A time will come when people will applaud your success. Congratulations, Mr. Omar Fatah

• Omar, you ran an exceptional campaign and we are all proud of you. Continue fighting the good fight!

• True leaders are defined by resilience, not results and you’ve shown that beautifully 🥰❤️

• Congratulations brother Omar Fateh you have opened the paths towards future success.

• Congratulations! Every setback is a setup for a stronger comeback. I’m sure you’ll rise higher, wiser, and more powerful than today.

• Thank you for your courage and dedication You inspired so many of us and gave hope to our city. This isn’t a loss it’s a new beginning Onward and proud of you.

• Omar Fateh, you fought so hard and came so close, and that in itself is something to be proud of. Your dedication and heart truly inspired so many of us. There’s always a next time, and I believe that one day you’ll represent the people and see your dream come true.

• Proud of your effort and dedication, Omar Fateh! You’ve shown real leadership and integrity. The fight continues, and we’re with you all the way!

• Thank you for your efforts. We truly need more politicians like you.

• I wish you all the best! Your campaign was so successful, and coming second to Frey was an amazing achievement. So try again next time.

• We love you, Omar Fateh! You ran an incredible campaign and your leadership and integrity are unmatched. You have opened doors for so many people and you are a role model for all of us. Thank you for your service!

• You ran an amazing campaign! Thank you for your hard work and dedication — we’re proud of you.

• Thank you, Senator Omar Fateh! 🌟 You ran an incredible campaign for Minneapolis Mayor, inspiring and engaging voters from all walks of life, and turning out an unprecedented number of supporters. Even without the numbers you hoped for, you won by organizing, connecting, and motivating our community.

• Congratulations, brother! 🎉 True leadership is not only about winning.

• Proud of the movement you built. This is just the beginning.

• A great effort. Thank you for shining your light. Minneapolis loses with Jacob Frey.

• Congrats! This marks the beginning of your success. You are a hero who has shown courage, confidence, and determination. I wish you a bright and successful future.

• That was an incredible campaign with a lot positive things to build on. Keep going!

• You have achieved something unimaginable; though it was difficult, you still remain steadfast in your goal and in proving that you truly deserve to represent us.

• You deserved more, Omar, but your impact was real. Keep going! We’re with you.

• You showed true leadership and integrity throughout your campaign. Keep your head high. This is just one chapter of a much bigger journey.

• You have made us all proud, and you will forever hold a special place in our hearts. May Allah continue to bless and guide you always.

Why Omar Fateh Lost

. . . and why his campaign still rewrote
Minneapolis politics

By Mukhtar M. Ibrahim

Omar Fateh lost because ranked-choice math and Minneapolis’s political geography made his path extremely narrow, even as he built one of the strongest insurgent coalitions the city has seen in years.

Here’s the simplest way to understand it.

1. Incumbent Jacob Frey started with a big lead, and Fateh never erased it

In Round 1, before any vote transfers:

• Jacob Frey: 61,444

• Omar Fateh: 46,614

Frey began the day with a 15,000-vote advantage.

Under ranked-choice voting, challengers usually need two things to overcome an incumbent:

• A close first round.

• A huge influx of second-choice votes.

Fateh got the second. He didn’t get the first.

Even after all the transfers, he still finished about 8,300 votes short.

2. Progressive voters backed Fateh, but not enough ranked him

The biggest block of redistributed votes came from DeWayne Davis, a progressive pastor with 20,414 first-choice votes. His supporters broke strongly for Fateh:

• 12,607 of Davis’s votes went to Fateh.

• 4,727 went to Frey.

• 3,080 exhausted (no other choices).

This was Fateh’s best moment. It cut deep into Frey’s lead, but it didn’t erase it. Why? Too many Davis voters stopped ranking after their first choice. Their ballots became “exhausted,” meaning they simply didn’t count in the Frey–Fateh matchup.

In a close race, exhausted ballots can be the difference between winning and losing.

3. A key centrist bloc broke slightly toward Frey.

Jazz Hampton’s voters were the most pivotal swing group. His 15,339 supporters leaned toward Frey:

• 6,623 of Hampton’s votes went to Frey.

• 5,661 of Hampton’s votes went to Fateh.

• 3,055 exhausted.

Hampton’s coalition broke more toward Frey. This is where Fateh’s comeback stalled. Even that small lean toward Frey made a difference. Fateh needed more of Hampton’s voters to close the gap.

4. The “other candidates” didn’t favor Fateh

Every ranked-choice election has a long tail of minor candidates. Together, they matter more than people expect.

From all the smaller campaigns combined:

• Frey gained ~929 votes.

• Fateh gained ~495 votes.

These numbers were tiny compared to the big blocs, but they all moved the needle in Frey’s direction.

5. Minneapolis’s political map still favors a pro-business centrist incumbent

Fateh reshaped the city’s political landscape, but he was still running uphill against its underlying geography. Neighborhoods with high homeownership — especially in Southwest and other higher-income areas that have long been the kingmakers in citywide races — stayed firmly with Frey.

Fateh dominated student-heavy, renter-heavy, and immigrant-rich parts of the city. His coalition was young, diverse, and energetic, but also geographically concentrated.

Meanwhile, the highest-turnout precincts tended to be Frey precincts. And in a ranked-choice election with lots of exhausted ballots, turnout geography matters even more than persuasion.

6. Frey deployed a huge financial war chest

Pro-Frey political action committees (PAC) raised more than twice as much money as groups supporting Fateh and his allies, giving the mayor far more resources for mailers, ads, and voter outreach. Money doesn’t guarantee votes, but it helped Frey dominate the airwaves and shape the narrative in the final weeks of the campaign.

The bottom line

Fateh lost because:

• Frey had a large initial lead.

• Swing voters broke slightly toward the incumbent.

• Too many ballots became exhausted.

• Minneapolis’s turnout patterns still benefit a centrist coalition.

But Fateh didn’t lose like an ordinary challenger. He lost like a candidate building a new political majority, one driven by renters, immigrants, young voters, and communities long shut out of the center of power.

He redrew the political map, even if he didn’t win the office.

– Mukhtar M. Ibrahim
via social media
November 6, 2025

NEXT:
Thank you, Omar!

Related Off-site Links:
Frey Defeats Democratic Socialist Fateh to Win Third Term as Minneapolis Mayor – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, November 5, 2025).
Pro-Fateh Group Wins Majority on Minneapolis City Council as Frey Secures Third Term – Luke Sprinkel (Alpha News, November 6, 2025).

See also the following chronologically-ordered Wild Reed posts:
• A “Racist and Factless Meltdown” Over Omar Fateh
• Omar | Jazz | DeWayne
• In His Efforts to “Build a City That Works for All,” Omar Fateh Secures a Key Endorsement
• Something to Think About – July 25, 2025
• The Longstanding Fault Lines Within the Democratic Party Have Surfaced Again in Minnesota
• Omar Fateh: “We Need to Meet the Needs of Working People”
• “Hopeful and Grounded”: Omar Fateh’s Vision of Democratic Socialism
• Omar Fateh: A “Person-Centered Leader”
• Why Omar Fateh Is the Right Choice for Mayor of Minneapolis
• Omar Fateh’s Grassroots Campaign for Mayor of Minneapolis
• The Rise of Omar Fateh
• Omar Fateh: A Mayor Who Will “Meet the Moment”

Until the Light Returns

By Steven Charleston

If this is a difficult time for you or someone you know
Let me speak a clear word straight to your heart:
There is no trouble stronger than the love of the Spirit.

There is no illness, no broken relationship.
No financial setback, no personal hurt
That the love of the Spirit cannot heal.
Not even death can overcome it.

That love is for you.
It may come to you as you read these words
Or it may take time, but it will come to you.

The assurance, the comfort,
The renewal of a love that will embrace you
And hold you and abide with you,
Until the light returns and departs no more.

– Steven Charleston
in Spirit Wheel: Meditations
from an Indigenous Elder
Broadleaf Books, 2023

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• What the Wind Says
• Aligning With the Living Light
• The Source Is Within You
• Like the Sun
• Be Just in My Heart
• The Light Within
• Shining On
• Honoring the Darkness While Remembering the Light
• A Living Light
• A Light That Will Always Shine

Image: Artist unknown.

Wednesday, November 05, 2025

Progressive Perspectives on Zohran Mamdani’s Win in New York City

Zohran Mamdani’s election in New York City is not simply a local upset. It is a breach in the ideological dam that has kept American politics safely contained for generations.

This victory is historic not because one office suddenly overturns entrenched power, but because it demonstrates that such power can be overturned at all.

For decades, political life in the United States has functioned as a managed marketplace in which both parties advertise different brands, yet deliver the same fundamental product: deference to private wealth, hostility to social investment, and a belief that the public should expect very little from its government beyond punishment and surveillance.

Tonight, that spell cracked.

Mamdani won not by courting the wealthy, not by flattering real-estate interests, not by running a campaign tailored to the comfort of cable-news pundits.

He won by naming the obvious: that the city belongs to its people, not to absentee landlords; that housing, transit, childcare, food, and dignity are fundamental rights, not privileges; that a budget is a statement of who matters in society – and it’s long past time a city as wealthy as New York put working people first instead of billionaires and real-estate developers. The bipartisan establishment will attempt to minimize this moment. They will continue to fund hysterical hit pieces designed to make people afraid of those challenging their rule. But their real fear is that this victory might prove contagious.

If New Yorkers can elect someone who openly challenges concentrated power, asks the wealthy to pay their share, and speaks in plain moral terms about economic justice, then perhaps Chicago can. Perhaps Los Angeles can. Perhaps Cleveland, Minneapolis, Atlanta and Kansas City.

The danger, from the perspective of those who currently command the political economy, is that people elsewhere may decide to stop begging for crumbs and begin organizing for a real seat at the table.

Power relies on a population convinced of its own helplessness. The most consistent project of elite politics is to cultivate resignation: nothing can change, no one like you can win, best not to try. When that illusion breaks, even in a single city, it sends tremors outward.

Across the country, millions watching tonight saw something rare in American politics: proof that a campaign rooted in solidarity can beat one rooted in capital.

They saw a future in which the public is not a spectator to its own dispossession.

They saw permission to believe in their own power.

They saw that politics need not be reduced to a stage-managed rivalry between corporations wearing different campaign colors.

As someone who saw this possibility in the presidential campaigns of Bernie Sanders, who saw our movement defeated by this same bipartisan establishment, tonight gives me a renewed faith in America's capacity to fight back against oligarchy.

Zohran’s win feels like the beginning of the first meaningful challenge to the neoliberal consensus in a generation.

And that is why this victory matters. Not because one candidate triumphed, but because a barrier was crossed.

The belief that the public must endure austerity while wealth accumulates above it has lost its inevitability.

The idea that the mass media can manufacture consent for a Wall Street-approved candidate every time has shattered. The attacks on Mamdani were relentless these past few months. But their hollow and desperate efforts failed. The majority didn't buy it and they went to the polls to send Cuomo packing.

For the first time in a long time, the message is simple and electrifying:

The people can win. And if they can win here, they can win anywhere.

– Tim Hjersted
via Films for Action
November 4, 2025

The socialist left has won power in New York.

Zohran Mamdani won a majority – the first candidate to win more than one million votes since 1969. He did so despite an unrelenting racist smear campaign, vast sums spent by billionaires, and threats from Trump to strangle New York.

You’re seeing, in part, the political consequences of the Iraq war, the financial crash, and Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians. All helped forge new politicised generations. And the 2016 Bernie Sanders campaign reforged the U.S. left – which made Mamdani possible.

That Mamdani owes his victory to a broken economic system is undeniable. But fury at Israel’s genocide played a key role in him securing the Democratic nomination. The dramatic political consequences of the genocide have only just begun to be felt

. In his victory speech, Mamdani quoted Eugene Debs, the U.S. socialist pioneer, because he firmly places himself in that historic tradition of the left.

He addressed Jewish people, Muslims, trans people – because the left is the antidote to a right embracing racism and hate. In an age of Islamophobia – which is mainstream, acceptable, respectable, normalised – for a Muslim candidate to triumph in New York matters. That an unapologetically socialist Muslim opposed to racism and bigotry in all its forms triumphed matters even more.

Donald Trump and the Democratic establishment want Mamdani to fail, and will do all they can to achieve their goal. How the huge numbers inspired by Mamdani’s campaign are mobilised will matter a lot in the coming fight. But we saw how Bernie Sanders’ 2016 campaign re-energised the U.S. left. Mamdani’s campaign will have an even bigger impact. So many leftist politicians and campaigns are going to emerge all over the U.S. because of his triumph.

In an age of darkness, Mamdani’s campaign offers hope.

The socialist left has now triumphed in New York. In New York!

Let’s hope that’s the beginning of the socialist left triumphing everywhere – and driving back the forces of fascism.

– Owen Jones
via social media
November 5, 2025

I’m levitating. This is such an incredible proof of concept of how to fight fascism. You know, Zohran, immediately after Trump’s election, went out and talked to Trump voters, people who had never voted for Trump before, Black and Brown people in working-class neighborhoods, didn’t vilify them, just listened to them.

I talked to Zohran for the first time a week after Trump’s election. And what he said to me was everything is broken for people. Like, the elevator in their public housing hasn’t been fixed for 10 months. Nothing is working. So it’s so easy for someone like Trump to come along and be like, “Blame the immigrant. Blame the unhoused person.” And his entire campaign was about proving that if you actually meet people’s real needs and raise the floor and say, “Okay, let’s freeze the rent. Let’s have free and fast buses. Let’s have universal child care. Let’s address that sense of scarcity and insecurity at its root,” that it can pull people back from the fascist abyss. And he won tonight. He proved that that is – that works. That message works.

This movement, this is anti-fascism, and it is also the antithesis of fascism, because fascists want everybody to be the same. They celebrate conformity, uniformity, sameness, hierarchy. Look in – New York is the most unruly city. The entire campaign was a love letter to the diversity, linguistic, faith, cultural diversity of the city, at a time when the Republicans never stop pouring hate onto cities and make people afraid of each other, right?

– Naomi Klein
Quoted in “This Is How to Fight Fascism:
Naomi Klein, AOC & Brad Lander on Mamdani Victory”
Democracy Now!
November 5, 2025

Since young men across the U.S. shifted right in the 2024 elections, with former Vice President Kamala Harris losing to President Donald Trump among men ages 18-29, the Democratic Party has searched for ways to win back the voting bloc – and on Tuesday night, progressives urged leaders to simply look to New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s resounding success.

Exit polls showed Mamdani, a progressive state Assembly member who remained laser-focused on making the city more affordable for working people during his campaign, winning the support of 68% of male voters ages 18-29, while Cuomo won just 26% of them – a margin of 42 points.

The democratic socialist’s support among men under the age of 45 was also notable, with a margin of 39 points.

Young male voters swung left in other closely watched races as well, with Virginia Gov.-elect Abigail Spanberger winning the group by 15 points and New Jersey Gov.-elect Mikie Sherrill winning by 12 points – but observers said Democratic leaders should pay special attention to the “blowout” in New York City as they seek answers about how to win over young men nationwide.

Housing campaigner Matthew Torbitt suggested that Mamdani appealed to young male New Yorkers by speaking clearly and emphatically about the need to make life for all working people more affordable – by establishing a network of city-run grocery stores to compete with private corporations, freezing the rent on rent-stabilized units, and expanding across the city’s bus system the pilot program he championed that made one bus line fare-free.

“Young men just need to feel like there is someone on their side,” Torbitt said.

– Julia Conley
Excerpted from “42-Point Blowout With Young Men
Helped Fuel Mamdani’s Victory”
Common Dreams
November 5, 2025

This is how you run. This is how you win. This is the politics we need right now. Democratic socialist candidates can inspire people again, and fight the right effectively. . . . The history of socialist mayors in the United States shows that they can actually succeed. Socialist Daniel Hoan is considered one of the best mayors in the history of Milwaukee, having focused on rooting out corruption, establishing public buses, and keeping up the quality of city parks and public schools. He didn’t exactly overturn the basic economic order, but he did show that socialist principles are compatible with competent, honest government. Likewise, Bernie Sanders is regarded as having been a capable and effective mayor of Burlington, Vermont.

Mamdani faces an immense challenge now. After ten years of insisting that if handed power, the left can deliver for people, we don’t want to be like “the dog who caught the car.” Many eyes are on Mamdani to see what he will do next, whether he will crash and burn, sell out, or provide evidence that democratic socialism is the politics America needs. If he defies the skeptics and haters, and is the best mayor in the history of New York, delivering on his agenda, Mamdani may massively improve the political fortunes of the American left. If, on the other hand, he disappoints, he may discredit the left, and make it impossible to get socialists elected to office in the future. I hope he and his team know what they are doing—but if they govern as well as they campaigned, New York City is in good hands.

For the last ten years, Current Affairs has been relentlessly making the argument that democratic socialist politics can win, and need to be given a chance. We now have that chance, and it is probably the most exciting moment in the history of the U.S. left. The pressure is on. The fight is just beginning. But this is an incredible victory, and the hard-working New Yorkers who made it possible have a lot to be proud of.

– Nathan J. Robinson
Excerpted from “Follow Mamdani’s Example”
Current Affairs
November 5, 2025

Tuesday, November 04, 2025

All Things Speak My Language

Following is my adaptation of one of Julia Cameron’s “heart steps.”

I open my mind and heart to guidance from the Beloved One. I am open to guidance in all its many forms. I accept help from the Beloved One through people, events, and places which inspire and instruct me. I listen to the song of the Beloved through many instruments – the ebb and flow of the tides, animal companions, the wind, a bird, a flash of sunlight sparkling off colored glass. All things speak my language. I listen to all languages with my heart. My heart hears higher and higher frequencies of guidance as I raise my own thoughts to the possibility of higher realms guiding and embracing my own.

– Julia Cameron
in Heart Steps: Prayers and
Declarations for a Creative Life
Jeremy P. Tarcher / Putnam, 1997
pp. 52-53

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Solstice Dawn
• Trusting the Flow
• Higher Perceptions
• The Guidance of Higher Forces
• Anew
• A Season of Listening
• Be in My Mind, Beloved One
• Resting in the Presence of the Beloved
• Secret Language of the Heart
• You Are My Goal, Beloved One
• Finding Balance in the Presence of the Beloved
• Your Peace Is With Me, Beloved One
• The Soul’s Beloved

Image: Photographer unknown.

Matthew Cooke on the Fallacy That Socialism “Doesn't Work”

With two Democratic socialists (Zohran Mamdani and Omar Fateh) potentially set to win their mayoral races in New York and Minneapolis respectively, Matthew Cooke’s recent video commentary on socialism is timely indeed!

Related Off-site Links:
The Data Show That Socialism Works – Nick Warino (Current Affairs, December 7, 2019).
How Could Socialism Work? – Socialist Alternative.
Understanding Dark Triads – Psychology Today.
Poll Shows 25-Point Mamdani Lead Over Cuomo as Frantic GOP Fearmongers Over “Socialist Uprising” – Brad Reed (Common Dreams, October 30, 2025).
“Our Time Is Now”: Zohran Mamdani’s Mayoral Campaign Inspires New York City’s Working-Class South Asians – Democracy Now! (November 3, 2025).
Meet Omar Fateh. Could He Be the Next Mayor of Minneapolis? – Democracy Now! (October 31, 2025).
Bernie Sanders Says a Mamdani Win Can Transform American Politics – John Nichols (The Nation, November 4, 2025).
Omar Fateh Has All the Right Enemies – Alex Skopic (Current Affairs, September 5, 2025).
“New York City Is Not for Sale” – Zohran Mamdani (Jacobin, September 8, 2025).
Minneapolis Gets Its Own Mamdani – Kayla Bartsch (National Review, July 15, 2025).
From Mamdani to Prop 50, John Nichols on Election Day Races and the Future of Democratic Party – Democracy Now! (November 4, 2025).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:

DEMOCRATIC SOCIALISM
• Martin Luther King, Jr. and Democratic Socialism
• Bernie Sanders: Quote of the Day – June 12, 2019
• Heather Cox Richardson on the Origin of the American Obsession with “Socialism”
• The Biblical Roots of “From Each According to Ability; To Each According to Need”
• Something to Think About – December 14, 2011
• Jonty Langley: Quote of the Day – August 17, 2011
• A Socialist Perspective on the “Democratic Debacle” in Massachusetts
• Obama a Socialist? Hardly
• Obama, Ayers, the “S” Word, and the “Most Politically Backward Layers in America”
• A Socialist Response to the 2008 Financial Crisis
• Capitalism on Trial
• No, Hitler and the Nazis Weren’t Socialists
• What It Means to Be a Leftist in 2025
• Ted Rall: “Democrats Are Not the Left”

ZOHRAN MAMDANI
• Dorothy Lennon: Quote of the Day – June 26, 2025
• A Timely and Important Conversation
• The Rational National’s Take on Zohran Mamdani
• How Democrats Can Start Winning Again
• Mike Figueredo on the “Political Malpractice” of the Democratic Party
• Memes of the Times – September 2025
• Zohran Mamdani and the Future of the Democratic Party

OMAR FATEH
• A “Racist and Factless Meltdown” Over Omar Fateh
• Omar | Jazz | DeWayne
• In His Efforts to “Build a City That Works for All,” Omar Fateh Secures a Key Endorsement
• Something to Think About – July 25, 2025
• The Longstanding Fault Lines Within the Democratic Party Have Surfaced Again in Minnesota
• Omar Fateh: “We Need to Meet the Needs of Working People”
• “Hopeful and Grounded”: Omar Fateh’s Vision of Democratic Socialism
• Omar Fateh: A “Person-Centered Leader”
• Why Omar Fateh Is the Right Choice for Mayor of Minneapolis
• Omar Fateh’s Grassroots Campaign for Mayor of Minneapolis
• The Rise of Omar Fateh
• Omar Fateh: A Mayor Who Will “Meet the Moment”

THE FAILURES OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
• Mike Figueredo on the “Political Malpractice” of the Democratic Party
• Ted Rall: Democrats Are Not “the Left”
• Exposing the Dark Money Network Secretly Funding Establishment Democratic Influencers
• Why the Democratic Party Is Not Going to Save Us From Fascism
• Howie Hawkins: “The Democrats Are Not the Answer to the Trump/Fascism Problem”
• The Longstanding Fault Lines Within the Democratic Party Have Surfaced Again in Minnesota
• Jeff Cohen on How Obama’s “Corporate Liberalism” Led to the Rise of Trump
• Progressive Perspectives on Bernie Sanders’ “Fighting Oligarchy” Tour
• Eric Fernández: Quote of the Day – May 14, 2025
• Marianne Williamson: Quote of the Day – July 26, 2025
• When Democrats Undermine Democracy

Progressive Perspectives on the Legacy of Dick Cheney

Dick Cheney has died. The former vice president and war criminal will be hailed in the corporate controlled press as the last “reasonable” voice in the Republican Party along with his daughter, Liz. Here’s some things the media won’t mention about this warmonger . . .

1. Cheney was a member of the Project for a New American Century (PNAC). This group of neoconservatives and imperialists called for America to rapidly expand the Pentagon budget, fight multiple wars and specifically overthrow Iraq. They do mention none of this would happen, “absent a catalyzing event, like a new Pearl Harbor.” Lucky for Cheney, he happened to be inside the Bush administration after 9/11.

2. The vice president helped lie America into Iraq. According to then-Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neil, shortly after the Bush administration was sworn in, they met for their first national security council meeting. There, before 9/11, they openly brainstormed how to start a war with Iraq. O’Neil even provided documents on how they could steal the oil of the Middle Eastern nation. Cheney invited oil and gas executives to the White House during and after the invasion of Iraq. He declined to make the content of those meetings available to the public.

3. Following the disastrous war in Iraq, Cheney tried to start a war with Iran. According to Seymour Hersh’s reporting for the New Yorker in 2006, Cheney tried to create a Gulf of Tonkin incident. He believed it could be a pretext to launch bombing campaigns on Iran. Thankfully, that never happened. After he left the Bush administration, Cheney bragged he was one of the most vocal voices for bombing Iran.

4. No one was a louder proponent of torture than Dick Cheney. The vice president repeatedly defended its practice and claimed that it saved lives. For the record, it never did. We now know that definitively from the Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program. To highlight Cheney’s hypocrisy on this issue, he was once asked by NBC’s Matt Lauer if Iran would be justified in water boarding an American spy if he had information on possible activities inside their nation. Cheney, unsurprisingly, said he would be opposed to such tactics on Americans. Cheney’s philosophy was it’s okay when we do it. It’s not okay when they do it.

Cheney’s legacy of blood, carnage and war crimes is still felt at American tables who have one less child returning home from the Middle East, and the one million Iraqis who died. As I stated at the beginning of this post, many will mourn him as a man who represented a time when the GOP was reasonable. I dare those same people to interview a family member who lost a child in Iraq or an Iraqi who lost a family member following that HORRIFIC war. They will give you a different answer.

– Dorothy Lennon
via social media
November 4, 2025

Dick Cheney rose from many government roles including U.S. Representative from Wyoming to Defense Secretary under George H. W. Bush, then became CEO of oil corporation Halliburton before serving as Vice President under George W. Bush.

As vice president, Cheney was one of the main forces behind the 2003 Iraq invasion. He pushed claims that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, which later proved false, and pressured intelligence officials to lie in order to support the case for war.

After the invasion, Cheney’s former company Halliburton and its subsidiary KBR received about $39.5 billion dollars in Iraq contracts, many awarded without competition. Audits later found overbilling and waste, fueling accusations of war profiteering.

Cheney also defended the CIA’s use of torture, backed secret prisons, and supported private contractors like Blackwater that were later tied to civilian killings.

In 2012, the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission found Cheney guilty in absentia of war crimes for authorizing torture, and Amnesty International urged that he be investigated if he traveled abroad.

Today, both liberals and conservatives will try to paint him as a good man, even though his decisions led to the deaths of millions of innocent Iraqi civilians.

– Rogue DNC
via social media
November 4, 2025

Former Vice President Dick Cheney’s death on Monday could be the perfect opportunity for media institutions in the U.S. to take a sober look at the George W. Bush era – but it’s more likely they’ll fire up the nostalgia machine than confront reality.

Liberal network MSNBC’s flagship a.m. program Morning Joe somberly announced the news on Tuesday and quickly worked to portray Cheney as a strong leader who fought for the country at all costs. Host Joe Scarborough said the former vice president was defined by his determination not to see another 9/11. Later in the show, author and historian Jon Meacham called Cheney “a remarkable American figure.”

“We don’t make them like this anymore,” Meacham said, implying this is a bad thing.

Scarborough celebrated Cheney as a “defender of democracy” for his opposition to Donald Trump, a common theme in his final act. The former vice president and Republican hard-liner was greeted warmly in recent years by powerful Democrats like Nancy Pelosi, Steny Hoyer, and Adam Schiff for the pivot.

It’s a pattern we’re likely to see continued in the wake of his death – and a sign that Democrats have still not learned hard lessons about their role in sending the country into the abyss.

In fact, Cheney had more of a role in giving us Trump than his later opposition might suggest, pioneering a cruel brand of post-truth politics that Trump would perfect.

Cheney said whatever he needed to in order to push his agenda. He cast aside clear legal constraints, wantonly starting illegal wars and ignoring nettlesome obstacles like the legal prohibition on torture. He ruthlessly attacked his perceived political enemies, decrying anyone who disagreed with him as “terrorist” sympathizers. Sound familiar?

– Eoin Higgins
Excerpted from "Dick Cheney
Doesn’t Deserve Your Heartfelt Eulogies
The Intercept
November 4, 2025

Dick Cheney is dead at 84. He did not die in disgrace, though he should have. He died wealthy, respected in certain circles, and utterly unrepentant. The man who once declared that the United States would have to go to “the dark side” after 9/11 lived long enough to see that darkness normalized, monetized, and weaponized against his own countrymen.

Cheney’s fingerprints are all over the machinery of our current decline. The torture memos that redefined cruelty as legality. The surveillance architecture that turned privacy into a privilege. The doctrine of preemptive war that made deceit a tool of statecraft. His genius was not in leadership but in the quiet conversion of fear into policy and secrecy into power. Halliburton profited as Baghdad burned, and a generation of Americans learned that truth could be suspended if the lie was wrapped in a flag.

He taught a generation to confuse vengeance with justice. He convinced them that brutality was strength, that secrecy was safety, and that democracy could survive anything so long as the right people were in charge. The corrosion of conscience that began in those years never left us. It calcified into cynicism, and that cynicism became the oxygen of the authoritarian movement that followed. In his time, Cheney was often caricatured as Darth Vader, a moniker he wore with amusement. In hindsight, it stands as one of the most fitting apologies in modern political history. The cruelty that once required justification now parades as virtue, a moral inversion born in the shadow of Cheney’s America.

Two decades later, that same machinery hums under a new operator. The Trump administration took Cheney’s hidden authoritarian blueprint and removed its disguises. Where Cheney cultivated plausible deniability, Trump cultivates spectacle. Where Cheney institutionalized secrecy, Trump broadcasts vengeance. Both rely on the same architecture: the executive branch as weapon, the law as accessory, the lie as gospel.

. . . History should not remember Cheney as a statesman. It should remember him as a technician of empire, a man who perfected the mechanics of control and handed them, like loaded weapons, to those who came after him. His legacy lives not in monuments or memoirs, but in the machinery of the American police state he helped design.

Dick Cheney is gone. But his shadow still governs. Until we dismantle what he built, America will remain what he made it, a democracy in name, an empire in practice, and a lie we keep telling ourselves.

– Tony Pentimalli
via social media
November 4, 2025

Related Off-site Links:
War Criminal Dick Cheney Dead at 84 – Common Dreams (November 4, 2025).
His Works Completed, Dick Cheney, Mass Murderer of Iraqis and American Democracy, Dies – Spencer Ackerman (The Nation, November 4, 2025).
From Executive Overreach to Undeclared Wars, We Are Living in the World Cheney Made – Kelley Beaucar Vlahos and Jim Lobe (Common Dreams, November 4, 2025).
“The Dark Side”: Dick Cheney’s Legacy from Iraq Invasion to U.S. Torture Program – Democracy Now! (November 4, 2025).
The Worst Crime of the 21st Century – Nathan J. Robinson and Noam Chomsky (Current Affairs, May 12, 2023).
Let’s Speak Ill of the Dead: 18 Reasons to Definitely Speak Ill of Dick Cheney – Lee Camp (Lee Camp’s Substack, November 4, 2025).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Joseph Wilson on the Bush Administration: "Corrupt from Top to Bottom" (2007)
• The Tenth Anniversary of the Iraq Invasion (2013)
• Something to Think About – June 18, 2014
• Progressive Perspectives on Liz Cheney (2022)

Monday, November 03, 2025

Zohran Mamdani and the Future of the Democratic Party

Recently Marc Lamont Hill and Briahna Joy Gray engaged in an insightful and timely conversation on the future of the Democratic Party.

Here’s how this conversation is introduced:

As inequality deepens and dissent is punished, many are looking to new voices like Zohran Mamdani, the democratic socialist running for New York City mayor on a platform of rent freezes, free public transit, and taxing the rich.

Can candidates like him revive the Democratic Party in the United States, or is real reform from within impossible?

There is a left populist economic path to electoral success and Zohran Mamdani is writing that path. You don’t need to become Liz Cheney to win. And in fact, Liz Cheney is not exactly winning in politics, and bear-hugging her did not turn-out so well for Kamala Harris in terms of ginning up votes. . . . So when you hear about compromise, and how we have to be a center party, and how we have to be pragmatic in order to win, that’s all propaganda to justify why the [Democratic establishment] won’t just ran on legitimate popular policies like universal health care, like taxing the rich, like a $15 minimum wage. Really basic stuff. . . . In this moment there’s an enormous amount of frustration with the Democratic Party among rank-and-file Democrats which presents opportunities for those of us who would like to see a break from the party. And, short of that, the threat of a break that is sufficiently real that it actually forces the Democratic establishment to have to choose the people over their corporate commitments. I don’t know if we’re close to that, if the party can fundamentally ever be reformed because I believe the purpose of it is to advance those corporate commitments. . . . I question if it is possible to be within the Democratic Party and carry on legitimate left, progressive values; economic populist values.

– Briahna Joy Gray

The Wild Reed

Thursday, November 06, 2025

Thank you, Omar!

Why Omar Fateh Lost

Until the Light Returns

Wednesday, November 05, 2025

Progressive Perspectives on Zohran Mamdani’s Win in New York City

Tuesday, November 04, 2025

All Things Speak My Language

Matthew Cooke on the Fallacy That Socialism “Doesn't Work”

Progressive Perspectives on the Legacy of Dick Cheney

Monday, November 03, 2025

Zohran Mamdani and the Future of the Democratic Party

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