I can only imagine the deep sigh from El-Sayed's people when they saw that quote. I'm going to give AOC the benefit of the doubt and assume her point was that a quasi-DSA candidate winning in a purple state shows the power of progressive politics. But I guarantee you, most Michiganders--fully aware that New Yorkers view Michigan as part of a vast, undifferentiated wasteland called the "Midwest"--will understand that quote as "if Abdul can get those racist hicks to put him in the Senate, the sky's the limit!"
Yeah, that quote won't help him here. "Look at the hick hayseeds out there votin' for an Arab! If those idiots can do it....."
As someone who lives in the Great Lake State, I'll say that El-Sayed is outworking his opponent to a degree that is rather astonishing. Dr. El-Sayed is everywhere, all at once, and it seems Rogers campaigns intermittently and indifferently. I don't think his heart is in it.
That energy alone helps.
And Dilfer, although no Tom Brady, was definitely north of competent. The Ravens as a whole were scary good.
I live here, too, and I agree that the Rogers campaign has been astonishingly low-energy.
The ironic thing about AOC trying to use a potential El-Sayed victory as proof of progressive appeal is that the Rogers campaign is doing its best to hang the DSA label and positions around Abdul’s neck (every time I go to the gym, I see Rogers ads replaying some stupid thing Abdul said in 2020 about abolishing prisons), while Abdul is campaigning on completely conventional Democratic themes.
Ha! It's at the gym where I see most of this stuff, too, and Abdul is definitey talking to the middle of the road Democrat around here. He runs ads with his very white, very midwestern looking grandparents a lot. He's even moderated his stand on Medicare for All to appeal more broadly. Not sure AOC is taking the right message from his lead.
Yes, I’m aware of the degrees. And still, not a doctor in the sense he wants people to believe. Just like PhD in education Jill Biden was not really a doctor (don’t tell Whoopi!).
It seems pretty insulting to El Sayed actually. Sure he’s got all the crazy DSA beliefs (that’s he’s sorta trying to walk back or at least change the subject on) but he’s super smart and charismatic.
Yup. I know people who worked with him during the 5 minutes he was actually working in public health, and word is that it's not an act: he actually is an asshole. Nonetheless, I voted for him yesterday.
Great analogy. I don't know why, but my Uncle is practically begging me to "change my mind" on El-Sayed. Which is weird because neither of us lives in Michigan.
I’m an Obama liberal who used to live in a Trump+30 state roughly equidistant from the Scopes Monkey Trial courthouse and the river where they filmed Deliverance. I can PROMISE everyone that there is no secret reservoir of socialist sympathizers there just desperate for an Appalachian Mamdani to carry them to the promised land.
I think AOC missed her calling. She should be a motivational speaker. All of her "we have to fight to take back the Bronx!" and "if he can win he can win anywhere" stuff isn't about policy and ideology as much as it's about making people who don't feel good feel better. Whenever she talks geopolitics she can't really string together coherent points, but she's really great at the "We need to stand up together and we won't ever let them hold us down" stuff.
I dunno if Dilfer is the right comparison. Sayed has all the tools - smart, likable, hard working, he just has all the crazy DSA beliefs.
Maybe a better comp is someone who had all the tools but kept throwing overconfident interceptions, like Jameis Winston, except Winston never won a Super Bowl because of a great defense.
There are quarterbacks like Jeff Hostetler and Trent Dilfer who are decent journeyman quarterbacks who find themselves on teams that will make a playoff run and win the Super Bowl if they don’t fuck it up. But give Dilfer and Hostetler credit: they didn’t fuck it up. Lots of people in that situation would find a way to lose. Dilfer didn’t. And then there are good-enough journeymen who manage to put it together in a certain magic year and get the W. Like Nick Foles. He’ll always have the Philly Special.
Foles also had that 27:2 TD to INT season. I think he could have been a lot better than he was with some stability and an offensive system the NFL didn’t figure out within 2/3 or a season.
That said, he will forever be a hero (maybe THE hero) in Philly forever.
Wow, I don't see him that way at all. I really like him. But I see Mandani as a smug insufferable prick when most people I know think he's the best thing since sliced bread, so don't go by me.
First, who is he? And, second, as has become apparent, it doesn't matter who casts the votes, it only matters who counts them: "Could Dennis Kucinich win Mississippi?"
It sounds like you and AOC are making similar points, even if she is understandably framing it more favourably? Why do you think it’s “obviously incorrect” when she implied they’re winning in spite of El-Sayed’s particular characteristics (“anyone can win anywhere”), when you’re saying essentially the same thing?
There are two parts to this: 1. Individual talent vs team talent, and 2. History vs future.
Joe Montana, Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Brett Favre and Peyton Manning can win anywhere because they are freakishly talented and elevate their teammates. The Ravens elevated Trent Dilfer's playing talent, and it is incredibly rare for a Super Bowl winning quarterback to get dumped from the team and to wind up a backup the next season.
If El-Sayed was a genuine political talent and not running against Mike Rogers who doesn't seem to have much energy for campaigning and for enjoying the conditions that Trump and the GOP have responsibility for, and if El-Sayed was running in a presidential year, he probably wouldn't win. If AOC said that if a DSA candidate could win in Utah, then he could win anywhere, she would be on firmer ground. She'd be on even firmer ground if she had more history on her side.
I’m not disagreeing with you; AOC’s statement is clearly incorrect, taken anywhere near face value (although it obviously shouldn’t be).
I’m pointing out that the author and AOC are *both saying* that El-Sayed’s electoral success is not due to El-Sayed’s qualities in particular. Like Trent Dilfer!
My purpose is not to defend AOC, who says lots of stupid things (although this isn’t really one of them, given that it was obviously supposed to be a crowd-energising rhetorical move rather than a semantically precise proposition about conditional probability (and, interpreted even slightly generously, there is some truth in it)). My purpose is to point out that, while they draw different conclusions from it, the author and AOC are essentially making the same observation- which makes it a bit silly to call hers “obviously incorrect” before making his fundamentally similar (if a bit sassier) one ten or so times in a row.
"Winning Michigan despite El-Sayed's particular characteristics" and "anyone can win anywhere" are quite different notions. Even assuming El-Sayed wins Michigan (and I hope he ultimately does), I still won't be convinced that a DSA candidate can win Wyoming and Louisiana.
I’m going to repost the comment I made earlier about El-Sayed in Slow Boring:
I would encourage anyone with El-Sayed takes (both pro and con) to listen to Ezra Klein’s interview with him. I think that interview did a great job of highlighting El-Sayed’s strengths and weaknesses. For strengths: he’s very charismatic and has a compelling life story. Here at Slow Boring a lot of us are policy nerds but we need to acknowledge that a lot of the electorate isn’t and charisma is really important (see also Zohran Mamdani).
But he has weaknesses. I think tying himself so closely Hasan Piker was a big one, and certainly helped contribute to the perception that he’s anti-Semitic. I didn’t get that impression from the interview but I understand why people have that from other things he has done. More worrying to me is an overall level of arrogance that might be tied to that charisma. Ezra asked him why he decided after med school to enter public health instead of becoming a clinician- Abdul told a long story about treating a woman with substance abuse issues and how clinical work wouldn’t truly allow him to help people like that. It wasn’t terribly compelling and even Ezra- not exactly a frothing conservative— seemed somewhat skeptical of what Abdul had or hadn’t learned from that story.
More importantly was the medical public policy discussion they had. Abdul styles himself as a medical policy expert whose top priority is to implement Medicare for All or at least some other significant reform. Nothing wrong with that as a priority, but it became clear in the conversation that Abdul is used to speaking with people who are not terribly knowledgeable about health care policy and plays fast and loose with framings and oversimplifications. That, to put it mildly, did not work with Ezra who pushed back repeatedly (of course always respectfully). What I noticed was Abdul never seemed to acknowledge any of the points Ezra was bringing up- he would just move on to his next talking point. It made me really wonder how capable he is of shifting his views based on new evidence.
If I were in Michigan I’d still probably reluctantly vote for him. I don’t personally think he’s anti-Semitic nor see any other significant red flags. Senate control is too important, especially with two years left of Trump. But I do hope he grows in office should he win.
El-Sayed seems to be (to use an old Churchill quote, "a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma". Anyone who doesn't understand that we are in a civilizational war with Islam is simply not paying attention. Moreover, anyone who doesn't understand that the Democrat party would make common cause with space aliens who were planning our annihilation, if it got them control of Congress and the White House. Plato predicted this in "The Republic" (I think his discussion of sophists was Book 10, but it has been half a century since I read it). Anything for a "click" or a vote.
Agreed. If the good doctor wins, it'll be because he intensely moderated his positions and tone--likely thanks to some PR consultant encouraging him to hit the Ezra Klein airwaves (he did well)--to suit non-primary MI voters, and not because all of America is ready for AOC-type progressives.
If you’re going to use a football analogy, El Sayed is a star running back, a Walter Payton type. No matter how many times Payton got hit, he always spun toward the goal line. He knew where it was and kept pointed there. No matter how many times El Sayed is asked about Piker or his Muslim religion, he stays pointed toward Michigan issues, affordability, health care, tariffs. As a good running back should. He will score in November and it doesn’t matter whether it’s a one yard run or a dramatic breakthrough from the 50, he will win.
As someone who knows how to run a pick six, I enjoyed this
That is a deep cut right there.
I can only imagine the deep sigh from El-Sayed's people when they saw that quote. I'm going to give AOC the benefit of the doubt and assume her point was that a quasi-DSA candidate winning in a purple state shows the power of progressive politics. But I guarantee you, most Michiganders--fully aware that New Yorkers view Michigan as part of a vast, undifferentiated wasteland called the "Midwest"--will understand that quote as "if Abdul can get those racist hicks to put him in the Senate, the sky's the limit!"
Yeah, that quote won't help him here. "Look at the hick hayseeds out there votin' for an Arab! If those idiots can do it....."
As someone who lives in the Great Lake State, I'll say that El-Sayed is outworking his opponent to a degree that is rather astonishing. Dr. El-Sayed is everywhere, all at once, and it seems Rogers campaigns intermittently and indifferently. I don't think his heart is in it.
That energy alone helps.
And Dilfer, although no Tom Brady, was definitely north of competent. The Ravens as a whole were scary good.
I live here, too, and I agree that the Rogers campaign has been astonishingly low-energy.
The ironic thing about AOC trying to use a potential El-Sayed victory as proof of progressive appeal is that the Rogers campaign is doing its best to hang the DSA label and positions around Abdul’s neck (every time I go to the gym, I see Rogers ads replaying some stupid thing Abdul said in 2020 about abolishing prisons), while Abdul is campaigning on completely conventional Democratic themes.
Ha! It's at the gym where I see most of this stuff, too, and Abdul is definitey talking to the middle of the road Democrat around here. He runs ads with his very white, very midwestern looking grandparents a lot. He's even moderated his stand on Medicare for All to appeal more broadly. Not sure AOC is taking the right message from his lead.
Awww are you two going to have a "meet cute" at the gym?
I could be Vlad's granny, but maybe he has some form pointers for my deadlift. I think I pulled a hamstring last time.
“Dr. El-Sayed.”😂 Like Dr. Jill. That title is as misleading as his campaign. The left always has to run in disguise.
He has earned an MD and a PhD, so the title is accurate. He does not have a medical license and cannot treat patients, that is true.
Yes, I’m aware of the degrees. And still, not a doctor in the sense he wants people to believe. Just like PhD in education Jill Biden was not really a doctor (don’t tell Whoopi!).
It seems pretty insulting to El Sayed actually. Sure he’s got all the crazy DSA beliefs (that’s he’s sorta trying to walk back or at least change the subject on) but he’s super smart and charismatic.
FWIW, I disagree about the charisma -- I think a big-and-understated part of his problem is that he seems like an asshole.
Yup. I know people who worked with him during the 5 minutes he was actually working in public health, and word is that it's not an act: he actually is an asshole. Nonetheless, I voted for him yesterday.
Worked for Bill Clinton!
Great analogy. I don't know why, but my Uncle is practically begging me to "change my mind" on El-Sayed. Which is weird because neither of us lives in Michigan.
In which direction?
I’m an Obama liberal who used to live in a Trump+30 state roughly equidistant from the Scopes Monkey Trial courthouse and the river where they filmed Deliverance. I can PROMISE everyone that there is no secret reservoir of socialist sympathizers there just desperate for an Appalachian Mamdani to carry them to the promised land.
Absolutely fucking delusional.
"a demographic mostly known for beer consumption and a que sera sera attitude towards head injuries."
How are you so funny mate??
The que sera sera line is really funny.
I think AOC missed her calling. She should be a motivational speaker. All of her "we have to fight to take back the Bronx!" and "if he can win he can win anywhere" stuff isn't about policy and ideology as much as it's about making people who don't feel good feel better. Whenever she talks geopolitics she can't really string together coherent points, but she's really great at the "We need to stand up together and we won't ever let them hold us down" stuff.
I dunno if Dilfer is the right comparison. Sayed has all the tools - smart, likable, hard working, he just has all the crazy DSA beliefs.
Maybe a better comp is someone who had all the tools but kept throwing overconfident interceptions, like Jameis Winston, except Winston never won a Super Bowl because of a great defense.
There are quarterbacks like Jeff Hostetler and Trent Dilfer who are decent journeyman quarterbacks who find themselves on teams that will make a playoff run and win the Super Bowl if they don’t fuck it up. But give Dilfer and Hostetler credit: they didn’t fuck it up. Lots of people in that situation would find a way to lose. Dilfer didn’t. And then there are good-enough journeymen who manage to put it together in a certain magic year and get the W. Like Nick Foles. He’ll always have the Philly Special.
Foles also had that 27:2 TD to INT season. I think he could have been a lot better than he was with some stability and an offensive system the NFL didn’t figure out within 2/3 or a season.
That said, he will forever be a hero (maybe THE hero) in Philly forever.
He’s not likable in the least. He’s a smug insufferable prick.
Wow, I don't see him that way at all. I really like him. But I see Mandani as a smug insufferable prick when most people I know think he's the best thing since sliced bread, so don't go by me.
First, who is he? And, second, as has become apparent, it doesn't matter who casts the votes, it only matters who counts them: "Could Dennis Kucinich win Mississippi?"
It sounds like you and AOC are making similar points, even if she is understandably framing it more favourably? Why do you think it’s “obviously incorrect” when she implied they’re winning in spite of El-Sayed’s particular characteristics (“anyone can win anywhere”), when you’re saying essentially the same thing?
There are two parts to this: 1. Individual talent vs team talent, and 2. History vs future.
Joe Montana, Tom Brady, Drew Brees, Brett Favre and Peyton Manning can win anywhere because they are freakishly talented and elevate their teammates. The Ravens elevated Trent Dilfer's playing talent, and it is incredibly rare for a Super Bowl winning quarterback to get dumped from the team and to wind up a backup the next season.
If El-Sayed was a genuine political talent and not running against Mike Rogers who doesn't seem to have much energy for campaigning and for enjoying the conditions that Trump and the GOP have responsibility for, and if El-Sayed was running in a presidential year, he probably wouldn't win. If AOC said that if a DSA candidate could win in Utah, then he could win anywhere, she would be on firmer ground. She'd be on even firmer ground if she had more history on her side.
I’m not disagreeing with you; AOC’s statement is clearly incorrect, taken anywhere near face value (although it obviously shouldn’t be).
I’m pointing out that the author and AOC are *both saying* that El-Sayed’s electoral success is not due to El-Sayed’s qualities in particular. Like Trent Dilfer!
My purpose is not to defend AOC, who says lots of stupid things (although this isn’t really one of them, given that it was obviously supposed to be a crowd-energising rhetorical move rather than a semantically precise proposition about conditional probability (and, interpreted even slightly generously, there is some truth in it)). My purpose is to point out that, while they draw different conclusions from it, the author and AOC are essentially making the same observation- which makes it a bit silly to call hers “obviously incorrect” before making his fundamentally similar (if a bit sassier) one ten or so times in a row.
"Winning Michigan despite El-Sayed's particular characteristics" and "anyone can win anywhere" are quite different notions. Even assuming El-Sayed wins Michigan (and I hope he ultimately does), I still won't be convinced that a DSA candidate can win Wyoming and Louisiana.
I’m going to repost the comment I made earlier about El-Sayed in Slow Boring:
I would encourage anyone with El-Sayed takes (both pro and con) to listen to Ezra Klein’s interview with him. I think that interview did a great job of highlighting El-Sayed’s strengths and weaknesses. For strengths: he’s very charismatic and has a compelling life story. Here at Slow Boring a lot of us are policy nerds but we need to acknowledge that a lot of the electorate isn’t and charisma is really important (see also Zohran Mamdani).
But he has weaknesses. I think tying himself so closely Hasan Piker was a big one, and certainly helped contribute to the perception that he’s anti-Semitic. I didn’t get that impression from the interview but I understand why people have that from other things he has done. More worrying to me is an overall level of arrogance that might be tied to that charisma. Ezra asked him why he decided after med school to enter public health instead of becoming a clinician- Abdul told a long story about treating a woman with substance abuse issues and how clinical work wouldn’t truly allow him to help people like that. It wasn’t terribly compelling and even Ezra- not exactly a frothing conservative— seemed somewhat skeptical of what Abdul had or hadn’t learned from that story.
More importantly was the medical public policy discussion they had. Abdul styles himself as a medical policy expert whose top priority is to implement Medicare for All or at least some other significant reform. Nothing wrong with that as a priority, but it became clear in the conversation that Abdul is used to speaking with people who are not terribly knowledgeable about health care policy and plays fast and loose with framings and oversimplifications. That, to put it mildly, did not work with Ezra who pushed back repeatedly (of course always respectfully). What I noticed was Abdul never seemed to acknowledge any of the points Ezra was bringing up- he would just move on to his next talking point. It made me really wonder how capable he is of shifting his views based on new evidence.
If I were in Michigan I’d still probably reluctantly vote for him. I don’t personally think he’s anti-Semitic nor see any other significant red flags. Senate control is too important, especially with two years left of Trump. But I do hope he grows in office should he win.
El-Sayed seems to be (to use an old Churchill quote, "a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma". Anyone who doesn't understand that we are in a civilizational war with Islam is simply not paying attention. Moreover, anyone who doesn't understand that the Democrat party would make common cause with space aliens who were planning our annihilation, if it got them control of Congress and the White House. Plato predicted this in "The Republic" (I think his discussion of sophists was Book 10, but it has been half a century since I read it). Anything for a "click" or a vote.
Yeah we're in a "civilizationional war" with the gulf petrostates that buy weapons from us. Give me a fucking break.
Yes comrade AOC! It is time for the people to rise up!
Year 178 will be the one!
B-list early 2000’s football players…now this is my kind of clickbait.
Agreed. If the good doctor wins, it'll be because he intensely moderated his positions and tone--likely thanks to some PR consultant encouraging him to hit the Ezra Klein airwaves (he did well)--to suit non-primary MI voters, and not because all of America is ready for AOC-type progressives.
He’s just an example that a vote for the Democrats is a vote for the DSA’s agenda.
If you’re going to use a football analogy, El Sayed is a star running back, a Walter Payton type. No matter how many times Payton got hit, he always spun toward the goal line. He knew where it was and kept pointed there. No matter how many times El Sayed is asked about Piker or his Muslim religion, he stays pointed toward Michigan issues, affordability, health care, tariffs. As a good running back should. He will score in November and it doesn’t matter whether it’s a one yard run or a dramatic breakthrough from the 50, he will win.