Nithya Raman and Zohran Mamdani are both socialists but theres a key difference

Karl Marx said that history repeats twice: “[T]he first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.”Marx was describing the 1848 revolution in France, but he may as well have been describing the socialist campaign of Nithya Raman in Los Angeles. Raman leads incumbent Karen Bass in the latest polls for LA mayor.If that lead holds, she will achieve the second major socialist victory since Zohran Mamdani in New York last November.  The biggest news, opinion and culture shaping California right now.

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Never miss a story Both share the same radical policies and have the same core constituency of disaffected elites.Both went to top colleges; both are immigrants of Indian origin; both chose a far-left path. But while Mamdani has leadership qualities that allow him to drive his agenda forward, Raman is a weak leader who lacks charisma and vision.

Mamdani has the persuasive skills to create an illusion of success; Raman is singularly uninspiring, both on social media and on the stump.Mamdani was a state legislator who built his profile behind a bullhorn, as a rabble-rouser in the antisemitic street protests that erupted after the Oct.7 terror attacks.

He mobilized the “trustafarian” activists who have disrupted New York City politics since the Occupy Wall Street movement, and joined them with a growing constituency of immigrant voters, especially from the Muslim community, which (ironically) has expanded rapidly since the 9/11 terror attacks.Raman, in contrast, is a city councilwoman who began her career in LA as a policy wonk.She focused on homelessness — to no great effect, as it has increased since she arrived in LA over a decade ago.

She has a self-effacing persona that is unusual in big-city politics, and perhaps unsuited to it. Her main skill appears to be timing: She rode the Black Lives Matter protest...