The Myth of Change: Why Zohran Will Disappoint Everyone

Everyone’s talking about Zohran. To some, he’s the next great progressive hope, the one who’s finally going to bring real change to a city that’s been worn down by decades of corruption, complacency, and false promises. To others, he’s the next big threat — a socialist, a communist, a radical who’s going to destroy what’s left of the city’s stability. But me? I don’t buy either story. I think the minute Zohran wins — no, the minute the numbers start showing he’s going to win — everything’s going to change. And not in the way people think.

Because once that victory is within reach, the tone shifts. The fire cools. The campaign rhetoric that got him there, the energy of rebellion, the vision of transformation — all of that starts to get buried under the weight of “governing responsibly.” And “responsibly,” in modern politics, doesn’t mean radical. It doesn’t mean courageous. It means moderate, centrist, cautious, calculated. It means trying to make everyone happy and ending up pleasing no one.

That’s why I think Zohran is going to end up being another centrist-neoliberal politician the moment he steps into office. He’ll start talking about healing divisions. He’ll say we need to come together. He’ll say, “I’ll work with Republicans where I can.” He’ll hold press conferences about “bridging divides,” about “common-sense solutions,” about “meeting people where they are.” It’ll be the same language we’ve heard for decades — the language of defanged progressivism, of ambition filtered through caution, of radical ideas reduced to committee talking points.

And that’s when the disillusionment will set in.

Because the people who backed him hoping for change — real change — will start to notice that the system he’s now part of isn’t designed for change. It’s designed for survival. The city machine is massive, old, layered, and immovable. It eats reformers alive and spits them out polished and pliant. And when Zohran faces that machine, he won’t fight it — he’ll merge with it. That’s what every “outsider” politician eventually does.

Look at history. Adams promised law and order, then turned into another corporate manager. Cuomo built his name on reform and ended up a caricature of ego and control. Bloomberg came in as an independent visionary, only to become another symbol of technocratic elitism. De Blasio ran on progressive change, on fairness, on hope, and wound up governing like a corporate moderate. Even AOC and Fetterman — for all their moments of boldness — have tempered their edges, learned to play the game, learned to survive the media storm by compromising their image, toning things down, smoothing over the rough spots.

Zohran’s going to be a mix of all of them. Adams 2.0. Cuomo 2.0. Bloomberg 2.0. De Blasio 2.0. Even AOC 2.0. Even Fetterman 2.0. He’ll embody pieces of each — the centrism, the caution, the media-savviness, the moral posturing, the PR gloss. He’ll be the perfect synthesis of disappointment.

That’s the irony of it all — that the very thing people fear he’ll become, and the very thing people hope he’ll become, will both collapse into the same thing: disappointment. He won’t be the radical socialist his opponents fear, nor the transformative progressive his supporters dream of. He’ll be something far duller — a cautious politician trying to appease everyone, to offend no one, to hold onto power by pretending to transcend ideology.

And that’s what’s going to hurt most for his supporters. Not betrayal, but slow erosion. Not revolution, but reform watered down into paperwork. Because that’s how the system wins — not through overt corruption, but through subtle absorption. It doesn’t crush idealism outright; it drains it. It turns passion into procedure. It makes radicals into moderates, moderates into managers, and managers into bureaucrats.

By the end of his first year, people will already be tired. The left will accuse him of selling out. The right will accuse him of lying about being moderate. The press will talk about “missed opportunities” and “complicated realities.” The city will still be the city — divided, expensive, chaotic, tired. And Zohran will be standing at a podium somewhere, talking about “working together to find pragmatic solutions,” unaware that everyone watching him has already seen this movie before.

And that’s the thing — it’s not even entirely his fault. The system is built this way. You can’t govern a place like this without compromise, and compromise always comes with a price. You can’t keep every promise. You can’t stay radical forever. You can’t change an institution that’s older than you, bigger than you, stronger than you. You can only learn to exist within it, and that’s exactly what he’ll do.

But when he does — when he makes that first big “reach across the aisle” deal, when he waters down that first major policy, when he walks back that first campaign promise — that’ll be the moment it all becomes clear. The city won’t be reborn. The people won’t feel heard. The system won’t bend. It’ll just keep grinding on, same as ever, powered by the same dull inertia of politics as usual.

Zohran won’t destroy the city. He won’t save it either. He’ll just become another name in the long line of politicians who came in with ideals and left with talking points. He’ll make speeches, sign bills, pose for photo ops, and hold hands with the very people who once called him dangerous. He’ll become respectable. Acceptable. Safe.

And that, more than anything, is what will make him a disappointment to everyone — the left, the right, the center, the activists, the moderates, the disillusioned. Because the city isn’t looking for safety anymore. It’s looking for something real. And no matter how many times someone new promises to bring it, the city keeps ending up in the same place — waiting for a change that never comes.

And even though the signs are clear to me that he’s not going to bring about change — good or bad — this time around, you’ve got so many folks on both sides who are so deeply emotionally invested in Mamdani that it’s going to get messy no matter what. The people who love him, the people who hate him, the people who think he’s going to save the city, and the ones who think he’s going to ruin it — they’re all projecting their hopes and fears onto him. And when that happens, division is inevitable. It won’t just be left versus right. It’ll be within his own base, too. Because when expectations are that high, and the reality turns out to be slower, softer, duller than promised, the cracks start to show.

And look, I say this as a progressive myself. I want to believe. I want to think that this time will be different, that maybe someone like him can actually hold onto his principles once he’s inside the machine. But I’ve seen this story before. Too many times. Candidates who seemed ready to shake up the system end up being reshaped by it instead. It’s like a pattern burned into the DNA of politics — hope rising fast, then collapsing under the weight of compromise. So maybe I’m cynical. Maybe I shouldn’t be. But experience makes it hard not to be.

Because even now, before he’s even officially in, I can already see the signs — the subtle walk-backs, the softened statements, the careful wording meant to keep donors, moderates, and power brokers calm. It’s that slow capitulation that tells you everything you need to know. You can always see the shift before the headlines ever catch it. It starts quiet. It starts small. But once it starts, it doesn’t stop.

And me, I’m voting for Sliwa. Yeah, I know — he’s probably going to lose. I know what people will say: that it’s a wasted vote, or worse, that it’s basically a vote for Trump. But no. Both of those takes are wrong. Because if you actually look at the tense, complicated dynamic between Sliwa and Trump, it’s clear — they’re not allies. They’re not on great terms. They tolerate each other, sure, but they don’t favor each other. They coexist, but uneasily. And maybe, just maybe, that’s exactly what this city needs right now.

Because what’s the alternative? Mamdani — who, just by existing in the political climate we’re in, is already a lightning rod. His candidacy itself is dividing people before he’s even sworn in. His potential victory will cause chaos — not necessarily because of what he’ll do, but because of what his win represents to people. The city will tear itself apart around the idea of him. His supporters will clash with his critics. The right will rage, the media will amplify every controversy, and the center will panic. And Mamdani, thinking that softening, walking back, capitulating will somehow heal the divide — won’t. It’ll only make things worse. Because the people who supported him will feel betrayed, and the people who feared him will still fear him. No one will be satisfied.

And I say this as someone who actually agrees with many of Mamdani’s policies. But agreement alone isn’t enough when the whole environment is primed for combustion. You have to look around, look at the climate we’re in. Someone like him — even if his heart’s in the right place — is marked for chaos. Not necessarily of his own making, but chaos nonetheless. And the city can’t survive another round of performative division dressed up as “change.”

Meanwhile, Trump thrives on chaos. He feeds on it. The more cities like New York spiral, the more fuel he gets to claim that blue states are broken, that “radical leftists” are destroying America. A Mamdani win would hand him that narrative on a silver platter. Even if Mamdani did nothing wrong, the image alone — the headlines, the culture wars, the endless pundit cycles — would empower Trump more than it would help the people of the city.

And then there’s Cuomo — the so-called “moderate” who’d probably be Trump’s favorite. Not officially, not in name, but in practice. He’d talk tough on TV, pretend to stand up to Trump, but behind closed doors, he’d cut deals. He’d go along with the power play because that’s what career politicians do — they preserve themselves first.

Sliwa, though? He’s a weird paradox. A Republican who isn’t exactly in Trump’s circle, who isn’t a loyalist. A guy Trump can’t quite control, can’t quite predict. And that dynamic — that uneasy distance — might actually give the city some breathing room. Because a city like New York doesn’t need another puppet. It doesn’t need another personality war. It needs space to exist, to function, without constant interference from Washington or from political theater.

So yeah, maybe voting for Sliwa seems strange coming from me. Maybe it doesn’t fit the mold of what a “progressive” is supposed to do. But I’m not voting based on ideology anymore. I’m voting based on the pattern I keep seeing — the same story repeating over and over, where the supposed agents of change either implode or get co-opted. And maybe, just this once, the best move isn’t to back the person with the boldest message or the biggest ideals, but the one who can keep the chaos at bay, even temporarily.

Sliwa isn’t perfect. He’s got flaws, plenty of them. But he’s not beholden to Trump, and he’s not the symbol of civil war that Mamdani’s become. In a moment like this, that alone might be enough. Maybe what the city needs most right now isn’t revolution — it’s a reprieve.

And I think — and here’s a hot take — Trump, in a weird way, might actually want Mamdani to win. Not because he supports him, not because he agrees with him, not because he sees anything in him politically. But because Mamdani winning gives Trump exactly what he wants most: a target. A justification. A pretext to unleash his full wrath on New York City.

It’s the perfect setup for him — a progressive firebrand taking control of one of America’s biggest, bluest cities under his presidency. It’s the kind of image that practically writes itself into his narrative. He’ll say, “Look, the radicals have taken over New York,” and use that as his excuse to tighten control, to cut funding, to escalate rhetoric, to pit Americans against one another yet again. It’s not about policy for him; it’s about spectacle. He thrives on chaos because chaos keeps him at the center of the story. And a Mamdani victory would hand him that spotlight on a silver platter.

You can already imagine how it would go: Fox News panels screaming about socialism in New York, conservative talk radio calling the city “lost,” Trump using it as an example of what happens when “the left takes over.” Every crisis, every protest, every budget dispute — he’d spin it into proof that “New York can’t govern itself.” And that would give him moral cover to go harder on the city, to “punish” it, to reassert federal dominance under the guise of restoring order.

That’s the part that makes me nervous. Because Trump doesn’t just attack opponents for what they do — he attacks them for what they symbolize. Mamdani, to him, would be a symbol of everything he tells his base is wrong with America. And once he has that symbol in office, it becomes the perfect excuse to unleash all his fury, all his vendettas, all his performative rage — not just at Mamdani, but at the city as a whole.

So yeah, maybe Trump doesn’t like Mamdani. But politically? Strategically? He might be quietly rooting for him to win. Because a city thrown into ideological chaos is exactly the kind of environment Trump feeds on — and the rest of us, we’d be the ones left to pick up the pieces.

And I think — another hot take — deep down, Mamdani knows this. He knows that a Trump presidency is waiting for him to win just so it can turn him into the poster child of “radical chaos.” He knows the city will become the next battleground in Trump’s culture war the minute he’s sworn in. And I think that’s why we’re already seeing signs of hesitation from him. That’s why he went on Fox News recently. That’s why, on the debate stage, he so quickly distanced himself from Hasan Piker — not because it was necessary, but because he wanted to show he could “play the game,” that he could look moderate when it counts.

But here’s the thing — if he’s already bending the knee this early, when the stakes aren’t even high yet, what does that tell us about how he’s going to govern once the pressure really hits? Because right now, he’s still a candidate. Right now, the full weight of the establishment, the media, the donors, the federal pressure — none of that has even come down on him yet. And if he’s already softening, already compromising, already trying to prove that he can fit into their world, then imagine what happens once he’s actually in office, with all those forces pressing down from every side.

That’s the part that gets me. Because if a candidate starts negotiating with the system before even winning, that’s not strategy — that’s surrender. That’s fear disguised as pragmatism. And the moment a politician starts making those kinds of preemptive concessions, you know exactly how the story ends. It ends with another “reformer” turned moderate, another “outsider” swallowed by the same system they swore to challenge.

So yeah, when I saw him on Fox, when I saw him create that distance from Hasan, I didn’t see a smart political move. I saw a preview. A preview of how he’ll govern — cautious, self-preserving, always calculating which battles to avoid rather than which ones to fight. And if that’s already the energy before day one, then we already know what’s coming next: more disappointment, more dilution, more of the same.

But of course, everyone else seems blind to these signs. Some people catch glimpses of them, a few murmurs of doubt here and there — but most don’t. Maybe they never will. Or maybe they’ll see it years from now, when it’s too late, when the excitement has faded and the reality has settled in. But me — I see it now. I feel it now. And that’s why I’m talking about it. Even if I’m one of the few. Even if no one listens. Even if people roll their eyes, dismiss me as cynical, call me negative or defeatist — I don’t care. I’m saying my piece because I think it matters.

Because what I’m trying to do isn’t to tear anyone down. It’s to help people prepare — mentally, emotionally, politically — for what’s really coming. And what’s coming isn’t the grand transformation people are dreaming of. It’s more of the same — the same kind of governance, the same kind of half-measures and compromises, the same cycle of promises and letdowns. But this time, it’s going to come wrapped in chaos, because both sides have poured so much of themselves into this one man.

That’s what makes this moment so volatile. It’s not just about policy anymore. It’s emotional. It’s spiritual. It’s tribal. People have made Mamdani into a symbol — a vessel for their hope or their hatred — and when symbols start carrying that kind of weight, they eventually crack. And when they do, everyone gets hurt. The supporters who thought he’d be their champion. The critics who thought he’d be their worst nightmare. Both sides are going to feel betrayed in their own way.

That’s why I’m saying all this now. Because I don’t want people to be blindsided when it happens. I don’t want the city to unravel in shock when the reality doesn’t match the fantasy. I want folks to be ready — ready for disappointment, ready for disillusionment, ready for the turbulence that’s coming. Because if you see it early, you can brace for it. And maybe that’s all we can do right now — brace for what’s ahead, speak the truth as we see it, and not let the noise drown out what’s obvious to anyone who’s paying attention.

And I’ll end on this. Maybe — just maybe — there’s a small chance things will work out. Maybe somehow, everything will run smoothly, no problems, no crises, no breakdowns. Maybe the city will find a rare balance, and people on both sides will surprise us by working together. I’m not completely ruling that out. But to me, that feels like wishful thinking.

Because under this second Trump administration — under Trump’s second term — I don’t see that happening. The environment is too charged, too raw, too divided. Every decision, every headline, every policy is going to be weaponized. Even something as simple as city funding or law enforcement cooperation will become another front in the larger national war of identity and ideology. Maybe things would have been calmer under Kamala. Maybe there would’ve been room for nuance, space for rebuilding. But that’s not where we are. That’s not our reality.

Our reality is that New York City, if Mamdani wins, is not going to experience smooth sailing. We’re staring down the barrel of chaos — from outside and within. External chaos from a federal government itching to prove a point, to punish its political enemies, to make an example of a city it’s long hated. And internal chaos from a population split right down the middle, from communities that no longer trust one another, from people who’ve staked too much of their identity on a single man’s victory or defeat.

And I’m not saying this to sound conservative, or alarmist, or dramatic. I’m saying it because I’ve seen the signs, and I’ve seen this cycle play out before. I’m saying it because the writing’s already on the wall. Mamdani won’t destroy the city. He won’t save it either. But his win will unleash forces that are bigger than him, bigger than his campaign, bigger than whatever ideals he holds. And in the middle of it all will be ordinary New Yorkers — the ones who always pay the price when politics becomes theater.

So, prepare for chaos. Not because chaos is what he wants, but because it’s what’s waiting for him — from every direction. From Trump, from the right, from the left, from the establishment, from his own base. It’s all converging. And when it does, nothing will move. Nothing will get done. It’ll be gridlock and noise, bitterness and backlash, all dressed up as progress.

That’s the nightmare I see coming. And I hope I’m wrong. I really do. But if I’m right — if the city ends up swallowed by the same pattern it’s been trapped in for decades — at least I can say I saw it coming. And at least someone said it out loud before it all unfolded.

And not to sound too doomer — but honestly, I think what the city is about to face, if Mamdani wins, might be the worst thing it’s seen in a long time. The chaos won’t come from him being some kind of radical or extremist. Because, like I’ve been saying, I don’t think he’s a socialist, I don’t think he’s a communist, and I definitely don’t think he’ll govern like one. That’s not what’s going to set things off.

What’s going to ignite the fire is perception. It’s the stories people tell themselves about him — the fear, the hope, the projection, the illusion. Because both sides have built him up into something larger than life. To the left, he’s the savior who’s finally going to break the cycle. To the right, he’s the villain who’s going to tear the whole system down. And when one man becomes both of those symbols at once, the fallout is inevitable.

If he wins, there’s going to be a storm like the city hasn’t seen before. Protests, outrage, endless media spin — not because of what he does, but because of what people think he represents. Every decision he makes will be dissected, weaponized, taken out of context. Every policy will be treated as an existential threat or a revolutionary act, depending on who’s talking. The chaos will be emotional, cultural, political — all at once.

And the worst part is, he won’t even have the chance to prove himself before the storm hits. It’ll start the minute the results are in. The backlash will be instant, the narratives pre-written. He’ll walk into office already surrounded by noise, already trapped in the contradictions people projected onto him. And that kind of environment doesn’t allow for governance — it only allows for survival.

That’s why I’m saying this now. Because I can feel it building. I can see the tension tightening with every passing week. The city’s sitting on a fault line, and his victory could be the tremor that sets it all off. Not because of who he is — but because of what people believe he is. And when that happens, when both sides go to war over an illusion, it won’t be politics anymore. It’ll be chaos — pure, unfiltered chaos.