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Mamdani Baloney
The swamp is filled with creatures who insist
on solving problems that do not exist.
They manufacture crises all the time,
like claiming cops are causing all the crime,
or how pre-teens need urgent gender care,
and others of which no one’s yet aware.
They also manage somehow to resist
the urge to fix the problems that persist.
Their first resort is to the public purse,
but all their spending makes our problems worse.
Despite the money spent and how they’ve railed,
their wars on drugs and poverty both failed.
But truthfully, their fondest dreams consist
of power clenched in their collective fist.
They do so by ensuring they create
emergencies that all necessitate
that we will grant them more and more control,
so they can keep their bank accounts chock-full.
They smile and tell us all to coexist,
but those who disagree just get dismissed.
They’re empathetic and sound so sincere,
but nothing that they say is ever clear.
Their plans cause costs to rise, and crime to soar,
so We the People aren’t safe anymore.
Mamdani is the latest on the list
who seems shocked to be called a communist.
But if he gets elected, then his tune
will start to sound a lot like Kim Jong-un.
He’s privileged and really can’t relate.
He’s weak and can’t bench press a manly weight.
The lesson that mankind has so far missed:
Mamdani and his archetype exist
to brazenly betray supporters who
believe that pleasant lies are always true.
This will not stop till everybody knows
that Emperors like them don’t have on clothes.
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Poet’s Note: Zohran Mamdani, leading candidate for NYC mayor, participated in the annual Men’s Day event in Brooklyn on August 23, 2025, where he failed to lift a 135-pound barbell.
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Warren Bonham is a private equity investor who lives in Southlake, Texas.
Warren, this is a perfectly wrought poem on the politically misbegotten with Mamdani the candidate for emperor without clothes. You have some great lines and truthful observations nestled inside this gem. His malevolence is manifest and comparison to Kim Jong-un (despite his anti-police policies) is well stated, since he would wield any power like a dictator and milk the electorate like a milking machine set on high.
We keep getting fooled by slick guys like this. I’m not sure what can derail his milk-machine at this point.
This is a terrific poem, Warren, and I’m deeply glad to see Mamdani skewered. He has earned it. I still cannot believe that New Yorkers could be so ideologically brainwashed that they would vote for a candidate who is so clearly contrary to their best interests. It’s a phenomenon. As for myself, I can’t even look at a picture of this man without being repulsed by his ever-present smirk — generated, no doubt, from his confidence in knowing that if the progressives are stupid enough to believe him then he can do anything he wants. Describing the elephant in the room might have hijacked your poem so I understand your not mentioning it… But there has never been a bigger antisemite in American politics that Mamdani who refuses to condemn Hamas and insists he will arrest Netanyahu if he ever sets foot in New York (defying Federal law and our absense of treaty with the ICC in the process.) And yet there are many Democrat Jews — probably a majority — who will vote for this vile communist hater. When Woke Progressivism replaces actual belief in God, all bets are off.
I couldn’t think of a way to satirize the “elephant”. There’s no way to make light of that.
Great stuff, Warren, with many entertaining rhymes: “control” and “chock-full”; “tune” with “Kim Jong-un”; “relate” and “manly weight”. Tonight’s debate should be very interesting.
I wasn’t even aware of the debate. Fortuitous timing. I did a quick scan and it seems like Mamdani came out relatively unscathed (unfortunately).
Jews voting for a pro-Hamas apologist like Mamdani are like Jews voting for Himmler or Goebbels. It is so blatantly suicidal and bizarre that it can only be explained as self-hatred, or more likely the internalization of a parareligion in them that has taken the place of their Jewish identity. That parareligion is left-liberalism. A good biopsy slide of this was the idiotic Rabbi Michael Lerner, who signed on to every single anti-Israeli position that existed.
I clearly don’t understand how their minds work. Self-preservation usually kicks in at some point, but it obviously hasn’t yet in this case for some inexplicable reason.
So many great, truthful lines, like “Solving problems that do not exist” ; “their wars on drugs and poverty both failed.” Your third verse brings to mind a quote (which I don’t remember exactly) from “That Hideous Strength” about emergency regulations being essential to the tyrannical government holding on to its power.
Oh, and the part about not being able to lift a manly weight— that just had to be in there. Great poem, Warren!
Thanks! Any comparisons to CS Lewis are always greatly flattering. I found Mamdani’s weight-lifting faux pas to be very amusing. I couldn’t believe his advisors let him do that without knowing how it would go. It doesn’t seem to have slowed him down.
Warren, your unique quality as a satirist is to take these news topics that could be ho-hum when treated with the usual railing or jeering, and create a distinct style for each one. Often you employ special metrics, but this is simple, straightforward iambic pentameter. It begins not with the vice of the day, but with those simple archetypal lessons that “mankind has missed” over and over. Since your poem presents a clear, amusing, proverb-style summary of these, you don’t need to go into Mamdani’s egregious errors. You can afford a joke about his latest silly flaw. This is refreshing to read. It invites the reader to think over the many manifestations of swamp creature known from history, and match Mamdani with those closest to him. Your reader as a thinking person can (we hope!) recognize the dire danger on today’s horizon in New York.
My brain doesn’t work in pentameter for some reason, but this one somehow flowed for me. As you surmised, I wrote this one in reverse beginning with the weight-lifting mishap and then working backwards from there to try and create the larger context. I’m glad it kind of worked that way in your mind.
I almost cannot believe how many Leftist absurdities you have nailed down in a single poem. I’m glad I got out of NYC decades ago, and I will not be making any plans to revisit the place. I say, let them turn these places into shitholes, because this will stand as a lesson to all sane Americans. I do feel bad for persons like Joseph Salemi who have deep roots there, but I can’t do anything about the situation. I wish I could.
Many thanks, Kip. I was born in Manhattan, raised in Queens County (very near to Jamaica Estates where Trump’s family lived), my father was East Side, my mother was West Side, and all four of my grandparents spent the bulk of their adult lives in this city. The house where I dwell has been in my wife’s family since 1910. Leaving New York would be like cutting my heart out.
The electoral problem is this: lots of people dislike and fear Mamdani (why not? — he’s a goddamned Communist), but they also can’t stand Cuomo for what he did during the COVID hysteria. Curtis Sliwa doesn’t have the political network or the financial wherewithal to run an effective campaign. So the anti-Mamdani vote will likely be split, and the Communist will win with a mere plurality.
So a city like New York, with more Jews than Tel Aviv, is probably going to elect an openly antisemitic mayor.
At one time I could have said that it’s a “nice place to visit, but glad I don’t live there”. I can’t even say the first part any longer.
“He’s weak and can’t bench press a manly weight.” My favorite line. Love it. Unfortunately when the city eventually goes to pot the metropolitans are all going to come running up here like they did during Covid, spreading their liberal seepage across the countryside.
You’re right about those metropolitans who are able to escape. But as New York Post columnist Miranda Devine said recently, the mayoral race is on the way to being determined by the turkeys who vote in favor of Thanksgiving. That goes along nicely with Warren’s title “Baloney” being a pejorative food word of sorts.
Thanks for this well-written poem. I can’t claim to be an expert on US politics (I’m a Brit) but have heard Victor Davis Hanson speak about Mamdani, and it’s nothing good! I guess Sadiq Khan, mayor of London, is a UK equivalent. It looks as if Khan may be involved in a scandal involving the cover-up of rape gangs. Maybe that will be the end of his political life: I hope so.