Ross Barkan

1 week ago | nymag.com | Ross Barkan

A single word, economy, can probably explain much of Donald Trump's popular-vote victory last year. The irony of Trump 1.0 was that he was such an inexperienced president he could only do so much damage. His political operation was not organized enough to assault the bureaucracy or launch an enormously damaging trade war. The economic agenda of his first term was not terribly expansive or even imaginative. He wanted a corporate tax cut, and he got it. He wanted a few tariffs and got them.

1 week ago | crainsnewyork.com | Ross Barkan

It’s becoming apparent that the mechanism for forcing a mayor of New York City from office in between elections does not work. As of now, only the governor can remove a mayor — there is no impeachment process built into the City Charter, and no possibility of holding a recall vote. Give credit to two state legislators, State Sen. Jabari Brisport and Assemblyman Harvey Epstein, for trying to change this reality with a bill introduced last week.

1 week ago | jewishbookcouncil.org | Ross Barkan

Review By – May 5, 2025 Glass Century, Ross Barkan’s ambitious and wide-reaching second novel, starts with a comedic deceit: Saul Plotz, married father of two, arranges a fake wedding with his lover, Mona Glass, to trick and appease Mona’s old-world parents. It’s New York City in the early seventies, and the two lovers believe that, despite their fictional union, their arrangement — involving Saul sneaking out to see Mona on a weekly basis — will be okay, at least for now.

1 week ago | nymag.com | Ross Barkan

Never before, in modern times at least, has a New York City mayoral race known such a generation gap. Andrew Cuomo, the former governor and unquestioned front-runner in the June Democratic primary, appears poised to dominate the primary with Democrats over the age of 45. These Gen-X-ers and baby boomers, as the writer Michael Lange points out, form the bedrock of the electorate in the five boroughs. They are regular voters, participating in elections at disproportionately high rates.

2 weeks ago | nymag.com | Ross Barkan

It's official - the cringiest Democratic phrase of 2025 is "dark woke." Brat Summer, indeed, is over. No need to hear aging pundits contemplating the nature of Brat and what it all might mean for a British pop star to casually endorse Kamala Harris. Brat, with its bright, irreverent greens, is last year's aesthetic. Now it's all about dark woke, which is, if the media coverage is to be believed, all about Democrats cursing.