Enter, Stage Left, Mayor Mamdani           

I do not mean this as a negative assessment when I say that what Zohran Mamdani’s inaugural address as mayor of New York reminded me most of was Woody Allen’s Manhattan—albeit with a more all-encompassing view of the city. Like Manhattan, Mamdani’s speech was a love-besotted tour of New York—though with a focus on the city’s multiracial working and middle class you can’t find anywhere in the Allen oeuvre.

For Mamdani, this focus was intended to be a means of identification and reassurance (I am one of you...