Zohran Mamdani, leftists fight Waymo, progress, and the future |
Zohran Mamdani, leftists fight Waymo, progress, and the future
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is fighting Waymo, the autonomous vehicles pioneered by Alphabet. The city had a pilot program to test out the driverless cars, but that test period has now ended, and the mayor so far has declined to renew it.
This is a huge mistake, and is emblematic of why progressive and far-left Democrats cannot be trusted to govern.
Driverless cars are, to be clear, dramatically safer. Every test run so far has shown that. This is important, because car crashes kill tens of thousands of Americans ever year: Along with firearms, it’s the biggest non-disease related cause of death in the country. Driverless cars, however, can reduce these deaths five- or tenfold, according to studies so far.
That doesn’t mean driverless cars will be perfectly completely automatically safe in every conceivable instance. Already, they’re being resisted because one probably ran over a cat somewhere. But people have to consider relative dangers — and no serious person can be prepared to argue, or has any evidence to suggest, that Waymo is dangerous. On the contrary, there are few innovations as likely to reduce mortality.
So you might expect that progressive leftists would want to get on board. But no. Leftists like Mamdani are fighting adoption tooth and nail — not because they contest the safety stats, but because they’re worried about taxi drivers and truck drivers losing their jobs.
To that end, More Perfect Union, a major leftist account on X, released a 12-minute documentary against Waymo. Take a look.
It’s regrettable when people lose their job. I’m in an industry, media, that is undergoing rapid transformation. Local and print journalism has been decimated due to structural changes about how people consume news, and while social media has helped some journalists flourish, it has also dramatically reduced employment opportunities for straight news reporters and legacy companies. But, I don’t know how else to say this, that’s life, man.
Sometimes you gotta adapt with the times and look for something else. That includes taxi and truck drivers, too. I know these were good-paying jobs in the past, but we can’t freeze time and make it so the exact same labor conditions persist even when the customer base doesn’t support them. Taxis and trucks were themselves new technologies that took jobs from train conductors and horse buggy drivers and wagon wheel repairmen.
Imagine if we had tried to snuff out those developments in the crib because somebody’s job was threatened. Actually, we don’t really need to imagine it, because there have always been luddites in every century trying to break new machines because technology is going to take their jobs. We can feel sorry for this people, we can even talk about redirecting public funds to them in order to mitigate their loss, but we’re absolutely not going to use government force to protect their specific job to the detriment of everyone.
But make no mistake, an anti-tech wave is coming. Sam Altman, the CEO of AI company OpenAI, was the recipient of two violent attacks in recent days, with lunatics shooting up and also hurling a Molotov cocktail at his residence.
This is following a big hit piece on him in The New Yorker by Ronan Farrow, a go-to journalist when you really want to smear somebody. The article is brimming with technophobia, so perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised when some crazy people takes the implicit argument — that Altman’s tech is a threat to the human race — quite literally.
Look online, and you’ll find plenty of comments supporting the person who threw the Molotov cocktail. This is the sort of mentally disturbed philosophy that today’s anti-tech left is catering to. Don’t fall for it.
Robby Soave is co-host of The Hill’s commentary show “Rising” and a senior editor for Reason Magazine. This column is an edited transcription of his daily commentary.
Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
More Opinions - Robby's Radar News
GOP senators grow uncomfortable with Trump rhetoric, endgame for Iran
TMZ launches DC bureau, tracks down Graham, Cruz on first day
Bessent says order requiring banks to collect citizenship information ‘in ...
Anthropic’s Mythos puts DC, Wall Street on high alert
Trump denies AI Jesus post was removed due to conservative backlash
Speaker Johnson: Cherfilus-McCormick ‘should be expelled’
Swalwell, Gonzales exits shift spotlight to other embattled lawmakers
Cook Political Report shifts 4 Senate races toward Democrats
Chinese tanker crosses Strait of Hormuz, testing Trump's blockade
Tariff refund system almost ready, Customs says
Graham tells Pope Leo ‘you’ve got this all wrong’ on Iran war
Appeals court halts Boasberg contempt inquiry over Venezuelan deportation ...
New York, California compete as disaster tourism destinations for economists
The Supreme Court’s refusal to stand up for press freedom is catastrophic
Luna says Swalwell ‘may go to jail’ with ‘more disgusting stuff coming ...
United CEO pitches merger to Trump that would create world’s largest airline: ...
Trump slams Meloni in Italian newspaper interview: ‘I’m shocked by her’
Garcia threatens Bondi with contempt on Tuesday