Horse race coverage is the dominant mode of political coverage in America. It sucks. It treats politics like sports, parties like favored teams, candidates like celebrities, and elections like personality contests. It focuses on who is up and who is down rather than on substantive issues. It discourages meaningful activism within parties for moral reasons. It is one cause of the widespread public cynicism towards our electoral system.

An advantage of holding genuine political beliefs and being a part of political movements is that you gain the ability to look at elections not as simple red-vs-blue personality contests, but as strategic steps on the long road towards our chosen ideals. Movements have goals that transcend individual candidates and individual election cycles. To embrace movement politics is to be able to look at any given campaign season and ask: What is the best, most meaningful way for us to use this election to build the movement, in order to make the world better in the long run?

For the American left, in the 2028 presidential election, there is a straightforward answer to that question: AOC must run for president. If she doesn’t, she is leaving significant gains on the table. Not gains for her; gains for the movement, for the working class, for progress, and for the world.

I do my best not to engage in “here’s what I think” crystal ball-style speculation about upcoming elections. (American journalism produces tons of this and it is all worthless.) So I’m not going to try to forecast polls a year from now. I’m just going to try to lay out the basic things that are true, today, that lead me to this conclusion.

First, this is going to be a backlash election. “The pendulum swings” is the most basic dynamic of national politics, and the pendulum is set to swing in the Democrats’ direction. Trump is historically unpopular. Not only that, but the entire Republican Party, having been purged of dissent, is inexorably aligned with his stink. Anything can happen, but the Democrats have a real inherent advantage going into 2028. Though centrists will, as they do in every election cycle, argue that we must nominate a centrist so as not to blow this chance, common sense tells you that if Democrats have natural advantages over any Republican candidate going into an election, we should rationally nominate the most progressive candidate that we can, because they have a better-than-usual chance to win, and they will accomplish the most good when they get in office.

So let’s talk about the Democratic primary. We all know that the left is surging electorally in a way that it has not in decades. Zohran Mamdani’s election as New York City mayor followed by wins by a host of socialist candidates in both local and Congressional primaries and elections across the country speaks for itself. “Strike while the iron is hot” is another piece of political wisdom that we ignore at our peril. It is generally a mistake, in American politics, to say “let’s wait four years and build.” It is wiser to seize every momentary advantage and push it as hard and as far as you can. Momentum is real. A billion different unpredictable things will happen between now and the next election cycle. You know you have a chance now, and you do not know if that will be true next time around.

Note that this is a different thing from saying “I am playing pundit, and I am going to forecast my imaginary polling averages for primary states to decide which candidates would be wisest to run.” No. We are a movement, remember? We believe in things. We ask instead, “Who is the candidate to carry our momentum into this election and do the most good?”

In this moment of momentum, with big structural changes necessary to defend American democracy itself, going into an election tilted towards Democrats, the left needs to run a candidate. That much, I think, is obvious. Having a presidential candidate to rally around boosts turnout, draws an enormous amount of attention to the movement, and helps lower-ballot candidates as well. There must be a real left candidate in the Democratic primaries. If we (and I realize that speaking of the political left as “we” implies a level of coordination that does not exist, but you get my drift) do not field a candidate we can unite behind in these primaries, we are fools, and we are throwing a lot of potential political capital in the trash.

(If we run more than one candidate who splits the left vote, we are also fools.)

So who will the left candidate be? As of today, there are only a couple of apparent options. AOC is widely reported to be considering a run, and, from what I hear, the uncertainty is genuine—though she has a large national profile, she’s young, she could just run for Senate instead and keep building herself up to a presidential run in the future. If AOC decides not to run, Ro Khanna is chomping at the bit to run as the most left candidate in the primaries.

Ro Khanna has good politics. But there are two significant drawbacks to a situation in which he ends up as the default left candidate. One, though he has more or less left political positions, he is not of the left. He did not come out of a movement. He is a rich guy with surprisingly good politics. I’m glad he has good politics. The problem is that since he is not really a person who rose up from within the ranks of the left itself, he does not have as strong a connection to the grassroots, to the base, to the most passionate left voters who make up the army that wins elections, as AOC does. There is a difference between an energized left united behind a popular candidate who rose out of NYC DSA, and a less energized left who defaults to supporting Ro Khanna because he is the only left option. In a competitive primary—which this is sure to be—that lack of genuine enthusiasm, that sense of “well, this is the best we can get,” is costly. It leaves you with less momentum and less support on the margins and less drive from your strongest base supporters.

Which is related to the second drawback: Ro Khanna would not win the Democratic primary. Though he has good politics, and he could surely raise some money, he is not exceptionally charismatic. And he will be running against candidates who can raise money and who are charismatic: Mayor Pete, Gavin Newsom, maybe Jon Ossoff, maybe Andy Beshear. You may like these guys or hate them but they are all more naturally charismatic than Ro Khanna. That matters in a competitive primary where many voters are deciding based on charisma. And it matters more when, as we just mentioned, the organized base of hardcore left voters who could potentially help you overcome that lack of charisma are not themselves naturally fired up about you in particular.

AOC is the opposite of Ro Khanna by these two measures. She inspires genuine enthusiasm in the base, in part because she came up through the movement and is seen as of the movement, rather than just as a politician aligned on the issues. And she does have charisma. Tons of it. I am doing my best not to drift into vague, vibes-based arguments here. I think these two points are inarguable. If AOC runs, the entire organized left will instantly spring into action, and its ongoing political momentum will instantly be thrown into her national campaign. If she does not run, and Ro Khanna does, this same mechanism will not happen. The left will perhaps drift behind him by default, but he will not at all inspire the same sort of instantaneous rallying around him that AOC would. Then he would have to somehow defeat more charismatic and more mainstream and at least equally well funded candidates on the trail. It’s not a good bet.

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Is there another viable left candidate who could run? One who has the same level of support among the left base as AOC, and who has comparable fundraising potential, and who has comparable charisma? I do not see one out there. Certainly, there are a lot of people that I personally like who could run for president, and who knows, maybe one of them would catch fire. But the unknowns and unpredictability involved in those campaigns prevent me from saying anything substantive here that would be worth saying, apart from “I like their politics.” We can all think of people we like who we think would be cool presidents and who we can fantasize about shooting to the top of the polls just because they are so great. But, in the summer of 2026, as we move closer to the time when presidential primary campaigns have to start organizing themselves in earnest, can we think of any other candidates who could credibly carry the flag of the left, and who could raise the funds necessary to run a credible national primary campaign, and who have the charisma and national profile to compete in a battle of other charismatic and media-savvy challengers, and who could quickly unite the bulk of the organized left around their campaign without either long and dreary internecine fights or a draining lack of enthusiasm?

I don’t think so. I think that this is pretty much where we are. All factors point to the conclusion that in 2028, it is AOC for president or bust. She is the one, the obvious one. It’s easy to see why she might choose not to run: She would have to forsake her seat in Congress, she would have to sacrifice any remaining normality in her lifestyle, and she is, surely, pretty young to be doing this. In terms of lifestyle, United States President is the worst job on earth, and asking a non-sociopath to seek the job because it is good for the movement is close to asking them to sacrifice their life for the cause. Still, the situation is what it is. Never in my lifetime has the left had this energy, credibility, and opportunity. And crucially, even if AOC runs and loses, it will be worth it. Fuck her seat in Congress. She could work for Zohran or do anything else she wants for a year or two and get reelected to Congress easily. We can all see, now, the benefits that Bernie’s two presidential campaigns produced. They in many ways planted the seeds that grew into the harvest the left is now reaping. Bernie himself understand that he is old and needs some sort of successor. AOC is the one he’s picked. She carries his blessing, his endorsement, his national profile on her shoulders. No one else does. She can produce a campaign that could inspire a new round of young people to fight for a better world and to engage in the political system.

This is not about saying she is a perfect candidate, or even about pretending to be able to make the impossible prediction that she would surely win. It is simply about asking ourselves, “In the context of the 2028 presidential elections, what is the best way for us to actually move toward the substantive political and social and economic changes that are necessary in the United States?” An AOC presidential candidacy is the answer to that question. No election is the beginning or ending of an entire movement. But it is a big opportunity to expand the movement, to push our momentum forward, and to force the Democratic Party to move left in accountable, meaningful ways that will change real people’s lives down the road.

So, AOC, while I completely understand why you might not want to run for president, I think you gotta. Sometimes history calls your name and you have to answer the call. If you don’t, you will regret it forever, and so will we.

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Also

• Related reading: Eugene Debs and All of Us; New York Socialist City; Horse race coverage is bad.

• The Trump administration has terminated TPS protections and is planning to deport thousands of Haitians from America. Here you will find a verified link to donate to support and protect Haitian families in Springfield, Ohio. (I wrote about Springfield’s Haitian community here.)

• I’m going to cover the 2028 presidential campaign. It costs money to do that. I do not have an expense account, because this is real live independent media. You can help make this sort of independent media coverage possible by clicking the link below and becoming a paid subscriber to How Things Work. It doesn’t cost much and it is the only way I continue to exist. Alternately, Bari Weiss will be making most of the news coverage decisions for the election. Thank you all for reading, always.

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Palmer Lucky is an evil fucking worm and dipshit beneficiary of government contracts. He’s the Oculus jackass with a shitty soul patch who runs a military defense company called Anduril. I could continue to talk about the general ways I dislike him on a personal level, but I’ll instead focus on a specific one: He shares many of my hobbies, including an enthusiasm for retro gaming and FPGA hardware. If you see the company ModRetro, know that’s his company. ModRetro recently released an FPGA-based machine in the shape of the N64 called the M64. You do not, under any circumstances, need to buy a war crime N64. 

First let’s just talk about the practical: There’s no shortage of ways to play the N64. You can get original hardware and a CRT or an upscaler like the Retrotink, a piece of hardware that’s made by people who really care. You can also mod an HDMI port into an old N64 if you aren’t a coward. If you want something FPGA-based that plays cartridges, the Analogue 3D works. The Superstation One runs FPGA cores just fine. Or to hell with it, just get a MiSTer or even just download a god-fearing emulator. Nobody needs Palmer Luckey’s evil little device, particularly when the market has never been more saturated. 

This is not the first product ModRetro has put out. They also put an evil Game Boy out, and specifically put one out in “attack drone metal.” I hate these winking little shits. Not only are they using retro gaming to be fascists, they’re doing it in the corniest way humanly possible. 

Former Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aimé took to X, The Everything App twice in one day to signal boost that evil dipshit’s pet project. In the spirit of Hater Week, I’d like to officially state that Reggie can go fuck himself as well. 

Argonaut Games also announced they’d be rereleasing Buck Bumble in collaboration with ModRetro, and immediately got dragged for it in the replies. Buck Bumble can also fuck off.

We cannot let these people feel comfortable in our hobby. Even if it’s just on a personal level, I’m sick of seeing them. The Video Game History Foundation’s Frank Cifaldi said it best last December: “I say this with zero irony: if you are even tangentially a part of a retro video game community, it is your civic duty to push back against this company and shun anyone who doesn't. This is fascism tapping gently at the door and as soon as you let it in, it's going to invite its friends.” 

If we do not draw a line somewhere, they will continue to bring their hatred to us. There’s no better time than the present.

Take capelin, a small silvery fish in the smelt family. Now add salt. Then throw those two ingredients in 110 vats, each of them about 10 feet tall, and let them sit in a defunct factory for over two decades. The resulting stench might haunt an entire community, as it has the people of St. Mary's, a coastal town of about 300 people in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. In 2019, one resident described the ritual of abandoning her home every summer, boarding up the windows and doors so the smell doesn't permeate her belongings. The people of St. Mary's have long fought for the fish sludge to be cleaned up; after an aborted attempt in 2016, that work finally began in earnest this week.

There are 900,000 liters of fish sauce to remove—some of it just liquid, some of it with fish solids. The province of Newfoundland and Labrador budgeted $2 million for the job, which was taken up by a local engineering firm and is expected to be completed in October. As workers cut open the vats, viscous brown fish goo shot out onto the factory floor. It will be mixed with peat moss, hauled out in about 200 truckloads, and thrown in a landfill lined with polyethylene, after which it will be sealed up "like a Ziploc," according to the lead engineer on the project. St. Mary's Mayor Steve Ryan reportedly teared up while describing new hope. "To be known as the 'sauce plant mayor' … it's time for that to be over," he said.

This story begins with a man falling through the atmosphere, plummeting towards his apparent doom. This is as surprising to him as it is to us watching at home, because he was asleep at the start of his plummet, and now he is awake and screaming, which is sensible. But hang on! He's resourceful, or as resourceful as you can be when falling from 35,000 feet. He stops screaming and spreads his limbs, slowing his descent like in Point Break. He's gonna figure this out. But not before we find out what he was up to 24 hours ago!

It turns out he was at his laptop, reading a blog on the internet. Not very exciting, huh? That's okay – soon he will get a coffee! Not sexy enough for you? That's what the pain au chocolat he'll soon be noshing on is about. How will this guy find himself up there? Guess you'll have to watch 45 to 50 minutes of this middling streaming drama premiere to find out! 

Wasn't that irritating? Well, I hope you're not planning on watching TV any time soon. Fucking everyone is doing this these days. 

Like many annoying things writers do, we have borrowed a phrase from Latin to describe what others would call simple buffoonery: in medias res. It translates to "in the middle of things," and it refers to the decision to start a story somewhere other than the beginning. 

But wouldn't that make it the beginning? you may ask. To which I say: Don't you have laundry to fold or a second screen to look at? Because that's why TV shows even do this nonsense. Netflix, for example, simply wants you watching long enough to count your stream as a "view." 

Look: there are many ways to do this and even do it well, but most television shows are not pulling it off. Most often, it's a tacit admission that what follows the shocking opening isn't compelling on its own without the carrot of the wild predicament dangling over it. It takes the burden of earning the audience's attention off story, and assuming you have the audience when you do not is perhaps the entertainer's greatest sin. 

But let's say you do not agree with me on a philosophical level. Whatever gets asses in seats ought to be fair game, right? Yeah, sure — except in 2026, it's the biggest cliché, and you ought to abhor a cliché. While there is no governing body deciding what is cliché and what is not (and there really should be; as much as I love writing a cranky blog I don't have the time to straighten everyone out), it behooves us all to notice when a new one is forming. If you haven't noticed, let me be the one to tell you: Beginning in medias res is now a cliché. Try something else. 

Don't think you can outsmart this. Everyone believes that they will be the one to pull off the genius instance, become an exemplar of the form like the Hannibal season 2 premiere. That way lies ruin, friend. You know what would actually help you? Writing a really fucking good beginning that starts the story where it is meant to start. It can even be in the middle of things, as a treat – Disclosure Day is one of the more divisive films of the year, but most everyone appreciates how the movie starts: immediately opening with a guy getting clobbered in a wrestling match, before revealing that a clandestine handoff is taking place in the stands. At first, this appears to be an in medias res opening but, crucially, the story continues from there. No flashing back. If anything before this happened, we didn't have to see it. It is simply the best place to start the story, and a thrilling one at that. 

Mostly though, my biggest objection to the in medias res opening is that it treats me like I'm an idiot who has to be tricked into a story, and I really dislike being treated like an idiot. Which I suppose might be adequate motivation for me to come to your house, knock you unconscious, and drop you from an airplane – although if the audience watching this scenario learned that this is the reason for your fate in a flashback after the scene where you were in freefall, they'd probably be disappointed. 

It's Hater Week here on Aftermath. This week we’re letting the hate flow through us by examining what it means to be a hater (and… a lover?), venting about some of our biggest pet peeves in games and life, and giving others a space to do the same.

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