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Why Is Cuomo still able to keep Office despite being the incarnation of corrupt politician? Who are his supporters/backers ?
by kwere 5y ago
Why Is Cuomo still able to keep Office despite being the incarnation of corrupt politician? Who are his supporters/backers ?
- mc32 5y agoAnd where are all the Kavanaugh detractors making noise about Cuomo? I'm also interested in seeing Anderson Cooper trot out the accusers and interview them about Cuomo.
- alistairSH 5y agoFWIW, every liberal I know wants Cuomo out of office. I don't know any Cuomo supporters outside of the NY Democratic political machine.
- mc32 5y agoI agree most “desire” to have him out. But they’re not making noisy rackets in the street demanding immediate removal (either when these things initially came out like 10 months ago or now).
- vkou 5y agoIf you're going to compare apples to apples, shouldn't you be contrasting the Republican party's response to that appointment, with the Democratic party's response to Cuomo? I, uh, don't recall either Trump or Mitch McConnel demanding that Kavanaugh withdraw his bid. Both Biden and Pelosi, however, have called for Cuomo's resignation. It's strange how the Republican party seems to be unwilling to hold itself to a much lower standard than what they demand from Democrats.
- iammisc 5y agoOkay but if you recall with kavanaugh, left wing insurrectionists were storming the supreme court building. Where are the activists? Or are they only called out for the gop?
- tomschlick 5y agoThey will do the same thing they did when it was discovered that Virginia's Governor dressed up in blackface, and his LT Governor was accused of sexual assault..... nothing at all. It was an election year and they needed the votes.
- mandevil 5y agoThere are major differences between Northam (did not commit a crime, happened decades ago) and Cuomo (did commit crimes, happened during his term in office). I suspect that the closer parallel in Virginia history would be Bob McDonnell- in 2013 he announced he was under federal investigation for bribery charges (like all sitting Virginia governors, he was ineligible to run for reelection, so this did not affect his campaign, though it definitely affect the campaign that was running to replace him). He ended up taking the case all the way to the Supreme Court, who ruled that what he did was not legally bribery.
- mc32 5y agoIt’s interesting to see some people get cancelled for things they said or did decades ago, but others don’t get cancelled for that. What are the considerations when they go for someone who said something decades ago (or in the cases of people in their early twenties, things they said on Twitter in their teens —and look at Jack, he said cancelable offenses when Twitter was young too but he remains a darling)
- arp242 5y agoYou mean like Biden? Pelosi? Both NY Democratic senators? You really can't pin hypocrisy on the Democratic party here. You saw the same with Al Franken (where, in hindsight, they were probably too quick to judge).
- mc32 5y agoI agree with the Franken incident. It was "bro" culture, but I don't think it was enough to dispatch someone from office. But Cuomo and the Virginia governor cases, had they been another party we would have had lots of clamoring for removal.
- arp242 5y agoThere were several issues with the Franken case; a number of claims don't really pan out on closer examination for example.[1] As for "lots of clamoring for removal", things are moving in the right direction; why make a lot of noise if things are going well? Plus in recent years at least, the Democratic party generally has a history of usually doing the right thing with these kind of issues as far as I know. The Republican party on the other hand has lost the trust that they will just do the right thing, and events from the last several years don't really make that lack of trust all that unreasonable to be honest. [1]: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/the-case-of-al-franken https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/the-case-of-al...
- mc32 5y agoI think this proves it’s politics and not based on principle (which is what these are sold as). They don’t say, yeah, he’s a lout (or a sexual assaulter or whatever) but he’s our guy, so let’s keep ‘im, it’s like shhhhh, let’s not make any noise, let’s do some party platform things to wash your sins and let’s get on with it. If it’s the opposition it’s, we will not rest till they are out of office, they cannot represent us, it’s a travesty, yes he did blackface decades ago but he’s still a racist (look at all the decades old sins they dig up on people they don’t like).
- _-david-_ 5y ago
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> Why Is Cuomo still able to keep Office It’s been hours since the Attorney General’s report was was released. This is asking “why are people allowed to lie unassisted” picoseconds after a car crash.
- tomp 5y agoNo, he was accused long ago, 6 months or longer. Many other men were cancelled on much flimsier accusations. But he’s a Democratic politician in NY, so he’s a favoured demographic by most media…
- lordnacho 5y agoOften what happens with a scandal is after it breaks the defendant will say they deserve a chance to be heard, and if an investigation is launched that's at least a reason to back off for a bit, and the bad press can go away for a while. Now that the AG has finished the report, it looks like a matter of time. It might just be a question of him positioning an ally to take his seat, or maybe tying up a few loose ends.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> he was accused long ago, 6 months or longer. Many other men were cancelled on much flimsier accusations. Fortunately, it takes due process to “cancel” a holder of public office. Part of that involves verifying claims.
- xyzzyz 5y agoWhat’s so “fortunate” about that? If the rulers were liable to be cancelled as easily as plebs, maybe the plebs too would then be allowed due process.
- ashtonkem 5y agoThat’s not actually true though. Impeachment is a political process, not a judicial one. An executive can be impeached for whatever the legislature feels like according to rules that the legislature itself sets. Historically officials have been impeached for such things as drunkenness and “intemperate speeches” (racist rants). If the legislature wanted to, he’d be gone in 30s flat.
- ceejayoz 5y agoNY Dems are hoping to push him out without a messy impeachment. He has few allies left, but he can make a fuss on the way.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> NY Dems are hoping to push him out without a messy impeachment The only way to do that is to credibly threaten impeachment. That’s the work that is being done.
- random_upvoter 5y agoI find it odd that a formal impeachment would be necessary. If NY Democrats just refuse any further cooperation with Cuomo then surely he has no option left but to resign?
- ceejayoz 5y agoNY’s Governor has quite a bit of power even if the Assembly and Senate refuse to work with him. Right now, a majority of the Assembly has come out in favor of an impeachment trial. We will see over the next few days if that threat is enough to push him out. I suspect it won’t be.
- atatatat 5y agoWatch House of Cards.
- MR4D 5y agoWow, that’s a mike-drop kind of comment - dead on! Politics is a weird thing, and to those who question situations like this really should watch that show. Aside than learning about the Constitution in school, you’ll learn more about real world politics from that show than you can imagine.
- ceejayoz 5y agoWatching House of Cards to learn about government and the Constitution is like watching Bond movies to learn spycraft. It bears little resemblance to actual workings of Congress and the White House.
- xadhominemx 5y agoAbsolutely not, it’s a fantastical fiction. Completely made up for entertainment purposes.
- game_the0ry 5y agoI live in NYC - Cuomo is still somewhat popular here, particularly (and perhaps counterintuitively) among older women. At least among the older women I know, his transgressions are processed in the same way that Trump's were when the "grab 'em by the p-ssy" tape leaked. Cuomo is skilled in playing "leader" on tv: * the daily covid press briefings - these were especially powerful among Americans looking for some kind of steady leadership they could latch on to and feel safe and were especially amped up by the media (remember "Cuomo-sexual"?) * in his response yesterday to AG's allegations, he showed multiple pics of him hugging and touching people he greeted, as a way of minimizing the pic that showed him touching one of his accuser's face * multiple staged videos on tv of him assessing and riding the subways, cleaning the subways, attending gay pride parade, etc all to create a fake image of him as a "man of the people" ^^ that stuff still works on the over 55 demographics that watch CNN, so they still support him. IIRC, he had like ~50% approval rating like a couple weeks ago.
- 3327 5y agoyeah i don't see why he should resign if Trump didn't. playing devils advocate here but this is the new normal.
- puszczyk 5y agoI don’t know why the answer is unpopular. I not an American and don’t follow the NY politics. I don’t know too much about the scandal. But the ^^^ description sounds like a playbook followed by many politicians in many places , and the one that seems to work quite often.
- game_the0ry 5y agoI will probably get more downvotes for this, but don't care. Likely being downvoted by folks who identify as liberal / democrat who still have misplaced faith that Cuomo is an effective leader. That's how strong the media effect is.
- iammisc 5y agoPolitics has become a religion substitute in this country. People are becoming blinded by dogma, but instead of the dogma being about unfalsifiable claims, it's about facts and real world happenings.
- pjc50 5y agoHe keeps the office until the next election regardless of what he does. Kind of a problem with elected positions. It used to be possible to shame people into resigning but that no longer works.
- thereddaikon 5y agoPolitics is by its very nature nasty and corrupt. New York politics is no different. In fact its kind of notorious for it. Cuomo is a powerful and politically connected family. The current governor's dad was once governor of NY as well. And his brother is a high profile news anchor. It shouldn't be that way. Families shouldn't have that much power. But they do. And it takes a fair bit to bring them down.
- okamiueru 5y agoI disagree that politics by its nature is corrupt. I can see how, in some countries, it is hard to think otherwise, but I find the statement itself to be false.
- totalZero 5y agoI agree with you. Certainly, you don't have to be corrupt to be a masterful politician. However, it is a fact that politics is a nasty business. We benefit when the people capable of doing it are the ones that we put in power. Otherwise, we will get gobbled up by the other factions and entities that do emplace that sort of person in their political institutions. Personally I find it very interesting that these behaviors have allegedly been known by those in his working radius for many years, yet they are only coming to a head now after Cuomo's profile was elevated within the party and on the national stage during the scary slog of covid. I am leery of the use of sexual indiscretions to hamstring political operators. If he did something illegal (to be clear, I am not saying he is innocent nor guilty), they should take it to court rather than to the New York Times.
- luma 5y agoPower attracts those who pursue power, and those most willing to go to any ends to obtain that power are those mostly likely to wind up with it. I don't think that power itself is necessarily a corrupting force, but it is a magnet for those who are corrupted.
- mc32 5y agoMaybe that’s part of it, but a lot of it is also how organizations of people work. When one person agrees and the other disagrees it comes down to interpretation of the rules and then imposing those rules. It can become very despotic quite fast. And it’s not because the people are like that. The “system” makes them into that. In the case above, if the agreer sees the disagreers side this encourages other disagreers to flout whatever it was and things can devolve into anarchy. So you necessarily have to enforce some rules.
- Spooky23 5y agoHe’s an old school political boss. Nobody loves the guy, but he usually has an air of competence backed by the combination of carrot and stick that governors wield. New York is a pretty complex state. When you hear somebody blabbering about “dems” and “blue”, you know they are clueless. It’s a conservative democratic state with a bunch of internal tensions that drive a lot of different dynamics. Another thing is that the competition is pretty lame. If he survives this scandal, he will win re-election.
- astura 5y ago>the competition is pretty lame The person elected governor before Cuomo (Eliot Spitzer) resigned due to a sex scandal. (prostitution in this case)
- papito 5y agoThe bar for a fireable offense has been set extremely high in the last few years. That said, the Democratic party is largely still center-left, well-functioning, and with a working moral compass (for a political party), unlike that other authoritarian cult. Cuomo will be forced to either resign or be impeached.
- ncallaway 5y agoFrom everything I’ve read it sounds like the NY legislature plans to move expeditiously toward an impeachment, so I’m not sure he is able to keep the office.
- danaris 5y agoNYS politics are a mess—not quite the level of habitual corruption stereotypically associated with Chicago, but it wasn't far off from that within my memory. The only governor we've had in the past 40 years who wasn't visibly corrupt was Eliot Spitzer—who allowed a sex scandal with no political/corruption elements (that I ever heard of) to push him out of office. Cuomo was actually looking pretty good for a while, relatively speaking. He was still very much a NY politician, but he was getting some stuff done, and with Silver and Bruno no longer keeping a stranglehold over the state legislature, we actually had budgets coming in on time (for many years, it was guaranteed that the state budget would be months late, at best, due to the deliberate gridlock in Albany). It is, of course, supremely unsurprising that Cuomo has been doing this sort of thing all along. It's exactly the sort of mid-20th-century "politician's perk" that anyone who's paying attention would absolutely expect him to be making sure he gets. Unfortunately, because he's built up a decent amount of political capital due to the aforementioned "getting stuff done", combined with the fact that it is something that far too many still consider "normal", and his almost fanatical stubbornness, it's also supremely unsurprising that he's not resigning. I expect to see a messy, drawn-out impeachment fight, at best. At this point, we can just hope that we might get a replacement who's actually interesting in improving New York, rather than one who mostly cares about improving his own image and network. But I won't hold my breath.
- PragmaticPulp 5y agoHe was elected through the public vote. Politicians aren’t removed from office the instant they’re associated with negative press. There will certainly be an impeachment process that can possibly remove him in the middle of an election cycle, but it takes time.
- dragonwriter 5y ago> There will certainly be an impeachment process The impeachment process against Cuomo has been underway for a while, and it has shifted into a higher gear with this report.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- blacktriangle 5y agoDemocrats gonna Democrat
- alistairSH 5y agoYes, by moving to impeach a serial sex offender.
- foolinaround 5y agowhen it became inevitable..
- fidesomnes 5y agoThe same people who blessed Obama.
- mandevil 5y agoI'm going to presume that you are not American. In the systems used by almost all other democracies around the world (either Westminster or Party List), where his office was dependent on maintaining support from Parliament, he probably would be gone by now. The US presidential/bicameral system (replicated in all of its flaws in almost every state) where the President/Governor is directly elected by the people does not have an effective means of removing someone, as we all learned by watching two impeachments of the previous President. The executive can resign if they choose, but forcing a independently elected official out of office basically takes a lot of work and effort. He would need to be impeached by majority vote in the lower house, then convicted by a 2/3 vote in the upper house (plus, in an unusual NY quirk, the highest court, the Court of Appeals, joins the upper house as jurors) after a trial, where the governor has his own lawyers making his case for the defense, there are sworn witnesses and testimony, etc. Impeachment has never removed a president. It has only ever removed one governor of New York. Cuomo has made enough enemies- and done enough heinous stuff- that he might lose, but it will be time consuming and painful, baring a resignation.
- dragonwriter 5y ago> The US presidential/bicameral system (replicated in all of its flaws in almost every state) where the President/Governor is directly elected by the people The US President is not directly elected by the people, even though the people by whom he is elected are not the legislature and he does not need to maintain their support.
- dragonwriter 5y ago> Why Is Cuomo still able to keep Office despite being the incarnation of corrupt politician? If corruption didn't work for politicians, the “corrupt politician” image wouldn't be a thing. But Cuomo is done, its just a matter of time. Unlike what has happened with the national GOP and Trump, NY Dems are done with Cuomo; his impeachment and removal are essentially certain even with his party hold majorities in both houses of the legislature, and it looks like there is a decent chance of him facing criminal charges as well, with DAs in multiple NY counties conducting investigations.