You win the White House and the Senate – and everything should be peachy. A conga line of executive orders follows, and a perpetual musical chairs-like majority in the Senate assures you can pass virtually any legislation your heart desires. Critical Race Theory is spreading across America faster than a junior high school rumor. Trump’s border wall? That is so last year. Transgender kids can compete athletically against cisgender kids (I think I got that right) and the number one problem in America – dutifully reported by the Fourth Estate with Beethoven’s 5th-like drama – has attained a near-COVID level urgency: the scourge of white supremacy.
To quote the LEGO movie: “Everything is awesome!” But then who comes along to spoil the fun Democrats are having faster than a parent at a keg party? New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (D), that’s who.
Those Were the Days
Governor Andy was super high-profile for a while there in 2020. He was growling at his counterpart in New York City, Mayor Bill De Blasio, releasing a best-selling book on his stupendous pandemic leadership, and middle-fingering then-President Trump to squeals of delight from progressives. He even accepted an Emmy for his stoic statesmanship during COVID; closing businesses, synagogues, and churches just because he could.
Cuomo even found the time to banter embarrassingly about his love life on his little brother’s TV show. He could practically smell that Dad-vanquishing fourth term as governor of New York – and the off-gassing from the window treatments he would install in a future oval office.
But like countless thousands of New Yorkers and Bad Orange himself – it all went South. Cuomo – and Governor Gavin of Cali, who faces a possible recall – are two Dems ruining the winning streak.
C’mon, man!
Cuomo’s Descent From Greatness
Cuomo’s disastrous edict of a year ago eventually resulted in the deaths of over 15,000 elderly Americans in nursing homes in his state – a fact he tried to obscure with an old school cover-up, according to a top aide. If he had been a Republican, that travesty would’ve certainly destroyed his career. But Democrats get some added latitude from their cosseters in the bubble-wrapping media. Maybe Andy could ride the uncomfortable swell to calmer seas?
And that’s when the first woman came forth bravely to allege sexual harassment against the Democratic Party superstar. Followed by another, and another, and another, and another. This week, a sixth woman claimed that Governor Cuomo crossed a line with her and broke her silence to add her story to the others. Now there is a seventh accuser. Close aides are pulling out – like Jenga pieces from an increasingly precarious Tower of Babel ready to fall.
The cultural imperative of stories too big to be continuously ignored by his media enablers forced major leftist outlets to finally grit their teeth and report Cuomo’s tragic and misguided nursing home scandal – and the multiplying sexual harassment claims. But having reluctantly done their duty as card-carrying journalists to report news they don’t like – the media then decided to take a pass for allegation number six. Like butter spread on the hardtack of an orphan in a Dickens novel, the Fourth Estate gave Cuomo’s sixth accuser as little coverage as possible. How much the seventh will get is yet to be seen.
Another Media Double Standard
Astonishingly, there was no mention of this anonymous accusation by anyone on CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, or CBS. That means no one, including Rachel Maddow, Anderson Cooper, Jake Tapper, Wolf Blitzer, and every other talking head from these media outlets, uttered word one about the accusation.
This beggars belief when one considers the sympathetic, wall-to-wall coverage Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s accuser Christine Blasey Ford received for weeks on end during that contemptible, scorched earth chapter in American politics. And that coverage is itself in stark contrast to that afforded President Biden’s sexual assault accuser, Tara Reade, who made allegations about him that Vice President Kamala Harris said she believed when she was running against Biden for the Democratic Party nomination. Harris effectively withdrew that belief when she became the favorite to share the ticket with him. All media obsessions are not created equal.
Coyly hiding institutional political bias is now a quaint memory of the past for the leftist media. Trump forced them to start playing poker with their cards facing the table. Bias is now a given. This is why these major networks passed on another damning accusation against a rapidly dimming blue-state star – a man that CNN’s Chris Cuomo can’t cover only now, you know, because they’re brothers. His network must be as slow as the muscle-bound anchor himself appears to be because it failed to notice Andrew and his Mini-Me were actually brothers back in 2020 when they teamed up for the Cuomo Variety Hour on CNN.
Apparently, that show got canceled – at the exact same time the phantom of journalistic principle magically appeared over at Jeff Zucker’s place.
And being canceled is precisely what Governor Cuomo now has to worry about. Thus far, he has played the same card that Governor Black Face Klan Robes of Virginia (Ralph Northam) played so successfully when he declined to step down after a highly incriminating photo from his post-graduate years emerged. Cuomo is hoping he can catch a little of that lightning in a bottle that Northam and Canada’s Trudeau caught, both of whom wore blackface but weathered the storm – something Megyn Kelly lost her job for just mentioning on-air.
Simply refusing to step down – no matter the litany of complaints leveled against one – is the new apology-filled resignation. And every time a Dr. Seuss controversy or a Meghan and Harry telenovela bobs to the surface of the media fathoms, Cuomo gets a spring in his step.
That the controversy which may undo Governor Cuomo is a series of #MeToo complaints and not the deaths of 15,000 elderly New Yorkers is a scandal in and of itself. It is evidence of how we perceive the aged as disposable in our society – something Cuomo affirmed with a callousness that takes the breath away. When asked about the nursing home deaths in January, Cuomo said:
“Who cares, 33, 28, died in a hospital, died in a nursing home? They died.”
Unless all occasions do inform in his favor – the same fate may await Governor Cuomo’s political career.
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Read more from Pennel Bird.
