A Tale of Two Cities

Part One: Hardball (9-28-07)

Chris Matthews: Mario Cuomo was a three-term governor of New York. Governor Cuomo, thank you for joining us. What concerns you about the democratic field right now and what they’re doing in terms of Iran?

Mario Cuomo: Well, it’s what their not doing that concerns me most. What they’re not doing is learning from the terrible mistake we made in allowing the president to seize the war power and take us to war …. And in the Constitution today is something we ignored in Iraq. It says, Article 1, Section 8, the power to declare war belongs to the Congress. The difference is – and this is what was said at the convention and it’s common sense – you give it to one man, he may be mad. He may be an egotist. He may be misguided. Or, he might be stupid. …. Now, remember, the Founding Fathers gave the power to declare war to the Congress. That power cannot be delegated to the president. … And my goodness, the president you are talking about is the president who started a war with a mistaken context. Assuming he was telling the truth, and I will, he was wrong about the reason for it. He was wrong about the complicity. He was wrong about how many troops we needed. He was wrong about how we would be greeted when we got there. He was wrong about the civil war, wrong about how much it would cost, wrong about how long it would last, and now you’re saying maybe he can start another war. It’s a mistake. This is an opportunity for the Democrats to show real leadership, and the presidential candidates should lead the way." …

Chris Matthews: Thank you, Governor. You’re the first person since this war began to remind us of the Constitution.

A lot of DUers enjoyed watching Mario Cuomo on Hardball last Friday. For younger folks, it might have been their introduction to a man who was once considered a potential president or Supreme Court justice. For others, it was an opportunity to listen to the man who gave one of the most impressive speeches at a democratic national convention in 1984.

I watched the segment with my 13-year old daughter, who is horrified that there is any chance the country could become involved in another war. She said that the nation and indeed, the world, would be a better place if Mario Cuomo was president, rather than George Bush. Her interest in Governor Cuomo motivated me to get out some of my old files from when I met him a couple times on some Iroquois Confederacy issues.

In 1974, Mohawk traditionalists (the "Eastern Door" of the Iroquois’ Longhouse) began to occupy land in Herkimer County. They created a small community at Moss Lake, and for a couple of years, tensions grew.

A few years earlier, when the Onondaga (the Fire Keepers) had a stand-off with the state near Syracuse (John & Yoko were among the non-Indians who put their bodies on the line!), the previous governor sent the NYS Troopers from that stand-off to put down the Attica prison riot. Tadodaho Leon Shenandoah used to say the inmates there died from the bullets that had been aimed at Indians. These were strange days.

Governor Carey picked Mario Cuomo to deal with the Mohawks. I do not think there were many other politicians who could do what he did. He and the Mohawks reached a compromise, and everyone won. He displayed a manner of thinking far different from that of the "leaders" who advocate violence as a first resort, be it in Attica, Iraq, or Iran.

I showed my daughter a notebook full of newspaper articles and documents from the Office of the Governor of New York State from the times, long ago, when her father was a participant in other dealings with Cuomo and the Iroquois. One Gannett article mentioned the Governor coming over to me at a public ceremony for veterans, and telling me that he had appreciated something I had recently done for him. My daughter, like the Gannett reporter, asked me what I had done? I told both that it related to one of Cuomo’s favorite quotes, from the Rabbi Hillel the Elder: "If I am not for myself – who is for me? And if I am for myself alone – what am I?" (Rabbi Hillel lived in the time of Herod, and so his wisdom fits for life in the time of Bush2.)

Part Two: Diaries of Mario Cuomo (Random House; 1984; pages 148-9)

"It was inevitable, then, that the interested parties would recall what happened in 1977 when the whole matter of accepting the Liberal line and agreeing to remain on it came up again in 1982. Koch, the heavy early favorite for the Democratic party designation, argued that I was a ‘spoiler’ – that is, I was willing to ruin the Democrats’ chances in November (remember, no Democrat had ever won a general election without the Liberal line) because I refused to say I would ‘support the Democrat’ if unsuccessful in my party’s lists. ….

"Koch had moved much further to the right …capping his transition with his 1980 speech at the Democratic National Committee meeting in Baltimore, in which he attacked ‘traditional Democratic philosophy.’ He had also been perceived as sympathetic to Reagan in 1980, (and) had run as a Republican as well as a Democrat in the 1981 mayoral campaign ….Koch’s move to the right was perhaps suitable for a general election in New York, when Republicans and Conservatives vote, but the mayor decided not to press it in the Democratic primary, where respect for ‘traditional principles’ was still high …."

Ed Koch was an intelligent, capable politician in the 1960s and 1970s. He had been involved in anti-war protests and civil rights marches. I have things from the Rubin "Hurricane" Carter defense efforts in the 1970s, where the Honorable Edward Koch, US House of Representatives, was actively involved. However, he moved to the right along with the group known as the neoconservatives. He supported George W. Bush in 2004, and is backing Senator Clinton this year.

I think it is interesting to consider the comparisons within the democratic party today. Some of the issues are, from time to time, even found on this forum. Let’s look closer:

Cuomo is a strict Constitutionalist, although he is flexible in how he applies the law – he has spoken of being firm but compassionate. He recognizes that the Bush administration’s bringing the nation to war in Iraq was a gross error, and that even if the president was honest, others misled him. There should, in a Constitutional democracy, be consequences. That is, of course, the responsibility of the congress.

Cuomo speaks for many DUers as far as our democratic values and principles. And he recognizes that the party has been most successful when it appeals to those who are liberals, and not registered democrats, when it comes to both winning elections and leading the nation on important issues. He does not insist that the only "true" democrats are those who always and only vote exclusively for the party’s candidate – especially when, in good conscience, the voter recognizes that a specific candidate is a democrat in name, and a republican in practice.

We also have people who sincerely believe that the party benefits from ignoring the liberal non-democrats, and attempting to appeal to moderate republicans. Their views on the Constitution, as illustrated by their lack of support for calls for congress to investigate and impeach VP Cheney, are not firm, though they show compassion for those in the administration who lied this nation into war in Iraq. Some express offense that some members of the Democratic Underground are unsure of what lever they would press if the democratic nominee has voted repeatedly to fund the Bush-Cheney madness in Iraq. They have a list of excuses for why the democratic congress which was elected to end the war, is instead funding Bush’s surge in the war of occupation there. And they discount the possibility of war with Iran, or worse, take the position that it may be necessary.

Part Three: A Tale of Two Cities (Democratic National Convention; 7-16-1984)

"Ten days ago, President Reagan admitted that although some people in this country seemed to be doing well nowadays, others were unhappy, even worried, about themselves, their families, and their futures. The president said that he didn’t understand that fear. He said, ‘Why, this country is a shining city on a hill.’ And the president is right. In many ways we are a shining city on a hill.

"But the hard truth is that not everyone is sharing in this city’s splendor and glory. A shining city is perhaps all the president sees from the portico of the White House and the veranda of his ranch, where everyone seems to be doing well. But there’s another city; there’s another part to the shining city; the part where some people can’t pay their mortgages, and most young people can’t afford one, where students can’t afford the education they need, and middle-class parents watch the dreams they hold for their children evaporate.

"In this part of the city there are more poor than ever, more families in trouble, more and more people who need help but can’t find it. Even worse: there are elderly people who tremble in the basements of houses there. And people who sleep in the streets, in the gutter, where the glitter doesn’t show. There are ghettos where thousands of young people, without a job or an education, give their lives away to drug dealers every day. There is dispair, Mr. President, in the faces that you don’t see, in the places that you don’t visit in your shining city.

"In fact, Mr. President, this is a nation – Mr. President, you ought to know that this nation is more a ‘Tale of Two Cities’ than it is just a ‘Shining City on a Hill’."

Governor Cuomo’s 1984 speech is just as powerful and true today for many, many democrats at the grass roots level. We do not live in the exclusive shining neighborhoods, where the Bush policies may be viewed as mistaken, but where the pain they cause is not felt. We live in that other city, in the surrounding towns, and in the rural areas that Mario Cuomo represents.

When we watch the news, and hear about the latest congressional investment in the war in Iraq, and the drums of war in regard to Iran, we must in good conscience support that most liberal and progressive democratic candidates in the primaries. We demand that our leader, in the spirit of Mario Cuomo, not give a speech that brings crowds to their feet, but rather, deliver a message that brings this nation to its senses.

It's hard to know where to start or which to focus on. This line struck me forcibly, "We demand that our leader, in the spirit of Mario Cuomo, not give a speech that brings crowds to their feet, but rather, deliver a message that brings this nation to its senses."

Will that ever happen, is often the thought which brings some progressives to despair from time to time. Trickle down has been the strategy since Reagan and it is still in effect. This just doesn't apply to economics, it is the thinking that is done behind closed doors and which as it seeps out and down to the rest of us, demands we fall in line. Imagine their surprise that everyone is not acquiescent. In fact the only ones who are seeming to do so are the beltway insiders, Congress and the fundies. One group lives in a city of eternal war and the other isn't able to stop that insanity.

"I refused to say I would ‘support the Democrat’ if unsuccessful in my party’s lists"

Do we hold our noses, again, and vote for candidates who are an anathema to the very things we believe. How difficult will it be to vote for a candidate who believes the war in Iraq should extend to 2013 and beyond as well as another in Iran?

The dems in Congress were worried sick about being viewed (at least so they say) that they would be branded 'do nothing' and be blamed for the sorry state of affairs in this country, and that the obstructionists would get off scot free. Well the numbers are in and by a margin of 2/1 the country views the republicons and * as the troublemaker, the party of warmongers. Seems the American people know how to figure some things out. So what will the next excuse be I wonder?

And where has Mario been the last couple of years? He's been sorely missed.

for me to say that in 2008, I am going to be voting for democrats. No one else in contests involving a democratic candidate.

However, I am not offended by someone who votes for democrats in 99% of contests, but does not pull the lever in a contest where she/he feels that conscience does not allow it. I read with a sense of amusement where some people demand that people must vote always and exclusively for each and every democrat, in order to qualify as a "true" democrat and member of the "base." Closed minds, like closed rooms, are often stuffy.

There are elections from village justice to county executive, from state legislator to the US House, and the Senate and the Presidency. Our party should be looking to expand the base, from the local level to the federal level. That has to include finding common ground with liberals and progressives who are not registered as democrats. It also includes convincing some members of our party to keep an open mind about 2008, and to not make any decision that they will refuse to support any one candidate if he/she is the eventual nominee.

We need to find common ground within the party, so that we can win elections in '08 that will allow us to move away from the tragic course that this administration has taken us on. That should not be mistakenly seeking common ground containing the dangerous trails the adminitration insists we take.

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However, I am not offended by someone who votes for democrats in 99% of contests, but does not pull the lever in a contest where she/he feels that conscience does not allow it. I read with a sense of amusement where some people demand that people must vote always and exclusively for each and every democrat, in order to qualify as a "true" democrat and member of the "base." Closed minds, like closed rooms, are often stuffy.
>>

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

The two counties where I tend to be the most politically active are largely republican. There are races where no democrat is in the running. If the choice is voting for a republican, a green party candidate, or simply not voting, I am going to vote my conscience.

In a place like this, it is important to understand how to organize a coalition. If I expect my friends who are greens, socialists, or something else, to listen to me when I want them to support a democratic candidate, then I must be willing to listen to them.

I always thought that one of Governor Cuomo's greatest strengths was his ability to listen to other people. That is a quality that the republicans view as a weakness. Our party will not be well served by adopting that republican stance.

We only have a little over a year before the elections. There's a lot of work to be done.

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However, I am not offended by someone who votes for democrats in 99% of contests, but does not pull the lever in a contest where she/he feels that conscience does not allow it. I read with a sense of amusement where some people demand that people must vote always and exclusively for each and every democrat, in order to qualify as a "true" democrat and member of the "base." Closed minds, like closed rooms, are often stuffy.
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I'm reading. ;)

Dude, two things: 1. You shouldn't give much of a damn about what I think on this matter, especially if your feelings are true and closely held; and 2. See #1.

Be a patriot in whatever way suits you best. Nobody can or should ever ask for more. I have my strongly-held opinion on this issue, and you have yours, and that shouldn't be cause for extreme strife or anger. I bet you and I agree on 95% of the issues before us...so having static between us makes no sense at all.

:toast:

If you refer to TO readers and my election opinions, I don't intend to write about that subject until my bosses force me to...and in any event, I can't and wouldn't advocate for any particular candidate on that site.

If that's what you meant...?

that I try to keep in mind, both in real life and on DU, is that I will be in contact with two distinct groups of people. They may or may not identify themselves as democrats, liberals, progressives, etc, but those are not as important to me as two groupings that I tend to make: (a) those who I share values with; and (b) those who I have shared interests with.

With those who I share values, I am confident that even if we have different opinions, or view certain things very differently, that these are relatively minor differences compared to those things we share. I will discuss and debate those differences, but it is fine with me when they think very differently than me. Indeed, any time two people think just alike, it is evidence that only one is thinking.

The size of an "audience" is not particularly significant in these cases. The discussions and debates are, by and large, between me and the other person. Of course, like most people, I would prefer if many people read (and hopefully agree) with the things I post here. But the validity of my position is not measured by audience or agreement. As Gandhi said, "In matters of conscience, the law of the majority has no place. It is slavery to be amenable to the majority no matter what its decisions are."

There are also DUers who have very different values than me. That is fine. I tend to avoid discussions involving values with them. I still may read some of their OPs, and even if I do not respond, I might think they raise interesting points. And it may be that I think they are nice people, who would be pleasant to sit near at a picnic. But I would not care to sit near them and talk about values.

These are people that I recognize can have common interests, however. We may live in different realities, but we share an interest in not having an industry dump TCE wastes in the water supply. We have a common interest in having jobs available in our communities, good schools, and safe streets. So if I like them or not isn't of any real significance. What matters is finding the common ground of shared interests.

In the end, we are not on a fence, where some people are going profit at the others' expense. The problems that the people of this land face today are far to great for that to happen at this time. We are in a very problemed time, one of the most dangerous in our nation's history. But we can solve our nation's problems, if we focus on those values we share, and our common interests.

Well said. Those with whom I share an interest are my allies, not my friends. Those with whom I share values are my friends, even if - sometimes - we don't share identical interests.

Allies can shift over the years. And those who are your allies on one issue, may be your opponent on another issue. Over the decades, I've had many, many allies, but relatively few friends.

There are some folks on DU (such as you) who though I have never met, I consider a friend. That is because of the shared values.

:pals:

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He does not insist that the only "true" democrats are those who always and only vote exclusively for the party’s candidate – especially when, in good conscience, the voter recognizes that a specific candidate is a democrat in name, and a republican in practice.
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Thank you for that.

And how many of the Dem candidates are actually supporting the upholding of the Constitution? How many?

Thank you, thank you, thank you, for this post.

that Mario Cuomo is one of the most thoughtful and wise leaders of our times. I was glad to see him on Hardball. It was a reminder to me that a lot of our DU friends were actually born after he gave his wonderful speech at the 1984 Democratic National Convention.

www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x58502

has the transcript up now. It's a very powerful segment. I printed it out, to be filed with the copies of about a dozen of his speeches that I have.

the effects of downsizing on our workforce...where he said asking "steel workers with their swollen fingers from years on the job were being asked to train to use computers" I've botched the quote but his imagery of what was being asked of Americans to "retrain" being impossible for some has always been in my mind. It might be the Convention Speech.

I'm going to Google for it...maybe I can find that quote...it was another of his magnificent ways of bringing a complicated subject down to the ground where it could be looked at for what it was and discussed by the ordinary person.

I'll dig around.

Great Essay, BTW.

to see if I can find it. It may be from the 1992 convention, when he nominated Bill Clinton. That speech was similar to the one from 1984.

I think it might be at the end of Part I...but listening to Parts II and III about the effects of Supply Side Economics and then Part III where he talks about Al Gore's issues of Global Warming are dejavu...that is astonishing. FIFTEEN YEARS and that speech could be given today. FIFTEEN YEARS....and we are back again revisiting every issue he talked about including all the importing that was raising the national debt... the environmental degradation....all of it is now 15 years later and worse.

You probably have the text of this or maybe you've listened to the You Tube..but here are links:

PART II

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6EzDLpV6vI&mode=related&search=

Part III

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkaFLhTwkLs&mode=related&search=

ON EDIT: I still can't find text of speech online ...at least from Google.

the answer about the steel mills. On April 30, 1983, Cuomo traveled to Lackawanna with Lane Kirkland and some other union officials, to visit a steel mill that had just been closed.

On May 21, he had an Op-Ed in the NY Times on what he saw there. I do not have a copy of that Op-Ed; in fact, I was not able to remember or find this information on my own. But I think that it may be the source of what you were speaking of. Does it sound right?

it was in a major speech and I don't think visiting a steel mill would have gotten the kind of coverage I remember. I think it's on Part I of the Nominating Speech...but I hit part II by mistake and once I got into it I had to hear Part III... I will go back to Part I when I have time. He mentioned Steel Workers again at end of Part III so that's what makes me think it's earlier.

I was hoping to find text because there are many young DU'ers who would be shocked to read this speech...since it seems it could be given today...and many others who probably vaguely remember it who would also find it interesting. But, listening to it is very depressing, to me. Actually, devastating when one thinks we are back at the beginning as if nothing occurred in all that time...and we had so many hopes and so many promises were offered. One could be a Rip Van Winkle and wake up 15 years later and the only thing to show for progress in the time inbetween is thousands of new shopping malls, fast food restaurants, big box stores and many, many new homes and gated communities in areas of the country that hadn't boomed at that time. Perhaps I'm being too gloomy about it...but I can't think of any candidate now who would change anything given that the one that was supposed to make all that promise a reality just squandered it away troubling personal behavior, despite the genuine likeability he has been gifted with. Don't see any with the talent of Clinton...but maybe that was his downfall...too much talent with not enough discipline.

should be considered required reading for progressive and liberal democrats.

and this post is a good caution to remember. Better to hang out with dogs you know than to encourage or go to close to the neighbor's dog who is a Pit Bull chained and hungry ...with fleas and pustulent sores and who lives with angry bullying owners who send the pit bull barking and frothing out to attack you every time you walk past the house.

Maybe there's some ability to speak to those neighbors or throw succulent scraps to that Pitt Bull that might encourage it to be more friendly and start a dialog with the owner....but it's not something that would be an urgent issue with most folks.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

speech I have ever heard.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=385&topic_id=25484

It was a great speech. I think it ranks with the best in our nation's history.

I also liked Jesse Jackson at both the '84 and '88 conventions.

up later.

I was so proud to have Mario as my Governor and it was such a rude awakening when mediocre Pataki was pushed in by Al D'Amato.

And you're welcomed! I wish there was some way to bump it on the political video board and I can't as it's archived. I tried re-posting it there, but once a video is posted, even if archived, it can't be posted again.

Can we dare to hope we will be successful in raising his (our) views into the mainstream of the party?

My interest in getting the message out was piqued over the weekend when I found the graph at The Political Compass comparing our presidential hopefuls.

I don't want to hot-link it and don't have ftp access to anywhere to host it for them.

-Hoot

I bet they'll view him as an inconvenient presence

to count on it, as it is to work towards it. It is an important goal.

We need to believe in the Power of Ideas.

K & R

It is something that has been on my mind since watching Governor Cuomo on Friday. I remember his running in the primary against Koch, a neoconservative, and then in the general election against republican Lewis Lehrman, the businessman who spent $9.6 million of his own fortune in that campaign.

Koch and Lehrman both attacked Mario Cuomo for having "traditional democratic values." Both advocated a different type of government, which would serve the rich. Koch, unlike Lehrman, had a social conscience, but it was being compromised by his rabid neoconservatism. Lehrman didn't even pretend, like Reagan, that he had any concern with the middle class or poor.

I think it's fair to say that there are a lot of those same dynamics in 2007. We even see reflections of this past on DU, from time to time.

recommended

Very, very important point. We should remind Mr. Matthews.

and Tweety has no clue.

the other point: "Ed Koch was an intelligent, capable politician in the 1960s and 1970s. He had been involved in anti-war protests and civil rights marches. I have things from the Rubin "Hurricane" Carter defense efforts in the 1970s, where the Honorable Edward Koch, US House of Representatives, was actively involved. However, he moved to the right along with the group known as the neoconservatives. He supported George W. Bush in 2004, and is backing Senator Clinton this year."

...
dp

had a lot of strong points. I respected his "How am I doing?" approach. But, sadly, he was part of the split in the party in the late '70s and early '80s, and he is one of the best examples of those politicians who have become the neoconservative/neoliberal group, with one foot in the democratic party, and the other in the republican party. I think that is why many traditional democrats are uncomfortable with some of the democrats who are in congress and running for president.

The obvious example that best illustrates this is, of course, Joe Lieberman. When I read some people demanding that the grass roots must take some type of purity pledge, and always support every democrat in office without question, I think they are making a gross error. Being a good democrat means voting your conscience, not supporting candidates who betray what we value the most.

Reading those words Mr. Cuomo spoke so long ago only reinforces my long-held opinion that the man belongs on the Supreme Court. Who knows? If we take back the WH and extend Congressional majorities, maybe Souter can get some well deserved rest and retire knowing he'll have a good replacement.

And he recognizes that the party has been most successful when it appeals to those who are liberals, and not registered democrats, when it comes to both winning elections and leading the nation on important issues.

That point cannot be repeated enough. One can look at FDR's presidency as an example. He wasn't courting just registered democrats. He was seeking the vote of all the downtrodden, depressed, disadvantaged citizens who were caught in the Great Depression. He appealed to the labor unions, the farmworkers, the unemployed and the elderly.

Today's Democratic Party seems to take their "base" or major voting constituencies (minorities, unions, liberals/progressives, etc.) for granted. As was discussed on this board previously, they know you'll never vote Republican. So in today's politics, no one really has to EARN the votes they receive anymore. Candidates are courting conservatives and independents, not realizing that the more Democrats turn themselves into Republican-lite, the more phony they seem and the less likely independents or one-issue conservatives will vote for them. In the meantime, the liberals, the young voters, the African-Americans, the women who comprise the bulk of Democratic votes may not pull a lever for Republicans. They'll just choose to stay at home because even when Democrats are elected into a majority, things just basically stay the same.

That's the crisis we face now - as a party and as citizens. How do we get reforms instituted and restore Constitutional order when those elected refuse to listen to We the People? I'm 100% Dem in '08, no question. But if there isn't any light at the end of the tunnel by 2012, I really do think at the grassroots level, it will be time to start recruiting and financing some Bernie Sanders-type progressive independents.

I don't blame anyone for voting their conscience. Candidates aren't entitled to votes, despite some believing that is the case. They should have to earn them. And if they don't earn enough votes, they really need to consider their campaign and their message and whether or not it represents the majority of Americans.

passed on the opportunity to be on the US Supreme Court, I felt that while it may have been the best choice for him at that moment, it was the wrong choice for this country in the long run. Everything he had done since serving as a law clerk for Judge Adrian P. Burke, of the NYS Court of Appeals, prepared him for what I think would have been one of the most influential Justices on the USSC.

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Candidates aren't entitled to votes, despite some believing that is the case. They should have to earn them.
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I wholeheartedly agree.

:kick:

Gov. Mario Cuomo would have gone a long way toward building the real Great Society. He is unafraid to call himself "Liberal" and to work for the things he believes in. People follow such a man. So, he is dangerous.

Thank you for another outstanding post, H20 Man. Thanks also for helping us see that there is a better path and that Democrats know how to get us there.

an old and perhaps over-used saying, Cuomo is a statesman, not a mere politician. There are times when I think it is difficult for citizens of this country to remember that there is a huge difference.

"We should not be embarassed or dismayed or chagrined if the process of unifying is difficult, even wrenching at times," Governor Cuomo told us at the '74 Convention. "Remember that, unlike any other party, we embrace men and women of every color, every creed, every orientation, every economic class. In our family are gathered everyone from the abject poor of Essex County in New York, to the enlightened affluent of the gold coasts at both ends of the nation. And in between is the heart of our constituency. The middle class, those people not rich enough to be worry-free, but not poor enough to be on welfare. ...

"We speak for the minorities who have not yet entered the mainstream. We speak for ethnics who want to add their culture to the magnificent mosaic that is America. We speak, we speak for women who are indignant that this nation refuses to etch into its governmental commandments that simple rule 'though shalt not sin against equality,' a rule so simple ... it can be spelled in three letters -- ERA!"

"Remember that, unlike any other party, we embrace men and women of every color, every creed, every orientation, every economic class. In our family are gathered everyone from the abject poor of Essex County in New York, to the enlightened affluent of the gold coasts at both ends of the nation. And in between is the heart of our constituency. The middle class, those people not rich enough to be worry-free, but not poor enough to be on welfare."

Thanks so much for reminding all of us that there are still leaders in this country of whom we can be proud of. Given the current political environment, it can be easy to forget.

Why do you think that Mario Cuomo was so torn about running. I am sure it wasn't "because he just couldn't make up his mind" the way it was framed in the media, like he was "wishy-washy".

There were plans to attack his in-laws if he ran. Sadly, there is still a level of ignorance about Italian-Americans, and the republicans planned a variation of the Willie Horton tactics they pull. While it is true that if there had been anything to the rumors, NYS republicans would have capitalized on them years before.

More telling, in my opinion, was when Clinton was ready to nominate him to the USSC. Cuomo passed on that opportunity. Sometimes health issues can make a man or woman pass up opportunities to do those things they really want to do. There could be other similar, personal issues that the public is unaware of. But I do not think that it was a case of being wishy-washy. Cuomo fought the "good fight" for many years. He did more for this country than he is given credit for.