I’ve criticized Steve Kelley (Creators) enough times for views I don’t share that it’s only fair I give him the lead-off position when he does one that nails the issue squarely.
I’ve seen no defenses of Andrew Cuomo except, as Kelley suggests, from Andrew Cuomo, and I’m more than a little surprised that he hasn’t stepped down, unless he’s planning to do it today at 4:59, the traditional Friday afternoon dead zone when politicians make announcements they hope will slip beneath the radar.
The same hubris that keeps him denying the obvious should hint that he’s such a Big Important Guy that there’s no likelihood of anyone missing the news.
Though that pride also suggests that New York may need tear gas and dogs to get him out of the Governor’s Mansion.
Meanwhile, the situation is generating a bunch of so-what cartoons and a few worthy of mention as well, the most interesting of which, IMHO, center on the partisan divide:
Juxtaposition of the Day
Summers and Plante compare Cuomo to a past president, though Summers cites a denial over a consensual affair with a subordinate, which isn’t (quite) what Cuomo is accused of.
Plante draws a comparison to President Pussygrabber, whose transgressions were more appalling in part because he did more to deflect them to deny them, and because hooking up with a porn star while your wife is bearing your son is just a lousy thing to do.
Both men were accused of rape, which Cuomo isn’t, though Clinton’s accusers were discovered by his well-financed political opponents while Trump’s came forward of their own accord.
I’m not sure how much that matters, but, while it isn’t wrong to wonder why the accusations against Clinton didn’t arise more bipartisan uproar, they happened before #Me-Too, a slight spin that makes the comparison problematic.
Which brings us to Sack’s cartoon, which is not only a valid commentary on GOP solidarity but gains a little extra je ne sais quois given that Sack is from Minnesota, which lost a dynamic senator at the start of #MeToo over a stupid, sophomoric joke.
However, what Cuomo is credibly accused of is no joke, and the fact that Democrats are calling for his head, while Republicans ignored, downplayed and denied the also credible accusations against Trump is telling, and pits a pair of aphorisms against each other:
Honesty is the best policy.
Politics ain’t beanbag.
The good thing for the Democrats being that Cuomo is only a governor, and so his ultimate fate is not likely to have a major impact much beyond his own state.
As for that, if NY Dems can survive Eliot Spitzer and Sheldon Silver, they’ll get through this one, too.
Speaking of governors and home-state issues, Marty Two Bulls notes that the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally will bring 750,000 or so unmasked riders to South Dakota just as the Delta Variant brings the pandemic back to the top of the news.
Gov. Kristi Noem, who waged a legal battle against tribal efforts to keep the coronavirus off their sovereign land, has not only encouraged the rally to resume full-bore after a truncated 2020, but is planning to be in the parade.
At least Florida Governor Ron DeSantis didn’t openly join Spring Breakers.
The Hill cites a report that last year’s rally ended up costing $12.2 billion in health care for those stricken by Covid, either participants or their close contacts, but Noem explained the issue:
“This report isn’t science; it’s fiction,” Noem said. “Under the guise of academic research, this report is nothing short of an attack on those who exercised their personal freedom to attend Sturgis.”
Anyway, the rally will bring $800 million in sales (which aren’t the same as profits) to the area, but it won’t be distributed among the communities where bikers may become ill, since, like the fans at last weekend’s Lollapalooza, they’ll be scattered throughout the country and Noem is at least semi-correct that estimates of transmission are only estimates.
How do you count a convenience store clerk who shared air with a Sturgis biker ten days later and 1,500 miles away?
A more nuanced issue is raised by Chip Bok (Creators), because, while landlords are supposed to be made whole by eviction moratorium legislation, it doesn’t appear to be happening.
Tenants were supposed to be getting money to pay their rent as part of the moratorium, or their landlords were supposed to be getting it. Here’s a short piece from NPR and a more detailed analysis from the National Review.
The pair provides a lot of information from both sides of the aisle.
It appears that you can’t blame Biden for the landlords not getting their money, an appalling amount of which is apparently sitting in state and local cashboxes rather than being distributed as planned. That National Review story cites a NY Times article as saying only $3 billion of an allocated $46.5 billion has been handed out.
Lisa Benson (WPWG) joins in with a “Welfare Queen” related view expressed by some landlords, that people have simply decided the moratorium translates to “Free Rent.”
But, like the speculation about people who would rather collect $300 in unemployment than go flip burgers for minimum wage, it seems more of an urban legend than a significant statement of the problem.
Still, if the moratorium is based on landlords being made whole, it’s not happening and, yes, they’re being hung out to dry.
They should trace the local roadblocks and direct their anger there.
It’s not the CDC’s nor Biden’s fault, except for failing to set up a separate federal bureaucracy to do what states should already be set up to do.
Can’t we talk about something more pleasant?
The Mt Pleasant (Tribune) kids continue their adventures at the county fair, and the last two days brought back memories of an evening at a carnival where a friend, my S2B wife and I burst balloons that all had “small” on the tag behind them.
Got it down to six balloons — if the game were on the square, some of which had to say “Large” — before the carny kicked the three of us out.
Ah, memories!