Living in New Jersey I have the pleasure of having a Democrat who is incompetent for Governor so that takes the whole blue state red state thing right away off the plate. Across the river in New York, the city and the state, are also run by Democrats in the position of Governor and Mayor respectively. Both are flying fucking idiots.
To begin, only a few weeks before the major shutdown Cuomo fired Transit Daddy, the much beloved and beleaguered head of the MTA. Since that time the service that is indispensible has struggled with employees becoming seriously ill, the homeless using the now near empty trains a home base, shut the trains leading to more confusion and chaos for those essential workers to get to work, and in turn the level of violence now occurring on these near empty trains is returning to 1970's level, where Charles Bronson become a vigilante. I won't be riding any of them for quite some time as well you don't have to as a cab gets you uptown in seven minutes so screw that.
Cuomo's shenanigans include his whining about the family bullshit with his brother already a figure of some questionable competence on CNN, and the endless trajectory of his competitiveness with the Mayor of NYC which has contributed to further confusion and policy that one day is this, the next another. Those two idiots posturing of which is the biggest douche is a tough call but here in New Jersey we had the triplets, the Mayors of Hoboken, Jersey City, and Newark, taking turns for who could be the most restrictive and invisible while doing so. These three have cleverly stayed of the limelight while simultaneously doing as little as possible but leaving as much confusion as possible in their wake. Why we have a curfew is still mind boggling, nothing is open past 5 anymore and why would they be? But again if you are black and poor the cops will be right by to check on that. Again the racial profiling, the absurd mask handing out and the endless sagas with the Orthodox sect never seems to end but hey standing outside sharing a drink or talking is death's warning. Be afraid be very afraid!
The Governor of Connecticut is not faring any better but no one seems to care that much for whatever reasons but he is clearly like Murphy taking the lead from Doppio as I call Cuomo.
I read this today in the Guardian and add Murphy to the list. Half the deaths here in New Jersey are from the older folks homes. Then to add to the problem forcing the same homes to take back the patients after hospital release. What the fuck? As for overall total deaths, I cannot be sure they are all legit, valid covid patients or even accurately accounted. The absurdity about the numbers is another as many counties here do not report fully the results, deaths are held for 24 hours or longer as we have no way of knowing any of it as here in New Jersey they are not responding to Freedom of Information Requests, thanks to a law that enables them to pass during a State of Emergency. Great transparency there.
And if you note all three stooges have made it impossible for anyone to sue hospitals or long term care facilities for Covid related injuries or deaths. Good plan on not knowing how many people died from inadequate to neglectful care.
In New York City, DiBlasio is being investigated by the City Comptroller and one day certainly Cuomo will be facing the Grim Reaper himself, when all is said and done about his mis-management of this crisis. And DiBlasio continues to demonstrate what a fucktard he is with each passing day. But then again he is not the first nor last Politician during this crisis to be called an idiot.
I have loved the posturing bullshit, from the naval ships, to the conference centers commandeered to be overflow hospitals. All without figuring out if they would take Covid positive or would they be better serving the elderly, the homeless or the sick from not Covid? That was fascinating to watch to watch that power play with Doppio demanding them to and then not and then yes and then a month later sailing away with a salute. How much did that cost per patient? Then the bullshit religious tent in Central Park, the histrionics about hospitals when they found in New York it was largely due to poor centralized communication and asset allocation. So basically a shit load of money and posturing for nothing as between them it appears they barely treated 300 people, and I question why and what was the reasoning behind that as there were no hospital beds anywhere available?
How about now starting contact tracing and tracking? Little late in the game and that will be fucked, trust me I feel it. How about now finding ways to resolve the homeless crisis before it ended up having to close subways? How? Why? When did you finally figure that out? I still love Murphy and the way he backpedals each executive order to fix the fucked up one from the day before. Talk about knucklehead.
This is a sham, a scam and a fraud. These three men plus one other did little to circumvent or handle any of this as it evolved and still are not. Each day another fire another saga and the lottery numbers continue. Why? Cause they fucked it up. They are in out of their depth, breadth and skill set not unlike Trump but the difference is that Cuomo is a career pol from a career family of the same. He understands the media and how to manipulate it down to his Steven Colbert screen of highlights of what the topic is. He is working the room in a way a crooner does to get the audience to tip big and leave happy. I watch as the misinformation grows, the confusion, the daily mis-mismangement and messaging continues to prove that we have no one in charge, no one capable and no one even willing to admit this. We are so fucked because of these white men. No wonder Covid is winning this war look at the Generals.
Andrew Cuomo is no hero. He's to blame for New York's coronavirus catastrophe
His record was terrible before coronavirus, but his abysmal handling of the crisis should get him thrown out of office
Lyta Gold and Nathan Robinson
The Guardian
Wed 20 May 2020
‘Elderly prisoners have died of coronavirus because New York has failed to act on their medical parole requests.’ Governor Andrew Cuomo
Andrew Cuomo may be the most popular politician in the country. His approval ratings have hit all-time highs thanks to his Covid-19 response. Some Democrats have discussed him as a possible replacement for Joe Biden, due to Biden’s perceived weakness as a nominee. And there have even been some unfortunate tributes to Cuomo’s alleged sex appeal.
All of which is bizarre, because Cuomo should be one of the most loathed officials in America right now. ProPublica recently released a report outlining catastrophic missteps by Cuomo and the New York City mayor, Bill de Blasio, which probably resulted in many thousands of needless coronavirus cases. ProPublica offers some appalling numbers contrasting what happened in New York with the outbreak in California. By mid-May, New York City alone had almost 20,000 deaths, while in San Francisco there had been only 35, and New York state as a whole suffered 10 times as many deaths as California.
Federal failures played a role, of course, but this tragedy was absolutely due, in part, to decisions by the governor. Cuomo initially “reacted to De Blasio’s idea for closing down New York City with derision”, saying it “was dangerous” and “served only to scare people”. He said the “seasonal flu was a graver worry”. A spokesperson for Cuomo “refused to say if the governor had ever read the state’s pandemic plan”. Later, Cuomo would blame the press, including the New York Times for failing to say “Be careful, there’s a virus in China that may be in the United States?” even though the Times wrote nearly 500 stories on the virus before the state acted. Experts told ProPublica that “had New York imposed its extreme social distancing measures a week or two earlier, the death toll might have been cut by half or more”.
But delay was not the only screw-up. Elderly prisoners have died of coronavirus because New York has failed to act on their medical parole requests. As Business Insider documented:
“Testing was slow. Nonprofit social-service agencies that serve the most vulnerable couldn’t get answers either. And medical experts like the former CDC director Tom Frieden said ‘so many deaths could have been prevented’ had New York issued its stay-at-home order just ‘days earlier’ than it did. On March 19, when New York’s schools had already been closed, Cuomo said ‘in many ways, the fear is more dangerous than the virus.’”
The governor has failed to take responsibility for the obvious failures, consistently blaming others and at one point even saying “governors don’t do pandemics”. (Actually, some governors just don’t read their state’s pandemic plans.) But much of the press has ignored this, focusing instead on Cuomo’s aesthetic presentation: his poise during press conferences, his dramatic statements about “taking responsibility” (even when he obviously hasn’t), and his invisible good looks.
The mask mural is yet another publicity stunt mistaken by the press as a sign of leadership. On 29 April, Cuomo unveiled a wall of handmade cloth masks that had been sent to his office by concerned citizens all over America. He called it “a self-portrait of America. You know what that spells? It spells love.” Since the arrangement of masks doesn’t form words, the mural doesn’t actually spell anything, but it is a perfect symbol of Cuomo’s leadership failures. Handmade cloth face coverings are not as effective as N95 masks, of course, but if unsuitable for healthcare workers they would still have been perfectly appropriate to distribute to New Yorkers (some of whom have been brutally arrested for not wearing masks). But Cuomo, rather than putting the needs of New Yorkers first, chose to tack hundreds of cloth masks on a wall as a monument to himself.
Cuomo’s record was shameful long before coronavirus began. He enabled the IDC (Independent Democratic Conference), a group of conservative Democratic state lawmakers, in allying with the Republican minority to block progressive legislation. (Cuomo denies any role in the IDC, but that stretches credulity.) Before the pandemic, he pushed through Medicaid cuts which shut down necessary hospital space in the name of “efficiency” despite the warnings of medical professionals. And on 3 April, as 3,000 New Yorkers already lay dead from the virus and hospitals like Elmhurst in Queens were overwhelmed with cases, Cuomo forced through further Medicaid cuts, slashing $400m from hospital budgets.
As the state now staggers to its feet, Cuomo has partnered with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to “reimagine education” (which almost certainly means privatization), and with the ex-Google chief Eric Schmidt to – as Naomi Klein puts it – “permanently integrat[e] technology into every aspect of civic life”. All of this has happened without the democratic input of New Yorkers, who would likely prefer that the progressive legislators they elected could govern without interference, that their hospitals have enough money to function and that billionaires don’t infiltrate and control every element of civic life.
There’s something disturbing about Cuomo being hailed as the hero of the pandemic when he should rightly be one of the villains. As Business Insider notes, he is now only able to attain praise for his actions because his earlier failures made those actions necessary. He’s lauded for addressing a problem that he himself partly caused. Of course, part of this is because Donald Trump has bungled the coronavirus response even more badly, so that Cuomo – by not being a complete buffoon – looks like a capable statesman by contrast. But this is the problem: for too long, Democrats have measured their politicians by “whether they are better than Republicans”. This sets the bar very low indeed, and means that Democrats end up settling for incompetent and amoral leaders who betray progressive values again and again.
