"Did Cuomo Violate Ethics Rules by Having Aides Help Him With Memoir?" https://reason.com/2021/04/02/did-cuomo-violate-ethics-rules-by-having-aides-help-him-with-memoir/ On Wednesday, The New York Times reported that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, used office staff to work on his memoir, American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic—which garnered a $4 million dollar book deal—in potential violation of ethics rules. The Albany Times Union reports that when the governor had communicated plans to earn outside income from publishing a book, Judith Mogul, Cuomo's special counsel, had advised him that no "state property, personnel or other resources may be utilized" according to New York's long-standing ethics rules, which he had agreed to. Still, top aides like Melissa DeRosa (whose name might ring a bell if you've followed some of the many Cuomo scandals from earlier this year) were heavily involved in editing and pitching the book, and more junior aides were involved in typing notes for the governor and transcribing things he said, since he voice-dictated many parts of the book. The New York Times also reports that "a top aide to the governor, Stephanie Benton, twice asked assistants to print portions of the draft of the book, and deliver them to Mr. Cuomo at the Executive Mansion in Albany, where he lives." Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi told the Times Union that the Cuomo staffers who worked on the governor's memoir had volunteered their own time to do so, adding that there is "nothing in law or regulation that speaks to a ban on state workers volunteering for a for-profit venture — this simply is not legally a 'thing.'" (Cuomo's office did not respond to Reason's request for comment by time of publication.) But those heading up the Cuomo impeachment investigation have decided to look into this further to discern whether state resources were improperly used for the governor to line his own pockets. The governor has had waves of scandal washing over him in quick succession for the last few months; most recently, Cuomo got roundly lambasted when news surfaced that he had secured special treatment for his own family members and other well-connected VIPs during the early days of the pandemic. There's the most famous scandal—the March 25, 2020, directive which required nursing homes to admit or re-admit COVID-19 patients regardless of whether they'd tested negative for the virus—and the way the administration subsequently hid the true nursing home death count, which was about 40 percent higher than they had claimed. There's the much more underground scandal, that the governor issued an April 10 directive, in parallel to the March 25 one, which similarly prohibited residential facilities for adults with intellectual disabilities from turning away COVID-positive patients. There are the sexual harassment scandals that have emerged in recent weeks as nine women have come forward with allegations of inappropriate behavior, ranging from unwanted sexual comments all the way to groping and kissing. And, of course, the vaccine scandal where medical providers in the state were forced to throw away precious vaccine doses due to the threat of $1 million fines being levied if providers allowed anyone to hop the state-mandated vaccination line. This guy is unsinkable. But then again, we're talking about someone who had both the extraordinary gall and terrifyingly large ego to write a book on just how great of a pandemic leader he was and make a fat advance off of it, while his state-employee "volunteers" scurried around to do his book bidding. Maybe the real American Crisis is the fact that, though we tally up the manifold transgressions (maybe even crimes) of Andrew Cuomo, corrupt and inept leaders like him get to remain in office—and sell some books while they're at it.
Rudy Giuliani's son Andrew is considering running against Cuomo in the next NY election https://nypost.com/2021/04/07/andrew-giuliani-considers-running-for-new-york-governor/
Cuomo shuts down nuclear plant, let's burn more fossil fuels!!! "Indian Point Is Shutting Down. That Means More Fossil Fuel": https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/12/nyregion/indian-point-power-plant-closing.html excerpt: For most of his long political career, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo railed against the dangers of having a nuclear power plant operating just 25 miles away from New York City, saying its proximity to such a densely populated metropolis defied “basic sanity.’’ But now, the plant is preparing to shut down, and New York is grappling with the adverse effect the closing will have on another of Mr. Cuomo’s ambitious goals: sharply reducing the state’s reliance on fossil fuels. So far, most of the electricity produced by the nuclear plant, known as Indian Point, has been replaced by power generated by plants that burn natural gas and emit more pollution. And that trade-off will become more pronounced once Indian Point’s last reactor shuts down on April 30. “It’s topsy-turvy,” said Isuru Seneviratne, a clean-energy investor who is a member of the steering committee of Nuclear New York, which has lobbied to keep Indian Point running. The pronuclear group calculated that each of Indian Point’s reactors had been producing more power than all of the wind turbines and solar panels in the state combined. When Mr. Cuomo announced four years ago that Indian Point — perched on the east bank of the Hudson River in the village of Buchanan — would be phased out, the plant was producing about one-quarter of New York City’s power. But the governor had already laid out his plan to have 50 percent of the state’s energy come from renewable sources — wind, solar and hydro power — by 2030. In 2019, a new state law raised that target to 70 percent from renewables by 2030. Taking away Indian Point, a reliable source of carbon-free power, will inevitably make achieving that goal far harder. In fact, it already has. After one of Indian Point’s two working reactors was permanently shut down last summer, the share of the state’s power that came from gas-fired generators jumped in 2020 to about 40 percent, from about 36 percent in 2019, federal data show. The share of the state’s power from renewable sources increased slightly, to about 30 percent. “This is one of the greatest strategic blunders in the history of energy in New York,” said Robert Bryce, an author who has been a constant critic of the shutdown. “It’s a catastrophically wrong decision.” more at the link
@Mr.Scarface and Mr. @jiggyfly , you can't tell me that this isn't funny, or at least mildly amusing https://babylonbee.com/news/cuomo-regretting-killing-all-those-elderly-after-losing-house-seat Cuomo Regretting Killing All Those Elderly After Losing House Seat April 28th, 2021 - BabylonBee.com ALBANY, NY—Governor Andrew Cuomo is disappointed after census data revealed his state had lost thousands of citizens, causing New York to lose a seat in the House of Representatives. "Yeah, I guess I shouldn't have murdered 15,000 elderly residents in nursing homes by forcing them to admit COVID patients," said the governor in between bites of his spicy meatball sub. "Maybe, in hindsight, I could have done better." "Or at least, maybe if I could have gotten 89 more of those old people to fill out a census form before dying I could have prevented this." Cuomo then finished his meatball sub and began plowing into a large bowl of spaghetti. Critics of the governor insisted that 15,000 precious human lives were worth infinitely more than just a seat in Congress, but Cuomo was unable to hear them due to chewing his food too loudly. Cuomo is promising new initiatives to ensure more people fill out the census as they should in order to counteract all the people dying and leaving his state in record numbers.
"Cuomo Aides Spent Months Hiding Nursing Home Death Toll": https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/28/nyregion/cuomo-aides-nursing-home-deaths.html excerpt: Cuomo Aides Spent Months Hiding Nursing Home Death Toll Aides to the New York governor, Andrew M. Cuomo, repeatedly prevented state health officials from releasing the number of nursing home deaths in the pandemic. By J. David Goodman, Jesse McKinley and Danny Hakim April 28, 2021Updated 3:48 p.m. ET The effort by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s office to obscure the pandemic death toll in New York nursing homes was far greater than previously known, with aides repeatedly overruling state health officials over a span of at least five months, according to interviews and newly unearthed documents. Mr. Cuomo’s most senior aides engaged in a sustained effort to prevent the state’s own health officials, including the commissioner, Howard Zucker, from releasing the true death toll to the public or sharing it with state lawmakers, these interviews and documents showed. A scientific paper, which incorporated the data, was never published. An audit of the numbers by a top Cuomo aide was finished months before it became publicly known. Two letters, drafted by the Health Department and meant for state legislators, were never sent. The actions coincided with the period in which Mr. Cuomo was pitching and then writing a book on the pandemic, with the assistance of his top aide, Melissa DeRosa, and others. President Donald J. Trump, whose administration made a public show of requesting nursing home death data from four states with Democratic governors, including New York. The number of nursing home residents who died in the pandemic has been a particularly sensitive question for the Cuomo administration. As the first wave hit New York in March 2020, the administration put in place a policy to prevent nursing homes from turning away patients discharged from hospitals after treatment for Covid-19. Some critics blamed the approach for the large number of resident deaths in the spring, a toll that the administration then put at around 6,000. But by the time the policy was rescinded less than two months later, it had become clear that not all the deaths were being included in that tally: Those who died after being transferred to hospitals were not counted as nursing home deaths. Lawmakers and others began asking for a complete count of all resident deaths, but the governor’s aides said parsing the numbers was difficult because of a fear of double counting, among other possible errors. The full data on nursing home deaths was not released until this year, after a report by the state attorney general in late January found that the official tally might have undercounted the true toll by as much as 50 percent. more at the link
Cuomo has been and is an embarrassment and a fair indictment of how tribal and stupid the media is. Sadly democracy reasonably based on an informed populace, yet you almost have two sets of polarized information rather than details and nuances of reasonable principles of both sides, let alone the issue that there are some how only two entrenched binary sides(still trying to find that acceptance in the constitution) He is a great case for term limits, he is a great case to be weary of rampant tribalism and hero worship as if one leader be it Him,Hilary,Obama, Trump, or anyone is supposed to be some savior, keep that to religion, which the constitution covers in the seperation fo church and state, other wise the bastardization of that leads to saudi, iran, CCP, North korea like blind worship otherwise you're not 'patriotic'. Almost like the revolution of not being represented or being told by one centralized power never happened. His sexual assaults should be investigated within our judicial system. He should be impeached for the Nursing home situation let alone his habit of threatening local lawmakers like mob boss, sort of similar to the last president.
