Wednesday, November 17, 2021

17 November 2021: Opinion - ‘J-Joke’ is on Andrew Cuomo

‘J-Joke’ is on Andrew Cuomo: Goodwin

This report fires back at the clumsy, tone-deaf statement issued by Cuomo's chief PR flack, Richard Azzopardi following the vote of the Joint Commission on Public Ethics commissioners to rescind the approval a low level staff member in their organization granted to Andrew M. Cuomo for his pandemic "leadership" book. For reference, here is the statement Azzopardi issued on 16 November 2021, as reported by Morgan Mckay in a Twitter post:

Now, here is an excerpt from Michael Goodwin's column taking on the "J-Joke":

Count this as another one of those shifting social norms that Andrew Cuomo didn’t know about until yesterday. A decade after everyone else in Albany, he is finally slamming the Joint Commission on Public Ethics as “J-Joke.”

Only this time, the joke is on him.

Cuomo is outraged that the commission he designed to be his lapdog dares to revisit its quiet approval of his $5.1 million book deal on COVID leadership. Through his mouthpiece, he assails the “hypocrisy” and spies proof that the panel’s members are “carrying water” for Gov. Kathy Hochul and the other pols who appointed them.

In a florid flourish, the disgraced former governor labels the vote against him “Albany political corruption at its worst.”

Now, now, that’s going too far. After all, Cuomo’s lethal nursing home policy and his cover-up of thousands of deaths make him the undisputed champion of “Albany political corruption at its worst.”

Game. Set. Match. Goodwin.

The column also provides some background history into JCOPE's origin as what Goodwin describes as a "protection racket" that operated in the interests of the now former Governor and his chief allies in New York's state government.

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