13 March 2022: Editorial - "Cuomo Is Going Nowhere"

Cuomo Is Going Nowhere

This editorial from the Albany Times-Union reveals they realize Andrew M. Cuomo's recent media strategy isn't one that's capable of putting him back into elective office in New York.

So what is the mysterious dark prince up to? Speculation of course, but Cuomo’s not all that complicated when you realize he’s a hard-core addict. He is and always has been addicted to politics and being the man in charge and while he has “many options” as he mentioned a few days ago, the only one that really counts for him is to get back in the game at the same level he left it and with all the speculation about his future he enjoyed before his staggering fall. He wants to be governor again, with people talking about him as presidential material. How realistic is that? Not the point.

So his recent “mergence” into the public eye is not to rehabilitate his image. That just doesn’t make sense. If he were serious about rehabilitation he would have taken an entirely different path forward, following the well traveled mea culpa route, begging for forgiveness. All the stuff his fans wanted him to do, which he conspicuously and rather arrogantly avoided.

The problem with that plan is it takes time and lots of baby steps or it won’t work, and even then doesn’t necessarily get him what he wants. Time is an issue for Cuomo. He’s 64. Realistically, he has a decade and maybe a little more. From the cesspool he’s in now, any meaningful ascendancy has to happen reasonably quickly and that’s not going to happen by a passive strategy. Besides, baby steps and admitting error doesn’t suit his narcissistic ego. He would always be one vicious, cutting remark to a critic from being back in the cesspool. Rehabilitation only works when you can walk the walk.

So instead he’s spending his campaign funds on an ad, and more to come, that looks like it belongs to some nut-job right winger from Trumpland, with half-truths, conspiracies and distortions. Easily refuted stuff. Cuomo’s aim can’t possibly be to turn the minds of the majority of New York voters, since he has already lost big time in the court of public opinion over what he’s peddling in the ad. What his object might be is far more modest, to push his own narrative while discrediting Attorney General Letitia James. Get himself talked about, written about. Build up his base by hammering untruths over and over. Declare his own relevancy. It worked for Trump. Recent polling suggests he is making modest inroads.

Our working theory is Andrew M. Cuomo's recent PR media strategy isn't aimed at getting elected, but is rather an attempt to pre-bias the jury pools who will be deciding the civil litigation cases Cuomo will be facing from the multiple victims of his alleged sexual harassment. Cases that would cost Cuomo multiple millions of dollars in settlements from adverse judgments.

As the Times-Union editors note, the PR effort is chock full of "half-truths, conspiracies and distortions". Andrew M. Cuomo desperately needs better PR people and more legal help.