Benched

For 25 years the Democrat Party has been the plaything of the House of Clinton. The price has been steep, of course. Just look at the White House.

Said fealty has also starved the Democrat Party of talent. After Algore in 2000 they didn't really have much of a bench. So in 2004 the Democrats turned to Jean Francois Kerry, a careerist who accomplished nothing in the senate but who fulfilled their Kennedy fantasies.  Why Kerry served on a patrol boat and even has the same initials! Then of course came Barrack Hussein Obama. President Obama left a shattered Democrat party, a regional party with strong enclaves in the cities but nowhere else.

Forgive me for engaging in a bit of nostalgia, but my first presidential cycle was '88-'92. I was a Democrat myself back then, a Scoop Jackson type who wanted a strong military, hawkish foreign policy and activist Federal Government.  Going into '92 the Dems had a deep bench. This included the above mentioned Algore, Congressman Dick Gephardt, Senator Bob Kerry (NE), defense hawk Senator Sam Nunn and a slew of others. As President Bush enjoyed high approval rating in the wake of Desert Storm, most of the Democrat talent wussed out. In '92 the Dem primary was an eclectic assemblage, Doug Wilder, Pauls Tsongas (for whom I voted), Tom Harkin, Governor Moonbeam and of course Bill Clinton, of whom normal people like me had never heard.

Back then the political will-he-won't-he of the day was centered on NY governor Mario Cuomo, whom traditional NE liberals were begging to run. He was always the governor when I was a kid. And in 1982 when Ed Koch challenged him for the Dem nomination for governor Cuomo's people printed up bumper stickers which read: Vote for Cuomo not the Homo. Alas he never ran.

This brings us back to the current Democrat Party conundrum. As it happens Mario's son, Andrew Cuomo is the gov and stories are circulating about himself forming an presidential exploratory committee.

Is he doing a good job? I hear about corruption scandals. I vaguely recall something about him caping yearly property tax increases at two percent or some such. Honesty I haven't paid much attention to my home state in a decade and half. One point of note. When I cross the Hudson I take the ancient Tappan Zee Bridge. Andrew's been building a replacement. Every time I cross a staggering amount of work had been done. Remember, it took them a decade just to decide how they were going to replace the World Trade Center. Andrew's getting a new bridge up in a few years. That in itself is impressive.

Maybe he would be an impressive candidate.