Governor Cuomo had several high profile appearances with Vice President Joe Biden the past few weeks in which Cuomo touted Biden as a presidential candidate even as the candidate Cuomo is allegedly backing, Hillary Clinton, struggles with political problems and falling poll numbers.
Fred Dicker's column today has three possible theories for why Cuomo is touting Biden, a move which is surely pissing off the Clintons and harming her at a time when she needs all the help she can get.
The first one is, Cuomo hopes to be Biden's VP if Biden were to win the nomination.
The third one is, Cuomo's looking to stick it to Bill de Blasio any way he can and touting Biden (and stealing away de Basio's minimum wage increase issue with Biden) was just another opportunity to do so.
I'm not sure I buy either of those theories, but Theory # 2 certainly seems plausible to me:
The second theory holds that Cuomo has been promoting Biden to put
pressure on Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Southern District US
Attorney Preet Bharara, and possibly Obama himself to block or terminate
Bharara’s investigation of Cuomo’s shutdown last year of the
corruption-fighting Moreland Commission and allegations he or his aides
sought to interfere with the probe.
“There’s no way Preet would bring an action against Cuomo without
Lynch and probably Obama himself signing off, and Biden would be right
in the middle of that,’’ said a prominent New York City official.
Many Republicans also subscribe to that theory.
“Obama and his attorney general will make the decision on whether
there will be a criminal prosecution of Cuomo, and one way of trying to
avoid this is by embracing the vice president at the expense of
Secretary Clinton,’’ said national GOP consultant John McLaughlin.
As Deadspin notes, there's "a variety of sexual, financial,
and ethical improprieties" swirling around Johnson. Among other things,
the mayor is suing -- and being sued -- by the National Conference of Black Mayors. And Johnson is also accused of using public money and resources for his own personal benefit involving work done for the National Basketball Players Association.
That last scandal is particularly interesting, because it mirrors accusations made against him in 2009, when he was accused of misusing federal grants meant for the Americorps program by Gerald Walpin, the inspector general of the Corporation for National and Community Service:
The most significant issue appeared to be Mr. Walpin’s
actions in connection with St. Hope Academy of California, which was
run by Mr. Johnson and Dana Gonzalez. St. Hope Academy received federal
money from 2004 to 2007 from AmeriCorps. Mr. Walpin said a large
amount of the money was spent improperly, some of it on personal
expenses.
Mr. Walpin made a referral to the United States prosecutor in
Sacramento, recommending that Mr. Johnson and Mr. Gonzalez face
criminal charges and be banned from future contracts.
According to Walpin, the chairman of the board of the Corporation for
National and Community Service, Alan Solomont, was a major Democratic
fundraiser and was unhappy with his reports pointing out the misuse of
federal money. Johnson was also said to be close to the Obamas, and
shortly afterward the president abruptly fired Walpin from his job. The
firing set off a flurry of inquiries from a bipartisan group of senators
concerned that Walpin's firing had been been politically motivated.
There were also allegations that the U.S. attorney in Sacramento,
Lawrence Brown, filed an ethics complaint against Walpin to help lift a
ban on Johnson receiving federal funds as well as curry favor with the White House. Brown was seeking a presidential appointment to become United States attorney for the Eastern District of California.
Now Johnson remains mired in scandal six years later and is being
accused of allegations of corruption very similar to what was first
alleged by Walpin. And in the intervening years, the Obama
administration has acquired quite the reputation for selectively
enforcing laws against compromised allies and for the vigorous
prosecution of political enemies on dubious grounds. Johnson's current
troubles certainly suggest that the president was wrong to fire Walpin,
and are an unpleasant reminder of the Chicago-style politics that have
come to define this administration's questionable uses of political
power.
Cuomo's interference into the commission - including the potential that Cuomo short-circuited the commission in a quid pro quo deal with either Sheldon Silver, Dean Skelos or both - leaves him open to at the very least an investigation by the feds.
From the KJ/Walpin scandal, it's pretty clear Obama will step in to help a pal out of some legal
trouble and it's quite plausible that's what Cuomo's counting on here
with the Biden bromance.
It's also plausible that Cuomo's just hedging his bets as Clinton's poll numbers and chances at getting elected continue to fall.
But given the court filing on Friday revealing that two out of the three Moreland co-chairs and the chief of investigations felt Cuomo and his staff were interfering in their work, I lean toward Theory # 2 from the Dicker column.
Vice President Biden and three Newtown families teamed up with Mayor Bloomberg on Thursday to demand that Congress do the right thing about getting guns off the streets.
“What Congress has to decide is if it’s politically popular, or is in
in their hearts the right thing to do,” the mayor said at City Hall.
“Congress just has to get some courage,” Bloomberg said, “and it’s up to us to sort of give them that courage.”
You can read that as "Give Me What I Want Or I Target Some Of You In Your Next Campaigns".
Since he's already bagged at least one Dem for not supporting his gun control policies, and since he's made it clear that he plans to drop millions into campaigns to promote his pet policies on gun control, health issues and education reform, you can bet some in Congress will listen.
You know, I used to be a big supporter of gun control over the years.
I've never owned a gun, don't want to own one, don't want to go hunting or shoot anything ever.
I find all of these shootings across the country horrific.
But I also worry about an oligarch like Bloomberg using his billions to promote his political agenda, to scare politician into doing what he wants, to push through these policies in a very anti-democratic way.
On top of that, I worry about a policy that looks to take all the guns away from people and ensure that only the cops and military have them.
Isn't it time we question why local police forces have so much military equipment at their disposal and just who they think they're going to use that stuff against?
Bloomberg and Biden want to get guns off the street - great, I'm all for it.
Let's take the unpiloted drones away from the NYPD and the armored assault vehicles away from the cops in Tupelo, Mississippi while we're at it.
One final thing - Biden used "those twenty dead babies" as the emotional blackmail to get the gun control bill passed.
The deaths of those 20 children in Newtown was a tragedy.
But Joe Biden and his boss Barack Obama have killed way more than 20 children with their drone bombing campaigns.
If Biden is so concerned about dead children, he ought to get Barack Obama to stop killing them in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia and elsewhere.
Those children deserve as much concern as the children in Newtown who were killed in that awful, awful event.
There may be no stranger bedfellows than Representative Paul D. Ryan and Mayor Rahm Emanuel of Chicago, the former White House chief of staff, but on Monday Mr. Ryan declared his support of Mr. Emanuel in the Chicago teachers’ strike.
“We know that Rahm is not going to support our campaign, but on this issue and this day we stand with Mayor Rahm Emanuel,’’ Mr. Ryan said.
Mr. Emanuel and the teachers’ union are at loggerheads primarily over a new evaluation system tied to student test scores and whether laid-off teachers should have priority to fill future job openings.
...
“This does not have to divide the two parties,’’ Mr. Ryan said at a fund-raising event in Portland, Ore., according to a pool report. “And so we were going to ask, where does President Obama stand? Does he stand with his former chief of staff, Mayor Rahm Emanuel, with the children and the parents, or does he stand with the union?’’
Mitt Romney also issued a statement condemning the Chicago Teachers Union and accusing the Obama administration of being beholden to unions at the expense of children.
It's nonsense that the Obama administration has been beholden to unions.
This is just another lie from a man who has made a living out of deception and double dealing.
In point of fact, Barack Obama has been as anti-union as many a good Republican, though perhaps not as virulent about it as, say, Scott Walker or Rick Scott.
Just ask the people at the UAW given a 50% pay cut.
Or the teachers Barack had whacked at Central Falls.
Nonetheless Paul Ryan does bring up a good point.
Where does Obama stand in this fight publicly?
Now you know and I know that behind the scenes, he sides with Rahm.
After all, the corporate education reform agenda that Rahm is trying to finish imposing on Chicago students and teachers is Barack Obama's official education policy - school closings, teacher firings, high stakes standardized tests all throughout the year and teacher evaluations tied to those scores.
Indeed, that was the agenda of Arne Duncan, Barack Obama's current Secretary of Education, when he ran Chicago schools back in the mid-2000's and it continues to be Duncan's agenda today.
Obama hired Duncan at USDOE and gave him wide powers to promote corporate education reform because that's the policy he wants promoted.
So it's no real secret where Obama stands on this.
But Obama can't come out and say that's where he stands on this because he needs the unions - particular the teachers unions - for November's GOTV effort as well as fundraising.
So instead the White House and the Obama campaign inhabit some jive ass middle ground that doesn't really exist.
Like Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, Barack Obama and Joe Biden stand with Rahm Emanuel against Chicago teachers and union members.
Is that a good enough reason to not vote for any of these people if you're a teacher?
I know it is for me.
Why help out in a campaign or vote for a guy who's just looking to use you until November, then do to you what his buddy Rahmbo wants to do now?
So Obama can remain mum on this strike all he wants - we know where he stands and it sure as hell ain't with the students, teachers and parents of the CPS.
