WTF IS THE MATTER WITH MARIO CUOMO???????

[The Count]

he's on C-Span "debating" Gingrich - with a smiling Ruslut. He's kissing Newt's butt and bashing democrats - totally making s* up: democrats don't want to debate because they don't want to confront the real issues like social security et al. (I was wondering where were all the GOP debates in 2000 - and when was the last time a GOPer answered a hard question). he can't say anything nice about any of the Dem candidates - but looooooves Newtie!

[baldguy]

1. Replaying the success of his 1992 Presidential campaign?

[Mojambo]

2. He never recovered from Nintendo's worldwide hatchet job on his first name. n/t

[babylonsister]

3. ROFL!

Best laugh all day! :rofl:

[Skidmore]

20. OMG. This is why I love DU.

You find some hillarious little nugget tucked in nearly every thread. Too darned funny!

:rofl:

[patrice]

4. There are as many games as there are players.

And I'm f-----g TIRED of games anywhere!!!

Very disappointing, I used to like him quite a bit.

Oh well, that makes just one less "leader" to deal with.

We have plenty of good people without him, maybe that's why he went over to the dark side, figured he couldn't compete with all of the stars on the Dem bench. And around Darth Cheney, he'll be treated like he matters, when he doesn't.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

12. Did you listen to his speech?

To say he is not a progressive because he refuses to deny reality and reciprocated nice comments from his opponent is hardly him selling out to the Republicans. On what issue has he sold out to the Republicans on?

[patrice]

16. I don't actually know.

I'm pretty busy; really trying to keep with everything that is going on.

Can you help?

[mmonk]

21. We don't anymore of the dems that slam fellow dems

that are trying to do the right things. It's why we aren't getting near as much done as needed that hits at the core of corruption and the assault on the constitution by the GOP. I swear I'll never get it as long as I live.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

22. Reality trumps party labels

The fact is that politicians today--of both parties--avoid real debates and real questions. Why should Mario lied and pretend otherwise? It was pathetic how just the other day our two leading presidential candidates could not even muster the courage to answer a simple question. This is a huge problem for our democracy. Anyone who calls candidates on this deserves credit.

[AndreaCG]

5. He's a hasbeen and a jerk

He wore out his welcome in NYS so much that a nobody like Pataki could beat him.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

13. What happened nationally in 1994?

Did Governor Cuomo sink the Democratic brand nationally in 1994? Was he the one who botched health care?

[robcon]

6. No Link. I'd like to read his words. n/t

[The Count]

7. Sorry, I was watching it on C_Span - I used to like him somewhat myself

He was quite good during the theft 2000 "Republicans are ugly people doing ugly things". But now???? Why do this? TV face time? On C-Span???
Here's something written beforehand:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/28/us/politics/28coop.html?ex=1174276800&en=3d6f5ea8efc822f4&ei=5070

[draft_mario_cuomo]

14. The link reveals why he did it

The title is: "One Night Only. Gingrich vs. Cuomo in Elevated Discourse."

Elevated discourse is why he did an actual debate.

Here are key excerpts from that article:

Invoking the spirit of Abraham Lincoln’s transformative Cooper Union speech, Mario M. Cuomo, a New York Democrat and former governor, and Newt Gingrich, a Georgia Republican and former speaker of the House of Representatives, will appear together on the stage of Cooper Union’s Great Hall tonight for a discussion, to encourage today’s presidential candidates to spurn sound bites for serious discussion and debate.

Debates in previous campaigns have been “largely unhelpful,” Mr. Cuomo said. “Ninety seconds to answer is designed largely to test glibness, memory, spontaneity and theatricality. What you should be testing is the person’s judgment, wisdom, experience. You don’t get that by hiding the questions from him and seeing if you can catch him by surprise.”

[The Count]

17. "Elevated discourse"= code for kissing GOP ass. Everything else is uncivil

Funny, how in that "elevated discourse" the war had no room whatsoever, but Mario was under the impression GOP-ers debate. Can't wait for their thoughtful primary debates!
Dems have one in August - ehen is the GOP's?
See? Lying=elevated discourse, and you buy it!

[draft_mario_cuomo]

23. People can disagree without being disagreeable

Cuomo and Gingrich proved that. The Hannityzation of politics is sad.

Cuomo did talk about the war--if you listened to his speech (he called it a disaster I believe)...he also said nothing about Republicans debating. The quote before the debate shows that he thinks the problem is widespread and afflicts both parties, which no one can seriously deny. The sad truth is our primary "debates" will be just as pathetic as the Republican "debates."

[hfojvt]

27. "elevated" discourse involving Newt Gingrich. Oh, the irony

"During the 1990 budget debate in Congress, Newt criticized Democrats involved in the talks as being 'sick, pathetic, liberal, incompetent, tax-spending traitors.'" "Rush Limbaugh is a big, fat idiot" p. 163

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/capitalgames?pid=24751

http://mediamatters.org/items/200601200009

The very man who so often drags the discourse into the gutter calls for an elevated discourse. And with a straight face too. Amazing. If only Hannity, O'Reilly, Coulter, and Limbaugh could have been there too.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

15. He espoused the same principles he always stood for

The debate should be up on Youtube at some point. Unfortunately, right now the only place you can see it is on Gingrich's website. I watched the entire debate and he did not waver from a single progressive principle.

[Lusted4]

8. I watched it also and heard him talk about

the 48 million americans without health insurance, how we need to keep religion out of government, how the rich are having it better on the backs of the poor. He talked about the need for stem cell research
He talked about social security.

[EFerrari]

10. The part I heard was about Bush's tough stance on Iran

would bring them to the table when we all know Iran has made more than one overture which Junior ignored.

[The Count]

18. And not a peep about Iraq - as a "relevant issue"

[EFerrari]

9. I had to turn it off.

:puke:

[draft_mario_cuomo]

11. Context please

1) Yes, Mario is capable of a real debate with someone who, while a right-winger, is certainly no intellectual slouch. Governor Cuomo is not one of those people who is limited to scripted, poll-driven and focus-grouped 90 second vague "everything-to-everyone" answers during the farces that pass for "debates" during our presidential campaigns.

2) He was simply being nice to Gingrich, just as Gingrich was nice to him when he spoke. Civility is not difficult when the focus is on the issues, not name-calling.

3) Cuomo is right on some Dems not wanting to debate. The issue came up regarding some campaigns who were whining about "debates" and wanting less of them. Anyone who knows Cuomo would know that he surely holds the same opinion about the Republican's similar fear of debating. He believes the political process has been dumbed down and favors a return to real debate and dialogue. This is precisely why he agreed to do this debate with Gingrich. Why should he be disingenuous and pretend that people who avoid real debates, real questions, are not that?

As Mario said: “Ninety seconds to answer is designed largely to test glibness, memory, spontaneity and theatricality. What you should be testing is the person’s judgment, wisdom, experience. You don’t get that by hiding the questions from him and seeing if you can catch him by surprise.”

If this is what he thinks about the farcical "debates" we have what do you think he would logically think about those who are demanding that they have even less of those "debates"? This was before the Faux News debate controversy. He was referring not to that but to the demand of some campaigns for less debates. We know why. They are afraid of their candidate accidently deviating from the poll-tested, focus-grouped script for a moment and paying the price for that. Why risk that when they could limit the candidates' chances for a mistake? The only way to have real debates is if the public demands it. As long as people are content with the current type of "debates"--and even are amenable to having even less such debates, campaigns will avoid as many debates as they can.

4) He refused to comment on the Democratic candidates for an obvious reason: doing so would smack of an endorsement from the longest serving Democratic governor in New York history. Either he is still undecided about the candidates or simply does not want to endorse one. What is wrong with that?

As post 8 pointed out, he talked about progressive issues and made strong arguments for progressive values. Mario Cuomo remains one of the strongest voices for progressivism--the same cannot be said about some other prominent Democrats...

edit: Some candidates refused to answer a simple question about homosexuality just the other day. Can anyone really imagine such individuals agreeing to an actual debate with 30 minutes for outlining their views on three or four major issues, 30 minutes of opposing comments from someone of the intellect of Newt Gingrich, and then a question and answer period with Tim Russert? Mario was right about the debating issue--unfortunately this is the state our politics has sunk to. Let us hope that what Cuomo and Gingrich did in NYC will be the first step in reversing the trend toward more platitudes, more ambiguity, more poll-tested and focus-grouped words and less discussion of ideas, values, and visions.

[The Count]

19. My definition of glib: ignoring a war going on.

Once you do that, everything else is a sin of omission, a lie - and therefore not progressive in the least.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

24. He didn't ignore the war

He also spoke against the rush to war in 2003 before the war back when very few had the courage to do so...

[Rex]

25. Newt wants to run for POTUS and Cuomo would love to be his VP.

Think of Mario as a downgrade to McCain. Ew. Better yet, don't think about that! :puke:

[draft_mario_cuomo]

26. What policies do you disagree with Cuomo on?

How dare he say a nice thing about someone who was nice to him, right? He is obviously a DLC trojan horse--except that he was against the DLC before it became mainstream.