Cuomo’s downfall sends the country a needed message

The line was still there. Soon Andrew M. Cuomo of New York Governor Andrew M. Cuomo (D) decided not to look at it – or, more importantly, decided not to believe that this government could apply to him.

“In my head I didn’t cross that line with anyone. But I didn’t know to what extent the line was redrawn,” said Cuomo in a resignation letter that fell far short of his apology – his constituency and especially the women he abused and then tried to intimidate and irritate.

Cuomo attempted such a defense – “I now understand that I have acted in a way that made people uncomfortable” – months ago when allegations against him first surfaced. It was incredible then, and now it was even more fragile and brutal. Cuomo is 63, not 83. He couldn’t just scream once or twice. He would call a subordinate “dear” or hug him with a handshake as soon as he turned pro. He made a woman after a woman, a civil servant after a civil servant, a feeling of uneasiness, behavior and aggression.

It’s a good day for New York, but it’s a good day for women from jobs in the country and in the United States. The system worked. As with former Minnesota Senator Al Franken (D), who was in no hurry to make a decision on Cuomo, the predicate facts are still the subject of reasonable controversy.

Similarly, if not more importantly, worked the ride-out strategy (D), developed by former President Donald Trump and pursued by Virginia’s Governor Ralph Northam after a blackface photo of his annual medical school book page surfaced, this time around not after the “Access Hollywood” tape. You can be sure that there will be a future cuomos and more, you will not feel so brave that you can escape without harm.

The unsubstantiated report by New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) provides not only new information and evidence about Cuomo’s “banner” of sexually explicit workplaces, but also convincing evidence of undesirable tampering, such as the criminal offenses of many.

These include a state soldier who was ordered by Cuomo to post his personal information (he claims his motivation was “diversity”); The army claimed that in another incident, Cuomo ran his hand into his abdoman, twisted his finger back into the elevator, and said, “Hey, you.” “I didn’t mean there was any sexual meaning,” said Cuomo. Cuomo said he was similar physically with the men’s army. “I had no intimacy. I never thought. Good effort. Not to buy.

“I take full responsibility for my actions,” said Cuomo on Tuesday. But he didn’t do that, he didn’t do anything. He apologized or half-father-in-law in the same breath and took another breath.

He claimed there were “serious problems and errors” in James’ 165-page report – a report in which Cuomo urged people not to make a final decision until they see their graduation.

He claimed that the attack on him was caused by politics. “My nature is to fight this controversy because I really believe that it is for political reasons,” he said. “I think it’s unfair and untrue … If I had been able to tell these facts through a frenzy, New Yorkers would have got it.”

He announced that he would not resign because he had made so many mistakes, but because the state did not want to “waste power on diversions”. But no skeptical New Yorker believes Cuomo was abandoned because it was “the best way to help the state”. It was the best way to help Andrew Cuomo – who lost voters getting rid of allies – when he was accused and removed from office.

Perhaps most repulsive of all, Cuomo, as is his wont, once again dragged his three daughters into the mess he had created. “I want them to know from the bottom of my heart that I never did and I never would intentionally disrespect a woman or treat any woman differently than I would want them treated, and that is the God’s honest truth,” he said.

This is a man who, according to one of his executive assistants, reached under her blouse and cupped her breast, and another time grabbed her butt cheek and rubbed it after asking her to take a selfie. Cuomo denies those allegations, but note that the woman said she had planned to take it “to the grave” and came forward only after Cuomo denied he had ever touched anyone inappropriately.

“It was almost as if he would do these things and know that he could get away with it because of the fear that he knew we had,” said the executive assistant, Brittany Commisso, who has since filed a criminal complaint.

The once fearsome governor is powerless. And the lesson of Cuomo’s demise is that other abusers in similar positions of power should worry about what they have done, and worry even more about whether they will be able to survive its disclosure.

This is a man who, according to one of his management assistants, cut his chest slit when he reached under his blouse. The next time he grabbed his buttocks and asked him to take a selfie, it was ragged. Cuomo denied the allegations, but note that the woman said she planned to take it to a “tomb” and that Cuomo only came forward after refusing to touch anyone inappropriately.

“He did these things and he knew he could get away with them for fear we would know,” said Brittany Kammiso, the acting assistant who filed the criminal case.

The once fearsome governor is powerless. And the lesson from Cuomo’s destruction is that other perpetrators of the same force should be concerned about what they have done and even more concerned about whether they would be able to avoid its disclosure.