The quotable Cuomo

The New York Post reports Governor Andrew Cuomo’s memorable response to “the damning state attorney general’s report that revealed his administration downplayed the total number of nursing home residents killed by COVID-19” (video in tweet below).

Cuomo explained, “A third of all deaths in this nation are from nursing homes,” Cuomo said. “New York state, we’re only about 28 percent — only — but we’re below the national average in number of deaths in nursing homes.” He’s done a good job! “But who cares — 33 [percent], 29 [percent] — died in the hospital, died in a nursing home? They died.”

The Post provides some useful background on Cuomo’s modus operandi:

Going back to a well from which he’s frequently drawn, Cuomo tried to blame officials from the Trump administration, specifically citing former Health and Human Services spokesman Michael Caputo, whom the governor described as a protege of veteran Republican strategist Roger Stone.

Caputo’s criticism of Cuomo — which included saying, “The deaths are on his hands” — actually began a month after The Post and other media began reporting on the impacts of the Health Department’s since-rescinded, March 25 directive for nursing homes to admit COVID-19 patients.

Throughout the pandemic, Cuomo has frequently dismissed criticism of his policies as politically motivated, and has publicly singled out The Post for his ire — even going so far as accusing the city’s favorite tabloid of wanting “to kill all Democrats.”

The Post has much more, all of it of interest.

I doubt this will make it into the next edition of Bartlett’s, but it’s a keeper.

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