In a nation desperate for leadership in this time of peril, New York State Gov. Andrew Cuomo has risen to the occasion, delivering reassuring daily press briefings in a no-nonsense style that contrasts sharply with Donald Trump’s nonsense in his own daily appearances at the White House.
Cuomo’s performances, in which he says “we’re not going to put a dollar figure on human life,” have catapulted him to national prominence. He is being widely promoted as the Democrat who should replace disappearing frontrunner Joe Biden to face Trump in November.
Mainstream media has been piling on the praise. The New York Times reported:
“His briefings — articulate, consistent and often tinged with empathy — have become must-see television. On Tuesday, his address was carried live on all four networks in New York and a raft of cable news stations, including CNN, MSNBC and even Fox News.”
MSNBC gushes over Cuomo:
MSNBC’s Cuomo-worship is embarrassing pic.twitter.com/xdgyPETgVR
— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) March 29, 2020
But Cuomo’s bubble is about to burst if the policy behind the rhetoric becomes common knowledge.
More Than One Face
Cuomo’s present regard for the well-being of every New Yorker, rich or poor, and his lyrical demands to ramp up the number of hospital beds and ventilators is undermined by an ongoing record of drastically cutting back on the state’s assistance to public medical facilities that serve the poor.
While he is now frantically trying to add hospital beds in the state (which has lost 20,000 in the past 20 years), Cuomo, over the past decade, agreed to close and consolidate numerous public hospitals, mostly serving the poor, to save money. For instance, in 2013 he approved the closure of the 500-bed Long Island College Hospital in Brooklyn, despite objections from the community.
Even in these extraordinary circumstances his budget proposal to shave $400 million off the state’s $35 billion Medicaid bill—which provides care to the poorest New Yorkers—was accepted by the state Senate on Thursday and the Assembly early Friday, when both passed Cuomo’s 2020 budget. It comes precisely as Medicaid recipients need it most.
“So determined is Cuomo to slash Medicaid spending that he’s prepared to reject more than $6 billion in matching federal aid approved earlier this month because it would force him to alter his austerity strategy,” The Nation reported on Monday.
It said:
“If Cuomo gets his way with the state budget [which the Legislature has now given him], many of the city’s most besieged hospitals will lose money at a time when Covid-19 is threatening to crash New York’s health care system. Central Brooklyn hospitals, serving many of the borough’s working class and poor, could lose $38 million a year. Manhattan hospitals could lose up to $58 million a year.
Naomi Zewde, an assistant professor in the Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy at CUNY, told the magazine: “’The proposal to cut funding to public hospitals during a pandemic reflects really poor decision-making.’”
Kurgen
Article URL : https://consortiumnews.com/2020/04/03/covid-19-cuomos-bubble-is-starting-to-burst/