Andrew, Chris or Rivers?
Who's your favourite Cuomo?
shareWhat about Mario
sharey'know, i remember when mario was the biggest deal. the guy who should have been president. he would have been president if he'd actually run in 92, many seem to think. clinton really was a bit of a non-entity and cuomo was a superstar who would have run the field easily, & only stayed out because bush seemed unbeatable.
he also turned down a supreme court seat as i recall. maybe he just didn't have that much ambition in him.
i've never heard any talk of him having any personal/behavioral issues, but who knows? he never faced the national press, and pols weren't held to the same level of scrutiny as they are now.
i can't say anything about mario's character, but he sure seems to have raised at least one jerky kid.
He lost to Pataki in 1994. Was Mario Cuomo really a viable Presidential candidate in 1992?
sharehe absolutely was. he was massively popular within the party.
the 94 loss was part of the massive republican wave that swept almost the entire country, keep in mind. clinton really was that unpopular at that point.
i recall newsweek reporting that the 1992 clinton campaign expected cuomo to enter and almost certainly win the dem nomination, and the belief was that clinton was entering the race to position himself to run in 1996 under the assumption cuomo would lose to bush.
if you google cuomo 1992 you'll find lots of references to his potential as a candidate.
the assumption seems to be that he either just didn't want to or he had perpetual cold feet.
Mr. Cuomo's announcement seemed to cement the Democratic field at six major candidates -- former Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr. of California, Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas, Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa, Senator Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, former Senator Paul Tsongas of Massachusetts and Gov. Douglas Wilder of Virginia.
All lack the stature and name recognition enjoyed by Mr. Cuomo. But the Governor's decision to withdraw from consideration opened an important new phase of the Democratic campaign, in which one or two of the contenders can escape from Mr. Cuomo's shadow and try to break from the pack in the New Hampshire primary on Feb. 18.
https://www.nytimes.com/1991/12/21/us/cuomo-says-he-will-not-run-for-president-in-92.html