Daily Times

Linking New York’s embattled and now former governor, Andrew Cuomo, Donald Trump, Covid and today’s American politics may sound a bridge too far. But there certainly is one. It is history.

No matter how deplorable the governor’s conduct may have been in harassing some eleven women, it does not share the same history with the behavior of Donald Trump, comparing the misdemeanors with the latter’s major felonies. Trump’s accusers far exceeded Cuomo’s in numbers and claims of criminal activity including rape.

According to his lawyer Michael Cohen, Trump ordered a payoff to a porn actress covering up his infidelity. Trump was also recorded as bragging over how his celebrity status enabled him to “grab” the private parts of women at his pleasure.

It does not appear that Cuomo committed rape or major sexual assault while exhibiting coarse, offensive unacceptable behavior. Unwanted touching or feeling and making inappropriate comments are inexcusable especially by any powerful official in the private or public sectors. Cuomo strongly denied all the charges made in the investigation and by his accusers before resigning.

Sexual harassment is often difficult to prove beyond a reasonable doubt. Much rests in the reactions of the victim. In today’s politically correct environment, what is said or meant by a male’s comments or actions can be interpreted entirely differently by the opposite sex. This display of alternate understanding is strongly reflected in today’s politics.

Any comment can be purposefully interpreted or misinterpreted as “sexist”, “racist”, fascist”, “socialist”, or any other incendiary term. That is not an excuse. It is reality.

The defense team seemed to shred the testimony of Ms. Lindsey Boylan by revealing a timeline that made her charges, of the governor stroking her breast, seem very unlikely.

Interestingly, while the Zoom Call press conference by Cuomo’s defense team last week was bitterly condemned as amateurish and even misguided, it does follow the Trump strategy of harshly denying any charges and attacking the integrity and credibility of the investigation and witnesses. The defense team seemed to shred the testimony of Ms. Lindsey Boylan by revealing a timeline that made her charges, of the governor stroking her breast, seem very unlikely.

That said, as Covid has claimed about 620,000 American lives, the James investigation will take Cuomo’s political life and future. The interesting question for historians is how did Donald Trump survive a far more serious list of allegations, and that ignores two impeachments, the second for inciting the January 6th insurrection, and Andrew Cuomo’s demise forcing him to leave office?

Using history as a further link, with the fourth wave caused by the Delta variant threatening to exacerbate the pandemic and recovery, references to the 1918-1920 Spanish Flu outbreak have disappeared. This is unfortunate, because how that pandemic ended might better inform us about the current one. After two years, the Spanish Flu simply ran its course.

The reason is unknown as no tests or vaccines existed then, or may be herd immunity took hold with so many infected people giving the virus nowhere to go. Whatever variants were created or still persist today with the seasonal flu keep taking its toll, Spanish Flu had almost magically gone. By 1923, the US had embarked on the greatest economic recovery in its history.

Today, no one can predict if variants E, F, G and possibly more will emerge, and whether the current vaccines will prove effective against new strains or not. Neither has any one predicted or forecast how this pandemic will end. Requiring vaccines for all citizens, unless granted waivers for health or other viable reasons, and ensuring inoculation seem a near certain means of ending this pandemic. Although some may argue that a future virus may prove to be a vaccine resistant.

These two cases of historical linkage raise the question of why history seemed to be ignored. In the Cuomo-Trump parallel, one answer is that Republicans were prepared to support the former president no matter what he did, even as he claimed he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and escape prosecution. The Democrats, on the other hand, have taken a zero-tolerance stance going back to the forced resignation of Senator Al Franken with the flimsiest evidence of real sexual abuse.

That does not excuse Governor Cuomo. However, it is an interesting contrast of the ideological divergences between the two parties’ over personal conduct. Indeed, that difference extends to Covid and the Red-Blue divisions over vaccines.

One could ask if Republicans are embracing personal freedom at all costs regardless of consequence. Have Democrats become the new moral Puritans? For the sake of the country, one hopes not. But that is far from any certain judgment.

The writer is a senior advisor at Washington, DC’s Atlantic Council and a published author.