Mario Cuomo was famous for the idealism he expressed in soaring oratory, but he had a prickly practical side as well. Cuomo, the political infighter, was famously combative: He frequently picked fights with the press and had a contentious relationship with the state legislature that included comparing them to clapping monkeys in one address. In 1977, Cuomo famously ran three races for New York mayor against Ed Koch in a single year, a bitter string of campaigns that included a scurrilous flier suggesting Koch was gay (Koch denied this until his death; Cuomo denied any knowledge of the flier).
Cuomo lost all three contests, but bounced back to defeat Koch in the 1982 race for governor. That’s when Cuomo began to tantalize his fellow Democrats, many of whom wanted him to lead a liberal counterattack on the conservative Republican philosophy embodied by President Ronald Reagan.
–
Join us on Facebook.com/CNNOpinion.
