I keep thinking about Andrew Cuomo’s court appearance Friday in Albany (via Zoom), and I keep getting aggravated about it. Cuomo doesn’t have to show up in person, he doesn’t have to face the allegations head on, and he never even had to do a perp walk. Deep down I think we all knew, or had a stinking suspicion, that it would end this way, but it didn’t have to…
In a sane, alternate universe this situation is playing itself out very differently. In that world, a car has pulled up in front of the courthouse, a door opens, and Andrew Cuomo steps out of it. At that point a horde of screaming reporters and cameras crowd the former Governor, and he and his lawyers have to forcibly shove there way through to the entrance of the courthouse. All the while a strikingly handsome radio host can be heard shouting at him, “Are you really going to use the ‘what, I’m Italian’ defense?” “Will you to try to kiss the judge, since that’s just your ‘normal’ way of greeting people?” “And where’s Captain?” Then, while being annoyed and distracted by the dastardly press, he slips on some ice and ends up on his keister. The tv cameras get a good long shot of him scrambling to his feet embarrassed, and they capture the pained look on his face when he realizes he spilled his coffee all over his suit during the fall. Oh, and he still has that silly porn moustache on his face too.
It could have been that way, SHOULD have been that way, but unfortunately Albany Happens. Or, in this case, Albany didn’t happen. Everyone that has talked to and/or heard Brittany Commisso’s story finds her credible – from reporters to the District Attorney to the Attorney General herself. NOBODY finds Cuomo credible. How could they? After all, he went on live television and gave the exact opposite definition of sexual harassment as a defense of his behavior than the one that is written into New York law- a law which HE signed by the way- and that definition makes clear that he committed sexual harassment. She’s credible, he is not, and juries lately have been pretty good at finding the truth in high profile cases (see Jussie Smollett and Ghislaine Maxwell). So why is it only in an alternate universe that this case is going to trial? Because this is Albany. In Albany BS walks, but it doesn’t perp walk, not when you’re Andrew Cuomo anyway. It’s all too predictable, and all too absurd.