My response to Capital New York's article: "Sources: Cuomo reaches tentative W.F.P. deal"

From veteran New York political journalist Jimmy Vielkind:

Several people within the Working Families Party said its leaders have reached a tentative deal whereby the party would offer its endorsement to Andrew Cuomo in exchange for a pledge by the governor to publicly endorse Democratic control of the State Senate.

As I've mentioned numerous times in this blog, Governor Andrew Cuomo's political personality is not earning him many friends. Sadly, I disagree with the WFP on the aspect of state Senate control. If November comes and the status quo remains (that means the Democrats control the Legislature as a whole and the state's highest offices remain in Democratic control), a split legislature might actually keep the Democrats on their heels and ensure they don't make poor legislative decisions.

But Cuomo does, as of right now, still has my vote. Rob Astorino's campaign is uninspiring and more negative than the ones of Jason Carter, Ed FitzGerald. And as I've argued in the past, Cuomo is making the moves that Astorino himself would make on fiscal issues. But Cuomo also needs a legislature that isn't so NYC-centric. And yes, New York isn't where it should be fiscally and competitively. Most of upstate is bleeding population-wise (unless you live in the Ithaca area, the Capitol District or the Watertown area, the three bright spots demographically Upstate). We need unfunded mandate reform. We need to do away with the most insane of our state's regulations.

But in my eyes, those aren't things that Cuomo can fix himself. New York State, as much as I love it, is defective by design. It's like Ukraine: the economic engine of the state is only in a small portion of it and influence is out of whack. Upstate New York needs downstate like the rest of Ukraine needs the Russian speaking part of the country. Part of the problems are defects in the state's Democratic Party, which thinks that great is good enough (when its not), the state party is being led by individuals like Sheldon Silver, a man I don't have a lot of respect for. I've been calling for an Upstate Autonomy Act, which would give all the counties north of Orange and Putnam more leeway in decision making. And possibly term limits, so we don't have legislators in office for four decades. Ten two-years terms is HIGHLY generous.