Tipsheet

Wow: CNN Torches Cuomo Over Shameless COVID Victory Lap

We've been writing about Gov. Andrew Cuomo's shamelessness in covering up and denying his administration's COVID failures for weeks, but his new self-congratulatory poster -- now available for sale -- is truly next level stuff.  CNN anchor Jake Tapper could hardly believe what he was seeing, ripping apart the governor's wildly misplaced victory lap in a series of tweets and a blunt on-air segment.  I wonder if a certain primetime host at the network happened to catch this clip:


Rich Lowry observes, "even if you are [a] partisan Democrat, even if you are alarmed by developments in Florida, Texas, and Arizona, even if you oppose re-opening, there is zero case to be made for Andrew Cuomo as the great conquering hero of COVID."  Cuomo is trying to will a heroic narrative into existence, and his own incompetence out of existence, and the media has far too often been complicit.  From David Harsanyi's latest column:

By any standard, the New York tristate area’s numbers are the worst in the country. By most measures, the numbers are some of the worst in the world. As the New York Times noted in May, New York City seeded the wave of outbreaks across the nation. Some of the carnage was likely unavoidable, but we can attribute the high number of nursing-home deaths, at the very least, to Cuomo’s ineptitude. Yet, even as his state was failing to meet its most serious challenge since 9/11 — it wasn’t until May 6 that cleaners began disinfecting the subway system, for example — Cuomo was busy taking softball questions on national cable news from his obsequious brother, Chris. On The Tonight Show, Jimmy Fallon marveled at how “smart” and “honest” Cuomo was as the two discussed the governor’s global popularity and “Cuomosexual fans.” For those who tell you the media don’t matter, Cuomo now has among the highest approval ratings of any governor in the nation, almost all of whom have governed far more capably. As I write this, the coronavirus death toll in New York stands at 166 people per 100,000 (even if we exclude New York City, the rate is 78.5 per 100,000), while it is still only 30 per in Arizona, 20 per in Florida, 17.7 in California, and 11.1 in Texas.

It's unclear how the spiking trajectories of case and hospitalizations (and rising death totals) in sun belt states will ultimately play out, but this is an interesting point:


Hopefully the wave now hitting places like Southern California, Arizona, etc. will surge, but on a longer and flatter curve than New York's disastrous, monumental, very deadly initial spike.  That was the whole idea behind 'flattening the curve.'  I'll leave you with this round-up of some good Coronavirus-related news, as well as this optimism-generating update on a leading vaccine candidate:

All 45 patients produced neutralizing antibodies, which scientists believe is important for building immunity and provided more promising data that the vaccine may give some protection against the coronavirus. In the trial, each participant received a 25, 100 or 250 microgram dose, with 15 people in each dose group. Participants received two doses of the potential vaccine. After two vaccinations, the vaccine elicited a “robust” immune response in all participants in all dose cohorts, Moderna said. The company said the levels of neutralizing antibodies in patients in the high dose group were fourfold higher than in recovered Covid-19 patients. 

Fingers crossed that 'Operation Warp Speed' will continue to deliver promising results on an accellerated timeline.