You tell ’em, Gov. Cuomo

If there is a national hero emerging from the coronavirus pandemic, it might be in the form of one of our nation’s governors, Democrat Andrew Cuomo of New York.

I’ll include Dr. Anthony Fauci as a hero, too. For this blog, though, I want to extol briefly the contribution coming from Gov. Cuomo.

He is giving daily briefings about the status of the plague in the state he governs. Cuomo said plainly today that he doesn’t play politics at times such as these. This is “no time for politics,” he said.

Yes! Andrew Cuomo is trying to manage the crisis’ impact on New York. He seeks to bring some sanity to the madness that has enveloped the nation. New York hospitals are being overwhelmed by the number of confirmed cases of the deadly virus. Cuomo is seeking federal help that so far hasn’t yet arrived in a way that will help stem the flow of infection in New York.

He is not alone, of course, in facing down the coronavirus.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump continues to criticize Cuomo while praising him at the same time. The president accuses some unknown person or group of stealing hospital masks; he wonders why hospitals need so many ventilators. Then he wonders whether Cuomo would fare better against him than Joe Biden, the nearly presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.

That is where Cuomo slammed the door shut on politics.

He is right to insist that we need national unity now. There aren’t “red states” or “blue states,” Cuomo said. “We’re all red, white and blue states,” he said, declaring the need for all of us to pull together to fight the pandemic.

If only the president of the United States could adopt that posture.