A Tale of Two Cities -- By Governor Mario Cuomo, Democratic National Convention, 1984

[Bagsgroove]

1. Possibly the best speech I've heard in my lifetime.

I do wish the man had run for President. And failing that, I wish he'd accepted Bill Clinton's offer of a Supreme Court nomination.

Cuomo (the elder) was a rare politician. He never shed his principles for votes. He ran every time as an opponent of the death penalty even though he knew a majority of of New Yorkers favored it. When he was asked about it he simply said that he knew that his position was not popular, and that if people wanted to vote against him because of that one stand, that was their choice.

Eventually they did, but he remains a profile in courage for me.