So Cuomo announced his resignation as Governor of New York yesterday and that his Lieutenant Governor, Kathy Hochul, will replace him in two weeks, making her the state's first female governor. Rachel Maddow put Hochul's path to this position in pretty clarifying perspective yesterday by chronicling the history of her political ascendancy over the last 15 years, revealing a remarkably consistent pattern of not only her, but also other women around her, ascending the ranks because of sex abuse type scandals engulfing the men around them: the Republican and Democratic ones alike. From Congress to Attorney General to Lieutenant Governor to Governor. Every step up the ladder for Hochul, and even for other women around her, has featured these same hallmarks. Maddow thus, I think successfully, paints a picture not of an isolated case of male toxicity on the part of Andrew Cuomo, but of indeed a whole culture of male toxicity and misogyny that has led to this moment -- from Letitia James becoming the Attorney General who led the investigation into Cuomo to Kathy Hochul becoming the state's next Governor. Maddow's point is...maybe this shouldn't be what it takes to get a female governor.
People sometimes ask me, "Janice, why do you feminist?" This is why. Because this is how a woman becomes governor in America in 2021. That is all.
