RIP: Mario Cuomo

The onetime lion of the left, former New York Governor Mario Cuomo (father to the current Governor) has reposed. I never cared for his politics, but he was one of the last truly grand orators of the old school in American public life. Hearing him speak about his parents coming over from Italy could bring a tear to the eyes of the most hardened conservative and his speech to the 1984 Democratic Convention brought the house down. As a Catholic who supported abortion rights he clashed often, and publicly, with the leadership of his church, usually in the person of the late Archbishop John Cardinal O'Connor.