Chose one of the following as the heart of next years' Re-elect Andrew Cuomo campaign:
A) What New York's economy needs is another round of spending cuts and tax cuts for business and high income taxpayers, to spur growth.
B) Our kids' future will depend on investing the physical and human infrastructure: Bridges and schools; highways and hospitals.
It sounds like a choice between the House Republican Majority and traditional Democratic economics. But all signs are that this is what Andrew Cuomo is pondering.
He's defined himself so far by creating a left/right coalition like no one's ever seen before. On the left, he's the master of hard-charging liberal social policy. If it's about guns, or abortion rights, or gay marriage Cuomo is way out front. On the right, he's Mr. Cut Business Taxes, Subsidize The Job-Creators, and Cut Spending.
In political terms it's worked. This "progractionary" positioning is new in the Empire State. It's a big part of his high voter approval numbers across party lines. It's also about more than re-election, it's the model for the 2016 presidential campaign Cuomo is no doubt considering, Hillary notwithstanding.
This is way, way outside the box. Conventional wisdom is that the Democratic primaries in 2016 will be about income inequality and rejecting Tea Party austerity in favor of FDR-type reinvestment. Tax and spending cuts are the discredited policies of Bush II that Democratic voters will reject, as will unions, environmentalists, minorities and the interest groups that decide on the nominee. Gay marriage and guns won't be enough. The man or woman with the populist economic message will win handily.
On the other hand, don't underestimate Cuomo's political instincts. He's managed the government, the Legislature and the political class with great skill. He may be smarter than all of us.
We'll know soon enough. Cuomo, at a Long Island fundraiser last month, said tax cuts are coming. Unshackle Upstate, our champion of Tea Party austerity, has begun to make noise. Senate Republicans called hearings. Neither would do much without a nod from the executive chamber.
But this won't be an easy fight for Cuomo. Dissident mayors are demanding help, and will no doubt be joined by New York City's new mayor, who will inherit a fiscal mess from Bloomberg. And Assembly and Senate Democrats are not inclined toward new tax cuts.
But the smart money is on "A" above. Sometime this fall, I expect Cuomo will set the stage for 2014 by proposing substantial, multi-year tax cuts. But to be large enough to get attention, they'll no doubt harm the state's ability to increase education and health care spending for years, and leave desperate municipalities without any significant help from Albany. But he'll run for re-election on that platform, and win. That will set the stage for Cuomo to challenge traditional Democratic doctrine on a national stage.
This could all catch New York's political left flat-footed. If they gear up, however, they've got constituencies with a lot at stake and with real political muscle, with implications for 2014 and beyond.
I sorta hope I'm wrong here. America can't sustain the kind of income inequality that years of Reaganomics and Bush-enomics and false austerity have brought. New York needs an investment strategy, not austerity. But I make the small bucks to go out on a limb: Cuomo goes with tax cut austerity, and soon.
Richard Brodsky is a fellow at the Demos think tank in New York City and at the Wagner School at New York University.