Cuomo: Reagan 'Killed Us'

Former New York governor Mario Cuomo said Tuesday that Ronald Reagan "killed us" when it came funding for the programs that liberal Democrat governors like himself depended on.

"As far as I was concerned as a governor, he killed us," Cuomo told CNN's Lou Dobbs.

"He cut our money for education, for health care, for housing. He made taxes go up at the local level everywhere. He gave us the biggest debt until President Bush set a new record for us recently."

Still, Cuomo said begrudgingly, Reagan's fiscal sins won't be counted against him.

"That's not going to matter historically," Cuomo told Dobbs. "Historically he will be on the $10 bill, the $5 bill. He'll be on Rushmore. He will get the whole treatment, and he deserves it."

Cuomo sounded the same note of begrudging resentment when it came to Rudy Giuliani.

9/11, said the former New York governor, made Giuliani "an unshakable instant idol."

"His record of mayor doesn't count," he added, as if cutting New York's murder rate by two-thirds was a negative.

"He will be able to run for president, anything he wants to run for on the basis of what he did for the American people at that critical moment," the embittered Democrat added.

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