I wonder if House of Cards is doing for politicians what The Godfather did for the mob, giving elected officials a surer swagger and finer sense of self-appreciation when it comes to the nuances of their kill-or-be-killed game.  Obama seems hazy and vague because he doesn’t hue to the right dramatic personae. The American diplomat, Victoria Nuland, recently over heard saying “fuck the EU”, is obviously on script. Chris Christie is living his own nightmare version of the show. And Hillary Clinton might, in our new appreciation of obsessive political focus, finally have come to look natural rather than awkward.  But there may now be no more elemental and elegant House of Cards-style subplot than the one marked by the phony smiles and honey-coated barbs exchanged on an almost daily basis between New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.  There seems to be a desire — a helpless one — on the part of both men to be more theatric than politic. Just a few weeks into the new de Blasio administration, the New York Times observed that the governor, while smiling, was also giving the “shiv” to the mayor.  It’s hard to be more transparent, or more clear, about the stakes: one man’s win costs the other a loss. That’s a political plot.  Now, it’s not like this sort of knife fight isn’t the nature of politics. But the unusual thing is that it’s so obvious, so out in the open — and, even, that both men seem to be so enjoying it. What this means, I suppose, is that both men believe they can win — and, like Francis Underwood, are thrilled and titillated that they will be the agent of the other’s loss. And perhaps, in a world suddenly attuned to the nuances of political ruthlessness and survival talents, they understand that the winner will be suitably appreciated.  It’s a pure political moment: two politicians, face-to-face, believing themselves to represent opposite sides of the coin — sides which necessarily negate the other — and with each believing they have a sure advantage over the other.  The governor’s side of the coin is classic middle-of-the-road liberalism, weighted less by ideological verve than by the realities of power — Andrew Cuomo is the real Francis Underwood. He uses the leverage of power to gain more power, and through that, to provide, with seeming prowess, liberal leaning policies and legislation. Indeed, his has been the most successful first term for a governor in New York in several generations.  The mayor’s bet is that middle-of-the-road, Democratic power-focused politics is very quickly looking hoary and ever-more transparently Francis Underwoodish — and that there is a new, proud, lefty sort of consciousness that the middle is going to have to deal with, and very soon. The new mayor believes he represents not just policies but zeitgeist, which is the one thing that trumps political power.  What is extra riveting, and probably extra galling to the governor, is that you wouldn’t think the new mayor would have such confidence, or at least that he wouldn’t be so open about it. He must be overreaching, no?  Andrew Cuomo may be the most gifted old school Democratic politician of his generation, but Bill de Blasio has reason to believe in his own talents.  Cuomo emerged from his first run for governor, as ignominious a defeat as there can be, as well as the humiliating break-up of a marriage (to a Kennedy) that had formed the bedrock of his political identity, having experienced a seemingly Damascus-like conversion inspiring him to become exactly the opposite kind of politician than the one had been. The entitled man became the hardened one. The liberal man became the pragmatic one. The loose-tongued man became closed-lip. This was all a demonstration of kind of a self discipline that still has the New York political world a little slack-jawed.  Bill de Blasio, for his part, became the mayor of New York, surely the most powerful local political position in the nation, and arguably — after Giuliani and Bloomberg — one with a national base, one with, practically speaking, no job at all. He went from marginal political flotsam and jetsam to extraordinary centrality within a few months time. He did this by trusting his instincts, which turned out to be phenomenal.  Such a face-off is doubly awkward because New York is a small place. Being the governor of New York is a mighty job because of the city of New York. You would not want to be the governor of just upstate. Conversely, Michael Bloomberg became, in part, as vaunted a figure because Albany was, thanks to Eliot Spitzer and then his hapless successor David Paterson, a vacuum of absurdity.  But now we have two men, of determined ambition and imposing stature, trying to bump each other off.  Andrew Cuomo, once with clear prospects beyond Albany but now hemmed in by the inevitability of Hillary, will go backwards if he allows Bill de Blasio’s left-wing politics to trend much beyond than Brooklyn. De Blasio can only advance if he can succeed in getting the governor to follow his script — and so far, so good.  Pre-K is to this story as the Jefferson Bridge is to the rivalry between Frank Underwood and Raymond Tusk. It’s not about education; it’s about primacy.  The story unfolds, promising many false climaxes to an ultimate denouement. Indeed, what are the chances that the Cuomo-de Blasio relationship is going to have a happy ending?  The House of Cards on Netflix and its real-life equivalents do not, I believe, make us more cynical about politics. Cynicism happens when people who are motivated by raging self-interest try, almost always pitifully, to disguise the real plot, or, in the case of the president, to pretend to be above it. We love the plot.
Michael Wolff: They may not be out for blood, but the warring styles of Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio reveal a showdown of the moment