The state of gov’ing today

David Paterson. 2008, NY’s 55th governor. First black gov. First legally blind one. He says: “You’d be terrified even if you weren’t disabled. People called 1:30 a.m. to say Eliot Spitzer’s resigned, something about prostitutes, and now you’re governor. I was scared.

“Lieutenant governors are never busy. Don’t let them say they are. Everybody ignores you. Start a conversation, nobody cares. After two weeks a guy has a suggestion. I say, ‘Give me your card.’ He says, ‘Governor, I work for you.’ Who knew?

“In a dark restaurant this friendly lady comes over. I said, ‘Sorry, I don’t remember your name.’ She says, ‘Don’t remember my name? I was married to you 20 years.’

“The mansion has a hot tub. I’m in the bubbles when suddenly lights go on and off. I figure if I throw a switch I could be electrocuted. In comes the duty staffer. Under 30, female, low-cut dress and she leans way down. I figure this is not working right. She was just there to fix the lights.”

OK. That was then. How about the governorship now?

“Suozzi doesn’t connect with the public. Williams is too far left. Zeldin? Don’t think he has it now. Astorino has the temperament to be conservative yet could appeal to the other side. Kathy Hochul probably wins the Democratic primary.”

Wise Wanda

Wanda Sykes: “So much craziness going on now that a pandemic, which shut us down, is not the biggest story happening in this country. People want to laugh — but we’re about to lose our democracy.”

Smart Wanda said this to the Hollywood Reporter.

Memberable moments

GRAFFITI, carvings, street language scratched on subways is as old as the BMT. But we’re New York. Tops in everything. First in whatever. No. 1 in whoknows. Now our East Side, West Side, all around the town also boasts — ready? — penis art.

Over in northern England is Vindolanda, a Roman fort dating to emperor Hadrian in the second century. If I’m off maybe a weekend, so what. Excavating the site recently, South Wales biochemist Dylan Herbert unearthed a stone carved with a good part of a good gent’s good parts. The inscription read “SECVNDINVS CACOR.” CoolHunting.com, Roman epigraphists, translate that to “bathroom user.” And why memorialize a guy using the can, this I don’t know. It’s the 14th phallic carving unearthed at this ancient loo plus the highest number of early penis graffiti found wherever. What this art taught us, who knows, but may we all rejoice in knowing the guy then felt better.

I thank Bill McCuddy — who has a stiff upper lip — for his report.

His diss-honor

Eric the dread. Despite what saloon pros tell him, “swagger” is phraseology for “vulgar.” Bracelets, earrings, collar studs, clown outfits. Notice his description doesn’t ever ever EVER come dressed with “able . . . accomplished . . . knowledgeable . . . excellent . . . efficient . . . praiseworthy.” The majority of the press has already peed on him. How’s that for swagger?

The ‘Eyes’ have it

Jessica Chastain stars in the recent-ish biopic “The Eyes of Tammy Faye.” Through those heavily mascara’d lashes and penciled lids Tammy first saw a huge televangelist operation then hubby in prison. In an early Villard memoir “Telling It My Way,” her own words excuse those years, saying, “My heart felt like a piece of liver that had been beaten until it was nothing but a bloody pulp.”

We’re coming to July Fourth. Thanks to our Founding Fathers, every child born in the USA today is endowed with life, liberty and a share of the government debt.

Only in America, kids, only in America.