Having never lived in New York, I really don't have a sense of how good or bad a public servant Mario Cuomo was. All I know is that he gave great speeches in which he explained the Liberal agenda in a simple, non-inflammatory manner…and yes, I know some who read this site think that's impossible.
If you're never going to listen to a (moderately) left-wing speaker for any reason except to hate him and find points to argue, skip the rest of this paragraph. But I was very impressed with Cuomo's two most notable speeches — the one in 1984 nominating Walter Mondale and the one in 1992 nominating Bill Clinton. Of the two, I think the second was the better one, possibly because he had a better product to sell. Those two links go to C-Span videos that I can't embed here. They're both pretty long but both pretty good.
Like I said, I don't know how good Cuomo was as governor of New York. But our country lost a fine orator when the man passed away yesterday. They don't make 'em like that anymore…or if they do, they now feel they have to accompany their rhetoric with some grenade-tossing.