Ed Koch: He did just fine
Ed Koch was a member of The Greatest Generation and not just by accident of birth. Sergeant Koch fought his way on foot across Europe in 1944 and ‘45, winning two battle stars for his service. His tenacity and courage would make him a star as a politician later in life.
Koch came from a cohort of guys whose mettle got tested and character was forged in the crucible of combat in World War II and in that he stands tall like JFK and his PT boat, Bob Dole and the recently deceased Daniel Inouye and their shattered arms and the fighter pilot George H.W. Bush. These were all kids from Everywhere USA, who like so many of their contemporaries went on to create the modern world as we now know it.
Koch had to overcome fierce opposition to become Mayor of New York. Although an incumbent congressman in 1977, he was not part and parcel of the Democratic Party machine; in fact, from his earliest days in politics and first elective office in the City Council he was the anti-establishment candidate surmounting the Tammany Hall pols who didn’t care much for blunt talking mavericks.
In that first race for mayor he had to overcome a crowded field in the Democratic primary, which included the then sitting mayor and future Governor Mario Cuomo. He had to get past a run-off with Cuomo and then the general election. My late grandmother, a lifelong New Yorker and passionate liberal Democrat, was a dogged Koch supporter, voting for him in each of those three contests.