America's governor

In the aftermath of 9/11, as he attended hundreds of funerals and held New York City together, Rudy Giuliani became America’s mayor. He rose to the occasion and set an example for every other mayor in the nation. None of them followed, and within two decades, NYC reverted back to being a sewer of crime.

Nearly a quarter-century later, a new hero has arisen on Florida. Ron DeSantis has become America’s governor. He may not be president next year, but he is a force to be dealt with who has shown that conservatives can make a big difference at the state level.

From opposing the totalitarian handling of covid to chasing LGBT groomers from the schools to deporting illegal aliens to sanctuary cities, DeSantis has shown that social issues matter and conservatives can win on them.

When Red China and Tony the Phony Fauci unleashed covid 19 upon the nation, DeSantis made sure Florida was one of the first states to open back up. The media carried water for the Faucists by portraying Florida as a hotbed of covid.

Typical was a CBS report on June 27, 2020:

Continuing its record-breaking week, Florida has reported 9,585 new positive COVID-19 cases — shattering the previous day's record of 8,942 cases. The state's total now stands at 132,545 cases.

Hospitalizations have hit 14,136, according to the Florida Department of Health. Nearly 3,400 people have died in Florida from COVID-19.

Florida broke its own record for new daily cases most days last week. The state also broke its own testing record on Friday, administering more than 78,000 tests. Conservative politicians including President Donald Trump and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis have blamed recent spikes on the higher testing rates.

Wow.

14,136 hospitalizations in a state with 22 million people. That’s not even 1 in 1,000 people. That is not a plague. The federal government’s cure of making people stay indoors and forcing an untested vaccine on people caused more deaths than covid.

The number of deaths of Floridians with covid was one-fourth the deaths in locked down New York, a state with 2 million fewer people.

Cuomo of New York was gone as governor before the 2022 election. Killing grannies and chasing skirts among your staffers carried a price that Democrats did not want to pay. They dumped him and welcomed Kathy the Karen as governor.

In Florida, as the Carpenters once sang, DeSantis had only just begun. He took on redistricting next. After his Republican legislators wimped out in their plan, DeSantis vetoed it and drew his own map.

The media, as always, called it racist. The federal courts declared it constitutional.

DeSantis picked up four seats for Republicans, giving them a majority in Congress.

The irony is Democrat gerrymandering in New York gave Republicans another four-seat pickup. Maybe not carving out electoral ghettos for black voters is not the best way to control Congress. Republicans who passed the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments (despite some Democrat opposition) knew what they were doing.

Then DeSantis took on LGBT teachers who groom kids. His Parental Rights In Education Act protected elementary school kids from predatory teachers. The press called it the Don’t Say Gay law.

No one in the peanut gallery asked why are kindergarten teachers saying gay to 5-year-olds?

Disney decided to side with the groomers. Disney chose poorly. DeSantis accepted the challenge and took on Disney, the state’s largest private employer. He got his legislature to yank Disney’s privilege of being exempt from local laws. Not many governors or lawmakers will take on their state’s largest employer — let alone the world’s largest conglomeration of media properties. DeSantis did.

From the Island of Never Trump, National Review bellowed about “Ron DeSantis’s Misguided Attack on Disney’s Legal Status.”

From the Island of Never DeSantis, the Miami Herald was wrong again in an editorial about him, “DeSantis unleashes vengeance on Disney. This is the stuff of Nixon’s enemies list.”

The thing about Nixon’s enemies list was all the people on it were enemies, including Art Buchwald.

The result of the feud was DeSantis was re-elected in a 19-point landslide and Disney’s CEO lost his job.

DeSantis then sent about 50 illegal aliens to Martha’s Vineyard, which billed itself as a sanctuary. With zero self-awareness, MV quickly rid itself of the invaders. How dare DeSantis make liberals live up to their insufferable rules.

Obviously, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has done more to undermine public support of illegal aliens with more shipments of more illegals to more sanctuary cities. But DeSantis lent support and humiliated liberals in their vacation homes.

Now DeSantis is schooling educators again. Politico said:

Gov. Ron DeSantis and Florida Republicans have spent years aggressively turning the state into a haven for school choice. They have been wildly successful, with tens of thousands more children enrolling in private or charter schools or homeschooling.

Now as those programs balloon, some of Florida’s largest school districts are facing staggering enrollment declines — and grappling with the possibility of campus closures — as dollars follow the increasing number of parents opting out of traditional public schools.

Failure to educate children carries a price. Why should taxpayers finance the anti-American indoctrination centers that many schools have become?

Rather than ax administrators in the bloated education bureaucracies, school boards are doing what they always do when voters refuse to renew a tax levy. The boards are shutting down schools and popular programs. Politico said:

One proposal aiming to turn a popular Fort Lauderdale magnet school that focuses on the Montessori teaching method into a neighborhood school brought a crowd nearing 200 people in opposition at a recent town hall. There, dozens of audience members, a sea of blue “VSY’’ shirts representing Virginia Shuman Young elementary, contended the plan would cause an unnecessary “disruption” for a top-rated school.

And where are those charter school students going to go? Private schools and homeschooling, that’s where.

DeSantis earned praise in USA Today, albeit from Never Trumper Nicole Russell:

If you’ve wondered why folks are flocking to Florida and presume it’s the sun, sand and surf, I have a better reason. Florida has much more to offer than its superior location and warmth. It has a great governor.

Florida has become one of the most popular and conservative states in America. Those two things are intertwined. While governors in blue states are losing residents by the thousands, hiking taxes and unable to fix crime, unemployment and homelessness, Gov. Ron DeSantis has turned the former swing state into a solidly red state.

That's exactly why Florida and its residents are thriving. The Republican Party and voters should take note — and so should DeSantis. Their dance with each other may not be over yet.

There is an irony in people escaping banana republic states for one of the two states that actually produce bananas without greenhouses.

Russell used the success of DeSantis as a blunt instrument against President Trump, and she attacked the very policies of DeSantis, which along with lower taxes are actually driving people to the Sanity State.

His policies are the attraction. I mean, come on, Florida ended its state income tax in 1855 — before the Civil War. Surely the rich knew this long before the state elected DeSantis governor.

As for the weather, many of them had wintered there. No, the Giuliani of governors was fighting for his state while Newsom and the rest were busy destroying their states — one dam at a time.

The only question remaining is whether America’s governor will become America’s president in 2028. Will the nation sing Ron, Ron, Get A-Ron?

I leave the answer to my friend, Will C.