Ron DeSantis has some lessons for America’s politicians
“God looked down on his planned paradise and said, ’I need a caretaker’—so God gave us Trump.” Thus intones the narrator of a video Donald Trump shared on his social-media platform, Truth Social, earlier this month. Amid the huffing and puffing, a mischievous, even puncturing note can also be heard: Mr Trump, as God’s chosen agent, will not only “fight the Marxists” but also pause to ”eat supper”. After taming the “cantankerous” World Economic Forum, the gravelly voice deadpans, Mr Trump might “come home hungry” yet he will wait “until the First Lady is done with lunch with friends—then tell the ladies to be sure and come back real soon”.
Mr Trump was aggrandising himself, but he was also once again making fun of poor beleaguered Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, aka, to Mr Trump, “Ron DeSanctus”, aka “DeSaster”, aka “Tiny D”. More than a year ago, Tiny D’s—ahem, Mr DeSantis’s—wife, Casey DeSantis, tweeted a video in which another thunderous male voice also described God looking down on “his planned paradise”. In that instance, God chose to create “a fighter”. Noble black-and-white images of Mr DeSantis illustrated baritone blather about defending what is “right and just”, without the slightest hint of irony. Solemn as it was, Mr DeSantis’s video was far sillier than the one Mr Trump celebrated.
But Mr DeSantis was riding high back then, before he challenged Mr Trump for the Republican nomination. Just days after that tweet, as Republicans across the country struggled in midterm elections, Mr DeSantis was re-elected by 19 points. The New York Post proclaimed him “DeFuture”: he had Mr Trump’s policy aims but not his baggage, his forcefulness but not his fecklessness, his killer ways but not his loser record. He was a college athlete, a navy veteran, a former prosecutor and congressman as well as a serving governor. And he was just 44,…
2024-01-11 08:57:26
Article from www.economist.com
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