Ron DeSantis Welcomes You to Florida, America's New Texas
Daily Mail in Overdrive with the "Feud" Narrative. Don't Believe Them. Plus: Miles Davis' "Water Babies"
I had a piece a few days ago in Newsweek. Rather than rattle and stoke the rumors about DeSantis and Trump in 2024 (and there will be a whole lot of time for that), I wanted to make trouble between Texas and Florida, two red states I love very much.
It seemed to work, as insurgent Texas gubernatorial candidates Allen West (an old pal going back more than a decade now) and Don Huffines both seized on my point about Florida’s conservative leadership leaving Texas’ in the dust.
They promise to make Texas more like Florida under DeSantis—which would’ve been a pretty funny thing to hear from anyone on the Right before 2020. This is the kind of friendly competition that works for everyone (other than, maybe, an establishment GOP now dancing on hot coals to maneuver right for their conservative base).
Elsewhere in the piece, the comparisons between DeSantis and Trump—in which, I believe, the governor comes out ahead on the crucial thing of governing—are not intended as an endorsement for a future election. Recall that it’s early 2022, and we’re about a year or more from when politicians declare their intentions.
UPDATE: Just as I’m writing this comes the Daily Mail with an article about the trip to Tallahassee to see the governor I’d mentioned in the last column. As many know, the corporate media has lately been stoking a feud between Trump and DeSantis, largely to distract from Joe Biden’s manifest failures as president. The reporting on the trip itself is true, but it played no part in whatever drama the media is pitching today. If you want to read the Daily Mail’s sensationalized reporting, dig “Ron DeSantis courts conservative influencers at the governor's mansion” here.
Ron DeSantis Welcomes You to Florida, America's New Texas
For conservatives all over the world, Texas has long been something of a promised land, boasting decades of government policy hospitable to freedom and the kind of straight-talking, kind people who'd greet you warmly even on a busy street. It's a place well-known for a rugged toughness, an embrace of tradition and a fearless independent streak.
Considering also the romantic notions that have attached to that state since films began to depict the Wild West over the last century, it's remarkable that Texas' once-nonpareil position in the conservative imagination has been displaced so quickly—and by a place that was long thought of as a blue-leaning swing state.
By last week, when Governor Ron DeSantis gave his State of the State Address in Tallahassee, Florida had already eclipsed Texas as the most energetic, forward-looking red state in America, having captured the imagination of hundreds of thousands of conservatives who have flocked here—and millions in other states and countries who are watching, often jealously, from afar. (Even from Texas.)
DeSantis' insistence on protecting normal life in Florida through the COVID insanity of the last two years has distinguished him in American politics. Through his own stubborn resistance to what he has called "blind adherence to Faucian declarations," he has made Florida a true beacon of sanity. By now, every Floridian knows how this happened, and most will never forget it.
In March 2020, the nation was in the grip of COVID hysteria, and America was locked down. In every state, stores, offices and factories closed as workers and business owners struggled to prove to nameless mandarins that their very livelihoods qualify as "essential." President Donald Trump, while skeptical of Anthony Fauci's edicts, nevertheless cowed to the pressure of the media and allowed his chief medical advisor to promote draconian lockdown policies.
Absurdly, gyms and even public beaches and parks boarded up. Violators of local COVID-inspired rules and closures were slapped with massive fines. As crime initially dropped during the lockdowns, municipalities repurposed their police forces as lockdown enforcers—levying massive fines on businesses that dared to open or allow customers to enter without masks.
Conservatives were shocked that, even in the liberty-minded Lone Star State, people's lives were being crushed by power-mad politicians. In Dallas, Shelley Luther was issued a large fine and was then jailed merely for keeping her hair salon open. Fearing the backlash from a lockdown-obsessed national and local media, Texas Governor Greg Abbott vacillated, failing to decisively bring the state back to normal.
As every conservative knows, things unfolded differently in Florida. By mid-June 2020, Governor DeSantis had had enough—both of lockdowns and the local municipalities that were raising millions in punitive fines for violating the lockdowns and mandates, especially in blue-leaning parts of South Florida.
DeSantis couldn't order those municipalities to relax their COVID restrictions, but he could make it impossible for the offending towns to profit from them. The governor's Executive Order 21-133 gave amnesty to thousands of businesses and individuals that had been swamped with millions in debilitating local fines.
Immediately, even the last cities that were holdouts to draconian COVID restrictions began to relax. Restaurant owners could begin to operate without the local police looking over their shoulders; gyms could be free of law enforcement spot-checking mask compliance. Florida, suddenly, was open for business again.
"In Florida," the governor said last week, "we have protected the right of our citizens to earn a living, provided our businesses with the ability to prosper, fought back against unconstitutional federal mandates and ensured our kids have the opportunity to thrive." By design, his state has "become the escape hatch for those chafing under authoritarian, arbitrary and seemingly never-ending mandates and restrictions."
Watching DeSantis' example in Florida—and in the absence of leadership in the White House—voters in Texas and other red states slowly began to demand similar measures. It's not an exaggeration to postulate that, had DeSantis not been as decisive and fearless in his own early-stage COVID actions in Florida, governors and other officeholders in even the most conservative states would not have had the courage to open and return to normal for many more months.
Of course, the governor's leadership on COVID has defined his first term in office, but that alone doesn't account for his near-universal popularity with Republican voters. Several clips from DeSantis' speech last week spread far and wide on social media. Thanks to his competence and resistance to intense pressure from Democrats and the corporate media across a whole host of issues, the governor has become America's de facto conservative leader. Accordingly, his State of the State Address last week was greeted—especially on Twitter—like a national event.
Troublingly for Trump loyalists in Mar-a-Lago, the enthusiasm with which Republicans across the country greet a new statement or memorable, combative press conference from DeSantis indicates that the governor has filled the void in what was previously seen as the party of Donald Trump.
DeSantis has taken the reins with creative, aggressive policy solutions to many of the issues left unaddressed over the four years of the Trump administration. The governor's tangible solutions to hot-button issues such as critical race theory indoctrination, election integrity, Big Tech censorship, protecting the unborn and immigration—all elaborated in his State of the State Address—stand in stark contrast to the former president's notable inability to do more than simply talk about them.
In a way, DeSantis' recent speech brought back memories of early 2009, when, also left without a national Republican figure in office, conservatives thrilled to the late Rush Limbaugh's speech at that year's Conservative Political Action Conference. That speech didn't catapult Limbaugh to national political office, but it did signal that what Rush called the "titular head of the Republican Party" was up for grabs.
What the political future looks like for Florida's governor is hard to tell. DeSantis isn't running for president—as far as we know. And Trump hasn't specifically announced his intentions. But in the last two years, the governor has captured the imagination and support of many millions, both inside and outside Florida.
Even as many blue state conservatives (and especially Californians) decamp to Texas, with both Trump and DeSantis in Florida, there can be no denying the gravitational pull the Sunshine State now has for the American Right. There is a sense here that this place is the future, especially as GOP voter registration has now overtaken Democratic voter registration for the first time in the state's history. Most Florida Republicans have no doubt who to thank for that.
Originally appeared in Newsweek.
On the Turntable
In the 70s—while Miles Davis was hip-deep in his molten, messy and dark electric funk period—Columbia assembled several LPs worth of studio odd-and-ends, most of it focusing on his nascent fusion period between 1969 and 1971. To my ears, these sets (Big Fun, Circle in the Round) were all pretty unwieldy; some fine moments, but they felt like the stuff only a completist would savor.
Water Babies, however, is far different. That’s because it features what’s known as the classic Second Quintet, with Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams. Side 1 is devoted to Wayne Shorter compositions, and is full of brilliant playing by the group; any track would fit nicely alongside The Sorcerer and Nefertiti in Miles’ discography. Side two switches in Chick Corea and Dave Holland on Fender Rhodes and bass. All of it is compelling and classic 60s Miles.
If a true split between red and blue states is coming, the sane/red part of this country is better off with DeSantis staying in Florida....unless he is ready to go to DC to dismantle it (although, I do not believe that is possible at this point). The zeitgeist of the moment appears to be the slow creation of a red state Byzantium anchored by Florida and Texas. Interesting times.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/10/15/hanson-is-america-becoming-rome-versus-byzantium/