The DeSantis - Abbott Rivalry Takes an Ugly Turn
Living in states run by a Republican governor is dangerous to your health.
Greg Abbott greets Ron DeSantis at a recent governors’ conference.
(Welcome to another installment of Life Its Ownself. If you enjoy reading it, please let me know by hitting the Like button at the bottom, subscribing to this newsletter, and recommending it to others. Also, feel free to comment below.)
Texas Governor Greg Abbott must be seething this morning. According to Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank:
Now that the omicron wave is over, a couple of new analyses of state-by-state data both point to an inescapable conclusion: Living in states run by a Republican governor is dangerous to your health. … the 14 states with the highest death rates were all run by Republican governors. This included Florida (at about 153 deaths per 100,000 residents), Ohio (142 deaths per 100,000), Arizona (138) and Georgia (134). Contrast that with the deep-blue District of Columbia (only 27 deaths per 100,000) and California (58 per 100,000).
Do you see what Milbank is doing here? Omitting Texas from the roster of states most likely to cause their citizens’ deaths due to COVID-19 is clearly a swipe at Abbott’s presidential aspirations. According to the data Milbank used in his column, Texas, with its 124 deaths per 100,000 residents, doesn’t even crack the Top Ten. (The spreadsheet is at the end.)
Milbank’s column is aimed at DeSantis, who has been consistent if nothing else. He consistently opposed mask mandates. He consistently fought local governments and private businesses who tried to use masks, social distancing and other measures to address the greatest public health threat in a century. He consistently invited tourists into his festering COVID-19 swamp of a state. When vaccines became available last spring, he dithered before acknowledging that, yes, he’d gotten one. And he still declines to say whether he’s received a booster shot, even after Donald Trump called his refusal “gutless.”
Yes, Ron DeSantis has created the kind of Pandemic Paradise that TX Lite Guv Dan Patrick had in mind when he said it would be better for older folks to die from COVID than to cripple the economy. As Patrick freely admits when the cameras aren’t running, Abbott was feckless in his handling of the coronavirus: first he ordered businesses to close, then he insisted they open up; first he instituted mask mandates, then he revoked them; first he let local governments decide how to keep their communities healthy, then he excoriated them for doing so; and so on.
Abbott’s irritation is probably compounded by the fact that his death rate numbers would be better if Texas counties, cities and schools hadn’t openly defied him by prioritizing public health over political preening.
DeSantis and Abbott are battling over who can be the most MAGA governor of a major state on a number of fronts. Abbott scored a major victory last year with the anti-abortion “bounty hunter” bill (now imitated by Idaho). Both competed during the fall to see who could demagogue the most on critical race theory, whatever that is. DeSantis has recently surged back into the lead with his state’s “Don’t Say Gay” law.
Abbott dreams of being President someday. So does Ron DeSantis. But politics operates according to certain immutable laws and Greg Abbott will never be President of these here United States. Let’s all pray that neither will Ron DeSantis.
