I thought I couldn’t hate anyone more than Trump but Ron DeSantis is challenging that assumption:
Fox News host Tucker Carlson suggested that he should be criminally investigated. Republican members of Congress introduced a “Fire Fauci Act” to remove his salary.
Now White House medical adviser Anthony S. Fauci — a polarizing figure in the U.S. response to the coronavirus — is also part of a rising GOP star’s political branding.
“Don’t Fauci My Florida,” read drink koozies and T-shirts that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s campaign teamrolled out just as his state sees some of the highest coronavirus hospitalizations, new infections and deaths per capita in the country. It’sthe latest example of Republicans running on their opposition to virus-fueled shutdowns and mask mandates. A pandemic hero to some and villain to others, Fauci has become a high-profile target.
While the merchandise is focused on Florida before the 2022 gubernatorial race there, DeSantis is seen as a potential front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination in 2024. A key part of his pitch: He resisted public health experts’ calls for stricter measures against the spread of the coronavirus, spurring criticism on the left andpraise from the right for keeping his state’s schools and economy comparatively open.https://30bcac4ba61073ef53aa1f32c0d861c7.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
While discussing the Florida budget this summer, DeSantis said his state’s rosy financial outlook would not have been possible “if we had followed Fauci.”
“Instead we followed freedom,” he said.
His campaign’s “Team DeSantis” Twitter account announced the new merchandise Monday. The Fauci items are listed alongside “Keep Florida Free” hats and red koozies that take aim at face coverings with a DeSantis quote: “How the hell am I going to be able to drink a beer with a mask on?”
The campaign team did not respond to The Washington Post’s questions Tuesday, and Fauci did not respond to a request for comment.
Almost 3,000 Floridians are being hospitalised each day, according to the New York Times, the highest number in the nation and the fourth-highest per capita. New cases increased by 429% over the past 14 days, a dramatic surge only superseded by that in Tennessee.
That is meaningless to him. He’s owning the libs and that’s the key to success in the GOP.
He’s also killing his own voters — only the unvaccinated are dying at this point and most of them are Republicans — which seems to be politically foolish but whatever. But now that kids are getting it, and young parents, this seems even more cruel than before. In fact, it should be criminal that these right wing nihilists aren’t doing everything they can to tamp down this virus.
I’m afraid they are going to be elected president instead.
Update: Tennessee says “hold my beer cooler”
First came public service ads alerting teenagers in Tennessee that they were eligible to get vaccinated for Covid-19. Then, the state’s top immunization leader, Dr. Michelle Fiscus, distributed a memo that suggested some teenagers might be eligible for vaccinations without their parents’ consent.
By this week, Dr. Fiscus said she was fired — a circumstance she attributed to pushback among Republican lawmakers in the state, who have complained that the Tennessee Department of Health had gone too far in its efforts to raise awareness of the shot among young people.
The Tennessean, the Nashville newspaper that earlier reported Dr. Fiscus’s dismissal, also reported on Tuesday that the health department was pulling back its vaccination outreach efforts to children for all diseases — not just the coronavirus — amid the backlash from lawmakers.
Now they want to make sure kids get sick and die from all the diseases. Maybe if they work at it they can bring back smallpox and polio too.