This article is going to be a little different than what you expect from me. For a change, I’m going to take off my hat as a partisan progressive blogger, and try fitting on my purely practical political hat instead. Because not talking as a partisan Democrat doesn’t mean that I can’t have a legitimate opinion on politics.

And here’s my take on the GOP 2024 primary campaign.  GOP Florida Governor Ron DeSantis would have to be an even bigger idiot than I already think he is to throw his hat into the ring in the 2024 GOP primaries. For almost more reasons than I can count.

For starters, there is no way that DeSanctis can beat Trump in the 2024 primaries. The moderate GOP has already hitched their star to DeSantis as Trump without the baggage. But unfortunately for him, DeSantis is also Trump without the personality. The man has the charisma of canned cling peaches. Also, DeSantis has no national imprint or presence. And worst, DeSantis is at heart a craven coward with a little man chip on his shoulder. Trump would mop the floor with him.

But there are more practical political reasons for DeSantis to sit this one out. With Trump already declared, paperwork filed, and in the race, anybody else who joins the field will be getting into a gobsmack mosh pit. Trump is fighting not just for his political life here, but his personal freedom. He is hoping to use his presidential candidacy as a shield against federal, and possibly state prosecution. And he will be like a feral cat. If anybody else actually survives him, they’ll come out so bloody that they’ll be unacceptable to the moderate base, much less Trump’s rabid base.

But DeSanctis’s best reason for staying right where he is simple political calculation. The GOP 2024 primaries are going to be brutal, and with the GOP House going full bore insane, it is highly unlikely that anybody who emerges can win the 2024 general election, DeSantis included. If Biden runs again in 2024, he’s a likely winner from where I’m sitting.

Stay in Florida. Burnish your far-right creds with the disaffected Trump base. You’re young yet. If Trump goes down in 2024, he ain’t coming back again. And if he wins, he’s turfed out in 2028. Do your job. Make some road trips to set up a national donor network. For Chrissakes get some lessons on how to develop a personality. Build your war chest, and keep your powder dry.

Because Florida has term limits. If DeSantis runs in 2024 and loses, he keeps his day job, but becomes branded as a national loser. If he simply serves out his term, he can get his ducks in a row, and then in 2028, when he’s no longer Florida Governor, he can make a grand announcement. If he runs in 2024 and loses, and then has to leave power in 2026, he leaves with the stigma of a national loser. Which would hamper him in 2027 when he announced his national run for 2028.

Look, from where I’m sitting, the Democrats retain the White House in 2024, retain the Senate, and retake the House. The GOP is a hot mess, and their bullshit neve rending investigations into Hunter Biden will turn off moderate voters. Far better for DeSantis to stay put, build his street creds, and wait until 2028 when neither Biden or Trump will be a factor anymore. He’ll still lose, because the GOP is a dying national party, but at least he’ll still be able to give it his best shot.

Help keep the site running, consider supporting.

7 COMMENTS

    • Here’s the problem Murph, and why Bare is right. You speak from intellect. DeSantis acts on ego. ZERO correlation. Brains and rational logic have NO CHANCE against unburnished ego. And that is why say “Point: Bareshark” 🙂

  1. Two years of the wrestling coach blaring his banalities in the house will be hard to endure but the democrats need to bludgeon the GOP the next time around. Preyingmantis already has his small kingdom of goose stepping morons.

  2. Let’s not forget that much of DeSantis’ ‘success’ in Florida is due to extensive and illegal gerry-mandering and abuses of power that are currently cruising through the legal system. This is, again, not something he can rely on outside Florida.

    Yet.

  3. Look folks, nobody got too much right about 2022. The ‘pubes foresaw a red tsunami. The dems thought the s.c. over-reach was going to be the ‘pubes death knell. The ‘pubes went nowhere senate-wise and did not get much of a majority in the house, and the dems did not gain much in the senate and in fact lost seats in the house. Anyone predicting anything politically is pretty fucking silly at this point and reading tea-leaves for candidates running in the 2024 prez. election are wasting their time: people like death sentence are indeed pure ego and as such, immune to things like logic and facts. Unless enough election pros slap him upside the head with enough facts, and he actually listens, he’ll run and tell former guy to go fuck himself regardless of the consequences.

    I think it’ll be quite fun to watch.

    4
    1
    • Well, that’s certainly…a take. But it ignores how all we ever needed to do was fight them to a draw to beat the odds. They NEEDED that “red tsunami” to not be seen as the broken losers they are. All they have to show for their troubles is a narrow majority in the House (which will be nothing like the conservative monolith of popular liberal imagination) and one flipped Governor’s seat. Everything else was a wash for them. From here, it will only get worse as far as they are concerned.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

The maximum upload file size: 128 MB. You can upload: image, audio, video, document, spreadsheet, interactive, text, archive, code, other. Links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other services inserted in the comment text will be automatically embedded. Drop files here