Ron DeSantis Gonna Make You Keep Looking At Him Until His Poll Numbers Improve
Ron DeSantis Gonna Make You Keep Looking At Him Until His Poll Numbers Improve
What kind of a fiend are we dealing with?
The media insist Nikki Haley’s presidential campaign has the momentum of a runaway freight train, and recent polls even show her speeding to a distant second place against national security threat Donald Trump.
That’s tough news for once and never Trump alternative Ron DeSantis, but the Florida governor has dismissed obvious polling realities, the very same defiant denial that worked out so well for Mitt Romney’s 2012 campaign.
“I don’t think any of it matters,” DeSantis told reporters in Greenville, South Carolina — now apparently taking political advice from Arthur Schopenhauer. “You’ve got to put yourself in a position to have the type of infrastructure needed to do well when the voting starts. But what’s going to happen is none of the polls are going to matter when people start voting. That’s what’s going to determine everything.”
DeSantis is currently polling third in South Carolina, matching former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s dismal polling average leading up to his political Waterloo. Good thing the only polls that matter are inside DeSantis’s shriveled heart.
Here’s some more pathetic rationalizations from DeSantis:
“I think at the end of the day, a majority of people have not made a decision,” he claimed. “So if you're polling someone, and you push them, well if they’re kind of on the fence and they know Trump more than anyone, they’re more likely to do that.”
Yes, Trump is benefitting from his name recognition as former president and current collector of felony indictments. That does put DeSantis at a disadvantage. However, DeSantis was leading polls back in December, when David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, declared — obviously prematurely — “There’s a new Republican sheriff in town!”
If DeSantis’s desperate coping theory were true, his polling would’ve remained consistent, but instead, it’s steadily declined ever since his quarter-assed campaign launch on Elon Musk’s social media site. He’s specifically lost ground with moderate Republicans in New Hampshire because his gross campaign thought homophobic ads were a crowd pleaser.
Non-MAGA Republican primary voters might’ve liked the idea of DeSantis — “Trumpism without Trump” — but they’re not that into the actual DeSantis, who is such a vacuum of charisma he apparently has to take smiling lessons.
And they aren’t working.
Now the DeSantis campaign appears to think that repeated exposure to DeSantis could build up a tolerance for him among voters, although it’s safer to just not contract DeSantis in the first place. Maybe wear a mask and avoid crowded places where DeSantis easily spreads.
Politico reports this week that instead of doing his actual job, DeSantis is set to embark on a “media swing that will take him into some uncharted, and more adversarial, territory.” Of course, Politico’s idea of a more “adversarial” media environment is … “Morning Joe.” Oh, the bravery DeSantis demonstrated when he entered that fearsome lion’s den and proceeded to praise Trump’s Iran policy.
DeSantis has already deigned to speak with reporters at CBS, ABC, and CNBC. He recently appeared on Bill Maher’s “Real Time,” where the host told him point blank, “If this campaign was going well, you wouldn’t be on this show.”
This media blitz won’t salvage his campaign for the very reason DeSantis would’ve been told so many times already if he were a woman: He is awful on TV. He makes Ted Cruz at least look like a professional actor playing an asshole. DeSantis is cringe theatre.
There’s no fixing that mess, but we’re happy to watch him humiliate himself. We’ll just avoid looking directly at him.
[Politico]
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"Now the DeSantis campaign appears to think that repeated exposure to DeSantis could build up a tolerance for him among voters, although it’s safer to just not contract DeSantis in the first place. Maybe wear a mask and avoid crowded places where DeSantis easily spreads."
Brilliant political epidemiology!
Ta, Stephen. No love for DeathSentence? Good.