This Carbon Based Life

By David Glenn Cox

There is the me you can see and there is me that is really me, that you can’t see. Ron DeSanctimonious is a large dose of Presidential ambition stuffed into the small body of a small earth man. Ron is a preplanned community of political opportunism. A screech of political comedy, the tough guy today and the expert in everything tomorrow.

But every once in a while, Ronnie missteps and the real Ron slips out and we get a glimpse of the monster behind the mad used car salesman. My apologies to mad used car salesman. Back in Iowa, about a month or so ago. Ron came upon a small boy eating an Icee at the fair. Ronnie could have asked, “What’s your name, little boy? How old are you? Are you having fun at the fair?”

Instead, he asks “That’s a sugary drink, huh?” Judgmental much? It is a fair you know. They got a whole Midway full of cotton candy and ice cream going on. But that’s just Ron, he knows the law but not people. Harry Truman had been a farmer and loved campaigning at fairs. Because he could show off how he was a regular guy who knew his way around horses and farming equipment. Harry could show off that he was one of them. “That’s a sugary drink, huh?”

Where are your parents’ son? Are all your chores done? Where did you get the money for that? You didn’t take that money out of your mama’s purse, did you?

When Ron was a congressman in 2013, he voted against hurricane aid for New York and New Jersey. Ron sympathized with the victims, but we can’t just put everything on a government credit card, you know. We gotta draw the line somewhere and so, I picked you. I don’t judge Ronnie too harshly for that act of political opportunism. A little man trying to get noticed in a big Party that praises skinflitery and phony toughness as the new Ebenezer Scrooge of our time.  

“Too Bad! Shit happens! It sucks to be you!” And as Ronnie would capitalize on other people’s sufferings to blow his own horn in a futile gesture of mindless cruelty.

During  the Covid pandemic lock down the states were offered additional food stamp monies for families with children to replace meals missed at school. Florida’s share was $50 million dollars and all the states had to do, was to ask for it. Florida never asked for it, Ron preferred children potentially food insecure be even more food insecure. He didn’t want any of that dirty old Joe Biden money. Thank you no, we’d rather not.

Now pretend for a second that you own grocery stores in Florida.

Ron refused money in the inflation reduction act to provide rebates on new appliances. People in Florida don’t want any rebates on major appliances, now do they? We don’t need any of your old woke polices, putting money back in the people of Florida’s back pockets around here. “That’s a sugary drink, huh?”

“ I suppose you’ll want off Christmas day.” That’s just Ron, punitive and judgmental. It must have burned his throat like gargling jalapeno sauce and washing it down with straight Tequila.

“Earlier today, I made a point to speak to all the governors most likely to be impacted by this storm.  I spoke with Governor DeSantis several times, Governor Kemp, Governor McMaster, and Governor Cooper about the impacts of the storm and — that made landfall at 7:45 this morning as a Category 3 hurricane.” – Joe Biden

There it was, 100% hurricane relief and all Ron had to do was to bob his head around a few times and mumble thank you, sir. And Ronnie had to take it. There he was Joe Biden, the devil himself, on the phone being good and beneficent and Ronnie was forced to choke out a thank you.

Florida hurricane relief is so much more essential than New York or New Jersey hurricane relief. But that’s such minor hypocrisy. Ronnie in his Governor’s message reminds Floridians, “You loot, and we shoot!” He could have said, “Hang on cause better days are a coming. We’ll all get through this if we all pull together or even some mindless Jesus verbiage. But no, we get “You loot, and we shoot!”

We got big angry state troopers with bad attitudes, and big guns with itchy trigger fingers, so don’t you try anything! You know, uniting mankind with their lofty soaring rhetoric. “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.” “That’s a sugary drink, huh?”

Recently, the superPAC (Never Back Down) associated with Ron’s campaign sort of backed down. Letting canvassing, door knocking staff go or redeploying them. Giving up on states later in play to focus exclusively on the early primary states. (Red alert! Danger Will Robinson!) Because Ron is in crisis, he didn’t do well in the debate and came off looking like a plastic game show host.

And the category is, “Things badly broken.” He’s slipping in the polls and doesn’t know what to do about it.

Ron has tried changing staff and management, but that didn’t work. He tried the humanizing bit, but that didn’t help either. Now, rearranging the staff or the deck chairs on the Titanic. Ron needs a good showing in the early primaries or it’s all over, Fina! Oh, what could the trouble be?

High winds split a large old tree that had graced the grounds of the Florida governor’s mansion for many generations. Ron commented that it will leave more room for his children, when they play baseball. His children are aged five and four and are certain big leaguers of the future.

A stupid insipid lie that shows where Ron’s head is at. More room for my preschoolers to play baseball. Look out windows! He could have said, “that tree has been with us for many years, and we will miss her beautiful shade, but time marches on!”

Ron has a people problem. He has cunning and he’s smart, but he doesn’t interact well with other human beings. And you can’t fake that, and you can’t spin it.

Harry Truman spoke to tens of thousands who showed at all hours of the day and night. Just to hear Harry speak from the back end of a train and Harry did not disappoint. “I never did give anybody hell. I just told the truth about them, and they thought it was hell.”  Thousands swarmed the motorcade of Robert Kennedy in a way no one would ever swarm Richard Nixon’s motorcade. There was no real personal connection with the people.

They say in Hollywood the script is passable if the characters are likeable. If the characters aren’t likeable,  it doesn’t matter how good the script was. They might like your plans but just not like you. Just because they agree with you, doesn’t mean they like you. Even if you can change their minds, you can’t change their hearts. If they don’t like you, they don’t like you.

“As happens sometimes, a moment settled and hovered and remained for much more than a moment. And sound stopped and movement stopped for much, much more than a moment.” ― John Steinbeck