{"id":4552,"date":"2023-07-25T13:01:40","date_gmt":"2023-07-25T18:01:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/?p=4552"},"modified":"2023-07-25T13:01:40","modified_gmt":"2023-07-25T18:01:40","slug":"is-ron-desantis-the-new-kamala-harris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/?p=4552","title":{"rendered":"Is Ron DeSantis the new Kamala Harris?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>His team seems more interested in meme videos, Twitter scraps and the internet field of conflict than the on-the-ground demands of winning<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%20370%20247'%3E%3C\/svg%3E\" data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"zeen-lazy-load-base zeen-lazy-load wp-image-4553\"\/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-4553\" srcset=\"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118.png 1024w, https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118-300x200.png 300w, https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118-770x514.png 770w, https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118-370x247.png 370w, https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118-293x195.png 293w, https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118-120x80.png 120w, https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118-240x160.png 240w, https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/image-118-390x260.png 390w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/noscript><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Florida governor Ron DeSantis arrives to deliver remarks at the 2023 Christians United for Israel summit (Getty)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">What if the problem for Ron DeSantis isn\u2019t that he resembles the spiraling candidacies of the past, but that he\u2019s emulating someone who had a great start, then turned a plateau into a cascade?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The general experience in Republican presidential flameouts over the past decade and a half has been the very obvious crash and burn. We have Rudy Giuliani in 2008, who botched his Houston abortion speech then said he would wait until Florida and dropped from a 44 percent lead into utter ignominy. We have 2012\u2019s Rick Perry, who surged to a 29 percent lead over Mitt Romney\u2019s 17 percent in the summer of 2011, only to drop out in the same place he announced, South Carolina. And in 2016 we have more than one example, but the most prominent being Scott Walker, whose double-digit lead evaporated in the space of weeks after two lackluster debate performances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For some reason, American voters really, really care about debates, which resemble in no way anything that candidates have to do as president. This is because American voters are programmed by the media to think these media-constructed and media-focused events matter a great deal more than they actually do. A better proof of management capability would be running a Dairy Queen for a weekend. But that\u2019s not as entertaining, so instead we judge our future commanders-in-chief based on the equivalent of a Cards Against Humanity question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The DeSantis campaign is struggling, everyone will tell you, despite the fact that he\u2019s raised more money than pretty much everyone and seems to be solidly in second place in the early states, unless you put your faith in weird online-only polls not known for their accuracy in Iowa or New Hampshire. But there\u2019s a definite quality to this campaign that seems, how shall we say it, flustered? Confused? Disoriented? And in a specific way that might remind you of another recent campaign with high expectations that got off track early.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Consider the 2020 campaign of one Kamala Harris, rising star, great speechmaker, looked up to by everyone, touted as the female Obama for years. And then she got into the race, and what happened? After a sparkling launch, she dropped out earlier than anyone expected \u2014 and&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2019\/11\/29\/us\/politics\/kamala-harris-2020.html\">the&nbsp;<em>New York Times<\/em>&nbsp;explained<\/a>&nbsp;why:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>One advisor said the fixation that some younger staffers have with liberals on Twitter distorted their view of what issues and moments truly mattered, joking that it was not President Trump\u2019s account that should be taken offline, as Ms. Harris has urged, but rather those of their own trigger-happy communications team.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The piece, written in November 2019 \u2014 a month before&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/thespectator.com\/tag\/kamala-harris\">Harris<\/a>&nbsp;would drop out \u2014 included this description of an attempt at a pivot:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Ms. Harris is now attempting a pivot, taking a less scripted approach to campaigning. On a conference call with donors after the last debate in mid-November, Jim Margolis, a senior campaign advisor, pointed to her improved performance as a case study in letting \u201cKamala be Kamala,\u201d according to one person who participated in the call \u2014 a reference to Ms. Harris\u2019s strengths when she is listening to her competitors\u2019 comments and reacting freely.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Oh. Oh no.&nbsp;<ins><\/ins><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Part of the Let X be X framing of things is valid \u2014 where a candidate has been put inside guardrails and prevented from being themselves. This worked as recently as 2008, where John McCain\u2019s campaign for the nomination blew up early, and he was forced back into an insurgent posture. But that approach is rarely successful, and marked more by risk than results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For DeSantis, the problems are clear. Loyalty to Donald Trump is still strong among half of Republicans, even with DeSantis\u2019s&nbsp;pointed&nbsp;critiques of his policies. The presence of multiple South Carolina candidates in the race hampers his potential momentum even if he wins Iowa, which seems to be the singular focus of his effort. And just as Harris\u2019s team suffered from an extremely online tenor to her campaign, DeSantis\u2019s&nbsp;team seems more interested in meme videos, Twitter scraps and the internet field of conflict than the on-the-ground demands of winning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Perhaps that won\u2019t be determinative this time around. But if it is, DeSantis could well end up in the Kamala category \u2014 someone who lost track of the demands of winning because there were so many things to respond to every\u00a0day. As two of the most prominent Gen X politicians, a DeSantis decline would be an indictment of the generational\u00a0vulnerability to the virality of distraction. They could focus on winning, but they\u2019d rather not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Original Article: <a href=\"https:\/\/thespectator.com\/politics\/ron-desantis-kamala-harris-winning-primary\/\">https:\/\/thespectator.com\/politics\/ron-desantis-kamala-harris-winning-primary\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>His team seems more interested in meme videos, Twitter scraps and the internet field of conflict than the on-the-ground demands of winning What if the problem for Ron DeSantis isn\u2019t that he resembles the spiraling candidacies of the past, but that he\u2019s emulating someone who had a great start, then turned a plateau into a cascade? The general experience in Republican presidential flameouts over the past decade and a half has been the very obvious crash and burn. We have [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-elections"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4552"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4552\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4554,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4552\/revisions\/4554"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nakedpolitics.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}