https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIn4C7Ip6tE
So, folks are getting onto Ron DeSantis for being AWOL during a spike of Covid. I don’t know if I have a dog in this fight or not. I’ve read a couple of articles about this topic, both of them condemning the governor.
https://crooksandliars.com/2021/12/ron-desantis-mia-spokesperson-calls-it
Let me start off by saying, I’m a Republican myself. I’d really love to say that this is just crass politics, and the poor guy deserves a vacation, and if I had the power to choose my vacation time I’d likely choose the Christmas time for it once in a while. So I’ll try to leave politics out of this and just talk leadership.
My political opinion is right, and yours is wrong. Happy New Year!
Ok…seriously, it’s not a matter of party or ideology. It’s a matter of…..what the heck ever happened to the idea of leadership? I know these guys aren’t marines, so they don’t have the ideals of your soldiers eat first and then you do, or the ideal of the Airborne Rangers that the commander will be the first on the battle field and the last off.
And yes….I do think they should be allowed vacations. But still….the timing of some of these guys is terrible.
Example one being Ron DeSantis.
Example two comes from my own great state of Oklahoma. Good ol’ governor Stitt was out of state when a record snow storm hit.
Then there is of course, Governor Cruz from our great neighbors to the south, Texas. I still have a “Marvin the Martian melts Texas” shirt from twenty years ago, but I digress.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/18/politics/vacationing-during-crisis-ted-cruz/index.html
And of coarse, both Obama and Trump were criticized by their political opponents for playing “too much golf” at what were considered inappropriate times. You will note the slant from both articles.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/25/politics/fact-check-trump-obama-golf/index.html
And just in case you fellow Republicans think I’m dissing my own party too much, here are some sources blasting the Democrats for similar foibles.
Nor is our nation the only one that has people who fiddle while Rome burns.
Of coarse I could go on and on. And it literally does go all the way back to Rome burning while Nero played some confounded instrument (the violin had actually not yet been invented, and while the story may be apocryphal, if you believe even half the stuff about Nero from Seutonious Twelve Caesars you know that madcap scamp was capable of all kinds of wicked fun).
But I also sometimes wonder how much of this is just bad politics. Honestly, if you waited till there was no catastrophe going on to take a vacation or go golfing, you’d never do it.
I think that a large part of the controversy comes from people noticing that there is a different set of rules for “them” than there is for “us.” The Prime Minister doesn’t want to wear a mask during his party….no big deal. If I show up to work without one, it is the end of the world.
For at least the last six thousand years we have record that the rules apply differently to different social scales. And people like Jesus and Socrates who hinted that maybe that was wrong, maybe we are all the children of God, well they had to be silenced. Permanently.
We feel insulted. We feel enslaved. We feel disrespected. And we don’t feel heard. I really don’t mean to sound like a snowflake here. I don’t really care who took what vacation where. I just wish there were some way to get the haves to understand that the have nots are people, just like them.
And I just found out Betty White died. Happy fricken New Year!
I’ve ranted about what I think, and shared articles about what other folks think, but what do you think? Please share your comments and let me know if you think this topic is worthwhile, or are we all just being petty and should mind our own business? What kind of instrument would you play while Rome burns? Where would you vacation if you were a powerful political mogul? And if you are a political mogul, any chance you’d take me to see the bikini clad….what….my girl friend is mad? Oh….just white out that last comment.
Happy New Year to all. May the weeping and gnashing of teeth begin anew.
Next year, surely the wealthy and powerful will learn their lesson……
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