Don vs. Ron: dead heat

By BRUCE LOWITT

In response to Donald Trump’s claim that a loss by him in the 2024 presidential election would prove it was rigged, Ron DeSantis promised he will rig the voting to guarantee himself a victory.

And when Trump said he would expand the rights of gun owners if he is reelected president next year, DeSantis responded by promising that if he wins the presidency he will require that all Americans over the age of 12 have a Glock .380 Auto surgically attached to their hand. “It’ll give all those out-of-work abortion doctors and gender-reassignment surgeons something to do,” DeSantis said.

Trump, the felony-indicted and twice-impeached former president, and DeSantis, the autocratic Florida governor currently ranked No. 2 in national polls of racist-bigot candidates, are engaging in their own version of Irving Berlin’s “Anything you can do, I can do better” as they try to destroy each other’s pursuit of the Republican party’s presidential nomination.

“Trumpet – that’s my new nickname for him ’cause he blows – obviously thinks the only way to win a national election is to gerrymander enough states to win the Electoral College,” DeSantis said, “but that’s the weasel’s way. I’d make sure the polls close early in some districts and never open in others. I’ll have thousands of my supporters at all the right sites to make sure only qualified voters get to cast ballots,” he added, putting air quotes around “qualified.”

Adapting the “Don’t say gay” theme that opponents use to attack his culture-war stance, DeSantis labeled his campaign “Don’t say shit” and warned that “homosexuals, bi-sexuals, trans-sexuals, any sexuals except straight white sexuals, would have to answer to the rest of us. Y’know, the ones packing heat.”

Trump said DeSantis’ plan to arm all civilians was “a weak-ass solution to a serious situation. Just giving people more guns than the criminals doesn’t solve it any more than walking around in shiny white boots makes you a hero.

“It still comes down to law enforcement and no one is more supportive of it than me,” Trump continued. “That’s why I’d make sure every police station and sheriff’s office has its own Black Hawk helicopter, armored personnel carrier, rocket launcher, flamethrower, howitzers and mortars as well as however many AR-15s they want – err, need – to protect our schoolchildren.”

When DeSantis, in his war with Disney World, suggested building a state prison next to the amusement park, Trump called it “a pussy approach to a huge crime problem in Florida. If I’m president I’ll employ eminent domain, taking over Disney World and turning it into the world’s biggest federal penitentiary, and everyone locked up in there will find out that, for them, it’s, heh-heh, a small world after all.”

But when Trump, during his CNN town hall meeting, hedged on whether he would support a federal abortion law and what type of restrictions one might entail, DeSantis pounced.

“I would absolutely support a federal law banning all abortions within six minutes of conception, with no exceptions,” he said. “It’s obvious Trumpelstiltskin – that’s my newer nickname for him ’cause, well, look it up – he hates babies. He just cares about rapists. If you think about it, considering his history, that makes perfect sense.”