BTRTN: Can't Understand DeSantis and Abbott? Permanent Covid is Good for Republicans

[reggieandlee]

Born To Run The Numbers attempts to understand why the governor of the state with by far the worst Covid infection rates in the country is positioning himself as the most aggressive anti-mask mandate politician in the nation:

http://www.borntorunthenumbers.com/2021/08/btrtn-cant-understand-desantis-and.html

Excerpts: "There is no mystery about where the opposition to vaccination in the United States is concentrated: all you have to do is look at the most current data on Covid cases. The American South represents 34% of the U.S. population, but a whopping 56% of the weekly Covid cases. Pick the data apart further, and you find a literally sickening statistic. Simply rank, top to bottom, the percentage of weekly Covid cases in the states that have a higher percentage of Covid cases than percentage of population. You see a national x-ray revealing the deep dark splotches of metastasized rejection of science. You see the Deep South...
"You would think, of course – and hope and pray, while you are at it – that those states are doing everything in their power to control the killing wave that is surging through their populations. They are not. They are doing pretty much the opposite...
"Sadly, it is becoming clear that Permanent Covid is very good politics for Republicans, who apparently see a lot of upside to a raging pandemic that preys most upon the poorest among us. It happens that the governors of Texas and Florida are two hyper-ambitious politicians who are eying 2024 and know that the path to the Republican nomination passes directly through Trump’s base. Permanent Covid is one key to successfully navigating that path... But good luck even achieving herd immunity simply in the United States if it is not really what Republicans want. And that, friends, is one too many ironies in the fire. You see, the only reason that Republicans claim to believe in 'freedom from government' is so they can get back in control of it."

[Thomas Hurt]

1. This is right in line with the conservative/fascist mind set.

The only people who are going to die are weak and undesirables. The usual self centered, eugenicist/social darwinist crap.

I would imagine a lot of Trumpers think they aren't going to get it due to their Aryan genes, blah, blah, blah. I am too tough for it to kill me....

[Mad_Machine76]

2. I dunno

Maybe in the near short term but in the long term they're killing off their own anti-mask/anti-vaxx voters, inevitably leaving healthier, more progressive voters, whom are watching all of this unfold and whom will take it out on them at the ballot box. Plus, they're assuming that some of their smarter voters whom are doing the right thing despite the propaganda won't get tired of being in a constant pandemic where there friends, family members, THEIR CHILDREN are getting sick (even a "mild" case of COVID isn't all that much fun- or so I've heard) and potentially even dying. Republicans like Abbott and DeathSantis are playing with fire IMHO if they think that the road to victory will be paved by a needlessly long pandemic.

[Vogon_Glory]

3. A pity for their voters that they don't read history

Then they’d remember that the trans-Atlantic slave trade killed off a lot of slave ship crewmen and that the French and American efforts to build a canal across Panama killed an awful lot of white workers. Those “superior” Aryan genes aren’t as effective as those idjits might think.