Little Ronnie

     No, that's not a photoshopped image. That's exactly how Ron DeSantis looked in a recent podcast, prompting some wags to speculate whether DeSantis' campaign staff hates him enough to set him up like this.

     The fact that he sits in that big chair with his shoulders defensively hunched over just exacerbates his smallness. Frankly, I'm amazed that Trump hasn't pounced on it like the world's last Big Mac, although, after his Tiny Desk Man moment, maybe he should keep his big trap shut for once.

     Indeed, DeSantis' Quixotic quest for the White House isn't so much a viable presidential campaign as it is a political death watch, with the MSM patiently perched on a dead tree, looking at DeSantis gasping and crawling across a desert floor. It's not a matter of if but when he finally suspends his campaign.

     And with the Iowa caucus less than three weeks away and the NH primary eight days after that, DeSantis' soon-to-be-ironically-named Super PAC, Never Back Down, decided this would be a helluva time to pull ads from Iowa and New Hampshire television.

     This $2.5 million clawback of rapidly dwindling campaign funds is actually the first evidence we've ever seen of DeSantis acknowledging the truth about anything. More than one poll has him in 4th place in New Hampshire. In Manchester, he's polling at 2%.

     He's not doing much better in the Hawkeye State. In FiveThirtyEight's sampling of four major polls, Trump is far ahead (+30% in every poll) of DeSantis. Hardly a reason to throw good money after bad. If he stands no chance of winning a caucus or primary, why give him more money?

     And that's another insoluble problem facing DeSantis. Even months before he declared, DeSantis had vacuumed up an estimated $200,000,000 in campaign contributions. So, what happened to it?

    

     Here's a clue.

     DeSantis took in more money than, as of 2020, all nations' defense spending save for the US and China. The number three country, Saudi Arabia, spends $67.6 million on national defense, which is just about exactly a third of what DeSantis racked up. So, assuming Ronnie didn't buy F-35s and ICBMs (Although, with his quick temper, one can never assume anything), what did he blow his money on?

     Well, the NY Times did a rundown of that last August, when DeSantis had long since begun slipping in the polls. In fact, this was the story's lede:

     "The super PAC supporting the presidential campaign of Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida spent nearly $34 million in recent months, pouring money into voter outreach, advertising, polling, consultants and other expenses as his standing in the polls steadily slipped."

     By June, DeSantis' campaign had more cash on hand than anyone, even Trump (which is not surprising. Why throw tons of money at a presidential candidate who's fated to win the primary, anyway?). But, at least until this summer, when money began drying up, the DeSantis campaign was spending money like a sailor on liberty. Tour buses, consultants, door knockers, fundraisers at expensive resorts. That shit adds up.

     Then they started lying about their hauls. $23 million became $30 million. Then ads started getting cancelled. By July, a third of the campaign staff got the axe. So, how did the guy who sucked up $200,000,000 in bribes burn through all that cash? Well, the $97,000,000 they had taken in by the end of June gave them the feeling that the money spigots were going to stay wide open.

     In one quarter, the million dollar donors dried up to seven. One high profile Republican donor, real estate tycoon Robert Bigelow, stuffed his fat wallet back in his pants. Other rich donors followed suit. You could actually see the DeSantis campaign wither in real time faster than a pile of chicken shit in a typhoon.

     So, why did the money stop coming in? Well, for one of two reasons. Either because DeSantis' poll numbers began dropping or because they began ditching him before that time when they actually met him and the evaporating money resulted in lower poll numbers. Chickens and eggs and all that.

     But one fact is undeniable- Ron DeSantis is about as good at retail politics as a starving fox in a hen house. He's yet to learn that you need more than to say "woke" 50 times in a speech to sustain a presidential campaign. He can't relate to adults, he can't relate to kids, and he certainly can't relate to the press. Those he meet are left utterly chilled by his sociopathic manner and the only mystery is why someone hasn't seriously floated the possibility that Ron DeSantis is a low-functioning autism subject.

     Donors have complained that he never thanks them even after getting seven figure donations. Like Trump, he completely lacks empathy. He's like a pod person vainly trying to pass himself off as the real deal.

     Another defect in DeSantis' character is that he thinks because he beat Charlie Crist in Florida's last gubernatorial election by 19 points, that he'd be a shoe-in to get the GOP presidential nomination. He still thinks every state wants to be Florida. Well, New Hampshire and Iowa voters couldn't give a flying fuck about his pointless war with Disney, which has a major footprint in just one other state and that one hasn't been carried by a Republican since Bush in '88.

     And perhaps most devastating of all is DeSantis' infallible ability to pratfall or step into one scandal or meme cringe after another. Between his questionable, faux Nancy Sinatra fashion sense to his lift shoes to his using shadowy airline carriers to export migrants to blue states to how he eats pudding, the man is a rapidly-rotating meme mill that never runs out of grist.

     But it's obvious DeSantis' star is setting. Term-limited, he cannot run for governor again. Barring a Senate run against Scott or Rubio, the best DeSantis can hope for is winning back his old Congressional seat and even that looks dicey.

     But before he can even hope to refill that seat or any other, first he has to fight his way out of that gigantic Lily Tomlin chair into which some enterprising genius had stuffed him for that disastrous podcast.