America, Don’t Do This To Yourself

My fellow Americans, I am a sixth generation Floridian. I have served my state as a public school teacher, a public defender of juveniles and mentally ill clients and as a professor in its higher education system. I also serve my spiritual community as an Episcopal priest in a local parish. With the exception of the four years I spent in seminary in California, I have lived in Florida all of my life.

I am now retired and chose to return to and remain in this state where my roots run deep. I love this state even as I am increasingly horrified over what it is becoming. Rumors have it that the current governor of Florida is about to announce his bid for the presidency. And so I come to you with just one thing to say:

Don’t Do This.

Do not inflict upon our nation this toxic narcissist that our state has not had the good sense to reject. He is an expert at fear mongering, driving a moral panic that has attacked LBGTQ people, people of color, immigrants and women. His list of enemies is reminiscent of that of the authoritarian regimes of 1930s Europe.

Indeed, his vision is frequently compared to the authoritarian vision of Hungary’s Viktor Orban. He is not God’s fighter (how much psychological inflation is reflected in such an assertion?), he is not a champion for “freedom,” nor is he the leader of a state. He is a classic demagogue, the manipulator of factions, turning Floridians against one another at a time when our state is facing existential crises.

Millions of tax payer dollars have gone down the drain due to his feud with Disney over its opposition to his homophobic legislation. This feud now is threatening the economy of this state which depends upon tourist dollars to stay afloat. His willingness to imperil the lives of working people all over this Orlando metro region where I live is simply incomprehensible. Just this week Disney walked away from a billion dollar investment that would have created 2000 jobs and positively impacted all the providers of goods and services they would have patronized. Another 17 billion in planned new construction and 13,000 jobs is also now on hold.

This is a very ominous development, indeed.

Under his watch, thousands of Floridians died needlessly from COVID as he fought any kind of common sense response to the pandemic whether it be quarantines, masking, social distancing or vaccines. This is not merely an academic observation. Four of my friends died from COVID, three before the vaccines were available and one whose husband refused to let her take it. The appointment of a religious fundamentalist academic to legitimate this abject failure in our state’s response to the pandemic has only made it worse. 

Think of what he would do to America.

Last year Hurricanes Ian and Nicole wrecked our state from virtually one end to the other. Having lost my home to Hurricane Charley in 2004, I know how incredibly devastating such a loss can be. Fortunately for us, our insurance company paid in full for our damages and, though it took us four years to get back into our rebuilt home due to contractor malfeasance, we ultimately were able to come home.

 But that has not been true for many Floridians who suffered damages, some of them losing their entire lives’ worth of belongings, in the hurricanes of 2022. For far too many, their insurance companies have either failed to respond to their needs or only done so in a partial manner leaving the homeowner to pick up the remainder. Neither our governor nor the state legislature that seems to believe it is his lap dog have proven willing to address this crisis. And in the meantime, several insurance companies have pulled out of Florida entirely.

This is irresponsibility on an existential level.

 

This governor has made our schools and public library systems the laughingstock of the nation. In measures that increasingly resemble those of Orwell’s dystopia, books have been taken from the shelves and teachers find themselves muzzled to talk with students who are at high risk given their struggles with their sexualities. And our once promising university system, right on the verge of greatness, has been saddled with the loss of tenure, prohibitions against any kind of critical approaches to history or society and an atmosphere of fear where mere accusations can end long careers of public service.

Laws which prohibit the teaching of anything that might make students uncomfortable evidence a lack of cognitive complexity and no small amount of immaturity. Whatever else such laws are about, education is not among them.

The most recent legislation by this New Pork Chop Gang - whose seats are insured by gerrymandering and face no constitutional check from courts stacked with Federalist Society ideologues - has made the ability of all Floridians to receive medical care uncertain. Not only doctors but insurance companies may now deny care based on “ideological” bases.

Translation: Doctors don’t have to treat those against whom they harbor prejudices and insurance companies don’t have to provide them coverage.

 

So much for the Hippocratic Oath. And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

With the end of the COVID emergency, almost a million Floridians will lose access to medical care through Medicaid. Florida was one of 10 states which refused to agree to Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act and currently one out of every 14 children in Florida have no medical coverage, ranking among the worst 10 states in the nation. 

This is simply shameful.

This is a man who is a demagogue on a good day. He is willing to do whatever will further his political career regardless of how it harms his constituents. And should he ever gain our nation’s highest office, he will make us pine for the disastrous days of George, the Unready.

So I beg you. Do not take the bait. Do not buy the bullshit. No matter how well the public relations people spin this candidacy, he remains an insecure, narcissistic, mean-spirited bully at heart. Worse yet, he is actually intelligent and well educated. The destructive possibilities of the combination of qualities he embodies are unlimited.

This man should NEVER be trusted with power over your lives, much less our country. A lot of damage to the body politic can be done in four years. Take it from the people who know. Because contrary to the governor’s self-serving blathering about freedom, we Floridians know the truth: 

Florida has become the place where our humanity comes to die.

 

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Harry Scott Coverston

Orlando, Florida

frharry@cfl.rr.com

hcoverston.orlando@gmail.com

If the unexamined life is not worth living, surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth holding. Most things worth considering do not come in sound bites.

Those who believe religion and politics aren't connected don't understand either. – Mahatma Gandhi

For what does G-d require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your G-d?  - Micah 6:8, Hebrew Scriptures

Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy, now. Walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it. - Rabbi Rami Shapiro, Wisdom of the Jewish Sages (1993)

   © Harry Coverston, 2023

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