Ron DeSantis has finally admitted that he is in this presidential race, something that we’ve all known for months now. Now, while I could care less about the career path of the governor of the “Sundown State,” I do care about how much lower the bar for presidency will fall.
The reality is that since Donald Trump took 1600 Penn those years ago, the highest office in the land has become the biggest joke in the world. There’s simply no respect for the U.S. presidency. The bar is beyond low and it’s not just Trump to blame. In addition to 45’s crass, ignorant persona, well the advent of aggressive social media and the encroachment of this anti-education era are both responsible for the current state. As far as the former goes, well, social media has made access to the lives of others somewhat of a right, rather than a privilege.
As of 2021, there have been approximately almost 300 million smartphone users in the US. That means there are journalists, historians, documenters everywhere, including in places and spaces that they generally were not before. That also means that those who have lived lives curated by pr executives in this well-crafted magazine profile-type past, is no longer able to access that. People are exposed in at any moment. That removes the veil of mystique that really surrounds celebrity. It really levels the playing field among the elite and it creates that parity that when these gods are exposed as mere men, well, their faults are on full display, and that desire that was there to be better and do better to attain these positions of greatness such as presidency, they’re no longer in existence. And as a result of that, well, it’s not that prestigious of a role and thus, the stock is a lot poorer.
Of course, the attack on education doesn’t help. The right has really invested in criticizing the Ivy League advanced degrees and 12th-grade level talk. And it’s funny because those right-wingers who are doing this are bearing crimson. They’re out here representing Rory the Lion and Handsome Dan. They’re Ivy Leaguers themselves, but they really want to have a certain class of people that they can control. Because they know the more ignorant people are, the easier they are to manipulate and fear monger.
We’ve really seen this push since Ronald Reagan and co. were in office, where they blocked affordable education because they feared an educated proletariat. Again, the fact is that people who are more educated are more difficult to control. But if you keep people dumb, disadvantaged and afraid, well, gosh, you can control everybody’s destiny. And the thing is, those in positions of power are really, really knowledgeable; they know exactly what they’re doing. And also, we know what they are doing because we have access to social media.
But at the same time, we do have to realize that there will be that intersect where there are people who aren’t afraid to show you exactly who they are, so you know exactly what they’re doing. And they’re not afraid to be dumb. And yet they find themselves in the position of presidency. And look at here we are today.