Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, who clearly wants to be President of the United States, faces a major crisis that puts him on the spot!
How is he going to handle Hurricane Ian, with millions of his constituents in crisis?
And will he conduct himself properly in his dealings with Democratic President Joe Biden, who has been to the forefront of this crisis, even as it was developing?
This is a test case for crisis leadership, and arrogant, right wing demagogic Ron DeSantis is likely to cause controversy, and show lack of empathy, sincerity, compassion, and decency, since he has no element of any of these characteristics!
On the other hand, Joe Biden exudes empathy, sincerity, compassion, and decency throughout his nearly half century of political leadership.
This may well be the test of Ron DeSantis’s planned Presidential candidacy, as the likelihood is that he will fail miserably, but will blame others, rather than take responsibility for the reaction to this natural disaster!
Will he even show the kind of leadership that former Governor Jeb Bush demonstrated in numerous hurricane crises in 2004-2005 when he was in charge in the “Sunshine” state?
And short term, how will this horrendous disaster affect the Florida Governorship election, which is less than six weeks from now, and will Democratic opponent Charlie Crist gain an advantage?
Crist was lucky that there were no major hurricanes in the four years he was Florida Governor as a Republican (2007-2011).
This crisis will be a possible forerunner of a DeSantis-Biden confrontation in 2024!