Mediocrates Meets The True Scotsman

Florida governor Ron DeSantis, who recently threw his hat into the ring for the GOP presidential nomination, has made a number of headlines during his tenure as chief executive of the Sunshine State. Notable among those are his culture war initiatives, which precipitated an on-going feud with Disney, the parent company of Orlando's "happy place."

My libertarian hackles were raised by the blunt-object retribution that DeSantis foisted upon Disney for its criticism of a (much-misrepresented) bill prohibiting gender-ed and sex-ed in grade schools, but I was also perturbed by the blatant favoritism and special treatment that Disney enjoyed for half a century. My conclusion was that neither side was a white hat in that fight, so those hackles calmed down and I found myself siding with RDS over DIS. As National Review reports, it seems that many other libertarian types (New Hampshire folks, who lean libertarian, and among whom are more than 20,000 Free State Project people), have a pro-DeSantis view of the feud.

DeSantis, culture-war aside, built quite a positive track record on the economic front, one that drew over half a million transplants since his inauguration, and has hit many other positive notes, including handling the COVID pandemic better than many-to-most of his peers.

DeSantis isn't a libertarian, and I take issue with some of his policies and actions, but he is, from my current knowledge of him, more than "good enough" as an anodyne to the various massive infringements of liberty we're enduring.

To offer an analogy, I, like many conservatives and libertarians, believe that the Civil Rights Act went too far in imposing public accommodation rules on private businesses. The purer approach would have been to wipe away all the Jim Crow laws that mandated segregative practices and let the market sort the rest out. However, as a remedy to the truly awful state of affairs, it was a quicker remedy, even if imperfect from a liberty perspective. A right delayed is a right denied, and the CRA as written fostered a faster departure from the structural racism that pervaded the South in that era.

That public accommodation has been misused and abused in recent decades does not mean it was a wrong move at the time. So, DeSantis thumping woke a bit too hard mightn’t be so bad. Everything is incremental, and what happens or doesn't happen after the first step shouldn't be used to kill that first step.

Concurrently, David French, who generates a surprising amount of rancor at my "home-base" Facebook group (one associated with National Review and therefore well-populated by conservatives, one of whom gets a hat-tip for blog-spiring today), posited the question:

Will DeSantis Destroy Conservatism as We Know It?

What is "conservatism as we know it?"

French offers two versions: the post-war tripod of social conservatism, economic libertarianism, and strong national defense; and the Trumpish "full-spectrum political and cultural opposition to the left, however it might be defined" coupled with "reward friends and punish enemies."

From where I sit, the Right has become more and more populist/protectionist/nativist, as embodied by Trump and his victories in the Primary and the General elections in 2016.

Is that "conservatism?" Or is conservatism, like a "no true Scotsman" argument, something that stands apart from a candidate? If the former, then DeSantis would merely continue with the evolution, and likely take it a somewhat different direction. If the latter, then, no, DeSantis (nor any other candidate or President) would affect conservatism, because it'd be considered a bedrock principle rather than an evolving label (or an amalgam, such as "Republican" and "Democrat" are).

But, the question is as much a clutching of pearls as it is a consideration of DeSantis as a substitute for Trump and as a potential President. A political label should not be defined by the guy at the top of its heap. A party platform obviously can, but they are different animals, and for practical purposes, the label becomes irrelevant once the platform has been assembled.

There will be purists out there who reject DeSantis for his imperfections. Were I looking at a sheaf of candidates who'd offer similar meh in different flavors, as some elections of yore have been viewed by libertarians, I'd intellectually sit things out. But, when we have "good enough" vs "train-off-the-cliff," there's only one "meh" option rather than a passel of them.

Again, change comes in increments. DeSantis may overdo it with the culture war stuff, but his power in that regard, even as President, isn't anywhere near absolute, and he'll be set off by a massive entrenchment that won't dislodge easily. A few steps to the right on that front (such getting XY chromosomes out of women's sports and locker rooms) might be a good idea.

As things currently stand, there's Biden, Trump, and DeSantis. All the others who've gone hat-in will make some noise and try to push some issues, but it's fair to conclude at this juncture that the horse race is between Trump and DeSantis for the nomination, and between one of them and Biden for the White House.

Despite DeSantis not being close to a true libertarian, I know who I'm rooting for.