A Hurricane of Bad Framing

By Charles C. W. Cooke

Wednesday, October 05, 2022

 

This framing, from Politico’s Gary Fineout, represents a slightly more refined version of the framing that both Phil and I criticized earlier in the week:

 

President Joe Biden and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis are testing a newfound détente this week when the president visits Florida Wednesday to survey damage from Hurricane Ian.

 

The two men, political enemies who routinely attack each other over a wide range of policy issues, have set aside their differences over the past week to cooperate on massive hurricane recovery efforts. They have spoken by telephone several times since the storm struck and publicly bat down any suggestion that they aren’t working together.

 

There is no need for a “détente,” because DeSantis and Biden exist within the same constitutional order. The two men are, indeed, “political enemies who routinely attack each other over a wide range of policy issues,” but that’s entirely irrelevant to the matter at hand — which is not one of those “policy issues,” but a hurricane. Fineout writes that the pair “have set aside their differences over the past week to cooperate on massive hurricane recovery efforts.” Yes. As opposed to what? There isn’t much disagreement in the United States over “hurricane recovery efforts,” but, even if there were, it would not prevent those who disagreed from “setting aside their differences.” There is a reason that Biden and DeSantis have “publicly bat down any suggestion that they aren’t working together,” and that is that they are working together. That isn’t a concession, and it doesn’t reflect badly on either of them. It is the system of government under which we live.

 

This way of looking at politics is particularly annoying because it treats governance as if it were sport, and it assumes that all disagreements over the correct size, scope, and direction of the state are for show. Time and time again since Hurricane Ian hit, I have seen reporters ask, in effect, “these two men don’t agree on taxes or guns or abortion, so why are they being cordial on hurricanes?” Fineout writes:

 

Before the hurricane, DeSantis clashed with the president over everything from vaccine and mask mandates to immigration policy. The governor’s decision last month to fly nearly 50 Venezuelan migrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard also drew a fierce backlash from Democrats and Biden, who called such transports “reckless” and “un-American.”

 

But there’s no “before the hurricane” about this. There is no doubt that, after the hurricane, DeSantis and the president will clash over almost everything once again. But they won’t clash on the hurricane, because the hurricane isn’t like those other issues. Fineout writes:

 

Yet DeSantis, who has asked for and gotten expanded federal aid to deal with the damage caused by the storm, has complimented federal authorities several times on the response and did so again on Tuesday, on the eve of Biden’s visit.

 

Right. That’s because federal authorities have done a good job in Florida, and because DeSantis does not object to their doing so. If federal authorities were passing laws, or taking actions, with which DeSantis disagreed, he would say so. They are not, so he has not. The “yet” in Fineout’s sentence is a non sequitur. That DeSantis opposes Biden in one area does not mean he has to in every area, and nor is DeSantis obliged to agree with Biden in other areas in order to agree with him here. This sort of reporting is profoundly tiresome, and, as a Floridian, Fineout should know better than to indulge it.