The Media Give DeSantis the Boot

By Christian Schneider

Thursday, November 02, 2023

 

Despite war breaking out in the Middle East, an election-denying back-bencher now being second in line to the presidency, and a major party’s presidential front-runner facing nearly 100 felony criminal counts, the American media this week found the juiciest story going: Apparently Republican presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis accentuates his height.

 

Early in the week, podcast host Patrick Bet-David asked DeSantis whether he was wearing boots with lifts in the heels in order to make himself appear taller. DeSantis said his boots were simply “off-the-rack Lucchese” and that he is a legitimate 5′11″ tall. (On the Lucchese website, boots sell for between $500 and $2,000 — not exactly everyman prices.)

 

Naturally, the media pounced, with everyone from Forbes to New York magazine to the Daily Beast trying to crack the case. Politico contacted three “expert shoemakers” to determine whether DeSantis was, in fact, wearing height enhancers. The Washington Post scooped them all, running a hard-hitting exposé last March about DeSantis’s gravity-defying footwear.

 

Mocking DeSantis for trying to look taller is a purely Trumpian swipe. (In fact, Trump has spent months ridiculing DeSantis’s height and other dimensions, giving him the unsubtle nickname “Tiny D.”)

 

But now, the very media that abhor Trump for his juvenile taunts are engaging in them. Publications that dismiss DeSantis as an unserious wannabe are showing how truly unserious they can be.

 

For one, it is not at all out of the ordinary for candidates — male and female alike — to experience head-snapping glow-ups before running for higher office. Study after study has shown that voters (especially underinformed ones) make voting decisions based on how candidates look. Further, people ascribe all sorts of traits to better-looking people, including being healthier and more trustworthy.

 

Obviously, these are characteristics that candidates want to claim for themselves, which is why they change their appearances. Take the current president. Three decades ago, Biden was a balding senator with saggy jowls that made him resemble Droopy the Dog. Now, Biden not only has hair but a face so tight it appears he is perpetually on a motorcycle screaming forward at 300 mph.

 

But of course, the idea that Biden has had extensive plastic surgery is outside the bounds of polite conversation. If you Google “Has the president had work done,” most of the websites that come up would infect your computer with a virus that will cause it to spontaneously combust.

 

Nonetheless, we can all see it. One more face-tightening visit to the plastic surgeon, and his eyes — which he can now barely open — will meet at the back of his head. (Better for him to see the backstabbers in his party calling for him to retire.)

 

Everyone knows that politicians get professional makeovers before hitting the campaign trail. Remember back in 2015 when Florida governor Jeb Bush seemed to lose half his body volume by cutting out carbs? This must be why Trump hammered Bush for being “low energy.” What Bush really needed was a bagel.

 

Bush wasn’t alone. Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee lost over 100 pounds — or about two Pelosis — in 2007 before his presidential run a year later. In 2016, Texas senator Ted Cruz was in lean, mean fighting shape as he toured the country. Now, with his presidential aspirations dashed, more like a baked potato.

 

Other candidates shot to the front of the pack because of their comeliness. In 2012, Mitt Romney seemed to be an unlikely nominee for a party lurching to the right, given his “flexible” past opinions on abortion and health care. But dammit, he looked like a president. It seemed like Romney’s chin alone could get things done.

 

Remember that with only two years’ experience in the Senate, the handsome and lithe Senator Barack Obama descended from the mount to run for president in 2008. He spoke in a buttery baritone that exuded reassurance and seemed worthy, journalists thought, of being inscribed on scrolls made from the pulp of redwood trees.

 

And then there are the most obvious examples. John Kennedy rode his movie-star looks to the White House. Even before he was elected, Ronald Reagan looked like he should be on Mount Rushmore. And who can forget the molten hot sexuality of Warren G. Harding?

 

As for the women candidates, their looks are picked apart far more intensely than male candidates’ (and mostly by other women).

 

Sarah Palin wasn’t just attractive by politician standards, she was legitimately stunning — and rode it all the way to a vice-presidential nomination. Senator Elizabeth Warren, who at age 74 could pass for a woman 20 years her junior, faced howls of mockery when she denied having had any work done, saying she stays young-looking simply by avoiding washing her face.

 

Republican Nikki Haley has had to put up with insults from cable-news anchors accusing her of being “past her prime” at age 51. (Author’s note: While I will not break my own rule by commenting on Haley’s appearance, I will simply say that I am her age, and if I was seen walking next to her, there is no doubt which of us would attract approving glances.)

 

Naturally, there are exceptions to any rule. No one would accuse Donald Trump, the dominant political figure of the past ten years, of being a GQ model. (Except perhaps Donald Trump, who would just print up his own copies of the magazine with himself on the cover.)

 

But Trump, who would win the gold in any vanity competition, employs a number of tricks to gaslight America into thinking he is better looking than he is. For one, on his legal documents, he lists himself as 6′3″ and 215 pounds — the proportions of your average NFL quarterback. He also parades his wife Melania, a former supermodel, around as evidence of his own aesthetic worth. A famous model wouldn’t date an ugly guy, right?

 

Of course, he spends a great deal of time mocking the looks of others as though he himself were Gary Cooper. He seemed to exhibit relish when insulting the looks of opponent Carly Fiorina. (“Look at that face! Would anyone vote for that? Can you imagine that, the face of our next president?”)

 

As crude as these taunts are, the media appear to be willing to run with them, as long as those barbs are against a Republican candidate. Ron DeSantis has done enough obnoxious things as a governor and a presidential candidate to warrant serious condemnation. But making fun of his boot heels is not only petty, it might actually help him among Republican voters. For GOP candidates there is no greater qualification than to have the mainstream media loathe you — and if they do so for stupid reasons, MAGA will love you even more. (See: Haley’s bump in the polls after Don Lemon’s catty insult.)

 

As long as legacy media outlets have one standard for Republican candidates and another for Democrats, Republicans will rightly object. So leave Ron DeSantis’s shoes out of it. The guy wants to look presidential, and given that most presidents have been tall — since 1960, every president has topped six feet except Jimmy Carter (a one-termer) and Richard Nixon (nuff said) — the media should just let him identify as someone of above-average height.