Parson Strives to Become Nation's Worst Governor

by Pa Rock

Missouri Citizen Journalist

In a classic race-to-the-bottom, the United States has some truly awful state governors.  Invariably the worst of the worst all have four things in common:  they are all white, male, and Republican - and they all think that the best sunlight is that which shines out of Donald Trump's flabby butt.  Currently the two who seem to be receiving the most sustained attention from the national press are Ron DeSantis of Florida and Brian Kemp of Georgia.  Others occasionally break in with a headline or two, but DeSantis and Kemp usually manage to hog most of the rightwing glory with their outrageous statements and behaviors.

Florida and Georgia are open for business, just like Trump intended, and anyone who is sick in those states can crawl off and die - just like Trump intended.

But as these Trump boot-lickers like DeSantis and Kemp keep moving forward with the party line, others seem to be backing down.  Yesterday Trump himself admitted the pandemic is getting worse instead of better, and he encouraged people to wear masks when they can't socially distance.  And beyond that apostasy, some Republican governors like Kay Ivey in Alabama and Asa Hutchinson in Arkansas, are now requiring that their citizens wear face masks when they can't socially distance.

The GOP fantasy world, it would seem, is beginning to crumble as a result of the sustained failure of the Trump administration to get control of the coronavirus / COVID-19 situation.

But all may not be lost for the party of hate and death.  Last Friday Missouri's Republican Governor Mike Parson, another white male who becomes light-headed whenever he's in the same time zone as Donald Trump, signaled that he would like to  challenge Ron DeSantis and Brian Kemp for the title of worst governor in the nation.  

Mike Parson is an unelected "accidental" governor who was serving as the state's lieutenant governor three years ago when then Republican governor, Eric Greitens, got caught up in a sex and bondage scandal that eventually forced his resignation from office.  Parson, a former rural county sheriff, had scrambled to move from the state senate to the lietutenant governor's office, a job with few responsibilities, to fluff up his state retirement and subsidize the income from his small farm in Hickory County - but then Greitens was forced into resigning and Parson had stepped into it big time.

As governor Parson had managed to tow the Trump / GOP party line while remaining fairly uncontroversial - but that ended Friday.  Over the past few days he has been quoted nationwide and has come to be the poster boy for the Trump administraiton's plans to try and force America's schools to reopen this fall - in just a few weeks.

When asked by the radio interviewer, Marc Cox, about reopening the state's schools, Parson replied enthusiastically in the affirmative:

"These kids have got to get back to school.  They're at the lowest risk possible.  And if they do get COVID-19, which they will - and they will when they go to school - they're not going to the hospitals.  They're not going to have to sit in doctor's offices.  They're going to go home and they're going to get over it."

Clearly with Governor Parson's level of ignorance on the effects and transmission of COVID-19, he would be well qualified to serve in the Trump administration.

The governor of Missouri seemed to think that the only people who will be in our schools when they open will be children.  He conveniently overlooked teachers, aides, administrators, secretaries, lunch room personnel, bus drivers - as well as the parents, grandparents, and others who are in and out of the schools on a daily basis.  And those children who he says "will" get COVID-19 - and the governor is right about that - they will go home and they will share their infections with relatives, neighbors, store clerks, and every single human being with whom they interact.

Governor Mike Parson paints COVID-19 in simplistic terms, when, in reality, the disease is a complex affair that has traveled to the most remote reaches of the earth in just a few months.  It is the governor who is simple.

Over the past few days Missouri's simple governor has been slapped down by several prominent individuals on social media.  One comment that I saw as particularly appropriate came from Chelsea Clinton over Twitter:

"If Republican leaders, including @realDonaldTrump, actually cared about getting kids back to school next month, they would be doing everything possible to crush #covid19 transmission today.

"And, @GovParsonMO, some kids don't 'get over it,' some get very, very sick, and some die."

Many school districts in Missouri are expected to begin releasing their plans for reopening next week.

 

Missouri has had 35,154 confirmed cases of COVID-19 so far and 1,158 deaths.  Last week the state averaged 854 confirmed new cases per day.  Clearly we are still in dangerous times.  

And clearly COVID-19 is more than an inconvenient case of the sniffles, regardless of what our simple governor thinks it is.  Some children will not "get over it," some will get "very, very sick," and some will "die."

That is our new reality.