Last week, Colorado Gov. Jared Polis made national headlines for jokingly suggesting that he would offer “asylum” to Mickey and Minnie Mouse in the wake of news that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was going after the Disney company for being critical of his “don’t say gay” bill.
DeSantis asked his Republican friends in the Florida legislature to dissolve a special improvement district that was created to bring Disney World to Orlando, Florida a half-century ago. Republican lawmakers obliged, and DeSantis signed the bill into law within a matter of days. Polis was rightly concerned about the idea that any government would sanction a private company for disagreeing with policy ideas. As he wrote in a widely-quoted Tweet on April 19:
Florida’s authoritarian socialist attacks on the private sector are driving businesses away. In CO, we don’t meddle in affairs of companies like @Disney or @Twitter. Hey @Disney we’re ready for Mountain Disneyland and @twitter we’re ready for Twitter HQ2, whoever your owners are https://t.co/r7Vcvu20eb
— Jared Polis (@jaredpolis) April 19, 2022
Polis later suggested that Colorado would be happy to host Disney — or other companies that are being attacked by DeSantis over cultural grievances — should they wish to relocate to a different state.
All of this apparently riled up Republican gubernatorial candidate Hiedi Heidi Ganahl, who explained her beef in a Friday appearance on The Leland Conway Show on KHOW Radio (in which Ganahl was presented as a “gubanoral candidate”). Ganahl is so daft that she took Polis’s comments on Disney seriously:
LELAND CONWAY: I imagine, Heidi, [that] you see a lot of hypocrisy here.
HEIDI GANAHL: Oh my goodness, do I, Leland. Thanks for having me today. You know, as usual, Jared Polis is an out-of-touch failure and a hypocrite. You know, the media will not ask – and I don’t mean your media, the mainstream media – will not ask the hard questions of Polis. They’re allowing him to get away with the perception that he is innocently courting Disney, and very libertarian-ish [Pols emphasis], and this idea that he stays out of the business of corporations and small business is ridiculous. He’s almost destroyed small business owners across Colorado with all of his regulations and taxes and fees. 83 new ones, to be exact, since he got elected.
Ganahl is correct that the “mainstream media” has not asked Polis about “innocently courting Disney,” but she has the rationale all wrong. The reason Polis isn’t being asked about courting Disney is not because there is a big conspiracy brewing with the mainstream media; Polis isn’t getting these questions BECAUSE EVERYONE ELSE understands that Polis was trolling DeSantis and making a joke in order to make a point.
Sorry to break it to you, Heidi, but Jared Polis is not really offering asylum to fictional mouse people.
Ganahl is such a ridiculous candidate that she grasps at anything she thinks can give her some sort of advantage in the culture wars 2022 election. Perhaps Ganahl doesn’t actually believe that Polis is trying to convince Disney World to rebuild in Colorado, though it’s entirely possible that she truly does think this is a real thing. The point here is that Ganahl is willing to entertain any absurdity if it allows her to criticize the incumbent Governor.
Heidi Ganahl is a non-serious person who wants to be elected to a very serious job. Unfortunately for Ganahl, silliness is not a good qualification for any public office.
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Oh gosh another Heidi story. Is it June yet?
Are saying that Colorado does not have a "mouse protection" program?
Our legislature needs to get on top of this terrible situation.
The special district dynamics are fascinating. Be careful for what you wish bozos – the last laugh is going to be on DeSantis.
There's a lot of ignorance out the over just who gets screwed and what hapoens with things like debt and municipal responsibility and such. The diehards are sure that Disney us getting screwed in every way possible and that DeSantis is a fearless genius. Reality is, neither Orange nor Osceola counties are going to be happy having to maintain Disney's public roads and such.
Funniest post was someone realizing that Disney would have to put up with inferior service – they will – without understanding why it would be that way – it was a "join the crowd and suffer because government sucks" attitude. No understanding of the fact that their government probably sucks at maintenance and such because, unlike Disney, they aren't paying enough to fund the work.
The 'anti-woke' agenda is going to cost taxpayers big bucks
Desantis is a Yale undergrad and Harvard Law grad. You would think he, or someone on his staff at least, would be smart enough to have thought this through.
I think DeSantis is playing this pretty well. He's able to virtue signal to his base in Florida; show his dominance over the Florida legislature (ESPECIALLY the impotence of Democrats in the Leg); make a national appeal to those concerned about WOKE corporation, and be on the side of the "Capitalism uber Alles" wing of the Republican party.
Plus bury the news on the Floriduh reapportionment.
AND bonus — there are several reasons to think the courts are going to issue injunctive stays and eventually rule the Florida actions are not Constitutional or legal, so he won't actually disturb Disney or Twitter. And when they do, he can rail against the "unelected judges" who are preventing the representatives of De Peoplez (like him) from doing the right thing.
LOTS more clever than anything Trump ever pushed.
Ups to Gov. Polis for calling DeSantis and the wingnuts in the FL legislature "authoritarian socialist[s]." That's gonna leave a mark.
One of the columnists on The Bulwark dot com used the same language.
I believe "Marxist" is one of the words associated with "authoritarian socialist".
Is Desantis a Marxist?
I'm a Marxist. I voted for Groucho every election.
Duck Soup!
Heidi is also very, very stupid.
Spacy, Heidi would need years of study and tutoring to rise to very, very stupid!