Florida faces something more ominous than forbidden matters lurking inside a snack-sized KitKat: government leaders working inside a state-sized tit-for-tat. Whew, I am spent after composing that sentence, but let’s try to forge ahead. Each week, the residents of Florida are haunted by another reminder that, if the current line of lawmaking continues apace, we will soon be whittled into Stepford Wives smiling in supermarket aisles while buying whole hams. Chilling.

The latest chapter in this deranged gothic horror novel, just in time for Halloween, comes from a proposed regulation aimed at choking diversity programs and activism at Florida’s public universities. This makes sense, as we all know that colleges are a place young people flock in order to close their minds, limit exposure to new types of people and ultimately effect zero change.

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With this incredible self-restraint in mind, here are some Florida-friendly costume ideas for 2023:

— Select founding fathers. James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, John Jay, Alexander Hamilton (not the musical theater version, of course), William Blount, Thomas Fitzsimons, Gouverneur Morris, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, mayyybe John Adams, but only at the right kind of party, you know? Oh, and Benjamin Franklin, but not the version who wore fur hats on sexy, er, diplomatic trips to France. Be reasonable.