You're both correct. What is being missed is that, partly because of less social-distancing, FL and the MO/AR/LA region are getting hit first, so you can point to the problems there this week. The media dishonesty is that they won't come back next week or in two weeks and give attention to the equivalent problems in VA, OR, WA, etc. The passive headline-reader, who throughout 2020 and 2021 has seen sob story after sob story about South Dakota, Texas, and Florida, must really scratch their heads when looking at the cumulative death rates and wonder how they ended up being so far from the top, when practically 100% of the reported problems were always in those states.