There’s an adage in journalism that goes something like this. A dog biting a man is not news; it happens all the time. A man biting a dog, though? Run it. One can imagine a rarer occasion, one in which a guy who had been going around biting dogs for months on end himself gets bitten by a dog. Still not that newsy, but, regardless, any news coverage is going to be less about the dog biting him than about all the dogs he’d bitten.

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       Which brings us to the national Republican Party.

       On Tuesday, the party had what it seemed to think was a slam-dunk takedown of the lamestream media. Fox News reported, correctly, that the rate of new coronavirus infections in Florida is now substantially lower than the rate in California. After months of focus on Florida’s rate, the GOP’s official Twitter account took a victory lap.

       The media has been quiet about this, it’s true, mostly because this particular ratio isn’t that interesting. In recent weeks, the rate of new cases in Florida has declined as the rate in California has plateaued, which is not great. Each, though, is lower than the national rate of new cases. If the rates in California begin to increase rapidly while Florida’s stay low, the picture changes.

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       In effect, the GOP’s tweet does the opposite of what it wants, demanding that the media explain why there was so much focus on Florida during the summer. For that, there’s a simple answer: Florida was absolutely hammered by the fourth wave of new infections.

       Over the course of the pandemic, Florida has consistently seen more new cases per resident than California — and, often, than the country overall. On 56 percent of days since March 1, 2020, Florida has seen more cases per resident than the country overall. California’s rate of new infections has been higher than the country’s only about a quarter of the time. On 76 percent of days, Florida’s rate of new infections has been higher than California.

       That’s particularly true in recent months, when the fourth wave of infections saw Florida with nearly as many new cases per resident per day as California had last winter — before any vaccines were broadly available. What’s more, the gap in population-adjusted new cases between the two states was wider over the summer than it was during the winter. Then, Florida was also seeing a big surge. Over the summer, California saw a smaller surge, but Florida was still seeing new case rates triple California’s.

       The GOP’s argument is one we’ve seen a lot during the pandemic, using ratios instead of raw numbers to make a point. The seven-day average of new cases in California per 100,000 residents at this point is 14.4. In Florida, it’s 6.8. But Florida’s rate has been above 14.4 on about three-quarters of days so far this year.

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       The figures on deaths are even more dramatic. On 6-in-10 days since the beginning of March last year, Florida’s population-adjusted death rate has topped the country’s. Its rate of deaths this summer was far higher than anything California had seen, again despite the availability of vaccines. Its rate of new deaths is still higher than California’s, though may change as California continues to see more new cases. Or it may not: A greater percentage of Californians are vaccinated, which may keep the number of deaths lower.

       Florida is home to about 6.5 percent of Americans; California is home to about 12 percent of them. But, month after month, the number of new cases in Florida made up more than 6.5 percent of the country’s total as, month after month, California’s made up less than 12 percent. The same holds true for the number of deaths in each state.

       It is important to emphasize that it is good that Florida’s rate of new cases has fallen. This decline means fewer deaths and fewer people suffering from acute or chronic illness. But by drawing a comparison with Democratic California, all the GOP is really doing is reminding everyone how long it took Florida’s case totals to drop. Again, California may see a surge that bolsters the GOP’s point here; we’ll see.

       But as of right now, the party is hoping to get credit for a guy who’s stopped biting dogs, meaning that his sworn enemy is now biting the same number of dogs that he is. If you want to make that a news story, it’s going to be one that talks a lot about all the dogs the guy used to bite.