Posted on 03/01/2015 9:21:19 AM PST by Oldpuppymax
We didn’t really notice the political ineptness of George H.W. Bush. He ran with the great Ronald Reagan who could have picked a name from the phone book as his running mate and won both times. Bush the elder brought little to the ticket as he knew little about politics. When he ran on his own and picked Dan Quayle to run with he proved that point.
George W. Bush was different. He had been Governor of Texas and knew things about politics his father never learned. He presented himself to us as a solid Texas style conservative at first but as his two terms progressed; his basic RINO streak came out. Nevertheless, he won two hard fought campaigns and demonstrated enough political skill to get by.
Now the younger Bush–brother Jeb–who was twice elected governor of Florida, wants to be the Republican nominee for president in 2016. His political skills are not to be dismissed, yet a case can be made that like his father he was merely at the right place at the right time.
Jeb Bush seems to think that he is entitled to the nomination because….. well it isn’t clear why; but it is certainly the case. He has openly declared his intention to capture the nomination without the support of the TEA party which is the conservative core of the Republican Party. This is simply not possible. There are just not enough moderate and liberal Republicans who will actually vote in the Party’s primaries to overcome the number of conservatives who will NOT turn out to vote.
Jeb’s winning Republican primaries will be as likely as his drawing the cards to fill an inside royal straight flash. This doesn’t seem to bother Jeb because he feels he is...
(Excerpt) Read more at coachisright.com ...
Re: Jeb’s flop at CPAC. The booing was an unexpected bonus. What a relief.
Ole Jeb is not going to get my vote ... sorry Jeb!
I would modify one se fence there “he was merely at the right place at the right time. *with the right last name* “ I mean who thinks Hillary would be anything more than an angry, second rate professor somewhere if her last name wasn’t Clinton? Jeb would be lucky to be a middle manager at a Wal-Mart store if his father, grandfather and brother weren’t high elected officials.
Reagan made a serious error when he ignored the advice of his wife who recommended Paul Laxalt be VP. Laxalt would have been far more effective working with the legislature.
It’s funny, because if Jeb would have won his race in 1994 against Chiles, he would have likely ran for President in 2000. I’ve always thought at first that Jeb was the more conservative, politically-astute of the brothers.
I wish that were true, but who does anyone think the big three leftist states of California, New York and Illinois will vote for in the Republican primaries? Blue states also participate.
The GOPe is counting on the same vote splitting among numerous more conservative candidates that allowed Dole, McCain and Romney to win in prior years, And we all know that's why Jebbie acted so soon to squeeze Romney out of the big donor money, and out of any major vote splitting among the Rinos.
Conservatives better decide on a candidate very soon in the primary season.
It’s not the nature of conservatives to avoid letting competition take its course. More than once there have been candidates I thought excellent men to lead this country but once they waded into the sleaze and backstabbing were not up to it.
If you can’t cut throats and kick ‘nads in the primary and general, you don’t have what it takes to play with Putin, Xi Jinping or even the crazy asshats in N.Korea and the Middle East. Look at the people we’ve had who really had/have good ideas but either haven’t run or ran and quit- Cain, Thompson, Keyes.....
Unfortunately, it just doesn’t work that way. When there are five or six or more generally conservative candidates and two, or even only one GOPe candidate, the odds are huge against a conservative winning.
No runoffs, so the vote splitting among many conservatives is the final tally. And open primary states where Dims can play games with the GOP primary if there is not a competitive race among the Dims. And the blue states, even though there are many conservatives in blue states, they still likely go for the more moderate candidate in high enough numbers to give the win to the GOPe moderate.
Being tough won’t win it in such a primary setup. If conservatives don’t settle on a candidate very early, Jeb Bush will be the nominee.
I think there’s a good chance you are right. But coming together early on amongst genuine conservatives is about as likely as training 10 cats to parade in formation.
Ditto. I'm a precinct captain in my town in my swing state. I will not make calls for, donate to, knock on doors or stand out in the cold on election day handing out leaflets for Jeb Bush.
I wonder who will have to hold their noses harder, Democrats or Republicans, if it’s Bush/Clinton in 2016.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.