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Bush 2012: Jeb Bush should run now, for at least eight reasons (Huh?!)
The National Review ^ | February 7, 2011 | Rich Lowry

Posted on 02/06/2011 9:37:34 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

John J. Miller has a cover story in the new issue of National Review that’s a compelling portrait of the accomplishments of Jeb Bush. Four years after leaving the Florida governor’s mansion, he remains one of the most impressive Republican politicians in the country, a formidable policy mind with the political chops to drive conservative reforms even out of office. So why isn’t he running for president? Bush told Miller what he’s said to others, too — he won’t run in 2012, but he’ll consider 2016. This is a mistake. Bush should run now for at least eight reasons:

1) It’s a wide-open field for a nomination that’s worth having. Rarely do you get such a convergence of a beatable incumbent president with a wide-open field to challenge him. Obama is slightly below 50 percent in the polls, with a real weakness in the middle of the country, and he’s saddled with a recovery that has yet to produce substantial job growth. Yet there is no true frontrunner in the race to challenge him. It’s hard to imagine an environment better suited for a heavyweight like Jeb to make a run.

2) 2016 is too late I. By 2016, Jeb will have been out of office ten years. No doubt he will have made many contributions to the cause in the interim, but by then his main credential — his governorship and its accomplishments — will seem like yesterday’s news. Right now he has the feel of an elder statesman of the party while his time in office is still fresh.

3) 2016 is too late II. By 2016, a bumper crop of Republican talent will be poised to storm the national stage. Marco Rubio not only will be the hot new thing out of Florida, he’ll be seasoned. Chris Christie will be ready. A host of senators and governors — freshly minted in the 2010 elections, so it’s too soon for them to run now — will be ready to go. Jeb will not be such a predominant figure in such a robust field. The crop of prospective GOP candidates this time reflects the downdraft in Republican fortunes in 2006 and 2008. Jeb would loom all the larger for it.

4) The Bush rehabilitation has begun. George W. Bush is not exactly popular, but two years of Obama have taken the edge off W.-hatred, and he’s risen from the depths of his unpopularity near the end of his presidency. Gallup had a poll in December that had Bush’s approval rating very slightly above President Obama’s. Bush’s book, Decision Points, and the accompanying media tour were successes. In 2008, Jeb’s association with his brother would have been an absolute killer. That’s not true anymore. The controversies that made the Bush years so venomous have faded, and — partly through the miracle of the accelerated news cycle — 2000–2008 already feels somewhat distant.

5) Jeb will still be a Bush in 2016. There’s no doubt that it will always be awkward for Jeb to be the third Bush; it will always have a dynastic feel about it. But that will remain as true in 2016. If Jeb runs in four years, after Obama presumably wins a second term in 2012, he will still be vying to be the third Republican president in a row who’s a Bush. Waiting until 2016 won’t make that fact any less odd.

6) He’s not just another Bush. Jeb is different from his patrician dad and different from his thoroughly Texan brother. As soon as people see him on the national stage, they’ll realize he’s his own person and has to be taken on his own terms.

7) Jeb can unite the party. Jeb probably has a better chance to unite the establishment and Tea Party wings of the GOP than anyone else, certainly a better chance than Sarah Palin or Mitt Romney would seem to have at this juncture. The establishment would presumably flock to Jeb, while he’d have a record of solid conservative accomplishment to sell to the conservative base. Some tea partiers will have zero interest in another Bush, and Jeb will take his lumps on immigration (at NR, we’ll look forward to administering some of them, and trying to change his mind). It’s a very volatile environment, and were he to run, much would obviously depend on how he actually campaigned. But he would stand a good chance of avoiding a damaging division in the party.

8) Waiting is almost always a mistake. It’s an axiom of presidential politics that you have to run when you have the opening, even if it seems “too soon.” This is why Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were elected president and Mario Cuomo never was. Jeb’s opening is now — “too soon” after his brother’s presidency, “too soon” into his life as an ex-governor — and it will probably never quite be there again.

In short, if Jeb feels a call to run for president, it has to be 2012, not 2016.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Editorial; Government; Politics/Elections; US: Florida
KEYWORDS: 2012; 2012gopprimary; bds; bdsclub; bush; bush2012; frbdsaliveandwell; jebbush; nooooooooooooooooo; obama; palin; romney; sarahpalin; teaparty
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Well, like we couldn’t see this coming. Better see if I can’t get a country club membeship so I can puff around with the old fart blue bloods running the GOP.


61 posted on 02/07/2011 2:28:26 AM PST by DaxtonBrown (HARRY: Money Mob & Influence (See my Expose on Reid on amazon.com written by me!))
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To: DaxtonBrown

Absolutely no Jebbie for me


62 posted on 02/07/2011 2:48:10 AM PST by Theodore R. (Rush was right when he said America may survive Obama but not the Obama supporters.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
NO Bushes.
NO Romney.
NO Huckabee.
NO Pawlenty.
NO RINOs.
63 posted on 02/07/2011 2:54:37 AM PST by Allegra (Hey! Stop looking at my tagline like that.)
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To: pissant

As usual on these threads, YOU DA MAN! Good one!


64 posted on 02/07/2011 3:46:21 AM PST by Doc Savage ("I've shot people I like a lot more,...for a lot less!" Raylan Givins)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet; Clintonfatigued; AuH2ORepublican; darkangel82; fieldmarshaldj; GOPsterinMA; ...

This article is correct in that if Jeb wants to be President he needs to run in 2012, not least of which because hopefully a good Republican will be elected in 2012 and be running for reelection in 2016.

However Jeb SHOULD NOT run for President. I don’t know why Rich Lowry has such a hard-on for Jeb Bush. Great guy to run if you want to hand the election to Obama.


65 posted on 02/07/2011 3:48:50 AM PST by Impy (Don't call me red.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet; Al B.; Brices Crossroads; Josh Painter; sarah fan UK

Rich is a closet RINO who just outted himself.


66 posted on 02/07/2011 3:50:56 AM PST by Virginia Ridgerunner (Sarah Palin has crossed the Rubicon!)
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To: Regulator

It took eight posts before the Schaivo-bots came out. You guys are slipping.


67 posted on 02/07/2011 3:58:57 AM PST by nonliberal (Graduate: Curtis E. LeMay School of International Relations)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The first seven are that his name is Bush..


68 posted on 02/07/2011 4:03:01 AM PST by mo ("If you understand, no explanation is needed; if you do not, no explanation is possible")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I want Jeb in an administration - atop either DHS or FEMA.


69 posted on 02/07/2011 4:03:38 AM PST by jimfree (In 2012 Sarah Palin will continue to have more relevant quality executive experience than B. Obama.)
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To: Arthur McGowan
The reaction to the Schaivo thing is a big reason I am not a Republican anymore. You guys would send in the SS to contravene a court order. That is just thug politics.

Unleashing government storm troopers is something liberals do. "Conservatives" who favored it are no less dangerous than the liberals.

70 posted on 02/07/2011 4:04:58 AM PST by nonliberal (Graduate: Curtis E. LeMay School of International Relations)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Rich Lowry: NO BUSH LEFT BEHIND

Good grief


71 posted on 02/07/2011 4:09:23 AM PST by Da Mav
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Other than on amnesty, Bush is a pretty solid conservative (much more so than his father and brother). But he is a non starter. Obama would love nothing more than to run against a “Bush.”


72 posted on 02/07/2011 4:32:42 AM PST by nhwingut (Palin '12... Accept No Other)
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To: hole_n_one
Lowry is disgusting.
73 posted on 02/07/2011 4:39:40 AM PST by MBB1984
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

NO more RINO’s
NO more “compassionate conservatism”
No more bush’s
Enough b.s.
REAL TRUE CONSERVATIVES


74 posted on 02/07/2011 4:39:59 AM PST by Joe Boucher ((FUBO))
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Bush 2012: Jeb Bush should run now, for at least eight reasons (Huh?!)

Supporting another Bush is indicative of a mental disorder likely as dangerous as liberalism.

75 posted on 02/07/2011 4:47:35 AM PST by Caipirabob ( Communists... Socialists... Democrats...Traitors... Who can tell the difference?)
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To: Caipirabob

No more damn bushes. What the hell is wrong w you people.

Papa bush gave us bj and junior gave us barry.


76 posted on 02/07/2011 4:56:04 AM PST by GlockThe Vote (Who needs Al Queda to worry about when we have Obama?)
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To: Impy; Liz; AuntB; bamahead; fieldmarshaldj; BillyBoy; pissant

Someone forgot to add the gag alert. We don’t need any more Big Government Open Borders “conservatives.”


77 posted on 02/07/2011 4:57:27 AM PST by Clintonfatigued (Illegal aliens commit crimes that Americans won't commit)
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To: Clintonfatigued; Condor51

You got that right. As FReeper condor51 insightfully posted: “NO MORE BUSHES - period. end. stop. Jeb can take his Mexican wife, and merry band of Mexican relatives and move to the Yucatan, or to Timbuktu for all I care. Just — STAY AWAY! — from all national elections and the republican party. We have enough Open Border, Amnesty loving, Dream Act RINOs now, we don’t need any more. Especially Jeb BUSH. “


78 posted on 02/07/2011 5:05:08 AM PST by Liz
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
John J. Miller has a cover story in the new issue of National Review that’s a compelling portrait of the accomplishments of Jeb Bush.

Oh, God, no -- heeere we go! Why compromise and settle for Mittens when you can have the original, barrel-proof Manor Bush?

Another National Review cover for "anybody but Sarah (that ignorant slut!)".

Same-old same-old from RiNO Central.

79 posted on 02/07/2011 5:10:06 AM PST by lentulusgracchus (Concealed carry is a pro-life position.)
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To: Arthur McGowan
That is not true....he did what he could under the law...her husband was the guardian...Jeb fought and fought...you just did notlike the out come...neither did I. I DO NOT blame Jeb
80 posted on 02/07/2011 5:13:34 AM PST by southphilly
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