Personally, I think Jeb Bush has one shot at being the president of the United States, and that’s if he doesn’t run in 2016, a Democrat wins that election and does very poorly, and then Jeb challenges that Democrat in 2020. Jeb will be 67 in 2020, still young enough to serve two terms. By 2024, he’ll be pushing the limits.
The former Florida governor may be having his moment, but he has many more reasons not to run in 2016 than he has to make the plunge.
The most obvious argument against running is that the Democrats are likely to nominate Hillary Clinton who will bring unusual strengths to the contest.
Longtime readers know that I am not a Clintonista and that I vehemently opposed her winning the nomination in 2008. But this isn’t about me. It’s about Jeb Bush, and what I believe is in Jeb Bush’s interests. In truth, I don’t give a rat’s ass about Jeb Bush’s interests; I’m only interested in the politics.
Hillary has strengths and weaknesses, but her strengths are not your garden variety. For sheer experience on the international stage, we’ve never had a candidate that can match her: served on the board of Wal-Mart, First Lady of Arkansas, First Lady of the United States, U.S. Senator from New York, and Secretary of State. Jeb Bush’s experiences (in the corporate world, as the son of Poppy Bush, and as governor of Florida) come closer than other Republican, but it’s really not a close comparison.
Jeb can’t match Hillary on the domestic front, either. Few Americans have more experience or understanding of health care from both a policy issue and a political circus than Hillary. She’s spent the last 21 years engaged in Congress to one degree or another. Jeb has never served in DC.
While there is an outspoken left in this country that will resist a Clinton restoration, over 80% of registered Democrats want Hillary to run. She has a unified party. Jeb Bush has a smoking husk.
You can basically go down the line listing Jeb’s unique strengths, and you’ll find that Hillary matches them (corporate support) or easily surpasses them (who’d you rather have as a surrogate, the Big Dog or Dubya?).
So, if I’m Jeb, I’m thinking that it won’t do me or my family any good to run in 2016 because I’ll lose. And the Bush family doesn’t need to lose to the Clintons for a second time. That’s not going to do anything for their legacy.
But 2020 could be a different story. For one thing, as long as the GOP keeps pushing through Establishment candidates (Dole, McCain, Romney, Jeb) that the base hates and then losing, the right will never figure out that unhinged conservatism is not the answer. The modern GOP needs an Eisenhower, not a Goldwater. If Jeb wants to be Eisenhower, he needs to let the base try Huckabee in 2016 or something and find out what happens. Then they might be able to give Jebby a try.
Also, if the Democrats win in 2016, they’ll have been in power by 2020 for as long as the Gipper and Poppy were when the Clintons came to power. Fatigue could set in and the timing could work out right.
Lastly, the more time Jeb can put between his campaign and his brother’s disastrous presidency, the more our country’s skill at amnesia will work in his favor.
If he works it right and beats Hillary in 2020 and goes on to serve two terms, we’ll be able to look back and say that between 1981 and 2029, the only years that a Bush or a Clinton wasn’t president or vice-president was during the Obama Era. And Hillary was Secretary of State for half of that.
tired and trying to write with 4 year old on sugar at your feet= sentence structure that sucks and that I hate.
In the voice of Arthur Gilroy
Rough day at the FEMA-Acorn gulag’s propaganda agency, Comrade? Now, let me tell you all about the post-racial Rand Paul and scofflaw ranchers are the true Occupy….
Joking aside, I think Jeb’s time has passed. He’s obviously going nowhere fast in his investigations of the possibilities of a Brand Bush revival in 2016. By 2020 it’ll be over a decade since he held political office and I don’t think he’ll be able to sell that period of leisure to the general public with any degree of credibility.
By 2020 it’ll be over a decade since he held political office and I don’t think he’ll be able to sell that period of leisure to the general public with any degree of credibility.
A valid point. But which, if the world of Republican politics maintains its status quo until 2020, won’t matter one whit to most of what comprises the modern GOP. How much cred he has with the lunatics will probably still be what matters the most.
I agree that little matters like competence and record don’t matter worth a damn to the GOP base, otherwise Songbird Keating McCain would never have gotten a look-in, but my objection was to the idea of Jeb as a credible candidate for the presidency, assuming that he had achieved the nomination. Frankly, these days you could run a rattlesnake successfully in the GOP primaries, provided you painted it red and taught it to hiss out the right sounds of white male victimhood (and I am not so sure that the paint job would be necessary).
Please, no more Clintons or Bushes…
While I don’t much care for political dynasties and I would much prefer some new faces in the line up, the reality is that Secretary Clinton does have a powerful resume and would be a very strong candidate.
And there is the additional attraction that a second Clinton presidency would be a sharp stick in the eye of the malcontents and grumblers on the outer fringes of the Left who keep threatening to throw elections to the Republicans (like they did in 1968, 1980, and 2000) so as to settle their petty scores and force the Democratic Party to the left in order to appease them lest they strike again. For the health of the party, the sooner and more forcefully these people are smacked down and induced to decide whether they are In or Out the better life will be for everyone.
So there’s that.
And there is the additional attraction that a second Clinton presidency would be a sharp stick in the eye of the malcontents and grumblers on the outer fringes of the Left who keep threatening to throw elections to the Republicans (like they did in 1968, 1980, and 2000) so as to settle their petty scores and force the Democratic Party to the left in order to appease them lest they strike again.
LOL!! Love you some corporatists, I see.
What a bleak picture.
The man should be in prison or hanging from a tree for his involvement in the Schaivo case.
Don’t forget: for harboring the 9/11 terrorists in his regime.
We were supposed to invade, occupy, and do violent regime change on any government that harbored “the Al Qaida terrorists that attacked us on 9/11”. Yet in spite of all the 9/11 guys hanging out in FL and attending flight school, somehow we never got around to to the carpet-bombing shock-n-awe.
Scrag Jebbie and we’ll call it even.
His resume is similar to that of Mitt Romney, but with one additional term as governor. Other than his surname, there isn’t much to distinguish him from the Republican herd. Maybe that’s a good thing these days.
Bush has sent signals he’s gonna stand his ground on his “principled” beliefs like immigration reform and a national education strategy. If that’s true, then that’s different than Romney, who flip flopped on every position that wasn’t acceptable to the base. Bush does not seem to have the “fire in the belly”. Romney now says he didn’t either, but that is BS. Bush will have to overcome the opposition of the tea party folks, who have already displayed their displeasure. Hard to see the shape of his campaign.
Clinton v Bush.
Being on the board of WalMart as a plus.
Gag me with a spoon.
If this is the best this country can do, we could save a huge amount of time, energy, and hope by anointing the Clintons and Bushes as our royal families to serve as head of state and head of government for alternating eight year terms.
To quote old Ben Franklin: “A republic, if you can keep it”
Does Emperor Norton have any descendants?
Also, if the Democrats win in 2016, they’ll have been in power by 2020 for as long as the Gipper and Poppy were when the Clintons came to power. Fatigue could set in and the timing could work out right.
Which is the main reason for Hillary not to run. Because she won’t do anything different than Obama, except start a war or two. Which means the economy will not appreciably improve for most people. Which means that in 2020 people will be looking for something new. And 2020 is really more important than this November or 2016.
Heard that story in 2000. I didn’t buy it then and I’m certainly not buying it now.
Voting for Democrats, no matter who the candidate is in 2016, should come down to this: SCOTUS. There’s the possibility that the next president will be making several appointments due to departures from both sides of the aisle, and it is our chance to finally refashion a working liberal majority after effectively being in the minority on the Supreme Court for over 25 years.
We’ve been expecting the top tier Republicans to fight to the death for the 2016 after rather conspicuously sitting out 2012. But the tradeoffs you’re talking about apply to any Republican and unless there’s a big change in the political winds in the next year I think we may see a lot of the top names find they need to concentrate on their current office or spend more time with the families or whatever. 2020 isn’t necessarily going to be a good shot for them, what with the demographic changes rolling on, but it looks better than 2016 at this point.
Bush has the additional incentive of another 4 years to forget his brother.
The other reason not to wait until 2020 is that it is almost impossible to unseat an incumbent. You need a primary challenger, then a third party candidate that siphons off votes (Teddy Roosevelt, John Anderson, Ross Perot) or you have to be Herbert Hoover.
Otherwise, you get re-elected.
So if you want to “take back” the White House, 2016 is pretty much your last shot and it’s not a good one.
I think this is wrong. We can argue about the importance of a strong third-party candidate, but Truman, LBJ, Carter, and Poppy all failed to win reelection, which is quite the counter to Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, Dubya, and Obama. As a percentage, it’s 40% of postwar presidents, excepting Kennedy, of course.
Didn’t both Truman and LBJ bail before the election? They might have lost had they run, but it’s not the same as failing to win reelection.
I’d say it is exactly the same thing as failing to win reelection.
No it actually isn’t, because they didn’t try.
Remember the establishment wrote Truman off in ’48 IE Dewey wins headline. BY ’52 he was going to be the next third term president and the electorate wasn’t up to that hence his lack-lustre showing in NH and his dropping out long before the general election.
LBJ might have been right about his prospects, The TET offensive was his hostage crisis. But unlike Carter he never even tried.
Poppy is the only 20th century president who actually lost something he probably should have won. No major problem IE depression, war going badly, hostage crisis, and he had just won a war a year and a half before, combined with the collapse of the USSR.
Both wanted to be reelected.
But, this is about Jeb and the odds he’ll face in 2016 vs. 2020. For that calculation, Truman and LBJ are both encouraging for 2020 and properly counted in the 40% odds.
Both wanted to be reelected.
Not enough to actually campaign for it.
We’re in a unusual situation, because as the wife of a popular previous president and (at this point) a political ally of the current present, Hillary is basically running as an incumbent and has the advantages incumbents normally have. So a given Republican is generally better off waiting until 2020 and hoping for public fatigue, errors, or a health crisis.
If Hillary doesn’t run, the Democratic nominee is not going to be an effective incumbent, the trade-offs change, and the top Republicans will be fighting to the death for the 2016 nomination.
2020 is a census/redistricting election. If the Democrats don’t come loaded for bear they will lose the opportunity to redraw the congressional/state districts until 2030. Since the GOP drew 1.4 million less votes but elected 33 more members than the Democrats, it will be essential for the Democrats to pull out all the stops and retake state legislatures and put an end to GOP gerrymandering at the state level.
It wouldn’t surprise me if they nominated him, but watching him try to convince himself to run makes me actually feel sorry for the guy.
The family dynamics of politics has always fed our tabloid appetites, and this family needs to back away for now. Jeb knows that, his mama told him so.