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Jeb Miffed There’s No Bush as Prez
Jeb Bush thought America should have three consecutive Republican Presidents from the same immediate family. Think about that.
In his “defense,” he may have known, either consciously or unconsciously, that if nominated, he would lose. I’m not ruling that out as a possibility seeing him and his family in light of transpired events.
I also wonder if Jeb thought about how his entrance into the field of Republican wannabes would affect other candidates and may (if he failed to get the nomination) scuttle the chances of Marco Rubio especially — a fully qualified candidate who held very similar policy views as the Bush family. This is essentially what happened as we look back.
Jeb raised a whopping $100 million, much of which would have gone to Rubio, as well as the endorsement of the Bush network and the famiglia Cespuglio itself. Trump would not have had much chance to emerge against a united establishment behind a young dynamic candidate with early momentum.
Now Jeb believes Republicans should have a “choice” in 2020. I don’t remember if he had the same sentiment in 2004 when his brother ran for re-election.
He likes moderate Republican from Maryland Governor Hogan as a primary challenger.
Two questions: Why should anyone, even establishment Republicans, listen to to the political advice or preferences of this guy?
Do these people — Jeb!, Bill Kristol, Max Boot, Jen Rubin, et al. — not see how whomever they tout and support for 2024 will be anathema to even the most reluctant Trump voter?
Published in General
Again, a point to consider: when a an individual runs for an office, and they don’t achieve that office, they can hold on to various campaign funds that were created as long as they continue to make everyone believe they will still be running for office.
Running for office, if you are a name brand candidate, is usually an extremely lucrative matter. Who in their right mind would want to give huge funds away? (I don’t remember what happens to campaign funds if you run for the US Senate or the Oval Office, but local candidates in California used to have to give whatever funds were left over after the campaign ended over to the charity of their choice.)
Lots of funds get used and there are probably kickbacks. So your brother runs a major print shop. How is anyone to know if you spent 3.4 mil at that print shop for brochures, mail packets et al, or you only spent 2.9? Or your cousin runs the ad department at a major TV company. Same thing.
Running for political office can also delay any indictments coming your way. I had a friend here who had not done anywhere near the crimes that she was charged with. She ran for Lt Governor for one campaign season. It kept the wolf from the door. Later on, maybe 18 months later, the Obama Admin offered her a full pardon. (All charges were related to med marijuana issues, from the goddamn Clinton family.)
I quickly found this (Federal elections are different than State):
“Candidates do sometimes end up with surplus funds, though, particularly if they’re incumbent members of Congress who decide not to run for another term. State and local governments have their own rules, but those running for federal office — including presidential candidates — must abide by strict FEC guidelines when it comes to their extra campaign money. They can donate an unlimited amount to a charity or political party. They can also, within limits, make contributions directly to other candidates. A campaign committee can give up to $2000 per election to each candidate. If the committee is converted into a political action committee, the limit jumps to $5000 – but to be established as a PAC, the committee would have to be in existence for six months, receive contributions from 50 donors, and make contributions to five recipients.
What candidates can’t do with leftover money is use it for personal expenses. Retiring federal lawmakers used to be able to pocket extra cash and use it for cars, vacations, clothes, pet grooming, whatever — but that changed in 1989 with the passage of the Ethics Reform Act.”
It makes me think there should be a law against spouses, children, and grandchildren serving in national office after a politician has retired . . . or been voted out.
I appreciate that you said that Jeb said “X.” However, I would appreciate a hyperlink so that I can judge for myself what Jeb said, in Jeb’s own words.
From time to time, I have noted that posters will consciously or unconsciously put their own spin on what someone has said, and that when I read the source material, I come to a far different conclusion. (E.g. the kurfuffle over what a reviewer had said about VDH’s book, when the reading of the review showed a far different story.)
I understand the desire on the part of some Republicans for a primary challenger to Trump. But either a primary challenge won’t happen at all or if Hogan runs against Trump in the primaries next year, Hogan will lose badly.
The reason why is because Trump has, for the most part, governed as a conservative Republican.
If Trump had nominated a left-leaning judge to fill Scalia’s US Supreme Court seat instead of choosing Neil Gorsuch, then a primary challenge to Trump would be in the offing.
If Trump had called for tax increases instead of tax cuts, then a primary challenge would materialize.
But Trump has basically followed the standard GOP playbook (or perhaps he has run the plays from that GOP playbook, but executed the plays better than prior Republican presidents). So, while many Republicans, including me, wish Trump could edit himself a little better (or a lot better) than he does, most Republicans won’t deny him the nomination in 2020.
I might wish it were otherwise (assuming Trump’s hypothetical replacement wouldn’t be Lisa Murkowski), but that’s the way it is.
I do think that Trump has erred in attacking McCain because there are lots of moderate voters in Arizona and Trump needs Arizona to get reelected. Hey, I didn’t like McCain either. But dude, McCain’s not around anymore. Stop talking about him.
The Republicans have been horrible in the post-WWII era. Three names have dominated since 1952: In 14 presidential elections between 1952 and 2004, there has either been a Nixon (5), a Dole (2) or a Bush (6) at either the no. 1 or no. 2 slot on the ticket. And as late as October 1999 Elizabeth Dole was in 2nd place behind W.
¡Jeb! still pines and George P. Bush has designs, too. If Nixon hadn’t resigned in disgrace we’d probably be up to our butts in his grandchildren, too.
Can we talk about his role in trying to sink the Presidency by passing along that fake dossier to the FBI?
McCain was trying to destroy the President, and used the intelligence agencies to do it. I repent of ever voting for him. (To be fair, I was actually voting for his Vice President.)
In the 2000 election, a copy of George W. Bush’s briefing book was mailed to the Gore campaign. Gore’s campaign had the integrity to call the F.B.I. Good for the Gore Campaign.
In 2016, Republican Senator John McCain who had endorsed the nominee of his party came across the Steele Dossier. He forwarded it to the F.B.I. Good for McCain.
Good for apples and oranges.
I repent of voting for his Vice President too !
Here are numerous articles on how McCain “came across” the dossier. You are acting like this was some sort of patriotic act of good intent on his part. It was anything but.
I think the problem with Jeb! in 2016 was not simply that he ran for president. It was the way he ran for president at the outset, by basically attempting to money-bomb all his competitors out of the race — which actually worked with Romney, who decided early on in 2015 he didn’t want to go through the fundraising efforts he’d have to go through to challenge the Bush fundraising machine, because the conventional wisdom of the moment was $$$+Name Recognition=Votes, and the person who had both would be the favorite to win …
… which turned out to sort of be true. Trump had the name recognition, and he had the $$$, but he never really had to spend much of it. The media was happy to give him millions in free publicity during the primary season to get his message across, since they thought Trump would be the easiest candidate to be in the general election, and would suck all the oxygen out of the room from, Jeb! or any other candidate trying to get their message across.
In a way, I think that plays into the anger here as much as Trump’s boorish behavior. Basically, Trump cut in line and elbowed Bush out, with the help of the media, and that’s part of the unfairness Jeb! sees with the ’16 results (leaving aside the fact Jeb! hadn’t run in 2012 and had no right himself to get snippy with Marco Rubio over running, as if the Bush family ‘owned’ the Florida vote). His campaign exuded a right of privilege due to blood line to the nomination, and that attitude of the 2016 nomination being a done deal by this time in 2015 ironically may have been a factor in pushing some voters towards Trump, to show the party elites that the voters don’t have to accept a presumed fait accopli especially if it’s tied to a attitude that seemed similar to the parents who were trying to buy their kids’ ways into elite colleges.
By 1992, I was sick of McCain. I haven’t voted for a Republican in a national election since 2000, so I never cast a vote for him. But six feet of dirt should settle the differences. Let him rest in peace.
@garyrobbins, you can start here. Do the homework if you doubt. There’s a button there to listen.
What I read from the Rush transcript was that Jeb supports a primary in 2020. So do I. I don’t see any problem with that.
That is a fair cry from saying that Jeb said that the Bush family should have had three Presidents in a row, which was Franco’s premise.
When he ran in 2016 he was announcing that he believed that there should be three presidents from his immediate family. I can’t remember if he mounted any campaign at all before 2016.
I actually didn’t vote for McCain in 2008. But to your point, there was definitely a Trump-McCain feud going on back in 2015.
McCain said, “Trump’s bringing the crazies out to Arizona” or something like that.
Trump responded by saying, “He [McCain] isn’t a hero. I like people who haven’t been captured.”
And then McCain, once he won his 2016 Arizona US Senate primary, in his first debate with his Democrat opponent, revoked his endorsement of Trump.
So, yes. The “fake dossier” issue is an important data point.
But one would think that even a bitter feud like the Trump-McCain feud would end when one of them is no longer living. It’s not like Trump is damaging McCain’s political career.
Trump needs those 11 electoral votes from Arizona. Sure, maybe Biden gets the Democrat nomination and Biden shoots his mouth off even more than Trump does. Who knows?
The actions of McCain are still damaging the President, because gullible, ill-informed, and willingly-brainwashed people still think there’s something to the Pee Dossier.
Please provide a citation for this pretty incredible assertion. I would think that if he had somehow said this, it would have been front page news.
Incorrect. Read the first sentence again.
I also allowed for the possibility that Jeb didn’t expect or want to win, which is the only other alternative. Choose one.
Charlie Cook says that Arizona is one of 5 toss-up states. Larry Sabato says that Arizona is one of 4 toss-up states. McCain was elected to the Senate 6 times in Arizona.
It would be wise for Trump to stop attacking McCain, however wisdom is not Trump’s strong suit.
I don’t think he’s referring to a literal statement. Running for President, however, is a pretty strong indication that you want to be President, and there were two previous Bushes in his immediate family who had held the office before.
Evident fact for those who have eyes and ears. His father was president. His brother was president. He ran for president in 2016. Unless he ran as a joke — I mean intentionally, since his candidacy was a joke –, he meant for there to be three presidents from his immediate family.
We are talking about G. H. W. Bush, G. W. Bush, and JEB!, aren’t we? Or am I using the term “immediate family” incorrectly?
Isn’t it ironic that no one has instantly rejected the pee-pee tape that Russia allegedly has?
Such a suggestion would have been immediately rejected if it had been alleged about Reagan, either Bush, Dole, McCain or Romney, or for that matter about Jimmy Carter or Barack Obama. (Bill Clinton on the other hand…)
All you have to do is to google Melania’s naked “modeling” photos, or Trump’s numerous adulteries.
“In 2016, Republican Senator John McCain who had endorsed the nominee of his party came across the Steele Dossier. He forwarded it to the F.B.I. Good for McCain.”
Really Gary? Come on, everyone with any knowledge of the Dossier knows that Mc Cain passed it around to damage Trump. So did Paul Ryan, btw.
And please stop trying to justify Jeb’s actions. He, his brother and his father are and were corrupt scum. They all support open borders which is seriously undermining this country and particularly the barrios and ghettos. Funny how the Bushes could not bring themselves to criticize the treasonous Buraq Hussein one bit, but are now all over Trump. Kinda shows where their allegiance lies.
Mexico is headed with a bullet to the place where Venezuela is now, which is fast becoming a Failed State/Zombie Apocalypse style horror movie in real time, and the Bushes want to bring those problems here? If Mexico and it’s new Chavez style government fail like Venezuela ( which is a very good bet) you could have many millions of refugees at our southern border real soon desperate to escape the chaos and violence.
The best thing we could do for Mexico and the rest of Latin America is to secure our borders good and tight and then going after the drug runners of the Cartel with a vengeance. Only destroying the market for the Cartel’s drugs, and making the Cartel’s drug runners seriously pay can help Mexico and much of Latin America now. Those countries are in that serious kind of trouble. I would seriously support making Cartel affiliated drug running a terrorist crime, with the penalty for the slightest involvement a life sentence at Gitmo or better yet execution.
Okay. You realize that a wildly popular Florida Governor would have been a much stronger candidate if his last name had been Smith, instead of Bush?
No Django, you don’t understand. Jeb never said there should be 3 consecutive Republican Presidents names Bush! See it doesn’t matter what a politician does, it only matters what he says. Does it make sense now?
In fact, I recall Jeb saying something like his sharing the same “last name” shouldn’t be held against him!
I remember thinking, well that might be very true, if Reggie Bush ( the football player) was running for POTUS and people were making a big deal over his last name, but for Jeb to use that terminology was pathetic. It’s just a coincidence that he shares the same last name! How unfair of you people!
So Jeb, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush all are and were “corrupt scum.”
I don’t think that we have a whole bunch in common right now.
How could I have been so blind????!!!!
Some here accept wild, unverified allegations about President Trump as if they were gospel. But we need DIRECT QUOTES from Jeb!