Monday, January 26, 2015

JEB BUSH'S HUNTSMANESQUE FLAMEOUT IS GOING TO BE PAINFUL TO WATCH

I see from Politico that Bill Vlinton has warned his wife's campaign to take Jeb Bush seriously ("Bill Clinton is already deeply engaged in the campaign, warning that Jeb Bush is a real threat, while New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is probably just a sideshow") -- but that suggests to me that the Big Dog has lost some of his political acuity. I can see that the campaign Jeb is running might make him an appealing general election candidate, but there's no way in hell Jeb's going to win even a single delegate:
This weekend in San Francisco while speaking to the National Automobile Dealers Association, former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-FL) said, “First and foremost we need to control our border.”

“The 40 percent of the people that have come here illegally came with a legal visa and overstayed their bounds,” he added. “We ought to be able to figure out where they are and politely ask them to leave.”

State and local enforcement should partner with the federal government to encourage illegal aliens to return to their home countries in a “compassionate” way, Bush continued.
(Emphasis added.)

I saw this story at Breitbart, and the quote is so gobsmackingly tone-deaf for a would-be Republican nominee that at first I thought it had to be a paraphrase of what Jeb actually said. No -- he really said it, according to C-SPAN.

This quote is going to haunt him until he drops out, which he will do very, very early in the race, assuming he runs at all. In fact, this quote is going to haunt him for the rest of his political life (although I guess this race will probably end his political life).

Mitt Romney, at least, is trying to win back the GOP's affection primarily by waving a lot of red meat at Republicans in order to achieve his goals, even if it's not as much as the rest of the field. But Jeb has apparently decided that the base wants to be insulted and will reward repeated insults with votes. It's the kind of conclusion you come to when you take centrist pundits seriously -- voters want you to give it to them straight. No, they don't -- Republican voters sure don't. Elsewhere we're told that Jeb said of America's population of undocumented immigrants, “There is no way they are going to be deported. No one is suggesting an organized effort to do that. The cost would be extraordinary." Really? Is that what you think, Jeb? The people whose votes you want think deporting all undocumented immigrants is precisely what we should be doing, cost be damned -- and we should have across-the-board tax cuts at the same time! And balance the budget! While fighting more overseas wars!

It apparently flatters Jeb's ego to imagine that he's going to be 2016's big truth-teller. Jon Huntsman went on the same ego trip four years ago. It's a weird, autistic-spectrum approach to running for president. And it's going to work out for Jeb exactly the way it worked out for Huntsman. Unless his real goal is a slot in Hillary Clinton's Cabinet.

12 comments:

Victor said...

Look, if conservatives can't actually used undocumented aliens as target practice for their 2nd Amendment rights, then they'll at least accept shipping them back in cattle cars like the - Godwin's Law forbids me mentioning who.

LIKE THE ONES HITLER AND THE NAZI'S USED!
THERE I SAID IT!

Fuck Godwin and his "law!"

mlbxxxxxx said...

Time will tell, but I think you're wrong about Jeb. Not saying he can beat Hillary (but he's got the best shot, imo) but when the Bush machine gets rolling, I think the nomination will be his. The wackos are going to fracture their vote because that's what they do and that will give Jeb his path to the nomination. I do not think Mitt is going to actually run and Christie, Jeb's only real competition, isn't going to make near the splash the media seem to think he is.

Victor said...

Christie makes a big splash wherever he goes - especially off the highest diving board!

conscious at last said...

I've been thinking along the lines of mlbxxx... above.. actually, I've been predicting that Jeb would enter the race for about 2 years now..

Seriously, what else do the GOP puppeteers actually have? Their Frankenstein astro turf teabaggers have turned on them (what a surprise?!?). Romney is now making populist utterances-- like Huey Long and Christie is not getting traction anywhere really...

Yastreblyansky said...

Maybe old Bill is playing a please don't throw me into that briar patch game. He doesn't need to give hrc advice in public.

Steve M. said...

Seriously, what else do the GOP puppeteers actually have?

Scott Walker. The Kochs love him. The teabaggers love him. The God-botherers love him. He's the guy who would actually best represent the present-day GOP -- and, of course, he got some of the best reviews from right-wing pundits over the weekend. Watch out for him.

conscious at last said...

Yes, indeed, there is a straight line from the Kochs to Walker-- they do love him- he is their most obedient fully funded investment, er I mean, lap poodle---

But there is great resentment against Walker in Wisconsin, like there is growing disgust with Christie in New Jersey... It's gonna be entertaining sport-- if nothing else!


.. and I'm just (re-learning) the basics of football for next week!

sdhays said...

I agree 100% regarding Jeb. I had Walker pegged as Tim Pawlenty without the charisma, but if he can get a lot of the big-money donors, he could indeed be a strong candidate. I wonder what a pissed-off, well-financed Romney campaign would try to do to Scott Walker...

Glennis said...

Well, if there's great resentment of Walker in Wisconsin, it didn't do anything to keep him from getting re-elected. I just don't get Wisconsin.

conscious at last said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
conscious at last said...

I think Walker got re-elected because he was bought and paid for by the Koch brothers -- that's all.

;-)

M.K.Singer said...

As has been said, imagine 'Godwin's Law' invoked at an Allied strategy meeting. And if we reject the word 'Nazi', we still must confront the phenomenon itself--and the mentalities behind it, which may prevail yet again in history: So many reactionary American aristocrats have historically believed in America's 'divine mission', and have chosen to see America as the nation fittest to survive. If you want to understand the phenomenon of Nazism, look at U$ history, American pseudoscientific racialism, quite influential in Europe, and the declaration that Native Americans were an inferior race, destined to be annihilated or driven into Canada. Think of Goebbels' acknowledged debt to U$ advertising, and more...