Jeb Bush Keeps Tripping over His Ponderous Mediocrity — Attacking Senator Rubio’s Voting Record without Foreseeing the Senator’s Obvious Response — Is Slow-Witted Jeb Someone We Would Want as President?

© 2015 Peter Free

 

29 October 2015

 

 

Even with time to prepare, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush couldn’t get the substance right

 

Which doesn’t say much for his mental acuity under pressure or that of his selected advisors:

 

 

The moment arose after [Senator Marco] Rubio was questioned by the CNBC [Republican 2016 presidential candidate debate] moderators about his poor attendance record at recent Senate votes -- an issue that the Sun Sentinel newspaper’s editorial board raised this week in calling on him to resign his seat.

 

“I’m a constituent of the senator and I helped him and expected that he would do constituent service, which means he’d show up to work,” Bush chimed in.

 

“He’s a gifted politician. But Marco, when you signed up for this, this was a six-year term, and you should be showing up to work.”

 

Like a predator waiting patiently in the tall grass, Rubio allowed Bush -- who has long vowed not to attack his GOP rivals and to campaign "joyfully" -- to ramp up his criticism.

 

“I mean literally, the Senate, what is it, like a French work week?” Bush scoffed. “You get like three days where you have to show up? You can campaign or just resign and let someone else take the job.”

 

Rubio pounced.

 

“Well, it’s interesting,” he said, noting that Bush has recently praised Arizona Sen. John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign comeback as a model for his own White House bid.

 

“You know how many votes John McCain missed when he was carrying out that furious comeback that you’re modeling after? Jeb, I don’t remember you ever complaining about John McCain’s vote record. The only reason you’re doing it now is because we’re running for the same position and somebody has convinced you that attacking me is going to help you.

 

“My campaign is going to be about the future of America. It’s not going to be about attacking anyone else on this stage.”

 

© 2015 Scott Conroy and Sam Stein, Call It Like It Is: Marco Rubio Is Just Better at This than Jeb Bush, Huffington Post (29 October 2015) (extracts)

 

Note

 

You can see the video of this exchange at:

 

M. J. Lee, Republican debate: Marco Rubio hobbles Jeb Bush, CNN Politics (29 October 2015) (with embedded video segment)

 

 

The problem with Jeb’s attack was that Senator Rubio’s response was easily foreseeable

 

Even a first year law student would have spotted Rubio’s rejoinder lurking among the “what ifs”.

 

 

The moral? — You should not give your adversary a club with which to expose your own lack of smarts

 

Yet, even with plenty of time to prepare, former Governor Bush did exactly that.

 

Electing a second intelligence-challenged Bush to Commander in Chief is not especially appealing.