The New York Times’ Frank Bruni devotes his Sunday column to the attributes of a Jeb Bush presidential candidacy, but concludes with the prevailing wisdom that it’s ultimately an unlikely prospect.
I’m told by people in the know that while Bush is definitely mulling a candidacy, there’s only a 20 to 30 percent chance that he’ll press the button. Many factors play into that decision: his family’s privacy; the reality that he and Rubio, his onetime political mentee can’t both run; the nascent political career of his son George P. Bush, who might be better served by a longer Bush lull.
Bruni also argues that it’s Bush who holds the “unalloyed affection of many of the Republican Party’s most influential moneymen,” who are wary of the other more moderate, seemingly electable candidate in the ’16 field, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.
Bruni says Christie is “scaring some Republican power brokers . . . because he’s so very loud, so very proud, a ticking time bomb of self-congratulatory bellicosity and gratuitous insult.”
If Christie’s pomposity does indeed begin to wear on GOP donors and Marco Rubio’s star continues to fade as a result of immigration, Bush may have no choice. That unique combination of events may make for the perfect storm, a scenario that Jeb — whose family name is synonymous with service — may not be able to resist.
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