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Over the years one of the things he mentions I have discussed with others .. The need to revisit Civics in schools in Jamaica....
The Bushes are not the extreme right.... despite the way they were demonised. Papa Bush was the last president who really served in the arm forces in a combat role...
Not just an immigration reformer
Mar 11th 2013, 13:44 by T.N. | LOS ANGELES
YESTERDAY morning Jeb Bush likened David Gregory to a crack addict when the "Meet the Press" anchor asked the former Florida governor whether he or Marco Rubio was more likely to find themselves elected president in 2016. "You really are obsessed with all this politics," he chuckled, half-generously, half-scornfully. But Mr Bush himself had rather a lot to say about politics when I saw him speak at the Ronald Reagan library in Simi Valley, southern California, on Friday.
Although he was there to promote his new immigration tome, Mr Bush did not restrict himself to discussion of America's broken immigration system. He had loftier themes in mind. He framed America's predicament as one of sluggish economic growth and declining social mobility, compounded by a politics of fruitless rancour. For America's economic performance to match Germany's (a comparison he made more than once), Mr Bush argued for three things: a "patriotic" energy policy, meaning a slightly qualified yes to fracking, a hearty yes to the Keystone pipeline, and more drilling on federal land; a reformed immigration system, ensuring that America's declining birth rate does not spell demographic doom; and improvements to schools, an issue on which Mr Bush provided little detail other than touting a scheme he instigated in Florida to provide letter grades to all public schools.
Lamenting the poisonous atmosphere in Washington, DC, Mr Bush praised previous occupants of the White House, from the arm-twisting LBJ to the resolutely pragmatic Reagan, for their abilities to get things done. (He spoke with particular passion about the enlightened self-restraint exercised by his father when the Berlin Wall came down.) Such leadership is sadly absent today, he said; although he did have kind words for Barack Obama's decision to take a group of Republican senators out for dinner.
It was a spirited and impressive performance. Mr Bush commands a stage better than either his brother or his father, during their respective heydays, and it is not difficult to imagine him orating in front of the presidential seal. Admittedly, he was on home turf; he flattered his audience with regular references to Reagan (and himself by suggesting that his prescriptions were those the Gipper would have followed were he alive today). The mainly white, graying crowd lapped the whole thing up—in the Q&A one elderly woman rose to ask Mr Bush simply, "Are you going to save us?"—but they reserved perhaps their warmest response for his call for a greater focus on civics in schools to ensure social cohesion.
This audience, in other words, was hardly representative of the sort of centrist voter Mr Bush will have to win over if he is to secure the White House for the Republicans in 2016. But to do that he will also have to fight his way through a round of primaries, and it was refreshing to see a solidly conservative audience shower applause on a man who had issued plaintive pleas for bipartisan policymaking and who had rather harsher words for his own party than for their opponents.
Mr Bush will not, of course, show his hand this far out from 2016. But in its wide-ranging nature his speech, and his decision to appear on a full house of Sunday talk shows, suggests that this is a man who does not consider his political ambitions over. Speaking of his son, George P. Bush, who is embarking on his own political career in Texas, he ominously noted that "something compels a Bush to run for office generation after generation" before issuing a shout-out to his 18-month-old grandaughter (named, of course, Georgia).
The political stars have aligned for Mr Bush, up to a point. After tanking among Latino voters in November, the Republicans are executing a drastic handbrake turn on immigration policy that leaves Mr Bush well placed to take advantage. His absence from the political stage since 2007 means no Republican excesses, of rhetoric or policy, since then need stick to him. As endless political gridlock turns Washington into a theatre of the absurd, Mr Bush's calls for bipartisanship will resonate. Only his calls for growth over austerity seem to place him outside the mood of his party, if not the country.
On immigration, although the rapid shift in Republican thinking has recently forced Mr Bush into an ungainly flip-flop, his personal and political credibility on the issue should keep him at the heart of the debate. At the Reagan library, although he framed his argument for reform in economic terms, he showed where his heart lies when he declared himself delighted that his "Iraqi-Canadian-Texan-Mexican-American granddaughter" would struggle to fill out a census form. She may be a "leading indicator" of where the country is headed, he said.
Some in Mr Bush's party may still need a bit of convincing, but they are moving in the right direction. And he is slowly accruing fans. The Republican hipster (Williamsburg beard, called me "bro", sported a double-breasted suit) who served me in the library's gift shop told me that whenever business was slow he tried to squeeze in a few more pages of Mr Bush's book; he found it utterly compelling.
The Bushes are not the extreme right.... despite the way they were demonised. Papa Bush was the last president who really served in the arm forces in a combat role...
Not just an immigration reformer
Mar 11th 2013, 13:44 by T.N. | LOS ANGELES
YESTERDAY morning Jeb Bush likened David Gregory to a crack addict when the "Meet the Press" anchor asked the former Florida governor whether he or Marco Rubio was more likely to find themselves elected president in 2016. "You really are obsessed with all this politics," he chuckled, half-generously, half-scornfully. But Mr Bush himself had rather a lot to say about politics when I saw him speak at the Ronald Reagan library in Simi Valley, southern California, on Friday.
Although he was there to promote his new immigration tome, Mr Bush did not restrict himself to discussion of America's broken immigration system. He had loftier themes in mind. He framed America's predicament as one of sluggish economic growth and declining social mobility, compounded by a politics of fruitless rancour. For America's economic performance to match Germany's (a comparison he made more than once), Mr Bush argued for three things: a "patriotic" energy policy, meaning a slightly qualified yes to fracking, a hearty yes to the Keystone pipeline, and more drilling on federal land; a reformed immigration system, ensuring that America's declining birth rate does not spell demographic doom; and improvements to schools, an issue on which Mr Bush provided little detail other than touting a scheme he instigated in Florida to provide letter grades to all public schools.
Lamenting the poisonous atmosphere in Washington, DC, Mr Bush praised previous occupants of the White House, from the arm-twisting LBJ to the resolutely pragmatic Reagan, for their abilities to get things done. (He spoke with particular passion about the enlightened self-restraint exercised by his father when the Berlin Wall came down.) Such leadership is sadly absent today, he said; although he did have kind words for Barack Obama's decision to take a group of Republican senators out for dinner.
It was a spirited and impressive performance. Mr Bush commands a stage better than either his brother or his father, during their respective heydays, and it is not difficult to imagine him orating in front of the presidential seal. Admittedly, he was on home turf; he flattered his audience with regular references to Reagan (and himself by suggesting that his prescriptions were those the Gipper would have followed were he alive today). The mainly white, graying crowd lapped the whole thing up—in the Q&A one elderly woman rose to ask Mr Bush simply, "Are you going to save us?"—but they reserved perhaps their warmest response for his call for a greater focus on civics in schools to ensure social cohesion.
This audience, in other words, was hardly representative of the sort of centrist voter Mr Bush will have to win over if he is to secure the White House for the Republicans in 2016. But to do that he will also have to fight his way through a round of primaries, and it was refreshing to see a solidly conservative audience shower applause on a man who had issued plaintive pleas for bipartisan policymaking and who had rather harsher words for his own party than for their opponents.
Mr Bush will not, of course, show his hand this far out from 2016. But in its wide-ranging nature his speech, and his decision to appear on a full house of Sunday talk shows, suggests that this is a man who does not consider his political ambitions over. Speaking of his son, George P. Bush, who is embarking on his own political career in Texas, he ominously noted that "something compels a Bush to run for office generation after generation" before issuing a shout-out to his 18-month-old grandaughter (named, of course, Georgia).
The political stars have aligned for Mr Bush, up to a point. After tanking among Latino voters in November, the Republicans are executing a drastic handbrake turn on immigration policy that leaves Mr Bush well placed to take advantage. His absence from the political stage since 2007 means no Republican excesses, of rhetoric or policy, since then need stick to him. As endless political gridlock turns Washington into a theatre of the absurd, Mr Bush's calls for bipartisanship will resonate. Only his calls for growth over austerity seem to place him outside the mood of his party, if not the country.
On immigration, although the rapid shift in Republican thinking has recently forced Mr Bush into an ungainly flip-flop, his personal and political credibility on the issue should keep him at the heart of the debate. At the Reagan library, although he framed his argument for reform in economic terms, he showed where his heart lies when he declared himself delighted that his "Iraqi-Canadian-Texan-Mexican-American granddaughter" would struggle to fill out a census form. She may be a "leading indicator" of where the country is headed, he said.
Some in Mr Bush's party may still need a bit of convincing, but they are moving in the right direction. And he is slowly accruing fans. The Republican hipster (Williamsburg beard, called me "bro", sported a double-breasted suit) who served me in the library's gift shop told me that whenever business was slow he tried to squeeze in a few more pages of Mr Bush's book; he found it utterly compelling.