Frank Rich:Jeb Bush’s Candidacy Is Like a Hollywood Sequel No One Wants to See

[LiberalElite]

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/06/bushs-candidacy-is-a-movie-no-one-wants-to-see.html?mid=google&google_editors_picks=true

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Most weeks, New York Magazine writer-at-large Frank Rich speaks with contributor Alex Carp about the biggest stories in politics and culture. This week, the magazine asked him about a slew of presidential hopefuls: Jeb Bush, Hillary Clinton, and, yes, even Donald Trump.

Jeb Bush officially entered the presidential race running both for president and away from his family. His campaign logo includes his first name only, and Bush 41 and 43 were both absent at his launch. How much will the memory of his brother's administration, and the threat of a GOP family dynasty, weigh down his run?

No one in America remembers anything, but surely our national amnesia doesn’t extend to Jeb’s lineage no matter how much he tries to bury it. Not to mention that the exclamation point in the Jeb! logo makes one feel that the whole enterprise is as contrived as a musical comedy. (Not for nothing did George H.W. Bush’s brother, Jonathan, have a brief career as a song-and-dance man, including a turn as Will Parker in a New York revival of Oklahoma! in the 1950s.) In any case, the real problem with being a Bush in this race may have less to do with his brother’s lingering taint than with the fact that Jeb is facing down a Clinton. The most basic Republican argument against Hillary is that America doesn’t want a retread. Jeb is the only candidate in the vast GOP field who cannot make that case.
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