Jeb Bush Breaks Into Double Digits

The latest polls show that Jeb Bush is hanging in there. While not skyrocketing to the top of the polls, he has acquired a respectable 10% of the vote as less well-financed competition has stepped out of the race. As I said in a previous post, candidates like Jeb can afford to wait for Donald Trump to either sabotage himself or simply lose the excitement initially garnered by a new face.

In my opinion, looks too much like his mother.

I do not think that Bush's message resonates with any more voters than before. He is simply benefiting from the thinning of the ranks that has occurred and from the thinning that is about to occur. By this, I mean that many voters are starting to see how continuing to hold their vote for Jindal, Graham or Huckabee is just pointless and they are gravitating to whomever they think has a similar message and a better chance. Jeb is getting some sloppy seconds, in other words.

Nevertheless, do not think for a minute that I count him out. He was the crown prince not long ago and has simply been overshadowed for a moment by an upstart. His background and his finances can still see him through to the end, no matter how much Trump's more fervent followers would like to see him fail. I would not be surprised to see him win this thing next summer.

In fact, as much as I enjoy the chaos started by Donald Trump, I would be more surprised if that eccentric billionaire won than I would be by Bush;s eventual victory. In the end, I don't see the establishment allowing the status quo to be overturned.

Who Is Marco Rubio?

After the second GOP debate, three top candidates were reconfirmed in their positions: Donald Trump, Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson. An additional member of the pack stepped into the foreground: Marco Rubio.

Some Biographical Data

Marco Rubio is one of the younger republicans running for national office this year. As of this writing, he is just 44 years old. If elected, he would be one of the youngest men to ever hold the highest office in the land.

Youth is not the only thing that distinguishes Rubio from past and present GOP candidates. He is a Cuban-American from Florida, one of three serving in the US Senate. His youth and ethnicity single him out at a time when liberals are more likely than ever to depict the Republican Party as a party of old, white men.

Furthermore, Rubio is a Roman Catholic. Only one Roman Catholic, the democrat John Kennedy, has ever served as US President, though the US population is more than 20% Catholic.

Political Background

Marco Rubio won his first election in 1999, when he narrowly defeated an opponent for the Florida State House of Representatives. In just three years, he became the Majority leader in that representative body. By 2009 he was ready for bigger things and ran for the US Senate seat that had been opened by resignation. He defeated the governor of that state, Charlie Crist, in that election.

As junior Senator from Florida, Rubio has represented ideas that have become fairly typical for Republicans today. He won his seat with strong Tea Party support. He has since distinguished himself somewhat from that political group with his stance on immigration reform (rather than enforcement) and his call for strengthening the military.

He takes a strong anti-abortion stance and received a B+ from the NRA on the issue of gun control. He is less republican on climate change, essentially taking an agnostic stance.

It remains to be seen whether Rubio will have the organization behind him to manage this sudden limelight. However, if his past is any indicator, he has been aiming for greater things since the very beginning.

GOP Front Runners

Even though we are far away from the Iowa caucus on February 1, things have really heated up in the Republican presidential race. Out of the crowd of some 15 or 16 remaining candidates, there are four distinct front runners coming out of the second debate.

• Donald Trump

Trump came away from the debate with fewer adherents apparently.

The latest polls have him at 24% support. Earlier surveys had put him above 30%. Most people seemed to think he either just held his own or did poorly at the forum of ten leading republicans that convened last week. So many posts are devoted to the Donald that I won't waste more space on him here.

• Ben Carson

Carson appears to be essentially tied with Carly Fiorina for second. Each of them comes in with 15% of the total GOP support. For Carson, this is a letdown because he was a strong second in the week leading up to the second GOP debate. I have already dedicated a lot of space to Carson so I will leave it at that.    

• Carly Fiorina

The former HP CEO made major gains after this last debate. There was a lot of buzz about her but not much movement in the polls prior to that. The expectations were high after her better-than-expected showing at the non-debate held outside the first GOP debate. She accomplished her mission and rose to vie with arson for second-place in republican hearts,

• Marco Rubio
  
  Someone was destined to rise up out of the remaining pack and make a respectable showing with these three leaders. Marco Rubio finally lifted his head above the rest and stood tall with Trump, Fiorina, and Carson. The junior US Senator from Florida since 2011, he is just 44 years old and notably hispanic. 

I'll give Rubio his own column shortly. In the meantime, I am noticing that the party which liberals characterize as old, white and male is supporting black, hispanic and female candidates, one of whom is just 44 years old.

The Walking Dead: Why the Republican Nominees Don't Give Up

When I see that some of the GOP nominees are still polling somewhere between 0 and 1% of the republican vote, I have a hard time figuring out why they are still in the race when virtually no one has expressed interest in their candidacy so far. Are they just stubborn or are they convinced that they can turn things around if they just hang on long enough?

It actually makes my brain hurt to think that George Pataki is still in this thing. He and some of his fellow nominees remind me of scenes from the Walking Dead where armies of zombies march silently on.

Is that Scott Walker in front?

After thinking about it for a while, though, the answer should become obvious to everyone. Give it enough thinking and the answer actually becomes disturbing.

I once jokingly suggested that the nominees were simply running to see who would be Donald Trump's VP. I was only being semi-facetious and I am not that convinced that Trump will be the last one standing. However, there is probably more truth in that statement than I originally thought.

Many of the people up on the stage during the debates are probably thinking that they can secure cabinet positions by hanging in there and demonstrating that a portion of the conservative electorate believes in them. I would guess that Lindsey Graham has his eyes on the Defense Department from all his war-hawking. Christie might have the State Department or even the vice-presidency in mind. One wonders what Mike Huckabee would actually want.

These positions are not just opportunities to stay in the limelight and position themselves for a future run at the presidency again. Federal jobs in the Administrative and in the Legislative branches come with hefty salaries and excellent retirement packages. Once you have been in a federal elected post or in the president's cabinet, you qualify for lasting benefits which vary depending on how much you earned and how long you held your post.

I think that these people are just eyeing potential gigs with the next POTUS. They are planning on putting in hours and credits just like regular people that try to get in enough work time to make meager increases in their social security or their own retirement packages. But at this level, they are guaranteeing themselves some really sweet benefits when compared to what most of us can ever expect.

After I got this idea, I still wondered at the number of would-be candidates. After all, this benefit of federal work has existed for some time. Why the rush now to get into the government? Is it because they are all in a position to understand that guarantees are running out? That the US government would be the last domino to fall during hard economic times? Do they agree with the doomsayers running around and predicting economic collapse?

Maybe of a lot these zombie nominees are really just trying to get last-minute tickets on Noah's Ark because they know that it is already raining. Depressing, I know.

Who Is Carly Fiorina?

It is hard to stand out in such a large crowd of candidates like the one that the GOP has fielded this year. Carly Fiorina is the only woman running for the republican nomination this year, so she immediately gains a little extra attention just for that. However, she has parlayed her mere position among the nominees into something much more formidable in the last few weeks.

Carly Fiorina was little more than a face in that crowd when the first GOP debate aired. In fact, she was not even allowed into the main circle of 10 front-running nominees but was rather set aside with a half dozen others in a non-debate forum. Each nominee there only had the opportunity to speak his or her piece and be done with it.

She made the most of the moment by coming off as a sober, intelligent candidate. Then she turned that into something more by playing up the idea that she had forgotten her notes and had spoken off the cuff. She earned a more prominent spot in the second GOP debate held earlier this week.

Fiorina's Background

At present, Fiorina is the chairman of a philanthropic organization known as Good 360. She is perhaps most well-known for her time as the CEO of Hewlett Packard (HP). Heading that business from 1999 to 2005, Forbes recognized her as the first woman to manage one of the top-20 companies in the world. She ran for the US Senate in 2010 in California but lost the general election to Barbara Boxer.

Among her more notable political positions are her pro-life stance, her acceptance of climate change theory and her opposition to Obamacare and the Iran nuclear agreement.

What Her Supporters Like

Fiorina's backers proudly point to her business experience as a major qualifier for the presidential role.

Her ideas are moderately conservative. For example, she is only against abortions after 20 weeks though she does state that she would defund Planned Parenthood and seek some route to overturn Roe v Wade. She proclaims support for Proposition 8 in California, which briefly banned same-sex marriage in California but worked to ensure domestic partners benefits for employees while at HP.

What Her Detractors Don't

Conservatives on the hard-right do not like her moderation. However, others have more technical and pointed concerns. For instance, although she has worked extensively in politics, she has never held public office. Furthermore, her business career does not withstand much scrutiny because she was fired from her position as CEO due to falling stock prices and a decline in earnings.

Nevertheless, in polls taken after the second debate, Fiorina appears tied with Doonald Trump. Each of them are now wielding about a quarter of the GOP electorate as the number of weaker candidates begins to decrease.