The Jeb Bush who snarked at Marco Rubio in last week’s Boulder debate and the Jeb Bush who attempted to restart his campaign with a new attitude in Tampa Monday were two different men. One jabbed at a friend-turned-rival — “What is it, like, a French work week?” — while the other pledged a higher road: “I will be true to myself — optimistic and inclusive.”
In Tampa, seeking to re-boot a deeply troubled campaign, Bush pledged to be himself. “I can’t be something I’m not,” Bush told the crowd, saying it was a lesson he had learned during his years as Florida’s governor.
Bush went on to suggest that he has been over-coached and over-advised in recent weeks — and to concede, without saying so, that perhaps he has listened to too much of that advice.
He did it in a roundabout way. Discussing Abraham Lincoln as a president who “held the nation’s highest office with humility,” Bush envisioned Lincoln running for office in today’s political circus.
“Imagine the foolishness he would have to suffer,” Bush said. “Think about it. Advisers telling him to shave his beard. Cable pundits telling him to lose the top hat. Opposition researchers calling him a five-time loser before he was 50.”
Then a pivot to Bush 2016. “I’ve gotten a lot of advice lately myself — more than enough, thank you,” Bush said. “Some is stylistic: take off the suit coat, ditch the glasses, get rid of the purple striped tie.”
“Some advice is more strategic. Nail that zinger. Be angrier. Hide your inner wonk.”
It was nail-that-zinger Bush who appeared onstage at the Boulder debate — only he didn’t nail that zinger. Now, Bush says the problem with all that advice — presumably coming from allies and people Bush pays to advise him — is that it conflicts with that lesson he learned in the Florida governor’s office: “I can’t be something I’m not.”
So now Bush pledges to return to a leadership style that isn’t so great at soundbites but knows how to get things done. The inner wonk will no longer be hidden.
The theme of Bush’s restart is “Jeb Can Fix It.” He’s renewing his emphasis on his record as governor: “Today we begin a four-day trip across Florida, South Carolina and New Hampshire to tell the Florida story,” Bush said. And he’s promising that, unlike all those good talkers on the debate stage with him, he knows how to make government work. “After seven years of incompetence, corruption and gridlock in Washington, we need a president who can fix it. I can fix it.”
Just to drive the point home, Bush took the stage to the rock oldie “Takin’ Care of Business” and left to “Workin’ for a Living.”
Bush’s unspoken message: That kind of attacking you saw in the debate is not me. I’m not good at it. I’m good at other things, and I’m going to emphasize them.
“He’s saying being angry and pessimistic is not me,” notes Bush aide Tim Miller. “It’s fair to say that he’s arguing the emphasis should be on who can do the job, and that’s where he shines, over some of this other stuff. So in that sense, it is related to the debate.”
Miller stressed that Bush will still draw “contrasts” in the campaign. And indeed, Bush drew a big one Monday when he said the solution to the nation’s problem is not “more talk.”
“The answer isn’t sending someone from one side of the capital city to the other,” Bush argued. “The solution won’t be found in someone who has never demonstrated the capacity to implement conservative ideas. And you can’t just tell Congress you’re fired, and go to commercial break.”
That was pretty efficient — in 45 words Bush managed to take a whack at Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Lindsey Graham and Donald Trump. And it showed that Bush is not out of the contrast business.
But the big point is that after too many Jeb vs. Marco stories, Bush is going back to where he started, selling himself as the reform-oriented conservative governor of Florida. Yes, that was a long time ago — Bush was first elected in 1998, left office almost nine years ago, and hasn’t been a force in politics between then and now. But it’s the best case he has: fewer zingers and more of his inner wonk.
