I meant to do this post ages ago, and forgot about it. Now that Jeb Bush is sort-of a candidate for the Republican nomination for President, I felt I should put some ‘noise’ up here for you to think about.
Here you will find the current Wikipedia article on Jeb Bush.
I am working from my notes of long ago, so feel free to check me up at every turn.
Jeb Bush as Governor of Florida is my main observation point. I would score him thus:
- Education: yes, except for libraries
- Fiscal: yes
- Labour: no (removed some protections)
- Environment: yes
- Gun Rights: egad, very first stand-your-ground law.
- Health: odd. Caps on non-economic damages. Supported anti-abortion license plates. Pushed from Medicaid to private health care. I guess those are no-no’s.
- Immigration: Brave. Tried to give illegals drivers licenses.
- Vetos: I think good. Stopped High Speed Rail Authority.
- Climate change: waffle
- Gay Rights: only correct politician I can think of. There should be no special rules for minorities: all laws should apply to all of us. Special rules are, in effect, reverse discrimination.
- The famous Florida West Election recount: (GWB got in because of this).
- Vote Pairing. look this up and see if you like it or not.
Given the above observations, how do you rate Jeb Bush? That’s the dumb question, which leads to a few extra ones:
Given the stand-your-ground law, which makes using a gun much less likely to result in charges, and which law has been copied repeatedly elsewhere, why is the gun lobby and NRA not supporting Jeb Bush? Do they think Donald Trump is even more shoot-from-the-hip?
Is Jeb too pro-illegals? Or do he and Obama vaguely agree on trying to create more solid citizens out of partially-fugitive persons?
Being in Canada, I can beg forgiveness for these last dumb questions.
Is it nuts to have roughly a dozen candidates for a single nomination? Or is each campaign part of a publicity stunt to ‘store up’ visibility for future possible campaigns? And, it that nuts too?