JEB! OPENED DOOR FOR $240 MILLION ‘BOONDOGGLE’ FEMA SCHEME AFTER HURRICANE KATRINA

Ring of Fire- When Jeb Bush, who is now evaluating a potential presidential run, was governor of Florida, he was known for being highly responsive to his e-mails – especially if you were a GOP donor of note. New e-mails released by theAmerican Bridge last week show that the latest Bush had a cozy relationship with Carnival Cruise Line and that the relationship may have produced a nearly $240 million contract for the company following the disaster of hurricane Katrina.

Just two days after Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast, Ric Cooper, an advertiser for Carnival at the time the contract was made, reached out to the then-governor Bush, writing, “None of us have any idea how to reach out to FEMA or whoever is appropriate. I decided to to my usual ‘I’ll give Jeb a heads-up.’”

What followed was an effort to utilize “two or three” of Carnival’s ship as part of the response effort. The company would be able to recoup income that the ships would generated, would they have otherwise been at sea, under the pretense that the ships would house between 6,000 and 10,000 people.

Cooper, who started this engagement, paid $50,000 to the Republican National Committee in 2004 in an effort to help re-elect Jeb’s brother – President George W. Bush. Read more

Mark Levin is not yet on board the Boehner-chauffeured JEB! 2016 Express.

Breitbart News- Nationally syndicated conservative radio host Mark Levin, a former official in President Ronald Reagan’s administration, is calling on former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush to answer whether he stands with House Speaker John Boehner, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, and Majority Whip Steve Scalise in the wake of a blistering Scalise scandal concerning his longtime ties to a top aide to former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke. “We’ve had nonstop Jeb Bush talk the last two weeks,” Levin said in an email to Breitbart News late Tuesday evening. “Is there a reason why he’s silent now about the GOP leadership debacle in the House? They are his supporters after all.” Read more.

The lucrative Obamacare connection JEB! is trying to cut

Washington Post (blog)- The for-profit hospital chain Tenet Healthcare announced on Christmas Eve that Jeb Bush would be stepping down from its board of directors by the end of the year. Bush, who has served on the board of Tenet since 2007, is starting to cut his business ties as he explores a run for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. And there's one obvious reason why keeping Tenet on his resume might not look so good politically: Tenet has benefited greatly from the Affordable Care Act, which much of the GOP base is still committed to repealing. Bush is giving up a lucrative board post. He earned $128,500 in cash plus $170,000 in stock last year for a total of $298,500 according to Tenet's 2013 proxy statement. Read more.

The overrated candidate: The case against JEB! 2016

The baggage he carries isn't likely to fly (anymore than pigs do):

American Spectator- Politically, Bushes are, like the value of the Ivy League degrees most of them have, vastly overrated. Jeb Bush, who recently, to the surprise of no one, all but announced he would run for president, is no exception.

Ever since Jeb established an “I’m Thinking About Running for President Committee” (translation to English: I’m running for president) a week or so back, the conventional wisdom, whooped up by the chatterati and the various great mentioners, is that this latest Bush is a lock for the Republican nomination for president in 2016. They also say he’s that party’s best hope for reclaiming 1600. He’s probably neither. Read more.

Would Jeb Be Like....?

Politico has an interesting piece speculating about how the Crown Prince's neo-conservatism might further the development of the emergent and illiberal national security state in the USA.  A statist system dependent more on the personality and power of the executive than the traditional constitutional system of checks and balances, and due process. The real question, implied but not directly asked by the article is whether another neoconservative president (another Bush) would essentially overturn the constitutional order, and effectively replace it with an authoritarian regime that is a constitutional republic in name only.  The source for this musing is the recent PR dump by the Bushistas of carefully selected internal emails from JEB!'s Florida governorship.  

What the article is really asking, without daring to do so exoterically, is whether Leo Strauss' reductio ad Hitlerum applies to Obama's continuation of Bush II's national security policies. Do they function as a sort of Bruening-von Papen-von Schleicher Article 48 prelude to a final neocon gleichschaltung of power in the figure of a Bush III neocon man-god, philosopher king? I guess we would find out after the dirty bomb goes off, post 21 January 2017.

With or without such an application of Godwin's Law, the Bushes are nonetheless sending an unambiguous message for anyone informed enough to look closely.  The recent email release, along with the Crown Prince's deliberate, and high profile dubious business activities over the last year portray a legacy scion with an imperial mindset bent on obtaining power willfully, and on his own terms.

Here is the Politico intro:

"An executive branch led by an insular, almost brooding [highly debatable] intellect  … running a tightly controlled, top-down policy machine with an aversion for leaks … and a mistrust—even disdain—for the legislative branch.

The Obama White House? Perhaps—but as fresh scrutiny of tens of thousands of his emails is starting to show, it could just as easily describe one of the current president’s would-be successors, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.

In his two terms in Tallahassee, the Republican governor pushed the boundaries of executive power. He unilaterally restructured the state’s affirmative action program through an executive order, rankling the state’s black community. He used his line-item veto pen liberally, axing hundreds of millions of dollars in hometown projects and upsetting even the state’s Republican Senate to the point that it successfully sued him on a technical point." Read more.

Why JEB! Can’t Bypass Conservatives

Daily Caller-Before Jeb Bush announced he was “actively exploring” a presidential bid came news he was just as actively seeking a way to avoid appealing to conservatives. (The Bushies prefer the word “pandering.”)

The would-be King Bush III consulted one of the country’s foremost experts on excelling in the Republican Party without being too conservative: Arizona Sen. John McCain.

“I just said to him, ‘I think if you look back, despite the far right’s complaints, it is the centrist that wins the nomination,’” McCain told Bush, according to The New York Times.

It’s definitely true that the establishment candidate usually wins the Republican presidential nomination. The only two exceptions since World War II are Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan.

But taking McCain’s advice is easier said than done. Conservatives have been inching closer to taking down the establishment in the GOP presidential primaries. Read more.

JEB! trying to clean up his checkered crony capitalist past in advance of a 2016 run

The Crown Prince is busy resigning from hedge fund, private equity and corporate boards (including ones where he profited from Obamacare) in preparation for the formal launch for JEB! 2016 sometime next year.
Here is the latest:

Resigning from Rayonier board:

USA TODAY- Jeb Bush is cutting ties to a real estate investment trust as he actively explores running for president in 2016.

The former Florida governor notified Rayonier Inc. last week that he’ll resign from the company’s board effective Dec. 31. The information is contained in a Securities and Exchange filing published Monday.

“Mr. Bush stated that there are no disagreements between the company and him related to the company’s operations, policies or practices,” according to the SEC document.

This is at least the third company Bush has severed ties with since announcing Dec. 16 that he will explore a White House bid. He also resigned from the boards of Barclays, the multinational bank, and Tenet Healthcare Corporation, a company that has profited from President Obama’s health care law and touted its economic benefits.

Rayonier, which is based in Jacksonville, Fla., is one of the nation’s largest private landowners. It owns, leases or manages 2.6 million acres of timberland in the United States and New Zealand. Read more.

Polls show JEB! 2016 setting GOP up for presidential disaster

The most recent CNN presidential poll illustrates just exactly how detached from reality the GOP primary voter may prove to be when faced with a presidential election demographic, and a turnout rate closer to 50 percent than 34 percent.

Since formally announcing his exploratory PAC, the Crown Prince has zoomed to the front seat in the circus train carload of likely GOP 2016 candidates, polling at 23 percent, ten points ahead of Krispy Kris Kristie, his nearest rival. Rand Paul polled in a tie with Mike Huckabee for forth place, with six percent. Dr. Ben Carson polled in third place with seven percent support.

The same poll showed the Hildabeast ripping JEB! to shreds, 54 to 41 percent in a general election matchup.  And JEB! does better than any other GOP alternative against Hilldog. This continues the same Bush trend shown in general election presidential polls to date:  the Crown Prince does not poll higher than the low forties.

JEB!'s time warp

Politico-Jeb Bush is trying to show he’s ready to run a modern-day presidential campaign: When he declared last week that he’s “actively” exploring a presidential run, the former Florida governor went straight to Facebook and Twitter instead of the more traditional route of a speech or news release.

But Bush will have a lot more work to do than just showing off his social media proficiency to prove he’s not full of cobwebs. It’s been 12 years since he last ran for anything. And while GOP donors are excited about another Bush making a presidential run surrounded by top-notch staff and all the high-tech gadgets he can buy, it’s another thing to campaign in the real-time Web, where a delayed reaction or a thin-skinned response can quickly dominate a news cycle. Read more.

JEB! Is Dismissing the GOP Base at His Own Peril

NationalJournal.com - Six months after President Obama's 2008 landslide victory swept Democrats into power across the country, Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney, and Eric Cantor sat down at a suburban Washington pizzeria to talk policy. They spent that May weekend arguing that the GOP's best path back into power was to improve the party's battered image by advocating reforms for education, immigration, and the economy. Cantor saw the session as a rebranding exercise, offering mostly platitudes about having a conversation with the American people. Romney used the event as early preparation for his second presidential campaign, mostly sticking to talking points. But Jeb Bush came prepared with a slew of creative proposals to test out at the town hall, like charging lower tuition to students pursuing high-end degrees in engineering and science.

After the event ended, several reporters (myself included) chased after Bush to ask him       the inevitable questions about his interest in running for president. He was visibly annoyed,        lamenting that Washington reporters only ask about the political horse race and have no               interest in policy.  Read more.

JEB!: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Waterboy

TownHall.com - Allow me to unite America's left, right and center in just three words: No, Jeb, No.

Former GOP Florida governor Jeb Bush made the obvious official this week when he announced on Facebook that he's "actively exploring" a 2016 White House run. Of course, he's running. That's what inveterate politicians do.

Well, I hate to break it to Jeb Inc. There's no popular groundswell for Bush Part III. None, zip, nada. Independents, progressives and conservatives are all weary of the entrenched bipartisan dynasties that rule Washington and ruin America. Only in the hallowed bubble of D.C. and New York City elites does a Jeb Bush presidential bid make any sense.

Jeb's indulgent (and ultimately doomed) enterprise has three privileged constituencies: Big Business, Big Government and Big Media. This iron triumvirate explains how the failed campaigns of so-called "pragmatic," "thoughtful" and "moooooderate" liberal Republican candidates such as John McCain, Jon Huntsman and Bob Dole ever got off the ground. The "Reasonable Republican," anointed and enabled by the statist Big Three, serves as a useful tool for bashing conservatives and marginalizing conservatism.  Read more.

For a Media That Worships Power, Bush vs. Clinton Is a Dream Matchup

Huffington Post-It's not official, but a Clinton-Bush matchup in 2016 is looking more likely by the day. Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush has announced that he's exploring a run, and Hillary Clinton has been meeting with potential campaign managers.

The prospect of becoming president seems increasingly reserved for those who have a husband, brother, or father who has previously held the position. American Democracy is now controlled by political dynasties. Even former first lady Barbara Bush has criticized the notion of only 2 or 3 families running for high office in a country of over 300 million people - a sentiment that 69 percent of Americans agree with.  Read more.

Why Elizabeth Warren won’t run and JEB! won’t win.

Slate Magazine-You could almost call this week the official start of the 2016 presidential race. Yes, the “invisible primary” of jockeying and influence has been going on since the end of the last election. But it’s only been in the last few days that the structure of the field, on both sides, has become clearer. For Democrats, clarity means the picture is still static. Hillary Clinton still towers over every potential competitor, the most popular person in the Democratic Party not named Barack or Michelle. Need proof? In a survey released this week, 50 percent of Americans said they could support Clinton in an election. And in a hypothetical primary—drawn from an average of available polls—almost two-thirds of Democrats support Clinton over everyone else in the field, from Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren to Vice President Biden. And, contrary to some observers, this isn’t like 2006 or 2007. Then, Clinton was a modest favorite in the field. Now, she’s the undisputed leader.  Read more.

JEB! Already Winning Over Some Supporters of Christie, Rubio

NBCNews.com-Some potential supporters of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio are already saying they will instead back the Crown Prince if he runs for president, illustrating the new challenge both men face with JEB! now likely to be a 2016 candidate.  Read more.

JEB!'S Ties to Donors Put Rivals in a Bind

Wall Street Journal-JEB!’s announcement that he will explore a White House bid threatens years of painstaking spadework by other Republicans who have cultivated many of the wealthy donors loyal to the former Florida governor’s family.  Read more

JEB!-Hilldog presidential race could spell doom for our current primary system

U.S. News & World Report (blog)- Despite several past elections and dozens of polls showing that Americans have neither any patience for, nor any interest in supporting political “insiders," Washington's elites seem to be expecting (even hoping for) a 2016 presidential race featuring former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and former Sen. and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.  Read more.

JEB! is still being destroyed by Hilldog in national polls

The Crown Prince is still losing to the Hildabeast by landslide proportions in national polls.  What else is new? The latest McClatchy-Marist Poll, conducted December 3rd through December 9th, 2014, has Hillary crushing the Crown Prince, 53 percent to 40 percent.  This poll continues the trend exhibited in all national polls since they began to test this matchup:  JEB! can't ever poll higher than around 40 percent. Hillary consistently polls between 46 to 55 percent.

These numbers suggest this likelihood.  A  JEB! nomination forced by money and delegate selection shenanigans could provoke a fairly high profile third option by a viable independent running to the right of JEB! and targeting nativists and tea party voters.   The result would probably result in Hillary getting around 48 percent, JEB! around 40 percent, and the tea party rogue candidate getting the rest. Absent a third option, the vote would probably break down about 55 percent to 45 percent for Hillary, with the Democratic base fired up by the prospect of preventing a third Bush presidency, and millions of members of the Republican tea party base sitting home.  But bet on a third option this time.

JEB! 2016 NEWS FLASH: The Crown Prince all but formally announces the Restoration effort

His Most Ersatz Christian Highness, The Crown Prince John Ellis Bush, Divinely Ordained by the Plastic Jesus of Neoconservatism to Rule in Mammon's name, has publicly announced he is "actively exploring" trying to buy or steal the White House in 2016, and will launch a PAC tasked with exploring a presidential putsch. This coming immediately after his retainers baited the press that The Crown Prince would also release 250,000 carefully selected laudatory emails from his days as Florida governor, and release an e-book explaining why the country should allow a third Bush to rule.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Rubin, the Royal Family's most loyal apologist in the Establishment media, outside of FOX BNN (Bush News Network) has viscerally denounced Ted Cruz in her Washington Post column, calling him the "next Sarah Palin" in what appears to be a proactive effort to formally marginalize and define him as a nuisance gadfly spoiler.  This strategy is likely part of a plan to goad the tea party favorite into an angry run, where he along with Rand Paul, and perhaps Mike Huckabee would safely divide the anti-Bush primary vote, and JEB!'s early announcement is also timed to show the party's plutocrat money base that he is their man, and put other Establishment hopefuls like "Wall Street Willard" Romney and Krispy Kris Kristie on notice that a run by them is now pointless.

The Clinton's have to be popping champagne corks with James Carville because the Crown Prince has been lured into drawing first blood in a dynastic showdown with Billary, and ignoring the Dowager Queen Bab's earlier warnings about "enough Bushes (and Clintons)." Hillary's rebuttal next spring to a Bush Restoration will now hardly been seen as inherently illegitimate or provocative, especially if polls show her still beating the Crown Prince in a head to head matchup.

A November NBC/WSJ poll found JEB! viewed positively by 26 percent of those surveyed, while 33 percent viewed him negatively.

Additionally, this particular PAC route, when compared to JEB!'s recent questionable off-shore private equity activities, is what one might expect from a Bush.  According to Howard Kurtz over at FOX BNN, JEB! could still change his mind, "...but a veteran politician doesn't pull the media strings the way he did if he's not 95 percent of the way there...[yet] one source close to Bush thinks I'm overreacting, and that this was more in the nature of dropping a hint to keep potential backers from jumping ship." 

One cynic on a media comment board offered what may be the best comment about this PAC move: "...he'll have half a dozen untraceable Super-PACs opened on his behalf, and then when he backs out in a year the money all the suckers donated will disappear into his [off shore] bank accounts."

JEB! 2016: Another Bush family effort at selling conceit and neocon imperium as principled national "service"

I'm coming at you, like a second Katrina, and in short order!

The Crown Prince and his retainers have been baiting the media for months with soft sells about JEB!'s "journey" to a "joyful" run for President.  This past Sunday, the Crown Prince outlined his campaign action plan of fraud with a sickeningly typical script from the Bush legacy playbook of self serving mendacity: "If you run with big ideas and then you're true to those ideas, and get a chance to serve and implement them and do it with passion and conviction,you can move the needle...And that's what we need right now in America."

One thing America does not need is a more "humble" war with Iran.  More "passionate" tax cuts on unearned income.  Untaxed repatriation of outsourced profits to fuel a new speculation bubble. Privatization of education to enrich Bush cronies. $5.00 gas as oil prices hit record highs.

One thing America does not need is a third Bush president.

But it looks increasing like those who don't want that are going to have a battle on their hands to prevent it.  According to Chuck Todd at NBC, "it looks like Republican Jeb Bush is moving closer and closer to presidential bid in 2016."

Todd draws this conclusion after weekend media dumps by the Bush faction that JEB! intends to release 250,000 (carefully selected emails) from his days as governor of Florida, and also release an e-book to show (that he, or some of his retainers are techno-literate and, as he put it himself, to show) why "I think I would be a good president."

Good for whom?  Oil companies, financial speculators, war profiteers, Islamic terrorists, crony capitalists, government contractors, employers of cheap labor, and the undocumented workers (about to become legal guest workers, but not citizens) who come looking for those jobs?

He is also leaking to the media all sorts of details about his private equity offshore business dealings with the Chinese and others, recent and ongoing.   Business dealings that would normally be fatal to a presidential candidate.

But JEB! is no ordinary candidate.  He is sending these conflicting signals to the nation to inform them that he is going to buy the White House for himself, his family, and his financial backers and cronies, and there is little anyone can do to stop him.

JEB! is beginning to make his move.  Locking down the money, and revving up the disinformation machine.

NYT Sunday Review: The Many Faces of Jeb

Ranger Rick sez runnin' for Prezident is not an IQ test

Ranger Rick Perry says there are more important things than IQ when it comes to being President. What else can he say? There will be a circus train car full of challengers to the Crown Prince in 2016. Some, like Krispy Kris Kristy or "Wall Street" Willard Romney could be fighting with him over big donor money. Others like Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and perhaps Mike Huckabee will be helping JEB! buy the nomination by splitting up the anti-Bush primary vote. And then there is Rick Perry.

Rick isn't going anywhere, except quietly into a cushy oil company lobbying job after he leaves the Texas state house, but another run for the White House is all about trying to go out as something more than a national joke.  If Governor Goodhair can just avoid, even once, what has now come to be known as a "Perry moment" in national debates, he might convince a few people he has an IQ at least barely in triple digits. That is the closest thing to a win he will ever get in national politics.

O'er the Water to Jebbie!

"Bonnie Prince Jebbie's" metaphorical landing on the Florida beaches and a formal beginning of the Bush Dynasty's Restoration efforts may come within weeks, according to nbc-2.com.

His supporters have been putting out the word among the donor clans of GOP plutocracy to keep their "powder dry," and a formal raising of the Bush standard is all that remains before they rally to his cause.  It will be a long two year slog to their Culloden, and defeat at the hands of "Sweet" William Clinton, and his Clintoverian Queen, the Butcher of Benghazi.

CBS: Hillary Clinton or Jeb Bush: Which do millionaires prefer for 2016?

Bloomberg: Clinton Trumps Republican Rivals on Leadership, Vision for 2016

JEB! 2016: All that's left is the announcement

Get Ready Amerika! 

Within the next two months (roughly), the Crown Prince should announce to a resigned nation still reeling from the economic collapse at the end of his brother's reign that he intends, with the help of unearned money and Karl Rove, to "joyfully" try and buy or steal the Presidency in 2016, and Restore the Royal Family to it's rightful place. Even the Dowager Queen Babs is now in favor of a Restoration, according to royal brother Neil Bush (who stands to make millions from Common Core cronyism if JEB! succeeds). because so many people have told her that JEB! is the best qualified option. Yet more proof that the Royal Family lives in a moral and factual bubble of their own creation.  If you want more proof, consider that King George II Walker Bush, while taking a break from his paint-by-numbers kits and Bob Ross instructional DVDs, and exhibiting a madness reminiscent of the King George that sparked the American Revolution, has now announced that JEB! would beat Hillary Clinton in a dynastic showdown.  This, despite the Crown Prince never having placed higher than the low 40s in any national poll to date, and in the latest national poll, by Bloomberg, JEB! comes in at a whopping 37 percent support level.

Does mad King George Dubya know something around 60 percent of Americans don't know?  He knows that JEB!, his financial backers, and Karl Rove will do anything to install another Bush in the White House if called upon to do so, but is the anything and everything they will do enough? Probably not.

BloombergPolitics: GOP Billionaires Plan: We'll Pick the Republican Presidential Candidate