JEB! the "wonk" is becoming the punchline to a national joke.

Rove is completely off his game now that eight years of Toto-reality from 2001 to 2009 pulled back the curtain on his "king-making" judgment and abilities.  His recent efforts to remake the lazy (if yet intelligible) "old school tie" brand of genial stooge for cronyism and elitism that is Jeb Bush into some serious policy wonk and intellectual with baited PR released through friendly media contacts has all but bombed out on the "Peoria" circuit.  No one with with a brain who pays the least bit of attention to politics, world affairs and history will buy Jeb Bush as an "intellectual." Smarter than his wastrel brother yes, (which is not that much of an accomplishment), but not much more than that.

The "punditocracy" is having a lot of sarcastic fun with this desperate Rovian ploy:

"Jeb Bush has a dirty little secret that he wants to tell, and he doesn’t even care who knows: He’s a “geek”! A nerd. He’s so silly like that, caring about policy all the time when all everyone else wants to do in life is have a good time.

Such is the message passed off in a weekend New York Times riff on the former Florida governor. It may be the most comically obvious attempt we’ve seen yet in the 2016 proto-campaign from Jeb’s handlers to show that he’s not an idiot like his elder brother, the former President Bush. The piece is filled with effusive quotes about how bookish and wonky and smart Jeb Bush is. Rarely is an image-crafting piece so indiscreetly dropped by a politician’s handlers. Hell, a reading list is even provided to run alongside the profile to offer even more proof that, yes, the rumors are true, Jeb Bush is literate. And the pace in which he devours middlebrow histories and libertarian at-length ranking and Bill O’Reilly’s “Killing ____” books is breathtaking."

And then there is:

[New York] "Times reporter Michael Barbaro (5/24/14) explains that Bush is "bookish," a "voracious reader" and "self-described nerd" who "flew in Ivy League social scientists for daylong seminars with his staff."  ...Indeed, Times readers are told that during his tenure, "the Florida governor's office at times resembled a mini-university." ...Barbaro notes that these days, "Bush peppers his speeches with statistics, academic-sounding references to 'quintiles' and self-deprecating jokes about his own geekiness."...The Times includes a sidebar consisting of  "a selection of what he has read or is now reading." On the list? Bill O'Reilly's latest, Killing Jesus...It's what all the nerds and wonks are reading."

Dumb and Dumber?

Those promoting JEB! for president are doing so because they think (probably correctly) that he will be a non-threatening, pliable, semi-articulate front man for their plutocratic control of the national government and its policies.  Selling JEB! to those less critical voters who have no control will be exponentially harder than peddling his inarticulate brother's "everyman" you-want-to-have-a-beer-with scam. JEB! won't be running against a wooden wonk himself, an opponent like Al Gore. The very idea of packaging JEB! as a right wing version of Al Gore illustrates the desperate dead end position the GOP finds itself in as it again prepares to do battle with the far more resourceful and charismatic Clintons.   As one pundit, putting aside the snark for a moment of actual intellectual prescience, noted:

"...Jeb Bush does not need to worry about proving his intellectual bona fides to the more pressing audience, the GOP presidential primary electorate. There’s plenty about George W. Bush’s legacy that they don’t like, but none of it has to do with the popular perception of him as a moron. These are not discerning customers, in that regard. What they do remember negatively about George W. Bush’s presidency, and have worked hard to eradicate from their ranks ever since, is his big-government [neo] conservatism. In this respect, George and Jeb are nearly identical."

Jeb Bush Is a Wonk–Just Ask Him

Jeb Bush’s humiliating plea: I swear I’m smart

Jeb Bush Claims He's More Bookish Than His Brother. Karl Rove Begs To Differ.