In his most definitive step yet toward running for president, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush told his followers on Facebook and Twitter he will "actively explore" a campaign.The Associated Press
The new year beckons, and so does the U.S. presidential race. The primaries are 14 months away, the election isn't for another 23 months, and yet the campaign is charging ahead, especially on the Republican side.
The first blast came in December when Jeb Bush, brother of one president and son of another, indicated he was exploring a White House campaign himself. That focused the Republicans' attention, for the party has long believed that the sooner it wraps up its nomination fight, the better its chances against the Democratic candidate, who most of them assume will be former secretary of state Hillary Clinton – itself a debatable point but nonetheless the point of reference for the Republicans on the cusp of 2015.
But before the Republicans move to settle the crown on Mr. Bush's head, voices are being heard crying "not-so-fast."
Not so fast, because a Clinton-Bush race would feel a lot like 1992, and the American people have already had that election.
Not so fast, because the Republican insurgents, sometimes known as the Tea Party faction, are not enthralled with nominating a bona fide member of the most establishment family in the Republican establishment.
Not so fast, because Mr. Bush, a two-term governor of Florida, isn't even assured of united, robust support from the Sunshine State, there being another claimant to that prize from Florida – Senator Marco Rubio, newly prominent for his dissent to President Barack Obama's notion of extending formal diplomatic relations to Cuba.
And not so fast, because Mr. Bush holds two positions that trouble many Republicans: on immigration, where he is congenial to Mr. Obama's notions of a policy overhaul; and on education, where he splits from the party's conservative wing on a controversial curriculum rubric.
Mr. Rubio, the son of two Cuban immigrants, conceded this month that Mr. Bush would be, as he put it on an NBC broadcast, "a very credible and strong candidate." Then there is the question of Mr. Rubio's Senate seat; under Florida law, he cannot run for both the White House and the Senate at the same time, so a presidential race would mean he would have to relinquish his legislative perch.
But he and a gaggle of other presidential possibilities are not about to concede the race, nor even the race to win the political operatives and fund-raisers essential to a modern presidential campaign, to Mr. Bush. Mr. Rubio and Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey already have made that unmistakably clear, saying that another man's decision would not shape their own plans.
That may be true, but two important questions are posed by the entry of Mr. Bush into the Republican conversation if not yet into the Republican presidential race.
The first is whether Mr. Bush's entry will crowd out other establishment candidates in a party that likes to nominate establishment figures but increasingly is composed of vocal conservatives impatient with the old order and insistent that its nominees, such as former governor Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, are doomed to defeat, as Mr. Romney was only two years ago. Even so, Mr. Romney, who has not indicated whether he will mount a third presidential campaign, leads all others in the race for the Republican nomination, according to a survey taken this month by the respected Marist/McClatchy Poll.
The second is whether those conservatives will unite behind one of those insurgents or whether there will be a battle among them. Chances are there will be the sort of battle that parties like to avoid but are powerless to do so. Already Mr. Rubio and Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky are sparring publicly about foreign policy, with the Floridian claiming, somewhat implausibly, that Mr. Paul has emerged as the "chief cheerleader" of Obama foreign policy. If them's not fighting words, then there are no fighting words in the Republican political lexicon.
Once those two questions are resolved, or engaged, a possible Bush candidacy will face resistance from those new, energized Republican conservatives. Mr. Bush's favourability and unfavourability ratings are about equal among people who describe themselves as members of the Tea Party, according to a Monmouth University poll. That's a danger sign, given that Tea Party members are more motivated potential voters than are other Republicans.
The broader danger for the Republicans is the potential size of the party's presidential field, which could easily surpass a dozen candidates.
Along with the more familiar names, the other potential candidates include retired Johns Hopkins neurosurgeon Ben Carson and Governors Mike Pence of Indiana, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, John Kasich of Ohio, Susana Martinez of New Mexico, Rick Snyder of Michigan and Scott Walker of Wisconsin, plus even former governor George Pataki of New York. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who appeals to Tea Partiers, and former senator and 2012 presidential candidate Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, who appeals to religious conservatives, almost certainly will run.
That's a recipe for one of the most colourful Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primaries ever. But also the most unruly. The Republicans are striving to be the new party of inclusion. On the eve of 2015, their potential candidates represent a field more inclusive than any party has proffered in modern times, or perhaps at any time. That's their glory – and their burden.