# Jeb Bush ends his campaign for POTUS **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [February 21, 2016, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669 "2016-02-21T03:54:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/1 "2016-02-21T03:54:28Z")
[He has left the building](http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/02/20/bush-suspends-campaign-bows-out-2016-race.html) ---
**Author:** ![Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/try2b_comprehensive/32/65_2.png) [@Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Try2B_Comprehensive)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/2 "2016-02-21T04:02:08Z")
Golf clap. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/3 "2016-02-21T04:05:19Z")
Wonder how it feels to not get as far as your dumber brother? ---
**Author:** ![Cardboard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Cardboard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardboard)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/4 "2016-02-21T04:07:26Z")
I remember when the media was trying to push him as a viable candidate last year … lmao ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/5 "2016-02-21T04:25:27Z")
Eh, he can always blame it on Trump… ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/6 "2016-02-21T04:51:19Z")
Several months ago, I never would have called that. What a fucking feeble attempt. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/7 "2016-02-21T05:12:57Z")
That’s what he gets for punctuating his first name. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/8 "2016-02-21T05:34:57Z")
He was apparently a corrupt governor and is an upper-class twit. Thanks for wasting our time, Jeb. Maybe you sabotaged a campaign that would have had a chance. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/9 "2016-02-21T05:41:15Z")
It’s his own fault. He didn’t follow the precedent from his brother’s South Carolina campaign in 2000, and start spreading a rumour that Trump had fathered a black baby out of wedlock. That’s the kind of principled, issue-based campaigning that the Bush clan thrives on. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/10 "2016-02-21T05:54:19Z")
Here’s a good post-mortem: [Inside Jeb Bush’s $150 Million Failure - His closest aides failed to predict Trump and never changed course, guiding a flawed candidate into a corner he couldn’t escape.](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/02/jeb-bush-dropping-out-set-up-to-fail-213662#ixzz40mMddnLY) > [@](#): > > The playbook, hatched by Sally Bradshaw, Mike Murphy and a handful of other Bush confidants in dozens of meetings during the first half of 2015 and described to POLITICO by some of Bush’s closest and most influential supporters, appealed to the Bush family penchant for shock-and-awe strategy. The campaign would commence with six months of fundraising for the “Right to Rise” super PAC and enough muscle to push aside Mitt Romney. There would be a massive, broad-based organizational effort to plant roots in March states at a time when other campaigns were mired in Iowa and New Hampshire. The plan outlined Bush’s positive, future-focused message with an emphasis on his decade-old record of accomplishment as Florida governor. > > And it included several pages about the former Florida governor’s case to prosecute against top rivals – dire political threats such as Wisconsin’s Scott Walker. > > The plan roundly underestimated threats: Bradshaw, his closest advisor and long-time defender, for example, told at least one campaign aide that Marco Rubio wouldn’t challenge Bush. Besides, Bradshaw and other top advisers believed, it would be next to impossible for someone with so little experience to beat him. “They thought there was going to be much more reverence and respect for the fact that Jeb Bush, a Bush, was getting into the race,” said one Florida-based supporter, an alumnus of Jeb Bush’s gubernatorial campaigns and former staffer. **“When they got Romney to step aside, they figured everyone else would too.”** > > Most critically, the playbook, people who have read it tell POLITICO, contained nothing about Donald Trump, who would spend the next excruciating year turning Bush into his personal patrician piñata. > [@](#): > > Those pivotal days in late August were one of the most critical inflection points for Jeb Bush’s troubled presidential campaign – the moments when Bradshaw, Kochel, and Diaz might have reconsidered the assumptions made months earlier and redirected their candidate. They didn’t, because that redirection wasn’t part of the playbook. > > “You cannot run a political campaign and not have the ability to adapt, to pivot,” one long-time Bush donor who has supported all five of the family’s presidential campaigns. “To sit there and say, ‘We have a book,’ just shows the immaturity." ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/11 "2016-02-21T05:54:42Z")
Wonder how the other members of the bush clan feel about w making anyone with the last name bush unelectable for the next 20 years. W’s legacy of a fucked up and more dangerous Middle East will be around as a constant reminder for decades to come. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/12 "2016-02-21T06:15:29Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > Here’s a good post-mortem: [Inside Jeb Bush’s $150 Million Failure - His closest aides failed to predict Trump and never changed course, guiding a flawed candidate into a corner he couldn’t escape.](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/02/jeb-bush-dropping-out-set-up-to-fail-213662#ixzz40mMddnLY) I recently read an article that was talking about how much social media has changed presidential campaigns and how they’re haven’t been enough presidential elections for the professionals to figure out the new rules yet. It’s like how they were trying to figure out how to use television in a political campaign back around 1960. Eventually, the pros will figure out what does and doesn’t work and things will settle down again. But right now campaigns are getting blindsided by things they didn’t see coming. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/13 "2016-02-21T06:21:55Z")
Wait a tick, he “pushed aside” Romney? When the hell was that, was that when Christie was the “prohibitive favorite”? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/14 "2016-02-21T06:22:58Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > Wonder how it feels to not get as far as your dumber brother? Not too bad, if he’s dumb enough to lend you money. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/15 "2016-02-21T06:42:00Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > Here’s a good post-mortem: [Inside Jeb Bush’s $150 Million Failure - His closest aides failed to predict Trump and never changed course, guiding a flawed candidate into a corner he couldn’t escape.](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/02/jeb-bush-dropping-out-set-up-to-fail-213662#ixzz40mMddnLY) Eh, to be fair, I’m not sure what a winning playbook would’ve looked like for Bush. He did try to go after Trump after all, but he just isn’t good at Trumps kind of chest-thumping style. And even if he was good at painting himself as an anti-establishment figure (and he wasn’t), there wasn’t really any way to sell that with his last name. Short of using some of his millions to straight up bribe Rubio, Christie and Kaisich to drop out of the race early, there really wasn’t any winning strategy for him. ---
**Author:** ![Kolak\_of\_Twilo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kolak_of_twilo/32/73_2.png) [@Kolak\_of\_Twilo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kolak_of_Twilo)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/16 "2016-02-21T06:49:28Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > Here’s a good post-mortem: [Inside Jeb Bush’s $150 Million Failure - His closest aides failed to predict Trump and never changed course, guiding a flawed candidate into a corner he couldn’t escape.](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/02/jeb-bush-dropping-out-set-up-to-fail-213662#ixzz40mMddnLY) Yep, Jeb is a great illustration of the fact that even an incredibly well financed organization can’t survive when it is being run by people who are unable to tell the ground is shifting under their feet. Shifting in seismic and unprecedented ways. They managed to piss away an incredible amount of money with almost nothing to show for it. Whoever was responsible for the decisions they made should just get the hell out of the business of running political campaigns. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/17 "2016-02-21T06:52:37Z")
He was a colorless, charmless candidate. I’m repeatedly stunned at the mooks running for POTUS these days on both sides of the aisle. Is there a some reason these are the only choices we have for choosing the most powerful man or woman in the world? It’s baffling. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/18 "2016-02-21T07:40:43Z")
There are hints abounding that the old tried and true has become the tired and false. That the old model of massive fundraising to support media campaigning just doesn’t work any more. Coupled with the rise of small donor financing, are very hopeful signs for our politics. Also, and the utter disarray of the Republican Party. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/19 "2016-02-21T15:00:34Z")
With any luck, this will be the end of the Bush dynasty at least in my lifetime. Inept buffoons, all three. Jeb has all the personality of a can of Crisco, and the all the charm of a dose of clap. It made me twitchy every time I saw him on the campaign trail in the news. Not to say there is anybody else in that mob of idiots that should be within driving distance of the White House. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2016, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669/20 "2016-02-21T15:20:52Z")
Hopefully that’s the end of the Bushes. Now if Bernie can just do the same for the Clintons, maybe we can actually move forward some in this country. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jeb-bush-ends-his-campaign-for-potus/746669.md?page=2)