As Plato, Abraham Lincoln, Will Rodgers Woody Allen once quipped: “Ninety percent of like is just showing up.”
Any good team can win at home. In order to be great, a team has to win on the road. For a Scott Walker, or Ted Cruz, playing CPAC is a home game. For Jeb Bush, it is a road game. Bush went to CPAC, and what he said matters less than the fact that he went, from Jason Russell, Washington Examiner [1]:
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, trying to tamp down conservative criticism over his support for Common Core, told thousands of activists on Friday that he opposes the federal government pushing any kind of educational standards on states, as President Obama’s Department of Education has been doing.
[…]
Fox News host Sean Hannity noted during the question and answer session that Bush instituted the first statewide voucher program. Hannity then asked Bush to address the issue of Common Core. Bush defended his support of Common Core by saying it was part of comprehensive education reform.
Jeb showed, and defended Common Core. Will Mrs. Clinton ever defend Benghazi?
Addendum: I am not sure what to make of this. For what is worth the WaPo seemed, or at least pretended, to like Bush’s appearance, from Washington Post [2]:
Good luck, smart organization and a solid performance in the face of adversity is what successful presidential campaigns are built on. Bush and his team knew they were going into a tough crowd and he (and they) did everything they could to mitigate those issues. Does that mean Bush won a bunch of converts in a room packed with an amalgam of libertarians, social conservatives and young people just there to have a good time? Probably not. But he didn’t — and doesn’t — need to in order to be the nominee. What he has to do is convince those folks that he’s not nearly as different from them as they might think.
Very interesting.