Posted on 01/11/2015 11:53:34 AM PST by Pelham
Jeb Bush once called for building prisons and emphasizing “punishment over therapy” for juvenile offenders. Today, he supports reforming the criminal justice system, arguing that incarceration can harden low-level lawbreakers into career criminals.
In the past, he stressed using deportation to rid the United States of unauthorized immigrants. These days, he describes crossing the border illegally as “an act of love” by migrant parents and supports a path to citizenship for those who have done so.
He used to emphasize the rights of big landowners who felt cheated by environmental programs. Now, he is a champion of state-sponsored conservation, celebrated for his $2 billion program to restore the Everglades.
Mr. Bush, 61, the former governor of Florida, insists that he will not contort himself to satisfy the ideologues of the Republican Party as he lays the groundwork for a possible presidential run in 2016. But as he pledges to stay true to his beliefs, an examination of Mr. Bush’s record reveals ways in which those views have already changed since his first run for elected office — in presentation, in tone, in language and, at times, in substance.
The long trail of Mr. Bush’s pronouncements — from his days as a candidate for governor of Florida in 1994 to today in his role as a public policy expert bent on recasting the Republican brand — will inevitability invite suspicion from within his party that he lacks genuine conservative conviction, a wariness that he needs to overcome to win the Republican nomination. But the journey may give Mr. Bush the broader, cross-party appeal necessary to compete in a presidential general election.
Over the past two decades, Mr. Bush has shifted from a doctrinaire and, in his word, “headbanging” version of conservatism, forged in the crucible of Newt Gingrich’s revolt-driven Republican Party,
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Agree.
sounds Clinton to me
Is a “headbanging conservative” to the left or right of a “severe conservative”?
Either way, if you have to tell us, you aren’t.
Uniparty wouldn’t be so bad if they were united in America’s interest under God (which is a very benevolent attitude).
They aren’t. They are a royalty unto themselves. The GOP has not yet dramatically booed the Lord, but they are getting closer to it.
We need to turn our hearts to our Heavenly Father and get ourselves a change of attitude.
Philosophically, he already has. The switch is all over except for the announcement.
If he can use the GOP apparatus to get elected, he won't formally switch. Instead, he'll announce a unity initiative. Since the left never compromises, we know what that means.
The whole Bush family might as well just move to Martha’s Vineyard. They would all fit right in there.
Amazing what lobbyist dollars can do. Look at Boner’s re-rlection!
evolving.... or devolving?
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