(AP/Lynne Sladky)

Why Does Jeb Bush Want to Be President?

Jeet Heer – New Republic

Nothing in Jeb Bush’s presidential candidate is as enthusiastic as the logo he released on Sunday: Displaying his first name in blood red, the logo is capped off with an over-eager exclamation mark….

Why does Jeb Bush want to be president?… Running for the White House is a gruel: It’s time consuming, often humiliating, and sometimes damaging to one’s psychological well-being or family happiness….

He’s running, it seems, because his wealthy supporters think that there is a vacuum in the GOP. The party needs to put a more moderate visage and the other major candidates are too far to the right. But the role of Jeb-the-moderate sits uneasily with the candidate’s own political instincts, which are more in sync with the party’s right-wing base than commonly recognized.

Watch Jeb Bush’s campaign video

It’s Really More Like ‘Jeb?’ Than ‘Jeb!’

Chris Stirewalt – Fox News

The biggest disadvantage that Jeb Bush has isn’t his last name, but rather the relative quality of the Republican field he is facing.

The younger Bush obviously understands the liabilities involved with his family name and the basic American resistance to dynasties. Otherwise, he wouldn’t pick a logo that emphasizes a nickname that sounds as if it were ringing across the tennis courts at Andover….

Bush is probably a better establishment-backed candidate than either of the two after his brother, and both John McCain and Mitt Romney won by comfortable margins. Yet, this time seems different….

This time, Bush has at least two rivals in Gov. Scott Walker, R-Wisc., and Sen.Marco Rubio, R-Fla., whose talents and positions make them real alternatives. Jeb Bush is a better candidate in many ways than Romney or McCain were…. But unfortunately for him, his chief rivals are furlongs ahead of the 2008 and 2012 pack.

Can Jeb Bush Remind Voters Why They Liked Him?

Tim Alberta – National Journal

Bush hasn’t actually been a candidate – and Monday’s launch will allow him to begin his candidacy on his own terms, in his own backyard, by getting back to the basics of what his campaign was always supposed to be about: the power of his positive ideas, and his record of implementing them in Florida.

It’s no accident that Bush will announce at Miami-Dade College, one of the nation’s largest colleges, at a campus in a non-Republican part of South Florida, attended by a majority of minority students. It’s in this setting that Bush can refocus his image and redefine what his candidacy stands for – appealing to the middle of the electorate, preaching the power of education, and yes, as the name of his political committee suggests, giving low-income kids the “right to rise” in society.

To do these things again, Bush will emphasize that he’s done them before – and for that, he’ll have plenty of help. Bush’s team announced Friday the endorsements of all three of Florida’s statewide officials … It’s a show of power designed to emphasize that Bush, not Rubio, controls the state – and that Florida Republicans haven’t forgotten all that their 43rd governor did for the state.