Back in 2008, Barack Obama was called “the anointed one,” but when it comes to the Republican establishment and 2016, that term could be applied to Jeb Bush. So it is important to examine the sorts of issues that just might occur to Democrat attack dogs as a basis for demonizing him. How about, for instance, this, via Forbes:

In the summer of 2008, as the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression was unfolding, Jeb Bush, Florida’s former governor and brother of then President George W. Bush, traveled to Mexico to ask Mexican telecom mogul Carlos Slim Helú to rescue Lehman Brothers, The New York Times reported.

In a front page article on Monday, The Times revealed that within a year of ending his term as Florida’s governor, Bush had signed on as consultant to Lehman Brothers, where he was enlisted to reach out to Carlos Slim in a plan code-named Project Verde(Green Project).

Obviously the Times is already building its portfolio of issues on which to attack Bush in the same way Mitt Romney was successfully demonized. Ironically, Slim is the same man who bailed out the New York Times Company with a high interest loan that carried a lucrative equity kicker in 2009, despite the paper having editorialized two years earlier:

...the momentous scale is not the most galling aspect of Mr. Slim's riches. There's the issue of theft.

Like many a robber baron - or Russian oligarch, or Enronexecutive - Mr. Slim calls to mind the words of Honoré de Balzac: "Behind every great fortune there is a crime." Mr. Slim's sin, if not technically criminal, is like that of Rockefeller, the sin of the monopolist.

Given the Times’ pre-bailout characterization of Slim, why is Jeb Bush on such familiar terms with him that he would be called in as an intermediary? Forbes notes:

As to why Lehman Brothers chose Bush, and not others, for the Slim mission has to do with his reputation as being close to Mexico. Bush is married to a Mexican national, speaks fluent Spanish and has long-standing connections to powerful Mexicans both in the business community and among the political elite.

How do you say "Mitt Romney" with a Spanish accent?