Jeb Bush and his supporters in the Republican establishment would have us believe that the former Florida governor is the most accomplished, intelligent, and reasonable man available to run for president on the Republican ticket. He is somewhat accomplished as governor of the very difficult to govern state of Florida, and I suppose in a way he is reasonable -- which in establishment-speak means he is a squishy moderate. You know, the way Bob Dole was the most "reasonable" in 1996, John McCain in 2008, and Mitt Romney in 2012. 

In Washington circles, reasonable is overrated. It normally means someone who doesn't stand for anything. 

Moreover, we know Jeb's father once infamously said he didn't have "the vision thing" -- you know, like any inkling of why it was he wanted to run for president in the first place. Today I'd like to take a peek under the hood of Jeb's "intelligence thing", so to speak.  And what better topic to filter intelligence through than education and Common Core?

Jeb has been a big proponent of Common Core from the beginning. And yet, I have to ask the former governor with all seriousness -- do you have any idea what Common Core is? I think his statements in New Hampshire this week cast doubt as to the answer to that question.

To his credit, he did not back down on Common Core, even knowing that it will be an obstacle for him in wooing Republican voters. Of course, in New Hampshire, the Republican primary often has little to with just Republican voters -- but crossover primaries are a topic for another day. 

Still, give credit where it's due, and Bush said again that “you don’t abandon your core beliefs, you go try to persuade people as I’m doing now. I think you need to be genuine. I think you need to have a backbone.” 

Okay, so I'll credit a few points for having a backbone -- given that there's no discernible evidence of a spine in most Washington Republicans. But Bush's case is just nonsense. 

Consider: After doubling down on his support for Common Core, Jeb admits that it was “wrong” for the federal government to offer money to states to get them to adopt Common Core, “but that doesn’t mean the standards are wrong.”

He then wanders further afield, adding that the Federal Government "should play no role in creating education standards" and to make sure we didn't misunderstand, added that we need to “put a big iron fence around it (Fed control), bury it, over and out."

Huh? Yeah, that’s really going to happen with Washington controlling the money.

Jeb, I hate to break it to you, but the program is called Common core. As in a common, 'one size fits all 50 states' core curriculum. That's the name of the program, and more to the point, that's the reason for its existence in the first place.

It's put together by a bunch of academic elitists who think they know what's best for all of us. Of course it will be run from Washington. Of course Washington will hold the power of the purse over states to get them to do it -- either in the spirit of a bribe, or with the implied threat of the power of government. 

It sounds to me like Jeb wants to have it both ways -- getting credit for standing his ground while professing a sudden conservative interest in getting the Feds out of the education business. I suppose it was an attempt to thread the needle politically. 

But it doesn't work. The majority of the proponents -- and the authors and developers -- of Common Core are absolutely committed to a political agenda and centralized control of education money and decision making. That's why we have it in the first place. 

The truth is, Jeb is just babbling on this topic. The "education governor," who founded an "education foundation" is simply not coming off as being very astute on what is supposed to be his pet issue. So, tell me about that 'intelligence thing' again?