Shot down over Hanoi during the bleakest days of the Vietnam War, he endured torture and isolation. Today he trumpets his plan to overhaul the campaign finance system, a brave crusade against the special interests that propelled him and his colleagues into power in the first place. Bush is running on little besides personality. The Texas governor's biggest asset is his upbeat disposition. The first Texas politician to be elected to two consecutive four-year terms as governor, his outlook reminds many Republicans not only of his father, who seems larger than ever at the 10th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, but also of Ronald Reagan, who taught the GOP the virtues of optimism and the danger of defining itself as merely opposing whatever the Democrats supported.
Some elections are about great issues.
This one isn't. Some elections portend great changes in the American political landscape. This one won't. Some elections unleash great waves of passion. This one doesn't.