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Marco Rubio as 'the Republican Obama'

February 25, 2010 —

Among national political media, the prize goes to The New Republic’s John Judis. He is among the first to realize that in politics, the shortest line between two points is the straight one of simple deduction. Judis recently wrote the piece, “Marco Rubio Is The GOP’s Obama.” 

Florida Insider offered the exact same notion about four years ago. We wrote it before Rubio had become Florida state speaker of the House, and before many people thought Obama would reach the White House so quickly, or at all. 

Back then, we weren’t so much predicting as we were suggesting.  Rubio’s youth, cinematic looks, and Cuban roots – his parents were born there – made him seem an obvious apprentice to high office. The Republicans needed to keep their base happy, but they also badly needed a sustained outreach to the swelling population of Latinos in Florida and elsewhere. How better to do that than by adopting a Jeb Bush acolyte with a political biography too sketchy to quibble with? Who better to recruit than this man with the million-dollar smile with which to work the room?  That was Rubio, and it still is. He’s only 39.  

In 2006 Tallahassee, a handful of observers thought our notion of Rubio as a national political figure was obvious. More thought it ridiculous. Wouldn’t it be an irony if both perceptions turned out to be right?  

One night in the mid-1970s, I was eating dinner with my family in suburban Atlanta. A radio newscaster informed us that Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter might run for president. Spontaneously, we each started laughing. Jimmy Carter for president? Our Jimmy Carter? From up-close observation, we knew he had clay feet, as everyone does.  

So does Rubio. So what? Extreme heat can make clay into something durable, and sellable.  What goes on in Tallahassee can stay there. 

I forget where I read it. Some political essayist described an experiment he’d heard about. Following a banquet or a symposium or some such, a squad of political science students culled from the empty auditorium the scrap paper notes and doodlings of those who had attended. They found that right-wingers sketched mostly geometric designs. Left-wingers drew people. Crudely put, Republicans look at politics and government and see abstract ideas. Democrats see human beings.  

The GOP needs ideas. Even more urgently, it needs a human face. A new face. A trustworthy and compassionate one. A face with which to present its narrative of anger and resentment. Rubio is that face, or could be, and that’s why the trajectory of his career right now is vertical.  

Is this an endorsement of him? A prediction that he will become US senator next year, or even president one day? No, and no. The political winds are swirling in cross-currents right now. They’re too gusty to be placing bets on anybody. 

Rubio’s chief opponent in the Republican primary this summer is one Gov. Charlie Crist. The governor has over-reached in his attempt to appear above partisanship. But he is about to open a homestand. He’s about to leave behind the frustration and tedium of governing, and instead hit the heady circuit of campaigning. He’s about to be tossed into the briar patch of electioneering, his homestead. Charlie Crist has made a career of being underestimated. He is a bounding hare deliberately disguised as a plodding tortoise.  

(Crist and his campaign staff have to be gnashing their teeth that the sour economy and the Democrats’ misplaced emphasis on health-care reform have delayed the next, inevitable heated national debate about illegal immigration. That might have ruptured Rubio’s ambitious try at building a pragmatic coalition of Latinos and angry Anglo Republicans. It’s a rupture that might be inevitable anyway, eventually.) 

Be all this as it may, the opposition to Crist isn’t just deep; it’s a bottomless pit of conservative contempt. What remains is to discover how wide that opposition is, and if the Rubio tribe can properly exploit it.  

The legitimate rap on Rubio by veteran politicians in Florida is that he doesn’t have enough experience in government, and especially in business, or “the real world.” The last guy we heard that about now calls the White House home. 

The man Rubio has met the time, which right now is one of voters with more zeal than focus. He hasn’t been offering up many practical solutions to what ails Florida and Washington. He’d be a fool if he did.  His road is laid out before him – ride on the shoulders of the disenchanted. Just as Obama did, Rubio is allowing citizen malcontents to project onto him their fondest hopes.  He absorbs them like a clean, fluffy towel. 

Rubio has to know full well that he is a human marketing campaign for the national Republicans. He’s a precious foundling, and everybody wants to adopt him as their own. Although no political genius, the man is bright. He's also tireless and disciplined, and he stays within himself. He doesn’t foam at the mouth. He carries the traditional Republican torch without committing arson. And yes, he tells people what they want to hear. Most of all, he is seizing the moment. Just as Obama once did.