As discouraging as the partisanship, polarization, and dysfunction are in Washington these days, I confess to being really excited by the unfolding 2016 presidential campaign. Not that there is another George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, or Ronald Reagan on the immediate horizon, but this race appears to have some really interesting aspects to it.

There are as many ways to look at presidential nomination contests as there are political aficionados. A few weeks ago, I wrote about my preferred method for understanding the GOP race: treating it like the NCAA basketball tournament. According to this scheme, the Republican race consists of four brackets - the Establishment bracket; the Secular/Conventional Conservative bracket; the Tea...

The front-page headline in The Washington Post said it all: "Democrats in key states ask: Where is Hillary?" Putting aside the simple facts that the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary are both 10 months away and that Hillary Clinton is not expected to officially enter the race before next month, this headline says so much more. In fact, it telegraphs the coming story line.

The race for next year's Republican presidential nomination is going to be fascinating on so many levels, but none more than the challenges facing former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.

For some time, polls have found former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush with higher negative ratings than one might expect of someone who has never before run for president or, until recently, maintained a high national political profile. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images)In the newly released NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll conducted March 1 through 5, among 1,000 adults nationwide, 34 percent of those...