Much has been made of the recessive and reactive—and borderline petulant—campaigning style of Jeb Bush, son and brother of the last two Republican presidents. The Bush name ought to be mud right about now—even if GWB’s wretched tenure served to make his dad’s performance on the job seem a lot less miserable than it seemed at the time.
The website Death and Taxes has taken to publishing somewhat prickly recent quotations from Jeb as read aloud in a “millennial” tone of voice—lots of question-mark-style upswings? At the end of most of the sentences?—and with the trademark speech inflection of the generation known as “vocal fry,” which comes about when you elongate a vowel sound and needlessly inject the back of your throat into the action, as in these canonical examples. (The term “vocal fry” apparently derives from a 2011 article in Science; it seems that it is mostly something younger women do and that it is a trend started by none other than Kim Kardashian.)
The actual reader of the quotes is Death and Taxes writer Jamie Peck.
I suspect that old Jeb will somehow pull off this stupid race for the GOP nomination, but boy, he’s making it look pretty unlikely right about now…..
Here are three examples of Jeb-as-whiny-millennial. Funny, but these would work even better as redubbed videos so you could see Jeb “say” it like this.
“First of all, I’m pretty sure Marco can put his big-boy pants on. ...”
“This is the first in the nation primary. ...”
“My aspiration for the country and I believe we can achieve it. ...”
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
An electoral map showing how Donald Trump could become President
Donald Trump: ‘F*ck your Hair,’ the beer