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. It's often been said that in presidential politics, Democrats fall in love, Republicans fall in line. But at least today, neither party looks like it is behaving in a normal fashion. When facing an open presidential contest, Democrats often begin by looking for the next Camelot era, the next John F. Kennedy or Robert F. Kennedy, but then end up in a rambunctious free-for-all. The late and great cowboy comedian Will Rogers famously said, "I am not a member of any organized political party. I am a Democrat." It was true then and still is now. Usually there is little orderly about the Democratic Party in presidential politics, unless an incumbent Democrat is seeking reelection—and even then, it can go either way. This

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