“He hadn’t campaigned in the last 10 years, but he’s starting to hit his stride,” said Al Cardenas, a former chairman of the Florida GOP and a close confidant of Bush’s. “The more he’s been out there, the better he’s been doing.”…

“Jeb has become what we all knew he would be, a very strong candidate,” said Ron Kaufman, a veteran GOP lobbyist who is backing Bush. “He’s the kind of candidate that Republican primary voters nominate: articulate, thoughtful, a conservative centrist who’s had management experience, someone who fills the stage.”

Bush’s demonstrated transparency was on display again last week, when his campaign turned the release of his 33 years of tax returns into a carefully packaged media event. The very issue that tripped up Mitt Romney in 2012 served only to help Bush contrast his own “nothing to hide” persona with other candidates…

The spike really started after Bush’s campaign launch June 15 in Miami, which cable networks carried live. It was the first true opportunity for the country, hesitant to send a third Bush or a second Clinton to the White House, to see and hear about a Florida governor whose persona and political record remain relatively little-known.