MARCO – AT 10:20 A.M. ET:  The contrast is beginning to show between Hillary Clinton and Marco Rubio, who immediately emerged as an important contender for the Republican nomination. 

Clinton is on her magical mystery tour to Iowa, desperately trying to assert that she's human.  She's having a tough time proving the impossible.  By contrast, Marco Rubio is conducting a grown-up campaign, discussing, for example, the challenge of dealing with Russia.  From The Hill: 

Rubio called for the U.S. to reinvigorate a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe and consider deploying additional troops in Western Europe. He also said the U.S. should arm Ukrainian forces facing Russian-backed separatists, something that President Obama has ruled out so far.

"At some point this spring, you mark my words, and you keep this recording, there is going to be at some point separatists moving on a spring offensive again," he warned.

"They’re going to try to seize key towns like Donetsk and Luhansk, and you’re going to see that happen here fairly soon. So we need to be prepared for that," he said.

Rubio said Russia's success in Ukraine was inviting further aggression, possibly against Eastern European NATO members, which the U.S. would have to protect.

Rubio also called for increased U.S. defense spending in 2016, and explained his decision to support increasing spending by $20 billion next year, without finding offsets.

"I have no problem offsetting it if it is possible," he said, but added, "The cause of our national debt is not military spending or discretionary spending in general.

"We need to fund national defense, because that is the priority of the national federal government, and that’s the reason, the primary reason why we have a federal government, is to provide for our national defense," he said.

He said the U.S. needed the Ohio-class nuclear submarine and a long range strike bomber, and that it should modernize nuclear stockpiles.

He also said the U.S. needed 12 or 13 aircraft carrier groups, over the current 10, to fill carrier availability gaps in the Asia Pacific.

He warned that although the U.S. had a military edge over China, it would be "not for much longer" unless the U.S. continued to improve its capabilities.

COMMENT:  That is a grown-up talking, and it's refreshing to hear.  Rubio would be a giant of a president compared to Obama, who, as we've said before, is more of a glorified town councilman.

Watch Rubio.  Americans are tired of mush, and he's not mush.

April 15, 2015