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SARASOTA Conventional wisdom has it that Florida is Jeb Bush country in the 2016 Republican presidential primary, while Florida Sen. Marco Rubio enjoys lots of conservative Sunshine State love as well.

But that didn't stop Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul from courting Republicans in Bush/Rubio home turf this weekend. At a Valentine's evening airport rally on Saturday he found plenty of Republicans receptive to his message.

"I like Jeb Bush. I've voted for him," said Republican business broker Dale Tindall. "But whether it's the Bushes or the Kennedys, or the Clintons, enough is enough."

That sentiment was repeated over and over again in random interviews among the several hundred people gathered at the Sarasota Bradenton International Airport on Saturday to see Paul, who told the Tampa Bay Times he is not intimidated by his rivals' Florida advantage or by Bush's expected overwhelming fundraising advantage.

"Most of the grass roots of our party believes that we should have less centralization of education in Washington. Most of the people I meet are opposed to Common Core, as I am," Paul, 52, said of the education standards championed by Bush and adopted by Florida and most other states. "I just think it's going to be difficult (for Bush) to win over grass roots conservatives."

Paul suggested he would like to see both Rubio and Bush jump into the presidential race.

"That would actually make it more like the vote would split enough ways for the state to be competitive," Paul said.

The Kentucky senator on Friday addressed the Orange County GOP's Lincoln Day Dinner, while Bush was in Southwest Florida at the Barbara Bush Foundation's annual event promoting literacy.

Asked at a news conference about his brother's handling of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Bush demurred.

"If I'm in the process of considering the possibility of running, it's not about re-litigating anything in the past," the Washington Post quoted him as saying. "I won't talk about the past. I'll talk about the future."

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Rand Paul gets receptive ear to his message behind enemy lines in Sarasota

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is adopting an old tactic of Hillary Clinton's, making a habitofworking across the aisle ahead of a presidential election.

Paul, a likely presidential candidate in 2016, has sponsored bills with Democratic colleagues on topics ranging from criminal justice reform to fiscal oversight of the Pentagon, apparently in an effort to broaden his appeal.

He could be helped in this regard by his overall worldview. Paul sees interventionism overseas and government surveillance at home through a skeptical lens, a position that is more common, overall, on the left than the right.

Still, Paul is best known to many people as a leader of the 2010 Tea Party revolution. Others recall that one of the first media firestorms he ignited was centered on his complicated view of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

Conspicuous teamwork with Democrats in Congress could help him appeal to independents in next years primaries and in the general election.

This week, Paul introduced legislation with Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to restore federal voting rights to non-violent offenders who have been released from prison.

Last week, he unveiled a bill with Sen. Patrick Leahy (Vt.), the senior Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, to give federal judges more discretion to hand out sentences below the requirements of mandatory minimums.

Paul and Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), one of the most liberal members of the Democratic caucus, last month announced a proposal to extend the Highway Trust Fund by giving companies a tax incentive to repatriate overseas profits.

In her time in the Senate, Hillary Clinton sponsored an array of bipartisan bills, with an eye on fashioning a pragmatic image after years of being seen as a hyper-partisan figure.

In the summer of 2006, for example, she co-sponsored, with former Sen. Robert Bennett (R-Utah), a proposed constitutional amendment to ban desecration of the American flag that came within one vote of passing the Senate.

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Paul takes page from Clinton playbook

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