Marco's Moment

Marco Rubio and his friend David Rivera crammed into a packed community center in Little Havana one night in the summer of 1996.

Rubio and Rivera, volunteers in the Bob Dole presidential campaign, were there to meet with a few dozen political leaders in the Cuban-American neighborhood in Miami. The topic, Bill Clinton's rise in the polls, was a downer. It looked like Dole was on the verge of being cast a loser in the race by August.

The night's speakers, one after another, stuck to that despondent theme.