The Rise of Marco Rubio, Roig-Franzia Manuel

Florida Senator Marco Rubio has been called the Michael Jordan of Republican politics. No one--not even his rivals in the Democratic Party--disagrees with the fact that Marco Rubio is going far in American politics.

Washington Post reporter Manuel Roig-Franzia tells the story of how Rubio rose so fast, and about the forces that have shaped him. Its a classic American odyssey: his parents left Cuba for a better economic life in Miami a few years before Castro came to power; the father worked as a bartender, the mother as a maid and then a stock clerk at Kmart. The small but tough Rubio made the football team, became an expert on the Miami Dolphins, and raced to begin a political career minutes after graduating from law school. By 2010, he had become the youngest-ever and the first Hispanic Speaker of the Florida Statehouse.