The curious case of Ted Cruz

The following is my opinion only.

So, Ted is officially running for president. I don't think this comes as much of a surprise, as he seems to have been campaigning since he took office in a very Obama-esque manner if I do say so.

As Ted seems to be given over to bombastic and over the top moments, I wanted to cut to the heart of the matter, to see what Ted Cruz is really putting forward.

It seems to be, to paraphrase a modern day cynic, a campaign about nothing.

If one goes to his current website, linked below, there is not a single page devoted to proposed policy, or even thoughts on policy. There is nothing written as to how Captain Ted will right the ship. There is nothing about tax policy, budget plans, defense, social issues.

In short, nothing.

Granted the page does use the word "liberty" with great enthusiasm, and does feature his very lovely wife and adorable family, but that is not policy.

Is Ted Cruz going to get the GOP nod? I doubt it, but anything is possible. But what does his campaign actually represent? Is the idea to simply shape and mold his campaign to the whims of the pollsters? To say whatever needs to be said in that moment?

It seems to me that it has reached a new high of rhetoric and cheap publicity stunts trumping thought and process. There is no killer app. There is no new idea, new thought, or even old thought. Using words or terms like "liberty", "Constitution", and "safer America" are nothing more than tired slogans that represent the preying upon the lack of knowledge of the average American and their preference for the least amount of thought involved.

So check it out. Maybe he will update it with his grand plan. However, as of now, it is just a couple of lousy pages with obligatory photos of him shaking hands with models made out to look like blue collar folks.


tedcruz.org

 

He seems to believe you can vote climate change out of existence.

 

This is what you should expect from all the candidates this early, high on rhetoric, low of specifics. Glad I could help.

 

Typical conservative. Lotsa noise, no substance. Just like fart.

 

Maybe he should just say 'Hope and Change'.

 

I welcome Carnival's gambit - even if it's just a stepping stone to a FoxNews gig.

Randy Paul has been kicking the ropa vieja poutine out of the banana showboat, but the GOP's nominative process is most entertaining when it is a garish variety show.

Can they possibly top the zany thrills and spills of '12 that culminated in their show-stopping Romney Landslide!?

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In contrast, the Democratic Party's rubber stamp process promises to be relentlessly dull unless they can spice it up. Hillary won't be sworn in until January 20, 2017, and we've got some time to fill.

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He claims constitutional righteousness then promises to violate it. He's a wonderful Washington politician. He's right in stride with the status-quo.

 

I don't know what point you were trying to make there. Contrary to the right wing narrative, the Obama campaign had a catalog of specific proposals, most of which he has acted on, or annouced plans to deal with.

 

Why was his plan to produce his birth certificate a 3 year plan?

 

Oh, you mean he should promise a lot of things he can't deliver.

 

Probably because it was irrelevant, but drove the extremists even more nutso for no effort whatsoever.

 

An interesting article in National Review looking at Cruz from the perspective of someone who supports many of his policies:
http://www.nationalreview.com/artic...peaking-people-instead-them-charles-c-w-cooke

Basically, when people who AGREE with you compare you to an oily used-car salesman, it's not good.

Ted's problem is not just that he's a supposedly smart guy who panders to the stupidest members of the base. It's that he TRANSPARENTLY panders to them, in the most obviously unworkable ways. "Abolish the IRS!" he cries. "Repeal Obamacare!" "Climate change is a myth!" These are applause lines for the least reflective voters, but either obvious fantasy (abolishing the IRS), a lot more complex than he pretends (repealing Obamacare and replacing it with... what?) or contradicted by the science he claims to value (climate change).

As the article says:


I hated every single moment of the address. Why? Well, because for all his obvious talent Cruz’s rhetorical style frankly makes my hair curl a little. Striking a pose that lands somewhere between the oleaginousness of a Joel Osteen and the self-assuredness of a midwestern vacuum-cleaner salesman, Cruz delivers his speeches as might a mass-market motivational speaker in an Atlantic City Convention Center. The country, he tells his audiences rather obsequiously, will be saved by “people like you” — people, that is, who are willing to text the word “Constitution” to the number 33733, and to contribute generously to his political action committee. America, meanwhile, is held to be in grave trouble, and it needs to be rescued, NOW. There is potential everywhere, Cruz notes; if only we could tap into it — if only we would believe.


The writer also notes that Cruz suffers from "that slight awkwardness that comes with the presumption that, deep down, every line deserves to be an applause line." In other words, he has a massive ego and is unable to hide it.

 

This snake oil salesman was born in Canada and lived there until he was 4 yrs old. He is not eligible to run for president !

 

I SO hope we don't get left-wing birthers going after Cruz. It was stupid when they did it to Obama; it will be stupid if they do it to Cruz.

 

Here's the difference. Obama was born in Hawaii and is eligible to be our president. Cruz was born in Canada and lived there for the first years of his life. He's not Constitutionally allowed to be our president.

 

Yes, he is. He was a citizen at birth thanks to his mom being an American citizen. That's all it takes to be a "natural-born" citizen.

Please don't start this stupidity all over again.

 

He produced in 08. Not his fault RW whackos chose to listen to idiots like Donald trump or WND

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There will be enough on the right doing it that we can just quote them and chuckle

 

That might be the case if such people were to present any substantive reason to make such a comparison, but of course your post provides no evidence to that effect...

...though I guess there's always hope that someone can find fault with the crease in his pants.

 

If I may revisit this topic.

It has been a few days, and I would think that if there were any glitches, any bugs in the magic wizard box we all stare into, they could have been worked out.

In the interest of fairness, let us not judge Cruz on not having his platform, his plan, his killer apps for a better America ready to roll when he made his announcement at Liberty University.

So, I gave him a few more days.

However, at the writing of this, his website still lacks any sort of actual plan or policy statement.

 

What's missing is why anyone should give a damn what you give him.

 

According to the Constitution of the U.S. he is qualified to run for president. You need to get all the facts and become educated.

 

It wasn't. He provided his qualifications promptly but the massive right-wing brain fart known as birtherism still lingers.
Thanks for playing.

 

So which constitutional provisions speak to the presidential eligibility of the foreign born?

 

Don't underestimate just how dangerous Ted Cruz can be. He is not just another wing nut dressed up to be a thorn in the side of both parties. He is serious and has the chops to manipulate the public to his point of view. He has been groomed for the job by the top Libertarian thinkers in the country.

His dad, (who we will see soon I'm sure), is a fundamentalist preacher that has been reviving the country since Ted was 3. He was a star on a national level debate team in college, clerked for Renquist in the Supreme Court, and was a lawyer at Cook & Carlson, the national law firm that helped get W into the White House, fought the Proposition 8 fight in California, crafted the NRA 2nd amendment challenge that gave us the SCOTUS ruling, and is the firm with the current challenge to Obamacare now before the Court. You can think them nut jobs, but they are successful nut jobs.

My rather cloudy crystal ball predicts Cruz will drive the entire Republican field, along with their Congressional candidates, far right. He will make the insane sound reasonable and will force a Conservative Loyalty Test onto the Republican Party for the next cycle. He will force the GOP to prove his ideas of ideological purity wrong by election results. He will either remake the Nation into his own personal vision or destroy the Republican Party brand for the foreseeable future. Either way, he is someone that deserves close scrutiny.

 

If he doesn't get past "abolish the IRS", "global warming is a myth" and "I make a point of not using a teleprompter", he won't make it past the first round of the primaries.