According to various sources including some close to the Trump campaign, Ted Cruz is in what is being described as final talks on the logistics of a coming endorsement by Cruz of Donald Trump.
It could happen as early as Monday, before the debate.
This is fairly credible for one simple reason...Ted Cruz has finally realized the extent of the serious damage he did to his own future political prospects by his behavior at the 2016 GOP convention and his failure to honor the pledge he and other contestants made to endorse the eventual nominee, which was Donald Trump.
As I reported here, even many of Cruz's supporters at the convention went ballistic over Cruz's failure to endorse Trump.
That fallout continued after the convention. Last month, a poll showed that 43 percent of Texas Republicans wanted a different 2018 Senate nominee, with former Gov. Rick Perry getting a majority if he ran against Cruz in the primary. George P. Bush, the state's elected land commissioner and a popular figure in the state broke with Ted Cruz and his own family last month and heartily endorsed Donald Trump. And just a week ago, Cruz's own; campaign chairman in Texas, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick blasted Cruz by name and 'NeverTrumpers' in general for not getting on board, accusing them of helping Hillary Clinton get elected.
The final straw was RNC chairman Reince Pribus announcing that former primary challengers who’ve refused to support Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump are likely to face difficulties getting the RNC to allow them to make another run for president.
I have a feeling that really got Ted Cruz's attention.
So, if this comes off, what difference will it make? It might have made a large difference if Cruz had kept his word and endorsed Trump at the convention, especially if he did what Scott Walker's doing and actually campaigned for Trump. That would have meant a far more unified Republican party going in, because it would have delegitimized a large portion of the #nevertrumpers. Now,the differences are going to be fairly minimal.
The #nevertrumper stance is fairly dug in, particularly among the paid for punditocracy and the GOP establishment. They like the idea of Hillary winning, because it means business as usual for them.
Polls show that Trump, without Cruz's endorsement, has the support of 80% of likely Republican voters, while Mrs. Clinton has the support of 81%. There are no polls showing how many Democrats are crossing over to vote Trump and vice versa for Mrs. Clinton, but based on the state poll numbers as well as Trumps inroads into the Latino and black vote, it's fairly easy to extrapolate those numbers going Trump's way, especially when you realize that Trump has energized a lot of people who haven't voted in some time and aren't likely voters. Many of the pollsters have mentioned this and it's driving them nuts.
So overall, a Cruz endorsement could add a couple of points to Trump's numbers in some places, if that. It certainly won't stop the attacks on Trump from the usual 'conservative' suspects, but then a lot of us stopped caring about what they had to say a long time ago.
But the real beneficiary, of course, isn't Donald Trump but Ted Cruz. If he endorses Donald Trump and then simply sits the campaign out, he can make another run for the presidency, if he manages to survive being primaried in Texas. That, my friends is exactly why Cruz is coming out with this last minute endorsement.
Here's hoping Trump didn't promise him a position in the Trump administration for this gesture. Ted Cruz has already proven amply that he's no team player and that his word isn't worth much.
Well, Ted Cruz made his convention speech, all right.
I had a conversation with a friend about what he might do and my prediction was that Cruz's speech would mostly be an attempt to set himself up for 2020. Cruz could, of course be the one guy who could unify the party and at the same time position himself for a future run. If nothing else, just the fact that he kept his word to support the GOP nominee would mean a lot to people down the line.
That's the choice Reagan made after he was robbed of the nomination in 1976, and he manned up and worked hard for Gerald Ford. I personally think it helped Ronaldus Maximus a great deal in 1980.
Cruz is a very different kind of man, and I use the term loosely where's he's concerned.
The speech itself was basically boilerplate, and at least listenable for awhile because someone finally convinced Cruz somehow to drop the faux-preacher delivery this time that's always been a dead giveaway.
He got away with a lot of cute little lies, like trashing the Iran deal when it was Ted Cruz who voted for the Corker Amendment that allowed Obama to shove it through the senate. Or Cruz talking about how bad out of control offshoring and illegal migration is. It was Marco Rubio who pointed out Cruz's curious record on illegal migration in the debates and stumped him. And you don't get more globalist or pro offshoring than Cruz's choice of running mate, globalist shill Carly Fiorina. And of course, Cruz wasn't going to mention that he helped Obama fast track TPP, and lobbied heavily to increase H1B visas that throw Americans out of work in favor of cheaper foreign labor.
But I was prepared to let him get away with this horse manure because I hoped that just this once, he'd be concerned with something other than Ted Cruz. Silly me.
After talking about how we need leaders who stand for what he called 'shared principles,' Cruz told people not to stay home in November, which the crowd took as a lead in to his endorsing Donald Trump. Instead, he told essentially told people not to vote for Donald Trump with a line he threw in that was missing from the copy of the speech he submitted to Trump and the convention..."Vote your conscience."
Here's what happened after Cruz came out with this beauty..he was literally booed off the stage amid chants of “We want Trump!”
Typical Cruz moment... when the boos started, he flashed that sickly cobra smile of his and said, "I appreciate the enthusiasm of the New York delegation." Except it wasn't just New York as you can see from the video. But Cruz just stood there, smiling that creepy smile that reminded me of nothing so much as Humphrey Bogart's Captain Queeg in 'The Caine Mutiny' smiling while telling the court martial all about the non-existent key and the strawberries. Because like Queeg, Ted Cruz is always right. All that was missing is the little metal balls rattling in his hands.
Even most of the Texas delegation was fed up with him:
Fortunately, Trump and Ivanka appeared to hear Eric Trump speak, and the angry crowd was diverted, which is why you can hear the loud cheers at the end.
The fallout didn't stop there. Back stage, many of Cruz's supporters were visibly angry with him, as the Politico, CNN's Dana Bash and the AP reported. Cruz was refused entry to Sheldon Adelson's Skybox loaded with Republican conservative donors and strategists and was told simply to get out, that 'you don't belong here after what you just did.'
Another well known, long time Cruz backer was reportedly so angry he had to be physically restrained from assaulting the senator, and Heidi Cruz was heckled so badly she had to be hustled out of the arena by security.
The fun didn't end there either. Apparently the Texas delegation holds a traditional breakfast the morning after every convention roll call, and it's usually a pretty easygoing affair. It wasn't this time. Ted Cruz attended to try and make up some lost ground and the delegates called him to account for his behavior, as the New York Times reported:
Repeatedly, the taunts rained down on him.
“Sit down!” one man said, before a “Clinton-Cruz 2020” sign was raised.
“You need to do it now!” shouted another.
“Do it!” yelled a third. “Do it now!”
The episode supplied another vivid demonstration of a party sharply at odds during a moment historically reserved for unity, a snapshot of a convention hurtling into chaos in what was intended to be a celebratory week.
When attendees pointed out Mr. Cruz’s past pledge to support the eventual Republican nominee, Mr. Cruz, under duress throughout 25 minutes of heated questioning, suggested that any agreement was “abrogated” when Mr. Trump attacked his family.
“I am not in the habit of supporting people who attack my wife and attack my father,” he said, adding that he was not a “servile puppy dog.”
(Quite a give away, since it proved it wasn't about Cruz's principles, but all about him. - ed. note)
A man in the back hollered at the stage: “You’ve got to get over it. This is politics.”
One attendee, Thomas Mathis, said loudly that he was helping to elect Hillary Clinton and demonstratively turned his back, facing a table of beverages, as Mr. Cruz pressed on.
Another guest, Shawn McAnelly, who twice shouted at Mr. Cruz, was warned by security that if he did so again, he would be ejected.
Mr. Cruz sought to depict his critics as reflective of two men considered boogeymen for hard-line conservatives: John Boehner and Mitch McConnell.
He suggested that the calls to endorse under any circumstances reminded him of Washington ethos of “sit down, shut up, just support the team.”
“If that’s the price, I ain’t gonna do it,” he said.
Other members of the Texas delegation made no attempt to mask their anger at Mr. Cruz, who rose to political stardom with his attacks on other Republicans.
“It’s consistent behavior from him,” Representative Pete Sessions said before Mr. Cruz spoke on Thursday, adding, “He continued what he is — it’s about Ted.”
Representative Jeb Hensarling told reporters that Mr. Cruz had delivered the beginnings of an effective speech on Wednesday night and then “missed a two-foot putt” at the end.
The criticism was particularly striking, given that Mr. Cruz will need the support of the activists and officials in the room here when he seeks renomination to his Senate seat in less than two years.
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, who spoke earlier endorsing Donald Trump said it exactly right..."If You're not voting for Donald Trump, you're voting for Hillary."
There's no doubt in my mind that Governor Walker, an uncommonly brave and principled man will work his heart out to get Donald Trump elected. What a contrast to the subject of this story!
The latest attempt by the #neverTrumpers to whitewash this was a series of articles by the usual suspects especially at places like the rapidly sinking NRO. According to their line of - well, I censor myself -why no-oo, Ted Cruz didn’t say anything negative about Donald Trump. 'Vote your conscience' never meant don't vote for Donald Trump, Trump supporters just chose to take it that way. And say, if Trump is such a great, principled guy and it didn't apply to him, then why are you complaining, hmmm?'
Oh, please. Everybody knew exactly what 'vote your conscience' meant after Cruz delivered it with his signature smirk. Even Hillary Clinton got it and tweeted the phrase right after Cruz uttered it, likely cackling while she did it. So did every delegate on the the floor and Cruz caught hell for it even from a lot of his own people. Ted Cruz essentially endorsed Hillary Clinton, with all that portends. She knew it, and so did everyone else.
It was a sick, shameful exhibition of a man putting his own ego before country, let alone party.
I'm sick and tired of people defending this malignant narcissist. This was Trump's convention, he earned it fair and square and if Cruz didn't want to do the right thing, he should have stayed home just like John Kasich, Jeb!, and Lindsay Graham.
Donald Trump showed some real strategy smarts in how he handled this. Cruz wanted a speaking slot and Trump agreed he could have one, even giving him one in prime time. Trump had held out an olive branch to Ted Cruz before when the campaign ended only to have his hand slapped away, but perhaps he figured that given time to get over himself, Ted Cruz might actually do what he pledged to do, swallow hard and support the nominee. That, by the way is how winners behave. They give people the opportunity to come around and do the right thing.
Instead Cruz saw this as an opportunity to do whatever he could to help Hillary Clinton torpedo Donald Trump, figuring the party would rally around him in 2020.
When Trump's people received the speech Cruz planned to give, Cruz's invitation could have been rescinded. It certainly would have if it was Hillary's convention. But Trump wisely let it go through.
He gave Ted Cruz enough rope to hang himself in front of the entire party and millions of voters on prime time television. It actually unified the party by showing people the real Ted Cruz.
The Ready For Hillary #NeverTrump diehards will still worship him, but a lot of people who used to support him now see Ted Cruz for what he is.
2020? I doubt he even gets re-elected to the senate in 2018.
At last Thursday's Debate, both Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz (who were filmed by CNN shaking hands behind Donald Trump's back during a commercial break) used as part of their double teaming routine the line that Donald Trump is 'neutral on Israel' by which they clearly mean he doesn't support Israel.
So I got this question from a friend: "I just was wondering about your opinion re: Trump and Israel. Do you think he is anti-Israel, or do you think this is a last attempt to derail him before Super Tuesday?"
Ted Cruz repeated this again during his 'victory speech' after winning his home state of Texas. It's become a staple now for both Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio.
Is it true? Is Donald Trump anti-Israel? Is he 'neutral?'
Let's look at a few facts and find out.
First off, let's look at some endorsements. I first ran into Sarah Palin before she went national. Among her other attributes, she is a firm Judeophile who sometimes attends Jewish holiday celebrations at the local Anchorage Chabad according to the rabbi there. And she is more pro-Israel, frankly, than a lot of American Jews. It's an issue that matters to her. There's no way she would endorse a candidate whom she felt was not pro-Israel. Ditto when it comes to Mike Huckabee, and I personally know Israelis that have traveled with Governor Huckabee on his many visits to Israel.his views on the subject are pretty clear too.
The odds on Senator Jeff Sessions or Rep. Duncan Hunter endorsing Trump if he were not very pro-Israel e are almost as remote. Check out their voting records on Israel sometime...and that of Duncan Hunter's father, who held the same seat until he retired. Dutch politician Geert Wilders and author Diana West have also endorsed Donald Trump, two people also known for their pro-Israel bonifides.
Here's some more 'neutrality' for you.
Unlike anyone else running for the GOP nomination, Donald Trump actually endorsed Bibi Netanyahu and Likud in the last Israeli election, and even made a campaign commercial for him:
Talking to Sean Hannity on Thursday night, Trump said that it was a wonder that the Jewish state would still even talk to the White House, given what he said was shoddy treatment at the hands of the Obama administration. “Israel is so important,” Trump said in response to a question about the Middle East, before launching into fierce criticism of the president’s policies. “What Obama has done to Israel is a disgrace. How they even talk to us is hard to believe. How do they talk to Obama? I have friends, they support Obama and I say, ‘How do you do it?’ It’s almost like they do it out of habit. They agree he’s been terrible,” he said. “You look at what he’s done to Israel, with just this Iran deal, which is such a terrible deal. He has been the worst thing that’s ever happened to Israel,” Trump continued. “Now, a lot of my friends that are Jewish do not support him any longer. But I still have some that do. I say, ‘How can you do it?'”
Further on in the article, Trumps explicitly mentioned Arab incitement as the major obstacle to any peace agreement, saying that Palestinian children “grow up hating.”
Sure sounds neutral on Israel, doesn't he? Actually, if you look at the quote Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio are milking, it's clear from the context that what Donald Trump was talking about was taking a shot at mediating between the two sides, not 'neutrality.'
Personally, I like Trump's stance on Jerusalem, peace negotiations etc. Every US president since George W. Bush has promised to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem, in accordance with legislation passed by congress. They've all lied about it. I prefer someone who honest enough to say 'I like the idea' rather than make a meaningless promise. In any event, the Israeli government bears partial responsibility for not insisting. Trump would go into office not owing anyone, so I think there's a decent chance it might actually happen with him in the White House.
I also don't see anything wrong in him saying that he would love to be the one to bring peace between the Israelis and the Arabs whom call themselves Palestinians. But I also doubt he'd invest much energy in that once he found out the realities involved. And he's alluded to that as well.
Contrary to what Marco Rubio said, this IS very much a real estate deal since Oslo, in which one of the parties has consistently acted in bad faith. The fault for that belongs to Israel's Labor government, who were elected due to interference in Israel's election process by President Bill Clinton which was subsequently made illegal under Israeli law. They later went along with Clinton's diktats about putting his good friend Yasser Arafat in charge of things, a historic mistake.
Trump might have a shot at peace negotiations, but if not, I doubt he'd keep up a futile exercise if it failed. It wouldn't be the first loser deal he's abandoned.
Contrary to another fairy tale Ted Cruz told in his 'victory speech,' Donald Trump has also been quite outspoken about the Iran deal, something the GOP senate allowed to slip through. That's of major importance, especially since Trump has the experience and the guts to actually do something about it and get a consensus in congress to make it reality. And as I see it, his stance on negotiating with Putin when it comes to fighting jihad is frankly far more intelligent than any of the other candidate's. That affects America as well as Israel.
Then of course, there's the personal connection. Trump is from New York, works in professions saturated with Jews and is well known in that community as a supporter of Israel and local charities. The executive vice president of his organization is Jewish, as is his lawyer and close associate Micheal Cohen.
Donald Trump is extremely close to his daughter Ivanka, who converted to Orthodox Judaism when she married. He has two Jewish grandchildren and G-d willing, a third due any day now.She studied for her conversion with Rabbi Haskel Lookstein of Manhattan’s Kehilath Jeshurun synagogue,where she was married to Jared Kushner, a fierce advocate for Israel and publisher of the conservative and very pro-Israel New York Observer among his other ventures. I have no doubt whatsoever that Donald Trump has received a fair amount of information on Israel from that source and been influenced in that direction.
More? Trump is also a close friend of Sheldon Adelson and his wife Miriam, and has contributed to the charity she runs to rescue victims of human trafficking. Adelson also publishes Israel Hayom, the most popular newspaper in Israel, one with a fairly Right wing stance. While they differ on illegal migration (Sheldon likes cheap labor for his casinos) Adelson has as much as said after meeting with Trump that they're on the same page where Israel is concerned. There's absolutely no doubt in my mind that if he and Donald Trump were on different sides of the Israel question, Adelson would be shouting it from the rooftops. As he's shown us in the past,Sheldon Adelson is not at all shy about doing it either.
I'd argue that Donald Trump has a closer personal connection with Jews and Israel than any of the other candidates, Democrat or Republican. So unfortunately, as far as I'm concerned what Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz are peddling is utter falsehood.
It's particularly unfortunate in Ted Cruz's case. He markets himself as the Evangelical candidate, and yet once again we find him bearing what amounts to false witness. This is hardly the first time, and I can see why a lot of Evangelicals have bailed on him.
Even worse is his embrace of the endorsement of Mike Bickle, a fairly well known Evangelical preacher based in Kansas City, Mo. whom Cruz is apparently close to. Bickle has a dedicated program to convert Jews, and has said those who don’t become Christians willingly will be hunted down and killed for it, noting Adolf Hitler as “the most famous hunter in recent history.”
Jews could be lured in by “fishermen” and converted or they could be wiped out by “hunters.” Bickle said his congregation were fishermen.
“The Lord says, ‘I’m going to give all 20 million of them the chance. To respond to the fisherman. And I give them grace. And I give them grace,” Bickle added. “If they don’t respond to grace, I’m going to raise up the hunters … And the most famous hunter in recent history is a man named Adolf Hitler."
Bickle claims he's not an anti-semite, but this is exactly the sort of nonsense Jews have heard throughout history, during the Inquisition, during the Crusades, and during the years when 'missionaries' like Bickle plagued them with conversion sermons they were forced to attend when they were locked up in ghettos. It was the excuse used to evict them from nearly every country in Europe by fire and sword for not 'getting with the program' and abandoning the faith of their ancestors. It's what the anti-semitic Cardinal Glemp in Poland - and he was by no means alone -used to say in those famous 'Easter Sermons' that preceded the most horrific pogroms.
This has been called to Ted Cruz's attention, but he doubled down and is on record as paying tribute to Bickle and praising him as a big influence. And yet, Ted Cruz has the nerve to question someone else's attitudes on Jews and Israel!
I doubt this will faze any of Ted Cruz's supporters but it should, just out of simple decency. It's definitely been a factor in changing my view of Ted Cruz 180 degrees.
The Iowa caucus is over and the results are in...sort of.
On the Republican side, Ted Cruz ended up winning by just over three points, earning 8 delegates. Donald Trump finished second earning 7 delegates and Marco Rubio had a surprisingly decent third place finish, finishing about a point and a half behind Trump and also earning 7 delegates.
The Democrats are an entirely different story, although the contest was officially called for Hillary Clinton..so far. She ended up with 49.86% to Bernie Sanders 49.57, but there were apparently a few irregularities. The Microsoft app used to tally votes for the Democrats failed utterly in some areas, the vote tallies from something like 90 precincts were mysteriously delayed, and six precincts were literally decided by coin tosses...all of which Mrs. Clinton somehow won. Just try replicating that one in your own home. If you manage to get it right six times in a row, don't waste your time reading this any further. You're obviously telekinetic and should head to Vegas and the roulette wheel as fast as you can!
In any event, Bernie Sanders is understandably calling for access to the raw votes. Of course, by the time he gets them, the caravan will probably have moved on. At any rate, just like Mrs. Clinton's e-mail irregularities, this is probably just that vast, right wing conspiracy in action again, yes?
All that aside, what can we take away from all this?
In spite of the outsized coverage Iowa doesn't mean much in the big picture except to political junkies, pundits and media talking heads. The state is small, largely rural and mostly white and retail politics matter more here than in larger, more urban states where the population is more diverse and the media markets more important. And there's the unique caucus system where actual votes can be overridden by sheer organization that skews results. Nevertheless, it is still an important testing ground for the appeal of candidates and ultimately, a battle ground state in the general election to come.
Ted Cruz's victory here is a testimony to the fact that organization and a ground game matters in these affairs. Cruz had 12,000 volunteers in Iowa, 1,000 precinct captains, and a pair of old college dorms, “Camp Cruz” to house them. His followers here were in place earlier and far more organized than anyone else's and it showed in the results, particularly among Iowa's Evangelicals. And given that the state has such a relatively small voting base, it was enough to win. Whether he can reproduce that elsewhere and whether it will work as well as it did in Iowa is an open question.
If I'm Donald Trump, I'm looking at this and learning a huge lesson. He expected to win here based on his media footprint and outsize persona, and invested comparatively little in ground game and get out the vote efforts. While second place here is nothing to spit on, I have a feeling that in spite of his gracious remarks afterwards his competitive spirit is fairly fired up, and his morning after discussion with his advisers is centered on exploring which experts are tops at putting a ground game together and on contacting, interviewing and hiring them ASAP. He's fairly far ahead of Cruz in New Hampshire, so that gives him a short breather of 3 weeks or so to put this together before South Carolina and the other primaries with more delegates at stake. If he isn't having this conversation and putting a ground game together accordingly, he probably won't win the nomination.
Marco Rubio's third place finish came at the expense of the other establishment candidates still in the race. He's now the Chosen One of the GOP establishment to carry the banner and preserve their perks and their continuing flow of cheap labor.
His third place finish came courtesy of some heavy donations from the expected sources which allowed him to carpet bomb Iowa with media advertising...you could hardly turn on a radio or a TV without hearing him. Chris Christie, John Kasich, and Jeb Bush will start being pressured to exit the race and make room for Rubio unless Christie manages to pull off a miracle in New Hampshire.
If Rubio's smart, he will pretty much ignore New Hampshire where he has little support and concentrate on South Carolina. He won't win it, but he's local,and some hard work and another infusion of donor cash could get him to the next stop. The idea, after all for the GOP establishment to knock out Trump first and then Cruz, with Rubio as the new GOP 'product.'
The surprise in the Democrat fold is the close finish. Actually,it shouldn't be.
For Mrs. Clinton Iowa was a major trial, because it involves on the ground, retail politics. Hillary despises the little people unless it's carefully scripted and controlled, and that was evident in Iowa.
She was aloof, visibly uncomfortable and even lost it a few times. Mr. Bill and Chelsea tried, but failed to help her much. She has plenty of money to spend and a good ground game, but pulling off a statistical tie with the likes of Bernie Sanders with all the advantages she had probably has a lot of people wondering how she'll do in the general.
Bernie Sanders now has a good understanding of the Clinton machine and how it works, but he isn't going to be able to do much about it. New Hampshire, a state with demographics like Iowa's right next door to his home state of Vermont will be his high point. It's all downhill from there.
The Democrats depend on big turnout from two key groups as part of their coalition, blacks and Muslims. Neither will vote for a Jew, even an irreligious, anti-Israel Jew like Bernie Sanders. The last time the Democrats put a Jew on their national ticket was in 2000 with Joseph Lieberman. George W. Bush carried 40% of the Muslim vote that year and that might very well have cost the Democrats Florida and the election. As for blacks, according to the Pew Trust, aside from Muslims they are the most likely group of Americans to harbor anti-semitic attitudes. The Democrats aren't going to make the mistake they made with Lieberman
again.
The Left is on a jihad to teach us differently, but Senator Ted Cruz, like most politicians, understands that most Americans approve of traditional family values and like to see them reflected in the people they elect to office. This is common sense on their part - a man or woman with a family to protect and care for has a stake in society and his or her decisions are going to reflect that.
If the family is photogenic, that's also a plus. And as anyone who's ever run for office will tell you, running for office is a time consuming, demanding enterprise. And having the spouse and kids along when possible gives the family a little more time to spend together.
So Ted Cruz decided to have some fun with his family doing a commercial with a Christmas theme. It's political of course, but in a lighthearted and witty way modeled on the old Saturday Night Live faux commercials. Anyone with a sense of humor should be able to appreciate it, even if you disagree with Senator Cruz's positions:
That when Washington Post editorial cartoonist Ann Telnaes decided to attack Cruz's five and seven year old daughters, depicting them in a racist cartoon as mindless dancing monkeys, with Senator Ted Cruz as the organ grinder. You can see this on twitter in a gif she created here. (this gutless creep subsequently has removed that as well)
Her excuse for this viciousness was that if they were 'props' in the ad, they were 'fair game.'
Oh really? I wonder what the reaction would be if a major outlet like the Washington Post used that logic to depict the kids in this political ad as monkeys? Malia and Sasha appear about twenty minutes in:
Or how about the quaint little family group pictured in this political ad below?
After a major outcry, Washington Post editor Fred Hiatt removed the cartoon and Ann Telnaes' lame explanation with this comment :
Editor’s note from Fred Hiatt: It’s generally been the policy of our editorial section to leave children out of it. I failed to look at this cartoon before it was published. I understand why Ann thought an exception to the policy was warranted in this case, but I do not agree.
He 'failed to look at it?' He's supposedly the editor and he just let this go through without even taking the ten seconds it would take to glance at it and see this for what it was? I'd certainly like to give him the benefit of the doubt, but given the Washington Post's default ideological position, it's not easy. Especially since the Left has always crossed that line, with some honorable exceptions. Just ask the Palin kids or the Bush twins.
And there's also the fact that this is blatant racism, since Cruz and his children have Cuban ancestry. Would a cartoon of Obama's daughters as monkeys have ever gotten by the WAPO's editors? And if it had, can you imagine the headlines, and perhaps even the racial violence in response? Hiatt and Telnaes would be fortunate merely to be fired and allowed to leave town in one piece. Needless to say, since its Ted Cruz and he has an 'R' after his name, they'll merely remove the cartoon, issue a lame response that isn't even decent enough to be an apology and perhaps just chuckle among themselves about it in private.
Ted Cruz was his usual classy self in response, of course :
Actually.. they are indeed out of her league, not that it's a very high bar. Their father and mother have obviously raised them with a sense of decency, of right and wrong. Ms. Telnaes obviously never had the benefit of that sort of thing.
Unfortunately, she's just the first one out of the box. Rest assured that if Ted Cruz's star continues to rise, you're going to see a lot more of this.
Imagine 4.9 million new jobs. Imagine, instead of President Obama’s income stagnation, average wages rising 12.2% over the next decade. Capital investment rising 43.9%. And Americans at every level of the economy enjoying double-digit increases in after-tax income.
Imagine exports and manufacturing jobs booming. The trade deficit falling as the tax bias against American-made goods is eliminated. Imagine a 10% income tax. Every American filing his or her taxes on a postcard or an iPhone app. And abolishing the IRS as we know it.
All of this is possible if we learn from the past and follow the example of what works.
In July 1981, Democrat Tip O’Neill, who was then House Speaker, drew a line in the sand: He was going to stop the Reagan tax cut, and he had enough Democrats to do it, with a 20-vote cushion. But President Reagan took his case to the people. Calls and letters flooded Congress, the speaker’s 20 Democrats jumped ship, and Reagan signed the tax cut into law.
President Reagan knew that after years of economic stagnation the country was ready for a big change, and he knew that he would win if the people had their say.
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And the people were right. The Reagan tax cut led to what the late Robert Bartley, then editor of The Wall Street Journal, dubbed “The Seven Fat Years”—the period from 1983-89 when the economy soared by an average of 4.4% a year, including one year by 7.3%. The economy grew by nearly a third, disposable income increased 20%, and 18 million new jobs were created.
Meanwhile, despite lower tax rates, government revenue in the 1980s increased 27%, and the share of federal taxes paid by the top 10% rose to 56%, from 49%.
Now we’re living through the Eight Lean Years. From 2008 to today, the economy has grown 1.2% a year on average, with the weakest postrecession recovery in 75 years. The Joint Economic Committee estimates Americans are almost $3 trillion poorer today than we would be if the economy had grown as quickly as during the Reagan years.
American workers are the most creative and dynamic people in the world, if they aren’t shackled by Washington. As President Reagan showed—and before him, President Kennedy in the 1960s (average annual growth of 5.3%) and Presidents Harding and Coolidge in the 1920s (4.7% growth)—tax reform is a powerful lever for spurring economic expansion. Along with reducing red tape on business and restoring sound money, it can make the U.S. economy boom again.
That’s why I’m proposing the Simple Flat Tax as the cornerstone of my economic agenda.
In constructing my plan, I had several requirements. The plan should: spur robust economic growth and job creation, while raising after-tax income for all Americans; be dramatically simpler, to allow working people to file their taxes with a postcard or phone app; and shrink Washington by getting rid of the rat’s nest of complex tax requirements, credits and loopholes.
With these goals in mind, based on a structure suggested by President Reagan’s tax adviser, Arthur Laffer, my Simple Flat Tax plan features the following:
• For a family of four, no taxes whatsoever (income or payroll) on the first $36,000 of income.
• Above that level, a 10% flat tax on all individual income from wages and investment.
• No death tax, alternative minimum tax or ObamaCare taxes.
• Elimination of the payroll tax and the corporate income tax, to be replaced by a 16% Business Flat Tax. This would tax companies’ gross receipts from sales of goods and services, less purchases from other businesses, including capital investment. Simple, efficient, fair.
• A Universal Savings Account, which would allow every American to save up to $25,000 annually on a tax-deferred basis for any purpose.
Today, the U.S. taxes American producers that export goods, but it imposes no burden on imports. My business tax is border-adjusted, so exports are free of tax and imports pay the same business-flat-tax rate as U.S.-produced goods. By shifting to a territorial tax system that doesn’t tax income earned overseas twice, my plan will reverse the incentive for U.S. companies to relocate overseas. Instead, businesses will be relocating to America.
Giant corporations will lose their loopholes and instead pay the exact same Business Flat Tax as small businesses. And billionaire hedge-fund managers will no longer pay a lower rate than working men and women.
To keep the tax burden fair, my plan includes a $10,000 standard deduction and a $4,000 personal exemption, which means a family of four pays nothing on their first $36,000 of income. It ends the payroll tax altogether (while maintaining full funding for Social Security and Medicare). It maintains the current child tax credit and expands and modernizes the earned-income tax credit, with greater reforms to prevent fraud and encourage marriage.
The Simple Flat Tax also keeps the current deduction for all charitable giving, and includes a deduction for home-mortgage interest on the first $500,000 in principal.
The 10% income tax covers ordinary income and investment of all varieties. The virtue of a single tax rate is that the rate doesn’t rise as people work more and invest more. This means better incentives to increase output, and fewer distortions. Compliance costs are minimized and capital flows to where it is most efficient—creating the most jobs—rather than where the tax burden is minimized.
To get companies investing in worker productivity again, the Simple Flat Tax allows full and immediate expensing of business equipment, which will especially benefit heavy industry, mining, energy, farming, ranching and manufacturing.
My plan also improves treatment of savings by creating Universal Savings Accounts. Any adult can save $25,000 a year with taxes deferred, like in an IRA, and savers can use those funds at any time, for any purpose. This will help create the next generation of capitalists by encouraging younger workers to save and invest.
According to the nonpartisan Tax Foundation, my tax plan would boost the size of the economy above current projections by 13.9% over a decade, add 4.9 million jobs and increase average wages by 12.2%. Every income group would get a double-digit wage increase.
Along with other pro-growth policies—repealing ObamaCare and Dodd-Frank, rolling back burdensome regulations, restoring sound money and restraining spending—the Simple Flat Tax will help the economy soar again.
Reagan did it in 1981, and we can do it again. I intend to take it to the people: a simple flat tax, to benefit every American.
A lot of this makes excellent sense.
I personally was never a flat tax advocate until recently, when it became apparent that an awful lot of Americans as well as many here illegally pay no taxes whatsoever. There's an inherent problem in that.What you don't pay for, you don't value. And if it's not coming out of your wallet, you ordinarily have little or no interest in government waste or corruption.
On the other hand,when you do pay for something, you value it immensely and you want your money's worth. There's no more casual attitude about waste and corruption.
So, let's look at the plan itself.
The first thing that pops out in my mind is that unless there's border control coupled with a solution to America's illegal migrant problem and H1B visa abuse, wages are unlikely to go up and the job growth isn't likely to be as robust as Senator Cruz thinks. Unless these problems are dealt with, employers will simply hire from the stream of cheaper labor available from outside America, which will negate some of the growth. It will improve, but not nearly as much as Senator Cruz says it will unless this problem is solved, and solved now.
I also wonder if it would be better to allow businesses to expense equipment or to depreciate them over time. Every business is different, and rather than mandating expensing, I'd probably lean towards allowing a choice.
I'd also be interested in what Senator Cruz's plans are for entitlement reform. That's the 5,000 lb gorilla no one wants to tame, although I have to give credit to former President George W. Bush for at least trying to raise the issue. A certain amount of the problem can be solved by real crackdowns on Medicare, SSI and Social Security fraud, which account for literally billions of dollars. But the system still isn't taking in enough, and that dates back to when President Johnson and the majority Democrat congress first raided the Social Security trust fund to pay for the War on Poverty.
Social Security was originally a sound idea when FDR created it during the Great Depression. The banks had failed, and the country had 13 million seniors who had lost all of their retirement savings and were destitute, as well as a number of widows with dependent children in the same fix. Giving them some money was not only humane but sound economic policy because as they spent it, it helped the economy somewhat.
At that time there was no other way to make it work but as a Ponzi scheme of sorts, but that wasn't the problem it is now because there were a lot more workers per recipient. Now, the system is paying out more than it's taking in.
The obvious answer to me is grandfathering people above a certain age whom have paid into the system for years and allowing other American below that age to either stay in the existing system or to use all or part of their contributions to fund private retirement accounts, which is something like what Cruz is proposing with the $25,000 tax deferred accounts he mentions. Among other things, this would be a tangible asset that people could leave to their heirs if they desired.
All in all though, a sound plan. Tweaked a bit here and there, I think it would definitely help restore American prosperity provided action is also taken on some of the other issues I mentioned.
I have to admit, I have never seen a spectacle like this before. Just when I think the Leftist media has struck bottom, they dig a new hole even deeper. CNBC's 'moderators' made no secret of their political bias or their disgust and hatred of every candidate on the stage tonight. The questions they asked them were designed either to get the candidates to attack one another or of the 'have you stopped beating your wife' category.
Senator Ted Cruz fianlly had enough after he was insulted by being called 'not the problem solver America's voters need' in yet another 'question.' He got the biggest wave of applause all night when he called out Pravda-on- the-Hudson's John Harwood and CNBC anchor Carl Quintanilla on the bizarre, hostile questions and compared them to how Democrats were treated at their debate:
"The questions asked in this debate illustrate why the American people don't trust the media."
"This is not a cage match. And you look at the questions -- Donald Trump, are you a comic book villain? Ben Carson, can you do math? John Kasich, will you insult two people over here? Marco Rubio, why don't you resign? Jeb Bush, why have your numbers fallen? How about talking about the substantive issues?"
"The contrast with the Democratic debate, where every fawning question from the media was, which of you is more handsome and wise?"
"Let me be clear," Cruz said. "The men and women on this stage have more ideas, more experience, more common sense, than every participant in the Democratic debate. That debate reflected a debate between the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks."
"Nobody believes that the moderators have any intention of voting in a Republican primary"
I wouldn't even call it Bolsheviks versus Mensheviks myself...more like bunch of carnies seeing whom could game the rubes the most by promising 'free' stuff.And would anyone be surprised to find that certain questions asked in the democrat debate were run by one or more candidates in advance?
"The questions being asked shouldn't be trying to get people to tear into each other, it should be what are your substantive solutions to people at home," Cruz finished before getting cut off.
It was a superb moment, both for Ted Cruz and for the American people. Right before the eyes of the entire country on nationwide television, he just revealed that the emperor really has no clothes. And that a big part of our dysfunctional politics is due to creatures like CNBC's Carl Quintanilla, Becky Quick and John Harwood.
Still, unfortunately, there's the stupid party (as opposed to the corrupt one) to deal with.
While Reince Priebus, head of the RNC tweeted harsh criticism of CNBC's antics. But he still has no excuse for allowing Republican candidates to appear in a biased forum like this. And if he didn't know it was going to be this bad, he should have.
Marco Rubio came out with an excellent jab, saying 'The Democrats have their own super PAC. It's called the mainstream media.'
That's really what we're dealing with here. The efforts of some of these people aren't journalism. They amount to a campaign contribution in kind, and the GOP candidates need to simply say no to any further exercises like this.
There's absolutely no need for these unethical, egotistical 'moderators.' Make the debates Lincoln Douglas style, where each party speaks for a set time and the only outside party is a timekeeper.
You can't continue to kiss the feet of people who kick you.
You have to wonder how far the Obama team is willing to go to appease Iran.
In their latest provocation, 'moderate' Iranian president Hasan Rouhani appointed Hamid Aboutalebi to serve as Iran's UN envoy, which means he would enjoy diplomatic immunity in America.
Aboutalebi, pictured above then and now ( he's on your left in the older photo) participated in taking our diplomats in Tehran hostage and holding them for ransom back in 1979.
Amazingly, the Obama Administration didn't raise a murmur at this blatant extension of the middle digit by Iran. That was left to the U.S. Congress.
The Senate unanimously passed a bill sponsored by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) that would ban terrorists from entering the US to serve as UN ambassadors, and the House quickly followed suit, in a bill sponsored by Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-CO).
“Congress has voted unanimously in support of a bill to reject Iran’s deliberately insulting nomination of a known terrorist – one of the 1979 hostage-takers – to be their ambassador to the United Nations,” Cruz wrote in a statement shortly after the House decision. “I thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for supporting it, and urge the President to act quickly. We, as a country, can send an unequivocal message to rogue nations like Iran that the United States will not tolerate this kind of provocative and hostile behavior.”
Now comes the interesting part. Will President Obama sign the legislation? And if he refuses, will congress override his veto?
White House Spokeshole Jay Carney was noncommittal about it. The Regime was probably hoping this would pass unnoticed.
This is a superb lesson in how to handle a Leftist, partisan journalist in an interview when she tries at every opportunity to apply the old Alinsky rule of personalizing the target, in this case Ted Cruz.
You refuse to play that game, you don't allow them to make up their own 'facts', you hit back with real facts, and you turn the Alinsky rule right back on them to expose their bias. And you do it with a smile.
Americans who despair of the future of our country will receive a welcome shot of hope today, as a brave man stands up for freedom no matter the cost.
Texas Senator Ted Cruz is speaking on the Senate floor, vowing to talk against ObamaCare 'until I can stand no more.'
He began at 2:41, and can talk up until noon tomorrow, when under the Senate rules he has to stop, and the Senate would proceed to vote on ending debate and bringing the spending bill to the floor.
This isn't a filibuster, unfortunately. Harry Reid saw to that by quickly locking in the floor schedule early Monday, and that forces the chamber to vote by Wednesday afternoon.
“I want to disabuse everyone. There will be no filibuster today,” Mr. Reid said as he opened the Senate floor action for the day.
I want to reiterate the political games going on here. Cruz supports the House bill defunding ObamaCare, but if Democrat majority leader Harry Reid can get 60 votes for cloture in order to end debate, Reid can pass a new budget that funds ObamaCare by a simple majority and send it back to the House. If Reid can't get cloture, the budget bill stays in the Senate and forces Reid and the Democrats to publicly own both ObamaCare and the onus for shutting the government down.
The RINOs in the Senate are going to try to fool you by voting for cloture to shaft Cruz and the conservatives, and then cast a symbolic, futile vote for the doomed bill, so they can go home in 2014 and lie to you about how they 'voted against ObamaCare'.
Don't let them do it. Call, e-mail and tweet your senators and let them them know you understand this scam, and that a vote for cloture on their part is a vote for ObamaCare.
You can watch (or at least listen to) Senator Cruz live here.
The link may take a while to load.That alone should tell you America is tuning in.
Strange days indeed, when Republicans eat their own over something that seems to be a no brainer - defunding the deeply unpopular ObamaCare and avoiding a national trainwreck.
The GOP establishment, which seems to have difficulty finding its behind with both hands is facing mounting discontent over President Obama's signature achievement. In fact, it's this president's legacy, if you don't count unprecedented debt, Benghazi, Syria, Fast and Furious, lavish vacations, IRS-gate and a slightly improved golf score.
But for most Americans, who now have taken ex-Speaker Nancy Pelosi's advice and are finding out what's actually in ObamaCare now that the bill's passed and the legislation is taking effect, it's a nightmare. The most conservative estimates are that ObamaCare will increase healthcare costs for an average family of four by $7,450 between 2014 and 2022..if you can manage to see a doctor in anything like a timely manner.
And those figures do not account for the additional costs incurred if the president gets his way and legalizes 11 million plus illegal migrants, virtually all of whom will qualify for the taxpayer funded subsidies.
Even President Obama's allies the unions are jumping ship on ObamaCare at this point.
When conservative Republicans in the House and in the Senate actually took a look at the poll numbers and spoke to their constituents, it seemed like a no brainer that with President Obama pushing for yet another expansion on his credit card to raise the debt ceiling, this would be an incredible time to own this issue and connect with the American public by funding the government but defunding ObamaCare.
When the GOP establishment proved reluctant, the conservatives in the House and Senators like Utah's Mike Lee and Texan Ted Cruz led the charge to mobilize conservatives. They got well over a million signatures on an online petition and defied expectations by succeeding in getting a budget through that defunds ObamaCare.
And that when the RINO crap hit the fan.
The bill has to go to the Senate, where the Democrats will need to get 60 votes for cloture in order to end debate so Democrat majority leader Harry Reid can pass a new budget that funds ObamaCare by a simple majority and send it back to the House. If Reid
can't get cloture, the budget bill stays in the Senate and forces Reid and the Democrats to publicly own both ObamaCare and the onus for shutting the government down. Senator Cruz explains this admirably to FOX News commentator Chris Wallace here:
Guess who Reid's allies are in getting cloture?
None other than Arizona RINO John McCain, his sidekick Lindsay Graham and the rest of the RINOs on the so-called Gang of Eight. And they're not limiting themselves to merely disagreeing with Cruz and conservatives. They're trying to destroy them politically.
As Chris Wallace revealed, the RINOs actually sent him opposition research on Cruz prior to his interview with Cruz on his Sunday show, which Wallace, being an actual journalist refused to use or reveal where it came from. And as Tammy Bruce correctly surmises, if they're sending it to Chris Wallace, they're sending it to everyone.:
“This has been one of the strangest weeks I’ve ever had in Washington. As soon as we listed Ted Cruz as our guest this week, I got unsolicited research and questions, not from Democrats, but from top Republicans to hammer Cruz. Why are Republicans so angry at Ted Cruz?”
Well, for one thing, it's not all Republicans, but the RINO faction led by John McCain. They loathe Cruz, Rand Paul, Mike Lee, Ron Johnson and others from the Tea Party class of 2010 because they're conservatives first rather than Republicans, and came to Washington to govern and try to take back the country rather than going along with the Old Boy network and business as usual. Like the members of the House, they haven't been in Washington long enough to become insulated within the DC bubble from the people that sent them there, and they still retain the principles they ran on.
Worst of all, they refuse to show deference to their 'betters', carpet chewers and sell outs like McCain.
ObamaCare is a particular sore spot with the RINOs because the waiver Obama gave Congress applies to the RINOs and their staffs, and they damn well don't want to lose it because of what McCain famously called 'wacko birds'. So they're willing to break Ronald Reagan's 11th commandment in spades and provide oppo research to damage fellow Republicans.
Sarah Palin, as usual has the right of it. She demands that Wallace reveal which Republicans sent him the material intended to damage Senator Ted Cruz (h/t The Noisy Room):
@FoxNewsSunday Keep it TRULY fair & balanced. Release the GOP names encouraging you to trash @SenTedCruz. No more anonymous sources.
As I mentioned previously, defunding both the mandatory and discretionary funding for ObamaCare is definitely possible. Congress does exactly that with the Hyde Amendment, which prevents funds going to MedicAid from paying for abortions with exceptions for incest and rape. It's done via a rider that is attached to the annual appropriations bill for the Department of Health and Human Services and has passed every year since 1976.
The RINOs, short sighted as usual, would rather not make waves.Losing elections has taught the Stupid Party nothing, although Cruz and his fellow lions appear to have learned something.
At the very least, this would put President Obama and Harry Reid in the uncomfortable position of having to whip their fellow Democrats into line to support shutting down the government to save a piece of legislation the vast majority of American hate...with the 2014 midterms coming on. The results of this might end up being surprising.
On the other hand, we have, apparently, a contingent within the GOP who have no allegiance to small r republican principles, or really, any principles whatsoever aside from getting re-elected again. Something is going to have to give, and it may just be the Republican Party.
That sharp, cracking sound you hear is the political borders re-aligning, and it may just be the start of the GOP establishment going the way of the Whigs.
Rafael Cruz, Senator Ted Cruz's father experienced both Batista's dictatorship and Fidel Castro's 'socialist' one in Cuba before he emigrated to America. He had a few things to say about liberty and tyranny that are well worth hearing, especially in Obama's America.
Because there's nothing new under the sun, really. Only the players change.
Hillary Clinton
