Okay--I have been trying to follow TX Senator Ted Cruz' various shenanigans regarding defunding Obamacare via a government shut-down or a default in a way that separates his
"strategery" from
his apparent personality. And I will admit defeat. I don't see what he's trying to do, here, because it looks like it won't actually defund Obamacare at all, but will cause the Republican party to shoulder the blame for whatever happens. Even if Cruz himself can walk away with the hero songs of Wingnut Valhalla resounding in his ears for trying.
He just seems very much to me a like a lad who went crying to his ma after being picked on, who got told "Well, bunnynose, it's because you are so very special and smart, that they are jealous of you!"
And he
believed it. And now thinks being picked on is all the proof of his specialness he'll ever need.
This is a nasty small thing to think and I don't even think it isn't true for a minute.
2 comments:
You linked to one of Dave Weigel's post, but the answer to your question may be another one of his posts. If he doesn't win this battle (and I don't see how he will), he can at least say that he went down swinging. Whether the government shuts down or not, eventually it will get resolved by some GOPers reaching a compromise and accepting that "ObamaCare" gets some funding. Cruz gets to say to the party true believers that he never signed on to the compromise. It's the true believers who decide the presidential candidate in the GOP primaries. What he's doing might be bad for his party overall, but it is setting him up to be the leader of whatever remains of that party when this is all over.
And thanks to the 2 party system, it's very hard for a party to actually be destroyed. No matter how bad a party does, it never goes away, it just stays in the wilderness for a while, waiting for the public to get sick of the other guys. At that point, no matter how awful the GOP is, the American public will probably be willing to give them another chance. If you don't buy the theory that the Republican party policies are responsible for its current problems, Cruz's strategy makes perfect sense. He gets to stay true to his beliefs, while waiting for the political cycle to cycle back to him.
I guess I'm being overly optimistic with the term "destroyed", there. I guess "pretty darn trashed as a brand" would be more what I have to hope for.
But when I take a look at how other members of his party are reacting to his nonsense (and with a primary challenge from the right--especially McConnell's lack of playing along), I wonder if there isn't some call for the GOP's grown-ups to get in charge.Not from the grassroots, mind. Just from what makes them so green.
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