Drumpf Is the Most Offensive GOP Candidate, But Cruz Would Be More Dangerous in the Oval Office

[KamaAina]

http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/trump-most-offensive-gop-candidate-cruz-would-be-more-dangerous-oval-office

As the 2016 primary season continues, the notion that Ted Cruz might be the Republican Party’s last best chance to save itself from Donald Trump’s takeover is a spectacle all by itself. Cruz, the most mistrusted and reviled Republican senator, a serial liar who led the 2013 government shutdown and called Majority Leader Mitch McConnell a fraud on the Senate floor, is now the party’s great savior?

It may be that Republicans would prefer the right-wing devil they know rather than the one they do not. Their fears of Trump resemble wide swings of a pendulum. On some issues it’s his ugly, bigoted and juvenile rhetoric and strongman posturing that repulses. On the other extreme lurks a sneaking suspicion among GOP luminaries that he might be too liberal and malleable, not just unpredictable, for conservatives to stomach.

Trump is the more offensive presidential candidate, but Cruz is far more dangerous. As Eugene Robinson, a Washington Post columnist, wrote in December, “If Ted Cruz is the Republican Party’s cure for Donald Trump, the antidote may be worse than the poison.”

That verdict is not unique. Cruz is not just a serial exaggerator and liar. He’s a conniving, uncompromising, power-hungry demagogue whose antics and beliefs would be right at home in the crusades of Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s 1950s America, many campaign fact-checking websites, longtime politicos and pundits have warily noted.

[lapfog_1]

1. yup.

[marew]

2. I'd previously come to the same conclusion. n/t

[TheCowsCameHome]

3. Cruz would be dangerous in a room full of Nerf balls.

The man is a psycho.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

4. The reverse is more accurate.

Cruz is more ideologically scary. But he's pretty much constrained by the political system. And he's pissed off just about everyone in DC, meaning he's only screwing his own agenda should he get in the White House. I see a Cruz administration as a lot of scary bluster but very little action.

Trump, on the other hand, isn't as ideological as Cruz but more opportunistic. However, what is completely terrifying about Trump is that he has zero concept or desire to abide by normal Constitutional or even basic societal provisions. He's a Cluster B psychopath with zero impulse control, and that is a recipe for disaster.

If Donald Trump gets elected, far right conservatism is the very least of our worries.

[Jarqui]

5. I remember Reagan scaring me that he was going to have access to the

nuclear football. I never felt he was the sharpest knife in the drawer and feared he could get suckered into using nuclear weapons.

Fortunately, my fears were not realized.

Trump has a vindictive temper - I'm not exaggerating, look at his history. Cruz comes across as a psycho to me. The notion of either of these men walking around with access to nuclear weapons is chilling.

That's one redeeming thing about Hillary that she's handily got over them - she cares too much about what people would think of her to use nuclear weapons easily. I cannot stand her dishonesty but the above is one reason why I might support her against these ghastly GOP wackjobs.

[Bettie]

6. Trump is on an ego trip

Ted Cruz wants to remake the country to his warped sense of reality.

Trump will do incidental harm and embarrass us.

Cruz other will do purposeful and carefully orchestrated damage to all of us.