The G.O.P.’s Nasty Newcomer
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/17/opinion/sunday/ted-cruz-the-gops-nasty-newcomer.htmlThe G.O.P.s Nasty Newcomer
By FRANK BRUNI
WHEN a Vesuvius like John McCain tells you that you belch too much smoke and spew too much fire, you know youve got a problem.
And Ted Cruz, a Republican freshman in the Senate who has been front and center in his partys effort to squash Chuck Hagels nomination as secretary of defense, has a problem. Hes an ornery, swaggering piece of work. Just six weeks since his arrival on Capitol Hill, hes already known for his naysaying, his nit-picking and his itch to upbraid lawmakers who are vastly senior to him, who have sacrificed more than he has and who deserve a measure of respect, or at least an iota of courtesy. Courtesy isnt Cruzs métier. Grandstanding and browbeating are.
He sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and during its final meeting on Tuesday about Hagels nomination, he made such nefarious and hectoring insinuations about Hagels possible corruption by foreign influences that McCain, whod gleefully raked Hagel over the coals himself, more or less told Cruz to cool it. It was an unforgettable moment, and one that Republicans shouldnt soon forget, because Cruz, 42, isnt simply the latest overeager beaver to start gnawing his way through the halls of Congress. Hes a prime illustration of what plagues the Republican Party and holds it back.
A fascinating illustration, too. On the surface, he should be part of the solution: young, Latino, with a hardscrabble family story including his fathers imprisonment in Cuba and escape to the United States. But Republicans who look to him and see any kind of savior overlook much of what drags the party down, which isnt merely or even principally the genealogy of their candidates. Its the intransigent social conservatism, the whiff of meanness and the showy eruptions. Its what Cruz, who rode a wave of Tea Party ardor to victory in Texas in November, distills.
johnnykooks
(12 posts)No doubt Ted Cruz is a favorite of the teabaggers and every other far right asshole in the U.S.
lavenderdiva
(10,726 posts)the New York Times writes an article that agrees with you:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/16/us/politics/ted-cruz-runs-counter-to-courtly-ways-of-the-senate.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
snip:
' Without naming names, Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California, offered a biting label for the Texans accusatory crusade: McCarthyism.
It was really reminiscent of a different time and place, when you said, I have here in my pocket a speech you made on such and such a date, and, of course, nothing was in the pocket, she said, a reference to Senator Joseph R. McCarthys pursuit of Communists in the 1950s. It was reminiscent of some bad times.
In just two months, Mr. Cruz, 42, has made his presence felt in an institution where new arrivals are usually not heard from for months, if not years. Besides suggesting that Mr. Hagel might have received compensation from foreign enemies, he has tangled with the mayor of Chicago, challenged the Senates third-ranking Democrat on national television, voted against virtually everything before him including the confirmation of John Kerry as secretary of state and raised the hackles of colleagues from both parties.
He could not be more pleased. Washingtons new bad boy feels good. '
MissMarple
(9,656 posts)The politically ambitious of them, sometimes, just go way over the top in the other direction. Maybe it is a form of PTSD or overcompensation.
Hekate
(90,793 posts)... and so are favorites among the wretched refuse teeming across the finish line that is our border. When Cubans float ashore and actually touch land, they get a whole different reception than when Mexicans stagger in across the desert.
There are hard luck stories ... and then there are other hard luck stories. At least that is my understanding.