We DO know Ted Cruz
One of the more bizarre narratives about Obama in 2008 was "we don't know anything about him." The implication was that somehow Obama emerged from the ether in 2007 had no friends, family or acquaintances, and therefor should be viewed with a high level of suspicion and skepticism. I had a number of otherwise-intelligent friends and family members who bought into this one, and it always baffled me because it was so easily refuted with this thing called Google. We knew where he grew up, where he went to college, what his views were ... but people will embrace any excuse to not like a guy who was otherwise highly qualified for the job and far more modern than the ignorant, blow-hard Republican they really wanted to vote for.
Fast forward to this year and Trumpageddon. I continue to chuckle anytime I think about the predicament into which the GOP has placed itself. They let the angry-white-man sentiment fester and ferment for decades now; supplying a new "boogeyman" or at least a "boogey issue" every election cycle for Merle Haggard's base to blame for their woes on; a clever misdirection from the fact that it was the Wall Street bankers + Washington elite (often one and the same) who were bending them over all along. It's the immigrants (a classic - that one is as old as when the first French guy showed up after the Mayflower landed). It's the poor people, those freeloaders. It's the people who want you to use polite words like "disabled" rather than "crippled." It's the environmentalists - their pesky rules about clean air and water are killing the coal industry! It's the drug dealers, if we'd just lock 'em all up things would get better (been trying that for 50 years, how's that working out?). It's the Muslims - their religion is "weird" compared to Christianity, so they are all terrorists, right? Yet rather than educating its members, dispelling these ignorant, xenophobic sentiments, the GOP decided to use them to their advantage. They did everything short of publicly embracing them. And it worked. They got a whole class of people so worked up and angry that they were ready to take action, fight, start a revolution.
Then Trump shows up and says if you guys need an ignorant, angry megaphone, I'm you're man. And that, too, worked spectacularly well. That's all he's doing. He's tapping into the anger and frustration that exists in the GOP, and he's doing a phenomenal job of it; a better job than a milk toast elite like Romney could ever do, which really shouldn't be surprising. WTF does Romney have to complain about? While he's commuting between his 3 homes on his private jet? Enjoying his investment based income stream on which he pays half the tax rate the rest of us do? Romney is a nice guy with a beautiful family. He's polite, he's been successful in business, and he's still on his first wife. How on Earth could he empathize with the angry masses?
Sure, Trump has a private jet too. And a lot of money. But he's totally Ebenezer Scrooge! I mean he's really the perfect modern day example of the Dickens character. He hates himself. He's failed at several of his ventures. He's so shallow, he's on his third wife, and people judge him for that. He treats women like objects, and apparently that's not ok anymore, and he's mad about that. He misses the old days when women and minorities knew their place in society, as accessories to the emperor, he's mad that he has to be all nice and equal about things now. He's the perfect mouthpiece for the angry white man whose prominence in society has fallen as women and minorities have gained ground. If you don't see how "Make America Great Again" is code for "bring back the good old days," you're blind. There are many groups in America who are seeing greater levels of equality and fairness for the first time, and in relative terms, they'd tell you things have never been better (though we still have a lot of room for progress). One of those groups is NOT straight white guys.
Thankfully, the angry Trump fans don't represent a majority of the GOP. There are reasonable voices that are saying "we can't really make him our nominee, right?" So then you have to look at Kasich and Cruz, two complete tools. And unlike Obama, there's no chance you can look at either of them (or Trump) and say "we don't know this guy." We know exactly who they are, all three of them. Anyone who has ever worked with Ted Cruz says he's an ass. Take a look at what John Boehner had to say about him just yesterday:
"Lucifer in the flesh,” the former speaker said. “I have Democrat friends and Republican friends. I get along with almost everyone, but I have never worked with a more miserable son of a bitch in my life."
Of the 99 colleagues he has in the Senate, he has struggled to earn just 2 endorsements. So this guy is the "better alternative to Trump?" In what universe?
Fast forward to this year and Trumpageddon. I continue to chuckle anytime I think about the predicament into which the GOP has placed itself. They let the angry-white-man sentiment fester and ferment for decades now; supplying a new "boogeyman" or at least a "boogey issue" every election cycle for Merle Haggard's base to blame for their woes on; a clever misdirection from the fact that it was the Wall Street bankers + Washington elite (often one and the same) who were bending them over all along. It's the immigrants (a classic - that one is as old as when the first French guy showed up after the Mayflower landed). It's the poor people, those freeloaders. It's the people who want you to use polite words like "disabled" rather than "crippled." It's the environmentalists - their pesky rules about clean air and water are killing the coal industry! It's the drug dealers, if we'd just lock 'em all up things would get better (been trying that for 50 years, how's that working out?). It's the Muslims - their religion is "weird" compared to Christianity, so they are all terrorists, right? Yet rather than educating its members, dispelling these ignorant, xenophobic sentiments, the GOP decided to use them to their advantage. They did everything short of publicly embracing them. And it worked. They got a whole class of people so worked up and angry that they were ready to take action, fight, start a revolution.
Then Trump shows up and says if you guys need an ignorant, angry megaphone, I'm you're man. And that, too, worked spectacularly well. That's all he's doing. He's tapping into the anger and frustration that exists in the GOP, and he's doing a phenomenal job of it; a better job than a milk toast elite like Romney could ever do, which really shouldn't be surprising. WTF does Romney have to complain about? While he's commuting between his 3 homes on his private jet? Enjoying his investment based income stream on which he pays half the tax rate the rest of us do? Romney is a nice guy with a beautiful family. He's polite, he's been successful in business, and he's still on his first wife. How on Earth could he empathize with the angry masses?
Sure, Trump has a private jet too. And a lot of money. But he's totally Ebenezer Scrooge! I mean he's really the perfect modern day example of the Dickens character. He hates himself. He's failed at several of his ventures. He's so shallow, he's on his third wife, and people judge him for that. He treats women like objects, and apparently that's not ok anymore, and he's mad about that. He misses the old days when women and minorities knew their place in society, as accessories to the emperor, he's mad that he has to be all nice and equal about things now. He's the perfect mouthpiece for the angry white man whose prominence in society has fallen as women and minorities have gained ground. If you don't see how "Make America Great Again" is code for "bring back the good old days," you're blind. There are many groups in America who are seeing greater levels of equality and fairness for the first time, and in relative terms, they'd tell you things have never been better (though we still have a lot of room for progress). One of those groups is NOT straight white guys.
Thankfully, the angry Trump fans don't represent a majority of the GOP. There are reasonable voices that are saying "we can't really make him our nominee, right?" So then you have to look at Kasich and Cruz, two complete tools. And unlike Obama, there's no chance you can look at either of them (or Trump) and say "we don't know this guy." We know exactly who they are, all three of them. Anyone who has ever worked with Ted Cruz says he's an ass. Take a look at what John Boehner had to say about him just yesterday:
"Lucifer in the flesh,” the former speaker said. “I have Democrat friends and Republican friends. I get along with almost everyone, but I have never worked with a more miserable son of a bitch in my life."
Of the 99 colleagues he has in the Senate, he has struggled to earn just 2 endorsements. So this guy is the "better alternative to Trump?" In what universe?
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