Ted Cruz and what the GOP establishment can learn from Osama Bin Laden…

Flopping Aces ^ | 08-13-13 | Vince

[Starman417]

In 1975 & 76 the United States was experiencing a crisis of confidence. Unemployment was at 8.5%, our allies in South Vietnam, who 58,000 American servicemen gave their lives to defend, had just been overrun and the reverberations of an OPEC embargo were sending oil prices from $15 a barrel to $100. At the same time Paul Ehrlich was warning about overpopulation and starvation, Newsweek was telling of a coming ice age and many thought we were conceding Eastern Europe to the Soviets.

It was into this emotional and economic morass stepped Ronald Wilson Reagan with a message of hope. He took clear aim at Gerald Ford and fought him all the way to the convention floor. He did so against the wishes of GOP party barons. He did so despite warnings that he would irreparably damage Gerald Ford and give the election to the Democrats. Reagan held firm, and indeed Ford lost to Jimmy Carter, who took an economic malaise and turned it into a full blown economic disaster. Interestingly, after Reagan’s speech at the convention many delegates left wondering if they had made the wrong choice…

If that’s where the story ended, it would indeed be a cautionary tale. But as we all know, the story didn’t end there. In 1980 Ronald Reagan picked up where he left off and eventually beat Carter in a landslide, taking 44 states and the Senate with him, the first GOP Senate majority in a quarter century.

At the end of the day, the 1980 election had something the Ford Carter contest four year before didn’t – a clear cut contest of ideas, with Carter suggesting the solution to the nation’s problems could be found in government action while Reagan felt government was the problem. The American people were faced with the starkest contrast since LBJ beat Barry Goldwater in 1964. Faced with that contrast and with conservative principals clearly articulated by Reagan the contest wasn’t even close.

The point to be drawn from 1976 & 1980 is not that one shouldn’t buck the establishment, but rather that when Americans are presented with a clearly articulated conservative candidate, conservatism wins and the establishment will eventually get on board… if only to avoid being left out in the cold. The Goldwater loss was unique in that it occurred in the shadow of JFK’s assassination.

Today we are faced with a somewhat similar scenario, where a number of “Wacko Bird” conservatives, with Ted Cruz leading the pack, are bucking the GOP establishment. While it’s not in a presidential campaign (yet) the lines are just as stark as they were a quarter century ago and the stakes just as high. Cruz, along with Mike Lee and few friends are suggesting that a government shutdown is preferable – although not necessary – to the American people getting the hook of Obamacare subsidies set in their wallets, because everyone knows that once an entitlement is in place it’s next to impossible to repeal. The barons of the party, from Boehner and McConnell to Rove and Krauthammer, suggest that the backlash from a stoppage will come back to bite the GOP at the polls in 2014. That isn’t a compelling argument in the first place, but it’s particularly feeble given the recent dire warnings – albeit from the president – but little actual blowback for the GOP from the sequester kicking in.

[Sirius Lee]

If Ted can keep hammering home a message of Freedom he will win.

[qaz123]

I agree.

But someone is going to have to chop-block Rove and his cronies to keep them out of it.

[moonshinner_09]

I do remember in 1979 the gasoline shortage in Houston we were having to get gas on odd or even days based on your plate number and the lines were so long...Just saw 1979 and thought of that