Posted on 10/22/2014 8:57:13 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
With the midterm elections approaching, Texas senator Ted Cruz penned an editorial in USA Today this week detailing what he’d like a potential Republican-controlled Congress to prioritize in 2015. As you might expect, the list is full of Tea Party staples: repealing Obamacare, cutting taxes, and slashing funding for federal programs. What makes Cruz’s list of Congressional priorities interesting is that it essentially previews what a Cruz 2016 presidential campaign agenda might look like–and it’s not pretty.
As Ted Cruz’s multiple trips to Iowa have suggested, Texas’ junior senator is all-but-confirmed to be running for president in 2016. Though his latest editorial is seemingly a guide for the next Congress, it reads as a list of Cruz’s own personal ambitions. He even references what he believes a newly elected Republican president will do in 2017.
Cruz’s list hits all the talking points he’s perfected over the last two years he’s spent in the Senate running his pre-presidential campaign. He’s big on cutting taxes, arguing for a regressive flat tax to replace all existing taxes. Cruz also wants to abolish the IRS, instead wanting to make taxes “so simple that they could be filled out on a postcard.” If you’re worried about how the government will be able to fund programs that help millions of Americans under a Cruz tax system, don’t be–he also wants to slash government funding for everything, so there won’t be any programs left to fund.
A Cruz presidency would also leave the environment in total disrepair. Cruz’s big suggestion for revitalizing the job market is to get rid of all environmental regulations and open up more jobs in fossil fuel for everyone. He is in favor of building the Keystone XL pipeline, and wants to open up even more protected land for oil exploration. Additionally, Cruz is a proponent of fracking, which he calls “innovative energy technology,” and he wants to stop fracking from being “handcuffed by the federal government.” And of course, he also wants to get rid of regulations on coal production, too.
The item Cruz spends the most time on is, unsurprisingly, Obamacare by any means necessary. Cruz suggests that Congress should continue to waste time and money voting on bills to repeal the Affordable Care Act, because 40+ failed votes and millions of dollars spent apparently isn’t enough for him. Cruz even acknowledges that President Obama will likely veto all the ACA repeal bills, but argues that Republican electoral success in 2014 will leave Democrats feeling threatened enough to vote in favor of repealing Obamacare.
Cruz’s discussion of Obamacare is also where he hints most directly at what he’d do as president, writing, “In 2017, I believe a Republican president will repeal Obamacare in its entirety. It’s obvious that the Republican president Cruz is referring to is himself, and that his first priority will be leaving millions of Americans without healthcare.
For those who stand in the way of this extreme right-wing agenda, Cruz has strong words:
"We will either pass a serious agenda to address the real priorities of the American people — protecting our constitutional rights and pulling us back from the fiscal and economic cliff — or the Democrats will filibuster or veto these bills. And, if they do so, we will have transparency and accountability for the very next election."
As Rebecca Nelson at the National Journal translated:
"In other words, the GOP is ready to paint its opponents as unwilling to compromise or get things done. And that strategy should give Cruz a solid foundation for a presidential campaign."
Cruz’s strategy for his 2016 campaign is becoming apparent, and Democrats should take note. It’s clear that he’ll stop at nothing to achieve his presidential ambitions, embracing all kinds of extremism in his attempts to woo the Republican base. But whether that strategy will actually get him elected remains to be seen, and for everyone’s sake, let’s hope it doesn’t.
As of now with respect to voting, depends on the State.
The SCOTUS is supposedly going to weigh in soon.
If it is a State call (as per the Constitution), then the COMMUNIST STATES will of course allow felons to vote.
The FREE states can decide for themselves.
If FEDGOV decides it has the power, then all bets are off.
The Burnt Orange Report ... no thanks!
I didn’t have to read anything to know where this was going!
Sen. Cruz should hire her to write some campaign promos! LOL
Editorials like this one can help unite the conservative vote behind a single candidate while the milquetoasts split their votes amongst a bevy of striving appeasing liberal Republicans.
let’s hope it doesn’t.
And so do you.
The GOP will absolutely freak. They will grovel
And they’ll go wobbly at this type of commentary.
But Cruz won’t blink
I love how she phrases "force other people to pay for things you think they should get."
If only he was this magnificent... I guess Katie loves her bureaucratic communist/totalitarian/fascist utopian nightmare state.
I don’t see anything wrong with Ted’s goals. But, that’s just me.
Making our health care system work better for every one is simply common sense.
But that’s being “extreme right wing” these days.
If Obamacare worked so well, the Democrats should be running on it, right?
Katie here is completely out of touch with reality.
Please let me preface this by stating that I agree wholeheartedly with your direction and conclusions.
What becomes problematic is that the control of elections, “right to work”;, etc. is properly in the control of the States. To create your more perfect future would require us to get rid of the 10th Amendment.
Cruz sounds like a reasonable man, a breath of fresh air after breathing Obama’s toxic pollution. I can’t imagine why the snot-nosed author of this whine is complaining.
Question: why should this matter?
Sould justice be different because of political positions? Should we base how we treat jurisprudence upon the politics of the statistical-majority of a class of people? If so, how is that substantively different than the IRS's political targeting? (And how would you propose to keep it from being turned upon yourself?)
The only way that I can think of to ensure against the last is to ensure that Justice is blind
— not looking at the the people and judging them based on their likelihood to cast a ballot a certain way.
So they should be disenfranchised and can be disenfranchised as the MF’s in Congress haven’t passed an amendment that would guarantee felons the vote.
But that doesn't make it right — as I said here:does the serving of a sentence pay one's debt to society or not?
I would argue that if serving the sentence does not pay one's debt to society
then it is the sentence that is in error.
The concept is to DESTROY the marxists.
How would embracing injustice do that?
Isn't it injustice that fuels our crony capitalistic system, where corruption and bribery are a-ok if it's an elite politician?
Disenfranchising FELONS helps.
I disagree — having felony-conviction as a disenfranchisement can be abused by making felonies incredibly easy to commit.
No, it's not as good as I had hoped for, but I will take it.
It’s rich irony that any demoncrat can claim tea party positions are extreme, when their party is teeming with and run by Communists and Eco-Fascist Luddites. And they don’t even try to hide it. Deny it, yes, but they can’t hide the obvious truth. Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
> She is a butt-ugly twit, ain’t she
Looks a little cross-eyed in that pic. Ted Cruz must have pissed her off so bad she couldn’t see straight.
When liberals attack someone, you can bet that person must be a God-fearing patriot with conservative values who knows how to shoot a gun, has worked hard to get where he is and doesn’t want to pay taxes to make sure some stupid, lazy, self-entitled, drug-using, sex crazed sodomy loving POS doesn’t have to work so he can play party or video games all day because he gets “free” food, rent, education, and healthcare paid for off the sweat of our brow!
How about felonious voting, you object to that too?
LOL!!!
Go, Ted, make the liberals cry!
I can’t wait to vote for this man.
Same here.
Of course, that's voting illegally.
My point is that it is immoral and unjust to continue punishing after the sentence has been served.
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