Posted on 01/25/2016 5:53:55 PM PST by BlackFemaleArmyColonel
Reagan was a liberal Democrat who decried wrongheaded Republicans before he became the conservative hero of wrongheaded Republicans.
Ted Cruz is positioning himself as the "true" conservative candidate for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. The senator from Texas wants his fellow partisans to believe that he is the surest heir of the secular saint of modern conservatism: Ronald Reagan. Cruz says he has read stacks of Reagan biographies to bone up on policy and presidential demeanor. He tells crowds that Reagan understood that "simply giving voice to values of American people has power, and speaking the truth with a smile has enormous potency. It's what Reagan did every day and what I'm trying to do in this campaign."
Unfortunately for Cruz, despite all his alleged reading and actual pontificating, he does not appear to know very much about his favored president. The senator--who is rarely accused of "speaking the truth with a smile"--is battling billionaire Donald Trump for the votes of conservatives in the first-caucus state of Iowa and the first-primary state of New Hampshire. And in this fight he frequently invokes the 40th president.
Ripping Trump for past expressions of sympathy with the Democratic party and at least some of its preferred programs, Cruz declared the other day in New Hampshire that "Ronald Reagan did not spend the first 60 years of his life supporting Democratic politicians, advocating for big government."
Seriously?
Does Ted Cruz not remember that Ronald Reagan was a Democrat before he was a Republican? Raised in a Democratic family, Reagan cast his first vote for Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1932--when Herbert Hoover was decrying Roosevelt as a radical--and remained an active and outspoken Democrat through the first decades of his Hollywood prominence.
(Excerpt) Read more at thenation.com ...
I didn’t write the article, did you? We all find different things to read about, that’s life...
If you want to write a better article, go for it...
I liked Reagan, and I voted for him....
We are not talking about Trump here, this article is about Cruz and Reagan...join in, you might learn something...
“The Nation? What next? Socialist Worker? Anarchist Monthly? Pravda? TeleSUR?”
I’m guessing we’ll get something from Mother Jones soon, and we’ll be told to suck it up and deal with it. I’m surprised Planned Parenthood news releases haven’t shown up yet.
Strange times to be a FReeper.
Good reply. That’s exactly how Trump responds to his critics. Must be a campaign strategy.
Are you familiar with The Nation? It was a Communist front for Soviet opinion during the Cold War and still toes a radical-left line. Why are you so accepting of anything written in such a magazine?
It is so over-the-top, what does one say? The Nation?? Senator Cruz deserves better than this
..
Sorry, just trying to correct the record on Reagan...I’m sure Trump has been a life-long ....uh, what. Help me out on that. won’t you?
That’s ok, as long as we stay on topic, and that is Cruz and Reagan...
There isn’t any mention of Trump in the article...
Where the comparison between Trump and Reagan fails is that Reagan was a conservative for more than 20 years before running for President. By that time, he had an extensive record of speaking, writing and campaigning for conservative principles and candidates, in addition to 2 terms as governor. During the past 20 years, Trump has jumped from Republican to Democrat to Reform and back again; has supported conservative candidates and issues and liberal candidates and issues and back again.
Trump supporters certainly can choose to accept that Trump's conversion to conservatism is sincere, and believe that he will keep true to what he promises now. But based on his record, can you understand why many are unwilling to take that much on faith when his record is spotty on some of these issues at best, and the fate of the country is at stake?
Then why is there an article in it about Cruz and Reagan?
What is the article trying to say? These are the topics we should be talking about...and why....
Trump is not mentioned in this article...this is a different article it’s about Cruz and Reagan...
So? I remember when a reporter asked Reagan if any of the current mess in Washington was his fault. He said "Yes..... I used to be a Democrat."
So I really don't understand where you are coming from. If The Nation came out with an article criticizing Trump, I would take the exact same approach and would immediately discount the article because The Nation isn't to be trusted. The Nation is composed of hardcore leftists who hate the United States and everything it stands for. And that really should color you opinion of this piece. It's trash and should be viewed as such.
Meant to say: Because The Nation hates Ted Cruz, just like The Nation hated Ronald Reagan.
...but the news media keeps telling all of us that everybody hates Cruz....Iowans, people in NH; all over, you mean the media lies???
How about The Daily Stormer? They have endorsed Trump.
Don’t know about them...what are they?
Filthy Jew Ben Shapiro Attacks Donald as “Not Conservative†in Breitbart
Andrew Anglin
Daily Stormer
January 25, 2016
Oh and that is supporting Trump? What have they said about the topic we are talking about, Cruz and Reagan?
Exactly. The DemocRats of today would have been communists nd socialists in the 30s and 40s.
Nichols makes a weak point, one that has been mentioned on FR many many times over the past year and more.
There are stronger points about RR than just his previous alliance with democrats and FDR.
RR was tough, as tough as Trump when it came to negotiations. He would not comprise an iota with the Soviets or with terrorists.
RR faced in 1980 an electorate that was not conservative, not liberal so much as it was leaderless, rudderless. Reagan was not elected based on his conservatism, he was elected because of his toughness, because of the Iranian Hostage Crisis and because Jimmy Carter was an embarrassing incompetent.
Sounds very much like Trump, doesn’t it? It does.
The electorate didn’t follow RR’s conservatism in 1980, they really didn’t understand it so much. It wasn’t until about the 2nd half of 1983 into RR’s first term that the electorate grabbed onto conservatism not because of its principles and philosophy so much as they had grown to love Ronald Reagan and then everyone wanted to be like RR. So there were a lot of demcrats that switched and a lot of moderates who started calling themselves conservative.
But these pseudo-conservatives have soiled the brand and now conservatism is not fashionable because the GOP leaders today are A-holes who are embarrassing and corrupt. They are a joke and they call themselves conservatives.
Note that conservatives long for RR but there’s a new electorate out there. Kids who were 10 years old when Reagan left office are now in their 30’s, etc. And conservatism smells to high heavens because of the A-holes who have been allowed to carry it as a banner.
This is why Ted is not in the lead. He’s not reaching the newbies in the electorate. It’s a whole new electorate out there and they are looking for someone to admire and it’s not a conservative because conservatism has been trashed.
But Donald is able to carry conservative positions not because of conservatism because he is his own force of personality.
That’s the gist of it.
If Ted can appeal to the new electorate, and he has a chance to, then he can close the gap. Trump may be forced to choose him as VP. Then conservatism has a chance to shine again with Cruz in the background influencing Donald and laying the foundation for a run in 2024 in which he can be very popular if he and Donald are able to deliver on making the country great again, meaning making everyone proud to be an American.
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