Posted on 03/24/2016 11:28:57 AM PDT by Kaslin
Listening to Ted Cruz's response to the terrorist attacks in Brussels raised a question: Is he a pitiful victim of hysteria, a calculated promoter of it or both? Major emergencies call for sober leadership and careful thought, but Cruz is intoxicated by his 150-proof ideology.
It's hard to tell whom he hates more -- terrorists or Barack Obama. In 1984, President Ronald Reagan's United Nations ambassador, Jeane Kirkpatrick, charged that when unwelcome events occur, Democrats "always blame America first." Cruz has the same reflex. His immediate impulse on hearing of the Brussels bombings was to attack the president of the United States.
"Radical Islam is at war with us," he asserted in a statement. "For over seven years we have had a president who refuses to acknowledge this reality. And the truth is, we can never hope to defeat this evil so long as we refuse to even name it."
There are two flaws in this argument. The first is that it's ridiculous. Apparently, Cruz's parents never recited the old adage about sticks and stones. Calling those in the Islamic State (also known as ISIS) by one name or another has no effect on their motivation or capabilities. It also has no effect on their ability to elude detection or survive drone strikes. Cruz's complaint is a hollow non sequitur.
The second defect is that it's fictional. Obama doesn't deny that the Islamic State is Islamic. In his December Oval Office address, for example, the president said that "an extremist ideology has spread within some Muslim communities. This is a real problem that Muslims must confront, without excuse."
Often it seems as though Cruz is determined to prove that he can match Donald Trump at his worst in scaremongering and scapegoating. What the two share is a consistent policy of mangling the truth and offering solutions that sound fierce but are about as solid as a helium balloon.
Cruz's fictions are part of a bigger fantasy: that Obama is so weak and craven that he is unwilling to protect Americans from those who want to kill us.
"We need a president who sets aside political correctness," Cruz declared, acidly accusing Obama of "surrendering to the enemy to show how progressive and enlightened we are."
It would come as a surprise to Osama bin Laden that Obama surrendered to al-Qaida -- that is, if bin Laden had survived the Navy SEAL raid the president ordered. It would come as a surprise to the estimated 26,000 Islamic State fighters the U.S. has killed in its lengthy air campaign.
This posturing is meant to keep voters from noticing that Cruz has no idea how to achieve his manly goals. He vows that as president, he would "utterly destroy ISIS." Somewhere he got the impression that stating an objective is tantamount to fulfilling it.
But what would he actually do as commander in chief? Ground troops in Iraq are one possibility he will neither embrace nor reject. He prefers to stress another option: "We will carpet-bomb them into oblivion."
If carpet-bombing were all it takes, we would have won the Vietnam War. Indiscriminate attacks that obliterate civilians would only guarantee that our supply of bloodthirsty enemies will never run out.
Another bright idea is "arming the Kurds," who are among the groups fighting the Islamic State. But this would largely reaffirm Obama's policy. The U.S. has already provided a lot of weapons and equipment to the Kurds -- enough to prompt outrage from the president of Turkey, who says we have created a "sea of blood" by helping Kurdish forces he regards as terrorists.
The Brussels carnage was a chance for Cruz to inveigh against Muslims, calling on police to "patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods," a transparently unconstitutional proposal he struggled to explain.
He repeated his claim that one of the San Bernardino terrorists was allowed to come here even though she "had publicly posted on social media calls to jihad" -- which FBI Director James Comey says never happened. "These communications are private, direct messages, not social media messages," Comey noted.
Cruz doesn't repeat this lie because he's unaware it's false. He repeats it because it serves his purpose in a way that an accurate statement would not. It's part of a pattern in his campaign, which is to twist reality to foster delusions and sow panic.
He may not know how to defeat Trump, Clinton or terrorists, but when Cruz speaks, the truth is always losing.
What does that mean? Is Cruz going to cut the head off truth, rape it, or suicide bomb it?
Yeah Obama did say they were not Islamic
http://www.cnn.com/2014/09/10/politics/obama-isil-not-islamic/
The reputation of a neighborhood should determine the amount of police presence in that neighborhood. A neighborhood known to have high gang activity and violence is obviously going to have more police presence than a neighborhood that doesn’t. Just like a neighborhood that is known to have a high volume of extremist Muslim activity should garner more attention from law enforcement. This is just common sense.
It seems to me that Cruz hates Trump more than he dislikes 0bama and terrorists.
In just the last few weeks, his alter ego, Glenn Beck, has repeatedly called Trump “Hitler” or a “Nazi” and his supporters “brownshirts”. Cruz himself has blamed the leftist organized and instigated riots in Chicago on Trump, and just the other day he implied that Trump’s position on NATO contributed to the ISIS attack on Brussels. Then there is the pro-Cruz Super PAC that ran the ad featuring Trump’s wife. He and Beck are sinking deeper and deeper into the muck, hopefully, they’ll disappear below the surface and never be seen again.
No let’s not blame the dancer-in-chief that he aided and abetted in the destruction of two nation states with the consequent fallout in Syria of the rise of ISIS and its resultant populations fleeing .
apparently children are writing for townhall now
That's like saying "It's hard to tell whom he hates more -- communists or Joseph Stalin".
One of Dirty Teddy’s most pressing problems is that he’s been told he’s the smartes guy in the room all his life and suddenly along comes Donald Trump and he’s not anymore. LOL!
Is Trump supporter Alex Jones Trump's alter ego? Is Trump responsible for everything Alex Jones says?
Cruz himself has blamed the leftist organized and instigated riots in Chicago on Trump...
Did he?
"This is a sad day. Political discourse should occur in this country without a threat of violence. Without anger and rage and hatred directed at each other. We need to learn to have disagreements without being disagreeable. To have disagreements while respecting human beings on the other side. Earlier today over thirty people were arrested at one rally and then tonight as violence broke out the rally was cancelled altogether. Now the responsibility for that lies with protestors who took violence into their own hands."
...and just the other day he implied that Trump’s position on NATO contributed to the ISIS attack on Brussels.
Did he?
"Donald Trump is wrong that America should withdraw from the world and abandon our allies. Donald Trump is wrong that American should retreat from Europe, retreat from NATO, hand Putin a major victory and while he's at it hand ISIS a major victory."
Then there is the pro-Cruz Super PAC that ran the ad featuring Trump’s wife.
It's illegal for Cruz to direct a PAC. In fact I or anyone else could have created and run the advert. BTW, there are thousands of similar "ads" running on FR and Facebook. Every time someone posts a picture of Cruz or Trump (or whoever) and superimposes some words on it and distributes is doing the same thing. Do you really think candidates need to be confronted with every thing one of the supporters does and demand them to disavow it?
Well said, let us keep in mind that we need to focus on defeating the democrats.
His desire to have extensive patrols around Christians should concern everyone. We have never had a bigger anti-Christian running for president. Between his follow your God nonsense about trump supporters and now this Christian patrols. Cruz is our worst candidate.
What has SENATOR Cruz done in the Senate. Has he introduced any legislation? Didn’t we already have someone who was a do-nothing Senator for two years and then ran for the Presidency. Isn’t he just taking a page out of Obama’s playbook?
Seems to me he’s all hat and no cattle.
Nice try, but not even close.
Cruz on Brussels
“Well, I will say, it is striking that the day after Donald Trump called for America weakening NATO withdrawing from NATO we see Brussels, where NATO is headquartered, the subject of a radical Islamist terrorist attack.”
Cruz on Chicago riot:
“I think a campaign bears responsibility for creating an environment, when the candidate urges supporters to engage in physical violence–to punch people in the face. The predictable consequence of that is that it escalates and today is unlikely to be the last such instance,” Cruz said in a sorrowful tone.
I don’t see Trump campaigning side by side with Alex Jones, and as far as I know, Trump has never heralded Jones’ endorsement, or even if Jones has endorsed Trump at all.
As for the ad, this is not the first time someone associated with Cruz has attacked Trump’s wife. None other than Glenn Beck, way back in August, posted this on his Facebook page: “... the First Lady would be the first to have posed nude in lesbian porno shots...”
Yep.
And we are too believe Trump is the truth teller?
Trump straddles both sides of the fence faster than a whore on a Saturday night.
The First Lady is now a political football, thanks to Rodham Rodham (gun grabs, national healthcare, Violence Against Women Act -- all hers!) and Michelle "Angry Black Woman Check My Pythons" Obama.
If it's true that Melania Trump has done soft-core porn (Gallery not Hustler), then shouldn't that be discussed? Do you really want to be the person who presents her to Queen Elizabeth and the President of France?
If it’s true that Melania Trump has done soft-core porn (Gallery not Hustler), then shouldn’t that be discussed?
Do you really want to be the person who presents her to Queen Elizabeth and the President of France?
I couldn’t find anything about Melania posing for Gallery. I did find her GQ shots, but she was a professional model, who cares? Those shots were almost 16 years ago.
I would be willing to bet that most people would jump at the chance to introduce her to Queen Elizabeth and the president of France or anywhere else for that matter.
Who says they're different?
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