Posted on 09/14/2013 1:58:05 PM PDT by Sparticus
On PBSs NewsHour on Friday night, New York Times columnist David Brooks warned that Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and similar legislators rise to prominence threatens the traditional Republican Party.
Brooks insists the motives of Cruz are less about legislation and policy and more about the politics of undermining the Republican establishment.
Whats going on in the House, and a bit in the Senate, too, is what you might call the rise of Ted Cruz-ism, Brooks said. And Ted Cruz, the senator from Canada through Texas, is basically not a legislator in the normal sense, doesnt have an idea that hes going to Congress to create coalitions, make alliances, and he is going to pass a lot of legislation. Hes going in more as a media-protest person. And a lot of the House Republicans are in the same mode. Theyre not normal members of Congress. Theyre not legislators. They want to stop things. And so theyre just being they just want to obstruct.
And the second thing theyre doing, which is alarming a lot of Republicans, is theyre running against their own party, he continued. Ted Cruz is running against Republicans in the Senate. The House Republican Tea Party types are running against the Republican establishment. Thats how theyre raising money. Thats where theyre spending their money on ads. And so theyre having a very obstructive role which is going on this week, and I think its going to make John Boehners life even more difficult.
Brooks hypothesized the reason the leadership in the House and Senate is unable to control the so-called Ted Cruz-ism movement is that members of it have become uninterested in any of the perks that the leadership has to offer.
Two things that are interesting that are happening, especially being talked about this week, Brooks said. One, leadership in both bodies, the leaderships inability to force any discipline. Thats partly because a lot of these people just are not interested in the committee assignments, the normal leverage the leadership has, in part because the earmarks are gone, some of the spending favors.
Brooks continued that the policy goals of Cruz and others werent actual policy goals, but a means to take over the Republican Party.
[S]o the leadership cant impose any discipline on a Ted Cruz, Brooks said. Theres nothing they can punish him with. And, remember, what these people, Ted Cruz and some of the tea party people, their object is not to win Obamacare. Their object is to take over the Republican Party. So, they really are running against the Republicans. And for Ted Cruz, its potentially to get the nomination. And taking this down, if it can mobilize enough Republicans so he can take over the party and become really transform the party, then that becomes the object. And one little straw in the wind, the Heritage Foundation, a very prominent conservative think tank, is running against Republicans. And thats part of the change that is going on here.
Go Cruz and Cruzitez! Brooks is a frustrated nobama suitor.
Translation for people with brains: Cruz and those of his ilk wish the government to be a servant of the people and to be a responsible and frugal entity IAW the Constitution - the author thinks this is a bad thing.
Cruz worries me with his less than assuring stance on amnesty. On Mark Levin’s show,it was said that Cruz was seen having dinner with McCain recently.
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